Who Does Your Shopping For You?

Imagine if the government decided that it was going to buy all of your
groceries for you. This is to make sure that everyone gets the amount of
food that government decides you need. It's to make sure that nobody does
without, regardless of their income. Such a noble, compassionate idea, and
only the cold-hearted rich could oppose such an idea.
But wait. In this program, just to make sure that everyone got groceries of
equal quality and freshness and nutritional value, the government will pick
out the fruit and vegetables, as well as the brand of cereal and milk, and
the size of the eggs. They'll even decide whether you get jumbo,
farm-raised, free range, etc. In short, as a part of that program, Uncle Sam
will make all of those decisions for you. And if anyone else tries to sell
you groceries, Uncle Sam will use the power of Congress to make sure that
those questionable grocers obey every regulation that can be squeezed into a
two thousand page document. You'll be able to use any grocer that you want,
but rest assured that your grocer won't sell anything that Uncle Sam doesn't
approve, or charge less for your groceries than Uncle Sam charges. If the
private grocer steps out of line, don't worry. Uncle Sam will take care of
them. Oh, and don't be foolish enough try to stay out Uncle Sam's grocery
plan. Because if you don't go with someone's plan, you could actually get
fined more than the price of a years' worth of groceries. Never mind that
Uncle Sam doesn't have the legal right (which by law MUST be specified in
the Constitution) to require you to subscribe to a grocery plan, they're
going to do it anyway.
This is obviously ridiculous. Nobody would allow the government (which
couldn't run a grocery store), to pick out their groceries for them, nor
would they want the government to put smaller, more efficient, less
expensive grocery stores out of business. I mean, when was the last time the
government ran a business better than the private sector?

The Executive Czar

I used to think that 'our friends on the left' just had a different idea of
how best to take our country into the future, and in fact, in the eighties,
I think they did. Oh, they were desperately wrong even then, but we all
lived in the same country, and we all believed that the bedrocks of our
country, the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, were
important and inviolable. They meant something, and even though we disagreed
on how best to support and defend the Constitution, we all loved and
respected it. Those were the good old days.
Now we have an administration that treats the Constitution like an old
novel. Quaint, interesting. Certainly worthy of study, (Mister Obama did
study constitutional law), but not really practical. Not relevant. Maybe
they think it's due a reboot. Witness the plague of un-elected, un-confirmed
and un-answerable czars that Mister Obama has visited upon us. They are now
dictating how companies can compensate executives. While I understand that
since the government is in the business of bailing out (swallowing up, or
'Chavezing') private businesses, the case could be made for dictating how
they spend the investor's money. Except that the czar making the decision
was not elected by the taxpayers who actually supplied the money. Nor was he
confirmed by the senate. So we have a crony. A bit of an appointed cossack
who decides how much someone in a now state-run business can be compensated.
I suppose when you put it like that, well, it doesn't necessarily sound
better, but at least it sounds familiar. It almost makes sense. If you're in
the Kremlin, and your last name is Putin. Or Stalin.
But that's just the start. Next, Mister Obama is going to grant himself the
power to break up large companies that he deems are 'too powerful'. See,
that line about governments "deriving their just powers from the consent of
the governed", well, that was okay for the Founding Fathers, (just like the
Second Ammendment might have meant something back then, but not now), but
hey, this is the 21st century. Fortunately, we seem to have a 'progressive'
executive czar who seems to derive his power from the just consent of...
himself.
Mister executive czar Obama may belong to the same esteemed club as Al Gore,
Jimmy Carter and Yasser Arafat, but the difference is that they are either
dead or irrelevant. Mister Obama still has a few years to warp the country
to his 'progressive' model.

Go Ask Harry!

Just a little note. The same 'man' who complained about sweaty tourists stinking up the capital (uh, Harry, you actually work for those people, by the way) was asked about Afghanistan, and angrily and dismissively told the reporter to "Ask Tiger Woods". Mister Reid, your attitude is elitist and ill-mannered, and inconsistent with the behavior of someone who wants to keep his job. But please, don't change on my account. I'm sure you'll do fine in whatever your next job is.

More Derailments on the Hope and Change Express

One of the moments I've been waiting for since Barack Hussein Obama was appointed... I mean, elected, (Well, not really. Ballots were never counted at the Democratic National Convention) has finally arrived, and he did not disappoint. With two wars on, there just had to come a point when the Commander in Chief would have to pretend that he represents the interests of the entire country. He would be forced to give the impression of being tough on the war front to satisfy anyone with a lick of common sense while properly serving the political bosses responsible for getting him appointed... er, elected. And he bobbled it like a master. But then I suppose that something like that is bound to happen when you make decisions beyond your pay grade without a teleprompter. I'm not talking about the 30,000 versus 40,000 debate. That is a decision, that while a mistake in my opinion, could be considered an honest difference in judgement. What I'm talking about is the month that he spent dithering about it, and then the naive, senseless and dangerous time table of 18 months, as well as the vow not to win, but rather to end the war. Tell me, Mister Obama, will we see you posing in front of a "Mission Accomplished" sign in your reelection campaign spots? Or is that timing just a coincidence? Nobody, not even his liberal overseers are willing to publicly endorse the foolish notion of an arbritary time table. Chris Matthews... yes, Chris Matthews even questioned it. Chris Matthews, who seems to get a shiver down his leg everytime Obama enters the conversation. It's almost like someone having the sense and courage to walk out on a deranged, racist preacher rather than sit listening obediantly for twenty years, until election time comes up. This was the moment I knew had to get here, and while I am pleased to see Mister Obama show his incompetence, I fear for us. He has four years to do incalculable damage to the country and the world, and Ronald Reagan is, sadly, no longer available to rescue us.