Tag: dumber than soap

Nancy Pelosi comes out strongly for… limiting federal court jurisdiction over the states?

This was considered a problem?

No, really: when asked a question about the debt ceiling/so-called “fiscal cliff” today Nancy Pelosi decided to respond by talking about how she was on the side of the Eleventh Amendment.  For those of you who need reminding, that’s the one that limits the ability of federal courts to permit private citizens in one state from suing other states as a whole (they can still sue private citizens in other states).

The Judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States by Citizens of another State, or by Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign State.

Anyway, this embrace of federalism by the House Minority Leader would be great – after all, I don’t particularly want, say, Californian eco-freaks suing Texas over its oil production; and probably neither do most of the people reading this – except that I don’t believe Nancy Pelosi for a second. She’d downright love to get that tool in the progressive toolbox, frankly. Continue reading Nancy Pelosi comes out strongly for… limiting federal court jurisdiction over the states?

#rsrh :raised eyebrow: Boehner’s comment is news, Mediate?

The quote in question:

[Congress is] just a slice of America, it really is. We got some of the smartest people in the country who serve here, and some of the dumbest.

I mean, I say this every freaking day. There are Members of Congress that I wouldn’t trust to put their shoes on the right way three days running.  I’m cheered to hear that the Speaker of the House is under no illusions, either…

A quick observation on the 8-K Fun.

Drawing on streiff’s excellent post: there has been at least one nice repercussion that has come from the entire sordid 8-K affair.  Thanks to it, you can pretty much filter out the ‘geniuses’ with no practical business experience; they’re the ones who have never seen an 8-K in their life, don’t know what one is for, don’t know when one needs to fill one out (or even why), and are especially startled to discover that there have to be fairly stringent penalties in place in order to convince corporations to fill out nitpicking paper-trail bureaucratic clap-trap without having to be nagged constantly for it.

You know.  Idiots.

Megan McArdle is not an idiot – and miracle of miracles! – neither is most of her comments section, for a change.  Gives you an idea of just how comprehensively Waxman – who has apparently never seen an 8-K in his life, doesn’t know what one is for, doesn’t know when one needs to fill one out (or even why), and is especially startled to discover that there have to be fairly stringent penalties in place in order to convince corporations to fill out nitpicking paper-trail bureaucratic clap-trap without being nagged constantly for it – mucked up this one.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

We elect far too many Constitutional illiterates to high office.

Yes, I know: you’re looking at the screen and nodding slowly, as you would towards somebody who has blurted out an ‘insight’ that everyone else in the room had had five minutes ago.

(CNSNews.com) –  When asked where specifically the Constitution authorized Congress to mandate that individuals buy health insurance, Sen. Jack Reed (D.-R.I.) said that he “would have to check the specific sections” but said that it was like making people “sign up for the draft.”

And in fact I had already worked said insight out a while ago.  But… sometimes you just have to come out and repeat the obvious, dammit.

Via Dan Collins‘ Twitter.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

Rasmussen CA-SEN: Fiorina within MoE of Boxer.

Although even Rasmussen has to say “It’s California.”

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey finds that Boxer attracts 45% of the statewide vote while Fiorina, her best-known possible Republican challenger, earns 41%. Seven percent (7%) say they’d vote for some other candidate, and seven percent (7%) are undecided.

In March, Boxer led Fiorina by nine, 47% to 38%.

Any incumbent who polls below 50% early in a campaign is considered potentially vulnerable. However, a Democrat running in a heavily Democratic state like California is often able to overcome weak poll numbers.

Which is very true: but it’s also Barbara Boxer. This is not a very good period of time to be reflexively supporting more taxes, less energy, and the imposition of health care rationing – and, given some of the topline results to this survey (MoE is 4.5%, by the way), you have to wonder how ‘heavily Democratic’ it is these days. On first reading, the results read as being more anti-incumbent than anything else: Fiorina isn’t even formally in the race yet, although these numbers are certainly encouraging enough. Chuck Devore (who is in the race) is probably finding them encouraging, too; people in California just aren’t happy with the status quo right now – and contra Rasmussen, you shouldn’t ignore sub-50 ratings if you’re a politician who wants to keep her job.

I’d assume that Senator Boxer is taking that into consideration, except, well.

Crossposted to RedState.

Harry Alford, revisited.

Twenty-one minutes long, but worth every second: this Breitbart interview with Harry Alford was done over the phone, so you can safely stick it in the background and listen and not miss anything.

Mr. Alford, as you remember, went round and round with Senator Barbara Boxer* over some racial attitudes that the latter has yesterday; he expanded on this a bit more. Highlights from the interview:

  • He and the NBCC are not shills for Republicans. In fact, they’re going to be on the other side on the health care issue. Mr. Alford himself is an independent.
  • This level of racially-motivated condescension is all the more outrageous because he’s never been treated like this before, in over a decade of testimony.
  • Mr. Alford’s – fully justified – outrage seems based on the fact that he was there to testify as a representative of a Black business organization, and Senator Boxer kept treating him as a Black representative of a Black (business) organization. Who was Black. Like all these other Black people who agree with Senator Boxer, so their Black opinions were just as relevant as Harry (Black) Alford’s.**
  • So if you’re going to dispute a report being used by the NBCC, and you simply must get your own Black people to back you up, they’d appreciate it if you went and got ones who can at least address the issue from an informed state.
  • And, oh yes: Boxer and staff ran away surprisingly quickly after the hearing.

Really, listen to the whole thing.

Moe Lane Continue reading Harry Alford, revisited.

Mental Parasite-free Kerry all caught up to AT LEAST 2006!

If you’re into science fiction at all, you’ve probably come across the concept of the Puppet Masters: creatures, usually alien (although sometimes demonic), that insidiously take over people and make them into organic robots with no free will or volition. Staple of the genre, in fact – but one thing that never really got addressed in the books or movies is what happened to long-term victims of the insidious mental parasites, once the control had been removed. Sure, the hero or heroine always snapped back, but they were usually only mind-controlled for several hours or weeks, tops. What would a puppet who had been ridden for thirty years look like, once that rider was removed?

Probably much like this:

The Bay State senator was telling a group of business and civic leaders in town at his invitation about the “bizarre’’ tale of how South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford had “disappeared for four days’’ and claimed to be hiking along the Appalachian Trail, but no one was really certain of his whereabouts.

“Too bad,’’ Kerry said, “if a governor had to go missing it couldn’t have been the governor of Alaska. You know, Sarah Palin.’’

[Via Hot Air: bolding mine]

…Yes. Yes, she is Governor of Alaska, Senator. Well done!

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

The Speaker changes her story AGAIN.

I said, ‘dumber than soap’ once*.  I stand by that statement.

(Via Hot Air Headlines) John Feehery, in the process of pointing out five reasons why we’re not dead yet as a party, noted this little comment by our illustrious Speaker of the House:

“It is important for us to have a strong Republican Party,” Democratic Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi tauntingly told a press conference on April 23. “And I hope that the next generation will take back the Republican Party for the Grand Old Party that it used to be.”

Well, since we’re discussing our hopes, Speaker, I have one of my own. I hope, someday, to have someone in your current job who can keep his or her story straight.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi insisted Friday that she was briefed only once about the “enhanced” interrogation techniques being used on terrorism suspects and that she was assured by lawyers with the CIA and the Department of Justice that the methods were legal.

Pelosi issued a statement after CIA records released this week showed that Pelosi was briefed in September 2002 on the interrogation methods. The briefings memo appeared to contradict the speaker’s claims that she was never told that waterboarding or other enhanced interrogation methods were being used.

“We were not — I repeat — were not told that waterboarding or any of these other enhanced interrogation methods were used,” Pelosi said on April 23.

The emphasis seems to be on “were used,” even though she conceded in a statement released Friday that she was told they would be used.

Speaker Pelosi, you hold the position once held by Joe Cannon, Henry Clay, Nicolas Longworth, Tip O’Neill, and Sam Rayburn. They were not all good people, all of them; but they were all effective, and they were none of them prone to panic in a tricky situation.

You do not measure up.

Moe Lane

*See here. And, of course, here.

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

No, really, Glenn: Dumber than soap.

[UPDATE]: I offer the traditional welcome to our Instapundit visitors – geekery on the main page, feel free to peruse – and cheerfully note to Dan Riehl that the woman did say it twice.  I’m only human.

My RS colleague Jeff Emanuel reported on this little oopsie by Speaker Pelosi:

The title of the YouTube was “Dumber than Soap,” which Glenn Reynolds was gentlemanly enough to discount. Alas, Jeff did some more digging, and it turns out that this wasn’t the first time:

Continue reading No, really, Glenn: Dumber than soap.