G'morning.

Doctors say they do more vasectomies during March Madness than at other times of the year. It gives the guys a reason to sit on the couch for three days while the games are on.

"Senator Puertorriqueño" didn't even get enough votes in Puerto Rico to trigger proportional awarding of delegates. Instead, Romney took all 20. It was not close. Question: was there any reason to believe Puerto Rico was in play before Santorum's English-language trainwreck?

Speaking of wasted trips, Santorum was at Tony Perkins' house yesterday to speak to dozens of pastors about social issues and urge them to tell their parishioners to vote for him. Has Santorum been slipping among evangelical voters and I missed it? When does he reach out to the voters he hasn't clinched yet?

NYPD is investigating a tweet from the "mostly peaceful" OWSer to "kill a cop" to "make a difference." Panicked fellow protests that he wasn't serious and, anyway, can't kill cops because he lives in Florida, or something.

Not even the WaPo Factchecker could stomach the claims made in the Presidential puff-piece documentary. Gave it three Pinocchios.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 02:51 AM | Comments (377)
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Starting early to get the average back down...

Dissing Rutherford

President Obama has a bad habit of denigrating his predecessors - usually inaccurately - and last week he indulged this unpleasant trait again by dissing President Rutherford B. Hayes as a luddite:

One of my predecessors, Rutherford B. Hayes, reportedly said about the telephone, 'It's a great invention, but who would ever want to use one?' That's why he's not on Mount Rushmore because he's looking backwards. He's not looking forwards.

And as is typical he was just wrong - it turns out that Hayes was quite the early adopter of technology:

Hayes, in fact, was such a technology buff that he installed the first telephone in the White House [in 1877, just months after it was demonstrated]. A list of telephone subscribers published in the article "The Telephone Comes to Washington," by Richard T. Loomis, shows that the White House was given the number "1."

And furthermore the B in Rutherford B. Hayes stood for Badass:

When the Civil War began, Hayes left a successful political career to join the Union Army. Wounded five times, most seriously at the Battle of South Mountain, he earned a reputation for bravery in combat and was promoted to the rank of major general. After the war, he served in the U.S. Congress from 1865 to 1867 as a Republican. Hayes left Congress to run for Governor of Ohio and was elected to two consecutive terms, serving from 1867 to 1871.

...Hayes believed in meritocratic government, equal treatment without regard to race, and improvement through education. He ordered federal troops to quell the Great Railroad Strike of 1877 and ordered them out of Southern capitals as Reconstruction ended. He implemented modest civil service reforms that laid the groundwork for further reform in the 1880s and 1890s. Hayes kept his pledge not to run for re-election. He retired to his home in Ohio and became an advocate of social and educational reform

Leave it to Obama to falsely insult a better man than himself.

Posted by: Maetenloch at 04:44 PM | Comments (690)
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Maybe not perfect for you, darlings; lord knows that Morons demand only the best and brightest in ladyflesh.

Besides her, um, cognitive issues, her husband registers a 9.5 on the Douche-ter Scale.

Posted by: LauraW at 02:29 PM | Comments (259)
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In space, no one can hear you scream about the high ticket prices.

Posted by: andy at 01:10 PM | Comments (112)
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Recall the Dunning-Kruger effect. In short, a personÂ’s incompetence inhibits their ability to recognize his or her incompetence. The people who think they are the smartest are the dumbest, essentially, because they are blind to their stupidity. The people who think they know better know the least. And isn't it interesting that they are almost always the first to hurl the insult "you're stupid"?

Anyway, I was reading about the police busting OWS people and closing Zuccotti Park today, and it occurred to me that there is a variation on the Dunning-Kruger effect that has to do with other forms of self-awareness. Several examples:

• Doesn't it follow that the people who think they're the most egalitarian become the most sexist, biased, and/or prejudiced? Because of the fact they admire that quality in themselves, egalitarianism, they are blind to the reality that they are not. These are the people who say "flyover states" and "rednecks." These are the people who come down on Limbaugh for a single use of "slut" while thinking someone else's use of much worse language is okay.

• Doesn't it follow that the people who regard themselves as the most open-minded are in fact the most close minded? Their errant self-view causes them to be blind to how close-minded they are. Progressives in many institutions like academia, for example, talk endlessly about diversity while at the same time denying, marginalizing, and shutting-up voices on the right. Conservative professors don't get tenure. Conservative voices on campus are shouted down and silenced by left wing perma-children. A more specific example: Andrew Breitbart was often called a fag by the most wonderful people in the world.

• Doesn't it follow that the people who think they're making the world a nicer place are the ones who are making it worse? They have a blind spot for their own bad behavior. A specific example: Al Gore and energy usage. Gore wants to make the world a better place by decreasing reliance on fossil fuels. (Assume for a moment he actually believes his bullshit. I don't think he does.) While having a bigger carbon footprint than anyone else on the planet, with the exception of the president... who at least has an excuse.

• Doesn't it follow that the people who think they are the best suited to lead others would often be the least suitable/capable to do so? Here's a quick example: One of the creepiest people I ever knew sought out positions of authority on ethical panels. He had to be one of the least ethical, least well-suited people to serve in such a position, but he thought he was fantastic, and very well-suited to judge the behavior of others. A friend quipped, to paraphrase, "The type of people who seek out positions of authority like this are usually the people you would least want to serve in those positions." We agreed that it's almost as if we should automatically eliminate anyone who volunteers for a such positions and recruit from those who do not.

• Doesn't it follow that the people who think they're the most wonderful/moral are in fact the most horrible/flawed? Their self-regard blinds them to their bad behavior. Tea Party people, for example, left the National Mall cleaner than when they found it. OWS people crapped on the ground. Union protesters in Wisconsin and people at the Rally to Restore Sanity left a huge mess for others to clean up.

• Doesn't it follow that the people who are the most selfish would believe themselves to be the most selfless? They want people to give more, to pay more taxes... so they themselves can have a bigger slice of the pie. Their self-view disables their ability to reality-test. Ever hear of a progressive avoiding a tax dodge? Related, doesn't it follow that the people most interested in redistribution of wealth would give the least? I recall reading an article about ten years ago that surveyed charity giving on a state-by-state per capita basis. Or maybe it was as a percentage of income. Anyway, the "flyover states" were the most giving. The least? Massachusetts. Followed by the usual suspects.

• A more specific example: I've read several times that Michael Moore is one of the most painfully greedy people in the entertainment industry. Now, from his words and actions--well, at least from the image he tries to project--one would think he would be easy to work with. After all, he's all about justice and fairness. And doing good. Right? But the reality is he's one of the most annoyingly greedy assholes imaginable.

Because of the built-in assumption that everything about the self is fine, time spent fixing flaws naturally has to do with others. And flaws must be fixed. "I'm fine. That's understood. So lets take a look at the actions of others." They don't look at themselves objectively. They don't question their own motivations and actions. They take it as a given they are exemplars of only the finest qualities. more...

Posted by: rdbrewer at 09:36 AM | Comments (418)
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This is for blah blah blah. But not yada yada yada.

Posted by: rdbrewer at 09:16 AM | Comments (37)
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I see Fritzworth's post below and this EO is getting a lot of chatter on Twitter and in email from folks nervous that it represents a new power-grab from the President. In fact, I'm hearing from the usual suspects (WND-types) that this is the foundation for Obama's plan to nationalize "everything" throughout the United States and even conscript private persons without compensation (slavery!) for government service.

So let's be clear about what this EO does not do.

(1) It does not allow the President or the named cabinet secretaries in either emergency or non-emergency conditions to conscript people without (or even with) compensation.

Sec. 201. Priorities and Allocations Authorities. (a) The authority of the President . . . to require acceptance . . . of contracts or orders (other than contracts of employment) to promote the national defense . . . is delegated to [the various named cabinet secretaries.]

So the authority to require private persons to accept contracts does not extend to contracts of employment. It says so right there in the order. No other provision of the order delegates authority to anyone to conscript private persons without compensation. Section 502 says the cabinet heads may employ certain folks without compensation (in violation of, among other things, federal minimum wage laws), but does not say that those persons may be conscripted, that is, forced to accept such an employment contract. I'm not sure where Goldstein got that.

(2) It does not allow the President or the named cabinet secretaries in either emergency or non-emergency conditions to nationalize anything.

The same provision seems to be what's tripping people up.

Sec. 201. Priorities and Allocations Authorities. (a) The authority of the President conferred by section 101 of the Act, 50 U.S.C. App. 2071 . . . is delegated to [the various named cabinet secretaries.]

Without the objectionable material, it becomes much more obvious that the order doesn't give the President authority to do anything. The authorities to prioritize and force acceptance of contracts (excluding contracts of employment) came from an act of Congress, the Defense Production Act of 1950. I suppose it could have been part of President Truman's "totalitarian" attempt to nationalize "everything," as Geller phrases it. (Geller also claims the order allows forced conscription, which, as discussed above, it does not.)

(3) It is not a power grab from Obama.

As discussed thoroughly by Ed Morrissey, this order simply updates orders issued by President Reagan (Executive Order 12656) and President Bush 41 (Executive Order 12919). Neither were power grabs by those presidents. This one isn't either. In fact:

The original EO dealing with national defense resources preparedness was issued in 1939 (EO 824 according to the National Archives. It has been superseded a number of times, starting in 1951 by nearly every President through Bill Clinton, and amended twice by George W. Bush.

So, nothing to get excited about here. And if you're really het up about the Defense Production Act of 1950, you should call your congressman, not complain about fictitious Obama power grabs. As Professor Jacobson says and as I have documented in numerous posts here, there's plenty of things to criticize Obama for, including numerous end runs around Congress. No need to waste energy criticizing him over unfounded fears that this executive order will nationalize everything or lead to government conscription.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 08:04 AM | Comments (264)
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Drudge and Memorandum both had links to an executive order issued by Pres. Obama on Friday. It appears to have to do with delineating responsibilities among Cabinet members during times of emergency, so I chuckled in light of the mocking of the MSM over the efforts of various states (such as Wyoming) to do the same thing.

But then I read the following paragraph and wondered if there might be more to this directive than meets the eye. Note the highlighted language: more...

Posted by: Open Blogger at 06:00 AM | Comments (236)
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Blog's working again. That's nice.

Posted by: andy at 04:02 AM | Comments (114)
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Happy St. Patrick's Day morons! Tip O' the cap to y'all and thanks again to Ben for covering for me last night.

Well since we're all aboard the SMOD ticket (although he does not seem to be running this year so far), I thought it might be beneficial to take a look at SMOD's family history. SMOD Family History: 6 Craziest Meteor Impacts.

It would seem SMOD has been busy on the moon too. The Moon's History Of Violence. Video of said violence below the fold. more...

Posted by: CDR M at 05:07 PM | Comments (672)
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