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Message: In memory of Jack.
Operation Fast and Fretless
Wednesday morning, federal agents stormed Gibson’s Guitar Manufacturing facility in Nashville.
A new scandal has left red-faced officials of the U.S. Department of Justice scrambling to explain a multi-agency program to put Illegal Guitars in hands of Mexican Drug Lords. After what was described as a wild battle of the bands, the steady barrage of power chords and piercing solo attacks attracted the attention of nearby U.S. Border Patrol agents, who arrived at the scene just as Los Zetas drug gang broke into Led Zeppelin’s ‘Immigrant Song.’ By the time the dust had cleared, U.S. Border Patrol Agent Oscar Jimenez was found in a catatonic state of headbanging. He was later flown to University of Arizona Hospitals, where his condition is listed as seriously rawked.
“Usually these guys are armed with Mexican Strats and Squires, Epiphones, small caliber stuff like that,” said Pedro Ochoa, 36, an eye witness to the sonic melee. “This time they were packing the heavy firepower.” IowaHawk has more on this breaking story.
Tony Blair’s Britain
Where the foxes caper unmolested, the government packs your school lunch and there used to be an England;
In 2010, a quarter of births were to mothers born outside the UK, according to the ONS…
If a quarter of all babies born in England and Wales are to foreign mothers, then we’re experiencing the biggest change in our demographic identity since the Anglo-Saxon invasions of the fifth century. Future historians will regard this as the major development in early 21st-century British history…
Y2Kyoto: Twinkle, Twinkle, Little…
The Tolerant Left
Christie Blatchford shares a sampling of the hate mail she received from Canadian Leftists. Proof positive of how incredibly impolite, uncivil, un-Progressive, unruly, ill-mannered, and absolutely un-Canadian the Left in our country truly are. Remember that the next time a Leftist talks about “Canadian values”, they have absolutely NO IDEA of what that term means!
Here are some interesting comments on Blatchford’s piece:
With regard to the reaction to Ms.Blatchford’s recent columns, ’twas ever thus that people of limited intellect find that their only recourse, when faced with opinions which run counter to their own ill-formed ideas, is to scorn, ridicule, and rudeness. The tendency becomes more noticeable when people are forced to face uncomfortable truths about themselves or about causes which they espouse. As T.S. Eliot so wisely said “Humankind cannot bear very much reality”. A frightening prospect is that these very people who resort to crude and unacceptable language are part of the body politic which elects the leaders of our country. Perhaps this is part of the reason for Plato’s dislike of democracy. — Giles Sidney
The ever tolerant lefties are simply expressing themselves. How dare you have a contrary opinion to theirs. I’m sick and tired of having my opinions derided by some merely because I support Stephen Harper and the Conservative Party, or right of centre politics. Thanks god there are good folks like you, Christie, who are still able to express what many of us feel. — Flagstik
The right is not chock-a-block with publicly funded, full-time activists. The original Blatch column amply demonstrated the lefties lemming-like tendency to swarm and choke out dissent. Self-righteous, too. A badly needed eye-opener for ‘moderates’ who question the need to de-fund the professional cry-babies. — Rhino Party Whip
Thank you Christie for having the courage to take on the venomous self appointed bullies of political correctness. That group has had an aggresive atitude toward anyone stepping outside their own designated rigid boundaries of correctness. They have been emboldened by a meek and permissive society. Their smug misplaced pride in their cowardly willingness to berate others is only limited to verbal abuse by circumstance. If they could get away with it they would become one of the many violent mobs one sees using some imagined slight to express violence and outrage. Boorish behaviour at best. Most are violent cowards. — Flyoften
Kate McMillan has a recurring theme, “The Tolerant Left.” These same outraged hippies smugly assure themselves of their civility even as they express shock at so-called wild-eyed right wing zealots. — Rick B
It’s Gas, Gas, Gas!
When refined in the US. Bugger the beetles:
The Politics of a Pipeline
State takes one step forward, but the greens are furious.
…
That was in April 2010. But the EPA cried foul, and State went back to work. Sixteen months later, State has now produced its latest impact statement. Volume One alone runs to more than 500 pages, taking in such considerations as “direct impacts to beetles”…
Alas, the saga is far from over…
Your guess is as good as Ms. Kidder’s about where Mr. Obama comes down—and it’s a pity that the decision will have at least as much to do with his re-election calculations as it does with U.S. energy security and job creation. But as a case study in how political indecision and bureaucratic delay contribute to the sickly economy we have today, the Keystone XL drama has few equals.
Hope for the Future
BBC Business reporter Peter Day has published a new podcast that provides an historical perspective on recessions/depressions, with a particular focus on the one the world is currently going through. Hopefully you’ll find it inspiring and realize that there is light on the horizon … especially if the economy-killer, Obama, is fired next year.
Update: Or you can just laugh your way into oblivion! (Better than crying) – h/t LC Bennett
Brilliant Insight from a Wisconsin Resident
In response to this posting, SDA commenter Amy P. provided some first hand knowledge of what has been going on in her state. Here’s a slightly edited version of her thoughts:
I live in Wisconsin and I have watched this insanity unfold for months now. All because the Governor wanted public employees to pay a little more for their retirement (which they paid NOTHING for) and health insurance (which they paid little for). At the end of the day, public employees still have some of THE BEST (and Obamacare exempt!) health insurance in the U.S. and GUARANTEED retirement for the rest of their lives (that can be transferred to a living spouse after the employee dies!)
For months, we’ve dealt with fleebagging [sic] Democrats who spent weeks hiding in Illinois like cockroaches exposed to light. We’ve had drum circles, vuvuzelas, and dirty protestors vandalizing our beautiful Capitol building while disrupting the work of government AND threatening to kill our duly and freely elected Republican governor and representatives.
The governor has a bad of merry left-wing psychopaths stalking him wherever he goes. Madison is officially a no-go zone for conservatives unless you travel in large groups because the liberals will get in your face (just as Obama commanded them to do!) and harass you for daring not to be as incredibly stupid as they are.
[Lefties can] blather all [they] want about one lame report *possibly* (and remotely so) connected to the TEA Party. Those of us paying attention know the violence and the threats and the vandalism come from the Left. Those of us paying attention also know the Left loves projection: they accuse us of being what they really are.
People are waking up to it. For all their public temper tantrums, for all the out-of-state union agitators they sent in, for the $30 MILLION they spent on recall elections…the Left in Wisconsin has won exactly NOTHING.
They didn’t get a majority in the Senate, so the Republicans still run Wisconsin Government. They lost the Supreme Court election in April, and a weak attempt to get the conservative who won thrown off the court for “choking” a fellow justice has been proven to be a lie. The recall movement against Governor Walker is losing steam and — while probably will be attempted — will ultimately fail.
On top of it all, Wisconsin’s government has set our economy on a path to recover at a far better and stronger pace than the nation. So I predict Scott Walker will go on to even bigger and brighter things.
P.S. For those not aware, one of the most regular on-the-scene “reporters” of what’s going on in Wisconsin is Law Professor Ann Althouse. You can read her via her blog.
Update: Nationally syndicated columnist George Will shares his thoughts about the Left’s losing fight in Wisconsin and why it very much has national implications. Be sure to read the very last line!
The Tolerant Left
In Wisconsin, it looks like devout Leftists will stop at nothing when it comes to their “crusade” against Governor Scott Walker. NRO’s Michael Walsh shares his thoughts.
Remember though folks, it’s all “for the children”!
P.S. Perhaps the BCTF is taking strategy notes themselves?!
Go ahead, medieval thugs…
Angry villagers stoned to death a local Taliban commander and his bodyguard in southern Afghanistan Sunday after the militants killed a 60-year-old man accused of aiding the government, Afghan officials said.
It was a rare reversal of brutality aimed at the Taliban and, some Afghan officials believe, suggests a growing sense of security in an area where the insurgency has lost ground to NATO forces in the last two years. The stoning happened in the Nawa District of Helmand Province, a verdant agricultural area along the Helmand River Valley, now considered one of the safest places in the volatile south as a result of a heavy influx of American troops and aid dollars.
“People won’t tolerate the Taliban’s barbaric actions anymore,” said Dawoud Ahmadi, a spokesman for the governor of Helmand Province. “They will stand against them whenever they are harmed.”
Reader Tips
Time for a little Friday night Texas Swing music: from a 1946 recording, here are Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys performing a tune about a big kid with a healthy appetite called Roly Poly. Gnaws through a biscuit in no time flat, he does.
The comments are open, as always, for your Reader Tips.
3 Simple Rules for Wannabe Pundits
Andrew Klavan offers some suggestions for those who want to be taken seriously as pundits:
Y2Kyoto: State Of Anorexia Envirosa
They shall not sleep until we’re shivering silently in the dark.
What Exactly Does “Living in Poverty” Mean?
Probably not what our friends in the Poverty Industry have lead you to believe:
HST defeated in BC!
“I’m obviously as a finance minister disappointed by the results but not altogether surprised,” said Falcon in a press conference in Victoria.
Laytonology
What a Sun TV man is posting at his personal blog:
Friday, August 26
Details on the music, readings, and eulogies for Jack Layton’s funeral
by DavidAkin on Fri 26 Aug 2011 01:41 PM EDT
Eulogies from Stephen Lewis, Karl Belanger, and Mike and Sarah Layton; music from Richard Underhill, Lorrane Segato, and Steven Page and other details of Jack Layton’s funeral.
more »
The Bells of Parliament Hill ring out for Jack Layton
by DavidAkin on Thu 25 Aug 2011 11:09 AM EDT
This just in, the music programme today on Parliament Hill as Jack Layton final few hours lying in state in the foyer of the House of Commons:
Today Dr. Andrea McCrady, Dominion Carillonneur, will be playing the following program to commemorate the late Honourable Jack Layton, Leader of the Official Opposition.
more »
…
Might Mr Akin be being ironic?
Update: The conclusion of a piece byKevin Libin at the National Post’s “Full Comment”:
The crass exploitation of Jack Layton’s death
…
When columnists in this newspaper dared to crash the public shiva for Layton with controversial critiques of his deathbed letter or plans for his state funeral, they were vehemently attacked as insensitive and disrespectful to the dead. But there’s a point where publicly advertising your sympathy while calculatedly drawing attention to yourself looks awfully insensitive and disrespectful, too. Imagine if a company like Trek bicycles marked Layton’s passing by issuing press releases expressing grief, while advertising how much he enjoyed pedaling their durable, light, fast, and fun-to-ride two-wheelers. Or if Sleeman offered a public consolation while asking us to take comfort in the fact that his living years were made that much sweeter by the extra body and clean finish of their Silver Creek Lager. Even if there was some truth to the claims, we’d have no trouble recognizing them as crass exploitation of the man’s death for promotional purposes. When activists and non-profits spike their eulogies with commercials for their pet causes, the tactlessness may be slightly subtler. But it’s there, just the same.
Upperdate: Even one of the Ottawa Citizen’s house progressives, Janice Kennedy, can’t take it no more:
…A great deal has been embarrassingly over the top.
Hordes of sobbing strangers on the street, a questionable state funeral (with full television coverage), Imagine pealing out from the bells of the Peace Tower – all this reflects little but a collective popcultural desire to bathe in the waters of emotional excess.
To defend, as some experts have, this mass outbreak of recreational grief as appropriate because the public “knew” Jack is charitable, but awkward. Unless you know the deceased as family member, colleague or friend, you simply don’t know him on a level personal enough to permit full-bore, teardrenched grieving. “The nation’s grief,” as media call it, is manufactured…
Not only does the post-mortem hyperbole do nothing to honour Layton’s name or memory, it cheapens it, turning it into something so grotesquely untrue it becomes laughable…
Tee hee.
Uppestdate: Mr Akin keeps crankin’ em out:
NDP organize “celebrate Layton’s life” events across Canada
by DavidAkin on Fri 26 Aug 2011…
Sun News Network will have live coverage of Jack Layton’s state funeral from Toronto beginning at 1400 ET Saturday. But if you can’t make to Toronto (or to your TV set), the NDP have posted a list of places where well wishers and supporters will be gathering across the country.
“This Saturday, in communities across the country, people are coming together to watch Jack Layton’s Celebration of Life, live from Toronto. From St. John’s to Victoria and from Terrebonne to Courtenay, these large and small communities will have the opportunity to celebrate the life and honour the work of the popular New Democrat leader. Here is a list of events we have heard are taking place across Canada tomorrow…”
Beyond Uppestdate: Publius summarizes:
The Layton Lamentations
The Cult of Jack Grows and Grows!
Scenes from the mourning:
Christie Blatchford fails to genuflect to an idol of the age…
All this for an innocuous piece on Jack! Do recall the Leftist vitriol that flowed at the death of John Paul II. I doubt the writers of those slander pieces received a fraction of the hate directed at Ms Blatchford. Then again JP II was only a Pope…
There we have it. Dippers, Canada’s reality impaired community.
Scratch A Director Of Equity, Diversity And Human Rights
Let’s Install A Plaque At 787 Dundas St W To Remember Jack Layton
The system set up by the New Democratic Party to honour former leader Jack Layton’s wish for donations for the fledgling Broadbent Institute will provide donors with much higher tax deductions than they would get if they were to contribute directly to the institute, iPolitics has learned.
By flowing the donations through the party, most donors will get tax deductions several times higher than they would have gotten if they were to donate directly to a non-profit corporation or a charity.
For example, a $400 donation to the Broadbent Institute through the NDP would net the donor a $300 tax credit. However, the same amount donated directly to a charity would provide a tax credit or only $119 to $176, depending on the province.
As of Thursday morning, $125,000 had been donated to the NDP, earmarked for the Broadbent Institute.
Hey – it’s not unethical unless Elections Coalition says it’s unethical.
(Via BC Blue)
Update! Diane Benson, spokeswoman for Elections Canada, says Section 405.21 of the Act prohibits a political party from soliciting or accepting a contribution if it has told the contributor that the money would be transferred to a body other than the party, a candidate, a leadership contestant or electoral district association.
It Was The Best Of Gas, It Was The Worst Of Gas
Now is the time at SDA when we juxtapose!
United Press International, Aug.24th – USGS ups Marcellus Shale reserve estimate
New York Times, Aug.25th – Geologists Sharply Cut Estimate of Shale Gas
h/t Don B. who asks “Are the reserves up to 84 trillion or down to 84 trillion? It depends on whether or not you hate fossil fuels.”
The Sound Of Settled Science
CERN’s 8,000 scientists may not be able to find the hypothetical Higgs boson, but they have made an important contribution to climate physics, prompting climate models to be revised.
The first results from the lab’s CLOUD (“Cosmics Leaving OUtdoor Droplets”) experiment published in Nature today confirm that cosmic rays spur the formation of clouds through ion-induced nucleation. Current thinking posits that half of the Earth’s clouds are formed through nucleation. The paper is entitled Role of sulphuric acid, ammonia and galactic cosmic rays in atmospheric aerosol nucleation.
This has significant implications for climate science because water vapour and clouds play a large role in determining global temperatures. Tiny changes in overall cloud cover can result in relatively large temperature changes.
Unsurprisingly, it’s a politically sensitive topic, as it provides support for a “heliocentric” rather than “anthropogenic” approach to climate change: the sun plays a large role in modulating the quantity of cosmic rays reaching the upper atmosphere of the Earth.