I knew it was a bad sign when I got up to ... ummm ... "check the perimeter" last night and Ace was still going strong on Twitter.

It was a dark and stormy night. Bill Clinton took the podium. The hall became an organism, breathing, sensing, knowing as one.

— The Student (@AceofSpadesHQ) September 6, 2012

He likely won't be in until around the crack of dusk, but we charitably updated the sidebar counter this morning in advance of confirming whether he is still the king of his castle.

(h/t Jammie Wearing Fool for the Twitchy link)

Posted by: andy at 07:25 AM | Comments (365)
Post contains 104 words, total size 1 kb.

Part of Bob Woodward's The Price of Politics leaked. Rick Klein at ABC has an advance look. Read the whole thing.

To recap, back in July of 2011, the Boehner-Obama budget talks fell apart. Speaker Boehner had gone way out on a limb, and at one point it looked like they had a deal that included tax increases and spending cuts, but in a case of the most inopportune kibitzing since the dawn of time, the "gang of six" chimed in at that precise moment with their own plan, which included even greater tax revenue increases. So, of course, Obama thought he could do better, and he pulled back from the agreement, demanding another 400 billion in tax revenue.

"But at a critical juncture, with an agreement tantalizingly close, Obama pressed Boehner for additional taxes as part of a final deal -- a miscalculation, in retrospect, given how far the House speaker felt he'd already gone."

. . .

When Boehner finally did call back, he jettisoned the entire deal. Obama lost his famous cool, according to Woodward, with a "flash of pure fury" coming from the president; one staffer in the room said Obama gripped the phone so tightly he thought he would break it.

"He was spewing coals," Boehner told Woodward, in what is described as a borderline "presidential tirade."

"He was pissedÂ…. He wasn't going to get a damn dime more out of me. He knew how far out on a limb I was. But he was hot. It was clear to me that coming to an agreement with him was not going to happen, and that I had to go to Plan B."

But the president claims he was "merely raising the possibility" of putting more tax revenue in to the deal. Anyone believe that? According to Speaker Boehner, it was a demand for $400 billion more, "despite the earlier agreement of no more than $800 billion in total revenue." So the parties had an agreement, but the president thought he could do even better and killed it with an absurd deal-breaker. Then, of course, when the deal fell through, he reacted with rage. Someone with executive experience wouldn't have handled things that way. The upshot was that people began to feel no one was in charge.

Woodward issues a harsh judgment on White House and congressional leaders for failing to act boldly at a moment of crisis. Particular blame falls on the president.

"It was increasingly clear that no one was running Washington. That was trouble for everyone, but especially for Obama," Woodward writes.

. . .

"The president was trying to get there. But there was nobody steering the ship underneath him," Boehner told Woodward. "They never had their act together. The president, I think, was ill-served by his team. Nobody in charge, no process. I just don't know how the place works. To this day, I can't tell you how the place works. There's no process for making a decision in this White House. There's nobody in charge."

Ill served by his team? I think Speaker Boehner is being charitable here. Obama calls the shots. Things may not run well, but Obama is in charge. It has something to do with that supreme confidence of his. No one on his staff could advise the man who thinks: "I'm a better speechwriter than my speechwriters"; "I know more about policies on any particular issue than my policy directors"; "I think I could probably do every job on the campaign better than the people IÂ’ll hire to do it"; "IÂ’m gonna think IÂ’m a better political director than my political director," and "I'd make a good chief of staff." Would a guy like that take advice on something he hasn't already delegated? I have no doubt he considers himself a great negotiator as well.

Woodward portrays a president who remained a supreme believer in his own powers of persuasion, even as he faltered in efforts to coax congressional leaders in both parties toward compromise. . . .

"John, I've got great confidence in my ability to sway the American people," Boehner quotes the president as having told him.

If he could only consider the possibility his great confidence may at the root of all his difficulties. All of them.

Follow me on Twitter.

Posted by: rdbrewer at 04:50 AM | Comments (464)
Post contains 744 words, total size 5 kb.

Let me just start by saying that I'm a huge fan of Mike Rowe's Dirty Jobs. So I find this particularly awesome.

Certainly, we need more jobs, and you were clear about that in Tampa. But the Skills Gap proves that we need something else too. We need people who see opportunity where opportunity exists. We need enthusiasm for careers that have been overlooked and underappreciated by society at large. We need to have a really big national conversation about what we value in the workforce, and if I can be of help to you in that regard, I am at your service – assuming of course, you find yourself in a new address early next year.

Be sure to read the whole thing, especially the part where he says he mentioned this to Obama four years ago, but President Ladies' Tee was too busy to respond. Must've been meeting with his Jobs Council or something.

Anyhow, Team Romney isn't making this mistake.

.@bdomenech Ben, the campaign has officially reached out to Mike Rowe, & we look forward to hearing back about this worthy cause.

— Ted Newton (@Ted_Newton) September 5, 2012

In addition to Mike Rowe's work in this area, Home Depot co-founder Bernie Marcus and actor John Ratzenberger have an initiative called the Center for America that also focuses on the skilled trades.

These efforts are dedicated to a simple idea: you did build that! Or at least you could if you knew a useful skill like welding, carpentry, plumbing or the like. Getting a degree in Womyn's Studies and the accompanying unemployment and mountain of student loan debt, on the other hand, seems like an exceptionally stupid idea.

Or, as Rowe said,

I always thought there something ill-fated about the promise of three million “shovel ready jobs” made to a society that no longer encourages people to pick up a shovel.

Indeed. More Mike Rowe goodness below the fold. more...

Posted by: andy at 04:07 AM | Comments (196)
Post contains 336 words, total size 4 kb.

Happy Thursday!

Over at the Rumble, I was not not impressed by the first day of the Democratic convention. And, of course, it was downhill from there.

Jen Rubin reviews Clinton's speech from last night. Her verdict: incoherent and incredible (in the correct usage of that word).

A federal judge has denied immigration activists' attempt to block Arizona's "show me your papers" law because their claims of racial profiling are speculative until it is mplemented.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 02:50 AM | Comments (176)
Post contains 83 words, total size 1 kb.

Have a gazillion things going on so tonight's ONT will be minimal. Entertain yourselves as usual (but in a non-fapatory way please).

Also get yourself tested if you've been in the VI, MS, or DC.

Posted by: Maetenloch at 04:49 PM | Comments (1589)
Post contains 298 words, total size 4 kb.

Wednesday night. This might be the worst night of the week for an NFL opener.

But that's ok I guess. At least it's back, and we can all be grateful for that.

At this very moment, Eli Manning is beginning his pre-game meditation.

Who knows what's going through his head right now? Or who? Not me. Not you.

BONUS Split thread! Link to live stream of DNC Convention, so you can watch 350 pounders goin at each other and still watch the football game at the same time.

BONUS BONUS cheerleader pic below the fold: more...

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 04:05 PM | Comments (506)
Post contains 112 words, total size 1 kb.

Well, they didn't really vote to add it back it. After THREE tries LA Mayor and convention Chairman Antonio Villaraigosa just claims it passed when it clearly didn't.

The best part (aside from super awkward Villaraigosa moments) is the man and women with the "Arab American Democrats" sign rather strenuously disagreeing with the vote.

The Huffington Post is awesome:

Democrats 2012: Yay abortion! Boo God!

More [ace]: I didn't see Drew had posted on this, and was drafting my own post as he was putting his up.

I'll add my old post, below: more...

Posted by: DrewM at 02:55 PM | Comments (599)
Post contains 482 words, total size 3 kb.

Guy stages his own elaborate death-by-car-crash, including bloody gore, to show his girlfriend how much she'd miss him if he were dead.

Then he proposes.

Then when I saw Alexey covered in blood lying in the road a paramedic told me he was dead and I just broke down in tears.”

Then Alexey “miraculously” rose from the dead, and proposed to Irina. And for some stupid, stupid reason, she said yes.

People aren't thinking right when they're in shock.

Legos are sexist for putting out Legos intended to appeal to girls (which do in fact appeal to girls; sales are high).

But they reinforce gender stereotypes or something so we all have to rub our chins and say how terrible it all is.

Here's something I don't get: Check the comments, where a bunch of bien pensants are weighing in with their dreary O What Hath Become of Us burblings. They're going on and on specifically about the use of the color pink in the line.

They're really, really anti-pink.

Now, riddle me this: Why are the same people, so opposed the color pink in toys for very small girls, dressing up in pink t-shirts and vagina costumes?

There is a curious inversion here, is there not? They demand that tiny little girls have the sophisticated tastes of adults, while indulging their own childish impulses for pink.

Why can't an eight year old girl like pink, but a 58-year-old professional activist won't shut up about pink?

I'm really very baffled by this amazing inversion that goes on in lefty politics. It is a well-nigh ubiquitous trope of the left that Children should be treated as adults but adults must behave as children.

Finally, a liberal wife throws away her husband's absentee ballot because she knows he's voting Republican. See, it was the moral, ethical thing to do.

This is of course another trope, perhaps the worst of all: The Ends Justify the Means.

Moral and ethical behavior begins on a personal level. You cannot justify theft, vandalism, and dishonesty by claiming these things serve a Higher Political Purpose.

No. Every human being's first responsibility is to be a good human being. If one's devotion to a Political Cause trumps his devotion to being good as a human being, on human terms, as regards the respect he shows for other human beings, that person is a sociopath using politics to justify his pathologies.

Abstraction is one of the mind's most powerful tools. It permits us to build bridges and skyscrapers and rocket ships to the moon.

It also permits us to decide things like One death is a tragedy; a million deaths is just a statistic.

Any philosophy which has cleaved from a regard for good behavior and good will towards one's fellow human beings will, inevitably, result in crimes, viciousness, and ultimately mass murder, if permitted to fester.

It has every single time before. it continues doing so now.

Speaking of Stupid: I was just writing, a few weeks ago, that "undecided" voters are 1, mostly decided and 2, hesitant about saying so because they haven't done their homework, and they know it, so they are reluctant to give an answer (having not done their homework). And they excuse their own failure to do their homework by blaming the candidates, saying things like, "I want them to explain their plan to me, I want more information, I want facts not negative ads."

Well, Frank Luntz was just focus-grouping some undecideds. The whole article is worth reading (though it just confirms what I keep saying), but I found this precious:

In many cases, they even seem to be fooling themselves about being undecided — a point Luntz made by laughingly taking on a man in the group who had many complaints about Obama , a slew of compliments for Romney, yet insisted that he didn’t know how he’d vote in the end.

Luntz also called members of the focus group, sponsored by the University of Phoenix, a bunch of hypocrites: “Almost half of you didn’t watch [Romney’s Tampa acceptance] speech and you’re telling me you want more information?”

No, they don't want more information. This is just the lie they tell themselves, and tell anyone else who asked, when confronted on why they have been so dilatory on doing their civic duty as Americans.

Given that Romney's speech was on all three networks, and all the news networks, they had to work pretty hard to miss it. And they did.

Posted by: Ace at 02:17 PM | Comments (223)
Post contains 752 words, total size 5 kb.

The Republican convention was relentlessly on-point, perhaps too much so.

That's not true of the Democratic convention, which has a decidedly schizophrenic nature. "Centrists" speaking calmly of "conservative values" in primetime -- and red-meat radicalism in all the hours before 10 PM.

As a rule, Democrats win when they run as mainstream conservatives — not as radicals. Thus, a born again Christian from Georgia named Jimmy Carter was elected president in 1976 — and a “new” Democrat from Arkansas named Bill Clinton in 1992 and 1996. Even Chicago’s Barack Obama — who made sure you knew he wasn’t against all wars (just the bad one) — was able to pull off the maneuver.

But if the first night of the Democratic Convention is any clue, the ruse might be up.

To be sure, there were several speakers who could appeal to mainstream Americans watching at home (Harry Reid and Tammy Duckworth were both compelling), but also, several who wonÂ’t play well in Peoria (for example, Nancy Keenan, NARAL Pro-Choice America and Rep. Rosa DeLauro.)

During the 10pm EST prime time hour, of course, they trotted out the TV-friendly marquee speakers — who furtively stressed conservative values.

Paul Ryan said he wanted to give voters a crystal-clear choice in this election.

It seems the Democrats agree with him -- except when they're being nationally televised. Then they want to blur the lines some.

Posted by: Ace at 01:05 PM | Comments (279)
Post contains 254 words, total size 2 kb.

The "Keepin' the Dream" calendar.

January's photo:

August's creepy blasphemy:

This actually does have to do with porn. Celebrity porn, I mean. A horrible Spectator Culture in which people spend far too much time thinking about their New Gods -- the gods of celebrity culture -- rather than their own lives.

I know this is going to be an intensely divisive thing to say but this is what really repels me about the Obama worship -- and the Same But Different worship of Ron Paul and, forgive me, Sarah Palin.

I don't say that every Ron Paul fan or every Sarah Palin fan has something they should be ashamed of. Promoting people we like -- especially if there's a political component to it, in as much as a politician you like could, in theory, advance your own political aspirations -- is normal and has been going on for as long as there's been a thing called "politics."

But there is, with these three figures particularly, sometimes a line that is crossed which I find both creepy and sad. When mere positive regard crosses over into an intense concern not about the figure's ability to advance one's own political agenda, but into primarily concern that that figure's life be as awesome as possible. When rooting for a politician ceases to be a rooting for one's own self interest -- in as much as a politician on the same wavelength will probably advance one's own interests -- and morphs into simply rooting for that politician himself.

My enjoyment of football declined rapidly when I felt silly about it-- when I realized I was, basically, rooting for millionaire sports-heroes, whose lives were already pretty awesome, to become even more awesome by winning that Super Bowl ring.

What's in it for me? How does my life improve if Eli Manning is finally recognized as among the true elite in the sport?

I'm pretty sure Eli Manning isn't going to begin his pre-game meditation tonight by thinking about me.

Identification with an athlete, celebrity, or politician is normal and probably unavoidable. But I do believe that it must be kept in check. There are people in one's life one is perfectly justified in rooting and praying for -- parents, children, spouse, close friends.

But Millionaire Strangers ought not be on that list. To the extent that Barack Obama matters, he should only matter as an avatar for policy changes and governance. To invest His Personhood with near-deity levels of worship is just wrong. It's an abasement of the self in favor of, essentially, rooting for Apollo to finally thwart his brother Ares.

When Obama came on the scene, the media called him an "aspirational figure." I already had a lot of problems with that formulation -- the first of which is that Obama didn't seem particularly accomplished to me. When selecting an "aspirational figure" -- a figure to aspire towards, a role model, a personal hero -- I imagined that the criteria should be stiffer than "graduated from law school" and "served as a little-noticed senator."

Still, at least if one is setting a figure up as a lodestone and attempting to better oneself by emulating that figure, that is normal and that has been going on for millennia.

But when the Self is wholly absent from this -- when the aspirational figure stops being a role model to aspire to (thus resulting in tangible betterment of the individual) and simply becomes someone to root for, like a Champion or, at worse, an actual Living God -- something is very wrong.

If an intense emotional connection to a figure cannot be explained by a self-interested justification -- i.e., "What I get in return for supporting this figure" -- then it seems to me that that emotional connection is being misdirected from the objects it should naturally attach -- spouse, children, parents, close friends, God, church. And yes, even Self.

It seems to turn natural sympathies and affiliations on their heads in favor of an attachment to a remote stranger.

Which seems to me to be quite poisonous to the spirit and the sense of self. We should each endeavor to be the Stars of our own lives. We should not make anyone -- not athletes, not presidents, not politicians, and for god's sakes not mere celebrities -- the Stars of our very own lives, the only lives we'll ever have.

Interactions with Strangers ought to be transactional. I do this for you, you do this for me. The urge towards protectiveness and benevolence for the sake of benevolence should be limited to family, friends, self, and God, and actual charity cases. When the element of the transactional disappears from a relationship with a stranger -- when it becomes one-sided, just loving on a remote figure -- something's gone wrong.

This to me is the Spectator Culture-- an almost sci-fi dystopia in which otherwise rational people trade away their own selves to root and cheer for Larger Than Life Avatars. Emotional energy is directed not towards useful purposes in one's own life, or for the benefit of the natural objects of one's intense affections, but towards simply rooting and cheering for pretty faces on gigantic television screens. As a hundred sci-fi stories and futurism articles have punned -- Circuits Maximus.

It is beyond question that the worst of this misdirection of the heart involves one Barack Hussein Obama. But the Spectator Culture is poisonous to the self in whatever form it takes.

From "Looker." A movie I've mentioned I like a whole heck of a lot.

Here's James Coburn as "John Reston," explaining his plan to manipulate people through the power of TV.

Television can control public opinion more effectively than armies of secret police, because television is entirely voluntary. The American government forces our children to attend school, but nobody forces them to watch T.V. Americans of all ages *submit* to television. Television is the American ideal. Persuasion without coercion. Nobody makes us watch. Who could have predicted that a *free* people would voluntarily spend one fifth of their lives sitting in front of a *box* with pictures? Fifteen years sitting in prison is punishment. But 15 years sitting in front of a television set is entertainment. And the average American now spends more than one and a half years of his life just watching television commercials. Fifty minutes, every day of his life, watching commercials. Now, that's power.

And yet the Internet has displaced TV as the king of Time Suck. Especially porn.

Just something to watch out for, is all.

This is my own personal thing-- I'm talking mostly to myself here, trying to lecture myself. What I'm trying to tell myself is that when you spend so much times seeking distractions from life you wind up with a lot of distractions and only a little bit of life.

more...

Posted by: Ace at 12:26 PM | Comments (302)
Post contains 1152 words, total size 7 kb.