There are so many choices for the title "Biggest Idiot in the Obama. Administration" From the man himself, through Sheriff Joe, Hillary "Reset" Clinton and of course Janet "Watch Out for Those Vets" Napolitano it's hard to pick one.

My personal preference is Energy Secretary Steven Chu. First he had no idea if he was actually part of the administration, then he wants to start a trade war over Cap and Tax.

This exchange (on nuclear power) from yesterday's House Committee on Energy and Commerce shows just how far in over his head this guy is.

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Posted by: DrewM at 10:21 AM | Add Comment
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There is some confusing backstory here: Republicans seized on an MIT study and used simple math (annual taxes raised by cap and trade divided by number of households) to come up with a figure of $3,188 per year.

The author himself then went on a media tour to claim that was a lie, claiming that the cost would be only $215 per year. Olbermann began shrieking about the Republican lie. (Which is about as necessary a sentence as "Water began liquiding.")

The author, Reilly, now says he miscalculated, and that the cost to each household would be $800 per year. I wait with bated breath for Olbermann's correction.

So which is right? $800 per year or $3100 per year? The answer is both, as in "add them both together, because this hack Reilly sets the direct costs of cap and trade at $800 per year, while the indirect, pass-through costs imposed on energy suppliers would, in fact, be $3188 per year, for a grand total of $3988 per year, per household."

These latter costs, Reilly insists, will not be passed through to customers -- but returned, he claims, to the households, via some kind of subsidy new welfare program for energy.

But that makes no sense -- Obama was quite explicit on the reasons for cap and trade: The whole point is to raise energy prices so as to urge people, through economic intervention, to use less energy and to make costly "green" energy more competitive with real energy, now that real energy's prices are inflated by government fiat. He said the whole point was a necessary "skyrocketing" of electricity prices, for example, and the actual bankrupting of coal-burning plants.

But you cannot change people's behavior through government-demanded price increases if you give the money back with the other hand and thus immunize them against your price increases. That defeats the entire behavior-modifying purpose of the price increases.

I don't doubt the very poor will get some vouchers back -- but the middle class won't. Obama's massive spending demands more tax revenues, and he's desperate to find them anywhere he can.

So yes: The Republicans were wrong. Obama's cap and tax scheme would not cost each household just over $3000 per year. It would in fact cost most households just under $4000 per year, with some poorer households seeing all the costs defrayed (or paid more than the actual additional cost, yet another disguised welfare subsidy) while the rest of us would get a token voucher for $200 or $300 so we know "Obama cares about us so much he sends us checks."

And, actually, in an email to the Weekly Standard, Reilly admits that the money won't be returned to households at all, but will be spent on government programs, which he considers the same thing as writing a check to cover the additional costs. It "doesn't matter," he says, which way the money is "returned," whether through an actual cost-defraying check or in the form of bigger, better government programs; either way, as far as he's concerned, that's "returning" the money to households:

It is not really a matter of returning it or not, no matter what happens this revenue gets recycled into the economy some way. In that regard, whether the money is specifically returned to households with a check that says "your share of GHG auction revenue", used to cut someone's taxes, used to pay for some government services that provide benefit to the public, or simply used to offset the deficit (therefore meaning lower Government debt and lower taxes sometime in the future when that debt comes due) is largely irrelevant in the calculation of the "average" household. Each of those ways of using the revenue has different implications for specific households but the "average" affect is still the same. [...] The only way that money does not get recycled to the "average" household is if it is spent on something that provides no useful service for anyone--that it is true government waste.

Note that last sentence -- as far as he's concerned, so long as the money is used on something that benefits someone, that's precisely the same as actually writing a check to the person actually saddled with the increased costs of energy. Either way, he says, that money is being "returned" to them, whether really returned, or returned in an even more wonderful way, i.e., not returned at all but rather given to someone else.

But the left is still whoopin' it up over the "lie" they discovered.

If the government takes money to you, and then gives it to someone else, Reilly claims it's "returned" it to you, albeit indirectly...

I think we see there intellectual foundation of Obama's claims of giving tax cuts to 95% of the public. If the government taxes you more and writes a welfare check to someone else -- hey, that's just an indirect way of giving you a tax cut!

Bonus: Energy Secretary Chu was once enthusiastic about eight dollar per gallon gasoline, on the theory, of course, that if such costs "skyrocket" people will buy less and we'll save the world.

He claims, under questioning before a House committee, he now finds that statement "silly."

Believe him? Because I don't.

REP. CLIFF STEARNS, R-Fla.: Last September you made a statement that somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe, which at the time exceeded $8 a gallon. As Secretary of Energy, will you speak for or against any measures that would raise the price of gasoline?

SEC. CHU: As Secretary of Energy, I think especially now in todayÂ’s economic climate it would be completely unwise to want to increase the price of gasoline. And so we are looking forward to reducing the price of transportation in the American family. And this is done by encouraging fuel-efficient cars; this is done by developing alternative forms of fuel like biofuels that can lead to a separate source, an independent source of transportation fuel.

REP. STEARNS: But you canÂ’t honestly believe that you want the American people to pay for gasoline at the prices, the level in Europe?

SEC. CHU: No, we donÂ’t.

REP. STEARNS: No. But somehow, your statement, “Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe,” doesn’t that sound a little bit silly in retrospect for you to say that?

SEC. CHU: Yes.

He offered the statement by his own volition, and only calls it silly now that he's being publicly called on it by a hostile interrogator.

And note the ever-present caveat -- it's unwise to drastically inflate the cost of gasoline now, in the current economic downturn.

Posted by: Ace at 09:55 AM | Add Comment
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I am going to steal several links from Hot Air in a row. As embarrassing as that is, the stories are too big to pass over.

Do something about Iran, President Prissypants.

The new Israeli government will not move ahead on the core issues of peace talks with the Palestinians until it sees progress in U.S. efforts to stop IranÂ’s suspected pursuit of a nuclear weapon and limit TehranÂ’s rising influence in the region, according to top government officials familiar with Prime Minister Binyamin NetanyahuÂ’s developing policy on the issue.

“It’s a crucial condition if we want to move forward,” said Deputy Foreign Minister Daniel Ayalon, a member of the Israeli parliament and former ambassador to the United States. “If we want to have a real political process with the Palestinians, then you can’t have the Iranians undermining and sabotaging.”

You will not be shocked to learn that President Prissypants thinks the way you beat Iran is by conceding everything to the Palestinians.

Yes, that's the way it works: Confirm that a strategy is successful by surrendering to it, and then wait for that strategy to be abandoned. Because, like, it's too successful or somethin'.

Posted by: Ace at 09:22 AM | Add Comment
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Maybe, maybe not -- no confirmation from the US military yet.

Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, the purported leader of the Islamic State of Iraq, an al-Qaeda-linked insurgent group, has been captured, Iraqi state television said on Thursday.

The insurgent group is one of a handful of Sunni Arab extremist groups blamed for suicide bombings and other attacks in the northern city of Mosul and other parts of Iraq. Â…

Al-Iraqiya television said Baghdadi was believed to have been captured in eastern Baghdad. Security experts have previously speculated that Baghdadi was a character invented by some extremist groups rather than a real person.

I've never wholly understood that speculation -- if I understand it right, some suspect Al Qaeda invented a leader with a fictional backstory with an Iraqi-ish name in order to make it appear that their largely foreign forces were led by a native Iraqi.

Even if that's the case -- and it's very plausible it is -- how does it follow from that that not only is al-Baghdadi's "background" a fiction, but his very existence is? Wouldn't it be more likely that Al Qaeda would give a real person a fictitious background than actually just make up a phantom of a person?

I can see reasons for attempting the latter -- you can never catch someone who doesn't exist, for example, and thus Al Qaeda's phantasmal leader would never himself be defeated.

But it seems unlikely to me; sort of a comic-book or mystery thriller conceit. There must be some leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq. Even if his bio departs from the supposed bio of al-Baghdadi, that person is al-Baghdadi, more or less. It seems a lot more plausible that he's an Egyptian, for example, who was simply dubbed "al-Baghdadi" rather than an entirely fictional contrivance of Al Qaeda's PR department.

If this gets confirmed, we'll soon know. I have some sense it will get confirmed -- Iraq's army is better now, and they are less in need of the short-lived morale boost provided by claims that a leader as been captured (only to retract that claim within a day or two). They're just more professional now. Maybe this is just another false "al-Baghdadi captured" report, but I'm betting they got their man this time.

And, of course, all credit for this should go to President Prissypants, who so cheered our troops recently.

Posted by: Ace at 09:10 AM | Add Comment
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This video...it makes me cry.

With hysterical laughter.
I don't know how to embed it. Just go have a giggle.

Posted by: LauraW at 06:49 AM | Comments (3)
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This is now three days old, but I just spotted it and think most of you will appreciate it. Go see what PowerLineBlog had to say about the Miss California "controversy", you can thank me later.

For my part: I agree with Ace and Allah that Perez Hilton, and his enormous out-of-proportion head, just set back their own cause by being a nasty douche on TV. Idiot.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 04:49 AM | Add Comment
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The captured Somali pirate faces five criminal charges, including conspiracy to take a U.S.-flagged ship by force and piracy. The complaint is here (PDF).

Piracy is one of the oldest crimes under federal law and the statute, 18 U.S.C. § 1651 is unusual:

Whoever, on the high seas, commits the crime of piracy as defined by the law of nations, and is afterwards brought into or found in the United States, shall be imprisoned for life.

First, there's no futzing with the sentence like most modern criminal statutes. If he's guilty, it's life imprisonment. No adjustments for his alleged youth or sad circumstances.

Second, there's this law of nations business. The U.S. has not joined the 1982 Law of the Sea Treaty. However, Article 15 of the 1958 Convention on the High Seas, to which the U.S. is a party, defines piracy in substantially the same way. Is that enough to determine how "the law of nations" defines piracy? I guess we'll see.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 04:39 AM | Comments (3)
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Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah! I thought I saw a spider on the ceiling above my bed.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 04:17 AM | Add Comment
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We're going to need some more "smart" and "tough" diplomacy STAT!

Pakistan's Taliban seized control of another district in the country's northwest just 70 miles from the capital after consolidating their hold on the Swat Valley, according to local government officials and residents.

The latest Taliban advance into the Buner district has spurred fears that a controversial peace accord, which allows the militants to enforce sharia law in Swat, has emboldened them to expand their influence.

Wait, giving into the demands of fundamentalist terrorists emboldens them? I thought it was caterpillars but never mind.

Militants have been moving into Buner since the Swat peace deal was signed with the government in February. But starting Tuesday night they seized control of the entire district, which has a population of more than one million people, local government officials and residents said. Heavily armed militants, streaming in from neighboring Swat, occupied government offices and set up their own checkposts. Terrified residents fled their homes.

Hillary's solution is for Pakistanis around the world to writer their representatives (seriously) and demand the government man-up or something.

The government may order the army into action but while that's likely necessary, it's also going to be ugly.

I have no idea what it looks like when armed, Islamic thugs take over a nuclear armed country after a bloody civil war but I'm pretty sure it's not good. I'm positive I don't want to see it but I fear we may sooner than later.

And yes, I know this isn't a joking matter but it's late and this is pretty horrible stuff.

There really don't seem to be a lot of good options or outcomes here. This isn't Obama's fault and it's not Bush's either. Despite what people like to think, Presidents aren't Gods, there are limits to their powers and ability to influence events in far off parts of the world. We made our bet with Musharraf after 9/11, which was basically to keep a lid on things as long as possible. We rode that horse as far as we could and now it seems our options and ability to drive events there are pretty limited.

Here's another report, which believe it or not has even more horrifying information. more...

Posted by: DrewM at 06:51 PM | Comments (2)
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(RunninÂ’ late today, so thought IÂ’d better at least get the thread up so you droogs donÂ’t trash one of the other threads. You people are really hard on the furniture. Thanks for all the great tipsÂ…IÂ’ll try to tack some on laterÂ…or not. )

Update: "rdbrewer" has kindly provided a link to the ultimate time-waster game called De-Animator. Ace has posted a link to it before, but it was a very long time ago and probably half of you weren't reading this blog at the time. So it's really not "old." I did a mini-review of it at comment #40 below. Now you'll get even less done at work than ever (as if any of you logs did anything in the first place).

TonightÂ’s overnight open thread is sponsored by the Dumbo Octopus.

(Dunno' why this one looks so different from the one at Wikipedia. Maybe it's a young-'un. Sickinmass my friend, you got some 'splainin' to do.)

Notice: Posted by permission of AceCorp LLC. Please e-mail overnight open thread tips to xgenghisx@gmail.com. Otherwise send tips to Ace.

Posted by: Open Blog at 06:16 PM | Add Comment
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