Plan here.
[UPDATE]: Speech done; copy can be found here. Lots of good stuff in it: to quote @DrewMTips…
Shorter Rick Perry: “What’s my plan? Just about every popular conservative idea that’s been floating around for 30 years”.
Pretty much, pretty much. I like ending baseline spending, myself. A lot.
Moe Lane (crosspost)
So… the Maryland redistricting map was revealed and signed into law recently, and – shock! Surprise! – the Democratic-controlled legislature managed to hack into one of the two Republican seats. The short version: they went into Roscoe Bartlett’s MD-06, switched out a bunch of districts to make it more competitive, and then put central Maryland into the redistricting blender and hit ‘puree.’ Because, well, central Maryland is dominated by the Baltimore and Washington DC metro areas, which is another way of saying that it’s prime Democrat country. The redistricting is likewise allegedly designed to give current Congressman John Sarbanes an easy, carefree life until such time as there’s a vacancy for MD-SEN; all in all, if you were hoping to see a Maryland redistricting map that didn’t look like a four-dimensional jigsaw puzzle, well, be disappointed yet again.
There’s just one small problem for the Maryland Democratic party, and it’s called the Voter Rights Act of 1965. Or, perhaps, ‘karma.’ Continue reading Maryland redistricting map to get Voter Rights Act challenge.
Screw it, I’m recycling this one. You know why.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZjavMEeXF4&feature=related
[UPDATE]: Welcome, Hot Air readers. I ain’t proud: Paypal’s on the side over there. I promise to frivolously spend it on roleplaying and video games, if that helps.
Via @MelissaTweets / @chuckdizzle comes this heartwarming story about how an internal dispute at Occupy Wall Street is threatening to bring the whole, somewhat fetid, thing down. Reportedly, the actual community – you know, the ones who pay taxes and actually live/work there – is SICK AND TIRED OF THE DAMNED DRUMMING GOING ON ALL THE TIME WHEN DECENT PEOPLE ARE TRYING TO GET THEIR KIDS TO SLEEP, and they’re on the verge of sending in the cops with the mops. Meanwhile, the Occupiers are a little slow on this entire ‘recapitulating civilization’ thing, so they’ve not yet culturally evolved to the point where they can force the DAMNED DRUMMERS TO STOP THE DRUMMING AT ALL HOURS OF THE DAY AND NIGHT. Because drummers WON’T STOP DRUMMING. EVER*. All of which means (supposedly) that unless the Occupiers can get their shit together – or more accurately, gone – shit will go down tomorrow at the real community board meeting.
And if you’ve never been to a community board meeting when it goes bad, well. It’s not pretty.
Mind you, @allahpundit refuses to believe that this isn’t a parody, which is fair: it’s hard to believe that such people as this… Continue reading #OWS hears the drums, drums, drums in the deep.
OK, let’s set the scene: you have these two guys named Steven Preckwinkle, and David Piccioli. Preckwinkle is the Director of Political Activity for the Illinois Federation of Teachers; Piccioli is one of its Legislative Directors. Neither is an actual teacher. Both of these men are getting to that age (Preckwinkle is 59; Piccioli, 61) where they’d like to retire, but… they’re lobbyists – which means that they’re union officials, not teachers. However, the Illinois legislature in 2007 passed legislation that allowed teachers union officials to be grandfathered into the state teachers pension system, with their union employment counting for the purposes of determining a pension – just so long as those officials had been plugged into the system by the time that the law had been signed. So Preckwinkle and Piccioli went out, got their teaching certificates, each subbed for a day – and thus became eligible to participate in a generous pension system originally designed to benefit teachers, which are generally held in higher esteem than are either union officials or lobbyists, and for excellent reasons.
The only entertaining thing about this is that Preckwinkle at least may not actually be able to take advantage of this loophole after all; the union lobbyists are ‘only’ being permitted to buy into the aforementioned generous pension system, and the recent economic woes are making it difficult for the poor lobbyist to make all the back payments. We are still talking about almost four to six million dollars being paid out to these individuals over the next two decades, which is still one heck of a bargain if either can scrape up the cash. And, again: this was a pension designed to be generous to teachers. Real teachers, not people who substitute taught for a day. Continue reading #rsrh Illinois and the magical lobbyist pension exemption.
You can see it here*: I’ll be damned if I have that filthy Jew-hating bastard’s video on my own site. But I will say this… I’m betting that Team Perry (and Team Gingrich) appreciates how much you hate them, schmuck:
But to be fair, David Duke also hates Teams Romney & Santorum. Well, actually, David Duke just hates everybody in the GOP, OK?
Moe Lane
*Obviously, it has to be up somewhere, so that you can see it for yourself. But still, I’m glad for the ability to hyperlink.
Eric Schmidt’s not very happy with life:
Eric Schmidt, executive chairman of Google, gave a remarkable interview this month to the Washington Post. So remarkable that Post editors preceded the transcript with this disclosure: “He had just come from the dentist. And he had a toothache.”
[snip]
“So we get hauled in front of the Congress for developing a product that’s free, that serves a billion people. OK? I mean, I don’t know how to say it any clearer,” Mr. Schmidt told the Post. “It’s not like we raised prices. We could lower prices from free to . . . lower than free? You see what I’m saying?”
Yeah, Eric: you’re saying that your company got mugged by the branch of the legislature (i.e., the Senate) still controlled by the political party (i.e., the Democrats) that you’ve been giving a badly-disguised leg up for some time now, and you don’t care for it.
…Oops?
Moe Lane
I loved Captain America: The First Avenger when it came out, particularly for this exchange:
Red Skull: What makes you so special?
Captain America: Nothing. I’m just a kid from Brooklyn.
Heh. So was I, Steve. So was I. It’s coming out tomorrow: can’t wait.
And so, adieu to X-Men: First Class. Which I also quite liked, for different reasons.
Moe Lane
Yup! I’m going there.
It’s funny: by the standards of a lot of people in the GOP I’m pretty firmly in the ‘pro-amnesty squish’ wing. [INSERT INTEMPERATE RESPONSE TO INSULTING AND PROVOCATIVE STATEMENT THAT WILL NOT FOSTER PARTY UNITY, BUT WILL MAKE THE RESPONDER PERSONALLY FEEL BETTER ABOUT BEING CALLED A RUDE NAME HERE] So it’s always a little interesting to talk about the immigration debate in the primaries. Particularly since the two people that I’ll be talking about – Rick Perry and Mitt Romney – are both considered to be pro-amnesty squishes themselves by some.
First off, we have what is an entertainingly unhinged response by Team Romney over something written about Rick Perry in passing by MSNBC:
Continue reading Romney, Romneycare, *free* health care, and illegal immigrants.
The background: Politico did an article on how Democrats across the land who have tough battles ahead in 2012 are kind of… avoiding… the President these days. The quote below comes right after the article in question noted that most sitting North Carolina Democrats were distinctly unwilling to get within camera range of Barack Obama:
“[Obama] may end up being Walter Mondale of 1984,” said Raleigh-based Democratic strategist Brad Crone, recalling how the only elected official who risked being seen with the party’s nominee that year was the longtime agriculture commissioner.
Man. Those ag commissioners are afraid of nothing, huh? Must be all that contact with genetically engineered food. No, really: I hear that the latest generation of GM corn has taken to carrying around switchblades and hassling the rutabagas. Continue reading Local Democrats still incognito when President Obama visits?
