Keep on dancing 'til the world ends.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 02:57 AM | Comments (381)
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Less than 48 hours until Judgment Day. Maybe. So enjoy all the hookers and blow you can charge up until then - just be sure and repent by 6pm local time, May 21st. I suggest setting an alarm just in case.

Geography And Time Puzzles

I've always enjoyed these kind of puzzles since they test your knowledge of geography and the ability to weasel out any logic loopholes in the stated conditions.

Here's one of my favorites:

You travel 10 miles south, 5 miles east, and then 10 miles north. You're back where you started and you see a bear. What color is it?

Answer (select to see): White since you're at the North Pole.

And here are some more from The Volokh Conspiracy:

1. “I am located in one of the 48 states in the Continental United States. If I go nine miles in a straight line, regardless of direction, I will leave the state I am in.” In what state was Art?

2. “I am located in one of the 48 states in the Continental U.S. If I go 90 miles in a straight line, regardless of direction, I will have needed to move my watch one hour ahead to keep it set correctly.” In what state was Art?

3. “Today is my 100th birthday. My twin brother Al is 9 minutes older than me, but his birthday won’t happen for another three days.” In what year was Art born?

4. “I’ve just gotten off the phone with my brother Al, who is in Alaska. We had a 15-minute phone call that started at 9:00am Al’s local time and ended at 9:00am my local time.” In what country was Art?

5. “Al and I are located in the same state, one of the 48 states in the Continental U.S. If I head due east, I’ll enter Canada. If Al heads due east, he’ll enter Mexico.” In what state was Art?

Posted by: Maetenloch at 05:58 PM | Comments (692)
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Look, I agree with him on the legalization thing, at least for certain aliens and only after the border has been secured and the criminals deported. But I'm just not sure this is the right time for Newt Gingrich to be publicly talking about anything at all that can be characterized as "amnesty."

This, my friends, is what's called a death spiral:

Newt Gingrich, whose campaign for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination has gotten off to a rocky start, risked fresh controversy on Thursday by suggesting that some illegal immigrants living in the United States "may have earned the right to become legal."

[...]

He preceded his response by acknowledging that he risked sparking another controversy.

Gingrich recounted how World War Two-era U.S. draft boards chose who would serve in the military, saying a similar system might help deal with the millions of immigrants living in the United States illegally.

"Because I think we are going to want to find some way to deal with the people who are here to distinguish between those who have no ties to the United States, and therefore you can deport them at minimum human cost, and those who, in fact, may have earned the right to become legal, but not citizens," Gingrich said.

Click over if you also want to read about Gingrich pathetically trotting out his "I'm an outsider" shtick again.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 04:06 PM | Comments (208)
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Very neat article at NRO pointing out the nuances of Obama's words for Israel -- compared to his words for Palestine.

It's all pretty neat, but these word-choices matter: These words have been chosen carefully. Including the passive/active voice and declarative or commanding tenses. This is essentially a publicly-delivered diplomatic cable.

There are other neat things, but the best observation, to me, is the fact that when Obama speaks of Israel, he speaks in terms of concrete demands that he, Obama, is laying upon Israel.

When he turns to the reciprocal concessions most urge on Palestine, however, he stops speaking in the command tense, stops speaking of demanding this or that, and simply says that Palestinians will do better if they stop killing Jews.

Not that they must stop killing Jews, mind you, like Israel must stop building settlements; just that hey, it would be better, you know? Or not, you decide.

For contrast, the writer quotes Bush, who was pretty command-tense with Palestinians: They must crack down on terror and dismantle the terror infrastructure.

Perceptive. Obama makes demands on Israel, but makes promises to the Palestinians. Tells you pretty much where he's coming from.

Obama Advisor Fareed Zakaria Pretty Stoked About Obama Speech:

FAREED ZAKARIA, CNN correspondent: Hala, exactly. It was his role as educator-in-chief that came out today. He provided a kind of worldview, almost a historical interpretation of the causes and consequences of the Arab Spring. He began in the beginning with Tunisia, and moved forward. And he tried to present a way in which he saw America's interests and values as squarely aligned with this Arab revolution.

Wow, he chose to start at the beginning of the Arab Spring and then move forward, linearly, from there. Truly that is "almost a historical interpretation." Almost, mind you.

This man is brilliant. When he tells a story, he relates events in the order they actually occurred in.

What's the name of that style of narrative? Oh right, we don't have a name for it, because it's so common it has no name other than the default of "default."

But eog-stroked non-entity Zakaria is just pleased as rum punch.

More from Fareed:

I think that he was also – he also gave a speech that I would be surprised if anyone in Israel would object to,

Well, prepare to be surprised. Check out Drudge, SuperBrain.

... because he was very clear that Israel's legitimate security interests have to be taken care of. He was very clear on the fact that Hamas could not be negotiated with as long as it refused to recognize Israel and call for its destruction.

Actually he was pretty damn unclear on that. He actually said this was a "question" that Hamas and Fatah would have to answer together. He did not indicate what that answer would have to be.

I think that there are many of those key issues that Israelis were worried that he would either ignore or half-state, he stated pretty fully. So I think that he was quite even-handed while calling for a Palestinian state on '67 borders, plus-or-minus land slots. He also recognizes Israel's legitimate security needs.

Notice he does what that writer at NRO just noted -- he speaks of "calling" for a Palestinian state, based on 67 borders, plus recognizing Israel's security needs.

The first is a demand made to Israel. The second is a demand made of nobody -- Obama himself is just saying he recognizes Israel's security needs. Not that anyone else needs to.

Anyone notice that no one ever heard of this jackass before 9/11 and then suddenly we needed an Arab moderate in the media and he suddenly had a career?

Thanks to Jane D'oh.

Posted by: Ace at 03:26 PM | Comments (290)
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The world's tiniest violin just emailed me to say "I don't give a rat's ass."

This produces another "They told me that if I voted for John McCain..." headline for Instapundit. I wish I had thought of that joke. It's pretty damn versatile.

In the past, editorial rejections had numerous causes: low budgets, lack of space, an editor who simply preferred another creator's work over yours.

Now there' s a new cause for refusal: Too tough on the president.

I've heard that from enough "liberal" websites and print publications to consider it a significant trend.

A sample of recent rejections, each from editors at different left-of-center media outlets:

· "I am familiar with and enjoy your cartoons. However the readers of our site would not be comfortable with your (admittedly on point) criticism of Obama."

· "Don't be such a hater on O and we could use your stuff. Can't you focus more on the GOP?"

· "Our first African-American president deserves a chance to clean up Bush's mess without being attacked by us."

I have many more like that.

What's weird is that these cultish attitudes come from editors and publishers whose politics line up neatly with mine.

Posted by: Ace at 02:56 PM | Comments (126)
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I'm making up the 10 years part, as I don't know that exactly. It will probably happen sooner than that.

The conventional number on this is the year 2024 -- that's when the system goes bankrupt, based on CBO projections. But as we learned with ObamaCare, the CBO is required by law to assume patently unrealistic scenarios in their projections... making CBO projections chiefly a strong prediction of what won't happen because it can't happen.

When you dump such silly assumptions, Medicare goes bankrupt well early of 2024. Says who?

Says the Board of Trustees of Medicare.

In past reports, and again this year, the Board of Trustees has emphasized the strong likelihood that actual Part B expenditures will exceed the projections under current law due to further legislative action to avoid substantial reductions in the Medicare physician fee schedule. While the Part B projections in this report are reasonable in their portrayal of future costs under current law, they are not reasonable as an indication of actual future costs. Current law would require a physician fee reduction of an estimated 29.4 percent on January 1, 2012—an implausible expectation.

That's the Doc Fix, I think. If suddenly all the past-due cuts in doctors' fees (building up, unexecuted) since 1995 were suddenly put into effect, sure, we could get all the way to 2024... but if we did that, seniors would have a very hard time finding a doctor at all.

Obama calls for across the board cuts in Medicare -- oddly, no one in the media wants to talk about him cutting, on paper, a trillion or more from Medicare.

He is cutting that by fiat, not by any smart mechanism, and he's taking a "meat axe" to the program, as Democrats said of Republicans' proposed automatic percentage-reduction cuts in spending. He's not suggesting any sort of way to get more with less; he's just saying "We're going to spend a trillion less on this. Period."

Now the only way that is typically undertaken is for Medicare to simply reimburse providers less. But Medicare already reimburses providers less. Obama, and the Democrats, and any fan of the current system, are currently voting for even sharper cuts in provider reimbursements.

Good luck getting anything treated when you're simply not able to pay what the market demands.

Without major changes in health care delivery systems, the prices paid by Medicare for health services [under the cuts required in the new law] are very likely to fall increasingly short of the costs of providing these services. By the end of the long-range projection period, Medicare prices for hospital, skilled nursing facility, home health, hospice, ambulatory surgical center, diagnostic laboratory, and many other services would be less than half of their level under the prior law. Medicare prices would be considerably below the current relative level of Medicaid prices, which have already led to access problems for Medicaid enrollees, and far below the levels paid by private health insurance. Well before that point, Congress would have to intervene to prevent the withdrawal of providers from the Medicare market and the severe problems with beneficiary access to care that would result. Overriding the productivity adjustments, as Congress has done repeatedly in the case of physician payment rates, would lead to far higher costs for Medicare in the long range than those projected under current law.

This is simply rationing. And this is, simply, pushing granny off the cliff.

This is what happens when one refuses to address problems. When one keeps putting them off because one don't wish to confront them. The situation builds and builds into true disaster. A disaster that could have been averted at any time, but for one's failure to realistically examine one's situation and act.

More at the link. I just stole the material Yuval Levin quoted.

Posted by: Ace at 02:43 PM | Comments (39)
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Governor Mitch Daniels is playing defense again. No, not because of his social issues truce. And no, not because of his foreign policy naïveté. Rather, today he's assuring people that he does not favor an individual mandate or universal healthcare (in the Democratic sense of the word).

Mitch Daniels in 2003:

The candidate said he favors a universal health care system that would move away from employee-based health policies and make it mandatory for all Americans to have health insurance.

Daniels envisioned one scenario in which residents could certify their coverage when paying income taxes and receive a tax exemption that would cover the cost.

"We really have to have universal coverage," Daniels said.

His spokesperson doesn't say when Daniels changed his mind, just that he "does not support a mandate." And when Daniels talked about universal coverage, she says that he meant, "He favors giving every American a tax credit individually so they can purchase insurance that is right for them. He believes nearly all would use it, so coverage would be nearly universal."

Obviously, Governor Daniels gets points for coming to his senses sometime between 2003 and now, but for a candidate who seems wishy-washy about everything else, this isn't at all reassuring. And I use "candidate" there in the hypothetical sense, since he still hasn't decided (or asked his wife to decide) whether he's even running for President.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 02:36 PM | Comments (60)
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The scheme of the War Powers Act is that a president can make war, absent authority, for sixty days. Once that sixty day limit is reached, he must begin winding down the effort as soon as possible, and must end all confrontation (even of the retreat/withdrawal under fire type) thirty days after that.

Now, the President can of course seek authorization for war in that sixty day window, in which case the Constitution is satisfied and the War Powers Act no longer applies.

The President has not sought any resolution or authorization. Has not even sought it. And the sixty day limit is upon us.

Cited there are a couple of law professors (one of whom, Bruce Ackerman, I seem to know as a left-leaning one):

Neither the president nor the Democratic congressional leadership has shown any interest. They have been sleep-walking their way to Day 60 . . . Make no mistake: Obama is breaking new ground, moving decisively beyond his predecessors . . . Since the House of Representatives is out of session this week, Congress canÂ’t approve the operation before the Friday deadline. But under the expedited procedures specified by the act, speedy congressional approval is feasible next week. If nothing happens, history will say that the War Powers Act was condemned to a quiet death by a president who had solemnly pledged, on the campaign trail, to put an end to indiscriminate warmaking.

I think this is wrong: Clinton did the same thing with Bosnia. So this isn't the first time.

Odd that only Republican Presidents need to, and do in fact, seek resolutions of war, while the Democrats who scream the loudest about this part of the Constitution (one of the few they like) just ignore it again and again.

Obama's theory (as was Clinton's) is that because this is being fought "by NATO," then it's not... what, war? I don't get this. If a President fights a war with Spain, Finland, and the Duchy of Geoff (where?) as his allies, can he say "I don't need an authorization for war because I'm part of the Spanish/Finish/Geoffish Alliance?"

Most nations go to war as part of an alliance of some kind. They always have. They likely always will.

Where does this idea spring from that when a Democrat wants to go to war without constitutional authorization, he can point to whatever countries he's in alliance with and say "I know the Constitution says I need an authorization of war, but look, I've got Martinique on my side, Hoss. Gold standard."

What?

I doesn't bloody matter what organization is nominally in charge of a war, or what combination of countries you're allied with. The Constitution does not say that you need either a declaration of war or France has your back.

There is one statement. It applies to all circumstances. It doesn't matter if we're doing it on behalf of the UN, NATO, the G-8, the NAFTA trade zone, SEATO, or fuck-all else.

This is an illegal war.

The President is a war criminal.

Posted by: Ace at 01:06 PM | Comments (211)
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There are several surprising things here.

First, apparently the feds don't simply routinely, as a matter of legal right, just take DNA samples from all prisoners.

Huh? I would think that if you're in jail for a major crime that should be automatic. I guess maybe they have it on file but it can only be shared via a court order? That makes sense I guess.

Second, Ted Kaczynski offered to give his DNA to the Tylenol serial poisoning investigators, and all he wanted in return was for his personal effects -- probably about $300 worth of crap -- not be auctioned off, as the Court had ruled.

Huh? Why? Why not get the DNA? Usually such statements are contingent upon the information forwarding a case and being true. I guess they just suspected that he didn't have anything to do with it, so the DNA wasn't all that important, " " so they told him to blow.

But still... this is a major unsolved case. All for the few thousands a serial killer's crap might get you at auction from some weirdos? (His manifesto, the most important objet d'psycho, is only fetching a few thousand bucks.)

I'm not sure how to read his refusal for denial.

Is he hinting he's involved?

Or, as the investigators must have thought, is he attempting to bluff them into giving him what he wants (his stupid personal effects kept from auction) by hinting around a connection to the Tylenol murders that doesn't exist?

"I have never even possessed any potassium cyanide," he wrote. "But, even on the assumption that the FBI is entirely honest (an assumption I'm unwilling to make), partial DNA profiles can throw suspicion on person who are entirely innocent."

Kaczynski asserted that if he is a suspect and his DNA profile is related to the 1982 killings, "some of the evidence seized from my cabin in 1986 may turn out to be important," apparently referring to some of the objects up for auction.

Eh, right now they're getting a court order. I can't think of many good reasons why he shouldn't be compelled to give up some DNA.

Thanks to rdbrewer.

Posted by: Ace at 12:26 PM | Comments (109)
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And cast as a sort of poem or fairy tale.

Thanks to gg.

Klavan, On the Hypocrisy: Klavan skewers hypocrites Nan-Nan Pelosi and Steven Colbert, as well as noting that Michael Moore is a big fat putz. more...

Posted by: Ace at 12:03 PM | Comments (51)
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