The latest incident of teens busting in and partying while the owners are out of town

A mounted snow leopard worth more than $250,000, pieces of armor and designer clothes were among the items recovered by sheriffÂ’s detectives investigating a party planned over social media and held, without the owner's knowledge, at a vacant, multimillion-dollar La Habra Heights mansion.

[Updated at 7:21 p.m., Dec. 11: Early Wednesday, 16 people were arrested in connection with the vandalism and robbery that occurred at the home in late November, Lt. Arthur Scott of the Los Angeles County SheriffÂ’s Department said....

About 300 teenagers are realizing they picked the wrong place to throw a wild party after breaking into a former NFL player's second home and causing more than $20,000 in damage.

Brian Holloway, a former offensive tackle for the New England Patriots, was in Tampa, Florida, over Labor Day weekend when his son told him he was receiving tweets about a party at their home in Stephentown, New York, Holloway said...

Posted by: Purple Avenger at 07:48 AM | Comments (221)
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Posted by: Open Blogger at 05:16 AM | Comments (369)
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We can haz morning thread?

The sign language interpreter at the Mandela memorial service claims he was having a schizophrenic episode.

Rich Lowry on the left's reality problem.

Paul Ryan on the House GOP leadership's reality problem.

Contra Ryan's claims in the piece linked above, Sean Davis writes at The Federalist: DonÂ’t Be Fooled: The Murray/Ryan Budget Deal Clearly Raises Taxes. Davis has the better argument, and I'm in thorough agreement with his conclusion:

Had top Republicans pitched this deal as the best way to avoid blame for another shutdown (even it the shutdown was solely the fault of Democrats who refused to abide by the sequestration law President Obama signed in 2011), I would have been somewhat sympathetic. I still wouldnÂ’t like the deal, but that rationale would at least have the benefit of being intellectually honest.

But Ryan and his allies in GOP leadership need to stop insulting the intelligence of their voters by expecting them to suddenly forget the meanings of certain words. GOP leaders have a serious and widening credibility gap with their base. Dishonest, Orwellian word games are only going to make matters worse.

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Posted by: andy at 04:18 AM | Comments (218)
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It works like this - you're a wealthy young punk with no restraint or ability to see consequences, but see -- its your parents who did that to you so its not really your fault that 4 people are dead because you stole beer, got drunk and mowed them down, so we're gonna give you probation.

...CouchÂ’s attorneys argued his parents were responsible for the teenÂ’s actions that night because of the way he had been raised. Defense attorneys put a psychologist on the stand who testified Couch was a product of wealth and got whatever he wanted. The psychologist also testified the teen was allowed to drink at a very young age and began driving at 13 years old. Defense attorneys argued Couch needed treatment, not jail and suggested a facility that costs almost half a million dollars a year...

If anyone thinks a poor kid with meth head parents, who provided an equally irresponsible upbringing, who did the same thing would be getting off with probation and a posh $500,000/yr treatment facility, raise your hand. Anyone?

The prosecutors wanted 20 years in prison, but 5 probably would have gotten the point across to this kid, and his parents. Now, both the kid and parents are walking away believing they can literally buy their way out of almost any crime. THAT is a lesson they will probably take to heart.

Posted by: Purple Avenger at 11:11 PM | Comments (171)
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Indistinguishable From Magic

As an adolescent, I loved to read the science fiction magazine Analog. One of my favorite Analog stories was "Hindsight" by Harry Turtledove. (I still have my copy of this "special spoof issue," dated mid-December 1984, in my garage.)

In "Hindsight," a 1950s pulp sci-fi writer is startled to discover that an unknown author has published a story that remarkably resembles one he had in the planning stages. He and his editor investigate, eventually discovering a woman who reveals she's a sci-fi writer from the future who has returned to the 1950s-all the way from 1983!-to try to change the world through science fiction.

...But my favorite thing about the story is a scene in which the writer from the future ushers the two men into her back room, where she keeps her future technology. There's a 1980s-era word processor and a dot-matrix printer, charmingly outmoded from the vantage point of 2013 but stunning to the men in the story. And in the corner, a top-loading VCR attached to a small color TV set. She plays Star Wars for the writer, and he's flabbergasted-not just by the color picture, but by a recognizable-yet-aged Alec Guinness as Obi-Wan Kenobi.

...I can't be the only person who thinks about this stuff. (I mean, Marty McFly's Walkman!) So I mentioned it on Twitter and suddenly found myself in a discussion about what Apple device you'd want to take back in time from today to blow away those sci-fi writers in 1956. (If you're interested, I've saved the whole thing on Storify.)

The iPad is probably the right answer, assuming you had time to prepare. (Be sure to bring a charger!) The tablet would be shockingly small, but it has a nice, big screen-big enough for a bunch of dumbstruck 50s denizens to crowd around. It also has the capacity to hold a staggering amount of content.

One of the mental games I play whenever I'm stuck someplace without anything or anybody to occupy me is to imagine that I was suddenly transported back to say 1959 with only what I'm holding and what's in my pockets. How would I be able to prove that I truly was from the future and how much information could clever investigators glean from the few objects on my person?

Well the dates on any coins or bills would be a big clue - and (assuming they aren't clever Commie fakes) would tell them right off the bat that we were still around 50 years later so probably no nuclear WWIII. The tags on my clothes would also be some evidence although I wonder what they would think of all the 'Made in China' labels - did we defeat and occupy China somewhere along the way?

My Jeep car keys with their radio-based remote control would probably impress them - especially the mysterious ICs used in the circuits. The high tech Swiss Army knife I always carry with a laser, pen, and USB stick would probably both amaze and baffle them. And then you have the unusual alloys in my watch and plastic products in my shoes and clothing. I figure all that plus my dental work would be enough to convince them that whatever my story is I'm definitely 'not from around here'.

And if I happen to have my iPhone with me....well then behold and fear my techo-magic all you puny twentieth century humans!!

Posted by: Maetenloch at 06:47 PM | Comments (450)
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What the hell, Paul Ryan.

What the hell.

Senate Republicans scrubbing the Ryan-Murray budget deal have come across a little-noticed provision that will limit the GOPÂ’s ability to block tax increases in future years.

The bill includes language from the Senate Democrats’ budget to void a budget “point of order” against replacing the sequester cuts with tax increases.

The process is quite complicated, but in practice it grants Harry Reid the authority to send tax increases to the House with a bare majority, rather than the 60 vote threshold that would be required under the point of order.

The provision has angered key Republican Senators. Reeling from Harry Reid’s unprecedented use of the “nuclear option” to end the filibuster on presidential nominations, they are incredulous that Paul Ryan would have backed another limit to their power.

“This is an appalling power grab that should never have been allowed to be in a final agreement. It’s essentially the ‘nuclear option’ part two, eroding minority rights in the Senate even further. Harry Reid must be very happy,” a Senate GOP aide says.

A House aide defending this piece of shit says, basically, Eh, it's no big deal, because the House can stop tax increases. Probably.

I don't know what to say.

Thanks to @rdbrewer4.

Posted by: Ace at 04:45 PM | Comments (452)
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From American Glob (give 'em a click and see what you like)...

Posted by: Ace at 04:22 PM | Comments (129)
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But you knew that.

There is one good thing I've heard about it and one neutral thing.

The good thing: The compromise calls for federal workers to pay more for their pensions. That is terrific. Update: Not so terrific. MTF writes:

Small point Ace, but the increased worker contribution to federal pensions applies only to new employees. It's still a revolutionary change, but the budget impact is delayed.

The neutral thing: The additional tax for airline travel that they're calling a "user fee" rather than a tax does seem like it can be fairly characterized as a user fee. Cavuto had a guy on explaining that a fee of $2.50 per ticket per leg was imposed in 2002, to partially defray the costs of the huge new TSA security system.

However, that didn't cover all of TSA's costs, and TSA actually costs more now than it did five years ago. Despite the fact that less people are actually traveling, due to Obama's Endless Recession.

So, calling it a "user's fee" does not seem to abuse the language. It actually does pay for the costs the user is directly incurring.

It might be better to cut back on the TSA -- in fact, I'm pretty sure it would be. But this small item doesn't seem to be a Gigantic Lie, like the ones Obama likes to tell.

The new charge will be a flat $5.60, but that won't (if Cavuto's guy had this right, which I'm not sure he did) be per leg of a trip. So the actual increased cost for a two-way flight might be only $0.60.

Update: The Wall Street Journal has the facts straight:

The feds currently charge $2.50 on nonstop flights, and $5 for flights with a connection, and the deal will establish a simple $5.60 fee for all one-way trips regardless of the number of connections. The fees will be passed along to passengers in higher ticket costs.

So you'll be charged an extra $2.50 per flight on nonstops and an extra $0.60 on flights with a connection.

Now for the bad stuff.

Here's the first and most important gimmick. Paul Ryan is claiming, "Hey man, how can you say I'm abandoning my principles? This compromise actually cuts the deficit by a further $28 billion (over ten years) than the current plan!!! So this actually cuts more spending than the current, sequester-bound spending levels!"

Yeah that approaches Gigantic Lie territory. Here's how they can spend more in the next year and then claim their compromise actually saves more money over ten years:

They spend more in the years they care about, 2014 and 2015. For these years, they increase spending by a total of $63 billion.

But currently, the sequester-capped spending levels would expire in 2021 (it was set to run from 2011 to 2021). So what Ryan says is "Now we'll also impose sequester-caps on the out years of 2022 and 2023, so that's two more years under the sequester, so we actually wind up cutting more spending!"

You can see the problem. They're not willing to abide by the terms of the sequester in 2014 and 2015. They want to spend more. So they undo the sequester caps in 2014 and 2015, and then pretend to extend the sequester from 2021 to 2023.

Instead of abiding by the sequester in the two following years, they'll abandon it in the two years we're actually about to pass into, and promise -- swearsies! -- they'll abide by it later.

This is obviously nonsense. First of all, it establishes the precedent of ducking the sequester forever. Two years from now, they'll vote to spend more money, but say "Over ten years, we're lowering the deficit, by extending the sequester from 2023 to 2025!!!"

No you're not. To spend less money, you have to, at some point, spend less money. If you keep delaying the day you actually start spending less money, you'll never spend less money.

This is like someone putting off going on a diet forever but promising "When I do go on the diet, I'll stay on it for a really really really long time!"

At some point, you have to actually go on the diet if you want to lose weight. Paul Ryan's plan just says, "Eh, we'll get in shape two years from now."

Even worse than all that is this heartbreaking chart from Reason, which shows federal spending unrestrained by the sequester (that is, what the government had planned to spend) versus the lower spending under the sequester.

This is the end of the world scenario we're working so hard to undo, Guys:

You see that teeny, tiny difference in sequester and non-sequester spending? That little difference is what we're now reduced to fighting over. That insignificant bit.

Even that pittance of savings is too much, too controversial, too politically dangerous to touch. So even that ludicrously small amount of savings must be undone by the Republican Party, because we just can't win elections when we're making draconian cuts like that.

But once the GOP is in control of all branches of government, then they'll start getting serious about putting the government on a diet.

Swearsies!

Posted by: Ace at 03:26 PM | Comments (250)
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He announces that his great-grandparents didn't all come into America legally. I guess this is Joe Biden's way of saying "Behold, the wonders of illegal immigration."

I'm not taking it that way.

I'm thinking we should have built a Border Wall in 1875, if that's what it would have taken to keep the embarrassing Biden clan out.

I'm also taking it as Biden's desperate attempt at relevance. He's practically begging us, "Please demand to see my birth certificate!!!"

From Politico:

“My great-great grandparents came escaping the famine and they didn’t all come here legally,” Biden said in response to a questioner who said her family came to the country legally from Ireland in the 1800s. “They didn’t all come legally. And the existence of the system isn’t all truncated like it is now. I’d check your ancestry to make sure that they did come legally if that’s a concern to you.”

Biden, who appeared alongside White House domestic policy chief Cecilia Munoz, several times called on House Speaker John Boehner to allow a vote on the comprehensive immigration reform bill the Senate passed in June.

It was a shift from President Barack Obama, who said last month that he could live with the House passing a series of piecemeal immigration bills.

“Pass the bill, John Boehner, bring the bill up and let us pass it,” Biden said.

Posted by: Ace at 02:32 PM | Comments (261)
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From @rdbrewer4 in the sidebar.

Now, understand, she's not calling for the repeal of Obamacare, certainly. She's trying to "fix" it.

But her ad begins like an ad you'd expect from a Republican -- alarming news reports of hundreds of thousands of people having their coverage cancelled by Obamacare.

It ends with an admonition to Obama: "You made this promise, you should keep it."

The ad of course is dishonest. It's fakey-fake triangulation, as Landrieu pretends to run against Obamacare. You'd almost think she was the anti-Obamacare Republican candidate in the race.

But it is something to think about: In many states around the country, as we approach 2014, we'll be seeing Republicans running anti-Obamacare ads, and their Democratic opponents running anti-Obamacare ads, too.

And what exactly will that do to public opinion? I don't know of many previous progressive/conservative disputes in which the representatives of both camps condemned a major law. The airwaves will be full of condemnations of Obamacare, and virtually no one speaking up in favor of it.

more...

Posted by: Ace at 12:33 PM | Comments (268)
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