Nightly Ramble: Loose Ends

• Sorry, Mark, I got your note just a few hours ago. No, my mind is intact, which in fact is the reason for my (Somewhat) belated response. I apparently have limits as regards how much sheer idiocy I will deal with, after all, which got crossed. I don’t know how many will understand that motivation in this context, but I really don’t much care, either. Mostly, that’s because I’m not convinced I or anyone else can do much for it. They figure they can live in isolation, apparently. The world simply doesn’t work that way.
• Jonah’s new book is number 1 on Amazon. Good going, Jonah.
• BBCT to Glenn, who notes Roger Simon asking if the New Media will destroy Hollywood. I dunno… Hollywood seems to be doing a pretty fair job without the help.
• Supposed to get really cold here this weekend…. the cold is currently north and west of us, whence it’ll come. Zero seems likely, following a fair snowstorm. I’m more worried about the wind chills, which will run to 40 below. I guess that trip I wanted to take is out of the question.
• So, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is ticked George Bush sent him a “message of confrontation.” If I’m you, Mahmoud, I’m damned glad the message wasn’t delivered by a flock of B-52’s. A message like that can ruin your whole weekend.
• Tax breaks for the economy. Bush has it right. And you know the numbers he’s pushing blows anything the Democrats are pushing out of the water?
• So Sarah Michelle Gellar thinks Americans are ‘Gluttonous’. This from somebody who when they turn sideways, all but disappears. Eat a sandwich, Honey.
• I see US magazine is breathlessly reporting that AP is working on a Britney Spears Obit. So says MSNBC, anyway.Well, it’s not unusual, first off, for them to do so. Anyone remember Reagan’s Obit showing up a few months early? Bob Hope, too. Then again, they were over age 80. I suppose their making such preparation now, this early, is as strong a damnation of what she’s been doing to herself as anyone could devise.

Addendum:  (David L)

The light hearted,  cold is good, at least for one weekend.   The Winterfest is this weekend.   While it went off last year with sixty degree temperatures, cold is better.

Not so light, three words to a Britney Spears obituary:  Anna Nichole Smith.    Britney makes the late Vickie Lynn Marshall seem sane by comparison.

Heavy, as in bombers, BUFF’s, a.k.a. B-52H, a.k.a. Stratofortress,   For the record, the second F in BUFF does not stand for Fellow.    A full flock of BUFF’s today would be forty-four birds    I suspect any heavy delivery of iron bombs would fall to the Bones, B-1B..   We could muster up about eighty of those.

I find myself in a bad situation. This is a hard thing to write.. and likely one of the hardest things to post in this blog that I’ll ever do.  I’ll set this up this way:

I said, back when I got into a knock-down drag-out flame war with Franks and Henke a year back that this blog (And my activities on comment areas of other blogs) that it was is and always will be about the ideas. That was true then as now.

If I’m to hold true to that, I’m forced by logic to at least partially, and quite publicly agree with someone who has been less than friendly to myself and to this blog for well over a year, now, and to disagree with someone I respect and have had a pleasant, if undefined friendship with, for many years.

There will be some who will be angry with me on this.  The ones I’m agreeing with will likely ignore me yet, and the ones I’m disagreeing with will likely lash out. In speaking up, I can do nothing but lose face.  I can’t let those minor points coerce me off the facts. Again, as always, I’m about the ideas, and the truth of the matter.  I may well err in pursuit of the truth, but I have seen nothing in this discussion either currently or anything previous to convince me I’ve done so here. Indeed, all the discussions, particularly those of late, have convinced me I’m not off target, here.  As we’ve discussed here many times, that process of the pursuit of the truth is never easy, but there it is. And anyway, history speaks loudly to me that people who speak, regardless of retaliation tend to be heard. Take our nation’s founders, as an example.

So what all am I talking about? This, and this. Oh… and this.

When Dale Franks’ string of Jury duty postings first went up, I observed, but did little more, because frankly, I felt torn on the issue, mostly for reasons not directly involving the case. The case involved, as is well known by now, a guy trying to smuggle about a half a ton of pot into the ‘states from Mexico.  The guy… one Steven Rhett, made his choice and is and should be paying the price he knew existed for the crime he did. The risk involved was why he was doing the crime; he’d get well-paid if he was successful. He was not. How in hell some can call such a man ‘innocent’ is well beyond any bounds of ‘reason’, because under no conditions is he innocent of the crime he’s accused of. He wasn’t a hero, he isn’t a free enterprise guru, he’s a criminal. He’s guilty…. in ever moral sense of the word, and of course in every LEGAL sense of the word. It was against the law to do what he did, he knew it and did it anyway.

So on what basis is Franks getting all of this grief for being on the jury that convicted the guy?  Because they disagree with the drug laws, on supposed freedom issues.

And why? To explain that, I think a comparison is in order;

I have spoken often to the dramatic change over the several years this blog has been online, to the change of direction that overtook Andrew Sullivan. His massive change in political direction occurred because he found he couldn’t justify his homosexuality within the framework of the politics he became famous for. I’ve said many times since that conversion that his entire political being is wrapped around self-justification, in that one area of his life. I suspect and suppose that the loud objections we hear on this issue with Franks et al, under the guise of ‘libertarianism” is much the same; Self-justification.  And yes, all that implies. Thereby, the arguments presented by each often make the same amount of moral sense; Which is to say, None at all.  I would have to ask, if there is ANY item that our purist “libertarian” friends would consider worthy of banning. .. anything at all… and on what basis they’d ban it.  After all, nuclear warheads being smuggled into the country would most certainly find a buyer.  Would they have been raising quite the stink they are now? After all Nuclear warheads don’t harm anyone.  It’s how they’re used, that creates the situation of harm. Right? If the answer comes back”Yes” you’ve exposed the flaw in the argument; Selective process. If they answer, ‘No, nothing should be banned in a free society’ then you’ve exposed them as bloody fools. There’s no middle ground here.

It should be said that Franks has his problems with the drug laws as such.  (Moreso than I) He’s stated so on a least a few occasions I’ve noticed. However, he makes the point that the law exists, for better or worse and must be dealt with as such, and at one point suggested a curative:

Perhaps you should address this policy through the legislature.

So what did these purists expect Franks to do? A jury nullification along the lines of that which freed OJ Simpson? Remember, that was supposedly done on moral ground as well. We see how THAT one turned out.

Look, gang, disagree with the law if you like, but work it through to change it, if that’s the goal. Because… and mark this well…  because if one ever expects the government to intervene in any matter… any at all, on what legal or moral basis will you stand?  Take their freedom of speech as an example… a right which I note they continue to exercise at an astounding rate.

Sorry, gang… The law is an all or nothing proposition. You cannot select which you’ll follow and which you won’t, particularly if you’re taking a stand on the basis of morality. Sorry. You either respect the law as it stands in all cases, or you don’t seek it’s protection, ever. Like for example in the case of free speech rights. I’m sure there are those who will bravely tell us they will not ever seek such protection. The fact was is and will remain that they already have benefited from such protection, and therefore their claims have no moral legs.

Let’s broaden the field just a bit and ask if there are ANY laws a libertarian feels bound to obey? Any at all?
As commenter Ted, over there said:

The real point is we are living in a country based not just on individual rights, but also individual responsibilities. Responsibility to follow the laws of the government we have, and to oppose that government if it’s laws become too oppressive.
If you don’t like the laws of the current system, the founding fathers gave examples of several honorable options.
A) Work within the system (i.e. obeying all the laws) while trying to get laws changed (Franks’ choice)
B) Fight outside the system to change the laws or the government. Either publicly defy the law or declare revolution. (The system is free to fight back, but that doesn’t make it right)
C) Move somewhere with a different system.

There’s also the somewhat less honorable

D) whine about the system and try to weasel around it while enjoying its’ protections.

I’ve said often enough, with several of the founders… Thomas Paine, I think, among them, that the government is a necessary evil.  For this particular conversation the discussion centers on the word “necessary”. If our libertarian purist friends feel drug laws are unnecessary, then work through the system to change that problem.  That is a process that involves changing minds.  That also takes time. Now; that they seem to have some problems with the mind-changing process would seem unquestionable. Then again, looking at the exchange of insults at the links above, one can easily develop a full appreciation as to why. But as I’ve said in these spaces previously, shortcutting that mind changing process doesn’t help us toward the goal.  If government at some level is necessary, one cannot simply ignore it on the basis of a disagreement with one law or another.  Because if that’s done as a matter of routine, government becomes impotent and unable to perform its function in those areas where it is necessary.

And that assumes the purist argument that drug laws are unnecessary.  That is an argument, which I do not share.  Nor do the majority of the American people.  Like it or not, those are the minds you’re going to have to change, if you want to get where you claim you like to be. if the goal is to keep that necessary evil in check, then minds are going to have to be changed and educated for the purpose.

The process I saw going on this last week doesn’t even approach that standard.

I note as I post this that Dale has added some thoughts worth considering.

Ezra Levant fired the cyber age’s version of the musket shot fired April 19, 1775.    Now the musical:

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Hat Tip: KShaidle, Small Dead Animals.

Ben Smith, Politico

The radio ad aired by one of Obama’s labor allies re-injects ethnicity into the Democratic primary contest in sharp terms.

“Hillary Clinton does not respect our people,” the ad says in Spanish (original and Clinton campaign translation after the jump), referring to the lawsuit that failed today to shut down special caucus sites on Las Vegas’ strip. “Hillary Clinton is shameless.”

Who’d have ever thought.

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Hat Tip:  Hot Air.

Addendum:

Dropped link and addded video. Went  surfing for a YouTube of Mrs. Clinton’s Scarlet O’Hara speech this morning but could not find it.   As luck would have it,  Patterico, Patterico’s Pontificiations,  had a copy posted.    So I borrowed it.   Surf over and read Patterico’s article as well.

• I see in Screw Up Your Life People Magazine Jenna Bush is getting married come this May. According to the story, they’re planning a small wedding at the Ranch.
• I wonder if this moron is one of the ones they’ve been waging war on over at Jawa, the last few months?
• Ya know, these idiots act like Rhett had nothing to do with creation of his current situation. Sorry; I’ve no sympathy whatever for the man, and less for those arguing he’s a ‘minor criminal’. Funny how absolutists can get all fuzzy where the law is concerned… at least, a law they don’t like… and the enforcement thereof.
• Did you see this bit with Bill Clinton making lots of noise about this lawsuit in California? Methinks thou dost protest too much, Bubba.
• Yet another Rovian plot was revealed last night as to a group of state level Republican officials, as to how the Republicans can beat the top Democrats in the White House Race. He says all we need to do is push the idea of smaller government, lower taxes, and a strong defense. Karl’s correct, of course, but I have to tell you that while with the current crop a strong defense is a given..(Save for Ron Paul) … the rest seem bent on running to the left on every other point, save for Fred Thompson. Thompson would seem the ideal guy to nominate, but apparently the message on this hasn’t gotten through to the rank and file Republicans, yet.  Personally, I’d be interested in Rove being hired by Team Fred.  I don’t know about you, but Rollins is perhaps the highest power strategist out there on anyone’s staff, and he’s not really getting the job done, either. Super Tuesday isn’t all that far away and some serious butt-kicking needs to occur, before then, promoting the points Rove mentions, here. I wonder who has the courage, to do so. I tell you, that person will be the nominee.
• Addendum:(Bit) Anotehr Honorable Mention at OTB’s Caption Contest

Barack Obama gives praises to Ronald Reagan:

Video:

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Transcript, via Open Left:

I don’t want to present myself as some sort of singular figure.  I think part of what’s different are the times.  I do think that for example the 1980 was different.  I think Ronald Reagan changed the trajectory of America in a way that Richard Nixon did not and in a way that Bill Clinton did not.  He put us on a fundamentally different path because the country was ready for it.  I think they felt like with all the excesses of the 1960s and 1970s and government had grown and grown but there wasn’t much sense of accountability in terms of how it was operating.  I think people, he just tapped into what people were already feeling, which was we want clarity we want optimism, we want a return to that sense of dynamism and entrepreneurship that had been missing.

The leftosphere gasps, Memeorandum.

Reality check:  VDH on RWR, via Real Clear Politics.

Commentary:  as I see it, Obama  did not come to praise Ronald Wilson Reagan.   He came to bury B.J. and Mrs. Clinton.   Mrs. Clinton, post Iowa, has been touting herself a having worked for change for thirty-five years.   How better to descredit  Mrs. Clinton’s claim to be agent of change than point out the abysmal record of the Clinton administration in achieving any change.  That is change which can be mentioned outside the locker room.

Obama is not praising Reagan   He is using Reagan like a dead fish to beat over the heads of B.J. and Mrs. Clinton.   It is fish that stinks both ways.

Addendum: 

More, Allah Pundit, Hot Air.

From a reader, this morning: 

One day a fourth-grade teacher asked the children what their mothers did for a living.

All the typical answers came up — teacher, nurse, businesswoman, saleswoman, doctor, lawyer, and so forth.

However, little Justin was being uncharacteristically quiet, so when the teacher prodded him about his mother, he replied, “Well, my mother’s an exotic dancer in a cabaret, and takes off all her clothes in front of men, and they put money in her underwear. Sometimes, if the offer is really good, she will go home with some guy, and stay with him all night for money.”

The teacher, obviously shaken by this statement, hurriedly set the other children to work on some exercises, and then took little Justin aside to ask him,

“Is that really true about your mother?”

“No,” the boy said, “She works for the Democratic National Committee, and is helping to get Hillary Clinton to be our next President, but I was too embarrassed to say that in front of the other kids.

Smart kid. After all, the dancer is likely the more honorable profession.

I commented last night on the state of Michigan, and the state of the economy there. Boortz did too, apparently yesterday noon time:

This is a state suffering under what people are calling a “single state recession.” The reason? A governor and legislature that wants to tax everything that moves and paint everything that does not. So, the candidates on both sides of the equation decided to preach the economy in Michigan. Every candidate, save John McCain, had their version of the “we’re going to bring jobs back to Michigan” refrain. McCain was a bit more honest in telling these people that those jobs aren’t coming back. They’ll have to work to develop a new job base.

Jobs? So it’s jobs you want? You want to see a boost in the economy that would create new jobs and lift all the boats? Well, let me tell you what isn’t going to do it. That would be those stupid $250 checks the MoveOn Democrats are promising to pay to every likely Democrat voter in the country.

Jobs have left this country because of our tax structure and regulation. Our tax structure takes the majority of the blame here. Roger Smith, the former HMWIC of General Motors told the Congress many years ago that the embedded taxes in the price of every car coming out of Michigan are having an adverse impact on the auto industry. Congress didn’t listen then .. and isn’t, for the most part, listening now.

He then goes on to tout the Fairtax. A great idea, but let’s be honest, it’s not gaining traction.  Still, the merits of reducing taxes vs raising them, is up there with the deals the unions shoved down the auto industry’s throat, as base causes for the demise of said auto industry. It’s a good thing they’ve got guards around that huge UAW mansion in Detroit… because if citizens of Michigan ever figure out how badly they have been screwed by the UAW, they’re going to need them.

And tax issues to one side for a moment, which party has been bending over frontwards for the unions for decades, now?   If the folks in Michigan ever wake up to that, Democrats won’t be able to get elected dog catcher there…. assuming they survive to the election.

Mike Huckabee, says:

‘The Lord Truly Gave Me Wisdom”

Well give it back, Mike.  You sure aren’t using any of it.   It one thing be given a gift.   It is altogether another, to actually use that gift.   It there is one thing Huck’s campaign message lacks, it is wisdom,  class envy yes, but wisdom no.

Hat Tip:  Allah Pundit, Hot Air.

Heard this on the drive into the office this morning:

630AM-WMAL

Man Wearing Dress Tests Transgender Law(Gaithersburg, MD) — A new law protecting transgendered people in Montgomery County doesn’t go into effect for more than a month, but the controversial law is already getting tested. Tuesday at a Sport and Health Club in Gaithersburg, a man wearing women’s clothing walked into a women’s locker room and his presence didn’t go unseen by real women who were there changing. He never said a word to anyone who saw him. The health club admits the man is a member. The gym also has unisex, family restrooms, which the man ignored. The president of Sport and Health Clubs said in a statement that his company will review the new law with company lawyers. Meanwhile, there’s a movement in the county to put the new law up for a referendum in November. But the county’s Human Rights Commission says the law doesn’t apply to accommodations that are uniquely private or personal, which may exempt restrooms from the anti-discrimination law.

The Reverend Al Sharpton is a race baiting bigot.  So why is a democrat candidate, and the spouse of one, groveling at his feet?  Ben Smith, Politico:

Al Sharpton didn’t run for President this round, and yet he’s placed himself at the center of things again.

Yesterday, Bill Clinton spent the bulk of an hour on his radio show, a hub of the Clinton damage-control tour, and even took calls. Today, Obama was on for 15 minutes, mostly talking policy and economics.

For the record, I am inclined to go along with Micheal Crowley, New Republic:

A savvy reader writes in to note that Sharpton’s influence among black voters is wildly overstated by the media. That’s totally my sense

Hat Tip: Memeorandum.

Addendum: (Bit)

And mine. This idea would certainly seem to be bourne out by the way the votes in the Detroit area went down last night.

• Quite the shouting match going on over at Q&O, over that bit that Billy referenced earlier this morning. The subject? Well, I’m convinced about half of those involved don’t know and another 49% don’t understand it. For the first time in bloddy years, I find myself in some degree of agreement with Henke when he says… oh, well, go read his comment, here. And then Erb shows up and provides the comedy relief. It’s as I said; “So much of this argument surrounds contextual application of principle… and most of the context goes missing, in these discussions, so much so that it reminds me of the old saw about a lot of blind men giving their perceptions of an elephant, and each coming to their own conclusions, all of them both wildly different and wildly inaccurate in the whole, yet each observation holding truth within the context of each speaker’s realm of understanding.” They’re arguing from two different concepts, and contexts. In the end, both sides are grossly misconstruing the original purpose of government and so will never understand the other, much less effectively debate the other. The sad fact is in the doing, they’re damaging what progress has been made on freedom. Yes, I said freedom. (Sigh) Absolutists have no concept of context. Even explaining, for example, the concept of “Harm”.
• Now, speaking of ‘harm’, here’s a prime example of it; I see Mike Nifong has filed for bankruptcy. Couldn’t happen to a more appropriate person. The harm he inflicted on those students for his own political gain should be a pillory example for DA’s all over the country.  Steve Verdon at OTB agrees, noting: Hopefully the plaintiffs will get punitive damages that are non-dischargeable an will haunt him forever.  Billy, meanwhile, echoes my own thoughts even more closely: I want to see that rotten bastard broken, crawling along a sidewalk clothed in burlap in the rain, and weeping for his life. He’s the one who took an awful power in hand and used it the way he did. He is no ordinary criminal. Quite the opposite, and the rest of his life should reflect the fact. Yeah, that’d be cool, but don’t hold your breath, guys…  It will not be…. and Steve, you being a legal type oughta know how that’s gonna go down.  And for the record, there’s a major difference between Dale Franks convicting someone for a drug crime and Nifong’s actions.  It alarms me that so many people I usually respect can’t make out the difference.
• The Centcom pipe I opened up a few months ago got broken, somehow. I’ve since been working to repair it. We’ll see if I can get that going by this weekend.
• I note with quiet pleasure at Bobby Jindal’s taking the oath of office in Louisiana. I see this as a direct result of Katrina, and the screw-ups of the Democrat party there.  Michelle has some links from the events, the other day.
• It strikes me that the main difference between the Detroit Auto Show and MacWorld is the latter’s sober understanding that neither one is going to get it’s former market share back.

If me and Bit, have an advantage over Rush Limbaugh, we do not have to actually able to pronounce names, only cut and paste them.

On April 19, 1775, a musket shot was fired, which was heard around the World.   Recently Ezra Levant uploaded the Web Age equivalent, the YouTube of his inquisition by the Canadian HRC.

Janet Albrechtsen, Australian, sees where Canada is heading and wants no part of if for her Australia:

CANADA: It was one of those rare, particularly sunny days in Vancouver in September when, addressing an audience at the University of British Columbia, I suggested that multiculturalism and its partner in crime, moral relativism, were leading to the demise of Western values.

“But you must understand,” implored a well-intentioned woman in the audience, “multiculturalism is Canada’s gift to the world.”

If Australia is set to follow Canada, then thanks, but no thanks.

I second the notion.   If liberals truly believed that all cultures were indeed equal, they would not be trying to change ours.   If all cultures are equal, then no culture can ever be improved, or degrade as the new culture would be deemed equal to the old.

Hat Tip:  Betsy Newmark, Betsy’s Page.

By way of Memeorandum, I see that’s the question Hillary Clinton is facing.

(CNN) — Hillary Clinton faced a grim statistic in Michigan tonight, despite her primary “win” there: results revealed that she may have reason to worry about her grasp on the African-American vote.

The Michigan primary vote was essentially meaningless: the national party stripped the state of its delegates because it held its contest too early in the election season, and Clinton was the only major Democratic contender whose name appeared on the ballot.

Even so, roughly 70 percent of Michigan’s African-American voters — a group that makes up a quarter of Michigan’s Democratic electorate — did not cast their votes for Clinton, choosing the “uncommitted” option instead. Yet these voters weren’t uncommitted at all: in fact, according to CNN exit polls, they overwhelmingly favored Barack Obama, whose name did not appear on the ballot.

I’ve said it before in a number of different ways, but I’ll say it again, here; This is the direct result of the Democrats playing the pander-bear game of group identity politics.

 And have you noticed that Hillary Clinton isn’t talking much of late about how GWB is doing in the approval ratings? Gee. Wonder why?

For all that I’m happy with John McCain’s loss in Michigan, last night, I will say to his credit he got one thing right; Michigan manufacturing… specifically the auto industry… won’t be coming back anytime soon. The unions and the liberal nutbags in Lansing and in Washington have seen to it that the golden egg goose has been bled totally dry, with no hope of reviving it. The problem was exemplified quite well last evening in the voting patterns… they’re still suffering from a governmental dependency that would make Marx proud.

Addendum: (David L)

You can give John McCain some credit for pessimistic view of the auto industry.  In fact, I give McCain credit for not pandering to Michigan’s voters.  Further, I will disagree with Mitt Romney that the government has some kind duty to invest in the automotive industry, and the same with tax payer funded job retraining McCain sponsors.

The problem with McCain is not he opposes revitalization of our automotive industry.  The problem is that McCain is dedicated to killing the entire industry.  McCain is hostile to commerce in general and to the automoiive industry in particular.  I don’t know from where our future energy will come, but leave it no McCain and it never from from ANWR.  It strange position for somebody running for president to put the interest of Moose ahead of people.  Then McCain is a strange guy,.

We, as nation, don’t need to invest in restoring our domestic auto industry.  We should however stop trying to kill it.