Hang on to Your Wallets!

It's almost a cliche to say, "If the Democrat wins, hang onto your wallet." But Presidential contender John Edwards demonstrates why it's a pretty accurate sentiment. Here are the nuts and bolts of his plan for univeral healthcare coverage:

When you file your income taxes, you will be required to submit a letter from an insurance provider confirming coverage for yourself and your dependents.

If you do not submit proof of coverage, the Internal Revenue Service will notify a new regional or state-based health-care agency.

The regional agency will then evaluate whether you are eligible for Medicare, Medicaid, S-CHIP.

If you are not eligible for existing public programs, the regional-health care agency will enroll you into the lowest cost health-care plan available.

You will have access to health benefits, but will also be responsible for making monthly payments with the help of a tax credit. The exact size of your obligation will vary according to your income.

If you do not meet your monthly financial obligation, the federal government will garnish your wages for purposes of collecting "back premiums with interest and collection costs."

Yeah, that sounds like a plan that will attract a lot of voters. It also gives more power to the IRS, which is a surefire winner, creates 50 new beaurocracies, and creates a burden on employers to help the government garnish your wages. I wonder if Edwards works at it a little more if he can't make his plan even more heavy-handed.

Dispatch From the Religion of Peace

I wasn't going to do any more of these, but hey, rules are made to be broken. Here's the lastest from the ROP:

KHARTOUM, Sudan - Thousands of Sudanese, many armed with clubs and knives, rallied Friday in a central square and demanded the execution of a British teacher convicted of insulting Islam for allowing her students to name a teddy bear "Muhammad." [...]

They called for Gibbons' execution, saying, "No tolerance: Execution," and "Kill her, kill her by firing squad."

They're such a nice, peace loving, tolerant people.

Final Dispatch From the Religion of Peace

I occasionally post a link under the "Religion of Peace" title when some Jihad inspired nutcase does something particularly vile. No need to do that anymore, now that I have discovered Religion of Peace website. They are really on top of things over there.

During the week of November 17-23, there were 57 attacks, with 453 killed and 529 injured. They're more consistent than I had realized! Here are some stories from November 28th alone:

Two Buddhist fishermen are abducted and brutally murdered by Islamic terrorists, who then cut off their heads. - Thailand

Islamists shoot, stab, then nail a man to a wooden cross and leave on the road to die. - Thailand

A local cop is gunned down by the Mujahideen. - Chechnya

Jihadis lob mortars into a residential area, killing five civilians. - Iraq

Berkeley "Controversy"

It's amazing what is considered controversial in Berkeley, California:

The Berkeley City Council approved a controversial plan Tuesday night to reduce unruly behavior in public places.

The new plan cracks down on yelling, littering, camping, drunkenness, smoking, urinating and sex on sidewalks and in parks.

One would think such things wouldn't have been tolerated in the first place.

Big Papi Opines

Boston slugger David Ortiz enlightens us on what's really important in life:

On another topic, Ortiz said the issue of performance-enhancing drugs in baseball had been blown out of proportion. George Mitchell is expected to issue his report by the end of the year.

"It's like they've placed that issue on the same level as (the war in) Iraq," Ortiz said. "It doesn't make sense to hear people talk more about whether Barry Bonds used steroids than about people dying in Iraq."

It's not enough to be lectured on foreign policy and war by singers and comedians, no we need to hear what designated hitters think, too.

A strategy for Iran

OpinionJournal - Wonder Land

Daniel Henninger on the split in US politics that started in 1968 and continues to this day.

One side, which took to the streets in Chicago or occupied Columbia University, concluded from Vietnam and the race riots that America, in its relations with the world and its own citizens, was flawed and required big changes. Their defining document was the March 1968 Kerner Commission report, announcing "two societies," separate and unequal. [...]

The other side was, well, insulted.

You can count me on the "insulted" side. I am tired of hearing how the one country that has provided more wealth, more opportunity, more prosperity, and more equality for more people than any other is broken and needs to be torn apart and rebuilt into some leftist utopia. Particularly since the people advocating such radical thing have no particular knowledge of economics, sociology, or any of the myriad other sciences it would take to create a new paradigm for the distribution of goods and services in a nation of 300 million people.

The mere fact that they expect me to accept their argument is, well, insulting.

Beware Hillary's 'Whitewash' -- 11/14/2007

Brent Bozell asks an interesting question:

How is it that the wife of an impeached president, the policy architect of a 1300-page left-wing health-care fiasco, and the document-shredding stonewaller of a welter of scandals can turn her controversial career and bizarre First Marriage into assets, and not liabilities? How is it that Team Clinton, disgraced and disgraceful, is back for another presidential run?

I have been wondering the same thing myself.

State Capitol Quiz

Unfortunately, they didn't tell me which ones I got wrong.

You Really Know Your State Capitols

You Got 18 State Capitols Correct You're either a geography buff... or you have an excellent memory.

Do You Know Your State Capitols?

Climate Change

This graphic illustrates the hubris of those that claim our climate is changing and we have to stop it. The truth is, the climate is always changing. That Al Gore and his ilk think the global climate needs to be "frozen" (pun intended) at the same temperature they have experienced during their puny little lives demonstrates the hubris and narcissism by which they see themselves.


Hat tip: Boortz

Democrats have put themselves in a position where they have to call good news "bad news." It's almost childish in its simplicity. Heck, it IS childish. Nothing good can be admitted to be happening in Iraq. Rather, it good news but turned on its head and spun into bad news so that it can be used for political purposes. So violence drops in Iraq, and Democrat Harry Reid treats us to this "analysis:"

Violence is down, and certainly that is important and good, but many of the experts are saying one reason the violence is down is that so much ethnic cleansing has already taken place. It is true they found 35 or 40 dead bodies today, and they are still finding them--not to the amount they were finding before. They were finding more than 100 a day. Many of the areas have been ethnically cleansed.

So, in Harry Reid's myopic and moronic view, decreasing violence in Iraq must be attributed not to success, but to failure to stop ethnic cleansing. What a disloyal, traitorous, moronic asshole.

Hat tip: Boortz

Update: Joe Lieberman agrees:

Even as evidence has mounted that General Petraeus' new counterinsurgency strategy is succeeding, Democrats have remained emotionally invested in a narrative of defeat and retreat in Iraq, reluctant to acknowledge the progress we are now achieving, or even that that progress has enabled us to begin drawing down our troops there.

John Coleman, creator of The Weather Channel, opines upon the nonsense of Climate Change:

It is the greatest scam in history. I am amazed, appalled and highly offended by it. Global Warming; It is a SCAM. Some dastardly scientists with environmental and political motives manipulated long term scientific data to create in allusion of rapid global warming. Other scientists of the same environmental whacko type jumped into the circle to support and broaden the “research” to further enhance the totally slanted, bogus global warming claims. Their friends in government steered huge research grants their way to keep the movement going. Soon they claimed to be a consensus. ...
I do not oppose environmentalism. I do not oppose the political positions of either party. However, Global Warming, ie Climate Change, is not about environmentalism or politics. It is not a religion. It is not something you “believe in.” It is science; the science of meteorology. This is my field of life-long expertise. And I am telling you Global Warming is a non-event, a manufactured crisis and a total scam. I say this knowing you probably won’t believe a me, a mere TV weatherman, challenging a Nobel Prize, Academy Award and Emmy Award winning former Vice President of United States. So be it.

I have read dozens of scientific papers. I have talked with numerous scientists. I have studied. I have thought about it. I know I am correct. There is no run away climate change. The impact of humans on climate is not catastrophic. Our planet is not in peril. I am incensed by the incredible media glamour, the politically correct silliness and rude dismissal of counter arguments by the high priest of Global Warming.

Hat Tip: Michael Williams

Damn.

It appears incumbent upon me to employ a more mature, poly-syllabic mode of verbal communications. Either that, or I should try to use bigger words.

Left Wing Hate

George Bush isn't going to be around much longer, so the left wingers need to start hating somebody new. And it seems Rudy Giuliani will do:

"Rudy Giuliani [is] probably the most underqualified man since George Bush to seek the presidency."

"[A]s president, Giuliani would grab even more executive power than Bush and Cheney."

"He's like a gang leader now, roving the streets, looking for some punk to bash."

"One thing I'm wrestling with is finding a way to convey how terrified I am of the prospect of a Rudy Giuliani presidency in terms of its impact on our foreign policy."

"Rudy Giuliani: The next Dick Cheney?"

"He's kind of channeling Rush Limbaugh. He's making the lunatic fringe mainstream."

"I refuse to believe that this could possibly happen to our country. I have too much confidence in our country to believe that this could really happen."

As usual with the left, not a single policy position to be made or debated. Just character assination and dark warnings, which constitutes political "thought" on the left these days.