Power and control

From Bob Owens, writer, blogger, and firearms instructor, his thoughts on where America is going:

Let’s not be fooled, America.

Both of this nation’s political parties operating at the federal level have far more in common with each other than they do with you and I.

The polimedia—the revolving door between the mainstream media, the consultant class, bureaucrats and elected officials—has no more in common with you, than you have with a Moro tribesman, and if your idealism and insistence upon clinging to your Constitutional rights gets in the way of their desire for power and control, they have little moral objection to treating you the same way.

Their goal is to exert their influence over you, using laws and regulations in such a way as to bring themselves both power and financial advantage. It is human nature that great power leads inevitably to great corruption, and it is no coincidence that the counties surrounding Washington DC are among the wealthiest in the nation.

These self-styled elite are offended and more than a little afraid of the electorate. No, they aren’t remotely concerned about the several dozen urban cores from whence they draw their power. They’ve pacified them with government handouts, and will continue to exert tremendous influence over those they’re paying off and scaring into complicity as long as they can steal from the productive and borrow from our enemies.

No, they’re specifically afraid of you, those who failed to gratefully receive your indoctrinations, who fail to see the State as benevolent, who continue to dare hold to those crusty old Enlightenment values that propose that man can be something greater than a datapoint, a row in a spreadsheet, or asset to be taxed.

Read the rest.

Straight Talk

Caddell Unloads on 'Racketeering' GOP Consultants

An excerpt:

When an audience member asked Caddell why he, a Democrat, was offering Republicans advice that would help them beat his own party, his response was met with huge applause. "I'm not a fan of Barack Obama," Caddell said. "My first allegiance is to my country. I have paid a huge price, and when I watch you people screwing up I'm offended."

 Read the whole thing.  

$16 Trillion Visualized

Tuesday news

Looking Ahead

• Dr. Ben Carson Fires Back at Critics: ‘Somebody Has to Be Courageous Enough to Stand Up to the Bullies
• Would New Gun Laws Spark Widespread Civil Disobedience?

It's The Economy

• 3 Reasons to Build the Keystone XL Pipeline

Big Government, EPA, Corruption

• America: Where the Green Graft Grows
• Critics Slam Taxpayer-Funded Political Attack
• Democrats Heart Medicare Fraudsters
• Green: The Color of Stupidity
• Jobless mother of 11 to get six-bedroom eco-house after moaning her TWO council homes are cramped

Media

• Attacking the aggressive Ted Cruz when Liz Warren simultaneously hits the Senate in full aggression mode
• Press corps expresses ‘frustration’ over lack of access to Obama
• Video: “Do you care, David? Do you care, David?”

Core Values

• Presidents' Day

Liberal Mindset, Tyranny

• About Paul Ehrlich and ‘The Most Spectacularly Wrong Book Ever Written’
• Chicago police chief: Second Amendment supporters guilty of corruption
• College: Fire professor who forced students to vote for Obama
• Thank Goodness THIS Rape Expert is a Democrat 
• REPUGNANT OBTUSENESS: Democrats Ask Manufacturers of High Capacity Magazines to Stay and Make Their “Baby-Killing” Products Here, Only Sell Them Somewhere Else 

Second Amendment

• How the Tide Turns
• After the 'toughest' gun law, gun crime rose
• The Most Serious Threat to Our Right to Keep and Bear Arms [Gary Marbut]
• McCain on gun control: Most of the Senate will support universal background checks 

State Government, Budget Battle

• Is new ferry a pricey sea-going lemon? And why?
• Taxing the dance away...

ObamaCareTax

• Another blow to ObamaCare: The increasing appeal of self-insurance

The Washington State Legislature website

The Washington State legislature has an excellent web site, well organized, and plenty of search features.  Bookmarking this page for your use is strongly recommended.  Here are some useful functions on the main page that you might use (they are tabs across the top):

• Committee meetings:  Schedules and agendas of the various committees in the Legislature, selectable by date.
• Legislator Information: Rosters, e-mail services, legislator home pages, and caucus home pages.
• Find Your District: A quick reference to find your Legislative District by street address.
• Bill Search: Find bill information by bill number (a 4 digit number).
• Find Laws & Rules: A means to research the Revised Code of Washington (RCW), Washington Administrative Code (WAC), and Register.

There are other features as well.  For example, each bill has sponsors, and must pass through committees.  The web site allows you to find out how to identify the sponsors, the membership of the assigned committee, and even to see which bills each member of the State legislature are sponsoring.

Below the fold are two examples for the 16th Legislative District, using two bills recently introduced to the 2013 legislature.

Tuesday Opinions and News!

Big Government

• Solis: I really wish I had been able to pass those spectacularly obtrusive farm-labor regulations, darn it
• Business world bracing for flood of new regulations from Obama
• If ‘Assault Weapons’ Are Bad…Why Does DHS Want to Buy 7,000 of Them for ‘Personal Defense’?
• We get £17,680 a year in benefits, buy 40 cigs a day, have a laptop and a home with 47-inch TV.. why work?
• IJ Scores Major Federal Court Victory In Massachusetts Civil Forfeiture Case

Looking Ahead

• Unite or Perish

Socialism, Communism, Liberal Mindset

• Powers: That Obama-Clinton interview looked just like "state-run media propaganda"
• Understanding Obama
• San Diego’s Top Cop: We can disarm Americans within a generation!
• EXCLUSIVE: Journalist Accosted by Security over Mayor Bloomberg Gun Control Question
• Touré: Thank God for abortion
• BREAKING: Lightworker Astride Unicorn Transcends Space-Time Continuum
• CBS's Charles Osgood: 'Is Constitution Truly Worthy of Reverence in Which Most Americans Hold It?'

Civil Discourse

• Father of 6-Year-Old Sandy Hook Victim In Tears: ‘The Problem Is Not Gun Laws’

Politics

• The "Border Control" Con
• Dems reassure supporters: The border-enforcement stuff in the new immigration plan is just a talking point for the GOP
• George Will Schools Donna Brazile: America's 'Going To Be an Assisted Living Home With an Army'
• What Difference, at This Point, Does It Make?
• Suicidal GOP senators join open-borders Dems for Shamnesty Redux
• Democrats beg Obama: Please don't offer your own immigration bill
• Immigration proposal: border security, visa overhaul, then normalization
• More Violent Democrat Rhetoric: “He is our number one target, yes. We definitely want him gone”

Unions

• Ten things you should know about union membership numbers

Core Values

• Aznar: We need to defend Western values

Media

• NYTimes Falls For Soros Group's PR Stunt Against Pro-Lifers
• Emails Reveal FBI Investigating Senator Bob Menendez For Sex With Underaged Dominican Prostitutes; CREW and ABCNews Had Been Aware of the Story Since
• National media focus on small gun-control protest, miss massive March for Life
• Bitterly Clinging to Made-Up Story, WH Has No Plans to Release Non-Existent Obama Skeet-Shooting Photos
• Above the Law: Media Matters Thug David Brock Protected With Illegal Weapons

Second Amendment

• Carolyn McCarthy: Women Shouldn't Use Assault Rifles, They Should Use Rifles InsteadGun Control Requires Our Willing Compliance
• Feinstein's New 'Assault Weapon' Ban: Read It and Sleep
• Update: Obama claim on background checks moved from ‘verdict pending' to 2 Pinocchios 

Agenda 21, EPA

• Study: We all might be "overestimating climate sensitivity"

State Government

• State’s taxpayers overcharged millions for locally built ferries

News and opinions for a Wednesday morning

Budget Battle

• The House GOP Is Ready To Cave on Sandy Pork . . . And The Debt Ceiling
• House Passes $50 Billion In Sandy Relief (Mostly Unrelated Pork) With Democrats Providing Majority Of The Yes Votes  UPDATE: Less Than Half The Money Is Sandy Related
• Obama Really Wishes He Never Gave This Speech About The Debt Ceiling
• New Social Security Retirees Will Outlive Trust Fund
• New GOP idea: How about offering to raise the debt ceiling for the rest of Obama’s term?

State Government, Budget Battle, Taxes

• Gregoire leaves office with a call for increased spending

The Constitution, Second Amendment

• QOTD: Norton v. Shelby County
• THE SECOND AMENDMENT: What can you do? This.

Financial

• THE OBAMA ECONOMIC RECOVERY: In One Chart
• It Begins: Bundesbank To Commence Repatriating Gold From New York Fed
• Bad news in the euro zone: Germany's economy contracts

Socialism, Communism, Liberal Mindset

• Senate Democrats Encourage Obama to Violate the Constitution
• Transsexual Bullies Successfully Censor Feminist Writers Who Criticized Them
• 'Insulting' words crime which made it illegal to call a police horse 'gay' is to be changed

Politics, Corruption

• Inauguration fund coming up $8 million short?
• Obama Accuses NRA of Ginning Up Fear, Warns Social Security Checks Won’t Go Out Unless GOP Raises Debt Ceiling
• Why Doesn't President Obama Support 'Citizens Against Senseless Violence'?

Core Values

• Mike Pence's first move: A regulatory moratorium for Indiana
• THINK OF THE CHILDREN
•  I agree with James Feehery

Media

• Piers Morgan to Ben Shapiro: How about participating in a townhall debate where my other guests and I can berate you?

Ringing in 2013 with news and opinions!

Budget Battle, Core Values

• Fiscal Cliff Deal: $1 in Spending Cuts for Every $41 in Tax Increases
• Fiscal Cliff Deal: Obama Takes Less In Revenue In Exchange For Destroying The GOP
• Senate passes fiscal-cliff deal; House vote next
• Senate passes massive tax cut which raised taxes over $600 billion in middle of night without reading the bill
• Tick tock: No deal on the fiscal cliff yet; Update: The last hope is …

It's The Economy, Financial, Core Values

• Mort Zuckerman: Brace For an Avalanche of Unfunded Debt

Politics, Foreign Policy

• Obama: Say, there was a little “sloppiness” in State Department security, huh?
• Senator urges Obama to rescind pay raise for Congress
• Obama Seizing Sole Authority for US Defense
• Gallup: Disapproval of Obama Has Climbed 5 Points Since Christmas

 
Big Government, Corruption, EPA

• Let My People Grow
• Warnings Not To use 'E15' Gas In Your Car
• Black Grassroots Activist: Jesse Jackson Family 'Traitors' to Chicago
• Office of Congressional Ethics could soon be silenced by those it investigates

Socialism, Communism, Liberal Mindset

• Kitty Werthmann Shares Her Eyewitness Account
• British Doctors Call for Ban on Long Kitchen Knives to End Stabbings

 
First Amendment, ObamaCareTax

• Obama Administration: We Can and Will Force Christians to Act Against Their FaithLet’s Be Frank (O’Brien)
• HOBBY LOBBY COUPONS: Show Your Support for the First Amendment

Second Amendment

• ‘It Ain’t True’
• Next Phase Of The Gun Control Fight....Gun Shows
• THE TOP 5 GUN CONTROL GRAPHS: The Gun-Grabbers' Failed Policies Are Exposed by Their Own Data!
• Teachers Learning to Shoot
• Feinstein Goes For Broke With New Gun-Ban Bill 
• Obama says gun control will be dictated by public opinion
• Cops in Schools 
• Marine to Gun-grabber Di Feinstein: 'No Ma'am'
• Obama: Chicago Blueprint for National Gun Laws
• Celebrities Who Demand Gun Bans Sure Seem To Celebrate Gun Violence In Their Movies A Whole Heck of a Lot

United Nations

• Top 10 Worst U.N. Decisions of 2012

Protect Our Most Important Treasure

From a commenter on the blog of Tim Blair, a conservative journalist in Australia:

I think it’s hard for people not raised in the United States to understand how difficult it is to live up to the ideal of American citizenship.  We have these God-given freedoms of speech, worship, assembly, and yes, firearm ownership, that are not granted by the government, but are expressly forbidden for the government to legislate, except for certain stated limits (libel, slander, etc.).

But with these rights come responsibilities, and what the US is suffering right now is an abdication of personal responsibility in favor of having the State take care of everything.  Thus the press for gun control legislation in the wake of this mass murder.  Certainly the mother, God rest her soul, showed poor responsibility by having easily accessible firearms around a mentally disturbed sociopath that she was trying to have committed.
We surround our President with guns for protection when he travels through his own citizenry.  Celebrities routinely hire armed bodyguards for protection.  The mayor of New York city says that Wayne LaPierre, the VP of the National Rifle Association (NRA) paints a “paranoid, dystopian vision of a more dangerous and violent America where everyone is armed and no place is safe.”

That pretty much IS most outsiders’ vision of America, isn’t it?  But actually, no place IS really safe—we only have an illusion of safety because no nut case has decided to make our corner of the world his last stand.

The bottom line is that it’s not the appropriate response to a tragedy of this scope to further reduce the liberties of the law-abiding portion of the country.  If we deem the President and Brittany Spears important enough to allow them to surround themselves with firearms, why not our most important treasure, our children?

JamesS of Washington, DC

This is from Tim's post "The Caro Doctrine", which you should read for full context, but the sentiment stands alone for anyone who loves their children.

(Legal) Insurrection

Moving from an Emboldened Left in 2012 to a Legal Insurrection in 2013

The 2012 word of the year ought to be “emboldened,” in reference to the radical left, the anti-freedom elements of our society: the union operatives, naive but militant Occupy, radical anti-Americanists, and leftist community organizers.

During my lifetime, there has always been an undercurrent of collusion between our public school systems and anti-America, anti-freedom philosophies. But they are now emboldened to profess the alliance in the open.

It's an excellent read, with good suggestions.

Perhaps "shoddy fraud"?

When reading scientific and technical papers today, one needs to see if the author has an agenda that is not scientific nor technical.  This is one example why:

An Open Letter to Dr. Janet Rosenbaum

Dr. Rosembaum: It appears today that your efforts to publicize your research ("Gun Utopias? Firearm Access and Ownership in Israel and Switzerland," Journal of Public Health Policy 33, p. 47 (2012)) have accelerated. The most recent showcase for your paper and the concepts that underlie it happens to be Foreign Policy ("A League of Our Own," Foreign Policy (December 19, 2012)) but Ezra Klein showcased your research in an interview for his Washington-Post sponsored Wonkblog some days before ("Mythbusting: Israel and Switzerland are not gun-toting utopias," Wonkblog (December 14, 2012)). It is unfortunate then that the body of your research on Switzerland can only be described as "shoddy," at best. At worst it appears more like raw academic fraud.

Here in Switzerland we resent being pressed into forced labor in the salt mines of America's rapidly devolving culture wars, but this would be somewhat easier service to tolerate if your representation of Swiss law, statistics on firearms related deaths and homicides in Switzerland, and Swiss culture were remotely accurate. They are not. Not even close.

Moreover, it is the considered opinion of finem respice that you know it.

 Read the rest for a demonstration why critical thinking is rapidly becoming a survival trait in this sad world.

(Note: "finem respice" is Latin for "consider the end", or "look to the end".)

This we don't need

Here's an interesting quote from outgoing Governor Gregoire:

Gregoire noted that the country's top oil companies have made billions of dollars in profits this year, "so I expect them to do this without passing this on to consumers."

A governor declaring how much money a company can make is beyond the pale.  And arrogant -- "I expect them"?  If it isn't in the law, why should the oil companies pay attention?  If it is in the law, how does the State enforce it, assuming that it's constitutional in the first place.

What might soon-to-be Governor Inslee say in a year or two, following this example?  "I expect everyone to pay an income tax", whether it's the law, or not? 

It's a good thing she's leaving office, but soon-to-be ex-Governor Gregoire is setting a poor tone for the upcoming budget debate in Olympia.  There's a need to balance spending and revenue, but behaving like this is not the way to get bi-partisan agreement AND not adversely impact the state economy.

Stay in contact with your elected representatives; at least with the power sharing scheme in the State Senate, there's a chance of setting an example for this sort of arrogance.

Wednesday Cartoons

More below the fold!

Indeed, none dare

None Dare Call It Default

The money quote:

Don't go running to a judge when this doesn't pan out. The courts do not overrule changes in government policy just because citizens find their promised free lunch isn't forthcoming. Nor will it be fruitful to appeal to politicians' sense of "fairness." Politicians can be relied on to do what will get them re-elected. And, believe it or not, that is the good news.

The rest is here.

Sunday Cartoons

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Saturday Cartoons

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Sound Advice

From the Freedom Foundation:

Washington’s revenue hole isn’t so deep it couldn’t be filled by standing up to the unions

OK, let’s have a quick show of hands. How many of you have gone from one year to the next without a pay raise?
For that matter, how many have seen your income reduced in a down economy? And although you certainly didn’t enjoy it, weren’t you relieved you still had a job at all when compared with your co-workers who’d been laid off?

Consider then, the plight of Washington state’s public-sector workers, whose employer – like yours, maybe – is having a hard time making ends meet. In fact, based on numbers released this week by the Economic and Revenue Forecast Council, the state is projected to take in $900 million less than it expects to spend during the next biennium.

Which isn’t to suggest the state is strapped for cash. In fact, the same projections show state revenue increasing by $1.5 billion for 2013-2015 and by $3.1 billion for 2015-2017.

It just isn’t increasing as the demand to spend it.

So what would it take to bring the budget back into balance? How about asking state workers to share a little of your pain?

The rest contains a decent proposal for helping balance the budget, and cut spending.....by not increasing spending.  But it won't  be a popular one.

So, contact your state legislators (use this handy web site), and let them know what you think about the next budget.  Now is your chance to do so, before it's approved.

Wednesday Cartoons

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The conservative European view, redux

Someone over there has it figured out. It was translated into English from an article in the Prague newspaper Prager Zeitungon:

"The danger to America is not Barack Obama, but a citizenry capable of entrusting a man like him with the Presidency.  It will be far easier to limit and undo the follies of an Obama presidency than to restore the necessary common sense and good judgment to a depraved electorate willing to have such a man for their president.  The problem is much deeper and far more serious than Mr. Obama, who is a mere symptom of what ails America.  Blaming the prince of the fools should not blind anyone to the vast confederacy of fools that made him their prince.  The Republic can survive a Barack Obama, who is, after all, merely a fool.  It is less likely to survive a multitude of fools, such as those who made him their president."

This quote actually dates back to April 2010, but is no less valid today than back then.  It's something to keep in mind for the years ahead.

Source: Republican Party of Oneida County.

Tuesday Cartoons

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