One of the saddest aspects of the current election process is that it has been so trivialized. The mudslinging this time around seems to be much worse than usual, though, of course, it’s bad enough in every cycle. With each candidate calling his opponent everything but a wiccan or some other personification of evil, especially considering the outright lies involved, the voter concludes that he is being marginalized because of his presumed ignorance while the candidates trivialize the whole process.
Or…take the appearances of the political celebs on various and sundry talk-shows. The president, in an obvious effort to shore up his weak party, made the unbelievable mistake of appearing on Comedy Central’s Daily Show with Jon Stewart, playing straight man to Stewart’s jibes/mugging and merely looking silly in the effort, hemming and hawing and hamming it up for the crowd, trivializing his own office. Without a teleprompter, he’s toast.
The prez has also done the other shows – Tonight with Jay Leno; the Late Show with Letterman, CBS’s highest-profile self-admitted adulterer (high-class company); Oprah, with Oprah (big White House Christmas show); but perhaps the worst, The View, with the ladies corralled by Whoopi and Barbara, featuring as much cheesecake thigh and cleavage as possible to go along with their inanities. Okay…I’ve seen only brief clips of these shows but I get the picture. Exercises in trivia!
The media helps in trivializing the process by letting celebs (especially Hollywood types) appear on their programs and in the papers spouting words of wisdom as if they are to be taken more seriously than the average joe, who probably knows more about life than they ever will in their make-believe world, where the biggest news of a day might have to do with the latest starlet to get pregnant or enter detox or both. Who cares, for instance, if Sean Penn delivers a broadside against this country from Venezuela? Jimmy Carter makes a practice of that…or at least he did until Obama came upon the scene.
Candidates often display their unfitness for office by doing desperate things that are so transparent to voters that guffaws are the result. The two democratic candidates in Kentucky furnish two examples. Senate wannabe democrat Jack Conway cited a college prank that his opponent, Rand Paul, helped pull off when he was around nineteen…accused Paul of kidnapping a poor girl but, of course, provided no proof, not even a misdemeanor citation.
House sixth-district incumbent Ben Chandler dug up an episode concerning his opponent, Andy Barr, from his college days when Barr, then nineteen, committed surely the worst felony in history by flashing a false ID in order to buy some booze in Florida on spring break back in the long ago day. Barr didn’t mention this in connection with a state job…but so what? A DUI would have been juicier but, alas, no such was available. At least neither democrat accused his opponent of wife-beating but it’s a lead-pipe cinch that they looked for some mayhem. Republicans pull the same stuff, of course. The point: TRIVIALIZATION of the government!
Outright chicanery (probably criminal) was carried out at least twice this year on the part of former POTUS William Jefferson Clinton. Republican-turned-democrat-for-the-sake-of-holding-his-seat Arlen Specter was in a tough primary-fight with Congressman Joe Sestak in Pennsylvania. Specter was Obama’s choice – nothing better than a turncoat republican in grovel-mode. Clinton (denials all around) “suggested” to Sestak that he skip the primary and accept a job in the administration, thus making Specter a shoo-in in democrat stronghold Pennsylvania. Neither Clinton nor Obama knows much about the military man (Clinton loathes the military) and couldn’t have known that Sestak, a former USN vice admiral, would not just drop off the radar. Sestak won.
So…just the other day, former POTUS Clinton made a trip to Florida to help the democrat, Kendrick Meek, win a Senate seat. W-e-l-l…not exactly, according to the scuttlebutt. Florida Governor Crist, recently turned from republican to independent after losing the republican primary to Rubio (using political Specter-philosophy), and a recent visitor to the White House, is Obama’s choice, the assumption being that Meek’s chances are zilch but he could help the cause by dropping out and JUST MAYBE split the vote only two ways, with Crist slipping by and caucusing with the democrats. This didn’t work, either
And then there’s the chicanery in Alaska. Incumbent republican senator Lisa Murkowski lost the primary to Joe Miller so she naturally did what any good senator would do – mounted a write-in campaign the better to split republicans and throw the election to the democrat. More than 100 other Alaskans registered as write-ins, apparently at the urging of a talk-show host. This is super-trivializing of the process…and it stinks. Of course, Murkowski is not as easy to spell as Jones but a girl can’t ask for everything.
Yeah…among the obscene layouts of cash, flagrant lies, pettiness, and outright skullduggery in high places, the process dreamed up by the founders for serious reasons has devolved into a silly season…trivia to the nth degree.
And so it goes.
Jim Clark
Friday, October 29, 2010
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Jim Gray & His October-Surprise!
October-surprises are just part of the election process as candidates use shock-and-awe in last-minute attempts to sway (make that…snow) the voters. Most of the time, the efforts involve skullduggery and may even smack of desperation. Dan Rather of CBS infamy tried the venal October-surprise in 2004, when he and his partners in crime claimed to have a document somehow denigrating George Bush only to discover that their hoax was easily discovered. The appropriate firings took place even though Rather lasted a bit longer than his fellow conspirators.
Lexington, Ky., vice mayor and current mayoral candidate, Jim Gray, has just tried the same kind of ploy, although he might have been better advised to wait a few days longer to do his shock-and-awe number. As it is, his opponent, Mayor Jim Newberry, has time to expose Gray’s fraud and dig up some dirt of his own, which shouldn’t be hard.
Gray’s outfit contrived a document exactly resembling a water-bill statement, placed it in envelopes made to look entirely official, even to the return-address window, and bearing the caption OPEN IMMEDIATELY – WATER RATE INFO ENCLOSED and mailed copies to the voters. The document purports to inform the public about rate-increases blamed on Newberry but neglects the small item that the main reason for the increase is to defray the $164,000,000-cost of a pipeline desperately needed since during drought-periods Lexington is threatened with water-shortage for its 300,000 people, a population that is growing.
The most ridiculous part of the “statement” has to do with the official-looking box having to do with the water-company’s campaign contributions to Newberry for 2005-2010, a staggering $28,150 in campaign coffers amounting to hundreds of thousands of dollars over four years, a drop in the bucket. Gray has “loaned” his campaign $280,000 but if the primary race is counted that figure rises to $380,000. Each candidate has raised about a million but Newberry has “loaned” his campaign zilch.
Gray has a history of “loaning” himself campaign funds during previous races, which, of course, amounts to attempting to literally buy the office, not unusual these days as the comfortably wealthy feel no pain or risk in parting with their cash. Shades of Mitt Romney and his $40 million outlay in the last presidential quadrennial quagmire – all for nothing!
This episode is illustrative of the chicanery involved in seeking office. It becomes more apparent each day that elective offices can be – and are – bought by the wealthy. They make their money while relatively young, get set for being rich the rest of their lives and then, almost as a diversion, use their millions to buy their way into government…sort of like another toy to add to their fun. Disgusting!
And so it goes.
Jim Clark
Lexington, Ky., vice mayor and current mayoral candidate, Jim Gray, has just tried the same kind of ploy, although he might have been better advised to wait a few days longer to do his shock-and-awe number. As it is, his opponent, Mayor Jim Newberry, has time to expose Gray’s fraud and dig up some dirt of his own, which shouldn’t be hard.
Gray’s outfit contrived a document exactly resembling a water-bill statement, placed it in envelopes made to look entirely official, even to the return-address window, and bearing the caption OPEN IMMEDIATELY – WATER RATE INFO ENCLOSED and mailed copies to the voters. The document purports to inform the public about rate-increases blamed on Newberry but neglects the small item that the main reason for the increase is to defray the $164,000,000-cost of a pipeline desperately needed since during drought-periods Lexington is threatened with water-shortage for its 300,000 people, a population that is growing.
The most ridiculous part of the “statement” has to do with the official-looking box having to do with the water-company’s campaign contributions to Newberry for 2005-2010, a staggering $28,150 in campaign coffers amounting to hundreds of thousands of dollars over four years, a drop in the bucket. Gray has “loaned” his campaign $280,000 but if the primary race is counted that figure rises to $380,000. Each candidate has raised about a million but Newberry has “loaned” his campaign zilch.
Gray has a history of “loaning” himself campaign funds during previous races, which, of course, amounts to attempting to literally buy the office, not unusual these days as the comfortably wealthy feel no pain or risk in parting with their cash. Shades of Mitt Romney and his $40 million outlay in the last presidential quadrennial quagmire – all for nothing!
This episode is illustrative of the chicanery involved in seeking office. It becomes more apparent each day that elective offices can be – and are – bought by the wealthy. They make their money while relatively young, get set for being rich the rest of their lives and then, almost as a diversion, use their millions to buy their way into government…sort of like another toy to add to their fun. Disgusting!
And so it goes.
Jim Clark
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
And Then There Was Football
As the football season progresses (or regresses, depending on point of view), one is amused at the newer wrinkles in the game. Celebrating is a big deal now. Back in the day, players simply handed the ball to the referee after scoring a touchdown or just got up after making a great tackle or open-field run and assumed position for the next play. Nowadays, a touchdown is celebrated the same way as the end of WWII was celebrated in Times Square (sans the famous kiss, of course). First comes the hip-banger as the celebrant is smashed on his loin by a teammate’s hip, hopefully without incapacitating him. Or, a chest-banger may be employed as torsos are treated to reasonable celebratory trauma in establishing that a veritable god has just descended from Mt. Olympus.
Taunting and teasing are also back. Trash-talk is back, with a vengeance. A player making a tackle can still be seen doing the crotch-waddle-hop (ducks do it naturally) through the opposing team's backfield, pointing to himself and then to God and then to the spectators (as if to say “Did you suckers see that?), and telling the fallen quarterback in no uncertain terms what a low-life he is and how unworthy he is to be on the same field with a genuine he-man.
The lucky scorer may jump into the crowd for some back-slapping worship or whip out his cell phone and call his girl-friend or groupie from the end-zone and tell her what a package from heaven he actually is (and maybe make a shack-up date while he's at it). Elementary-school-age-skipping is in vogue as a scorer dances into the end-zone. This makes sure the crowd has noticed him since the other players are just doing dull slower-than-his running. For their part, the ever-present scantily-clad cheerleaders are still flashing their navels (and anything else that wiggles) at the crowd and waving their pom-poms as if the George Bush axis-of-evil has just been blown away.
Head-hunting is the big thing these days, i.e., effecting success through totally incapacitating the opponent, especially the opponent’s quarterback. The quickest way to do this – besides breaking various and assorted bones – is to simply actuate a concussion, something fairly easy to spot in the stands or on TV. The player sits up and looks blankly into the distance while trying to figure out where he is and what day it is. The trainer asks the standard questions as to his name and date of birth. If he can remember those he’s good for at least another quarter.
Whereas back in the day a tackle was effected on a ball-carrier from the waist down, the methods used now are the helmet-to-helmet brain-rattler or the body-slam (driving head-on and straight-up), which may also include helmet-to-helmet, thus breaking bones while also delivering a concussion and perhaps gloriously removing the victimized player from action for the whole season. The doer of the deed, of course, chances injury to himself but is always prepared for the mayhem he is about to produce and usually comes out okay, in which case he may lean over his victim and sneer.
The NCAA and the NFL try to lighten the mayhem by introducing new rules to “protect” players, as if the crowd comes to see protected players…about like the crowds that watch auto races to see the carnage. On roughly 50% of punt/kickoff runbacks, the return team will be penalized for a “block-in-the-back.” Rarely does any spectator or TV crew see this and most people wonder what it is. Since the players seem to be attempting to murder each other by blocks-in-the-front (legal), one wonders why the opposite blocks are so dreadful. A hundred blocks-in-the-back are not worth one good concussion.
There’s a rule now that penalizes a player for executing a “horse-collar tackle,” the grabbing of the top of a runner’s jersey in the back in order to jerk him off his feet with the possibility of cracking a vertebra or three and eliminating the opposition’s fastest runners. This calls for a 15-yard penalty, which is small potatoes compared to the hospital bill that ensues.
Some attempts at outright manslaughter are so flagrant that players – though in rare instances – are sometimes fined and/or given suspensions for one or a specified number of games. Since the average NFL player-salary is at about $1.8 million, not counting signing bonuses, the fines mean little, just something to mark off on the tax-return, just doing business. What’s a lousy $25,000 fine to a linebacker making $4 mil? As for suspensions…what could be better than dodging the bruises for a game or three, unless, of course, the salary has to be forfeited, in which case that linebacker could cough up $250,000 per game, but that’s just so much less on which to pay taxes in the top bracket.
So the game goes on…about four hours worth, when it could be finished by maybe two-and-a-half hours. The combination of commercials and the time to handle coach-challenges to referee-decisions has made the game into a marathon. This fan has given up watching but a fraction of the legalized mayhem. Watch the beginning and the end and a few segments in-between and the deed is done.
And so it goes.
Jim Clark
Taunting and teasing are also back. Trash-talk is back, with a vengeance. A player making a tackle can still be seen doing the crotch-waddle-hop (ducks do it naturally) through the opposing team's backfield, pointing to himself and then to God and then to the spectators (as if to say “Did you suckers see that?), and telling the fallen quarterback in no uncertain terms what a low-life he is and how unworthy he is to be on the same field with a genuine he-man.
The lucky scorer may jump into the crowd for some back-slapping worship or whip out his cell phone and call his girl-friend or groupie from the end-zone and tell her what a package from heaven he actually is (and maybe make a shack-up date while he's at it). Elementary-school-age-skipping is in vogue as a scorer dances into the end-zone. This makes sure the crowd has noticed him since the other players are just doing dull slower-than-his running. For their part, the ever-present scantily-clad cheerleaders are still flashing their navels (and anything else that wiggles) at the crowd and waving their pom-poms as if the George Bush axis-of-evil has just been blown away.
Head-hunting is the big thing these days, i.e., effecting success through totally incapacitating the opponent, especially the opponent’s quarterback. The quickest way to do this – besides breaking various and assorted bones – is to simply actuate a concussion, something fairly easy to spot in the stands or on TV. The player sits up and looks blankly into the distance while trying to figure out where he is and what day it is. The trainer asks the standard questions as to his name and date of birth. If he can remember those he’s good for at least another quarter.
Whereas back in the day a tackle was effected on a ball-carrier from the waist down, the methods used now are the helmet-to-helmet brain-rattler or the body-slam (driving head-on and straight-up), which may also include helmet-to-helmet, thus breaking bones while also delivering a concussion and perhaps gloriously removing the victimized player from action for the whole season. The doer of the deed, of course, chances injury to himself but is always prepared for the mayhem he is about to produce and usually comes out okay, in which case he may lean over his victim and sneer.
The NCAA and the NFL try to lighten the mayhem by introducing new rules to “protect” players, as if the crowd comes to see protected players…about like the crowds that watch auto races to see the carnage. On roughly 50% of punt/kickoff runbacks, the return team will be penalized for a “block-in-the-back.” Rarely does any spectator or TV crew see this and most people wonder what it is. Since the players seem to be attempting to murder each other by blocks-in-the-front (legal), one wonders why the opposite blocks are so dreadful. A hundred blocks-in-the-back are not worth one good concussion.
There’s a rule now that penalizes a player for executing a “horse-collar tackle,” the grabbing of the top of a runner’s jersey in the back in order to jerk him off his feet with the possibility of cracking a vertebra or three and eliminating the opposition’s fastest runners. This calls for a 15-yard penalty, which is small potatoes compared to the hospital bill that ensues.
Some attempts at outright manslaughter are so flagrant that players – though in rare instances – are sometimes fined and/or given suspensions for one or a specified number of games. Since the average NFL player-salary is at about $1.8 million, not counting signing bonuses, the fines mean little, just something to mark off on the tax-return, just doing business. What’s a lousy $25,000 fine to a linebacker making $4 mil? As for suspensions…what could be better than dodging the bruises for a game or three, unless, of course, the salary has to be forfeited, in which case that linebacker could cough up $250,000 per game, but that’s just so much less on which to pay taxes in the top bracket.
So the game goes on…about four hours worth, when it could be finished by maybe two-and-a-half hours. The combination of commercials and the time to handle coach-challenges to referee-decisions has made the game into a marathon. This fan has given up watching but a fraction of the legalized mayhem. Watch the beginning and the end and a few segments in-between and the deed is done.
And so it goes.
Jim Clark
Saturday, October 23, 2010
DNC Memorandum #19
From the office of Tim Kaine, chairman, 23 October 2010
***Just a reminder that everyone needs to be proud of the president and first lady account their unflagging campaigning for the democrats who are considered most vulnerable to defeat 02 November! The president has made the backyard-warm-fuzzy-hug-fest the envy of even John Edwards, who developed this style during the last election cycle. The president has blamed George Bush for every bad thing that has happened since 1946, the year of his birth, but keeps hearing mutterings about the economy and high unemployment rate being his own fault. Therefore, he’s requested a list of new things for which Bush can be blamed and which fit easily on a teleprompter, especially the backyard type that can be folded and carried by a peon. The president has already mentioned Bush’s tree-chopping that results in harmful deforestation but anyone with knowledge of his enhancing global warming by, for instance, not using a hybrid-tractor or exhaling CO2 more than inhaling O2 is directed to report such things immediately.
***The first lady has also requested a red/yellow/black/white (non-discriminating) paper on the reasons she is now proud to be an American, a distinct change from her position in 2008, when she was earning only a paltry $300,000 per year as some sort of vice president or occupying some other seat-warming position at the University of Chicago, and therefore suffering financial persecution and also suffering racial discrimination because she wasn’t the university’s president. Since taking office with the president, sort of like the Clinton twofer, she’s had little time to sort out her reasons for liking the country now, not least because of her travels outside the country to places like Paris and Spain to represent the best of America, and to the beaches in New England to campaign for low-fat diets and high-carbohydrate cars, speaking of which, staffers will soon be using only electric cars, necessitating plans for travel of no more than 80 miles per day. Anyone caught discombobulated on an interstate account a dead battery will be disciplined by having to listen to replays of Glenn Beck radio/TV shows 12 hours a day for a week.
***Michael Moore’s new movie predicated on Beck’s 400,000-person “mall brawl” (his terminology) and tentatively titled The Mad Fool of the Reflecting Pool is in the editing stage. Beck will appear as a wiccan foaming at the mouth and pronouncing curses on republicans, the Tea party, John Boehner, Goldman-Sachs, and then finally executing the founding fathers through channeling them via Eleanor Roosevelt via Hillary Clinton, known for her seances with Eleanor. Three deranged Pentecostals named Faith, Hope and Charity will do the deed and burn the Constitution, the latter as they morph into federal judges in California. Congress, no longer needed, will be annihilated through trauma caused by being made to read the bills it has passed. The movie promises to be a sellout.
***Staffers are warned about duties in California connected with the campaign of Senator Boxer with regard to addressing the senator always as Senator Boxer, certainly not by Ms., Madame, or Fido (little joke there). The senator was forced to reprimand Brig. Gen. Michael Walsh in a Senate hearing concerning Katrina for answering her using the address “ma’am,” which is standard in the army for addressing female officers. She let him know she preferred to be called Senator. If she was being testy then, imagine her state of mind these days in a tough race to keep her seat, so be warned. Anyone who forgets may be on the receiving end in the ear of a copy of the Health-care bill that at 2,000+ pages weighs a ton and can make one feel as if he’s the Cleveland Browns quarterback under full concussion.
***In a conference call last month to a few thousand religious leaders, the president made the statement: “Get out there and spread the word.” Nasty republicans have complained that he was un-separating church and state, a no-no under the First Amendment, even accusing him of putting the tax-exempt status of the churches involved in jeopardy. Press guru Robert Glibs (Gibbs…another little joke there) is putting out a statement explaining that the president was simply exhorting all the folks of the cloth to go out in the highways and the hedges (little scripture there…Luke 14:23) and get on the street corners (Matthew 6:5) to bring the Word and make their prayers…just encouraging them to do their thing…had nothing to do with elections, legislation or anything governmental. However, any staffer who can discover a biblical mandate concerning voting democrat instead of anything else will be rewarded with a three-day trip to Manhattan for the purpose of admiring the future site of the newest Muslim mosque to be built near Ground Zero, with the understanding that she/he will face east five times a day (Harvard grads may need help with this) and listen to the muzzeins’ practice their future call to prayer.
*** Since an effort must be made in the South to gain support, the effort must be made to understand NASCAR, church revivals, and at least a passing knowledge of the names of Confederate Civil War generals. Be sure to accuse Sherman and U.S. Grant of perfidy, but only in the South. Do this with care because there is a handful of media types who might leak this in the North, although most of them wouldn't know Confederate generals from the Notre Dame backfield of 1939. Cultivate a taste for grits and hominy, and DO NOT grimace when eating these foods. While they may appear as poisonous to the palate, former chairman Doctor Dean assures that they will not harm and may even aid and abet the workings of the alimentary canal. If this should overly happen, be sure to have on hand at all times a bottle of Pepto-Bismol or Imodium. If you should actually like these foods, you may need to be reeducated at an indoctrination facility soon to be established, since you may be more red than blue.
And so it goes.
Jim Clark
***Just a reminder that everyone needs to be proud of the president and first lady account their unflagging campaigning for the democrats who are considered most vulnerable to defeat 02 November! The president has made the backyard-warm-fuzzy-hug-fest the envy of even John Edwards, who developed this style during the last election cycle. The president has blamed George Bush for every bad thing that has happened since 1946, the year of his birth, but keeps hearing mutterings about the economy and high unemployment rate being his own fault. Therefore, he’s requested a list of new things for which Bush can be blamed and which fit easily on a teleprompter, especially the backyard type that can be folded and carried by a peon. The president has already mentioned Bush’s tree-chopping that results in harmful deforestation but anyone with knowledge of his enhancing global warming by, for instance, not using a hybrid-tractor or exhaling CO2 more than inhaling O2 is directed to report such things immediately.
***The first lady has also requested a red/yellow/black/white (non-discriminating) paper on the reasons she is now proud to be an American, a distinct change from her position in 2008, when she was earning only a paltry $300,000 per year as some sort of vice president or occupying some other seat-warming position at the University of Chicago, and therefore suffering financial persecution and also suffering racial discrimination because she wasn’t the university’s president. Since taking office with the president, sort of like the Clinton twofer, she’s had little time to sort out her reasons for liking the country now, not least because of her travels outside the country to places like Paris and Spain to represent the best of America, and to the beaches in New England to campaign for low-fat diets and high-carbohydrate cars, speaking of which, staffers will soon be using only electric cars, necessitating plans for travel of no more than 80 miles per day. Anyone caught discombobulated on an interstate account a dead battery will be disciplined by having to listen to replays of Glenn Beck radio/TV shows 12 hours a day for a week.
***Michael Moore’s new movie predicated on Beck’s 400,000-person “mall brawl” (his terminology) and tentatively titled The Mad Fool of the Reflecting Pool is in the editing stage. Beck will appear as a wiccan foaming at the mouth and pronouncing curses on republicans, the Tea party, John Boehner, Goldman-Sachs, and then finally executing the founding fathers through channeling them via Eleanor Roosevelt via Hillary Clinton, known for her seances with Eleanor. Three deranged Pentecostals named Faith, Hope and Charity will do the deed and burn the Constitution, the latter as they morph into federal judges in California. Congress, no longer needed, will be annihilated through trauma caused by being made to read the bills it has passed. The movie promises to be a sellout.
***Staffers are warned about duties in California connected with the campaign of Senator Boxer with regard to addressing the senator always as Senator Boxer, certainly not by Ms., Madame, or Fido (little joke there). The senator was forced to reprimand Brig. Gen. Michael Walsh in a Senate hearing concerning Katrina for answering her using the address “ma’am,” which is standard in the army for addressing female officers. She let him know she preferred to be called Senator. If she was being testy then, imagine her state of mind these days in a tough race to keep her seat, so be warned. Anyone who forgets may be on the receiving end in the ear of a copy of the Health-care bill that at 2,000+ pages weighs a ton and can make one feel as if he’s the Cleveland Browns quarterback under full concussion.
***In a conference call last month to a few thousand religious leaders, the president made the statement: “Get out there and spread the word.” Nasty republicans have complained that he was un-separating church and state, a no-no under the First Amendment, even accusing him of putting the tax-exempt status of the churches involved in jeopardy. Press guru Robert Glibs (Gibbs…another little joke there) is putting out a statement explaining that the president was simply exhorting all the folks of the cloth to go out in the highways and the hedges (little scripture there…Luke 14:23) and get on the street corners (Matthew 6:5) to bring the Word and make their prayers…just encouraging them to do their thing…had nothing to do with elections, legislation or anything governmental. However, any staffer who can discover a biblical mandate concerning voting democrat instead of anything else will be rewarded with a three-day trip to Manhattan for the purpose of admiring the future site of the newest Muslim mosque to be built near Ground Zero, with the understanding that she/he will face east five times a day (Harvard grads may need help with this) and listen to the muzzeins’ practice their future call to prayer.
*** Since an effort must be made in the South to gain support, the effort must be made to understand NASCAR, church revivals, and at least a passing knowledge of the names of Confederate Civil War generals. Be sure to accuse Sherman and U.S. Grant of perfidy, but only in the South. Do this with care because there is a handful of media types who might leak this in the North, although most of them wouldn't know Confederate generals from the Notre Dame backfield of 1939. Cultivate a taste for grits and hominy, and DO NOT grimace when eating these foods. While they may appear as poisonous to the palate, former chairman Doctor Dean assures that they will not harm and may even aid and abet the workings of the alimentary canal. If this should overly happen, be sure to have on hand at all times a bottle of Pepto-Bismol or Imodium. If you should actually like these foods, you may need to be reeducated at an indoctrination facility soon to be established, since you may be more red than blue.
And so it goes.
Jim Clark
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
Dreams from My Father
Most people have probably expressed to others or at least thought to themselves some opinions about President Obama. I have, as well, but decided recently that to be fair in my assessments of both him and his presidency I should read his Dreams from My Father, written in 1995 and updated in 2004, not that I could get inside his head and hope to know much comprehensively. In this book, Obama recounts the main events of his life virtually from the beginning until his becoming a law-school student in the late 1980s. My conclusions are not remarked pejoratively, merely stated as…conclusions.
Two things stick out – obsession with race/personal-identity and a bent toward being a dreamer. Notwithstanding the fact that Obama’s mother was Midwestern-white, he makes it plain that he is an African American, a black, not a white. Unlike Tiger Woods, who claimed to be multi-racial, Obama made it clear that he identifies with blacks. In his famous “invasion” of Berlin in the summer of 2008 during the campaign, he made it clear that he was a “different” American from those the Germans had recognized previously…black, not white. Indeed, he basked in that revelation.
On page 171 of the paperback edition is a mention of the fact that he had heard that his grandmother was “scared of a black man,” perhaps a precursor to his alluding to it after his famous “race speech” in Philadelphia in March 2008 (typical white person), the speech being largely an unsuccessful attempt to whitewash racist remarks by the Rev. Dr. Jeremiah (God damn America) Wright, his pastor at Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago. Without question, he identified with Wright, having been a 20-year-member of the church and hearing Wright constantly berate white people in his sermons, even accusing them of inventing HIVAIDS in order to kill blacks.
At page 100 describing his time at Occidental College, Obama, to prove his loyalty to blackness, wrote that he chose as friends the more politically active black students, foreign students, Chicanos, Marxist professors, structural feminists and punk rock performance poets. The term he used to describe his “crowd” was alienated, “resisting bourgeois society’s stifling constraints.” He wrote, “… it remained necessary to prove which side you were on … .” This “class” approach smacked of victimization and may be the driving force in Obama’s world, characterized by some as Marxist or socialist.
In any case, dredging up the race question in the campaign for no discernible reason other than exonerating Wright simply pointed to his obsession with the subject, not to mention his loyalty to Wright, whose phrase he used in titling a later book, The Audacity of Hope. Later, he disavowed Wright but only after the preacher had appeared before the National Press Club a few days after the Philadelphia incident, praising Nation of Islam guru Farrakhan and accusing this country of terrorism.
Obama’s Kenyan father (also named Barack Obama) had multiple wives, but in Kenya, apparently, that was okay. He was already married, with children, when he married Obama’s mother and later abandoned them both, first attending Harvard and then returning to Kenya, where he married yet another white woman. Whether or not polygamy was/is acceptable anywhere, it was certainly acceptable to Obama, Sr., because he was a Muslim. Muslim men are allowed four wives, though Osama bin Laden, the world’s most notorious Muslim, was the son of his father’s tenth wife. Mohammad seems to have had 12 wives, one of them a nine-year-old.
The final segment of the book is devoted to Obama’s first trip to Kenya to visit his relatives, a bittersweet recounting of what he found, especially about his father. By that time, late 80s, his father had died some years before as the result of an auto accident. What he found was tribal tension and poverty, which he may automatically have connected to the slavery matter in this country, thus firming his identification with blackness, never mind that he never suffered more than socially – if that – because of his preferred ethnicity, and had all the advantages he needed to do well.
Obama’s father, with his Harvard doctorate, was successful in business and also held high office for a time in the Kenyan government but was on the wrong side tribally and was later reduced to having practically nothing, though attempting to live as if he did. His relatives did not spare the father in re-introducing him posthumously to Obama, who had met his father only once during a tension-filled month in Hawaii when Obama was ten. Obama learned that his father was a sort of charmer and dreamer, unable to face his failures while being demanding and overbearing with his children.
It might not be fair to say that in this case the fruit did not fall far from the trunk of the tree…or the book might indicate just that. Obama is charming and speaks well enough but perhaps gave away his bent toward dreaming – like his father – when he virtually casually said during the campaign that he would sit down with Ahmadinejad without pre-conditions and talk things out, thus showing a complete misunderstanding of his self-supposed powers of persuasion (charm) or of world affairs. Or…he rather glibly (dreamily) campaigns now for democrats, depending on his charm at a time when this nation demands substance, not charisma.
Hopefully, Obama has matured – at least politically – since his days at Occidental, recognizing that class warfare is not acceptable. Much of the book had to do with his “organizing” activities in Chicago in the 80s, many of which were praiseworthy and effective. He may have mentioned it but did not make much of the fact, however, that the almost total breakdown of the black family lies at the heart of black troubles, not white people or the U.S. government.
And so it goes.
Jim Clark
Two things stick out – obsession with race/personal-identity and a bent toward being a dreamer. Notwithstanding the fact that Obama’s mother was Midwestern-white, he makes it plain that he is an African American, a black, not a white. Unlike Tiger Woods, who claimed to be multi-racial, Obama made it clear that he identifies with blacks. In his famous “invasion” of Berlin in the summer of 2008 during the campaign, he made it clear that he was a “different” American from those the Germans had recognized previously…black, not white. Indeed, he basked in that revelation.
On page 171 of the paperback edition is a mention of the fact that he had heard that his grandmother was “scared of a black man,” perhaps a precursor to his alluding to it after his famous “race speech” in Philadelphia in March 2008 (typical white person), the speech being largely an unsuccessful attempt to whitewash racist remarks by the Rev. Dr. Jeremiah (God damn America) Wright, his pastor at Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago. Without question, he identified with Wright, having been a 20-year-member of the church and hearing Wright constantly berate white people in his sermons, even accusing them of inventing HIVAIDS in order to kill blacks.
At page 100 describing his time at Occidental College, Obama, to prove his loyalty to blackness, wrote that he chose as friends the more politically active black students, foreign students, Chicanos, Marxist professors, structural feminists and punk rock performance poets. The term he used to describe his “crowd” was alienated, “resisting bourgeois society’s stifling constraints.” He wrote, “… it remained necessary to prove which side you were on … .” This “class” approach smacked of victimization and may be the driving force in Obama’s world, characterized by some as Marxist or socialist.
In any case, dredging up the race question in the campaign for no discernible reason other than exonerating Wright simply pointed to his obsession with the subject, not to mention his loyalty to Wright, whose phrase he used in titling a later book, The Audacity of Hope. Later, he disavowed Wright but only after the preacher had appeared before the National Press Club a few days after the Philadelphia incident, praising Nation of Islam guru Farrakhan and accusing this country of terrorism.
Obama’s Kenyan father (also named Barack Obama) had multiple wives, but in Kenya, apparently, that was okay. He was already married, with children, when he married Obama’s mother and later abandoned them both, first attending Harvard and then returning to Kenya, where he married yet another white woman. Whether or not polygamy was/is acceptable anywhere, it was certainly acceptable to Obama, Sr., because he was a Muslim. Muslim men are allowed four wives, though Osama bin Laden, the world’s most notorious Muslim, was the son of his father’s tenth wife. Mohammad seems to have had 12 wives, one of them a nine-year-old.
The final segment of the book is devoted to Obama’s first trip to Kenya to visit his relatives, a bittersweet recounting of what he found, especially about his father. By that time, late 80s, his father had died some years before as the result of an auto accident. What he found was tribal tension and poverty, which he may automatically have connected to the slavery matter in this country, thus firming his identification with blackness, never mind that he never suffered more than socially – if that – because of his preferred ethnicity, and had all the advantages he needed to do well.
Obama’s father, with his Harvard doctorate, was successful in business and also held high office for a time in the Kenyan government but was on the wrong side tribally and was later reduced to having practically nothing, though attempting to live as if he did. His relatives did not spare the father in re-introducing him posthumously to Obama, who had met his father only once during a tension-filled month in Hawaii when Obama was ten. Obama learned that his father was a sort of charmer and dreamer, unable to face his failures while being demanding and overbearing with his children.
It might not be fair to say that in this case the fruit did not fall far from the trunk of the tree…or the book might indicate just that. Obama is charming and speaks well enough but perhaps gave away his bent toward dreaming – like his father – when he virtually casually said during the campaign that he would sit down with Ahmadinejad without pre-conditions and talk things out, thus showing a complete misunderstanding of his self-supposed powers of persuasion (charm) or of world affairs. Or…he rather glibly (dreamily) campaigns now for democrats, depending on his charm at a time when this nation demands substance, not charisma.
Hopefully, Obama has matured – at least politically – since his days at Occidental, recognizing that class warfare is not acceptable. Much of the book had to do with his “organizing” activities in Chicago in the 80s, many of which were praiseworthy and effective. He may have mentioned it but did not make much of the fact, however, that the almost total breakdown of the black family lies at the heart of black troubles, not white people or the U.S. government.
And so it goes.
Jim Clark
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
DADT Legislation from the Bench
Legislating from the bench has been an increasing phenomenon in recent years but perhaps the latest exercise involving federal/state statutes being set aside by one person in California (where else?) is the most egregious. Federal Judge Virginia Phillips has ruled that the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy passed during the Clinton administration is un-constitutional and that discharging homosexual members of the military must stop immediately.
Phillips went far beyond making a decision on simply what she construes to be the law by making a personal judgment without any expertise to back it up, not that such would have been a factor in the first place, since a judge’s personal opinions should never enter into the decision-making process. She indicated in her ruling that the DADT policy doesn’t help military readiness and has a “direct and deleterious effect” by hurting recruiting while the country’s at war.
Phillips spent nine years in private practice after finishing law school in 1982, followed ever since by commissioner/judgeships of one kind or another, swilling at the public troughs, until being nominated for her current job in 1999 by Bill Clinton. She’s had no military experience whatever, has probably never been in a barracks or on a navy ship, at least for a significant time, and knows nothing about combat, but obviously considers herself a military genius. This is the kind of arrogant elitism that remarks the liberal mindset. In even presuming to make a military statement, notwithstanding that it was totally unwarranted and unprofessional, she announced to all that she’s as dumb as a gourd. Judges are supposed to know better than that.
Phillips has forced the president’s hand, or at least that of Attorney General Holder, whose responsibility it is to represent the government in appealing this nutcase decision, even though President Obama, who also has had absolutely no military experience, is for the repeal of DADT, just recently denied by a vote in the Senate. Added to the mix is the fact that the top military brass, at least the ones responsible for the everyday operation of the services, have said very publicly (thus perhaps putting their own jobs in jeopardy by nay-saying the commander-in-chief) that DADT should not be repealed…and they don’t give a fig about social engineering, which is what Judge Phillips is all about.
Presumably, the government’s appeal – and there has to be one since the law is the law and Holder is sworn to uphold it – will have to go through the Federal Ninth Circuit (California again), which is practically guaranteed to uphold Phillips, not on the basis of law but on the basis of political correctness, which is all this case is about. Prior to DADT, homosexuals were not even allowed in the military, and asking about it was perfectly okay, as it should be. The reasons are obvious enough, at least to men who’ve served in the military.
Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker (also California, where else?) ruled in August that the constitutional amendment that Californians have just approved defining marriage as between a man and a woman is unconstitutional, notwithstanding, also, that federal law enacted in the 1990s serves the same purpose. One rinky-dink judge has presumed to overturn the California Constitution and federal law – legislating from the bench. Walker is a homosexual himself and for that reason alone should have recused himself from a matter so firmly established as settled law not only federally but in virtually every state and by State Constitutions.
The military services have regulations that proscribe a lot of folks from joining-up. Those with myopia/astigmatism may not fly airplanes. Those with low IQs may not serve at all. Those with other physical disabilities or prior injuries may not serve. It has been accepted for hundreds of years that those with the behavioral/emotional problems connected to homosexuality may not serve, mostly because of the ill effects on the service itself, not the homosexual. Yet, a judge who knows nothing about the military has decided that while some regulations are okay the one concerning homosexuality is not. This makes no sense, but ruling from the bench is the name of the game these days.
In other years, ruling from the bench gave the country forced busing, something that was so detrimental to education that its progenitor, University of Chicago professor James Coleman, pronounced it a failure long ago but school districts have had to put up with the disruptions it caused and is still causing, not to mention the nosedive academically that it helped engineer. Five years ago by a 5-4 ruling (Kelo), even the SCOTUS got in the act, approving a land-grab from a private citizen by local-government condemnation not for governmental use but for private business.
Given the constant drumbeat in the current administration for getting things done by executive order rather than legally through the Congress (admittedly damned by too many opportunists rather than informed legislators), one wonders, assuming the obvious cooperation of the courts comprised of mischief-makers with lifetime tenure, if the nation is about to become a monarchy, i.e., with King Barack on the throne.
And so it goes.
Jim Clark
Phillips went far beyond making a decision on simply what she construes to be the law by making a personal judgment without any expertise to back it up, not that such would have been a factor in the first place, since a judge’s personal opinions should never enter into the decision-making process. She indicated in her ruling that the DADT policy doesn’t help military readiness and has a “direct and deleterious effect” by hurting recruiting while the country’s at war.
Phillips spent nine years in private practice after finishing law school in 1982, followed ever since by commissioner/judgeships of one kind or another, swilling at the public troughs, until being nominated for her current job in 1999 by Bill Clinton. She’s had no military experience whatever, has probably never been in a barracks or on a navy ship, at least for a significant time, and knows nothing about combat, but obviously considers herself a military genius. This is the kind of arrogant elitism that remarks the liberal mindset. In even presuming to make a military statement, notwithstanding that it was totally unwarranted and unprofessional, she announced to all that she’s as dumb as a gourd. Judges are supposed to know better than that.
Phillips has forced the president’s hand, or at least that of Attorney General Holder, whose responsibility it is to represent the government in appealing this nutcase decision, even though President Obama, who also has had absolutely no military experience, is for the repeal of DADT, just recently denied by a vote in the Senate. Added to the mix is the fact that the top military brass, at least the ones responsible for the everyday operation of the services, have said very publicly (thus perhaps putting their own jobs in jeopardy by nay-saying the commander-in-chief) that DADT should not be repealed…and they don’t give a fig about social engineering, which is what Judge Phillips is all about.
Presumably, the government’s appeal – and there has to be one since the law is the law and Holder is sworn to uphold it – will have to go through the Federal Ninth Circuit (California again), which is practically guaranteed to uphold Phillips, not on the basis of law but on the basis of political correctness, which is all this case is about. Prior to DADT, homosexuals were not even allowed in the military, and asking about it was perfectly okay, as it should be. The reasons are obvious enough, at least to men who’ve served in the military.
Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker (also California, where else?) ruled in August that the constitutional amendment that Californians have just approved defining marriage as between a man and a woman is unconstitutional, notwithstanding, also, that federal law enacted in the 1990s serves the same purpose. One rinky-dink judge has presumed to overturn the California Constitution and federal law – legislating from the bench. Walker is a homosexual himself and for that reason alone should have recused himself from a matter so firmly established as settled law not only federally but in virtually every state and by State Constitutions.
The military services have regulations that proscribe a lot of folks from joining-up. Those with myopia/astigmatism may not fly airplanes. Those with low IQs may not serve at all. Those with other physical disabilities or prior injuries may not serve. It has been accepted for hundreds of years that those with the behavioral/emotional problems connected to homosexuality may not serve, mostly because of the ill effects on the service itself, not the homosexual. Yet, a judge who knows nothing about the military has decided that while some regulations are okay the one concerning homosexuality is not. This makes no sense, but ruling from the bench is the name of the game these days.
In other years, ruling from the bench gave the country forced busing, something that was so detrimental to education that its progenitor, University of Chicago professor James Coleman, pronounced it a failure long ago but school districts have had to put up with the disruptions it caused and is still causing, not to mention the nosedive academically that it helped engineer. Five years ago by a 5-4 ruling (Kelo), even the SCOTUS got in the act, approving a land-grab from a private citizen by local-government condemnation not for governmental use but for private business.
Given the constant drumbeat in the current administration for getting things done by executive order rather than legally through the Congress (admittedly damned by too many opportunists rather than informed legislators), one wonders, assuming the obvious cooperation of the courts comprised of mischief-makers with lifetime tenure, if the nation is about to become a monarchy, i.e., with King Barack on the throne.
And so it goes.
Jim Clark
Friday, October 08, 2010
Krugman's Angst
New York Times columnist Paul Krugman in a recent screed heaved and heaved and delivered himself of what he must have considered both a scoop and a profundity, to wit, that Fox News is not fair and balanced, after all, and, even worse, is in the process of buying up the nation’s politics, mainly by placing wannabe presidents on its payroll…the result of billionaires like Rupert Murdoch simply creating a government bought fair-and-square.
Never has Krugman been more laughable, and that’s saying a lot. He has for the most part merely stated the obvious. People who are interested in success make the effort, especially financially, to gain it. Murdoch may be less interested in influencing politics than he is in (gasp) making money, though politics impinges heavily upon the ability to do anything. Result: Fox outdraws by huge differentials all the other networks and, despite Krugman’s self-serving claim, actually DOES present anybody and everybody who’s willing to take the plunge.
Some of the most unsavoury characters appear on Fox. Who can forget the appearances of the Rev. Dr. Jeremiah (God damn America) Wright on Fox or flaky Jon Stewart? Al Sharpton is a regular, as is a certified wacko liberal, Dr. Marc Lamont Hill, professor at Columbia, Obama’s alma mater. Illinois ex-governor Blagojevich has appeared. Office-seekers and/or would-be political commentators of all stripes routinely appear on Fox.
No one doubts that Fox is the other side of the coin to NBC, CBS, ABC, MSNBC and CNN, all of which carry the water for the democrats. The citizenry, however, is fed up with Obama/Pelosi/Reid and the liberal propaganda they and “their networks,” mentioned above, generate. Murdoch is a businessman (as is Imam Rauf, the mosque-guy in New York, who also invests in Murdoch’s enterprises), and Roger Ailes, who oversees Fox News, is a genius at generating political controversy and cash.
The objective is to retain, with all its warts, the capitalism that has made this country the envy of the world. The liberals, led by Obama, have made it abundantly clear (since 2007 in Congress and 2009 for the anointed one) that they intend to reduce this country to the level of the lowest common denominator globally, but the American people are onto it now.
The same thing was tried in the 1930s by the socialists and communists, who operated with a degree of respectability then, but they failed exponentially because even the working stiffs (just about all wage-earners) would have none of it even when the unemployment rate averaged 19% per year in roughly 1933-39. The current generation is far wimpier than that one, which turned out to be the greatest account WWII, according to Tom Brokaw, but is not dumb/weak enough yet to be led down the primrose path to governmental control of everything.
Conveniently when addressing the theme of “government-by-billionaire,” Krugman didn’t mention the “greatest of them all” – George Soros, who has bankrolled freely the farthest left outfits imaginable. Indeed, presidential “spiritual adviser” Jim Wallis and his rag Sojourners, according to WORLD magazine, have been bankrolled by Soros, an atheist billionaire who has financed groups promoting abortion, atheism, and same-sex marriage, with a $200,000 grant in 2004. Since then Sojourners has received at least two more grants from Soros organizations altogether totaling $325,000, the most recent in 2007. Sojourners revenues have more than tripled – from $1,601,171 in 2001-2002 to $5,283,650 in 2008-2009.
Krugman reaches for exponential absurdity when he claims that “scientists willing to deny the existence of man-made climate change” have essentially been bought-off by a handful of ultra-wealthy families operating through “a network of organizations that may seem independent on the surface… .” What rubbish – not least because the global-warming-alarmists have been thoroughly debunked by credible scientists, especially those connected intimately with the United Nations (IPCC, CRU)! Not only has their science been faulty but – even worse – they’ve been exposed – or, rather, exposed themselves – as outright frauds through e-mails understood as cover-up attempts.
Krugman made the same claim vis-à-vis the ultra-wealthy with respect to their buying out economists, strategic thinkers (to come up with rationales for “wars of choice” – EGAD!), and lawyers to defend – don’t laugh – torture. He didn’t explain how wars of choice or torture were improper concerns of the ultra-wealthy. Krugman is a Nobel winner, but that prize means nothing, especially since the Nobel for Peace was awarded to Al Gore and Barack Obama, happenstances that still have people all over the world scratching their heads in consternation.
This is a bad year for liberals of Krugman’s stripe and that may be the reason for the futility that engenders the frustration leading to the foolishness put out by the mainstream media as evidenced in Krugman’s column.
And so it goes.
Jim Clark
Never has Krugman been more laughable, and that’s saying a lot. He has for the most part merely stated the obvious. People who are interested in success make the effort, especially financially, to gain it. Murdoch may be less interested in influencing politics than he is in (gasp) making money, though politics impinges heavily upon the ability to do anything. Result: Fox outdraws by huge differentials all the other networks and, despite Krugman’s self-serving claim, actually DOES present anybody and everybody who’s willing to take the plunge.
Some of the most unsavoury characters appear on Fox. Who can forget the appearances of the Rev. Dr. Jeremiah (God damn America) Wright on Fox or flaky Jon Stewart? Al Sharpton is a regular, as is a certified wacko liberal, Dr. Marc Lamont Hill, professor at Columbia, Obama’s alma mater. Illinois ex-governor Blagojevich has appeared. Office-seekers and/or would-be political commentators of all stripes routinely appear on Fox.
No one doubts that Fox is the other side of the coin to NBC, CBS, ABC, MSNBC and CNN, all of which carry the water for the democrats. The citizenry, however, is fed up with Obama/Pelosi/Reid and the liberal propaganda they and “their networks,” mentioned above, generate. Murdoch is a businessman (as is Imam Rauf, the mosque-guy in New York, who also invests in Murdoch’s enterprises), and Roger Ailes, who oversees Fox News, is a genius at generating political controversy and cash.
The objective is to retain, with all its warts, the capitalism that has made this country the envy of the world. The liberals, led by Obama, have made it abundantly clear (since 2007 in Congress and 2009 for the anointed one) that they intend to reduce this country to the level of the lowest common denominator globally, but the American people are onto it now.
The same thing was tried in the 1930s by the socialists and communists, who operated with a degree of respectability then, but they failed exponentially because even the working stiffs (just about all wage-earners) would have none of it even when the unemployment rate averaged 19% per year in roughly 1933-39. The current generation is far wimpier than that one, which turned out to be the greatest account WWII, according to Tom Brokaw, but is not dumb/weak enough yet to be led down the primrose path to governmental control of everything.
Conveniently when addressing the theme of “government-by-billionaire,” Krugman didn’t mention the “greatest of them all” – George Soros, who has bankrolled freely the farthest left outfits imaginable. Indeed, presidential “spiritual adviser” Jim Wallis and his rag Sojourners, according to WORLD magazine, have been bankrolled by Soros, an atheist billionaire who has financed groups promoting abortion, atheism, and same-sex marriage, with a $200,000 grant in 2004. Since then Sojourners has received at least two more grants from Soros organizations altogether totaling $325,000, the most recent in 2007. Sojourners revenues have more than tripled – from $1,601,171 in 2001-2002 to $5,283,650 in 2008-2009.
Krugman reaches for exponential absurdity when he claims that “scientists willing to deny the existence of man-made climate change” have essentially been bought-off by a handful of ultra-wealthy families operating through “a network of organizations that may seem independent on the surface… .” What rubbish – not least because the global-warming-alarmists have been thoroughly debunked by credible scientists, especially those connected intimately with the United Nations (IPCC, CRU)! Not only has their science been faulty but – even worse – they’ve been exposed – or, rather, exposed themselves – as outright frauds through e-mails understood as cover-up attempts.
Krugman made the same claim vis-à-vis the ultra-wealthy with respect to their buying out economists, strategic thinkers (to come up with rationales for “wars of choice” – EGAD!), and lawyers to defend – don’t laugh – torture. He didn’t explain how wars of choice or torture were improper concerns of the ultra-wealthy. Krugman is a Nobel winner, but that prize means nothing, especially since the Nobel for Peace was awarded to Al Gore and Barack Obama, happenstances that still have people all over the world scratching their heads in consternation.
This is a bad year for liberals of Krugman’s stripe and that may be the reason for the futility that engenders the frustration leading to the foolishness put out by the mainstream media as evidenced in Krugman’s column.
And so it goes.
Jim Clark
Wednesday, October 06, 2010
Homosexuality & the University
The usually astute columnist, Kathleen Parker, characterized the actions of Dharun Ravi and Molly Wei, who spread movies online of Tyler Clementi in a sexual encounter with another man, as an episode of “unforgivable bullying.” Clementi, Ravi’s roommate and a Rutgers freshman, committed suicide apparently as the result of Ravi’s unspeakable behavior.
The verb “bully” is defined thusly: “to treat abusively: to affect by means of force or coercion: to use browbeating language or behavior: BLUSTER.” There seems to be no action on Ravi’s part that fits the definition. It would be more accurate, perhaps, to say that he simply meant to profoundly embarrass his roommate, who was a homosexual.
There’s no argument with the fact that Ravi acted despicably but if there was a crime, was it a hate crime, and, if so, what would be the charge? Can Ravi be charged with something like manslaughter or reckless homicide on the basis of hate, especially when he obviously did not push Clementi off the bridge? Hardly. Can one person be penalized for another’s frame of mind?
Parker made the whole thing into a “privacy matter.” Clementi had made a deal with Ravi to be alone in their room until a certain time. He and his partner were alone, except they were not alone entirely because of Ravi’s web-cam chronicling the episode. The camera was a voyeur unseen by the two homosexuals, who thought they were enjoying their “privacy.”
There are no easy answers, especially taking into consideration that adolescent minds were at work here, though probably none of the actors were minors, including the “partner,” who, as Parker would have it, had his privacy invaded, also. This leads to further considerations concerning what should be done by institutions of all kinds to guard against episodes such as this.
Should an institution knowingly pair a “straight” guy with a homosexual as a roommate? It’s probably fair to say that most straights would rather not be placed in that position. Certainly, no student should be placed in a room where homosexual behavior is practiced, since that behavior, besides being obviously unnatural, involves the use of bodily organs and orifices in ways that are unsanitary, actually filthy. Significantly, known homosexuals are barred from all U.S. military academies and from any branch of service, from which they are discharged immediately upon being “outed,” either by themselves or some other method. The reason should be obvious.
In the 37 states with confidential name-based HIV infection reporting in 2008, diagnoses of HIV infection among adults and adolescents totaled 41,087 with 30,755 diagnoses in males and 10,332 diagnoses in females, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. This being the case, especially with males, why should any student be exposed to even the possibility of contacting AIDS, which remains a scourge among homosexual men, known for their promiscuity.
Granted, few homosexuals will admit to their proclivity if asked about it on a college application but each institution should make the effort to put them together if possible, not blindly subscribe to the nutcase diversity nonsense that has blinded the nation. Under no circumstances should a known homosexual be paired with a straight. Nothing could be more repulsive than anal intercourse or the other things endemic to homosexual “sex” and no one should be forced to live with someone engaged in that stuff.
The quick answer is that, after all, both Defense Secretary Gates and Joint Chiefs Chairman Admiral Mullen agreed with the president that “don’t ask, don’t tell” should be repealed; however, when a bill to that effect was actually presented in the Senate both men backpedaled at warp speed, counseling a “go-slow” policy. In other words, they had no intention of this happening on their watch. More to the point, the top military honchos who actually run the services have come out strongly against this “promise” made by Obama.
The Clementi suicide constitutes a reminder that known homosexuals in the military are always in danger. Their antagonists will not show movies on the Internet. They can become much more physical. Actual bullying can turn nasty with grown men who resent living in close quarters, such as on a ship, with people who do strange unnatural things.
This is in no way an effort to excuse the insensitivity and stupidity of Ravi and Wei or to disparage Clementi. Rather, it is simply to state some facts that Parker would do well to consider, though she may be at a disadvantage with trying to understand the overall picture such as, for instance, 60 or more men living in a small compartment and sleeping in racks (beds) configured in stacks and using toilet facilities in anything but privacy.
And so it goes.
Jim Clark
The verb “bully” is defined thusly: “to treat abusively: to affect by means of force or coercion: to use browbeating language or behavior: BLUSTER.” There seems to be no action on Ravi’s part that fits the definition. It would be more accurate, perhaps, to say that he simply meant to profoundly embarrass his roommate, who was a homosexual.
There’s no argument with the fact that Ravi acted despicably but if there was a crime, was it a hate crime, and, if so, what would be the charge? Can Ravi be charged with something like manslaughter or reckless homicide on the basis of hate, especially when he obviously did not push Clementi off the bridge? Hardly. Can one person be penalized for another’s frame of mind?
Parker made the whole thing into a “privacy matter.” Clementi had made a deal with Ravi to be alone in their room until a certain time. He and his partner were alone, except they were not alone entirely because of Ravi’s web-cam chronicling the episode. The camera was a voyeur unseen by the two homosexuals, who thought they were enjoying their “privacy.”
There are no easy answers, especially taking into consideration that adolescent minds were at work here, though probably none of the actors were minors, including the “partner,” who, as Parker would have it, had his privacy invaded, also. This leads to further considerations concerning what should be done by institutions of all kinds to guard against episodes such as this.
Should an institution knowingly pair a “straight” guy with a homosexual as a roommate? It’s probably fair to say that most straights would rather not be placed in that position. Certainly, no student should be placed in a room where homosexual behavior is practiced, since that behavior, besides being obviously unnatural, involves the use of bodily organs and orifices in ways that are unsanitary, actually filthy. Significantly, known homosexuals are barred from all U.S. military academies and from any branch of service, from which they are discharged immediately upon being “outed,” either by themselves or some other method. The reason should be obvious.
In the 37 states with confidential name-based HIV infection reporting in 2008, diagnoses of HIV infection among adults and adolescents totaled 41,087 with 30,755 diagnoses in males and 10,332 diagnoses in females, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. This being the case, especially with males, why should any student be exposed to even the possibility of contacting AIDS, which remains a scourge among homosexual men, known for their promiscuity.
Granted, few homosexuals will admit to their proclivity if asked about it on a college application but each institution should make the effort to put them together if possible, not blindly subscribe to the nutcase diversity nonsense that has blinded the nation. Under no circumstances should a known homosexual be paired with a straight. Nothing could be more repulsive than anal intercourse or the other things endemic to homosexual “sex” and no one should be forced to live with someone engaged in that stuff.
The quick answer is that, after all, both Defense Secretary Gates and Joint Chiefs Chairman Admiral Mullen agreed with the president that “don’t ask, don’t tell” should be repealed; however, when a bill to that effect was actually presented in the Senate both men backpedaled at warp speed, counseling a “go-slow” policy. In other words, they had no intention of this happening on their watch. More to the point, the top military honchos who actually run the services have come out strongly against this “promise” made by Obama.
The Clementi suicide constitutes a reminder that known homosexuals in the military are always in danger. Their antagonists will not show movies on the Internet. They can become much more physical. Actual bullying can turn nasty with grown men who resent living in close quarters, such as on a ship, with people who do strange unnatural things.
This is in no way an effort to excuse the insensitivity and stupidity of Ravi and Wei or to disparage Clementi. Rather, it is simply to state some facts that Parker would do well to consider, though she may be at a disadvantage with trying to understand the overall picture such as, for instance, 60 or more men living in a small compartment and sleeping in racks (beds) configured in stacks and using toilet facilities in anything but privacy.
And so it goes.
Jim Clark
Monday, October 04, 2010
Baseball Criminality Exposed!
The glorious protection provided by the government these days was evidenced graphically the other night when some good citizens in Ohio carried out the communist mantra – TATTLE – with regard to a social and criminal evil practiced by the Cincinnati Reds as they celebrated a victory that made them champions of the Central Division of the National League. The players were spotted (oh, Green-peace, say it isn’t so) actually lighting VICTORY-CIGARS in their clubhouse.
Plainly, this was against Ohio state law patently and totally forbidding lighting up anywhere in a closed space, even if nobody in the space cares or objects. And – HORRORS – some of the smoke might have mingled with the diesel exhaust of the river tugs just outside the outfield and asphyxiated a gnat flying in the glare of the field’s floodlights.
After all, the champagne bottles had already been opened and the bubbly was being both consumed and sprayed all over the closed space…but so what! In Ohio, that’s perfectly okay unless, of course, one of the players decided to drive the clubhouse home and was picked up for drunk locker-room-driving. The Reds pooh-bahs were contacted by the powers-that-be and admonished for behavior that not only was dangerous to the atmosphere of the locker-room but was also simply unlawful, an even worse circumstance.
Without question, Al Gore has been contacted about this (unless he’s been too busy with his latest masseuse) since all that hot cigar-smoke could have provided the proverbial “tipping-point” that will damn the nation into hellish temperatures making the House’s approval of cap-and-trade too late for the learning…or spurning…or whatever. The evil Senate has not acted on the legislation, which no one but the lobbyists have read anyway, but it’s a sure bet that cigar-smoke is covered. This matter could very well go to the United Nations in solemn assembly, thus putting Reds manager Dusty Baker in danger of a trial at Nuremberg for crimes against humanity. Cigar-smoke is known to cover whole populations.
Actually, Baker might be guilty of other crimes, such as overuse of wood account his penchant for chewing on toothpicks throughout an entire game. There’s no telling how many of these miniature logs he goes through, but it could be disastrous since deforestation is said to be killing the planet. His players are at risk, too, with respect to the courts since they constantly chew sunflower seeds or dip snuff during games and consequently spit all over the place, thus spewing everything from possible flu germs to tobacco nicotine into the air and onto the ground, where an unsuspecting fan or groundskeeper, respectively, could become infected/addicted and…who knows…premeditated death by baseball! Just think of the civil lawsuits against whole teams residing, of course, in the Big House.
Baseball players do other bad things…like blowing bubble-gum bubbles during the game. Washington Nationals homerun hitter Adam Dunn blows these germ-ridden bubbles throughout his entire trip around the bases after knocking one over the fence. Every time he emits the saliva and phlegm associated with launching and recapturing a bubble, literally billions of potentially deadly H1N1 viruses that thrive on gum-sugar could attack a whole stadium. Imagine a swine-flu epidemic occasioned by Dunn and all the other players who blow bubbles and/or spit upon the air-waves and terra firma. It’s enough to send one to the ER just thinking about it.
The greatest surprise is that Ohio lawmakers have been remiss in requiring a safer habitat for spectators at baseball games. Whether by law or common sense, racetrack honchos have put up fences to protect spectators from race-cars that occasionally take to the air, usually after one driver has “tipped” the back fender of another driver’s car and sent it off the course, the better to win through elimination of the competition.
Strangely, there have been no laws either disallowing the hitting of a line-drive foul ball or requiring that fences be built reaching the height unto the 75th tier of the stands, thus protecting onlookers from traumatic shock and awe, often accompanied by hospital stays after taking one in the anatomy. It’s a wonder that premier ambulance-chaser John Edwards of the $400-haircut has not homed in on this, but it’s only a matter of time.
Back in the day of 154 games and no playoffs (thankfully), the World Series ended in the first week of October but now the playoffs haven’t even begun. The Series was demanding enough then, but the added pressure of interminable playoff games and the threat of snow for the Series will drive the baseball players into such stress that the increase of spitting, blowing bubbles, chewing toothpicks, launching sunflower seed-pods and errant foul balls at unwary fans will be virtually intolerable – just like Gore’s melting icebergs – and will put tens of thousands of spectators at risk. Lawmakers have not done enough.
Sadly, though, if the Reds should win it all they will be under the strictest scrutiny of the nicotine police and will not be able to celebrate adequately…by lighting up! In Ohio, the law is the law.
And so it goes.
Jim Clark
Plainly, this was against Ohio state law patently and totally forbidding lighting up anywhere in a closed space, even if nobody in the space cares or objects. And – HORRORS – some of the smoke might have mingled with the diesel exhaust of the river tugs just outside the outfield and asphyxiated a gnat flying in the glare of the field’s floodlights.
After all, the champagne bottles had already been opened and the bubbly was being both consumed and sprayed all over the closed space…but so what! In Ohio, that’s perfectly okay unless, of course, one of the players decided to drive the clubhouse home and was picked up for drunk locker-room-driving. The Reds pooh-bahs were contacted by the powers-that-be and admonished for behavior that not only was dangerous to the atmosphere of the locker-room but was also simply unlawful, an even worse circumstance.
Without question, Al Gore has been contacted about this (unless he’s been too busy with his latest masseuse) since all that hot cigar-smoke could have provided the proverbial “tipping-point” that will damn the nation into hellish temperatures making the House’s approval of cap-and-trade too late for the learning…or spurning…or whatever. The evil Senate has not acted on the legislation, which no one but the lobbyists have read anyway, but it’s a sure bet that cigar-smoke is covered. This matter could very well go to the United Nations in solemn assembly, thus putting Reds manager Dusty Baker in danger of a trial at Nuremberg for crimes against humanity. Cigar-smoke is known to cover whole populations.
Actually, Baker might be guilty of other crimes, such as overuse of wood account his penchant for chewing on toothpicks throughout an entire game. There’s no telling how many of these miniature logs he goes through, but it could be disastrous since deforestation is said to be killing the planet. His players are at risk, too, with respect to the courts since they constantly chew sunflower seeds or dip snuff during games and consequently spit all over the place, thus spewing everything from possible flu germs to tobacco nicotine into the air and onto the ground, where an unsuspecting fan or groundskeeper, respectively, could become infected/addicted and…who knows…premeditated death by baseball! Just think of the civil lawsuits against whole teams residing, of course, in the Big House.
Baseball players do other bad things…like blowing bubble-gum bubbles during the game. Washington Nationals homerun hitter Adam Dunn blows these germ-ridden bubbles throughout his entire trip around the bases after knocking one over the fence. Every time he emits the saliva and phlegm associated with launching and recapturing a bubble, literally billions of potentially deadly H1N1 viruses that thrive on gum-sugar could attack a whole stadium. Imagine a swine-flu epidemic occasioned by Dunn and all the other players who blow bubbles and/or spit upon the air-waves and terra firma. It’s enough to send one to the ER just thinking about it.
The greatest surprise is that Ohio lawmakers have been remiss in requiring a safer habitat for spectators at baseball games. Whether by law or common sense, racetrack honchos have put up fences to protect spectators from race-cars that occasionally take to the air, usually after one driver has “tipped” the back fender of another driver’s car and sent it off the course, the better to win through elimination of the competition.
Strangely, there have been no laws either disallowing the hitting of a line-drive foul ball or requiring that fences be built reaching the height unto the 75th tier of the stands, thus protecting onlookers from traumatic shock and awe, often accompanied by hospital stays after taking one in the anatomy. It’s a wonder that premier ambulance-chaser John Edwards of the $400-haircut has not homed in on this, but it’s only a matter of time.
Back in the day of 154 games and no playoffs (thankfully), the World Series ended in the first week of October but now the playoffs haven’t even begun. The Series was demanding enough then, but the added pressure of interminable playoff games and the threat of snow for the Series will drive the baseball players into such stress that the increase of spitting, blowing bubbles, chewing toothpicks, launching sunflower seed-pods and errant foul balls at unwary fans will be virtually intolerable – just like Gore’s melting icebergs – and will put tens of thousands of spectators at risk. Lawmakers have not done enough.
Sadly, though, if the Reds should win it all they will be under the strictest scrutiny of the nicotine police and will not be able to celebrate adequately…by lighting up! In Ohio, the law is the law.
And so it goes.
Jim Clark
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