Pun Salad

URLs du Jour — 2009-07-02

• The Official Progressive Politician's Guiding Philosophy on Tax Fairness and Equity:
  1. You got the money.
  2. We want the money.
  3. So gimme the money.

  … or so it seems. At Cato, David Boaz remembers that Senator Barbara Mikulski, in a refreshing moment of candor, came pretty close to saying exactly that once:

  Let's go and get it from those who've got it.

  David goes on to the various ways the Obamites are implementing that philosophy, and the list is sobering.

  I say "sobering", because one of the proposals is a massive hike in taxes on beer, wine, and liquor.

  David also recalls the words written 233 years ago:

  He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.

  Try saying that to an Obamalator today, and the reply would no doubt be: "You say that like it's a bad thing!"

• One of the few actually good ideas John McCain had during the campaign was to replace the tax break for employer-paid health plans with an individual tax credit. (Genius Harvard Econ Prof Greg Mankiw liked it; so did Cato's Michael Cannon.)

  And, of course, McCain was relentlessly demagogued on the issue by Obama and Biden.

  All the more ironic then is the Obama Administration's willingness to embrace the idea now. The difference being that McCain's proposal empowered individuals and their private health care choices; Obama's looking for money to grease the skids toward a totally socialized system making us all more dependent on government.

  This was number 2 on Shikha Dalmia's list of Obama's health care lies blogged yesterday. Today, however, you should read a couple in-depth takedowns of this brazenly dishonest Barackrobatic hypocrisy by an NRO tag team: (1) Jim Geraghty with the text version recounting the $44 million in Obama campaign ad buys savaging the proposal; (2) Guy Benson with a video collection of YouTubed examples.

• The "Troubled Asset Relief Program" (TARP) was a horrible idea, but at least offered the prospect that taxpayer funds could be eventually "paid back" by the bailed-out financial institutions.

  But…

  But now Rep. Barney Frank, the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, has come up with a proposal to spend any TARP profits before they can be returned to the taxpayers. Last Friday, Frank introduced the "TARP for Main Street Act of 2009," a bill that would take profits from the program and immediately redirect them toward housing proposals favored by Frank and some fellow Democrats.

  Moral: once you send money down the rathole, the rats won't give it back without a fight.

Posted 2009-07-02 6:30 PM EDT

Captain Horatio Hornblower

[IMDB Rating: 7.6] [Tomatometer: 100%]

Ah, this is more like it. Good guys. Bad guys. Guys sticking together through thick and thin. True love. Ships shooting at each other with cannons. Outwitting the French. It's all here.

Gregory Peck plays the title character in this 1951 action-adventure movie. As near as I can tell, he doesn't bother with an English accent. He travels the world for King and Country, and he's not one to back down from a scrape.

It's a lot of fun. Great special effects for 1951. (I was about to say: they don't make them like this any more, but every so often, they do.)

Gene Roddenberry sold the idea of Star Trek as kind of a Hornblower-in-space. Many parallels are noted here. I think it's arguable that Alexander Courage kind of ripped off a measure or two of this movie's theme for the show as well.

Posted 2009-07-02 6:00 PM EDT

URLs du Jour — 2009-07-01

• Barackrobatics du Jour: At Forbes, Shikha Dalmia rattles off President Obama's top five lies about health care; two during the campaign to get himself elected, three in current rotation to snooker the American people into acquiescence. See if you can guess them before clicking over.

• We can add at least one lie to the total that Ms. Dalmia doesn't specifically mention: Candidate Obama's promise:

  "I can make a firm pledge," he said in Dover, N.H., on Sept. 12. "Under my plan, no family making less than $250,000 a year will see any form of tax increase. Not your income tax, not your payroll tax, not your capital gains taxes, not any of your taxes."

  David Freddoso transcribes the recent tergiversations of White House press secretary Robert Gibbs as he was pressed to reaffirm that (already broken) "firm pledge".

• If you weren't completely outraged by the passage of the Waxy-Markman Crap-N-Fade bill—I'm so put out I'm even making third-grade puns, you'll notice—Ed Morrissey notes one of the last-minute provisions to buy the vote of an Ohio Congresswoman (quoting a Washington Times story):

  They finally secured the vote of one Ohioan, veteran Democratic Rep. Marcy Kaptur of Toledo, the old-fashioned way. They gave her what she wanted - a new federal power authority, similar to Washington state's Bonneville Power Administration, stocked with up to $3.5 billion in taxpayer money available for lending to renewable energy and economic development projects in Ohio and other Midwestern states.

  And that's only one example; the bill is shot through with similar larcenies against your tax money.

  If you haven't done so already, I urge you to check the vote tally to determine how your representative voted.

• And you probably need to get your blood pressure down after that. Ladies and gentlemen, Web Site Story:

Posted 2009-07-01 6:00 PM EDT

URLs du Jour — 2009-06-30

• Proposition: the best editorial cartoonist in the world is currently Michael Ramirez at Investor's Business Daily. A recent example:

  

• At NRO, Victor Davis Hanson examines one variety of Barackrobatics: the "noble lie". You should Read The Whole Thing™, but here's the final paragraph:

  In other words, Obama is our first truly postmodern president. And the Guardians who form his elite circle -- in the very manner that they once falsely accused neo-cons of doing -- deliberately, but "nobly," distort the truth on behalf of us all.

• But if you have the time to Read Another Whole Thing™, make it Thomas Sowell's column on the wacky unreality pervading all discussions of health care reform.

  The great haste with which the latest government expansion into medical care is being rushed through Congress suggests that the politicians don't want us to stop and think. That makes sense, from their point of view, but not from ours.

  To adapt a saying I've used in a different context: the politicians want you to think that they're controlling prices; but there are no controlled prices, there are only controlled people.

• A pictorial collection of misplaced optimism: There, I fixed it.

Posted 2009-06-30 6:00 PM EDT
Last Modified 2009-06-30 7:36 PM EDT

User Support Translation III

Just a helpful note: when you're in a "support dialogue" (e-mail or verbal) with a system administrator, and he or she types or says this:

You're right that…

What you just said was full of misconceptions, irrelevant information, and probable lies. Nothing was the slightest help in even figuring out the problem, let alone in trying to fix it. However, you did manage to say something technically true, even if it was trivial and obvious, and in an effort to keep this discussion on a positive note, I'll go out of my way to point that out to you.

(Previous entries in the User Support Translation series here and here.)

Posted 2009-06-29 6:30 PM EDT

Le Doulos

[IMDB Rating: 7.9] [Tomatometer: 95%]

I'm being a total philistine here. The critics and IMDB crowd waxed ecstatic about Le Doulos, but I was much less impressed. Hey, don't go by me: you'll probably like it!

It's a French crime movie, directed by the famed Jean-Pierre Melville. The two main characters, Silien and Faugel, are nobody's sweethearts: Faugel cold-bloodedly murders a fence in the opening scene. Later, Silien knocks Faugel's girlfriend unconcious, ties her up, and tortures her to get her to reveal Faugel's whereabouts. The plot is driven by Faugel's suspicion that Silien is a police informant.

But the plot is unusually twisty; nothing is as it seems, and "what really happened" flashback revelations are postponed as long as possible. Kind of an early version of The Usual Suspects.

So why didn't I like it that much? Probably the lack of sympathetic and interesting characters, and way too many scenes where people are just walking around, driving around, looking all moody. Ho hum.

Posted 2009-06-29 6:00 PM EDT

URLs du Jour — 2009-06-28

• Call me crazy, but I've never been a huge fan of corporate welfare, bloated bureaucracy, massive regulation, or killing prosperity. At least without detectable benefits. In voting for the Waxman-Markey Cap-n-trade bill, at least 219 members of the House of Representatives, however, have shown that they are all for that stuff. Marc Morano has a good summary.

  The House of Representatives passed a bill it did not read, did not understand. A bill that is based on crumbling scientific claims and a bill that will have no detectable climate impact (assuming climate fear promoters are correct on the science and the bill is fully implemented – both implausible assumptions).

  You can see how your Congresscritter voted here. Mine own, Carol Shea-Porter, unsurprisingly voted yea.

  The thing that really sticks in my craw, though, is the "did not read" bit. Tom Smith rakes his dimwitted (Republican) Congresswoman over the coals for her vote:

  I don't doubt there are plenty of smug hybrid drivers around Temecula but really, in a bill this bad, you could have found a good reason for voting against it just by opening it at random. Of course, that assumes there was a copy in existence, which I gather was not technically the case. But even there, I think most people would regard it as a good reason to vote against a bill that it was in fact impossible to read it, or even most of it, before voting on it. Many of us in law related areas, just to take a random example, would consider it our fiduciary duty to actually read, perhaps even carefully, a legal instrument that would dispose of trillions of dollars of other people's money, before attaching our name to it. Is it too rash for a Congressperson to be expected to do the same? If so, you could have a rule of thumb -- less than $100 Billion: no worries, whatever, go ahead and sign without reading. But more than $100 Billion, or $1 Trillion, say, maybe read that sucker first. Just a thought.

  Just do a quick s/Temecula/Portsmouth/ on that paragraph, and it's a wish-I'd-written. Any half-competent GOP candidate running against Carol Shea-Porter in 2010 should wrap this misfeasance around her neck like the dead albatross it is.

• On the "health care reform" front, Michael Cannon of Cato gets a high priest of the Church of Universal Coverage to admit that 'universal coverage' isn't much about improving health; it's pretty much all about power.

• As if to provide an example, McQ notes a current proposal to finance the scheme: taxing any private health plans deemed overly generous by Your Federal Government.

  Unless, mind you, such plans were negotiated by a union. In which case, they're off the table.

  So "health care reform" is not really about "fairness" either. Cannon's right: it's all about power. And unless you belong to some powerful Democratic Party constituency, you ain't got much.

• Thank goodness the watchdog press is focusing like a laser beam on all this! Oh, wait…

• I cant imagine that DraftSanford2012.com will be around for much longer, so click while you can.

Posted 2009-06-28 12:00 PM EDT

URLs du Jour — 2009-06-26

• I didn't know this.

  The Red Sox telecast on NESN is one of only three in Major League Baseball that places its main camera directly behind the pitcher in straightaway center field. The other 27 clubs, including the Braves, put the camera off-center, about 10 to 15 degrees toward left field.

  I did notice, however, that the (relatively recent) camera angle put an end to the phenomenon once noted by many of the maturity-impaired: when the "GIANT GLASS" ad came up on the Fenway backstop, and a hitter stood in a certain way, the "GL" was obscured, leading to immature snickering throughout the NESN coverage area.

  I miss that.

• Shawn Macomber goes to Mars. Mars, PA, that is, to recount the story of Stephanie Babines, who fought for her right to teach pole-dancing fitness classes on in Mars.

  Diligent Pun Salad research has revealed uncovered found Ms. Babine's website, so if you're in the Martian area, and are so inclined, check her out. (Unless you're allergic to way too much pink.)

• Are you a big enough math geek to figure out what the xkcd guy is doing today? (Answer is here.)

• Again, something I didn't know: Stoned wallabies make crop circles.

Posted 2009-06-26 6:00 PM EDT

URLs du Jour — 2009-06-25

• You might be amused at the chutzpah of news5alert.com, which looks like a news site, but … well, here are the first couple paragraphs of their "news story":

  Are online jobs the next big thing? For Mary Steadman it sure is. Mary, a mother from Durham, NH is thriving, in the middle of an economic recession working in the comfort of her own home.

  From her website: "I get paid about $25 for every link I post on Google and I get paid every week... I make around $15,500 a month right now"

  Well, it says "Durham, NH" for me. But when you click, you'll find that "Mary Steadman" almost certainly lives closer to your own home. And the whole page is full of links going to the same stupid scam: buy our package that will tell you "how to make money posting links online."

  Wired has a good article about fake news sites, and how their links appear in even reputable web publications. (Well, … Huffington Post.)

  I don't keep close track of what's going on over there in the Google ad box. My apologies if it gets invaded by this sleaziness.

• Since I bitched and moaned about it: the invitation for Iranian diplomats to attend Independence Day picnics at American embassies has been revoked.

• And I've pretty much given up on writing to my Congresswoman/Toothache, Carol Shea-Porter, but after you read about the Waxman-Markey Cap-n-Trade bill, you might want to try importuning your own congresscritter to vote against.

Posted 2009-06-25 5:59 PM EDT

The Lucky Ones

[IMDB Rating: 7.2] [Tomatometer: 34%]

A few warning signals here: (1) Tim Robbins in (2) a film dealing with soldiers returning from Iraq which (3) went nearly directly to DVD. I was expecting something earnest and tediously left-wing. But such are the benefits of low expectations: it wasn't good, but it wasn't awful.

Robbins plays grizzled vet Fred Cheaver, ending his military career, returning home after being injured in Iraq by a falling porta-potty. He makes the acquaintance of TK (Michael Peña) and Colee (Rachel McAdams), on leave to recover from their much less amusing injuries. Circumstances cause the trio to start off on a cross-country road trip in a rented red minivan. Many incidents ensue, colorful characters are encountered, lessons are learned.

The movie treats its main military characters with respect, and all three are fine actors. Most civilians they encounter treat them wonderfully; a few exceptions are clear bad apples.

The main problem is that the movie never quite lifts off from its "Little Miss Sunshine except with soldiers" premise. The writer/director, Neil Burger, previously wrote/directed The Illusionist which was much, much better.

Posted 2009-06-24 6:30 PM EDT