Is There An Anti-Parent Trend In The United States?

Well, if you asked me that question say five years ago, I would have said no. An emphatic no.
But ask me today and I think that there is a sometimes subtle, sometimes not subtle anti-parent attitude in the United States today.
What got me thinking about this was reading yesterday's Morning Jolt from Jim Geraghty of National Review. If you don't get this in your inbox every weekday, you should. And as an aisde, Mr. Geraghty is one of my favorites over at NR. I have quoted him many a time on this blog.
What Mr. Geraghty wrote about was taking his young boys over to a local Starbucks every Sunday morning and spending some quality time with the kids. Something that every father should do, no matter what their own marital situations.
But one Sunday, they went to a different Starbucks. Actually one near a playground in Alexandria, Virginia.
And it was not a good experience.
First is Mr. Geraghty's description of the crowd:

And the clientele was . . . different. You know the type: Beard. Skinny. Vintage t-shirt. Probably a piercing or two, definitely a tattoo. If they lived in New York, they would live in Brooklyn.

Ok, I would just change that to a Left Coast theme. If they lived here, it would probably be North Hollywood or West Hollywood. Or in downtown Los Angeles in one of the lofts. Basically, a hipster or a SWLPL type of vibe.
And then was Mr. Geraghty's description of the, well, disapproving looks from this hipster, SWLPL crowd:

I definitely got the feeling that our presence was disruptive to their perusal of the New York Times book-review section or their work on their screenplay. Nothing vocal, just regular disapproving looks in our direction. How dare a breeder like myself desecrate their temple of almost-urban cool.

And there was an awful word Mr. Geraghty wrote.
Breeder.
Breeder?! I had to read that a couple of times to realize that what Mr. Geraghty meant was that he was. . .a. . .dad! And a dad in the ol' fashioned way.
And what is wrong with that?
In my mind not a damn thing.
Being a step dad has been the most rewarding thing I have done other than getting married. Sure, I am not a breeder per se, but I have had the privilege to be a part of my stepson's life as much a father except for the "breeding" part.
Yet the thrust of the piece by Mr Geraghty is simple.
There is an anti-parent culture out there and it is getting louder and louder.
To stay with the coffee theme, there are three big chains here in So. Cal. They are the aforementioned Starbucks, then there is Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf and Peets. And I confess that I like them all. Even though all three are very, very liberal in their politics.
Which leads to a rule of your humble blogger. Try not to let politics get in the way of what you like. Laugh it  off as a 'Well, hello?!' moment. Thus, until there is a Righty Coffee chain, I will continue to like the three I mentioned.
Back on point.
In the following order of the vibe and politics, Peets is the worst and Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf is the least of the hipster, SWLPL type of crowd. Which, oddly enough, means Starbucks is pretty middle-of-the-road.
I think that it is great that parents can take their children to a place like this. It is certainly better than the local pub. Or the race track. Or, well you get the point.
Are there some crappy parents? Yes, but most do not have children to be crappy parents. Not all parents let their kids run amok in inappropriate places. But come on, it is a coffee house. A chain coffee house. Hey, hipsters and SWLPLers, if you want to the full European coffee house vibe, there are a boatload near college campuses.
A lot of people like to emphasise the negative parents out there. Again, there are some. But there are many parents that are trying to be good. And teach their children how to behave. Right from wrong. All that kind of stuff.
I for one love seeing dads especially have a close relationship with their kids. It is sign of maturity. Of a dad giving of himself. I know that it is sexist to write what I am writing here, but it is true. It is expected that moms are naturally giving of themselves. But dads, that is another story.
And that is another point Mr. Geraghty raises.
How this hipster, SWLPL crowd is male dominated.
So true.
And they like their "freedom".
Freedom from what?
Their freedom is a myth.
What it really is is a self-absorption that they are too lacking to realize.
It is all about one's self. What? You want me to care about another human being? You know, beside bedding down a gal (or a guy-being a wee bit PC here!), actually a having a relationship? Having to give of my self to another person? WTF, man?!
When anyone gives of them self, that is true freedom.
I think that the problem here is that too many people have a misconception of freedom. And are just plain self-centered. And some of these people are. . .breeders. And they pass down their self-absorption to their offspring.
For me,  I get how people feel about the modern parent. But I try to remember my parents and how they raised us. And yeah, it is pretty different from parenting in the 21st century.
But again, I do hate to admit, there is a trend of anti-parent and anti-parenting that is on the rise. And you can find some of it at the local coffee house.










 

Wanna Know A BIG Difference Between McCain And Romney?

Well, my friends, there are a lot of differences between the 2008 Republican presidential candidate, Sen John "F--- You" McCain and the presumptive 2012 Republican standard-bearer, former Massachusetts governor, Mitt Romney.
But for all the differences, it comes down to a word and a phrase.
The word is money. The phrase is that one wants to win, the other wanted to run a "respectful" campaign against then Sen. Messiah Barack.
Let's start from the phrase.
I'll put it blunter.
One is a winner and one a loser.
Back in 2008, when there was a lot of information out there about then Sen. Messiah Barack. From the relationship between then Sen. Messiah Barack and his former pastor, the "Rev." Jeremiah Wright. And his relationship with an obscure yet important local Chicago fringe left-wing group known as The New Party. A group that Sen. Messiah Barack thought so important that he actively sought it's support for his run for the Illinois state senate.
Yet there was Sen. "F--- You" McCain not using any of the obvious issues to his advantage. No, no, no. Sen. "F--- You" McCain kept saying that he wanted to run a "respectful" campaign and hoped that then Sen. Messiah Barack would do the same.
HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! HEE! HEE! HEE! HEE! HEE! HO! HO! HO! HO! HO!
Sorry to have a loud laugh here, but we see how well that worked out.
Think that Gov. Romney is going to do the same thing?
Not a chance!
Gov. Romney is going to leave the "Rev." Wright saga alone lest allow the Obamiacs another chance to denigrate his being a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
But on anything else, anything goes.
Recently, the White House advisor and Svengali, David Axelrod, was trying to rally the troops in Boston of all places. Well, there were a slew of Gov. Romney's supporters shouting down the White House tool. And while Mr. Axelrod did finish his comments, he was clearly rattled.
Now, if this had been 2008, Sen. "F--- You" McCain would have been condemning. . .his supporters and not supporting the thrust of their message. Gov. Romney could not care any less.
Thinking that somehow the other side is going to play by the Marquis of Queensbury rules is a sign of a loser. Period.
Sen. "F--- You" McCain seemed to think that and lost. Gov. Romney does not worry about such things. He wants to win. And he understands that supporters get a little excitable and will do such things. Since that does happen to him from the Obamiacs. It is part of the game, folks.
And now the totally glaring difference is in the money chase.
Sen. "F--- You" McCain could not raise money to save his campaign. And it showed. And once he had informally wrapped up the Republican presidential nod in 2008, he made a fatal choice of taking federal matching funds. By doing so he completely limited any serious fundraising to keep up with the Obama Machine.
So, what about Gov. Romney? Is he going to take the federal matching funds?
HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! HO! HO! HO! HO! HO! HEE! HEE! HEE! HEE! HEE!
Once again, sorry for the laugh but are you kidding?
Once again, Gov. Romney understands the stakes and wants to win the presidency.
Here is a startling statistic, courtesy of The Race For 2012.
During the month of June, the Dear Leader, President Obama, and his team fund raised $71,000,000. Team Romney? How about a cool $106,100,000? Yup, Team Romney whooped Team Dear Leader, President Obama, by $35,0000,000.
Let's compare the 2008 candidates to today.
Then Sen. Messiah Barack had raised $74,000,000. Pretty good for an unknown who somehow easily defeated the Democrat establishment favorite, Sen. Hilary Clinton.
And how much did Sen. "F--- You" McCain raise in the same period? A respectable $48,000,000.
But because he just did not get it that you have to raise money to win, Sen. "F--- You" McCain opted to accept $84,000,000 in public financing and restrictions that went with it. In the end, Sen. Messiah Barack raised a cool $778,642,962, or an average of $10.94 per vote. Sen. "F--- You" McCain? He ended up raising $383,913,834, or $5.97 a vote and lost the election by about nine and a half million votes nationwide.
Now, in Sen. "F--- You" McCain's minimal defense, he was trying to keep the White House in GOP hands with an economic meltdown and finally nearing the end of eight years of George W. Bush and his presidency.
But still, had he ran a better campaign, he could have very well won and be running for reelection.
Gov. Romney is showing Republicans a quite different candidate this cycle. One that realizes the current occupant of the White House, the Dear Leader, President Obama, is taking this nation down the toilet. And that it will take money and will to defeat Team Dear Leader.
That is the difference between Sen. John "F--- You" McCain and Gov. Mitt Romney.

Why I Have Not Been Blogging Much

For some reason, this particular summer has me in the blog blahs!
I mean, we are in the middle of a historic presidential race and I have not been overly inclined to write about it.
There are all the cultural issues. Again, it just seems sort of like meh.
And there is all the foreign policy issues that should get this blogger pretty excited to blog about.
Meh.
I guess one reason is that the weather here on the Left coast is really great and is a big distraction to  blogging.
But this week I am on vacation from the day job and I think I am getting the feeling back.
The blogging feeling.
So hopefully there will be many more ruminations of your humble blogger this week.
Maybe I am getting over the summer blogger blahs.

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY!

Happy Independence Day! It is the 236th Independence Day.

Sometimes I think that I can not add to what we celebrate this day.

And this is a time that I will not.
I will let those who toiled in a very, very hot summer in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania colony in 1776 express the reason for this day.

For I present the Declaration of Independence in its entirety along with all the signers.

These men nearly did make the ultimate sacrifice. Had they been captured by the British forces sent to quell our rebellion, they surely would have been executed.

And here is the Declaration of Independence:

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America

hen in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.
New Hampshire:
Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton
Massachusetts:
John Hancock, Samuel Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island:
Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery
Connecticut:
Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott
New York:
William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris
New Jersey:
Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark
Pennsylvania:
Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross
Delaware:
Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean
Maryland:
Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia:
George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton
North Carolina:
William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn
South Carolina:
Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur Middleton
Georgia:
Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton



Sen. Mitch McConnell And With Friends Like This. . .

The senate minority leader, Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) made an unbelievable statement today that essentially said, go ahead and try but we probably won't be able to repeal the monstrosity known as Obamacare.
Good Lord!
What is wrong with this dude?!
I mean, while the irons are still blazing hot, this guy decides hey, maybe I should throw a jug of freezing cold water on those who think that there is really going to be a shot at repeal.
So, here is that jug of freezing cold water to those of us who want to fight for a senate majority and an eventual vote for repeal of Obamacare:

"If you thought it was a good idea for the federal government to go in this direction, I'd say the odds are still on your side. Because it's a lot harder to undo something than it is to stop it in the first place."

Really, Sen. Mitch?!
Well of course it would have been easier if one Barack Hussein Obama did not become president in 2008. And let us not forget it would have been better that Democrat majorities in the House and Senate did not balloon to near super majorities.
But that is the hand that was dealt.
Because of the way the 2,700 page monstrosity passed in the first place, a lot of the more serious aspects of the officially known Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act will not begin until after the upcoming election.
So there is time if the Republicans do indeed increase their majority in the House, win the majority in the Senate and Mitt Romney is elected president.
But why is Sen. Mitch saying such things at this point?
Is it possible that Sen. Mitch has had a little too much time inside that Beltway? Because the comment does strike me as such. And one can make the case that Sen. Mitch is being realistic.
But what Sen. Mitch and the mealy-mouthed Republicans are not getting is this.
The American public in poll after poll, after poll, after poll, have given Obamacare a big fat thumbs down.
In fact, even after the supreme court decision that essentially upheld Obamacare when the 5-4 majority found that the mandate was really a tax, the American public did not like the fact that Obamacare was upheld.
Sen. Mitch, dude, get out of the beltway. Realize that the public wants health care reform. And even if some of what is in the current monstrosity is kept after repeal, they do not want what the federal government has to offer.
Sen. Mitch, how can you get a Republican senate majority when you make comments like this?
You can't if Team Dear Leader, Team Obama, gets this out on their communication platforms. Especially the Obamawhore media.
This is not brain surgery.
The public wants a do over. The only way we get a do-over is to get rid of those that forced this abomination on us in the first place. We have the supreme court ruling that the thrust of the funding for this, the mandate, is a tax. That is what we keep driving home. Day after day. Hour after hour. Minute after minute.
I want the senate to be a Republican one. What I don't want is a majority leader in Sen. Mitch that seems to not have a stomach for the fight. If that is the case, the first order of business after the election is to look at a new majority leader. One that will fight for repeal and replace. One that will not be afraid of the Obama/Leftywhore media. One not afraid of the Democrats. One that will not cut a deal but stand his or her ground. No more "nuanced" leadership.
Sen. Mitch, I hope that you clarify the remarks. I hope that you show the fight that you did in the McCain/Feingold so-called campaign finance reform.
The Republicans at all levels need to get this and get it good.
This is a fight for the nation. A fight as to whether we get a total socialist makeover in a, God forbid, second term of the Dear Leader, President Obama. We can not treat this as just another election when it is not.
We Republicans need to heed the words of former Pennsylvania senator, Rick Santorum, who urged supporters to join the fight. It is a fight and we better bring big guns and not a kitchen knife. Team Dear Leader plays for keeps. We conservative Republicans must do that and more.
Because with friends like Sen. Mitch McConnell, well I am not all that confident that he realizes what is at stake.

Hmm, Would These People Protest To Save My Job?

This past Saturday, Mrs. RVFTLC and I were doing some errands and as we left the local Starbuck's (remember, this IS California and not a Dunkin Donuts this side of the Rockies!) to go across the shopping center to the cleaners, we were about to be accosted by some solicitors.
From a distance, I could see one wearing a t-shirt referencing the so-called 99%. That was a cue to steer clear of these two guys. Yet Mrs. RVFTLC kept going toward one of them unessesarily. As the gentleman was about to hand some propaganda, he asked if we wanted to join them in a protest that was scheduled for today. When the man said that it was to save 200 postal worker jobs, to my shock, Mrs. RVFTLC said loudly, "I don't care!" Then the man asked "You don't care about people who may lose their jobs?!" Then she said tersely, "NO!" and we kept going.
As we were doing our cleaning business, I saw that the propriator had a propaganda brochure on the billboard.
It is the save the Pasadena Mack Robinson post office processing center from closure.
Now since that article, there appears to be a compromise that would keep the actual post office open, yet close the processing center portion.
No matter what, up  to 200 jobs could be lost.
Now Mrs. RVFTLC is not a rabble-rouser on these subjects. I mean, one the reasons that I blog is because she can not take my discussing current events. So, I was surprised at her reaction.
Oh, insert memo here to Mrs. RVFTLC.
As I explained to her, I never engage with solicitors no matter what the cause is. Even if is something I may agree with. If possible, I have the ear buds in the ears and when I do have the potential encounter, I simply raise a hand to say "No thank you." so they do not bother me. Once you stop for one, you end up stopping for them all. And since this usually occurs on my lunch hour at the day job, it precludes me from really doing so. Thus I explained that to Mrs. RVFTLC.
Now, I asked why she was so upset.
And she said, paraphrasing, would these people be there to save my job? How about your job?
I pondered that and said, well of course they would not.
Mrs. RVFTLC works for a non-profit. I work indirectly in the medical field for a for-profit company.
Oh, neither of us are in a labor union. For there is not one at either of our jobs.
And in thinking of it further, that is what really bothers me about the so-called defenders of the so-called 99%.
They really do not care about the real people that make America work.
What they were doing was standing up for government, unionized employees who have been riding the gravy train for many, many years.
As noted in the linked article, the United States postal service ran a $5,100,000,000 deficit in 2011. The only reason it is not worse is because the USPS has been making cuts through attrition mostly. And some post offices have been closed.
But the reality is that mostly because of people being able to pay most bills online, even read their newspapers, books and magazines online, the USPS has taken a huge hit. Throw in FedEx and UPS, and it is an even larger hit.
And it is not sustainable.
FTR, Mrs. RVFTLC is not really uncaring about people that may lose their jobs. But it is seemingly worrying about people that had been feeding at the trough for a long time now. And not willing to make nessesary cutbacks to maybe have some stability.
Ideally, the USPS should become privatized and thus it would be competitive with FedEx and UPS.
But they do not want to. And their patrons in congress do not want to make the tough moves that might save the USPS.
Some of the moves maybe having to cut jobs.
But again, what if my wife's non-profit were to make cuts that she and some of her co-workers would lose their jobs? FTR, it came really close a couple of years ago and she and her co-workers had to take pay cuts essentially to keep their jobs. Now things are better and she even got a raise.
Would these same people so concerned about postal workers be trying to save my wife's job?
What if the same scenario I wrote above were to happen to me?
Would these same people so concerned about postal workers be trying to save my job?
See, this is the real world that the government unionized work force has no idea about.
We who are at will employees can have our jobs ended if it has to be for whatever reason.
See, I do not blame the postal workers at all. Their union sold them a bill of goods for many years and regretably for these people, to coin something a pastor once said, the chickens are coming home to roost.
We are sympathetic to the workers, but we can not be saying that their job is so important we have to continue going through unsustainable debt to keep them employed.
Now as I write this, maybe we should have engaged the man and explained why we thought the way that we do.
And to ask a simple question.
Would you be protesting if we had our jobs threatened?

When Did Conservatives Suddendly Support Judicial Activism?

The one thing that I think we conservatives should have learned this week is that we should not be like liberals and think it is good for the courts to make our laws.
Yet most of us hoped apearantly against hope that the United States supreme court would rule the four points of contention in Obamacare as unconstitutional. We especially wanted to see the mandate ruled unconstitutional. Oh yeah, what we forget is that it was. But, through the wisdom of the Chief Justice Douchebrain John Roberts, he said well, if we just change the word mandate to tax, well then it is cool.
And thus, the financial mechanism of Obamacare stands. And that means the law can continue to be implemented.
This past week, we conservatives acted like liberals.
We do not like a said law, in this case Obamacare, and we hoped that a court would rule the whole thing unconstitutional. And for us we ended up pretty disapointed. But the lesson is that we can not and should not depend on the courts to remedy such situations.
As I have heard a lot this week, elections have consequences. And in 2006 and 2008, it appeared that the voters of the United States wanted a change in government management. And the culmination was the election of the Dear Leader, President Obama.
Now, throughout the campaign, then Sen. Messiah Barack kept talking about fundamentally changing the United States. He never gave details. One thing that he kept talking about is never, ever raising taxes on the middle class.
Yet once becoming president, the Dear Leader, President Obama, spent one year and a half evenutally passing what is officially known as the Patient Protection and Affordability Act, what the rest of us call Obamacare.
And once 2010 rolled around, once again the adage elections have consequences came home again as the Republicans took control of the House of Representatives and made substantive gains in the senate.
What the supreme court decision did was make those of us opposed to the full implementation of Obamacare realize that now, we have public opinion on our side, we need to put Republicans in firmer control  of the house, retake the senate and win the White House. For it will be the only way to end implementation and repeal Obamacare and come in with better solutions than one-size-fits-all.
Conservatives can not and should not depend on the courts to end an unpopular policy or to implement one that is extraconstitutional. That is what liberals do. And they try to stack the courts with sympathetic judges.
Conservatives have correctly railed how that is not what the judiciary should be about. And we were right then. And while we may have deviated regarding Obamacare, once Republicans are victorious in November, we will be able to legislatively end Obamacare. And that is what we should have been talking about all the way through.

Sooo, The Politics Of The Supreme Court Obamacare Decision

Of course there is politcal fallout from the supreme court decision that essentially upheld Obamacare today.
The Dems are wetting themselves in orgasmic delight that the march to a single-payer health care system, the ultimate goal, can contiue.
Why one of the reactions is from this choice douchebrain, Patrick Gaspard. His tweet:
its constitutional. Bitches. *
Nice. But hey, as noted by Ace, there is another more to the point one.
I will link Ace, but will not write it out here.
Of course the Dear Leader, President Obama, droned on and of course got it wrong by implying the supreme court somehow arrived at its decision so that all Americans can have "affordable" health care.
Wrong, but is not the Dear Leader, President Obama, usually wrong.
Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney succinctly said to insure this abomination does not take full effect, well you have to replace the current occupant of the White House with him.
So, very, very short term it is a pyhrric victory for the Dear Leader, President Obama.
The problem is that the Patient Protection and Affordability Act is still wildly unpopular. And the one thing that the supreme court decision did was state the obvious. That the so-called mandate that all Americans had to purchase health insurance and if not be penalized is in reality a tax.
And guess who suffers in that scenario?
The very middle class that the Dear Leader, President Obama, kept saying he will not raise taxes on.
The reality is that if this abomination is not repealed by a Republican congress and a President Romney, this is how it will indeed become a tax and very primarily on the middle class.
As the link points out, if I am to understand that taxes are only to be raised on the eeeevvvviiiiillll rich fat-cats that make $250,000 a year, that threshold gets a lot lower. If it all happens, $50,000 is the new $250,000.
Say, I fall in that category.
Why damn! Mrs. RVFTLC will be the nouveu-riche in Obamaland.
And as Mr. French points out, the best ad that Team Romney can and should run is the infamous interview between the Dear Leader, President Obama and George Stephanopolous in which four times he says that the mandate is not a tax.
That and pointing out the economy in tatters should be the theme of the Romney campaign.
But more than that is that Mr. Romney must not just say that he and the Republicans will repeal and replace Obamacare. He has to be very clear what the replacement to Obamacare will look like. And he has to address the reality that the lower end of the economic ladder will have to be taken care of in some way.
That is what he has to do.
The gift that the decision gave to the Republicans is that the Democrats have to contort that they will somehow not be raising taxes to pay for Obamacare.
That may be enough to help put the Republicans over the top in November.

A Bizzare Supreme Court Decision On Obamacare

OK, FWIW, I have written many times that I am not a lawyer and I am not a constitutional expert. That being said, today's supreme court decision regarding Obamacare is a bizzare one to say the least.
Chief Justice John Roberts amazingly saved the Dear Leader, President Obama's, bacon by contorting that the mandate that Americans have to buy health insurance is not cool. But hey, if you call it a tax and I think it is, then its cool and you get to keep the thrust of the abomination known formally as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, and move on. And hell, I will join with the four libs to make it happen and it will be a 5-4 decision.
WHOA! Wait a minite! A tax?! But, but, did not our Dear Leader, President Obama, tell former Bill Clinton hack George Stephanopolus not once, not twice, not three but four times the PPACA mandate was NOT a tax? If ye don't believe me, go to this link and see for yourself. And note when Mr. Stephanopolus has to whip out the dictionary to define the word tax, the Dear Leader, President Obama, mocks him.
The Democrat congress that passed this abomination kept saying the same thing. The mandate was not a tax at all.
But when push came to shove in argueing this case before the supreme court, well then the mandate suddendly became. . .a tax.
Again, if ye don't believe me, here it is in the leftywhore media Holy Bible, The New York Times regarding the arguement made before the supreme court in the at the time desperate attempt to save the PPACA.
I guess it turns out it was not so desperate after all.
So let's get to the way Chief Justice Douchebrain Roberts concluded, yeah, this is a tax and I say so:

3.CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS concluded in Part III–B that the individual mandate must be construed as imposing a tax on those who do not have health insurance, if such a construction is reasonable.

The most straightforward reading of the individual mandate is thatit commands individuals to purchase insurance. But, for the reasons explained, the Commerce Clause does not give Congress that power.It is therefore necessary to turn to the Government’s alternative argument: that the mandate may be upheld as within Congress’s power to "lay and collect Taxes." Art. I, §8, cl. 1. In pressing its taxingpower argument, the Government asks the Court to view the mandate as imposing a tax on those who do not buy that product. Because "every reasonable construction must be resorted to, in order tosave a statute from unconstitutionality,"

Hooper v. California, 155

That is directly from the 193 page decision written by Chief Justice Douchbrain Roberts.
Now why I am calling this dude a douchebrain?
Because he simply did not judge on the merits of the bill, which was 2,700 pages, on the merits as written and passed by congress and signed by the Dear Leader, President Obama. No where in the legislation was the word tax mentioned. Thus, it is how the Democrats kept saying that no, it would not lead to a tax increase on anyone let alone the middle class.
But he simply divined that oh, what is really meant by a penalty is a tax and thus, I'll just make that correction.
Which is not his job.
It is judge on the merits if said legislation is constitutional or not. Not whether the political class lied about some wording.
It was a bad decision by a court that did not want to be seen as blocking the largest government over reach since the New Deal era.
But there is a silver political lining and that is the next post.

What Does The Supreme Court Ruling On Arizona's SB 1070 Mean?

Today the United States supreme court in a 5-3 decision struck down three of the four critical components of the Arizona immgration law known in shorthand as Arizona SB 1070.
The four provisions of the law that the court ruled on as follows.
1) Whether or not it can be a state crime to be an illegal alien in Arizona.
2) Whether or not it can be a state crime to be an illegal alien and seek and or perform work.
3) Whether or not it can be a state crime to be an illegal alien and not complete and or carry immgration documentation.
4) Whether or not law enforcement in the state can verify the immigration status of suspects stopped during investigating another crime.
So, the supreme court, led by the erratic justice, Anthony Kennedy, struck down the first three and allowed the last one to stand.
Although three of the four provisions were struck down, the fourth one being allowed to stand means that there is still a half a mouth of teeth in this law.
Now here is the ruling from the supreme court.
I admit, I am not a legal eagle, and would love commentary from some actual legal eagles.
But my understanding is that the majority believe the the state of Arizona overstepped in assering the right to actually enforce, no assist, federal law.
Yet somehow, the majority said, well it is still OK for local law enforcement, during routine traffic stops primarily, to ask suspects to prove their immgration status.
To me, it is a convoluted split decision that should make no one happy.
Yes, it is obvious that we need to have real immgration reform. It does not nor should it be all comprehensive. It should be in stages. Absolute control of all borders, north, south and the coasts. Once that is acheived, then also in stages deport those here five years or less. Period. Those who have been here five to ten years, they should be able to get work permits, but not a path to citizenship. And those who have been here 11 years plus should be on a pathway to citizenship. No, I have not thought the logistics of it all. But if a lot are deported, we would be dealing with less people in seeking a serious reform. And having the borders secure will make what I propose palatable.
There will never be a perfect plan to please all.
But what we are doing now is almost pointless.
What Arizona did in passing SB 1070 in the first place was react to the inaction of the federal government to the situation along the border of Arizona and Mexico. Throw in New Mexico and Texas and to a lesser extent California.
The federal government did not do its duty according to the state government. And they have been correct.
And the not so dirty secret is this.
NOTHING will be done this year. This is an election year. Once the election is over and it depends on the outcome, then maybe something will be done.
While some aspects of the Arizona law is out, state and local law enforcement will still be able to question the immigration status of suspects in overal determining of a situation in a traffic stop.
Oh, and another thing to count on.
More and more demogogary and misinformation and fear mongering during this presidential campaign season.
The supreme court split itself in trying to have it all ways on this issue and did nothing to bring clarity to the issue of illegal immigration.
Let's hope that they do a better job in their decision regarding Obamacare.

A New Creepiness In The Presidential Campaign

OK, I am now thoroughly creeped out by the presidential campaign of Team Dear Leader.
It appears that the Dear Leader, President Obama, is so desperate for cash that they would like supporters, I kid you not, getting married to register for people to donate to the Obama/Biden reelection campaign.
If you think it is a joke, here it is:

Yup, just what I would want to do.
Get an invite to a wedding and when the part about where the happy couple are registered and that would show up.
Oh, but please. This is not limited to weddings. No, no, no.
Say, what says Happy Birthday more than giving a gift to Team Dear Leader. Or if you are already married and celebrating that special anniversary, why don't you give a gift to Team Dear Leader.
It is really creepy on a whole lot of layers.
First, it is politicizing special days that people should not be thinking about politics in the first place. And that goes for our side too. FTR, if Team Romney were doing this, I would be just as if not more creeped out. Second, as one that does have good friends that are on the other side politically and or apolitical, I do not want to use special occasions to push my politics on them. All three days are special in their own way to individuals and couples. And said couples should respect the fact that many of their wedding guests or birthday or anniversary party guests may not feel the way that you do on the upcoming election.
Now this kind of gifting is not new.
It is a form of gifting that has been big among the left for a while now.
For instance at All Saint's Episcopal Church, or as it is known on this blog, All Socialist's, there has been what is called the "Alternative Christmas" in which people are encouraged to send gifts to a cause rather than give to each other and or friends, etc. Here is a website dedicated to the concept of an "Alternative Christmas". Now I am not opposed to the concept. I do agree that Christmas has been very commercialized. But I also believe that by and large, people gift each other not out of obligation but out of genuine love and care for each other. But again, I would not want to force that on other people.
But gifting for politicians?
NO FRICKIN' WAY!
But that is not all of the creepiness.
Consider what columnist and activist and now radio talk show host Ben Shapiro got in his e-mail from Mrs. Dear Leader, Michelle Obama last week.
OK, now that you have read the link and the message from Mrs. Dear Leader, Michelle Obama, and are cleaning the mess from your meal from the laughter, let me zero in on the highlight:

For the first 10 years of our marriage, Barack and I lived in an apartment in my hometown of Chicago.

The winters there can be pretty harsh, but no matter how snowy or icy it got, Barack would head out into the cold -- shovel in hand -- to dig my car out before I went to work.

In all our years of marriage, he's always looked out for me. Now, I see that same commitment every day to you and to this country.

The only way we'll win this election is if we can rely on one another like that, all the way to November 6th.

You should know that your recent donation means a lot to both of us.

Barack is working hard, but he can't do this alone -- he needs your help.

Will you make another donation today to build this campaign? When you do, you'll be automatically entered to join Barack and me for a casual dinner:

https://donate.barackobama.com/Barack-and-Me

Your flight, your meal, your accommodations -- that's all taken care of. Just bring yourself and a guest, and get ready to enjoy a good meal together.

We're so grateful that you're out there, ready to keep fighting alongside us from now to November.

            Thanks,

Michelle

OK, I am NOT married to the Dear Leader, President Obama. I don't really care that he shoveled snow back in the day. Now he is shoveling a hoard of manure and dragging this nation down with it.
And I want to be fair.
Team Romney has been doing some unusual shilling. Such as Have a Meal With Mitt. It is donating $3 to $5 bucks for a possibility of joining Mr. Romney for a meal.
That is unusual but at least I don't have to register for people to donate to the Romney campaign instead of giving actual gifts. Same for the birthdays and anniversaries.
I just think that this goes too far. It is one thing to promote a candidate. But to gift him or her, again, NO FRICKIN' WAY!

Another Reason Why Gay "Rights" Advocates Set Back Their Cause

You know, I know that the gay community is not anymore monolithic than any other group.
But the following shows why for every step that homosexual rights advocates take toward gaining acceptance, things like this show the immature, and just plain childish approach not becoming of a movement that wants to take itself seriously.
Apparently our Dear Leader, President Obama, invited a slew of homosexual rights advocates to the White House for reception celebrating Gay "Pride" month.
And a couple of the advocates could not control themselves.
Like the children that they are, a couple of these homosexual rights advocates decided to stand in front of the portrait of President Ronald Reagan and proceed to give him the bird.
And the Dear Leader, President Obama thinks that he is so persecuted.
The two suspects, Matthew Hart and Zoe Strauss, were moved to such a mature expression about Mr. Reagan because of an old canard. Well, let me show you the words of Mr. Strauss:

"Yeah, f– Reagan. Ronald Reagan has blood on his hands. The man was in the White House as AIDS exploded, and he was happy to see plenty of gay men and queer people die. He was a murderous fool, and I have no problem saying so. Don’t invite me back. I don’t care.”

Really?! Yeah, I am certain that Mr. Reagan was rubbing his hands together with glee, maybe saying something like "Well, another faggot died from, what is it called? Oh yeah, AIDS." Hey, maybe Mr. Reagan had a list of all the homosexuals that died from AIDS.
That is the canard.
That Ronald Reagan did not care about the outbreak of AIDS. That somehow, he and his administration did not care about AIDS because it affected overwhelmingly homosexual men.
No, Mr. Reagan was concerned like all of us about AIDS.
Like so many people at the time, there was such a limited knowledge about the disease.
But I want to cite this column from Deroy Murdock from a 2003 issue of National Review concerning Mr. Reagan and his response to AIDS.
One thing that is important to note about AIDS. That it was not even identified as what it was until 1982. And roughly $8,000,000 was part of the federal budget in research and the like concerning the disease. By 1984, federal funding for research and a possible vaccine and or cure rose a staggering 694% to $103,000,000. By the time Mr. Reagan left office, the federal government was spending $2,232,000,000.
But, Mr. Reagan did not care about the epidemic.
What a lot of people do not realize about Mr. Reagan is that he came out against a controversial propostiton in 1978 that would have barred open and "activist" homosexuals from teaching in the public schools. It was his opposition that led to the measure's crushing defeat.
I guess Mr. Hart and Miss Strauss must have forgotten about that. Maybe if he was for the measure, it would have passed. And many teachers would have probably been fired. And many may have not even been homosexuals themselves.
Mr. Reagan had a live and let live attitude about homosexuals. After all, the man was in Hollywood all those years. And I am certain that he and everyone else knew who was and who was not a homosexual.
But one should never have expected Mr. Reagan to push the homosexual left agenda. And he did not. And that is why these two dim bulbs will not "forgive" him for "letting" all those homosexuals die in the early days of the epidemic.
But to suggest that Mr. Reagan was openly hostile to homosexuals is wrong. He was not hostile and probably knew quite a few in his day.
So, what does it gain for these two to give the portrait of Mr. Reagan the bird? Nothing. But it once again spotlights the worst in the activist community and what makes many people that may be more like Mr. Reagan, live and let live, have doubts about their maturity. Politically and socially.
And the response from the White House? Rather pathetic if you ask me. Here is Shin Innoye's tepid comment:

“While the White House does not control the conduct of guests at receptions, we certainly expect that all attendees conduct themselves in a respectful manner.  Most all do. These individuals clearly did not. Behavior like this doesn’t belong anywhere, least of all in the White House.”

My question is that this is not something that happened out of plain sight. These two could not have been walking on their own around the White House and flipping off the former president's portrait. There HAD to be other people around if not high level White House personnel. So, where these two shown the door? And if not, why not?
While I, as a conservative, am told constantly how we are the problem in regard to discourse in politics today, what about these two dirt bags? What about the total disrespect that they showed to Mr. Reagan? Actually, to all the presidents that have served this nation? Maybe Mr. Reagan was their wrath, but what about the one that comes by in the future and feel like maybe flipping off Franklin Delano Roosevelt's portrait? You know, the one that ushered in the socialist era in the United States. Oh, I can go on and on.
Here is the thing.
If these activists want to be taken seriously, hey act like it! Be like the rest of us and show some respect. You do not have to like any president's policies, but you don't lower yourself and your cause by doing such a douchebrain thing like these two did. And by not doing anything about it, Team Dear Leader tacitly approves of such behavior.
None of us should tolerate any behavior like this. Left or right.
And if homosexual rights advocates want to ingratiate themselves with middle America, they need to purge douchebrains like this from their ranks.

A Real Leader Vs. A Faux Leader

Today when I got home from the day job, the latest issue of The Weekly Standard was in my mailbox and the cover story was The Real Reagan by Fred Barnes.
After reading it not once but twice, what struck me was that Ronald Reagan was truly a real leader. He really did not care so much about the nuts-and-bolts of minutia of the job of being president. But he understood so much about the issues of the day. And much more than he ever let on.
It stands in stark contrast to a faux leader, the Dear Leader, President Barack H. Obama. One never really vetted. One that we have never seen his college transcripts. I mean, after all, unlike Mr. Reagan, the Dear Leader, President Obama, went to Occidental College, Columbia and Harvard law school. And he "wrote" a book before he actually became anything.
Yet as Mr. Barnes points out in the article, Mr. Reagan was portrayed in this manner:

These anecdotes (referring to a story about a movie)  may not appear to be terribly significant. But they’re more revealing than I thought at the time, for they undermine the profile of Reagan created by the media, the permanent Washington establishment, political insiders, many Democrats, some Republicans, and even a few members of Reagan’s White House staff. Their idea of Reagan—a bumbling, likable lightweight blessed with good luck and clever aides—wasn’t the Reagan that I encountered. It wasn’t the real Reagan.

Mr. Reagan we have come to find out was really a kind of smart guy after all. Not bad a dude that went to a Christian college, Eureka College in the middle-of-nowhere Illinois.
For instance, Mr. Reagan wrote himself every radio commentary that he delivered while a syndicated commentator in the late 1970s between presidential campaigns. That is something many, including your humble blogger, had no idea. But the book Reagan In His Own Hand shows an engaged person that wrote all the commentaries long form and wrote is the operative word. And courtesy of Mr. Barnes, here are some of the topics he dealt with during that time: Namibia, ocean mining, Cambodia, Korea, Taiwan, Vietnam, treaties, the B-1 bomber, missile defense, national security strategy, intelligence, Chile, visas, Vladimir Bukovsky, human rights, the Helsinki Accords, Cuba, Rhodesia, the Panama Canal, Guantánamo, Leonid Brezhnev, foreign aid, Palestine, Jamaica, and the United Nations.
But remember folks, Mr. Reagan was but an amiable dunce. He just got lucky.
Where was all of that from the Dear Leader, President Obama? How do we know anything about him? What he really has thought on the major issues of the day? I mean, yeah it is great that he "wrote" not one but two self-serving books before he did anything. But again, why was he not thoroughly vetted the way someone like Mr. Reagan was?
And why is it, even to this day, that Mr. Reagan seemed to be the only one interested in defeating Soviet communism?
As governor of California in 1972, Mr Reagan said that Soviet communism would soon be confined to “dustbin of history.” And he said the same thing 10 years later as president. And the establishment thought to a man and woman that Mr. Reagan was dreaming. If not a little daft. Too bad that by 1991, the Soviet Union ceased to exist. That East and West Germany would be one with the West winning out.
Where is that kind of leadership from the Dear Leader, President Obama?
Understand that the Dear Leader, President Obama, ran as something that he clearly was not.
A mushy moderate.
Since becoming the president, Mr. Obama has driven home the fact that he is the most left-wing president since Lyndon, nope, Lynchin' Baines Johnson. And for sure even more to the left than Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
On issue after issue, Mr. Obama is almost at odd with the very people that elected him in the first place.
A leader has to sometimes make adjustments, even if he or she does not want to.
So yes, Mr. Reagan did raise taxes while president. But in the end, he enacted the largest tax reform to date. So many of us conservatives can forgive the tax hikes because in the end tax reform was a better deal for the nation as a whole.
Where is that kind of leadership from the Dear Leader, President Obama?
I know many will say with so-called health care "reform".
The problem is that the majority of the American people did not want the "reform" that was being sold to them. Unless you can bring a majority to that, then it looks like it was bad from the beginning.
What I see from the Dear Leader, President Obama, is an iron fist instead of the velvet glove.
And most important of any leader is to have the people believing in themselves.
Ronald Reagan did that.
Barack Obama does not do that.
And thus the difference between Ronald Reagan, a true leader, and Barack Obama, a faux leader, is crystal clear.
One can only hope that Mitt Romney is more Ronald Reagan than Barack Obama.

HAPPY FATHER'S DAY!

Here is to all the dad's, stepdads, grandads (no, not the bourbon whiskey!) and all the male role model's out there. Today is our day. So, Happy Father's Day.
I often complain to Mrs. RVFTLC that dads, well we kind of get the shaft when it comes to the days set aside for moms and dads.
Part of it, historically, is the way that a dad's role had been in our society.
Dad has always been the one to work. Sometimes more than one job. Sometimes endless hours at the one that he had. The time that a dad would spend with their children, boys or girls, was often limited in comparison to the mom.
Even now that does still hold true, but thankfully less so.
One of the few good things to come out of our modern disaster known as culture is that dad's are becoming more a part of their children's life.
No, dad does not have to come home from work, hear the often bad report from mom and lay down the law. Well, some do. But sometimes the dad is the one that does the reporting for mom. Or because we now have stay-at-home dads, or dads that work from home, they get to do it all.
As my pastor pointed out in part of today's sermon at church, only about four out of 100 children have had a closer relationship with their dad over their mom.
That is very sad.
One hopes that even with the tragedy that is divorce, that is changing.
I have a friend that I often quote from that is a divorced man. He gets his son on a schedule as is wont of divorcees. But it does seem that he has a very good relationship with his son. He has taken him to many a concert. Gets him all involving his love of rock music.

The Dear Leader Resorts To Faux Amnesty For Young Illegal Aliens

Well, nothing like another election-year ploy from the Dear Leader, President Obama, to raise the hackles of your humble, yet blog-funked, blogger.

Yesterday, the Dear Leader, President Obama, by executive order, has circumvented congress and will no longer enforce the law regarding the children of illegal aliens.
What this means is that up to 800,000 children of illegal aliens between 16-30 years-old will be eligible for work permits. One of the conditions include not having a criminal record.
To all of this I say really? You, our Dear Leader, President Obama, want to begin, by executive order, an amnesty process around congress. The same congress that your party, the Democrat party, controlled for two years of your presidency.
There is so much about this faux amnesty that is has to be broken down, which I will do.

1) Totally disingenuous
Again, as noted above, when the Democrats controlled both houses of congress and the White House, they could have passed legislation such as this. But they did not. Once Republicans took control of the House of Representatives and gained senate seats, legislation such as this was not gonna happen. But to think that this is not aimed at gaining more support from one particular group of voters, Hispanics, then please get your head examined. In an accompanying article at the Left Angeles Times, here is the accompanied photo and caption direct from the Times website:

Nancy Guarneros, 25, right, hugs Jorge Gutierrez, 28, as they join more than 150 students and Dream Act supporters who rallied in downtown Los Angeles on Friday to voice support for President Obama's decision to halt the deportation of young illegal immigrants who have no criminal records and meet certain other criteria. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times / June 15, 2012)

Now note that there are not a slew of Danish illegal aliens. Nor Indians. Nor Red Chinese. Nor Australians. Nor people from the Arabian peninsula. No, this is a sop to Hispanics. But especially those of Mexican ancestry. Overwhelmingly the vast majority of the 800,000 plus possible for this scam, er program will be Mexican. It is nothing more than to assume that all Mexican Americans will be supportive of this. Which leads to number two.

2) Er, Not All Mexicans Think Alike
One of the great lies is that Mexican Americans are totally monolithic when it comes on how to deal with illegal immigration.
But there is a serious divide between multi-generational Mexicans that have been in the United States vs. the illegal vs those that have played by the rules to immigrate here.
The most upset group are those that did it right.
Yes, it is a bureaucratic nightmare, but they played by the rules and did everything right. They did not come here illegally. Nor did they bring their children here illegally. They have to wonder why bother? Why not just wait for a desperate president like the Dear Leader, President Obama, and they can just be rewarded. Especially where their children are concerned.
Then there are the multi-generationals.
They look at such things as the "DREAM" act as more of the nightmare act. They see such things as possibly affecting their children when it comes to attending college. And now in the fight for jobs in this wretched economy.
In California, the above two groups without a doubt voted for the controversial measure Prop. 187 in 1996 and I believe would do so again. Do not believe that it was only the eeeeevvvvviiiiilllll White Republicans that voted for the measure. A vote does not get 59% without the vote of some Hispanics.
But that does not mean they are the majority just yet.
There are enough Hispanic voters that do not get what I noted and look at what was done yesterday through the prism of race and not national interest.

3) Economic Impact
OK, so if these 800,000 plus young people become part of the work force at this point, where are the jobs for them?
Since unemployment has been at eight percent plus throughout the whole Dear Leader, President Obama administration, will these new workers get jobs over American citizens? What if they can not find employment? Are they not then in even more of a limbo than not?
Well, it will take a while for the process to work itself out. The economy may improve somewhat by the time we see the first beneficiaries of the program in the work force. But the fact that it is even being announced now in the midst of a disastrous economy shows a tone-deafness of this administration beyond belief. It makes it look like the president cares more about the fate of illegal aliens children over that of actual Americans.

4) Political Impact
That is a good question. Will it hurt or help the Dear Leader, President Obama in the long run? Well, his sudden "evolution" on same-sex marriage sure did not help. When one balances this all out on the next couple of weeks, it may prove to be a wash. Not much of a gain if any among the general electorate. It is the pure opportunism of these latest pronouncements that will roil the electorate. There are just not enough gay activist types and or illegal alien advocate type to offset the rest of the regular people. If this does not motivate the right to oppose this administration by voting them out in November, nothing will. In the end, I do not think that this will help the Obama campaign.

5) Totally Ignores Congress
This is an interesting fact.
The Dear Leader, President Obama, totally did an end-run on congress. By doing so, he risks a potential Romney administration simply shutting down the program. By not going through congress with a compromise measure such as what this could have been does not make it an actual law. It shows the misguided approach that a president can just sign an executive order and voila! No future administration would dare to go the other way, would they? Why risk it? And why totally flaunt a potential abuse of the Executive Order? Does anyone think in the current administration that no one will bring a lawsuit? And the possibility that the supreme court could rule this one unconstitutional?
Again, one must look at number four. All about the politics.

And that is what is wrong with this.
It is all about pandering and politics.
When the Democrats controlled the executive and legislative branch, they could have passed something like this. And maybe even so-called "comprehensive" immigration reform. But they did not. Deep in the craniums of most Democrats, they had to know that this is a toxic issue. And surprise! It still is.
I expect more and more of this "evolution", er pandering, to continue right up to election day.

LOS ANGELES KINGS WIN 1ST STANLEY CUP!!!!!

After 45 long, sometimes really, really bad seasons, the Los Angeles Kings are truly the Kings of the National Hockey League and winners of the Stanley Cup as they defeated the New Jersey Devils, 6-1 in game six tonight.
As I noted in an earlier post, I have been a Kings fan for roughly 34 years. I was the first one in my family to watch hockey, got all my brothers interested and hooked and we have been fans ever since.
To me there is nothing like ice hockey. It is fast, hard hitting, and in so many ways indescribable.
Hockey changed in Los Angeles in 1989 when new owner Bruce McNall made a blockbuster trade that brought the greatest hockey player evah, Wayne Gretzky, to the Left Coast. Within five years, the Kings made their first trip to the Stanley Cup finals, but lost to the mighty Montreal Canadiens, four games to one.
And there were a lot of years that the Kings were in the wilderness.
But this year, some things happened in mid-season that changed the fate of the Kings.
A coaching change was made in December when Terry Murray was replaced by Daryl Sutter. He brought new life into the Kings. They went from a defense-minded team to being able to score goals and play the D. And what can you say about Jonathan Quick, the goalie that went 16-4 in the playoffs?
While the Kings barely made it as the eight and last seed in the Western Conference (formally the Clarance Campbell Conference), they defeated the best team in the Western Conference. The Vancouver Canucks fell four games to one. Then came the second best team in the conference, the St. Louis Blues. And it was a four-game sweep for the Kings. Then came the third best team in the conference, the Phoenix Coyotes. And another four game to one series. Only two games over the minimal possible number of games to play. And then came the sixth-seed in the Eastern Conference (formally the Prince of Wales Conference)), the New Jersey Devils.
Ahh, the Devils. They have been down this road before. They started life as the Kansas City Scouts, and well that did not work out too well. After a couple of seasons in K. C., well they became the original Colorado Rockies until 1982, when they moved to East Rutherford, New Jersey and became the Devils.
The Devils have three Stanley Cups under their belts. But this time, well they were not gonna get number four.
The Kings played amazing winning the first two games by identical scores of 2-1 in overtime both games. Then they came back here to Los Angeles and won again. It was the Kings up three games to none. But in game four, the Devils came back to life and won that game, forcing a trip back to New Jersey. And the Devs pulled off the win in game five and forced a game six back here in Los Angeles.
And tonight it was a magical night for us who have spent many a season disappointed. We are so happy that it is unfrickingbelievable to write the following.
Los Angeles Kings, 2011-2012 STANLEY CUP CHAMPIONS!

As Promised, Ace Of Spades Open Letter

Here is the link to the Ace of Spades open letter to regarding the Brett Kimberlin matter.
That is all

No More Blog Posts Until Saturday

In my medically and medicated conditions, I have not been keeping up with the Brett Kimberlin saga as I should.
But a great place to get enormous background and first hand the evil that is Kimberlin in here at The Other McCain.
This Kimberlin douchebrain is one piece of work. But regrettably, a smart one.
Why thanks to either Kimberlin or one of his goons, a new word has entered the vocabulary of the blogosphere.
SWATting.
Yep, SWATting. When someone has enough to call the police on you and say that some horrible crime has occurred at your residence. Unbeknownst to the victim, police will come banging at your front door and thus, it could be the local SWAT team.
If you think that is BS, ask  Erick Erickson, Patrick Frey of Patterico Pontification's, Mike Stack.
All were given the Kimberlin treatment.
Oh, Brett, BTW, I am in Pasadena, California, not Texas, FWIW.
One other thing about this douchbrain is that he is the clown that claimed former Vice-President Dan Quayle bought dope from him while he was in law school. Of course that turned out to be one of the many lies this douchebrain gave to the leftywhore media, always looking for anything bad and or wrong about any conservative.
But if you go further in the Wikipedia link, this Kimberlin douchebrain became the worst kind of lawyer. A jailhouse lawyer. One who had a lot of time on his hands since he was serving time in a federal prison. Plenty of time to really read the law if you will.
This douchebrain is a lefty jail bird who probably should be there now. But, alas, he is not. He is stirring a lot of trouble.
And this leads to why I will be silent tomorrow, Friday, June 8, 2012.
Over at Ace of Spades, Ace calls for a Day of Silence from those of us in the conservative blogosphere, and those that believe in freedom of speech for all. A day in which the only blog I will post will be the open letter to congress that Ace is going to put up.
A lot of people got all worked up over the SOMA act and that is fine, but this is just as if not more important.
People can not try to shut people up because they do not like what they are writing about. If it is blatantly false, then corrections are always necessary. But if is not incorrect and the information is factual, then it needs to be out there. If one does not like it, refute it.
I admit, one of the reasons this is personal for me is one of the best people in the conservative blogosphere, Robert Stacy McCain is being railroaded. Another friend, political activist Ali Akbar, is now in the cross hairs of Kimberlin and his people.
Freedom of speech is for all, not just those we like. And reporting on very uncomfortable things is also protected. It is that pesky First Amendment to the United States constitution. You know, the one that protects freedom of the press.
That is all for now. Until Saturday. . .

California's New Primary System Sucks As The Old One-And Even Worse

Tuesday, out of a sickbed, your humble blogger literally took a walk across the street from the RVFTLC Bunker to do my civic duty and vote in the California presidential primary.
Well, there was absolutely no drama in that part of the vote.
Mitt Romney squeezed by the listed GOP candidates by a measly 60% over the second place finisher, Crazy Uncle Ron Paul. FTR, Mr. Romney had 80% of the Republican vote. Here is the link at the California Secretary of State website.
And the Dear Leader, President Obama, in true one-party fashion pulled off 100% of the vote as there was no other candidate on the ballot.
And how about the other races on the California ballot?
You know, for congress, senate, state assembly and state senate?
Well, it was interesting.
This is the first election in which new rules were instituted as part of the reform package regarding redistricting.
This time, no matter what party you belong to, there is one ballot for all the candidates. Thus, here is the page for all the United States senate candidates, regardless of party.

So, although not a great photo, all 24 candidates were on one page. The incumbent senator, Democrat Dianne Feinstein, is sixth from the top. And the Republican that one (and I voted for), Elizabeth Emken, was just below her eighth from the top.

Oh, here is how all that works.
Out of the 24 candidates, the top two vote getter's move on to the general election in November.

Now, if you go to this link at the California SOS website, you can look and see that Sen. Feinstein was the overall top vote-getter. And in second place was Mrs. Emken. So, in this case, it will be a classic Democrat vs. Republican. And if you look and shriek that Mrs. Emken only got 12.5% of the overall vote, consider that there were 14 Republicans out of the 24 candidates. and the overall percentage of the vote was 37%. Which is about seven percent more than are registered Republican in California.

Keep  this in mind. That it is the two top vote getter's, regardless of political party that move on the the general election.
So, humble blogger, does that mean that it is conceivable that two Democrats can run against each other? Or two Republicans?

Why yes dear reader. And in fact, in two So Cal congressional districts, that is indeed what has happened.

In the California district 30, two very influential Democrats that were in different districts were merged together. And of course the two big egos have to duke it out to see who would carry the Democrat banner in November.

Howard Berman, who has been in congress since 1983 and Brad Sherman, in congress since 1997 were, until this election, in separate congressional districts. Both are liberal Democrats and Jewish and represent their districts as to be expected. If there is any real difference between the two, it is a matter of style. But this time around, they had to make a choice. One of them could have ran and one outright. It is a very safe Democrat seat. But, as noted that did not happen. Both ran and as these results show, Congressman Sherman finished first and Congressman Berman finished second. Both Democrats.
Say, what about the Republican candidate, Mark Reed?

Remember, it is the top two regardless of political party that get to the general election.

Do you realize what happened here?
Republicans are totally disenfranchised because their candidate did not finish in the top two. It is not that the party chose not to run a candidate. They did and still do not get to the next round.

OK, you may say well, humble blogger, you're a Republican and it is just sour grapes.

Sort of true I guess. But no, I do believe that certain voters are disenfranchised because of the process, not the political party.

So, here is example number two to read about.

In California congressional district 31, a Republican incumbent wanted to run for another term. But, the state Republican leader in the senate also wanted to run. And like district 30, this is a very Republican district.

The players on this stage are incumbent Congressman Gary Miller, who has been in congress since 2001 and state Senator Bob Dutton who has been involved in state politics since 2003.

Like ego-driven politicos that they are, both men decided to run for the same seat, knowing that one could lose outright.

But, surprise, surprise.

Both made it to the next round as you can see here. Congressman Miller got the first spot and state Senator Dutton got the second.

Guess who's missing?

If you said the Democrat, you are correct.

Poor Pete Aguilar got screwed. Just like Mark Reed for the Republicans in district 30.

OK, this new arrangement was supposed to create more competitive districts. We are supposed to see this boat load of "centrists" from both parties emerge out of the woodwork.

Really, is that what happened here?
No. In fact, it is more protecting the two major parties and insuring that incumbents will not have to face serious challenges in the future.

Explain to me how in the 30th congressional district with two liberal Democrats running in the general election are Republicans going to care who wins? What is the incentive for either candidate to actually attract. . .Republicans? There is none. This is a Democrat district and a Democrat will win. One of these men will get some cushy job, just won't be a member of congress.

And take the above paragraph and just change it to conservative Republicans and Democrats not caring who wins.

This is not a good reform.

A better reform would be to no longer register voters by political party. It is done that way in over 30 states. Thus everyone is independent. It is up to the party to make the rules how people participate in the choosing of their candidates for elected office.

I do not like any of it, but this is not a good reform. It will not bring the "center" together.

I hope that there is a change in this for the next presidential election in 2016.



The Flu Turns Out To Be Strep Throat

Well, what I thought was a really bad case of the flu, I wished, has turned out to be strep throat. And boy it really sucks to have it when your pushing 50.
If you read the link to WebMD, I had every symptom that is listed. The doctor did in fact take a throat culture.  Here are the symptoms to look for:

A sudden, severe sore throat.

Pain when you swallow.

Fever over 101°F (38.3°C).

Swollen tonsils and lymph nodes.

White or yellow spots on the back of a bright red throat.

Well, the only difference is that I no longer have tonsils, yet my lymph nodes were indeed very swollen. Even today I still have pain swallowing and a lot of congestion.
It is my public service announcement that if you have any of the above symptoms, get to your doctor yesterday.
Thankfully, Mrs. RVFTLC is a persistent one.
I felt sick Wednesday, it hit like a ton of bricks Thursday and she insisted that I go to the doctor on Friday. Which I did. See, I really was sick. I would normally argue. But I knew whatever it was I had to go.
And yes, it takes a long time to even marginally recover as I am now.
And I hope to at least get a post in on how voting was here in California this past Tuesday.
Again, if you are feeling ill and have any of the above symptoms, get to the doc right away.

A Very Bad Flu Strikes Your Humble Blogger

UGH!
Since Wednesday evening, I have had quite possibly the flu from hell. And I only figured it out yesterday after a visit to the doctor.
Started with a horrible sore throat that devolved into the full body ache, inability to eat, just an overall feeling of BLAH!
Now on two strong anti-biotics, heavy duty cough syrup and pain killer, I hope that I am turning the corner.
But honestly, I still feel like crap.
A lesson learned here.
I am too old to get this flu business. When available I will get the flu shot. A cold, no problem. A bad cold, no problem. This, oh this is like the worst I can remember having in a long time.
Hope to be back blogging next week.