EU President Van Rompuy Continues Playing Whack-A-Mole, When Whack-A-Budget Is Needed

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by Smitty (h/t Memorandum via Google Reader)

Reuters reports:

European Council President Herman Van Rompuy has called an emergency meeting of top officials dealing with the euro zone debt crisis for Monday morning, reflecting concern that the crisis could spread to Italy, the region’s third largest economy.
European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet will attend the meeting along with Jean-Claude Juncker, chairman of the region’s finance ministers, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso and Olli Rehn, the economic and monetary affairs commissioner, three official sources told Reuters.
Van Rompuy’s spokesman Dirk De Backer said: “It’s a coordination, not a crisis meeting.” He added that Italy would not be on the agenda and declined to say what would be discussed.

Yeah, when Van Rompuy says “It’s a coordination, not a crisis meeting,” that’s a code phrase to his wife, meaning: “Honey, please bring me a change of underwear.”
For those not paying attention to EU politics outside of the Greeks imitating Wisconsin, Nigel Farange provides an ‘introduction’ of sorts:
My take: we need to hire Nigel to cross-examine Ben Bernanke. Nigel strikes, I think, a most appropriate tone for un-elected, over-powered officials.

FMJRA 2.0: Crisis King

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CA-36: GAME-CHANGER! L.A. Station’s Report Destroys Democrat Janice Hahn

Rebecca Watson: ‘Stop Sexualizing Me!’

HOLY FREAKING CRAP! Casey Anthony Becomes the O.J. Simpson of Baby-Killers

‘Hey, TSA, Is That My iPad in Your Pants, or Are You Just Happy to Frisk Me?’

CA-36: Janice Hahn Spent a Million Scaring People, Now She’s Broke!

John Cornyn Endorses Obama on Taxes

Ghouls for Ginsberg?

The 7 Millionth Hit Approaches

Michele Bachmann Boogies!

FMJRA 2.0: Light & Magic

Satan Reads This Blog

Genesis 12:3

‘Signs of Strain Within the Campaign’ UPDATE: You Call This ‘Rumors’?

LIVE AT FIVE – 07.04.11

7,000,000 Hits, 7-Minute Blogs

Live Free or … SPLAT!

Rule 5 Independence Day

LIVE AT FIVE – 07.05.11

Another Cain Iowa Staffer Resigns

How Not to Dive Into a Lake

‘A Haunting Piece,’ IYKWIMAITYD

‘Like Losing Your Virginity …’

LIVE AT FIVE – 07.06.11

Feminism, Victimhood, Therapy

Golf Poses Are Usually Not Suggestive

I Bet Doug Hoffman Is Laughing Today

Iowa Organizer Says He’s ‘100 Percent’ Certain Sarah Palin Is Running

Milwaukee Celebrated 4th of July With Fireworks, Looting, Racial Mob Violence

Black People Say Casey Anthony Trial Proves America Is Racist or Something

LIVE AT FIVE – 07.07.11

Obama: ‘Hey, Grandma, There’s Still Room for You Under This Bus!’

SHOCKING REPUBLICAN SCANDAL!

Democrats to America: ‘Sucks to Be You!’

How @FilmLadd Feels Tonight

LIVE AT FIVE – 07.08.11

Does the Los Angeles Times Understand the Meaning of the Word ‘Discredited’? UPDATE: Hahn Admits Placing Call on Behalf of Rapist Gangster ‘P.J. Steve’

Prediction: BHO Does Not Even Complete Term, Much Less Run For Reelection

MoveOn.org Threatens Obama: ‘I Won’t Ever Give His Campaign Another Dime’

To the Reader Who Bought the 1/8 Carat Gold and Diamond Heart Pendant

Betty Ford, Dancer, R.I.P.

2001: ‘A Cultural Collapse’

Ann Althouse: Rube

Top linkers for this week:

  1. The Pro From Poca (14)
  2. The Lonely Conservative (10)
  3. Da Tech Guy (8)
  4. Instapundit (5)

Thanks to all for their linkagery. Blogspot bloggers, please e-mail me your links at Wombat-socho with “Shameless Blogwhoring” or “FMJRA” in the subject line, because WordPress hates you.

From the Undeceived to the Rube: My Second Notice of Your Previous Insult

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It’s come to this: Not content to insult our intelligence by claiming that her vote for Obama in 2008 was a “rational choice,” now Ann Althouse has sown discord between Smitty and me, distracting me from important issues — there has been another royal upskirt incident that regular readers would normally expect me to cover in comprehensive detail — while I replied to his pro-Althouse post:

Smitty, I assure you I don’t give a damn about Ann Althouse’s voting habits, but was ticked off by her attempt to distinguish her “rational choice” from the millions of other fools who voted for O.
You can’t do that. If anyone had bothered to read the “Future Ex-Democrats” column that I linked in the post — and I linked with the express hope that people would read it — they would find my own confession that I was a huge supporter of Bill Clinton in 1992. And I explained why I was such a damned fool. What I did not do was to attempt to claim that my folly was anything but folly.
Althouse evidently wants to have her cake and eat it, too, without any questions. Pretty damned imperious, don’t you think? And, indirectly, an insult to those of us who were never fooled by Obama. If it was “rational” to vote for Obama in 2008, after all, isn’t Althouse saying that those of us who didn’t vote for him were irrational?
Well, maybe you’re willing to be publicly insulted that way, but I’m not going to take it. Unless and until she owns up to her rubitude — and takes back that slanderous insult — she is still a rube.

Far be it from me to seek to make enemies of Professor Althouse and her many loyal readers. But there is an old country saying that applies here: Don’t piss down my back and tell me it’s raining.

Every man is the steward of his own honor, and none of us can make ourselves judges of whether someone else has been insulted.

We can, however, judge whether the insulted party has responded prudently to the insult. Continue reading From the Undeceived to the Rube: My Second Notice of Your Previous Insult →

Allen West Continues To Answer The Question ‘What If BHO Was A Leader?’

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by Smitty (h/t Lucianne)

As reported in the Daily Caller

Appearing on Nashville radio host Steve Gill’s show last week, West said Obama would be “complicit” with what he sees as Justice Department attempts to slow down and avoid a congressional investigation into Operation Fast and Furious and Project Gunrunner if he didn’t push his attorney general to resign. “The president needs to realize that Eric Holder needs to be removed from the Department of Justice,” West said after detailing why he thinks Holder should appear before an investigative committee to testify about how the DOJ has handled its response to the Operation Fast and Furious investigation. “Or else I believe President Obama is complicit and he is in approval of the actions of his attorney general.”

Gill followed up by asking West if he thought a special prosecutor was needed to investigate Operation Fast and Furious. West said he thought so, adding that the mishandling of the operation is a part of a “trend” he sees forming at the DOJ. West said the way Holder has handled Operation Fast and Furious is reminiscent of how he handled the New Black Panther Party voter intimidation scandal.

Read the whole thing.
I’m already on record as saying I think this scandal will result in a premature ejection from Pennsylvania Avenue. OFF has a special straw-breaking-camel’s-back feel to it, atop all of the other creepy, idiotic undertakings from this administration. It will be the OFFramp for this clownshow.
And who better to be the spokesperson for the ‘Get this joker out of here!’ chorus than West? Having shaken the man’s hand, I daresay they don’t arrive more impeccable. Thank you, Florida, for electing him.

Tut Tut, Stacy: Let’s Not Stand Here Bickering And Arguing
Over ‘Oo Voted For ‘Oo

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by Smitty

In a rare moment of disagreement with the marquee name on the blog, I don’t think taking swipes at any repentant, legal voter over the 2008 election is helping matters.

  • History is immutable. If someone made a rational decision, based upon imperfect information, then that should be respected. Bainbridge ran the Philadelphia aground on an uncharted reef; sometimes, it happens.
  • Sometimes worse is better. They told me that if I voted for McCain, and McCain won, that the ru[b|d]e awakening would be put off another four years, and I replied: “Nice counter-factual!”. In other words, the come-to-Beavis meeting the country has needed would have been less likely in a McCain Administration. From that perspective, BHO ain’t no bug; he’s a feature.
  • The Progressive Project to wreck America did not begin under BHO. BHO is perhaps the icing, but he is not the cake. The upshot here is that since we’re pretty much all at least little guilty of insufficient civic participation, we can dispense with the finger pointing. I’m neither Jewish nor Roman Catholic; this point is not a guild projection. Quite the opposite. Anyone willing to come to their senses and realize that Statist Idolatry of the Progressive flavor is a Bad Thing, and repent, should be the last target of guilt. Anyone still clinging bitterly to their unaffordable Utopian ideals (and I know one or two) merits a gentle hug. You can’t get into recriminations without resembling the Wisconsin teachers union or a pack of clowns, insofar as the two categories differ.

While I hate to see anyone suffer, I also don’t hope we recover so quickly as to blow by the structural causes of the current crisis: centralization, Socialism, the Iron Law of Bureaucracy, and civic laziness. The people have quietly endorsed the Progressive project through inactivity. We have to reclaim Liberty and gently refuse to let any silver-tongued devil promise some cheap substitute for Liberty and go unchallenged.
That is all.

Cthulhu 2012

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“Why settle for the lesser evil?”

Sarah Palin on the current evil in Washington:

It’s a matter of public record that I did not go to Harvard Law School, but I can add.
The same “experts” who got us into this mess are now telling us that the only way out of our debt crisis is to “increase revenue,” but not by creating more jobs and therefore a larger tax base; no, they want to “increase revenue” by raising taxes on job creators who are taxed enough already! As Margaret Thatcher said, “The trouble with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people’s money.” That’s where we are now. Hard working taxpayers have been big government’s Sugar Daddy for far too long, and now we’re out of sugar. We don’t want big government, we can’t afford it, and we are unwilling to pay for it.
This debt ceiling debate is the perfect time to do what must be done. We must cut. Yes, I’m for a balanced budget amendment and for enforceable spending caps. But first and foremost we must cut spending, not “strike a deal” that allows politicians to raise more debt!

Don Surber has video of Saturday’s meeting of top White House advisers:

“Gentlemen, we must do something Immediately! Immediately! Immediately!”

Perhaps Ann Althouse has something relevant to say about President LePetomane’s “steely nerve, his intelligence, and his groundedness.”

Speaker Boehner has said the two magic words: “No deal.”

So now we’re back to zero. The Lonely Conservative fears they’re putting budget BandAids on a fiscal gunshot wound.

We should listen to the voice of reason: “We’ve got to get our fiscal house in order here in Washington. I’m not sure it’s going to happen under the current leadership.”

Questions for a rube: “Remember? That conversation with Joe The Plumber? Were ya sleeping?”

Yet the larger question remains: “Where Did the Pleasant Cthulhu Go?”


Re-Explaining the Amazon Thing (Or, Is Your Husband Reading The Right Blog?)

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When I’d mentioned earlier that someone bought a $199.99 piece of jewelry via my Amazon Associates link — thereby earning me an $8 commission — some of the commenters seemed not to understand how it works. Look, here’s the wonderful Amazon “carousel” widget:

This is a selection of products I’ve picked out — including a fedora, and a couple of books I highly recommend — but it doesn’t matter whether you actually buy those specific items. If you click the Amazon link and purchase anything (big, small, expensive, cheap, whatever) during that visit to Amazon, that earns me a 4% commission.

So it doesn’t necessarily matter what Amazon products I advertise, so long as you click the links and buy stuff. Of course, if you want to buy some really expensive stuff, that would be super-cool with me.

Maybe some of these “right-wing billionaires” I keep hearing about might want to help a cracka out, y’know? (Go with the mink, Mr. Koch!)

The reader who bought the $499 3-D Blu-ray player last week? He explained that he’s furnishing his personal home theater via Amazon. He lives within driving distance and has invited me to come watch movies when he gets everything set up. I’m not so much into 3-D, so maybe we can have a film noir festival.

But these are mere suggestions. It doesn’t matter whether you’re buying books or mink coats, whether you’re furnishing your home theater or buying jewelry for your wife. As long as you click the Amazon links on this blog and buy something — anything — I get 4% of the purchase price.

So, ladies, if your husband is reading this blog and you don’t get a $4,500 mink coat for Christmas, don’t blame me. I tried. IYKWIMAITYD.

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