A Love Song

Teen drives off top of Pikes Peak

Just bouncin'
And bumpin'
And crashin'
And thumpin'
And screamin'
And swishin'
And leapin'
And wishin' her kisses will start,
That might get you into her heart...
So if you're thinkin' how hard true love is,
All you gotta do is drive up to Pike's Peak
Then off an embankment,
Into the blue like Thelma and Louise
And after you do, she'll wear your ring.

Wishin' and Hopin'

Fight the duopoly

Why drill for oil now?

"God dang it, the roof is leaking again."
"So, fix it."
"Cain't fix a roof while it's rainin', dumbass."
"So, wait until it's not raining."
"Well, duh. When it ain't rainin', the roof don't leak!"
"Been a Democrat long?"
"All my life."

Here 'n' There

An advocate of states' rights, I can only come down on the side of Louisiana's decision to raise superstitious little Luddites if the scientific method is not acceptable.

If I were a parent of such, though, I would turn my little snowflakes into steely-eyed atheists before submitting their soft cranial Play-doh to be mashed onto Louisiana's colored funny papers.

***********************

The actions of a handful of their co-religionists on that fateful day wrecked that trajectory beyond recognition and unleashed something base and ugly in the American character. ----Leonard Pitts, Miami Herald

All the American muslims had to come up with were a few large street demonstrations against the murderous catastrophe unleashed by some of their fellows. Islamic silence unleashed an American suspicion Muslims did nothing to dispel.

The author is another student of the Winnie the Pooh school of foreign relations -- "It must have been something we did."

****************
Most fun I ever had at Six Flags over Texas was when I unwittingly went on High School Seniors Night. The park was open until, like, midnight, which made for cool temperature, no long lines, and dark is so much funner.

They used to have a ride called the Cliffhanger (?)
that took you up way high, then dropped you and
let gravity take over for what seemed an eternity.
The pre-drop pause at the pinnacle gave you time
to look at the grand high altitude vista and ask yourself,
"My Gawd. WTF am I doing?"

No more PUMA?

Party unity, huh?
Guess let's change Party Unity My Ass to...where they will take us.

Democrats
Engaged
Equally,
Proposing
Socialism's
Hoariest
Incarnations
Today

Teh Yellow Kid Today

Hey la, hey la, Perot is back

.

See, what you got here ain't much different from your automobile.
Let's just lift up the hood and poke around a little.
Now, you see that? That's your fuel injection, and it takes gas from your tank back there.
You with me so far? Okay, now, your gas tank has been sitting here full for the last year.
The gas in there cost you $25 and now it's worth $50.
Hear that? That's the whooshing sound of profit you made without working for it, so you ain't any better than Exxon.
We're all entre-manures: small business is the SUV in the American garage and don't let some camel-toad tell you any different.
Thank you, and go Cowboys.

Why Sunday School is child abuse

Overheard on the web...

Religion is generally taught to children at such an early age, that normal mental defenses against nonsense simply don't apply, or more to the point, grow up around it and take it for granted. Like doing a xenograft into a fetus, the mental 'immune system' does not attack what is already present when it forms.

For that reason, believing the religion you were raised in is not the least bit indicative of a tendency to believe other nonsense. Indeed, it may even have a protective effect, by filling that mental "receptor" so that nothing else can reach it.

Coming to believe in a religion after attaining adulthood, OTOH, that's a quite different matter. That's not a normal exception to the functioning of a mental 'immune system', it's evidence that system isn't working.

...and then they both got ran over.

"Alphonse, the oil will flow and a Democratic Congress will get the credit. You may lift the moratorium."
"I'd be happy to do so, Gaston. We will turn the keys together. Please proceed to first lift the executive order."
"Oh, after you, Alphonse. As a lame-duck President, playing silly-assed partisan games would be beneath contempt were it not for my willingess to reach out and let you have the glory of going first."
"My dear Gaston, since I won't need the energy issue to send your party into the wilderness for another forty years come November, I am willing to allow you to take the first step towards energy independence. After you."
"No, Alphonse, after you."
"No, Gaston, I wouldn't dream of it."

Gas Pump Blues

Gas Pump Blues

My country 'tis of thee,
Living a fantasy,
Arabic pawn.

Keeping our energy
Locked underneath the sea,
Funding O-P-E-C,
Bashing Exxon.

What I Don't Get

.
I don't understand the oil profits situation. Perhaps someone can set me straight.

Suppose a barrel of oil cost fifty dollars and it produced twenty gallons of gasoline.

Suppose further that gas at the pump cost a dollar a gallon.

Finally, suppose the oil company made a profit of ten cents per gallon of gasoline sold, or ten percent, leaving the underlying passed-on cost of oil at ninety cents a gallon. I know this doesn't include transportation, retail markup, etc, but let's keep it real simple.

Now, double the cost of a barrel of oil to one hundred dollars. It still produces twenty gallons of gas. The oil company raises the price at the pump to reflect the increased cost of oil per gallon of gasoline from ninety cents to $1.80, adding their profit of ten cents, and the new pump price is $1.90 a gallon.

Although the oil company's profit falls as a percentage of the cost of a gallon of gasoline, it remains ten cents per gallon. There is no increase in refining cost, and the increase in the price of oil is passed through to the consumer.

There are no windfall profits generated in this scenario, the ROI of the oil business remains the same.

What is the mechanism by which higher crude results in a Niagara of profits for oil companies?

Stuck on Stupid

.
"You mean George Soros isn't behind it all?"
"No, that's what I've been trying to tell you."
"Well, what am I supposed to do with all my emotion-laden conspiratorial fantasies?"
"I don't know, man. You weren't reasoned into them, so you can't be reasoned out of them."
"I'll follow the money, then. It must be going into the pockets of titans. They're doing it. They're George Soros!"
"Uhm, look man..."
"George Soros is subverting this election so he can funnel money to big business!"
"I'm oughtta here..."
"First thing we'll do is cap CEO pay..."

I Don't Cry for You, Rodham-Clinton

I Don't Cry for You, Rodham-Clinton

I don't cry for you, Rodham-Clinton.
The truth is I never liked you.
All through Whitewater,
You lied and glided,
Then poor Vince Foster
Was Arkancided.

And as for fortune, and as for fame
There could never be enough
In one life to sate you, woman.
They are illusions
Not the solutions
To such a cinder of a human.

The O'Bamy Blues

.

Yet, both groups rated integrity as the third most important of 24 character traits when asked to reveal what they view as necessary for the next president. (Open-mindedness and perspective were first and second.)

How bizarre... but if true, Obama will win. Uncluttered by experience, his mind is open to whatever will get him into the White House, his perspective is buried under platitudes and he has the wooden body language of Pinocchio: guileless, cartoony, and ungainly . You can almost see the strings.

All the makings are there. In as little as two years of O'Mamy Bamy blues a chastened Republican party exploiting a shell-shocked electorate will return to the days of Newtonian conservatism. Ah, I can dream can't I?

Nazinomics? Not so much.

.

Economic nationalism

That's only the second time I've seen this peculiar phrasing and the first time was just last week.

Are we seeing the birth of a euphemism?

"Economic nationalism" is coming from the left in the US and now from Russia. It is used as a counter to global trade. Not far away is "economic egoism" coming from the desk of US Secretary of Commerce Pancho Villa.

"Economic nationalism" seems to mean putting one's country's interests first in dealing with trade. The rumbling undercurrent of national socialism in the phrase signals we're dealing with the fashioning of a new hammer for an old nail.

I'm a free trader, but I don't think those who ride to the sound of their own gums, and that's you Mr Buchanan, will be dissuaded by being compared to Nazis and that goes double for Mr Buchanan.

But it's not just free trade. The devaluation of the dollar is a form of economic nationalism as is 'buying locally.'

These aren't necessarily bad and don't deserve such a Cold War appellation.

KC's jones

.

Katie Couric, who was at NBC in the lead-up to the war, has called it "one of the most embarrassing chapters in American journalism."

Of course the Toonship from Mena to Fort Marcy Park doesn't rate a Perk on Katie's scale of I-blush-at-my-incompetence. That's because you had to be THIS TALL to see out of media's foxhole.

Obammy, Obammy Bammy Blue

"You got the delegates, if not the votes, Obama, so the VP choice is yours."
"Well, that's damned white of you, Hillary."
"That's because I'll all white. You should listen to your better half."
"You mean Michelle?"
"No."

Today's Quote of the Week

“The Founding Fathers intended us to be inert, and we’ve expanded that ability."

Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.)
Politico

Which past president is Obama?

Nah, Obama isn't Kennedy or Al Smith.

He's Warren Gamaliel Harding, a rust-belt Senator with a record of having done nothing of note, married to a sharp-elbowed woman who may be smarter than he is, given to speeches full of flourish but without substance, not entirely of one race, and the candidate enabled by boys in the back room.

A letter to Mr Ickes

Mr. Ickes said the outcome for Michigan was a hijacking of voters’ intent because it assigned delegates to Mr. Obama even though he did not win them as his name was not on the ballot.

NYT

Hill'ry Clinton took an ax,
And gave her parents forty whacks.
And when the job was neatly done,
Applied for status -- orphaned one.

Dear Harold Ickes,

That's the most cynical claptrap of the season. 
Obama wasn't on the ballot ... indeed didn't even
campaign there ... by way of complying with the
rule that was instigated at Hillary's wish.

I'm gaining a new respect for Bill Clinton's ability
to piss on our shoes and tell us it's raining.  At least
he told us is was raining.  That some sort of
minimal respect.  You don't even pay us the
courtesy if being ashamed of yourself.