Someone tell Dan Rather that clairvoyance is not a "source"

The hat tip for this one goes to Roger H via this tweet. Get this: it turns out that not only did former President George W. Bush not dodge going to Vietnam, but he volunteered to go! However at that time he was 200 hours short on experience so he was not able to under the military regulations. Here's the pertinent excerpt:

Retired Col. Ed Morrisey, the man who swore Bush into the Guard, told CBS affiliate WVLT in Knoxville, Tenn., a different story. "The Air Force, in their ultimate wisdom, assembled a group of F-102s and took them to Southeast Asia. Bush volunteered to go. But he needed to have 500 (flight) hours, but he had just over 300 hours, so he wasn't able to go," Morrisey said.

Fact is, Bush enlisted as an airman basic in the 147th Fighter-Interceptor Group at Ellington Air Force Base in Houston on May 28, 1968 — when the 147th was participating in combat in Vietnam. From 1968 through 1970, pilots from the 147th participated in operation Palace Alert.

The F-102 Bush flew was designed primarily for defense against the threat of Soviet bombers, and units charged with this task were the best of the best. Only a return of his unit's mission to continental air defense before Bush completed his flight training made it unlikely he'd fly in combat. Bush avoided nothing.

The heart of the Mapes-Rather hatchet job was that Bush was a coward who avoided action in Vietnam. That was false, and CBS' own report on the matter shows that Mapes knew it was false.

Hey, maybe someone should tell Dan Rather! Forget it—that jerk knew.

Glad this article wasn't written using Microsoft word—that weird little "th" character screws up the blog for some web browsers.

Couldn't find many good Ted Kennedy jokes online

I was really disappointed, but I found a few. They were from really dumb sites which contained some I didn't like for various reasons, so I'm not going to bother linking them. But since we're assuming Ted went to Heaven (right?) we know he'll be laughing at these. Let's laugh along with him, shall we.

Ted Kennedy has been sober since August 25, 2009.

Q: Why did Teddy Kennedy's staff call him "Mr. Bookmark"?
A: He can most often be found wedged between two pages.

Ted Kennedy had a plan to stimulate the Auto industry, but his program was called “Cash for Kerplunkers”.

How did people find out Ted was dead? He didn’t show up to the bar this morning.

With news of Ted’s death, the Massachusetts liquor industry is now going to need a bailout.

Q: What did Ted Kennedy's office staff do when they need to refill the
petty cash drawer?
A: Turn in all of Teddy's empties.

If the Liberals can talk about Camelot then we can talk about the Lady in the Lake.

Ted Kennedy never became president because unlike George Washington, he couldn’t cross a river.

Q: What do you call a Kennedy, vodka, and water?
A: A fuzzy recollection.

Ted Kennedy would have passed away a long time ago if only the government could find a safe place to bury his liver.

Did you hear the latest about Iran? There’s good news and bad news. The bad news is that Jane Fonda is going to Tehran. The good news is that Ted Kennedy is driving her to the airport.

Q: How many Kennedys does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
A: Two: one to hold the lightbulb, and one to drink until the room spins.

Teddy: The "Third Tower"

From Fred Barnes' article:

Of course, if Obama follows Kennedy's path, he will retain the affection of one important group until the end: the press corps. The senator's death was treated in the media as the tragic loss of an irreplaceable leader of the nation. One journalist reported that on Martha's Vineyard, where Kennedy took his holidays in the summer, "it feels a bit like 9/11... end-of-summer weather is achingly beautiful but the mood is melancholy because of Teddy".

So... where are the truthers? Was Kennedy's cancer an "inside job"? No, don't answer that, please.

You could be laughing more

If you aren't laughing enough today, read this. Warning: crude language. Via Pikkumatti, via Jonah.

Only my son

Only my seven-year-old son says, upon whipping out his blue, plastic Star Wars light-saber, "Say 'hello' to my little friend!!" Heh-heh... where'd he learn that? I wonder....

Then my wife in her best Yoda voice: "To my little friend, say 'Hello'!" She's certainly the comedian in the family.

Postmortem Rehab Begins

From CNN: "Kennedy called a man of quiet faith". Sure, I'll buy it. But was he quiet in any other aspect of his life? Or was his faith the only thing about which he was quiet?

Damaged III?

Via Tammy Bruce. Henry Rollins--the "Lion of the American Punk Senate"--asks "Where's Mary Jo Kopechne's Eulogy?":

Not Far Under The Surface. Let’s say I am driving myself and a passenger in my car at night. I accidentally drive off a bridge into the water below. I am able to get out of the submerged vehicle but for some reason, I am unable to free the passenger. I gather two friends, a relative and my lawyer and return to the scene. We are unable to rescue the person trapped in the car. Several hours later, myself nor the two others I took to the site have called the authorities. In fact, it’s two fishermen who find the car the next morning as even then, no one has been called to the scene. The car is removed from the water and it is determined that its occupant is dead. This tragic incident is made international news by my circumstances. I am very well known, a United States senator. My family is incredibly powerful. There are allegations that I had been drinking heavily hours up to the time I got into the vehicle with the passenger. I deny this for the rest of my life. That at no point did I make an attempt to call for rescue would probably be considered by many people to be outrageous and horrible, perhaps a crime that would carry a prison sentence. Can you imagine what the parents of the deceased would be going through when they found out that their 28-year-old daughter died alone in total darkness? I serve no time. Not inconvenienced by the burdensome obstacle of incarceration, I seek to maintain my elected position. I am successful and remain a senator for the next four decades. Would any deed I performed in that time, besides going to prison for the negligent homicide I committed all those years ago, be enough to wipe the slate clean? After my passing, would you fail to mention the incident and the death of this innocent person in reviewing the events of my long and lauded life? You wouldn't forget about her, would you? That would be negligent.

Poetic.

Don't think Rollins is a Lion? Well, hear him roar.

Crunchy Kennedy Commentary by Pikkumatti

[the following guest-post was submitted by Dallas correspondent, Pikkumatti.]

Nothing livens up the Pauli-blog like a little of the Crunchy One's fine work. Well, down here in Dallas, we are frequently treated by some of Rod Dreher's output landing on our front door step. In today's edition of the local rag,, we get the following moral relativism, Crunchy-style, regarding the Greatest Senator of Our Time:

Today, it's almost unthinkable that a politician could get away with what Ted Kennedy did, which is good. Still, it's worth thinking about how much we lose because a Ted Kennedy is not really possible today.

Whatever their motives, if the people of that era hadn't been so tolerant of a Ted Kennedy's vices, America would have been a different place – and, for liberals, a worse place. Why are so many great men also morally mad? Moralism may make for a more sane politics – it's certainly more sanitized since the day the priapic lion of the Senate roared after whisky-soaked lunches at Capitol Hill brasseries – but it also makes the world safer for mediocrity.

The great thing about writing a blog post about what Rod Dreher writes is that his words speak for themselves.

[P.S. For a description of what Crunchy refers to as "Ted Kennedy's vices", I refer to the GQ article by the late great Michael Kelly. According to Rod Dreher, if only we would tolerate a few "whiskey-soaked lunches" like those described in the article, we would continue to receive the greatness that comes with it. Good thing Senator Dodd continues to serve, or we'd have to muddle along without his great leadership, too (read the Kelly article).]

Teen World Savers 2

This was awesome!

I cracked up at the part where we learn that Glenn's character's name is Disaster. I was wondering what his name was.


The wizard reminded me of the "Sphinx" character played by Wes Studi in Mystery Man.

Great job, Joshua. The soundtrack rocked.

Van Jones: Green-with-envy Czar?

Another video from Glenn Beck. Here's a short bio on the Green Czar, Van Jones, the ex-con he mentions in my last post.

The line that caught my eye/ear is close to the beginning: "What I do, to kinda make it simple, I'm basically a community organizer inside the federal government." Nice.

Here's what's on the back of his bubble-gum card, also from Beck.

Green Jobs Czar - Van Jones
Title: Special Adviser for Green Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation at the White House Council on Environmental Quality
Salary: unknown
Reports to: Head of Council on Environmental Quality Nancy Sutley
Appointed: March 2009
Agency or department that might have handled similar issues: Environmental Protection Agency; Labor

• Will focus on environmentally-friendly employment within the administration and boost support for the idea nationwide
• Rose from near obscurity in the Oakland, Calif., grassroots organizing scene to the leader of a national movement to spur the green economy.
• Founded Green For All, an organization focused on creating green jobs in impoverished areas
• Also co-founder of the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights and Color of Change, which includes Bay Area PoliceWatch, a group devoted to "protect[ing] the community from police misconduct"
• Published New York Times best-seller The Green Collar Economy: How One Solution Can Fix Our Two Biggest Problems, in October 2008
• Started career as a prison-reform advocate in Oakland, Calif., lobbying for reform of the juvenile justice system and youth-violence prevention programs
• Has law degree from Yale
• 2007: worked on the Green Jobs Act with then-Rep. Hilda Solis (D-Calif.), who co-sponsored the bill in the House
• 1993: was arrested at the Los Angeles riots that followed the acquittal of cops in the Rodney King beating. "I was arrested simply for being a police observer," says Jones, who had just graduated from Yale Law School and was working with the Lawyer's Committee for Civil Rights in San Francisco.
• 1999: was arrested in the 1999 Seattle protests against the World Trade Organization
• Excerpt from a Nov. 2005 interview in the East Bay Express:
Jones had planned to move to Washington, DC, and had already landed a job and an apartment there. But in jail, he said, "I met all these young radical people of color—I mean really radical, communists and anarchists. And it was, like, 'This is what I need to be a part of.'" Although he already had a plane ticket, he decided to stay in San Francisco. "I spent the next ten years of my life working with a lot of those people I met in jail, trying to be a revolutionary." In the months that followed, he let go of any lingering thoughts that he might fit in with the status quo. "I was a rowdy nationalist on April 28th, and then the verdicts came down on April 29th," he said. "By August, I was a communist." In 1994, the young activists formed a socialist collective, Standing Together to Organize a Revolutionary Movement, or STORM, which held study groups on the theories of Marx and Lenin and dreamed of a multiracial socialist utopia. They protested police brutality and got arrested for crashing through police barricades. In 1996, Jones decided to launch his own operation, which he named the Ella Baker Center after an unsung hero of the civil-rights movement.

Glenn Beck discusses the groups who authored the Obamacare bill

Source.

Congress, beyond not reading these bills, is not even writing these bills. They are being written by a vast network that is not conspiratorial — it is completely out and wide open — yet the media refuses to report on them.

Organizations that are filled with socialists, communists, revolutionaries. Organizations that pull their members from legitimate businesses, politicians and from groups that most Americans have never heard of, like Movement for a Democratic Society — a group started by members of the Communist Party USA, other radicals and Socialists of America.

I have demonstrated these radicals are not only instrumental in shaping legislation that's being jammed through, but are also -- by invitation -- personally advising the president of the United States.

And again the media remains silent.

As the man says, "Speak without fear."

Ted Kennedy's shamelessness

Even in his last hours, Kennedy was ever the Machiavellian prince. When I read the first part of this Taranto piece to my wife, who's not as political as me, she quipped "These people are like children; they never grew up." Well, yeah, and I guess that their parents are to be found among the citizenry they govern who bear the brunt of their childishness.

Kennedy's shamelessness in urging repeal of a law he himself pushed for was either appalling or admirable, depending on your point of view. To conservatives, it was a pure partisan power play: Kennedy favored whatever gave Democrats a tactical advantage, procedural fairness be damned. To liberals, however, it was an act of idealism: Kennedy had spent a career trying to advance "universal health care"—which to him and them is a matter of basic justice—and the Bay State vacancy could make the difference between ObamaCare's passing or failing. To our mind, the conservatives have the better of the argument, though we must concede that Kennedy's motives likely did have an ideological component as well as a partisan one.

It's also true, as Michael Barone has observed, that "all procedural arguments are insincere, including this one." One could argue that Kennedy's brazenly instrumentalist appeal to Beacon Hill has the virtue of honesty. But democracy depends on procedural fairness and the appearance of procedural fairness, even if all political players have ulterior motives whenever they promote such fairness. By this standard, Kennedy's effort to change the Massachusetts law without even a pretense of concern for fairness was objectionable, and that is true even if we are objecting insincerely.

This is why it's called a machine. Republican in office? throw this switch. Democrat in office? pull it back. Just like a friggin' railroad.

70% of American People Don't Think like Obama

Great new Rasmussen poll out. From the Associated Content site:

Rasmussen conducted a poll asking Americans on whether they would prefer a:

a) Government that would provide fewer services, imposing lower taxes OR
b) Government that provides more services, imposing higher taxes

The results of the poll revealed that 70% of likely voters favor a Government that offers fewer services, imposing lower taxes. 88% of registered republicans polled shared this view. 78% of Independents shared this view. And surprisingly 48% of Democrats shared this view.

I just wish these people would have voted with this in mind. Yes, I know that McCain could have done a better job revealing Obama's big government tendencies. But remember this little poll? John Ziegler revealed that many Americans who voted for Obama thought the Republicans were in control of the House. So they didn't even realize that putting Obama in the Whitehouse would be a vote for one-party control, not gridlock.

It's all a shame, but we'll keep fighting.

John Kass Says Good Riddance to Camelot

I agree with him; "'tis a silly place".

His is a good article, avoiding invectives and shooting for the almost impossible journalistic objectivity when dealing with the mythologized celebrity of the Kennedy family. His conclusion deals with an image which could have changed our political iconography substantially.

During her interview with White, Mrs. Kennedy also spoke of drama and history in those moments before photographers made the iconic pictures on the day the president was assassinated.

"Everybody kept saying to me to put a cold towel around my head and wipe the blood off. Later I saw myself in the mirror, my whole face spattered with blood and hair. ... I wiped it off with Kleenex. ... History! ... I thought, no one really wants me there. Then one second later, I thought, why did I wash the blood off? I should have left it there. Let them see what they've done.

"If I'd just had the blood and caked hair when they took the picture. ... Then later I said to Bobby -- what's the line between history and drama? I should have kept the blood on."

That line between history and drama for the Kennedys was never very thick, like the line between American realism and our yearning for royalty, and for comforting political myths.

He's right about the confusion of drama with history where the Kennedys are concerned. I'm not sure I "yearn for royalty" as an American, though. To me and many others, the neck brace on young Teddy at Mary Jo's funeral is the best icon of the Kennedys: it’s all about appearances, perceptions of the camera, excuses, an officially-accepted narrative for followers to trumpet and getting people to feel sorry for you when others suffer more.

Ted Kennedy was Pro-life

...until he sold out.

"When history looks back to this era it should recognize this generation as one which cared about human beings enough to halt the practice of war, to provide a decent living for every family, and to fulfill its responsibility to its children from the very moment of conception." - Senator Edward Kennedy, 1971

Source.

There is no Lou but Lou

Really liked the bass player in this performance.

I always liked the way Reed spontaneously rephrases his lyrics while making it still sound totally natural. This vid is cool; as it ends you get to follow him backstage, kiss his wife, etc.

My Favorite Country Song

It seems like people either love this song or hate it.

I love it. It's one of those tunes that I like have going through my head for some reason.

Why did Mick start playing that big acoustic guiltar? Who's he think he is--Bono?

Free Our Health Care Now Petition could break record

Sam Adams said this: “It does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set brush fires in people's minds”.

With 1.15 million signatures, the Free Our Health Care Now petition stands on the brink of breaking a record for most signatures on a petition. Please sign it if you haven't already by going here. If you're feeling brave and have some extra time, email the link to everyone you know. I did it once, might do it again....

Homeschooler Pwns RMU Admissions Office

From Homeschool Legal Defense.

Timothy Williams (name changed to protect privacy) was delighted to receive word that he was not only accepted as a student at Robert Morris University (RMU), but also accepted into their athletics program and honors program. He was all set to leave home for his freshman orientation when the admissions office called and abruptly cancelled his admission.

The college official informed the Williams family, who are members of Home School Legal Defense Association, that they could not accept the homeschool transcript. The official said they needed to submit an accredited transcript, a GED score, or an RMU placement test score. With their son’s acceptance on the line, the Williams family called HSLDA.

After reviewing the facts and documents, Staff Attorney Scott Woodruff quickly sent a letter to the admissions department explaining that their actions could be construed as discriminatory and were clearly out of line with federal law. Federal law allows homeschoolers to self-certify their diplomas for purposes of financial aid.

When Woodruff’s letter arrived, university officials immediately held a meeting. The next day, the Williams family received a call from RMU’s admissions department. They apologized for their action and reinstated Timothy’s acceptance into the college, the sports program, and the honors program.

Patrick Courrielche on the Riefenstahlization of the Art Community

Pikkumatti sent me this link which links to this Reason piece by the same author which I read first because it's shorter. Excerpt:

Throughout modern history, art typically enters politics on a mass scale in two fashions: first, as a check on power; second, as a tool used by those in power. Freedom of the Press comes into play in both cases, but in very different ways. In the first case, it protects political commentary by artists. This freedom is not a garnish. It is a necessary weapon, enshrined in the Constitution for the purpose of countering contradictions, hypocrisies, and distortions made by politicians and others in power. Yet the art community has responded to the Obama administration's contradictions, hypocrisies, and distortions with near total silence.

Consider the recent flurry of debate over the Obama "Joker" posters that have been appearing in Los Angeles. This image represents the only substantial counterpoint to Obama's current agenda from the art community. What's been the response?

One writer from the LA Weekly declared of the image, "The only thing missing is a noose." Philip Kennicott of The Washington Post stated, "So why the anonymity? Perhaps because the poster is ultimately a racially charged image." Bedlam magazine, the first to comment on the poster back in April, argued, "The Joker white-face imposed on Obama's visage has a sort of malicious, racist, Jim Crow quality to it." Why would any artist who hopes to have (or keep) a career create images that criticize the president when both journalists and art reviewers make such irrational comments? To give some perspective, remember that the "noose" comment came from a publication that once presented a cover image of George W. Bush as a bloodthirsty vampire.

I can give Mr. Courrielche an answer, but he won't like it. Artists nowadays aren't very good, and they put ideology much higher than actually creating anything beautiful, good or true. If all the examples in these two pieces don't just about prove that to you, I don't know what to tell you except maybe go lick Obama's shoes; you'll enjoy it.

Here's a good example of how I interpret a piece of pro-Obama "art". Notice that this is not really art, but what marketing people call a "mashup" which can be whipped out in a matter of several hours.


Here we see the Theological Virtue of "Hope" scripted in an elegant font, yet entirely lowercase, descending into CHANGE which charges forward from the left in bold, capital letters. Notice also how "hope" fades into the background which is the same color of red whereas CHANGE is a contrasting blue. Then we have a profiled bust of smiling Obama, squinting leftward as if into the bright daybreak. The subjects are all presented on the background of a "floppy flag" with scribbled stars and cloudy stripes. I like American flags a little less... deconstructed?

So it looks like propaganda to me, but admitted I'm not a fan of Obama. If it is art at all, it's modern art. An artist friend of mine summed up the problem with modern art: "It lacks virtue." There you go. But this image certainly doesn't lack power which, as we know, is something entirely different. Or the ability to communicate a message.

More Ted K Commentary

For serious and extensive commentary on the death of Senator Edward Kennedy, check out this Fark page. 1673 comments and counting. Some great pictures, too.

News Heading of the Week

From this article, about halfway down: Some Never Forgave Kennedy for Chappaquiddick. What? Who would those ignoramuses be? Forgive and forget–we're talking about one girl here, jeez.

I liked the following question posed by Ted Kennedy biographer Edward Klein: "How could he be one of most trusted members of Senate–and they trusted his word as good as gold–be an out of control frat boy most of his life?" Then he answers his question: "Life is complicated and people aren't as simple as we'd like them to be."

After that night, the word Chappaquiddick became synonymous with deception and abuse of power, and for decades until this day, each anniversary was dredged up in newspapers around the country.

But oddly, the darkest moment in Kennedy's career also sealed his fate as a work-horse senator and ultimately transformed him into one of the most highly regarded politicians in Congress.

Yeah, "highly regarded" because no one could win an election against him. With the Kennedy machine behind him, the guy could do whatever he wanted.

Well that's that. Wanted to make sure I had the word "chappaquiddick" on the blog for some hits.

RSM on Mackey

Robert McCain supports John Mackey's free market ideas on healthcare, but he rips Mackey for being in the organic food business, here:

Considering my deep and enduring antipathy toward “Crunchy Cons,” I am more than willing to believe that Whole Foods CEO John Mackey is a menace to society.

...and here...

What red-blooded American can resist the temptation to hate a man who made his fortune marketing stuff like organic vegetables, free-range chicken and all manner of whole-grain products appealing to the colonic-health obsessions of aging Baby Boomers?

I agree with RSM's larger point, the stupidity of the boycotters and the superiority of the market to supply goods and services. However, I think the above statements and the one he concludes with, "I stand ready to hate Mackey as a peddler of holistic hokum", are signs that he misses what should be a fairly large point to anyone who believes in the American free market system. Mackey found a market among aging hippies who worship their taste-buds and colons, and are easily manipulated by guilt about the environment, then he subsequently discovered ingenius ways to separate them from their money. I think that is cool. Shouldn't he be commended for coming up with this idea whether he himself buys it or not? Otherwise you could spend your life criticizing those who "sell the sizzle" not the steak; they are not in short supply in our society.

I know McCain would probably hate my saying this, but I think the harshness of his words reveal that he has fallen prey to the same narcissistic tendency as Dreher. He's placing his tastes over his belief in the freedom of the market. And if he truly believes there is something immoral about selling these organic products, how is that different than tilting at the Walmart windmill for selling plastic Chinese trash?

More Adventure is On the Way!

I heard a rumor that Teen World Savers 2 is on it's way. I can't wait! The first episode was a smash hit, so please review.

Here's a teaser trailer for the 2nd episode.

Yeah, saving the world is cool enough, but even cooler if you are a teenager.

I guess the "Terrorism Recession" is finally over

Under the Bush Administration, Islamic terrorism suffered a fairly awful recession of sorts. But under Obama, it appears that recession is over. Recent stimulus packages such as Obama's Ramadan speech, the freeing of the Lockerbie bomber and the omission of illustrations from a book about the Danish cartoons, against the advice of experts as well as the sensibility of normal people, have boosted the market for Islamic Jihad. I guess "happy days" are here again if you are into targeting civilians, caning women and mucking up elections in the name of the Prophet Mohammed and war and violence upon everyone else.

Ralph Peters has the scoop. Excerpt:

Scotland's craven release, "on humanitarian grounds," of Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi, the mastermind of the bombing that killed 270 passengers aboard a Pan Am flight two decades ago, was merely the noisiest terrorist triumph during a week of shame.

And noisy it was: Libya's Moammar Khadafy staged a huge homecoming party for the terrorist. (Think that would've happened while W was president?) The gleeful Khadafy rubbed the West's snout in our feckless taste for appeasement.

Appeasement was also the watchword back in the United States, where Yale University Press delighted Islamist extremists by removing all illustrations from a scholarly work about the Danish cartoon debacle -- not just the caricatures of Mohammed.

Can't wait for that unillustrated Calvin and Hobbes retrospective. Or that exciting scholarly work on the philosophy of Charles Schultz sans pictorial representations of Charlie Brown or Snoopy; preview following:

Frame 1. [Shot of Snoopy with right ear draped over wooden dog house] Snoopy: (thought bubble) "Today is my first day as "Head Beagle". (secondary thought bubble) "As soon as my new secretary arrives, I can begin work." Frame 2. [Snoopy now sitting on dog house. Woodstock the bird approaches from left in upside-down flight pattern.] Frame 3. [Snoopy covers eyes with both anterior paws. Bird not shown; assumed to have struck dog house causing loud "Bonk!" sound and "pain star" symbol to issue forth from the soffit area of said dog house.] Frame 4. [Snoopy looks down at Woodstock who sits underneath dizziness scribble] Snoopy: "I had sort of hoped the head beagle rated a better secretary..." (source)

It's a go for the Tea Party Express in Canton, OH

WRT aforementioned Tea Party, I'm definitely planning on being there. I will be wearing my newly-acquired Dissent is Patriotic T-Shirt, of course.


Here is the link on Facebook and here is the official site link. This is the first time I'll have attended anything quite like this, so I will attempt to get lots of footage from it and even blog on-site it if that's possible.

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes....

I'm going to be making a few changes here at ol' Est Quod Est. First off, I'm going to ditch the "Pile of stuff I've been reading" in the side-bar. If I'm reading something which I feel is worthwhile sharing, I'll just throw it in as a blog post. Anyone who cares will still be able to view to old pile here.

Secondly—and I don't think this is nearly as radical as it might sound to some—I'm hereby extending an open invitation to any regular reader of this blog to become a contributor. Just leave a comment here or email me, and I will extend an official invitation with the signup link. There aren't any quotas you must meet to do this, and the "Golden Rule" should suffice as the blogging guideline. Obviously I'm the boss, but I'm the kind of boss that gets a kick out of people "taking advantage" of him. (That guilty look as you sneak a pile of wire bound notebooks or a stapler into your briefcase is... priceless. I know you'll be back tomorrow, laboring slavishly for cheap coffee and pennies on my dollar... MWA-HA-HA!)


Ahem.

Finally, I'm going to be making a concerted effort in the near future to find ways to promote this blog. This will take form in a few ways to begin with, as I see it. I'll probably begin attempting to write something of an editorial nature around once a week with a word count of between 500 and 1,000. This should increase the value of the blog by decreasing the percentage of the blog which is of a purely derivative nature. Also I'll probably be hat-tipping other bloggers more to acheive new traffic. Other ideas: book reviews, product reviews, local news... recipes?

Please think about whether you'd like to contribute to this blog, and don't be shy of giving me advice. This blog, albeit begun as sort of a joke, currently has an average of 40 visits a day. This places it firmly in the underachiever territory, but I think we can all turn it into something bigger and better and... who knows? What say ye?

Isn't Dissent Patriotic Anymore?

Andrew Breitbart exposes the inconsistency of those cheesed off at Whole Foods and its Founder/CEO, John Mackey for his aforementioned alternative health care reform article.

Yet amid the cries of "dissent is patriotic" - a phrase seen on the bumper stickers of cars in the Whole Foods parking lot - the antiwar movement grew and grew, unfettered by the war's supporters or by the party in power.

As the Hollywood Left churned out antiwar film screeds, it was creating a narrative of its victimhood as it victimized Mr. Bush and his administration with the false accusation that dissenters were being persecuted. But now that they are in power, Democrats are brazenly wielding punitive weaponry against dissenting Americans and are using the power of the state to shut up citizens.

The Democratic leadership - and its friends in the mainstream media - seem determined to brand opposition to the president's legislative agenda as illegitimate, even racist in origin. Individuals and grass-roots organizations are helping the statists' cause by advocating boycotts and other means of stifling dissent.

The strategy is clear: Intimidate people from speaking up or from attending public protests by telegraphing that anyone can be made a demon for standing up and exercising basic, constitutional rights.

To call these people hypocrites would be a grave insult to those who fail to live up to their own standards. Liberalism has never been about establishing a universal standard. Liberalism is simply intellectual cover for those wanting to gain political power and increase the size of the state.

Well, I think I'll mosey on down to a nearby Whole Foods store to check it out. If they really are "anti-union", then that sounds likes a business I'd be into supporting.