When Liberals Lose…

The first course of action is to threaten those that oppose them, physically attack anyone identified specifically as supporting the opposing winning side. Simultaneously they head to the courts to declare that people, that is the voters, have no right to amend the constitution.
Well, hush ma mouf! All these years I labored under the misconception that was how constitutions were amended. Whadda know!

Here’s the definitive word from the California Supreme Court of Clowns:

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - California’s highest court has agreed to hear legal challenges to a new ban on gay marriage, but is refusing to allow gay couples to resume marrying until it rules.

The California Supreme Court on Wednesday accepted three lawsuits seeking to overturn Proposition 8. The amendment passed this month with 52 percent of the vote. The court did not elaborate on its decision.

All three cases claim the ban abridges the civil rights of a vulnerable minority group. They argue that voters alone did not have the authority to enact such a significant constitutional change. (emphasis mine)

“All I know is that I am not a Marxist” - Karl Marx 

“Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly, and applying the wrong remedies.” - Groucho Marx

Conservative radio pundits and some of their callers, along with a few bloggers, have described Barack Obama as a “Marxist. ”  If  by “Marxist” they mean that Obama’s politics are a brew of socialism, authoritarianism and radical egalitarianism, they’re right.  But I see no evidence that Obama believes in violent overthrow of our capitalist system, or in any of the real complexities Marxism aims at the stupid, the envious, the unbalanced, the power-mad and the credulous. 

True, the Black Liberation Theology of Trinity United is infested with Marxist class dynamics and socialism; it offers up some Marxian and Neo-Marxist musings on the subject of consciousness, hermeneutics, violence as means, and an entire honey bucket load of dialectical excreta.   But I doubt that Obama is a BLT believer; its spurious but powerful demands for charity and sanctioned humility compete with his personal vanity, his insight, and his desire for the good life.  We will not see Barack Obama in any real egalitarian arrangement.

As for Marxist orthodoxy, it’s difficult today to find any political philosophy, Left or Right, which doesn’t incorporate some of the prejudices, social values and processes which shaped the pseudo social-science built by Karl Marx.  Some hard, utilitarian market-love adored by conservatives is, in ways, Hegelian/Marxist.  It’s impossible to define or isolate Marxist “thinking” as the sole property of Marx.   

That’s because so little that Marx wrote about, or formulated, was actually original or creative; it consisted of pages of intellectual theft, and the elaboration of ideas and concepts broadcast by his predecessors, collaborators and contemporary superiors, among whom the primary concerns were human liberty and dignity.  The elements of “Marxism” were everywhere before Karl Marx grew his first beard.     

His ideas floated atop an age of rationalism, where eventually Darwin and Freud would add their own gears and wheels to the “scientific” study of mankind.  That Marx’s clockwork absurdities, his  observations and predictions have survived at all into our age of deconstruction is puzzling.  A lot of it is simply obvious and mundane, while its emotive theorizing and puffery continue an egalitarian road blazed by Rousseau, and the communard, utopian silliness of thinkers as far back as Plato.  

The reason I doubt that Obama is a Marxist is that Marxism has fallen on hard times and Obama is no consumer of the second-rate.  Marxism appears in a few places, like shiny scales dropping from a rotting fish - leftist riffraff, for example, who gorge on the lard of weirdo capitalism, then show up to protest in mass-marketed fancy-dress, and assert their devotion to a dead, 19th century socialist failure and crank. Laughable.  

You can also find Neo-Marxism in that intellectual burger joint, Critical Theory,  where brainy work is found for otherwise unemployable socialist academics. Critical Theorists question everything, including Marxism, except the dialectical process which makes Marxism possible.   Hello? Why?  Because without it, Critical Theory would be 100% charlatanry rather than just 99%. 

No, Obama is worse than a Marxist.  He’s a modern “progressive”,  a clever, wildly ambitious believer in the ever-progressing good society.  He believes that group life is a process, and that he’s going to have something to DO with it!  In his world, nothing can be left alone to develop, mature or even regress on its own.  He’s interested in YOU, and that should scare the hell out of you.    

GM Has $15.5 Billion Loss on U.S. Sales Drop, Leases

Aug. 1 (Bloomberg) — General Motors Corp., the largest U.S. automaker, reported a second-quarter loss of $15.5 billion because of plunging U.S. sales and the declining value of truck leases.
The deficit of $27.33 a share marks GM’s fourth straight quarterly loss and compares with a profit of $891 million, or $1.56, a year earlier. Excluding costs GM considers one-time, the per-share loss was 4 times bigger than analysts projected. Labor strikes contributed to a $9.9 billion drop in North American revenue, and sales worldwide tumbled 18 percent to $38.2 billion. [snip]

Big Oil rapes the Public

Exxon Mobil reported today its best quarterly profit in history…[],,,Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) reacted in remarks prepared for a Senate floor speech:

“Today there is some good news and some bad news. The bad news is that oil is at $123 a barrel and working people are paying $4 for a gallon of gas, and this coming winter residents of the Northeast could be paying over $5 for a gallon of heating oil. But there is some good news. Today, the CEOs of Exxon Mobil, Shell, BP and ConocoPhillips are celebrating. They’re feeling pretty good. And, they have good reason to feel that way. [snip]

Senator Sanders made no mention of giving GM any windfall loss tax rebate.
Rather curious that he thinks in that way, isn’t it?

Another thing Senator, the animal rights faction here at NER
want to know why you are wearing a lamb pelt on your head.

The Canadian Human Rights Commission will have to look at the facts to see if the perp is:

Knife-wielding man beheads fellow passenger on bus

A passenger traveling on a bus across Canada’s vast Western plains stabbed, gutted and decapitated a man seated next to him in an unexplained attack, a witness told media Thursday.

The victim had been sleeping before he was repeatedly stabbed in the chest by a man with a large knife, witness Garnet Caton told public broadcaster CBC.

If the victim is not Muslim, the Commission must determine is he dreamed an infidel thought besmirching the Prophet. You know of course, in Canada, mere thought is punishable by fines and public scourging, ask Mark Steyn. Beheading is however a bit stronger than a fine.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police said they were investigating a “major incident” that occurred at 9 pm Wednesday (0200 GMT Thursday) on a Greyhound bus traveling eastbound from Edmonton to Winnipeg, but offered no details.

Makes one glad the Canadians have strong gun control laws. Uh Oh, just like England, they’re using BIG knives. How civilized of them.

Glad too this is only a major incident, but what constitutes a horrible incident?

Teenager among four fatal stabbings in London in 24 hours

• A teenager is among four victims of separate fatal stabbings which took place in London over the past day, as a fifth man fights for life.

• His death brings the number of teenagers killed in the capital this year to 20 and comes just days after the Metropolitan police announced that knife crime had usurped terrorism to become their top priority.

• In Walthamstow, north east London, a man in his 20s was fatally stabbed in an attack in St David’s Court yesterday evening.

• In Tottenham, north London, a murder inquiry was launched after a man was found stabbed to death at the rear of a disused pub in Tottenham High Road.

• Four people remain in custody today after a 20-year-old man was fatally stabbed in Leyton, east London.
  The man, named locally as Adnan Patel, died from a stab wound to the chest after crashing his Ford Focus in Downsell Road, Leyton.
  Detectives are investigating whether he was fleeing from the occupants of a van who stabbed him in an apparent road rage attack moments earlier.
  Paramedics were called as passers-by gave emergency first aid and tried to stem the bleeding but Mr Patel died at the scene.

• A fifth man is in a life-threatening condition after a knife attack in London Willesden, north west London at 4.20am this morning.

All of these individuals are were upstanding citizens, who avoided fighting back which breaks the law. Instead, they calmly left all this unpleasantness up to the police.

Police officer dies of heart attack after being diagnosed with indigestion

From NHS, we get news of this money saving treatment. Brits better hope this doesn’t become the new medical rage.

A policeman with a family history of coronary disease was sent home and told to take indigestion remedy when a hospital failed to recognise he was having a heart attack.

PC Brian Burnett, 49, a dog handler, was three months away from retiring when he was taken ill with severe chest pains.

He went to Lincoln County Hospital’s accident and emergency unit where he was examined by a doctor and given an electrocardiogram (ECG) test to check his heart.

But he was told to go home and take Gaviscon, over-the-counter treatment for heartburn and indigestion.

PC Burnett collapsed and died 34 hours later from an atherothrombosis, a condition which leads to arteries becoming blocked.

His widow Christine has now been awarded a six figure sum in compensation three years after his death, with United Lincolnshire Hospitals Trust accepting negligence.

Of course, a tidy sum to be sure at first glance. Think of the tidy sums saved by not having the surgical costs on the NHS and savings on his pension.

National health care does save the system money.

Anna Temple, of United Lincolnshire Hospitals Trust, said: “We offer our condolences to the family of Mr Burnett.

How wonderful and sensitive of them to care.

What do Syria, Myanmar, Darfur, Hell, Afghanistan, Iran and Britain have in common? God-awful places to live is the answer.
However none except Britain are so uncivilized as to keep you from protecting life and property. The U.S. under the Donks and libs strive mightily to get us to that place particularly with the “progressive education” so enjoyed.

For more than two years, Sydney Davis’ house has been under siege from stone-throwing youths. And more than two hours into the latest attack on his family home, the police had yet to respond.

So after a particularly large missile landed in his kitchen, the 65-year-old grabbed a plank of wood and ran towards the gang to scare them away. But his desperate act came just as the police finally arrived on the scene - where they promptly arrested him for possession of an offensive weapon.

He now faces up to six months in prison. [snip]

In Britain, protecting oneself by means of a weapon, from assault with intent to maim or kill, is punishable with time in prison, not short either.

How did they get they get to this position. By the liberal method of constantly moving the goal posts back to get a bit more correctness in the law.

When the Donks took over congress in the ‘70’s here, they got their ideas from across the pond. We are about 10 years behind Britain in rampant stupidity, only because of luck and some members of SCOTUS. No problem seeing why the left vilifies the conservative side of the bench, is there?

A sampling of cases illustrates the impact of these measures:

In 1973 a young man running on a road at night was stopped by the police and found to be carrying a length of steel, a cycle chain, and a metal clock weight. He explained that a gang of youths had been after him. At his hearing it was found he had been threatened and had previously notified the police. The justices agreed he had a valid reason to carry the weapons. Indeed, 16 days later he was attacked and beaten so badly he was hospitalized. But the prosecutor appealed the ruling, and the appellate judges insisted that carrying a weapon must be related to an imminent and immediate threat. They sent the case back to the lower court with directions to convict.

A proper and PC verdict, would you say?
Now if the jogger said he was carrying the metal to help him lose weight and build up stamina, what could the prosecutor have said?
The lesson to be learned in this PC world is do not tell the truth!

In 1987 two men assaulted Eric Butler, a 56-year-old British Petroleum executive, in a London subway car, trying to strangle him and smashing his head against the door. No one came to his aid. He later testified, “My air supply was being cut off, my eyes became blurred, and I feared for my life.” In desperation he unsheathed an ornamental sword blade in his walking stick and slashed at one of his attackers, stabbing the man in the stomach. The assailants were charged with wounding. Butler was tried and convicted of carrying an offensive weapon.

NYC has a law that allows prosecution for assault if one defends themselves with their cane. A prosecutor can bring the case to the grand jury, which as you know, will indict a ham sandwich for not having mustard. I presume using your crutch would make matters ever worse.

In 1994 an English homeowner, armed with a toy gun, managed to detain two burglars who had broken into his house while he called the police. When the officers arrived, they arrested the homeowner for using an imitation gun to threaten or intimidate. In a similar incident the following year, when an elderly woman fired a toy cap pistol to drive off a group of youths who were threatening her, she was arrested for putting someone in fear. Now the police are pressing Parliament to make imitation guns illegal.

Absolutely right! We cannot have these young malefactors wetting their pants, can we.

In 1999 Tony Martin, a 55-year-old Norfolk farmer living alone in a shabby farmhouse, awakened to the sound of breaking glass as two burglars, both with long criminal records, burst into his home. He had been robbed six times before, and his village, like 70 percent of rural English communities, had no police presence. He sneaked downstairs with a shotgun and shot at the intruders. Martin received life in prison for killing one burglar, 10 years for wounding the second, and a year for having an unregistered shotgun. The wounded burglar, having served 18 months of a three-year sentence, is now free and has been granted $5,000 of legal assistance to sue Martin.

Comparison
Bernard Hugo Goetz, known as Bernhard or Bernie (born November 7, 1947) was dubbed the “Subway Vigilante” by the New York press. How the BBC views this.

This has to be one of the more humorous articles published about socialism in some time. No attempt at humor seems to be a cause to write this article, but reality has a way of inserting twists never intended by the penman.

I experienced that “Groundhog Day” moment reading these words, until I realized this is what scribes always write about how socialism turns out.

Sadly, we read about it here too. In Vermont, Massachusetts, Maine, etc.; the list goes on. Our housing troubles, trucking, bad roads, oh pick it. Some entity wants a handout from another’s pocket via pork spending. The government has the solution, right over in that sand pile. Must be, that’s where their heads are.

Read the whole article to see our destination with the Donks, bring tissues:

Spain Smacked by a Dose of Economic Reality

Spaniards, used to socialist largesse, are struggling with market economics — and their prime minister is in heavy denial.

A national truck driver’s strike in Spain may be winding down, but it has brought the already-troubled Spanish economy to a standstill. It has also highlighted what happens when a welfare state goes wild. Some 90,000 self-employed hauliers…[snip]… are betting that the government will cave in to their demands. After all, the Spanish government always gives in to labor unrest. [snip]

Spain complains

[snip]
Considering all these grievances, it seems strange that Spanish voters in March gave Socialist Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero another four-year term in office. After all, pre-election polls showed that the majority of Spaniards knew full well that Spain was not on the right track, economically or otherwise.

Maybe they allowed themselves to be persuaded that everything would somehow be okay, thanks to Zapatero’s postmodern relativistic political discourse, which posits that all problems are by definition imaginary. Or perhaps they were bribed by the 22 billion euros — a whopping 2.1 percent of Spain’s GDP — in handouts that Zapatero promised to bestow upon them if re-elected. [snip]

During the past 20 years, Spain cashed in on some 100 billion euros — equivalent to nearly one percent of its GDP every year — by way of EU Structural and Cohesion Funds, which are designed to narrow the gap between the EU’s wealthy and poor countries. But now that Spain has reached a per capita GDP of 98.5 percent of the EU average — it was 72 percent in 1986 — the country will begin paying more into the EU than it receives back.

The implication is that Spaniards will have to strike less and work more. But that seems an unlikely prospect. Spain recently led a block, including Belgium and Greece, which sought to prohibit British workers from working more than 48 hours a week. Spanish Socialists complain that if Brits work more than Spaniards, Britain will have an unfair competitive advantage. (emphasis added)

Can’t have productivity, can we?

Problem? What problem?

Just before the March elections, Zapatero insisted that the Spanish economy would grow by 3.3 percent in 2008; since his re-election, however, the government has revised that figure downwards on an almost daily basis. [snip]

So far Zapatero’s post-modern approach to Spain’s economic crisis seems based on three reality-evading pillars: denial, passing the blame, and more denial. His Plan A has involved a pop psychology campaign advising Spaniards that “pessimism does not create jobs.” Plan B blamed “radical liberalism,” which in euro-speak means the free market. Zapatero now wants to implement Plan C, a global advertising campaign in the world financial press designed to highlight his economic management skills.

Spaniards, having grown accustomed to three decades of spoon-feeding by Socialist largesse, are in for a long, hot free-market summer.

Good, big pain might bring some reasoning gain, like getting out of the EU.

A basic tenet in the prog playbook deals with outcomes at variance with wishes. Lie to yourself about what you see. Works every time; ask Gorbachev, Castro, Jong-Il. Or ask the chink leaders who gave up pure socialism in favor of capitalism, why the Great Leap Forward put them on their butt.

Islamic extremists should get therapy, Home Office tells local councils

Islamic extremists could escape prosecution and instead receive therapy and counselling under new Government plans to “deradicalise” religious fanatics.

The Home Office is to announce an extra £12.5 million to support new initiatives to try to stop extremism spreading.

The central element of the Home Office plan is a new national “deradicalisation” programme that would persuade converts to violent and extremist causes to change their views.

Two through the towel works better, faster and has a 100% success rate.

 I don’t think one can get more boring and drear than Liz Smith unless one is listening to the actual persons about whom she writes. Which means you don’t have a life.

SUSAN SARANDON, who appeared in three films last year and won kudos for her TV movie “Bernard and Doris,” is still not a contented soul. She says if John McCain gets elected, she will move to Italy or Canada. She adds, “It’s a critical time, but I have faith in the American people.”

OK, American people. You don’t want Susan to move out of the country, so it’s up to you to elect Barack Obama. What? You thought Susan of all people would be for Hillary Clinton? Well, no. She told John Hiscock: “I thought the whole point of feminism is that you’re not supposed to be defined by gender. I don’t understand the reasoning behind that, because I wouldn’t vote for Condoleezza Rice, and I hated Margaret Thatcher.”

Alec Baldwin, Robert Redford and a couple of other clowns were going to move out of the US if Bush was re-elected. He was, they didn’t. That was disappointing in the extremis. Redford did move to Vermont which counts for something I guess.

Why cannot these mentally indigent personages keep their word?

The Logo of Efficiency Vermont is Camel’s Hump as seen from the western side. After reading this article it looks more like a shark cruising for idiots.

We’re From Efficiency Vermont And We’re Here To Help You

I recently contacted my electric company concerning high electrical usage at my residence. After converting from an 80-gallon electric hot water heater to a 95 percent efficient propane indirect unit, my usage went up. My electric company said to contact Efficiency Vermont and they could “help” me. I thought, “Great, finally I will get some value for the extra money being paid out of my electric bills.” Upon review of this government’s Web site, I realized they offered up to a $ 1,000 incentive for converting from electric hot water to other efficient fuels. I contacted the organization and asked if I qualified. [snip]

CA might decide to tax the porn industry. Given the whores we have in office here, a tax of this nature is in order.

Porn Tax Considered As Solution To Budget Shortfall

LOS ANGELES - California state lawmakers are considering an unusual idea to solve the state’s huge budget shortfall: Tax pornography.

The idea was proposed by a state assemblyman, and would impose a 25 percent tax on the production and sales of pornographic videos — the vast majority of which are made in southern California. [snip]

All news clips of the VT and MA legislative and executive actions then produce revenue. Compared to these chunks of degradation, CA porn looks like Mother Theresa at Vespers.

I have no idea of the political bend of the “Left in Lowell” blog, though the name and the word progressive in the banner might be indicative.

Seems that one of the posters had a dustup with the local powers causing worry that this might occur to “less influential” citizens.

She came home last Tuesday to find a “cease and desist” order posted on her front door. [snip]

Those of us who write on this blog and those of us who are involved in politics understand the impact of power, influence and authority. I am not worried about Kristin she can take care of herself. But my concern is for the average resident who is not an activist, who has no connection, who does not have a voice. What is he or she to do? [snip]

I believe they got what they wanted: more government. Tough when your pet bites you isn’t it.

Luddites loose in La-La land

The price of oil is likely to hit 150 dollars (Canadian, US) a barrel by 2010 and soar to 225 dollars a barrel by 2012 as supply becomes increasingly tight, a Canadian bank said Thursday. (April 24^th) [snip]

Electricity and heat production in the Northeast derives from oil for the most part. In Vermont, there are no oil or coal plants; however, we have a clean energy producer in Vermont Yankee nuclear plant. The other energy source, a contract with Hydro Quebec, which proved to be a bad indenture, is defunct in 2009. Whether it is renewed or not, indubitably it will not be at current rates.

This chart comes from a Green Mountain Power bill insert.

Instead of embracing nuclear power as a means of insuring clean energy, the Vermont house:

MONTPELIER — The House voted 81-58 Wednesday for a bill that would require new corporate owners of the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant to guarantee more money is available to dismantle the plant when the time comes.

Senate President Pro Tempore Peter Shumlin, D-Windham, agitated in the Senate to require Entergy (Vermont Yankee owners) to deposit the money to clean up the site now.

This response came from corporate spokesmen.

Vermont Yankee officials, meanwhile, provided fuel for a possible veto by saying that if the bill passes they would likely sell or shut down the Vernon nuclear power plant because it would no longer make sense financially to include it in the new corporate spinoff. That could make the plant more expensive to run as a lone unit and raise the cost of the electricity it produces, he said.

The Luddite fascists in Vermont want the plant closed yesterday regardless of cost to the ratepayers. Money set aside at interest by Entergy, is sufficient to decommission and clean up the site. If this shutdown occurs, average monthly electric bills will go from $100/mo. to $200, maybe $250/mo.

Welcome to socialist economics, these idiots wish to festoon the mountainsides with wind turbines. The cost of electricity will enforce conservation, the desired goal; no other idea makes any sense. And they cannot tell from where the replacement power will come.

Vermont will be a microcosm of a Democrat controlled country if Yobama is elected. Clinton will be just as bad.

Interesting to see the imagery warped to fit the ad. The image of the rifle shown was flipped to balance the composition befitting a Leftist.

Bolt action rifles are manufactured to accommodate southpaw shootists. Scopes however are not. Note the windage adjustment on the scope at the very top of the picture. That is always on the right side of the scope.

Hillary’s people are knowledgeable about guns? Only to recognize one to grab it themselves.

The knife wielders must be the “poor and downtrodden.”

Gun control at work

A violent and deadly weekend continues in Chicago. At least 12 people have been shot, two of them killed, since Saturday morning. Two others were stabbed in a home invasion. This comes after at least 20 people were shot, four of them killed, from Friday night through early Saturday.

For a city that has strict laws on guns and no concealed carry, it seems that an inordinate amount of recreational shooting took place. All those laws and the police cannot stop this mayhem? Mayor Daley, Obama and the Illinois legislature would have you believe all these anti-gun laws work just like in Britain.

Britain banned private gun ownership that completely stopped upstanding citizens from shooting up the countryside and cities. Police work is easier too; separating the law-abiding from the criminals is simple. The criminals are the ones with guns; the citizens are the ones dead or wounded.