Stories like that always bring a tear to my eye. There’s nothing quite as stifling to art and creativity than arbitrary rules placed on artists by disinterested third parties, and labor unions are a major offender. Thus, it’s heartwarming to see union members rebel against their leaders because of the passion they have for a project–going the extra mile to make it an outstanding product and to make it feasible by charging less than their standard pay.

—–

That documentary’s story also stuck out to me because a recent Pitchfork interview with Anthony Gonzalez, frontman for the French electronica group M83, revealed a similar story, this time involving his newly-released double album “Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming”:

Pitchfork: When I spoke with you last year, you said you were worried about having enough money to make a double album.

AG: We had a good budget to make a 10-track album with good sound, so we had to find ways [to stretch that out]. It was difficult. But [producer] Justin [Meldal-Johnsen] did an amazing job putting a lot of artists together who worked for no money, just because they were in love with the project. I always wanted to play with strings and brass, and Joseph Trapanese, who did the arrangements for the album, didn’t get paid. We didn’t put the real names of the string and brass players on the album because they’re part of a union, and it’s illegal to work for shitty money. They’re credited, but with fake names. [emphasis added]

Though Gonzalez is an established artist who does receive funding from a record label for studio time, his story is but another anecdote in the continuing democratization of the music business. Because of the amazing technology available to artists for cheaper than ever before, songwriters and performers are bypassing the arcane rules and unfair nepotism of existing power structures such as labels and unions. They have virtually complete control over their final product and its distribution if they want it, and we are therefore seeing the firstfruits of a truly free music market where anyone can become someone and no idea or product gets buried without a fair chance to attract an audience.

As such, the world of music is being much more personalized, much more experimental, and, to those who explore beyond the world of Top 40, incredibly rewarding. I can’t think of a better example than “Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming”’s first single, “Midnight City,” which you can view above. While the song evokes the dark soundscapes of ’80s New Wave, something this ambitious would never have been feasible at that time for an artist with such a small audience. Thus, it’s a fitting welcome to the music world of 2011; this will be the decade of the individual toppling the gatekeeper.

On Wednesday, Affleck — who wrote and directed “The Town” — said that he too found the whole scenario a touch bizarre. And in a statement his spokesperson provided to The Huffington Post, he suggested that Republicans use a different one of his movies next time they need to whip votes.

“I don’t know if this is a compliment or the ultimate repudiation,” said the actor, who is currently in Turkey directing and starring in “Argo,” an adaptation of the Tehran hostage crisis. “But if they’re going to be watching movies, I think “The Company Men” is more appropriate.”

We weren’t aware it was a slow nws day in DC.

For one, every President seems to really like it.

Case in point – Bush wanted it raised too.

But do you know who was against it then? Obama.

Because, he wasn’t President yet.

Now he is.

Suddenly raising the debt ceiling is paramount.

So to me, the President is like your wife, and the debt ceiling is a credit card. You can’t blame her for loving it.

But it’s time to cut that card in half. We need to say, “Honey, I love you – but hand it over. We’ll live.”

The point is, raising the debt ceiling is easy, because it’s easy!

In the past five years I put on the weight of your average sized child, because I kept raising my “weight ceiling.”

I didn’t die or anything, although over time, my wife found me repulsive.

Still does, actually.

See, no one just wakes up weighing a thousand pounds – they become morbidly obese incrementally.

The same way we end up with a morbid government – it expands imperceptively into a bloated monstrosity that smells bad and embarrasses you in public.

And speaking of money – isn’t it time we find someone who can explain how spending will help you out of a “spending crisis?”

I don’t sober up by drinking more, do I?

Well, maybe I do.

Anyway, you can’t spend your way out of spending crisis and you can’t tax people to make them prosperous.

But if Democrats believe government spending is the answer – - why not do it with tax cuts?

Aren’t tax cuts like government spending – except we’re the ones doing the spending. The government is just handing the cash over to smarter people like you and me.

Lord knows we’ll make better decisions on what to do with our cash. I have my eye on four houseboys. I need new bed posts.

And if you disagree with me, you’re a racist homophobe.

Tonight we’ve got:

John Gibson

Paul Mecurio

Jessica Coen

In the battle for the soul of our country, popular culture is the biggest guy in the room.  And it’s time that conservatives took a swing.  The Powerline Prize contest is a potential haymaker in one of the most important battles of our campaign.

Here’s how it describes itself:

The Power Line Prize of $100,000 will be awarded to whoever can most effectively and creatively dramatize the significance of the federal debt crisis. Prizes will also be awarded to the runner-up and two third-place finishers. Anyone can enter the contest—individuals, companies (e.g., advertising agencies) or any other entity, as long as the contest rules are followed. Any creative product is eligible: videos, songs, paintings, screenplays, Power Point presentations, essays, performance art, or anything else, as long as the product is unique to the contest and has not previously been published or otherwise entered the public domain. Entries may address the federal debt crisis in its entirety, or a specific aspect of the debt crisis, such as: the impact of the debt crisis on the young; the role played by the “stimulus” (Where did the money go? Why didn’t it stimulate?); how entitlements drive the debt crisis; the current federal deficit; how the debt crisis impacts the economy; or any other aspect of the debt crisis. The contest is non-partisan. Its purpose is to inform the public about the federal debt crisis.

Conservatives often dismiss the world of art as a milieu of posing half-wits seeking government subsidies for the unsellable, ridiculous and boring crap they churn out for the benefit of goateed posers and other suckers.  This is because an enormous amount of what is today labeled as “art” is manufactured by   posing half-wits seeking government subsidies for the unsellable, ridiculous and boring crap they churn out for the benefit of goateed posers and other suckers.

However, mockery – while necessary and awesome – is not enough.  We need to get into that world – into all of the creative worlds – and compete.  That’s the lesson the ubiquitous Ben Shapiro teaches in his bestselling new book on TV, “Primetime Propaganda: The True Hollywood Story of How the Left Took Over Your TV,” and that seems to be the intent of the Powerline Prize contest.

But can conservatives make art?  I don’t know – maybe we should ask David Mamet.  But there is a problem with conservative art, which is the same with all art in general – most of it sucks.  Most art is bad.  Conservative art seems to be bad in its own unique way.  As my Twitter pal @Salty_Hollywood – a Hollywood graphic artist – remarked the other night over drinks, “Can we get some conservative art without flags and eagles?”  I agree – I like flags and eagles as much as the next right-wing knuckledragger, but frankly that well has gone dry.  As the old saying goes, we need some new clichés.

The Powerline Prize contest is one way we on the conservative side can start to look for an answer.  But it can’t be the final word – it needs to be only the first in a long process of creating art for our sake.

Patrick Courrielche’s kickoff article exposing major university faculty and graduate students’ Cry Wolf Project is alarming. Each installment in the series has only made it more so.

CWP’s solicitation for policy briefs designed to construct politically driven narratives is a confession of academic malpractice. As Kurt Schlichter has pointed out, its participants’ intentions are unethical, insubordinate, and potentially illegal.

The CWP email shows its players to be intolerant of varying viewpoints in the pursuit of their ideological ends. The fact that they are offering colleagues and grad students money to predetermine outcomes proves their intent: to tell partisan political stories:

Drier-Email –

What are they afraid of?

We pay the bills. We want our children to receive comprehensive, legitimate educations as advertised by the schools we choose; educations in which multiple viewpoints of issues are honestly presented, empirically considered, and respected by professors. We do not want our schools to act as political parties and centers for ideological indoctrination.

But, the Cry Wolf Project is in violation of joint policies adopted by the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) and the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AACU). From the Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure:

As scholars and educational officers, they should remember that the public may judge their profession and their institution by their utterances. Hence they should at all times be accurate, should exercise appropriate restraint, should show respect for the opinions of others, and should make every effort to indicate that they are not speaking for the institution.

From the Statement on Professional Ethics:

Professors, guided by a deep conviction of the worth and dignity of the advancement of knowledge, recognize the special responsibilities placed upon them. Their primary responsibility to their subject is to seek and to state the truth as they see it. To this end professors devote their energies to developing and improving their scholarly competence. They accept the obligation to exercise critical self-discipline and judgment in using, extending, and transmitting knowledge. They practice intellectual honesty.

In soliciting the creation of political propaganda through their schools and the facilitating organizations that receive public funding, CWP scholars abandon their ethical principles.

Nationwide university regulations, education codes and tax law strictly prohibit the unauthorized use of school resources for partisan political purposes. There are formal complaint procedures that can and should be initiated immediately against the Cry Wolf Project.

The project’s Request for Proposals was sent from Professor Dreier’s Occidental email address, and presumably communicated to and from the other schools’ servers. This creates the impression that Occidental, UCSB, Harvard, Yale, et al. endorse the plan by which Dreier & Co. intend to carry out the project. How prevalent is it that our tuition and tax dollars fund similar activities?

The Zinn Education Project is a notorious example. Its ‘guerilla-warrior’-in-chief, the late professor Howard Zinn, publicly instructed participants to violate education codes as he channeled Saul Alinsky:

Don’t obey the rules. You have to play a kind of guerrilla warfare with the establishment in which you try not to be fired. You have to depart from the curriculum… outside the lines that are set for us by the school administration, or the politicians.

With the high cost of tuition, people must practice due diligence in choosing schools. Universities not only promise an excellent education, but also the practice of good, legitimate intellectual values and principles we want to instill in our students’ young minds so that they can be successful, productive citizens in our American civil society.

The actions of the Cry Wolf committee and the schools associated with its participants should cause parents and taxpayers to reassess their very dear investments in these institutions.

President Obama, touted as one who “embodies diversity,” attended three CWP schools: Occidental, Columbia, and Harvard, where he was recalled as being an “even-handed leader.”

I got into politics at Occidental. I made a conscious decision to become involved in public policy.

That decision would lead him to Columbia University and his first exposure to community organizing, “I really wanted to see New York and become more involved in politics.”

Obama of course later enjoyed his own teaching stint as a University of Chicago law lecturer; the same university’s alumni association once awarded CWP coordinator Peter Dreier a distinguished Public Service Award.

In his Hampton College commencement address last month, President Obama stated:

[So that] all those checks you or your parents wrote to Hampton will pay off… now that your minds have been opened, it’s up to you to keep them that way. It will be up to you to open minds that remain closed that you meet along the way. That, after all, is the elemental test of any democracy: whether people with differing points of view can learn from each other, and work with each other, and find a way forward together.

Mr. President, as an even-handed leader who embodies diversity, do you believe the Cry Wolf Project meets your elemental test of democracy? Or is it “just words? Just speeches?”

“Intellect loses its virtue when it ceases to seek truth and turns to the pursuit of political ends.” – Robert H. Bork

Seeing as the “Green Day Liberals/American Idiots” started the whole “Bush is not my President” schtick and their new album is dropping this week, I couldn’t think of a more appropriate time to issue a retort. Granted, the men of Green Day have had to overcome a lot to attain the success they enjoy today. It’s not every day that a group of legally-declared midgets can produce platinum-selling albums. Folks, I can give credit where credit is due. Rather than accept this success on behalf of the “little people” however, Green Day (along with other generic punk bands) had to start the “not my President” crusade against their commander in chief during a time of war. Punk bands even collectively put out the “Rock Against Bush” album which was eyebrow-raisingly sympathetic towards our enemies. Some would call it treason, I call it “a-bunch-of-uneducated-toolbags-playing-power-chords-in-an-attempt-to-brainwash-the-youth-of-America.”

Considering that “fascism” was the justification for the punk-rock community’s public hatred of the former-president, one has to imagine how they feel today. Their own liberal buddies are in charge of everything from the White House, Congress and Senate to the mainstream media. Combine that with the biggest government takeover of private companies that we’ve ever seen (along with the biggest spending increase, of course), and I’m starting to think that maybe a “Rock Against Obama” album might hold a little more water. I wouldn’t expect to see that from Green Day however, for one reason only; These people are idiots. I’m talking borderline Biden-esque in their level of stupidity.

Folks, I support Barack Obama “the President,” really I do. Whether I voted for him or not, he was elected as our Commander in Chief. When one looks at the actual DUTIES of a president however (which is in short; To preserve and protect the Constitution), anyone with a brain (barring some kind of Sean Penn-type learning disability) can see that Obama has gone far beyond the parameters of his calling.

When Barack Obama tries to continually weasel his ever-expanding government into the private sector or does something like try to sneak the biggest backdoor tax in history into the books, he ceases to be “Presidential.” When Barack Obama acts with complete disregard for the Constitution (and American principles) he is no longer Barack Obama the president, he becomes Barack Obama… “the man.” I would even go as far as to say a very bad one. Yes Napolitano, you heard correctly. Come and get me toots.

Let’s say for a second, that you hired a plumber to fix your sink, only to come home and find that he’d decided to dry-clean your clothes… And did a terrible job of it. Naturally you’d be upset and “unsupportive” of his douchebaggery. You didn’t HIRE him as a dry-cleaner, so why would you have to pay him as such or even commend his work? In the same breath, why do I need to support Barack Obama with his company takeovers and creepily intruding government?

On Presidential issues such as national security, the preservation of life etc., I’ll support Barack Obama with all of my heart.

As for all of his other shenanigans… Well, I think it’s time to “Rock Against Obama.”

Who’s with me?

A lot has happened in fourteen days — since Friday, the 24th of April — when the wires started buzzing 24/7 about the “Swine Flu.”

Oh wait, my bad. Now it’s the much more politically correct, H1N1 (Dems can’t offend the porcine population, they might need Porky Pig or pro-choice Miss Piggy to vote in 2010 and 2012).

In the meanwhile, a lot of stories haven’t been covered nearly enough outside of blogs and Fox News. Oddly, the vast majority of these stories seem to be things Obama God, Jr. wants to keep quiet. Here’s a not so exhaustive list:

• That little problem of a projected 1.7+ trillion dollar deficit, from the very people who moaned at Bush’s comparatively minuscule deficit.
• That’s okay, God, Jr. promised a chicken in every pot, and his biggest supporter Oprah provided! There were line-ups at Kentucky Fried Chicken locations across the country, however, her coupons for free food often proved as useless as an American dollar in Paris. But at least those who got the free grub got gas.
• Speaking of fuel, people right of center and those in NYC know, Scare Force One buzzed NYC for the $380,000 photo op. The results of which may (or may not) actually be released. And may, or may not further terrorize New Yorkers when they realize exactly who is in the oval office.
• Oh, on total transparency, God, Jr. has proclaimed the tracking of ‘every dime’ of stimulus will be delayed until 2010.
• In the meanwhile, Bank of America needs billions and billions more, likely to be spent long before we achieve Deepak Chopra style transparency, world peace, and the universal ability to take a free yoga class, in 2010.
• But back to the present, I heard there is a successful school voucher program in DC being revoked. Who would do such a thing?
• No one knows, but the USA’s Community Organizer in Chief wanted Grey Poupon on his burger.
• Speaking of community, God, Jr.’s plan to close Guantanamo includes them being released in your backyard. That’s cool with you, right?
• It better be, or the Obama misadministration might threaten you with public attacks, the way they didn’t to Chrysler creditors who refused to surrender their contractual rights!
• Speaking publicly, John Edwards, formerly the pretty-bunny-boy of the Democratic party has a wife with terminal cancer and a book coming out, which mentions his alleged affair with possible baby mama, Rielle Hunter.
• Plus, someone doled out a bunch of hush money for Rielle, and guess whose campaign funds are being looked over?
• Of course, some good did come of the swine flu hysteria. Joe Biden told people not to fly or expose themselves to confined areas. He should know all about confined areas, having been released from his own undisclosed padded location.

Some people might be wondering where Moses works into this, and why an atheist is mentioning Moses at all. But as the story goes, Moses had to tap the rock twice to produce water…and many stories are worth repeating. Even if we can’t add anything new.

But I know I missed so many stories, glossed over by the mainstream media, feel free to add them in the comments.

Moxie can usually be found not posting at her own blog Moxie.nu.

The handsome man instinctively brushed aside the hair barely hanging down on his forehead as he pressed on towards the residence portion of the house.

“Ah… I am here to see Obama” he told the secret service guard inside the residence. The guard did not react at all.  John Fitzgerald Kennedy knew right off that his presence would be seen only by his intended audience and the guard saw nothing. “Fix your tie pal.” Kennedy joked as he walked passed the oblivious sentry.

“You must be President Kennedy”, Obama sheepishly asked the figure now standing above him as he lay in bed.  ”These visits are getting quite regular, are you the last?” 

“Well, Teddy Roosevelt wants to come and see you, but ahh… we talked him out of it… well okay we restrained him.  Well,  I wouldn’t worry too much about that… for now.

Obama turned and looked towards his wife.

“Don’t worry Mr. President, your wife will hear and see nothing… time is standing still.” Kennedy mentioned, as he pointed to then tapped his watch.

Obama moved to get up, and President Kennedy interrupted; “Please don’t get up on my part, what I have to tell you won’t take too long, and you will be needing your rest for the coming months and years my friend.”

“Well, here it is Barack;

 I’m all for social programs that really work, and I know you need money to pay for them, but when you create bureaucracy that can only barely pay for its own fat self with those hard earned tax dollars, burdening the government itself and of course the poor taxpaying citizen, well son, then you are on the road to socialism.

You are creating agencies and bureaus that exist to feed themselves, and how the hell is that going to help a nation that is in deep debt? The state is not always the answer Obama, American know-how, and the unfettered creativity that powers it almost usually is. Yes, tighten the belt on business cheaters and scammers, but don’t choke off the growers and the doers. It’s real simple Barack, if you turn each and every time to bureaucracy, well, let’s just say you’ll be turning our country in the wrong direction.

We aren’t Europe. We aren’t communists. We aren’t socialists. And we sure as hell aren’t in the business of making the latter two of those particular groups stronger.

For you to raise a communist island that enslaves it’s people up to equal our democracy with so called talks is just nuts son. They are rotting away faster than their ‘57 Chevrolets and you want to bring them into a dialogue? You notice how Fidel’s brother said that the prerequisite is that you talk as equals? This guy is now gonna dictate the talks? Instead of trying to ‘understand’ what every other country is about, I suggest you study and understand what we are all about. Not every one on this earth is worth being friends with.

“Mr. Kennedy, you are a Democrat!” Barack exclaimed incredulously.

“Don’t give me that crap Barack. Your party does not even resemble the Democratic party of my day. You’re acting like a teenager that thinks he knows everything there is to know, and all that came before him was so ‘uncool’. Come on, the only ones you won’t talk to are the people in your own country who are hopping mad at you and your policies. For instance, you can ignore that Tea Party all you want, but it sure is a group I’d be talking to, before the seeds they are sowing start taking root. Those are Americans for God’s sake, and you got that Pelosi out there belittling them. That is just silly. I don’t hear her even saying one cross word to the despots and dictators you both are facing.

“President Kennedy, I ‘ve gotta say, on that note sir, you once said: ‘Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate.’

“Yes I did Barack, but there must be some kind of a goal there. Cuba? Iran? Chavez?  Unless you are now in the business of helping communists and terrorists, what are we as a democracy to gain from them?  And I think you really need to think about the first part of that quote and search your soul Obama.  You might think you are making it easier to be liked, but what you might just be doing is making it easier for us to be beat. Obama, understanding who your real enemies are is much more important than being nice to everyone. And for goodness sake, start using the word terrorist again. 

Listen, I’ve got to go, but let me leave you with another one of my quotes; ‘The cost of freedom is always high, but Americans have always paid it. And one path we shall never choose, and that is the path of surrender, or submission.’ 

Well, I wish you luck son, .. oh and I’ll try to dissuade Teddy Roosevelt from charging on in here” 

With that he smiled that million dollar smile, turned, and disappeared into the golden light beaming through the bedroom window.

And to think all the “smart people” in Hollywood sold him as a “brilliant” mind. Of course, this is brilliant by Hollywood standards. The place that remade “The Beverly Hillbillies.”

Let’s review how brilliant the president is. After spending his campaign complaining about President Bush’s lavish outlays, he decided to triple it.  Not just triple it, but spend more than all the presidents who preceded him combined. Take a good look at this chart of deficits and look at the one he’s projected. Here is a “best case” scenario from Obama fluffer network MSNBC. Now this is how his budget stacks up against “stupid” president Bush and others before him. This is Bush’s deficits compared to Obama’s. Yes, Obama’s budget is brilliant if you want to bankrupt the U.S. and keep its citizens indebted for generations. But maybe that’s his cunning plan.

According to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office Obama’s deficits could reach 9.3 trillion dollars. How much is a trillion anyway? Here’s a visualization. It’s an insane amount of money. There is no real excuse for the spending were doing other than gross incompetence or corruption. The government is supposed to watch these financial institutions to prevent the kinds of things that were happening, but instead they encouraged a lot of it.

It will take generations to pay off this debt. And for what exactly? So corrupt businesses can be saved? So failed companies who failed because of government policies and unions can continue to fail a little longer? They gave billions to failed banks with no conditions and the money went overseas. They gave billions to AIG three times, and billions went overseas. They got all upset because AIG wanted to pay bonuses to their execs, as they were contractually obligated to do, and then decided to tell the angry mob their names and where they lived so the mob would have a scapegoat other than the politicians who set up this mess in the first place.

They got so “outraged” they decided they wanted to pass laws to break contracts and take over any company they feel is “corrupt.” This means that the government could decide to take over any company at any time. Nullify any contracts. Basically kill the rule of law and give the government unprecedented powers over business. Like a totalitarian state. Like a banana republic.

What business would want to operate here under those conditions?

But that’s not all. The president wants to draft our kids into some pseudo-military and put them in education camps. The bill approving this has already passed.

…the legislation threatens the voluntary nature of Americorps by calling for consideration of “a workable, fair and reasonable mandatory service requirement for all able young people.” It anticipates the possibility of requiring “all individuals in the United States” to perform such service, including elementary school students.The bill also summons up unsettling memories of World War II-era paramilitary groups by saying the new program should “combine the best practices of civilian service with the best aspects of military service,” while establishing “campuses” that serve as “operational headquarters,” complete with “superintendents” and “uniforms” for all participants. It allows for the elimination of all age restrictions in order to involve Americans at all stages of life. And, it calls for the creation of “a permanent cadre” in a “National Community Civilian Corps.”

But that’s not all. The bill also calls for “youth engagement zones” in which “service learning” is “a mandatory part of the curriculum in all of the secondary schools served by the local educational agency.”

Gosh, what kind of education do you think they will get at these camps? Maybe global warming hysteria lessons which will be used to incite them to watch their friends and parents to make sure they aren’t “carbon criminals.” After all, Obama wants to enforce a cap and trade program that is designed to punish energy companies and other industrial factories. And they will of course be forced to pass the costs along to you, driving oil prices back up, gas prices over $4 a gallon again. Maybe $5 or $6 or even $8 a gallon like it is in Europe. In other words, it will cause a loss of more jobs and hurt the economy way more than it is now. He still looks brilliant to you?

Well, let’s add the latest genius move. The so called “Food Safety Act” which would punish small farmers by putting them under a mountain of byzantine regulations that would shut them down. And punish people who try to grow their own food with million dollar fines. This will make people reliant on big agri-corporations and restrict or ban people from trying to support themselves.

Obama’s government is going for the most extreme kinds of control over financial, auto, energy and agriculture companies. Either through their bailouts which come with strings, or new autocratic laws.

How is he supposed to save the economy by making it worse exactly? Is this his brilliant plan?

Who can forget all those dopey celebrities singing songs about how great Obama is. I’ve never seen such a creepier bunch of dolts in my life. All those Internet videos of singing children who looked like they were auditioning for Kim Jong II. Guess what, chumps? You’ve been played. If Obama does one good thing, he’ll prove that race doesn’t matter. Politicians are their own hideous species.

The last two months feels like a  “re-imagining” of 1984 with “meet cute” moments. He’s the product of the so called  “smart people.” The culture mavens who have talk shows where they claim to tell us what’s “really going on” through their alleged jokes that sound more like desperation with a laugh track. Of course, nowadays they don’t use canned laughter. They just collect a studio full of ideologues who laugh on cue. It’s the bland leading the bland.

The media was shoving Obama down everyone’s throats last year. And now we see what a great choice he was. This is a man with little experience and no accomplishments other than getting elected to higher positions every time he gets a job.

The next time a bunch of celebrities want to sing you a song about their great leader,  bring a bunch of rotting vegetables to throw at them.

Hey, I don’t care a wit about these AIG guys, and to hell with them.  They screwed up their company but good, and I’m sure more than one shareholder would like to spend a few up-close-and-personal minutes in a closed room with them.  And if job performance is to be the criteria for bonuses, it’s probably more equitable that, rather than receiving a bonus, they should be perp-walked off to prison; straight to the showers to sing the Song of Sodom.  Put them between a jailhouse rock and a hard place.  So to speak.

But that’s not what has me riled. I’m pissed off that the Prez is using this as an excuse to dodge responsibility and instead foment class warfare.  “Yeah, ya see?  The rich get rich and the poor get poorer.  Ya see how they do ya?  Let’s get even with ‘em!  Tax the living snot out of them!  That will help me!  That will save the economy!”

President Obama has absolutely no problem sticking the taxpayers with $872 Billion in a ‘stimulus’ bill, (with more on the way)…but $165 Million gets handed out to some executives and he has a public hissy fit.

I feel like Scooby-Doo tilting his head when he hears Grandpa rip a loud one.   Hmnh??  

Am I the only one who feels like he’s got some charlatan trying to sell him a bag of shit?

“But it’s really, really good shit, Mr. Graham!”   

“Oh…well then…if you’re sure it’s really really good…uh…”

FTS!  And wait – did I not see the honorable Congressman from Massachusetts, Barney Frank decrying the bonuses on the news this morning?   He, of all people, being the Chair of the House Financial Services Committee, and the primary engineer of the practice of forcing banks to make irresponsible loans to people who had poor credit rating and/or no collateral…the practice that helped sink the mortgage industry which got the economic avalanche started?  Barney Frank is all puffed up with outrage??

Hmnh??

And while we’re on Strange Things In the Press That Keep Getting Stranger…did I or did I not hear on the news today, and please correct me if I’m wrong…Ben Bernanke, Chairman of the Fed, and Newsweek’s rated 4th most powerful man in the world…say “”The biggest risk is that, you know, we don’t have the political will,” he said.”We don’t have the commitment to solve this problem, and that we let it just continue.   In which case … we can’t count on recovery.”

Oh.  Okay…so, as long as we have the ‘political will’ …and a “commitment to solve the problem”…then we’ll be fine. 

So what the H-E-L-L does that mean??   By political will, he must mean government solution.  Yes?  Am I missing something there?  Not a free enterprise system, doing what it does best, creating wealth, but government solutions.  Regulations, committees, oversight, new laws…you know, government doing what it does best – meddling.

And all we need (aside from an apparently unending reliance on government to straighten out our lives) is a “commitment to solve the problem”.  

Let me translate this, for I do speak fluent Lefty:   RELAX.  LET THE GOVERNMENT CONTROL YOUR LIVES, BECAUSE THEY CAN DO NO WRONG.

Mr. Bernanke went on to say in his 60 Minutes interview: “…the government needs to get banks to lend more freely and get the financial markets to work more normally.”

Wait just a doggone second.   Now I know I’m being punked.  Ashton, damnit, you got me, ya bastard, where’s the damn camera?  Wait, no camera?  He really said that?  Hmnh???  Wasn’t government forcing banks and financial institutions to lend money more freely…wasn’t that what started the collapse of the housing market and mortgage industry in the first place??  So…once again, the financial geniuses of our time are recommending that the way out of economic instability and insolvency…is to go deeper into debt?

FTS!  I say we get a bunch of fence rails…heat up some tar…get a few thousand goose-down pillows….and run these bastards out of town!  In the manner they deserve!

Okay, maybe I’ve seen too many old westerns in my day.  But damn!  Sometimes these days I think that instead of watching the news, I’m accidentally receiving errant transmissions from some distant far-off galaxy…some alternate universe where up is down, good is bad, and nothing makes sense.   I mean…surely this is not America in the year 2009! 

Hmnh??