Daily Translation

Which is closer to the truth?

The original:

House Democrats will ask the wealthiest Americans to help pay for overhauling the health care system with a $550 billion income tax increase, the chairman of the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee said Friday.

Or the translation:

House Democrats will compel, via force and the threat of punishment/imprisonment, the wealthiest Americans to help pay for overhauling the health care system with a $550 billion income tax increase, the chairman of the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee said Friday.

Asking usually implies a choice.

Because they’re Uniters not Dividers, I Guess

Today, Vancouver Women's Health Collective have opened Lu's: A Pharmacy for Women. This will be the first women-run and women-only pharmacy in North America.

Remember: exclusionary behavior in accommodations of any sort is perfectly okay when you are a mindless stinking leftist zombie. Otherwise, they will smash your ‘little club’ or your economy, or get all ‘revolutionary’ on you or something, so long as it’s subsidized and a there’s a grant in it for them.

These gullible, insular fools seem to have intentionally ignored the horrors that decades of Marxism, that stuff that they underhandedly promote with a rather more Trotskyite spirit than ol’ Vlad and Uncle Joe ever did.

Now if they still don’t seem pathetically two-dimensional enough to you, they seem to also have a simplistic affection for the heroic naming of things too as proof for the cause.

The pharmacy was named after longtime volunteer Lucette Hansen, who is 85. Heart-warming happy feelings? Check!

Tedious lack of depth? Check. Autonomic reaction to reinforcement? Check, there too! It’s how a blogger ends up with more “ists” that she professes to than anything I’ve seen looking at history. What she doesn’t seem to have is any of the grounding that real revolutionaries have: namely some connection, no matter how false or tenuously they are sold as, which is a real job, or at least SOME sort of link to some real or productive connection to economic society, that thing that informs much of human behavior and feeds all of us. Instead we have a freelance writer who is likely getting work by networking like-minded people living off of the grant and foundation racket, after having had enough of a heroic looking make-work past to make that acid-test compliant CV possible.

What’s telling is why she thinks it a ‘feel good’ story: it’s no different than however many class-warfare arguments and the empty political tribalism that it reinforces repeated over the decades. It lulls people into accepting uncritically why exclusions and exceptionalism is okay when it strokes their own egos. As with cults and past leftist revolutionary movements, the conditioning starts with the paranoid belief that certain types of people in the world are after you, that they are all-powerful, and that any violation of your own beliefs in the combat against them is acceptable. It requires an exclusionary code of behavior, a sort of uniform, and other reinforcement tools no different that the jihadists’ head scarf or beard, or the fascists’ brown shirt.

The regime's most widely used tools of uniformization are the hijab
for women and the beard for men-both props in a campaign of visual terrorism, designed to frighten opponents and enforce conformity.

-The Persian Night: Iran under the
Khomeinist Revolution (Amir Taheri)

Which is a fetish no different than those employed here: hemp wear, fair trade this and that, and the other mainstays of the domestic revolution. An initiation on the cheap, the intention is to force on the believers a physical act committing them a little more greatly in their devotion, and being able to identify the others living in the same mental bunker and politicized social sect that you are. Ah, but how that exclusion and isolation makes them feel good.

NOW Do You Understand the Difference?!

While you're at it (laughing or crying, don't know which), be sure to check out P Blakeney's EC comics parody (merci à François)

Veteran Imposter Did It for the Servicemen, He Says (and, Oh, By the Way, Also to Help Democrats Win Elections)

The veteran imposter lying about service in Iraq turns out to be a mentally ill phony lying also to… help Democrats win elections (03:40)

Pizza Psychology

There are no limits to your eating. You often devour the scraps your friends can't finish.

You aren't particularly picky about pizza. It's so good... how could you be? You fit in best in the Western part of the US.

You like food that's traditional and well crafted. You aren't impressed with "gourmet" foods.

You are dependable, loyal, and conservative with your choices.

You are deep and thoughtful. You should consider traveling to Paris.

The stereotype that best fits you is guy or girl next door. Hey, there's nothing wrong with being average.

Among the Ambassadors of the Age of Aquarius: an old college roommate, the head of an entertainment company, and a lawyer who sold vacuum cleaners

So, tell us, BHO (aka A-New-Age-Is-Dawning Man): What happened to hope and change and a new climate with a new way of thinking in Washington?

The White House, unaware of historic norms, had been on track to give more than the usual 30 percent of ambassadorial jobs to political appointees until objections from career diplomats forced it to reconsider, administration officials say.

…Mr. Obama has been criticized in recent weeks for continuing the tradition of handing out ambassadorships to major campaign donors with no experience in foreign affairs.

The Washington Times reported Tuesday that an old college roommate, the head of an entertainment production company and a lawyer whose family made its money selling vacuum cleaners are among more than a dozen people who have been given ambassadorships after raising a total of at least $4 million for Mr. Obama's campaign, according to public records.

…Mr. Obama ran on a pledge to emphasize diplomacy and transparency but appeared to be well on his way to inflating the number of political appointees as ambassadors until the Foreign Service intervened.

…[A] senior administration official … noted that those who expected jobs but will not get them now should not be too concerned, because the administration "will need talent later."

Photo round-up

Looks like the real hound dog was Sarkozy, shocker....

Face it. You are What you Bleat.

Georges Lane blogging on Le Forum Libre reports on the European left’s high level of sophistication, concern for the public well being, and thoughtfulness.

On 29 May, a well-organized leftist “commando” ransacking the conference hall of the Hotel Pestalozzi in Lugano in front of a shocked staff. The objective (successful): was to prevent a conference on pension reform organized by the Ticinese Liberisti with Ignazio Cassis and Jose Piñera. The Liberisti had received threats from communist and socialist groups before the conference. Gabriele Lafranchi, organizer of the conference, does not expect that the "red fascists" to get away with their violent action. The thugs have been identified.

As if calling people who trash property to make sure no-one they disagree will has a venue a ‘commando’ wasn’t funny enough, Lane goes on to explain why:

Jose Piñera, the guest speaker, is the pioneer of a pension scheme that allows "proletarians of the world" to access capital ... something that genuinely consigns the rhetoric of "class struggle" to the dustbin of history!

The leftists do have never forgiven him."

Because the the far left, a closed mind that you can claim is more open that anyone elses’, and open wound that never heals is more politically useful than actually putting some class in class struggle, and actually redistributing the wealth for real.

A picture worth more than 1,000 words

It's on!

Brussels after Dark

Ladies wear those kind of shoes as a warning:

Another Political Storm Is Rapidly Coming

Washington insiders are going to try and push the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (sic) on the United States through the Congress before the summer is over…

No wonder people talk about the A400M as a nightmare

Can elephants fly?

asks Celestine Bohlen.

That’s one way of looking at the Airbus A400M military transport plane, which a group of mostly European nations has been trying to get off the ground since 2003.

Time and money are running out on the project, and the four-engine turboprop, designed to ferry troops and equipment, still hasn’t even had a test flight.

After a delay of almost four years, and cost overruns that are digging into profits, European Aeronautic Defense & Space must be starting to wonder whether it should pull the plug on this €20 billion, or $28 billion, project, and let its customers buy American.

With 6,000 jobs at stake, this would cause economic pain and howls of political protests. European pride would be wounded, and the reputation of the region’s defense industry would be badly damaged.

…Politics have plagued the project from the start. Early on, EADS was forced to pick a group of European companies, including Rolls-Royce Group of Britain, to make the plane’s engine, instead of the American manufacturer Pratt & Whitney, whose price was better.

The project has become a kind of Christmas tree, with the different governments trying to add on special features, such as low-flying or all-weather capability. The result is a product that looks more like a camel than a racehorse, according to Bernard Jenkin, a Conservative member of the British Parliament who sits on the House of Commons defense committee.

“We should dump it,” he said. “It was always a political airplane.”

…Before they start throwing more good money after bad, the governments involved should think about their priorities. As a top adviser to President Nicolas Sarkozy of France said this week: “All we want is a plane that works.”

Save Paris's Centre Culturel Suédois

By popular demand:

Join the Save le Centre Culturel Suédois Committee

The Swedish cultural center is situated in Paris, the capital of culture and is Sweden'sonly one of its kind abroad. Every year, 100.000 parisians can discover and take part in Swedish art, theater,design, film and music as Swedish artists perform and expose regularily at the center.

Swedish companies are present and have conferences in the premises of the center. There are also rooms available for visiting artists and people doing research.

CCS plays an important role in the French-Swedish cultural exchange both in a cultural and scientific manner and it would be devastating for Sweden, and not so good for France, should it cease to exist.

Surrounded by the Best and the Brightest, no Doubt

Some White House [flunky] spells Obama's name wrong

In a release touting an agreement between Obama and President Dmitry Medvedev over how to craft a follow-up to the START arms reduction treaty, the White House claimed the document had been signed by one "Barak Obama."

Maybe it happened because mister historic über-mind wasn’t doing it himself, dammit! After all his historic administration is the most historically intelligent one ever in history!

The truly craven left

They just can't tolerate the free-flow, give-and-take, sophisticated and/or nuanced greys of differing, yet enriching, all encompassing consensus-driven points of view:

Further libertarian comments on this and other economic issues will be blocked for good reason - I do not think the discourse you offer any more acceptable to society than that of the BNP

In other words, they just don't like it up 'em.

Added bonus:

You are abusing those who depend on taxation for their well being - as millions do - and which you would deny them

Can You Imagine the Uproar If George W. Bush Had Gotten the Age of His Daughters Wrong?!

Mr. Obama has seemed tired here, several times fumbling the pronunciation of Mr. Medvedev’s name and Mr. Putin’s title. Beginning a speech here, he mistakenly said he first met his wife in school instead of at the law firm where they actually met. And he misstated his younger daughter’s age.

Can you imagine the (neverending) scorn and the (neverending) ridicule (not least in the New York Times) had George W. Bush fumbled the pronunciation of a foreign leader's name and/or title or had Dubya (spasibo to Larwyn for the link) misstated the place where he first met his wife or either of his daughters' ages?! There would have been an uproar — and not only liberals would add "rightfully so."

With Barack Obama, what do we get? "Mr. Obama has seemed tired." No, not "he was (is) clueless", not "he was (is) unprepared", not even "he was tired" that day, no, "Mr. Obama has seemed tired."

In the meantime, I hate to say this, but Russians — even the young, starry-eyed ones (!) — have seemed more intelligent than Americans lately…

“We don’t really understand why Obama is such a star,” said Kirill Zagorodnov, 25, one of the graduates. “It’s a question of trust, how he behaves, how he positions himself, that typical charisma, which in Russia is often parodied. Russians really are not accustomed to it. It is like he is trying to manipulate the public.”

As a matter of fact, in the photo below, Dmitri A. Medvedev seems precisely to react to Barack Obama's main tool of diplomacy, internal as well as external — which is (after apologizing for just about everything any of his 43 predecessors have ever done) to call everybody and everything anybody does (except for American conservatives, natch) "extraordinary" or "splendid" or "smashing".

In fact, making the photo below a caption contest might not be a bad idea, the one I have in mind being:

"Oh Lord, there that Yankee goes again, using once more that 'extraordinary' gavno! (Does he really think we Russkis haven't seen through that one yet?!)"

Apart from that, the Apologizer-in-Chief still thinks that the presidency is about some kind of personal journey for him; he doesn't understand that going to Paris or to Moscow as President of the United States of America is not an excuse for going touristing alone with the family… And that foreign leaders, rightfully or otherwise, do not like it!

Update from Fausta: What we have here is a failure to communicate: Pres. Obama’s foreign host, be it Sarkozy, Dmitri Medvedev, or whoever the next dignitary may be, naively considers the office and duties of head of state to be the top priority during state visits. They simply don’t understand that the endless self-promotion and apology tours are mere background opportunities for Obama to showcase himself as above all such mundane concerns

Update from Timeswatch: Clay Waters points out that right after the "handy excuse for Obama's gaffe" (the president "seemed tired"), Peter Baker followed up "immediately [with] a counterexample designed to reassure readers that the president was still sharp as a tack" ("He was quick on his feet, however").

The Left’s Frotteur with Totalitarianism Continues

Tacit new friends of O!: a clutch of dictators at their Alba summit in 2008: Ralph Gonsalves of St Vincent, Evo Morales of Bolivia, Cuba's Raoul Castro, Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, Roosevelt Skerit of Dominica, Nicaragua's Daniel Ortega, Manuel Zelaya, Honduras, and Rafael Correa Ecuador.

Forget what they say, watch what they do, so the saying goes. By virtue of actions and political alignments, Obama is now an ally of sorts of Hugo Chávez, Daniel Ortega, and Evo Morales who operate in a vapid intellectual environment where the demonization of ideas, anti-intellectualism, coups, and open chicanery are what the public dialog has devolved to.

CNN (Español) using Zelaya imposter

As crazy as this may sound, CNN is using feeds from Hugo Chávez's Telesur network. Telesur have stooped to using a Zelaya impostor in a supposed phone-in interview with the Telesur reporter.

There is no question that it is not Zelaya and I am shocked that the announcers on CNN in Atlanta, who have talked to him so many times do not recognize that. The man has a Venezuelan accent according to El Jefe and sounds nothing like Mel Zelaya.

But for the grace of God, it’s where the west is going, and it’s going to that thuggish sort of society not by laziness, but by willful action in support of some strange collection of leftist truisms that is supposed to be some sort of social model. We are lead to believe it’s some kind of Social Democracy that they’re after, but all evidence of their actions show that what they seem to prefer is Communist style social control of the population with ineffective social institutions to complement it – a sort of failed version of the new Chinese “Socialism with Chinese characteristics”, except with Latin American style charismatic strongman leadership, and Barak Obama seems unable to see nothing wrong with it.

If the G-8 never met again, would anyone ever notice?

For that matter, G-anything:

Preparations for Wednesday's G8 summit in the Italian mountain town of L'Aquila have been so chaotic there is growing pressure from other member states to have Italy expelled from the group, according to senior western officials.

In the last few weeks before the summit, and in the absence of any substantive initiatives on the agenda, the US has taken control. Washington has organised "sherpa calls" (conference calls among senior officials) in a last-ditch bid to inject purpose into the meeting.

"For another country to organise the sherpa calls is just unprecedented. It's a nuclear option," said one senior G8 member state official. "The Italians have been just awful. There have been no processes and no planning."

Seriously, can anyone point to anything of actual substance being accomplished at a G-anything meeting? Powerpoint, communiqués, group photos (the really important things) excluded.

This is not possible

Surely this article has it all wrong. How is it that these individuals are making their own economic choices, based upon their own criteria, without being compelled or forced by some governmental edict:

The phenomenon is initially American, but already a local chapter has been formed in the Flemish-speaking part of Belgium. The philosophy is simple: rather than boycotting shop owners for not doing enough for the environment, carrotmobbers use their consumer power to reward those that do.

What's new about carrotmob - the name comes from the carrot rather than the stick approach - is that it concentrates not on large corporations but on small neighbourhood businesses: the grocery store, the supermarket, the local restaurant.

"Everybody shops but it is not organised," Niel Staes of the Flemish chapter explained. "When you do organise shopping, you can get the shop owner to make an effort in exchange for your business." For instance: get the shop owner to invest some of the proceeds in saving energy.

"Instead of telling the shop owner: we're not going to buy from you anymore until you invest in making your shop more sustainable, we will go to his store on a particular day with a bunch of people to shop. In exchange we ask that part of the money we've spent is invested in green management."

Could it be something called "a market"?

Notice the Similarities with That Other "Coup", the One That Overthrew Leftist Saint© and Martyr™ Salvador Allende?

Has anyone noticed what seems to be the (very real) similarities between the overthrow of Manuel Zelaya and that of Salvador Allende? Plus ça change… (Needless to say, the Apologizer-in-Chief recently voiced regret about Augusto Pinochet's "coup" as well…)

In Latin America, José Piñera, armed with evidence including "the momentous Agreement of 23 August 1973 … widely unknown outside Chile", opines that because

President Allende became a tyrant when he broke his solemn oath to respect the Constitution and the Chilean laws [and because] his government [had] fomented the creation of armed militias … the origin of the Pinochet government is that of any revolutionary one, in which only the use of force was left in order to remove a tyrant [and to] "put immediate end" to these constitutional violations. It must be agreed that this was, in fact, an unequivocal call to remove by force the President who had initiated the use of force with the purpose of imposing a communist dictatorship.

…the truth demands recognition that former President Pinochet led a legitimate rebellion against tyranny and that the origin of Chile's civil war --and its victims-- lies with former President Allende and his marxist Socialist party. … The Economist said it clearly at the time: "The temporary death of democracy in Chile will be regrettable, but the blame lies clearly with Dr. Allende and those of his followers who persistently overrode the Constitution" (September 15, 1973).

Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God

Read also about Allende's purported suicide…

And check out Romanticists Overlook Allende's Many Faults: Senator Ricardo Núñez Muñoz added in a NYT interview (emphasis mine) that

It’s wrong to say that the CIA, the armed forces, and the bourgeoisie alone brought down the Allende government. It’s obvious we need to admit we made critical economical and political errors that were as decisive if not more decisive

No less a figure than the president of the Partido Socialista, Núñez went on to conclude that

we know another Allende-like experiment would only be a collossal failure.

(Then again, that NYT report was back in 2001…)

Foreign Policy, as if it were Dictated by ‘Politically Aware’ Junior High Kids

The Commander in Chief is a buffoon.

If Richard Nixon had been impeached and convicted for Watergate, and then refused to leave office, until being forced out by the military, would that have been a “military coup”? Of course not. But Obama and many in the press are taking essentially that position in demanding the reinstatement of Honduras’s would-be dictator.

The WH’s handling of the Hondurans’ legal removal of their own president is laughable. They either don’t have anyone at state actually watching what’s going on, someone ignoring communications from the Embassy, or they just have a thing for leftist strongmen. Then again, maybe it’s all just aspritational, and they need to hold to this course of action to head off any future accusations of inconsistency.

Now, Obama, who knows nothing about Honduran law, is ignorantly claiming that Zelaya's removal was "illegal," and demanding that Zelaya be reinstated as president. His demand is joined in by the Organization of American States, many of whose leaders, like Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez, have either violated their own countries' constitutions, or likewise seek to eliminate term limits contained in their own countries' constitutions. ("A senior Obama administration official said the United States would probably move to suspend economic development and military assistance" to Honduras, one of the poorest countries in the Western Hemisphere).

Sheez-o-peak! Give peace a chance, will ya man? I mean I know it’s all about not trying to look like you’re siding with dictators, but do you have to side with dictators to try to prove that whole ‘image thing”?

Besides, what would THAT victory lap look like? Will the entertainment at the hand-shaking ceremony with Chavez, Daniel Ortega, and aging Cuban Milli Vanilli cover act, the Castro boys, be a couple of public hanging and a parade of Chinese discount missile launchers?

Breaking free from reality

Our left-wing touchstone unwittingly brings up an interesting question yet fails again to find a proper answer:

It is in the private sector that we need cuts – or more tax if they refuse to do it. The reason is straightforward: much (and I know, not all) of what the the private sector does is froth on the top of the cappuccino, nice but wholly unnecessary. It’s the state sector that provides what we need most: health, education, housing (oh yes – all of it is regulated), safe food (oh yes – again, we only have that because it is regulated), transport infrastructure, safety, protection and so much more. They are, if you like the coffee in life. The froth is the extra. And we can do without some froth – we can’t do without the coffee.

The relationship is of course inter-related with both relying on each other. It is the extent of reliance which is the debate (if anything the proper starting point is precisely opposite of the hyper-regulating tax-gobbling mindset displayed above). A simple question to start from, where does the public sector get their funding?

Update: Gosh, that is not what we really meant.....
Update II: Gosh, well we sort of really meant it.....

It is finally a reality

Where the hell is U*2 to enjoy it?!

France on Monday unveiled a list of state-owned stakes in companies, worth 14 billion euros, that will be transferred to the government's strategic investment fund.

Sarkozy, a long-standing advocate of government intervention to support domestic industry where necessary, said the fund would allow the state to protect companies weakened by the financial crsis from foreign "predators".

The government will also transfer 20 stakes in listed companies held by state bank Caisse des Depots.

These are: Accor, L'Air Liquide, Alcatel-Lucent, Altran Technologies, Assystem, Danone, Eiffage, Eutelsat Communications, Imerys, Lagardere SCA, Nexity, Schneider Electric, Seche Environnement, Sodexo, Technip, Ubisoft Entertainment, Valeo, Vallourec, Vivendi, Zodiac Aerospace.

Strategic yogurt production is finally a reality. Félicitations U*2, you have been waiting for years!

Breaking News: Russian PM Signs some kind of Paper

The White House is flailing under a pall of ignorance, disorganization and unprofessionalism. It has the air of an Italian city’s Sanitation Department. In a desperate bid to not make the US into an appetizing target, the president presiding over this embarrassment is trying to find a way international policy matter that will permit him to preach to the converted, and get visible kudos on cue: arms control. Now the eternally troubled baby boomers and everyone they’re conditioned into parroting them can take get sentimental about an old straw man from the malaise of the 1980s.

The president:

yesterday hailed an agreement with Russia to cut the two countries’ nuclear arsenals by two-thirds as a move that would "liquidate the legacy of the Cold War".
The president said the agreement would usher in a new phase in US-Russian relations. "The new era will be a period of enhanced mutual security, economic security and improved relations," he said.

It’s an old dream, this age of Aquarius business where we want to buy the world a Coke and keep it company, or like, whatever.

Under the agreement, the United States and Russia will reduce the two countries’ nuclear arsenals to an agreed upon range of 1,700 to 2,200 warheads. The United States currently has about 7,000 strategic nuclear weapons, Russia about 6,000.

The president in question is George Bush, and by virtue of ideological fanaticism and blindness unparalleled since Mao’s cultural revolution, it was not considered at all, and immediately identified as a bad idea based solely on the ideological reflexes of the press.

Now, it will be called “historic”, “brilliant”, and any other superlatives that are available for rent. Absent is the fact that Moscow signs things that look great in the news (such as the Kyoto accord, or as agreed with the EU on the Georgia adventure,) with no intention of actually abiding by them.

Evidently the fact that this nearly always happens isn’t enough evidence for the press to be skeptical about Obama’s childish bid for good publicity. He’s such a lightweight, his office is acting as though this is no different than cutting a ribbon at a kindergarten, something that when brought to idly signing treaties undermines America’s plausibility and moral authority.

The obviousness that pandering wrecks the tools of soft power seems completely lost on the White House. “Seems” I say, because it could well be that they’re just acting out a holding action to prevent the world from noticing what a horrible state State is in.

This is what a Martyr Looks Like

No, not the corrupted Jihadist notion of one, the kind that chooses to actively murder others because of who they represent to him, even if the use of the word has infected the rest of the Arab world and now most of the perceptual boundaries of the European left.

Piotr Stanczak did not exhibit the slightest hint of hesitation when the Pakistani Taliban asked him to choose between execution and conversion to Islam.

Whether the Polish geologist acted out of pride or religious conviction, he decided to pay through his blood to save his faith, a choice that bewildered his killers and keep them talking about him with respect after his murder.

Stanczak, 42, was kidnapped September 28 on his way to survey for oil exploration in Attock district, of Pakistan's eastern province of Punjab. The kidnappers also killed his driver and two guards.

Late Polish engineer Piotr Stanczak is a martyr, a man who died holding on to his convictions, even though dispensing of them would be easy.

The description of a martyr given by the pagan historian Ammianus Marcellinus (XXII, xvii), shows that by the middle of the fourth century the title was everywhere reserved to those who had actually suffered death for their faith.

Slow burn

It has been interesting to watch the Dutch slowly chip away at the statist/governmentalist mindset when it comes to that smoking ban. It is unfortunate that one has to take mini-steps in restoring individual rights and individual liberties, but if the result in the end is the same, so be it:

The appeals court in the northern city of Leeuwarden on Friday ruled that the owners of a cafe in Groningen are not guilty of breaking the law by allowing their customers to smoke. The law holds "no obligation for those without staff to impose a smoking ban", the court said.

A Groningen district court had fined Cafe De Kachel 1,200 euros, but that verdict has now been overruled by the appeals court. Last month, a bar in Breda won a similar case before a different appeals court.

A smoking has been in place in bars and restaurants in the Netherlands since July 1, 2008. The owners of small bars have objected to the ban from the beginning, saying their size makes it impossible to create sealed-off smoking areas in their cafes, as larger cafes are allowed to do. They also said they should be exempted from the smoking ban because they do not employ staff other than themselves. The Dutch ban was imposed as a measure to protect personnel from secondhand smoke by guaranteeing a smoke-free work environment.

Hardcore statists/governmentalists rarely shrink from using the legal system to impose their point-of-view on the rest us, why not use a bit of their own medicine to blow a little smoke right back in their face?

Using the tools of the statists/governmentalists to defeat them makes the victory (no matter how small) just a tad sweeter.

Tax is a good thing! (continued)

It pays for those things we want?

Licence payers fund BBC chief's £8m pension

Two BBC bosses have racked up the biggest pensions in the public sector, together worth more than £14m.

Mark Byford, 51, the deputy director general, is to receive a pension of at least £229,500 a year from a pot valued at almost £8m. This could rise to more than £10m if he works at the BBC until the age of 60.

Alan Yentob, 62, the arts presenter and creative director of the BBC, has accumulated a pension worth £6.3m, giving an annual retirement income of £216,667 for the rest of his life, according to new research.

Quiz time

Weekends are good for quiz time:

1) If you are a woman, where would you live to find the most happiness:
A) Saudi Arabia
B) Germany

2) If you are a parent, where would you live to find the most happiness in raising your children?
A) Bangladesh
B) France

3) If you are an entrepreneur, where would you live to find the most happiness in running your business:
A) Venezuela
B) Netherlands

If you answered anything other than (A) above, well you must not have the nuance and/or lucidity to understand this year's Happy Planet Index. For a much more trenchant critique of the HPI check out Tim Worstall, of course.

Btw, the US scored #114 out of 143 (Just edging out Nigeria but light years behind the happiness powerhouses of Moldova and the Congo).

An Excellent Analog for the State of the Culture’s Intellectualism

Some societies are just better at mental masturbation

It's on the internet, it must be true