Thoughts On A Sunday

We celebrated Old Home Day in our little town yesterday, a gathering of present and past residents of the town, year round and seasonal.

Yours truly participated starting with the Old Home Day parade in the morning through the opening ceremony at noon, and the on to they various events, booths, foodstuffs, and other sundries until about 3PM.

The WP Mom and the older WP sister also participated, handling jewelry sales at the local church's fair which coincides with Old Home Day.

I did miss the fireworks last evening, getting involved with something at home and losing track of time. I realized I has missed them when I heard the first salvos echoing off of the surrounding hills.
I have to say I thought there were more people attending this year if the crowd lining the streets during the parade were any indication.

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Gee, is Obama going to do for 401(k) retirement accounts what he's done for health care? It certainly seems that way as it appears he's having the Department of Labor working towards nationalizing them in order to 'punish' retirement plan service providers despite court rulings that ban the government from doing just that.

Then again, Obama has never worried about little things like laws, courts, or the Constitution, nor have the heads of federal agencies under his watch.

Can you say “crony capitalism”?

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You know the DNC is either totally out of touch or seriously deranged after it wrote a “slobbering letter to Obama, supporting his Iran deal.”

As more Democrats in the House and Senate are backing away from this awful deal, the DNC wants to go forward with it, allowing an avowed enemy of the US to attain nuclear weapons we know they will use as soon as it becomes advantageous for them to do so.

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What she said.

No, cupcake, there is no right to not be offended.

I swear… our society has become this bizarre caricature of itself, where everyone is searching for something to be outraged about, anything that will allow them to whine and claim racism… or offense… or microaggression… or some other perceived offense.

Somehow these fragile snowflakes believe that only they have rights and that their actions against those who offend them may actually offend the people they feel offended by. I think they call that being a spoiled brat. Too bad no one has had the balls to call them on it and show them just how spoiled and weak they really are.

Welcome to the real world.

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By way of Glenn Reynolds comes an offshoot of the problem above, with the University of Tennessee telling staff and students to stop using 'he' and 'she' and to use gender-neutral pronouns instead.

These people have got to stop pounding back “the PC Kool-Aid” and get an effin' clue.

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I find this to be an intriguing question.

Is it time to bring back the battleship?

While the days of battleships slugging it out against each other pretty much ended for good in WWII, particularly with the advent of the aircraft carrier, there are some advantages of having capital ships that can withstand heavy weapons fire. One of those advantages is the ability carry more weapons and systems than many of the existing ships.

Big ships with heavy armor are unlikely to solve the A2/AD [anti-access/area-denial] dilemma.  However, big ships with effective systems of defense components, combined with a large number of extremely lethal offensive systems, can go a long way toward defeating a system of anti-access systems. In this sense, the “battleship” could return, although it will play a role more like a classic monitor (intended to fight against shore-based systems) than a line-of-battle-ship. And these new “battleships” will survive less because of their ability to absorb hits, than to avoid hits altogether.

I remember when a number of people inside the Beltway criticized Ronald Reagan when he ordered the reactivation and upgrading of the four Iowa class battleships – the Iowa, Missouri, New Jersey, and Wisconsin – not too long after the Falkland Islands war between Argentina and Great Britain. The argument was that modern anti-ship missiles would make short work of battleships, particular after seeing what Argentina's Exocet missiles did to the HMS Sheffield and a few other British Navy ships. But those ships were tin cans compared to the Iowa class ships which had 18 inches of belt armor, double hulls, and were designed to go up against the 18 inch guns of the Japanese Yamato class battleships and survive. But the anti-ship missiles didn't have the penetrating power of 18 inch armor piercing rounds. It was more likely a deckhand would be sent out with a broom to sweep the missile debris off the deck after it bounced off the armor plating. While newer missile systems carry more punch and can perform so-called 'pop-up' terminal maneuvers to try and penetrate through decks rather than hull plating, properly designed armor can help minimize damage from this kind of hit.

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It appears Progressives have a different definition of the word “sustainable” that in no way resembles the one in our copy of Webster's. In this case, “sustainable” means “to greatly increase the cost of”, used as a means of destroying our previous health care system by making it so expensive that no one can afford it. They will, of course, then replace with a slightly less expensive system that provides no actual care, forces health care professionals out of health care, and end up with resembling the National Health Service of Great Britain which provides neither health or service.

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And that's the news from Lake Winnipesaukee, where summer is quickly winding down, schools have reopened, but where summer camps and cottages are still open.

A New Initiative

I have to admit that I spent some time thinking about this, wondering if it were just comedy or whether it might actually work. The more I pondered the issue the more I came to believe it just might work. Just what is “it”?

Call it the “Some Asshole Initiative.”

What is the initiative? To paraphrase the source (linked above), it is means by which we diminish, if not eliminate glorifying someone when they kill a bunch of people. This makes sense considering what we've seen after mass shootings – the shooter's name on every TV, radio, and other media outlet. The schmuck becomes a notorious celebrity, with the level of that celebrity being dependent upon how many people he/she snuffed before being stopped. (I am making sure we don't ignore the female contingent of the human race, seeing as they make up over 50% of the population.) The name the media blasts across the airwaves almost always includes the middle name even if no one had ever used it before this miscreant committed their crime. They get their so-called 15 minutes of fame even if it lasts for much more than 15 minutes.

So how does this initiative work? It's simple, really.

Al we do is make sure none of these jokers are ever mentioned by name in the media. We strip them of their identity and hence their infamy because no one will really know who committed the heinous crime until after all the brouhaha has faded away. He/she will only be referred to as “some asshole.” There will be no mention of their name, gender, race, religious or political affiliation, national origin, or favorite sports team (if any). There would be no mention of the miscreant's family, upbringing, hometown, no pictures, no interview with friends or family.

Let's use a recent event to illustrate how this would work, in this case the killing of two TV journalists on live TV. It would go something like this:

Viewers of WDBJ, a small CBS affiliate in Moneta, Virginia, watched in horror this morning as Vester Lee Flanigan II some asshole shot dead 24-year-old reporter Alison Parker and cameraman Adam Ward, 27, on live TV as the two were filming a light-hearted segment at 6:45am.

After carrying out the shocking on-air execution, Flanigan the asshole rented a car at the airport and then started driving east.

Police finally cornered Flanigan the asshole just before noon, about three hours northeast, in Fauquier County, Virginia, but he refused to stop and sped away from troopers.

Flanigan The asshole then crashed the car off the road and when police surrounded the vehicle, they found him suffering from a life-threatening gunshot wound.

See? Isn't that much better? No one would know who he was until after everything had calmed down a few days later. There would be no hand wringing over the murdering wacko nutcase. Any focus would be on the victims and the perpetrator would be relegated to anonymity until well after the media frenzy faded away, just as it should be.

Thoughts On A Sunday

The heat has left us, though the humidity remains here in the Lakes Region. Not that I'm complaining. All I have to do is remember what it was like here last January and any thought of complaining about the summer weather disappears.

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There was a crisis here at The Manse last night, that being BeezleBub and Horse Girl having decided to go their separate ways. He tried to put up a good front, but it was evident he was devastated by it even though both had seen this coming for some time.

At best all the missus and I can do is be there for him. There are no words that will make the heartache go away. In the end, this is something he has to work through.

I have never felt so useless as a parent knowing there's nothing either Deb or I can do to help him feel better. I also won't waste his time with lame words of advice that will give no comfort.

Sometimes is sucks growing up.

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The Denver City Council is flexing its politically correct muscle, trying to decide if they can get away with banning Chik-fil-A from Denver International Airport because of the corporation's stand for traditional marriage.

Who's being discriminatory now? It sure as heck isn't Chick-fil-A.

If they're willing to ban one business because it disagrees with the City Council's philosophies, how long before they go after other businesses because they don't conform with the Council's bigoted and close-minded ideology?

Maybe it's time to start boycotting Denver until the self-righteous members of the Council are voted out of office. The last thing this country needs is yet another Portlandia.

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Actress Ellen Page found out the hard way she should not get involved in a debate with Ted Cruz as he totally pwned her on the subject of gay rights, religious freedom, and the fact she wants the government to force people to do business that goes against their religious beliefs. That Cruz was the Princeton Debate Champion during his student years certainly gave him the edge. It also didn't help that Ms. Page was woefully unprepared and delusional about what's important.

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David Starr reminds us that any form of electronic transaction, transmission, or record is inherently not secure.

There's something to be said for paying cash and retaining paper records. And never ever send anything classified or containing important personal information by e-mail.

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I have to agree with The News Junkie on this matter: Why do we fight forest fires?

Have you wondered why the brush and forest fires have been so bad out west recently? Could it be because there were decades of dry fuel waiting to be ignited because we foolishly let it build up rather than letting it burn every few years or so? With so much fuel and the dry conditions, much of the forest and brush land will never recover and the forests won't regenerate. The fires burned so hot that the normally fire-resistant trees and/or seeds didn't survive, meaning there's nothing left to revive the forests once the fires are out. A lot of it will end up becoming prairie, grasslands, and scrub lands.

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I find it interesting that people (including the WP Brother-In-Law) keep hammering the Koch Brothers for funding political campaigns but there's not a peep out of those same people decrying the much larger contributions made by Tom Steyer and George Soros that dwarf those made by the Koch's.

Once they start doing that I might start listening to their complaints. Otherwise they're just hypocrites and I won't waste my time listening to them.

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Oil prices are still dropping and the question is whether it's the excess supply or the plunging demand that's causing it. The answer is it's both, and it's expected to get worse.

While that will mean lower prices at the pump and for heating oil and propane, it also signals the world's economies are softening. While the US has 'officially' been out of its recession since 2009, in reality it lingered on and on and the economy is still weak. That has negatively affected oil demand even as domestic reserves have skyrocketed.

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And that's the news from Lake Winnipesaukee, where the summerfolk are trying to jam in one last week of summer vacation before school starts, the seasonal businesses are trying to finish off the summer in the black, and where yet another Monday has arrived too soon.

By way of Facebook:

Yes. Yes we are....

How To Shoot Like A Marine Sniper

If you're looking to improve your shooting skills, particularly with a long gun, the let the Marines show you how to shoot like a Marine sniper.

Shooting with the precision and accuracy of a Marine is a delicate and carefully honed skill. Sporting an M40A5 long range precision sniper rifle, Sgt. Alex Kesler, a scout sniper with 3rd Battalion, 3rd Marine Regiment, explains the steps involved in mastering this skull accurately and effectively in a new YouTube video for III Marine Expeditionary Force. Here’s how to shoot a sniper rifle like a Marine.

Very cool! I hope to give it a try soon.

Who Are The Racists?

Here's another great video from Prager University asking one of the important question: Who are the racists: Conservatives or Liberals?


Much of the racism practiced by the guilt-ridden white liberals is “soft racism” like that portrayed in the video above. They believe minorities can't make it without a helping hand, either theirs or others coerced into 'helping'. However the best thing any of us can do for the “poor incapable minorities” is to get out of their way and let them do it themselves because they are capable.

As has happened again and again since the creation of the Great Society programs in 1965, too often that so-called 'helping hand' holds them back rather than lifting them up. The best thing those guilt-ridden white liberals can do is stop 'helping' because, in the end, they aren't helping anything. They're just trying to lessen their self-deluded guilt by doing something, even if it's the wrong something and makes things worse in the end.

A Commencement Speech That Should Have Been Given

The following is what college graduates should have heard during their commencement speeches last June. Too bad so many of them are learning the lesson of what it takes to live in the real world the hard way.


Of course I expect that if someone ever tried to give such a commencement speech too many of the graduating students would either plug their ears and scream “I'm not listening!” over and over again, or they would swoon and faint away.

Poor fragile snowflakes!

The group that really needs to hear this are the high school students looking to attend college next year.

Thoughts On A Sunday

A fortuitous event allowed Deb, BeezleBub and I to attend Bob Marley's Campapalooza show over at out local concert venue last night. Deb was a little reluctant to go, but once there she had a wonderful time, as did BeezleBub and I.

If you're looking for good, solid New England Yankee humor, then Bob Marley ios one fellow that can provide it.

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This weekend also brought us the annual Timberman Triathlon, a qualifier for the Iron Man Triathlon in Hawaii. This has grown every year since its inception in 2000 and now brings in a large numbers of international competitors. The course takes the competitors through four towns, with the swimming portion of the race plying through 1.2 miles along the shore of Lake Winnipesaukee.

The one downside: it ties up traffic through or little town for a few hours on each day of the weekend. If that's the worst that can be said about it, that's not bad.

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Eric the Viking reports to us that Pink Floyd is now officially broken up.

As Eric says, “They realized they suck without Roger Waters.”

Indeed.

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Glenn Reynolds links to an article that quotes actor John Rhys-Davies talking about the West's reluctance to address Islamic extremism, citing its 'extraordinary silence' over the threat.

Writes Glenn, “He’s right, but our ruling class doesn’t like judgment, because they know how they’d be judged by those they rule if that were permitted.”

Indeed...again.

Read. The. Whole. Thing.

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Who lost Iraq? Obama lost Iraq.

What's worse is that he did it in order to look good in the polls. The Iraqi people are paying the price for our Narcissist-in-Chief's need to be adored by his followers. We had things well in hand and could have helped maintain the cohesion of Iraq, but then Obama abandoned Iraq, painting it as a triumph because “he brought the troops home.” No amount of spin is going to be able to make Iraq look like a success...except for ISIS.

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The war on men on campus, also known as the “campus rape crisis” has been backfiring on college after college, with male students 'convicted' by the kangaroo courts mandated by the Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights filing and winning lawsuits against the colleges who have done so and expelled them. That hasn't stopped them from continuing the blatantly unconstitutional practice from continuing, but it's costing them in time, money, and their reputations.

Already some male students have returned to campuses from which they were expelled, the latest being a student a court ordered USC to allow to return to campus after the court found USC's disciplinary process was “lacking in due process, with no hearing, no right to counsel, no rules of evidence, no presumption of innocence, no right to possess copies of witness statements and evidence and no right to confront witnesses against him.”

A male student would have more rights if he murdered someone than if someone with whom he had consensual relations decided she regretted the sex and later accused her paramour of sexual assault.

That's the other thing that has me scratching my head. How is a sexual encounter that one may come to regret some time in the future been redefined to equate to rape, a violent crime?

As far as I'm concerned these colleges haven't received nearly the abuse they deserve in regards to these matters, but I have a feeling they will soon.

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Neo-neocon digs into the facts about Carly Fiorina and finds she's been ahead of The Donald on a number of issues, including illegal immigration.

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On more than one occasion I've read about visiting Europeans commenting upon our ubiquitous 'over use' of air conditioning. More than a few have reminded them that the average summertime temperatures in the US are generally much higher than those seen in most European countries along with much higher humidity.

I heard a pair of young British women I ran across today while out grocery shopping with my wife commenting upon the 'oppressive heat and humidity' here today and what a blessing it was to have the air conditioning in the supermarket. I had to respond, asking if they really thought it was all that bad outside (It was about 85ºF with a dew point of 67ºF, meaning it was quite humid.) They both said they thought it was dreadful and I had to shake my head. I guess we New England Yankees are used to summer weather like we experienced today so A/C isn't quite as necessary as others might think.

It's a good thing these two lovely ladies weren't down in Florida right about now.

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And that's the news from Lake Winnipesaukee, where the beaches have been full, the lake has been busy with lots of boats, and where the ice cream stand have been doing a booming business.

Where Obama's Clean Power Plan Will Lead Us

Reading the various reports about Obama's Clean Power Plan and the continuing war against the American economy by Obama and the rogue EPA, one has to wonder if they're really trying to bring us back to the 17th Century. I think this picture aptly expresses my viewpoint on that topic.

'Nuff said.

Thoughts On A Sunday

It's been another gorgeous summer weekend, weather-wise.

Between a Christian music festival being held at a nearby venue, another concert at Meadowbrook Farm, great boating weather, and the numerous people here getting a last week of training in before next weekend's Timberman Triathlon, there's been a lot of traffic. The biggest problem has been so many people speeding on the local roads around here. Roads with speed limits of 30, 35, or 40 MPH have been seeing people doing 50, 55, and even 60 MPH. It has certainly made it an adventure pulling out onto the state road that runs past our road.

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Carly Fiorina explains why she's running for President.

I agree with her wholeheartedly.

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It appears the EPA may have to wait before imposing new emission limit regulations because 16 states are challenging them in court, claiming they violate the law because they do not take into account economic conditions and the costs the regulations will impose on businesses.

The EPA has already been called on the carpet by the US Supreme Court once for ignoring this requirement. In Michigan vs EPA, the Court ruled the EPA “ 'unreasonably' interpreted the Clean Air Act when it decided not to consider industry compliance costs and whether regulating the pollutants is 'appropriate and necessary'.”

While the agency is afforded a certain level of power to interpret the law, the court wrote, “EPA strayed well beyond the bounds of reasonable interpretation in concluding that cost is not a factor relevant to the appropriateness of regulating power plants.”

I expect the EPA will make some minor changes and go forth with the plans it was going to enforce prior to Michigan vs EPA as they've ignored Supreme Court rulings before and gone on to do as they damn well please.

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And speaking of the EPA and their mandate to protect the environment, who's going to protect the environment from the EPA?

Considering the EPA released about 1 million gallons of mining wastewater containing heavy metals like zinc, iron, and copper as well as a number of toxic chemicals into the Colorado river, I think we need to find someone more competent to deal with environmental issues.

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It appears comedy is dead on college campuses. Thank the Social Justice Warriors, the Permanently Aggrieved and Permanently Offended asshats on college campuses for that. It appears someone will always be offended by something someone says somewhere, particularly when it comes to comedy.

I have a solution for the SJW/PA/PO groups on campus: If you don't like comedy, then stay the hell out of performances by comedians on campus. Then you'll never be offended by anyone...until you find something new to be pissed off about and then you'll make yet another group of people's lives miserable with your whiny drivel.

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When a group of outsiders come in to tell college administrators how they have to handle the overblown “campus rape” crisis when they have never run a college campus, let alone be able to find that campus on a map, you know it's going to get all effed up. It also tends to drive good people who know how to handle such things out of the halls of academia because they can no longer deal with the hypocrisy and “I/We know better than all of you” bulls**t coming from those same outsiders.

But what do you expect from a government that has an incompetent and narcissistic head of state surrounded by sycophants who also have no experience or expertise in the Real World?

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Warmists link Hiroshima and climate change.

Is there anything climate change can't do? Now it's time travel and creation and use of the atom bomb.

Not.

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Carly's kicking ass! As Jazz Shaw states, she's the “real deal”.

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As ambition as Obama's Clean Power Plan is, there's one thing it cannot overcome: the weird physics of the electric grid.

The idiosyncratic physics of electricity will ultimately doom the aspirational goals of the new 1,560 page Clean Power Plan, more than will an army of lobbyists, lawsuits and laborious studies. It is an inconvenient truth that electricity is profoundly different from every other energy source society uses; it is, in fact, weird.

The Clean Power Plan (CPP), as by now everyone knows, sets a course to radically increase the use of wind and solar power everywhere in America. And, cost aside (which it never is in the real world), it should go without saying that neither wind nor solar are available all the time.

In order for the grid to deliver power continuously and nearly instantaneously in the face of inevitable challenges (plant failures, or the highly cyclical nature of demand), operators must have access to unused capacity that is available to be called upon, any time. While wind and solar have very low average availability compared to conventional power plants, what is more important is that they have zero availability for many hours at a time every day. And similarly neither are available, even when operating, to increase output to follow normal daily and hourly demand surges.

That is their weakness. Other plants, even those fueled by 'evil' fossil fuels, will still be needed to immediately respond to plant failures or spikes in demand. Another downside: clean energy, with the exception of nuclear, require large amounts of real estate to implement. That can mean decimating the local environment, something totally un-green, in order to build these clean power systems. You rarely hear any of the proponents talk about that, do you?

To paraphrase a Vietnam War era claim, “We had to destroy the environment in order to save it.” Even that version rings hollow to me.

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Bogie talks about the town replacing a culvert on her road, wishing they had also removed the last of the poison ivy that surrounded it.

The state is going to do something similar on one of the state roads near the town line between our town and the one just to the east of us. The down side – the road will be impassable for three weeks. That means folks living on one side of the town line wishing to get to the other side of the town line will have to make a 9 mile detour. This merely illustrates an old northern New England joke: “Ye' can't get theah from heah.”

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And that's the news from Lake Winnipesaukee, where roads are being fixed even as the summerfolk are using them, the political silly season is ramping up, and where there's still a few weeks before school starts again.

First GOP Debate Impressions

I admit I watched the GOP debates Thursday with anticipation. I wasn't quite sure what to expect, but I wasn't disappointed.

During the first 'off-card' debate, the so-called “Happy Hour” debate, it became apparent there was on candidate that stood head and shoulders above the rest – Carly Fiorina. While most of the candidates gave what I would consider the usual canned responses to the questions posed by the moderators, Fiorina had forceful, well thought out replies. She didn't just say there was a problem and that she would solve it. She also said exactly what she would do and how.

The 'main event' was more lively, with more than a few point/counterpoint exchanges between candidates. The Donald certainly livened things up, at one point claiming that an important issue like immigration, specifically illegal immigration, wouldn't even be mentioned if it wasn't for him. But the best part were the zingers thrown towards the self-presumed Democrat nominee, Hillary Clinton.

Scott Walker on her 'personal' e-mail server - “It’s sad to think right now, but probably the Russian and Chinese government know more about Hillary Clinton’s email server than do the members of the United States Congress”

Mike Huckabee, using a bit of misdirection aimed at Trump - “It seems like this election has been a whole lot on a person who has been very high in the polls, who doesn’t have a clue about how to govern, a person who has been filled with scandals and could not lead. And of course, I’m talking about Hillary Clinton.”

But the best line of the night had to be from Ben Carson during his closing comments, talking about his own accomplishments:

“Well, I haven’t said anything about me being the only one to do anything, so let me try that.”

“I’m the only one to separate Siamese twins…”

“The — the only one to operate on babies while they were still in mother’s womb, the only one to take out half of a brain, although you would think, if you go to Washington, that someone had beat me to it.” (Emphasis mine - ed)

At that point the venue filled with the sound of thunderous laughter.

All in all it was a decent event, though at times it seemed to be more of a media Q & A session rather than a debate. I suggest at the next debate the moderators let the candidates go more head-to-head on the issues.

Intelligence Doesn't Mean Intelligent

This is something I've known for a long time: Intelligence does not automatically equate to to being smart. In fact, I have known many intelligent people who have the manners of a spoiled child, the social skills of a skunk in attack mode, and often had very little common sense when it came to every day living.

Explains psychologist Ray Hyman:

"Intelligence is a capacity," he said. "Intelligence tests don’t tell us what people will do, they tell us what people are potentially able to do. It’s how people use their abilities that make the difference."

The number of otherwise intelligent people who believe in “pseudoscientific topics like extrasensory perception, astrology, and parapsychology” is staggering. These otherwise 'smart' people are totally irrational.

One has to wonder about the number of supposedly smart people who buy the claim that “the science is settled” when it comes to something like climate change when any knowledgeable person who understands science knows science is never 'settled'. The same could be said about topics like economics because there are so many otherwise smart people who believe economies can be fixed if we give government even more control over the economic system when history abounds with examples where that fix always fails and never succeeds. But these smart people want to try again because, after all, they're smarter than their predecessors and won't make the same mistakes (but they always do).

Intelligent folks can be the stupidest people at times.

Jon Stewart's Attempt To Rewrite History Is A Major #FAIL

I love it when those who would rewrite history are hoist upon their own petard. It teaches them that first they should know what it is they're talking about, otherwise someone more knowledgeable about the particular part of history they want to rewrite will show them for the unthinking and lying bastards that they are.

Case in point, Jon Stewart's attempt to revise the history of the atom bomb and the decision to drop one on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Stewart even goes so far to call Harry S Truman a war criminal. It's easy to do when you're 70 years past the event and have no actual frame of reference. It's also easy to lie about the facts surrounding the decision to use them.

Fortunately we have Bill Whittle around to show Stewart's accusations for what they are – a load of self-serving political crap.

Thoughts On A Sunday

The humidity fled from New Hampshire just in time for the weekend, making for wonderful weather. Deb and I attended to errands on Saturday, spending a good portion of the day out and about. I eschewed yard work on Saturday, not wanting to spoil and otherwise perfect day with something as mundane as yard work.

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Is this the first example of the unintended consequences of cocooning college students?

It appears a poor little snowflake has learned she doesn't set the JC Penney dress code.

It’s now “unfair” to require employees to wear appropriate attire, I guess. Hey, perhaps she could purchase her own store and allow employees to wear whatever they want. BTW, in quite a few workplaces, men have it much tighter than women. We have to have our shirts tucked in, we have to wear shoes and socks, rather than sockless shoes and sandals, and often have to wear ties. So, cry me a river.

Welcome the real world, snowflake!

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This is something I've known for a long time: Organic agriculture is a con job.

For the most part 'organic' vegetables aren't any better or any healthier for you than those grown using modern techniques. One reason they're more expensive is because yields tend to be lower.

There's also the cachet of “organically grown, all natural” that appeals to food snobs. All it means is that it gives the snobs an excuse to pay more money for food that isn't better than what most of the rest of us buy at the local supermarket.

As I wrote once a long time ago, the label of 'organic' is a license to (legally) steal. Our friend Farmer Andy once exploited this by selling “organically grown, solar dried” firewood, charging more for it than his regular firewood.

The joke: All of the firewood he sold came from the same wood lot, same wood pile. All of his trees were organically grown, and once cut down, cut to length, split, and piled to dry...in the sun. Most firewood is just like that.

The bigger joke: He sold a lot of the more expensive firewood.

As the man once said, never underestimate human stupidity.

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It seems the example the American Left has used as a model to promote socialism here – that being Sweden – overlooked one huge factor that doesn't exist here in the US that allowed it to succeed there as long as it did. That factor: a homogeneous culture.

American culture can in no way, shape, or form be considered homogeneous. That has been both one of greatest strengths and one of our weaknesses.

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A lexicon of nonsense, indeed.

A few of my favorites:

Philosophical = Using evidence and experience to create a well-thought out opinion on a matter of policy, culture, etc. = Whatever I believe

Ideological = Stubbornly sticking to a viewpoint, regardless of the facts = Whatever people who disagree with me believe

Free (via government) = Stuff other people will pay for, or that you’ll pay for in a way you may not realize

Compromise = Demanding that conservatives cave on beliefs

Read the whole thing.

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Stephen Moore writes about the demise of the small American bank.

This is something I knew would happen after that awful piece of crap known as Dodd-Frank passed. Chris Dodd and Barney Frank knew exactly what they were doing when they pushed their bill through Congress, following the orders of their Wall Street 'contributors' to ensure only the Too Big To Fail banks would benefit while their smaller competitors would be crushed by new regulations created by Dodd's and Frank's legislation.

This is yet another example of crony capitalism perpetrated by members of the very party who always say they're against it...until their corporate masters give them their orders to support it.

The hypocrisy runs deep in the Democrat Party.

The GOP isn't much better.

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On of my favorite media guys, John Stossel, informs us that the EPA is no longer an independent, science-based government agency, but a rogue organization governed by zealots who have no interest in facts, evidence, court decisions, or science.

These days the EPA is nothing but a government funded branch of the radical tree-huggers who so hate humans that everything they do is aimed solely at preventing anything we humans want to do even if the benefits far outweigh any of the negatives, no matter how minuscule they are.

It's time to clean house at the EPA and remove the bought-and-paid-for bureaucrats that have done far more damage to our nation than any of the so-called polluters they're trying to destroy.

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Call it a flashback to the bad old days of the Soviet Union.

One of the regular activities many Soviet citizens partook of on a regular basis was called “standing on line.” The old joke back then went something like this:

“Excuse me comrade, is this the line for the store that has no bread?”

“No. This is the line for the store that has no shoes.”

Flash forward to 2015 and we can see that particular activity has now made an appearance in Venezuela and for exactly the same reason: socialism.

Of course I expect the Maduro government is still blaming the Yanqui Imperialists for the failure of socialism rather than the socialism's built-in fatal flaws.

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Lawrence Mayo takes a look at what it is that is really dividing us, more accurately defining the political battle lines that exist. They aren't what you think they are.

Many people are under the mistaken impression that the political battle lines in America are Democrats vs. Republicans. Some even erroneously believe the battle lines are Liberal vs. Conservative.

But if you wish to understand modern politics in our country — if you want to make sense of the seemingly-irrational behaviors of both parties — consider the reality that the battle lines are actually Elitists vs. The People.

Yeah, I'd say that pretty well sums it up. Read the whole thing.

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It's bad enough that Title IX is being used for purposes for which it was never intended. Some are arguing it should be expanded to cover even more, and not by legislation but by fiat. It's being twisted from its original intent, to ban sexual discrimination, and being used to institute sexual discrimination. That no one amongst the Powers-That-Be sees a problem with this is frightening. That it is now violating the Fourteenth Amendment and will increasingly do so is being willfully ignored.

At this rate it I expect we'll soon see a proposal to expand it well outside its original intent and be applied throughout our entire society. I also expect the MSM and the Progressives will embrace that expansion with open arms. Then again they've never really been fans of the Constitution, have they?

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To quote Inigo Montoya, “You use that word a lot. I do not think it means what you think it means.”

The word? “Holistic.”

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You might be a liberal if....

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And that's the news from Lake Winnipesaukee, where the summerfolk are enjoying the weather, the ice cream is tasting better every day, and where work during the week intrudes upon or recreation time.

Discovering One Is A Conservative

Dana Casey tells us how she came to realize she was a conservative even though she grew up in a “union household and surrounded by progressive peers.”

It wasn't an overnight realization, but one she came to after years of observing her friends and family, no longer being able to reconcile the hypocrisy of their words and actions.

Her first big exposure to that hypocrisy? Food.

I remember some of the students sitting around one afternoon talking about the beauty of Native Americans and their respect for nature, recounting that, when the natives killed an animal, they first prayed to thank gods, ancestors, or perhaps the animal itself. My schoolmates talked about how the natives honored the animal they had killed by using every part, wasting none: the meat for food, the skin for clothes, the bones for tools and jewelry, the sinew for bindings and cords, and the hooves for rattles and bells. I could feel the awe this inspired in my fellow classmates. They felt enlightened, that a truth was revealed.

The next morning, I brought a scrapple sandwich to school for breakfast. A friend, who was indeed wearing a calico skirt with long johns and work boots (although no deodorant) leaned over to me and asked, “What ’cha eating?”

“Scrapple,” I replied.

“Eww! That’s disgusting! Do you know what they put in that stuff?” Thus the Scrapple Theory was born to me at the tender age of 16.

For those of you who are not familiar with scrapple, it is corn meal, ground pork, and spices baked in a loaf pan, cooled, sliced, and fried in butter. It is often eaten with catsup, a nice sweet contrast to the peppery spiciness. It is a true American specialty of the Pennsylvania Dutch. It was originally made from “scraps” of pork (i.e., scrapple) left over from butchering that could not be sold or used elsewhere, in order to avoid waste!

….According to my schoolmates, Native Americans who “honor” an animal by using all of its parts are noble human beings in touch with nature. However, a good German peasant (from whom the Pennsylvania Dutch originated) who makes use of the entire animal is abhorrent and disgusting. This scrapple sandwich epiphany was one of my first observations of ubiquitous liberal progressive hypocrisy.

Such was her first experience with Progressive Hypocrisy, where if it came from Western Civilization it is automatically bad, but if it comes from some place other than that, it's good. This is despite the same philosophy being applied to the same action. But wait, it gets worse!

I would read books like J.D. Salinger’s “Catcher in the Rye,” Jack Kerouac’s “On the Road,” and Carlos Castaneda’s “The Teachings of Don Juan,” expecting the illuminating awakenings my friends professed, but the books always fell flat. I just didn’t get it. I wondered what was wrong with me. It turns out that there was little to get. The books were crap.

But I also read the theology of C.S. Lewis and George McDonald, the fiction of Ayn Rand and Elizabeth Gouge, the classics like “The Histories” by Herodotus, “Confessions” by Augustine, and the philosophies and plays of the ancient Greeks and Shakespeare. And my faith was strong; it was a constant, and I went through bouts of church-going that irritated my liberal friends to no end. They actually said to me, “How can someone as intelligent as you believe in nonsense like that, especially Catholic dogma?” Ironically, they believed in runes, tarot cards, psychics, the supernatural, séances, auras, and every other idiot mystical fad that came around.

New Age was in. That “old style religion” was out, even though the New Age stuff was really ancient. It was merely repackaged as something else. This also crossed over into failed political ideologies.

Socialism was the 'religion' of the enlightened Progressives. It would make everyone equal. But as more than a few 'experiments' in socialism proved, it failed to meet the needs of the people and eventually failed, collapsing from within due to self-inflicted wounds. But that hasn't stopped today's Progressives from wanting to try that experiment again because, after all, they're much smarter and better informed than those who went before them...or so they believe. But they aren't. If anything, they are even less well informed because what they know isn't knowledge, but indoctrination. It is dogma, not to be questioned and adhered to even if reality proves it is a false belief.

I started to see that liberal policies rewarded poor choices, while penalizing those who worked hard, didn’t get pregnant as a teen, and were responsible for taking care of oneself. It really ticked me off. Little by little, I was starting to see that liberalism was hypocritical and destructive while conservatism actually promoted individual freedom, self-reliance, laws applied equally and fairly to each individual, and limited government. These were ideas I thought liberals, particularly hippie-type liberals, actually believed. I was mistaken.

And there's the crux of the matter. “Liberal policies rewarded poor choices.” Why? Because poor choices mean more people become dependent upon government, specifically government run by the Progressive Liberal elite who enabled these people to make those poor choices and not suffer the consequences. After all, beggars are easier to please. Free and independent men and women, not so much. Some of that is because they don't want anything from government other than to be left alone, something the Progressives hate because it means they can't easily control them through bribery or threats to withhold their largess, that largess gained by taking it from the people who actually created it.

Is it any wonder Ms. Casey has discovered the hypocrisy of the Left and wants nothing to do with it?

Welcome home, Dana.