The Other McCain

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

New York Times Buries the Lead — Deliberately — on Egypt Story

Posted on | July 12, 2013 | 45 Comments

Yesterday, the New York Times put a story on its Web site with the headline: “Christians Targeted for Retribution in Egypt.” Then, evidently, the editors took over and turned it into a story headlined: “Egypt Calls for New Look at Morsi Prison Escape in 2011.”

As they say in the newsroom, they added a new top, and what had been the lead of the story became the B-matter.

While working on something else yesterday afternoon, I saw the headline at Memeorandum (which aggregated it at 5:45 p.m. ET) and made a mental note to blog about it later, but when I checked again this morning, the entire story had been changed.

The elements of the original story about the persecution of Christians by Muslims — 14 paragraphs, 445 words  — has been shoved to the bottom of the story and a new top — 12 paragraphs, 545 words — has been added. Here’s the original lead, accidentally preserved by Doug Mataconis at Outside the Beltway who linked the story yesterday:

CAIRO — The military’s ouster of President Mohamed Morsi has unleashed a new wave of violence by extremist Muslims against Christians whom they blame for having supported the calls to overthrow Mr. Morsi, Egypt’s first Islamist elected leader, according to rights activists.

And here is the new lead:

CAIRO — Egypt’s new rulers gave new credence to a court case against the ousted president, Mohamed Morsi, and members of the Muslim Brotherhood on Thursday over their escape from prison during the uprising that toppled his predecessor, Hosni Mubarak.

On what planet is this second story more newsworthy — more interesting, more readable, more important — than the first?

Answer: Not on planet Earth, buster.

Never mind anything about politics. This is simply a matter of news judgment. “Extremists Unleash Wave of Violence Against Christians” is the kind of headline that sells newspapers. And instead we get some gobbledygook about what happened in 2011?

You suck, New York Times editors.

 

Category: Egypt, Media Bias, New York Times

LIVE AT FIVE: 07.12.13

Posted on | July 12, 2013 | 8 Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho


TOP NEWS
State Department Official Grilled Over Benghazi At Nomination Hearing

“I did not make any edits,” Nuland claimed

Victoria Nuland raked over coals for role in editing “talking points” on Benghazi

Jay Carney Doesn’t Know About $34 Million Afghan HQ Troops Won’t Use
What boondoggle?

House GOP Stands Together On Farm Bill
Bill passed with no Democrats, 12 Republicans voting against after food stamps carved out


POLITICS
Harry Reid Embraces Nuclear Option He Once Opposed

Because it's not fascism when WE do it

Because it’s not fascism when WE do it

Senate Majority Leader threatens rule change to prevent nominee filibusters


Hillary Keeping Busy Giving Speeches To Industry Groups For $$$


San Diego Mayor Admits He Needs Help Amid Sexual Harassment Allegations

Palin Takes On Begich In War Of Words

Booker Raises $4.6 Million For Senate Race

California Senate Approves Former Critic Beard To Run State Prisons

Federal Appeals Court Rejects Liberty University’s Challenge To Obamacare

US Posts $117 Billion Surplus In June

Fauxcahontas Joins Crazy Cousin John To Push New Glass-Steagall Act



THE ECONOMY, STUPID
WTI Pares Weekly Gain On Job Claims: NYMEX $104.88, Brent $107.61
Unemployment Claims Jump 16K
Asian Markets Soar As Bernanke Promises To Keep The QE Flow Going
Will The Quebec Disaster Derail The Oil Train Boom?
Rate On 30-Year Mortgage Hits Two-Year High
Global PC Shipments Shrink Again
PRC’s Airports, Airlines Worst In Flight Delays
Sprint Guarantees Unlimited Talk, Text And Data For Life
Pebble Passes 275K Orders, 1 Million App Downloads
Google Chromebook Under $300 Defies PC Market With Growth
Surface RT 32GB Tablet Gets Price Cut At Staples
Steam Summer Sale Starts With Steep Discounts



SPORTS
Yasel Puig Won’t Apologize For The Way He Plays

“That’s the way I learned to play.”

Snakes players whine to press about Dodgers rookie’s aggressive playing style


Related: Freeman Beats Puig For All-Star Roster Slot

Lakers Waive Player Formerly Known As Ron Artest


Jeter Returns To Yankees Lineup, Promptly Gets Injured

Devils’ Kovalchuk Retires From NHL, Goes Home To Russia

Dodgers Move Over .500 For First Time Since April

NBA Teams Finding Value In Summer League Players

Chris Davis Sets Career High With 34th Homer As O’s Stifle Rangers

 Salazar Wins In Indians Debut, Jays Fall 4-2

Sox Win Split With M’s In 10th With Nava RBI

Nats Bats Limp Again As Phillies Win 3-1



FAMOUS FOR BEING FAMOUS
“King Of Queens” Star Leah Remini Reportedly Quits Scientology

Leah posing on arrival at Elton John’s Oscar viewing party, 2011

Tired of interrogations and “thought modifications” for questioning David Miscavige’s rule

Henry Cavill And Kaley Cuoco Break Up

Bieber Sidekick Busted For DUI, Also, Weed

Britney Spears’ Kids Make Music Video Debut

Bieber Apologizes To Bill Clinton For Shocking Video

Ben Affleck To Star In Fincher’s “Gone Girl”

Amanda Seyfried’s Got A Secret

Rihanna Sends $5K Check To High School

“Glee” Books Adam Lambert For Season 5



FOREIGNERS
Egypt To Investigate Morsi For 2011 Jailbreak
Manhunt For Hundreds Begins After Indonesian Prison Breakout
Sergei Magnitsky Verdict “Most Shameful Moment Since Stalin”
Japanese Officials Confused By Google, Spill Confidential Data
Snowden To Meet Rights Groups At Moscow Airport
Malala Defies Taliban To Take World Stage
Mandela Remains In Critical Condition After Month In Pretoria Hospital
Kremlin Security Agency Buys Typewriters To Avoid Leaks
Rio Clashes Follow Day Of Strikes In Brazil
Ireland’s Parliament Approves “Life Saving” Abortion



BLOGS & STUFF
Valley Of The Shadow: Chess, Policy And Tactics For 2014
Daniel Flynn: The State’s Case Against The State
John Fund: Obama’s Alinskyite Administration
Michelle Malkin: America’s Sociopath Fetish
NRO Corner: Senator Hatch – “I’d Fight To My Death For The Rights Of The Minority”
Lonely Conservative: Democrats Infuriated That GOP Took Food Stamps Out Of Farm Bill
Marginal Revolution: Microsoft, Security, And The NSA
Protein Wisdom: Effort To Create New “North Colorado” State Grows
Weasel Zippers: Jay-Z Brags He Still Texts With Obama
Dr. Milton Wolf: Obamacare’s Panicked Democrats
Megan McArdle: The Employer Mandate – A Necessary Impossibility
Bryan Preston: Nancy Pelosi Lives In Her Own Fantasy Reality
Allahpundit: HuffPo Poll Shows Americans Overwhelmingly Support Abortion Ban After 20 Weeks
John McCormack: Cecile Richards Can’t Explain The Difference Between Gosnell Killings, Elective Late-Term Abortions
Mary Katherine Ham: Poll Shows Americans Hate Journalists Even More Than Four Years Ago
American Thinker: Santo Domingo Is Not San Francisco
Clayton Cramer: More Smart Diplomacy From The Obama Administration


It’s Friday. Deadline to submit links for the FMJRA is midnight tonight.


Category: Live at Five

Brett Kimberlin: The ‘Musician-Activist’ That @MonicaHesse Wants You to Forget

Posted on | July 11, 2013 | 115 Comments

1992: Gary Trudeau’s cartoon strip frequently cited Brett Kimberlin’s claims

The Prisoner and the Politician
Brett Coleman Kimberlin, a convicted marijuana smuggler,
says he sold marijuana to Dan Quayle in the early 1970s.
— Mark Singer, The New Yorker, Oct. 5, 1992

“In any case, it was [Cody] Shearer who, during the 1992 presidential campaign, introduced the world — through the unlikely medium of Doonesbury — to Brett Kimberlin. Kimberlin, you may recall, was the convicted bomber, habitual liar, and all-around sociopath who claimed to have sold drugs to Dan Quayle. Was Shearer acting on behalf of the legendary Clinton ‘opposition research’ outfit, which had floated damaging rumors during the ’92 primaries about Paul Tsongas’ health and Jerry Brown’s drug use?”
— “Cody Shearer,” Slate, May 22, 1999

Nobody loves you when you’re down and out, and erstwhile liberal hero Brett Kimberlin is learning this lesson the hard way. Kimberlin once made headlines and was the subject of sympathetic magazine and newspaper articles — indeed, the major publisher Knopf paid good money to commission Mark Singer’s book about Kimberlin — and yet his liberal journalist friends have now lost interest in him.

Progressive Activist Brett Kimberlin
‘Abusive … Threatening,’ Wife Claims

That headline today is not from the Washington Post, although these shocking claims against a famous activist were made in a Maryland court in the Montgomery County suburbs of our nation’s capital. Any reporter can click here to read the relevant document.   Two or three phone calls, an hour or two of background research — a 500-word story for the Metro section would be an easy day’s work. And yet Brett Kimberlin is now apparently so insignificant and obscure that this case doesn’t even merit a 150-word item in the briefs column.

“‘Happy Springtime (Bush Is Over)’ is more than five minutes of John ‘n’ Yoko footage, of birds fluttering past a billboard reading ‘Imagine Peace’ and of beautiful children singing . . . A credit at the end leads viewers to Justice Through Music, a civic engagement nonprofit run by Kelsie’s father. . . .
“The credit for ‘Springtime’ goes to Kelsie’s dad, musician-activist Brett Kimberlin. . . .
“‘All of the kids in the choir are very liberal,’ says Brett Kimberlin. ‘They wouldn’t do this if they weren’t in the cause.’
“Kelsie agrees. ‘I don’t like Bush because he sends people to be killed,’ she says.”
— Monica Hesse, “A Little Surprise For the Prize-Giver,” Washington Post, Nov. 8, 2007

The “musician-activist” Brett Kimberlin and the activities of his “civic engagement nonprofit” were indisputably newsworthy in 2007. The Washington Post thought this story was worth an 800-word feature article and a photograph of Brett Kimberlin and his family.

For some reason, Washington Post staff writer Monica Hesse‘s interest in musician-activist Brett Kimberlin didn’t inspire her to do the kind of research that would have led her to the archives of the Indianapolis Star.

“The investigation of the Speedway bombings followed a twisted trail that started with the murder of a housewife . . .
“On Saturday, July 29, 1978, Julia Scyphers, a 65-year-old grandmother was in her living room chatting with her granddaughters . . .
“About 3 p.m., a man knocked on her door asking about some items she had displayed at a garage sale.
“When Mrs. Scyphers went outside to the garage to show him the items, he slipped a .25-caliber pistol from his black briefcase and shot her once in the back of her head. . . .
“Speedway police were puzzled by the murder. ‘She had no enemies,’ they said.
“But she did. Investigators learned her daughter, Sandra Barton, was a close — very close — friend of Brett C. Kimberlin. The relationship between the pair was complicated by his strange affection for Mrs. Barton’s pre-teen daughter, Debbie.”
— R. Joseph Gelarden, Indianapolis Star, “Kimberlin case a maze of murder, deceit,” Oct. 18, 1981

The 1978 murder of Julia Scyphers is certainly less newsworthy than a YouTube video about that bad man George W. Bush whom Brett Kimberlin’s daughter said she hates “because he sends people to be killed.” The shooting death of an Indiana housewife has no relevance to the career of a “musician-activist” and his “civic engagement nonprofit,” the enthusiastic promotion of which is the paid professional duty of Washington Post staff writer Monica Hesse.

Laziness or stupidity are plausible excuses for why a journalist would write about Brett Kimberlin without including the facts about the crime spree for which Kimberlin was convicted on federal charges that could have sent him to prison for 230 years.

This has always struck me as highly relevant. While the maximum penalty for Kimberlin’s federal crimes would have put him away for the rest of his life, prosecutors were shocked when the judge sentenced Kimberlin to only 50 years. And, of course, Kimberlin ultimately served only 17 years, because he was convicted before the enactment of federal “truth in sentencing” laws. Yet Washington Post staff writer Monica Hesse, who may be lazy or stupid or both, did not seem to regard this as sufficiently relevant to mention in her 800-word publicity piece about “musician-activist” Brett Kimberlin and his “civic engagement nonprofit” that produced his daughter’s anti-Bush video.

Is Monica Hesse stupid? Is Monica Hesse lazy?

Or is Monica Hesse deliberately dishonest?

Here is why I ask these question: The truth about Brett Kimberlin is not difficult to discover, and yet Monica Hesse did not report it.

She did not report the truth about him in 2007, and it seems neither she nor anyone else employed by the Washington Post is interested in reporting the truth about Brett Kimberlin now.

  • 1973: Washington Post courageously exposes a cover-up.
  • 2013: Washington Post actively assists the cover-up.

If she were too lazy to do her own research, Monica Hesse could have consulted Mark Singer’s 1996 book, Citizen K: The Deeply Weird American Journey of Brett Kimberlin. Reviewers of Singer’s book describe Kimberlin as “a top-flight con man” (Publisher’s Weekly), “a fairly typical hustler” (Library Journal) and “a man whose idea of the truth is utterly malleable . . . a dangerous smooth talker” (Kirkus Reviews). That is to say, Brett Kimberlin is notoriously dishonest, a very bad man, and if Monica Hesse had the slightest interest in truth, she would have reported how bad he really is.

But perhaps, as I say, Monica Hesse‘s defenders will say she is stupid and lazy rather than dishonest. Maybe she lacks the kind of basic journalistic aptititude that would lead her to ask a common-sense question like, “Why would federal prosecutors want to put Brett Kimberlin away for the rest of his life?” I mean, so what? One of your bombs blows off the leg of a Vietnam veteran — big deal. Carl David DeLong, who cares?

I also worked with the daughter of the man who was so seriously injured, and was in so much pain, that he killed himself. The daughter never got over it; the pain and loss of her father bothered her all the time, and she finally ended up quitting her job, saying she couldn’t concentrate on her work anymore. The damage of such crazy people goes on and on.

See, if you cared about the truth, you would find those facts worth reporting. But no one who cares about the truth would work for a newspaper as dishonest as the Washington Post, which only hires professional liars, or people too stupid and lazy to find the truth.

When you encounter someone as habitually committed to dishonesty as Brett Kimberlin or a Washington Post reporter, the question of motive naturally occurs to anyone with common sense.

Why does Brett Kimberlin hate the truth so much?

Answer: Because the truth about Brett Kimberlin is that
he is so evil, no decent person could ever admire him.

Everybody who knows the truth about Brett Kimberlin despises Brett Kimberlin, except for twisted people who admire dishonest evil. And so Brett Kimberlin has been lying all his life, developing the proficiency of “a dangerous smooth talker,” “a top-flight con man” whose perverse motives he habitually conceals. Julia Scyphers’ granddaughter, whose name the Indianapolis Star gave as Debbie Barton, shows up in Mark Singer’s 1996 book as “Jessica.” Probably this was at the insistence of the legal department at Knopf.

“For three consecutive summers, 1974 through 1976, they took vacations of a week or longer in Disney World, Mexico, and Hawaii. Sandi couldn’t get time off from work, so on these summer trips it was just the two of them — Brett and Jessica.
“Eyebrows levitated. A drug-dealing colleague had memories of conversations with Kimberlin that struck him as odd: ‘We’d see a girl, who was pubescent or prepubescent, and Brett would get this smile and say, “Hey, what do you think? Isn’t she great?” It made me very uncomfortable.’ Another recalled Kimberlin introducing Jessica as ‘my girlfriend,’ and if irony was intended, it was too subtle to register. To a coworker . . . Sandi confided that Kimberlin was ‘grooming Jessica to be his wife.’ To another, Sandi explained that although Kimberlin’s relationship with Jessica was chaste, he intended ‘to wait for her and would marry her.’”
— Mark Singer, Citizen K: The Deeply Weird American Journey of Brett Kimberlin, Page 78

“Eyebrows levitated,” you see, because Debbie/Jessica was only 10 when she met 20-year-old Brett Kimberlin, and those vacations with “just the two of them” occurred during “three consecutive summers” when Sandi Barton’s daughter was 10, 11 and 12. Alas, the girl’s grandmother was shot to death and, while police were investigating that murder, the Indiana town was struck by a series of bombings.

“Kimberlin seemed to be the only one with a possible motive — to distract police attention from the Scyphers murder and delay or halt their quiet investigation of him.”
— R. Joseph Gelarden, Indianapolis Star, “Kimberlin case a maze of murder, deceit,” Oct. 18, 1981

If Brett Kimberlin was “the only one with a possible motive,” it’s interesting how he was eventually caught: On Sept. 20, 1978, wearing a fake uniform, Kimberlin was arrested at a print shop where he was attempting to get phony military identification — a federal crime. And when the FBI searched Kimberlin’s car, they found the same kind of blue-and-white timers that had been used to detonate the bombs.

Fake uniform, fake IDs, real evil.

After Brett Kimberlin was arrested, there were no more bombings, but that was two weeks after his eighth bomb — in a school parking lot, a nice touch — blew off Carl David DeLong’s leg.

The facts about Brett Kimberlin were simple enough for Mandy Nagy (“Liberty Chick”) to discover and publish in October 2010 (“Flashback: Progressives Embrace Convicted Terrorist“), but she worked for an honest and courageous man who hated evil lying cowards.

The depth of Brett Kimberlin’s evil is hard for most people to comprehend, especially reporters who either don’t want to know the truth or are too stupid and lazy to find it.

If you don’t know the truth about Brett Kimberlin, you may be deceived.  Dishonesty is not his only persistent sociopathic trait. If you didn’t know about Brett Kimberlin’s “strange affection” for Sandi Barton’s little daughter and those “just the two of them” vacation trips, maybe some other things wouldn’t bother you, like when the “musician-activist” was interviewed for City Paper in 1996:

Not all the songs on his album … have political overtones … others, like “Waiting to Meet” and “Teen Dream” (both about having sex with teenage girls) are lacking in subtlety and tend to make one squirm. But this is exactly what Kimberlin wants.
“I say things a lot of people are afraid to say. Yeah, ‘Teen Dream’ is about f–king a teenage girl. Every guy who’s seen a good-looking teenage girl has thought about it. I’m talking about that lecherous quality that every man, though he won’t act on it, has.”

Brett Kimberlin was a 41-year-old convict on parole when he recorded those songs “about having sex with teenage girls.” But  Washington Post staff writer Monica Hesse evidently could not be bothered to read that, just like she apparently never read the Indianapolis Star account of Kimberlin’s crimes  or Mark Singer’s book about “a man whose idea of the truth is utterly malleable” or that 1999 Slate article that called Kimberlin an “all-around sociopath.”

Did Washington Post staff writer Monica Hesse do any research at all about Brett Kimberlin’s creepy past? This is hard for me to believe, because in her 800-word article, her entire summary of his criminal career consisted of two sentences:

His Quayle revelation came from the clink, where he was serving time for a series of Indiana bombings, one of which wounded a Vietnam veteran. Kimberlin always contended he wasn’t guilty of the bombings and would have been paroled earlier, except for the government machine trying to keep him quiet about Quayle, who said he never had met the man.

Two sentences. Sixty words. “Musician-activist.”

Too bad about your leg, Mr. DeLong.

Too bad about that grandma who got shot dead.

The “all-around sociopath” says “he wasn’t guilty,” and that’s good enough for Washington Post staff writer Monica Hesse, to whom it is entirely logical that federal prosecutors have nothing better to do with their time than to convict innocent marijuana dealers of bombings they didn’t commit to cover up a murder they had nothing to do with and never mind . . . uh, something about a little girl.

Never mind the facts. Blame that “government machine,” you see?

Never mind those songs “about having sex with teenage girls,” and never mind that Kimberlin conspired to have witnesses against him killed. If you’re the kind of person who doesn’t give a damn about the truth — for example, a staff writer for the Washington Post — never mind any of the facts about what kind of monster Brett Kimberlin really is. Whatever you do, you must never mind the facts:

The estranged wife of progressive activist Brett Kimberlin says he has been “mentally abusive” to her, claiming in a Maryland court that Kimberlin has been “threatening” her and trying to get her fired from her job at a Montgomery County daycare center.
Tetyana Kimberlin, 32, sought a domestic protective order this week, saying her husband had “been going by my work and telling my employer I am going to be arrested,” and that Kimberlin, 59, “had me arrested before on false charges.” . . .
“He told me if I will try to take my kids with me he will hurt me and I will see what will happen to me,” Kimberlin’s Russian-born wife wrote in her petition for a protection order, a case that was heard Tuesday in Silver Spring, Maryland. “He tells my 14-year-old about his plans about me and what he is going to do with me.” . . .

Please read the whole thing at The American Spectator, because you’re never going to find the truth in the Washington Post, which does not employ the kind of decent people who care about what happens to victims of “musician-activist” Brett Kimberlin.

All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is dishonest reporters like Monica Hesse. That sentence would fit in a Tweet. But I could probably think of some shorter sentences. IYKWIMAITYD.

 

 

 


Category: History, Journalism, Media Bias, The Kimberlin Files

IN THE GRIM FUTURE OF HUMANITY, THERE IS ONLY WAR.

Posted on | July 11, 2013 | 24 Comments

— by Wombat-socho

In this installment of the weekly book post, we’re going to take a look at two sets of novels which are set in the aforementioned Grim Future, but which have very different approaches to the Crapsack Universe humanity finds itself in, whether it’s Twenty Minutes Into The Future or forty millenia hence.

Not quite what we’re talking about this week, but close…

Unusually for me, I’m going to start with the good – or at least the not completely horrifying – first, and introduce you to a series of tales set in the extraordinarily grim, dark world of Warhammer 40K, which author Dan Abnett describes as,

…the grim nightmare of the far future, where there is only war and the galaxy’s alight and everyone’s got a headache...

…and the bureaucratic inefficiency, technological feudalism, and theocratic oppression make you wonder how the Empire of Humanity and its half-dead cyborg God-Emperor can possibly last. Good thing there’s guys like Commissar Ciaphas Cain, eh what? Hero of the Imperium and pivotal figure in dozens of critical battles over the course of a century, the legendary Commissar turns out to be an amusing fusion of Captain Blackadder and Lord Flashman. He claims in his sloppily organized personal diaries (cleaned up for publication by his sometime girlfriend, an Inquisitor) to be an abject coward, but time and again he manages to do something heroic, awe-inspiring, or morale-boosting – and quite frequently at least two of the three at once. His aide and sidekick Gunner Jurgen is likewise reminiscent of Blackadder’s dogsbody Baldrick and Private McAuslan, insulating Cain from the tedium of paperwork and annoying visitors partially by dint of his incredibly foul body odor. Sandy Mitchell does an excellent job balancing gut-wrenching horror with occasional slapstick (but more frequent subtle) humour, while salting the text with enough references and shout-outs to provide more amusement without being annoyingly distracting.

I personally recommend the anthologies Ciaphas Cain: Hero of the Imperium and Ciaphas Cain: Defender of the Imperium, which between them include six of the nine novels plus some additional material. Even if you don’t care for Warhammer 40K -and I, for one, do not- these are worthy successors to George MacDonald Fraser’s Flashman novels, and like Flashman, good for a few laughs into the bargain.

Just about as long, but considerably more grim, is the “Legacy of the Aldenata” series by John Ringo. The basic premise is fairly straightforward: one day, Humanity is contacted by benevolent aliens who want to hire us for a job, in return for which we’ll get a cornucopia of advanced technology. These peace-loving, pacifist aliens have a problem, and it’s a big one: the all-conquering, all-consuming Posleen are in the process of conquering the Galactic Federation and converting its four intelligent species into Posleenburgers, and since the aliens quite literally can’t fight back, they need humanity to pick up the slack and do the soldiering (and space navying) for them. Of course, the Federation proves to be an excellent example of why it’s a good idea to keep your friends close and your enemies closer, and to establish clearly who the enemy is. Beginning with A Hymn Before Battle , Ringo spins a multi-leveled tale of bloody action and (sometimes) equally bloody intrigue in which it becomes apparent that the Posleen may not be the worst threat to humanity in the long term – but in order to worry about the long term, you have to survive the short term. Unlike other authors previously discussed, Ringo does an excellent job of keeping our attention focused on the main characters, even if they’re off-stage for (literally) entire books at a time, while not forgetting to flesh out and develop the secondary characters, even those doomed to die in the next chapter. And the first two books in the series are free on Kindle, if you want to test-drive them first.

The first four novels of Ringo’s series (A Hymn Before Battle , Gust Front , When the Devil Dances , and Hell’s Faire ) cover the war against the Posleen; there are also three side novels set during the war or just after it (Yellow Eyes , Watch on the Rhine: Die Wacht am Rhein , and The Tuloriad ) and three dealing with the secret war between Clan O’Neal, their Indowy allies, and the Darhel-controlled Federation (Cally’s War , Sister Time , and Honor of the Clan ). A further novel, Eye of the Storm, raises the curtain on a threat that makes the Posleen and Darhel look warm and fuzzy by comparison. All good reading, and not PC in the least.

Category: Books

The Perverse Incentives and Unintended Consequences of ObamaCare, Continued

Posted on | July 11, 2013 | 44 Comments

The road to Hell is paved by liberal Democrats:

An upstate New York grocery chain that had been praised for offering health insurance to its part-time employees will eliminate those benefits as a result of the federal health-care law passed in 2010.
“Several Wegmans employees confirmed part-time health benefits had been cut and said the company said the decision was related to changes brought about by the Affordable Care Act,” the Buffalo News reported late Wednesday. Under the so-called ObamaCare law, “part-time employees are not eligible for health insurance subsidies if their employer offers insurance,” the newspaper noted. By eliminating the employer-provided benefit, Wegmans makes its part-time employees eligible for government coverage funded by taxpayers.

Moe Lane points out that this boomerangs against workers who are always told they will benefit by voting for Democrats. But even if you stipulate (as I do not) that Democrats care more about “working families,” this does not necessarily translate to Democrat policies that actually benefit the people about whom Democrats care. Have none of these people ever read Mises, Hayek, Friedman, Sowell?

Oh, I’m sorry: They’re Democrats. Knowledge is optional.

The Weekly Standard has a video report from WHAM-TV:

 

Category: Economics, Health Care

LIVE AT FIVE: 07.11.13

Posted on | July 11, 2013 | 6 Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho


TOP NEWS
House Republicans Resist Establishment Cries For Immigration “Reform”

Salvadorans attend a rally supporting immigration reform

Caucus has no interest in passing a “comprehensive” bill with “path to citizenship”

Egypt Orders Arrest Of MoBro Chief Badie
Accused with nine others of instigating Monday’s riots

Boston Bomber Tsarnaev Pleads Not Guilty
Relatives, survivors present for pleading



POLITICS
Spitzer Slithers To Lead In Early Poll

Ex-Governor, convicted fornicator Spitzer talks to the press about his comeback

Leads Scott Stringer 42-33 among registered Democrats

Former Ft. Campbell IG Accused Of Identity Theft

Poll: Almost Half Believe Federal Government Infringes On Personal Liberty

Jury Selection In Ft. Hood Court-Martial Begins As Shooter Calls Army Uniform “Enemy Of Islam”

LGBT Job Protections Advance In Senate

Questions Surface Over Donations To Virginia Governor McDonnell’s Family, Company

Mayoral Hopeful Among Fifteen Arrested At Long Island College Hospital Rally

Did DOJ Stoke Anti-Zimmerman Protests After Martin Shooting?



THE ECONOMY, STUPID
Oil Hits 14-Month High: NYMEX $104.46, Brent $107.89
Bernanke Supports Continuing Stimulus Amid Debate Over QE
SEC Lifts Ban On Hedge Fund Ads
US Home Foreclosures Hit 6 1/2 Year Low In June
Smithfield CEO Says Company Won’t Change After PRC Deal
Tribune Will Spin Off Newspapers After TV Deal
Bookstores Not Dead Yet As Riggio Bets On Barnes & Noble
Federal Judge Finds Apple Guilty Of Conspiring To Raise E-Book Prices
Google Prepared To Blow $500 Million On Moto X Marketing
Instagram Enables Photo, Video Web Embedding
Samsung To Ship Smaller 4K TVs
Leaked Sprint Document Shows New Unlimited, My Way, All-In Plans



SPORTS
Big Papi Makes DH History

All-time DH hits leader David Ortiz

Sets new record of 1689 hits with double off Mariners’ Aaron Harang

Nyets Face Almost $70 Million In NBA Luxury Tax

Lions QB Stafford Gets $53 Million Contract Extension

Former Braves Closer John Rocker: Baseball Was Better With Steroids

Wheeler Leads Mets To Sweep Of Slumping Giants; Also, Giants Pitcher Accused Of Groping Woman in Hospital

Cavs Roll Dice On Andrew Bynum With Two-Year Deal

Cano Hits Three-Run Dinger, Overbay Grand Slam As Yankees Tee Off On Royals

Former Phillie Darren Daulton Diagnosed With Severe Brain Cancer

Decimated Rangers Rotation Loses Yu Darvish

Nats Tag Cliff Lee For For Homers As Gio Stifles Phillies’ Offense



FAMOUS FOR BEING FAMOUS
Courteney Cox Overdoing The Botox?

Showing off a newly puffy face

Also, other celebrity plastic surgeries gone awry – or not

Justin Bieber Urinates In Restaurant Mop Bucket: Same Douchebaggery, Different Day

Pregnant Halle Berry To Marry Olivier Martinez This Weekend

Randy Travis Suffers Stroke In Hospital

Lisa Edelstein Swapping “House” For “Castle”

Denzel Washington In Cheating Scandal?

Olivia Wilde Is InStyle’s August Cover Girl

“Two And A Half Men…And A Lesbian?”

WWE Star Randy Orton Wins At Divorce, Keeps Bentley And Guns

“Jungle Book” Live Action Reboot In The Works At Disney

Paul Schrader: Lindsay Lohan Is Just Like Marilyn Monroe



FOREIGNERS
Britain Offers Plan To Privatize Royal Mail
US Arms Showing Up In Syrian Loyalists’ Hands
New Czech PM Faces Instant Opposition
Irish Lawmakers Agonize Over Abortion Bill
Buddhist-Rohingya Clashes: Was Economy The Real Trigger?
Pakistani President’s Security Chief Killed In Probable Suicide Bombing
At Least Seven Dead, 48 Missing In Szechuan Flooding
Missing In Quebec Train Disaster Presumed Dead
Pope Asks For Removal Of Buenos Aires Statue
Saudi Princess Charged With Human Trafficking After Domestic Slave Escapes From Orange County Condo
Luxembourg PM Quits Over Spy Scandal



BLOGS & STUFF
Breitbart: Poll Shows Support For Senate Immigration Bill Plummeting
Power Line: Tom Cotton Hammers Senate Immigration Bill
Bryan Preston: Jonathan Chait Is A Silly Little Boy
Lonely Conservative: Harry REid Never Sent Senate Immigration Bill To House?
Ed Morrissey: FOIA Documents Show DOJ Facilitated Zimmerman Protests In Florida
Conservatives4Palin: Palin Says DOJ Misuse of Funds Is Unbelievable
Lee Stranahan: Trayvongate – Newest Obama Scandal Is 17 Months Old
Jawa Report: Stupid Conspiracy Theorists Who Think Boston Marathon Bombing Was Conspiracy Chant “Free Jahar”
Weasel Zippers: “Free Jahar” Freaks Rally Outside Boston Courthouse
Jammie Wearing Fools: Al Jazeera Claims Administration Bankrolled Morsi Opponents
Hit & Run: US Funding To Egypt Only Making It Easier For Egyptians To Scapegoat America
NRO Corner: Issa Set To Call DC IRS Officials To Testify
Patterico: Lois Lerner In 2011 – “Receiving A Thick Questionnaire From The IRS Is A Behavior Changer”
Dr. Ben Carson: Restoring Plain And Civil Speech To Politics
NewsBusters: PolitiFact Nails Maddow For Blatant Lie About Ohio Abortion Law
Neo-neocon: US Drops To #2


Category: Live at Five

#TrayvonGate: How the U.S. Justice Department Abetted a Legal Lynching

Posted on | July 10, 2013 | 104 Comments

While I haven’t followed the George Zimmerman trial closely, I have noticed the widespread reaction to the trial, namely, “Why are they even having this trial?” There is no way in hell Zimmerman will be convicted. Some see it as a clear-cut case of self-defense, but everyone who has watched the testimony sees enough “reasonable doubt” in the prosecution’s case that it seems obvious the jury will acquit.

So, once again: Why are they even having this trial? And the answer would seem to be, because the Obama administration wanted it.

Lee Stranahan writes at Breibart.com:

Welcome to Trayvongate, where the President of the United States used both the bully pulpit, the Department of Justice and sly media manipulation to gin up charges of racism in the George Zimmerman/Trayvon Martin shooting. Now that the trial is almost finished and the only act of racism mentioned so far came from the victim–Martin called Zimmerman ‘a creepy ass cracker’ according to testimony–the cynical and repeated use of the race card by the White house is even more abhorrent.
Judicial Watch revealed documents today that proved what Breitbart News reported in April, 2012: that Eric Holder’s Department of Justice took an active role in racially charged rallies in Sanford, Florida and that the Community Relations Service helped force the temporary resignation of Sheriff Bill Lee. That resignation made it appear that Sanford authorities were suspect and possibly complicit in covering up something. . . .

Read the whole thing.  Welcome to the New Normal. And if there are riots when the acquittal is announced, you’ll know who to blame.

 

Category: Crime

U.S. Senate or Insane Asylum?

Posted on | July 10, 2013 | 47 Comments

At Memeorandum, I saw this headline:

HISTORIC: Senate panel
advances trans-inclusive ENDA

Perhaps you thought the “Gang of Eight” amnesty bill was the craziest thing the Senate could ever do, but obviously you were wrong.

What this legislation would do is to make it a federal crime to discriminate in the workplace against the “transgendered.” And you may think to yourself, “Well, discrimination is bad and I’m not prejudiced or homophobic or anything” and shrug it off. So what?

If you are indifferent to ENDA in this manner, then quite clearly (a) you don’t know how “discrimination” law actually works in the modern workplace, and (b) you lack sufficient imagination to contemplate the potential consequences. Suppose you’re Sam, the loading dock foreman at a large hardware store — Home Depot, let’s say — and you’ve got a crew of four guys whose job is to unload the trucks as they arrive each day. Driving forklifts, hauling pallets of merchandise off trucks and moving them around the store so the items can be put on the shelves. One morning you arrive for work and here comes your crew man Joe, wearing a dress, wig and makeup.

“Morning, Sam.”
“Joe? What the –”
“I’m not Joe anymore. Call me Delores.”
“What the hell are you talking about Joe?”
“Sam, I’m Delores now. If you call me ‘Joe’ one more time, I’m afraid I’ll have to report you to Human Resources.”
“Human resources? But . . . I don’t understand.”
“It’s simple, Sam: For years, I’ve lived with this secret — a woman, trapped in a man’s body — but I’m not hiding it any more.”
“But Joe . . .”
“Delores.”
“OK, whatever — Delores. But this is just crazy. I’ve known you since high school. We played baseball and went fishing together. And what about your wife and kids?”
“They’re entirely supportive. As a matter of fact, we got the idea this weekend, watching the news together.”
“Watching the news?”
“Yeah, there was a gay guy who sued his company under the Employment Non-Discrimination Act. His boss got fired and he got a $250,000 settlement. Civil rights and stuff.”
“So you’re wearing a dress now?”
“Yeah, you like it?”
“Hell no. I mean, you’re six-foot-three and 270 pounds. Your legs aren’t even shaven. You look ridiculous.”
“Ridiculous, huh? How long have I been working here, Sam?”
“Three, four years.”
“And when was the last time I got a raise?”
“Well, your last evaluation — I dunno. What? October, I think. It was 75 cents more an hour, right?”
“Sixty-five cents, Sam. Sixty-five f–king cents.”
“OK. right — now I remember. What’s your point?”
“My point is, I’m tired of being victimized by your transphobia.”
“Trans-what? Have you gone nuts, Joe?”
“F–k you, Sam. I know my rights. I’m going to Human Resources. This kind of discrimination has got to stop!”
“But Joe . . .”
“It’s Delores! Hater!”

As far-fetched as that scenario may seem, no one in 1965 ever imagined that claims of “discrimination” and “sexual harassment” — and the fear of such claims — would result in the situation now so widespread, where lawsuits and threats of lawsuits are a sort of constant threat of blackmail, where disgruntled employees make complaints knowing full well that companies are reluctant to go to court to defend against such claims. Instead, nine times out of 10, the complaining employee is given what’s informally called “go away money,” a settlement usually equivalent to a year’s salary, just so the company can rid itself of the legal nuisance.

Oh, and guess what happens to your insurance premiums when “non-discrimination” means that you must hire transsexuals and cover the cost of their surgery and other treatments?

People who shrug their shoulders about ENDA and other such nonsense, or who hesitate to denounce it because they don’t want to seem prejudiced, have no idea how all this talk about “fairness” and equality” actually operates, once it becomes law and people start getting sued or fired over flimsy claims of “discrimination.”

 

Category: Gays, Senate
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