Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Happy Halloween!


(Almost forgot!)

And now for something really scary....

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"BOO!"

By the way...

...congratulations to the San Francisco Giants for their (sob!) commanding victory over the Detroit Tigers.

Careful with that question, it might be loaded

A recent academic survey touted by the AP suggested that 51% of Americans are racist. The Weasel Times takes a close look at the survey and finds that it is based very solidly on complete crap.

Can Joe Biden be prevented from making any gaffes in the last days of the campaign?

Insiders say that the White House is taking every precaution.

Update: Hmmm. Probably should have ordered several.

Tuesday, October 30, 2012

My name is nobody

Smitty finds that there are quite a lot of "nobodies" out there.

How's that again?

The latest Gallup poll shows Romney significantly ahead in early voting; however, Politico calls this a "draw".

Well, maybe it's a draw in one sense...


High and dry

By the grace of God, to whom I give thanks. We made it through the hurricane with no damage and - much to my surprise - no power outage. Our prayers go up for the souls of those who died, and for their families, and for a return to normal life everywhere, but especially in New York and New Jersey, which seem to have been particularly hard hit.

Democrat beclowns himself

My congress-critter, pug-faced Gerry Connolly, who faces a challenge from former Green Beret Chris Perkins, recently scoffed at the notion of veterans serving in Congress:
Virginia Congressman Gerry Connolly (D-11) shocked constituents by suggesting that military Veterans are unqualified to serve in Congress because their deployments prevent them from putting “sweat equity” into the districts they hope to serve in Congress.
Now, in the first place, the whole notion of Connelly talking about "sweat equity" is preposterous; he was a cog in the wheel of Fairfax County Democratic politics for years before successfully running for the House, and his legacy was what you'd expect: during the housing bubble, when property taxes were generating a lot of local government revenue, he spent lavishly. As a congressman, he has remained true to form, supporting every one of Obama's big-spending initiatives. He may well have worked up a sweat spending all that money, but the equity is the taxpayers', not his (or did he actually lay the bricks when Fairfax built that Xanadu that serves as our county government center? I think not.) And of course he's talking through the back of his neck when he questions the qualifications of veterans to hold public office. For example, might they not know a thing or two about...oh, I don't know, say, national security policy and protecting our diplomats and the danger of letting political calculations interfere with the timely use of military force? I believe it's probably good to have representatives who can provide intelligent oversight on little matters like that.

If you share, with me, the ignominy of being represented by that puffed-up little ward heeler, Gerry Connolly, then remember to vote for Chris Perkins on November 6.

Monday, October 29, 2012

Bin Ladin may be dead...

...but apparently his credit card is alive and well.
Using a Pakistani Internet Protocol and proxy server, a disposable credit card and a fake address, “Osama bin Laden” has successfully donated twice to Barack Obama’s presidential re-election campaign.

The “Bin Laden” donations, actually made by WND staff, included a listed occupation of “deceased terror chief” and a stated employer of “al-Qaida.”

Monday movie

Cary Grant recruits Ingrid Bergman in Notorious.


Sunday, October 28, 2012

We will never forget you

Tyrone Woods. Glen Doherty. In the finest tradition of the Navy SEALS.

I used to think that Obama's reelection would simply be something very unfortunate. I now see it as an absolute obscenity.

Update: President gutsy call voicemail.

The Paco Command Center battens down the hatches

Hurricane Sandy looks like it'll be blowing into our area sometime Monday. There could be significant power outages, so, if I'm offline for awhile, you'll know why.

St. George, Utah, is looking better and better.

Update: Yeeeeehaw! The yankee gummint's closed tomorrow!

Sunday funnies

Frank J has the best take on the creepy Obama campaign "First Time" video: "I guess if your first time was with Obama in 2008, you can look at Romney as the penicillin you now desperately need." BTW, Boy on a Bike has found a funny new parody.

Another reason not to play golf.

Hope and Benny look for a gig.



Update: Gremlin!

Saturday, October 27, 2012

Smitty provides an update on Dan Riehl's condition

Feisty conservative blogger Dan Riehl was recently hospitalized for respiratory failure. It was a close call, but he seems to be getting better. Smitty has visited him in the hospital and has posted this report.

Chilling

There's a creepy new video out featuring zombie children singing a leftist anthem.

I was watching this thing - bucket in hand, just in case - and I kept wondering what it reminded me of. Then it hit me...



Update: Haw! Stacy McCain finds the video, er, mildly annoying.

Update II: In the comments, Dave of Tacoma provides an even better film analogy.

Paco’s male fashion tips for Inside-the-Beltway professionals


“The proper study of mankind”, said the poet Alexander Pope, “is man”. I agree, and I think this includes even the small change of man’s life, to wit, the drapery in which he ensconces himself during his forays into the work-a-day world.

I cannot help but observe the sartorial felonies and misdemeanors that are committed by male subway riders each and every day. This is troubling. Not only because it tends to distract me from the far more pleasurable occupation of observing the many pulchritudinous female specimens who travel by Metro into Washington every morning (and back to Virginia in the evening), but because of what it says about the continuing decline of good taste and of that healthy level of esteem and respect that my fellows ought to show for the outer man. Herewith, a few criticisms and suggestions:

1) Sir, that is a handsome dark gray suit you are wearing. I admire the cut and the fabric. Are you perhaps unaware that you are wearing brown shoes with it?

2) I saw a gentleman yesterday, descending the steps of the parking garage at the Vienna Metro. He was wearing a beautiful slate-blue suit with pinstripes (and black shoes). How unfortunate that he chose to top the costume off with an old, crumpled, olive-colored fishing cap.

3) If you’re wearing a suit, the proper baggage for transporting documents is a briefcase. Why would you want to wear a backpack? It rumples up the back of your suit jacket, and the straps crush the shoulder-padding, eventually creating a permanent rut across each shoulder. And you’re not hiking to D.C.; you’re riding the subway. Well, I don’t want to be too critical; a little positive reinforcement can go a long way. So, thank you for at least not wearing your Smoky the Bear hat.

4) Ah, a thigh-length trench coat! That sort of thing looked good on Nancy Sinatra 40 years ago; however, sir, permit me to make an observation: you are not Nancy Sinatra, and it is not 40 years ago.

5) Now, that, my friend, is a fine looking navy-blue suit! But, er, whatever possessed you to wear a necktie of Phosphate-Mine-Retention-Pond-Green?

6) Let’s see…that’s certainly a decent enough gray suit, and the maroon tie complements it well. But what’s with the Australian drover’s coat and outback hat? The whole effect is a tad heterogeneous, wouldn’t you say? I mean, perhaps if you’re attending a cattle auction or something similar it would be appropriate. By the way, is there one being held in Washington today?

7) Ha ha ha ! No, really, sir, be serious. Why are you wearing clip-on suspenders and a belt? For that matter, why are you wearing clip-on suspenders, at all?

8) You know, I think I once saw a photograph of Woodrow Wilson wearing a single-breasted suit jacket with four buttons, just like the one you’re wearing now.

9) As a fan of hats, far be it from me to condemn another’s choice of headgear. But don’t you think the combination of suit and newsboy cap is more in line with, say, a racketeer’s personal driver in the prohibition era?

Update: Gregory, in the comments, has some interesting views on the subject.


Friday, October 26, 2012

What is it about Democratic presidents and their tendency to cancel air support?

Kennedy during the Bay of Pigs invasion; Obama during the Benghazi attack?

As Doug Ross says, "If you don’t get torches-and-pitchforks irate about this, you are not an American".

I agree. If you still vote for Obama after this, then I want to see your American passport in my hand by close of business.

More from Mark Steyn:
But a funny thing happened over the next six weeks: Obama's own cue balls shriveled.
Dear Lord, please deliver us from the clutches of this hollow man.

An odd fascination

Gone With the Wind is a very popular novel in North Korea, of all places.

In other North Korean news, a government minister who fell from favor has been…well, vaporized.

This must make Romney the hot knife

A bust of Obama has been created out of butter.

I was going to make a crack about this being one of those lower-priced spreads, but with the national debt where it is, I guess the joke doesn't work.

Happy Feet Friday

Vanita Smythe sings “They Raided the Joint”.


Thursday, October 25, 2012

Noooooooooooo!!!

President to root for Detroit Tigers?

I guess this is part of his ground game in Michigan.

"And then we're going after that Paco guy, just to be on the safe side"

Hillary Clinton makes an odd promise to the father of Ty Woods, who was killed in the Benghazi attack: “We’re going to have that person arrested and prosecuted that did the video.”

Looks like a consensus

During the first debate in Denver, tens of millions of Americans were gathered around their TV sets, watching Obama stink. John Kerry has now joined Al Gore in support of the theory that Obama’s awful performance was due to the high altitude.

In a way, I agree. I, too, think Obama suffered from altitude sickness; but it wasn’t Denver’s height above sea-level. It was the dizzying altitude of his own vaulting ego that made him light-headed and insufficiently alert to the threat posed by a sharp, enthusiastic and committed opponent. Pride, fall.

Colinoscopy

Quin Hillyer takes a look at Colin Powell and does not like what he sees.

Klass

Obama calls Romney a “bullshitter”.

If Obama loses this election, I foresee a long life of festering bitterness and absurd attempts at self-justification – further increasing his resemblance to Jimmy Carter.

Man, things really don't seem to be going well for the Secret Service these days

First it was prostitutes in Colombia; now it's sexual assault in Virginia.

The ATF just emailed: "Yeah, those guys have always been loose cannons."

Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Presidential

The Obama limbo. How low can he go?

Elsewhere: let the recriminations begin!
Some Democrats are apparently not waiting for Barack Obama to lose the presidential election before starting the inevitable recriminations about whose fault it was. Whether writing strictly on his own hook or as a result of conversations with campaign officials, New York Times political writer Matt Bai has fired the first shot in what may turn out to be a very nasty battle over who deserves the lion’s share of the blame for what may turn out to be a November disaster for the Democrats. That the Times would publish a piece on October 24 that takes as its starting point the very real possibility that the president will lose, and that blame for that loss needs to be allocated, is astonishing enough. But that their nominee for scapegoat is the man who is almost certainly the most popular living Democrat is the sort of thing that is not only shocking, but might be regarded as a foretaste of the coming battle to control the party in 2016.

Democratic hack's October surprise

Gloria Allred is attempting to bring Romney down by throwing a nut at him.

Congratulations on your escape, Mr. Stemberg.

Oh, and I'm sure this is just a coincidence.

Time to turn on the high-beams

I can't see through all this transparency.

Gun-walking to al Qaeda?

Frank Gaffney at the Washington Times assembles evidence that the Obama administration's initial attempt to portray the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi as the result of a protest that got out of hand was a piece of disinformation designed to conceal the support that the U.S. government has been providing to jihadist groups in both Libya and Syria.

If this turns out to be true, then Obama will have proved that his competence in the area of foreign policy is on the same level as his competence on the economy.

Tuesday, October 23, 2012

That’s not a yard sign…

that’s a yard sign!


Update: Old Tanker, in the comments, provides a link to the back-story.

I think Chris Matthews has spent too much time playing goalie in horseshoe-pitching matches

Nuts. Positively nuts.

Even as a mere leftwing bullhorn, Matthews is over the top, a high-priced political televangelist whose role consists exclusively of preaching nonsense to an adoring choir of yawping fantasists. He’s just there to ensure that the fringe doesn’t become detached from the greater Democratic carpet.

One of these days, MSNBC might figure out that the kind of audience to whom Matthews appeals would be equally happy with a lower-cost barker, and then what will happen to Tingle Pins? I envision him travelling the country, hiring out to county fairs as a human target in the always-popular dunk-the clown booth. I predict that he will enjoy a very successful career in this new endeavor; after all, there are few men so adept at inspiring people to throw things at them.

Related: Chris Matthews runs for the U.S. Senate… inside his head.

Obama inadvertently accuses Romney of being Reaganesque

Thanks, Mizzle Preshizzle! From the The Sun:
So we’d like to think that Mr. Obama has stumbled onto something here. If voters get the idea that Mr. Romney can deliver the foreign policy of the 1980s, when we defeated a vast, hostile conspiracy in Soviet Communism, then Mr. Romney is moving in the right direction.

Update: A collection of interesting Tweets on last night's debate at Legal Insurrection.

Monday, October 22, 2012

Assortment

Joe Biden, class clown: “What’s he doing back there?”

Important new endorsements for Barack Obama.

Not all Europeans are blind to the risk of cultural suicide.

Coal-fired anger.

Governor Christie sums up Obama’s leadership problem: “He's like a man wandering around a dark room, hands up against the wall, clutching for the light switch of leadership, and he just can't find it, and he won't find it in the next 18 days.”

Obama: slow to see terrorism at home and abroad.

Who is Robert Roche, and why does he enjoy such influence with President Obama?

An African-American citizen directs his ire at Obama and the federal deficit (Warning: Strong language).



Radio caller: hey, why are we encouraging deer to cross busy highways by putting up all those deer crossing signs? (Sounds like your typical undecided voter, to me).

To break for a moment from politics, the Daily Telegraph has a very interesting article about Kim Novak, including details on her working relationship with Alfred Hitchcock and Jimmy Stewart (H/T: Captain Heinrichs). And Seraphic Secret takes a look at one very peculiar aspect of the stormy relationship between Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor.

Monday movie

Charles McGraw and Marie Windsor go at it in the film noir classic, The Narrow Margin. In the film, detective Charles McGraw has the unpleasant task of guarding Marie Windsor, a moll who has decided to turn state's evidence against her gangster boyfriend - or is she really the moll?



Everything must go!

The Obama campaign is having a going out of business sale.

Order today and get a special gift!

Elsewhere...


Sunday, October 21, 2012

I love science

I've long suspected that the first human ancestor looked like a squirrel. I even commissioned an artist to prepare an illustration of the first Paco...


Sunday funnies

Paco Enterprises' consumer products division regretfully announces a recall.


Looks like Fearless Felix traveled a whole lot faster than anybody figured.

Scrap metal thief gets overly ambitious.

Dude, what were you thinking?

Strange encounter: Ray Bradbury and...Groucho Marx.

Saturday, October 20, 2012

Found in the neighborhood

Near their Romney yard sign...


Yeah, I thought it was something like that

The European Union won the Nobel Peace Prize this year.

My first reaction was, "Huh? What's up with that?" But Are We Lumberjacks? uncovered the back story.

Friday, October 19, 2012

Happy Feet Friday

Benny Goodman, with both his small group and his full orchestra, appears in a series of video clips from the 1930s.


Thursday, October 18, 2012

Mr. Empathy

President Obama considers the murder of four of our diplomatic personnel and, with that mastery of the oratorical art for which he is so justly famed, pronounces the episode "not optimal" (H/T: Robert of Ottawa).

A proctologist’s hat-trick

Martin Sheen, Woody Harrelson and Ed Asner to star in a 9/11 Truther movie.

New art form

The capacity for human inventiveness never ceases to amaze me. Artist Bert Hickman captures “lightning” in acrylic.

Well, if they don’t, they ought to

Jeff Goldstein on liberal commentator Sally Kohn’s Tweet, “Nobody gives a s**t about Fast & Furious” (a “manufactured issue” per the, er, “fair and unbiased” Ms. Kohn). You need to read the whole thing (as you always should do with Jeff), but here’s a sample:
What Ms Kohn - a sometimes FOX contributer and liberal commentator - really meant to say was, nobody who matters gives a shit about Fast & Furious. That is, the liberal press, progressive activists, and those who insist it should be they who get to manufacture, finesse, and drive the cultural narrative, including, importantly, the news cycle, beginning with what comes to be counted as important news (Congressional hearings on the Libya debacle, featuring the murder of an Ambassador? Page 3, NYT), and ending with what ultimately is considered news to begin with.
Elsewhere in this world turned upside-down, I have to say that I am wholeheartedly with Mr. Bean (H/T: Ace).

Go Tigers!!!!!

Detroit sent the Yankees home today after four straight wins.

World Series, baby!

Do they make remotes for these things?

The case of the exploding toilet (scroll down).

Via the always alert Captain Heinrichs.

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

Of heroism

Real and bogus. Ross Kaminsky contrasts the plight of two girls in Pakistan just trying to get a decent education with the whiny entitlement crowd represented so perfectly, and so disgustingly, by Sandra Fluke and her ilk.

I especially esteem the quote from Bastiat, particularly these lines:
Man can live and satisfy his wants only by ceaseless labor; by the ceaseless application of his faculties to natural resources. This process is the origin of property.

But it is also true that a man may live and satisfy his wants by seizing and consuming the products of the labor of others. This process is the origin of plunder.
This is essentially the message of Obama and the Democrats to the productive classes: Stand and deliver!

”Your purse, citizen!”

So am I, Michelle, so am I

FLOTUS: “On Nov. 7 we're going to party hard”.

Well, yeah, I guess a wake is a kind of party.

Let’s see, what can I do when I retire?

Well, I probably won’t be joining an over-the-hill biker gang:
Eight members of the Forbidden Ones, the Dirty Ones and the Trouble Makers — whose average age was 51 — were charged with firearms trafficking. But four of them were too sick to make their arraignment in Brooklyn Federal Court, and were admitted to the hospital instead.

Accused gun smuggler Scott (Spider) Brannigan, 61, was complaining of high blood pressure and a bad ticker; Frank (Afro) Miranda, 50, and Samuel Moya, 44, needed heroin detoxification, and Jose (Rusty) Perez, 49, the reputed “supreme president” of the Forbidden Ones, needed treatment for sleep apnea, sources said.

A few suggestions for future debates

A convenient excuse for not watching the debate last night was the fact that there was a playoff game on television between the Tigers and Yankees – which the Tigers won, incidentally, taking a commanding 3-0 lead in the ALCS. But that is a side issue which need not detain us.

From what I’ve been reading, Democrats are spinning the debate as an Obama win, albeit a narrow one. Strangely, however, on the underlying issues, Romney seems to have tied or won most categories; I suppose the win accorded to the president was based simply on the political theater angle, since Obama showed signs of having revived from his first-debate coma, and threw himself with gusto into his usual routine of aggressive pandering and towering mendacity. I think it all comes down to this line from liberal Jeff Greenfield: “Obama won the debate. Too bad it wasn’t the one that mattered.”

For the future, I would pass along the following suggestions to Republican candidates:

Don’t accept a debate format featuring overtly liberal “moderators”, or, at least, not just overtly liberal moderators. What’s wrong with insisting on having representation by somebody like Brit Hume or Brett Baier? And if a moderator breaks the rules, or looks as if he or she is trying to coach one side or the other (and you know which side that always is), then that person should be permanently excluded as a moderator in future debates.

Why should a townhall debate be in an irreversibly blue state like New York? Are there really any undecided voters in New York? If the idea is that the candidates are talking to a room full of undecided voters, why not insist on a swing state venue? Better still, get rid of the townhall debate format altogether. There are typically so many “plants” in the audience that the candidates are likely to get completely loaded questions of fraudulent provenance (say, the apolitical single mom who turns out to be a local Democratic Party apparatchik, or the unemployed worker later revealed as an SEIU union goon).

I don’t know if split-screen presentation is used in all of the debates, but I think it should be. Frequently, the body language and the facial expressions offer revealing insights into the candidates’ temperament and state of mind.

And the Republicans on the Commission on Presidential Debates need to get off their asses and stop letting the liberal media set the formats and pick the moderators. Crowley was a disgrace (and so was Radditz, who “moderated” the VP debate). Here’s the main thing you Republican commissioners need to remember: the MSM is also the enemy. Don’t let them choose the ground and the rules of engagement.

Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Assortment

It isn't every day that I develop (a) a higher opinion of someone's intelligence, while also (b) arriving at a lower opinion of his character. Thanks, James Carville, for the novel experience!

The global economy is in the best of hands. Former IMF head Dominique Strauss-Kahn apparently needed a lot of help unwinding from the day-to-day stress of his job.

The Ryan girl (H/T: Captain Heinrichs).

The final nail in the coffin of Obama's presidency.

You mean, like a zookeeper who hates animals?

The French seem to have their very own dumbass president problem.

Nice ad from Dick Morris.

American Digest takes a look at the undecided voter.


Caption time!


"Maybe I'd better handle the debate tonight, buddy."

Footnote to the family reunion

One thing that I found interesting at the reunion was the touching belief among my relatives that, because I work for the yankee government in Washington, I might have some special insights into the upcoming election (the Paco clan has been solidly Republican since Reconstruction, and there was absolutely no one at the reunion that wasn't pulling for Romney). There was an earnestness to their interest in the election that was far greater than in previous times - probably because these good, deeply conservative, hard-working, self-reliant people realize the importance of the stakes involved. I did my best to be upbeat, and informed them of what appears to be a big shift toward Romney in most of the polls. In any event, there won't be any shirking among the Pacos come election day.

I will close with a story Old Paco told the crowd about his early days in law enforcement when he was a deputy sheriff. He was out on patrol one evening and cruised over by one of the remote roads that served as a lovers' lane. He spotted a car and went up to it and flashed his light inside, catching a couple in the backseat preparing for a frolic. Old Paco smiled and asked, "What are you doing, mister?" The man replied, "I came up here to canoodle with my wife." Old Paco said, "How come you're married and you came all the way out here to make love to your wife?" The fellow said, "Well, I didn't know she was my wife 'til you flashed that damn light in here!"

Mmmm,y-e-s. Possibly an apocryphal tale, but, still, you never know...

Update: One last footnote, and then I'm done. We had a very distinguished person in attendance at the reunion: Billy Queen. He's not a blood relation, but is a kind of relative by marriage. Billy was also a member of the ATF and had an outstanding career (see here for details).

Monday, October 15, 2012

Monday movie

James Cotton is a serial killer in Shadow of a Doubt.


No place like home

We've just returned from a big Paco family reunion in North Carolina. Amazing how old all those other folks have gotten.

A special treat was seeing my great aunt Mary. She's 102 years old, and looks to be on track for celebrating 103 in January. There was some fine home-cooked barbecue and hot dogs and ribs, and the company was extraordinarily jolly. Plus, my brother put together some genealogical information going back to the mid-18th century and distributed copies to everybody (I was amused to learn that I had a great great uncle named "Iron"; I kept looking for an uncle Stainless Steel and an aunt Magnesium, but couldn't find 'em).

One thing my brother and I worried about: would cousin Neal show up? Phil told me a story about how, when we were all kids, he (Phil) and I tied Neal to an apple tree and left him there. I didn't remember the incident myself, and figured if there was any truth to the yarn at all, Neal wouldn't remember it either. Sure enough, Neal showed up - a devastatingly handsome fellow who somewhat resembles Mitt Romney; he's now a medical doctor - and he recognized me and came over to chat. He gave me a big smile and shook my hand. I said, "Gosh, Neal, it's been a long time." He laughed and said "It sure has! In fact, I think the last time we saw each other, you and Phil had just tied me to an apple tree." I confess to having felt some embarrassment over his immediate recollection of an incident that had completely slipped my memory. Of course, I did the honorable thing - pinned the whole idea on my brother, and threw in cousin Mike as a bonus conspirator - but there was no need. Neal just laughed and we spent a pleasant hour catching up on each other's history.

My father, Old Paco, hosted the event at his beautiful home located on a ridge overlooking some sixty acres of pasture land. I was greatly pleased that he bestowed on me a commemorative revolver (a Colt Python .357 magnum), decorated with some nice gold work celebrating the moonshiner-chasing epoch of the ATF.

BTW, what's a good birthday gift for a woman who's turning 103? I was thinking of a skateboard.

Update: Not really related, except that I saw most of the first game on television the night before the reunion: congrats to the cats for taking the first two games of the American League Championship Series - in New York. I am genuinely sorry about Derek Jeter, however; best wishes to the Yankee captain for a speedy recovery.

Friday, October 12, 2012

Botanical inquiry

Mrs. Paco has expressed an interest in knowing what kind of plant this is...


It looks like some sort of ornamental grass, but it has these crazy, serrated seeds.

If anybody knows what it is, give us a holler.

Update: I believe they are, indeed, Northern sea oats. Thanks, Anonymous!

Grab some popcorn

Is Obama getting ready to throw Hillary under the bus?

Update: And are the American people about to do the same to Obama? Rick Wilson:
Ohio, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire and Michigan have moved in the RCP averages from “Leans Obama” to “Toss-up”... today's polls are about to move a number of other states into the “Lean Romney” column. Florida will likely move there in the coming days. It's not just the swing states, and they know it.

The swing states matter, but when any of the states of Obama's “Blue Wall” flips in the polls to “Lean Romney,” the cascade effect will be psychologically devastating. For months, there were two underlying predicates for an Obama victory: first, that Obama was inevitable, and second, that Mitt Romney's path to 270 electoral votes was narrow and highly constrained.

Today, it's Obama's path that seems to be narrowing.

Their panic tastes delicious.

Ryan vs Biden

I'm continuing my perfect record of not watching the debates, but, from what I've read, it looks like Paul Ryan came to debate the issues, and Mr. "One-Heartbeat-Away" showed up to hoot and throw feces (which is exactly what I figured Biden would do).

Update: Alternate post title: "Paul Ryan survives attack by psycho chimp".

Update II: Too bad they didn't have one of these outside of the building...


Lovingly pinched from Pete Da Tech guy.

Sweden's cultural suicide

Looks like the old Viking spirit is lost and gone forever (H/T: Jill J).



Update: I guess Dearborn isn't far behind (H/T: Captain Heinrichs).

Happy Feet Friday

Will Bradley and his Six Texas Hot Dogs rip out with Basin Street Boogie.


Thursday, October 11, 2012

“20 al Qaeda attacks every single day

In Iraq; God knows how many everywhere else.

Obama’s hubris in confusing the death of the chairman emeritus of al Qaeda with the death of the terrorist organization itself has become an enormous foreign policy liability, with the murder of the U.S. ambassador to Libya and four other Americans, and now, the assassination of the head of a security team at the U.S. Embassy in Yemen.

My advice to the president? Recall the Hydra of Greek mythology.

I obviously need a hipper keyboard

"13 little-known punctuation marks we should be using" (I think I could really use the marks for irony, sarcasm and snark; on the other hand, maybe, for me, the marks would just be redundant).

Update: As usual, TimT was ahead of the curve.

"Financial Repression"

A longish post at Zero Hedge on the ways governments steal money from their citizens - longish, but well worth reading. Just a taste:
But what does [financial repression] actually mean? The simplest, most encompassing explanation is this: it describes various insidious and underhanded methods by which the State intends to rob its citizens of their wealth and income over the coming years (and perhaps even decades) above and beyond the already onerous burden of taxation and regulatory costs that is crushing them at present.
And, of course, insidious methods of State-sponsored theft + large numbers of low-information voters = disaster.

Il Duce-bag

Hype and change.

"All within hype, nothing outside of hype, nothing against hype."

(H/T: Moonbattery)

Let's get serious...


(H/T: Gateway Pundit)

Update: Icarus

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

Alex Karras, RIP

Alex Karras, one of the defensive war horses for the Detroit Lions in the 1960s, has died at age 77.

Tuesday, October 9, 2012

Obama gets real

Nah, just kidding. His campaign responds to the drubbing their guy got from Romney with a silly Big Bird ad.

Here, let me fix that for you...


Update: Haw! From Stacy McCain:
Obama strategy 2008: "They bring a knife, we bring a gun."

Obama strategy 2012: "They bring a knife, we bring a Muppet."

Update II: Here's the notion the Obama campaign is peddling with respect to Romney's views about PBS...


Photo gratefully lifted from Are We Lumberjacks? Also via AWL?: the real reason PBS funding needs to go.


That, and unsound in mind and stoned on meth

Obama:
“I very much intend to win this election,” Obama told donors in San Francisco Monday night. “But we’re only going to do it if everybody is almost obsessive for the next 29 days.”

Update: C’mon, preshizzle! You’re kidding me, right?


Thanks, Mr. President!

I hope Mitt Romney doesn’t look this gift horse in the mouth: Obama provides more fodder for the debate on foreign policy.
Jewish leaders expressed outrage Friday over the State Department’s praise for, and defense of, a controversial Muslim leader who has defended terrorist groups and suggested that Israel may have been responsible for the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Salam al-Marayati, founder of the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC), was picked to represent the United States government at the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe’s (OSCE) annual 10-day human rights conference, the Human Dimension Implementation Meetings (HDIM).
H/T: Seraphic Secret.

So, what is this? More pusillanimous pandering to resurgent Muslim militants abroad? A bid to sew up the Arab/American vote? Another poke in Netanyahu’s eye? I’m tempted to consider it as a bit of all three – and evidence of an incurable tin ear, to boot. Although the tin-ear aspect is probably not a big worry for the Obama people because of the reliable lack of curiosity that undoubtedly will be displayed by the lapdog media.


Join me in the “Let’s Ignore David Brooks” movement

Brooks offers some unexceptional blah about how he thinks there will be a big “Draft Hillary” movement in 2016. I, for one, don’t doubt it. In fact, she’ll probably chair the movement.

But then Brooks makes the mistake he always makes when he happens to voice the obvious: he continues to speak.
Brooks diagnosed Obama’s inability to establish these close political relationships as being part of his personality, and referred to how he has been unable to be an effective proponent for legislation on Capitol Hill.

“In my view, he has a writer’s personality,” Brooks said. “He likes the solitary time to think…”
Ah, yes, a “writer’s personality”. Now I get it. We’re all just characters – most of us very minor – in Obama’s Great American Novel.

With respect to the title of this post, I suspect my readers are way ahead of me.

Belated

Somehow I managed to miss Global James Bond Day (H/T: Captain Heinrichs).

Monday, October 8, 2012

Transparency so thick you need fog lights to navigate through it

Looks like a ton of money may be flowing into the coffers of the president's reelection campaign from overseas.

I was wondering where that huge mound of lettuce - $181 million, wasn't it, in September? - came from.

Update: More from Doug Ross.

What the...

This I really can't understand. Why would the Obama administration throw a wrench in the USA's cruise ship construction industry? The article does offer some speculation: "The American Flagship project claims Obama bulldozed its long-planned, private sector funded, job-creating initiative – perhaps to spur already prolific foreign-flag campaign contributions."

H/T: Gateway Pundit.

In other news: Obama is lying, says...CBS reporter.

Terrible news

The body of missing teenager, Bryan Glenn, was found today by volunteers searching a park in my neighborhood.

I offer prayers for the repose of his soul, and for his grieving family and friends.

No one knows how this happened, yet, but it is a sobering thing for me. I have walked the trail many times while out with Mabel, and there are several things about the case that puzzle me. We don't know whether the boy was killed where his body was found, or whether he was killed somewhere else and his body somehow transported there, but the trail is frequented by joggers, cyclists and dog walkers from early in the morning until the sun goes down, so it seems unlikely that he was forced to walk the trail against his will without somebody seeing both him and whoever it was who killed him. If somebody else killed him - I suppose it's possible that it may have been a suicide; however, the PI hired by the family to search for Byran said he doesn't believe this was a suicide.

By the way, it was through the efforts of the PI, and the volunteer searchers he organized, that the body was found. The Fairfax police did a search last week, but, according to the policeman who appears in the video embedded in the linked story, they came in from both ends of the trail, but never searched the whole length of it. It was precisely near the middle of the trail, where the police failed to link up, that the body was ultimately found.

When I walk the trail from now on, you can be sure I'll be putting my concealed carry permit to good use.

State Department geniuses didn't see any need for maintaining beefed up security in Libya

The PJ Tatler reports. Be sure to watch the embedded video featuring Jake Tapper.

Yeah, Bin Laden's dead, but al-Qaeda is still very much alive.

Obama campaign targets Catholic voters

Pretty clumsily, if you ask me, by, among other things, going after Romney's Mormon faith. Deal Hudson has some first hand experience with these so-called Catholics for Obama (if there were any truth-in-labeling regulations legally applicable in this matter, they'd have to call themselves Catholic Apostates for Obama).

H/T to Stacy McCain for bringing the story to my attention.

Happy anniversary, Che!

Tomorrow is the 45th anniversary of Che Guevara's execution. Humberto Fontova recalls some of the, er, highlights of the communist revolutionary's career. A sample:
So for many, the questions remains: how did such an incurable doofus, sadist and epic idiot attain such iconic status?

The answer is that this psychotic and thoroughly unimposing vagrant named Ernesto Guevara de la Serna y Lynch had the magnificent fortune of linking up with modern history's top press agent, Fidel Castro, who -- from the New York Times' Herbert Matthews in 1957, through CBS' Ed Murrow in 1959 to CBS' Dan Rather, to ABC's Barbara Walters, to NBC's Andrea Mitchell more recently -- always had the mainstream media anxiously scurrying to his every beck and call and eating out of his hand like trained pigeons.

Monday movie

In the 1947 film, A Double Life, Ronald Coleman plays an actor who is tackling the role of Othello, but who ultimately gets carried away by the storyline, with tragic consequences.


Sunday, October 7, 2012

Assortment

Troglopundit brings the geometry (very clever stuff).

Gillian Anderson never looked like this on the X-Files.

On not having to answer to anybody.

The next Obama scandal (which will, of course, be ignored by the lamestream media).

A North Korean soldier shoots his way out of his country.

A true libertarian heroine: "Disabled Grandma Uses Bear Spray To Fend Off 13 Attackers After Her Marijuana Grow".

Bloomberg's top ten headlines this week (via Zero Hedge).

(Via Liberty at Stake)

Color photos from WWI.


The "Democrats' Reagan"? Haw! Nah, just Carter redux.

How long before California starts looking like a set from Mad Max?


Sunday funnies

Barney gives Otis the third degree.



Two Amish men encounter an elevator.

Putting that college degree to work!

Bumper sticker of the week:


Saturday, October 6, 2012

Great moments in golf

"Former world number three Paul Casey had his ball stolen by a dog while lining up an eagle putt during the second round of the Dunhill Links Championship on Friday."

Unfortunately, the few times I've committed golf, I never had such a convenient excuse.

Update: Here's a link with a picture of the dog caught in the act.

Update II: Sweet! Ed Driscoll, posting at Instapundit, digs up my old comment about the clothes having no emperor (H/T to Spiny Norman in the comments for bringing it to my attention).

Friday, October 5, 2012

Ominous news


A local Woodson High School senior, Bryan Glenn, went missing Monday afternoon. Fairfax County Police ask that anyone who might have any information, please contact police at 703-691-2131.

We offer our prayers for his safe return, and for his family.

Obama slices up Romney with his rapier-like wit

Two days after the debate, and with the assistance of a couple of teleprompters. From the Mail:
Speaking at an event in Fairfax, Virginia, a relaxed and confident President Barack Obama had plenty of witty retorts and quotable sound bites to aim at his challenger Mitt Romney.

The problem was that they came a day and a half after he had been demolished by Romney during the first presidential debate in Denver and were scripted and delivered with the aid of a pair of teleprompters flanking the stage.
He's like the kid who stands on his porch shouting insults at the bigger kid out on the street - the one who recently thrashed him soundly - secure in the knowledge that he is only a few steps from the safety of his front door.

Update: Haw! Romney's cheat sheet.


Dennis Miller tweets the debate

The inimitable Dennis Miller provides some great zingers.

Oh, and Obama found somebody to blame for his poor performance – er, Mitt Romney (Heh. Per Jay Leno, “the only people who thought [the president’s performance] was good were the NFL's replacement refs.”)

When the going gets tough…

…the tough get creative.

BTW, I love the quotation from Tacitus with which the linked post opens: “The more numerous the laws, the more corrupt the state.”

Happy Feet Friday

Just for fun, and because I've got a hankerin' for some bluegrass, here's the "Darling" family performing "Dooley" in an episode from the Andy Griffith Show.

Hey, Democrats, how's that early voting strategy going? (Part II)

Absentee ballots in Ohio showing dramatic shift from 2008 - and I mean that in a good way.

Thursday, October 4, 2012

Scapegoat

It is universally acknowledged that Obama lost the debate last night; therefore, it must have been the moderator’s fault.

Or maybe it was the thin air (is there no one close enough to Al Gore who is willing to tell him that his every public utterance is the equivalent of having the word “Dumbass” tattooed in fire engine red ink on his forehead?)

Update: Did you ever lose an argument, and then, much later, think up a whole bunch of cool things you could have said?

Update II: MOMMIEEEE!!!

Update III: Our Taiwanese animator friends give us their rendition of the debate (H/T: Captain Heinrichs).

Well, now, that’s strange

Reporters, random snoops and (for all we know) terrorist spies apparently have no trouble getting into our consulate in Benghazi, and picking through the many documents scattered about the place – but the FBI investigators are still holed up in Tripoli. Will there be anything for them to investigate when they do finally get to the consulate?

On top of all the other failures in connection with the disaster in Benghazi, we can add failure to secure the scene by U.S. authorities. Can things get much worse?

Update: Why, yes. Yes they can.

Update II: Investigators finally arrive.

The One goes ahead to prepare a place for us

Or perhaps it’s for Gitmo detainees. Who knows?

About those polls...

Things seem to be tightening up, for some strange reason.

Wednesday, October 3, 2012

So, how did the debate go?

Didn't watch it myself, but these folks did. Sorry to be ugly and racially divisive and all, but it looks like a clear win for Romney.

Update: Bob Owens has the best visual of the evening.

First they came for the superheroes...

"Batman charged with obstructing a police investigation in Michigan".

And you, Ann, simply look clueless

I think the video released by the Daily Caller yesterday, in which we see Obama imitating – who? Al Sharpton? Flip Wilson? – is newsworthy, if hardly earthshaking. Perhaps it would not be so newsworthy today had it been covered by the press back when Obama was running for president. In any event, it struck me as standard mendacious liberal b.s.; maybe my long-term exposure to this kind of stuff just leaves me unsurprised.

Ann Althouse, on the other hand, sees something nasty in the woodshed. She has published the following post at Instapundit:
AM I THE ONLY ONE OF THE INSTAPUNDIT BLOGGERS AND GUEST-BLOGGERS who loathes the Daily Caller’s exploitation of the 2007 video of Barack Obama stirring up the black churchfolk? I don’t think this is helping Mitt Romney with the swing voters at all. Like last week’s playing and replaying of the Obamaphone lady’s ravings, it repels me from Republicans. I’m a swing voter — I voted for Obama in 2008 and Bush in 2004 — and I am genuinely undecided this year. Those of you who are pleased with these seemingly exciting new weapons to use in the fight to defeat Obama are losing perspective. You are not thinking about how you look to the people you need to convince. Here’s a clue: You look ugly.
Conservative bloggers “look ugly” because they have drawn attention to a video in which the self-proclaimed racial healer demonstrates his ability to be a rabid race- baiter? Ugly because they point out that Obama told lies about the federal government’s response to Hurricane Katrina, and knew, or had reason to know, that they were lies? Ugly because they’re highlighting a side of Obama’s character which, had it been revealed in 2008 by an honest press, might have made a difference not only in the general election, but in the outcome of the Democratic primaries? And why on earth should so-called “undecideds” object to the airing of this video, or to conservatives giving it attention? Why should they interpret this as being unfavorable to Romney? As of this morning, the Romney campaign’s position was essentially “no comment.” We have been told repeatedly, even by the panjandrums of the legacy media, that Obama is an “enigma”, that no one really knows him. Is it the fault of conservatives that they should seek to remedy this problem?

I'm sure Ann is a nice person, and a fine law school professor; but whenever she opines on politics, more often than not she is to be found talking through the back of her neck. Her writing is too often like that of David Brooks, but without his fluid prose style: an intuitive, basically emotional response to the externals of a specific event, with little or no consideration given to the underlying elements of the event, itself, resulting in a squib of spluttering, yet tedious, piffle. And, sorry, but if you voted for Obama in ’08, and even at this moment, this late in the day, haven't made up your mind about which candidate to support, then your grasp of the stakes involved in this election is too utterly tenuous for your political opinions to be of interest for any reason other than as a portal through which the curious may wish to view the confused mind and muddled thinking of the "genuinely undecided" voter.

Update: I know this is ugly of me, but I couldn't resist the urge to point out this fabulous bit of hypocrisy.

Cover up!

It’s a pity that one has to turn to the foreign press these days to get reasonably factual reports on our own foreign policy disasters, but with the American media falling in as Obama’s willing propaganda militia, that’s just the way it is.

Con Coughlin of The Telegraph weighs in with an important and perfectly legitimate question: “Did the White house order a cover-up over the murder of Libya’s U.S. ambassador?”
But the real smoking gun is whether the Obama administration was warned in advance that al-Qaeda was planning an attack. A number of Israeli newspapers have suggested that Washington was warned as early as September 4 – a week earlier – that the environment in Benghazi was becoming increasingly hostile and anti-American, while in London the Foreign Office took the decision to withdraw all its consular staff from Benghazi two months before the murders. This decision was based on an intelligence assessment made by MI6 that al-Qaeda was openly operating in the area following a failed assassination attempt on Sir Dominic Asquith, Britain's ambassador to Libya, in June.

It is well known that British intelligence works closely with its counterpart in America, and if MI6 knew al-Qaeda was operating in the Benghazi region, then it is highly likely that the CIA did too.
I also heard some local conservative radio hosts discussing the issue this morning, and one raised what I thought was a first-rate question: Why was Susan Rice, our ambassador to the U.N., trotted out to represent the White House on the talk shows after the attack in Benghazi? The U.N. ambassador doesn’t have anything to do with our embassies and consulates, or with their security. Could it be because Hillary Clinton knew that the argument - the film made ‘em do it! - was a lie, and that to go out and make that statement would have been a career-ending move for her? I can well imagine her reluctance to admit any negligence on her part, or to fall on her sword to cover up for Obama’s fecklessness; so perhaps Rice was the sacrificial goat. This is an important issue, particularly in light of recent reports that the consulate in Benghazi had requested additional security and had been turned down by the State Department. And the issue isn’t going away simply because the American “mediacracy” refuses to pay sufficient attention to it. Eventually the emboldened terrorists of the Middle East will attempt to repeat their performance – with results that will have proved to be predictable to everybody except for the invincibly ignorant “smart diplomacy” advocates of the Obama administration.

Tuesday, October 2, 2012

Obama's foreign policy: winning friends and influencing people

Or, perhaps, maybe not.
A senior U.S. official says there is strong circumstantial evidence that Mexican federal police who fired on a U.S. Embassy vehicle, wounding two CIA officers, were working for organized crime on a targeted assassination attempt.

Meanwhile, a Mexican official with knowledge of the case on the Aug. 24 ambush confirmed on Tuesday that prosecutors are investigating whether the Beltran Leyva Cartel was behind the attack.
Hey, maybe the Mexican police saw a sneak preview of the Univision report on Fast and Furious.

Unfiltered Obama

Here's the speech from 2007 that broke today in which, among other things, Obama gives a shout-out to his pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

The accent is...bizarre. It's like he borrowed Jesse Jackson's vocal chords for the evening.

Mostly it just seems like typical boilerplate delivered to an important segment of his base. I admit that I just skimmed through the video, but the part I did see and hear was kinda...meh. I mean, there's a lot of garden-variety liberal crap, tailored for a black audience, but nothing new (unless I missed something).

And there is the bogus accent (or is the one we're now familiar with the bogus one?)

The Obama administration: it definitely has a certain air about it

Corrupt power-lust stank, I’d say. Patrick Caddell at Breitbart’s Big Peace has the lowdown on three Obama minders: Valerie Jarrett, David Plouffe and Tom Donilon. A sample:
Understandably, Donilon himself has kept a low profile since the leaks and their blowback. Yes, he is a longtime Democratic political operative with no real national security credentials. Yes, former Defense Secretary Bob Gates warned that Donilon would be a “disaster” if were ever to become national security adviser. But Donilon had reason to think that he would be okay if he just hunkered down.

Yet now, from out of his own sordid past, new revelations arise to haunt him. Thanks to Andrew Stiles at The Washington Free Beacon, we now know that Donilon has been receiving a $148,000-a-year pension from Fannie Mae.

Indeed, it’s hard to know where to begin on this one. After working in all those Democratic campaigns, Donilon found his inside-the-beltway reward--a cushy lobbying job at Fannie Mae, the place where all hacks went to get rich, even as Fannie made the country poor. The Fannie bailout has, in fact, cost taxpayers more than $154 billion through 2010, and the company is still, today, losing billions every quarter.

And now Donilon, 57, having earned millions as a Fannie Mae lobbyist, is currently collecting his pension, even as he works full time at the White House, for a salary of $172,000 a year. Is that how things are supposed to work? Can such rapacious double-dipping possibly be squared with the ideal of public service? As one senator put it, “Most taxpayers are struggling to make ends meet. Yet, Mr. Donilon is still profiting from his work during the Fannie Mae buildup of the housing bubble that led to a recession and massive taxpayer bailouts."
Get. These. People. Outta here. If we don’t end their careers this November, the hurdle for a return to the rule of law, transparency and individual freedom is going to be raised to an ominously high level.

Update: You people in the diplomatic service ought to be voting for Romney this year; you know, as if your lives depended on the outcome.

Go Tigers!


Well, it wasn’t a pretty season, but the Detroit Tigers finally got ‘er done, winning the Central Division title of the American League last night, having come on particularly strong in the last 10 or so games. Guess I’ll be feeling that ol’ playoff angst for at least the next week (of course, playoff angst is better than elimination blues).

Just completely lawless

Now the Obama administration is counseling defense contractors to break the law by not notifying workers of potential layoffs.

The truism is that "it's the economy, stupid." Sometimes I feel like screaming, "it's stupid that's it's the economy". Sure, Obama's economic policies have utterly failed; but that's really not the worst thing about him and his whole rotten government. It's the cavalier attitude toward laws, both constitutional and legislative, the astonishing sense of entitlement that has pervaded Obama's entire life and now threatens to turn our country and its future into nothing but a bullet point on his resume (and an untruthful one, at that).

Update: And let's not forget the dirty tricks.

Really, I'm now seeing this election as a chance for our country to take a national shower to wash the Democrat filth off.

Monday, October 1, 2012

Ben Bernanke would like for you to believe that he’s the love child of Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz

Sorry, Ben. The lab called, and the DNA is not a match.

What fragile little dears our Afghan "allies" are

That's right, it's our fault - again.

Not buying the hope and change piffle

Mabel, the official dog of Paco Enterprises, expresses disdain for the Democratic ticket.


Monday movie

Brian Donlevy illustrates the principle, much beloved of Democrats, that one should vote early and often (from The Great McGinty, 1940).