The Rule of Law vs. “Calvinball”

I’ve been swamped all week, so I’m re-posting an item from last summer, back before our readership really started to climb. And given much of the news we’ve been seeing lately, this post is even more applicable now than it was then. 

Please note its author is Dapper Dan, a buddy of ours who blogs over at Principles, Not Men. Any and all kudos should be directed to him. 

I’ll simply mention what I said six months ago: anytime you can combine Hayek, the Federalist Papers AND ‘Calvin & Hobbes‘ into a single, highly cogent post, you’re doing somethin’ right.

Happy Friday, gang.

–JTR

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Rule of Law

The term “Rule of Law” is an important term in political dialogue.  Accepting this belief or not will determine where you stand on many, if not most, of the issues.

In The Road to Serfdom, F.A. Hayek describes it thus:

Since we only have a few more shopping days until Christmas….

…I thought it’d be appropriate to re-post this. 

Everyone keeps saying that we buy more and more online, and that the bricks-and-mortar stores are suffering. Well, someone neglected to tell that to the people in my city. I live near a large shopping district and a mall, and the only way to get more folks in here on the weekends is if we airdropped them in like relief packages. 

So, whether you’re venturing out to just purchase one present or all of them, you should probably read this first. It’s some good information to have freshly tucked away, before you and your MasterCard leave the house. The merchants have been waiting all year to see you, …and they’re intent on having you spend some cash during your stay. 

Here’s hoping you enjoy the ‘hustle-and-bustle’ of the stores (that sounds more festive than ‘crazed mobs‘, don’t you think?), and be sure to wish everyone a Merry Christmas!

–JTR

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BEFORE YOU GO SHOPPING TODAY….

(***Originally posted 6/23/2012)

….you may wish to check out Kathryn Blaze Carlson’s excellent article in the National Post from earlier this month. It touches on something that we all know in our hearts, but we usually feel we’re smart enough to avoid: Marketing.

The marketers are everywhere: Google, the supermarket, where we buy gas…….we can’t escape ‘em. To deal with being constantly saturated by marketing, we simply believe we’re so savvy that we can see through all of the marketer’s ploys.

Yeah, right. Guess again.

From Canada’s National Post:

Judge on Pennsylvania Voter ID: “Sounds like a good idea. So, ..no”.

Why do I live in such a stupid state?

Courtesy of MSN.com:

Updated at 11:10 a.m., 10/2/12 – A Pennsylvania judge has blocked enforcement of the key section of a voter identification law which the state legislature enacted and Republican Gov. Tom Corbett signed last March, meaning that the law will not be in effect for the Nov. 6 election.

Judge Robert Simpson said that even with the streamlined procedures that state officials proposed to make it easier for voters without ID cards to obtain them, “the proposed changes are to occur about five weeks before the general election, and I question whether sufficient time now remains to attain the goal of liberal access” to ID cards.

He said, “I expected more photo IDs to have been issued by this time. For this reason, I accept Petitioners’ argument that in the remaining five weeks before the general election, the gap between the photo IDs issued and the estimated need will not be closed.”

Notice that the judge doesn’t bother to specify what amount of IDs would have qualified as “more”. Thanks so much, Justice Nebulous….

However, it wasn’t a total loss:

Simpson also said that those challenging the law have conceded that the part of the law which requires proof of identification for absentee voting does not harm would-be voters and may be implemented.

Okay, that’s something, especially since early voting tends to favor the Democrats.

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Rather than go off on my typical rant, I’m just going to offer a refresher course in why Voter ID makes total, absolute sense and those folks throwing a fit over it are clearly either (A) up to no good or (B) semi-sentient.

This post ran back during the summer, and was from our Guest Noggin, ‘LivinRightInPGH’. I’m just including the essential parts, but you’re certainly welcome to go back and read the entire thing.

I’m intrigued and more than a little concerned by the whole issue that surrounds the integrity of voting in these great United States.  Moreover, I’m perplexed as to why the US Department Of Justice, led by Eric Holder, is doing everything in its power to block any measure that would enforce Voter ID laws.  I’d like to say that I don’t understand why they’d do such a thing, but sadly…I do.

If you can’t win on the issues, and if you can’t win fairly at the ballot box, you’re going to need a whole bunch of dead folks, non-citizens, et al, to swing the election your way.

Perhaps this is why Holder’s Justice Department stopped non-partisan election reform by claiming that unless there was a “D” next to a candidate’s name, African-American voters “wouldn’t be able to identify and vote for the Democrats.”  He went on to call laws requiring valid voter ID a “poll tax,” with the clear aim of stoking racial animus.  It was such a distasteful argument that even the Ninth Circus Court of Appeals rejected it.

As I recall, JTR covered a ton of places where ID is needed in a post several months ago. They included:

• Driving
• Getting on an airplane
• Opening a bank account

(Oh, by the way:  If you want to visit the USDOJ, you need to show proper and acceptable ID.  Just sayin’…)

The whole argument against voter ID laws from the left is a smokescreen of perceived racism just to cover up one simple fact:  Without voter fraud, they CAN’T win.

The Heritage Foundation recently noted:

“Georgia, which has had voter ID since 2007, allows six different forms of ID to vote.  And there has been no stampede of would-be voters who lack identification:  ‘The number of photo IDs issued by Georgia to individuals who did not already have one of the forms of ID acceptable under state law is remarkably small, averaging less (than) 0.05% in most years, and not even reaching 3/10ths of 1% in a presidential election year.’”

You may be interested to know, however, that in Georgia, Hispanic voting increased over 140% from 2004 to 2008, while African-American voting increased by 42% over the same time frame.

So much for disenfranchisement.

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One more quote from Heritage:

“America cannot allow its elections to be anything but secure and legal.  Preventing voter fraud is common sense, and it is outrageous that the U.S. Justice Department would stand in the way.”

Well, my friends, outrageous or not, this is EXACTLY what they’re doing.

Obama’s ‘War on Coal’ is marching on. YOU can stop it.

COAL. Along with natural gas, coal is an American energy source which is affordable, proven and incredibly plentiful in our country.

Which means, of course, that Obama wants to kill it.

What else?

Not scary enough for ya? No problem: we’ve covered this before, in detail:

• In Obama’s cross-hairs: COAL
• Battling the big MACT
• Raked over the Coals

That new 30-second ad arrives on the heels of a recent article by two Representatives in U.S. Congress, Shelley Moore Capito & Bill Johnson. Writing in ‘The Hill‘ blog, they detailed one thing: President Obama’s disdain for all things Coal.

“Since taking office, President Obama and his extreme EPA have issued new rules and regulations that are crippling the coal industry. In the weeks following President Obama’s inauguration, his administration was already in the process of rewriting the Stream Buffer Zone Rule – a rule that took 5 years to codify under the previous administration. President Obama’s rewrite of this one rule would cost tens of thousands of direct and indirect coal jobs.

New and costly regulations on coal-fired power plants are on their way. This “Train Wreck” of new EPA regulations has already caused companies like AEP and FirstEnergy to close coal-fired power plants throughout Ohio and the East costing jobs in places where unemployment is staggering. Also, President Obama’s EPA has taken actions toclassify coal ash as a hazardous material. Coal ash is used in drywall, concrete, and even bowling balls.

There’s no denying that we want clean air and clean water. But the President’s policies in no way balance protecting the environment with protecting jobs.”

Congress must have read their article, because the U.S. House of Representatives took a vote the very next day:

19 Democrats joined with their GOP counterparts in the House today to vote in favor of legislation aimed at keeping coal plants open. The 233-175 vote is the last House lawmakers will take for the next seven weeks, as they now head back to their districts to campaign for the November 6 elections.

The Stop the War on Coal Act, H.R. 3409, introduced by Rep. Bill Johnson (R-Ohio), would prevent the Obama administration from enforcing or instituting any new regulations on coal producers until at least the end of next year.

And, of course, Guess Who has already threatened to veto this Bill?

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So, if ANY of this is important to you, your family, your town or your way of life…..you know what to do:

Pass it on….

Hey, “Bush-Lied-People-Died” crowd! Where are you guys NOW?

My, how times change.

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The White House has now acknowledged that the events on 9/11/2012 in Benghazi were, indeed, a terrorist attack. This comes on the heels of their insistence that, for two weeks, the attacks were inspired by a “YouTube video”. You will hear only a very few of the reporters (for now) report on the obvious and flagrant lie: the White House immediately suspected terrorism, and it now is certain that they confirmed this as a terrorist act within 24 hours.

Now, do me a lil’ favor, if you please: think back to the Bush years, when the mantra of “Bush Lied, People Died” became as ubiquitous as hearing “Bless you” after a sneeze. This narrative was constant: G. W. Bush had intricately planned and rationalized the Iraq War, misleading our nation & the world into a war-for-oil, and not to prevent Saddam Hussein from using his non-existent WMD’s.

Remember all that? I sure do.

Consider, then, that prelude to the War in Iraq took from September 12th, 2001 to March 19th, 2003. Over a year, with mountains of evidence. And somehow he fooled everyone? For over a year? This man, who throughout his presidency was repeatedly portrayed as being slightly dumber than a bag of hammers, was able to construct history’s most complex prevarication, without the truth leaking out? Code Pink and the Media would then have us believe Bush was, incongruously, the world’s first-ever ‘stupid evil genius‘.

Only Liberal logic could make that claim with a straight face.

And yet, the mantra persisted, and is still accepted as fact today by many in the self-professed ‘Smart Party’.

In contrast, this month is what it looks like when a president actually lies, even if that president is protected by the Media as if he were Charlemagne 2.0.

Because now, when his own Press Secretary says that it is “self-evident” (two weeks later, of course) that this attack was not from a whacked-out Muslim mob spontaneously reacting to an unknown YouTube clip but an actual act of terror, we have the Obama Administration flailing around, jumping from story to story, as each previous lie unravels.

And yes, the word is lie. 

Not a shading of the truth. Not spin. Not a fib. Not a dodge.

A big, fat, ugly, narcissistic, contemptible lie.

And a lie which cost, and will continue to cost, American lives. Coming on the heels of Fast and Furious, this is beyond unconscionable.

It will be all I can do to contain my emotions as I watch our current elected Commander-in-Chief waltz around the countryside, promising Utopian solutions to problems he has created. We keep precious little alcohol in our house at any one time, and I may need to stock up in order to cope.

But after watching the self-serving and pusillanimous way he has allowed these atrocities to occur and then tried to obscure the facts afterward, I can only hope you’ll join me in trying to alert everyone to his treachery prior to election day.

***Shorter version of that last sentence: “help us kick him to the curb”.

Romney: “I want to get us back to being AMERICA”

A quick follow-up from our earlier post today.

Courtesy of HotAir.com:

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The debates are next week, as Erika Johnsen at HotAir points out, and the stunningly stark differences between the two candidates should be even more visible.

Just for a quick review, here’s a (very) partial recap of Obama’s record:

• The Muslim world is rioting against us.
• Allies (Poland, Israel, the Czech Republic, just to name three) have been repeatedly let down or ignored by this administration.
• Food Stamp usage has more than doubled.
• Obama has now normalized the (previously unthinkable) term “Trillion dollar deficit“.
• Record-breaking unemployment: above 8% since February 2009, this is the longest period of such elevated joblessness since the Great Depression of the 1930s
• He has consistently gone around Congress with Executive Orders: in Libya, with Amnesty, and with work requirements in welfare.
• An astonishingly corrupt Department of Justice: New Black Panthers (not prosecuted); punishing Arizona for enforcing federal immigration laws; and, of course, Fast and Furious.
• Gas prices: doubled.
• Housing market: stagnant, at best.
• Food prices: significantly higher, and climbing fast.
• Taxmageddon.
• Obamacare.
• Religious freedom: ignored and patronized.

I don’t care if you voted for Obama last time. Don’t much care if you were a Ron Paul supporter, or still currently favor Gary Johnson. It doesn’t concern me in the slightest if you are “uninspired” by politics today. Those are indulgences which a country in decline can no longer afford.

If President Xerxes is allowed a second term, we’re toast. Doomed. Consummatum est.

So: Step up. Help out. Call. Write. Contribute to a campaign. Put up a sign. Do something.

Like an unsightly stain on your new shirt, Obama won’t go away just by our wanting him to.

Surprise, surprise: “U.S. Officials knew Libya Attacks were work of Al Qaeda”

Wow, who could have guessed this was the case? Other than, well, …everybody?

Courtesy of the Daily Beast:

“U.S. Officials Knew Libya Attacks Were Work of Al Qaeda Affiliates”

The phrase res ipsa loquitur comes to mind: ”the thing speaks for itself“.

Within 24 hours of the 9-11 anniversary attack on the United States consulate in Benghazi, U.S. intelligence agencies had strong indications al Qaeda–affiliated operatives were behind the attack, and had even pinpointed the location of one of those attackers. Three separate U.S. intelligence officials who spoke to The Daily Beast said the early information was enough to show that the attack was planned and the work of al Qaeda affiliates operating in Eastern Libya.

Nonetheless, it took until late last week for the White House and the administration to formally acknowledge that the Benghazi assault was a terrorist attack. On Sunday, Obama adviser Robert Gibbs explained the evolving narrative as a function of new information coming in quickly on the attacks. ”We learned more information every single day about what happened,” Gibbs said on Fox News. “Nobody wants to get to the bottom of this faster than we do.”

I’d say this is despicable, but that word just doesn’t quite encompass the enmity I’m feeling towards these traitorous cretins.

And just to review: it was a full FIVE days later, or four days AFTER they knew this was the case, that the Obama Administration trotted out UN Ambassador Susan Rice to make the rounds on the Sunday talk shows and deliberately lie to the American people.

Yes, lie. There is no other word for it. 

THIS is your current administration, folks.

Anyone want them around for four more years? You must truly hate our country if you do.