Breakfast Scramble (Thursday)

Welcome to December, from 13WHAM:

Rochester, N.Y.— The first day of the December brought some more holiday-like weather as the Rochester area saw the first major snow accumulation of the winter season. Early Wednesday morning rain caused several car accidents and traffic tie-ups. As of the afternoon, conditions worsened with reports of slushy roads and poor visibility.

My power, along with circa three thousand others, was off for about four hours.    And think, winter is still three weeks away.

Obama to America, get a  horse, from Juliet Eilperin, Washington Post:

Obama administration officials will announce Wednesday afternoon they will not allow offshore oil drilling in the eastern Gulf of Mexico or off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts as part of the next five-year drilling plan, according to sources briefed on the plan, reversing two key policy changes President Obama announced in late March.

Maybe in Barack Obama cocaine induced stupor, he imagines a world that doesn’t need petroenergy.    Meanwhile in my portion of the real world, Rochester, NY,. gasoline is averaging three dollars ten a gallon.

Dirty Harry Reid can’t read, from Roll Call:

A food safety bill that has burned up precious days of the Senate’s lame-duck session appears headed back to the chamber because Democrats violated a constitutional provision requiring that tax provisions originate in the House.

By pre-empting the House’s tax-writing authority, Senate Democrats appear to have touched off a power struggle with members of their own party in the House.  The Senate passed the bill Tuesday, sending it to the House, but House Democrats are expected to use a procedure known as “blue slipping” to block the bill, according to House and Senate GOP aides

Hat tip:  Ed Morrissey, Hot Air.

More, Jonathan H. Adler Volokh Conspriacy:

Senate Slip Up Could Doom Food Safety Bill

The Hill reports that the Senate’s failure to follow constitutionally prescribed procedures could doom the food safety bill.  The bill includes fee provisions that constitute taxes and the Constitution requires that all tax bills originate in the House of Representatives, and it looks unlikely that House Dems will let the slip pass.  Based on what Walter Olson has written about the bill, this could be a good thing

Given the democrats are placing higher priority in the institution prerogatives of the House, than actually passing the bill, I suspect that the bill in not nearly as important to food safety as the democrats were trying to get us to believe.

Ladies Professional Golf Association to allow (some) men to play, from giannascatchell, Chicago Now:

Bye Bye Birdie … LPGA allows Transgendered Women on Tour

Golf has not been a sport that aroused much controversy. Perhaps the biggest shock came when a member opted not to wear a collared polo and a pair of wrinkled chinos. But that all changed a little over one year when the Tiger Woods scandal rocked the golf world. Did Tiger’s shenanigans open up the floodgates of liberalism? Recently the Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA) announced that the “women at birth” clause has been dropped for their members. What does this mean? It means that transgendered women are now able to play golf on the tour.

The LPGA has gone dickist.   If a person is not a woman at birth, he can never become one.If the ladies will allow men without dicks to play golf, what rational, aside from blatant dickism to the ladies have to prohibit men with dicks from joining the ladies’ tour?    After all,  Lana Lawless is no more a women than I am  and I have won the same number of tournaments in the last year as Tiger Woods.    Heck ladies, let Tiger join your tour.    He really digs chicks and me finally might be able to win a tournament.

Lastly, I almost as good playing gulf as I am spelling it.

Algore’s mistake, Debra Saunders, RCP:

You Can Stop Paying for Al Gore’s Mistake

In Greece earlier this month, Al Gore made a startling admission: “First-generation ethanol, I think, was a mistake.” Unfortunately, Americans have Gore to thank for ethanol subsidies. In 1994, then-Vice President Gore ended a 50-50 tie in the Senate by voting in favor of an ethanol tax credit that added almost $5 billion to the federal deficit last year. And that number doesn’t factor the many ways in which corn-based ethanol mandates drive up the price of food and livestock feed.

Ethanol was, and is, nothing more than a welfare program for some farmers, paid for by taxpayers and anybody who has to buy food

Nice ride if you can get it:

DETROIT (WJBK) – The son of Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., says items were stolen out of the government vehicle he was driving last Wednesday in downtown Detroit, FOX 2’s Simon Shaykhet reports.

John Conyers III, 20, told police two Apple MacBooks, valued at $1,100 apiece, and more than $27,000 worth of concert tickets to the Fillmore were stolen out of a burgundy 2010 Cadillac Escalade registered to the 14th Congressional District.

What is our government doing buying Cadillac Escalades in the first place, and why is the son of congreescritter using government transportation.   Concert tickets do not sound like official use to me.   Does it sound like official use to you?

JonesToTheGrindstone.com

By Karen Leigh Jones

I posted as my Facebook status, “Bill Clinton, John Edwards, New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer, New Jersey Gov. John McGreevey: Anybody want those guys?”

This caused a downpour of comments from my Facebook friends. We took jabs at all the extramarital affairs and labeled the men as “indiscreet,” “not trustworthy,” and “sloppy.” Politicians, like celebrities, have had their marital problems picked over and strewn about for public consumption. The media has covered their personal calamities for weeks, months — years. There has been criticism that the media should not be wasting their time on personal concerns of public servants; it’s an invasion of privacy.

Nevertheless, when a scandal breaks, it permeates households across America and, too, becomes Facebook fodder. I think it can have no more value than being dirty laundry for us to poke around in, but it can also offer realistic insight in to how people genuinely behave, famous or not.

Those who think that the media should handle the politicians’ personal lives with kid gloves suggest that it isn’t newsworthy. If President Barack Obama, they could argue, had fifty mistresses, it would still have no significant consequence for the public or the job of leading America. This argument says that the only person who should care about his hypothetical mistresses would be his wife, Michelle.

Those who prefer that the personal, negative antics of public figures should remain private worry that the “real news” is somehow being neglected and that the only thing that the media is concerned about is how much profit will come in from running the salacious stories.

With as many options available for a news source, logic seems to support that somewhere out there, the real news is still being reported. First, take into consideration the number of the American broadcasted news outlets, like ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox News, CNN, and all the talk and news radio options. Second, as far as American print news goes, just to name a few, there is The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and USA Today. And third, the Internet also provides news from the broadcasted channels, the printed news, news aggregators, like Google.com, and, yes, even blogs. As many choices as are available to receive the “real news,” a hard-news-seeker can find his fix.

Tonia Bennett and Alexander Adams, posted in the Spring 2003 edition of the Bowling Green State University website, BGSU.com, an article, “Sex Sells…No, really,” The article stated, “Hypothetically speaking, the more promise of sex appeal a product has, the better it will sell. This is fact, as the numbers prove that products that utilize sexual imagery sell substantially better than comparable products.” In this free market, news is a product that must sell in order to survive. Throwing sex stories in the mix is good for business.

Furthermore, politicians’ marital foibles can have significance for the public and are newsworthy. The website, WomanSavers.com, which provides a data base for women to “Research & Rate [men]  B4U Date,” offers that, “Controlled cheating surveys are scarce … 22 percent of men and 14 percent of women admitted to having sexual relations outside their marriage.” Assumingly, more people cheat on their spouses than are willing to admit it. So, it is not impossible to believe that those percentages are much higher in reality.

Seeing that a politician is not necessarily any better than the non-famous-cheating-suburban-husband-next-door may offer a “reality check” to those who believe that famous people are somehow better at following society’s rules. Therefore, former President Clinton can more accurately be viewed as, well, a former president, and not as a trophy husband or any other kind of moral superhero.

People are held to a higher standard when job seeking, applying for special programs, or being seen as a media darling. With things like social networking sites and blogs, regular people are showing off their lives, and being publicly scrutinized, too.

For example, Western Michigan University’s website, WesternHerald.com, posted an editorial on March 24, 2009, stating that with a having a Facebook account, “For those graduating and moving on into the world, it may be a big red ‘A’ stamped on their forehead … that big job in the sky will have their HR people trying to find an online profile to get a little more insight into the applicant pool. That pic of you taking down a beer bong will probably not show well.”

Because of that, many people are choosing to “sanitize” their social accounts to make it appear as though they never drink or ever have sexual thoughts. It is absurd to think people should perhaps only post pictures of themselves in church, at the mosque, or working in the homeless shelter’s soup kitchen.

Publishing or broadcasting the private sexual indiscretions or other examples of politicians’ poor judgments can be newsworthy if it serves the public in some way. Regular people make bad decisions and sin, as do those in the limelight.

The news media and the self-editing social networking junkies and bloggers, together, display how the “world goes ’round.” Perhaps with all this insider knowledge, one day we can all stop hiding from ourselves.

Obama the bully, from Kyle Smith, New York Post:

One staffer was conspicuously overweight. The president, in an incident that Wolffe believes proves how caring the man is, took it upon himself to present the aide with a salad for lunch — “then listened to him protest that he could take care of his own health. ‘I love you, man,’ Obama said. ‘I want you to look after yourself. Eat the salad.’ “

How does Barack Obama come off telling anybody how to eat?    If  Obama had any balls, he would have the Fat Lady of the United State, his wife, having to dine on salad rather then his hapless staffer.

Hat tip:  Pundit & Pundette.

Bah Humbug, school bans Christmas colors, from Nice Deb:

It’s that Time Of Year, Again: School Bans Christmas Colors

To all you in your face atheists out there:   Merry Christmas.

Good Intentions, by Jay Ambrose, Orange County Register:

Good intentions will get you if you don’t watch out. That’s true of the invasion of the body scanners, of minimum-wage laws, of some welfare programs and – please don’t forget it – a supposedly altruistic push by federal agencies and politicians to put low-income families in their own homes.

Hmnn,  who was who said:   See road to Hell, paving materials?

Bad intentions,  Blue Dog blames Mrs. Pelosi for taking democrats for ride off the cliff, by Halimah Abdullah,  McClatchy Newspapers:

Over at OTB, James Joyner looks at the current wave of reports surrounding Tom Delay:

Tom DeLay, the poster boy for everything that was wrong with the last Republican majority in the House, has been found guilty of money laundering.

NYT (“Ex-House Leader DeLay Found Guilty in Texas Case“):

Tom DeLay, one of the most powerful and divisive Republican lawmakers ever to come out of Texas, was convicted Wednesday of money-laundering charges in a state trial, five years after his indictment here forced him to resign as majority leader in the House of Representatives.

After 19 hours of deliberation, a jury of six men and six women decided that Mr. DeLay was guilty of conspiring with two associates in 2002 to circumvent a state law against corporate contributions to political campaigns. He was convicted of one charge of money laundering and one charge of conspiracy to commit money laundering.

As the verdict was read, Mr. DeLay, 63, sat stone-faced at the defense table. Then he rose, turned, smiled and hugged his wife and then his weeping daughter in the first row of spectators. He faces between 5 and 99 years in prison, though the judge may choose probation.

A few minutes later, Mr. DeLay said outside the courtroom that he would appeal the decision. He called the prosecution a political vendetta by Democrats in the local district attorney’s office, and revenge for his role in orchestrating the 2003 redrawing of Congressional districts to elect more Republicans.

WaPo (“DeLay convicted of money-laundering charges in campaign finance scheme“):

A jury in Austin found DeLay guilty of money laundering and conspiracy to commit money laundering. Punishment for the first ranges from five years to life in prison, but the former congressman from the Houston suburb of Sugar Land could receive probation.

DeLay will remain free until he is sentenced on Dec. 20.

“This case is a message from the people of the state of Texas that they want – and expect – honesty and ethics in their public officials,” said Travis County District Attorney Rosemary Lehmberg. “All people have to abide by the law.”

Reporters in the courtroom described DeLay as stunned by the verdict, which came after 19 hours of deliberation.

“This is an abuse of power,” the former congressman said outside the courtroom. “It’s a miscarriage of justice, and I still maintain that I am innocent. The criminalization of politics undermines our very system, and I am very disappointed in the outcome.”

I have little doubt that DeLay stretched every law and rule he could to the breaking point and have long considered him a rather sleazy fellow. But violations of Federal campaign finance legislation are civil matters, punishable by fine, not crimes.   So, how did they turn this into a local money laundering cause?   NYT:

During the three-week trial, the prosecution presented more than 30 witnesses in an effort to prove that Mr. DeLay conspired to circumvent the state law. Since 1903, Texas has prohibited corporations from giving money to candidates directly or indirectly.

Mr. DeLay was initially charged with breaking campaign finance law.  But prosecutors later switched strategies because it was impossible under the law at the time to accuse someone of conspiring to break campaign finance rules, prosecutors said.

Instead, prosecutors used a novel legal theory never before tried in Texas: They argued that Mr. DeLay and two of his political operatives — John Colyandro and Jim Ellis — had violated the criminal money-laundering law.  They were charged with conspiring to funnel $190,000 in corporate donations to state candidates through the Republican National Committee.

The main facts of the case were never in dispute.  In mid-September 2002, as the election heated up, Mr. DeLay’s state political action committee, Texans for a Republican Majority, gave a check for $190,000 to the Republican National Committee. The money had been donated earlier in the year by various corporate lobbyists seeking to influence Mr.  DeLay, several witnesses said.  On Sept. 13, the check was delivered to the R.N.C. by Mr. Ellis, who was Mr. DeLay’s top political operative in Washington and headed his federal political action committee.

At the same meeting, Mr. Ellis also gave the Republican director of political operations, Terry Nelson, a list of state candidates and an amount to be sent to each. Mr. Nelson testified that Mr. Ellis had told him the request for the swap had come from Mr. DeLay.

In early October, donations were sent from a separate account filled with individual donations to seven Republican candidates in Texas. Six of them won. Republicans took control of the Legislature for the first time in modern history and in 2003 pushed through a redistricting plan, orchestrated by Mr. DeLay, that sent more Texas Republicans to Congress in 2004 and helped him consolidate power.

I’m dubious, indeed, of “novel” applications of state laws to convict people for something other than what the statute was intended to punish.  Rather clearly, “laundering” of legally obtained money is not supposed to be a crime.  The statute is specifically aimed at criminal enterprises who earn money illegally.

Quite so. And James continues, importantly,

Recall that, in August, the Justice Department ended a 6-year probe of DeLay without filing charges.

He goes on in the comments:

I understand what the technical charge is. And I agree that DeLay, in this instance in particular and with the whole K Street Project in general, was a sleazebag who, at very least, subverted the rules of fair play.

While that’s as may be,Perhaps someone can explain to us all how that’s any different from what the Democrats have been doing upwards of 50 years, now?   Barring an answer for that, I must assume that this extra measure of prosecution is politically motivated.

Let’s recall, please, the lay of the land here, then, and now.

Boortz said at the time this anti-Delay BS started:

As Boortz pointed out:

Let’s be clear about this: Tom DeLay has done nothing illegal, and he has done nothing that other members of congress, both Democrat and Republican, don’t do regularly.  Democratic liberals and the leftist media decided to make DeLay a target for destruction, and they have been relentless in their efforts.

So, why are the left going after DeLay this far down the years? Let’s recall what Tony Blankley said back when the original charges were laid against DeLay:

Tony Blankley on Tom Delay:

“I understand why the Democrats are going after Tom DeLay. Snakes gotta slither, mosquitoes gotta bite, hyenas gotta laugh, and Democrats without a blooming idea in their heads gotta go negative. ”

…

Tom DeLay has been the most effective majority whip in living memory, never having lost a vote. He has engineered passage of every vital piece of Bush legislation as majority leader (sometimes with as little as a single hard-sought vote difference). By his tough work in Texas he has almost assured Republican control of the House for at least another decade. (I say “almost,” because a party of nitwits and cowards are capable of throwing away anything.)

Tony takes it a step farther, though.

If a party can be stampeded — by phony charges and a run of shoddy stories in whorish newspapers — into dumping their most effective congressional leader, I wouldn’t give two cents for their near term future. A party that would voluntarily cut off its own testicles and FedEx them to their opponent as a trophy is not likely to manifest any regenerative powers. That’s the thing about losing those organs.

And that’s really what the Democrats are after, here.

Well…. That, and some diversion away from  the cases of Charlie Rangel, William Jefferson, and Maxine Waters.

There is a certain level of irony, here;  Consider that the mechanisms used to bring these criminal charges against DeLay, were supposedly a big worry in the case of Charlie Rangel  and William Jefferson.  I suppose, that were this really an ethics issue, and were Democrats in general motivated by a strong sense of the ethical,  (Like that’s ever going to happen) the question of Charlie Rangel, William Jefferson, and Maxine Waters, and others, for that matter would have been dealt with a long time ago, instead of waiting until they were forced to deal with it by an election wherein the party opposite would have taken action.

Let’s not forget, also, the degree to which George Soros is involved with this attack on Delay…. An involvement which started at day one.

The bottom line here, is that this is not, repeat, not, about ethics.  This is about politics.

Religion of Peace, Tim Fought and Nedra Pickler, Associated Press:

PORTLAND, Ore. – A Somali-born teenager plotted “a spectacular show” of terrorism for months, saying he didn’t mind that children would die if he bombed a crowded Christmas tree-lighting ceremony, according to a law-enforcement official and court documents.

Give an infidel sanctuary, and instead of thanks, he tries to kill you.  Send all the Somali back.

Sure Barack, from Elise Viebeck, Hill:

Praying and reading the Bible are part of his everyday life, President Obama said in a wide-ranging interview broadcast Friday.

Speaking with Barbara Walters, Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama also described how they involve their daughters in daily prayer.

“Michelle and I have not only benefited from our prayer life, but I think the girls have too,” the president told Walters. “We say grace before we eat dinner every night. We take turns.”

“[I]n the end, we always say we hope we live long and strong,” the first lady said.

Obama will never be able to get to Heaven by lying.    I’d say if the Obama are praying to live long, they praying to somehow avoid Obama Care death panels.  What say you?

Roland S. Martin lauds FLOTUS, Martin attacks Sarah Palin for questioning the Fat Lady of the United States’, a/k/a Michelle Obama anti obesity jihad:

(CNN) — It’s clear that we can’t go 24 hours without Sarah Palin saying something so stupid that it defies logic, but leave it to the Kim Kardashian of politics to find something wrong with first lady Michelle Obama’s effort to curb obesity in America’s kids.

In a radio interview on Wednesday with conservative talker Laura Ingraham, Palin took dead aim at the first lady’s “Let’s Move” initiative, which is all about getting children active and involved in exercise and healthy eating.

In the wacky world of Wasilla’s finest, Palin tries to cast the effort to fight obesity as part of Michelle Obama’s “different worldview.”

Between Sarah Palin and Michelle Obama, only one is fat.  Only one has fat children.   Fat Lady obama simply has no business tellimg anybody, other than her husband and her two children how to east.   Fat people was simply not in the position to deam themselves as if they were some kind of authority on diet.  Simply put, if Michelle Obama knew anything about diet, she would not be fat and she would not have fat children.   It time of Mrs Obama to shut up

Upon further review, Martin looks more than a little rolly himself.   Time for Martin to start a diet and excercise program, and shut up himself as well.

Dumbo Care meets reality, and loses. Bruce McQuain explains classic economics to the Obamatards, from Questions and Observations:

For those slow on the uptake – when limited resources meet unlimited need, rationing is going to take place regardless of whether one wants it or likes it.  Rationing can take effect in many ways.  Two of the most common are by price and by availability (or a combination of both).

Declaring everyone is “entitled” to health care doesn’t make it more affordable or available.  Because its availability doesn’t increase automatically on such declarations.  And that was the fly in the ObamaCare promise from the very beginning.   Then add in the absurd claim that you can get more for less and you’re where we are now with doctors and Medicare patients.

In a free society, citizens will not voluntarily makes contracts which will cost them more than they receive.  If physicians are citizens and unlike the Obamatards not stupid.

Miss Andrea Sullivan, on character, in reference to Sarah Palin’s smackdown of Dim Won’s, b/k/a Barack Obama, gaffe, via Weasel Zippers:

This may be a smart-ass retort; it may be useful innoculation against a potentially damaging gaffe; it may even be a well-researched blog-post, but what it isn’t is anything approaching the kind of character we expect in a president.  A simple respect for the office she seeks would not reflect itself in these increasingly callow, sarcastic, cheap jibes at a sitting president. But sadly, like so many now purporting to represent conservatism, there is, behind the faux awe before the constitution, a contempt for the restraint and dignity a polity’s institutions require from its leaders.

I suggest that Miss Sullivan knows about as much about character as the Fat Lady of the United States knows about diet and exercise, to wit squat.    As a private citizen, Mrs. Palin has no need to shows more respect towards the Office of the President,  than the current occupant, Dumbo, shows towards the office.     You can not show respect to the Office of the President by constant insults of your predecessor and forever demeaning the very country you purport to represent.

Religion of Peace:

Islambad, Pakistan (CNN) — Two prominent Pakistani Muslim leaders threatened Wednesday to call for nationwide protests if the president pardons a Christian woman sentenced to death for insulting the Muslim prophet Mohammed.

“If the president pardons Asia Bibi, we will raise our voices across the country until he is forced to take his decision back,” nationally known mufti Muneer Ur Rehman said.

Sticks and stones may break my bones, but mere words will never hurt me.

Fat Lady of United State to allow the peasants to eat pie, from Jim Hoft, Gateway Pundit:

Michelle Obama said it’s fine to eat what you want on Thanksgiving.

“Don’t worry about how much you eat. Just enjoy it,” she said. “This is the time. Have pie.”

I make it a point never to take diet advice from fat slobs, such as Michelle Obama.   Do you?

Alas Poor Tiger, or long time no win, from Steve DiMeglio, USA  Today:

A year removed from running his SUV over a fire hydrant and into a tree, an accident that sparked a deluge of revelations of serial infidelity that shattered his impeccable image and eventually cost him his marriage, millions of dollars in endorsements and his No. 1 world ranking in golf, Woods has a new Twitter account, a new Facebook page, a new swing coach, a new house and a new outlook as he eagerly awaits the new year.

As Woods continues to rebuild his life and swing, he says he wants to reconnect with fans and remains driven to break Jack Nicklaus‘ record of 18 major championships. But can he reclaim his prominence atop the golf world — he hasn’t won in more than a year — and recapture the appeal that made him the gold standard in the world of endorsements?

Woods will never regain is fomer larger than life status.

Janet Napolitano still crazy, after all these years, or dimwit wants to put scanners in bus stops, from Fox News:

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano hinted this week that the body scanners and “enhanced” pat-downs that have caused a ruckus at airports across the country could be coming to a train station, port or subway near you.

Editor’s note:

As this is written, (Edited, really) I’m preparing to go to bed. I have to leave at 3am for Southern PA from my western NY home, to make a 10am delivery.

As such I really don’t have a bunch of time to write a new thought for this thanksgiving day. Fortunately, I have several years worth of writings to lean back on. Here’s a post I put up a couple years ago, on the subject of Thanksgiving, and as usual, it takes a cultural bend….

-1-

Britt Hume a couple nights ago:

A traditional Thanksgiving meal between two elementary schools in Claremont, California, has parents in an uproar over costumes.
The kindergarteners have long celebrated the holiday by dressing up as pilgrims and Native Americans and taking turns visiting the other school to share in a holiday feast, but parents this year are divided over what the costumes represent and whether they should be allowed at all.

Michelle Raheja, whose daughter is a kindergarten student, wrote to her teacher, “It’s demeaning. I’m sure you can appreciate the inappropriateness of asking children to dress up like slaves (and kind slave masters), or Jews (and friendly Nazis) or members of any other racial minority group who has struggled in our nation’s history… There is nothing to be served by dressing up as a racist stereotype.”

The Los Angeles Times reports after a school board meeting last week, officials decided to hold the meal without costumes. That decision angered the parents who supported the original event.
Mother Dena Murphy said of Raheja, “She’s not going to tell us what we can and cannot wear. We’re tired of [district officials] cowing down to people. It’s not right.”

Well, just so. Kids have been dressing up and taking part in Thanksgiving plays, since the Civil war. It’s my view we risk losing ourselves in all this sensitivity. I can’t help but wonder if it isn’t the case that at least some of the noise we hear on days like this, isn’t aimed at exactly that.  I mean, how much more dispiriting a message can we send our kids than our own culture and history isn’t worth a damn? Welcome to government schools.

Ah, yes… Government schools. Always a battleground anymore, over exactly this. The comparisons Raheja draws are incredible on their face, but so too is the overall position being taken.  It does, however have the action of prying us from our American heritage. That always seems the goal of such actions, doesn’t it? And the teachers and administrators seem to be willing participants in such battles… on the side opposite of American values.

Sometime ago I read a quote from an educator who later went on to political life, whose name I can’t recall at the moment. If any of you can remember the quote I would appreciate passing it along in the comments. But paraphrasing, he said the intent of education was to get students to come out different than their parents. While there may be positive aspects involved with this, I have come to regard this as particularly ominous, given that at least part of the task the quote assigns educators, is to alter the culture, by teaching the students values which their parents do not share. You can certainly understand, therefore, why so many consider Catholic and other religious-based schools to run afoul of their vision of what Education is for; As I’ve said these tend to teach the cultural values which have been handed down generation by generation.

As a result of decades of this brand of “education’, we’ve become sensitive to the point of active denial of our own heritage. Our own story isn’t known to our kids… and the bit Hume speaks of, proves that… and it also shows us the narrative that IS being pushed… that the US is the enemy of everyone.

Because of that long standing effort to demoralize the United states…(in every meaning of that phrase)…  perhaps even some of you are unaware of the origins of this day being set aside as a national day of Thanksgiving. Let’s examine the day’s history and historical meaning, shall we?

Let’s start with the fact that Ol’ Ben Franklin wanted to make the Turkey the national bird, thinking the Eagle a bird of Bad moral character, a rank coward.

‘course now, the turkey Ben Franklin knew was brightly plumed, and a rather cunning bird… and not today’s bird, so darned fat he couldn’t fly… such a creature would have never made it in a world of predetors.  So, had Ben had his way, the turkey would be in the endangered species list, and we’d all be eating roast Eagle, with all the trimmings, I suppose.

Seriously, though… some of you wonder who we’re thanking, and for what. A look back will answer these questions, and possibly give you a new perspective on things.

Many of you, I’m sure don’t know that Thomas Jefferson wasn’t interested in a national day of Thanksgiving, apparently being conflicted about who we were to thank. However, some more open minded people prevailed. Like George Washington, for example… who said in part, in his Thanksgiving Day Proclamation;

NOW THEREFORE, I do recommend and affign THURSDAY, the TWENTY-SIXTH DAY of NOVEMBER next, to be devoted by the people of thefe States to the fervice of that great and glorious Being who is the beneficent author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be; that we may then all unite in rendering unto Him our fincere and humble thanksfor His kind care and protection of the people of this country previous to their becoming a nation; for the fignal and manifold mercies and the favorable interpofitions of His providence in the courfe and conclufion of the late war; for the great degree of tranquility, union, and plenty which we have fince enjoyed;- for the peaceable and rational manner in which we have been enable to eftablish Conftitutions of government for our fafety and happinefs, and particularly the national one now lately instituted;- for the civil and religious libertywith which we are bleffed, and the means we have of acquiring and diffufing useful knowledge;- and, in general, for all the great and various favours which He has been pleafed to confer upon us.

In 1863, Lincoln had cause to be thankful, as well.

By the President of the United States of America. A Proclamation.

The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union.

Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle or the ship; the axe has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the wastethat has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consiousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom. No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American People. I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens.

And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.

In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the City of Washington, this Third day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the Unites States the Eighty-eighth.

By the President: Abraham Lincoln

William H. Seward,
Secretary of State

Of course Thanksgiving in it’s current context would be eventually declared unconstitutional, if we allow the courts to run things. the bit that Hume speaks of is exemplary of how that course is run.  And perhaps that’s something we ought to remember today, as well.. and be thankful that they’ve not gotten that kind of power from us, yet. That, I am certainly thankful for. (May they NEVER have such power!) If original intent counts for anything in the realm of the Constitution, and I think it does, these proclamations should end the argument about claims of separation of church and state.. and the push toward the removal of the one we should be thankful to, today.

Johnathan Rothenburg said a few years ago, aptly,

While we can and should have debates within the political arena as to the correct role that religion should play in contemporary American society, that debate should be settled democratically by voters, not capriciously by judges. Liberals have often enjoyed success in the courts when they have failed at the ballot box, such as with broad interpretations of the Establishment Clause, these precedents set by our greatest Presidents demonstrate that America’s cultural underpinnings were never based on atheism.

Quite correct.

Well, that touches on the historical and cultural background.  But there’s a more personal meaning as well. I’m going to tell you to have yourself a good Thanksgiving.  But what do I mean when I say that?

Look, here it is; even with everything going on, today, we have a lot to be thankful for. Myself, for my family, that I have a fairly good job, and so on. Worth celebrating, every one of them.

Please…. Pay attention to those around the table with you this day. Look them in the eye. Let them know.  Give thanks for them while you have them. Consider that no relationship is forever, since we are all mortal.

Put aside what petty differences you have with these special people in your life, for special they are. Alas!, that many of us find out how special they were only after they are gone from us.  I think there’s no pain deeper than that belated understanding. Celebrate those relationships today and celebrate that whatever else happens, you are together, on this day.

Also think about the fact that the small mountain of food on your table, today, is possible because we are still a blessed and semi-free nation. Such feasting is possible only in nations that are free.

So, think about those in uniform serving these United States to ensure we ARE free to the degree we are. If you can’t do something special for them, pray for them, anyway. If you’re not a religious type, think good thoughts about them, karma counts too.  If you are traveling this weekend, through airports or whatever, and you see someone in uniform, thank them for their service. It’ll make their day, trust me. If you see a group of uniforms, obviously traveling together, well…. Billy Beck told us of an experience he had recently…

I happened to spend a few minutes in the atrium of Atlanta’s Hartsfield International Airport. (Oh wait… it’s now “Hartsfield-Race-Grifter-Maynard-Jackson International Airport”. I almost forgot.) Sitting there, I observed a line of troops in desert camo, standing two-abreast in the outlet of a corridor into the atrium space. On a signal, they took up their gear and began to move out, in column. They made their way through the atrium, and the whole place — perhaps three hundred people (it was early) — stood up as one, rendering a thunderous ovation for the whole time that the troops were in sight.

Lamed by the spectacle, I couldn’t move to get out my camera. I wish I had, though. It was terrific.

So, you get into that situation, stand up and bang your hands together. You’ll be amazed how many others join in, and at the smiles of the uniformed. It’s a feeling you won’t soon forget.

Pay heed today to the fact that freedoms unguarded do not abide forever, and that with the kind of business Hume talks about, and what we’ve seen of late, the last year or two, those freedoms may not outlast us, and as with family, many of us find out how special they were only after they are gone from us.

In looking over this post I see I sound a bit more cautionary than I have in years past.  Perhaps it’s advancing age, perhaps it’s the political climate, perhaps it just a better understanding of all this, perhaps it’s a combination of all of them, I don’t know.  But I’ve never held back from you what I was thinking before and I’m not about to start at this late date.

Again, have a good Thanksgiving, today.

Jimmy Carter has the Norks all wrong, former and disgraced President Jimmy Carter wants to appease North Korea for their recent temper tantrum, from the Washington Post:

No one can completely understand the motivations of the North Koreans, but it is entirely possible that their recent revelation of their uranium enrichment centrifuges and Pyongyang’s shelling of a South Korean island Tuesday are designed to remind the world that they deserve respect in negotiations that will shape their future. Ultimately, the choice for the United States may be between diplomatic niceties and avoiding a catastrophic confrontation.

Nobody and no nation deserves respect.  Rather respect has to earned, and all the Norks has shown is that third rate bully who likes to throw temper tantrums.  The way to deal with temper tantrums is not to reward them

Our Thanksgiving sermon, video:

The kid has got talent.  Got into an argument about her today.  I said she had a future in the clergy.  Phil said she has future as an actor.  Then of course preaching and acting have a fair bit in common.

Don’t worry about Sarah. Will I agree with every thing Sarah Palin says?  No.  Then Sarah does worry about every thing Barbara Bush says either, video:

Have a happy Thanksgiving, and don’t over do the football.

Obami* stuck on Green, going green is not the same as going smart.  from the Washington Post:

[Laurence] Anton has been out of work since 2008, when his job as a surveyor vanished with Florida’s once-sizzling housing market. After a futile search, at age 56 he reluctantly returned to school to learn the kind of job skills the Obama administration is wagering will soon fuel an employment boom: solar installation, sustainable landscape design, recycling and green demolition.

Anton said the classes, funded with a $2.9 million federal grant to Ocala’s workforce development organization, have taught him a lot. He’s learned how to apply Ohm’s law, how to solder tiny components on circuit boards and how to disassemble rather than demolish a building.

The only problem is that his new skills have not resulted in a single job offer. Officials who run Ocala’s green jobs training program say the same is true for three-quarters of their first 100 graduates.

(*)  The WaPo might want to bone up on the term Obami.   She will be seeing plenty of it, come One December.

Doing job market research is not exactly rocket science, but Anton flunked.    A trip to your local library can show what jobs employers are seeking.    For example, our founding blogger got trained as Over the Road truck driver and managed find a position.   A quick study of  want ads would reveal a large demand for truck driver.

Now did Anton do any job research before he went green?   It would appear not.   The jobs the Obami are touting simply do not exist, and may well never exist..

WaPo strikes Gold,  Washington Post hire Jennifer Rubin, from John Podhortz,  Commentary:

Jenifer Rubin

For the past three years, Jennifer Rubin has set this blog and this website afire with her breadth of knowledge, her love of the intricacies of politics, her passion for ideas and policy, and her commitment to principle. The living embodiment of the word “indefatigable,” Jen has labored daily from her home in suburban Virginia, writing early in the morning and late at night, on computer and Blackberry, all the while getting her two boys to school and back, and to Hebrew school and back, never missing a news story, never missing an op-ed column, reading everything and digesting everything and commenting on everything. She is a phenomenon, especially considering that for the first two decades of her working life, she was not a writer or a journalist but a lawyer specializing in labor issues who worked for Hollywood studios primarily.

On December 1, Jen will be leaving COMMENTARY, where she has also served as our contributing editor for the past year, to take up blogger’s residence at the Washington Post. It is a brilliant hire

Eric, would you believe we missed her by that much?  Well nether would I.

Obami smart diplomacy,  not so much,  Scott, Powerline links a story of the Obama administration being played for fools:

Peter Schweizer notes this strange report by Dexter Filkins in the New York Times that the supposed Taliban leader with whom we have been negotiating in Afghanistan — the man we thought was Mullah Mansour — was actually an impostor.

Maybe the Obami think the Taliban are democrats, who will all sell out for a price.

TSA stuck on stupid, TSA chief John Pistole, from CNN:

Well, I think the Israeli model, which a number of people have talked about, uses intelligence in a different way, profiling. And then if in terms of a pat-down, if they suspect you of something, you receive a very thorough pat-down there.

That is top-notch security. The question is, do we profile here in the U.S.? No, we don’t. So how then do we use intelligence that informs the decisions and judgments. And given what we saw from last night in terms of this new Web publication that describes in detail how the cargo bombs were done, how the design concealed, and how they are using technology to disguise and defeat the screening mechanisms we have in place, look, it’s a difficult question, Candy.

Hat tip: RS McCaiin

Algore stuck on stupid, or Gore is just a plain whore, from Sharon, Doerbittter Dispatch:

The whole ethanol business was a scam from the get-go. Ethanol contains less energy than gasoline and takes more energy to create (by a lot). Al Gore has come out against ethanol subsidies, but here is the point which reinforces my anti-environmentalist stance: he admits that he was for them in the first place because he wanted to pander to farmers when he was running for office.

And THAT, ladies and gentlemen, is what is wrong with the environmental movement. It’s NOT selfless, it’s NOT scientific, it’s NOT about what is best for the planet. It’s about getting a piece of the pie, about profits, about power, and in extreme cases it’s about pushing an anti-human agenda.

The math, energy used versus energy produced, never made sense.   Algore, now says he knew this all along, but was promting ethanol from corn, rather than say sugar cane, to promote his presidential ambitions.    One suspects that Algore is working on a new energy scam, where has a lerger stake.

Pigford stinks like pig shat,  Government to pay 93,000 reparation to 18,000 black farmers, from Jim Hoft, Gateway Pundit:

More than 92,000 “black farmers” have signed up for reparations from the Obama USDA after the Pigford case was extended this past year. That’s five times the number of blacks who were actually farming during the time period in question and would possibly qualify for the reparations.

Leave to our government to shaft the tax payers by paying reparations to five hundred percent of black farmers.

If these completely arbitrary naked scans and gropings of American citizens by the TSA could actually protect us from terrorists, then perhaps we would be willing to go along with them. But surely it has already occurred to the terrorists — even if it has not occurred to our brilliant president and his beyond-brilliant secretary of homeland security — that all they need to do now is use package bombs instead of people. Right — they did that. And they have also figured out that neither the high-tech scanners nor the sexually molesting pat-downs will detect explodable things put into their little body cavities.

Kyle-Ann Shiver, American Thinker.