Do You Want Fries With That?

Isn’t their new slogan “I’m Luvin’ It”?

A Los Angeles woman was arrested after she offered sexual favors in exchange for chicken McNuggets, Burbank police said.

The Costa Hubris

I’m still just amazed by this shipwreck. It seems the Captain was “showboating”, they still seem not really sure about how many people are missing, there was a lot of chaos on the evacuation…it goes on and on.

Imagine the toll had they been actually out at sea.

I Think I Gained Five Pounds This Weekend

And a fair portion of that was probably in my liver…but any time you get a chance to break bread and open bottles with Suzette and Fausta and Jim and Gregor well, hell, you don’t even hesitate.

There’s no finer, more satisfying way to celebrate the gifts we have in this life than with good friends.

Question of the Day: So Huntsman’s Quitting and Gonna Endorse Mittens

Will we need a Mandarin to English Babelfish page for that, or will the voluble former ambassador be able to resist the irresistable pull of one last shot at “how they’d say it back in Guangxi Zhuang“?

It Has Nothing to Do With a “Natural Fit” or Being On the “Democratic Plantation”

They all really just want to know where Debbie gets that amazing hair done.

DNC Chairwoman Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (FL) appeared on the season premiere of HBO’s “Real Time” with host Bill Maher this Friday.

In the Overtime portion of the show, which is broadcasted and available only on the internet, Wasserman Schultz got into race politics, claiming the Democratic Party is the “natural home” for minorities.

“Just look at the chamber at the State of the Union. Look at the side of the chamber that the Democrats sit on and the side of the chamber that Republicans sit on. And you can notice a dramatic difference in who chooses to affiliate as Democrats and who chooses to affiliate as Republicans. The diversity in the Democratic Party is remarkable. We truly are the big tent party.”

[break]

“There is a reason that the Democratic Party is far more diverse than the Republican Party, because the natural home, politically on major issues to Hispanics, to women, to Jews, to Asian-Americans, the diverse spectrum — to African Americans.”

“The entire spectrum of diversity is comfortable in the Democratic Party because we stand up for the issues that matter to those communities and Republicans shun them.“

Yes, we do. You sure got us pegged, girlfriend.

I wish we had a tag for “despicable”…or “icky”. We should have “stupid”, but it would be so overused already ~ schmaybe we could call it “Honore” and we’d all be in on the joke.

Depends What Your Definition of “Desecration” Is

A comment on another blog considering the Marines tinkling on turbans got me pondering.

Didn’t the Commander-in-Chief himself condone and direct the desecration of Osama Bin Laden’s vile bones by consigning him to the briny deep, vice 6 feet under terra firma?

Well, didn’t he?

We’re From The UN…

And we’re here to help

Compelling new scientific evidence suggests United Nations peacekeepers have carried a virulent strain of cholera — a super bug — into the Western Hemisphere for the first time.

The vicious form of cholera has already killed 7,000 people in Haiti, where it surfaced in a remote village in October 2010. Leading researchers from Harvard Medical School and elsewhere told ABC News that, despite UN denials, there is now a mountain of evidence suggesting the strain originated in Nepal, and was carried to Haiti by Nepalese soldiers who came to Haiti to serve as UN peacekeepers after the earthquake that ravaged the country on Jan. 12, 2010 — two years ago today. Haiti had never seen a case of cholera until the arrival of the peacekeepers, who allegedly failed to maintain sanitary conditions at their base.

Over 500,000 people have since been infected by this strain.

7,000 dead.

Compare the press that this story has gotten with the story of four Marines relieving themselves on some dead terrorists.

RIP Al

He spent his 19th birthday in a foxhole in the Ardennes.

One week later the Battle of the Bulge began.

This afternoon I had the honor of singing at his memorial service.

He was the sweetest guy you’d ever want to meet.

Rest In Peace, Al, and thank you so much.

I Get the M-W “Word of the Day” Emails Every Day and Oddly Enough

…today’s is:

crucible \KROO-suh-bul\
DEFINITION
noun

1: a vessel in which metals or other substances are heated to a very high temperature or melted

2: a severe test

3: a place or situation in which concentrated forces interact to cause or influence change or development

Tebow’s playing the Golden Boy this afternoon, right?

Just wondering…

Speaking of “Piss Poor” Judgement

…Obama’s mouthpieces at PBS could use a lesson in what constitutes a truly “stunning scene” and “damning image”. (And check the tags under the video.)

Four Marines juvenilely tinkling on dead savages barely rises to public indecency.

Watch Taliban: Marines Video Shameful, Inhumane, but Won’t Hamper Peace Efforts on PBS. See more from PBS NewsHour.

JUDY WOODRUFF: The U.S. military faced a new firestorm of criticism today over stunning scenes of American troops and enemy dead in Afghanistan. They raced across the Internet and around the world, triggering condemnations and investigations.

A single still photo captured the damning image purportedly showing four U.S. Marines urinating on three bodies. The video, too graphic to air here, was posted on YouTube. The posting said the bodies were Taliban fighters and the troops belonged to a scout sniper team with 3rd Battalion, 2nd Marine Division out of Camp Lejeune in North Carolina.

Astonishingly enough, the two comments under the piece are incredulous at the outraged hue and cry.

ths adds: For the record, I think it was moronic of these goobers to do, less mind video it and up load the damn thing, especially now that they’ve identified two of them as Sgts. NCO’s should know better, but life has a way of handing you brainfarts. That being said, going after them like war criminals is moronic and there is no excuse for the rhetoric. NO one should be talking about prison time in conjunction with this, but it’s mentioned in every single report on it! I sure would love to hear that from any of the same mouths when the Taliban plays their childish game of “heads will roll”.

More: Well, EXACTLY.

I have sat back and assessed the incident with the video of our Marines urinating on Taliban corpses. I do not recall any self-righteous indignation when our Delta snipers Shugart and Gordon had their bodies dragged through Mogadishu. Neither do I recall media outrage and condemnation of our Blackwater security contractors being killed, their bodies burned, and hung from a bridge in Fallujah.

All these over-emotional pundits and armchair quarterbacks need to chill. Does anyone remember the two Soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division who were beheaded and gutted in Iraq?

The Marines were wrong. Give them a maximum punishment under field grade level Article 15 (non-judicial punishment), place a General Officer level letter of reprimand in their personnel file, and have them in full dress uniform stand before their Battalion, each personally apologize to God, Country, and Corps videotaped and conclude by singing the full US Marine Corps Hymn without a teleprompter.

As for everyone else, unless you have been shot at by the Taliban, shut your mouth, war is hell.

~ Col. Allen West, ladies and germs.

Quote of the Day

Via Pater Familia, The Grinch during our daily morning phone call:

“Well, they [the Marines] sure used piss poor judgement!“

Ebola Versus The Ronulans Part I

As much as I want to harp on multiple points outside of Foreign Policy, I’ll stick directly to what he’s actually said repeatedly strictly concerning foreign policy. I will analyze the initial individual policy and its subsequent impacts on (A) foreign relations/diplomacy, (B) trade, (C) logistics of military operations, (D) military operations and the continued ability towage force projected kinetic conventional and unconventional warfare in foreign and domestic defense of the United States, its territories, allies and assets.I will also investigate the historical fallaciousness Doctor Paul uses to legitimize his foreign policy decisions (ETC).

Ron Paul’s Foreign Policy thesis points:

I) Remove ALL troops from overseas. See also concerning historical accuracy of the overseas bases being the sole catalyst for Muslim terror operations.
REF: Here

III) (cont.) “If anybody dared touch us we could wipe any country off of theface of the earth within hours. And here we are, so intimidated and so insecure and we’re acting like such bullies that we have to attack third-world nations that have no military and have no weapon.”

IV) Illegality of conflicts outside of declared war hither to Constitutionality and his record on voting concerning “Unconstitutional” conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq.
REF: Here|| Attn: Sept 14, 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force, AKA PUBLIC LAW 107–40 which passed Congress as a whole Sept 18th, 2001.

I) Doctor Paul has repeatedly said his first order of business in office, through executive powers will be to recall all troops from overseas. Closing all bases and additional quotes:

(I-a) “All those troops would spend their money here at home. And besides those troops overseas aggravate our enemies, motivate our enemies. I think it’s adanger to our national defense and we can save a lot of money cutting out the military expenditures that contribute nothing to our defense.”
Here
(I-b) “..We have 12,000 diplomats, I’m suggesting that maybe we ought to use some of them. But just think of how we prevented a nuclear war with the Soviets when the Soviet missiles were put in Cuba. We didn’t say we’re going to attack you, Kennedy and Khrushchev talked and they made a deal: “You take your weapons out of Cuba, we’ll take them out of Turkey”. That’s the kind of talk that I want. I think the greatest danger now is for us to overreact, and this is what I’m fearful of. Iran doesn’t have a bomb, there’s no proof, there’s no new information, regardless of this recent report. And for us to overreact and talk about bombing Iran, that’s much more dangerous. We got the Libyans to get rid of their nuclear power and their nuclear weapons, and look at what happened to them. So we got to understand that…”
Here

These two statements show both a complete misunderstanding of history, economics, as well as strategic and tactical asset with their combined logistics.

Foreign relations/Diplomacy: The US currently has military accords and agreements with an amazing assortment of countries to the point that we do not have the space to list them so I’ll use specific examples and broaden as our discourse continues.

Imagine, if you will, that the US abruptly within 90 days of an executive order(the necessary time before Congress can act, provided it is issued properly) severs all military alliances, accords and agreements with its allies and trade/military partners as Ron Paul has repeatedly announced he will do. 12,000 diplomats do no good if the US breaks its word to hundreds of countries, never mind all at once. The impact here should be blatantly obvious, but I’ll illuminate further on it shortly.

Trade: With the dissipation of Status of Forces agreements with key regional allies, for this example we will use South Korea, Japan, Australia and European Union member states. Our trade with South Korea alone is projected at $10.1b for FY2010 additional GDP for the US, so let us assume thisis the mean amount for these four adding to a grand total of $40.4b additional GDP for the US. Far below the reality though enough to make a point for this argument. We can assume that there will be immediate non-military repercussions from our allies for failing to uphold our end of the bargain. There is no way to guestimate, but it would be irrational not to think that our once-allies would react quickly where trade is concerned and cut ties as well as free trade agreements as there would be little other way to react. However, even were they to maintain some semblance of the trade status quo, we haven’t accounted for the repercussions of removing our ability to protect trade militarily.

Logistics of Military Operations: This portion needs to be said in order to understand the direct impact on US military capability to project and conduct kinetic operations (blow shit up, bang bang, I realize a lot of people don’t get this term as it has recently popped up to more politely explain we’re killing people directly with conventional weapons).

The US military is limited by its logistic resupply capability, meaning that we are essentially dependent on hundreds of camps, stations, air fields, ports and War Reserve Stocks(WRS) around the world in order to project deadly force. By this I mean that in order to conduct effective missions against both insurgent activity and conventional forces (IE China, Russia). We do not have any platform, short of thermonuclear tipped Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs) that can strike targets reliably,much less in mass, without refueling and rearmament necessity not to mention forward operating maintenance. With a 90day limit before Congress can intervene concerning “President” Paul’s issued executive order the military will lose the majority of its assets in any local theater of operations. This is at the cost of trillions $US as the military will be forced to abandon gear on short notice and transport hundreds of thousands of troops through civilian means as military transport assets will bealmost assuredly locked up in transporting equipment rather than key personnel.

Military Operations: Assume now that the military is now inside of the Continental United States (CONUS). Our only military assets abroad are now strictly submarines, which we’ll cover later. We’ve established that short of ICBMs we’ve no way of responding militarily to any threat to ourselves outside of CONUS and its surrounding waters. More importantly we have no way to defend our allies in strategically important theaters of war.

Within five years, rest assured that South Korea will be annihilated by North Korea backed by China/Russia. We will likely also lose Taiwan and Japan to China within five years of the last US boot leaving foreign soil in the region.Chinese predation through the region, already increasing (I-c: below) as our military capabilities diminish under the current administration in the region, will continue to increase throughout the South Pacific. Given the event of conflict with China we can assume the loss of ALL trade from the West due to the ease of Chinese or even Russian interdiction on trade routes. We won’t be able to stop them concerning this as we’ll have absolutely no method of projecting firepower with our logistical supply line being non-existent past the Aleutian Straits in the North Pacific (NORPAC), the Hawaiian Islands in the Central Pacific with the South Pacific belonging almost uncontested to whoever wished to claim it. Guam as well as our other South Asian island chain territories will be cut off with absolutely no effort on the part of enemy conventional forces.

As for Europe keep in mind the Georgian–Ossetian conflict of 2008. Also recall that the EU’s military forces are almost solely dependent on the US for mass transport and “rapid” response to conflicts as well as the fact that Europe is almost completely dependent upon Russia for natural fuels. Now, the Georgian conflict came to a rapid conclusion because the Russians were flexing their muscle but we responded by rounding up military assets. Without US presence in the region do you seriously think for a second that Russia, especially given its current socio-economic issues, would hesitate for a moment to make a power grab against a neutered Western Europe?

Finally our lack of military assets concerning non-conventional forces: Ignore the early concept of direct conventional power grabs by Russia, China or anyother would-be world power in this rapid power paradigm shift thanks to Ron Pauls’ policy of military isolationism. Piracy, as evidenced with the increased last few years of piracy along the Somali coast, is already on the rise. Currently it is requiring a coalition force to even limit its already considerable effect. With our military essentially landlocked for all pertinent purposes we will no longer be able to stop nonconventional predation on US trade fleets, something that hasn’t happened since a decade after this great nation’s inception to the world stage. That means that “indigenous insurgent” Somalitype forces could feed on our tradeships along with essentially state sponsored profiteering of larger states. This alone, ignoring a direct military move against the US, would cripple the economy beyond repair in short order.

Further REF for Section I:
1-c) http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/jan/10/navy-readies-for-chinese-power-grab-on-shipping/?utm_source=RSS_Feed&utm_medium=RSS
1-d) http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2007/11/europes-strategic-dependence-on-russian-energy

Fallacies and Word Play: Doctor Paul has made a number of unfortunate remarks to back his isolating the US and hamstringing the effectivenessof the Armed Services.

“All those troops would spend their money here at home. And besides those troops overseas aggravate our enemies, motivate our enemies. I think it’s adanger to our national defense and we can save a lot of money cutting out themilitary expenditures that contribute nothing to our defense.”

While no one would argue that if we could magically transport all our gear, goods and personnel back to CONUS in all brand new or revitalized bases to house said assets it would save money …the undertaking of such an effort IRL would be so costly even in a surplus economy that it would nearly be economically unfeasible. His assertion that the troops would be home spending money isn’t incorrect as much as it purposely ignores that the vast majority ofthose troops would be discharged due to the lack of housing these Brigades, Wings,etc. The amount of money required to revitalize and expand current bases, purchase old bases and revitalize them as well as build new bases to house the amountof troops, supplies, ordinance and tactical assets makes maintaining the current military numbers completely infeasible. That is even ignoring the costof bringing them home instead of the far lesser annual cost of maintaining existing offshore assets. This means that Paul is suggesting adding hundreds of thousands of veterans to an already dismal jobs market, raising unemployed numbers and likely costing more as troops cash in on their Post-9/11 and Montgomery GI bills in order to keep themselves and their families fed for at least a short while. There could not be worse doublespeak or economic naiveté than this statement displays. It’s all pretty until you actually start realizing the legitimate numbers involved. If you’d like I can easily do some gross estimates backed by current statistics.

As for a danger to our national defense, I think just the initial A-D of Section I readily displays what the true danger to national defense is: This policy.

Next: “..We have 12,000 diplomats, I’m suggesting that maybe we ought to use some of them. But just think of how we prevented a nuclear war with the Soviets when the Soviet missiles were put in Cuba. We didn’t say we’re going to attack you, Kennedy and Khrushchev talked and they made a deal: “You take your weapons out of Cuba, we’ll take them out of Turkey”. That’s the kind of talk that I want. I think the greatest danger now is for us to overreact, and this is what I’m fearful of. Iran doesn’t have a bomb, there’s no proof, there’s no new information, regardless of this recent report. And for us to overreact and talkabout bombing Iran, that’s much more dangerous. We got the Libyans to get rid of their nuclear power and their nuclear weapons, and look at what happened tothem. So we got to understand that…”

While I realize the first sentence of this statement can be attributed to hyperbole I find it morally repugnant coming from the “Moral Choice.” As for the Cuban Missile Crisis portion of the statement, I can’t get over how idiotic it is. We prevented nuclear war not through removing all military presence. President Kennedy activated the Air Force in such a way that an eighth or more of our strategic nuclear bombers were in the air at all times. He blockaded Cuba to keep further Russian assets from reaching Cuba and aiding in the rapid completion of the launch sites. Please explain where all of this is a slackening in strength? So, after this increase in responsive posture and DISPLAY of military might, Khrushchev calls Kennedy and backs down. It wasn’t Kennedy removing military armament. Actually, it should be noted that the government actually OFFERED to remove existing armaments in Turkey. That didn’t aid in the negotiations, in fact nothing but an aggressive posture did.

For a man that rides on both his military service and his supposed dedicated “veteran” following I, nor 99% of my active duty brethren I’ve spoken to on the subject, have never met, this is a large flaw.

A Chill Little Wind Just Blew Over

…the administration’s faux rosy glow.

Futures Pare Gains After Jobless Claims Report

Futures came off their best levels Thursday after a weaker than expected jobless claims and a disappointing retail sales report, but held some gains after successful bond auctions in Europe which also pushed European stocks higher and sent the euro to a session high.

…On the economic front, weekly claims for unemployment benefits gained more than expected, according to the Labor Department, climbing by 24,000 to a seasonally adjusted 399,000, the highest in six weeks. The four-week average claims also rose to 381,750 from 374,000.

Meanwhile, retail sales rose a disappointing 0.1 percent in December, the weakest pace in seven months.

If we set Dr. Peabody’s WayBack Machine to just a fauxny few weeks ago, you’ll remember MSM hype was in hopeful, helpful swing…

Obama bolstered by Republican fight, economic gains

President Barack Obama’s re-election hopes in 2012 could be getting brighter as the bruising Republican nomination fight intensifies and the struggling U.S. economy shows signs of hope.

Oh, golly. What WILL they do now?

Oddly enough, I’m sure we’ll find out directly.

Bingley Update: Here’s the really scary little nugget hidden in this data:

Spending at electronics and appliance stores fell 3.9 percent in December, while shopping at department stores slipped 0.2 percent.

Fueling the overall increase in retail sales during December, receipts for motor vehicles and parts increased 1.5 percent, adding to the prior month’s 0.9 percent gain.

Excluding autos, retail sales fell 0.2 percent, the first decline since May 2010.

Put that in your pipe and smoke it.

Gerbil Warmening Update

Ice(now non-existent, of courseGorese)breaking ship and Russian fuel tanker impeded by several feet of differently melted global warming as they try to bring desperately needed but wholly unnecessary load of pureed dinosaurs to Alaskan city lovingly swaddled by Gaia under 18 feet of global warming.

Prayers for Mrs. Paco

Along with many warm thoughts and best wishes for a full recovery!

Big hugs, girlfriend!!

Paging Bill Maher!

We’ve just heard from Hitler.

This One is Just Funny

Tired, fat, cranky old man versus too cool for school MSNBC hosts.

Tweet of the Day

@TRMirCat
MirCat

Can Bain please buy GM?

A Church is a Church is a Church, Minister Decisionwise

So says a UNANIMOUS SCOTUS today.

Supreme Court Decision in Hosanna-Tabor a Major Win for Religious Freedom

Today the U.S. Supreme Court issued a unanimous decision that resoundingly affirms the freedom of religious groups to choose their own ministers.

Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School v. EEOC involved a lawsuit brought by an employee against a church-operated school. The employee alleged that her employment was terminated in violation of a federal anti-discrimination law.

The question in this case was “whether the Establishment and Free Exercise Clauses of the First Amendment bar such an action when the employer is a religious group and the employee is one of the group’s ministers.”

In an opinion authored by Chief Justice Roberts, the Court answered in the affirmative, stating that

“[b]oth Religion Clauses bar the government from interfering with the decision of a religious group to fire one of its ministers.”

The post I’ve linked to is an excellent read.

Mittens on SquawkBox This Morning

He does well.

There’re A Few Occupiers Back In Zucchini Park

Guess mom got pissed about the mess they were making in the basement…

Obama’s Super Pac Already Has Knives Out for Mittens

So new, it’s even got the “love to fire people” snippet in there.

I’ll say it again. If a wet paper napkin with “Alice’s Restaurant” printed in the corner gets the GOP nomination for President, THAT’S who I’m voting for. And working my ass off for the second he gets nominated.

We won’t become La Republica Baracko El Guano because I didn’t go to the polls in a fit of pique.

I Don’t Get Why Romney Is Being Such a Dolt

When the peanut gallery yells “Are you going to fire the baby?!?!?”, it’s a simple f*cking thing to laugh and yell back,

“NO, but I’m sure GOING TO FIRE BARACK OBAMA!“

Lather, rinse, repeat repeat repeat.

It’ll quit quick enough, trust me.

Groundhog Day Is Coming

This is from an email a friend sent me this morning:

In the coming New Year, 2012, both Groundhog Day and the State of the Union address will occur on the same day.

One involves a meaningless ritual in which we look to an insignificant creature of little intelligence for prognostication.

The other involves a groundhog.

Am I a bad person for chuckling?

Judging By This Post on SCOTUS Blog

…if I ever argue before the SCOTUS, I will try NOT to “surprise” or “confuse” the Justices and then “get their attention”, especially if I’m the gub’mint trying to do something really unpopular and, oh, kinda fascist.

…Apparently, however, Schiff had gotten the attention of the Justices on the issue of the double penalty, and that prompted Deputy Solicitor General Malcolm Stewart, as he began his response, to concede the possibility of double penalties. He said it had been put in the EPA brief “as an exercise of our duty of candor to the Court.” He said it was “theoretical,” not “practical.” When Justice Stephen G. Breyer noted that the compliance order issued to the Sacketts had mentioned only $37,500, not double that, Stewart said that was all that the order needed to say.

Soon, Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr., said he was confused, asking whether there were double penalties? Stewart said it was a legal possibility, but he knew of no case in which it had been done. The Justices, though, were now fully engaged on the double penalties, and other members of the Court pressed Stewart on it. Justice Alito, for example, got an admission from Stewart that the government had not adopted a policy to rule it out. “So,” said Alito, “‘it’s more than theoretical.” And when the government lawyer continued to say double fining had not been done, Justice Scalia remarked sarcastically,

“I’m not going to bet my house on that.”