Oy. Earlier I posted on the phony tort reform in Reid's version of healthcare reform which will make healthcare more expensive. Now let's talk about its tax on indoor tanning. Yes, ReidCare imposes a ten percent tax on ultraviolet tanning at tanning salons.

Tanning causes cancer (except for those studies that say it doesn't; whatever), so Democrats link tanning to healthcare and voila: tax it. Hey, never pass up an opportunity to tax something that idiots will say should be illegal. This is fairly banal creeping socialism: the government should discourage stuff that's legal but not good for you by tax and regulation. In other words, these are mincing steps toward making it illegal. (See Smoking, indoors, in the presence of children, in your own car, etc.)

Entirely facetious observation: isn't the tanning tax going to disproportionately impact Americans of a certain racial type?

UPDATE [DiT]: More Taxes! Here's a comprehensive rundown on additional taxes and penalties (taxes) imposed in the Reid-Obama version of the health bill (via eddiebear).

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 11:45 PM | Comments (226)
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I continue to find that I must have seen a different movie than other folks who saw Avatar this weekend, particularly the ones who are complaining that it is some kind of indictment of conservatives, or the Iraq War, or imperialism. ItÂ’s also apparently too pro-environmentalist and pro-feminist.

At least, thatÂ’s what theyÂ’re telling me. John Podhoretz pans it for these flaws and more, but one thing from his review made me certain they must be showing different versions of this movie in different places:

[T]he movie is nearly three hours long, and it doesn't have a single joke in it.

In fact, the movie has many jokes and some comedic gags, including portions where the audience I saw it with laughed out loud. I’ll give just two examples so as not to spoil anything and one of them is from the trailers. Both come from the scientist character played by Sigourney Weaver. In the trailers, she tweaks the main character, Jake, for being an idiot. It’s delivered like a joke in the movie because there’s more of a setup (she’d been ragging on him for being an idiot earlier and the “Jake is a moron” theme is used for more chuckles later). The other one I’ll mention happens the first time the protagonist is in his avatar. He’s inspecting the odd tentacle-y thing coming out of the back of his head. She quips: “don’t play with that, you’ll go blind.” Most in the audience recognized that as a joke.

So I think they must be watching something else altogether. (But not Ed. We apparently saw the same version.)

Anyway, the movie I saw was entertaining. Not outstanding, not great, but definitely entertaining. And it certainly is worth seeing it in theaters to get the full effect. Warning on the ticket price, though: because itÂ’s in 3D, tickets are about twice what they usually are. This was the first movie IÂ’ve seen in 3D and I was a little worried about that. Turned out not to be a problem. With two exceptions, Cameron didnÂ’t do the abusive, gimmicky pop-right-out-at-the-audience shots that 3D filmmakers (and all those irritating theme park rides) have done. After the first 20 minutes, I stopped noticing the 3D glasses and just saw the movie.

The movie comes up short in the plot department. It has one serious plot hole (seriously, who has the high ground? hello McFly, they call the humans “the Sky People” for Pete’s sake). The real shortcoming is that the movie’s plot has been done to death. It’s your standard fish out of water meets going native meets noble savage story. It has no surprises at all, even though it’s also an everyone can die story. Finally, there are a few contrivances which make for a happy ending all tied up neat with a bow. Honestly, an excruciatingly sugar-coated contrivance ending puts me off a movie or tv show quicker than ten-foot tall Smurfs.

Otherwise, this is a very standard sci-fi fantasy actioner. I saw someone complain on Twitter that the movie wasn’t “deep.” No shit. It’s an action flick set in a black-and-white morality universe where no character has to face any tough decisions or do anything that might be misconstrued by an impressionable teenaged audience as “character development.” There is no surprise twist. Sorry to spoil that for you, but in the words of celebrated American statesman and noted cinema critic Thomas Jefferson: “GTFOOH, n00b.”

Now, as for the objections that this is Hollywood Leftism shitting on Right-wing imperialism, industrialism, capitalism, and the War on Terrorism, I kept my mouth shut ‘til I’d actually seen the movie. But I suspected that these folks were being hysterical he-bitches with gigantic chips on their shoulders and it turns out I was right.

I understand it’s possible to believe that a single disapproving reference to “shock and awe” (against a helpless village of women and children) and villainous calls for “fighting terrorism with terrorism” and “preemptive strikes” are indictments of the War on Terrorism. But you have to really, really want it. The villain of this film is so generic and the situation presented so far removed from reality, the connection between the film’s mercenaries, natives, and corporate greed and the real-world’s U.S. military, Iraqis, and War on Terrorism exists mostly in the minds of people desperately hoping to find it.

What IÂ’m saying is that Leftists anxious to find moral support from a film will proclaim it has the environmentalist answer to 9/11. It doesnÂ’t. It has some corporate types knocking down a tree that doubles as a dormitory (didnÂ’t that happen in Berkeley?).

Similarly, those that make hay criticizing Hollywood professionally or as a hobby will seize on its simple color-coded-for-your-convenience assignment of “natives are good” and “mercenaries are evil” to claim the movie is making a statement about American soldiers. Except that the last time American soldiers went up against lily-white natives (morally white, I mean) was exactly never. And the movie takes pains in the first five minutes to emphasize that the mercenaries are, well, mercenaries hired by the Company and not part of any military. And the movie also notes in the first few minutes that the offscreen "folks back home" don't exactly approve of the Company slaughtering a bunch of natives.

So, the final verdict: Avatar is entertaining, but not a masterpiece of plot or characterization. In fact, the plot and characters are pretty dull. It has perhaps three leftist lines which may make individuals carrying some weird guilt over the colonization of the Americas upset. Otherwise, itÂ’s gorgeous, loud, and shit blows up. Did I mention the Smurf sex?

IÂ’ll see Avatar again when IÂ’m visiting my brother for Christmas. If he pays.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 09:58 PM | Comments (387)
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Pretty good Drinking With Bob rant vid below the fold...

While CRU was cooking the data with Sterno, Wikipedia was cooking any dissenting scientific opinion with a flame thrower. (via commenter K~Bob's tip)

And it looks like Obama's support among blacks is softening. (H/T Duane on this one)

...A breakout of black voters in Washington Post surveys over the past eight months shows that those who “strongly” approve of Obama fell from 85 to 69 percent, while his disapproval rating quintupled—from 2 to 11 percent. Admittedly, that’s still very low number, but it’s evidently moving in the wrong direction...

Posted by: Purple Avenger at 06:44 PM | Comments (92)
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Good evening all and welcome to the official pre-Christmas Saturday extravaganza. So grab your favorite drink or cough syrup and settle down for a evening of snarky good cheer.

Sad News in the Alien-sphere: Alien Screenwriter Dan O'Bannon Dead at 63
After a long battle with Crohn's disease. You probably never heard of him but he went to film school school with John Carpenter, worked on 'Star Wars' and helped write 'Alien', 'Lifeforce', 'Total Recall' and many other movies you'd recognize.

Here's the final script for Alien, but that was after a few changes that improved it and removed the ghey gnome stuff that somehow crept in. And for fun here is an early version of the Aliens 3 screenplay that was written by William Gibson. If only they had used it instead of the POS that actually got filmed.

Oh and just for good measure here's 10 Things You Never Knew About Alien.

Posted by: Open Blog at 05:50 PM | Comments (769)
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So, Nelson sold out. But we have a little bit of hope on two fronts: Stupak in the House is claiming he'll refuse to vote for a bill with his no-abortion-funding language gutted from it, as is the case with the Senate bill.

Meanwhile, the progressives in the House could create trouble too: exono, who seems to know what he's talking about, holds out the hopes that the Progressive Caucus, the biggest in the House, will in fact insist upon some form of public option in the House bill. If the conference bill contains anything like that, Lieberman walks.

Heather Radish highlights this snarky headline by Jake Tapper about the president's "unprecedented" progress on both global warming and health care.

Headline: President Obama Heralds as "Significant Progress" Unpopular Compromise on Health Care Bill, Non-Binding Climate Change Accord

Although Tapper never was in the bag for Obama (at least not in his reporting), I think the fact ABCNews allows him this much snark at Captain Perfect's expense indicates the bloom is officially off the rose.

And why? Well, not because he offended so many conservatives and moderates (including those who voted for him) in pursuing an avowedly left-wing agenda after promising (with the media vouching for him) to govern as a centrist. Those folks got upset over the long hot (well, not so hot -- global warming made it cooler than usual) summer and the media not only refused to credit them with a point, they insulted them with puerile sexual put-downs.

No, the media is now willing to be a bit agnostic about The God Who Walks because the one cadre of people in America whose opinions actually count -- the left wing -- is now griping about him.

Some system we have, eh? The left is not just the permanently privileged voice in politics, deciding solely amongst themselves when it is appropriate to have a dollop of skepticism about a president and which positions are "centrist" and "common sense" in politics -- of course they have a privileged voice; the media is itself left -- but we're finding out increasingly that voice is not merely privileged, but solitary.

No other voices or opinions count.

It's only now, at this precise moment, that the left has itself a snit, that it's permissible to question the divinity of The God Who Walks.

I Guess... I shouldn't say the left is having a "snit," as if their feelings are unreasonable. The God Who Walks promised everything to everybody, one promise contradicting another, and the media let him get away with it and papered over the incongruities in his "agenda" in order to sell him to the public, in any way possible. You want a hard leftist? Okay, he's a hard leftist. You want a centrist? Okay, he's that too. You want a conservative? Okay, in away, he's the "conservative with common sense" in this race.

I mean, after all -- he's going to cut your taxes (of course he will, darling) and personally put Osama bin Ladin's ass in a sling. He's that hard-core, you know.

And of course there are a large pile of promises that can't be fulfilled, and the left, too, is now realizing this guy just pretty much says anything and the media falls over itself to cover up for him.

"Just words"? Indeed, Just Words.

Oh: DC's also getting hit with snow so it seems the Christmas Eve goal is out of reach. But this monster will be back soon.

Posted by: Ace at 03:42 PM | Comments (255)
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Pretty obvious, but in case anyone had any doubts about it, it seems the Red and Green agendas are practically the same thing. more...

Posted by: Ace at 03:12 PM | Comments (121)
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It establishes a 5-year $50 million grant program for states to establish an alternative to the current medical malpractice liability system.

Wait, did I say "alternative"? I meant additional med-mal liability system. So not only will doctors and hospitals and patients continue to be plagued by the extremely expensive current med-mal scheme, Congress is encouraging the states to set up a med-mal alternative to add another layer of complexity to an already over-complicated system.

See for yourself:

Section 10607 (p.344 of the Manager’s) establishes a 5-year grant program. The program is administered by the HHS Secretary (Sebelius), in consultation with a review panel. The review panel is structured to ensure that trial lawyers are amply represented, with seats specifically reserved for “patient advocates,” “attorneys with expertise in representing patients,” and “patient safety experts.”

[...]

The conditions tied to the grants ensure that the “alternative to litigation” established under the grants will, in practice, increase doctors’ liability and trial lawyers’ paydays. Most importantly, the grantee-State is required to “provide[] patients the ability to opt out of or voluntarily withdraw from participating in the alternative at any time and to pursue other options, including litigation, outside the alternative . . . .” If the plaintiff has a unilateral right, at any time, to pull out of the “alternative” and pursue litigation, then the “alternative” will only be used when the plaintiff’s lawyer believes that the “alternative” is more plaintiff-friendly than the litigation system.

The demonstration project also cannot “limit or curtail a patient’s existing legal rights, ability to file a claim in or access a State’s legal system, or otherwise abrogate a patient’s ability to file a medical malpractice claim.” This language means that damage caps and statute of limitations reforms would likely be off the table in any “alternative to litigation” established under the grants.

Bang-up job, guys.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 02:49 PM | Comments (47)
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Northeastern US gettin the smackdown, from Virginia to Maine, and westward through that Ohio valley.

Not so much here in Texas.

You gots the one to two feets of snow, winds, and power outages. Flight cancellations began yesterday morning.

Here's hopin all you morons are safe and warm.

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 01:23 PM | Comments (181)
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Goddammit.

This is what it is, pinning our hopes onto the opposition.

Hey, what's missing from this?

Democrats released Saturday a broader amendment to the bill, which includes proposals designed to boost support for small businesses, toughen federal regulatory oversight of insurers, and strengthen provisions intended to curb the rapid growth of health care costs.

Die in flames Ben. You made your mark onto history and Nebraska will let you know how they feel about it next year election, you jerk.

*damn, forgot it's 2012 for him. Bet Nebraskans don't forget though.

UPDATED: He's just a gigolo, and everybody knows, via Slublog

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 08:58 AM | Comments (464)
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Am I in favor of this? Of course I am.

On orders from President Barack Obama, the U.S. military launched cruise missiles early Thursday against two suspected al-Qaeda sites in Yemen, administration officials told ABC News in a report broadcast on ABC World News with Charles Gibson.

Yemen? Never heard of it.

One of the targeted sites was a suspected al Qaeda training camp north of the capitol, Sanaa, and the second target was a location where officials said "an imminent attack against a U.S. asset was being planned."

The Yemen attacks by the U.S. military represent a major escalation of the Obama administration's campaign against al Qaeda.

Major escalations do not set well with the already irritated base. But a quick skim of the lefty sites over the past few days contains an awful lot of "civil war spreading in Yemen" stories.

ALSO, Senate passes $636BB military spending bill, which among other things extends the Patriot Act.

Expect quiet signature.

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 06:01 AM | Comments (107)
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