LESSON IN HUMILITY

PAUL RAHE: The Party Of The Living Dead. “A few days ago, in India, Barack Obama gave a three-minute speech in which he referred to himself 118 times. That speech is emblematic of his entire administration. . . .

APPEASER

spoons made me fat

“ If guns kill people, then spoons made me fat.”

OBAMA'S OATH

PRESIDENTIAL OATH:

OBAMA- “I swore an oath on the steps of this Capitol: to do what I believe is best for America.”  From State of Union 2015.

ALL OTHER PRESIDENTS- “I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.”  As specified in Article II, Section 1, of the Constitution.

KEY DIFFERENCE:  Obama – “…what I believe is best for America.”

                                    Constitution – “…preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.”  

WHAT A DIFFERENCE!  AN AUTOCRAT/KING/DICTATOR/TOTALITARIAN IMPOSING HIS VIEW ON A SUBJECT NATION.  OR, A PUBLIC SERVENT BEING BOUND BY LAWS THAT APPLY TO EVERYONE UNDER THE CONSTITUTION.

MEMORY TEST FOR OLD GEEZERS

“During World War II, when men like my grandfather went off to war, having women like my grandmother in the workforce was a national security priority – so this country provided universal childcare.”  From State of Union 2015.

Any geezers remember government “provided universal childcare”  during WII?  Never was, didn’t happen.  But our president/monarch knows there are few alive to remember the facts and fewer younger people who have learned any history.

Have a nice 2 more years.

ANOTHER BLOVIATION

            Swan Song

A laundry list of impossibilities, a pack of lies and contradictions, a swan song for a President ( still in office 2 years) but at the end of a Democrat majority run-on the Congress.  Who could have known listening to the big “O” last night? 

The absurd faith in government

The absurd faith in government

 (Don Boudreaux)

“The chief difference between free capitalism and State socialism seems to be this: that under the former a man pursues his own advantage openly, frankly and honestly, whereas under the latter he does so hypocritically and under false pretenses.

People of an unreflective or a romantic bent are deafened by happy talk, misled by pretentious titles, blinded by lovely costumes, and overawed by magnificent stage sets.  Such credulous people hear government officials proclaim grand, good, and selfless goals, and they see these officials working away amidst glorious marble columns in statue-laden buildings that line wide boulevards, and thereby childishly conclude that the motives of these officials are higher than – and the results of their labors superior to – those of business people who make little or no pretense of being “public servants” or of spurning personal gain in order to work for the “common good.”  This absurd faith in government, of course, only grants those wielding state power the cover and freedom to be far more greedy, rapacious, irresponsible, and destructive than anyone can possibly be in competitive private markets.”

… is from page 264 of the 1997 Johns Hopkins University Press edition of H.L. Mencken’s insightful, frank, and (of course) immensely entertaining 1956 collection, Minority Report:

Je Suis Chicken

ARE BUREAUCRATS AND POLITICIANS ANGELS?

(Don Boudreaux)

… is from page 206 of Michael Huemer’s brilliant 2013 book, The Problem of Political Authority:

First, given the existence of a powerful government, the people who are most likely to wind up in control of that government are those who (a) have the greatest drive for power, (b) have the skills needed for seizing it (for example, the ability to intimidate or manipulate others), and (c) are unperturbed by moral compunctions about doing what is required to seize power.  These individuals are not in the game for the money.  They are in it for the pleasure of exercising power.

One myth, as dangerous as it is common, is that because power exercised by democratic governments seldom is as arbitrary, as total, and as gruesome as is power exercised by totalitarian governments (Uncle Sam is not the North Korean state), power exercised by democratic governments is not really ‘power’; instead, it is on most occasions merely the carrying out of The People’s will.  Such ‘power,’ therefore, (the myth holds) is not to be feared.  It is, indeed, to be celebrated as The People acting in unity, as one, in furtherance of their common interests.  (If you read a lot of “Progressive” literature, as I do, you’ll discover that by far the chief abuse of power on the domestic front that “Progressives” fear is the state’s failure to intrude into private market relationships as heavily and as thoroughly as “Progressives” think appropriate.  Perversely, “Progressives” see as the greatest instantiation of abusive power in democratic societies the alleged success of oligarchs and corporations bribing government officials not to exercise power that The People, in their wisdom, really want those officials to exercise vigorously and widely.)

But of course actual, flesh-and-blood, self-interested individuals exercise government power, even in democratic societies.  That their power in democratic societies is seldom, if ever, as absolute as that possessed by the likes of Stalin or Mao or Castro emphatically does not render that power sweet and good.  It is still to be feared, not least because it is widely mistaken, both by those who hold it and by many who are subject to it, as being justified and guided in all of its detailed applications by the good and glorious voice, and attentive supervision, of The People.

WHERE SOCIALISM ENDS - SCANDINAVIAN STYLE

 The dead-on satire of Scandinavian mores “Together” is a 2000 movie by Sweden’s Lukas Moodysson set in a multi-family commune in 1975, when the groovy Social Democratic ideal was utterly unquestioned in Sweden.

In the film’s signature scene, a sensitive, apron-wearing man tells his niece and nephew as he is making breakfast, “You could say that we are like porridge. First we’re like small oat flakes — small, dry, fragile, alone. But then we’re cooked with the other oat flakes and become soft. We join so that one flake can’t be told apart from another. We’re almost dissolved. Together we become a big porridge that’s warm, tasty, and nutritious and yes, quite beautiful, too. So we are no longer small and isolated but we have become warm, soft and joined together. Part of something bigger than ourselves. Sometimes life feels like an enormous porridge, don’t you think?”

Then he spoons a great glutinous glob of tasteless starch onto the poor kids’ plates. That’s Scandinavia for you, folks: Bland, wholesome, individual-erasing mush. But, hey, at least we’re all united in being slowly digested by the system.

Freedom as imposed by politicians

Freedom as imposed by politicians:

The urge to save humanity is almost always only a false-face for the urge to rule it.  Power is what all messiahs really seek: not the chance to serve.

  H.L. Mencken’s indispensable 1956 collection, Minority Report

Happy New Year

            Happy New Year

I  planned to watch the ball drop from Times Square in New York, but no ball drop was covered – just noise, confetti, music, fireworks and kissing.  To add to the start of 2015 is my realization that everything American is now overload for eyes with nothing leftover for the brain.  TV, TV commercials, movies, media, etc. Getting older sure has its advantages.