Author: Moe_Lane

More threats to Chrysler by White House surface.

Personally, I can’t wait to hear how anonymous revelations don’t matter when they’re not advantageous to Democrats not involving endangering American troops through the revelation of national security secrets not suitable for use in an election against a Republican …well, I’m sure the Online Left will find a suitably plausible-sounding rationalization, even if it’s only plausible to them;

New Allegations Of White House Threats Over Chrysler

Creditors to Chrysler describe negotiations with the company and the Obama administration as “a farce,” saying the administration was bent on forcing their hands using hardball tactics and threats.

Conversations with administration officials left them expecting that they would be politically targeted, two participants in the negotiations said.

Although the focus has so been on allegations that the White House threatened Perella Weinberg, sources familiar with the matter say that other firms felt they were threatened as well. None of the sources would agree to speak except on the condition of anonymity, citing fear of political repercussions.

See Ace of Spades HQ, who’s already guessing which pushback will be used against this one; and Ed Morrissey, who’s having fun with the ‘madman theory’ thing. For my part, I’m actually a little surprised. I knew that the current President is woefully inexperienced – and not a little petulant – when it comes to dealing with people who don’t already love him, but surely he must have realized that things like this always come out in the end, yes? Continue reading More threats to Chrysler by White House surface.

Van Gogh’s Ear was an inside job!

Err… well, OK, that title doesn’t really work. Still! There was a conspiracy!

Gauguin ‘cut off Van Gogh’s ear’

Vincent van Gogh did not cut off his own ear but lost it in a fight with fellow artist Paul Gauguin in a row outside a brothel, it has been claimed.

It has long been accepted that the mentally ill Dutch painter cut off his own ear with a razor after the row in Arles, southern France, in 1888.

But a new book, based on the original police investigation, claims Gauguin swiped Van Gogh’s ear with a sword.

A PLOT! A PLOT BASED ON LIES! AND SECRETS! AND… SECRET LIES! WHAT DID CHARLES FLOQUET* KNOW, AND WHEN DID HE KNOW IT?

Moe Lane

PS: Alas, the book (“Van Gogh’s Ear: Paul Gauguin and the Pact of Silence“: sounds like a Harry Potter sequel) is not yet available.  But the first link there has some interesting odd stuff associated with it at Amazon anyway.

*Of course I had to look it up. I’ve never had to memorize the prime ministers of the Third French Republic, and now that there’s Wikipedia, I never will have too.

White House not to release Scare Force One photos.

(Via Drudge) I can actually understand this:

PHANTOM AIR FARCE PICTURES

The $328,835 snapshots of an Air Force One backup plane buzzing lower Manhattan last week will not be shown to the public, the White House said yesterday.

“We have no plans to release them,” an aide to President Obama told The Post, refusing to comment further.

People running in terror from our own airplanes don’t really photograph well.

Crossposted to RedState.

Barney Frank and the ‘Big Tent.’

Your laugh line of the day: “The party has grown by becoming the party of inclusion.”

…which is the worried reaction from a Lefty blogger who can’t quite understand why Barney Frank, head of the House Financial Services Committee, would say anything like the below in response to the way that the bankruptcy bill got shot down in the Senate (if only temporarily):

The reason that he said something like that, of course, is because the Democratic party is not the ‘party of inclusion:’ it’s the ‘party of expedience.’ The leadership (which is somewhat more liberal than its current Congressional roster, and very much more so than the rank and file) have been throwing this inclusion line around, with admittedly some success: but they have no intention of actually living up to it.
Continue reading Barney Frank and the ‘Big Tent.’

Regarding the Entire ‘Happy Cuatro de Cinco’ affair.

Much as I dislike having to disagree with the lovely and talented Mary Katharine Ham on any issue, I have to say that this particular incident is somewhat excusable. After all, Presidents are human beings; with their own special skills, advantages, and disadvantages. They’re not at all interchangeable.

On the eve of the Mexican holiday, Obama on Monday had an event in the East Room of the White House with Mexico’s Ambassador Arturo Sarukhan (sahr-oo-KHAN’).

Obama joked that it was “Cinco de Cuatro,” botching a play on the Spanish word for “four” when he meant to say “Cuatro de Mayo,” or the Fourth of May. He tried again, but he still did not get it right.

So it’s a bit unreasonable to expect Barack Obama to be as linguistically gifted as George W Bush*.

Moe Lane Continue reading Regarding the Entire ‘Happy Cuatro de Cinco’ affair.

“Play some Skynyrd, man!”

You know those drunken idiots who would shout that at hapless bar bands at every possible opportunity? Even when the band in question clearly had no desire or ability to play any Lynyrd Skynyrd song?


“FREEEEBIIIIIIIIIIRRRRRD!!!!!!!!,” Lynyrd Skynyrd

Yeah, I was one of those guys. And, let me confirm something that you might have always suspected: we really were doing it just to be jackasses.

Although calling for Turning Japanese (our usual alternative) should have been diagnostic in that regard.

Coming soon: unmanned helicopter with sniper rifle.

Because Life Is Not Fair. And apparently that Xbox 360 is going to come in handy after all:

UAV Helicopter Brings Finesse to Airstrikes
One shot, one kill, zero pilot. That’s the goal of the Autonomous Rotorcraft Sniper System, a new unmanned helicopter that’s controlled with an adapted Xbox 360 controller.

Of course, the conversation that the webcomic Backward Compatible imagines will probably never happen, but it probably should. After all, joystick versus mouse/keyboard is an actual debate…

Crossposted to RedState.

Free the Hops!

I’m as hyper-partisan as anybody else – but, really, I’m not going to get behind keeping Alabamans from getting access to something approximating decent beer.  Which is currently being stymied pretty much by one guy (from my party, unfortunately) who wants to filibuster the whole thing because he doesn’t like booze.

Background here.
Typically lecturing, yet more or less accurate The Next Right post on the problem here.
Latest word on the struggle here.
And, of course, the post that triggered this one here. I’m reprinting the specific instructions:

For those of you already tweeting (and the rest of you once you sign up), here are the necessary components your message should contain:

@SENATORERWIN #alpolitics #fth (insert your message here)
Here’s a sample of an one possible message you can use:

@SENATORERWIN #alpolitics #fth Please let the Senate vote on Free the Hops

As I’ll be updating this article from time to time indicating how many messages Senator Erwin has received, it’s important that you include the information above in your tweet so I can tally the results.

Please note that the Alabaman container/ABV rules do not currently prevent beer from being sold; they merely prevent good beer from being sold. Even if you think that the stuff that’s available in Alabama now is perfectly acceptable, show a little pity for the people that don’t, ‘kay?

Chris Dodd (D-CT) thinks that you’re all a bunch of Nazis.

[UPDATE] Welcome, AoSHQ readers.

Because you can tell the difference between pouring water on a towel held over the mouth of three separate individuals (and under very carefully controlled conditions), and sending 17 million people to the gas chamber*.


(H/T: Melissa Clouthier)

But, do you know something? Don’t get mad.

Get even.


More here.

Moe Lane

*For the record: this comment does not mean that I deny you your right to disapprove of the former. Merely that Dodd’s equation of it with the latter neatly shows why we have Godwin’s Law in the first place.

Crossposted to RedState.