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Oh, how gauche!
4.30.13

I've been watching the BBC TV series called Downton Abbey. It's about an aristocratic British family in the early twentieth century. The family has inherited wealth and it's funny to see how they look down on people who earn their own living. They have a cousin who is a barrister (or solicitor or whatever they call a lawyer over there) and they are concerned that he'll bring shame on the family because he works. He says that he can manage the estate on the weekends, and the Countess asks "What is a week end?"

It occurred to me that the show is a metaphor for Barack Obama.

You've seen his tax returns; you wish you had the kind of wealth that guy has. He's wealthier than anyone you know, but he hasn't earned any of it. That's why he doesn't consider himself evil, like the Mitt Romneys of the world who have contributed something to society to get their money. Obama looks down on people who have gotten their money through such vulgar means. In his mind that's crass and uncouth and gauche, and they (we) should be punished.

The only honorable way to have money is to just have it given to you, like his Nobel Peace Prize was.

What's funny is how you find yourself becoming sympathetic to the viewpoint of the aristocrats and almost resenting the cousin for his attitudes of wanting to do things for himself.

Years ago I saw a cartoon in Mad magazine that showed an American Indian couple commenting to each other how interesting it is that media can influence your allegiances. In the next frames we see that they're in a theater and the their kids are saying "Go cowboys! Shoot those stupid Indians!"

One of the daughters, Lady Mary, is engaged to a newspaper man who has built himself a fortune. He wants to get paintings to decorate the estate he's buying and Mary says "Your lot buys them—my lot inherits them." You start to see guy as a little ill-mannered, because he built his own fortune—or maybe it's just that he's a complete schmuck. Yeah, that's it. He's a total horses patoot.

At any rate, it's an interesting study in attitudes.

This topic takes us into the whole concept of everyone being a combination of things we are given and things we earn. It gets into the religious aspect of redemption and the idea that we are saved by grace, but, as James says, we still have to work for it.

It's a fascinating topic and could take pages of discussion . . . and I'm not going to do it.

That is my gift to you.

Barack Obama's gun control legislation got voted down, so today he held a press conference about it.

Am I the only one who found that curious?

We already knew what happened; all the information was readily available to us. What purpose did it serve for the President of the United States to meet with the press?

You know the answer. Little Barry had to throw his temper tantrum.

The President shook his little fists and stomped his little feet and cried. "I didn't get my way! I want my gun control!"

Obama said that the NRA "willfully lied" about the content of the bill. That was pretty funny, coming the very sentence after that whopper about "90% of The People supported the bill."

You could have written the script—you've watched him hold his breath and threaten to run away enough times. Little Barry got in the obligatory "How could anybody possibly disagree with me?" Oh? But they did. It's done, who are you trying to convince? Then he revealed his true purpose in holding the press conference. He said the "other side" (some Republicans voted for the bill, some democrats voted against it) were just "playing politics."

There it is. As Little Baby Barry himself made clear, the press conference was just him playing politics. The bill was defeated. That part is done. Nothing the Pissant in Chief said was designed to persuade anyone to action on the bill. The whole show was just his infantile attempt to poke a stick in the eye of the little boys and girls who won't let him win when they play.

I was closing some windows on my computer and glimpsed this page and thought "Did I really just see that?"

The picture of him delivering his remarks on the budget has him sucking on a pacifier! Is this some new era of honesty in journalism?

Nothing more accurately depicts the character of the current President of the United States than the image of a child playing dress up in adult clothing. Barack Obama's approach to everything is just plain childish.

Well, here's my reaction to his little bill getting defeated: Neener neener neener!

It's like Obama said to McCain: We won, you lost. Okay? You lost. Okay? We're not campaigning any more. You lost, we won. You don't get to say what happens here, you lost.

Back when I was eight years old we had a saying: He can dish it out, but he can't take it.

President Barack Obama Reacts to Defeat of Gun Control Bill

The above link sometimes breaks . . .

A story is often the best way to illustrate a principle. Today we are going to talk about how to write a metaphorical story that represents a larger principle.

First, let's create a character—completely out of our imagination and without reference to anyone we might know or have heard about. Let's make it . . . I don't know, a man who is going through a divorce.

This man resents his soon to be ex-wife for daring to leave him. He wants to hurt her. This is the most important thing in the world to him.

So in our story we're going to have some little expense come up in the course of the divorce. Let's say the judge says he has to pay to file some document for his wife. It's an expense that the (completely fictitious) man would barely notice. In our story (since we're making it up and we can do whatever we want) the man is rich. He blows all kinds of money on himself and his own lavish hobbies—which is his business. But he is still married and his family is still his responsibility.

So the guy feels obliged to write a letter to the judge and both lawyers saying that this is unfair and a burden, but he's figured out a way to pay it. He says he is going to have to take it out of the kids' lunch money.

The (completely fictitious, unimaginably evil) man isn't bluffing. He so badly wants to punish his wife that he's willing to make his kids go hungry. Their sacrifice is a small price to pay for the victory of blaming his wife for something.

Okay, so maybe that's a very transparent and clumsy maneuver, and of course no real human being is so evil as to pull something like that in the course of divorce. But it's our story and we intended it to be that way, as you'll see, because it accurately represents the larger principle we are shadowing.

Barack Obama is the resentful man. Cutting off lunch money is the game Barack Obama is playing with the sequester. That is his Clinton Government Shutdown. It's clumsy, it's transparent, it's childish and it's not fooling anybody, but Obama doesn't care. He gets to blame the Republicans for something.

Obama doesn't care that cancelling air shows and White House tours hurts people. It doesn't affect his lavish vacations or golf outings or private concerts in the least. The more people that he can make suffer, the more he can demonize the Republicans, which, after all, is more important than anything else.

Okay, let's pretend for just a minute.

Let's pretend that you're a Chris Matthews and that Obama can do no wrong. Let's pretend that you bought his ridiculous speech on the budget. Let's pretend that that horrible, awful, stupid, short-sighted, not good sequester was somebody else's idea, and it's killing us and Obama's budget is a smarter way to do it. And let’s make believe that his budget could not be controversial and no one could possibly oppose it and it does give everyone what they want and it really doesn't add one single dime to the deficit.

Can you explain why he's kept this brilliant plan a secret for five years?

Just floors me.

I don't get it. How can anyone believe a word that Obama says? How? I've tried to figure it out.

Maybe it's like hockey. I like watching hockey games—they're a blast. But I don't follow hockey. I couldn't name a single current professional hockey player. I'd be hard pressed to come up with the names of two NHL teams. I think there's something called a Stanley cup, and I assume it's a trophy and not a piece of equipment the goalie wears (they do have goalies in hockey, right?)

I just don't follow hockey.

Is that how Obama can get away with saying such stupid things? People just don't follow politics?

It's got to be one of those deals. If ESPN reported "Hockey officials are changing the rules to eliminate turbocharged engines from the third base referee on most hockey rackets" I wouldn't know the difference. I'd say "Yep, yep, yep. I guess they know what they’re doing."

I wouldn't say I really "follow" politics, but it has more of an impact on my daily life than hockey does. The taxes I pay and the laws I have to live under and freedom and security I live with directly affect me and my family. So I do pay a little bit of attention.

But maybe that's not most people's deal. Maybe it's like when I go to the occasional hockey game, you wouldn't expect me to say "Hey! Isn't high-sticking illegal?"

The occasional spectator must not understand what he's seeing when the highlight reel shows this play: "And that’s why my budget replaces these cuts with smarter ones, making long-term reforms, eliminating actual waste and programs we don’t need anymore."

They don't question it. They don't say "Well, why did he institute those dumb cuts in the first place, if he knew all along about the smarter ones?" They don't follow the sport; They don't understand how stupid that sounds.

For you new fans, let me help you understand what you're watching. Obama is evil. Until you understand that, you are going to be very confused by this sport.

You cannot know the league and the players and have watched very many games without crying foul at underhanded plays like this:

Well, as president, my top priority is to do everything I can to reignite that (sic) I consider to be the true engine of the American economy -- a rising, thriving middle class. That’s what I think about every day. That’s the driving force behind every decision that I make.

If you are new to the cage match between Capitalists and Socialists, let me give you some background: Socialism destroys the middle class. That is its entire goal. This is because the socialist rulers of mediocre intelligence can't live like kings while a middle class thrives. The confusing secret for newcomers to the sport is this: The way the elitists sell the concept to their prospective victims is by claiming to be champions for the middle class. Yep, that same middle class they are intent on destroying.

Here's another little hint for watching the game: the socialist will always tip his hand. You know who and what he's trying to destroy by what he pretends to defend, and you know what he's guilty of by what he's accusing the other side of.

If you've watched any of the earlier matches you understand how stupid this bellicose trash-talking for the camera sounds:

And if anyone thinks I’ll finish the job of deficit reduction on the backs of middle class families or through spending cuts alone that actually hurt our economy short term, they should think again. When it comes to deficit reduction, I’ve already met Republicans more than halfway. So, in the coming days and weeks, I hope that Republicans will come forward and demonstrate that they’re really as serious -- as serious about the deficits and debt as they claim to be.

I hope the Republicans don't let this cheating low-life kick them in the Stanley cup again.

Here's my Michelle Obama moment. For the first time in my adult life . . . I have entertained the thought of finding someplace better than America to live.

I won't. I'm not giving up. But I honestly had the thought come into my head that a smart man might find a way off this once great ship that is sinking.

This thought dashed into my head unbidden the moment the guy who did my taxes ("my accountant" is way too lofty of a moniker for the trained monkey who typed the numbers I gave him into a computer program) showed me my 1040 this year. Obscene. That's the only way to describe the criminal acts that the US Treasury committed on my person this year.

Ob-freaking-scene.

Then it cemented itself today when I accidentally tuned the radio into KSL and heard the Deceiver in Chief pitching his 2014 Budget.

I'm not sure why I bother. If you understand the peril we are in, I don't need to tell you. If you don't, I can't convince you. Either way I'm wasting my breath, but I have to vent to someone or I'll explode.

Let's take a breather and talk about something completely different.

Let's talk about How to make engineers write concisely with sentences.

By combining journalism with the technical report format. In a newspaper article, the paragraphs are ordered by importance, so that the reader can stop reading the article at whatever point they lose interest, knowing that the part they have read was more important than the part left unread.

State your message in one sentence. That is your title.

Write one paragraph justifying the message. That is your abstract.

Circle each phrase in the abstract that needs clarification or more context. Write a paragraph or two for each such phrase. That is the body of your report.

Identify each sentence in the body that needs clarification and write a paragraph or two in the appendix.

Include your contact information for readers who require further detail.

There's another version of it here (look in the comments at the bottom of the page).

Let's try a little exercise using this approach.

Barack Obama is a thief and a liar. That is our title.

Now, on to our abstract:

Barack Obama proved today he is not only a liar, but a thief as well, when he pitched his budget for 2014. In part he said "That’s what this so-called 'sequester' means . . . And that’s why
            my budget
replaces these cuts with smarter ones . . .
            educating our children from the youngest age, helping more families afford college,
making sure that hard work pays.
            These are things that should not be partisan; they should not be controversial. We need to make them happen.
My budget makes these investments to grow our economy and create jobs, and it does so
            without adding a dime to our deficits.
            . . . here’s a clear and unassailable fact:
Our deficits are already falling. Over the past two years I’ve signed legislation that will reduce our deficits by more than $2.5 trillion, more than two-thirds of it through spending cuts, and the rest through
            asking the wealthiest Americans to begin paying their fair share."

Since I don't think you can circle things in html code, I have italicized and isolated the points that need clarifying in the body of our little piece. Which, I present here, voici:

Barack Obama talks about "the sequester" and "my budget" like they are two different things. This a lie in the sense that a lie is any communication designed to deceive. Obama's communication is designed to deceive you into thinking that the sequester was not his idea, which is a lie.

On a side note, the arrogance of "my budget . . . smarter ones," meaning that Obama is brighter than anyone else in the country and his is obviously better because it's his, is a theme that will be further addressed in this objective scholarly dissertation.

When Obama speaks of educating our children from the youngest age and "helping more families afford college," he is proposing stealing money from us. Handing out free education is not free, but in addition he is proposing taking "our" children out of our homes earlier so that parents have less influence. Not only is he trying to steal our money, in a way he is proposing stealing our children. These are concepts that are very controversial and should be subject to a spirited debate. But in his mind (or should it be His mind?) we are not allowed to examine them. They "should not be partisan." We just need to "make them happen." Your ruler has spoken.

Barack Obama lies again when he says that his programs will not add a dime to the deficit. Again, his communication is designed to deceive. 'Deficit' is a lofty sounding word meaning how much more you spend than you bring in. He is counting—and with good reason—on people being too intellectually lazy to think about that. To decrease a deficit you simply raise taxes. That may decrease the deficit, but it does not decrease the debt. It doesn't even stop the debt from growing. Debt is the disease that will kill us, and his treatment doesn't address it. Obama knows that, and his talk of "deficit this" and "deficit that" is all designed to provide an illusion.

But the lie is also less sophisticated. The statement is simply not true—he knows that his increased spending will add a great many dimes to the deficit.

Obama again uses his standard verbiage to quell debate: "Here's a clear and unassailable fact." This means "how dare you question me?!" and is invariably followed by a whopper.

Finally, Obama trots out the drinking game line that is a mandatory incantation for every one of his spells: "asking the wealthiest Americans to pay their fair share." Were this not an objective, scholarly speech examining Barack Obama being a thief and a liar, I would have to say "The man just makes me feel tired."

Mr. Obama isn't "asking" anyone to do anything. If you don't pay what he considers your "fair share," he's going to send people with guns that your taxes bought to haul you off to a prison your taxes paid for. He is going to take however much of your money he decides, and there ain't crap you can do about it. That sounds like a thief to me.

The way Obama says it, successful people, who foot most of the bill for running this country, are trying to get out of their obligation to help. That is a lie. Barack Obama told it. Ergo, Barack Obama is a liar.

I think you get the idea. We can forego the appendix and the contact information.

Here's a "clear and unassailable fact" for you: Barack Obama is a thief and a liar.

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Lady Thatcher

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Jobs Report

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Obama and Gun Control

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Mapping the Brain

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Covering the News

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Misc.

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Your fair share
4.05.13

I'm obliged to "Agreed" for posting this archive of income tax records for Presidents.

That link was posted in the feedback area, which, of course, you already knew since you check there all the time.

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Class Warfare

Dennis Miller nailed it (no surprise there) yesterday with his assessment of Barack Obama.

Miller said, in essence, that his problem with Obama was not that he is the anti-Christ or anything like that; he's never bought into that sort of nonsense, and he doesn't care where the guy was born. Miller says the man is inept, certainly, but what really pisses him off is the way he engages in class stratification. Miller says that certainly there are people out there that are needy, and he's got no problem taking care of them, but it really messes things up when you group them together with the people who are gaming the system.

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New Post

I'm going to let that one stand on its own. So here's my rambling and disjointed bloviating in a separate post so as not to pollute Dennis's message.

Obama does that. He pits Americans against each other to gain power for himself. Honestly, who knows why the man does what he does? I'm neither trained in or inclined to practice the craft of trying to ascribe logic to the actions of crazy people. But what he does has the effect of keeping Americans from focusing on the real problems.

I posted about the Hitler Hustler (or Barack Ballet) where you recruit people to your side by creating a common object of scorn. Obama is never shy about deriding entire classes of Americans--gun owners, successful people, married people, heterosexuals, white people, religious people--in order to appeal to some particular group he wants support from. There is no end to the groups of Americans he's dismissed as beneath consideration because their lips are not surgically attached to his butt.

That's part of what Dennis Miller was talking about. By grouping the truly needy with the wastes of skin he gets to demonize more people all at once, which recruits the idiots he's trying to recruit. If I don't think my money should be confiscated for healthy 20 year-olds to knock up ghetto women and play video games instead of working, then I have no compassion for widows and orphan.

Obama doesn't give a crap about the widows and orphans. If he did he wouldn't structure his ideology to group them with the wastes of skin.

Same thing with guns. The past few days he's been dancing on the graves of Sandyhook victims. Do you think he cares if people get killed by guns? Probably a little. But not enough to accord them decent respect. Not enough to try to solve the problem that caused their death. And not nearly as much as he does about raising money to maintain power.

Fixing the problem of gun violence is a complex and tricky thing. Raising money is a simple matter of standing in front of the group that he wants to get it from and demonizing a class of people that group hates.

What he's doing is raising money. That's an activity that you can engage in without any worries about decency or respect for the dead.

I'm going to make it easy for the White House internet crawlers.

Barack Obama is a steaming pile of crap.

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Anybody see a dead horse around here?

You'd think my Billy's Blog deal would eliminate my need to keep Ayn Randing every durn thing I've already said.

But I guess it doesn't . . .

Bill Bennett, Michael Medved, et. al. make the assumption that Obama wants America to be better. They assume that Obama, like them and decent people everywhere, want to leave the planet better than they found it. They assume that Obama cares about his legacy.

People, people, people . . .

Do you think Hugo Chavez cared about his "legacy?" Or Stalin or Castro or . . . you name 'em. I've been asked why a man would try to trash the very country he lives in. Doesn't he want to raise the country up so that he lives better?

The answer lies just to the south of us. The reason God put Trashcanistan right across the border from the greatest country in the history of the world is to serve as a constant reminder to us.

Leaders of nations like Cuba are not affected by the poverty in their country. Here's the secret the lie that is socialism is trying to keep you from knowing--Capitalism is the great equalizer. Socialism reduces almost the entire population to poverty so that a relative few can live in palaces.

Capitalism rewards the industrious. Hugo Chavez, Castro, and Obama are not industrious. Being rewarded for your contribution is way too much work for that kind of people. The system they thrive under is where ruthless people of mediocre intellect and ability can rise to the top.

I'm going to Westonize this for you.

Dude, I'm all "Capitalism is the great equalizer."

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Omigosh, is that the date?

Holy bags of stolen money, Batman, can you tell April 15th is approaching?

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Leading by example
4.04.13
(close to April 15th)

Barack Obama, praised be His name forever, in a grand and generous gesture worthy of our glorious ruler, has said that he will voluntarily return five percent--five percent!--of his salary to the US Treasury in a show of solidarity for . . . something or another.

I think we should follow his example.

I will gladly voluntarily give 5% of my salary to the US Treasury . . . if they will give me back the obscene percentage they stole from me this month.

I was thinking that the tax code should mandate that no citizen be required to pay tax at a higher rate than the President of the United States. I don't know what actual rate the Narcissist in Chief paid in taxes last year, but if it was more than one fourth of the rate that I paid I will kiss a democrat. Without knowing the number (but knowing the man and his nature) I can say I would love to have paid the tax rate that The Amateur paid last year.

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Lifestyles

In theory—very rough and not thought through theory—that kind of law would work. However (because it's against the rules to start a sentence with "but," but not with a word that means exactly the same thing) it would have to be an average tax rate of government officials or the lowest rate of some group of officials. This is because The President could pay 100% of his salary in taxes and it wouldn't affect how he lives in the least.

You and I can't do that. Ask me how I know.

The salary that the President makes has very little to do with how he lives. I'm not talking about the fact that he makes more money from his investments and under the table dealings and has his money hidden in offshore accounts. I mean that you couldn't live like he does on $400,000.00 a year.

What do you use money for? Let me phrase it this way—I don't care about money. I care about the things money can do. I know people who care about money. I know people to whom it's a hobby. They love moving it around, thinking about it, playing with it. I don't. Money and dealing with money is a pain in the posterior adipose tissue.

The President doesn't need money the way we do. This came up during the Clinton years. Clinton whined and cried about how broke he was. He did this while flying around on the biggest private jet in the world and living in the most prestigious mansion in the world. Who gives a crap what the balance sheet showed? If Clinton wanted his own Cummins diesel pulling a trailer full of snowmobiles to his private cabin in the mountains, do you think he would have any difficulty getting it? While you're trying to decide between replacing your worn out work shoes or getting a roast for Sunday dinner, do you really think that he ever has to decide between the new car or the trip to Europe? Get 'em both. Do you think that finances weigh into his health care decisions in the least?

And I'm not just talking about while he was President. There is no realistic limit to what the Clintons can have, and that is completely independent of what any ledger shows.

So . . . you'd think I get paid by the word here . . . maybe I do and that goes to my whole I don't like dealing with money thing—I lose money every transaction, but I make it up in volume . . .

Bottom line is that Barack Obama can make any grand gesture he wants and it means absolutely nothing. And you fit the very definition of a fool if you think it does.

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So smart, so wrong

Bill Bennett, who is 164% smarter than I am (264% as smart as I am), was telling a caller this morning that yeah, Obama is destroying the country, but that's the effect of his actions, not the intent. He says that Obama sees himself as a modern-day Martin Luther King cum Lincoln, and his main focus is his political legacy and if he thought what he was doing was making the country worse he wouldn't be doing it.

People, people, people . . .

That's the problem with really smart people. They just can't dial back the intellect and look at the world through eyes that are connected to a brain that functions on a much lower level.

Barack Obama is not a politician. That's not what interests him. Barack Obama has one interest—Barack Obama. And people like Bill Bennett (and Rush and Monica Crowley, and countless others), looking at this through the eyes of their own intelligence, think that translates into building his legacy. That was Bill Clinton. That is not Barack Obama.

Obama is a socialist, but he's not a socialist revolutionary. He's not interested in changing the world—that's too much work. He's interested in looking like he's in changing the world. Celebrities don't do actual work.

Barack Obama does care about his political legacy—just not enough to break a sweat over it. And fortunately for him, he doesn't have to. "What's he doing now?" Nothing, just sitting there. "Omigosh, the man's a brilliant political strategist! It's impossible to out-think or out-maneuver the guy!"

Barack Obama is the political equivalent of the teenager playing video games. That teenager isn't thinking "I'm developing my hand-eye coordination, I'm building my reputation as a gamer, I'm working on the future." He's doing what he feels like doing at that moment.

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Almost done

Here's the advantage of being a nobody . . . well, in addition to being a low priority to the internet crawlers that have reported to the White House that the words "Barack Obama" and "complete piece of crap waste of skin narcissistic wannabe" have appeared together in sentences here.

I've got no reputation to protect.

If I agreed with Rush, and Dinesh D'Souza, and Karl Rove, and all the rest in their inaccurate assessment, I would just be another one in the crowd, even when it turns out they're wrong. As it is, I am venturing a bold explanation that no one else is; I'm hanging it out there, putting my reputation on the line, and, when it proves that I'm right . . . well, I'll still be just a nobody.

Actually, I quite like that.

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