Monday, March 31, 2014

LAX SUPER GENIUS

There are cameras everywhere but after many many years of thieves looting the bags in one particular place in the airports, they never quite got around to putting any cameras in the baggage handling and stealing areas. What kind of crack brained security morons do they hire at airports?

SUBMARINE NON GRATA

The United Arab Emirates denied entry to HMS Tireless, a 30 year old traveling radioactive leak that had sought entry to the Emirates in order to effect a crew swap. After fruitlessly hanging around the port for more than a week waiting for diplomatic clearance, the submarine headed to Goa which is well known for its tolerance of mobile maritime disasters.
 Once one of these things starts to go bad, it goes downhill pretty quickly. It's irreversible.

ROARING LOUDLY, CARRYING A SMALL TWIG

I can't help but be amused when I read what the courts are getting up to these days as the Justice Department seeks to mold and shape America's foreign policy without any assistance whatsoever from the State Department. Obama's ability to annoy friends and inflame hatred and contempt is bad enough but the fetid courts of New York seem bound and determined to outrage any possible friendly relations we could have with the worlds largest democracy.

It's bad enough that they engage in mal-diplomacy but do they have to do it with such stunning stupidity? Here is yet another case in point from the Indian Times.

The court has ordered Sonia Gandhi, President of the Indian National Congress of a country of almost one billion people, to furnish it with a copy of her passport so that the Court can use it to determine if she was actually in the United States at the time in question when one party in a case against her insists that she was legally served papers while receiving treatment in a medical facility.

Isn't that peculiar? As a citizen of India she would need to have a visa to legally enter the United States. State Department would have a record of her visa. She would have to pass through Immigration to enter the United States so ICE would have a record of her arrival and departure. If she was receiving treatment at a medical facility, the medical facility would have a record of her as a patient. But none of them seem to be able to offer anything that would inform the court about whether or not the President of the Indian National Congress was in the U.S. at the time in question.

This seems odd though. In our context, she would seem to be right up there as visible as our Speaker of the House or Senate majority leader. Somebody would know where they were unless they deliberately drop off the grid while doing the bidding of Satan the Koch brothers.

For some reason though, all the court wants is a copy of her passport to show that there are no entry and exit stamps for the time in question. The funny bit is from the comments to the article in the Indian Times: Which passport does the court want? Her Italian or her Indian passport? Why not say her house was broken into and her papers stolen along with her passport? Who is this court to demand anything?

Why is it that all these presidents seem to have multiple passports from different countries and the State Department and Immigration are clueless about them? More importantly, why is New York so determined to screw around with India? It is fine and good to say that all are equal before and answerable to the law but that's clearly a lie and made more manifest every day as the Obama administration simply ignores, breaks and flouts the law.

When we were a powerful and unified country leading an alliance that shaped the world and held some of it in check, we could get away with casual arrogance and disdain for our fellows but since we elected Obama we dropped the mantle and the power that shielded us from our arrogance. We don't command respect and have not for some time. By the same token, we have gone out of our way to antagonize other countries over trifles since we got Obamad.

It is sad to admit that the country elected a trifling little man as president without also observing that he has squandered all of the good will and statesmanship of three generations. He knows nothing of speaking softly and has nothing but twigs and reeds with which to threaten the planet. Al Gore is scarier.

Saturday, March 29, 2014

ANTICIPATION

From our Washington DC correspondent,

Friday, March 28, 2014

BOUND TO GROVEL

I wonder what undignified and disgraceful image he'll return with this time.


NAVAL COASTAL RIVERINE WARFARE

Now everyone can play riverine. Heads exploding are the least of their problems. They don't play well with others and their mission went away when we left Iraq. Their only hope of survival was to be picked up by Special Boats and wrapped in the warm and caring embrace of Navy Special Warfare and in that they failed.

Riverine adopts new strategy to get a little love from SPECWAR

Thursday, March 27, 2014

UNSPEAKABLY DIVERSE IN NEW YORK

It appears that the most segregated schools in America are found in New York.
NEW YORK (AP) -- New York state has the most segregated public schools in the nation, with many black and Latino students attending schools with virtually no white classmates, according to a report released Wednesday.
Thanks to policies put in place in America, all of the negative racial trends were reinforced and compounded by progressive social theorists and politicians. They left nothing to chance as they worked year after year to increase ethnic divisions and make ethnic boundaries harder, more inelastic and almost impossible to cross.
In New York City, the largest school system in the U.S. with 1.1 million pupils, the study notes that many of the charter schools created over the last dozen years are among the least diverse of all, with less than 1 percent white enrollment at 73 percent of charter schools.
"To create a whole new system that's even worse than what you've got really takes some effort," said Gary Orfield, co-director of the Civil Rights Project and an author of the report.
New York City charter schools have been created by and cater almost exclusively to very specific ethnic backgrounds, race and genders. We have reached the point where self-segregation is the preferred option for those most in favor of forcing increased diversity in your society using every form of government coercion and compulsion; not to improve, but to make diverse.

The amount of money allocated to a school within a city or town is the same regardless of the ethnic and racial makeup of the student body. Even though there is parity in spending there is something other than money at the heart of school performance. The study is blunt: "the study suggests that New York's segregation is largely due to housing patterns, because housing and school segregation are correlated, but that it could be mitigated through policies intended to promote diversity."

Neighborhoods self select segregation now by making and keeping the price of all housing within some neighborhoods very high in order to exclude all of the urban poor. The real estate prices are extremely high and local ordinances are passed mandating high annual maintenance costs and of course, extremely high taxes. The only effort with regard to low income, multifamily and Section 8 housing within the neighborhood is frenzied activity to keep it out. Berkeley was a wonderful town to live in but watching the city council go berserk trying to keep low income housing out of Berkeley of all places was a delight to me. OK, that and somebody's war on Berkeley's parking meters.

You see, whatever they profess, the people living in those neighborhoods suspect that they have been lied to about the benefits that they receive by embracing diversity. That's why real estate websites focus on the school associated with every dwelling within a school district.  Parents need to know because it matters.

The map below shows just the public schools. They are all located in the Huntsville School District.

The hyperlink takes you to the zillow page I took the picture from. This was my old town when I went to high school. Note the student/teacher ratio at the very best high schools and the very worst. Not what you thought it would be, is it?

The study was dishonest but it was reliably so. They could not help themselves as they noted all of the schools in New York State and then declared that most of the non-white students attended schools with a tiny white minority instead of all schools having a student racial breakdown matching the statewide racial breakdown.

This also is my old neighborhood and where I attended my final year of high school. It is a fascinating map courtesy of the New York Times Census Taker. The map covers the entire U.S. and is well worth a look. Due to its large size, I could not fit a map of all of New York State but you can see it at the link if you like. New York is a large state but the racial makeup between NYC and the rest of the state is enormously different. The races are not distributed equally across the entire state.

I can't see the courts ordering the state to end school segregation with busing. Well, actually I can see a court ordering that. What an interesting place.

Wednesday, March 26, 2014

LAWYERS KEEP TURNING UP AT WARMING SCAMDAL

I just read this at Steynonline today. He finally pulled off his mask and revealed what everybody with a brain knew. He was not without expert legal advice after firing the legal counsel he shared with National Review which pranced through a year and half of legal farce in Washington DC. It looks like he has some good lawyers who have done some very important work.

When it comes time to shoot the lawyers, I think we should save these for last.

I wondered how long it would take before he revealed that he was in this for the kill and not for the sport. You might reconsider the pronouncements of doom from those who sneered at Steyn when he fired the legal team he shared with NR. The $30 million dollar counter-suit he filed against Michael Mann is probably not so daft and funny looking now, is it Mike?

How Global Warming Kills Birds At One Pass In America
Seriously, who didn't see that coming?

Tuesday, March 25, 2014

ACID FREE OZONE

Remember the 80's and 90's when mankind was killing everything with acid rain and causing the gigantic man-made hole in the ozone layer? Thank God my patented Ozonic Device kicked into high gear in time to not only patch the hole but also re-base-line the acid clouds that were polluting the environment and making it uninhabitable long before global warming killed us all.

Isn't it funny how you never hear about these Extinction Level Events anymore?

 Y'all owe me 10,000,000 dollars.

Pay up.

AN EVOCATIVE ECHO FROM THE PAST

Everyone should take the time to read and enjoy the History of the Peloponnesian War by Thucydides. Whenever the major world powers embark on a course described 2500 years ago by Thucydides it is interesting to see the parallels between the politics and morality of the Ancient World and the Modern World. Current affairs seem almost to come alive as one reads the following paragraphs taken from Missouri State.



Civil War in Corcyra (427 BC) 

The democrats were afraid that the [Peloponnesian] fleet would attack them, so they entered into negotiations with the other party in order to save their divided town. They prevailed upon some of their enemies to go on board the ships, of which they still had thirty, to defend against the expected attack. But the Peloponnesians, after ravaging the country until midday, sailed away, and towards nightfall were informed by beacon signals of the approach of sixty Athenian ships under the command of Eurymedon, which had been sent off by the Athenians upon learning of the revolution [on Corcyra] and that the Peloponnesian fleet with Alcidas was about to intervene.

The Peloponnesians [to avoid encountering the Athenians] at once sailed with all speed by night for home, coasted along shore, and hauled their ships across from the Isthmus of Leucas, in order not to be caught at the cape, and so got away. The Corcyraeans, seeing the approach of (their allies) the Athenians and the departure of the enemy, brought the Messenians from outside the walls into the town, and ordered the fleet which they had manned to sail round into the harbor; and while it was so doing, slew as many of their enemies as they laid their hands on; those whom they had persuaded to go on board the ships they later put to death as well. Next they went to the sanctuary of Hera and persuaded about fifty men to stand trial; all were condemned to death. The mass of the refugees who had refused to leave their sanctuary, on seeing what was taking place, put each other to death, right there in the consecrated ground [rather than face certain death at the hands of their enemies]: some hanged themselves upon the trees, and others destroyed themselves by any means they could find. During the seven days that Eurymedon stayed with his sixty ships, the Corcyraeans were engaged in butchering those of their fellow-citizens whom they regarded as their enemies: and although the crime they were charged with was 'attempting to overthrow the democracy,' some victims were slain for purely private grudges, others were put to death by their debtors to avoid ever having to pay back their debts.

Death thus raged in every shape, and, as usually happens at such times, there was no extreme to which violence did not go: sons were killed by their fathers and those who had taken refuge at the altar were dragged from it or slain upon it; while some were even walled up in the temple of Dionysus and died there. So bloody was the march of the revolution, and the impression which it made was the greater as it was one of the first to occur. Later, one may say, the whole Hellenic world was convulsed; since everywhere they had the chance the popular leaders would bring in the Athenians, and the oligarchs would call in the Lacedaemonians. In peacetime there would have been neither the pretext nor the desire to bring in an outsider; but in wartime, with allies always ready to assist either faction for the hurt of their adversaries and their own advantage, the insurrectionist made the most of the opportunity for foreign intervention.

The sufferings which revolution brought upon the cities were many and terrible, such as have occurred and always will occur, as long as the nature of mankind remains the same; though in a severer or milder form, and varying in their symptoms, according to the variety of the particular cases. In peace and prosperity states and individuals have better feelings, because they do not find themselves suddenly confronted with dire necessities; but war takes away the easy supply of daily wants, and proves a rough master, that brings most men's characters to a level with their fortunes. Revolution thus ran its course from city to city, and the places where it arrived at last, from having heard what had been done before, carried to a still greater excess the refinement of their inventions, as manifested in the cunning of their enterprises and the atrocity of their reprisals.

[In this chaotic world] words had to change their ordinary meaning and to take on new signification. Reckless audacity came to be considered the 'courage of a loyal ally'; prudent hesitation, 'an excuse for cowardice'; moderation was held to be a cloak for unmanliness; ability to see all sides of a question was inability to act on any. Frantic violence became the attribute of virility; paranoid plotting (was seen as) justifiable self-defense. The more extreme a man's schemes, the more valuable an ally he seemed; anyone who opposed extremism was suspected of treachery. To succeed in a plot was to have a shrewd head, to divine a plot a still shrewder; but to try to provide against having to do either was to break up your party and to be afraid of your adversaries. To prevent an intended crime, or to plot a crime when it seemed likely to succeed, was equally valued, until even blood became a weaker tie than party, because those united by party loyalty were bound to dare everything without reserve. For such associations had not in view the blessings derivable from established institutions but were formed by ambition for their overthrow; and the confidence of their members in each other rested less on any religious sanction (of oath) than upon complicity in crime. The fair proposals of an adversary were met with jealous precautions by the stronger of the two, and not with a generous confidence. Revenge also was held of more value than self-preservation. Oaths of reconciliation, being only proffered on either side to meet an immediate difficulty, only held good so long as no other weapon was at hand; but when opportunity offered, he who first ventured to seize it and to take his enemy off his guard, thought this treacherous vengeance sweeter than an open reprisal, since success by treachery indicated superior intelligence. Indeed it is generally the case that men are readier to call rogues clever than simpletons honest, and are as ashamed of being the second as they are proud of being the first. 

The cause of all these evils was the lust for power arising from greed and ambition; and from these passions proceeded the violence of parties once engaged in contention. The leaders in the cities, each with the most righteous of claims on the one side with the cry of political equality of the people, on the other of a moderate aristocracy sought prizes for personal gain in those public interests which they pretended to cherish; in their struggles for dominance [the ends justified the means]; in their acts of vengeance they went to even greater lengths, not stopping at what justice or the good of the state demanded, but making the party caprice of the moment their only standard, and invoking with equal readiness the condemnation of an unjust verdict from a trumped up lawsuit or the authority of brute force, in order to glut the hatred that roused them at the time. Thus religion was respected by neither party; but the use of fair-sounding phrases to arrive at vicious ends was in high reputation. Meanwhile the moderates perished at the hands of extremists on both sides, either for not taking sides or simply because those caught up in the troubles could not bear to see anyone unscathed. 
 
Thus every form of iniquity took root in the Hellenic countries by reason of the troubles. The ancient simplicity which sense of honor had inspired was ridiculed and disappeared; and society became divided into camps in which no man trusted any other. And there was no way to end the cycle: there was no promise that could be believed, nor oath that could command respect; but all parties dwelling rather in their calculation upon the hopelessness of the status quo, were more intent upon self-defense than capable of confidence. In this contest the blunter wits were most successful. Apprehensive of their own deficiencies and of the cleverness of their antagonists, they feared to be worsted in debate and to be surprised by the combinations of their more versatile opponents and so at once boldly had recourse to action, while their adversaries, arrogantly thinking that they would foresee any serious threat and that it was unnecessary to make their plan a fait accompli, often fell victim to their want of precaution.

Meanwhile Corcyra gave the first example of most of these crimes: of the reprisals exacted by the governed who had never experienced equitable treatment or anything but arrogance from their rulers; of the iniquitous resolves of those who desired to get rid of their accustomed poverty, and ardently coveted their neighbours' goods; and lastly, of the savage and pitiless excesses into which men who had begun the struggle not in a class but in a party spirit, were hurried by their ungovernable passions. In the confusion into which life was now thrown in the cities, human nature, always rebelling against the law and now its master, gladly showed itself ungoverned in passion, above respect for justice, and the enemy of all priorities; since revenge would not have been set above religion, and gain above justice, had it not been for the fatal power of envy. Indeed men too often take upon themselves in the prosecution of their revenge to set the example of doing away with those general laws to which all alike can look for salvation in adversity, instead of allowing them to subsist against the day of danger when their aid may be required.

Monday, March 24, 2014

BET HE FEELS LIKE A TOTAL MORON NOW

Jesse Lee, the Director of Progressive Media at Barack Obama's White House who was so damned stupid he leaped at the throat of Matt Drudge when he stupidly and mistakenly thought Drudge made a mistake.

Progressives are like that. They'll poison the well, burn the boats, enslave the local population and then discover they've stranded themselves on a desert island with nothing but cannibals.

It's a pity they leave such a foul taste in the mouth. Progressives aren't even good eating.

NOTHING BETTER TO DO

This jackass is the United States Attorney for Southern New York. [fixed link et al]
 Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said: “Former President Alfonso Portillo may have thought his position of power prevented him from having to answer for accepting multi-million dollar bribes to shape his country’s foreign policy, for embezzling money intended to benefit the Guatemalan people, and for using U.S. banks to launder the ill-gotten funds. But he was wrong.
 Mr. Bharara praised the outstanding investigative work of the New York Field Office of the Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation, the Drug Enforcement Administration’s (“DEA”) New York Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Strike Force – which is comprised of agents and officers of the DEA, the New York City Police Department, Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations, the New York State Police, the U. S. Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation Division, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, U.S. Secret Service and the U.S. Marshals Service – the DEA’s Guatemala Country Office, the Department of State, and the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of International Affairs for their work in this investigation. Mr. Bharara also recognized and thanked the United Nations Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala (“CICIG”), the Guatemalan Special Prosecutor’s Office for the CICIG, and the Ministerio Público in Guatemala for their assistance in this investigation.
In his spare time he is also engaged in tearing the clothes off foreign diplomats accused (but not found guilty of), underpaying their maids.

I guess it's only a matter of time before that gang drags Putin into the dock in chains, convicts him and sentences him for his serial violations of U.S. law. If they start running out of foreigners to prosecute for breaking our laws, remember, it is your duty to point out other law breaking foreigners that deserve the focused attention of the forces of order.


Keeps them off our back.

Sunday, March 23, 2014

THE PASSING STILLNESS OF TIME

I was tunneling under the grotto of Demeter the other day when I came across a really fascinating thought piece that I hadn't thought of in quite some time. It was from this place.
8. Cleopatra lived closer to the invention of the iPhone than she did to the building of the Great Pyramid.
Think of it! Two thousand five hundred years passed between the construction of the  Great Pyramid of Cheops and the reign of Cleopatra III.













 
 It was once a fascinating place filled with artists, scientists, rulers and slaves.

Saturday, March 22, 2014

PROVOCATIVE COMMERCE

It always makes me happy to see entrepreneurs engage in business and commerce. The government exists to give them more opportunities and no government is more opportunistic than New York.
More than half of the cigarettes sold in New York State are smuggled in from other places to avoid the Empire State's taxes on smokes, which have soared nearly 200 percent since 2006, according to a report issued by the conservative Tax Foundation.
New York is the highest net importer of smuggled cigarettes -- illegal smokes account for 56.9 percent of the state's total market. New York's cigarettes tax is $4.35 per pack, the country's highest. The situation there isn't unique. The Tax Foundation also cites a study that found that 58.7 percent of discarded cigarettes found in five Northeastern cities lacked proper tax stamps.
Taxes on cigarettes, which are designed to discourage smoking, vary widely. States such as Missouri, North Carolina and Virginia have levies of less than a $1 per pack. These wide differences make smuggling "both a national problem and a lucrative criminal enterprise," according to the Tax Foundation. 
Thanks guys!

Clearly revenue to the state was secondary to the State's beneficial screw them all tax on smokers. That's not quite how this story parses it though. It reveals that New York is in the game purely for the revenue they can get out of addicts. If you read the link it makes reference to one of the most oft heard and never seen bogeymen, the hit man. Have you ever noticed how 100% of the hit men you hear about are actually undercover police? It makes you wonder.

Oh well, now that the war is over there might be a few people interested in turning their hands to the profitable business of moving a perfectly legal commodity from one side of the New York border to the other side.
Look!!!! A smuggler!

Friday, March 21, 2014

IF THEY GO I WILL MISS THEM

At the turn of the last century I used to commute back and forth from San Diego to Silicon Valley. I would usually find myself driving out of San Jose bound for San Diego via Gilroy and Blood Alley. It was long days, late nights and a 10 hour drive ahead of me. I would tune the car radio to my all time favorite station to get charged up for the drive. Radio Havana was always good at getting my blood flowing and keeping me alert and energized as I drove up into the hills heading for Pacheco Pass.

Back in the day there was no median divide. It was strictly head-on collisions
I will miss the lunatics at radio Pacifica if they do finally shutter their offices and head back to Havana or board their cow-fart powered space ships and leave. The article is fun to read if you ever listened to Pacifica but they get one thing wrong. One of the workers claimed that people would miss the slice of radio to the left of NPR. That's wrong. At this point NPR pretty much blankets the far left spectrum and can be counted reliably in the friend of Fidel and friends with Hugo category. They are even friends of the People's Car Company and had dozens of guests on this week explaining how the People's Car Company had no idea that faulty ignition locks could kill people quite dead if they switched themselves off while driving.

Once the signal out of Santa Cruz faded away as I reached the pass and headed down to the desert floor it was time to tune in the incomparable Art Bell and his wonderfully disturbed radio show for those abroad in the lateness of the night. Aliens, remote viewing, secret CIA programs, Joe vs the deer.

Radio used to be so damned entertaining.

Thursday, March 20, 2014

SPOTTED FROM ORBIT



IT WAS OBVIOUS FOR ALL TO SEE

When the United States embarked on this course back in 2009, I changed avatars to reflect the inevitable and ineluctable path of the American military. It flamed out in January of that year and it spent a few futile years trying to restart but there was no fire to be found. The election of 2012 confirmed and speeded the collapse of both the nation's foreign and military policies. Anybody could have told you that would happen back in 2007.

The U.S. Military resized for the 21st Century
There are some people who regret the rollback but I am not one of them. I regret the inevitable disgrace that will follow our foreign policy being left in the hands of opportunists and liars but the writing was on the wall for those who thought they could depend on America. What? You thought that the people who won the elections here were just kidding about their intentions and plans? I don't think you are that gullible. The majority of people wanted this outcome. They really don't care about anybody living overseas. I mean that literally. The people who elected our current leadership treasure their ignorance to the extent that they don't know and don't care about anything that isn't about them.

The weapons of war are getting more and more expensive and this country has gotten into the habit of providing it's soldiers, sailors and airmen with some of the best weapons on the market. The problem of course, is that the widest market is needed to keep the price of weapons within reach so a lot of our very best weapons and technology finds its way into the hands of our fellow Earthlings. That doesn't do as much damage as one would think because, a) the weapons are fiendishly difficult and expensive to build, and b) they cost the earth to maintain and require a constant stream of spare parts and, c) they require an education and the ability to read to be at all operational and effective. We can't save money if we don't cut the numbers needing weapons, training and equipment.

Getting back to our shrinking Army, it looks like we'll barely have enough for home defense, says the Army Chief of Staff. We won't be able to station more than a few thousand soldiers in Korea to help our friend and ally there to stave off and beat back the attack of the weakest largest army on the planet now that we've eviscerated Iraq's Army. There aren't going to be enough maneuver brigades to fight simultaneous wars in Afghanistan and Iraq------wait, those two wars are over. Well there won't be enough to fight the Russians in Europe if they suddenly decide to invade France or Belgium.

Good.

I think the world is going to be a little dynamic for awhile and it might be best if we sit it out for the time being and let the victims sort themselves out before we lend a hand.  Tomahawk missiles are relatively cheap but we should exercise some restraint and only kill people that need killing. There are some pluses and minuses to this approach since it involves human suffering on a potentially global scale but we have a plan for that.

We don't need another 13 years of war against allah's boys where we go all-in and after 13 years of fighting and nation building, nothing changed. We don't need another Vietnam where we piddled and dicked around at war for 10 years and the upshot was, we might as well have just stayed at home since nothing we did changed the outcome and only delayed the inevitable at a tremendous cost in human suffering.

The planners need to answer a few simple questions before we set minimum force levels. This approach has gotten something of a bad rap since the politicians at Whitehall came up with the idea that they would know in plenty of time when the next war was coming and have all the time required to rebuild their armies and fleets. They then took to doing nothing and a little later, started viewing with alarm, and then moaning that any defense buildup would lead to an arms race. They were idiots. Where are we going to deploy military forces in the next 10 to 20 years? 

North America seems secure.

Central and South America seem secure. Our fellow socialists ruling Venezuela, Cuba, Brazil and Argentina are sitting on unrest that their policies of expropriation and theft have created. We don't wish to defend the status quo there or to intervene militarily. If our socialists wish to intervene there, I'd rather that we didn't have the means to go all-in and occupy a Latin American country for 10 years while dicking around and not seeking any diplomatic or military resolution to the conflict. There are no such solutions. The problems these countries face are ones of their own making and fixing them probably requires something truly awful to happen to their form of government. It's going to take Revolution, Civil War, repudiation of debt and a lot of bloodshed. The chances of this happening are just about nil. Still, better they do it without military intervention from the North.

Africa seems secure. When you think about sending soldiers to Africa think of this:

All of Vietnam and Afghanistan superimposed on part of Africa. We had over half a million soldiers in those 2 countries at the height of our police actions. When some complete jackass talks about sending 5000 soldiers to Africa, hit him very hard.
The map superimpositions at this site. It's a really neat map tool.

Europe seems secure. By what token can we be dragged into a fight in Europe if they do not fight for themselves first? Let them pick the force they think they need to fight their most likely enemy and then arm, equip and train that force because I don't see why we have to be their mamelukes. It's not like they paid us for anything. NATO is a slender thread, just one country, to hang your entire country from and they should see that plainly now. We just sold a nuclear armed country down the river last week. Well, they used to have nukes, but they believed us when we promised faithfully to guarantee their borders and national sovereignty if they let us cart their nukes away and burn them.

I would not have thought our socialists would take to Realpolitik as easily as they have. They spent many decades in the wilderness shouting for the exact opposite as the rest of the country struggled to contain a tyranny that seemed intent on spreading to encompass the Whole Earth.

Australia seems secure.

Asia seems to be on the edge of another major contraction just as it has for the last 78 years. Nothing is really new here except we don't ever hear about the Chinas fighting each other any more. The whole face-off across the Taiwan Strait has faded away to nothing as China gears up to exercise its dominance in its region in a fairly straight forward effort at exploiting the resources our idiot policies made available to it when we negotiated and signed the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea and let countries reach the point of fighting over sea washed rocks since each one can be used as the epicenter of a 200 mile radius Economic Exclusion Zone bestowing all rights for mineral and sea bottom exploitation in the hands of the rock's owner. What idiot thought that was a good idea? Well, if you look at the parties that benefited the most, you won't be surprised.  Honestly officer, it seemed like a good idea at the time.

There is a philosophy that has crept into being in recent times. It might be called, peek-a-boo, I can see you. The President and his cadres know that the NSA and CIA give them the ability to execute any man on the face of the planet within a matter of hours. The Agencies that can hoover up and record every phone call on earth and analyze them in real time, can find its enemies if they ever dare to live like a 20th century man and use the phone. Why fight and kill whole armies if all you need to do to stop them is to kill the commanding general or his political masters?

Have you noticed how the science, technology and information to build drones has totally slipped out of control and into the unregulated hands of the world's drone makers and experimenters? As far as I can tell nobody made any effort to control the spread of drones and drone technology. As I've pointed out a number of times, every cruise missile is a drone and every drone can be a cruise missile. With drones proliferating like mad who will be able to say in a year or two, from where came that drone that killed the Dear Leader? Oh sure, fingers will be pointed but there's plausible deniability built right into the drone. "It wasn't me officer! Anybody can build a killer drone! Look, my Secretary of State was standing right beside the Dear Leader when they both got whacked! It was a plot to kill my comrade!"

10 years ago we had the True Believers™in my world who gloated about the effects they could achieve if only we could gain Total Maritime Domain Awareness. Now they can rave about Total Global Awareness and achieving effects all out of proportion to the size of the blow. Know your enemy has new meaning today. The President now knows who that guy is, where he lives, what he had for breakfast, what kind of car he drives and where he will be in 4 hours and 39 minutes which is all the time it takes to get a Reaper overhead with a couple of Hellfire missiles. 

If the President can do that to an American citizen who actually enjoys Constitutional rights almost on par with enemy terrorist jihadists detained in Cuba, then he can also kill Putin or Nigel Farage or an actual enemy of America anywhere on the planet.

The people who consider themselves our enemies are alive to the situation and know that he can do that whenever he wants to since there are no known constraints on presidential power in Argentina, Russia, Cuba, Venezuela or the United States of America. The law is whatever the president says it is.

Tuesday, March 18, 2014

SIC SEMPER SATYRS

A selfie portrait tears apart a satyr forged from the likeness of one of the Barbereni Popes...or something like that anyway.

Friends don't give Fauns cameras

UGLY AND VICIOUS

It's bad enough when the vicious depraved city preys on you but to add insult to injury, the place is also infested with criminals who steal even the nailed down stuff. Seriously, making the place even more unattractive and predatory than it has to be in the name of revenue is a really bad idea when you are faking a sincere attempt to lure businessmen and shoppers into your blighted urban Democratic Party created, operated and not maintained, workers paradise.
Detroit — For the first time in more than a decade, the city may increase its parking fines and come down harder on repeat offenders who don’t pay up.
The recommendations, which would bump the current parking fines of $20, $30 and $100 per ticket to a two-tiered structure of $45 and $150, are among the revenue-generating strategies recommended by Detroit’s restructuring consultants.
If you billed it they will come is overrated as a practical approach to building loyalty among your consumers, especially when they can stay out in the suburbs and spend their money in places that actually cottoned on to the idea of FREE PARKING as a means of attracting customers.

Shouting at people to COME and SAVE Detroit while at the same time crapping all over them is a really bad idea. It would be interesting to see what it would take to turn the real estate on the lake around and actually make it a mecca for business. I don't believe we will like it at all if it ever comes to pass. It's like the line from the old children's story. "I could do it but you really really wouldn't like it."

TURNING A PROPHET

I see that yet another lucrative market of e-commerce is being created. This time it is happening in Australia where a lawman wants to make it a crime to fail to turn over encryption keys.  They are playing it up as some sort of pre-tyranny to accustom you to the idea that there is really no such thing as a right to privacy. Well I say, let them! Bring it On!

I think we're all becoming accustomed to the government requiring us to get government forms and paperwork and requiring that we pay for the privilege. I don't see any reason that citizens should not bill the government in like manner for access to what the government wants from the serfs. We could bill the government $2,000,000 per page, after taxes have been taken out, for all the documents they want. It would also take some small amount of time to get the information they insist I sell them so I have no problems with billing them $1100 dollars per hour to that noble end. It might take me about as long to get back to them as it has taken the regulators to furnish us with an answer on the Keystone Pipeline. As you can see, the project was proposed in 2008 and 6 years later we are still waiting for government to furnish an answer.

If everybody travels with an encrypted 32GB USB drive and helped the government as promptly to the information therein as the government has dealt with Keystone, we could all be billionaires! And best of all, it wouldn't really cost anything because it's the President's stash!  Another win win!

Mr. Krugman, may I have my Nobel Prize now?

Monday, March 17, 2014

FASCISTS YOU CAN RELY ON

Dateline:
Heart of the Dark Realm

 It will surely come as no surprise that the EU dictator (unelected) has denounced the referendum of the people of Crimea in the strongest possible terms and has vowed to oppose it to the last drop of American blood if that's what it takes to restore non-democracy to the Crimean Peninsula. France and England are saddling their horses and preparing for Round Two of the Crimean War.

Europe needs to be very careful how they step into irredentism. Bravely taking the opportunity to poke Russia in the eye for a perfectly normal and acceptable coup-de-main over Russian territory is one of the more irredeemably stupid behaviors we have come to expect from Europeans. Every single inch of Europe is contested. That's why they perfected ethnic cleansing.

The herd of Europe should have quietly lined up before Putin and asked him nicely to not be blatant about exercising Russia's preeminent authority in Crimea. All things considered, Putin did a masterful job of allowing the people united to speak for themselves. He was helped in this matter by the nasty bit of extermination carried out in the last century which saw to it that the native people living in the area were all appropriately rewarded for zealous exercise of enlightened self-interest. I cannot recall who said that we should all fight together or surely we shall all hang together. Wars have consequences and letting the Bolsheviks win because you couldn't be bothered to oppose them? Big mistake.

There is another warm water Russian port in Europe although I think I am using a most liberal interpretation of the word warm in describing the Baltic Sea. In this purely Russian Port in the former Kingdom of Prussia, there are almost no irredentists because that would have reflected poorly on the NKVD. Those guys were pretty thorough.


The right of self-determination is not new for our friends in Europe. They simply persist in not believing in it until someone makes them. I look forward today to seeing the results of the freedom referendums in Venice, Spain, Gibraltar, and later on, in Scotland.

 It will be interesting to watch the establishment of the new Hanseatic League and its predestined struggle with the creaking State regimes who will have to prove a lot more nimble or more Russian to cope with the new Robber Knights. Still, Progress!

WON'T STOP DIGGING

I suppose that just as there must have been millions who sided with Eliot Ness, so too must there be people who side with this vindictive and vicious lawyer. Assuming that this woman who was stripped naked by the law in New York had done all the things the prosecutor charged her with, how much is it worth to society to continue to attempt to prosecute her for doing it?

The link leads to the story at the Times of India and the comments are what make it worth noting. Side with or against her, nobody can see what net positive value accrues to the United States by continuing this charade. The fact that this prosecutor wants to make this woman suffer more at the hands of US justice than any terrorist who ever attacked our diplomats overseas, is telling the world more about us than Operation Enduring Freedom did.

It is fine to bleat about upholding the law but we have bigger fish to fry than a woman who might have underpaid her maid in the eyes of a ridiculous law that is right up there with the 18th Amendment. If you feel the need to prosecute somebody, there's always one of our own government officials...  It clearly demonstrates that the law has nothing else to do in New York except relentlessly go after a woman who lied, and frankly, that's just unAmerican.

Saturday, March 15, 2014

ECONOMIC WARFARE IS WARFARE

The problem I have long had with people who propose that we should wage economic warfare against countries that we are not altogether happy with, is that it is a form of warfare. I know, you'd never guess that from the title but there it is. It really shouldn't be a surprise when Russia retaliates in kind. The thing about war that escapes politicians is that once you embark on a course of war, it escapes. It consumes and grows and gets out of control. One really shouldn't allow an idiot to talk about imposing economic sanctions on a foreign country unless that idiot is referring to some banana republic.

Russia is not any kind of banana republic. John Kerry Won't You Please Come Home.*

*They made a movie with a title just like this, but different.

CIVIL WAR LETTER HOME PELHAM TENNESSEE

I'm trying something new since this is a short letter home.

And the original.


Friday, March 14, 2014

THINGS THAT ENDURE

I plan to cover just a few of the many things that will last a very long time.

 This is the school across the street from where I live. As you can see from the cornerstone, it was built in 1918, just as the Great War was coming to an end. It has stood for almost a century and will likely stand for another since it has been well maintained and it is used for the instruction of little children.

Little kids don't really need all that much stuff in order to learn their ABCs geography and the times tables. This school is ranked very highly and is marvelously diverse. I see the kids coming  and leaving and they look and sound happy in this old school.


 The ship doesn't look like much does she? She lies on a beach on the coast of France surrounded by soldiers. Churchill called it England's finest hour. Over 338,000 allied troops were safely removed from the beach at Dunkirk. Not everyone made it. Not all of those that went to save those men came back.

My grandfather wore these during the war. He gave them to my father who wore them for years and then he gave them to me. I pinned them on a uniform for a time. They're Army eagles though so they're not scaled to wear on a Navy uniform except the foul weather jacket and I lived in San Diego so there wasn't much of that.

Well built and kept buildings will endure as will the education they deliver to the young minds that really are so eager to learn. Courage is going to endure and perhaps England will endure for a thousand years. The eagles are pretty solid and they only get worn for about 8 years every generation. They may prove the most ephemeral. Still, they look brand new and might survive another generation. It's a different world and who knows, maybe my little pilot will want to serve in the military too.

FAR FROM THE WORKS OF MAN

Watch this video I shamelessly stole from Exile in Portales.  It captures something that almost half of America never sees and likely never will because most people simply don't stop for the night in the exact middle of nowhere far from the works of man. They press on to the bright city lights.

This is what they miss. Put it on full screen.


Thanks Buck. That made my day.

Thursday, March 13, 2014

WHO MUST WE INVADE NEXT

Our Dear Leader's Minister for International Diplomas is threatening Russia if it doesn't take steps. I'm not sure what his plan is for our next step. Do we cancel our participation in the Olympics now or do we send the Marines to Crimea, invade, push back the endless Russian hordes right there on the Central Steppes of Asia and restore peace, freedom and the Egyptian way, or do we just nuke them?

Who are we supposed to attack if Scottish separatists vote to secede from the United Kingdom? Do we send our boys to invade Scotland? England? Canada? The entire EU? Should we buy an ocean of red paint so we can get ready to draw those lines now? Maybe, you know, get a discount?

Seriously Kerry, it's undignified to see you thrashing around like this. Would you consider staying home for a couple of years and letting things take the course they're going to take without making a buffoon out of yourself and by extension, us?

Do you think the EU is with you on this gamble into a war with Asia? You do know they get 30% of their fuel and gas from Russia and that they are still enjoying the depths of unrestrained Global Warming right now. They probably would like you to reconsider threatening their heating supplies.

Still, our Dear Leader and the Hillary will need you to play the role of Ana Pauker next year. Evil regimes need people like you John Kerry.

THE RELENTLESS CRUELTY OF GLOBAL WARMING

They didn't come out and use the scare words but the spin on this news just cries out for an appeal to stop the warming! CBS news Chicago reports:
Record amounts of ice coating the lake is to blame, keeping the birds from their only source of food.
“It just seems like they literally can’t find enough food and are starving,” said Engel.
The dozens found dead so far are likely just the tip of it.
This is, at least as far as I know, the first time I’ve heard of anything like this,” said Engel.
Nobody is going to believe that it freezes in the Windy City

METROPARKCENTRALIS

There are a couple of places that have become happy ports of call here in MPC. One is the Blue Star Tavern in Solon on Miles Road. It has a nice atmosphere, plenty of TV to watch sports, good company and you cannot beat the steak quesidilla. Seriously. They make the best steak quesidilla in the western hemisphere. If you are fan of just steak and cheese ask for without the sauce.

Another great place is Moosehead Hoof and Ladder in North Olmstead Falls. It has a deck outside for dining and watching the river and the railroad traffic. The food and service are great. Both are friendly to military veterans.

Wednesday, March 12, 2014

NAVY MAKES SHIP UP

I have to hand it to the admiralty in the Pentagon. They come up with the most bizarre stupid crap on the planet. On the face of it, it may seem a little unusual to suddenly decide that little patrol craft should be counted as line of battle warships but the USN has been playing this game for a very long time. The admirals fight like hell to hold on to old ships to keep the numbers up, get screwed out of them by budget manipulators in the Pentagon and then fight like hell to remain relevant as the world's largest navy by reclassifying impotent and harmless ships as "warships."
USS TEMPEST off the coast of my old town, Manama, Bahrain (MC3 Billy Ho/Navy)
I didn't have a problem counting Mine Countermeasures ships as warships since these ships are the ONLY ships capable of sweeping mines more than once and mines have been, far and a way, the most damaging and destructive weapon used against the USN since World War II ended almost 70 years ago. In my view it is the same as counting ballistic missile submarines as warships. They also specialize in a unique form of naval combat and few would refrain from referring to them as warships even if they do call them boats.

This is a little embarrassing for me. I drove ships alongside the pier in the film below a hundred times and we never would have dreamed of using a tug on my 173 foot long ship. This video speaks volumes about the seamanship of the modern USN.


Some interesting fact sheets from that fount of factual misinformation wikipedia.   The first link was to the Littoral Combat Ship which consists of two totally different designs but it doesn't matter much since both types are harmless. This wikipedia link describes the Patrol Combatant ships. The LCS costs around $560 million per ship. The PCs were bought with bottle caps and some left over green stamps. 

In other LCS related news today I see that the Chief of Naval Operations is establishing yet another top policy council of admirals to advise him on the little crappy ships (LCS) that it bought and is still buying in enormous numbers. His first little crappy ship council headed by the number 2 officer in the navy hasn't had much of an impact selling us on a ship that is effectively harmless and landlocked. The LCS has enormous trouble getting underway and on the rare occasions it does get underway and leaves port it promptly breaks down and needs to be towed back and it still doesn't have any functional weaponry or sensors. You'd think the ships would work after all that money, time and effort making power point slides and since the ships have been around now for almost 10 years.

It's worth noting that the PC's were no bargain either. They were initially designed and built to a fake specification to replace the MK III patrol boats used by Special Boat Squadrons. They were rejected by just about everybody in Special Warfare and the navy gave them away to the Coast Guard, who gave them back to the Navy. The Navy desperately wanted to give them to the Reserve but the GWOT and the Mina al Bakr and Khor abd Ullah Iraqi oil terminals needed a meaningful non-islamic defense forces to keep from being blown up, so the Navy/Coast Guard war-fighting team kept the boats around. They were though, on their way out with the A-10 if not for 9/11.

MUTUAL BALANCE OF TERROR

I cannot count the number of times in recent weeks that I have been told by extraordinary Americans that they don't mind paying more taxes and that they believe that they get good value in return for their money. They demonstrate their sincerity by living in a town where the local property taxes are extraordinarily high. Unfortunately, they translate their pocket socialism into National Socialism and believe that paying higher and higher taxes yields equivalent value on a national scale and they don't mind paying for that. They vote their beliefs every election and cheerfully vote for the National Socialist Party.

It's America and in spite of all, it's a democracy and we all get to vote, some more than others, but I am less and less impressed with their connection to reality. They seem obtusely and profoundly ignorant of the simple fact that they are not paying for the value they receive. They're only paying for a small fraction of what they keep voting for.

What they really do as they relentlessly support overspending at local, state and national levels, is fail to admit that they are not spending their own money at all. They spent $18 trillion counted dollars of their children's money. That doesn't count the $120 trillion dollars in unfunded national government liabilities for medicaire, social security, obamacare, etc. That doesn't count all the State and local unfunded pension plans.

They are exactly like the people that ruined Detroit and they sincerely believe that there is no problem. What is going to happen is painfully obvious. A lot of the people that vote pocket socialist and don't mind paying more and more workers higher and higher wages are going to move away in a few years, after the kids are gone, leaving behind the masses of public debt that their largesse scattered in their unknowing and uncaring wake. Meanwhile the neighborhoods decline as people that would like to buy there cannot afford to pay the very high taxes for the privilege. The houses sit vacant and that destroys property values around them. The people's workers strive to maintain their unjustified high wages and pensions at literally any cost and the creeps that ruin civilization are elected to run local government and start to borrow money rather than trim payments or the number of workers. That's how towns and cities go bankrupt.

I see it everyday as I move around MetroParkCentralis. There are scores of neighborhoods that are host to hundreds of amazing and beautiful old homes but the homes are ruins even if people still dwell within them for they are in the formerly high end and nice neighborhoods of a city that was once of the 5 richest cities in America. The Wreckers can look at the ruined houses and devastated neighborhoods that once were far wealthier than where you live and never comprehend how it came to pass that they fell into ruin. The people with the money left.

I retaliate by telling some of them that not only do I not believe in man-made global warming, I think all those who preach it are scam artists, thieves and ignorant hicks who like to lynch people who they hate. In a democracy it is important to keep things level and balanced. This way each of us can hate the other and maintain the balance of terror.* They're afraid of mankind and we're afraid of them.


*why yes, most of people who vote Socialist also firmly believe in man-made global warming. They never saw an ice sheet move in any season for any other reason. They're very credulous folk.

THE AWESOME SECRET OF THE NSA

It is now well known that the National Security Agency hoovers up every scrap of digital information in the world. Its probes and sensors are collecting everything from your cell phone calls to your baby monitor. It delves deeply into every single computer information system, network and cloud.

We never hear about NSA computers crashing because they were suddenly infected with a virus.

I wonder how many times over the years various news networks have been approached by some shadowy figure saying he worked for the NSA and knew what happened to Amelia Earheart and her plane, or knew Obama's GPA at all the schools he attended but got brushed off by the likes of Dan Rather. Now the hackers know to take the scoop to sock puppets instead of fake news outfits like CBS.

The NSA can get away with anything it wants because there is no oversight and no limit on their activities. I laughed out loud when I heard this referred to on the radio this morning and then read the news:
The head of the Senate Intelligence Committee said Tuesday that the CIA searched the panel's computers and that the search may have violated the Constitution.
"The CIA just went and searched the committee's computers," California Democrat Sen. Dianne Feinstein said in a lengthy speech on the Senate floor, calling the the matter a "defining moment" for the oversight of the Intelligence Committee.
"I have grave concerns that the CIA's search may well have violated the separation of powers principles embodied by the United States Constitution, including the speech and debate clause," she said. "It may have undermined the Constitutional framework essential to effective congressional oversight of intelligence activity or any other government function."
 Gee Dianne, do you think?

Tuesday, March 11, 2014

QUEEN MARY'S STRANGE HOOD ORNAMENT

I spotted this today at gCaptain.

Queen Mary's captain stands on the leading bulb of the 151,000 ton ocean liner off the coast of Bali.

Monday, March 10, 2014

FOR DRAB AND HUMDRUM LIVES

 
PJ O'Rourke and the CATO institute have prepared an amicus brief for submission to the Supreme Court. It is a gem and has the following:
 Laws like Ohio’s here, which criminalize “false” speech, do not replace truthiness, satire, and snark with high-minded ideas and “just the facts.” Instead, they chill speech such that spin becomes silence. More importantly, Ohio’s ban of lies and damn lies* is inconsistent with the First Amendment.
* Amici are unsure how much torture statistics can withstand before they too run afoul of the law.
 It is 15 pages so only if you have plenty of time.

A UNIVERSAL NAVAL OBSERVATION

I've noticed that ships that cannot repair themselves and get underway have the cleanest engine rooms on the waterfront.

Friday, March 7, 2014

ANOTHER CHAT WITH THE PONTIFEX MAXIMUS

I can't say I'm surprised. The dismal failure of the news makers to comprehend that their bias lost them almost every viewer they ever had is hard for them to accept.
Neither CBS nor ABC have included a (sic) skeptical scientists in their news shows within the past 1,300 days, but both networks included alarmists within the past 160 days -- CBS as recently as 22 days ago. When the networks did include other viewpoints, the experts were dismissed as "out of the scientific mainstream" or backed by "oil and coal companies." 
There are a lot of very bright people out there, just none in the news business. I think I know why but it's hard to accept that the adults let ignorant kids take over a medium and use it to preach their bias and ignorance 24/7 without any of them having to take a test or demonstrate even the slightest level of professional knowledge or faintest ethical standards. 

Let us contrast the State requirements for cutting hair and State requirements for journalists. Here are California's mandated minimum requirements. There are no requirements to be a journalist.
  • COSMETOLOGIST LICENSE: 1600 Hours / 3200 Apprenticeship
  • BARBER LICENSE: 1500 Hours / 3200 Apprenticeship
  • NAIL TECHNICIAN LICENSE: 400 Hours
  • ESTHETICIAN LICENSE: 600 hours
  • ELECTROLOGIST LICENSE: 600 Hours / 3200 Hours Apprenticeship
  • MASSAGE THERAPIST LICENSE: 250 Hours Practitioner, 500 Hours Therapist 
Gaa! It's enough to curl your hair!