Steam Valve

Recycling

The first time I heard the commercial on wcco, I thought I must be hearing things. Early onset Alzheimer's or something. But tonight, I listened closely. sure enough, we are being told to "recycle" our christmas, or as wcco calls them, "holiday" lights by giving them to the tv station. As though we would be otherwise throwing them out. Instead of putting them away for next year, just like mom used to do (isn't that recycling?)

Hey, I have another green idea. Recycle your money. Give it to me. I'll use it to buy led lights. To save on my energy bill.

These Chicago Liberals Love the Bushes Now

Now that they have our current CIC for comparison purposes, these Hillary supporters admit that they

"were wrong about the Bushes. . . and are deeply, deeply sorry for any jokes we told about them in the past, any bad thoughts we had about these good, good people."

Americans are waking up.

When is a Public Place Not a Public Place?

When Speaker Pelosi's staff says so. Most people assume that the public can normally enter public places, particularly when they are the venue for public announcements.  Not for Speaker Pelosi's announcement today, however.  You had to be invited.

Blast from the Past

Here's a cartoon from 1948 that turns out to be timely today.

Cap and Tax ad

New cap and trade advertisement:

Let's Have an Honest Debate

To have an honest debate about health care, you need to start with the truth.  The public option's not about choice and competition, it's about government controlled health care -- the opposite of choice and competition.  Watch this video to hear the truth directly from the mouths of those pushing it.

Why isn't the so-called mainstream media reporting on this?

How's this for Scary?

While some ponder what to wear for Halloween, here's something really scary:

Update: What about Lord Monckton's assertion that "In the next few weeks, unless you stop it, your president will sign your freedom, your democracy and your prosperity away forever, and neither you nor any subsequent government you may elect will have any power whatsoever to take it back again."

Pretty strong language. Is this an accurate legal statement?

It turns out that the US Supreme Court has never directly ruled on the issue of whether treaties are subject to the same constitutional limitations as statutes

It's difficult, if not impossible, to believe that the Founders went to the trouble to hammer out the federal constitution only to allow its guarantees of liberty to be undone with the stroke of a pen on a treaty with a foreign country.

But to say that treaties are subject to constitutional protections does not, of course, guarantee that our leaders will not agree to treaties with provisions that abrogate our constitutional rights, nor that our government will not enforce and facilitate the enforcement of such provisions.

Regardless of the precise formulation of any future US Supreme Court opinion on the issue of whether treaties must conform to the Constitution, the threat to our sovereignty is nonetheless real. As John at Powerline has recognized,

The creeping tendency to cede control over our domestic policies, including taxation, to international organizations and international treaty commitments represents an enormous threat to both our freedom and to our democracy.

The threat is real enough. We don't need to exaggerate it.

Watching PBS tonight

We watched Ken Burns' "The National Parks" tonight.  Interesting.

Did you know that capitalism funded the national parks?

We learned that John D. Rockefeller Jr. contributed millions to purchase the land bought for Smokey Mountains National park.  You know, money from that profit that came from Standard Oil. 

We heard about the people who used to live on the land that was taken for the Smokey Mountains National Park:  "Their hearts were broken and most of them left crying."

But before all of the land had been taken for the National Parks, the depression came and promises made to fund the parks were left unfunded.

Then came FDR, who allocated federal money to purchase park land.  "The first time the federal government spent its own money to buy land for national parks."

PBS' website described the program:

The National Parks: America's Best Idea is the story of an idea as uniquely American as the Declaration of Independence and just as radical: that the most special places in the nation should be preserved, not for royalty or the rich, but for everyone.

Except for those whose hearts were broken and left their homes crying.  And the taxpayers who pay for the land but will never visit it.

Don't get me wrong, the national parks are truly amazing places and it's good to preserve them.  What I find hypocritical is the position that some take that capitalism is destroying us even though it has enabled individual philanthropy that benefits many people; and that forcing people from their homes for the public good, although our forefathers might agree is "radical," might not agree that it is "uniquely American."

Need for Freedom

We need freedom.  Without it, we suffer.  How else can you explain why people are willing to risk their lives for freedom?

Unbelievably, the resistance persists in Iran, despite the iron fist of the government.  From twitter:

Nobody I know really has anything approaching confidence in the size of the demonstrations, but we will know very soon.  Estimates range as high as 3 million in Tehran.  The Mousavi/Karroubi people are of course hoping for a very big turnout, and they have taken measures (within their limited capacity) to protect their supporters against armed attack.  Everyone expects considerable violence from the regime.

It’s significant that top regime leaders, such as the Kurdish representative on the Assembly of Experts, are being gunned down.  This is obviously in response to the wave of arrests of family members of the opposition leaders.  Mrs. Mousavi’s brother, for example, has been in Evin Prison in Tehran for three months, and subjected to harsh torture.

Even abc reported on it:

One of the most repeated chants today: "Tanks, rape and torture have no effect anymore."

Harmony

Reading Dr. Zero's on-the-money post, The Death of the Individual, brought to mind the sickening Toyota Prius commercials that use humans as landscape.

The commercials display the pretty picture of "harmony between man, nature and machine," complete with a snappy little tune and cute kids.

Watching the video ("The Making of Harmony") where the commercial's creators congratulate themselves on their "epic" achievement, it's clear they have no clue that these commercials dehumanize people.  While these artistic folk give lip service to "human energy" and "humanity," their human actors portray docile slaves, dressed up as grass, flowers and clouds, swaying in the breeze created by a hybrid car.

It's a vision no doubt cherished by those who seek to have throngs of unquestioning people buy their sales pitch.  It's a picture of the alternate reality that liberals believe actually can exist, if only everyone altered their behavior in the right ways. 

It's a picture of an alternate reality where humans don't go to town halls and criticize their representatives, an alternate reality where nobody says anything bad about president Obama.  They call it "harmony."