Moe Lane

Last week Scott Ott, Lisa Scheller, and Vic Mazziotti all won their elections to Lehigh County, Pennsylvania’s board of commissioners.  And, folks?  That’s what we need.  More of us actually elected at the local and state level.  Go in from the bottom, work your way up, influence the people around you as you rise.

…sayeth the guy who just sits around on a computer and types away all day.  Still, it is good advice.

Secretary Chu will take “full responsibility” today for the government’s decision to throw a half-billion’s worth of taxpayer money into a failing energy company, despite its own watchdogs’ recommendations (and the government’s decision to pressure Solyndra into not reporting layoffs until after the ’10 midterms) – while at the same time insisting that nothing untoward occurred. In other words, Chu will not take any kind of responsibility at all.

But this is not about ‘responsibility.’ This is merely the next step in the resignation game. Chu will be grilled today on this topic:

In advance of Thursday’s hearing, investigators with the Republican led committee released the latest batch of internal emails it has reviewed. Among them were emails that suggested that Energy officials asked the company to delay layoffs at its California facility until after the Nov. 2 midterm elections.

The two congressmen leading the investigation, Reps. Fred Upton (Mich.) and Cliff Stearns (Fla.) released a statement saying they hope Chu’s testimony will “shed light on key questions about the decision-making inside the Department of Energy and the role of other agencies and officials, from the Office of Management and Budget to the west wing of the White House.”

Secretary Chu will then be expected to beat his breast a bit. Then the President will express his ‘full confidence’ in his ‘embattled’ Secretary, which will be the signal for Republicans to release still more damaging revelations on the subject. Shortly thereafter, Chu will announce his resignation, in order to ‘spend more time with his family.’ End result: one Energy Secretary gone and a ‘tarnished’ administration.

And probably a Republican establishment that might be just a little confused about why the base isn’t happier about this. I mean, Chu’s gone, right? It’s always great to force out a Cabinet member – and there’s limits to what can be done in this sort of thing, anyway. I mean, what does the base expect, jail time?

Well, increasingly… yes, that is what they’re expecting.

Moe Lane (crosspost)

PS: Oops! Via Hot Air Headlines.

Walkin’ On The Sun, Smash Mouth

This made it onto a Weird Al Yankovic polka medley.  Those are, by the way, actually a fairly accurate predictor of whether a song’s any good or not; Weird Al has an ear for this stuff

The BBC and the Guardian both make them sound like a growing guerrilla army against the Assad regime, but you have to take virtually everything that comes out of that region with a ton of salt.  But somebody is attacking Syrian military targets: I just don’t know whether it’s this “Free Syrian Army.”  Or what the FSA’s long-term plans are.  Or anything else, really: there’s not much reliable info.

As I understand it, actual residents of the district are sufficiently enraged, infuriated, disgusted and distressed by the plague-ridden  squatters that were recently forcefully reminded that they happen to live in a civilization with actual rules that said residents are now making it clear that if the city caves and lets the squatters come back then there will be trouble.  Lawyer trouble.  It’s hard to blame them… actually, it’s impossible to blame them; after all, the Occupiers have the typical Activist Left bad habit of simultaneously worshiping the concept of the People, and being utterly contemptuous of the actual , not-Activist Left people around them.  I generally start grinding my teeth after half an hour in the presence of your standard Occupier-type, so I can only imagine what months of forced proximity to these people must be like.

Which probably explains why NY-08′s Jerry Nadler is considerably happier with the Occupiers than his constituents are: he doesn’t have to deal with them every day.   Although he may like the Occupiers more than he does his own constituents… (more…)

…but it’d actually be interesting to find out whether or not cows can detect magnetic fields.  Not least because, if cows can detect magnetic fields then the next question would be why cows can detect magnetic fields.  Generally, living creatures have abilities for a reason.  The reason may no longer apply in the modern era, but there should have at least been one to start out with.

I dunno.  I don’t think that abstract research in the sciences is a waste of time, per se.  It’s often a waste of money, or at least an inefficient use of limited funds – but then, you never know.

Via Instapundit.

…to Obamacare’s individual mandate provision, without ever once explaining why there’s a constitutional challenge to the individual mandate?

Here you go. In the interests of educating the populace – even those poor unfortunates who are stuck getting their news from The New York Times. God help them – here’s the central argument: forcing individuals to engage in commercial activity is not a Constitutionally enumerated right of Congress.  Buying health insurance is a commercial activity.  Proponents argue that the Commerce Clause applies, but if it does then frankly the Tenth Amendment is meaningless.  The Ninth, for that matter.  This would, of course, shock the life out of the Federalists and the anti-Federalists, given that these Amendments were explicitly ratified to reassure the latter that there would be clear limits to governmental power in the new Republic.

No, I am not going to explain any of those terms: if you have to ask what any of them mean, then you are not qualified for participation in this conversation.

Anyway, via RCP.

Moe Lane

PS: Almost forgot: yes, most locales require you to buy car insurance if you wish to operate a car.  Guess what?  There’s no federal mandate requiring citizens to own a car.  That means that car ownership is ultimately a choice – unlike, say, breathing. That means that the analogy is too tenuous to succeed.

[UPDATE] Before anybody starts complaining that I shouldn’t have taken this calendar entry seriously, I’d just like to note: as of 10:54 AM EST, so did up to 71 Wisconsin Democrats. One wonders how many people they’ll have sign up to conspiracy to commit election fraud before the plug is pulled? – I’m hoping for three digits, myself.

This almost has to be a fake. Surely the Democratic party of Wisconsin isn’t THAT brazen.

Surely?

Cemetery Petition Drive (Recall Petition Signing)

We will be taking names from headstones and making recall petitions with the names we find. We will start in Holy Angels Cemetary on Decorah and go from there.

The goal is 10,000 names – we can do this!

Here’s a screenshot for when this goes away – which it will, and probably within the hour. Which would be true either way, I suppose. Meanwhile, here’s an anti-recall ad from Scott Walker.

Remember, folks: Yes on Recall means Yes on Higher Property Taxes. Because the Left resents it when you take your tax money away from them. And that remains true, even if the cemetery thing isn’t.

Moe Lane (crosspost)

They’re too damn high and brutally hard to get rid of, on the average; and they’re largely that way because the colleges don’t actually have any skin in the game.  I think that it was Glenn Reynolds who suggested that one answer would be to allow student loans to be discharged by bankruptcy again – and to put the schools that facilitated the debt on the hook for ten percent of the liability.  Even if that’s just going forward (IANAL, but I think doing otherwise runs you into ex post facto territory), you’d still be amazed at how fast colleges get spiraling costs under control.

See?  I’m not totally heartless.  Or, at least, I can direct my heartlessness at Big Academia, which is frankly in need for a little laudable public humiliation and shaming.

The n-dimensional geniuses over at SEIU (Michigan) have decided to link up with the Occupy Ringworm people in declaring November 17th to be Bridge Action Day – which should, of course, be more accurately characterized as Bridge Inaction Day.  The idea is that all these public sector union folks will take an unofficial day off from their jobs – which are probably a lot more secure than the average private sector person’s – and use their paid-for leisure to block some Michigan bridges, which will of course keep ordinary Michigan workers from getting to work on time.  This is apparently to show… solidarity… with the people whose day SEIU is ruining.  No, don’t think about it too hard: you’ll just get a migraine from the resulting irony fumes.

Trust me on this.

Anyway, couple that with the inevitable copycat ‘direct actions’ – and, of course, this charming promise to firebomb Macy’s – and it becomes increasingly obvious that tomorrow might be an excellent time to telecommute to work.  Assuming, of course, that you still have a job that will let you do that, thanks to this marvelous economy that the Democrats have given unto us…

Moe Lane (crosspost)

Links via here and here.

Ode To A Superhero,  “Weird Al” Yankovic

Not really the music video, and I dunno why Weird Al Yankovic never did one.  It’s one of his better songs.

…looks like it’s official: I’ve been credentialed for the CNN/Heritage/AEI debate next Tuesday. This would be for RedState, by the way.  At any rate, I should have a considerably better seat this go round for blogging/tweeting the next debate.