Sleepless in Midland

Oops, blue state discovers it has laws similar to Indiana's

The left is in attack mode over the religious freedom law of the state of Indiana, and woe be to anyone standing in the way. This whole thing is reminiscent of the Seinfeld episode in which the (seemingly gay) bullies, Bob and Cedric, instigate a mob attack on Kramer because he refused to wear the AIDS ribbon.

Now our neighboring blue state of New Mexico is discovering they've had a similar law since 1978. Oops.

But as Rush Limbaugh says, it's another "hands-up-don't-shoot" fiction. More to the point, it's partisan politics designed to demonize Christians and sway voters away from conservative candidates.

I'd like one of those Airbus cockpit doors for my house

A popular way for burglars to gain entry to a house is to kick in a door. The door and/or the door frame split apart after a few kicks. And the door can swing wide open.

Let's shift gears and go to that GermanWings Airbus that crashed into the side of a mountain. According to reports, the pilot couldn't regain entrance even after beating on the door with an ax. It's hard to come up with any good news from that story, but we have to acknowledge that that door was one tough momma.

I want one. Oh, and I guess I'd better get the frame to go with it.

Reporter warns of power company vulnerability on C-Span

Steve Reilly, a reporter at USA Today, was a guest on a 30 minute segment of C-Span's Washington Journal this morning. Watch it here. Mr. Reilly's article can be found at Bracing for a big power grid attack: 'One is too many'.

Actually, we've experienced quite a few more than one. We've been warned about cyber and physical attacks of power stations for years, and Mr. Reilly reports that there have been 362 over a four year period according DOE data.

From the C-Span program:

Host: What is your worst fear?

Reilly: The worst fear is an attack on multiple substations or pieces of substructure at the same time. The concern obviously is that we might see some sort of large scale outage, um, possibly along the line of what we saw in 2003 in the Northeast corridor, an outage that affects millions of people at the same time. It would be devastating to society.

Mr. Reilly's article seems concerned with the lack of regulatory movement in this area. He notes that an industry group, the North American Electrical Reliability Corporation (NERC) writes the standards for the industry, and the government's FERC takes a back seat. The industry itself is probably best equipped to come up with solutions for protecting the power grid. But getting those solutions implemented is another matter. Whether they are doing a good job is something we may have to find out the hard way, because it's hard to find evidence that much has been done by the power companies themselves.

A caller to C-Span asked about EMPs. That was not the focus of Mr. Reilly's report, however he did say that nothing has been done to protect against them. However, some of the thinking on that topic has resulted in suggestions of Faraday cages constructed around vulnerable structures. Now that might work.

The real vulnerability, though, is the lax security around the typical power plant.

Chicago law prof bemoans the insults directed at Obama

Poor Barack, constantly under attack by those all those heartless conservatives. Geoffrey R. Stone tells us all about it in Obama faces vile insults like no other president has. It's almost enough to make a person cry.

Prof. Stone admits that some of the past presidents had to endure some insults, but he conveniently skips the ones between Nixon and Obama. Then there's this:

But no president in our nation's history has ever been castigated, condemned, mocked, insulted, derided and degraded on a scale even close to the constantly ugly attacks on Obama.

Oh, give us a break. One would have to have had his head in the sand not to have seen George W. Bush's detractors hurl venom by the barrel at him. But none of that matters in partisan politics. A skillful partisan can take advantage of fading memories and start anew each time. History is a thing of the past.

But let's go back anyway through the time machine that is the internet. Here's the same Professor Stone castigating George W. Bush in 2007 in U.S. needs to hear Bush admit errors. To his credit, Mr. Stone did suggest some thought be given before pulling troops out of Iraq. Unfortunately, President Obama didn't appear to have given it much thought at all and barreled ahead anyway. He took a victory and turned it into a disaster. In fact, it's hard to find anything regarding the Middle East that he did right. And he's not done yet.

The U.S. doesn't need to hear President Obama admit to errors. The U.S. needs a new president who is a smart and capable leader, characteristics Obama lacks.

There, Professor Stone. Add that to your list of insults Obama has to endure. And kick yourself once in the rear for each time you voted for Obama.

Fox Friday 3-27-15 -- It was a good week for foxes

Welcome to Fox Friday, the weekly display of urban fox ... oh, you know the rest. Let's get started.

Typically, the feral cats arrive first and get their fill. And there are usually some leftovers the cats sometimes try to protect. So when the foxes do get supper, those are the photos that get top priority. But for starters, here are the cats being their felonious, feline selves.

Left, a fox watches from a safe distance as two cats gorge themselves on the free meal. Right, on a different night the same scene with Yellow Cat trying to scare the fox. It worked.

Earlier in the week the foxes had their act together and double teamed Yellow Cat.

Old Crooked Tail approaches warily and made off with one of the chicken legs.

It was a good night for the foxes.

Ten minutes later the fox comes back for the second chicken leg. Yellow Cat: "Hey, where'd my free food go?"

They're learning that there's strength in numbers. Whichever team had the greater number got the food this week. Hence ...

Yellow Cat sidles up to her new BFF.

That's it for this Fox Friday. See ya next time!

IRS instructs us on keeping our info safe but comes up short on its end to help keep snoops out

A few years ago I tried to file my tax return online only to have it rejected because someone else had already filed one with my name and Social Security number. The impostor had requested a sizable refund, and for all I know, the IRS paid it. But the other me had an address in a different town, and I never saw the refund.

This seems to be a regular problem. Here's an excerpt from IRS Combats Identity Theft and Refund Fraud on Many Fronts:

In fiscal year 2014, the IRS initiated 1,063 identity theft related investigations. Criminal Investigation enforcement efforts resulted in 748 sentencings as compared to 438 in FY 2013, an increase of 75 percent and the incarceration rate rose 7.1 percent to 87.7 percent. The courts imposed significant jail time with the average months to serve in FY 2014 at 43 months as compared to 38 months in FY 2013 — the longest sentencing being 27 years. ...

The Identity Theft Clearinghouse (ITC) continues to develop and refer identity theft refund fraud schemes to Criminal Investigation (CI) Field Offices for investigation. Since its inception in FY12, it has received over 7,600 individual identity theft leads. These leads involved approximately 1.47 million returns with over $6.8 billion in refunds claimed.

The ratio of identity theft investigations to potentially fraudulent returns isn't very good at 1,063 to 1,470,000. But detection is always one step behind deception. So let's move on to the IRS itself and its own lack of safeguards.

They're constantly nagging the general public about protecting our private information. But the IRS itself isn't doing such a good job of protecting our information. The GAO issued this report: IRS Needs to Continue Improving Controls over Financial and Taxpayer Data. Summation:

Until IRS takes additional steps to (1) address unresolved and newly identified control deficiencies and (2) effectively implements elements of its information security program, including, among other things, updating policies, test and evaluation procedures, and remedial action procedures, its financial and taxpayer data will remain unnecessarily vulnerable to inappropriate and undetected use, modification, or disclosure. These shortcomings were the basis for GAO's determination that IRS had a significant deficiency in internal control over financial reporting systems for fiscal year 2014.

And along came Obamacare. Apparently our leaders decided that the IRS should handle our medical information of top of what's it doing already. What a topsy-turvy world we live in in which a highly politicized agency is in charge of so much of our sensitive information. It's almost as if they want bureaucrats to make our lives as difficult as possible.

Reporters give Hillary Clinton a standing ovation

Apparently, they made no secret of their loyalty. According to Breitbart.com, msm reporters who attended Hillary Clinton's speech saying she was going to have no more secrets from the media gave her a standing ovation. See Reports: MSM Reporters Give Hillary Clinton Standing Ovation after She Takes No Questions, Jokes about Email Scandal.

Do they love her? Probably not. More likely they just feel protective of her because of all the sexism and hostility they expect from Republicans. Now if you put Elizabeth Warren in her place, then we would see some real love.

The answer to why Obama got so huffy about Netanyahu's speech to Congress

Remember the open mic gaff Obama made to the Russians a while back when he wanted Putin to know that he would have more flexibility after the election? We learned from that that Obama was merely trying to sound tough for the U.S. audience, but he didn't really mean it.

Something similar was going on with the negotiations with Iran. William A. Jacobson relays a story from the subscription only part of wsj.com. Apparently, Obama had not come clean with the American public about what was going on behind closed door with the Iranians. Jacobson came to this conclusion:

Now it’s all making sense. The Israelis saw Obama acting deceptively, hiding negotiations that would affect Israel’s existence, and giving away the store to the Iranians.

Netanyahu saw no choice but to go to Congress both through the Israeli ambassador and the speech to Congress, knowing that it would harm Israel with the administration.

This was not something done for election purposes.

Jacobson provides some lengthy excerpts from the WSJ article. See them at Obama furious Israel found out Iran nuke deal secrets and told Congress.

Finally, a backwards time machine, courtesy of Obamacare

The development of a forward time machine is difficult enough. But a backward time machine is currently beyond *speculation. However, President Obama has done the impossible with his signature transformative legislation called Obamacare. Obama claims that Obamacare has reduced the rate of medical care inflation from day one of Obamacare to the present. But as David Catron kindly points out, Obamacare didn't go into effect until 2014. OK, maybe Mr. Catron wasn't so kindly. See Obamacare’s Amazing Wayback Clause. Excerpt:

The most celebrated effect of this amazing provision is its retroactive reduction of medical inflation during the years preceding the law’s implementation. Obamacare was passed in 2010. However, except for a few minor provisions, it didn’t go into effect until 2014. Yet the law’s wayback clause is such a powerful cost control tool that it has been able to traverse the time-space continuum and slow the rate of health care inflation, as the President himself has phrased it, “every single year since the law passed.” ...

Nonpartisan studies attribute the decline in health care inflation to economic factors, insisting that the recession was the most important factor in reducing growth in medical spending: “This suggests that the recent decline is not primarily the result of structural changes in the health sector or of components of the Affordable Care Act.”

Some have even suggested that considerable credit for the slowdown in health care inflation — you Obamacare advocates should sit down before reading further — must go to the policies of George W. Bush. Much of the decline has been driven, these researchers point out, by a “remarkable” slowdown in Medicare spending, particularly in the Part D prescription drug program. Specifically, they write, “Our analysis shows that Part D has accounted for over 60 percent of the slowdown in Medicare benefits since 2011.”

Unfortunately, Mr. Catron speculates that the party is already over and that health care inflation is on the rise again. Oh well, we'll probably be trying to survive in a post apocalyptic United States after Iran explodes a few EMP bombs overhead anyway. So this may someday be remembered by survivors as the good old days.

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*A backwards time machine isn't possible under currently accepted premises because Einstein's theory suggests that time slows as one's speed accelerates, so the theoretical time machine has no reverse gear. For the best treatment of time travel possibilities, see Professor Farnsworth's forward time machine.

All your browsers are belong to us

This is discouraging. Apparently *researchers participating in the latest Pwn2Own contest successfully exploited each of the top four most popular browsers. This is from Your Favorite Browser Just Got Hacked, But Don’t Panic. Here's an excerpt:

This past week marked the 8th annual Pwn2Own, where security researchers come from near and far to flex their talents. The goal? Demonstrate exploits on the latest builds of popular browsers, get a pile of cash in return.

The good news: because of the nature of the competition, none of the specifics of these exploits are made public until the companies behind the browsers get a chance to patch things up. So while the bugs being exploited here might be lurking in your browser, you’re probably not in danger of actually getting nailed by them before they’re cleaned up.

Mozilla, for example, tells me they’ll have Firefox patched by the end of today. None of the other browser makers had responded to our requests for comment at the time this was published.

Sure enough, Mozilla offered up two patches to users because of that. As of the time of this writing, the latest version of Firefox is 36.0.4.

*We would probably call them "hackers" in another setting.

OK Obama, if voting is going to be mandatory, here are some options we need to consider

We could have the right to vote for "none of the above" for voters who were disappointed with the whole lot. If no candidate got a majority of the total votes then the election is thrown out and the process would begin again.

Another idea is the right to vote against a candidate. An "against" vote would negate one vote the candidate received from someone else.

But those are just ways to give disenchanted voters a chance to thumb their noses at the system.

If we want real fairness we need to reevaluate the one-person-one-vote. The progressive income tax made it archaic. Factor in the disproportionate amount of the total tax revenue that is paid by a small percentage of the population and the unfairness is obvious. A more modern system would grant a person the equivalent of multiple votes on a sliding scale dependent on how much he/she pays in taxes with the highest tax revenue generator getting the most votes.

So Obama, if you want to mess with the voting system, then let's get busy. High tax revenue generators need their fair share of voting power.

Fox Friday 3-20-15 -- A fox has to be stealthy to get one past the cats

Welcome to Fox Friday, the weekly display of the best of the urban fox photos taken at the Bone Yard, a feeding and photo station in the heart of Midland, Texas.

As I've noted before, the area is overrun with cats, both domestic and feral. One of them, Yellow Cat, is barely out of kittenhood and appears to be making a home at the Bone Yard. Unfortunately, she may have become dependent on the food put out for the foxes, which is not a good development. It's as if I'm the government, and I've created a situation where the citizens are dependent on handouts. Enough about that, let's get started.

Given the voraciousness of the cats, it's always a pleasure to see a fox grab a morsel. So let's start with Old Crooked Tail getting some meat.

Old Crooked Tail arrives on the scene, finds the drumstick, and she's off with it. Good for you, gal!

Here she is again on another night.

Holding her crooked tail high in the aftermath of a rain shower.

Yellow Cat is small, but as a rule, these foxes don't mess with cats of any size.

Here we see Yellow Cat holding her ground in an almost-confrontation. Old Crooked Tail circles then heads for the exit, still hungry, poor girl.

That's it for this Fox Friday. See ya next time.

If Dan Higgins surrendered peacefully to sheriff's deputies how did his face get bashed up? Morning paper answers lingering question.

According to the story, several Midland County Sheriff's Office deputies went to Dan Higgins house to question and/or arrest him on October 9, 2014. And during the course of events, Mr. Higgins shot one of the deputies who died shortly thereafter. There was about a three and a half hour standoff before Higgins surrendered peacefully.

Then there was the published mugshot following his arrest. If he surrendered peacefully, how did he get those abrasion on his face?

Today's morning paper provides an answer. The Midland Reporter-Telegram eventually obtained results from an open records request and reported about the contents at Report: Gun that killed Naylor was reported stolen.

Here's an excerpt in which Higgins addressed the treatment he received from the arresting deputies:

"I understand that y'all beating the (expletive) out of me. I did it. I did it," he said. "I didn't fight back, but I get it; I understand that. But if that is the way it's going to be for the rest of the time, can we do it right here, can y'all shoot me up?"

At that point he was probably regretting having passed up the suicide-by-cop option.

Most citizens would want to see standoffs end peacefully rather than in shootouts. And it would seem that most law enforcement officers should want that too. But to telegraph to potential standoff subjects, as they did here, that if the person surrenders they will beat the expletive out of that person, then that doesn't seem like a message that will get positive results.

Kaus out at Daily Caller -- says they won't allow him to criticize Fox News

One of the big problems many of us have with the msm is that they omit or underplay news that would be important to their conservative audience and should be important to all of their audience.

So here we have Mickey Kaus, who has always been a reliable commentator, getting his column pulled from Daily Caller because it was critical of Fox News' failure to cover immigration. Source: Mickey Kaus quits Daily Caller after Tucker Carlson pulls critical Fox News column.

Fox News is often described by its critics as an arm of the Republican Party, and the msm often acts as an arm of the Democrat Party. At least there is some balance, of sorts. However, there are those of us who are critical of both parties and would like to see some real balance.

Mickey Kaus is a Democrat with common sense, and it is always refreshing to read his critical remarks about both parties. Kaus will probably land somewhere else that will pay to publish his smart observations, so he's not gone for good. But it's discouraging to see conservative outlets circle the wagons like that.

Kausfiles.com was his old address, but it still redirects to Dailycaller.com. Maybe he'll correct that and get it back up and running again. Meanwhile, we'll miss you, Mickey.

Karin McQuillan makes a very convincing case for blaming Obama for Hillary's most recent problems

She sums it up in the first three paragraphs in Of Course Obama Wants to Take Hillary Down. To wit:

We can believe Ed Klein’s sources claiming Valerie Jarrett is the White House point woman for the destruction of Hillary Clinton.  Evidence:

It was the New York Times which broke the story. The Democratic press does not eat its own, ever. Yet here was the Gray Lady, setting the headlines for Drudge.

People asked how Hillary could have been so stupid.  The answer is that in the normal course of mainstream reporting, there is no Democrat crime too large for the press to cover up.  She knew she was perfectly safe.

The Democrat media has covered for prominent Democrats for years. But this time they didn't. McQuillan speculates that Obama was behind this because he wants to control the party more than he wants the next president to be Democrat.

Funny. Not too awfully long ago the msm would condemn such talk as a "conspiracy theory." Not any more. President Obama has taught us that for explanations for his actions we have to look in the gutter.

Would the Mexican drug cartels protect us from ISIS trying to cross the Southern border?

The knee jerk reaction is, "Fat chance!" However, according to Breitbart.com, it depends on which cartel. In How and Why ISIS Will Use Texas to Enter the US If They Choose to Cross the Border, Brandon Darby & Ildefonso Ortiz explain that the cartels farther west have older leaders who wouldn't sacrifice future profit for a chance of a short term payoff. Whereas the cartels operating southeast of El Paso are now run by younger guys looking for the fast buck. They would be the ones most likely to escort Islamic extremists across the Texas border at a vulnerable spot, say, between Del Rio and Laredo.

Here's how, according to the authors:

Border Patrol agents from both the Del Rio and the Laredo sectors told Breitbart Texas that they simply do not have the resources to secure the area. They said that their resources are stretched so thin that only large groups are followed and tracked. The agents see “sign,” footprints or other indications that an illegal crossing has occurred, an unless the sign indicates a large group, the agents often do not have the ability to track and apprehend the smugglers or illegal aliens. This area is another region where an ISIS member or small group could pay a substantial sum to Zetas smugglers to secretly enter the U.S. without ever being known to authorities. The Zetas cartel would send one smuggler with a large group of illegal aliens in one direction, and then another smuggler with one or two ISIS members in another direction. The Border Patrol would pursue the larger group and be forced to ignore the two sets of footprints created by the ISIS group. It is important to note that the State of Texas has done little to increase State Trooper or National Guard presence in this area. That state effort largely focused on the Rio Grande Valley Sector and is only now beginning to be seen in the southeastern side of the Laredo Sector.

They would then have to cover a lot of barren land by foot, motorbike, or all terrain vehicle, so our best hope is that they would be too lazy to do that.

Mrs. Clinton, tear down that firewall

The Benghazi Select Committee has subpoenaed Hillary Clinton's emails regarding Benghazi. But committee chair Trey Gowdy admitted on Fox News that the committee can only subpoena documents, not the computers on which they are/were stored.

That's something the House of Representatives could do if they have the wherewithal to do it. Meanwhile, Republicans are merely asking for the server.

So how about it, Mrs. Clinton? Tear down that firewall.

Meanwhile, we've got this enemy-of-my-enemy-is-my-friend thing going on here. It was Obama's right hand woman who got this whole scandal going. So weakening Hillary strengthens Liz Warren. What a soap opera the feuding Democrat factions are giving us now. If only both sides could lose.

Bucket lists the easy way -- with Youtube

I didn't dream bucket list accomplishments could be so easy.

One of mine was to see a lava flow into the ocean. Done! Watch one right here.

Don't stop there. Move on to this one to watch some artificial lava being poured onto ice. It's got a scientific explanation and everything!

See how easy that was?

Next up, driving a Ferrari.

Fox Friday 3-13-15 -- they're back!

We went the full week with scant sightings of foxes. Cats dominate the feeding station. And I was worried that Fox Friday might have to end. However, maybe Friday the 13th brought us good luck, because last night and this morning we hit pay dirt. The cat that had made a home at the Bone Yard was absent most of the night, and while the other cats did get their fill, two foxes came back and got some of the raw chicken. Yes!

Let's get to it.

Old Crooked Tail likes to perch on a limb like a bird and crouch like a cat.

A half hour later she's back up there tip toeing down that branch.

Six hours later she's back at the same spot, this time with her companion.

We don't know when she'll be back, so let's have a final look at that magnificent, wild, canine.  What a beautiful creature she is.

That's it for this Fox Friday. See ya next time!

Is Hillary laying a trap like Obama did with his birth certificate?

With all these Republicans demanding Hillary's emails and conservative pundits salivating over potential scandals, one has to suspect that Hillary's henchmen have already erased any incriminating emails, and that the ones turned over to the State Department are all about wedding invitations and Easter egg hunts.

It's all reminiscent of the Obama birth certificate. Obama laid a trap for some unwary conservative to step into, and he waited patiently for years. Finally Donald Trump fell in. Hilary's email server could be a similar trap if she is good enough of a politician to pull it off.

But that now seems doubtful as there's as much venom being sprayed at her over this from Democrats as from Republicans. Or as Thomas Lifson observed, Democrats are twisting the knife in Hillary. She was the inevitable nominee, but Democrats see an opportunity to dump her in favor of their next favorite, Elizabeth Warren.

Poor Hillary can never seem to catch a break. If she's not the nominee her speaking fee is going to drop drastically, and donations to the Clinton foundation will dry up. They'll be dead broke again before they know it. It's almost enough to make a person feel sorry for her.

Obama admin complains about Republicans' letter but says by the way a deal with Iran won't be binding on anyone -- so what's the point?

John Kerry seems to be saying that any deal the Obama crew makes with Iran will be simply a gentleman's agreement. And Congress need not bother itself with it. That's his reasoning for opposing the letter 47 Republican Senator sent to Iran that explained that the Senate would have to approve of any deal they planned to enter into with the U.S.

Of course, the concept of a gentleman's agreement is that the parties to the agreement can trust each other to abide by it. And in this situation neither party trusts the other. So one has to wonder, what's the point of an agreement?

It's looking more and more like Obama simply wants a deal, any deal will do, so long as he can claim he made a deal. As for Iran, they're already claiming a victory.

Daylight Saving Time or Standard Time -- just pick one and stick with it

On an individual basis that's easier said than done, of course. I've tried to keep my biological clock on one time standard at past changeovers, but over time I reverted to the prevailing standard without even realizing it. It's hard to be out of sync with everyone else. Now if everyone else did it, that's another matter.

That brings us to the efforts by a few to get rid of Daylight Saving Time.

Rep. Dan Flynn of Canton, TX, along with four others have coauthored H.B. 150 in the 84th Texas Legislature to take advantage of the federal law's opt-out provision and get Texas off Daylight Saving Time for good. And look at this, a public hearing is scheduled for tomorrow (3/11/15). Go for it, public.

Representatives in other states are looking at it, too, and decided they want to stay on Daylight Saving Time all the time. All righty then. Just choose one and stick with it.

Dead Charlie Hebdo staff named Islamophobe of the Year by Islamorationalizers

I had to read this twice to convince myself it wasn't a parody. But no, it appears to be real.

There's a group of Islamic rationalizers called Islamic Human Rights Commission which just awarded International Islamopobe of the Year to the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo. If you must see for yourself, go to the following *website: http://5pillarsuk.com/2015/03/08/home-secretary-theresa-may-voted-islamophobe-of-the-year/

Breitbart.com makes this observation:

Staff at Charlie Hebdo were unable to accept the award as many of them had been murdered for mocking Mohammed. Their offices were attacked on 7th January, when two gunmen called individuals out of the morning editorial conference to be executed.

As I understand it, a phobia is supposed to be an irrational fear. Sounds to me like any fear they had was quite justified.

*Website not hyperlinked due to blogger's Islamophobia.

Apparently it is not that hard to get a gun illegally in Europe

The anti-gun crowd in the U.S. is dead set on disarming the citizens. While they might say they just want to cut the murder rate, we could probably speculate that there's a more sinister motive.

At any rate, that old saw is still true: Outlaw guns and only outlaws will have guns.

Europeans who didn't know it already are seeing it played out. See Getting a gun legally in Europe may be hard, but terrorists have little trouble. Excerpt.

In contrast with the free-firing United States, Europe is generally seen as a haven from serious gun violence. Here in Denmark, handguns and semiautomatic rifles are all but banned. Hunting rifles are legally available only to those with squeaky-clean backgrounds who have passed a rigorous exam covering everything from gun safety to the mating habits of Denmark’s wildlife.

“There’s a book about 1,000 pages thick,” said Tonni Rigby, one of only two licensed firearms dealers in Copenhagen. “You have to know all of it.”

But if you want an illicit assault rifle, such as the one used by a 22-year-old to rake a Copenhagen cafe with 28 bullets on Saturday, all it takes are a few connections and some cash.

“It’s very easy to get such a weapon,” said Hans Jorgen Bonnichsen, a former operations director for the Danish security service PET. “It’s not only a problem for Denmark. It’s a problem for all of Europe.”

Give me the guns rights of "the free-firing United States" any day.

Al Qaeda is on the run -- another Obama statement he knew was a lie

It's probably a safe bet that if Obama says something that doesn't ring true, it probably isn't true, especially if there's a election to influence.

So here's another Obama lie that eventually became obvious but took a while to unearth. The source is a Wall Street Journal article that's behind a paywall. But the gist of it can be found at the Weekly Standard and Fox News.

Fox news has a nice summary at Sources: bin Laden docs conflict with Obama's talk of Al Qaeda demise.

The Weekly Standard has some significant excerpts at Top Intel Official: Al Qaeda Had Doubled When Obama Claimed It Had Been Decimated.

The titles say it all, but click the hyperlinks to get the details. In any event, Obama's statements, while presented as truth, lacked validity.

Fox Friday 3-6-15 -- Meet the newcomer, Scar

Last week the foxes got dry dog food, and they didn't like it. This week it was the return of the chicken drumsticks, but as usual, cats got their fill first. And on five of the seven days of this session the foxes stayed away. It's a dilemma -- how to feed the foxes without feeding cats.

Anyway, there was a new arrival this week. Meet Scar.

Tuesday morning: In the photo above right we see him mimicking a Jaguar. In the photo on the right we can see his namesake scar atop his shoulders. How did that happen? Slipping under a cyclone fence, perhaps?  You sly little fox.

Thursday morning: There's Scar in the left photo calling his companion. The bait the night before consisted of one drumstick and some dry dog food, but the cats got the drumstick. In the photo in the middle both foxes scrounge for the dry dog food. But look at the photo on the far right. Scar's companion appears to be Old Crooked Tail. Aw, what a sweet couple they make.

Well, that's it for this Fox Friday. See ya next time.

Pigs' blood spray as defense against terrorists -- cute idea but wouldn't work

There was an email circulating a while back about General John J. "Blackjack" Pershing which had him using pigs' blood to thwart Islamic terrorists. But it was too good to be true.

That didn't stop one enterprising inventor, according to Mirror.co.uk. See in "Anti-terror" invention designed to spray Muslims with PIG BLOOD is "deeply offensive", says faith group.

There we learn about patent #US 20130047879 A1 which proposed a system of containers of pigs' blood mixed with emulsion which would become aerosol upon detonation. The result would be a dead terrorist sprayed with pigs' blood. He wouldn't be allowed into heaven, or so the theory goes.

Too bad it's not that simple. The terrorists have been shown to be very resourceful, and to think their imams couldn't rationalize that away is just wishful thinking.

Hillary figured out how to do what we would all like to do -- keep prying eyes out of her emails

That's something we all would like to have -- an email account that is truly private, not just from those annoying commercial services that scan for information useful for buyers of that data, but from the government's prying eyes.

The Clintons have found a way:

In most cases, individuals who operate their own email servers are technical experts or users so concerned about issues of privacy and surveillance they take matters into their own hands. It was not immediately clear exactly where Clinton ran that computer system.

Clinton has not described her motivation for using a private email account - hdr22(at)clintonemail.com, which traced back to her own private email server registered under an apparent pseudonym - for official State Department business.

Operating her own server would have afforded Clinton additional legal opportunities to block government or private subpoenas in criminal, administrative or civil cases because her lawyers could object in court before being forced to turn over any emails. And since the Secret Service was guarding Clinton's home, an email server there would have been well protected from theft or a physical hacking.

That's fine for private citizens Clinton. But it's not so fine for those of us out here in flyover land who expect honesty and transparency from so called "public servants" who increasingly appear to be looking out for themselves more so than for us.

The NSA probably has Hillary's emails, but expecting them to give them up to a Congressional subpoena would presume the agency isn't politicized.

Meanwhile, if the Clintons ever end up flat broke again, there's a business for them in email service providing. Although, customers would probably want to take a close look at their privacy policy.

There's nothing wrong with ridiculing delusional girls who want to join ISIS

Ridicule is the progressives' favorite weapon against people with whom they disagree. And some have made a pretty good career out of it -- see Jon Stewart.

But that shouldn't mean other Americans can't enjoy mocking those insane young girls who think it's a smart career move to go join ISIS.

Along comes Saturday Night Live with a delightful skit mocking a sweet young thing off to join ISIS. But wouldn't you know? The PC crowd objects. The PC enforcers are due for a good dose of mocking, too.

Meanwhile, we learn that the shy, sensitive lad who grew up to be Jihadi John was a victim of school yard bullying. Maybe SNL should do a skit about his sexual inadequacy.

Extending Marxist principles to the entitlementariat

Entitlementariat -- that's a new word to me. Although, entitlementarianism appears to have been around a while to identify the belief that some people were born with a legitimate ownership or entitlement to certain things.

Michael Bargo, Jr. has applied the concept to Karl Marx's principles in A Marxist View of the Democrats' Entitlement Economy.

Marx divided people into two classes: either bourgeoisie -- the people who owned the factories, or proletariat -- the people exploited by the bourgeoisie to work in the factories. Bargo says Marx omitted the class of people who would become dependent on government, the entitlementariats, the class that replaced the proletariat. And about the bourgeoisie, he continues:

The entitlementariat may have replaced the proletariat but then one can ask if Marx’s bourgeoisie has been replaced by the Democrat Bourgeoisie. The answer is “yes” since Democrats, not Republicans, have created the entitlementariat and they have complete power over them. And just by coincidence they use this power to transfer the wealth of the nation to themselves through campaign contributors from public sector unions and accumulation of personal wealth.

Everywhere Democrat bourgeoisie are in power, the middle-class workers are exploited and subjugated, while those who are in poverty are forced into the entitlementariat. ...

Up to now, since America is a wealthy country, it was temporarily able to afford to subsidize the entitlementariat. But no longer. The money needed to sustain the entitlementariat is obtained from national debt which will, in the long run, result in the oppression of the working class.

To paraphrase the brilliant Margaret Thatcher, the problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money.