Moe Lane

Newsbusters (via Hot Air) has the details.  Short version: the realization that our current President is actually a pretty bad communicator of what I will charitably call his faction’s “ideas” is starting to sink in among our Beltway would-be overlords.  Particularly among the circadian media.  It then follows that, should a member of said media happen to want to get President Obama re-elected, it would be necessary to do some of the heavy lifting him- or herself.  Alas, there isn’t a block and tackle in existence that can lift Obama’s domestic policy out of the Swamp of Fail, so if you’re a self-appointed agitprop specialist for this administration you’re left with talking up the President’s foreign policy, which at least has the virtue of not having anything to do with Obamacare.

But, wait!  How can any of these people talk up Obama’s foreign policy ‘successes’ without also talking up George W Bush’s, given that the former is pretty much (badly) imitating the latter?  That’s a silly question: they open up their mouths and start talking.  You don’t think that they really meant all that old talk about how awful Bush’s foreign policy was, do you?  No, that was just pap for the room-temperature IQ Left – pap designed to get the media’s Democratic Beltway buddies some sweet, sweet House and Senate chairmanships.  But now things are serious.  Just ask Tom Friedman. (more…)

And you know that I never fisk things.  But I am going to fisk this one. Or at least translate it.

Dear Business Leader, 

[Dear company fiscally affected by our screw-up,]

This morning at approximately 4:30 a.m., the Oakland Police Department enforced the “Notice of Violations and Demand to Cease Violations” issued on Friday, November 11, to persons lodging at Frank H. Ogawa Plaza related to the Occupy Oakland demonstration.

[We finally sent out the cops to get rid of Occupy Oakland squatters, after they've spent over a month defecating all over our city.]

From the outset of the demonstration, which began a month ago on Monday, October 10, the City of Oakland has focused on three clear goals: 1) facilitating the protesters’ right to free speech and peaceful expression, 2) maintaining public health and safety, and 3) crowd control.

[We've been messing around with these people for a month now, despite the fact that they're such a menace to society that we've had to treat them as a public health issue.  But, hey, free speech! - We're kind of hazy on what that means, but it's important, right?]

City staff has been trying to communicate with the protesters from the outset of the demonstration, which began as a peaceful demonstration that was supported by many of the City’s elected officials, was funded by labor and enjoyed widespread support by many progressive groups and individuals as an outgrowth of the national and international “Occupy Wall Street” movement.

[oh god oh god oh god we didn't realize that they really were going to try to smash oakland please don't blame all us democrats who signed on because we were too young for summer of love oh please oh don't close your checkbooks everybody else was doing it too wait do it to julia do it to julia not me julia i don't care what you do to her tear her face off strip her to the bones not me julia not me]

Our goal has been to facilitate individuals to remove their tents, cooking facilities, and belongings, and to leave cooperatively. We partnered with community allies to help facilitate communication with the protesters regarding their departure, and we partnered with Alameda County to provide services to assist those with housing and behavioral health needs. It was only until this week, with the help of community dialogue, that we were able to obtain communication and facilitate partial voluntary removal in the Plaza.

[Yeah.  We took seriously these people's claim that they had the 'right' to squat on public property.  And then we couldn't get rid of them!  Who would have guessed?  Oh, yeah, not-Democrats.]

However, as of Sunday evening, a majority of protesters were still lodging in Frank H. Ogawa Plaza and given unfortunate occurrence of Thursday evening’s homicide, the City could not assure adequate public health and safety in the plaza. The complexity of securing an adequate level of mutual aid has been a challenge, and has impacted timing of the City’s response. We are fortunate that law enforcement agencies have made themselves available to provide this service, which has been coordinated by the County Sheriff’s Office.

[Let's not mention that riot last month, shall we?  Or that the city let the squatters come back.  Or that we let these people shut down the port last week.  And, yeah, there was that murder.  Guess it's not a good idea to 'off the pigs' after all, am I right?  Right?]

We have instructed City staff working around Frank Ogawa Plaza this morning to delay their arrival at to 10 am. We are sharing this information with Downtown Businesses so that you can use discretion on whether to delay your work day based on your assessment of the situation. I greatly respect the commitment and support that the business community has shown during these events and appreciate your patience this past month.  The City of Oakland is fortunate to have such a dedicated, resilient, and engaged business community.  We know that these have been trying times for your business and for Oakland’s economy in general.  We are committed to working with you now and into the future to strengthen Oakland’s business climate, create jobs, and grow the economy.

[Hide.]

We will continue to provide updates as they become available; news releases will be posted to www.oaklandnet.com throughout the day for additional information to assist with your decision-making process.

[No, really.  Hide.]

Sincerely,

Deanna J. Santana
City Administrator

[For now.]

I am beat.

Inquiring minds want to know.

Via Instapundit.

In the airport now, waiting for the flight; I was trying to download DCU Batman Year One,, but I’ve given it up as a bad deal. I have books for the flight; that’ll do.

As to Blogcon 11: lots of fun, especially the panel that I did (it always seems a little weird that people know who the hell I am without me having to tell them). Freedomworks put up a pretty impressive program; they (and Tabitha Hale in particular) should be commended. As for the Occupy Denver people… well, they never came back Saturday after getting thoroughly embarrassed and out-organized Friday, and I’m pretty sure that they started getting rousted from their squalid shelters at about the time that I was having some South Korean crispy BBQ beef dish downtown.

There’s a moral in that somewhere, I’m sure.

Moe Lane

It really does. I wonder why? Is it the accent, or just the subtle absurdity that we associate with the accent?

The last time I checked, didn’t the Left call this sort of thing ‘crony capitalism?’

Over the last year, the Obama administration has aggressively pushed a $433-million plan to buy an experimental smallpox drug, despite uncertainty over whether it is needed or will work.

Senior officials have taken unusual steps to secure the contract for New York-based Siga Technologies Inc., whose controlling shareholder is billionaire Ronald O. Perelman, one of the world’s richest men and a longtime Democratic Party donor.

(more…)

This is just darn funny, any way you look at it:

Jay-Z is releasing a new line of T-shirts in support of the Occupy Wall Street movement Friday via his Rocawear clothing label, but he doesn’t plan to share any of the profits with the protesters.

(more…)

I see (via Instapundit) that Seattle has spent over half a million dollars to keep the Occupiers under some sort of semblence of control, or indeed behaviors consistent with human beings who wear clothes and can function in society. This is, of course, half a million dollars that cannot be spent on other things, so the city is a little aggrieved.

Now, you may say “HA! Democrats. Tough.” But that would be unfair: even in Seattle there are beleagured enclaves of Republicans, conservatives and Ordinary, Decent Democrats that have to pay for the Occupiers’ inability to get past the emptiness of their childhoods. So I propose that the city of Seattle start sending the bills to the various corporations and groups that actually run the Occupy movement – and couple that with somewhat more rigorous paperwork requirements from these people. If nobody wants to take formal responsibility for this ‘movement,’ then they are merely a bunch of unwashed, unhygenic squatters whose squalid encampments may be thus scraped away with a front-end loader without further delay.

As the video mentions, Matt helped kick off the festivities this morning. We talked about Blogcon, Freedomworks, and various priorities for 2012:

It’s kind of sad when you show up to a protest and the people that you’re trying to intimidate have better and louder chants.

“We want the dog! We want the dog!” This is a reference to Occupy Denver’s decision to elect a border collie their leader last week, and frankly that might have been smart of them; they’re not very organized, poor things. Certainly not up to Tea Party standards…

Occupy Denver showed up – sans dog, the lamers – fifteen, maybe twenty of the kids. Kind of sad, up to the point where one of them tried to rush the door. Hotel’s apparently pissed at Blogcon for that, for some bizarre reason.

As for the Occupiers… surrounded two to one, with a camera ratio that was more like six to one in Blogcon’s favor. You’d think that these kids will have learned by now to emultate the Tea Party and either show up with a camera, or don’t show up at all…