Year: 2008

Tribune Co. Files for Bankruptcy……Bloggers Laugh.

Anyone who reads this blog more than just coming in from a Search Engine or happening to follow a link in from another Blog; knows that on this Blog, I fight for the little guy.  I fight for the middle class person that goes to work every day, punches a time clock, and simply goes to work to make a decent and meager living.  I do this because it is my background, it is my World, and it is who I am as a person.

I read today that the company called Tribune Co. has filed for bankruptcy.  This company owns the Los Angeles Times, Radio Station KTLA, The Chicago Tribune, The Chicago Cubs, and a few other businesses.  I can only the imagine the stress that this has placed on all the employees of these companies, not just the writers, but all of the people involved in getting the news to the people of the respective areas.

What troubles me, is the reaction that I am seeing in the Blogosphere.  Sorry people, there is nothing funny about not knowing if you will have a paycheck in the coming months or not.  I really must say that I am highly disappointed to see my fellow Conservatives, as well as some decent and respectable Liberal Blogs making light of this fact.

The reason why this bothers me is this.  First off, I consider these people that work for these papers as fellow writers.  Second of all, is this here; you know, it is one thing to be a Blogger, to sit in your basement and get free hosting from a friend and sit here, day after day, firing off opinions of the politics of the day.  However, when it is your livelihood, when you are feeding your family, when it is your career, when it is everything you have worked your entire life for, your existence; it is a completely different matter.

This is why I cannot help, but sit here and wonder aloud of how in the name of the Living God in Heaven that some right wing Republican Blogger or even a Democratic Liberal Blogger, even if it is a humor site; would have the abject chutzpah to mock another group of writers in a time of grim news.  I would suppose that is what separates me from the Republicans and Democrats, or perhaps those Political junkies, who look at every piece of news, which happens to come around the vast expanse that we call the internet, through a distorted prism of politics.

In case, no one in the political world has figured this out yet.  This has zero to do with politics, unless perhaps you are some moronic fascist, who thinks that all of the employees of this company deserve to be punished for a newspapers particular political editorial stance; In which case you probably should not even be using a computer, much less writing a blog.  In case any of you forgotten, there are people that work for these companies that could frankly give two rips about politics or anything related to it.

In this time of economic turmoil, there is just no place for this sort of heartless idiocy.  I just wish my fellow bloggers felt the same way.

Bill Kristol Enrages Libertarians

Stuff likes this cracks me up. It should not, but it does. 😛

NYT Columnist Bill Kristol basically kicks the Libertarians and fiscal Conservative purists square in the jewels.

Money Quotes:

But conservatives should think twice before charging into battle against Obama under the banner of “small-government conservatism.” It’s a banner many Republicans and conservatives have rediscovered since the election and have been waving around energetically. Jeb Bush, now considering a Senate run in 2010, even went so far as to tell Politico last month, “There should not be such a thing as a big-government Republican.”

Really? Jeb Bush was a successful and popular conservative governor of Florida, with tax cuts, policy reforms and privatizations of government services to show for his time in office. Still, in his two terms state spending increased over 50 percent — a rate faster than inflation plus population growth. It turns out, in the real world of Republican governance, that there aren’t a whole lot of small-government Republicans.

Five Republicans have won the presidency since 1932: Dwight Eisenhower, Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan and the two George Bushes. Only Reagan was even close to being a small-government conservative. And he campaigned in 1980 more as a tax-cutter and national-defense-builder-upper, and less as a small-government enthusiast in the mold of the man he had supported — and who had lost — in 1964, Barry Goldwater. And Reagan’s record as governor and president wasn’t a particularly government-slashing one.

Even the G.O.P.’s 1994 Contract With America made only vague promises to eliminate the budget deficit, and proposed no specific cuts in government programs. It focused far more on crime, taxes, welfare reform and government reform. Indeed, the “Republican Revolution” of 1995 imploded primarily because of the Republican Congress’s one major small-government-type initiative — the attempt to “cut” (i.e., restrain the growth of) Medicare. George W. Bush seemed to learn the lesson. Prior to his re-election, he proposed and signed into law popular (and, it turned out, successful) legislation, opposed by small-government conservatives, adding a prescription drug benefit to Medicare.

So talk of small government may be music to conservative ears, but it’s not to the public as a whole. This isn’t to say the public is fond of big-government liberalism. It’s just that what’s politically vulnerable about big-government liberalism is more the liberalism than the big government. (Besides, the public knows that government’s not going to shrink much no matter who’s in power.)

Well, There are some Libertarians that having none of this. Some Libertarians that I happen to read are quite ticked.

David Donadio basically calls Kristol a “Self Loving Liberal” and lays the smack down, albiet nicely:

This is all quite clarifying. In Kristol’s view, modern conservatism has to have “a strong commitment to limited…government,” while passing trillion-dollar drug entitlements. In other words, Republicans aren’t going to restrain the undue growth of government. So, assuming one thinks Obama has a cooler head and better judgment than the GOP has shown on foreign policy of late, why exactly should he vote for Republicans anymore?

Kristol is surely right that a platform geared toward libertarians would fall flat, but he seems to have missed the memo that a platform geared toward neocons isn’t exactly going anywhere either. If the Republicans are going to alienate economic conservatives, foreign policy realists, and a whole rising generation that’ll eventually get wise to the fact that it’s footing the bill for all these bloated entitlements, what’s left? Somewhat socially conservative, self-identifying liberals who support school choice and tax cuts and Israel?

That’s not the swing vote, it’s the staff of The New Republic.

Stephen Bainbridge was not so nice about it, he basically said, “Excommunicate Kristol”:

Kristol thus reaffirms his position at the heart of the trio of reasons the conservative movement is in trouble: Iraq, K Street, and big government conservatism.

It’s true that government has a role. It’s true that sometimes government needs to do big things (like World Wars and bailing out the financial sector). But Kristol wants us to basically punt on the idea that government can be useful, productive, and effective at doing the big things society needs and still be a limited government.

The USA does not need two parties of big government. It doesn’t need two parties that support the nanny state. It doesn’t need two Mommy parties.

The USA does need at least one Daddy party. It needs at least one party that believes in individual freedom and limited government.

The GOP needs to become that party.

The GOP and the conservative movement don’t need Bill Kristol and his ilk. It’s time to kick his ass out.

Memo to Kristol: Put the pin back in the grenade! Before someone or yourself gets hurt! I mean, turning on your own base, which is mainly fiscal Conservatives and Libertarians is just not smart Bill, really. I thought even you would have known better than this.

To what was said above, let me simply say this. That only people that are getting any sort of anything out of this, is liberals. Hell, if they read this, they would be busting a gut laughing. I mean it cracks me up, because the Republican Party seems to be at a loss as to why their party is in such disarray. I submit this as one of the reasons.

The again, this is the same nimrod who was totally wrong about Iraq.

Others: (Left and Right) – Ross Douthat, Upturned Earth, The Corner, The Hill’s Blog Briefing Room, Copious Dissent, Below The Beltway, Wonkette, Right Wing Nut House, StephenBainbridge.com, RedState, Washington Monthly, The New Republic and Reason

The Obligatory SCOTUS Rejects Obama Birth Certificate Challenge

I went looking where I blogged about this, and it turns out, I’ve never touched the subject. Yes, I feel that it is that stupid.

Anyhow, AP reports that the SCOTUS has rejected some attention whoring idiots claim that Obama is not a citizen of the United States.

One word; Good. Now can we please move the fuck on? Thank You.

Others: : Agence France Presse, Little Green Footballs, The Politico, Alan Colmes’ Liberaland, Big Brass Blog, Guardian, Stop The ACLU, Outside The Beltway, Political Machine, Ballot Access News, Brendan Nyhan and PoliBlog (TM) (Via Memeornadum)

Liberals not to keen on Obama anymore

So says a report from The Politico:

Liberals are growing increasingly nervous – and some just flat-out angry – that President-elect Barack Obama seems to be stiffing them on Cabinet jobs and policy choices.

Obama has reversed pledges to immediately repeal tax cuts for the wealthy and take on Big Oil. He’s hedged his call for a quick drawdown in Iraq. And he’s stocking his White House with anything but stalwarts of the left.

Now some are shedding a reluctance to puncture the liberal euphoria at being rid of President George W. Bush to say, in effect, that the new boss looks like the old boss.

I’ve blogged about this before, Obama; once the inevitable was about to happen and he was about to be elected, choose to run a more moderate campaign. Now that he is elected, is choosing to run his campaign as a centrist or a pragmatist. Well, this has some on the far left, a bit upset.

Which prompted an former Obama staffer to fire off a article about it:

This is not a time for the left wing of our Party to draw conclusions about the Cabinet and White House appointments that President-Elect Obama is making. Some believe the appointments generally aren’t progressive enough. Having worked with former Senator Obama for the last two years, I can tell you, that isn’t the way he thinks and it’s not likely the way he will lead. The problems I mentioned above and the many I didn’t, suggest that our president surround himself with the most qualified people to address these challenges. After all, he was elected to be the president of all the people – not just those on the left.

Well, the far left is having none of that:

People on the left are not looking at Obama’s appointments with a jaundiced eye because they think he needs to apply some liberal orthodoxy litmus test. They have legitimate concerns that people like Geitner, Summers and other Rubin acolytes created this mess, and it’s reasonable to ask why they’re being appointed to get us out of it. While some of us want to give Obama a chance to fulfill the promises he campaigned on and work with the staff of his choice in order to do so, we’d have to be a bunch of intellectually dishonest kool-aid swilling freaks to pretend his economics team didn’t have some troublesome baggage.

[…]

And after the past eight years, it’s a bit much to stomach someone saying “just shut up and trust me, because I know better.”

There is a lot of speculation right now about what will happen with the 13 million member email list the Obama campaign built, and there is some talk of Hildebrand running an organization that manages it.

I wonder how long those membership numbers will hold up when any criticism of Obama is greeted with patronizing lectures and sneering condescension for its liberals?

I think the biggest problem is that the far left thought that Obama was going to serve their purposes.  The problem with that is, The President of the United States serves everyone, not just the far Liberal left. He also serves the people that did not vote for him.

The problem with this issue is this. The Democratic Party, lead by those of the far left attempted to make Barack Obama into a Messianic figure, who would be perfect, who would serve their proposes and further the progressive agenda. Turns out, they were quite frightfully wrong. It is nothing new, the Democrats have been overreaching and dong this sort of stuff for years. It is, quite frankly, nothing new at all.

(Hat Tip to Q&O for guidance and Memeorandum for Lead)

Quote of the Day – Pearl Harbor

A short comment is no place to settle the controversies that have raged ever since the attack about what Roosevelt and his chief subordinates knew in advance, but one thing has been known for a long time: however “dastardly” the attack might have been, it was anything but “unprovoked.” Indeed, even admirers and defenders of Roosevelt, such as Robert B. Stinnett and George Victor, have documented provocations aplenty. (See the former’s Day of Deceit: The Truth about FDR and Pearl Harbor and the latter’s The Pearl Harbor Myth: Rethinking the Unthinkable.)  On December 8, the same day that Roosevelt asked Congress for a declaration of war against Japan, former president Herbert Hoover wrote a private letter in which he remarked, “You and I know that this continuous putting pins in rattlesnakes finally got this country bitten.”

On the basis of facts accumulated over the past seven decades and available to anyone who cares to examine them, we are justified in saying that Hoover’s characterization of the war’s provocation was entirely accurate – both with regard to the Japanese imperial government as “rattlesnakes” and with regard to the U.S. government’s “putting pins in.” Indeed, we now have a much firmer basis for that characterization than Hoover could have had on December 8, 1941. Countless lies have been told, massive cover-ups have been staged, propaganda has flowed like a river, yet in this one regard, at least, the truth has undeniably been brought out.

Most American historians, of course, no longer bother to deny this truth. They simply take it in stride, presuming that the Japanese attack, by giving Roosevelt the public support he needed to bring the United States into the war against Germany through the “back door,” was a good thing for this country and for the world at large. Indeed, some actually shower the president with approbation for his mendacious maneuvering to wrench the American people away from their unsophisticated devotion to “isolationism.” In no small part, Roosevelt’s unrelenting dishonesty with the American people (Stanford University historian David M. Kennedy tactfully refers to the president’s “frequently cagey misrepresentations”) in 1940 and 1941 – plain enough if one reads nothing more than his pre-Pearl Harbor correspondence with Winston Churchill – is counted among his principal qualifications for “greatness” and for his (to my mind, incomprehensible) status as an American demigod.

I have noticed, however, that in polls of historians or lay persons to determine which presidents were “great,” the dead never have a vote. Lucky for Roosevelt.


Done with Twitter….

Well, Sort of…

Here’s is the truth about why the comment moderation is enabled and Why I’ve basically hung it up with Twitter.

I’ve made it quite clear on this Blog that I am in favor of the loans to the big three in Detroit. I’ve Blogged many times as to why. I realize that it is a very complex issue and that no matter what happens, someone isn’t going to like what happens.

Anyhow, this discussion came up on twitter. I happened to be following a great deal of Conservatives, mainly Neo-Conservatives and Republicans. I admit it, I get upset when I hear people trashing my area, and also the big three, because my Dad worked there. I take it personally, it’s just not something I can control. It’s my family and I’m close to my family.

Anyhow, I lost my “cool” as it were, and I said some things that really pissed off a good number of people. I ended up hosing the twitter account, I’m done with the twitter stuff.

Oh, there’s an account there. I created a new one. Well, it was an older one, that I never used. So,  went to that one. Set up twitterfeed to auto post my Blog entries there. But I’m not using it anymore.

Anyhow, I offer no apologies to the assholes who insulted my Father, yes, I equate my Father with G.M. Sorry, it’s the way I roll. To those who got caught in the crossfire, if I snapped at you an anger. I apologize, but this one issue, I take personally.