Moe Lane

Because in an ideal world a man would rather be killed or die than tolerate being called a would-be Communist apparatchik.

[UPDATE] I just read the letter – also, did you know that the courts have just ruled that “the government has no anti-corruption interest in limiting contributions to an independent expenditure group”?  Translation: a group that wants to simply let people know , say, that Henry Waxman and Bart Stupak aspire to the level of East German rubberstamp apparatchiks can now spend as much money as they like to do so.

Hint, hint.

It seems that Volkskammer Energy Chair Henry Waxman will be investigating various capitalist entities for right-deviationism, sabotage, creeping defeatism, and of course general counter-revolutionary behavior*:

Perhaps that explains why the Administration is now so touchy. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke took to the White House blog to write that while ObamaCare is great for business, “In the last few days, though, we have seen a couple of companies imply that reform will raise costs for them.” In a Thursday interview on CNBC, Mr. Locke said “for them to come out, I think is premature and irresponsible.”

Meanwhile, Henry Waxman and House Democrats announced yesterday that they will haul these companies in for an April 21 hearing because their judgment “appears to conflict with independent analyses, which show that the new law will expand coverage and bring down costs.”

In other words, shoot the messenger. Black-letter financial accounting rules require that corporations immediately restate their earnings to reflect the present value of their long-term health liabilities, including a higher tax burden. Should these companies have played chicken with the Securities and Exchange Commission to avoid this politically inconvenient reality? Democrats don’t like what their bill is doing in the real world, so they now want to intimidate CEOs into keeping quiet.

No doubt the crypto-fascist wreckers on the Wall Street Journal‘s editorial board (and the capitalist running dogs of The National Review) will be the next brought in to answer to Parliamentarian Waxman, and his fellow-agents of the righteous anger of the People.

Moe Lane

PS: Hey, the Democrats can stop acting like this any time that they like.  Then I can stop, too.

*Otherwise known as ‘large companies required to announce large, immediate losses via increased taxation as a direct result of the new health care legislation.’  Why, the nerve of those… those… those capitalist stooges, and their primitive devotion to bourgeois truth and the technical letter of the law!

Crossposted to RedState.

I like Glenn Reynolds, but I think that he’s wrong here about why the President is mucking about with Israel right now:

I think Obama expects Israel to strike Iran, and wants to put distance between the United States and Israel in advance of that happening. (Perhaps he even thinks that treating Israel rudely will provoke such a response, saving him the trouble of doing anything about Iran himself, and avoiding the risk that things might go wrong if he does). On the most optimistic level, maybe this whole thing is a sham, and the U.S. is really helping Israel strike Iran, with this as distraction.

For three reasons:

1. He’s a Democrat, and Democrats are not very good at foreign policy.
2. He’s a Democrat, and Democrats are not very good at foreign policy*.
3. Even if he wanted to do this, his staff are all Democrats, and Democrats are not very good at foreign policy**.
   

Come right down to it, if the President was planning to implicitly or explicitly let Israel take care of our Iran problem we’d already know, because somebody in his administration would have leaked a warning to the Iranians via the New York Times.  Which is probably more ‘sedition’ than ‘treason’ – not much of a distinction, admittedly – but still something that any Democratic President has to take into account when trying to formulate a foreign policy at odds with the neocom wing of the Democratic party.

Moe Lane

*To paraphrase a classic: “I know that, technically, that’s only one [reason], but it was such a big one I thought I’d mention it twice.”

**Or three times.

Crossposted to RedState.

Yeah. We’ll get back to them on that.

Real Soon Now.

Moe Lane

PS: Trust me, there are a lot more of those kinds of pictures at the first link.

Oops.

And so (I suspect) ends the sad, vaguely sordid, and rather bizarre tale of Scott Ashjian. You should have vetted your spoiler candidate better, Harry:

A Nevada asphalt contractor who faces a legal challenge to his Tea Party of Nevada candidacy for U.S. Senate was hit Friday with felony theft and bad check charges in Las Vegas that allege he bounced a $5,000 business check last year.

Scott Ashjian is one of a record 22 candidates, including 12 Republicans, running for the seat held by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who is seeking a fifth term.

Bernie Zadrowski, head of the Clark County district attorney’s office bad check unit, said he would seek an arrest warrant Monday in Las Vegas Justice Court. Ashjian could face up to 14 years in state prison if convicted.

Via Hot Air Headlines. The actual Tea Party folks have already been pretty adamant about pointing out that they don’t know this guy, but there’s nothing like a bad-check felony arrest to torpedo an election bid.  Which means that the major Republican candidates can get back to the happy task of determining who is the most conservative of all (and thus worthy of the honor of beating Harry Reid like a drum), and that Harry Reid can get back to creating the tradition that Democratic Senate Majority Leaders always end their terms by losing a re-election bid…

Moe Lane

PS: Of course, there’s always the possibility that the Ashjian thing was really a convoluted cry for help on Reid’s part.  You know, a subconscious wish to fail or something like that.  It’d explain the lack of vetting, at least.

Crossposted to RedState.

The Sounds Of Silence, Simon And Garfunkel

…Interesting. I like it, but this and their other songs always make me feel like it’s a midwinter noon, with the wind painfully scraping the clouds from the sky. Paul Simon solo, on the other hand, is 8 PM in July somewhere where the sun’s been behind a building long enough to keep the temperature just short of sweltering. And there’s more cold beer, just over there.

Anyway.

…although I’m sure that various friends of mine will continue to suggest ‘nerd’ is more appropriate.

Via the Corner.  Tragically, some would insist on ‘dork;’ even more tragically, I don’t feel like giving those folks traffic.

Yeah, you: Brad Woodhouse of the DNC!  It’s cool if the state GOP raises some money on NH Democrat Nickolas Levasseur’s hate speech, right?

My Interests

Medicine, biology, mathematics, anything that doesn’t involve Organic Chemistry, cars that don’t begin with “Ford” and end with “Aspire”, HBO series, Bill Mahar, politics, the hunting of neo-conservative Reaganites (a shooting sport brought to you by the republican party in more ways than one!), sleeping (it is sad when necessary life takes become occational hobbies).

(Via Riehl World View) I mean, I know that he hangs with the President and everything, but, hey: on spelling errors alone surely we’re entitled to raise some cash off of him.  Particularly since he’s an actual racist, and not one of the imaginary ones that you constructed to get monthly revenues back up after February.

Moe Lane

PS: You guys should really start thinking about how many Nikolaus Levasseurs are out there and habitually talking trash because nobody in the Democratic party (present company not excluded, Brad) has had the backbone to police its own side.   Or maybe you shouldn’t: we’d like as many seats as possible in November.

Crossposted to RedState.

Which the actual film will undoubtedly have.

Gladiators V. Werewolves. Topless Robot has more, and by ‘more’ I mean the line “Finally, someone made the movie that was in my head during the entirety of 7th grade,” which is pretty much what I was going to write, only better.  Then there’s the actual film blurb: that it included the phrase  “The heroic Centurian” is the icing on what promises to be a veritable cake o’schlock.
Yes, I’m likely to see it.  Your point?

Well, here’s my Dana Walsh interview:

If my intro above the video sounds flat, it’s not because Dana is running in Nancy Pelosi’s district.  Having a candidate willing to speak truth to power in Madame Speaker’s home district is actually good news for the party and for conservatism; we need to contest these seats, and sometimes everything lines up for a challenger.  Dana’s a small business owner – the kind that will be steadily-more-squeezed by the health care monstrosity – and she’s not afraid to be a pro-War on Terror candidate in San Francisco. That’s worth respecting right there. (more…)

I’m going to say some time in mid-May. It’s going to take about that long for Palestinian terrorists – to the extent that they can be distinguished from either Palestinian ‘government’ – to internalize this new ‘weak horse’ stance of the United States:

…Mr Obama was less inclined to be so conciliatory. He immediately presented Mr Netanyahu with a list of 13 demands designed both to the end the feud with his administration and to build Palestinian confidence ahead of the resumption of peace talks. Key among those demands was a previously-made call to halt all new settlement construction in east Jerusalem.

When the Israeli prime minister stalled, Mr Obama rose from his seat declaring: “I’m going to the residential wing to have dinner with Michelle and the girls.”

As he left, Mr Netanyahu was told to consider the error of his ways. “I’m still around,” Mr Obama is quoted by Israel’s Yediot Ahronot newspaper as having said. “Let me know if there is anything new.”

(more…)

The call can be heard here (the language is NOT SAFE FOR WORK, although people getting tired of that one annoying loudmouth babbling about how he’s about to get murdered in his sleep by senior citizens upset about their health care might think differently); via Instapundit [Oops! Sorry, Glenn].

Moe Lane

PS: I’d just like to note for the record that I had forgotten about Jean Schmidt’s hit-and-run* until reminded; and that Rep. Schmidt has been a favorite target of the netroots since 2004 (as a woman who was pro-victory in Iraq, this is not really unexpected).  Apparently, at least one person out there remembers both; I suggest that Rep. Cleaver start earnestly praying that there aren’t more who only heard what he said, and not what he actually was seen to do.  Because what he did was recorded, by people who would be happy to release it as evidence.

So let’s all hope that doesn’t become an issue, hey?  Yes, even the DNC/DCCC: I don’t think that they want to get dragged into this any further than they have to, February fundraising deficit or no.

Moe Lane

*I understand that they never found the guy who did that, either.  Which is… interesting, no?

Crossposted to RedState.

This pretty much cuts to the roots of the Matter of Frum. It also impressed the heck out of a few people who work with snark on a regular basis.

Moe Lane

PS: If you’re just getting into politics, RealClearPolitics should be one of your go-to places.  They do authorized reprints of some of the most important daily articles (from both sides of the spectrum), collect polls from the major pollsters, and have a couple of blogs that I should link to more often.  Well worth perusing, whether Left or Right.