A must read

Victor Davis Hanson takes a multi-week field trip to observe firsthand the wreckage of his once-great home state of California, and the journey leaves him with several insightful (and poignant) observations.  Here's just one of them:

"Fresno’s California State University campus is embroiled in controversy over the student body president’s announcing that he is an illegal alien, with all the requisite protests in favor of the DREAM Act. I won’t comment on the legislation per se, but again only note the anomaly. I taught at CSUF for 21 years. I think it fair to say that the predominant theme of the Chicano and Latin American Studies program’s sizable curriculum was a fuzzy American culpability. By that I mean that students in those classes heard of the sins of America more often than its attractions. In my home town, Mexican flag decals on car windows are far more common than their American counterparts.

I note this because hundreds of students here illegally are now terrified of being deported to Mexico. I can understand that, given the chaos in Mexico and their own long residency in the United States. But here is what still confuses me: If one were to consider the classes that deal with Mexico at the university, or the visible displays of national chauvinism, then one might conclude that Mexico is a far more attractive and moral place than the United States.

So there is a surreal nature to these protests: something like, “Please do not send me back to the culture I nostalgically praise; please let me stay in the culture that I ignore or deprecate.” I think the DREAM Act protestors might have been far more successful in winning public opinion had they stopped blaming the U.S. for suggesting that they might have to leave at some point, and instead explained why, in fact, they want to stay. What it is about America that makes a youth of 21 go on a hunger strike or demonstrate to be allowed to remain in this country rather than return to the place of his birth? "

If you read nothing else this week at least check out Hanson's entire piece.

The old saying goes something like "As California goes, so goes the rest of the nation".  If that maxim is indeed true then we as a country are in big trouble indeed.

The British babies threw a tantrum

As many as 50,000 British university students rioted in London yesterday because that utterly bankrupt Nanny state has had the temerity to ask them to pay a higher portion of their college tuition instead of completely mooching off the taxpaying subjects.

Egged on by the usual suspects of anarchy-promoting leftist organizations (isn't it odd how conservative groups never advocate random violence and the destruction of private property?  Maybe because those people actually own something instead of living a pointless life of sponging off the public teat), the students assaulted the headquarters of the conservative Tory party, causing significant damage to the building and several injuries to the riot cops who were attempting to control the mob.

Here's one supposedly educated female Cambridge student's take on the protest:

"The majority is a completely non-violent protest. I’m not really worried about violence against property or objects, smashing buildings is completely fine, it’s a great image of our anger. I’ve got no problem with that at all as long as nobody gets hurt."  (emphasis ours)

Well fine then, ma'am.  But don't complain to the police when someone destroys your house because they are upset with something you've done or said.  After all, it's a "completely fine" message of "anger".

Britain's future.  Aren't they charming?  (AP - from the article)

This is the inevitable result that occurs when people who have been given entitlement upon entitlement for multiple decades get told that the free ride is coming to an end.

Hopefully this episode starkly illustrates to everyone the inevitable result of the road that Dear Leader wishes to take America down, and why we must redouble our efforts to stop our country from one day turning into today's Britain.

From the Department of Glaringly Obvious Headlines

"An Effort to Recapture Democratic Enthusiasm"

Dear Leader plans to hold a good old-fashioned pep rally on Tuesday in Moscow West Madison, Wisconsin, in a desperate and last-ditch effort to fire up his faithful worshipers.

Yeah, good luck with that.

He's flat-out wrong

"I think that there are very few Constitutional limits that would prevent the Federal Government from rules that would affect your private life"

- Representative Fortney "Pete" Stark, D(ictator wannabe)-CA, one of the rudest and most martinet-like members of Congress (Google him.  His fellow Democrats actually denied him his opportunity, earned by seniority, to replace Charlie Rangel as head of the Ways and Means Committee pretty much due to his inability to get along with anyone on Capitol Hill), informing his constituents that he and his fellow conspirators can impose pretty much anything they wish on American citizens (such as requiring them to purchase health insurance they may not need or want for themselves and everyone else), and that there's bupkus those proles can do about it:



Stark is quite mistaken, of course.  The Constitution, via the Tenth Amendment, specifically limits the power of the Feds, to what is specifically granted to them elsewhere in that document, and we sure don't recall seeing anything there about forcing people to buy things.  The brave lady in the audience has it right - that sort of onerous policy is nothing more than naked slavery.

This is precisely the sort of arrogant, elitist attitude that lifers such as ol' Fortney get after enjoying 37+ years of unchecked power.  We think it's long past time that Mr. Stark be returned the ranks of the peasantry from whence he came, as he hasn't deserved the privilege of leading his district for quite some time, if ever.

Unclear on the concept

We note with amusement (and more than a little disgust) the irony of a website that apparently wishes to turn a profit by selling clothing, accessories and other tchotchkes commemorating a brutal, homicidal thug who fervently believed that the state should own all means of production (and, naturally, all profits).

Bonus - "eco-friendly" apparel, for the discriminating and sensitive guerrilla to wear whilst gunning down the simpleton proles who refuse to quickly embrace the sweetly seductive embrace of Communism.

"Make the ultimate revolutionary fashion statement"

Unbelievable.  What's next - Khmer Rouge Cola?  Genocide is such thirsty work, you know.

You're having a major effect

The Washington and Scottsdale phone lines for our local Congressman, Harry Mitchell, have been dead solid busy all day.  We finally managed to get the voice mail for the Washington extension, only to be regretfully informed that the mailbox was full.

Representative Mitchell is widely viewed to be a safe "yes" vote for President Obama's health care Ponzi scheme "reform" bill.  Perhaps this heartwarming massive outpouring of outrage from his constituents over that fact will serve to change his mind.

Ignore the emphatically stated wishes of your voters at your political peril, Mr. Mitchell.

Not making any sense

"The leader of the New Black Panther Party for Self-Defense says the U.S. Justice Department was right to drop a voter intimidation suit against his group because the case was weak."

Allrighty, but if that is indeed the case then why did that virulently racist group go ahead and

"[suspend] the member who stood outside a Philadelphia polling place with a nightstick during last year's presidential election"?

We've commented on this outrageous story twice, once on Election Day last November and then again in May, right after Attorney General Eric "Neutral, leaning towards favorable" Holder's Justice Department decided to let these goons off the hook for some unknown reason. In case anyone's forgotten, here's just one small video of the incident, captured by a local poll watcher:



Now imagine a white person being caught on tape behaving in a similar manner in front of a predominately black polling station. Think they would have been immediately jailed for a hate crime, as well as charged with blatantly intimidating voters?

We certainly do.

"[Malik] Shabazz says he wants to set the record straight"

And ends up failing miserably, in our opinion.

A bald-faced lie

"'Frankly, it's not really something I've followed closely,' Obama said. 'I didn't even know that ACORN was getting a whole lot of federal money.'"

Our President, commenting on the burgeoning ACORN scandal while appearing yesterday on ABC's This Week.

Contrast this statement with one of the Messiah's previous utterances, taken straight from his propaganda website:

"I come out of a grassroots organizing background. That's what I did for three and half years before I went to law school. That's the reason I moved to Chicago was to organize. So this is something that I know personally, the work you do, the importance of it. I've been fighting alongside ACORN on issues you care about my entire career. Even before I was an elected official, when I ran Project Vote voter registration drive in Illinois, ACORN was smack dab in the middle of it, and we appreciate your work.” (Emphasis mine)

We're expected to swallow being informed by the Messiah that an organization loyal to him and to which he has very old and close ties (and one to which his campaign paid out $800,000 for services rendered during last fall's election) has been booted from working on the upcoming Census after specifically being made a key partner in that event by his own administration, is in the process of being stripped of every cent of its Federal funding by Congress and is currently being slowly roasted alive by some responsible media journalists, and these are developments that he's not "following closely"?

You are a liar, sir, and not even a particularly good one.

We can't wait to find out what other unchallenged whoppers you're going to be allowed to spew on your talks show appearance tonight.

This situation would be comical, if it weren't so infuriating

Here are the outfits the two amateur filmmakers from BigGovernment.com apparently wore when they asked ACORN workers in three different cities (that we know of to date) for help in getting a fictitious prostitution service (that would be staffed by underage illegal alien women from El Salvador, no less) off the ground, as well as hide the illicit proceeds from that enterprise - which the workers shockingly all agreed to do:

(Picture is from the New York Post article)

How anyone could have someone dressed like this walk into their office and proceed to ask for assistance in setting up a blatantly illegal (not to mention morally reprehensible) business and not immediately conclude that they are being set up on Candid Camera or Punk'd is beyond us. Nonetheless, help them was exactly what the ACORN workers did:

"counselors at the social-services group shockingly offer suggestions [on the latest tape] on how they can launder their earnings"

Naturally, instead of hanging their heads in shame, the organization is going full-bore against the group that exposed their disgusting policies (Sorry ACORN, having the investigation net the same exact results in three different cities means that this sort of behavior is standard operating procedure for your entire organization, not just a few rogue employees freelancing on their own as you pitifully argue):

"'And, in fact, a crime it was -- our lawyers believe a felony -- and we will be taking legal action against Fox and their co-conspirators,' the statement said."

Well, you won't be doing it with our tax dollars anymore, since the Senate just voted to block your group from accessing federal housing funds in the future. Combined with being booted from the Census project, this sure has been one bad week for you, ACORN. Whatever will you leeches do for income now?

We agree with James O'Keefe, the man who portrayed the pimp in the videos, when he points out ACORN's complete hypocrisy in these cases:

"O'Keefe said, 'ACORN wants it both ways.'

'You can't fire the employees and then say I have defamed them,' he said."

In a just world, O'Keefe and Hannah Giles (the woman who portrayed the prostitute) would be immediately nominated for a Pulitzer Prize for uncovering the sleaze going on at ACORN, instead of being ignored by every news outlet save Fox as well as being pettily threatened with prosecution in Maryland by a Messiah-supporting district attorney.

Personally, we can't wait to see what else the Big Government site's got on that particular bunch of low-lifes. Pass the popcorn, willya?

Voter intimidation: White on black, go to prison. Black on white, meh.

Remember the story we commented on last Election Day, about the three Philadelphia Black Panther thugs who were intimidating and scaring white people away from a local polling place by using a nightstick, curses and threats?





Well, we're sure you'll be happy to know that Obama's and Attorney General Eric Holder's political appointees at the Justice Department have seen fit to overrule career prosecutors at that agency, and have dropped all sanctions against the men, despite video evidence of their misconduct and despite the fact that one eyewitness to the incident named Bartle Bull, a veteran of the 1960's civil rights movement,

"described it as 'the most blatant form of voter intimidation' that he had seen, even during the voting rights crisis in Mississippi a half-century ago."

Incredibly, an affidavit by Bull (a liberal Democrat, by the way) describing in detail the blatant intimidation by the goons didn't even make it into the pile of evidence supporting the government's complaint, according to the story.

Violating the Voting Rights Act, hurling racial slurs and threatening people with violence are all A-OK behaviors with this new administration as long as the perpetrators are black, we guess, especially since it seemed to be a foregone conclusion at the time that we "crackers" were "about to be ruled by the black man", as Bull recalls one of the goons braying in triumph.

Welcome to the new "Justice" Department, soon to be presided over by such reverse racists as Sonia Sotomayor.

Maybe we just don't understand why the men were let off because we're not a Latina woman and therefore lack a certain "richness of life experience", eh, Judge Sotomayor?

ACORN's up to their old tricks again

ACORN, the "community activist group" currently being investigated by 14 states as well as the FBI for suspected voter registration fraud in the 2008 election (members of the group have previously been convicted in numerous states on such charges), and which now stands to be given free access to up to $4 billion dollars by a grateful Messiah as part of his "stimulus" bill (in addition to the $53 million dollars or so of taxpayer money already given to the group in recent years, has now added burglary and property theft to their impressive resume:

"A community organization breaks into a foreclosed home in what they are calling an act of civil disobedience."

Sorry. Sitting at the front of a bus because you have been denied that seat because of your race is civil disobedience. Illegally occupying someone else's legally acquired property is simply your garden variety breaking and entering.

The group's members actually have the gall to come right out and admit to the press that what they are doing are crimes that are no different than shoplifting or auto theft:

"'We are actually trespassing, and so this is a way of civil disobedience to try to stay in the house," said [ACORN thug Louis] Beverly. 'Legally it's wrong, but homesteading is the only means that she has left to stay in her house.'" (Emphases mine)

Ironically, it was the irresponsible "Community Reinvestment Act" lending policies forced on banks by groups like ACORN that ended up putting people like this into houses that they could in no way afford in the first place.

"'This is our house now,' said Louis Beverly, ACORN."

You've certainly got that right.

Oh, wait a minute, for a second there I thought he was talking about the White House, not this woman's abode. My mistake, although what I first understood his statement to mean is probably much more likely to be proven true than the latter.

UPDATE: ...and that didn't take long:

"An activist with ACORN — the Association of Community Organization for Reform Now — faces criminal charges after breaking into a home in southeast Baltimore on Thursday to protest the foreclosure crisis sweeping the country."

Yep, it's the aforementioned Mr. Beverly, who now is facing fourth-degree burglary charges.

This latest news story also documents the rampant "failure" of ACORN's voter registration efforts in getting the Messiah elected:

"Its large-scale voter registration drives most recently came under scrutiny during the 2008 presidential race, during which ACORN reportedly gathered more than 1.3 million voter registration forms in 21 states. Approximately 400,000 forms were reportedly rejected for duplications, incomplete forms and fraudulent applications."

Fully one-third of the registration forms the group submitted were rejects, in other words. And that's not counting the ones that slipped through the cracks and were counted as legitimate votes, cheapening yours and mine. That's not a very good success rate, when falsifying such documents is a serious crime punishable by prison time.

That's the obvious kind of results one gets when one pays people by the form to sign people up for something.