Spirits And The Spirit of Freedom

Here Bruce Bawer points out the connection between cheap, easy access to booze and overall freedom.

A couple of days ago a friend of mine here in Norway, where I live, posted a note on Facebook in which he sardonically noted: “Think what it’ll be like if it becomes possible for adult people to buy a bottle of red wine…at 5 PM on a Saturday or — horrors! — 7 PM on a weekday.”

Here’s the background. In Norway, all wine and spirits are sold in government-owned stores dedicated strictly to that purpose. The stores — which collectively are known by the cozy name vinmonopolet, or “the wine monopoly” — are open from 10 to 6 on weekdays and 10 to 3 on Saturdays. They’re closed on Sundays and on all sorts of holidays. Around Christmas and Easter they’re closed for days at a stretch.

Posted by: Maetenloch at 05:24 PM | Comments (678)
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Photographs from the tsunami stricken Fukishima Nuclear Power Plant.

These men are risking their lives to save others. I don't think I can add anything to that. It is just that.

via DrewM.

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Posted by: Dave in Texas at 03:42 PM | Comments (100)
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Fallon dares to inquire about the sartorial choices of the Emperor.

Brian Williams assures him no, the clothes are quite splendid. He wants to assure Fallon that the "machinery of government" is always working. Odd that we never had such reassurance when Bush was in Waco.

For bonus points, Williams brushes Fallon back with a chin-level pitch, asking if he's not offering up a little "political 'tude." more...

Posted by: Ace at 03:38 PM | Comments (93)
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Happy Birthday ObamaCare!

The New York Democrat said that he does not have the power to get the city to apply for a waiver but that he is “personally looking at whether he can make the numbers work.”

“We in New York already have hospitals, we already employ doctors and we employ nurses. We have a lot of uninsured people. … [Setting up] the exchanges is the one piece of the puzzle that would be difficult for us to do,” he said. “I’m just looking internally to whether the city can save money and have more control over its own destiny.

Ah yes, NYC should have "more control over its own destiny" but you poor schulbs who aren't connected enough to get a waiver? You're welcome!

In case you'd forgotten, Weiner was one of the biggest ObamaCare boosters. In fact, until just recently he was spoiling for a fight with Republicans about how great ObamaCare really is.

"Republicans want another debate about health care reform? Well, so should Democrats. They beat us in round one with lies and scare tactics — we welcome a second shot," Weiner said. "By planning to introduce a bill to repeal health care reform the first week of the 112th Congress, Republicans have made it very clear what direction they intend to take the country — backwards."

I think it's kind of funny that he thinks the GOP won the first round over this monstrosity. Sure the public hates it, so there's that. Ultimately though the only thing that counts is votes and we sure did win that one.

Here he is just the other day.

“Look, we tried the hiding-under-our-desk strategy on this issue during campaign 2010. Too many candidates who did that lost,” Weiner said in an interview for the POLITICO series “Health Care Reform: One Year Later.” The better strategy, he said, is a “leaning into it” approach, which recognizes that Republicans will force the issue and that voters will want to hear about it.

“You can’t ignore the elephant in the room. People care about it, want to talk about it; they’re affected by it; we’ve got to explain it; and it’s something to be very proud of,” Weiner said.

Everyone expects Weiner to run for mayor in a year. It's pretty clear what kind of damage it's going to do to the city that so he wants to get out from under it ASAP.

Posted by: DrewM at 02:23 PM | Comments (181)
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He says that in the first interview, he was answering a question about how to further Obama's stated goal of "Qadaffy must go," which was not in fact his own goal. That is, he considered the US policy to now have been set by an ill-considered presidential commitment, and was explaining that "diplomacy" could not achieve this but only intervening on the side of the rebels.

Meanwhile, in the second interview, he was speaking of his own preferences -- no intervention, and of course therefore no presidential statement that "Qadaffy must go."

It's actually plausible, but I'd have to hear the whole of that first statement.

Wait... From this quote from his earlier remark...

VAN SUSTEREN: What would you do about Libya?

GINGRICH: Exercise a no-fly zone this evening, communicate to the Libyan military that Gadhafi was gone and that the sooner they switch sides, the more like they were to survive, provided help to the rebels to replace him. I mean, the idea that we're confused about a man who has been an anti-American dictator since 1969 just tells you how inept this administration is. They were very quick to jump on Mubarak, who was their ally for 30 years, and they were confused about getting rid of Gadhafi. This is a moment to get rid of him. Do it. Get it over with.

... he does not sound to me like a man who's merely accepting Obama's predicate that Qadaffy must go. It sounds very much like he's criticizing Obama for being "confused" about that conclusion.

Posted by: Ace at 01:13 PM | Comments (72)
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Gotta be something on that birth certificate Obama doesn't like, Trump reasons.

Whoopi Goldberg asks "Is it because he's black?"

Thanks to rd in the sidebar.

Posted by: Ace at 01:05 PM | Comments (257)
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I don't love Rockstar and it's oh-so-socially-maladjusted attitude, but this may in fact be something.

For one thing, the uncanny valley seems overcome.

For another thing, these facial models are so detailed I recognize about half of these actors. They're a lot of "those guys" (guys whose names you don't know but you know you've seen them) but I do recognize them.

The interrogation stuff, starting at 2:00, is the big thing. The facial animations are so detailed you can see people's jaws set when they lie.

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Posted by: Ace at 11:18 AM | Comments (226)
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I know there are some conservatives who have derided Obama for failing to lead in Libya, when a judicious application of Tomahawk missiles would have permitted the already-advancing rebels to swarm into Tripoli.

I know there are some conservatives who feel Obama is was basically acting properly by not intervening -- they take a "let them sort it out" position. They may criticize Obama for ancillary stuff (like issuing tough-guy bluster like "Qadaffy must go," then going golfing), but they believe that non-intervention is the correct policy, and have been consistent in this from the beginning.

Both of these positions are respectable (I think) and both have a good pedigree in the conservative movement. For every interventionist, there is a noninterventionist.

There is a one-sentence sum-up that everyone agrees on as foreign policy: "We must promote liberty and justice and defend the national interest, but we must not be the world's policeman or be drawn into bloody foreign adventures."

Everyone agrees with that, because it sort of says both everything and nothing at all. The real question in foreign intervention comes down, of course, to which of those two ideas, separated by that mischievously meaningful "but," do you most agree with?

Everyone agrees with that statement, but that's meaningless. The question is which part of it do you nod more vigorously along with.

I know where McCain and Lindsey Graham stand -- they are hawks and eager for foreign intervention. (Too eager, I think.) And I know where Rand Paul stands -- like his father, he is a skeptic of intervention.

I can speak politely with either camp. I may think either is wrong (or too ideological or not "flexible" and nuanced enough or whatever) but I wouldn't say any of those men is insincere.

But what is disrespectable and dishonorable, to me, is simply taking a position opposite whatever Obama is doing at the moment. That is just as much a hypocritical partisan game as what Johnny Come Lately military interventionists Chris Matthews and Joan Walsh are doing.

What is Newt's real position? I do not see any editing in these video clips, so I don't think these clips misrepresent his words. (We'll have to see, though.)

But it is unserious and partisan and cynical to urge muscular interventionism when Obama was sitting back and doing nothing but suddenly urging sitting back and doing nothing when Obama opts for airstrikes.

There was in fact a changed situation here -- 16 days ago the rebels just needed some airstrikes to take out Qadaffy's tanks and artillery and jets and they would have taken the whole country. At this point, the rebels may or may not win, even with Qadaffy's war machinery taken away from him.

But I don't hear Newt making that distinction, or saying that Obama let the situation shift in such a way as to now make intervention futile and therefore foolish. What I hear him saying is now that Obama's ordering airstrikes that he actually wouldn't have intervened before.

Which is the exact opposite of what he said 16 days ago.

This illustrates perfectly my basic problem with Newt Gingrich -- I just don't trust him. He is very clever at being clever, but beneath all that cleverness, what is real? What is genuine?

Is everything a game? Everything positioning for political advantage?

I do not know how Gingrich would respond to this -- I imagine he'll have to within the next few days.

It remains possible that there is deceptive editing here -- this video is offered by ThinkProgress. It is possible there is important context left out.

But, that said: I cannot easily imagine what context might reconcile these statements into something that looks like policy rather than political posturing.

Posted by: Ace at 10:20 AM | Comments (226)
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We needed to pass it to find out what was in it, but it turns out, what was in it was worse than expected.

Thirty-seven percent of Americans support the measure, with 59 percent opposed. That's basically unchanged from last March, when 39 percent supported the law and 59 percent opposed the measure.

Based on this I think we are being far too timid on repeal -- or defunding, for now.

I understand that the GOP will be timid when public opinion runs against us. That's normal, and (I would argue) tactically defensible and maybe even optimal.

But when 59% -- as clear a majority as you can realistically hope to have in our divided nation -- opposes the measure? And of course when almost all of that 59% is either "the base" or "the persuadable right-leaning independents"?

Maybe not this time, but soon: We need to just vote to delay all implementation of ObamaCare until, say 2013. We can claim we'll "look it over" at that point. Or something.

But defunding this now seems cost-free. And if Obama chooses to shut down the government over it, so be it; a shut-down is coming one way or another anyway.

If 59% of the public is opposed to ObamaCare they will not blame us for saving money by defunding it until 2013.

I say "until 2013" but of course you know I have in mind full repeal in January 2013. But claiming funding is only delayed rather than completely removed puts us in the position of saying, "And this Obama character is shutting down the government over a mere delay of funding of a bill that's not even to take effect until 2014...

Hell, dress it up as Obama's favorite punt -- we're going to delay funding while we compose a fact-finding ad-hoc blue-panel committee to study the effects of the law.

But we have to be more forward leaning on this. This is no radical move. This is mainstream and popular.

Meanwhile, a reminder from Ron Johnston: ObamaCare will destroy health care.

Posted by: Ace at 09:14 AM | Comments (130)
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How Andrea Mitchell did swoon over the "remarkable" coalition Obama had assembled! Apparently this stupid bint doesn't read the newspapers, or else she'd have known that 1, Britain and France pushed for this, while America refused to commit to either intervention or non-intervention, and 2, Germany was against it. (So was Russia, but that's more expected.)

When Andrea Mitchell praises Obama for assembling such a grand coalition, then, she's speaking entirely of France, as France supported this action but notoriously undermined Bush in Iraq.

And, again, she's getting the Hero and Sidekick in this story reversed -- it was the French who used a combination of diplomacy and shame to change Obama's mind, not the other way around. Of course, it will be the US that does the bulk of the heavy lifting, because of our "unique capabilities" (no thanks on that to Obama and the Peace Fags), but it was France who either convinced us or snookered us to paint the Libyan fence.

Saying "Obama persuaded France to join our coalition" is like saying "Chuck Lorre persuaded Charlie Sheen to be winning." You can't convince someone to do what they're already climbing the walls to do.

You know who wasn't super-forward-leaning on Libya? Like, who actually had to be persuaded? Germany. And they remain unpersuaded.

If Obama's such a stellar diplomat and so good at charming and Spocking allies into aiding us, how come Germany's pulling its ships out of the Mediterranean in order to avoid having them used in Libya as part of a NATO action?

Once again, Obama is getting credit for, basically, the sun coming up in the morning. For stuff he actually didn't do. And when it comes to stuff he could do but fails to do -- well, the media is silent.

Let's just give him praise for "getting France on board" and ignore the part about France being a main driver of interventionist policy from the second week of the rebellion.

And let's also ignore the part about another ally withdrawing its ships from NATO control.

Posted by: Ace at 08:21 AM | Comments (183)
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