Post #5,000

I started this blog in 2004, and have now posted 5,000 pieces of brilliance…or drivel…or some combination thereof.  Thank you, friends, so much for humoring me and wasting a minute or two of your day!  I am humbled!  🙂

USA gives $20 million to Pakistan to show Sesame Street to “promote tolerance”

Dude.

Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch are nowhere in sight. But there’s Elmo. And new creatures too, like Baily, a kindly donkey who loves to sing, and Haseen O Jameel, a vain crocodile who lives at the bottom of a well.

Sesame Street is coming to Pakistan but not as generations of Americans know it.

The TV show has a new cast of local characters led by a vivacious 6-year-old girl named Rani who loves cricket and traditional Pakistani music. Her sidekick, Munna, is a 5-year-old boy obsessed with numbers and banging away on Pakistani bongo drums, or tabla.

The U.S. is bankrolling the initiative with $20 million, hoping it will improve education in a country where one-third of primary school-age children are not in class. Washington also hopes the program will increase tolerance at a time when the influence of radical views is growing.

“One of the key goals of the show in Pakistan is to increase tolerance toward groups like women and ethnic minorities,” said Larry Dolan, who was the head education officer for the U.S. Agency for International Development in Pakistan until very recently.

Hey, why not?  I mean, they’ll listen to Allah when it comes to blowing themselves and infidels up; but once they get a load of Elmo and Haseen the Crocodile telling them to respect everyone and not self-detonate, then these heretofore loyal-to-the-death jihadists will tell Allah to go pound sand.  “Sorry, God, but puppets have told us that you’re full of crap.”

Because while the fear of death is nonexistent as a deterrent to commit murder, the guilt of having saddened Baily the Talking Donkey is more than they can bear.  Brilliant, B.O.

Democrat strategist and MSNBC analyst: GOP likes Cain for being “a black man who knows his place”

To recap: Voting for Obama in 2008 proves you’re not racist.  Voting for Cain in 2012 proves you are.  Got it?

Details:

On Martin Bashir’s television program this afternoon, Democratic strategist and MSNBC analyst Karen Finney said that Republicans are supporting Herman Cain because of his race…

“One of the things about Herman Cain is, I think that he makes that white Republican base of the party feel okay, feel like they are not racist because they can like this guy,” Finney said. “I think he giving that base a free pass. And I think they like him because they think he’s a black man who knows his place. I know that’s harsh, but that’s how it sure seems to me.”

“Thank you for spelling that out,” Bashir responded.

Fortunately, this was on MSDNC, so this shameful bigotry was limited to only their viewers…both of them.

Pelosi: It’s OK that over 1800 companies have gotten ObamaCare waivers

San Fran Nan’s rationale?  Heh.

“They’re small. I couldn’t speak to all 1,800 of them, but some of the lists that I have seen have been very, very small companies. They will not have a big impact on the economy of our country,” Nancy Pelosi said in an interview with CNBC.

If, by “small companies”, you mean McDonald’s (one of the top employers in the nation), then yeah…”small companies”!  Besides, didn’t she and her leftist ilk crow about how small business will love ObamaCare?  Yeah, they love it so much that they’ve asked to be excused from its onerous requirements.

Way to go, San Fransicko.

Why do OWS moonbats hate black people?

Remember when the Tea Party folks were called racist?  Good times, good times.

But what really struck me was the small number of black and brown people among the marchers. I had to hunt for Brian Johnson, a 40-year-old African-American male who was surrounded by a group of college-age white males wearing bandanas.

Johnson said he is committed to doing whatever it takes to support this cause.

“If we would pay attention to this movement, we would understand that it is not about young white people. It is about all of us,” he said. “A lot of people are struggling when they don’t have to.”

Zakiyyah S. Muhammad was the only African-American female I spotted.

“I’m here because this has gotten the attention of the people who make policy, but I don’t think enough of us has gotten involved,” she told me.

“It’s a funny thing to see white people marching and black people sitting around talking,” Muhammad mused.

 “White people are marching for change like we used to do and black people are complaining.”

 To paraphrase Kanye West: The Occupy Wall Street type doesn’t care about black people.  Or the homeless, either.  😆

Questions posed to the Occupy Wall Street parasites

Ace lays it down on ’em:

When you buy a loaf of bread, you are giving up some of your time, in the convenient unit of exchange called money, by which you were paid for your time, for someone else’s time.

This is why virtually everybody works. (Except for that blessed, tiny cadre of people who literally love their jobs and do their jobs almost entirely because they so enjoy it.)

So, these guys work for themselves. When they are compensated for the time they spend at work, they put that money into their pockets, and spend it on themselves (or their families).

And yet the self-deluded, entitled OWS crowd are absolutely insistent on the idea that other peopleshould spend large amounts of time working for the benefit of the OWS parasites.

Imagine walking up to any of these people on the street and ordering them: Come back to my house and clean my gutters, for free, because I want you to dedicate your time towards making my life easier.

Can you imagine the shock? The outrage? …

So does Peter Schiff:

Night and Day, “Democrats and ‘ObamaCare'” edition

Democrats: Stop calling it “ObamaCare”!

Use of the word Obamacare as a shorthand reference for the health care reform law has become a rallying cry for conservatives who are working to repeal the law.

Democrats have objected to the term.

Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY.) said Obamacare has “become sort of pejorative, for no particular reason — through usage and the way it’s used and who uses it. The Republicans are trying to make it pejorative.”  (News flash, fat boy: the voters confirmed it as a pejorative in November 2010. Notice that a lot of your colleagues from last year haven’t been going to the swank D.C. buffets with you lately?  “Man, it’s been quiet.  Where’s Grayson?” – CL)

Nadler added that Republicans were trying to seize on Obama’s unpopularity to make the health care law unpopular as well.

“If you can identify something with someone who’s unpopular for whatever reason, then it becomes somewhat unpopular,” he said.

Obama: You know, I’m totally cool with “ObamaCare”!

Complicating things, President Barack Obama himself appeared to embrace the term in August.

“I have no problem with folks saying, ‘Obama cares,’” Obama said in Minnesota while he was on a bus tour of the Midwest.

“I do care,” he said. “If the other side wants to be the folks who don’t care? That’s fine with me.”  (Dude, if crushing us with trillions in debt for a failed “health care” law that has delivered on none of its promises is caring, then please stop “caring” so much! – CL)

What we have here is a failure to communicate.

Obama to San Fran crowd: If I lose in 2012, you’re going to have to be self-reliant

Gasp!  Perish the thought!  Here’s Chairman Zero from San Fransicko:

At a million-dollar San Francisco fundraiser today, President Obama warned his recession-battered supporters that if he loses the 2012 election it could herald a new, painful era of self-reliance in America.

“The one thing that we absolutely know for sure is that if we don’t work even harder than we did in 2008, then we’re going to have a government that tells the American people, ‘you are on your own,’” Obama told a crowd of 200 donors over lunch at the W Hotel.

Self-reliance is a bad thing?  As opposed to reliance?  How’s reliance been working for you, liberals?

And to think that Normal America perceives B.O. to be a socialist!

Irony of the day: OWS kitchen staffers angry about serving food to freeloaders

Irony: you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup. Savor the aroma of the details:

The Occupy Wall Street volunteer kitchen staff launched a “counter” revolution yesterday — because they’re angry about working 18-hour days to provide food for “professional homeless” people and ex-cons masquerading as protesters. (How funny is it that the homeless are indistinguishable from your average OWS protestor? 😆 – CL)
…
Some protesters threatened that the high-end meals could be cut off completely if the vagrants and criminals don’t disperse.

Unhappiness with their unwelcome guests was apparent throughout the day.

“We need to limit the amount of food we’re putting out” to curb the influx of derelicts, said Rafael Moreno, a kitchen volunteer.

Scarcity of resources?  Rationing?  Welcome to socialism removed from the pages of academia and put into practice, boys and girls!  Sucks, doesn’t it?

See, while OWS is a bunch of freeloaders looking to mooch off of the taxpayers for the rest of their lives, they don’t like the homeless and vagrants and other moochers.  See, if you want to get fed, you have to be their kind of moocher!  😆

Exit question: Since the homeless are being excluded from the so-called 99%, does that put the homeless in the same category as the 1% the OWS crowd deplores?

Defeated Democrat Congressman sues group who contributed to his loss

Al Gore set the precedent: If you lose, sue.  Details:

There’s nothing quite like a politician scorned.

When voters in Ohio’s 1st Congressional District threw Democrat Steve Driehaus out of office after only one term, he did not bow out gracefully.  No, he decided to get even.  So he did what anyone does in today’s culture: he sued somebody.

Charging that its activities contributed to his defeat and thus to his “loss of livelihood,” Driehaus is suing the Susan B. Anthony List, a group that supports pro-life candidates for Congress and which has been one of the leading and most effective organizations involved in the fight to cut off federal funding to Planned Parenthood.

What a jackwagon.

Let the arrogance and gall sink in for a second.  Driehaus is saying that because he lost an election, he had a “loss of livelihood”…as if he had a right to live off of the taxpayers’ dime!  Hey, he’d fit right in with the Occupy Wall Street losers, wouldn’t he?  With that kind of entitlement mentality, no wonder he’s a Democrat.

So why did the Susan B. Anthony List oppose Driehaus?

During the 2010 elections the Susan B. Anthony List engaged in a campaign to identify and call out a group of allegedly anti-abortion-rights members of Congress who provided the margin that allowed President Barack Obama’s reform of the nation’s healthcare system to get through the U.S. House of Representatives. The Susan B. Anthony List said their vote in favor of the law, which did not include any pro-life protections, amounted to a betrayal of their pro-life principles.

According to Driehaus, who was one of that group, what the Susan B. Anthony List said in its public communications amounted to a malicious lie that contributed to his defeat. …

The SBA List said that voting for ObamaCare was a vote against their pro-life principles.  How can this be a lie?  They saw a vote for ObamaCare without the Stupak Amendment as a vote against pro-life, and Driehaus did vote for ObamaCare.  So exactly where is the lie?

Anywho, at least a judge is tossing the case out of court with a guffaw and scorn.  Nah, just kidding:

…Amazingly, rather than laugh the suit out of court U.S. District Court judge Timothy S. Black, an Obama appointee, is allowing it to go forward.
…
Driehaus’s suit is breaking new legal ground and may already be having a very chilling effect on political speech. It goes directly at the heart of our First Amendment protections and criminalizes what is at least a difference of opinion. And it’s curious that the case has not received more attention from the national press.

What is equally curious, however, is why Judge Black has allowed the case to move forward and why he did not recuse himself from it since, as Barbara Hollingsworth reported Friday in The Washington Examiner, he apparently is the former president and director of the Planned Parenthood Association of Cincinnati.  As seeming conflicts of interest go this one is a real humdinger.

First Amendment?  Bueller?  Bueller?

So, an Obama appointee who used to be the director of Planned Parenthood of Cincinnati didn’t think there was a conflict of interest in hearing a case involving an organization who is opposed to PP’s mission?  A man who used to run the nation’s largest taxpayer-funded abortion mill organization is somehow totally objective when it comes to lawsuits against a group that was undoubtedly a thorn in his side?  Un-friggin’-believable!

I doubt any court above this one will uphold a ruling in favor of Driehaus, and I am certain that higher courts would take Black to the woodshed.  But how shameful is it that a loser sues a group for trying (with success) to get him defeated in an election by simply reporting his vote and not endorsing him for his vote?  Election results would be forever altered if courts allow this kind of shameful sore loserness to occur.

Obama: Screw Congress, I’ll “heal the economy” by executive fiat

Yeah, his policies thus far have been so wildly successful that…they made the economy worse and got his party run out of power by the electorate.  So what do you do when the peasants revolt against you?  Why, you take matters into your own hands, the Constitution and the will of the people be damned!  Details:

President Barack Obama told an audience in Nevada on Monday that he will be regularly announcing “executive actions” his administration will take to “heal the economy” without the “dysfunctional” Congress.

“I’m here to say to all of you and to say to the people of Nevada and the people of Las Vegas, we can’t wait for an increasingly dysfunctional Congress to do its job. Where they won’t act, I will,” Obama said.

“I’ve told my administration to keep looking every single day for actions we can take without Congress, steps that can save consumers money, make government more efficient and responsive, and help heal the economy. And we’re going to be announcing these executive actions on a regular basis,” the president said.

Right, because growing the leviathan of Big Government is a great way to…um…save money and make government efficient.  Alrighty then.

Well, when the economy doesn’t improve (and there are no signs that it will), he won’t be able to argue that it wasn’t his fault.  OK, he’ll try to argue that (and, naturally, blame it on Bush), but that dog won’t hunt anymore.  Normal America sees right through it.

Remember when the left hated a perceived overstepping executive branch?  Good times, good times.

Senate FINALLY working on important legislation: tackling fake maple syrup

The Senate hasn’t proposed a budget in 900+ days.  How can they, when they’ve got far more pressing issues to address?

Six senators introduced legislation that would make selling fake maple syrup a felony offense leading to fines and up to five years in prison.

The Maple Agriculture Protection and Law Enforcement (MAPLE) Act is a response to what chief sponsor Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and others say is the increasing practice of cheating Vermont, Upstate New York and other maple syrup regions by selling inferior, fake syrup.

“I have been alarmed by the growing number of individuals and businesses claiming to sell genuine Vermont maple syrup when they are in fact selling an inferior product that is not maple syrup at all,” Leahy said Thursday. “This is fraud, plain and simple, and it undermines a key part of Vermont’s economy and reputation for quality that has been hard-earned through Vermonters’ hard work.”

He added that others in the syrup-producing regions of Maine, New York and other states also have been hurt. Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) are all co-sponsors.

Under current law, selling fake maple syrup is a misdemeanor offense.

Under the bill, S. 1742, selling fake maple syrup would be listed as an act of fraud that is seen as a felony offense, along with falsifying bank entries, mortgage transactions, loan applications and citizenship records, along with dozens of other activities.

“We need to make sure that those who intentionally deceive consumers get a trip to jail, not a slap on the wrist,” Leahy said. “Schemers should not easily be able to sully the seal of quality that is associated with genuine Vermont maple syrup.”

The bill specifically lists what qualifies as real maple syrup: a liquid food derived from heating tree sap or mixing water and maple sugar. In either case, not less than 66 percent of the weight of the product must be “soluble solids derived solely from the sap of a species of tree in the genus Acer.”

Of course, leave it to the Maine sisters to join this lunacy.

Democrats are pro-rape

How else would Joe Biden explain this?

President Barack Obama’s jobs agenda hit another roadblock in the Senate on Thursday night, as the two parties remained locked in a bitter stalemate with the economy sputtering and tens of millions looking for work.

In their first attempt to advance individual pieces of the president’s sprawling American Jobs Act, Democrats fell short of the 60 votes needed to move forward a $35 billion package for states and localities to hire and prevent the layoffs of teachers and first responders.

A united GOP Conference, along with three members of the Senate Democratic Caucus — Sens. Mark Pryor (D-Ark.), Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) — voted 50-50 to block a debate on the package, which would have been funded by a 0.5 percent surtax on those earning more than $1 million.

Bipartisan.  Right?  I mean, whenever any RINOs get peeled away into voting for Democrat legislation, we’re told the legislation was “bipartisan”.  So this is bipartisan opposition to B.O.’s rape prevention jobs bill, right?

Occupy Wall Street miscreants crapping on doorsteps of residents

Not just cop cars, mind you, as if that weren’t bad enough.  No, now these vermin are defecating everywhere other than toilets.  From JWF:

Infuriated lower Manhattan residents went ballistic on Zuccotti Park protesters at a chaotic Community Board 1 meeting tonight while blasting politicians for allowing the siege to continue without any end in sight.

“They are defecating on our doorsteps,” fumed Katherine Hughes, a stay at home mom who has the misfortune of living one block from the chaos. “A lot of people are very frustrated. A lot of people are concerned about the safety of our kids.”

Fed up homeowners said that they’ve been subjected to insults and harassment as they trek to their jobs each morning. “The protesters taunt people who are on their way to work,” said James Fernandez, 51, whose apartment overlooks the park.  (Because work is for suckers, right? – CL)

Remember: these are the scumbags to whom Obama says “we are on [your] side!“

Gaddafi dead

He’s dead, Jim.

In other news, Obama still sucks.

 

Obama at campaign stop to subdued crowd: Go ahead and clap…please…pretty please…

Pathetic.

out his bus tour on a low-key note, President Obama made a pitch for his jobs package at a firehouse, where a subdued crowd needed a bit of prompting to applaud his proposal to boost the economy.

Obama visited Fire Station 9 to draw attention to a major piece of his $447-billion jobs package. He wants to spread $35 billion among states and cities, in part to prevent layoffs of police and firefighters, and would pay for it with a surtax on millionaires. Congress may vote on that measure as early as this week.

On Wednesday afternoon, Obama stood at a lectern against a backdrop of firefighters and offered his prescription for solving the persistent jobs crisis: “A fair shot for everybody; a fair share from everybody. That’s the principle that built America.”

The president got a polite reception from the 100 or so people crowded into the station garage. Early in his speech he mentioned his American Jobs Act.

One or two people clapped.

“You can go ahead and clap,” the president said. “Go ahead, nothing wrong with it.”

It’s pitiful when Uhhh-bama has to beg for applause…and still gets virtually none of it.

The greatest orator the Oval Office has ever had, sans his telebinky

Or should I say “uh-rator”?  Take it away “Uhhhhhh-bama”!  😆

But remember that Bush was the one who lacked eloquence!

Quote of the day, “Reid admits which is more important, public or private sector jobs?” edition

Dude.  Seriously?

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on Wednesday said Congress needs to worry about government jobs more than private-sector jobs, and that this is why Senate Democrats are pushing a bill aimed at shoring up teachers and first-responders.

“It’s very clear that private-sector jobs have been doing just fine; it’s the public-sector jobs where we’ve lost huge numbers, and that’s what this legislation is all about,” Reid said on the Senate floor.

Right.  Government hasn’t gotten nearly big enough over the last 3.5 years, has it?

Biden: Opponents of jobs bill need to know what it’s like to be raped or robbed, or something

The Vice Plagiarist, pitching B.O.’s Porkulus II:

(CNSNews.com) – Vice President Joe Biden said that he wished opponents of President Barack Obama’s jobs act knew what it felt like to be robbed or raped, indicating that if they did, they would not oppose government spending on public jobs such as police officers.

“I wish these guys who thought it was temporary, I wish they had some notion of what it was like to be on the other side of a gun, or [to have] a 200-pound man standing over you, telling you to submit,” Biden told a crowd at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia on Tuesday, adding, “Folks, it matter, it matters.”

Um…OK.  I get it: B.O.’s jobs package would keep people from being raped and robbed, and if you oppose it, you deserve to be raped and robbed.  Thanks for the clarification, Joe.

Occupy Wall Street miscreants stunned to find thieves in their midst

Let’s see: a bunch of losers who have been demanding handouts stolen by government from the producers and given to non-producers are all of a sudden big proponents of private property?  Fascinating.  So what has brought about this about face?  This:

Occupy Wall Street protesters said yesterday that packs of brazen crooks within their ranks have been robbing their fellow demonstrators blind, making off with pricey cameras, phones and laptops — and even a hefty bundle of donated cash and food.

“Stealing is our biggest problem at the moment,” said Nan Terrie, 18, a kitchen and legal-team volunteer from Fort Lauderdale.

“I had my Mac stolen — that was like $5,500. Every night, something else is gone. Last night, our entire [kitchen] budget for the day was stolen, so the first thing I had to do was . . . get the message out to our supporters that we needed food!”

Crafty cat burglars sneaked into the makeshift kitchen at Zuccotti Park overnight and swiped as much as $2,500 in donated greenbacks from right under the noses of volunteers who’d fallen asleep after a long day whipping up meals for the hundreds of hungry protesters, the volunteers said.

Evil corporations make their gadgets, so think of the thieves as doing the non-bathing Marxists a favor by lifting their gadgets from them.

I’m guessing the irony of their outrage to theft while advocating government theft will be lost on them.

The face of Occupy Wall Street, “unwashed”…literally

A most awesome column by…wait for it…Obama’s cousin!  I’m thinking he’s not getting invited to the family reunion (whether in Chicago or Kenya) any time soon.  Excerpt:

Liberalism is dying before our eyes, not with a whimper or a bang, but with a grand unbathed and so apropos whine-fest. The central tenets of statism are in free-fall, and its beneficiaries, namely those who live off the fruits of other people’s labor, are in a panic for one last round of government handouts before they completely bankrupt the nation.
…
Enter the disillusioned “Occupy Wall Street” protesters. Suddenly the 1970s “Me Generation” seems altruistic, and the ‘60s hippies seem hygienic. What a perfect name for their movement: “Occupy” – to take up space. If there’s one thing these overcredentialed but undereducated people excel at, it’s taking up space. They occupy university campuses for years without learning skills that can actually contribute to our society’s economy. They demand to occupy a child’s place on their parents’ health insurance plan and then can’t understand why everyone’s premiums have risen further out of reach. They occupy a place in their mothers’ basements and can’t believe their fathers have become little Eichmanns in a capitalist world. Heck, at this point, I’d be happy if they’d just occupy a shower once in a while.

Heh. 😆

I wanted more excerpts, since it is an excellent and juicy column.  But you must read the column, the whole thing…or else you officially suck.  And you don’t want to suck, do you?

Occupy Wall Street poster boy is a trust fund baby and Colmbia grad with a criminal record

Because 99% of the country attempts to stow away on a flight from JFK, right?

Breitbart has the video and the details, but how awesome is it that the poster boy for Occupy Wall Street is living off of a trust fund, managed by Wall Street brokers, set up by his grandfather…all while protesting how bad Wall Street is?  😆

What 99% of the country apparently does, per the Occupy Wall Street miscreants

So the OWS folks are the 99%, huh?  That’s odd, because I don’t know anyone, much less everyone, who does the following:

• Goes on anti-Semitic rants;
• Vows violent revolution while proclaiming “Long live socialism!“;
• Craps on a cop car;
• Spits on members of the U.S. Coast Guard.

And now, MSDNC hosts are thinking that the best way for the OWS movement to succeed in their goals is…to get gunned down by the cops or the national guard, Kent State style.  And to think that MSDNC has a ratings problem!

But hey, where would you get the crazy idea that this movement was anything but a bunch of average Joes and Janes with legitimate grievances?

Biden: Pass Obama’s jobs bill or there will be more rapes, or something

Why are Republicans (plus the two Senate Dems who voted against Porkulus II) in favor of rape?  From The Weekly Standard:

“In 2008, when Flint had 265 sworn officers on their police force, there were 35 murders and 91 rapes in this city,” Biden said. “In 2010, when Flint had only 144 police officers, the murder rate climbed to 65 and rapes–just to pick two categories–climbed to 229. In 2011, you now only have 125 shields. God only knows what the numbers will be this year for Flint if we don’t rectify it.”

The vice president also seemed to suggest that the Obama administration’s first stimulus is the reason rapes and murders were not even higher in 2010 and 2011.” And God only knows what that number would have been had we not been able to get a little bit of help,” Biden said.

Ho. Ly. Shiite. 

So building more roads, bridges, and pork projects, plus raising taxes on millionaires, will…um…prevent rapes in Flint, Michigan?  Seriously?  That’s the greyhound you’re betting on, champ?

Media coverage of Occupy Wall Street and of Tea Party

Via Network Blogs:

Headline of the day, “Cain gets lectured on his blackness” edition

The headline of this blog post comes from El Rushbo, in regards to MSDNC’s Lawrence O’Donnell questioning the “black credentials” of African-American GOP presidential candidate Herman Cain:

Herman Cain Endures Lecture on Blackness from MSNBC White Guy

Heh.

Night and Day, “NYT and filibusters” edition

The Old Gray Hag in 2005 on filibusters, when Democrats were in the minority:

The filibuster, which allows 41 senators to delay action indefinitely, is a rough instrument that should be used with caution. But its existence goes to the center of the peculiar but effective form of government America cherishes. . . . A decade ago, this page expressed support for tactics that would have gone even further than the ‘nuclear option’ in eliminating the power of the filibuster. At the time, we had vivid memories of the difficulty that Senate Republicans had given much of Bill Clinton’s early agenda. But we were still wrong. To see the filibuster fully, it’s obviously a good idea to have to live on both sides of it.

The Old Gray Hag in 2005 on filibusters, when Republicans were in the minority:

Democrats scored a small but significant victory for the cause of progress in the Senate late last week when they voted to prohibit one of the many delaying tactics that keep the chamber tied up in pointless partisan arguments. It was a long way from desperately needed filibuster reform, but it showed that sufficiently frustrated senators can take action to prevent the Senate from being a total dead weight. . . . Fear of ending up in the minority makes majority parties in the Senate avoid sensible rules. But ending the abuse of the chamber’s traditions–ultimately the far more significant abuse of the filibuster–would benefit both parties, and the country as a whole.

Nope…no liberal media bias hypocrisy!

Quote of the day, “The left’s flipping out as Obama sinks” edition

Excellent column from James Taranto, an excerpt of which follows:

The left got what it wanted in 2008: a liberal president with a sweeping agenda and big Democratic majorities capable of enacting it. The result has been a great and failed experiment in progressive politics and governance. In due course, one hopes, the left will absorb some lessons–but for now, they seem to be suffering a nervous breakdown.

That is one way to understand why so much of the liberal establishment is rallying behind Krugman’s Army, as the “Occupy Wall Street” protests are known. Everything they believe in has failed, so they are turning nihilistic.

Awesome takedown of liberalism’s failed experiment in America, and how the left is coping (hint: not very well).

Congress’ only Muslim: You know, regulations are GREAT for job creation!

Nice to see that economic ignorance doesn’t discriminate based on religion.  From MSDNC, and interview with Keith Ellison (D-MN):

Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) tells MSNBC regulations create jobs because a business will have to hire people to help them comply with the new requirement.

“I think the answer is no,” Ellison said when asked if he believes regulations kill jobs. “And here is why: When we talked about increasing fuel efficiency standards, the industry responded, and they need engineers and designers and manufacturers, and they need actually more people to help respond to the new requirement.”

“I believe if the government says, look, we have got to reduce our carbon footprint, you will kick into gear a whole number of people that know how to do that or have ideas about that, and that will be a job engine. I understand what you mean, because if anything adds a cost to a business, you could assume that that will diminish that business’s ability to hire. But I don’t think that’s actually right. I think what businesses want is customers and what — if they are selling product, if they have a product to sell they will do well even if they have some new regulations to meet,” the Congressman said.

Wow.  Just…wow.

Right, businesses just sit back and take it up the chute when big government comes in and imposes newer and bigger regulatory burdens on them.  They don’t lay off workers or raise prices of their goods/services in order to fund the new help (temporary, usually) to comply with the regs.  They don’t relocate to friendlier business climes.  They don’t close their doors for good.  No, they don’t do any of those things, do they?

Look, Muhammed, if increased government regulations spurned job creation, then the economy would have caught fire in the last 2.5 years.  But it hasn’t.  It’s gotten worse.  Why, it’s almost as if the anti-business regulations have strangled the economy and job creation!  Almost, of course.  From Investors:

If regulations were job-creation engines, the economy should be in danger of overheating right about now. Obama has overseen the fastest growth in new federal rules ever, imposing 75 new major regulations in his first 26 months in office at a cost of more than $40 billion, according to the Heritage Foundation.

And the left wonders why their efforts to revive the economy have fallen flat?

Republicans blocking Obama’s jobs bill

Wait, did I say Republicans?  My bad:

Democratic leaders in the Senate are scrambling to avoid defections on President Obama’s jobs package, which appears headed for defeat on Tuesday.

A lack of Democratic unity on the president’s bill would be embarrassing for the White House, which has been scolding House Republicans for refusing to vote on the measure.
…
Democrats who will vote no or are leaning no include Sens. Joe Manchin (W.Va.), Jon Tester (Mont.) and Ben Nelson (Neb.), who all hail from red states and are up for reelection next year.

Of course, this inconvenient fact won’t keep B.O. or his minions from blaming Republicans rather than their own party.  But the left is impervious to facts and truth, so this is no surprise.