Happy Thursday.

Last night, the Canadian House of Commons voted to repeal the much-abused hate-speech section of the Canadian Human Rights Act. That free speech win was a long time coming in America's hat.

According to a new book about Obama's foreign policy, former SecDef Gates, pissed at the White House for the operational leaks about the UBL raid (in particular John Brennan's inaccurate bragging), offered a "new strategic communications approach." "Shut the f@*k up," the defense secretary said.

President Obama and Gov. Romney are both taping comedic segments for the opening of tonight's Country Music Awards.

Obama also made an off-color joke about his wife at a fundraiser last night, which has some folks on twitter aghast. I absolutely agree that racy jokes about women are absolutely unacceptable and absolutely inappropriate---absolutely at informal fundraisers like this one---and I'm absolutely shocked that this president (or any president) would use a pregnant pause to suggest that he has sex-thoughts about his wife. Absolutely.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 02:58 AM | Comments (318)
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Thomas Sowell: The Fallacy of 'Meaningful Work'

It was painful, for example, to see an internationally renowned scholar say that what low-income young people needed was "meaningful work." But this is a notion common among educated elites, regardless of how counterproductive its consequences may be for society at large, and for low-income youngsters especially.

What is "meaningful work"?

The underlying notion seems to be that it is work whose performance is satisfying or enjoyable in itself. But if that is the only kind of work that people should have to do, how is garbage to be collected, bed pans emptied in hospitals or jobs with life-threatening dangers to be performed?

...Telling young people that some jobs are "menial" is a huge disservice to them and to the whole society. Subsidizing them in idleness while they wait for "meaningful work" is just asking for trouble, both for them and for all those around them.

And too often universities and parents encourage young adults to stay in a idle holding pattern while they're waiting for the 'real' job to appear. That serves no one's interest but especially not recent graduates with little work experience and few practical skills.

The truth is that very little work is 'meaningful work' in the above sense or else it'd just be called 'meaningful happy-fun-time' instead. But there is some meaning in all work - even in the menial. And every day you wait for the dream job, there's someone else out there with the same dream who's mastering the details of getting stuff done, making contacts, and getting paid in the process.

Posted by: Maetenloch at 05:23 PM | Comments (661)
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70 Years ago this week, the battle that changed everything. It was a stunning victory for the US Navy and the nation, reeling from six months of war that began with a disaster at Pearl Harbor.

The playing field was roughly leveled after Midway. The Navy had sunk 4 front-line Japanese aircraft carriers and a heavy cruiser, losing a carrier (the crippled Yorktown was torpedoed while in tow on June 6 and sank the following day) and a destroyer.

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 04:03 PM | Comments (154)
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Okay, that's funny, but let me argue against Allah's and Krauthammer's suggestion he's working an angle.

All politicians bullshit. Right? It's a skill they have.

Nevertheless, whether they're skilled at bullshit or not, it's more difficult -- it takes more energy -- to lie than it does to tell the truth.

Bill Clinton is now an ex-politician. He doesn't have to bullshit -- or lie -- any longer.

He can lie. He could bullshit. But the question I'd ask is: Why would he bother?

For one thing, he did a lot of lying in the past. He's used up his quota.

For another thing: Why should he go out of his way for Obama? What has Obama done for him?

Bill Clinton is in a very small club of people-- Presidents of the United States of America. That's a big f'n' deal, as Joe Biden would say.

Whenever someone goes all-in in supporting a politician, he is inherently, unavoidably sort of putting himself beneath that politician.

It's unavoidable, really. Every day we talk about Mitt Romney, for example, and urge his victory, we're sort of saying "Mitt Romney is more important than we are, in the grand scheme of things, than we are."

Now, that's actually true. Not fun to confess, but it's true: The number of people who will have a greater impact on history, for good or for ill, than Mitt Romney (or Barack Obama, should he win) will be very small indeed.

But while that's true of almost everyone in America, and the world, as a matter of fact, there is one person that's not true of: Bill Clinton.

Bill Clinton almost certainly favors Barack Obama to win again in 2012. That said, his ego would probably not permit himself to act as a simple flunkie or flack for Obama.

That's the kind of crap that Paul Begala does -- endless water-carrying for whatever idiot the Democrats have nominated this time 'round.

But Bill Clinton? Bill Clinton can tell himself, with some justification, that he doesn't need to lower himself to Paul Begala's level (or, for that matter, my level).

To many Democrats, Barack Obama is a hero and the most important transformational figure since... Bill Clinton.

To Bill Clinton, he's an idiot who f***ed everything up.

Like I'm said, I'm sure Bill Clinton would prefer if Barack Obama were reelected.

I also don't think he's going to work very hard to make that happen.

As Zaphod Beeblebrox's psychiatrist said of him: "He's just this guy, you know?"

Now, having said that: I'm actually not altogether sure Bill Clinton really thinks Obama is a good president, or should be trusted for four more years of maladministration.

It's definitely expected that he claim he believes this, and he's willing to conform himself to expected social obligations.

But I can understand him having less than full enthusiasm for the project. Obama is a disaster, and surely he knows this.

You can ask a friend to tell your wife you were out bowling, instead of doing what you were really doing, like making it rain at a strip club.

And he probably will cover for you.

But you can't expect him to lie with the same gusto as you might.

Barack Obama should stop expecting Bill Clinton to swear upon a pack of Bibles they were out bowling. Bill Clinton doesn't have to lie about making it rain anymore.

Oh, Here's a Better Analogy: Every have a very old relation who says racist things and embarrasses the family?

And then people say two things: "He's very set in his ways" and "He just doesn't care anymore."

I don't, but Adam Carolla was talking about that last month.

So: Bill Clinton's retired. He earned his federal pension. It's Golf City for him now.

He'll show up at family gatherings if you insist on it, but don't get him started on his Dominican Maid Who Steals His Pills.

He may say embarrassing things, but he's very set in his ways, and he just doesn't care anymore.

Posted by: Ace at 02:21 PM | Comments (298)
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TURNOUT! screamed the left.
TURNOUT! screamed the pundits.
If you did a twitter search of that phrase your blackberry would have melted yesterday.

EVERYBODY was crazy about turnout.
Here are the figures, to show who turned out (though we already know):
STATEWIDE: 57% unofficially per the GAB.
MILWAUKEE: 65%(est)
DANE: 80%
WAUKESHA: 83%
WASHINGTON: 86%
OZAUKEE: 82%

Always watch the WOW. Republicans as a unified front turnout out more voters than the Democrats could even hope to do, expanding Walker's margin over 2010 in both the raw margin and percentage of the overall vote, despite increased turnout in Milwaukee and Dane Counties.

This is the model and the end result of total unity across the party- you had the establishment GOP funneling money and manpower into the race under the RNC and the RGA, you had grassroots manpower courtesy hundreds of TEA party groups in the state and from across the country, coordinated phone-banking and explosive use of social media, efficient and effective absentee ballot distribution, immediate response to Democratic attacks, effective dismantling of false polling and "momentum" memes by those on the right inside and out of the traditional media, everyone focused on one single goal: keep Governor Walker in Wisconsin.

The Democrats' "superiority" in social media, in GOTV, in WINNING is as big a lie as the Lake poll showing the race "all tied up". The results last night make that glaringly obvious. If we attack from a united front, we win.

The question now is not can we do this in November, but do we want to. If the answer is a resounding yes, that we really want this, then it isn't a question how the Presidential race will turn out. DWS bragged this was a "test-run" for November.

You're damn right it is.

Posted by: CAC at 02:11 PM | Comments (32)
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Let me say, I doubt it is real.

Still, this one of those things where everyone's talking about it so if I don't link it, then I seem like I'm not paying attention.

So, I will say: The account is unverified, and I sort of doubt that the President of Estonia would get into a Twitter fight with Paul Krugman (even if he feels his country has been slighted), but, whatever, here it is.

As Drew says, "I want to believe!"

Reasons To Believe? @RBPundit says "scroll back through his timeline," suggesting a parody sockpuppet would not spend so much time posing as the President of Estonia just to goof on Paul Krugman.

@tommccammon says that the account's use of a joke -- "is this a Columbia vs. Princeton thing?" -- indicates authenticity, as the President of Estonia did in fact attend Columbia. He says Ilves is also known for being a "direct" politician, which I take to mean combative.

I suppose we'll soon know.

Posted by: Ace at 01:52 PM | Comments (95)
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While the rest of Europe squabbles about austerity, France tackles the far more important subject of Social Justice.

Retirement age will be dropped to age 60 for 'early' workers who started working at 18, an age known by many of us here in the US as "four years after I got my first job."

The reforms will cost the state billions of euros a year but can be afforded through higher worker and employer contributions, according to the government.

As usual, the socialist solution is to nail the taxpayers again.

Well, screw them, right? Helping current businesses and employees succeed (by removing the lamprey from their necks) is not the kind of social justice that excites anybody. It's not sexy and it doesn't sell in Paris. Also, this kind of unjust-justice carries with it the terrible risk that someone might make a lot of money.

But allowing people to more quickly stop contributing to their own upkeep and start a thirty-year vacation on the backs of others, even though the state cannot long afford the retirees it has now? To spit tempestuously into the face of imminent fiscal and demographic doom?

That is a more justicey-justice. It's hot, it's exciting, it's avante-garde and fashionable, it's-

“madness”.

Blah -blah-blah.
Iceberg, shmiceberg. Help me rearrange these chairs.

Posted by: LauraW at 01:09 PM | Comments (179)
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This guy is B A N A N A S, bananas.

Whatever you do, you don't re-weight a flawed exit poll to accord with actual election results.

That's too obvious. That's just what they'd be expecting you to do.

You should read his piece, but I'll digest it. There are still uncounted votes, so there remains some question about the final margin of Walker's victory.

Barrone looks at two scenarios, one with a final tally with a larger Walker margin of victory (suggesting a bigger Democratic skew) and one with a smaller margin of victory (suggesting a smaller Democratic skew).

With the smaller Democratic skew, the actual exit polls, weighted properly to reflect the fact that too few Republicans and right-leaning independents were queried, show a 48-48 tie between Obama and Romney.

With the larger Democratic skew, the exit polls, properly weighted to eliminate the skew, show Romney ahead by two points, 49-47.

Posted by: Ace at 12:44 PM | Comments (210)
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Although I still plan on urging a letter writing campaign to Congress -- to make them all aware of the urgency of the situation -- it must be noted that they are beginning to act, and should be praised for doing so.

So, if you write a letter, be polite: Many don't know yet, but the ones who do are beginning to act.

Below the fold, Saxby Chamblss' press release and letter to Eric Holder.

more...

Posted by: Ace at 12:08 PM | Comments (179)
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I think it would behoove Mitt Romney to contrast Greece (Obama's model) with little Estonia (the conservative model).

@comradearthur made a good point: Scott Walker was only in office for two and a change years, rather than Obama's three and change years, but Scott Walker's reforms produced tangible, positive results in that time-frame, whereas Obama is still blibble-blabbing about "needing more time."

This is the acid test of politics: Do your policies correlate with positive results, or do they not? Theory and ideology and partisan rooting-interest are all well and good, but ultimately, do your policies actually produce the results you predict they will?

Scott Walker turned a $3.4 billion deficit into a $156 million surplus. Scott Walker's union reforms were praised as helpful by every school district that implemented them (and the reason that property taxes did not go up for the first time in a long time). Scott Walker's tax cuts and more business-friendly policies produced new job creation in a state that had had little of it during the downturn.

Those are results, not theory. The things he said would happen did, in fact, happen.

And Obama's promises?

Obama's predictions did not even come close to tracking with reality.

In science, you would look at the predictive ability of the two models, or theories, and decide that one seemed far more better-evidenced than the other.

Which brings us to Estonia.

Crisis? Estonia asks. What crisis?

Sixteen months after it joined the struggling currency bloc, Estonia is booming. The economy grew 7.6 percent last year, five times the euro-zone average.

Estonia is the only euro-zone country with a budget surplus. National debt is just 6 percent of GDP, compared to 81 percent in virtuous Germany, or 165 percent in Greece.

...

EstoniaÂ’s achievement is all the more remarkable when you consider that it was one of the countries hardest hit by the global financial crisis. In 2008-2009, its economy shrank by 18 percent. ThatÂ’s a bigger contraction than Greece has suffered over the past five years.

How did they bounce back? “I can answer in one word: austerity. Austerity, austerity, austerity,” says Peeter Koppel, investment strategist at the SEB Bank.

After three years of painful government belt-tightening, thatÂ’s not exactly the message that Europeans further south want to hear.

A diabetic does not wish to hear he cannot eat donuts and must prick his skin several times a day to monitor his blood sugar, and yet that is what medical science tells us he must do.

While spending cuts have triggered strikes, social unrest and the toppling of governments in countries from Ireland to Greece, Estonians have endured some of the harshest austerity measures with barely a murmur. They even re-elected the politicians that imposed them.

They slashed the salaries of public-sector employees by 10% (and cut high minister's salaries by 20%, to share the pain -- something we should consider in America).

It wasn't popular, and Estonians say it was "tough," but they are now reaping the rewards of having a stable, sustainable system of finance. They have made their country a safe bet for investment and a good bet for business, and investors and businesses are therefore betting on them.

We can continue pretending that we have an imaginary source of infinite money to meet infinite demands of government clients, or we can recognize the obvious reality of the situation -- we do not.

Jay Cost's article is, as ever, worth reading in full.

Cost's article, The Politics of Loss, has a simple basic point: During boom years -- and/or while running up massive deficits that future generations will be expected to pay -- both parties can conspire to be profligate. The Democrats want higher spending, the Republicans want lower taxes; they can agree that the man who is not represented in this negotiation -- the Future Hypothetical Taxpayer -- shall have the difference in outlays versus income taken out of his hide.

Since Future Hypothetical Taxpayers do not vote in current elections, he's always the most popular guy in the world to punish with very high tax rates and unsustainably high unfunded mandates.

He doesn't get to vote.

Now, some of us will turn out to be these same Future Hypothetical Taxpayers we're shackling with economic misery. But we don't really think about that too much, for the same reason most people decide they will have a huge feast today, and begin their diet later.

Or they will smoke up a storm tonight, but get serious about quitting smoking tomorrow.

Everyone secretly hates their Future Selves, because in the present, we are constantly burdening our Future Selves with crushing problems and unfinished wori.

Every delay a major paper or project for work until days before the deadline? Yes, that's you deciding that your Future Self will suffer all burdens and pains for your procrastination, while your Current Self watches a Deadliest Catch marathon.

This is how government grows by leaps and bounds -- current goodies are popular, and we can always just not think about the future miseries we are making for ourselves.

People are good at not thinking about things they really ought to be thinking about. That's how people get into serious trouble.

But what happens when we've even maxed out the largest possible burden the Future Hypothetical Taxpayer can conceivably be expected to shoulder? What happens when credit rating agencies decide that it is no longer even plausible that Future Hypothetical Taxpayers will honor the debts we made on their behalf, and will, quite rationally, choose to default?

At that point, the luxury of not thinking about things is stripped from us. We are forced to confront, in the here and now, the ramifications of our choices.

And thus our politics shifts, as Cost notes, from merely deciding "Who gets what, when, and how," to "Who are we going to take from in order to meet the outsized commitments we're making?"

And then, and only then, the Spend Now Pay Later model begins to become unpopular enough that the always, always unpopular choice of Pay For What You Spend, Now begins to become politically viable.

Not because the latter has actually gained in popularity -- people still hate the thought of having to pay for their goodies.

But because all other options have become foreclosed to us.

As a sage said, "Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others."

And living within our means is the most painful and polarizing economic model -- except for all the others.

We will continue to select Spend Now Pay Later until we no longer can.

And then, at that point, we will be forced to make painful choices.

And "that point" is now.

There is good news, however. We are moving into the most painful and rancorous and angry period Americans have seen in perhaps 80 years. Probably longer, as far as political rancor.

There is no way cheap piousness about a "New Tone" will avoid this -- because we're forced, by economic reality, to begin deciding not just Who Gets What, but Who Loses What-- a much more personal and emotional decision about who will collect the most goodies from the Future Hypothetical Taxpayer who doesn't yet exist to complain of the situation.

Now, Current Actual Taxpayers -- and Current Actual Government Clients -- are going to have to argue about Who Is Going To Lose.

Both parties -- he who gains and he who loses -- are finally both at the table. Which they hadn't been before.

And now we're actually going to have that argument with real flesh-and-blood people, and not Future Hypothetical Taxpayers who exist only in our account-books as The Guy Who Will Pay For All This Crap.

That politics is about to become very personal indeed is unavoidable.

But the good news is that Scott Walker and plucky little Estonia have shown us what lies beyond the rancor, if we make the right choices: Financial stability, financial security, stable government, an environment which encourages industry and produces prosperity, and, ultimately, national success.

It will not be easy, and it will not be friendly.

But in the end, it will be done, for we have no other options remaining.

The diabetic hates the loss of the donuts, but he gains a benefit from his caloric austerity: He gets to live, and with adjustments to his lifestyle, he may even find himself living well.

I would be remiss if I didn't note that Jay Cost is such an expert on the shift of the Democratic Party to a Tamany-Hall Political-Spoils client-service conglomeration that he wrote a book about it, called Spoiled Rotten: ow the Politics of Patronage Corrupted the Once Noble Democratic Party and Now Threatens the American Republic.

Which currently has a five-star rating on Amazon, because they don't let you give six.

Posted by: Ace at 10:22 AM | Comments (272)
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