Under the Fedora: Incentive

Life is full of various incentives and this week has been full of them.

Breaking news today is the IRS is continuing to target conservatives even though the scandal is in its 90th day.

Since the MSM is totally ignoring the scandal & Eric Holder has apparently no intention to enforce the law, this should be no surprise. There is no incentive for this administration to stop.

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NBC & CNN provided an incentive to Reince Priebus to make a move that a lot of people in the GOP were very pleased to see.

The problem becomes if you pull out of these debates or keep these people from moderating them then the MSM storyline becomes: “GOP candidates duck real journalists.” and that would be the meme on every single network and their excuse to duck out of coverage.

However the Hillary Movies solve this problem admirably. It provides an excuse, a justification, well of COURSE we can’t have our debates with the people from CNN or NBC. as Reince put it:

The question is, if the party is going to spend time and money and resources in organizing an intelligent and reasonable debate calendar, should we have networks and moderators that are promoting Hillary Clinton depose our candidates and I say: No Way!

It’s rather funny when your political foes give provide incentives to do the right thing.

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The Bob Filner case also is an example of incentives can you move you. New accusers keep popping out & word is out that democrats knew all about what has been going on, but Filner had an incentive to ignore this. Pick out Bob Filner in the video of the House lining up behind a defiant Bill Clinton during his post impeachment speech of defiance?

Don’t you think Filner took note of what happened to Bill Clinton since that day? What would the incentive be for him to stop or fear being punished by Democrats for what he’s done?

I don’t see one.

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In Colorado a property company provided an incentive as well, for thieves:

As of October 1, residents cannot display, use, or possess any firearms or weapons of any kind, anywhere on the property.

However the reaction and negative provided enough incentive for them to reverse direction.

Incentives giveth, incentives taketh away.

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RS McCain has been talking about apparently a rash of sexual harassment in the Atheist Skeptic community

Now more women are coming forward to testify that the “hostile climate” for women in the atheist movement is not limited to the Radford situation. Atheist podcaster Stephanie Svan described a case involving Jim Frenkel, while Carrie Poppy describes her problems at the James Randi Educational Foundation (JREF), which hosted the conference where Stoltznow claims she was sexually assaulted by Radford.

The most interesting aspect of Carrie Poppy’s accusation is the finger she points at JREF President D.J. Grothe, whom she denounces for “constant duplicity, dishonesty, and manipulation.”

I don’t understand the problem, if these people man in an evolved animal rather than made in the image of God that this behavior, while socially considered rude or in some cases illegal because of man made social constructs, would in fact be a natural result of said evolution. If that’s the case shouldn’t it be treated accordingly.

That being the case what is the incentive for them to behave otherwise if that’s the logical conclusion?

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The Owners of the Boston Globe were responded to two incentives this week. The regular losses were a huge incentive to sell to whoever was willing to buy.

After purchasing the Boston Globe in 1993 for a then-record $1.1 billion, the financially troubled New York Times just announced it sold the 141 year-old paper to Boston Red Sox owner John Henry for a mere $70 million. That’s a straight 93% loss. Figuring in two decades of inflation would only make it worse — as does the fact the Times retains the Globe’s pension liabilities, estimated at over $100 million.

and the Red Sox owner has incentives of his own

Maybe the Globe figures if anyone can turn things around, he can, after all he has a history of producing Miracles that nobody would have believed possible. (and that doesn’t even include this season).

Their fanatical liberalism however was an incentive for them to take an offer less than 1/4 of the high bid.

There is no incentive greater to the left than to keep the right away from any cultural component that can break their monopoly.

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Since we talked a little baseball let’s join the A-Rod chorus. He is playing pending the appeal of his suspension. He has hit .273 with two walks & a HBP to this point. No RBI’s extra base hits or runs scored to this point.

The Yankees are 11 games behind the Red Sox & seven games out of the Wild Card with three teams ahead of them before they even get to the wild card teams. He’s not going to take the over the finish line. Why do you think he is coming back rather than just taking his suspension. Well here is an incentive $28 million this year and between $20 & $25 million per year left on his contract. Until he loses his appeal his contract is solid but once he does…

“The Yankees could argue that they’re going to try to void the contract, and certainly Alex Rodriguez would oppose that through grievance, and in all likelihood it would end with some kind of buyout rather than either side entirely winning,” McCann said in a telephone interview on July 29.

As long as baseball is giving out 10 yrs/$275M to people there is a huge incentive to keep doping no matter what the Penalties

Speaking of money you might remember the name Tawana Brawley. Steve Pagones whose life was ruined by the accusations pushed by Al Sharpton et-al does and he’s finally getting some satisfaction:

10 checks totaling $3,764.61 were delivered to ex-prosecutor Steven Pagones — the first payments Brawley has made since a court determined in 1998 that she defamed him with her vicious hoax.

What I found interesting is that while Brawley will apparently be working to pay off Pagones for the rest of her life, fans of Sharpton paid off his share of the debt years ago.

You see Sharpton is very useful when it come to generating race bating headlines for the left or to incite a black community unwilling to deal with the reality of certain issues.

Brawley is not, so while there is incentive to pay off the Rev Al there is none to bail out a LPN trying to support her daughter on her pay.

Yeah the left really loves regular people.

Finally I got into a big discussion on twitter this week over homosexuality. While I’ve always been a fan of the whole inch people toward the right direction people seemed really upset that I was unwilling to declare gay sex not sinful. One writer was particularly interesting as he kept insisting that prohibitions were all based on faulty translations.

I found the argument VERY Amusing:

It assumes for 100's of yrs people were mistranslating including the people closest to its time @NotGayDalek @OscarGaldona @CatholicLisa

— Peter Ingemi (@DaTechGuyblog) August 9, 2013

The Bible is not only THE best selling book in history one of the most studied books in the history of history. The idea that all of the greatest scholars in the the last 1700 years have been totally mistranslating Greek for over a dozen centuries, including the people closest to the writing of the time until suddenly in my lifetime enlightened folk finally figured out that there is no prohibition against Homosexual acts.

The arrogance of such a belief is amazing but there is a powerful incentive to such things that I wrote about a long time ago:

Over and over when I read about Anglican priests becoming Catholic we hear about the study of doctrine and the conclusion that the Church is true and right. On the other side we hear the I wants. The church doesn’t allow something that the person whats or objects to a sin that the person does, so they find a different church.

One group looks for truth and goes toward it, the other has sin and wants justification to allow it.

There are people who understand the truth of Christ but have trouble with their sins, for myself it’s a constant struggle & fight that I wrestle with daily but for some they’ve decided to simply redefine what sin is suddenly no guilt, no temptation, just something you enjoy.

It’s quite an incentive that can pay dividends for the rest of one’s life.

the question becomes will it pay dividends beyond it and that is, to me the most powerful incentive of all.

Under the Fedora Popes, Huma and Kentucky Derby Pie

At mass this week the first reading was the famous exchange between Abraham and god/his angels concerning Sodom & Gomorrah as Abraham starts at 50 and finishes with God declaring that if he find 10 righteous people in the city he will not destroy it for the sake of those 10.

I couldn’t help but think that is why cities like San Francisco no matter how much they would like, will never drive out the Church completely.  They wanna have those 10 people in the city just in case.

BTW on a side note as I’m typing this in word both Sodom & Gomorrah are in the spell checker.  Just a reminder how deep the cultural roots of the Bible actually are.

Speaking of this he media is absolutely having an orgasms over the Pope’s word on the plane back from the hugely successful World youth day in Rio.

Pope Francis is reaching out to gays, saying he won’t judge priests for their sexual orientation, in a remarkably open and wide-ranging news conference as he returns from his first foreign trip.

Francis says: “If someone is gay and he searches for the Lord and has good will, who am I to judge?”

To someone not familiar with you know actual Catholic Belief ,this are shocking words.  But to those who know Catholic Belief he hasn’t said anything extraordinary.  The media is spinning and selling a bill of goods:

Once we define ourselves, are lives and our actions based on sin, or based on our desire for sin everything changes. Instead of being the woman caught in sin accepting the forgiveness Christ offers her:

“Neither do I condemn you. Go, (and) from now on do not sin any more.”

we instead answer back:

But Jesus, I like this sin, I enjoy this sin and who are you to really say this is sin? Maybe you should reconsider.

The media is setting two traps with the same bait. The media want both the uninformed about the faith and the faithful to think the Pope is saying something he is not

For the media it is and always will be about spinning something rather than reporting something.

Anthony Weiner continues to be in the news.  Byron York notes that those saying he is using the Clinton playbook is wrong.

Mrs. Clinton was a key player in her husband’s defense on both occasions, and today she is close with Abedin, her long-time aide. So why shouldn’t Abedin try to emulate her mentor’s success?

Because it won’t work. Abedin can’t follow Volume I of the Clinton playbook because Weiner can’t deny everything, as Clinton did — falsely but successfully — in ’92. And she can’t follow Volume II because Weiner is not president of the United States.

While one can say he is not specifically using the Clinton Playbook he is certainly using the main Clinton tactic.  DON’T RESIGN, DON’T QUIT.

Bill Clinton rightly figured there was no percentage in resigning and forever being the first democrat to resign the presidency. He understood what a post resignation presidency would be and it wouldn’t be anything like it is today and that doesn’t even count Hilary. His wife would forever be tagged as not the woman who stood by him but his accomplice in deceiving the public at the start. the first lady who did so and it would have made her own ambitions much harder to achieve.

So they went all in vs Starr and with the media’s help managed to win.

Weiner & Huma are using the same calculus.

Weiner and Huma are staying in the race because they understand there is no advantage to leaving. If he pulls out he is the guy whose comeback failed and is done and Huma’s future is compromised by her defense of him. If he stays there is a chance, a tiny one, but a chance that he makes the cut to the next round.

If he does he can credit Huma’s public defense of him and if he fails it can be dismissed as just not enough to save the day. As for the critiques of her while right now women are hitting Huma for backing him some were hitting Hillary too. That will pass but Huma’s connections and the funding they can provide will not.

While one can debate if he is playing out of the Clinton playbook one can’t deny he seems to have a lot of members of the Clinton team on his bench

In addition to Mr. Reines, other longtime Clinton loyalists, including Maggie Williams, who managed Mrs. Clinton’s unsuccessful 2008 presidential bid, Cheryl Mills, who was Mrs. Clinton’s chief of staff at the State Department, and Mr. Clinton’s longtime aide Doug Band, have all reached out to Ms. Abedin to offer support and guidance, according to several people close to the Clintons. Ms. Abedin, now 37, is something of a little sister to the group, having started working in the Clinton White House at the age of 19.

Or should I say Huma has a lot of members of the Clinton them on HER bench.

I still think Huma is the real story here, her connections to Mrs. Clinton is, in my opinion nothing short of miraculous:

In 1996 Bill Clinton was president and people were already talking about a political future for Hillary. Working with her must have been on of the most coveted positions for a young woman in the democrat party. Certainly there must have been plenty of sons and daughters of pols, campaign workers and democrat fundraisers who would have died for the chance to be in that position.

Yet Huma Abadin a young lady still in college who has spent a lifetime in Saudi Arabia not only gets the job, but has stayed with Hillary Clinton her entire life since.

Remind me, who is the one with the power, with the juice? Who is the one with the backers that people want to associate with?

I can’t understand why anyone isn’t asking these question other than me.

We’re still 3 months away from the Big Doctor Who anniversary episode and I still have no idea how they are going to play it.  Everyone seems to be keeping their mouths shut.

I’ve always figured it you have something good, why keep it a secret?

Still no clue who the new 12^th doctor is going to be, but this will be announced Sunday at 2 PM EST.

I’m still of the opinion that they should have him regress, start to fix the procedure and then have it stick on the 8^th doctor.

That would not only solve the “having all the old doctors” in the special but would give Paul McGann a chance to actually play the role on TV.  He has been first rate in the Big Finish adventures and I think deserves a chance on the small screen.

we’ll find out if that happens today

How cool is it that the GOP chairowoman is a fan of the Tom Baker Dr. Who episodes?  It makes me feel a lot better about being old enough to be her father.

Age is catching up to me and I’m finding more and more obits in the paper that are within a few years of me, this came to mind at a mini high school class party to celebrate all of our 50th birthdays this year.

Apart from the purely physical appearance of people it was interesting and rather pleasant to simply speak to people who had interests as diverse as Bird Watching to the same Doctor Who fandom that I enjoy. Their stories were no less interesting for my familiarity with the people there.

It highlighted the advantage, at least in my mind, of NOT being on Facebook. Because I was not as familiar with everyone’s day-to-day activities the pleasure of discovery and the sheer joy of being with people was more pronounced

As for physical appearances let me say that the fact that some really charming and beautiful women there were not attached is a scathing indictment on the quality and gumption of single men between the ages of 45-54.

I’m getting older there are less of these things left than I like, I’m glad went to this one not only for the reasons above but the restaurant had Kentucky Derby Pie.

You haven’t lived till you’ve had it.