Under the Fedora: Contradictions

Pope Francis has been named Time Magazine’s Man of the year

How do you practice humility from the most exalted throne on earth? Rarely has a new player on the world stage captured so much attention so quickly—young and old, faithful and cynical—as has Pope Francis. In his nine months in office, he has placed himself at the very center of the central conversations of our time: about wealth and poverty, fairness and justice, transparency, modernity, globalization, the role of women, the nature of marriage, the temptations of power.

The bench said: “In the light of plain meaning and legislative history of the section, we hold that Section 377 IPC would apply irrespective of age and consent.” It added that the section does not discriminate any group with a particular sexual preference, a stand that was diametrically opposite to that by the Delhi HC.”It is relevant to mention here that Section 377 IPC does not criminalize a particular people or identity or orientation. It merely identifies certain acts, which if committed, would constitute an offence. Such prohibition regulates sexual conduct regardless of gender identity and orientation,” Justices Singhvi said.

“Parliament, which is undisputedly the representative body of the people of India, has not thought it proper to delete the provision.” Parliament has not amended the law either, it added.

Under the Fedora: Giving Thanks

it’s a time of thanks and I’m thankful that I have most of the mobility and movement back in my thumb after the break, there are a lot of other people who are thanking too.

In Denver the Democrats are thankful that one of the recall target’s decided to play ball rather than fight.

State Sen. Evie Hudak has decided to resign rather than risk facing a recall election that, should she lose, would flip control of the senate to Republicans, FOX31 Denver was first to report Wednesday.

Later Wednesday morning, Hudak made her resignation letter public.

“In the interest of preserving the progress made over the last year, I am resigning as State Senator for District 19, effective immediately,” Hudak wrote.

Under Colorado rules her a Democrat committee will pick her replacement. I’m sure she’s be thankful for the job she will be get for it.

Nationally The Obama Administration also has reasons to be thankful, first of all thankful for the Thanksgiving Holiday to dump the news of their latest delay in the program they are so anxious to run on in 2014

The Obama administration today announced a one year delay of online enrollment for small businesses looking to purchase health coverage through federal Obamacare exchanges, another high-profile setback for HealthCare.gov.

It’s the second delay for online small business enrollment, which the administration had said would begin this month.

Oddly enough this delay puts off the enforcement till after the next election while the Ted Cruz delay would have been before. I’m sure Despite protests to the contrary Harry Reid & Debbie Wasserman Schultz will be very thankful for that.

The White House is certainly thankful for the people who support Obamacare, like the acolytes willing shill at the Thanksgiving Table:

Organizing for America – the Obama grass roots organization – has some helpful hints for those who want to ruin everyone’s Thanksgiving with political talk.

USA Today:

The tips including asking your family and guests coming over for the holiday to bring the information they’d need to sign up for Obamacare, because it’s absolutely not awkward at all to tell someone you’d like him to bring wine and oh, his social security number and annual salary, too. You’re advised to bring up Obamacare during “family time … downtime after meals or between holiday activities.”

Thankful for “nonpartisian” groups willing to give and take a Million to put out ads to support it

Families USA (FUSA) — an organization that describes itself as a “national nonprofit, non-partisan organization dedicated to the achievement of high-quality, affordable health care for all Americans” — was given a $1.1 million grant by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation on October 4, 2013, to gather “success stories” of Americans dealing with Obamacare and distribute them to the media who often refer to them as an “independent” group. This is part of a greater upcoming effort to bolster the perception of the lowly health care law.

“The purpose is to bridge the information gap for people who can significantly benefit from the Affordable Care Act,” Ron Pollack, the Co-founder and Executive Director of Families USA, told TIME on October 25, 2013.

However, the organization is a far cry from “non-partisan” and is extremely close to the Obama Administration and Enroll America – the group leading the efforts to sign people up for Obamacare.

Thankful that AARP is willing to play

AARP understands that without young, healthy Americans signing on in droves the whole thing will come crashing down. So they want moms to do their dirty work, according to the New York Times.

In one cheeky campaign, AARP is urging mothers to send e-cards to their children reminding them to sign up. One e-card reads, “As a reward for signing up for health insurance, I’ll defriend you on Facebook.” Another group, Organizing for Action, is seeking to steer holiday conversations toward health care by encouraging parents to have “the talk” with their adult children. And a Colorado group is promoting an adfeaturing a hapless young man who calls his mother from the golf course: “Yo, Mom, do I got insurance?”

It sure made me grateful that I had the good sense to tear up the cards AARP sent me when I turned 50.

But if there is one Obamacare the White House is most grateful for, it’s that the MSM doesn’t want to bother to report stories like this:

Less than 72 hours ago I posted on the new videos from Project Veritas along with my exclusive interview with Daniel Francisco the Executive Director showing Obamacare shenanigans in Texas

Well it didn’t take long for those caught on videos to become expendable:

The Urban League of Greater Dallas has reportedly fired one person and suspended three others after an undercover video from James O’Keefe’s Project Veritas caught Obamacare “navigators” advising a potential applicant to “lie”and provide false information to get a lower premium and more subsidies.

In a statement Tuesday, the Urban League said it “does not condone, nor would we ever sanction, misleading the public or any individual who seeks our assistance about any issue, and particularly in this case, an issue as critical as health care,” KDFW-TV reports.

Or This:

As a person of the right who would like to see some coverage of this for a change I would push this video with one simple phrase:

“This conversation never happened”

Those words should be repeated over and over again by us, we should also stress that the media has totally bought into this phrase by their unwillingness to cover the story.

and are instead posting stuff like this:

A left-liberal magazine’s publication of an article titled “The Republican War on Competence” would have seemed unremarkable at just about any point in this columnist’s adult lifetime. But this article, by Jeff Shesol for The New Yorker, was published yesterday–with a Democrat in the White House presiding for the 51st day over the most stunning display of governmental incompetence since Prohibition, maybe since Nero. In that context, it’s like a dispatch from a different planet.

I can only conclude that the only difference between the Master Race in fiction and the Reporter race of reality are the faces.

Well in their eyes it’s better than having a president like we used to have who spends his Thanksgiving like this:

Come to the site and check them out, I’m sure you’ll be thankful for it.

Later

Under the Fedora: Meanwhile

I’ve been spending a lot of time on the Ted Cruz Obamacare debate but while that has been the headline there are a lot of things going on that deserve more attention. Such as Babalu Blog post on the murder of Lara Jones:

It makes the dictatorship look good, and more importantly, it helps drive tourism to the island. Tourists like Lara Jones, a British teacher who thought she was vacationing on the Castro regime’s highly touted low-crime island. Instead, this young lady ended up murdered in her Cuban hotel room, and it took the press more than a year to finally report this heinous crime.

Normally the murder of a young lady in an exotic country like Cuba would be something the MSM would swarm over but anything that paints such a country in a bad light isn’t apparently news fit to print.

However there is a movie out about Cuba Una Noche Jay Nordlinger had this to say about it.

In Una Noche, life in Cuba is depicted as nasty, grim, and hopeless. Is it even worse than depicted? Oh, sure, for a great many. I am reminded of The Lives of Others, that masterpiece of a movie, which appeared in 2006. It is about East Germany and the Stasi. When I wrote about the movie, I heard from former East Germans who said, “Life in our country was worse — a lot worse — than what that movie portrays.” I mentioned this to the maker of the film, Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck. He said essentially this: “They’re right. But good luck finding a movie that’s closer to the reality.”

And asks this question:

After the Castros fall, will the media and our cultural elites at large speak honestly about Communist Cuba? Will they speak about Cuba the way our ESPN writer spoke about East Germany? I doubt it. They have too much invested in the myths about Cuba: the glories of its health care, literacy, and racial enlightenment.

Vanessa James is a British lawyer who wrote a column for the Guardian newspaper with the headline, “Formal complaints over sexism should be last resort for women,” which included this:

Vanessa James is a successful lawyer — and that’s a bad thing, says Katie Halper, who writes for a feminist blog.

This is the difference between pragmatism and ideology: Do you want to solve your problem, or do you want to construe every problem to fit political categories and intellectual abstractions?

The Abubakar as-Saddique mosque in Minneapolis has recently been taking actions to combat al-Shabab recruiting of their members. However, this is only coming after they distanced themselves from the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR). Abdirizak Bihi, a Somali-American community leader in Minneapolis, states that while the mosque was affiliated with CAIR it was a center for recruitment by Islamist terrorists.

“All of our kids were going there for years. That’s where indoctrination happened.”

“[The al-Shabaab recruiters] become the father they never had. They engage them. And the way they engage them, is — these angry young men who are left on the street, it’s like, ‘[Americans] don’t like you. They hate you. So we’ll love you.’ In the end, they end up being brainwashed.”

When Mr. Bihi brought the terror recruiting activities to the public, CAIR responded by calling him an Islamophobe, the standard title attached to anyone who dares tell the truth about the actions of Muslim Brotherhood groups and other Islamist factions. There are a lot of Somali refugees that were resettled by the State Department in Minneapolis as the government of Somalia fell to Islamist warlords. While this humanitarian move is to be lauded, problems arose when the community did not assimilate and spread out as new Americans. Instead, they stayed insulated and a perfect target for radicalization and brainwashing by terrorists. According to a Washington Post 2011 profile of Bihi, at least 25 young men disappeared from Minneapolis to fight for Al-Shabab and dozens of others were being investigated for recruiting or fundraising for the terror group.

Defund Obamacare Petition at Freedomworks

This week we saw the US public rise up and stop the war in Syria.

we have the same chance to do the same with Obamacare. Freedom works has a petition for conservatives to contact their congresspeople to defund Obamacare.

The house has the power of the purse, the time has come to use it.

To sigh the petition click here.

Under the Fedora: Credibility

Hi did you miss me?

A lot happened while I was gone but current events in Syria trump everything else.

In terms of the realities on the ground, not much has changed.  The various rebel groups continue to fight Assad.  Hezbollah Syria & Iran’s proxy force in Lebanon has been enlisted to help defend the regime while Hamas and Al Qaeda are fighting with the rebels and attracting swarms of Islamists all over the world to help in the fight.

Meanwhile we are informed that there are some rebels on the side of the angels who are not Islamists and simply want to remove Assad (a very reasonable desire) and some in the government particularly John McCain and Lindsey Graham have been pushing to arm these folks (there may also be reason to believe that attempts to do so might have had something to do with the Benghazi attacks.

Reports of a chemical weapons attack broke in late August.

On Aug 21^st the White House was “deeply concerned”  within a week they went from deeply concerned to “about to attack” and just as quickly to seeking a vote in congress.

Right now the smart money is on the president losing the vote but Michael graham Disagrees:

it won’t be “fence-sitters” who give Obama the “yes” vote he needs. It will be hard-core, partisan liberals. They need Obama to help fight their fights, protect Obamacare, push amnesty, etc.  An Obama who’s humiliated internationally by a Congress that then pays not cost for it (remember, Americans oppose bombing Syria) will have achieved his “fork moment” (as in “stick one in him, he’s done”) three years before the end of his term.

Loyal Democrats won’t let that happen.  

Given that we’ve already seen him try to pretend that he didn’t set a red line concerning Chemical Weapons in Syria it will take more than a congressional vote to make him look strong.

There are legitimate reasons to attack Syria, I’ve listed them but that doesn’t change one thing.

Barack Obama is a weak man in charge of a strong country.  No amount of missiles fired at Syria or boots on the ground when that fails, is going to change this fact nor convince our enemies  who figured this out long ago, otherwise.

If we decide to go to war just so this president can assert his manhood then we deserve the consequences but if the whip counts don’t change there is a chance that they won’t even bring this up for a vote.

One of the oddest things about the entire Syria debate is the sudden decision by part of the left particularly the MSM that war IS the answer. 

The other day, I saw Andrea Mitchell interview Bill Kristol on MSNBC and, if you have any memory at all, you know that Kristol was the Evil Neo-Con Liberals Hated Even More Than Karl Rove during the Bush era. This morning, I woke up early and caught the 4 a.m. replay of Rachel Maddow, and she was so rabidly pro-war you half-expected her to break out into the “Patton” monologue:

I watch MSNBC a lot and I constantly hear that if we don’t strike it will send the wrong message to Iran about our resolve of our country and president to stop their nuclear program.

Of course that whole “resolve” argument would have more teeth if the president didn’t veto Israel planned strike on Iranian nukes last year:

Giora Eiland, a former national security adviser to the Israeli government and a retired Major General in the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), told the Israeli press that Obama “vetoed” the strike, which was planned to take place at the height of the 2012 election cycle.

“Israel has the capability to destroy the Iranian nuclear program” and was prepared to do so, Eiland was quoted as saying in a private meeting earlier this month, according to the Israeli paper Mida.

However, top White House officials “pressured” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to cancel the attack on Iranian nuclear sites, according to Eiland.

“There are many areas where Israel is free to act independently: building in Jerusalem, striking in Gaza, and other areas in our region, where we do not need an approval from the U.S.—even when they do not like it,” Eiland told the Israeli paper, confirming that Netanyahu “was about to give a go-ahead” before being told by the United States to stand down.

“But when it comes to issues that affect the broader American interests, we cannot act contrary to their considerations,” Eiland was quoted as saying.

The record is rather amazing.  The President was against the revolt in Iran against the Mulahs, pro Muslim brotherhood in Egypt, wouldn’t give the order to relieve Benghazi and support hitting Syria now that Islamists are fighting to remove Assad.

I guess when Glenn Reynolds put it “They not anti-war, they’re just on the other side” back during the Iraq war days he wasn’t kidding.

It’s a given with the number of elected officials in the United states that you are bound to hear one of the say something stupid on a regular basis but that woman from Colorado takes the cake

Another Colorado Democrat has stoked the state’s raging gun-control debate by challenging the argument that guns are needed for self-defense.

Colorado House Majority Leader Dickey Lee Hullinghorst said in an interview on YouTube last week that firearms ownership is redundant because the state Legislature keeps citizens safe from harm.

Does that mean if you are an unarmed person in Colorado and are robbed or injured by an attacker you can sue the state?

We found out that the Fix was in during the Bobby Riggs vs Billy Jean King match from my youth.  This had huge cultural significance at the time.  I wonder how many of the people who celebrated that win at time would have spoken up if they knew then what we know now.

Speaking of the Fix Anthony Wiener apparently used a company to create phony supporters.  This actually isn’t as big a deal as it sounds as our friends on the left have been doing this forever.

I still can’t believe the Red Sox are in first place.

I also think it was a mistake for the Pats to release Tim Tebow, now there is no way to distract the media from the Hernandez murder trial.

The 8^th doctor special ran last weekend and it was strictly about the Doctor Who movie.  What a waste of time.  No Paul McGann no Charlie Pollard no Big Finish.

I wonder since Big finish isn’t allowed to mention the 9^th Doctor on if the BBC is restricted from mentioning Big Finish in reverse.

I got to the movies this month and saw “The World’s End”.   I thought it was really funny my wife thought it was hilarious.  If that’s not the sign of a good date movie I’d like to know what is?

I’ve been watching the Drama Broadchurch on BBC America.  I’ve seen up to episode 5 so far and it’s one of the best things on television. 

In theory I could look online to find out who did it as this was broadcast last year but so far I’ve managed to hold off.

One oddity, my son was watching it and noticed how many actors from Doctor Who including 10^th doctor David Tennant and Arthur (Rory Williams) Darvill where there.  There are  quite a few but given the amount of time the show’s been on it would almost be harder to find someone who hasn’t appeared on Doctor Who at some time or other.

Finally my youngest who has had trouble finding work for a while picked up two jobs in a week and is working both while back in college.  On the way back from the bank he was commenting on how much money is deducted from his checks.

The surest way to spot a future conservative voter is to find a teen who notices the amount of money he earns that the government takes from him.

Next week all.

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.

Under the fedora: Repeats

I’m a Big Three stooges fan and being a Stooges fan it means I like repeats, this has been a big week of repeats.

The most obvious repeat has been Anthony Weiner once again being caught with his Pixels down

New York City mayoral candidate Anthony Weiner confirmed the authenticity of new lewd, sexually charged online chats and photos that were posted by a nightlife website over the past day.

Nightlife site “The Dirty” posted images and conversations that allegedly came from Weiner to a 22-year-old woman under the pseudonym “Carlos Danger.”

With his wife by his side, Anthony Weiner said Tuesday he’s not dropping out of the New York City mayoral race despite new revelations that he sent additional lewd photos and text messages after he left Congress in disgrace for his prior online chats.

I think this and his wife’s decision to not only stick with him but to do it in a very public way designed to have the maximum impact on the campaign says a lot of very interesting things.

While according to Mika Brizinski everybody loves Huma Abadin and thinks the world of her I find their whole situation fascinating the daughter of a leader in the Muslim Brotherhood female auxiliary marrying a prominent Jew in 2010 as he is at the peak of his power and influence.

I like Romeo & Juliet as much as the next guy but the Capulets and Montagues have nothing on the Muslim Brotherhood and the Jews

He then crashes HARD and what happens next? Not only does he still maintain financial strength. Not only did people remain on the net defending him, but he manages to get sufficient financial backing to launch a campaign for the highest profile Mayoral position in the United States.

People give money to pols and perspective pols because they either expect a return or they have a fanatical belief in the candidate. I’d be really interested in knowing who backed this guy up.

Or to put it another way,. Was Huma protecting her investment in her investment in her marriage & family or was she protecting the investment of the Muslim brotherhood and or the backers of Anthony Wiener?

It’s not a comfortable question but it’s not an unfair one either.

There is also the offer of a position at Politico, we’re talking about repeats, I’d really like to know if Anthony Weiner in particular or more importantly if Liberal Democrats in general have hiring privileges at Politico at even an advisory level.

That is one repeat that would be critical to discover.

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A second repeat took place this week in New Hampshire. James O’Keefe of project Veritas spoke at an Event in Nashua. You might remember he had some issues with the NH AG over his sting revealing how easy it is to vote the dead in NH.

Well in his return he laid down the gauntlet:

“I’m going to come to the 2016 presidential primary here in NH. And I’m going to expose the fact that I can be voting the names of dead people AGAIN.“

Here is the video:

Breitbart said “Bring it on” O’Keefe does the same

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A third repeat took place for myself. I guest hosted on Conservatively speaking on WCRN and did two hours there. It was a good time and a good show, it proves you can go home again

I also had the repeat appearance of Mike Hummell the former Hostess baker on my regular show talking the return of Twinkies.

The fifth repeat comes from England as the story of the Royal family continues with the birth of a new heir to the throne. The crowds have come the cheers have come and the circle of life continues. A few hundred years ago the birth of a new king would have huge political implications for the world, now it’s a media event. Not all things repeat in the same way

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In Rio yet another repeat, the Catholic World youth day has come again and the New Pope has been greeted with adoring overwhelming crowds.

Fr. Longenecker said this about it

Surrounded by throngs of young people I realized that this faith–ever ancient and ever young was suddenly alive to me and true to me as never before.

What other institution, what other political party, what other ideology, what other celebrity, what other religion can marshall such crowds and inspire such joy, freedom and power? No wonder the powers of this world hate and fear the pope. No wonder Catholicism is the one religion–despite all its human faults and frailties–that remains at once ancient and wise yet youthful and strong. Only the power of the Holy Spirit himself could pour out on the world this great surge of faith, love and hope.

The Mass the pope celebrates in Rio and the creed and prayers celebrated there are repeated in every house of every day . The faith remains new and old forever.

There was also an explosive device left at the shrine before the Pope arrived some repeats are not good ones

As it is summer TV is full of repeats, although the episodes of the Drama 666 park avenue were new or at least unaired. Because of the cancellation of the show the last episode or two were re-written to give the show closure.

I didn’t like the ending, it seemed contrived but given the circumstances what else could it be, but it is consistent with the possibility of bringing the series back at some future time.

The Big Bang theory is in repeats too, they however are just as funny as the last time around.

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There are repeats at the movies too. Red 2 is out and Monsters University as well there is also the story of repeated failure in some box office blockbusters.

People make a fuss about this but there are always summer movies like this that crash and burn big time. It’s not a surprising repeat.

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The most important repeat of the week however took place in the House chambers on Thursday when the investigation of the IRS scandal was connected for the first time to the White House.

The IRS scandal was connected this week not just to the Washington office—that had been established—but to the office of the chief counsel.

That is a bombshell—such a big one

As I watch the White House spin and the media duck this story I’m reminded of the Nixon white House as the train of Watergate chugged along slowly toward it’s finish. Even the impromptu press appearance of the president on Trayvon Martin was yet another repeat, an attempt to change the subject from anything but what is going on.

Still, what landed was a bombshell. And Democrats know it. Which is why they are so desperate to make the investigation go away. They know, as Republicans do, that the chief counsel of the IRS is one of only two Obama political appointees in the entire agency.

And of course Al Sharpton and Jessie Jackson’s race baiting and the smallness of their crowds, that’s a repeat too.

Detroit going under, now that’s new

There is one repeat involved however. Detroit got where it did by repeatedly following the liberal economic tax and borrow model for 50 years.

And the repeat will become apparent when other liberal bastions unencumbers by GOP conservative voting blocks follow that same path

This column will repeat in a week. See you then.

Under the Fedora: All Trayvon all the Time

George Zimmerman has been found not guilty and the left is delighted.

I know I know you are seeing outrage, violence and many people beating their breasts, but believe me it is the dream result for the left and the Obama Administration.

If the verdict had been guilty what would the left use to justify more gun laws? To attempt to remove stop and frisk? How else would they be able to pretend that white on black violence is the greatest threat to young black men as opposed to other young black men?

As they say at the American Thinker

We are forever being told by the left about how awful this country is for anyone who is not white. Blacks are being gunned down in the streets by non-blacks. Except they’re not. Muslims are being discriminated against wholesale, and are afraid to leave their homes. Except they’re not. Gun owners are violent crazies bent on mass murder, except they’re not. Christians are trying to force their religion on us. Except they’re not. Tea Party members are racists and violent. I believe the Breitbart reward for evidence of the accusations of tea party racism remains unclaimed, even in this day of cell phone cameras and video.

The narrative is all and if you have to turn George Zimmerman into a “crazy ass cracker” then so be it.

The Irony of course that George Zimmerman’s while being as white as Barack Obama also has a black grandparent. If he had been elected in 2004 he would be celebrated by the same people who want his blood as the first black president.

Let’ s not also forget there is a 2^nd advantage for the left here. In addition to the things the left is talking about, there are also the things that are not being talked about. The Economy, Syria, Egypt, Iran, the Economy, the Obama scandals…

Eventually of course the Zimmerman stuff will fade and the media will need to find another reason to not talk about the president’s performance in office.

I don’t see why the administration keeps worrying about that. Four years of Obama didn’t cause the public to turn against him in 2012 and he’s not running again.

One aspect of the Trayvon Martin story that is getting absolutely no press are the details as to why he was hundreds of miles from home on what would normally be a school day.

You never know the answer to a question you never ask, and after this one story by Frances Robles in the Miami Herald, it seems that the media stopped asking questions about Trayvon. But that one article by Frances Robles pulled the thread that unraveled an important story, and for a long time, the only people who kept digging on that story were the bloggers at The Last Refuge.

MDSPD Chief Charles Hurley was suppressing the truth about the crime problem within the Miami-Dade school system, and this was why Trayvon Martin never got arrested for his crimes. Instead, he got suspended from school,

And that is why Trayvon Martin was hundreds of miles from home and on his path to George Zimmerman, and way Stacy McCain was mentioned twice in two days on the Rush Limbaugh Show.

There was testimony on the IRS scandal this week. It linked the White House to the IRS scandal. I wonder if anyone in the MSM is going to bother with it or if the trayvon noise will still be too loud?

Sorry that’s not true, I don’t wonder at all.

North Korea have been caught trying to smuggle weapons through the Panama Canal.

Some things simply never change.

It’s considered a given that a CEO and labor are meant to be at people’s throats, this isn’t the case at Market Basket a Supermarket chain in New England where Arthur T Demoulas a multi Millionare owner and CEO faces ejection from the 9 person board.

Mr. Demoulas potential ejection has mobilized workers throughout the 72 store company to appear at the location of the vote to show support for their owner.

How many companies would absolutely KILL for that kind of loyalty from their non union staff?

Ok this might sound slightly sexist, but I was watching, A Few Good Men Recently. It’s a great movie but what I really noticed was just how attractive Demi Moore was in that picture. Not once in the movie is she wearing anything even slightly revealing yet she was simply strikingly beautiful, something I never really noticed before.

That is the true measure of beauty. Sort of like my wife 1st thing in the morning, best morning face in the world.

I find my self noticing this stuff a lot lately, I’m guessing it has something to do with turning 50.

Speaking of Movies I caught two conservative pictures this week. I finally saw Hating Breitbart on DVD. It was very weird to see events I was at, it was even weirder to seen Andrew in places where I hadn’t seen him before.

I wish I knew him better, he always treated me very nice, one odd thing, I don’t see why I got a credit in the movie, the two views of me were in passing and none of my footage was used.

I also saw Monsters University, this time with the entire family. This was one of the best written animated movies I ever saw and (minor spoiler) the decision to use the old technology from the first picture and then switch to modern technology.

This movie simply oozed conservative values and themes, I’m shocked Hollywood allowed it to come out.

Some sports. The AL won the All Star Game 3-0 but the big story was the last All Star Appearance (barring another comeback) of Mariano Rivera, objectively the best closer of all time and it’s not even close.

Red Sox fans have a soft spot for Rivera because they were able to beat him twice on the way to the World Series but players like Rivera & Jeter and Posada have always been a struggle for Red Sox fans who are torn between the instinctive hatred of the Yankees and respect for players of great skill who play the game the right way.

I’m going to miss Rivera when he’s gone, except in the 9^th inning of any game the Yankees lead the Sox by 3 runs or less.

I talked about the sixth Doctor special in my last piece and re-watching it I noticed one thing that was missing from that special that was in every other.

David Tennant

The 10^th Doctor had appeared in every other Doctor Who special but the 6^th doctor, Nah.

I wonder if he’s skip the seventh doctor’s special too.

Speaking of Sylvester McCoy the 7^th doctor his plays the wizard Ragagast in the new Peter Jackson trilogy the Hobbit.

Jackson’s 2^nd movie looks great but he’s taking a lot of liberties with the book, given it’s a short book you have to stretch it with three movies but there are things that shouldn’t be hard to keep.lays the wizard Ragagast in the new Peter Jackson trillogy one thing that was missing from that special that was in

Finally while the Zimmerman case continues to dominate the news some extraordinary things have been happening. Including Pope Francis being named man of the year by …Vanity Fair Italy.

Slowly but surely this Pope is setting up the background noise. He is the ultimate in the shrewd as serpents and simple as doves field.

But as the Pope, he oughta be

See ya next week.

Under the Fedora: Zimmerman, Egypt & More

For the mainstream media there is no story more critical than the George Zimmerman trial

In one regard it’s no surprise. Anything that can provide 24 hour cable networks with a steady stream of content is of value. The MSM’s obsession with the case and the continuous coverage has been dangerous to their credibility. For a year the people have been told by them that George Zimmerman was a murderer who killed Travon Martin and walked because of race, unfortunately for them the state of Florida’s case has been so weak that their own people can’t see how Mr. Zimmerman can be convicted. Even more amazingly they’ve been saying this prior to the defense presenting its case.

If there is any consolation for the left, the probable acquittal of Mr. Zimmerman can and will be used as a political football in 2014 in the same way that the case itself was used to help re-elect Barack Obama in 2012

One thought. George Zimmerman’s parents are Robert Zimmerman and Gladys Mesa.

I submit that if George’s parents had been Robert Mesa and Gladys Zimmerman and if he looked more like his mother than his father, the media and the race hustlers would not have made a peep and the case would not have progressed beyond the initial police investigation.

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There was an interesting moment on Morning Joe this week where both Elliot Spitzer, the former NY governor who was hiring hookers and Anthony Weiner who was tweeting out his junk to young women appeared for interview on the same day concerning their campaigns in NYC for Comptroller and Mayor receptively.

Mika Brizenski was raising the question of how New Yorkers, particularly women could vote for either man given what they had done but the answer to that question didn’t come from the interviews, it came from what might be considered a throw away segment on the very same show.

With the news that Governor Rick Perry is not running for a 4^th term in Texas and is obviously (although he has not announced it) running for president in 2016 A segment comically hitting Texas’ governor was aired.

That’s really says it all. Rick Perry failures on the campaign trail were pretty much of style and may have been induced by the medication from an operation, while Spitzer’s & Weiner’s failures were of character, honesty and in Spitzer’s case law. Yet who is openly mocked?

I submit that if Governor of Texas who has, during one of the worst financial times in the last 100 years, made his state a success choose to run for either of the Comptroller or Mayor of NY his chances of winning the votes of the people of New York in General and Mika in particular over Spitzer & Weiner would be less that winning the Powerball jackpot with the purchase of a single ticket.

As any person who watched voters in Massachusetts return Gary Studds repeatedly to congress after his issues with 17 year old male congressional pages let me tell you this. One a location becomes left leaning enough, it reaches a point where nothing a liberal can do will make them less acceptable as a candidate for office than a conservative, nothing!

Mickey Kaus doesn’t trust John Boehner when he says he will not bring the Senate immigration bill up for a vote in the House. I share his distrust. The only way to assure he doesn’t give in to the left and the large moneyed interests who want cheap labor pressuring the leadership of the GOP on this issue is for votes to express themselves loudly through 2014.

The 2^nd Egyptian Revolution has been most clarifying in many ways. It established, for example the willingness of the media to side with Islamists when the chips are down, but the thing that has been the most dramatic has been how it has proven Michael Totten’s 2005 prediction correct:

“I’ve had this theory for a while now,” I said. “It looks like some, if not most, Middle East countries are going to have to live under an Islamic state for a while and get it out of their system.”

Big Pharaoh laughed grimly.

“Sorry,” I said. “That’s just how it looks.”

Lucky for Egypt they got it out of their system faster than most, even more lucky for them unlike Iran the military had not been compromised to the degree that they were willing to stop the people.

In Turkey removing islamists is proving a whole lot harder. That Islamist leader was a lot more deliberate in his actions.

I wonder if the Hillary 2016 campaign is adding Egypt to her resume as secretary of state to go along with Russia, Syria and Libya?

One of the characteristics of Arab democracy, Islamic or no , has been danger to the Christian community. Christians have been fleeing for their lives in droves. This has produced an interesting side effect in Israel, Christian Arabs openly and proudly joining the Israeli defense forces:

Khaloul said that until now, many in the community had been too afraid to speak out, but that was going to change. Many are now even referring to themselves openly as “Israeli Christians.”

Ali, an organizer for the forum, noted that local Arabs see what is happening across the Middle East and realize that Israel is the only place in the region where Christians can feel safe and belong. “That’s why more and more of us are realizing that there is no other country here that is worth fighting for,” he added.

Arab Christians have resisted siding with Israel for three generations. It really speaks to the current crop of Islamists that they could produce such a result.

A little culture? Have you heard the latest trend in “empowering women” Taking group shots naked.

Designed to empower women, they are used to celebrate everything from upcoming nuptials to milestone 30th and 40th birthdays, with professional shutterbugs like Catherine Leonard — who shot Richards and her pal Amy Blair’s joint bachelorette bash in Manhattan last month — capturing the spirit of friendship with carefree portraits celebrating the female form.

Because nothing empowers you as something other than a sex object than a group photo naked that men will stare at.

I’m telling you right now, guys we won the sexual revolution, hands down.

The Doctor Who 6^th Doctor special was on last week. All during it I got the feeling those appearing were apologizing for the series without much to say good about it. That’s not a surprise as this was the era that began the path to decline and cancellation

Considering that the series was cancelled during the 7^th doctor’s run and the 8^th doctor only had the movie, the next two special should be interesting, unless they bring in the Big Finish Audios.

Sports: In Baseball the Red Sox continue to not only win but as of this writing the Sox have the best record in baseball.

If anyone had predicted this in April they would have been called out of their minds. That’s the great thing about baseball 162 games really fleshes out reality from prognostication.

I’ll wager nobody was betting on a Brit winning Wimbledon either.

Finally The Lone Ranger has turned into yet another summer Box office bust as even Johnny Depp could not draw people to see it. The Atlantic while not meaning to provides a clue as to why:

It comes across like a Western as told by Howard Zinn

And while the world according to Howard Zinn might be attractive to Hollywood sensibilities it just isn’t attractive to the folks who actually pay to see this, the Atlantic again:

You can learn a lot about a film’s values from examining the motivations of its villains, and you can learn a lot about a society–or at least what Hollywood thinks society want to hear–when it produces three mainstream movies in a few months that gives its villains the exact same motivation.

Actually you can’t tell anything about what Hollywood thinks society wants to hear, but you can tell a lot about what Hollywood wants people to think.

Later all.