Saturday, October 12, 2013

And in the 'Let Them Eat Cake' Department

That scrunt currently using up taxpayer funds on a staff larger than her husband (because we all know that being the First Baby Mama entitles her to a full household of personal servants) has managed to reach an incredible height. Or should I say "depth", since we ARE talking about TFG and his baby mama?

Turns out she is in a bidding war with Kate Moss (yes, THAT Kate Moss) for the services of Adele (yes, THAT Adele) to perform at her upcoming birthday party. The last time Adele was asked to perform at a private function (a wedding), she was asking for £100k a minute (roughly $160,000 - or TFG's entire goddamn annual salary for hearing a single rendition of "Rollin' In The Deep", just to make it clear how much we are talking about).

To sweeten the deal and beat out Kate Moss (who can easily match The FBM's taxpayer-backed checkbook), she has offered to "let her sing alongside Beyonce".

No word on whether Beyonce has to be paid to hang out with The FBM, too, but my question is "who, exactly, will be paying the millions of dollars to a pop star for the entertainment of someone who was, in fact, NOT elected to anything at all?"

Or is it going to be a fundraiser, with tickets on sale to the 1%?

Depths, indeed.
£100k a minute
£100k a minute
£100k a minute

Freedom of the Press does not refer to an occupation

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.


In no other respect is any other single profession granted special protection under the Bill of Rights, so why would anyone try to argue that someone who claims to be a "Member of The Press" gets something special out of the Constitution? Members of the clergy don't claim that they get special legal protections, even if legal precedence has caused the de facto status.

When the Founders first started arguing about the Bill of Rights, it was their intention to protect the freedom to express opinions. There are several different ways to overtly express an explicit idea, but the two main ones were most in need of protection - either through speaking or by writing it down. The new printing press had managed to start giving the colonists a means of expressing ideas to people who might not be present at its conception and evolution (say, around drinks at a tavern one night), and who would come along later to read the broadsheet pinned up in the public square. And it was the freedom of using your speech to express an idea, or to use the [printing] press to express it.

It was all about expressing the idea, not whether the person was paid to express it. Think of the two different levels of damaging another's reputation, slander and libel. The only difference between the two is whether the damaging expression was spoken aloud or written down and handed around. It's the same with the "Freedom of Speech, or of the Press" (which is exactly how it is phrased - see above), and should give a clue to what the Founders meant when they wrote it down the way they did). The lack of a semi-colon shows that it is part of the same clause, and part of the same thought.

Your right to express an idea, and the reach of that expression is entirely dependent upon your assets. If all you have is a soap box on a corner, then the only ones who hear your ideas will be the people who wander by during the length of your speech. If you happen to have access to a TV network or high-volume blog, you can have hundreds of thousands of people, or even possibly millions, (or merely hundreds if you're MSNBC) see what you have to say every day, and that is perfectly legal. You don't have to belong to any kind of specific union to be able to print out something and hand them out on street corners. And you don't have to have a special ID card just because your printing is actually appearing on a laptop monitor in a Starbucks halfway around the world. It is the expression.

So the next time someone starts saying that one must be an accredited journalist to have protection of that Freedom of the Press, let them know the truth.

If today's workers are screwed, that makes tomorrow's workers....

What, exactly?  Measured in Gold, the story of American wages is an ugly one.

The bottom line is that, in terms of gold, wages have fallen by about 87 percent. To get a stronger sense of what that means, consider that back in 1965, the minimum wage was 71 ounces of gold per year. In 2011, the senior engineer earned the equivalent of 63 ounces in gold. So, measured in gold, we see that senior engineers now earn less than what unskilled laborers earned back in 1965.

That’s right: today’s highly skilled professional is making less in real, comparative terms than yesterday’s unskilled worker.

When measured in dollars, wages and prices appear to be rising and, comparing wages to prices, we see only a small loss of purchasing power. However, prices do not tell the whole story, because they reveal nothing about costs. Costs also fell and this explains why the apparent drop in the real wages seems small.

But measured in gold—and this is crucial to understanding why we need a gold standard—we see reality with clarity. Incomes are about one tenth what they were in the 60’s. Prices are down too, but not as much.
Reminds me of something I read recently.....

In the Carboniferous Epoch we were promised abundance for all,
By robbing selected Peter to pay for collective Paul;
But, though we had plenty of money, there was nothing our money could buy,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "If you don't work you die."




Friday, October 11, 2013

A little Catholic Humor

Two Irish nuns were sitting at traffic light in their car when a bunch of rowdy drunks pulls up alongside of them. "Hey, show us your tits, ye bloody penguins!" shouts one of the drunks. The Mother Superior turns to Sister Immaculata, "I don't think they know who we are - show them your cross." So Sister Immaculata rolls down her window and shouts, "Screw off ye little fookin wankers, before I come over there and rip yer balls off!" Sister Immaculata looks back at the Mother Superior and asks, "Was that cross enough?"

Thursday, October 10, 2013

Andouille

Just finished up a batch of andouille sausage.  The Mrs. and I use lamb casing, because with it's small size we can cook the sausage entirely with just smoke.  True andouille uses a larger casing, but we don't have the facilities here to properly smoke a larger sausage the way it needs to be smoked.  So we use lamb casing.

I had forgotten just how badly lamb casing stinks.  Sheep are truly some of the most foul smelling animals on the planet, both inside and out.  I've helped butcher one before.  I often wonder just why we ever domesticated them.  And then I put on a wool sweater on a cold day and go "Oh, THAT'S why!"

So, Saturday we fire up the smoker.  Some friends of ours have given us plum wood from a tree they had to fell; we'll see how that makes the sausage taste.

Today's stolen post

Is not safe for work.


Wednesday, October 09, 2013

Sean Duffy destroys Andrea Mitchell

Sweet Jeebus, I enjoyed watching a Republican actually fight back against a media that has gone the full fellatio on Obama.



The sooner that Republicans realize that the media is not their friend, the sooner they can have an impact on how their message gets out.  Thank God there are GOPers who get it.  Watching that anti-American stretch-faced progressive cow get her ass handed to her was a thing of beauty. 

He's not just...

TFG isn't just an incompetent, he is actively and knowingly anti-American. If he were just a fucking idiot, he would get some things right from time to time, but when he deliberately sets out to target disabled veterans, retired seniors and now, brand-new widows, that is a vindictiveness and contempt for this country and its weakest and most vulnerable citizens.

Evan Sayet said, in his wonderful speech, "Regurgitating The Apple", at the Heritage Foundation several years ago, that his eyes were opened when he saw the liberal response to 9/11:

Imagine being in a restaurant with an old friend, and you're catching up, and suddenly he blurts out, "I hate my wife!"... and you kind of chuckle to yourself, because he says that every time you're together and you know he doesn't hate his wife, they've been together for 35 years. He loves his daughters, and they are just like her, no, no, he doesn't hate his wife.

And you're having some dinner, and you look out the window, and you spot his wife out the window, and she's being beaten up. So you grab your friend, and say, "C'mon, c'mon, let's help her, let's help your wife!" And he says, "Nah, I'm sure she deserves it."

At that moment, it dawns on you that he really does hate his wife.

This is going to be the point where some people realize that TFG really does hate the military.

Tuesday, October 08, 2013

They are Sowing the Winds

and they are about to Reap The Whirlwind...

Presented without further comment (because if I say what I really think, I'm likely to get the blog yanked for vulgar language):

http://instagram.com/p/fMKBmWhmvs/#

Veterans arrested for refusing to leave the memorial built to honor the very battles they fought in.

Lock and load, folks.

Monday, October 07, 2013

Seen at PJ Media

How far should churches go to appeal to men?

1 - the fact that this question is being asked shows you just how far to the Left and feminized churches in America are today.

2 - in order to attract men back to Church, you have to go back to the Church's original teachings, not the feminized, hippy-peace-love crap that spews out from almost every denomination today.

Lemme give you a small example of what I mean, shall I? 

There is a Catholic saint, born under the name Giovanni, who once had the balls to stand in front of a Sultan and tell him that he worshiped a false god, and followed a false prophet.  This Saint directed that two blazes be set, and that he and the muslim priest walk through the fires.  The one who came out the other end unharmed would prove who followed the true God.  The muslim priest ran away in fear.  The Saint prepared himself to walk through the fire even though the muslim priest had ran off, and the Sultan had to demand that the Saint not attempt the passage. 

This same Catholic Saint was once ignored by the people he attempted to speak to.  And so, this Saint told the people "Since you will not listen to me, I will preach to the things who will listen to God's word".  And he turned and spoke to the forest, and the animals and birds of the forest came and listened to him. 

This Saint would challenge anyone who allowed themselves to wallow in sin, no matter what their status was, or what their station in life was. 

This Saint came from a wealthy family in what is now Italy, and after a run-in with his father, where he was standing in the town square with his father, the town governor, and the local bishop all around him, took off every stitch of clothing he had, handed it to his father and said, "I give you back everything you have given me, including my name."  And from that point on, he was not addressed as Giovanni.  He was known only by the name his father had given him as a way of mocking him.  Giovanni's mother was from modern day Burgundy, and Giovanni's father, when he was in a fit of rage, would call is son Francesco.  The Frenchman. 

Francis.  From a little town known as Assisi.

Now, do a quick search of St. Francis of Assisi and you'll find plenty of prayers for peace.  The prayer of St. Francis begs God to "Make me a channel of your peace".  But St. Francis was troubled by anger all of his life.  His prayers aren't just a man making platitudes in church, they are the heart-felt prayers of a man who has a temper, and who knows just what damage that temper can do to him and those around him.

Francis just so happens to be my Confirmation name as well, so I've done a bit of research on the guy.  Yes, he begged for peace.  But he did it as a man who had gone to war and spent a year as a prisoner of that war, and most likely suffered from PTSD the rest of his life.  Yes, he gave what he had to the poor.  But he did it as a man who saw the indulgence of the Church's leadership, and spoke out directly against those indulgences.  Imagine working at the White House and telling the President that he needs to knock off all the golfing and partying with celebrities.  How long do you think that guy would last in Obama's White House?  Yes, he spoke the word of God to animals when men would not listen to him.

But he had the manhood to stand up to the falsehoods of Islam, and directly challenge a man who could have cut off his head.  He stood up against the bishops who lived fat and happy while the people they were supposed to minister starved.  And he kept his integrity and his honor intact despite every negative thing that happened to him.

And yet, the modern church makes him out as nothing but a peace-loving hippy who liked animals.

Ann Barnhardt (who finally has hyperlinks!) loves to show pictures of the Saints as they were seen and known.  There are quite a few Saints shown with weapons in their hands.  They are shown that way for a reason.  You have to fight evil.  And sometimes, you have to do it physically.  St. Michael the Archangel is shown with his foot on Satan's neck, holding a sword in one hand and the scales of justice in the other.  "St. Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle".  But how many Catholic churches even pray that particular prayer, even though the should be praying it every Sunday at the conclusion of Mass?

How many Catholics even know about the Leonine prayers after Mass?  I didn't, and I grew up Catholic.  I first found out about them when the Ragin' Mrs. bought me a Sunday Missal at a garage sale, a missal that had been printed in 1954.  And they had the Leonine prayers after mass, and all manner of religious doctrine, and not a bit of it had been taught to me when I was a child in church.  Not a bit of the doctrine, not a bit of the history, nothing like what I was able to learn by just reading a Sunday missal printed decades before I was born.

And people wonder why I left for a decade.

You want to get men back in Church?  Go back to what the Church used to teach, unabashedly and without reservation.  Start with the Ten Commandments.  Morality.  Integrity.  When a person is confirmed in the Catholic church, the bishop confirming them is supposed to slap them across the face.  HARD.  Why?  Because it represents the fact that the Confirmant is now joined the battle against Satan, and that battle is going to be HARD.  It is going to HURT.  It will not be easy, but the alternative is even worse.

Try teaching that for a bit, and see what happens. 

Sunday, October 06, 2013

So let's sum up, shall we?

In a fit of temper rivaled only by my great-niece Alexis (who recently turned two), That Fucking Guy (henceforth TFG) currently using precious oxygen at #OccupyResoluteDesk has:


And then TFG has the nerve to go on TV and insist that people need to stop blaming Democrats for the slimdown, while Harry Reid flatly refuses to even offer eight, count 'em, EIGHT different spending bills passed by the House to fund the Monuments, to fund the VA, to fund the National Institute of Health, and several others, none of which have anything to do with Obamacare, come up for a vote, even though the bill to fund the military passed 97-0.

Because Harry knows that there would be an overwhelming surge of support for these bills if these Senators had to put their names on the record. Their party loyalty will insist that they support the President, and that the only possible solution will involve the Republicans giving in - again - but those speeches can't really be used against them, since it's the votes that count. Words are a politician's stock in trade, and they use them without even meaning it most of the time, but a vote is an action that has to be written down.

Which means it CAN be used against them by the folks back home who have to vote for them.

This is exactly the same reason that the Senate has not yet produced a budget in almost five years (check the counter over on the right)... because they all know that the only chance they have of getting this thing off the ground is for the public to not actually know what the numbers say. The CBO has put out these predictions that they admitted up front were bullshit, and the Dems have used these bullshit projections as actual facts when praising Obamacare. (Which brings up an interesting question: has Nancy found time to read it yet?) The only time Obama tried to put out a budget, it failed, 0-97. So they have been limping by on "Continuing Resolutions" instead of a budget, because the CRs merely extends the spending levels of the last actual budget passed, which was back when Obama was still a Senator.

But when the Senate actually puts out a budget, the numbers must be published, and that means the jig is up. For the Democrats, certainly, for the Republicans probably, and for the nation, possibly.

The only question is how far the rubble will bounce...

Barry sinks deeper into petulance and pouting

By ensuring that the FedGov puts up barrycades along the roads in South Dakota, to ensure that people cannot pull over and take pictures of Mount Rushmore.

From the comments at that post:

Don’t we have in all of these shutdowns a perfect example of what Obamacare will do to medical care.

No Federal money, so no access even if you have the money.

I think we need to start calling this “the shutdown that foreshadows what Obamacare will do to our medical care.”