Salman Rushdie Protests Random House Censorship - San Francisco Chronicle Buries the Story

I clicked on “Google News” to scan the headlines, and this caught my eye: GOP plans shot down over oil, The San Francisco Chronicle, August 16, 2008. Wow! I thought. It sure didn’t take long for Nancy Pelosi to renege on her statement that she would allow debate on offshore drilling.

However, on further inspection I found what Google News featured as a news article was actually only a very opinionated, fact-free Letter to the Editor. In a way I can understand the Google News confusion. The San Francisco Chronicle news articles and editorials usually are very opinionated and fact-free.


Aisha, Mohammad says he has a big surprise for you tonight!

When real news is afoot, The Chronicle has no appreciation for its relative worth, and we find abominations like their placement on page E-3 (the Entertainment section) of Salman Rushdie’s complaint about Random House pulling an historical novel about the prophet Muhammad and his child bride Aisha because of speculation that it would anger Muslims.

Damn it! Everything angers Muslims! Since when have American publishers, writers, and journalists based their actions on avoiding offending Christians, Jews, Hindus, Whites, Blacks, misogynists, racists, and etc.? Actually, if the misogynist and racists are Muslims, which many are, are publishers, writers, and journalists do go out of their way to avoid making them angry.

Why have violent, ignorant savages been given power over the thoughtful and educated of the world? Once the irrational fear of Hitler and his Brown Shirts that brought the Nazis to power in a cultured and refined nation, one with a proud tradition of great literature and music.

What Random House has done is a book burning without the messy need of inciting a howling mod and lighting a fire. They have allowed a book to be banned by illiterates.

In America we proudly (but erroneously) quote Voltaire: "I disagree with what you have to say but will fight to the death to protect your right to say it."

But then we amend our courageous stance: “However, even if I agree with you, if it might annoy an illiterate Muslim ten thousand miles away, I’m out of here!”

Democrats – They Even Screw Themselves

No matter how bad you think a Democrat’s conduct is, it can always get worse. John Edwards is only the latest in a long, typical line. I can hear Democrats now saying, “So he had an affair, but he did his job. What’s the big deal?”

I’m sure they feel righteously indignant that the Great Right Wing Conspiracy is sticking its prurient nose in another Democrat’s personal life again. After all, John told Elizabeth about the affair two years ago, while she was still in remission for breast cancer, then promised to be good, and in return she promised to give witness to his being an honorable, moral presidential candidate.

However, when her cancer recurred and Elizabeth was told it was incurable, John clumsily continued the affair and made a mockery of the lies that he and Elizabeth told to further his ambitions.

Who would be that callous and cruel?

Or stupid?

Actually, when talking about Democrats, the list of the callous, cruel, and stupid ones is quite long when it comes to sexual misconduct. And their loving wives seem to all be Hillary clones, because they all “stand by their men.”

However, Hillary paid the ultimate price for her loyalty, because she will never be the First Woman President of the United States. Hillary was understandably filled with glee when Bill’s scandal weakened Al Gore enough to cost him the presidency, because that fit well with her own presidential ambitions after she first paid her political dues in the Senate. After all, if Al had won in 2000, he probably would have won again in 2004, and Joe Lieberman, as his vice-president, would have been the favorite in 2008.

However, with Al out of the way, and your place-holder Kerry conveniently losing in 2004, the way was clear for your anointing.

Except John Edwards took a very large portion of votes that would have gone to Hillary in Iowa, giving Obama an easy first place victory over Edwards, and Hillary a close third. It was all over for Hillary before she even got started. Her aura of invincibility and inevitability was shattered – even though she got the non-Black female vote, Obama got all the Black vote, which was enough for him to win in the South (where Democrats don’t win presidential elections), even as Hillary won all the big states that give Democrats a shot at winning the presidency.

If Edwards had been found out sooner – the Inquirer reported his scandal in November, but the Main Stream Media ignored it – Edwards would have been a non-starter, and Hillary would be the Democrat nominee.

Hillary would then have the female vote, the Black vote, the union vote, the teachers vote (I guess I already covered that in the union vote), enviromentalist, socialized medicine - in a word, all the Democrat special interest groups that vote for their selfish agendas instead of for the good of the nation.

How about that, Hillary? You set the Gold Standard for Democrat women by standing by Bill through all his cheating, and now Elizabeth stood by her man long enough to let him shatter your dreams. Bill and John certainly screwed around, but you ended up screwing yourself. You’re finished, and you know it.

The parade has passed you by.

If Obama wins, it’s all over for Hillary, because he runs again in 2012, and in 2016 Hillary is a 68-year old Senate drudge.

If McCain wins, Hillary has a chance because she’ll only be 64, but McCain will be doing a good job, and Republicans will be on a roll. Democrat Senators like Hillary will be back on the legislative dung hill where they belong – prospering mightily financially, accomplishing nothing legislatively.

Still screwing each other, but not screwing us.

"Well, Democrats are furious, they're going on record now saying John Edwards will not be allowed to speak at the convention because of this affair. Yeah, instead speaking in his place: Bill Clinton. You have to put your foot down." --Jay Leno

Give Us Back Our Chains!

The International Herald Tribune, now an acolyte of The New York Times, laments the deaths of “–isms” in India caused by recent rampant individualism (In India, idealism falters in the face of power, by Anand Giridharadas, published: August 14, 2008). According to the author, when India was powerless, they were a land of idealists bent on reforming the world. Now that Indians are doing well, they just want to do better instead of spending a lot of time in government showing others The Way.

One can understand this turning inward. India has long been a land of external restraints. Families told you whom to marry, what to study, where to work. Bureaucrats told you whether you could get a phone line or start a business. A caste determined the amount of respect you could command.

Today millions of Indians, from maidservants to doctors, are revolting against those destinies. They share a new belief in the power of self-contained individuals: a belief that individuals must not slight elders but must no longer depend on them; must not forget their roots but must now stray from them; must not crave a government job like their fathers but must now survive as though the state did not exist.

And, in relying ever more on themselves, this group of Indians relies ever less on India.

It might seem uncharitable of me to mention that when Indians were full of ideas and dedicated to government service, i.e., were red hot socialists, almost all Indians led miserable lives mired in crushing poverty. Intellectuals spent copious quantities of time discussing almost everything and accomplishing absolutely nothing. As such they were prototypical intellectuals, knowing that they have the answers to all the ills of mankind, if mankind would just put them in charge.

Much to their chagrin, when socialism waned and individuals gained power formerly exercised by the state, individuals found that freedom empowered them in a way that following political ideologues never did. They discovered that people serve states, not vice versa, and that by relying on themselves they do better for India than they did when they placed their reliance on India.

Of course, that is anathema to liberal politicians, who understand that if the people realize they can take care of themselves, they won’t be beholden to politicians for special treatment and favors.

To a liberal politician, losing faith in the power of government to take care of you is a loss of idealism. It is also the first, best step to take to prosperity for both the individual and the state, and to gain true power for both.

T. Boone Pickens Can't Say the "N" Word

The San Francisco Chronicle devoted their entire August 11, 2008 Op-Ed page to “T. Boone Pickens’ plan to break the stranglehold of foreign oil” (Jay Mandle, economics professor, Colgate Univ.) through replacing natural gas used to generate 22% of our electricity with wind power, and then diverting this natural gas to transportation needs to reduce our need for oil. I wasn’t surprised that Mr. Pickens avoided the “n” word – nuclear energy, which already generates 20% of our electrical requirements, is available 24/365, produces no Greenhouse gases, and has been and continues to be improved in terms of safety, cost, and reliability.

Mr. Pickens noted that Robert Kennedy Jr. is an enthusiastic supporter of wind power, although he didn’t mention that Uncle Ted and the Kennedys virulently opposed placing windmills off Hyannis Port. As Mr. Mandle mentioned, Mr. Pickens also avoided mentioning “the enormously expensive construction of new wind turbines and the vast extension of the national electrical grid that will be required.”

If we doubled the percent of electricity generated by nuclear to 40%, we would still be behind France at 78%, and Japan will be at 40% by 2013. In the European Union, nuclear power generates 30% of electricity.

Apparently Mr. Pickens, recently investing heavily in Texas wind power, sees no need to mention that nuclear can achieve his goal of reduced dependence on foreign oil much more effectively and less expensively.

Chicago Passes on Global Warming

When you are having global warming, isn't it supposed to get warmer? Anomalies abound, such as revisions to NASA's temperature records which now show that six of the warmest years of the past century occurred over fifty years ago, and that 1934 was the warmest of all.

Apparently the United States, land of the most complete and sophisticated weather measurement and recording systems, has decided to pass on global warming, and Chicago is only one of many measurement points that are not cooperating with the United Nations global warming alarmists.

I'm sure that Al Gore and the Alarmists are going to find that Chicago's cooler summers are another sign that man-caused global warming has taken firm hold. True believers interpret everything to support their beliefs.

Decade has had fewest 90-degree days since 1930, By Tom Skilling, Chicago Tribune, August 13, 2008

August is the wettest and often the muggiest month of the year. Yet, summer heat continues in short supply, continuing a trend that has dominated much of the 21st Century's opening decade. There have been only 162 days 90 degrees or warmer at Midway Airport over the period from 2000 to 2008. That's by far the fewest 90-degree temperatures in the opening nine years of any decade on record here since 1930.This summer's highest reading to date has been just 91 degrees. That's unusual. Since 1928, only one year—2000—has failed to record a higher warm-season temperature by Aug. 13.

Of course everyone remembers Al Gore and his Acolytes getting all over the Category 3 hurricane that hit New Orleans, citing it as proof positive that the Warming was upon us.

That is why this linked article should be of interest. It shows steadily decreasing hurricane strength since 2004, and that:

During 2007, the Northern Hemisphere as a whole experienced the lowest ACE hurricane energy & number of hurricane days since 1977. 2007 was the 4th slowest year in the past half-century (since 1958)...

Socialist Masquerade - "Progressive" Economics

(This is a response to a letter in our local weekly paper, The Independent Coast Observer, by a local Liberal touting the virtues of Progressive economic theory. From my studies of Progressive theory, it seems just another word to disguise warmed over Socialism.)

Mr. Skibbins is apparently proud of Progressive economists, since his letter was only a bibliography of their names and titles, devoid of any other information besides their admission of belief in greater government control. I could cite many experts more prominent and relevant to current economic theory that the Progressives, but two will suffice: Mr. Skibbins’ late Sea Ranch neighbor, Milton Friedman, and Friedrich Hayek, prescient author of The Road to Serfdom, published in 1944.

Progressives strangely think that if an uneducated, unskilled, malnourished worker overseas can do a job as well and cheaper than an American, that the American should want his government to fight outsourcing instead of encouraging him to get a better job. Or that it is in mankind’s best interest to deny the world’s impoverished the means to survive and perhaps even prosper.

While progressives believe in government solutions, John Maynard Keynes was shown the light. He said that Hayek’s claim that temporary governmental fixes usually become permanent and growing government programs, stifling the private sector and civil society, was "deeply moving." Hayek included this quote on the cover of The Road to Serfdom.

Mr. Skibbins concludes that corporations should not be “making profits for their owners at the expense of the rest of us.” Of course, corporations get their operating capital from investors. When they are unprofitable, owners lose their investments, the corporations soon cease operations, and then their former workers join the ranks of the unemployed. And unlike the “exploited” workers dear to Progressive lore, today’s workers are usually also owners of corporations through 401K and IRA investments.

Government already mismanages many things at the expense of the rest of us, particularly Social Security and Medicare, so I’m sure they could completely foul up corporations if we were fools enough to let them try.

Dumb Democrats Blame Speculators

In response to my letter that speculators were not to blame for the high price of oil, a letter writer to our local weekly paper, the Independent Coast Observer, who I shall call Mr. McManus, observed that there are multiple factors driving the cost of oil, then blamed the Republican Congress of 1999 for enabling Enron to play games with energy costs (and I might add, go bankrupt). Apparently confusing spot prices with the futures market, Mr. McManus then noted that barrels of oil – I assume he is referring to futures contracts for oil – may be traded more than 20 times before the oil is delivered.

Indeed, futures contracts are traded numerous times before the commodity – not just oil - is finally delivered. In fact, that’s the way commodity market trading is designed to function.

As Robert J. Samuelson explains in Newsweek, July 7, 2008, commodity investing is different than stock trading or real estate. Unlike Mr. McManus’s Enron-like example of traders trading oil back and forth on paper, oil futures trading creates a gain and a loss on each trade.

The International Energy Agency predicts that demand for crude oil will rise strongly over the next five years (2007 through 2012), driven by global economic growth of 4.5 to 5.0 per cent a year.

Concominantly, world crude oil production declined about half a million barrels per day in the past three years (2005 through 2007), and the combination of rapidly increasing demand with supply stagnation has drawn down worldwide oil inventories.

The surplus oil buffer – the excess of production capacity over demand – is shrinking from 3 million barrels per day to 1.5 million.

In summary, demand for oil is strong and growing steadily, and supply is actually shrinking along with productive capacity.

For the United States, oil production has declined steadily since 1970: 9,640,000 barrels per day then, only 5,100,000 now, or a decline of 47%.

US oil consumption is 20,770,000 barrels per day, compared to approximately 14,500,000 in 1970, or an increase in consumption of 43% while our production was falling 47%.

In the past two decades US crude oil reserves have fallen 23% to 280 million barrels, or enough to last less than two weeks at our current consumption rate of almost 21 million barrels a day (an additional 706 million barrels, or 34 days’ worth, is held in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve).

While Democrats demagogue speculators, all signs are that the market is adhering to the laws of supply and demand. Light, sweet crude for September delivery has now fallen in six of the last nine sessions and has shaved 18 percent off its trading record of $147.27 reached July 11, curbing speculation by costing many speculators their shirts..

"People are looking for any excuse to sell oil right now," said Jim Ritterbusch, president of energy consultancy Ritterbusch and Associates in Galena, Ill., and are doing so, even when faced with possible strife with Iran and a hurricane in the Gulf.

Following Obama's remarks that he would support offshore drilling in the US, "the market is increasing the odds now that the drilling deal will get done and we will see more production coming out of the Gulf of Mexico," said Phil Flynn, analyst at Alaron Trading Corp. in Chicago. "There's nothing that cures high prices like high prices."

As Anthony deJasay cogently explains: Like oil, speculators too can burn.

Republicans Clone Cajones

Following the prescription of their practicing physician from Oklahoma, Senator Tom Coburn, when Sen. Reid (D-Nev) tried to expose Republican impotence and parade it for public ridicule, Republicans stiffened and showed they still could get it up for fiscal conservatism.

Accustomed to dealing with limp-noodle Republicans, Democrats bundled thirty-five bills already passed by the fiscally promiscuous House and planned to ram them up Sen. Coburn to show him that the Senate could practice unsafe spending as well as the House. Sen. Coburn had placed a hold on each of the bills primarily to focus attention on the need to reduce some programs to pay for increased funding of others.

The Democrats didn’t want anything to do with such fidelity to fiscal integrity, preferring instead orgiastic overspending to please their insatiable special interest groupies. The Democrats’ motto: “If you think money can’t buy you love, you don’t know Democrats.”

But just as Democrats could feel a free-spending climax coming, Republicans dealt them an abrupt dose of spendus-interruptus. The Democrats deflated like a man told he got the placebo instead of Viagra.

Like Bill Clinton when Monica said she it was her turn.

Like Bill Clinton when Hillary told him she felt “frisky.”

When Republicans told Democrats they had to stick to their budget pledge of no spending increases without offsetting decreases, the Democrats lost interest faster than Ted Kennedy when he found out the all-girls school he was speaking at was a nunnery.

As they left the Senate chambers without consummation, Democrats were heard to whine: “Safe spending is no fun!”

Then one of them shouted: “Let’s gang-tax the oil companies!”

As one they raised a rapacious cry and raced back into Senate chambers in the Capitol building.

“We’ve got a Big One for Big Oil, and they’re really going to feel it!” they moaned.

John McCain was Right - Social Security is a Disgrace

I have been drawing Social Security for two months now, and John McCain was right: “It’s an absolute disgrace, and it’s got to be fixed!” Social Security is a horrible investment using the very simple yardstick of what you pay in compared to what you get out.

I am receiving $1,874 per month, or $22,488 per year. I’ve paid into Social Security for 48 years, and in many of those years I paid at or near the maximum annual contribution. During my real estate career of the past eight years, I paid both sides – the employee and the so-called employer contributions – into Social Security. That made obvious what I already knew: the “employer” contribution has always been paid by me, even when I worked for someone else. If the employer did not have to contribute to my Social Security, he would have had to pay me more, and I would have had to contribute more.

Therefore, all the money contributed in my name to Social Security over the years was paid from my earnings.

Many years ago I offered to take what I and my employer had contributed towards my Social Security (forget even getting interest on total contributions going back to 1958) and invest it myself, and in return I would never ever ask the government for a thing from Social Security.

Think about it. The government would have received a “no interest” loan from me, and all they would need to do to drop me forever as a liability is just give me a few of the Special Treasury Bonds they hold in the Social Security Trust Fund.

Of course they can’t do that. The money I contributed has been spent, used to pay other Social Security recipients and any excess used to pay other government operating expenses, like the Medicare cost overrun. The Special Treasury Bonds are worthless. If they were sold to pay current Social Security obligations, more Treasury bonds would have to be sold immediately to replace the cash needed to pay for other government expenses.

Many Americans, including innumerable PhD’s, can’t understand this, so do this simple test: put $10 in a jar labeled “Dining Out Fund.” Now take the $10 out and pay your phone bill, and in its place write an IOU for $10 to the “Dining Out Fund.” Now go out for dinner (at a real cheap place), and when the bill arrives pull out the IOU as payment.

At this point, even a Democrat would refuse the IOU and demand real money, even as you protest that you already spent it on your phone bill. So you reach into your wallet and pull out the $10 you planned to use to fill your empty gas tank. Then you tell your date, “If you don’t want to walk home, you’ll have to loan me $10.”

Our government has done the same thing, and now each and every American has a $455,000 share of the unfunded long-term liability for future Social Security and Medicare expenditures for which we through our government are obligated to pay.

This situation was brought into clear focus by the mortgage banking crisis, with calls for the government to bail out huge mortgage lenders like Fannie Mae and Fannie Mac. With what?

"People seem to think the government has money," said former U.S. Comptroller General David Walker. "The government doesn't have any money."

Simply put, the government does what is doesn’t allow businesses to do: it doesn’t put its long-term unfunded liabilities on its books, and the total now for Social Security and Medicare is a whopping $53 trillion, or $455,000 per person.

"Health care costs are just amazing," said John Shoven, director of Stanford University's Institute for Economic Policy Research. Total health care costs now consume 16 percent of the economy and are headed quickly toward 30 percent, Shoven said. "Social Security is a big problem, but it's dwarfed by health care. Even the housing problem is dwarfed by health care."

Just the built-in rise in spending on programs for the elderly will cost about 25 percent of workers' payrolls over the next generation, said Richard Jackson, director of the Global Aging Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

When I was in the Air Force I griped about having to contribute to Medicare, because at the time military members had “guaranteed” life-time medical coverage in military hospitals. Many military retired near military hospitals. Trust the government to mess things up. Congress passed a law that once a retiree became 65 years old, they had to join Medicare and not be treated in military hospitals.

How about those retirees living near military bases far away from civilian hospitals?

Retirees raised a stink, and for once were listened to. The military retiree program for under-65’s, Tricare Prime, was expanded to Tricare for Life, the secondary insurer to Medicare. So the military retiree gained a little, but basically still came up a loser: the retiree could now use both Medicare facilities without prior approval (which was almost always granted) and military hospitals, but instead of a $460 annual fee covering both retiree and spouse, the annual Medicare fee for a typical retiree and spouse is now $2,360, or roughly one month’s Social Security payment more expensive.

Now I’m having second thoughts about all this, and I realize that John McCain was wrong when he said that Social Security is an absolute disgrace. He should have said that both Social Security and Medicare are absolute disgraces!

San Francisco Mayor Newsom – I Finked on You to Drudge!

The story is simple and tragic. San Francisco, following its sanctuary policy, did not alert immigration officials of felony convictions of “juvenile” illegal immigrants in order to prevent their being deported and barred re-entry for life.

(This photo illustrates Mayor Newsom answering "Who, me?" and trying to blame the problem on the courts when asked about why his administration spent taxpayer money to illegally fly convicted "juvenile" crack dealers back to Honduras instead of alerting immigration authorities as required by law - and not by San Francisco's sanctuary policy.)

One of the illegal immigrant felons, twice convicted but shielded by San Francisco’s sanctuary policy, used an illegal AK-47 assault weapon to violently murder a father and his two sons in a senseless and unprovoked road-rage attack on a San Francisco street.

At fault were San Francisco Juvenile Justice Department officials who have used their limited brain power and complete lack of common sense to do everything they could think of to defy immigration law.

Dumb No. One was flying convicted “juvenile” crack dealers to

their homeland, Honduras, instead of referring them to immigration authorities for deportation as legally required. With no federal record of felony convictions, the Honduran drug cartels would have their hardened and experienced youthful-appearing crack dealers back on the job faster than you could say “dumb Democrats doing dastardly deeds.”

Dumb No. Two, after being caught doing Dumb No. One, was putting the “hardened and experienced youthful-appearing crack dealers” in unlocked group homes in Southern California at a cost to taxpayers of $7,000 per “hardened and experienced youthful-appearing crack dealers” per month.

The “hardened and experienced youthful-appearing crack dealers,” although uneducated, were not as dumb as the San Francisco officials who sent them to the group homes, and wasted no time in escaping and getting back to dealing crack.

Still with no record of felony convictions that would trigger actions to remove them permanently from plying their illegal trade.

What with "Dumb," and then "Double Dumb" to the credit of San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom and his benighted Board of "Stupidvisors" (as they are called by anyone who has studied them in action), I waited expectantly for Drudge to link to this embarassing liberal mess, and give national exposure to the tragedy of the triple killing that Newsom's administration aided and abetted.

Days passed and no link by Drudge, so last night I used the "send news tips to Drudge (anonymity guaranteed)" block at the bottom right of his page to send him a brief summary and a link to my blog post - hoping against hope it would get his attention and that he would link to my bombastic post on the issue. That would have really lit up Blogger!

Of course he didn't link to my post, but this morning I found this link on Drudge: Killings turn focus on San Francisco sanctuary law...

Now the rest of California know what Northern Californians are already aware of about the serial philanderer and buck-passer who thinks he can be California's next governor.

It's fitting that Gavin Newsom's political future has been torpedoed by his city's idiot sanctuary law. It's just an awful pity that three honest, innocent citizens had to meet violent and senseless deaths to focus attention on the monumental stupidity of the city government of San Francisco.

John Edward’s Love Child

UPDATE:

The ENQUIRER caught John Edwards red-something-or-other sneaking to visit his mistress and their love child in Los Angeles. Unlike sex scandals involving Republicans - Larry Craig, who got made, but not laid; and Mark Foley, guilty of e-mailing while gay, but not of page penetration (unlike Gary Studds, Dem-Mass, deceased) - John Edwards was able to experience the full flowering of his philandering and its fruiting (forgive me, I couldn't stop myself from "effing" this up).

However, the main stream media are not having any such problems in controlling themselves, and are studiously avoiding embarrassing a Democrat for doing what would get a Republican banner headlines and non-stop television exposure 24/7.

Although Helen Thomas emphatically denied that journalists have liberal biases, isn't this hypocritical treatment resounding proof that they do?

Enquiring minds want to know.

(I notice my labels for this post are "Dimocrats" and "Hypocrisy," but I repeat myself)


The following is my previous post on this issue dated December 20, 2007. All that has changed since is that the baby arrived, and the main stream media still is in full avoidance mode.

In the news:

The ENQUIRER has learned exclusively that Rielle Hunter, a woman linked to Edwards in a cheating scandal earlier this year, is more than six months pregnant — and she's told a close confidante that Edwards is the father of her baby!

This story will cause particular outrage here in the San Francisco Bay/Northern California area.

“The nerve of John Edwards! Cheating with a ‘breeder!’ Can you imagine the damage to his boyfriends’ self esteem!”

“They’ll be devastated!”

At this point, I apologize to all I’ve offended by this reportage and commentary. I realize that no Democrat will in any way be so narrow-minded and judgmental as to be offended by the sexual adventures of their leaders, and I apologize for even suggesting they would.

Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa

I also apologize to anyone offended in any way by my suggesting that John Edwards is a viable presidential candidate. However, I cannot be totally blamed for this, since I’ve heard that there are some Iowans who actually think he is.

Apparently, these are Iowans who slept through the John Kerrey-John Edwards presidential campaign.

Maybe that explains the John Edwards campaign.

A lot of Americans went to sleep as soon as John Kerrey began to drone his campaign speech. Kerrey, in his only campaign strategy step that appeared wise, kept Edwards quiet and out of sight.

It still didn't do any good.

Maybe if he could have found a way to keep himself quiet and out of sight too.

California Governor Hopeful San Francisco Mayor Newsom Protected Illegal Alien Murderer

As a result of San Francisco’s sanctuary law, a father and his two sons were murdered by an illegal alien who San Francisco had twice shielded from federal immigration authorities when he had committed felonies and should have been deported.

Today (July 23, 2008) Edwin Ramos pled not guilty to charges of murdering San Francisco residents Tony Bologna and his two sons, Michael and Mathew near their home on June 22nd. Ramos, a native of El Salvador whom prosecutors say is a member of a violent street gang, was earlier found guilty of two felonies as a juvenile: a gang-related assault on a Muni passenger and the attempted robbery of a pregnant woman (San Francisco Chronicle reporters investigated and discovered Ramo’s prior convictions, and that city officials had shielded him from federal authorities).

In neither instance did officials with the city's Juvenile Probation Department alert federal immigration authorities, because it was the city agency's policy not to consider immigration status when deciding how to deal with an offender. Had city officials investigated, they would have found that Ramos lacked legal status to remain in the United States (see SF Chronicle article).

Were it not for the incalculable tragedy of the murders of three honest, innocent, beloved, and productive citizens, the way San Francisco complied with their illegal alien sanctuary law would be comic. Their first approach to preventing convicted illegal alien felons from being deported and banned for life from United States immigration was to fly, at taxpayer expense, the felons back to their home countries.

As Chronicle columnist Debra Saunders notes, this "put the welfare of juvenile gang-bangers and drug dealers, who also were illegal immigrants, before the safety of law-abiding residents who are victimized by gangs and thugs." It signaled drug dealers that using juveniles, or undocumented individuals claiming to be juveniles, to conduct drug dealings in San Francisco was the way to go. When caught the “juveniles” received soft treatment through the city’s Juvenile Probation Department, and when returned to their home countries, were immediately sent back to San Francisco to resume dealing drugs.

When a city official and two convicted “juvenile” offenders were stopped at the airport in Houston enroute to being returned to Honduras, San Francisco’s defiance and violations of federal immigration law finally came to light. That didn’t stop San Francisco officials from compounding their idiocy at taxpayer expense.

Continuing to shield felons from immigration officials, San Francisco recently placed eight illegal immigrant “juvenile” crack dealers in unlocked group homes in Southern California at a cost of $7,000 per individual per month. All eight immediately escaped (i.e., walked out the door) to return to their illegal activities.

For those who believe they escaped to reform themselves and now lead honest lives in America, there is always a place for you in the San Francisco Juvenile Probation Department.

Overlooked in all the tragic-comedic aspects of San Francisco releasing felons to continue drug dealing and murdering is the San Francisco District Attorney Kamala Harris’ vow to never seek a death penalty. Since San Francisco has repeatedly earned its reputation as “The City That Knows How…To Really Foul Things Up,” a group is calling on the U. S. Attorney to prosecute the triple murder case.

Not only does San Francisco have a well-deserved reputation for fouling things up, but it would be a conflict of interest, particularly in this case, for San Francisco to prosecute Ramos when they were responsible for him being free to murder in the first place. The San Francisco DA would be under pressure from San Francisco officials to rush to sweep the whole embarrassing matter under the rug rather than seeking justice.

Particularly while the primary offender, Mayor Gavin Newsom, is poised to launch a bid to become California Governor. When this issue was first brought to his attention, he looked totally surprised and immediately blamed the courts for what city officials were doing to comply with San Francisco sancturary policy.

His eagerness to pass the buck exemplified his qualifications to be the Governor of California, where no state officials ever take responsibility for fixing any problem - they just wait for voters to finally lose their patience, pass a proposition, and then have the courts declare it unconstitutional.

Only in California could a serial philanderer (he had an affair with a subordinate, his best friend/campaign manager's wife), recently out of alcohol rehab, who denies any responsibility or even knowledge of what his officials are doing, be considered a serious candidate for any political office, let alone governor.

Texas Trolls Causing High Oil Prices

James Oglesby’s reply to David Skibbins (Ponzi Scheme, The Independent Coast Observer, Gualala, CA 7/18/08) illustrated textbook economic principles. The following may aid Mr. Oglesby to comprehend Mr. Skibbins’ economic understanding: Mr. Skibbins is a mystery writer, and economics are a mystery to him (leading me to coin the term “Skibbinomics” a couple of years ago).

Mr. Skibbins is not alone, since Democrats are equally mystified. Faced with rapidly rising oil prices, Nancy Pelosi led a Democrat charge against…. commodity speculators! Great shades of Harold Wilson and his 1964 condemnation of the Gnomes of Zürich!

Bush hatred coupled with economic ignorance and myopia make Democrats blame high oil prices on Bush, oil companies, and speculators. Apparently they haven’t noticed the strong economic growth of developing nations – China, India, Brazil, and numerous others – causing prices to increase dramatically since 2002 for resources: aluminum, 96%; copper, 360%; corn, 70%; gold, 125 %; nickel, 452%; steel, 117%; zinc, 314%; and, oh yes, oil, 177%. (see "Let's Shoot the Speculators," by Robert J. Samuelson, Newsweek.com)

Oil prices are set in world markets, and demand has risen sharply while production hasn’t. China and India alone account for 70 percent of increased consumption.

While Democrats blame Bush, oil companies, and speculators, they continue banning drilling in ANWR (2200 acres of mosquito-infested tundra and bog, about the size of a small airport) and offshore (out of sight from land). Democrats fan fears of offshore drilling oil spills, which now average only 6500 barrels a year, or less than four days worth of natural daily seepage.
(see "Stop the Energy Insanity," By Mortimer B. Zuckerman, USNews.com)

Democrats argue that drilling now wouldn’t produce more oil for ten years. That’s what they said ten years ago. Had we drilled then, we’d have more oil now from reserves totaling 96 billion barrels (equal to 200 years of Saudi Arabian imports), plus 420 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.

Unlike Democrat scapegoating, we would actually be doing something to reduce gas prices.

Unglued Idiot of the Day - Governor Schwarzenegger

It’s sad when the steroids that bulk up your body make your brain muscle-bound too. Today Arnold shows that some of his injections when right to his brain. With no evidence that man-caused global warming exists, but abundant evidence that natural climate change is occurring, the anthropogenic Austrian has criticized President Bush for not believing in something for which there is no evidence of its existence.

Next he will be all over President Bush for not believing in the Tooth Fairy and Easter Bunny.

It’s too bad that Arnold didn’t have time between injections to study World History and learn of recent periods of greater natural warming: the Medieval Warm Period of 1,000 years ago, and the Holocene Optimum of 5,000 years ago. Or he could have learned of the end of the last Ice Age, only 18,000 years ago, or the terrible famines, epidemics, and storms of the recent Little Ice Ages.

Had he but known of these recent natural climate extremes, he wouldn’t have exposed his Mr. World ignorance - unless, of course, it’s just more pandering to the immensely ignorant masses of California Democrats, who have made him what he now is: just another fumbling, bumbling California politician, succeeding only in making things worse with every misguided attempt at improvements.

It’s Grey Davis on steroids with a charisma transplant.

Unglued Idiot of the Day Award - Paul Krugman of the New York Times

A very upset woman once phoned her bank, outraged that checks she had written were bouncing. “What do you mean, I have to stop? I still have lots of checks left.”

In his article, Mr. Krugman acknowledged that Medicare is broke:

This year, the automatic cuts (Medicare expenses far exceed income) would have reduced doctors’ payments by more than 10 percent, a pay reduction so deep that many physicians would probably have stopped taking Medicare patients.

In previous years, payments to doctors were maintained through bipartisan fudging: politicians from both parties got together to waive the rules. In effect, Congress kept Medicare functioning by expanding the federal budget deficit.

In other words, Medicare is broke.

Mr. Krugman applauds the Democrats for solving the Medicare insolvency problem by ignoring it. According to Mr. Krugman, this is a positive step towards universal rather than privatized health services.

Let’s see if we can sum this up. The government run health system, Medicare, is insolvent and cannot pay its obligations without violating the rules that established its payment methodologies.

The Democrat answer is not to do anything to rescue Medicare from insolvency, like privatization, but instead to increase payment rates beyond legally established levels, and expand the federal budget deficit.

Why do we criticize the woman who wrote checks beyond the funds in her account, when we elect leaders to do the same with our tax money?

For being such a vocal advocate for irresponsible Medicare management, Paul Krugman is today’s honored recipient of the Unglued Idiot of the Day Award. From the evidence of his past articles, Mr. Krugman will consider criticism of his advocacy of irresponsible government spending to be an honor.

Unglued Idiot of the Day Award - Barack Obama (2nd Award)

After being a part of the Democrat chorus about President Bush being a “unilateralist” and not working with allies, Obama comes out with a pronouncement on Iran that shows he favors being a unilateralist and not working with our European allies.

This is his pattern: criticize when President Bush does one thing, and criticize again when he does the other.

H's saintly grandmother must have at sometime told him, “You can’t have your cake and eat it too.” (To Democrats President Bush is "W", and to me, Senator Obama is "H." Fair's fair.)

Unless you’re an unglued Democrat idiot.

Congratulation, Mr. B. Hussein Obama.

You’re our first repeat “winner.”

Unglued Idiot of the Day - Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd

This one is too easy. Australian PM Rudd is a raving fool every day, but when he speaks of Australia’s role in fighting “man-caused” global warming, he reaches the epitome of lunacy.

An able Australian columnist, Andrew Bolt, notes that the draconian measures Australia could inflict on its economy to reduce CO2 emissions would be equal to 28 days of world emissions in the next decade. In other words, following Al Gore’s admonishments would destroy Australia’s economy with no measurable effect on world weather.

Bolt also reports that India has been tracking climate changes in India for many decades, and does not detect any of significance.

It is obvious that fighting global warming is a “solution in search of a problem.”

Unglued Idiot of the Day Award – Barack Obama Wriggling on Troop Withdrawal

The following excerpt is from an International Herald Tribune article, Changing dynamics in Iraq pose challenge for Obama, By Michael Cooper and Jeff Zeleny, Published: July 4, 2008.

Obama said that under his plan, there would still be combat troops in Iraq in 2010, seven years after the war began. And he questioned the premise that the recent gains could complicate the withdrawal.

"Those are the same folks who said that we can't pull troops out because things are too violent," he said. "Now that the violence has subsided, you can't pull troops out because things have improved. It's a Catch-22."

So, Mr. Obama, what is confusing you?

Things were too violent, so we didn’t pull the troops out, and now the violence is greatly reduced. So it was a good idea to leave the troops there, wasn’t it? And you were wrong to oppose leaving the troops there to quell the violence, weren’t you?

Now that the violence has subsided, you want to pull the troops out and let the violence increase again? Then what should we do?

I bet your grandmother once told you, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”

Mr. Obama, you have what appears to me a thoroughly undeserved reputation for intelligence. What sense is it to succeed in reducing the violence, and then set the stage for a recurrence of violence?

Mr. Obama, the United States had and still has bases in countries that haven’t attacked us for over half a century, or more (the UK hasn’t attacked us for almost 200 years, and we still have bases there). While in the Air Force I was stationed in Turkey and England, and had duty at bases in Japan, Korea, Germany, Thailand, and The Philippines. My oldest son was stationed with the Army in Germany for a total of ten years.

Why wouldn’t we maintain troops in Iraq indefinitely, as long as it serves our national purposes, the same as we have in so many other countries?

That Democrat donkey kicked you in the head, right?

That explains why you're "Stuck on Stupid."

Unglued Idiot of the Day – Nancy Pelosi and the Fairness Doctrine

Nancy Pelosi, perennial contender, wins the Unglued Idiot of the Day Award for June 25, 2008, for her support of bringing back the “Fairness Doctrine,” which was dispatched during President Reagan’s administration.

Rep. Mike Pence (R.-Ind.) has written a bill to outlaw the “Fairness Doctrine” - which would require radio station owners to provide equal time to radio commentary when it is requested.

Nancy Pelosi supports the resurrection of the Fairness Doctrine, primarily because conservatives have done such a good job of gaining and holding the interest of radio talk show audiences, and liberals have not. According to Ms. Pelosi, New York Democratic Rep. “Louise Slaughter has been active behind this [revival of the Fairness Doctrine] for a while now.”

I have a theory about why Democrats want to revive the moribund “Fairness Doctrine.” It’s a desperate attempt to save Air America. Air America, with its ultra-liberal lineup of hosts, steadily tanked from its opening, which is terminal and is maintained on life support only by the Liberal practice of throwing good money after bad. Theoretically, if stations broadcasting Air America had to also include conservative shows – Rush, Hannity, etc. – then maybe people would listen, and sponsors would sponsor.

Air America is like the host of failed Liberal schemes of the last century. If a dumb Liberal idea isn’t working, then the problem must be that it was underfunded, and instead of mercifully pulling the plug and allowing “death with dignity,” Liberals throw more money (usually other people’s) at it.

Off the top of my head, examples include: busing to integrate schools (which succeeded in increasing school segregation while wasting scarce education resources); refusing over ten years ago to allow oil drilling offshore and in ANWAR “because we won’t get more oil for ten years” (now it’s ten years later, and we would have more oil, except… and now Democrats are again saying we shouldn’t drill because “because we won’t get more oil for ten years”); unilaterally saving the planet from “global warming” by proposing destruction to the United States economy, while China and India feed their burgeoning economies a steady diet of oil and coal; and proposing to lower gas prices by increasing taxes on oil companies (I know Liberals who think this will work, the same ones that believe you can raise taxes to grow the economy).

Actually, I don’t believe reviving the “Fairness Doctrine” is a Liberal attempt to save Air America; it just gave me another way to kick failed Liberal programs around some more.

I actually believe that all Liberals want to do is kill the popular outlet for conservative thought, talk radio, because they tried to compete with Air America and failed miserably. In accordance with the Liberal doctrine of “if you can’t compete with it, kill it!”, Democrat legislators know that if they require radio stations to carry expensive but unpopular Liberal programs, the radio stations will have to drop the popular conservative shows and go back to brain-dead formats like “all news,” of course provided by the Liberal dominated Main Stream Media.

Now there’s a good idea! Why don’t Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats require all news and entertainment media to provide equal time? What makes radio different from television, magazines, and newspapers? Throwing aside irrelevant technicalities, they are all in the entertainment business.

Why are news readers (the appropriate British title for news anchors) Katie Couric, Brian Williams, Charlie Gibson and Diane Sawyer paid huge salaries? Why is Rush Limbaugh paid more than four prestigious anchors – according to the New York Times, his new contract calls for $400 million through 2016 – combined!?

While the Liberals in my half-vast audience are fuming about Rush’s high valuation, I’ll answer my own question: Rush is paid exorbitant sums because that is his entertainment value. Anyone can read a news article, but only Rush can comment on that article in such a way that he has a huge daily audience eager to hear his take on daily news items. If a radio station carrying his program was forced to run programming every day that in essence said, “we don’t agree with Rush,” that station would lose audience in droves as soon as Rush signed off each day.

Instead of engaging in such programming stupidity, Rush’s stations follow his show with Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, and other popular conservative talk show hosts, building on Rush’s popularity instead of fighting to diminish his effect.

Tiger Woods has a similar effect in golf. There are thousands of professional golfers, and I’m sure that Liberals feels each should be given a chance to appear in a tournament. Therefore, if golf was run the way Democrats want to do radio, each tournament would have to have an equal mix of winners and losers.

Until the Democrats spread their influence wider, golf and most other activities will select participants by ability, not some politicians’ idea of “fairness.”

However, that won’t stop the Democrats from trying to “hush Rush.”

Michael Kinsley Sank by Swift Boat

To Swift-Boat or Not
Time Magazine, Thursday, Jun. 12, 2008 By MICHAEL KINSLEY

Michael Kinsley remarks early in his article that “Swift-boat is shorthand for the brilliant, despicable Republican campaign strategy in 2004 that turned John Kerry's honorable service in Vietnam into a negative factor in his campaign. “

Then Kinsley dismisses any arguments about the merits of Kerry’s service:

If you remember the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth campaign and don't see anything wrong with it--or if you believe it was the work of "independent" operatives unconnected to George W. Bush's campaign--I'm not going to waste precious space on the back page of a national newsmagazine arguing with you.

I for one remember the Swift-Boat campaign – it is seared, seared in my memory.

Just like John Kerry’s memory of Christmas 1968 in Cambodia.

"I remember Christmas of 1968 sitting on a gunboat in Cambodia. I remember what it was like to be shot at by Vietnamese and Khmer Rouge and Cambodians, and have the president of the United States telling the American people that I was not there; the troops were not in Cambodia. I have that memory which is seared -- seared -- in me."

This was the version of his Swift Boat exploits that John Kerry gave on the floor of the Senate in 1986 in a “carefully prepared 20-minute oration against aid to the Nicaraguan contras.”
(Kerry’s Cambodia Whopper, Washington Post, By Joshua Muravchik, Tuesday, August 24, 2004; Page A17)

The president he referred to, Richard Nixon, would not take office for another month. The Khmer Rouge were a couple of years away. None of Kerry’s supporters corroborated his searing memories of any Cambodian incursions.

I don’t see anything wrong with Swift-Boat veterans or anyone else making an issue of Kerry’s truthfulness about his Christmas in Cambodia claims, do you, Mr. Kinsley?

If you do, Mr. Kinsley, are you opposed to seeking out truth, or only opposed when a Democrat is challenged? Do you think Kerry told the truth about his 1968 Christmas in Cambodia?

We soon learned that there was no way a Swift Boat would have gone unnoticed into Cambodia. One, the border was well marked and patrolled; you just didn’t stumble across it, because the Mekong flows directly out of Cambodia into Vietnam. Two, a Swift Boat is large and extremely noisy; only a fool or a Democrat would even conceive of one being used for clandestine activities.

But enough of beating on a deserved loser for the lies he told repeatedly over a period of three decades.

Is it fair that Michael Kinsley gives Republicans sole credit for a campaign strategy in 2004 that turned a man’s honorable military service into a negative factor in his campaign?

If you think the answer is yes, then I'm not going to waste precious time in this fascinating blog arguing with you.

Like Hell I’m not!

There was an organized effort by Democrats in 2004 – and before – to denigrate George W. Bush’s service as a fighter pilot in the Texas Air National Guard. This effort was despicable at many levels.

The first is that at the time George Bush and John Kerry volunteered for duty, serving as a National Guard fighter pilot, even in peacetime, was far more dangerous than Swift Boat service. George Bush went through hazardous pilot training, and then was assigned to fly aircraft intercept missions, often in all weather conditions and at night.

The critics of his service must not have ever served in the military to be so ignorant of the dangers of flying fighter aircraft intercept missions at night and in foul weather.

In contrast, when Kerry chose Swift Boats, their mission was coastal, and only later were Swift Boats assigned riverine warfare duties. Even then, the threat from the Viet Cong was minimal, since they had no ships or guns that posed credible threats to the fast, armored and well-armed Swift Boats.

The cause célèbre of the Democrat’s attack on George Bush’s military service was the forged Texas Air National Guard (TANG) letters that CBS News and Dan Rather rushed before the American public. Unfortunately for CBS News and Dan Rather, the American viewing public included both computer and military experts. The computer experts immediately identified features in the letters that could not have been produced by the typewriters used by squadron military administrative assistants at the time they were purportedly written, and the military experts identified the use of Army terminology instead of Air Force.

Now only Dan Rather, and probably Michael Kinsley, believe that the TANG letters were genuine. And probably only Mr. Kinsley believes that they were the work of "independent" operatives unconnected to John F. Kerry's campaign.

So, Mr. Kinsley, what’s the score?

The Swift Boat Veterans for Truth exposed obvious Kerry lies.

On the other hand, Democrats engaged in a campaign to smear George Bush’s military service that ignored the inherent dangers of flying fighter aircraft, and attempted to pass off forged documents to discredit his service.

Isn’t it odd that you are offended by the one, and not the other?

Are you a seeker of truth, or just another Democrat tool?