I can't say it any better.

So I'm stealing -- in its entirety -- the letter from Congressman Tom McClintock explaining the recent government shutdown.

Facts are stubborn things.

Dear Friends,

This nation has gone through 18 government shutdowns in the last 37 years. Fifteen of those 18 shutdowns occurred when Democrats controlled the House. In those 15 shutdowns, the Democrats demanded increased abortion services and labor and environmental policy concessions.

Perhaps the reason we don’t remember those shutdowns as vividly is because in those days, presidents negotiated around the clock to resolve the disputes that caused them and did everything they could to minimize the public’s inconvenience and suffering.

This time was different. This time, the President refused to negotiate and took unprecedented steps to amplify the pain and suffering that the public endured.

Why would the administration do this? They told us why – because they were winning politically.  

What was the outrageous Republican demand that Democrats refused even to discuss during the 16-day shutdown while they ordered our public servants to make life as difficult as possible for people?

On September 30th, with the deadline just hours away, House Republicans had dropped all conditions to fund the entire government with one substantive exception: delay the individual mandate that forces people to buy policies against their will. Democrats summarily rejected this proposal and for 16 days refused to negotiate on this single point, while literally accusing Republicans of sedition.

Then this past Monday, the President’s Press Secretary made this stunning admission: the Obama administration may itself seek to delay the individual mandate by dropping the penalty for non-compliance.

They’ve got to be kidding.

For the 16 days of the shutdown, the only substantive dispute was the Republican plea to delay the individual mandate for the millions of Americans who couldn’t find or afford Obamacare policies.

Doing so could have ended the impasse instantly. During those 16 days, it was clear to everyone that the exchanges weren’t working. Yet the President and Congressional Democrats refused even to discuss the matter, while they turned their formidable propaganda machine to the task of winning politically.

These facts speak for themselves and need no embellishment from me. John Adams once observed that “Facts are stubborn things.” As passions cool and reason resumes its rightful place in the nation’s discourse, these facts will speak eloquently and stubbornly of what happens when politics trumps policy and propaganda trumps reality. 

Sincerely,

Tom McClintock

"That's not rain."

David Angelo explains trickle down economics.

Apparently trickling down prosperity is so much more socially just and progressive when it's trickling down through the theft of government instead of the action of a free market. Who knew?

Math is hard.

Making stuff up is not.

Rep. Maxine Waters gave this dire prediction about sequestration at a Thursday press conference: The United States would experience a loss of 170 million jobs, if Congress and the White House fail to strike an agreement.

Only thing is: The Bureau of Labor Statistics says there are only about 140 million jobs in the United States, as Breitbart reports.

Either she's lying or she's stupid. Take your pick. Okay, I'll give you a third option: All of the above.

I just want to know if Maxine can make change at the corner store with both shoes on.

Actually I blame Obama for this level of WTF stupidity.

When you have the leader of your own party making constant, outrageous threats and lying through his teeth every day with the most hilariously over-the-top predictions of cannibalism and meteor strikes because of sequestration, the people who get most worked up by the frantic atmosphere are the idiots who follow him with absolute devotion.

Once lying and threats become the standard of communication from your Dear Leader, who among the devoted Politburo will deny themselves the opportunity to get some of that attention?

Not Maxie, that's for sure.

Sumpin' Just Don't Add Up.

"Don't just stand there!
Start shooting!"

Over the last couple of days a series of stories have crossed my newsfeed that have, when taken together, raised my level of concern from, "Things are getting a bit sticky" to "Better start shooting!"

First, over at DOUBLEPLUSUNDEAD, alexthechick posted yesterday about the citizen resistance concerning gun control and confiscation in New York. NEW YORK. Pause and let that sink in. New York. Neeeeeew York! New York is supposed to be a "smart" state, like California or Illinois. You know, run by Democrats and filled with liberals. SMART-smart. They certainly aren't supposed to be the location of the beginning of the revolution.

"Bring it on!"

As Alex notes, this video is "chilling." Chilling because only 40 years ago this scene was unthinkable in America. Now it has happened and we have police officers and officials taunting the crowd of law-abiding citizens with, "Bring it on!"

Bring it on. Really? I think, perhaps, he should consider the wisdom of that challenge.

Then, hilariously, we have the Department of Homeland Security releasing a video instructing ADULTS in the fine art of cowering.

The highly instructional video is entitled, "Options for Consideration Active Shooter Training Video." One will notice that shooting back is not an option. Cowering, hiding, running away, begging for help from 911, leaving behind wounded victims, fearing for your life, peeing in your pants, becoming hysterical (but quietly so the active shooter won't actively find you and actively shoot you), are all considered much better options than being armed and just shooting the fucker dead. Oh, and if you HAVE to fight back, use scissors.  Excellent advice. I've always known scissors were dangerous. Remember that warning about running with them? I think I've made my point.

My sense is that DHS would very much like to convince us that cowering in fear is the appropriate response to ANY show of force...even theirs. Especially theirs. And the military...e-ven.

Citizens, it is coming down to a couple of options. Grab your guns and prepare for battle or run away. OH! I forgot. Grab your scissors is the third choice.

 I always thought Monty Python was a farce, not a tactical choice of adult men and women. 

But wait! There's more. If they can't make you frightened and defenseless in the face of open aggression and violent threats, maybe they will just kill you all civilized like. Krazy Krugman gives away the game. (Bolding entirely mine.)

"And we’re also going to have to make decisions about health care, doc pay for health care that has no demonstrated medical benefits . So the snarky version…which I shouldn’t even say because it will get me in trouble is death panels and sales taxes is how we do this."

Why, hello, kittens. What have we here? The compassion of liberals married to the pragmatic use of force - which is all the state really is and so force is all it's capable of using to fix a problem. And as the esteemed and really, really smart Mr. Krugman admits, "Eventually we do have a problem." Really? That's not good because when states have "problems" -- big problems -- people end up dead. Every time. Always.

Or course they intend to tax you into poverty, then kill you. Nice. Mustn't "off" anyone who is still useful to the state.


The smart, kind, caring people believe we have too many of you and not enough money for them, so please go quietly or be shot. You get to choose. Well, damnit! I'm not going and I have SCISSORS! Get BACK!!!

The last story would be funny if it weren't becoming so nauseatingly familiar. The liberal elite are threatening us with their attack dogs. DHS and the military aren't enough. No, they are revving up the teachers. Yes, indeed. Mrs. Brown and Mr. Miller. You're kindergarten teacher. You're biology teacher. Just make anyone beholden to the Great God of Government for a couple of decades (in this case via the Department of Education and the NEA) and you create foaming-at-the-mouth greed and insanity. The trick is keeping the crazed teachers under control when they keep attending rallies where leaders are saying this kind of nonsense:

Lethal working conditions apparently
don't include loss of lunchroom privileges.

"The labor leaders of that time, though, were ready to kill. They were. They were just - off with their heads. They were seriously talking about that."

The comment drew laughs and some scattered applause before Lewis added, "I don't think we're at that point. The key is that they think nothing of killing us. They think nothing about putting us in harm's way. They think nothing about lethal working conditions."

Killing teachers. Callously. Routinely, it would seem. Lethal working conditions. Uh-hmmm....Lethal. Working. Conditions. One can only assume that she is talking about schools. Schools where our own children spend most of their days from age 6 to 18. Schools with lethal working conditions. I missed the news broadcasts where the little darlings and their desperately noble teachers were being taken out on gurneys virtually every day as we ruthlessly allowed them to DIE. What kind of people are we??? MY GOD! We deserve to die. Here's my scissors. I'll go quietly.


H/T: DOUBLEPLUSUNDEAD, Breitbart, American Thinker

Good news...bad news...

Keep your pants on, boys.

When you're in a knife fight and someone brings a gun, it's not advantageous to have your pants down around your ankles, boys. Republicans in Congress need to grow a pair, hike their pants up and load their pistols. This is a real fight they are getting from President Dick Tator and it's not really about the money.

It's about power. Absolute power.

With the looming fiscal cliff dampening everyone's Christmas spirit, Obama's negotiating style resembles a vengeful wife in a nasty divorce who keeps refusing settlement offers and demanding ever more from a whipped soon-to-be-ex-husband. Even when Boehner caves on alimony, custody and the house, our miffed and petulant POTUS refuses the offer and demands more.

Charles Krauthammer hammers this point:

Let’s understand President Obama’s strategy in the “fiscal cliff” negotiations. It has nothing to do with economics or real fiscal reform. This is entirely about politics. It’s Phase 2 of the 2012 campaign. The election returned him to office. The fiscal cliff negotiations are designed to break the Republican opposition and grant him political supremacy, something he thinks he earned with his landslide 2.8-point victory margin on Election Day.

This is why he sent Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner to the Republicans to convey not a negotiating offer but a demand for unconditional surrender. House Speaker John Boehner had made a peace offering of $800 billion in new revenue. Geithner pocketed Boehner’s $800 billion, doubled it to $1.6 trillion, offered risible cuts that in 2013 would actually be exceeded by new stimulus spending and then demanded that Congress turn over to the president all power over the debt ceiling.

Boehner was stunned. Mitch McConnell laughed out loud. In nobler days, they’d have offered Geithner a pistol and an early-morning appointment at Weehawken. Alas, Boehner gave again, coming back a week later with spending-cut suggestions — as demanded by Geithner — only to have them dismissed with a wave of the hand.

This isn't the negotiating behavior of someone who wants to find an answer. This is the negotiating behavior of someone who wants to break his opposition. Someone who is ruthless - and ideological enough - to break his country to do it. Obama wants political dominance for his party in a country where they are effectively the Politburo. Forever.

Uncle Joe (Stalin) said, "You can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs." Apparently we have plenty of gutless egg-heads in Congress.

What’s going on here? Having taken Boehner’s sword, and then his shirt, Obama sent Geithner to demand Boehner’s trousers. Perhaps this is what Obama means by a balanced approach.

He pretends that Boehner’s offer to raise revenue by eliminating deductions rather than by raising rates is fiscally impossible.

But on July 22, 2011, Obama had said that “$1.2 trillion in additional revenues . . . could be accomplished without hiking tax rates, but could simply be accomplished by eliminating loopholes, eliminating some deductions and engaging in a tax reform process.” Which is exactly what the Republicans are offering today.

I have often said that the biggest  reason 9/11 resulted in so much tragedy when the hijackers were minimally armed and decidedly overwhelmed was that the passengers thought they were playing a different game. They had been conditioned from decades of hijackings and terrorism to believe that you followed the directives of the hijackers and let the authorities deal with their demands - that the safest thing to do was to do nothing. It wasn't until passengers on UA Flight 93 learned that the planes were being used as missiles that they realized the rules of the game had changed.

This is what Obama is doing. He has changed the game and we don't realize it. He is deliberately destroying this country. That is his intent. It isn't an unfortunate impasse with recalcitrant and intransigent Republicans that we are seeing as we race toward the fiscal cliff. This is a game for the "fundamental transformation" of this country. There are new rules.

Obama has never shown interest in genuine debt reduction. He does nothing for two years, then spends the next two ignoring his own debt-reduction commission. In less than four years, he has increased U.S. public debt by a staggering 83 percent. As a percentage of gross domestic product, the real marker of national solvency, it has spiked from 45 percent to 70 percent.

Obama has never once publicly suggested a structural cut in entitlements. On the contrary, he created an entirely new entitlement — Obamacare — that, according to the Congressional Budget Office, will increase spending by $1.7 trillion over 11 years.

The difficulty is in getting people to see the gravity and the magnitude of Obama's plans. No one wants to believe that the president wants to really shred the Constitution and assume unprecedented power. No one wants to believe that we've elected a man twice who really hates this country and the freedoms its citizens have enjoyed for over 200 hundred years. No one wants to believe that Obama is really a bad person, not just an incompetent one.

He is one or the other, though. Flat out bad. Or flat out stupid.

Pick one.

Thomas Sowell pointed out in a column a few weeks ago that the most serious problem concerning the implementation of Obamacare was all the waivers Obama had given out. What Obama has essentially done is create a law that gives him limitless power to punish and reward, according to his whim.

Among the objections to ObamaCare, one that has not gotten as much attention as it should is the president's power to waive the law for any company, union or other enterprise he chooses.

The 14th Amendment to the Constitution provides for "equal protection of the laws" for all Americans. To have a law that can cost an organization millions of dollars a year either apply or not apply, depending on the whim or political interest of the President of the United States, is to make a mockery of the rule of law.

How secure is any freedom when there is this kind of arbitrary power in the hands of one man?

What does your right of freedom of speech mean if saying something that irritates the Obama administration means that you or your business has to pay huge amounts of money and get hit with all sorts of red tape under ObamaCare that your competitor is exempted from, because your competitor either kept quiet or praised the Obama administration or donated to its reelection campaign?

And now Obama wants to be given total power over spending by removing any restrictions placed on the debt ceiling by Congress.

John Adams said, "There are two ways to conquer and enslave a country. One is by the sword. The other is by debt."

John Marshall wrote, "The power to tax is the power to destroy."

Obama wants both these powers, with no restraints.

Say goodnight, Gracie.

How About We Try Electing a REAL President?

We tried going with the cool kid, but that didn't work. 

—23 Million Unemployed or Underemployed
—47 Million on Food Stamps
—5.5 Million Homes in Crisis/Foreclosure
—$4500 Drop in Household Income
—$5.5 Trillion of New Debt
—$716 Billion in Medicare Cuts
—$2.6 Trillion for Obamacare
—$1.9 Trillion in New Taxes in Obama’s Budget
—100% Increase in Gas Prices 

How about we try electing a real grownup, with a lifetime of real success to be a real president? What's the worst that could happen?

He's making a list...he's checking it twice

Obama may not have a list...or a plan, but Paul Ryan has both. Here's his list. Let's compare this with the Democrats' plan, which is: SPEND MORE MONEY.

* Corporation for Public Broadcasting Subsidy (Self-flagellation fund)– $445 million annual savings.
* Save America’s Treasures Program (Starving artist fund) — $25 million annual savings.
* International Fund for Ireland (Guinness fund)– $17 million annual savings.
* Legal Services Corporation (Obstruction fund) — $420 million annual savings.
* National Endowment for the Arts (elitist crony fund)– $167.5 million annual savings.
* National Endowment for the Humanities (atheism fund)– $167.5 million annual savings.

It's a long list. Find the rest at Joan of Argghh's Primordial Slack.

The Democrats Have Lost Their Collective Mind

The Borg are completely nuts. Trouble is, they are half the country.

In the squishy warm hug of fascism the Democratic party, it is comforting and reassuring to learn that we all belong to the government. Get that? Stay with that a moment and let the meaning sink in...I'll wait. Back? Still feel warm and squishy? If you do, it's your brain that is squishy, kittens.

A video shown at the Democratic National Convention proclaims "government is the only thing we all belong to." No wonder the Dem platform, like our president, doesn't mention our rights come from our Creator.

Yes, no wonder.

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee has suggested that when President Obama said "you didn't build that," he was really saying that it doesn't belong to you. That jibes with a statement Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill., made on Chicago's Don & Roma radio show recently.

Schakowsky was asked to define what Democrats meant by paying your fair share and define how much of our income we deserve to keep. "I'll put it this way, you don't deserve to keep all of it. It's not a question of deserving, because what government is, is those things we decide to do together." Government has the right to all your income and will decide what you get to keep.

Taxation is a freedom issue, kittens. If you never thought of it that way...start. Because it's about to get real.

Here's how they feel when you don't want to submit to their great big hug.


Think they're kidding? I don't.

Isn't she adorable? 

So how far does the idea of taxation and confiscation go...for the Democrats? All the way to losses. As in everything. And more.

The young blonde, God love her, at around 0:38 pipes up with the most delightful economic theory of the video. Let's take it all!!! But the ENTIRE VIDEO, kittens, is an extension of Obama's top three most revealing statements (in order of go)

1. When we spread the wealth around, I think it's good for everyone. 
2. At some point, I think you've made enough money. 
3. You didn't build that. 

There you have the Democratic platform in a nutshell. OH! And ABORTION!

Don't like it? They want to kill you.

Big group hug.

Why can't we all just get along?
Because fuck that shit.

Going Out of Business

In California, we're not just GOING out of business, we're DRIVING OUT the business. Through a combination of massive taxes, massive regulation and massive red tape, businesses are fleeing this state in record numbers. But we are assured that we will be left with an environmentally protected paradise once we get rid of all those businesses which are "just in it for the profit."

One of the most curious aspects of liberalism is its almost superstitious fear of business and profit. All you have to do for a good liberal is reassure them that something will never make a profit and they LOVE it. As insane as this sounds, it is, IMHO, due to two fundamental tenets of liberalism:

Democrats blow billions of
tax dollars because they care

1. Profit is greedy and self-serving and just bad. You know, bad like in kicking kittens out in a blizzard bad. So if something can be PROVEN to be completely, entirely, utterly and eternally UNPROFITABLE, they're all in because then it's not selfish. Which leads to the second tenet...
2. Government exists to do all the things that will never make a profit. This is because government is the very expression of humanitarian selflessness to the liberal. In the liberal head, average (well...below average, but I quibble) people are routinely transformed into devoted paragons of virtue and sacrifice just by being voted into office. Actually, this only happens to Democrats who get voted in; Republicans become raping, pillaging monsters spending public money to throw lavish parties in Las Vegas...wait...oh, never mind.

So instead of remaining in the forefront of the aviation and space technology industries, we're getting a TRAIN! Yup. A brand spanking new train. Why? 'Cause that's what the Europeans have, I guess. And it's going to go really fast. Not as fast as a SPACE SHIP..but pretty fast. Okay...not as fast as they TOLD us it would go when they got the idiots in California to approve it...but pretty fast. Okay...not much faster than trains normally go. BUT! It will cost billions and billions more than any train ever! That should count for something. 

Remember the Bridge to Nowhere? That was a Republican...so SHUT UP!

In another brilliant and scathingly pointed video, Bill Whittle contrasts the different visions of liberals in California, with their magic choo-choo train purchased with magic public dollars by magical kind-hearted Democrats, with the vision of a greedy evil private company working with private investment to bring the future to us all - from Texas where Republicans live.

Turn the lights off when you leave. We want to be green. This is California, after all.

Anybody care for some ouzo?

Tomorrow Might Really Suck - UPDATED WITH STRIPPERS!

(Which, I suppose, makes it harder to convince people that tomorrow could suck.)

Peter Schiff is predicting an economic collapse of the markets worse than 2008...and it could happen as early as tomorrow! Isn't THAT special?

"If the Fed ultimately comes through with QE3... it won't strengthen the economy, but it will weaken the dollar," Schiff said, noting that Bernanke's policies will eventually lead to a Greek style debilitating sovereign debt crisis where the dollar plunges and consumer prices and interest rates spike.

"We have a much bigger collapse coming, not just the markets, but of the economy. It's like what you're seeing in Europe right now only worse," Schiff said.

Apparently the debt bomb is about to go off. And its going to hurt. A lot. Sort of like a WMD but without all the noise and dust. At least I won't have to dust again. I hate housework even more than owing $691,000 dollars in government debt, which is the amount each family of four is in the hock for from government promises.

 He goes on to say that things will get truly ugly when we hit our fiscal cliff and have to slash government spending across the board.

"People on entitlements like Social Security and Medicare... they're not going to get the benefits they've been promised. Government workers are going to have to take pay cuts... banks are going to fail... people are going to lose money, not just investors but depositors. The housing market is going to fall again."

So tonight it's some Glenmorangie over ice and AC/DC:



UPDATED!
Commenter, RG, directed me to this awesome video.

"Run up a deficit, ignore the facts! Blame someone else, put up tax."

Besides, you didn't spend that. Someone else did that.

True. Can't argue with that.

"You didn't earn that."

In fact, you got it on the come...and it not only never came, it skeedaddled out of town.


BIG H/T: Moonbattery

Despite Canada Having Only One Road, They Are Now Richer Than We Are

Despite Canada having only one road, they are now richer than we are.

I am sure it has something to do with the fact that they've had socialized medicine longer than we have. 

I wonder if their Prime Minister thinks they built it, or if he tells them they haven't done squat either.  

Terrence and Phillip are no doubt delighted!  

Used To Be A Game Show

Now it's not that much fun.

The $64,000 Question


H/T: Protein Wisdom

If I had a Gun...

...I could make all my dreams come true.

More accurately, since I own several guns and my dreams remain obdurate and frustratingly distant, I should say, "If I was willing to USE my gun, I could make all my dreams come true."

And if I could be assured that no one could defend themselves against my desirous force, I would clean up. Rake it in. Gut the hog. Have it all.

It'd be easy.

I need to get elected for something, somewhere, because this is what government does...and I want in. I'd be stupid not to.

Liberals understand this. They REALLY understand this. It's the sly little secret that they all know; it's the shared glance around the table before the expected display of practiced moral outrage at your suggestion that their policies don't work or create corruption or destroy the very people they were intended to help.

"How DARE you? At least I care!" screams the liberal. Spittle, at this point, is de rigueur; often there is table-pounding, which is a nice touch.

And we are silenced.

Because we actually do care and it is hurtful to be accused of selfish and heartless intentions.

So screw it. I'm going to show just how much I care. I'm getting a gun.

However, as a law-abiding citizen, I can't just go get my OWN gun and start robbing people. I have to understand the game and play by the rules. It's a great game, too. All I have to do is vote Democrat. That's it. Put the gun in government's hand and they'll do the driving stealing for me.

Game over. I win.

And I want all the shiny things! Pay up, bitches. I'm a Democrat now.

Who Knew Romney Could Be Funny?

To be honest, though, when Obama is feeding him material like "The Life of Julia", it's alot easier.

H/T: Ace of Spades HQ

Hey, girl...

 

Paul Ryan: Budget wonk, heartthrob Internet meme

 

 

It all started with a fantasy about noodling for catfish with Paul Ryan.

At her office in Chicago, Emily Zanotti, 30, a conservative political consultant, was reading Monday's New York Times profile of Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan that mentioned his love of hunting catfish with his bare hands.

The image of Paul Ryan "standing half naked in a river"—as she envisioned it—gave Zanotti an idea.

...and then it got weird. 



H/T: Gabriel Malor at Ace of Spades HQ

 

THEY'RE ALL IN ON IT

Both Democrats and Republicans are the problem. Both parties are in up to their necks in corruption. That should come as no surprise. How much corruption might surprise you.



What also is not surprising is that even at corruption the Republicans suck and the Democrats are 1,000's of times better.

Republicans can't figure out how to "take back America" and they can't really figure out how to just take it. The Democrats have taken it and they aren't giving it back.  We're doomed.

I KNOW THE ANSWER

SCREWING THE POOCH

Mark Steyn, in his best Steynian style, gives us the gory details on the ruff and tumble Dog Wars, where one candidate vacationed with his dog and the other ate his.  Guess which one is considered "cool"?

Yes, kittens, it is "cool" to be the Exotic Other. It is NOT cool to be American As Apple Pie.

From the article:

The exploding cigars are revealing not merely of Democratic hypocrisy but of a key difference in worldview between liberals and conservatives. Jeremy Funk and Governor Schweitzer reflexively believe that their dog-eating polygamy-scion is different from the other guy’s dog-transporting polygamy-scion. This is nothing to do with young Barack being six or ten years old and meekly eating whatever was put in front of him. He was 34 years old when he wrote the passage quoted above and ten years older when he recorded the audio edition. And, as both versions make plain, he thinks it’s kinda cool, and he knows that to the average upscale white liberal it has the electric frisson of the exotic other.

[...] 

Axelrod is right. Obama’s appetite for dogs isn’t as critical as his appetite for spending and statism. But it was part of his cool. “Mitt Romney isn’t cool,” declared Brian Montopoli of CBS News this week in a story headlined “Can Mitt Romney Make Boring Sexy”? For economically beleaguered Americans, the more pertinent question is: “Can Barack Obama Make Cool Affordable”? It’s not just that Obama ate the dog, but that he’s screwing the pooch.