Quote of the Day
He who is firm in will molds the world to himself.
Johann Gottlieb
My Favorite Former Judge, Andrew Napolitano, Has Something to Say:
"When Presidents Go Bad": Thumbs UP!
In yesterday's post, I argued that ICE's disingenuously rationalized backdoor amnesty, unauthorized by the Congress, is not only politically motivated, but a dereliction of duty and patently a violation of equal protection (and hence unconstitutional). Judge Napolitano points out other unconstitutional things that Obama, who allegedly "taught" constitutional law at the University of Chicago, has done in office and his hero, FDR, before him.
Ron Paul, Mitt Romney and the Pundits
Two Iowa caucus polls completed Wednesday show Romney with a 2-point lead over Paul and a second with a 5-point lead over second-place Gingrich. Romney's lead over Gingrich in the Gallup daily national poll tightened slightly to 2 points. A week ago former President George HW Bush informally endorsed Romney.
The Union Leader (NH) publisher Joe McQuaid decided to go after Romney (what else is new? He did it in 2008, too) because (gasp!) Romney decided in the unlikely event Ron Paul won the GOP nomination, Romney would support him even if he had foreign policy differences with him (e.g., over Iraq and Israel). The hypocrisy is staggering: the neo-cons like McQuaid desperately want Ron Paul to make a loyalty oath because they know he could siphon off GOP votes as an independent. (There are good reasons I don't expect that to happen; for one thing, it would put Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) in a difficult position; second, Ron Paul has no chance of being elected through a third party, and there is no way that he wants his legacy to be the reelection of Barack Obama.) There are a lot of times we vote for a politician, even when we disagree with him on some issues. For example, there are a substantial number of pro-abortion choice Republicans whom vote for the almost exclusively pro-life GOP Presidential candidates since Reagan was elected nearly 32 years ago.
I've tried to stake out my own stake on the Middle East, Iran and North Korea. It would be national suicide for a rogue state to attack the United States or Israel, for that matter. Some of these neo-cons seem to be almost begging someone to attack these countries, and that's very dangerous territory. What have we learned from the fact that more Americans have died in Iraq and Afghanistan that the people whom died on 9/11? We have a budget with a 40% hole in it, we spend more on defense than the next few nations combined and we're spending more blood and treasure in the region than neighboring allies? We need to choose our battles better: we do not have the resources to do unrestricted nation building on all the continents; we need to be tighter with a buck across budgets, not just domestic expenditures.
Even the first and best American Idol Kelly Clarkson found herself attacked for daring to tweet her support of Ron Paul. Ron Paul is also drawing some heat over certain racially-insensitive comments made by other writers in newsletters he published under his own name between his failed Presidential bid in 1988 and his return to Congress in the mid-1990's.
I am standing by my preliminary endorsement for Ron Paul in Iowa next week. I don't necessarily agree with everything he says or does, but I get tired of 5 or 6 Presidential candidates basically giving the same talking points on the same issue. Ron Paul presents a philosophically consistent critique of Big Government--including the military-industrial complex. For more than half of our history, we basically didn't get involved in the military conflicts on other continents. Paul is the the person saying that the emperor is wearing no clothes. We've got to stop costly foreign entanglements; we've got to get a fiscal mess in order. We've got to stop surrendering our constitutional rights against the ever expansive government scope creep (including the TSA and the Patriot Act). Ron Paul is the one candidate from either national party whom addresses these issues consistently. His is a voice that deserves to be listened to, and polls suggest that he is nearing a 20% support level in virtually every state leading off the path to the nomination. For other Republicans to be dismissive of what Paul has to say is to ignore the 20% of the people intending to vote for him.
Happy Birthday to the Blogger! Old Days...
Some Google Notes
I use all 5 major browsers, but I heart Google technology. (The core search engine is wonderful; I was an early adopter of Gmail and Chrome, Google Translate is a thing of beauty (you can optionally translate a foreign-language webpage at the press of a button), and of course there are the acquired brands (Blogger, which I use for this blog, and Youtube, which I use almost exclusively for my video clips). In fact, I like some of its products and services they've desupported, like the daily humor website Giglish, Notebook (folded into the awesome Docs), and Desktop/Sidebar (the Google Calendar gadget is a very attractive tile with color-coded event dates and a list of upcoming events underneath).
If you are new to Chrome, there's a new built-in toggle switch new page between most frequently used website and user-installed web apps (complementary concept to add-ons or extensions) tiles. Here are a few extensions I have used and recommend: Magic Actions for Youtube (cinema mode is amazing; among the options: full-screen, replay, not autoplay but buffer a video, etc.), 2D browsing (simple window/tab dashboard)/TooManyTabs, Lastpass (passwords)/Xmarks (bookmarks/favorites), Bookmark Sentry (scan for and optionally delete duplicate or obsolete bookmarks), iReader (or Readability bookmarklet) (strips off extraneous webpage content other than base text for say pdf-prints) , Wisestamp (configures signatures for your online Gmails), Google Dictionary (double-click on a webpage word for a popup definition) and Evernote/Metaproducts Inquiry (webpage clipping downloads: note there are corresponding freeware desktop clients). The extension icons in the address bar can also be functional; for example, some will indicate the number of emails in your Gmail account, your local area temperature, and the amount of time until your next scheduled event. Google has a second calendar extension which serves as a dropdown list of future calendar events.
Musical Interlude: Nostalgic/Instrumental Christmas
"The First Noël"
The Priests
Andy Williams
Kenny G. (instrumental)
Mormon Tabernacle Choir (with Hallelujah)
