Because we don't think about future generations,
they will never forget us.
Henrik Tikkanen
Pro-Liberty Thought of the Day
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| Via Drudge Report |
Cop of the Day
The Vandegrift Lady Vipers just won their first Texas state soccer championship when fans streamed onto the field to join the celebration. Georgetown cop George Bermudez is seen in these clips trying to stop the rush by tripping, pushing and or kicking at jubilant fans, with at least one victim filmed limping off the field. FOR SHAME!
SCOTUS Gets One Right: Schuette v Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action: THUMBS UP!
Ratified Michigan Proposition 2 in 2006 banned preferential treatment to public college applicants based on their racial/ethnic characteristics. In fact, as Reason's Shapiro points out, that's the essence of the principle of equal protection. Only "progressive" sophistry could view the ban of discrimination as discriminatory. SCOTUS, in a 6-2 decision, reversed the Alice in Wonderland split decision by the sixth circuit.
Democracy? Yes or No?
I loathe the concept of a mobocracy, of unprincipled "finger-in-the-wind" politics, of the volatility of government between election points, zero-sum, class-warfare politics. I don't think there's any virtue in voting for populist promises of unsustainable, unpaid for government goodies. I believe that the average voter is better off having his needs addressed by an unfettered free market with little, if any government intervention... I do think there is a place for acknowledging majority opinion, but my concern is tyranny of the majority over the political minority.
Facebook Corner
(Lew Rockwell). NBC, if you want high ratings for the tanking ‘Meet the Press,’ don’t replace the unpleasant statist David Gregory with the equally State-sycophantic Chuck Todd, but with the happy libertarian, Judge Andrew Napolitano. And btw. NBC, almost nobody remembers statist-shill Tim Russert, except for his attempted mugging of Ron Paul.
The interviews by Gregory are so blatantly uneven that I've sometimes parsed the transcripts paragraph by paragraph in my blog. He's more likely to engage in gotcha interview tactics with a GOP politician or critical follow-ups, serving up "progressive" talking points whereas he may ask a Dem an occasional tough question, but will rarely follow up weak responses, lots of softball questions, served up on an ideological tee.
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| Via Cato Institute |
Not speaking for CATO, but the issue is one of incentives. None of us welcome incursion by polluters harming our own property.
(Reason.) See above clip.
Yes, in the sense that real solutions will never be advanced by political whores. Too many parasites are vested in the status quo. Only an unprecedented crisis will restore economic freedom and limited government.
Predictable, boring, and wrong. INCOMPETENTS control, instead of the marketplace.
(Judge Andrew Napolitano). Obama offers thousands in prison clemency. I discuss on Fox & Friends at 6:50a. Do you think it's a good idea?
I don't mind seeing much overdue prison reform, particularly of victimless crimes, but I don't trust this lawless administration and its rule by man vs. rule by law, pick-and-choose law enforcement. I would prefer to see the Congress enact relevant, specific reforms.
(IPI). Illinois lawmakers are using doomsday scenarios as scare tactics to convince Illinoisans that they need to pay higher taxes.
State Sen. Don Harmon, a chief proponent of higher taxes in Illinois, says that allowing the tax hike to sunset would mean cutting teachers from the classroom, denying kids access to education and releasing thousands of inmates.
These scare tactics are nothing more than falsehoods. Too often Illinois policy debates focus on how to raise taxes or where to make indiscriminate cuts to the budget.
But that’s not what Illinois needs. Illinois needs to completely overhaul and modernize the way it spends money. Reforming state spending can result in better outcomes and achieve significant budget savings.
I predicted this in a recent comment. Dems always do this--they try to find the most visible, popular spending and argue that spending will be cut first. It's nonsense, of course; you can thin the bureaucracy, consolidate agencies, cut programs or at least narrow eligilibility, privatize or at least eliminate user fee subsidies, and a million other things. Threatening to release prisoners--remember DHS releasing jailed immigrants just as the sequester was approaching? Next thing you know, they'll be arguing they can't afford to fix potholes... What these demagogues hope to do is to fear-monger popular opinion into supporting their tax and spend schemes.
Political Cartoon
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| Courtesy of Eric Allie via IPI |
Glen Campbell, "Galveston". This is one of one of my favorite more subtle anti-war songs. Glen's Alzheimer's has progressed to the point he has reportedly checked into a related care facility; there was also a recent Internet hoax about his alleged death.
The Jimmy Webb song has also been adopted as an anthem by the city and island of Galveston. In 2008 I was working for a leading university software application vendor. One aspect of my job was training customers and I had flown down to Houston, my first return to the city since earning my doctorate, to shadow a colleague, whom had a training gig at the downtown affiliate of UH. He suggested one afternoon eating dinner at a restaurant he and his family liked and frequented every visit to Galveston, so we drove down there. He thought the restaurant was on a pier, but it seemed there was now a Hooters in its place. We didn't drive all the way out there to go to Hooters and decided on a nearby family restaurant (which served the most incredible desserts I've ever seen or tasted in a restaurant of that genre) a few blocks off the beach. Anyway, in mid-September there was Hurricane Ike; in one shot during or after the storm I recognized the boulevard we had driven down--but no pier or Hooters! From Wikipedia: "None of the many wooden piers that gave Galveston much of its unique character survived the landfall of Hurricane Ike. In addition to the Balinese Room, Murdoch's, Hooters and the 61st Street Pier were all completely destroyed. Murdoch's Pier was rebuilt and reopened in October 2009, while Hooters Galveston (housed in the former Ocean Grill building) was not rebuilt; the site remains vacant as of 2011."
