I don't do political posts as much as I used to...

I found some time ago that I seem to resonate more with people for whom politics is not the most important thing in the world.  That it isn't the be-all and end-all of the human condition.

Those are the people I tend to write more for.  The ones who are like me: interested in ideas, not ideologies.

So maybe this post will come across as an outlier.  Or maybe not.  I'm only sharing what's been on my mind the past day or two.

I believe that President Biden pardoning his son Hunter for any and all crimes going back to 2014 is establishing a precedent that will come back to haunt us all.

I could say something about how much this demonstrates the wickedness Joe Biden, and even the Democratic Party in general.  In a sane world someone like Biden should never have been allowed to get as far as he did.  The man has a half century of corruption to his name.  A responsible political party would have not given him any path to power whatsoever.

Then again, the American people, from the citizens of Delaware on up, should have never trusted someone like Biden.

And now Biden has damaged the rule of law in this nation, perhaps irreparably.

This pardon will be seen as one of the worst examples of abuse of power in American history.  There is no excuse or rationale for it.  Biden could have put the best interest of the United States over his own.  It was his last chance to prove himself to have some semblance of being a statesman after all.  And he failed.  Miserably.

This pardon will forever hang around Joe Biden's neck, and will ever after be a mark of shame upon his entire family.

Now, I wonder what this portends for the future.  And some president yet to come who may feel so emboldened as to abuse the authority granted him.

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All that I will likely say about former President Donald Trump being indicted

 

Kindly allow me to boil down certain recent events into something that can be readily grasped. And I say this as someone who has never voted for Trump and likely never will.

The people applauding former President Donald Trump's indictments don't know what the (BLEEP) they are cheering for.

 

The United States is entering a dark place. We have already been poised to cross that line for a very long time. Now it is barreling headlong into the cave.

 

America is headed for grief.

 

And idiots are clapping and howling in delight as we do.

 

This is about larger matters than "we gotta get Trump". But the ones screaming loudest probably don't want to be bothered to be concerned for that.  What is befalling the former president right now is not the disease itself, but a symptom.  And I would be saying that regardless of who is being targeted.

 

I'm writing this, as I often do write, because I want nothing to do with what's to come. I've done my part and am still doing my part to encourage people to turn aside from their foolishness.  I saw what's coming even as a teenager and for more than thirty years, I've tried to get people to think about the disaster that will befall us.  Many of them haven't thought about it at all.

 

What is to transpire is not on my hands, but theirs.

 

Just my .02

 

 

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There is no possible contesting it: The IRS must be abolished

The Founding Fathers would "repent in Heaven" - as John Adams threatened those early Americans - if they could see the country they founded and what has come to light in the past few days.

If anybody can tender any argument whatsoever in defense of the Internal Revenue Service, I for one wish to hear what it is.

I am not a conspiracy theorist but hey, whaddya know: the conspiracy theorists were right all along.  The United States Federal Government really has been spying on the dissidents, the disaffected and those who want less intrusion into their private lives.  Add in how the government has also been found to have been spying on Associated Press journalists and then the whole mess about Benghazi (which cost lives, mind you) and only an idiot would deny that We The People are no longer in charge and that our own government has become a colossal, reprehensible beast.

Audits.  Threats.  Intimidation.  Favoritism toward political allies.  Cover-ups.  Seizing millions of private individuals' medical records.  Bullying a conservative education group to turn over the names of high school and college students.  Not even Billy Graham's ministry has proven safe from the IRS.

Our forefathers went to war with England for far, far less than this.  They bought our liberty with their blood.  Too many of them paid the price for a freedom they knew they would never know but wanted their children and their children's children to have.

We owe their memory better than this.

Yes, Mr. Adams.  The time has come to repent in Heaven.  The government which you and Jefferson and Franklin and Washington and Madison and Morris and Calhoun and the rest gave us, doesn't exist anymore.  We had a republic and we couldn't keep it.

And now we have a "government" of thugs with all the mentality of street hoodlums, or a Mafia family.  Barack Obama, Eric Holder, Janet Napolitano...

They may have been elected, but they are not leaders.  They aren't my leaders, anyway.  They are, at most, glorified gangsters.  Albeit gangsters with their very own Gestapo.  And lots and lots of bullets (which we still haven't been given an adequate explanation for).

The Founding Fathers never would have entertained the notion of a government agency empowered to intimidate and threaten and confiscate the property of the people of the United States... much less approved of one!

So here's how I see it as things stand tonight...

Either the Internal Revenue Service is abolished for good, obliterated totally and its entire structure laid waste.  Or, there can be no more confidence and trust that We The People can place with our own government.

This is our Runnymede, folks.  King Obama Lackland needs to be dragged kicking and screaming to the pasture and told in no uncertain terms "you've gone mad with power, John.  Now sign on the dotted line and get the hell out of our way."

Say what one will for all his faults, but at least King John had enough sense to comprehend what the barons were telling him.  But then again John didn't have mega-sized computer databases, airborne drones and a secret police at his beck and call.

Either the IRS goes, and with it all its power and authority (which there is considerable evidence it was never meant to have to begin with), or there is no longer any pretending that we are living in a free nation of the people, by the people, and for the people.  There will be only government for the sake of government.

That is not the country I want my children to grow up in.

And you shouldn't want it either.

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Bullying from Boy Scout big-wigs?! Executives manipulating data?! Gay policy under fire from on high?!

If true... IF this is at all true... this represents the most insane turn of events that I have ever seen coming out of the Boy Scouts of America in my thirty-some years affiliated with the organization.

The honor of a Boy Scout, painting by Norman Rockwell

First, I wish to direct your attention to an article by Austin Ruse on the website for Catholic publication Crisis Magazine.  Titled "Something Rotten in the Boy Scouts", Ruse raises a red flag about apparent manipulation of data at the Boy Scouts home office regarding the possible change of policy that would allow boys of homosexual orientation to have membership in the Boy Scouts.

Awright, let me be put it this way: the home office is ignoring the data from its own survey!  From the article:

There’s deception going on in the front office of the Boy Scouts. It includes deliberate misrepresentation of polling data, and threats to pack an upcoming meeting with anonymous and unqualified voters so that the Boy Scout policy on homosexuality gets forced on the majority of Scouts and parents who don’t want it.

The Boy Scouts are considering changing their policy of not allowing open homosexuality in either their Scout or leadership ranks. The policy has placed the Boy Scouts in the buzz saw of the zeitgeist and up until recently they have resisted. There are some weak-kneed leaders who want to throw over the policy and appear willing to violate the Scout Law to do it.

The Scout front office released the result of a national survey and “listening” process that purported to show that the Scouts—boys, parents, leaders and donors—favor a change in the policy. The Boy Scouts say the process reveals great changes in attitudes and that a majority of those at all levels of Scouting “tend to agree that youth should not be denied the benefits of Scouting.”

This was dutifully and even triumphantly reported in the mainstream press. The only problem is the news reports were wrong. And the news reports were wrong because the Boy Scouts misrepresented the results. One close observer of the Boy Scouts calls the poll “a pack of lies.”

The results of the BSA Membership Standards Survey:
A solid majority polled want NO change
to the current policy.

Do Scouting parents want to overhaul the policy and allow open homosexuality in the Scouts? The Executive Summary of the Poll says, “yes”, but the numbers say “no.” Fifty percent of Cub Scout parents support the current restrictive policy while 45% oppose it. A whopping 61% of Boy Scout parents support the current policy.

How did Boy Scout leadership get anywhere near the assertion that a majority of those in Scouting support homosexuality in Scouting? Part of what they did was what is known as a push-poll, a questionnaire designed not to elicit an accurate opinion but one designed to change opinions.

(snip)

What is going on here? Deception, that’s what. There is a small group on the Executive Committee of the Boy Scouts who want this policy to change. What they face is a membership that largely opposes the measure. So, they try to get their way by lying about a poll. But there is more deception than that...

The entire article cannot be recommended enough because Ruse's piece is by a wide margin among the best and most informative that I've found about the matter of homosexuality in the Boy Scouts.  Which, shouldn't be a matter at all.  The Boy Scouts are not meant to be a tool of politics.  Especially the politics of radical homosexuality.  The Girl Scouts of America let that happen to them and look at them now: a pitiful shadow of their former selves.  And one that has lost significant numbers of past and potential members to competing organizations for girls and young women.

But then comes this bit of information, which is even more full-tilt whacko.  A week ago I wrote about the Boy Scouts of America and how homosexuality is a concept which is in total conflict with the principles of the Scout Oath and the Scout Law.  In that post I mentioned OnMyHonor.net: a group of Scouts, Scouters and supporters who "are united in their support of Scouting's timeless values and their opposition to open homosexuality in the Scouts."  OnMyHonor.net has become a significant presence in this discussion, its leaders appearing on nationally televised news broadcasts in recent days.

So look at what was posted on the official OnMyHonor.net Facebook page a short while ago...

"Today, top BSA officals contacted OMH coalition partners to ask them to stand down! LOL. (not a joke)."

What the...?!?!? 

Is this right?  OnMyHonor.net has been told to cool it by the executives of the Boy Scouts of America's national office?

How the hell is what the BSA head office doing honorable?  HOW is it at all honest, "morally straight", or respecting the Scout Law?

It is not.  It is NOT!!

There is other information which in recent days I have been made aware of regarding next month's vote to keep or change the policy.  I haven't had enough corroboration about that information to confidently write about it but if there is any substance to those as well, in the mind of this blogger the executive are guilty of even more shameful acts, apparently for the cause of political correctness.

And if there is the least shred of truth to these assertions, if the Boy Scouts top executives are behaving in such a manner, then they should do the honorable thing and step down and leave the Boy Scouts of America.  They should make way for true leadership which is sincerely dedicated to the principles of Scouting which Lord Robert Baden-Powell knew were needed for young boys to become the responsible leaders that this world sorely needs.

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EVERYONE in U.S. under virtual surveillance by federal government (and why)

The government of the United States is not of the people, by the people and for the people. And it has not been for a very long time. Maybe not even in the memory of anyone alive today. We all know it. Unfortunately there seems to be damned little we can do about it. But having spent most of my life as a historian I also know that the established order can and eventually will be overthrown, no matter where or when. Either by outright revolt or crashing down under its own weight.

What is the "established order" controlling America? Steve McCann at American Thinker has a thorough understanding of it: an entrenched system of career politicians, sellout journalists whose lust for limelight eclipses love of truth, elitist academic types depending on the public treasury to justify their inflated sense of self-important, lobbyists and crony capitalists with a vested interest in making sure things stay the way they are, political hacks...

Corruption looks after itself.

That's why it should come as no surprise that according to a former top encryption analyst with the National Security Agency, the United States government - through the Federal Bureau of Investigation - is compiling the mother of all data mines: a vast repository containing EVERY e-mail, tweet, text message and God knows what else sent by American citizens. WITHOUT the Constitution-mandated search warrants for such a thing.

What surprises me however, is that if William Binney is telling is us true, then it represents a brazenness we haven't seen yet from our own government. It's been the understanding of many who have researched such things that for at least the past decade the National Security Agency has employed a system called ECHELON to monitor communications not just within America but throughout the world. Indeed, it's the international scope of ECHELON which has allowed the NSA to keep a listening ear on American at all: ECHELON keeps tabs on phone calls and electronic exchanges between the geographical United States and other countries... which, the government argues, does not require judge-approved warrants. A colossal using the letter of the law to defeat the spirit of the law. Not that that should be a surprise either...

But according to Mr. Binney, our government has taken it to a whole new level of abuse:

The FBI records the emails of nearly all US citizens, including members of congress, according to NSA whistleblower William Binney. In an interview with RT, he warned that the government can use this information against anyone.

Binney, one of the best mathematicians and code breakers in the history of the National Security Agency, resigned in 2001. He claimed he no longer wanted to be associated with alleged violations of the Constitution, such as how the FBI engages in widespread and pervasive surveillance through powerful devices called 'Naris.'

(snip)

"...what I’ve been basically saying for quite some time, is that the FBI has access to the data collected, which is basically the emails of virtually everybody in the country. And the FBI has access to it. All the congressional members are on the surveillance too, no one is excluded. They are all included. So, yes, this can happen to anyone. If they become a target for whatever reason – they are targeted by the government, the government can go in, or the FBI, or other agencies of the government, they can go into their database, pull all that data collected on them over the years, and we analyze it all. So, we have to actively analyze everything they’ve done for the last 10 years at least.

(snip)

"It’s everybody. The Naris device, if it takes in the entire line, so it takes in all the data. In fact they advertised they can process the lines at session rates, which means 10-gigabit lines. I forgot the name of the device (it’s not the Naris) – the other one does it at 10 gigabits. That’s why they're building Bluffdale [database facility], because they have to have more storage, because they can’t figure out what’s important, so they are just storing everything there. So, emails are going to be stored there in the future, but right now stored in different places around the country. But it is being collected – and the FBI has access to it."

A long read, but technically rich and altogether persuasive.

Why must our government believe it has to look upon We The People as potential enemies to be numbered, catalogued and monitored?

Because to those in power, the established order must be preserved at all cost. Because, again, corruption looks after itself.

Personally, I think Batman had the right idea...

Even the Caped Crusader "gets it" (click to enlarge)

Someday, perhaps this country will crash hard enough to knock the lechers and parasites off of their lofty perch. Perhaps then true leadership will come to serve the American people. There would be few better gestures of faith in the common citizen than to abolish the National Security Agency, reign-in the FBI and give the CIA a good hairy eyeball.

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One reader's tale of incompetence at the Internal Revenue Service

Way, waaaaay back when this blog was just getting started, I posted an essay titled "People who should be shot when the revolution comes". It was a tongue-in-cheek (kinda) piece about who in our society should be the first ones to be thrown against the wall if and when the citizens of this country finally get their fill and overthrow those who have gotten too uppity for anyone's good.

That this particular post should come to mind more than seven years after writing it, might clue y'all in on the kind of rage that I feel when I read the e-mail that one of The Knight Shift's viewers sent me recently.

I can't put it any more plain than this: the income tax is a means of economic and personal slavery. Think about how much time and energy gets wasted by millions of honest people in this country every year. Seriously folks: ever think about about what could be done productively, if all those billions of aggregate man-hours that we spend preparing tax returns were done away with?

Then there is how decent people do their best to adhere to a mountain of burdensome legislation that not even the finest tax attorneys in the land can agree on what it's supposed to mean. It's just not possible. I guarantee that if the government wanted, that it could find grounds for criminal indictment against every single taxpayer in America... only because it's impossible to meet each and every single condition of a tax code that is ridiculously volumnious!

And then there are the heartless bastitches of the Internal Revenue Service. Heck, let's name some names here: like Robert W. Nordlander, the IRS "special agent" who prosecuted a cold and cruel vendetta against ultra-marathoner Charlie Engle. Click on that link and just see if that story doesn't get your blood boiling.

I bet what I'm about to share will resonate with too many good people as well. It's what one individual submitted and asked me to pass along to this site's readers...

Waiting for me when I arrived home this evening was an "important" message from the I.R.S., saying it was "important" that I return their call by close of business today (which surprisingly to me was 8 p.m.). I was also asked to reference a "case number" when I returned the call.

After confirming the number appeared to be legitimate from the IRS web site I returned the call, despite my concerns (who wants to get harassed by the IRS?) and suspicions (that this was a scam.)

I decided in advance that I WAS NOT going to give out any personal information, so I bypassed the prompt asking me to enter my Social Security Number. After a 10-minute wait, a "Mrs. C***, ID# [deleted]" answered the phone. She asks for my SSN, and I inform her I'm not giving out any personal information. "Well, we're not going to get very far," she replied. I told her the message I received instructed me to give a case number and that I would give that, which I did.

Little good giving the case number did though, as "Mrs. C***" said she couldn't give me any information unless I gave her my name and "verified" that she was talking to the right person. I told her why not give me the name of the person your trying to reach, and I'll verify if I'm that person or not. No good.

I then mention that I find it peculiar that the IRS would try to contact me by phone rather than mail about a tax issue. (Let me say here that I've been contacted about errors on my federal tax returns before, and each of those few occasions, I was contacted by mail.)

Her explanation was that the IRS does try to make initial contact with individuals by mail based on the address that's on file with their tax return. Only afterwards, do they try to contact an individual by phone.

So I mention that the address they have for me is good because I haven't moved since I filed my taxes. And since since I haven't received a letter prior to this phone call, I must not be the person they're trying to reach. She says, "No! What did I say?"

I responded, "You said that the IRS tries to first contact individuals by mail based on the address filed with their tax return if there are issues. Then you try to contact them by phone." She says that's correct.

So, I ask again, since I HAVE NOT received anything in the mail from the IRS, may I deduce I'm not the individual this case number involves?

"Mrs C***" tells me no, that she can't give me any information unless I give her my personal info, accuses me of arguing with her, says she has other calls she needs to take and that I need to go my local tax office for information.

I could see this wasn't getting anywhere (and wasn't going to) so I ended the call. This drives me crazy and makes me mad on so many levels I gave them the case number they referenced on the message. That's all they asked me to give, and that's all I was going to give. I've "rendered unto Caesar" and filed my taxes on time every year.

Perhaps what made me the most angry was "Mrs. C***'s" comment that she "had other calls to take." Last time I checked, the federal taxes I pay (and we all pay) pay "Mrs. C***'s" salary. The least she could do was do the job I help pay her to do and be a little more helpful.

This is the kind of bureaucratic crap that was symptomatic of the Soviet Union. And the late Roman Empire.

I defy anyone to tell me that the above example is something that should be tolerated by a free people who enjoy the liberty that God has given us and that so many fought... and died... so that we might continue to have.

And I was woefully shortsighted when I came up with that list in 2004. Perhaps we should make room for soulless cretins like Mrs. C*** and Robert Nordlander. I can hear it now...

"But we were only following orders! We were ONLY FOLLOWING ORDERS!!"

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Grinch Obama's heart grows three sizes in a hurry as "Christmas Tree Tax" is called off

Late last night this blog joined numerous other outlets in reporting that the Obama Administration was set to impose a 15-cent tax on all freshly cut Christmas trees. You can read that initial post for more information, including some stuff I came across during a bit o' investigatin' (I'm still curious as to who the heck the people behind "Christmas Tree Promotion Now" are...)

Looks like Obama and gang got the message: the tax is being put on hold. But not without some snide commentary from the White House...

White House spokesman Matt Lehrich told ABC News that despite some media coverage, “I can tell you unequivocally that the Obama Administration is not taxing Christmas trees. What’s being talked about here is an industry group deciding to impose fees on itself to fund a promotional campaign, similar to how the dairy producers have created the ‘Got Milk?’ campaign.”

Nonetheless, the criticisms have apparently had an impact as the program is now being delayed.

I did not know until a comment left on my post last night that the "Got Milk?" campaign is funded with money taken from farmers without their consent by the Department of Agriculture. This "Christmas Tree Tax" would have done much the same. And in the case of the dairy farmers we're talking thousands of dollars extracted from their budgets each year. No doubt that the larger commercial milk producers can easily pay that. But as someone who grew up on a small family-run dairy farm and knows people who still operate small farms well... let's just say that five or six thousand dollars a year ain't chicken feed.

More and more I'm inclined to believe that this scheme to tax Christmas trees came in part - however large or small - from larger tree growers. Can't outright prove that mind ya, but even so: it would be good to know who the people are behind the Christmas Tree Promotion Now outfit.

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Why Republicans WON'T try to repeal health care overhaul

Michael D. Tanner of the Cato Institute has written an essay about the costs of Obamacare, which passed the House last night (and which I nearly reacted to on this blog with a blunt "We are sooo f-cked", before better angels of my nature prevailed).

In his article Tanner makes the following prediction, and I thought it was well worth making note of...

Republicans won't really try to repeal it. Republicans will run this fall on a promise to repeal this deeply unpopular bill, and will likely reap the political advantages of that promise. But in reality there is little chance of their following through. Even if Republicans were to take both houses of Congress, they would still face a presidential veto and a Democratic filibuster.

But more important, once an entitlement is in place, it becomes virtually impossible to take away. The fact that Republicans have been criticizing Obamacare for cutting Medicare shows that they are not really willing to take the heat for cutting people's benefits once they have them — no matter how unaffordable those benefits are. Paul Ryan put forth a serious plan for entitlement reform — and attracted just six co-sponsors at last count. Enough said.

Sadly, I suspect that Tanner will be proven correct about this. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if many Republicans are secretly happy that last night's health care "reform" passed and will soon be signed into law by President Obama.

Because the very massive public outcry against this legislation is a huge carrot that a lot - if not most - of the Republicans in or running for high office will be using to lure Americans into "vote for us!" Oh, I'm fairly sure (not positive, but have a gut feeling) that the Republicans will take control of the House and Senate come November. But if there is any effort to repeal Obamacare it will only be a token gesture. There will be some bills passed in Congress, and Obama will veto them all (I doubt there'll be a supermajority in Congress to override that). And then we won't hear anything about it again because the Republicans in general will boo-hoo about "it's too hard for us to fight the veto". And of course they will use that to justify that we the people merely need to elect more Republicans.

And nothing will change.

Fercryingoutloud, the GOP had the White House and both houses of Congress for six years. Did government decrease in size at all during that period?! Hell no it didn't! On the Republicans' watch it increased more than any other time in living memory, until last night. If anyone seriously believes that things will be any different the next time the Republicans "have the power", I've some oceanfront property in Nebraska to sell.

The Republicans have been promising to revoke the "right" to abortion for three and a half decades. They haven't done it yet. I'm not entertaining any optimism that they will be more rigorous in ridding us of this latest embiggening of big government.

So let me wrap this up by writing what I perhaps should have said last night, because there are times when a writer has done his absolute best to articulate his sentiments to the fullest but can sincerely go no further without violating the mores of polite society...

We are sooooo fucked.

God help us.

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Ohio town's traffic cameras send out 10,000 tickets in 1 month

If you can help it, I'd consider the town of Heath, Ohio to be a place to steer well clear of. That personal assessment comes after word that it's newly-installed traffic-enforcement cameras have sent out more than 10,000 tickets after just four weeks of operation. With the tickets being $100, after camera provider Redflex gets its cut that's $83,000 that the city government would put into its coffers.

As you can imagine (and you can see it in the comments of the above-linked article) quite a number of folks are honked-off about this. I would be too. Traffic cameras, be they for speed or at stop-light intersections, are not about enforcing laws for sake of safety. They are, first and foremost, a "revenue enhancing" scheme.

And these cameras are inherently not constitutional. We are supposed to have the right to face our accuser in a court of law, regardless of how small the offense.

How does one do that when the accuser is a robot?

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About the "climate" bill that just passed the U.S. House...

I don't mind saying this aloud at all:

Any so-called "legislator" who votes on a bill WITHOUT READING THE FRICKIN' THING needs to be dragged out into the street and shot.

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Is Obama Admin punishing Chrysler dealers who donated to Republicans?

Longtime readers of this blog know without me having to remind anyone: party allegiance doesn't exist in this dojo. Personally I'd rather see a country full of citizens who are beholden to no political parties at all. And I like to think that one of the end characteristics of that drastic un-affiliation is that this blog and its peculiar proprietor are equally hard on both Democrats and Republicans.

But I also believe absolutely in the right to expression, whether in speech or belonging to the party of one's choice, if one chooses to belong to one at all. I just try to do my best to encourage people to think about it before they commit to something, but that's beside the point of this post...

WorldNetDaily was the first to report that there is apparently a disturbing pattern among the Chrysler dealerships that have been targeted for closure as part of the company's bailout by the federal government. One-fourth of its dealerships will be shut down... but as WorldNetDaily discovered, 90% of those to be closed were owned by donors of "substantial sums" to Republican candidates.

I'm not going to automatically jump on the "bash Obama" bandwagon on this, 'cuz... well... 'cuz if something like this was politically motivated it seemed too brazen. Then I started hearing about how many of the dealerships scheduled for closing had been some of the most profitable to the company.

And then I discovered that one group that donated heavily to the Democratic Party was getting to keep SIX Chrysler dealerships that it owned while its local competitors who gave to GOP candidates are getting shuttered.

Could Obama's White House be so brazen?

I'm starting to now think... yeah, it could.

This not only merits some formal investigation, it demands it. Like, congressional hearings with everyone involved in this hauled before the lights and cameras. If for no other reason than to apply the scrutiny this incongruity calls for and clear the air one way or another.

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Obama forces out General Motors CEO

I said Friday afternoon that I was leaving the blog until Monday. Anytime I take a respite, I'm serious about it. And it's gonna take something really damned bad to drag me back here.

If this ain't bad enough, then I sure as hell don't know what is...

President Barack Obama has effectively FIRED Rick Wagoner, the CEO of General Motors.

What this means is that the United States federal government has pretty much nationalized and taken over a private company. It's likely not going to be called that officially, but the policy is still the same.

Has a President of the United States ever done anything like this, in the history of this country? Certainly not in recent memory. The closest I can think of is what happened between Ronald Reagan and the air traffic controllers' union... but not Reagan or any other President in living recollection ever seized enough control of a company to call the shots about who it hires.

Scary stuff.

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Lobbyist admits getting access to Bush and officials for donations

Y'know, it's funny: I remember when Bill Clinton was President, and access to him and his staff was being "sold" in exchange for donations. It was some of the worst corruption of the highest office in the land, and a lot of us were right to have been angered by it.

So then here comes George W. Bush, and we were told that he would "clean house" and that this sort of thing would never happen in his "ethical" administration...

...only to find out that the Bush Administration is involved with the same thing. Long story short: if you donate enough to the George W. Bush Presidential Library, you get access to Dick Cheney and other Bush officials, and possibly even Bush himself.

This is the kind of thing that makes me believe that the only thing that makes the current White House administration more upstanding than the previous one, is that so far as we know George W. Bush has kept the Oval Office sink clean. But everything else is dirtier than it ever was under the Clintons!

That this is money for Bush's library affirms what I realized a long time ago: the politics of high office has nothing to do with serving the people and everything to do with "securing one's legacy". It seems that only the most narcissistic are drawn to positions like Senator and President, and the game is rigged too much in their favor: witness our current crop of "front runners".

This country isn't gonna get cleaned up until regular Americans (a) finally get wise to the con game the major parties and the mainstream press is pulling on 'em, and (b) become so honked-off that they toss these bastitches out of office hard on their asses and begin to take charge on their own. Hey, I've run for office before. It's not so hard to do :-)

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Eating their young: Anti-Paul hijinks demonstrating GOP corruption

Anyone left who still believes that we have to "work within the system" to effect change in this country had better read this and think real hard about what they're advocating.

Because the undeniable truth is: the system no longer works. The system has not worked in a long time. The system is hopelessly broken. We're just now becoming able to see how bad the damage is.

And anyone who still believes we must abide by the status quo and stay within the confines of the system is... well, an idiot.

The status of the Republican Party of the United States isn't much different from that of the Communist Party of China, when you think about it. Both are controlled by hardliner old guards who won't bend and will crush like a bug any new blood that tries to bring fresh ideas to the scene. I'm not talking about Republicans as a whole mind you: I'm talking about the Republican National Committee and too many of the individual states' party leaders. Witness, f'rinstance, the lengths of chicanery they've gone to in order to shut out Ron Paul: the one sincere believer of Constitutional rule of law who's run as a candidate from that party.

At the statewide convention of the Republican Party in Nevada yesterday, the Ron Paul delegates were set to win control in a super-majority of votes. And then GOP officials actually SHUT DOWN their own convention to keep that from happening. As of this morning Nevada Republicans don't have delegates to send to the national convention. All because their party bosses insist on sending pro-John McCain delegates.

I'm especially disgusted at what one McCain shill is quoted as saying in that story...

"But at the end of the day, part of the job of being a national delegate is to do what is best for the party in November. And that means supporting the party’s nominee."

Just drag everyone kicking and screaming into the smoke-filled room and get it over with already, why don't ya?

In addition to the above report by the Reno Gazette-Journal, you can also read a firsthand report by a party member who was there.

Here's a delegate to the convention, who posted a YouTube video about what happened yesterday...

And then I received an e-mail from a friend who said that the same thing has been happening here in North Carolina as well...

The same thing happened at the NC 2nd District. Only they allowed counties to choose the Delegates and when the Ron Paul folks called for a point of order (40 of them) someone else made a motion to dismiss and the chair called it.

My friend further commented that "It amazes me that the GOP will eat their young just because they don't agree with them."

This is the "democracy" that we're trying to convince other countries is a good thing that they should adopt?

And how in the Hell does anyone even remotely like John McCain become the anointed candidate of the supposedly "conservative" Republican Party? More to the point: Why should anyone of good conscience feel obligated, in any way, to support McCain? Is personal conscience the price that must be paid for ultimate loyalty to a political machine?

Has America finally arrived at that terrible line where both rule of law and private character are made sacrifice for sake of power?

Because if so, then America is lost already.

Here's what I think: the Republican rank-and-file, the "grassroots", is finally waking up to what it's own leadership has been doing to it for going on decades now. And that's the last thing the GOP leadership wants. Their control is now more threatened than ever before. And it's become patently obvious that the Republican National Committee and other GOP elites actively despise the grassroots Republicans.

And now it's been laid bare before everyone.

It wouldn't surprise me if this election year is the final one for the Republican Party as a viable political force in this country. The rift between the sincere believers in limited government and the "blue blood" party management that's exploiting them threatens to become the greatest political divorce in this country's modern memory.

And I can't help but think that maybe that will be a good thing. Something as inherently corrupt as the two major parties should be let to collapse and fall into ruins. The Republican leadership should have been thankful for Ron Paul, and for the wisdom and fresh perspective he brought with him. Instead it conspired to shut him down at every conceivable turn.

Now it's going to have to pay the price. If Clinton or Obama win the White House, the GOP's honchos will have no one to blame but themselves.

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Fred Reed laments the "New Improved America"

Fred Reed - master of the blunt truth and art of curmudgeonry - is spot-on as usual with his latest analysis of what is amiss in this country...

Something is wrong with the United States. I think most of us have noticed it. There is a mortal rot in the country, made manifest by many little rots that are hard to integrate mentally yet are, I think, somehow related. The change is grave, accelerating, probably irreversible, and fascinating. Things are not as they were...

...The Constitution really is going away, or has gone. It never did work as well as it should have, but few things human ever do. Habeas corpus is dead, right to an attorney, congressional right to declare war—it's not even worth listing the list. Joe iPod in the burbs doesn't care because it doesn’t affect him, yet. Git them Hay-rabs, ain't no draft, plenty sushi. Urg.

Hit the link above for more.

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You can't work unless Homeland Security approves you

My good friend Marc alerted me to this. Pay real close attention, boyz and goylz...

Soon you will need approval from the Department of Homeland Security in order to hold a job.

Do you understand what that means?

First of all, these are the people who maintain - and constantly bungle - the "No Fly List". Now they are going to do the same thing with your work eligibility.

But worse than that: this is something straight out of the Soviet Union. Hell, let's call a spade a spade and say that this is something out of Nazi Germany. Sure was hard to find work there unless you proved that you weren't Jewish, wasn't it? Lord only knows what our government will come up with that would disqualify someone from employment.

And what's to keep "them" from stopping there? If we can have No Fly Lists and No Work Lists - and they've already got No Gun Lists well in the works - then why not No Marry Lists and No Hospital Care Lists and No Food Lists...?

When does it stop?

More to the point: when do we stop them?

A little over three years ago I wrote "People Who Should Be Shot When the Revolution Comes". Maybe it's time to update that directory...

EDIT 7:16 p.m. EST: Yes, I know that this was hidden away in the "immigration reform" bill. But there is nothing about stemming the flow of illegals into this country that possibly necessitates putting the damned Department of Homeland Security in charge of whether or not anyone can work.

If that doesn't pop a huge red flag, then I don't know what will.

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Legalized dictatorship: Bush clears way for unprecedented seizure of power

George W. Bush is the worst President in American history. As I've said many times before: it will be decades before we have completely cleaned up the mess that this evil man and his cronies have done to this country.

Some will claim that for me to say that is not becoming a true Christian. If only Germany had been inundated with such insincere Christians in the years leading up to 1938.

The fact that I am probably in a government database somewhere as a "dissident" and a "troublemaker" for what I've posted here should be enough to make anyone pause.

Here's the story from Jerome Corsi at WorldNetDaily. This is certainly the first I'm hearing about this...

Bush makes power grab

Posted: May 23, 2007
1:00 a.m. Eastern

President Bush, without so much as issuing a press statement, on May 9 signed a directive that granted near dictatorial powers to the office of the president in the event of a national emergency declared by the president.

The "National Security and Homeland Security Presidential Directive," with the dual designation of NSPD-51, as a National Security Presidential Directive, and HSPD-20, as a Homeland Security Presidential Directive, establishes under the office of president a new National Continuity Coordinator.

That job, as the document describes, is to make plans for "National Essential Functions" of all federal, state, local, territorial, and tribal governments, as well as private sector organizations to continue functioning under the president's directives in the event of a national emergency.

The directive loosely defines "catastrophic emergency" as "any incident, regardless of location, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the U.S. population, infrastructure, environment, economy, or government functions."

WND Exclusive Commentary Bush makes power grab
Posted: May 23, 2007
1:00 a.m. Eastern

President Bush, without so much as issuing a press statement, on May 9 signed a directive that granted near dictatorial powers to the office of the president in the event of a national emergency declared by the president.

The "National Security and Homeland Security Presidential Directive," with the dual designation of NSPD-51, as a National Security Presidential Directive, and HSPD-20, as a Homeland Security Presidential Directive, establishes under the office of president a new National Continuity Coordinator.

That job, as the document describes, is to make plans for "National Essential Functions" of all federal, state, local, territorial, and tribal governments, as well as private sector organizations to continue functioning under the president's directives in the event of a national emergency.

The directive loosely defines "catastrophic emergency" as "any incident, regardless of location, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the U.S. population, infrastructure, environment, economy, or government functions."

When the president determines a catastrophic emergency has occurred, the president can take over all government functions and direct all private sector activities to ensure we will emerge from the emergency with an "enduring constitutional government."

Translated into layman's terms, when the president determines a national emergency has occurred, the president can declare to the office of the presidency powers usually assumed by dictators to direct any and all government and business activities until the emergency is declared over.

Ironically, the directive sees no contradiction in the assumption of dictatorial powers by the president with the goal of maintaining constitutional continuity through an emergency...

All it takes is for President Bush to declare a "national emergency", and he goes from being The Decider to being The Dictator.

Think it can't happen here?

Is anyone willing to bet good money with me that it won't?

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Carter was the most ineffective, but Bush IS the worst ever

You've probably heard already about former U.S. President Jimmy Carter calling George W. Bush "the worst in history".

Y'know, Carter really was the most inept and ineffective president America has had in the past 50 years. His entire presidency could well be summed-up by the word "malaise".

But even more than Carter, the worst was easily Lyndon B. Johnson: a man who's damage to this country has still yet to be fully calculated. Where Johnson trumped Carter was having the most corrupt presidency up 'til his time. Say what you will of Carter: I've never thought that he did have anything but the best of intentions at heart, however much he bungled those intentions. Barry Goldwater was right: Carter should have kept his head down once he was out of office, and he would have gone down in the history books as one of the better ones. Too bad Carter didn't listen. But there was never anything redeemable about Lyndon Johnson's term: the man bloated government and firmly put the military-industrial complex in a position to exploit the taxpayers to its hearts content... to say nothing of the quagmire that was Vietnam.

That's how I've long seen it: Lyndon Johnson as the worst in American history, followed by Carter... who I was reluctant to peg as a bad one but I really had no choice.

Then along comes George W. Bush.

I don't know if America will ever recover from the damage that this very evil man has inflicted upon her. Carter and Johnson (and Clinton for that matter) combined could not have been as detrimental to this country as Bush II has been.

Let's look at the accomplishments of The Great Decider...

- Biggest growth of government in American history

- Most spending in American history

- Almost thirty-five hundred American soldiers and other service personnel and countless thousands of civilians dead in the most meaningless, ill-conceived conflict the United States has ever engaged in (this figure only counts those mortally wounded in Iraq, not those who were injured and died elsewhere)

- The PATRIOT Act

- Destruction of Habeas Corpus

- Nominating Harriet Miers for Supreme Court

- No Child Left Behind

- Cutting pay and supplies to American military personnel

- Rampant cronyism that puts the Ulysses Grant administration to shame

- Most secretive administration in American history (EVERYTHING can be made a "classified top secret" on Bush's watch)

- Active suppression of dissidents and others who disagree with him

- "Free-speech zones"

- "No-bid" contracts given to companies like Halliburton... which clearly constitute a "conflict of interest" considering their connections to Vice President Cheney and others

- Presided over loss of most American jobs since the Great Depression

- The New Freedoms Initiative, which mandates mental health screening and possible medication - against parents wishes - for every schoolchild in America (I say again: I will shoot the bastard that tries to medicate my child against my will)

- Lying about the "weapons of mass destruction" in Iraq... and still trying to cover up that lie

- Domestic spying on Americans without warrants

- F***ING-UP THE BORDERS BY ALLOWING MILLIONS OF ILLEGALS TO STAMPEDE INTO AMERICA

- "Signing statements" intended to circumvent Congress and the Constitution

- The Department of Homeland Security (that one sounded Nazi from the start)

- Giving communist China a greater foothold on the American economy than ever before (and now we're paying for it: see the recent mess with poisoned pet food)

I decided to end there, if for no other reason than because I would be up all night adding to this list and still wouldn't have anything nearly a comprehensive a list as it could be.

George W. Bush is the worst President in American history... and no thin veneer of feigned Christianity is going to make it any better.

Yes, by all means let's condemn Carter for meandering mess he spun America into during his four years in office. But if we are going to be fair about it, we'd darn well better be able to face up to the fact that the current president has been far, far worse.

I never thought I'd live to see the day that somebody would outdo Carter and Johnson... and even Clinton. But, there ya go. Heck, I've heard from too many people that compared to George W. Bush, Bill Clinton was a saint. Go figure...

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Cop uses confiscated weed in brownies, then calls 911: "I think we're dead"

Thanks to Mark Childrey for sending this along...

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