Most Productive Congress

The talking points being parroted throughout the media (and we all know that the MSM coordinates these things) are that the least popular Congress in all the time that polling data has been collected is actually the “most productive Congress” since… well, since whatever hyperbole you feel like shoveling on. (Video H/T: Big Journalism)

It’s not surprising that the Democrats would prefer you judge their legislation on quantity rather than quality. But then, it’s easy to past thousands upon thousands of pages of laws when you can’t be bothered to take the time to read them first.

And They Should Know

Staten Island, NY – Many Russian immigrants to the “red borough” of Staten Island are flocking to the Republican Party, saying that the national Democrats’ “socialistic” policies remind them too much of the top-down oligarchy they fled in their native land. With many of the borough’s Russian arrivees already owning businesses and active in civic organizations, their muscle could help the Island GOP solidify electoral gains made this year, when the party took back congressional and Assembly seats. Businessman Arkadiy Fridman said that the newly formed Citizens Magazine Business Club, a confederation of more than 50 Russian-owned businesses here and in Brooklyn, has aligned itself with the Molinari Republican Club (MRC) in an effort to increase the Russian community’s political and economic clout. … Fridman said that the Democrats “are going in an absolutely different direction,” focusing on “income redistribution” and rich-versus-poor “class war.” … The Big Brother approach reminds Fridman too much of what he left behind in the former Soviet Union. … Former Borough President Guy Molinari, the MRC’s namesake, said he’d noticed over the years that Russian immigrants here tended to register Republican. Molinari called the affiliation with MRC “a natural marriage.” State Sen. Diane Savino (D-North Shore/Brooklyn) said she understands the Russian aversion to anything that looks like big government, but thinks the criticism of the Democratic Party is off-base. … “You can’t compare the policies of the Democratic Party with communism. It’s absurd.”

(H/T: Weasel Zippers)

Obama Pants Gaffe

I somehow managed to miss this gaffe when it happened back in May; Obama verbally stumbled on his teleprompter while giving a speech and referred to “epantsipation”, which the Urban Dictionary defines thusly:

n. e•pants•i•pa’tion. 1. To free from pants, dungarees, trousers; to pull down someone’s pants against his will.

“Information becomes a distraction, diversion, a form of entertainment rather than a tool of empowerment; rather than a means of epantsipation.”
  Barack H. Obama in a speech to Hampton graduates.

“Let’s epantsipate Joe Biden in the cabinet meeting again this afternoon.”

‘Cause It’s a THRILLAAAAA

The thrill up Chris Matthews’ leg is MRC’s 2010 Quote of the Year (RTWT!) I wish I had kept track of which quotes I had voted for, so I could see how well my choices did… Anyway, this is also a win for Stephen Kruiser, who focuses regularly on Matthews for his Kruiser Control show on PJTV.

Global Warming: Fact, Fraud, or Fabulous?

Today’s best headline ever comes from The Register: “Samoan Clerics Finger Homosexuals Over Global Warming”:

Clerics in the South Pacific have fingered the key cause of climate change – homosexuals. The revelation came at a conference at the University of the South Pacific considering the implications of Climate Change and Creativity.

I wonder if they suffered from the Gore Effect like the Cancun conference?

Academics were apparently thrown off their consideration of “Arts in the Age of Global Warming” and “Ecology in Poetry / Poetry in Ecology” by reports of Church Ministers who maintained that climate change in Samoa are clearly attributable to to homosexuals. …

Arts and poetry. Yeah, that’ll save the planet.

… Details of exactly how the ministers think homosexuals are pumping more CO2 into the atmosphere, thereby trapping heat around the planet, driving up the average temperature and causing massive economic and environmental dislocation are scant.

I’m going to guess that this is all a wacky sitcom misunderstanding, brought about when one of the clerics heard that some homosexuals are “flaming”.

What’s Your Favorite Christmas Movie?

Mine is still

It’s Not Penumbras, It’s Plain English

(Gun cozies: because happiness is a warm gun.)

Continuing a theme from my last post about people who don’t give a damn what the Constitution actually says, we have Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer telling us that the Second Amendment doesn’t really say what we think it says; or, even if it does, it doesn’t count because James Madison had his fingers crossed or something.

Yes, We’re Serious

Last year, Nancy Pelosi was asked by CNSNews.com, “Where specifically does the Constitution grant Congress the authority to enact an individual health insurance mandate?” Her response was a repeated, incredulous “Are you serious?” Her press spokesman, Nadeam Elshami, later added that “You can put this on the record. That is not a serious question.” She was far from the only Democrat who openly didn’t worry about the Constitution or thought that it was wrong, denied that there were any restrictions upon what the federal government could do, or admitted that the Democrats “make up the rules as they go along“.

Well, guess what: A federal judge in Virginia ruled Monday that a key provision of the nation’s sweeping health-care overhaul is unconstitutional, the most significant legal setback so far for President Obama’s signature domestic initiative. (H/T: Weasel Zippers) It turns out that the Constitution does matter, it does say what it clearly appears to say, and there are people who still care about it. Obviously, it ain’t over until it (and/or the other state suits) reach the Supreme Court; but remember, if even part of ObamaCare is ruled unconstitutional, the whole thing might collapse since the three zillion pages of legislation apparently don’t include the standard severability clause.

Jack Webb on How to Deal with the TSA

Regarding WikiLeaks

If you have a security clearance, you should probably avoid the WikiLeaks site (assuming you can get through the cyber attacks against it, heh) or going to any site which advertises the fact that it has information from WikiLeaks. This includes reading The Treason Times. Classified information has been stolen and leaked remains classified; it does not become de-classified in the process. Only the government (which classified it in the first place) can deem the information to be un-classified.

If you have a security clearance, you may be asked during an interview if you’ve ever intentionally viewed classified information for which you were not cleared. It’s probably best to be able to answer “No.” If you see information from WikiLeaks on CNN Headline News, the Drudge Report, or mentioned in conversation on a blog, that would not necessarily be your fault if you had not sought out the information. If it’s unintentional, it’s unintentional.

(Just a warning that was sent to me, which some of you may wish to forward on…)

TSA Coming to Bus Stations

I wonder how long it’ll be before people are getting groped (by professional security personnel, I mean) on the DC Metro?

Remember Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano hinting on November 22, 2010, that those invasive body searches may be coming to trains, subways, and boats? Well, it is happening. Your friendly TSA goons are now in bus terminals in Florida. Welcome to the UPSA, the United Police States of America. (H/T: Fellowship of the Minds)

I found a few things interesting about this video:

• No naked scanners (yet), but they are wearing the blue gloves that don’t get changed from person to person and can transmit diseases and parasites.
• Among the various federal personnel interviewed is “Steve McDonald, US Border Patrol.” People getting on a bus in Florida are not likely to be leaving the country and are hundreds of miles away from either the Mexican or Canadian borders; why aren’t the Border Patrol actually out there patrolling the borders with anywhere near the thoroughness they’re using on American citizens?
• Funny how they get bomb/drug-sniffing dogs while airports don’t. Must be because this is a Greyhound terminal.
• The program is called VIPAR: “Visible Intermodal Prevention And Response”. Note the word “Visible” right at the beginning – it’s there because this is yet another variation of the TSA’s Security Theater. They also mention later the security is “on display”.
• They only showed one passenger giving a (positive) opinion. How many passengers did they have to interview before they got him?

I’m surprised that the TSA’s next move was the private company Greyhound and not the federally run and subsidized Amtrak.