The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

In The Mailbox: 02.06.14

Posted on | February 6, 2014 | 3 Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho


Live At Five was pre-empted by an early morning doctor’s appointment, but will return tomorrow.
Thanks for your patience.


OVER THE TRANSOM
Proof Positive: Bill O’Reilly’s Next Interview With Obama
First Street Journal: His Wildest Dreams
Wyblog: Freedom’s Just A Buzzword For Liberals Without Clues
Blackmailers Don’t Shoot: Sandra Fluke Won’t Go Away
Michelle Malkin: The Obamacare Security Nightmare – It Gets Worse
Twitchy: This Pajama Boy Photoshop Hilariously Nails WH Obamacare Job Losses Spin
Sarah Hoyt: We Played The Pipes For You And You Did Not Dance
Kevin Williamson: The Feminist Mystique


RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES
American Power: Social Media Erupt Over “Biggest Loser” Winner
American Thinker: America Has Lost Her Will To Live
Blackfive: Mission VALOR
The Necropolitan Sentinel: Obamacare Watch – Are You Ready For Even More Expensive, Required Plans?
Conservatives4Palin: Obama’s Corrupt DOJ Continues To Harass Americans
Don Surber: Daily Scoreboard, February 5
Jammie Wearing Fools: 45,000 Liberated From Jobs In January
Joe For America: Sandra Fluke Aborts Congressional Bid
JustOneMinute: That Is A Lot Of Obamacare Losers
Pat Dollard: Congressional Candidate Clay Aiken Criticizes Obama In First Interview
Protein Wisdom: Give Government Agencies Control Of Health Care And What Could Possibly Go Wrong?
Shot In The Dark: He Who Forgets/Never Knew History Is Condemned To Being A Liberal “Journalist”
The Jawa Report: Terrorist “Workplace Accident” At…Georgia Tech?
The Lonely Conservative: Portland Residents Lose Out On Trader Joes Thanks To Community Organizers
This Ain’t Hell: Phil Carter Struggles To Remain Relevant
Megan McArdle: Even Death Can’t Stop The Bureaucrats


Category: Linkagery

How Much Do You Hate Commies?

Posted on | February 6, 2014 | 142 Comments

Gen. Nguyen Ngoc Loan executes a Vietcong terrorist, February 1968.

Salon.com’s Jesse Myerson (@JAMyerson) says “misconceptions” about Communism are the real problem, although survivors who escaped Communist regimes might beg to disagree.

Personally, I think the main problem with Communism is that we haven’t shot enough evil lying Commie scum:

Five years after the Bolshevik Revolution, Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises predicted that the Soviet project was doomed to fail. In his classic work Socialism, Mises explained that the attempt to replace the market system with central economic planning could not succeed, because the planners could not possibly have the information necessary to make all the decisions which, in a market economy, are made by individuals whose needs and desires are reflected in prices: “The problem of economic calculation is the fundamental problem of Socialism.”
“Everything brought forward in favour of Socialism during the last hundred years,” Mises wrote in 1922, “in thousands of writings and speeches, all the blood which has been spilt by the supporters of Socialism, cannot make Socialism workable. …. Socialist writers may continue to publish books about the decay of Capitalism and the coming of the socialist millennium; they may paint the evils of Capitalism in lurid colours and contrast with them an enticing picture of the blessings of a socialist society; their writings may continue to impress the thoughtless — but all this cannot alter the fate of the socialist idea.”
Undeterred by Mises’ criticism, the Soviet Union spent the next seven decades proving his prediction correct. By the time the Communist utopia collapsed in bankruptcy and disgrace, it seemed that everyone with two eyes and a brain understood the lesson: The Marxist-Leninist project was a complete failure and, as historians documented in The Black Book of Communism, tens of millions of people had died for this mistake, deliberately starved or slaughtered by totalitarian Communist governments.
The persistence of Marxist-Leninist regimes in Pyongyang and Havana notwithstanding, socialism has been utterly discredited in exactly the way Mises prophesied in 1922. . . .

Read the whole thing at The American Spectator. It’s already a Memeorandum thread, linked by Instapundit and Patterico — thanks! — and to answer the question, “How much do you hate Commies?”

Probably not as much as you should.

 

 


Category: American Spectator, Economics, History

‘A National Political Celebrity’

Posted on | February 5, 2014 | 4 Comments

Brett Kimberlin could have been sentenced to 230 years in federal prison.

May 19, 2012, was a Saturday, two days after I first saw Aaron Walker’s 28,000-word account of how he says Brett Kimberlin tried to “frame” him for an assault charge. I’d dug into the story and, by Saturday, was ready to write a linear account of the story.

“File it and forget it” — it’s a habit.

You hit the deadline and move on to the next story. And I’d forgotten all about that post from May 2012 until, while doing a bit of online research this evening, I happened onto a post by Professor Donald Douglas at American Power that quoted it at length:

Kimberlin’s infamous criminal past could scarcely have been a secret to those who funded his organization. Kimberlin became a national political celebrity during the 1988 presidential campaign because of his claim, made while he was still serving time in federal prison, that he had once sold marijuana to Dan Quayle, who was then the Republican candidate for vice president.
Kimberlin offered no proof for that unsubstantiated allegation, but it drew the attention of award-winning journalist Mark Singer. A reporter for the New Yorker, Singer was initially sympathetic to Kimberlin, and the two men split an advance for a book deal to tell Kimberlin’s story. Singer ended the co-authorship deal after he became disillusioned by Kimberlin’s habitual dishonesty. In 1996, Singer published Citizen K: The Deeply Weird American Journey of Brett Kimberlin, which exposed Kimberlin as a “world-class liar” and “first-class con man.”
In fact, according to both Singer and Indianapolis Star reporter Joseph Gelarden, prosecutors suspected a particularly sinister motive for the Speedway Bomber’s terroristic rampage: To distract law enforcement officials who were investigating the July 29, 1978, murder of Julia Scyphers, the grandmother of a pre-teen girl toward whom, Gelarden wrote in 1981, Kimberlin had “strange affection … questionable relationship.”

You can read the whole thing. The point of quoting it now is that Brett Kimberlin’s notoriety — his status as a public figure with a nasty reputation — is not something created by myself or by any of the other co-defendants in Kimberlin’s lawsuits. The original sources were cited, and anyone could look it up for themselves. And then there was this attention-grabbing headline:

For Brett Kimberlin, It All
Started With A Little Girl

I didn’t write that headline, but like I said, you could look it up.

 

BOMBER SUES BLOGGERS





 

 


Category: The Kimberlin Files

Boycott Abortion Cookies

Posted on | February 5, 2014 | 45 Comments

Three years ago, I remarked that it had become “increasingly obvious that the national Girl Scouts organization has been hijacked by radical feminists.” You may remember the occasion:

The World Association of Girl Scouts and Girl Guides hosted a no-adults-welcome panel at the United Nations where Planned Parenthood was allowed to distribute a brochure entitled “Healthy, Happy and Hot.” . . .
The brochure claims, “Many people think sex is just about vaginal or anal intercourse … But, there are lots of different ways to have sex and lots of different types of sex. There is no right or wrong way to have sex. Just have fun, explore and be yourself!”

That was March 2011, and the iron grip of radicalism has not been relaxed. Feminists would rather destroy the Girl Scouts as an institution than to abandon their ideological agenda.

Pro-lifers are now officially boycotting Girl Scout cookies:

“The Girl Scouts still proclaim to be honest and courageous, while denying their continual collaboration with the nation’s largest and undeniably dishonest abortion chain,” [Ryan Bomberger of the Radiance Foundation] said. “Abortion doesn’t make the world a better place, unless you agree with the deeply racist and elitist pseudoscience of eugenics — the foundation of Planned Parenthood.”
Eric Scheidler of the Pro-Life Action League commented, “As the father of six girls, I’m extremely disappointed by the Girl Scouts’ increasing collaboration with Planned Parenthood, an organization that aborts over 150,000 unborn baby girls every year.”
Similarly, Jim Sedlak of the American Life League told Breitbart News, “Through their continued support of the Culture of Death, the Girl Scouts have betrayed their heritage and their future. There is nobody who should purchase Girl Scout cookies to fund this group.”

The Associated Press is clueless about the meaning and significance of the boycott, acting as if everyday Americans don’t have the right to consciously redirect their own discretionary spending. Most consumers today expect a straightforward transaction, whether they are relaxing on a Friday night with a fast payout online casino, subscribing to an independent political podcast, or just picking up a decent ribeye from a local butcher. They simply prefer to know their leisure money isn’t quietly funneling into left-wing activist networks. Get the full background at LifeNews.com.

UPDATE: It is an axiom of modern media that no controversy is complete until Amanda Marcotte makes a fool of herself about it:

Baseless Christian-Right Attacks on the
Girl Scouts (Yes, the Girl Scouts) Go Big Time

What is interesting (but typical) is that Marcotte does not actually rebut the “attacks” she calls “baseless.” That is to say, Marcotte is unable to refute the truth, which is that the Girl Scouts are now committed, as a matter of organizational policy, to a pro-abortion, pro-gay agenda. Instead, Marcotte is just arm-waving: “Look, a Christian preacher said something mean about liberals! The boycott was discussed by Megyn Kelly on Fox News! Extremists! Eek! Eek!”

You realize, of course, that if the Girl Scouts had done something in line with American patriotism, free-market economics or traditional Judeo-Christian moral values, Marcotte would be denouncing the Girl Scouts. The fact that Marcotte is instead defending the Girl Scouts is therefore sufficient proof that the organization has been captured by the radical anti-American Left.

 

Category: Abortion, Feminism

Unemployed Magazine Executives

Posted on | February 5, 2014 | 36 Comments

Time, Inc. — which publishes Time, Fortune, People, Sports Illustrated and In Style magazines — is laying off hundreds of employees, and the hit list includes executives in the company:

Gone in the cutbacks are David Geithner, an executive vice president who was in charge of the style and entertainment group that included No. 1 moneymaker People and top monthly In Style. Geithner is the brother of former Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner.

Good news: He’ll qualify for ObamaCare.

RELATED: “Students Are Tired of Hearing There’s Never Been a Better Time to Be a Journalist.”

 

Category: Journalism

LIVE AT FIVE: 02.05.14

Posted on | February 5, 2014 | Comments Off on LIVE AT FIVE: 02.05.14

— compiled by Wombat-socho


TOP NEWS
CBO: Obamacare Will Push 2 Million Workers Out Of The Job Market

Approved!
(with apologies to Mike Williamson)

White House argues reduction in work force is a good thing

Turkish Deputy PM: Progress In Talks With Israel
Still no agreement on weregild for Turks killed in Mavi Marmara incident


Russia Has Had About Enough Of Your Free Speech Bullshit
With political protests banned from Olympics, Russia plans to block dissidents from attending even as spectators



POLITICS
After Three Years Of Talks, Farm Bill Finally Passes

An Illinois farmer walks along his cornfield

Most of $100 billion/year budget allocated to food stamps; bill ends direct subsidies to farmers in favor of crop insurance

Alaska To Vote On Legalizing Pot


NY State Delays Common Core Tests

Boehner: Immigration Still Iffy For 2014

Obama Forgot To Consult DOJ Before Claiming No Corruption At IRS

Navy Opens Investigation Into Reactor Training Cheating

Texas Exonerated More Inmates In 2013 Than Any Other State

S&P Cuts Puerto Rico Bond Ratings To Junk



THE ECONOMY, STUPID
America’s Polar Vortex Pumps Up Asian Crude: NYMEX $97.59, Brent $105.88
Microsoft Gets Style Shift As Nadella Replaces Ballmer
JPMorgan To Pay $614 Million Fine In Mortgage Fraud Cases
Wall Street Bounces Back As Bargain Hunters Move In
Asian Stocks Higher On Modest Rebound In Japan
WSJ: Radio Shack To Close 500 Stores
Microsoft Buys $15 Million Stake In Foursquare
OpenDaylight Debuts Hydrogen Open-Source SDN Platform
Apple, Microsoft, Mobile Carriers Pony Up For Obama’s School Broadband Plan
Evernote Adds Descriptive Search With Filters And “Everyday Language” To Mac App
Satellite Hotspot Will Leave No Stone Unturned To Get You Wifi



SPORTS
Boozer & The Bulls Bounce Back

Carlos Boozer shoots over the Suns’ Channing Frye

Bulls defuse Suns explosive offense in 101-92 win; stops Phoenix’ win streak at five


Thorburn Lifts Jets To 2-1 Win Over Canes

Journalists Find Incomplete Hotels, Other Unpleasantries In Sochi

Nash Returns, But Lakers Lose To Timbermutts Anyway

Bourque Helps Habs Shut Down Flames


Pacers End Streak Of Losses In Atlanta At Twelve

Sens Edge Blues In Shootout

#8 Kansas Shakes Off Sluggish Start To Beat Baylor

Iginla, Lucic Lead Bruins To 3-1 Win Against Canucks

#18 Kentucky Tops Mississippi 80-64

Thomas Makes 20 Saves As Lightning Down Leafs

Ex-NBA Star McGrady Tries His Hand At Baseball

Nationals Still Interested In Oliver Perez



FAMOUS FOR BEING FAMOUS
Taylor Swift’s Dating Tips

“I would repeat all the same mistakes”

Glamour’s March cover girl dishes on the one thing she won’t do in relationships


NYPD Arrests Four In Hoffman Death

The Paltrow Affair

George Zimmerman To Take On Rapper DMX In The Boxing Ring

Katy Perry Blows Thousands On Strippers After The Super Bowl


Baba Wawa Defends Woody Allen

“He Was Sleeping With Half The Women In Hollywood”

George Clooney On The Epic Battle To Make “Monuments Men”

Netflix Renews “House Of Cards” For Season Three

Candice Patton Cast In CW Pilot “The Flash”

Gwen Stefani Calls Herself “Chunky” In 1983 Photo, Gets Slammed For “Body Shaming”

Jenelle Evans Of “Teen Mom 2” Pregnant With Second Boy



FOREIGNERS
US Reportedly Curtails Drone Strikes In Pakistan
Russia Says Syria Will Ship More Chemical Weapons For Disposal
Rival Koreas Discuss Resuming Family Reunions
Libya Says Qaddafi Regime’s Chemical Weapons All Destroyed
Rwanda Genocide Trial Opens In Paris
Thai Opposition Seeks Annulment Of Election, Disbanding Of Ruling Party
Suicide Bomber In Peshawar Hotel Kills Nine
Scottish Parliament Votes To Allow Gay Marriages
EU Corruption Draining 100 Billion Pounds/Year From European Economy
New Afghan Law Protects Abusers Of Women
Turkish PM Erdogan Campaigns At Berlin’s Tempodrom



BLOGS & STUFF
First Street Journal: Another One Bites The Dust
Blackmailers Don’t Shoot: Atlantic – Philip Seymour Hoffman Died Because We’re Not Canada
Doug Powers: CBO Revises Estimates On Obamacare Again – It’s Going To Be As Big A Disaster As Opponents Warned
Twitchy: Josh Barro Unloads On “Anti-Intellectual” US Conservatives; “Hicks” Fire Back
Chicks On The Right: Honoring America In An American School May Offend Non-Americans, Just FYI
American Power: LBCC Tiered Tuition Scam Makes Front Page Of LA Times
American Thinker: GOP Amnesty – The Final Last Straw
Blackfive: The End Of American Exceptionalism?
The Necropolitan Sentinel: Obamacare Watch – Consultants Say Obamacare Is Affordable…If You Ignore All Those Other Costs
Conservatives4Palin: Governor Palin Thanks Rep. Gosar For Standing Up For Everyday Americans
Don Surber: Daily Scoreboard, February 4
Jammie Wearing Fools: Woman Who Can’t Afford Own Birth Control Scrapes Up Money For Congressional Run
Joe For America: Ohio Late Term Abortion Clinic To Remain Open Despite Not Meeting Standards
JustOneMinute: Portrait Of The Artist As A Young Pedophile
Pat Dollard: Ryan, Gowdy In Secret Amnesty Talks With Chuck Schumer
Protein Wisdom: Electability, Respectability, Realism
Shot In The Dark: Caucasus Night
The Jawa Report: Heartache – Taliban Going Bankrupt As Wealthy Saudi Donors Send All Their Cash to Syria
The Lonely Conservative: National Debt Grew $6.666 Trillion During Obama’s Presidency
This Ain’t Hell: Obama Says GI Bill Is Welfare
Megan McArdle: Learning From Iraq, Katrina, And Other Policy Disasters


Category: Live at Five

‘The Court Should Dismiss … With Prejudice in Favor of All Defendants’

Posted on | February 4, 2014 | 26 Comments

The title quote is from John Hoge’s Reply to Plaintiff’s Oppositions in the federal RICO lawsuit Kimberlin v. the Universe, et al. Hoge is proceeding pro se — acting as his own lawyer against Brett Kimberlin, who is doing the same — and it’s interesting to contrast Kimberlin’s accusations with Hoge’s defenses, knowing that the burden of proof is on the plaintiff. Hoge today posted Kimberlin’s opposition, which begins with this exercise in verbose gesturing:

Nary a day goes by without Defendant Hoge falsely accusing Plaintiff of some sort of crime or malfeasance, if not in a court filing then on his blog. This harassment has been ongoing for the past two years, and it goes to the heart of Plaintiff’s Complaint, that this pattern of defamatory intimidation and constant “threats of doom” are being done to retaliate and chill Plaintiff’s right to redress.

This is just nonsense. What, pray tell, is “defamatory intimdiation,” and how is Hoge — a defendant in two separate lawsuits filed by Kimberlin — acting to “retaliate,” simply by arguing his case?

Kimberlin seems upset that the defendant is defending himself!

Kimberlin has been neither defamed nor harassed by Hoge, but the Plaintiff evidently hopes that repeating these allegations will impose his beliefs on a federal judge. It’s the Jedi Mind Trick Theory of Law, and amusing to watch, knowing that Kimberlin’s RICO complaint is a gigantic wad of legally flawed fact-deficient gibberish.

So Hoge has replied to Kimberlin’s opposition, and I’m sure he’ll want to discuss that on his own blog — to retaliate by defamatory intimidation and chill! — but I hope my co-defendant doesn’t mind if I quote a few of his pro se sentences:

Plaintiff has attempted to remedy the deficiencies in his Amended Complaint by alleging new “facts” and new bases for his claims . . . but that should be done in an Amended Complaint. If Plaintiff wishes to amend his Complaint a second time, he should seek the Court’s leave to do so. In the meantime, the Court should disregard Plaintiff’s new allegations until they are properly presented in a new Amended Complaint. . . . Defendant Hoge opposes allowing a second Amended Complaint. The various Defendants’ Motions and Replies have pointed out facts not alleged and legal points improperly raised. Plaintiff’s ongoing demonstrations of bad faith strongly suggest the likelihood of his using another Amended Complaint as an opportunity to fill in those blanks with false information. The Court should dismiss the instant suit with prejudice in favor of all Defendants.

What Hoge is saying is that Kimberlin — whose complaint is a carnival of errors — should not be permitted to benefit from the defendants having pointed out the holes in his complaint.

The complaint is fatally flawed and Kimberlin, having compounded his errors through his “ongoing demonstrations of bad faith,” deserves to lose. But I suppose it’s “harassment” to say this.

UPDATE: Mirabile dictu! Hoge has now posted the entirety of his Reply to Plaintiff’s Oppositions, so you can read it all there.

 



 

 

Category: The Kimberlin Files

Whose Children Are They?

Posted on | February 4, 2014 | 42 Comments

Tell you what: How about me and Harvard University Professor Paul Reville go on one of those tacky tabloid TV talk shows where they DNA test children? I’ll bet $100 — no, make it $1 million — that Professor Paul Reville is not the father of any of my children, no matter what he has been telling his liberal buddies:

Paul Reville, the former secretary of education for Massachusetts, recently said “the children belong to all of us” at a panel discussion at the Center for American Progress when discussing those who oppose Common Core.
“To be sure, there’s always a small voice — and I think these voices get amplified in the midst of these arguments — of people who were never in favor of standards in the first place and never wanted to have any kind of testing or accountability and those voices get amplified,” Reville said, according to CNS News.
Reville’s language is reminiscent of MSNBC’s Melissa Harris-Perry in April of last year, when she said, “We have to break through that private idea that kids belong to their parents . . . kids belong to whole communities.”

Leave my children out of your plans. Damned liberal weirdos abort all their babies and then think they can tell us how to raise our kids.

 


Category: Education
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