Liquidate to Ameliorate

The housing market has now entered the feared "double dip," after rebounding slightly in the past few quarters.

Liberal pundits and media are furiously spinning the seemingly unending stream of bad economic indicators as "unexpected." Heck, Glenn Reynolds at Instapundit has made an internet meme of "anything bad that happens during Obama's administration = unexpected.

Despite vigorous protests otherwise, the continued tanking of the housing market, as well as plummeting consumer confidence and stubbornly high unemployment, should be as expected as day following night.

The policy of the Obama Administration, from day one, has been to use government intervention (whether monetary or regulatory) to "fix" all aspects of our economy. When the Democrats' Keynesian stimulus programs failed, the Administration's response was trillion dollar stimulus wasn't big enough. When the banks wobbled, the solution was to create new regulations. When foreclosures loomed, Obama intervened to stop them.

Let's grant President Obama and the Democrats the benefit of the doubt for a moment. Let's assume for the sake of argument two things: (1) Democrats' intent is to cushion individuals from market forces and (2) Democrats actually believe Keynesian policies work, and aren't just cynically using them as an excuse to grab and consolidate power.

Even granting those two premises, everything the Democrats have done regarding the housing downturn could not have been better planned to extend the crisis and prolong consumer pain.

As noted repeatedly, in order for the housing market to rebound, it must first hit bottom. The stimulus and foreclosure regulations are designed to prevent the market from hitting bottom. These responses are designed to support prices artificially, whether by increasing the money supply to inflate away losses or by increasing regulations to strong-arm banks to uneconomically restructure debt obligations.

In order for the market in housing to settle, the losses must be realized at both the consumer and the banking levels. Any action that prevents recognition of these losses only creates investor uncertainty, leading to a chronically sick housing and banking sector.

Democrats are playing up the "we're for the little guy" angle. Yet each and every action the Democrats have taken costs the little guy. If housing prices don't reach bottom and recover, many can't afford to move. If banks don't know what the rules are, they won't lend. If houses aren't selling, and banks aren't lending, consumers are scared. Couple that with inflationary pressures on food and energy (both also primarily Democrats' fault -- think ethanol subsidies and green energy/environmentalism garbage), and you've got the makings of a full on Lost Decade.

If the government wants to fix the housing problem, it should take the money it's spending on forced mortgage modifications, homebuyer tax breaks and various other stimulus programs, and use it to purchase all bank's portfolios of real estate owned. Once purchased, the government should raze the structures and auction the vacant lots.

Addressing the cause of housing troubles (oversupply) rather than the effect (whiny voters who irresponsibly overbought and whiny banks who irresponsibly overlent) may actually do some good, regardless of what one thinks of government intervention.

'Puter will leave for another day his thoughts on forcing banks to scrub their portfolios of bad loans by setting minimum portfolio performances thresholds, then having the FDIC liquidate noncomplying assets in owner-blind absolute auctions. The FDIC would then use the proceeds garnered, and perhaps some taxpayer dollars to recapitalize the banks.

Liquidate the losses, and growth will follow.

Science on Trial

Your Mandarin is once again flabbergasted by the inability of people to understand what science can and cannot do as evidenced by the manslaughter charge leveled against a group of seismologists by Italian government officials.

This criminal charge against Italy’s top seismologist and his team stems from their apparent inability to predict the 2009 earthquake in L’Aquila that killed 308 people.

Now your Mandarin has to ask the obvious question, why is the Italian government going after these seismologists? Is it an attempt to divert blame and focus away from inadequate disaster response? Your Mandarin does not have an answer, but why go after real scientists who have never made the claim that they can predict when or if an earthquake will occur?

Would the Italian government rather have these seismologist constantly telling people that an earthquake is about to occur just to cover themselves and have the population in a constant state of panic? At what point – think back to the constant elevated terror alert we were on in this country for 8-years – do people begin to tune out the constant warnings because the “big one” hasn’t happened?

Your Mandarin also finds it ironic that these same Italian officials haven’t leveled criminal charges against the pseudo-scientific community that is constantly bemoaning man’s impact on the climate. But then again, that pseudo-science has provided an actual benefit to the progressive/socialist government in the form of taxes and fees.

Your Mandarin surmises that the socialist/progressives haven’t figured out a way yet to show how you have caused these quakes by the very act of walking and a way to tax how many steps you take. Maybe they can imbed sensors in your shoes that would show how hard your foot impacted the ground and then tax you accordingly for your impact on the environment.

Ryan vs. Obama: What the Numbers Suggest

How bad are things for the President?

According to Weekly Standard’s Jeffrey H. Anderson,, Paul Ryan could beat him solo. According to his calculus:

To win the presidency, Ryan would just have to win his home state and hold GOP-leaning Florida, Ohio, and Virginia. That would be it: election over, Obama defeated, Ryan’s pen poised to sign the Obamacare-repeal legislation.

Further, he might not even need to win Florida: he could probably do it even if he somehow lost Florida (where Obama remains especially unpopular right now) just by taking Wisconsin.

But key to that is winning Wisconsin, and right now, only Paul Ryan is the only candidate held in overwhelming esteem within that state (and that’s true of either party).

If Ryan does not run, another candidate would possibly, if not probably, lose Wisconsin; so in lieu of the Badger State, a candidate would need to pick up Pennsylvania. That one would be tough. But, Anderson adds, Ryan could win the election losing both Florida and Pennsylvania: he could clinch victory simply by winning Wisconsin, Nevada, Colorado, Iowa, and New Hampshire (as well as the other reliably Republican states): all quite doable. Again, if Ryan does not run, the situation becomes harder, but Pawlenty has the polling numbers to do it—according to Anderson’s analysis, that is, but the situation is a little more complicated.

Hmm. Paul Ryan. You know, James Polk once said that some people seek the office, and others are called to it; that we should avoid the former, but always pray for the latter.

Why We Remember

No possible additional comment.

Remove Contents From Can Before Use

GorT recommends the use of Easy Off to clean grilles.

Maybe the Czar missed the point, here, but he tried it. And after 20 minutes, the can exploded on the grille. Big mess.

So important safety tip: spray Easy Off onto the grille while the grille is cool. Evidently that’s how it works.

Morning With His Petulancy

The President walks into the White House kitchen early this morning. “I would like breakfast.”

“Yes, Mr, President. Our choices this morning are pancackes or eggs.”

The President tilts his chin upward. “I would like Belgian waffles.”

The cook nervously looks around. “Er, yes, Mr. President. But for that, I’d have to go down to storage, pull out the waffle maker, clean it, get some batter...”

“So the choice is really between Belgian waffles and total starvation. That’s what they teach in cooking school, these days, I guess. Starvation?”

The cook sighs. “Yes, Mr. President, I’ll go get the waffle maker.”

“Excellent. I knew we could compromise. Now, I would love to read the paper.”

A staffer comes forward. “Yes, sir. We have The Washington Post and the New York Times for you, as always.”

The President tilts his chin. “I want the LA Times.”

The staffer bites her lower lip. “Um, yes, Mr. President, but we don’t have that here. I would need to run to the newstand on 18th Street. In the rain.”

“Interesting. I ask for a little news, and you advocate ignorance. I see. So the choices we have are the LA Times or total ignorance. Great choices for the President of the United States.”

The staffer turns and goes to get her raincoat. Meantime, the First Lady enters the kitchen. “Barry, your blue pinstripe jacket still isn’t back from the cleaners.”

The President turns to her. “So I gather we have to choose between my blue jacket and total nudity?”

Mrs. Obama shakes her head and storms out. “Doesn’t work on me, big guy.”

Re: Grilling

The Czar is spot on with his grilling advice. I'd like to chime in with a few other notes:

First, for those with gas grills (or those saying that gas grills can't get that smokey flavor), try a "smoke packet". Go to your local DIY store, decent grocery store or local forest and get some chips of wood. I highly recommend the following: hickory, mesquite, apple, pecan and cherry. Soak the wood in a bowl of water - an hour or so should do, more won't hurt matters. Take a piece of aluminum foil (and, by the way, if you don't have this on hand ALL the time, you need to correct that) and wrap up a fistful of the wood forming a sandwich-sized packet. On the top side of the packet, poke a few holes in the foil through to the wood. Drop it on top of your grates and you're good to go.

Second, for cleaning your grill - I highly recommend Easy Off oven cleaner. Take the grills to your driveway, sidewalk, etc. spray some of this on it. Let it sit for 5 minutes and then come back. I'd wager all you need is a wet sponge and your grills will be looking like new. If you do get more stubborn buildup, try re-applying and using a scouring pad.

Third, lighter fluid is unneeded - do what the Czar says and I'll highly recommend getting a charcoal chimney. It's worth it. Stack up the pieces, stuff newspaper and other kindling under it, light it, and 10 minutes later you'll have coals raring to go.

While I continue to grill (year-round, actually and in all sorts of weather - just finished a pork tenderloin a few nights ago in a rain storm), I've moved onto having a greater passion for smoking. Mrs. GorT purchased a relatively inexpensive vertical charcoal water smoker two Christmases ago. I've made a few modifications to it (high-quality thermometer added, better charcoal grate for ash fall-thru) and have a few more planned. It is simply awesome once you get the "low and slow" method down. I mix up my own dry rubs now and have done chickens, turkeys, ribs, pork shoulders (for pulled pork), and briskets. If you have the interest, time and patience, there's nothing like some good Q from a smoker.

Enjoy!

The Volgi should note...

It’s entirely possible he got that pork recipe from the Necronomicon, Seven Cryptical Books of Hsan, or perhaps a Weber or other grill cookbook…

Memorial Day Grilling

Ordinarily, on a holiday like Memorial Day, you get a lecture about how good you have it, and how you should be remembering all those lost lives rather than going out and partying.

Not this year, though. Instead, with this weekend being the unofficial kickoff to American summer, the Czar is going to give you something worth remembering.

The Czar, truth be told, fancies himself as a bit of a grilling wizard. In fact, the Czar would grill every day if he had the time, or at least every weekend if the weather permitted. The Czar has done pretty much every meat there is on the grille, along with uncountable vegetables, and yes: he does fruits, breads, and even salads on the grille. The Czar is at home with gas and charcoal grilles, and enjoys the times that he has both going at once.

And so today, the Czar will impart a few basic tips that will make any of you a much better griller. If you are doing these already, nice job. If you are doing some, great; but these really are the mandatory ones you should always work toward doing.

First, clean your damn grille. You know how the grille rack is encrusted with a quarter-inch of black grime? You need to get rid of that, fast. Take the rack off, soak it in hot water with lots of dish detergent, and get rid of that much. Someone once told you that it adds flavor, or helps cook the meat, or something. Nonsense: all it does is put bitter, acrid dirt on the meat. It certainly is not good for you, and makes your hard work look like you dropped it on the ground while bringing it in. Scrub it all off.

Once the grille rack is thoroughly clean and washed, you are good to go for a while if you follow the rest of these directions.

Second, oil that puppy. Spray on some Pam or other non-stick spray, or use the oil of your choice to brush onto the rack. This prevents meat from sticking to the rack, and helps keep it cleaner, longer. Some grillers do this every time they grille; the Czar does it only when meats show evidence that they would like to stick to the rack. However you elect to do it, do it. You will see a difference.

Charcoal grillers: stop with cheap charcoal and lighter fluid. Instead, use real charcoal chunks, and light it with newspaper, clean twigs and sticks (take off the leaves, and do not use green wood) from your yard, and the like. Light the paper in a couple corners, let it start the kindling, and let that start the charcoal. Once you taste food cooked without a quart of lighter fluid as a starter, you will never go back. Also, for an added treat, if you have any old firewood left over, split it up into chunks. Soak it in a bucket of water for an hour. When your coals get lit, carefully distribute the dripping wet wood into the coals. You will get glorious smoke that will double the flavor of your food.

Charcoal grillers: another tip for you. When your coals are all burning, push them to one side. This concentrates the heat on one side of the grille for real hot cooking. Put your meats and foods in the middle, so that they cook evenly, or even push them to the far, cool side to slow down cooking if the food starts to dry out. The one thing you no longer want to do is have an evenly spread coal bed with your food cooking inches above it. You cannot control the heat that way, and all you do is burn the outside and leave the inside raw. Indirect is the way to go, everybody: evenly cooked food throughout.

Gas grillers: preheat. Light all your burners, close the lid, and walk away for a few minutes. When the grille hits about 400°, turn off all but a couple burners. Preheating dramatically reduces your cooking time. The Czar likes to cook on the two middle burners: this allows the Czar to do indirect cooking on a gas grille. This is how you can do breads and salads without setting them on fire: put them over a non-lit burner, and the heat from the sides will cook the stuff quickly without burning it.

Ready for the most important tip? This one is very important, and the number one error the Czar sees people screw up. Put your food on the grille, close the lid, and leave it the f— alone. Every time you lift the lid to check on the food, even for a quick second or two, you add about five minutes to the cooking time. For thin foods, check it after 3-4 minutes. No sooner. For thick steaks, 5-10 minutes. For larger foods like turkeys, even longer. Avoid lifting the lid until you have to. This is the most important thing.

Actually, you should get to the point where you lift the lid only four times: once, to rotate the foods 90°, once to flip, once to rotate 90° a second time, and one last time to monitor for final done-ness (you can leave the lid up at this point). Anything more, and you are simply wasting fuel and time.

Grill marks are essential for perfect cooking! Here is how to get those beautiful grill marks. Well, we already told you: rotate the food! If you food is square or circular, it almost does not matter how you position the food; if your food is rectangular, place them at 45° angles on the rack. As the sides start to turn color, carefully rotate the food 90°. This puts the “#” on the bottom. When juices start to pool at the top of the food, flip it over and quickly angle it again. Rotating once more will put fantastic grille marks on each sides, criss-crossing neatly.

Your food is done? Transfer the food to a serving plate and leave it the f— alone for five minutes. The Czar gets into arguments all the time about this, but letting food “set” is very important. Sure, for fatty steaks, burgers, and sausages, this might not be that essential. But for flank steaks, pork chops, chicken, lamb, etc., that gets tough and chewy, let the food set. What happens is that as the food cools slightly, steam inside coalesces back into juice. This turns tough chewy meat back into succulent, flavorful joy. Cutting the meat before it sets, on the other hand, lets the steam (and your juice) escape. Let it set.

Besides, you have one last thing to do before cutting the food and eating it, and that is our last tip: get back out there and while the grille is still searing hot, clean it with a wire brush. Right at this point, the fat, drippings, goo, and grease are very weak and loose. Scraping now is easy, quick, and cleans your rack before it hardens into that black concrete again. Do this, and your grille will need cleaning only once or twice a year even with heavy use. By the time you finish scraping and brushing the hot racks, you can go carve that meat.

All right, but what to cook? As a treat to our most loyal readers, we present Gormogon pork chops. The Volgi concocted this recipe from centuries of dark sorcery. The Czar will add some thoughts. Your Volgi:

Whisk together 2 Tablespoons of maple syrup, 2 Tablespoons of Dijon mustard, and 1 Tablespoon of steak sauce.

Put the chops out at room temperature for 20–30 minutes in advance of grilling. Lightly brush or spray the chops with vegetable oil, then brush on the above glaze and, if you want, season with kosher or sea salt and freshly ground black pepper.

Grill the chops over direct medium heat (in a closed grill) 10-12 minutes (rotate after 3 minutes, flip at 6 minutes, rotate again at 9 minutes, and by 12 minutes the juices should be running clear. Let the meat rest five minutes or so and then serve.

These are pretty much no fail, and work even if you forgot to marinate anything. The Czar has discovered this works mind-blowingly well for pork steaks, if you can get them. Don’t like or don’t eat pork? No problem: substitute with chicken or turkey breasts.

So if your weather permits, get out there: clean that grille, oil it up, light and heat it correctly, and get these bad boys cooking for you. Keep the cover closed, put on them grill marks, let the meat set, and clean the grille before it cools. And don’t say we didn’t warn you that your results will immediately show.

They Still Can't Admit It

It’s seriously bad when your blinders are on this long.

The Chicago Sun-Times tends to skew slightly right-of-center in its editorial reporting (though it is getting lefty), but its featured columnists are way off the left end. Competing for most ignorant is Neil Steinberg, on whom we have previously commented, who seems progressively (!) desperate to convince his colleagues that his past views on gun ownership and President Bush were a brief, misunderstood aberration.

The other day, Steinberg wrote a piece ardently hoping Sarah Palin would run for the presidency. Why? Because, ha ha, she is so stupid!

Some reasons Steinberg offers as to why she would be a disastrous president?

• Her followers salivate awaiting her next utterances without any question or logic


• She is an absolute doofus on foreign policy


• Her beliefs are so far to the extreme that she would risk destroying this country to implement them


• She is so polarizing that opponents redouble their efforts


• But her defeat would be spectacular, and push opposition “back into their caves” for a while so that real work could get done.

Wow. No doubt he is basing this on Barack Obama’s presidency. How perfectly Mr. Steinberg describes the present POTUS.

Steinberg, like many of the Last True Believers, cannot seem to let go of the fantasy that is the man Barack Obama rather than the President Barack Obama. He is hardly alone. Why, one of the reasons Obama sounds like such a putz when he goes off script is because he is too smart for us to understand. His bungling of Iraq, Afghanistan, and Libya proves he is a master tactician in war. And so on: they still need us to believe that Obama is the greatest guy, ever, to be President—the point that the premises make no sense. Really, it’s as weirdening for the average American as watching someone at a race track earenstly cheering on a horse that strolls out of the gate while the others are a league ahead.

Before we get too annoyed with the inability of the press to forego the leg tingling over the Man, the awful facts about the President remain: unemployment has remained high every year of his presidency. Inflation is back. The housing market is not being allowed to respond normally. He has no consistent message on foreign policy except for speeches clarifying what he meant to say (or should have said). He has increased the number of military engagements we are fighting. He has dealt with more War-On-Terror near-incidents. On any domestic front, or on any foreign policy issue, he has been incapable, uninterested, or incompetent. His popularity as a president means that the GOP could run an iMac against him and probably win. The Democrats, using the same arsenal of false arguments and bogus candidates and assorted dirty tricks, cannot gain major ground. And there is still the small matter of the long absent budget.

How bad is it? The GOP budget proposals, although defeated, got votes. The Democratic budget proposals, thought defeated, got zero votes. This is a harbinger to anyone who is honest with himself. The GOP marketing machines have not even been turned on, and already America is begging for Ryan, Christie, or Bachmann to run for president, and is largely uninterested in Gingrich, Romney, or even Palin. This is not because the majority of the country wants younger candidates, but because at this point they want anyone new or different.

Steinberg is right, as usual, about one thing: most Americans probably prefer to see Sarah Palin stay out of the race; but it isn’t because they love Obama. But because they urgently need him to be another embarrassing Democratic presidential footnote.

The Evidence Must Favor Our Side. Or Else It's Wrong.

All part of life’s rich pageant.

NOAA: We have data that corresponds to evidence of climate change.

Lib Media Machine: Ah! You should listen to NOAA. They are scientists! They know this stuff. Now fund our green jobs. Global warming is killing us. Look at these tornado events!

NOAA: The recent rash of tornado activity is completely unrelated to climate change.

Lib Media Machine: Pfft. What do they know, anyway?

The Doctor Is In

Regarding our attempt to fathom the President’s weird dissonance on Israel, the Doctor writes:

Czaralicious,

I liked your post.

I grew up with very pro-israel Jews as friends, so I'm a bit of a Zionist. Besides I see them as in the right compared to their neighbors.

I agree, I don't think President Obama likes Israel or The Chosen one bit. I think he is a sufficiently intransigent idiologue that he's fully prepared to throw them under the bus.

All of the good things about Israel that you mentioned, like strong ally of the US, good trade partner, stable democracy are all things he thinks are bad. Further, American Jewry vote sufficiently consistently Democratic (sadly I suspect based on my many discussions with Jewish friends is because they see doing so as the open minded and intellectual thing to do, and there is that abortion thing that they seem more in favor of than Catholics do) that Barry can take them for granted.


There are enough American Jewish voters that would prefer to keep their right to choose or at least look smart than to support Israel.


Then again, Dr. J. Knows a lot of cafeteria Catholics who pull the D lever too.


Best
Dr. J.

Charles M. Russell Speaks Anew

Man, the Czar wishes he didn’t agree with this.

Can you imagine the US becoming a Euroweenie country as bad as any you can name? You bet you can, and Ken Blackwell points out that 2012 is the Rubicon for it. This is how close we are, right now.

And the Czar keeps hearing the voice of Charles M. Russell: “Guard, protect and cherish your land, for there is no afterlife for a place that started out as Heaven.”

Re: NYT's Wheelbarrow of Stupid

What migth get lost in 'Puter's excellent post here is the following:  The elephant in the room that liberals steadfastly ignore is that the housing market under the best of conditions is destined to deflate or at best hold level over the next twenty or so years. Why? Because demographics are destiny.
The liberals will continue to bemoan those who say "let the market take it's course".  But, in the end the market will take it's course.  I'll equate the situation to something from my past: years ago I went on a Boy Scout high adventure camp where a small group of us did whitewater canoeing in Maine for a week.  Two jokers in our group who didn't listen to the guide ended up sideways in the middle of a class III (bordering on class IV) set of rapids.  Their canoe broadsided a rock in the middle of the river, tipped upstream and began filling with water.  The jokers got out safely and the gear was recovered, but do you know what happens to an aluminum canoe pivoted on a rock with a river of water rushing into it?  It's starts to bend...and rivets pop...and 4 grown men with Z-lines and pulleys couldn't budge it.  Eventually a crowbar/pin-iron was added to the mix and the remnants of the canoe were trucked off.  Much like the river, the market forces which include demographics, cannot be swayed much by government intervention. 

In closing, I'll add one point that 'Puter didn't add.  Not only are the demographics of the housing market in play here, but you need to consider the investment profiles of the demographics.  The Boomers are starting to remove money from the investment markets as they retire.  Note 'Puter's ratio of 3:2 between the generations - there will likely be more money coming out than going in.  It's not a pretty picture.

Two Quick Points

First, the Czar would like to confirm that yes, the ability to time travel with GorT has many educational advantages. You can learn a whole lot about the future by going there.

Second, and somewhat related, the Czar would like to apologize for his excessive use of a certain family unfriendly profanity in an essay, published on this site, on March 18, 2025. He will regret any embarrassment or lengthy conversations with the kids this will subsequently cause.

Obama's Dissonance on Israel

The following is a subject the Czar has been struggling to understand for some time now, and no doubt (most of) you are equally puzzled. But really, what the hell is going on with the President and Israel?

First, in 2009, President Obama refused to meet Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the AIPAC summit, but then publicly visited Hugo Chavez instead.

Then, in 2010, Vice-President Biden visited Israel and publicly embarrassed his hosts by denouncing the construction of new homes in East Jerusalem—not once, but a few times, before the world press. Israel was irate that Biden would condemn a perfectly legal action (especially when he was a guest), and changed government policy so that visiting American presidents and vice-presidents would not be made aware of any future internal actions until they were out of the country. In response, Obama walked out on PM Netanyahu when he visited the White House.

The latest middle-finger gaffe was the President’s comments that “the borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps....” This shocked most people who realize that Israel nearly lost its life in 1967, and defensively took those positions with undeniable military advantage ever since. The White House had been promising something big, fun, and clever, and meant every word of it!

Until they learned that hundreds of millions of people around the world were outraged by it. Then, the next day, the President explained that he more or less meant something totally different, and he underscored this by repeating it:

And since my position has been misrepresented several times, let me reaffirm what “1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps” means.
By definition, it means that the parties themselves — Israelis and Palestinians — will negotiate a border that is different than the one that existed on June 4, 1967. That’s what mutually agreed-upon swaps means. It is a well-known formula to all who have worked on this issue for a generation. It allows the parties themselves to account for the changes that have taken place over the last 44 years.

Interestingly, most of the people who have worked on this issue for a generation still don’t know what the heck that means, because it sure as hell sounds like he wants Israel to put itself back in a severely weakened position. Every time he attempts to explain himself further, he throws more mud.

Sure would be a lot easier for himself, and the United States, if he said he screwed up. Might be a good idea if, in future, he reads through his speeches before he delivers them.

This is but nonsense to the liberal media. Glenn Kessler at Wa Po jumps up and down on Michele Bachmann for (a) twisting the President’s words around (b) because she’s a stupid woman. Everybody who knows anything knows Bachman is wrong, and the President is very clear on what he meant, and the whole thing is a perfectly brilliant solution. Read through it, and determine for yourself if Kessler has any clue what Obama meant, because it is quite clear the President had no idea what he was saying and is probably wishing, once again, he could pull those words back.

And he would not be the only one: the entire Democratic party has been expressly embarassed by the issue, especially since major political donor Haim Saban has announced he will no longer support the President. Harry Reid and Stenny Hoyer have gone further and openly dismissed the comments as bad foreign policy.

Therefore, one is inclined to ask: when even the Democrats are ardent supporters of Israel, what on earth is the President doing trying to alienate them so badly? The Czar really is at a loss for a short answer, but connects some dots.

Dot one. Barry Sotero spent a large amount of time in Muslim-based education. As a result, he imagines that he, as an apostate, understands the Muslim world view. It should be evident by now that he does not, based on the Muslim world’s responses to his efforts that range from lukewarm apathy to complete disdain.

Dot two. Need we say it? Jeremiah Wright. For evidently 20 years, Barack Obama listened to Wright’s anti-semitic jeremiads, in which Jews were blamed for most of the evils in the black community.

Dot three. The junior senator from Illinois entered politics thinking that Israel was pretty much a source for evil and oppression in the world, and that the United States would do better distancing itself from Israel, and maybe extending some welcoming hands to the Muslim world.

Dot four. The junior senator from Illinois is elected President of these United States, and discovers that a serious number of Islamic extremists want to destroy us, and have no patience for hand-holding.

Dot five. The President discovers that despite all this, Israel is a major friend to the US. Israel is one of our best trading partners, has a powerful military that buys American hardware and sells some futuristic software to our military in return. And that she is a fully functional democracy that has served as the keystone to stability in the region since the late 1940s. She also has a powerful lobby that turns many a politician’s ear on both sides of the aisle.

So perhaps what we are seeing is the President’s cognitive dissonance: that the Israel he assumed as a bad, nasty, wicked land of perfidy might indeed be a friendly, powerful, and extremely useful ally. And this has got him spinning around in confusion.

Unfortunately, each time he elects to test his original hypothesis, he is publicly humiliated. Perhaps he will quickly learn to stop testing Israel, and realize he has been deeply wrong about so many issues. Crap, even Carter understood this.

A Wheelbarrow Full of Stupid from the NYT

The New York Times editorial board strikes another blow for market ignorance today in this editorial. Its premise is that in order to save the housing market, we have to destroy it. Sadly, this is an all too common attitude among our Democrat friends these days.

The editorial argues as follows (editorial comments in parentheses):

1. The housing market tanked in 2008 and hasn't recovered. (So far, so good).

2. Government stimulus programs such as the home buyers' tax credit caused a temporary spike in home sales. (And every bit as reliably, sales plummeted with the stimulus' end as demand was artificially pushed forward).

3. Foreclosures are putting downward pressure on home prices. (Increasing supply with constant demand generally has that result).

4. Banks are slowing down foreclosures, hoping to time the market. ('Puter's a moron, but trying to avoid selling into the teeth of a bear market seems rational to him).

5. These problems will not solve themselves. (Yes, they will. Prices will fall to a point where people will buy them, and demand will then pick up).

6. Government intervention is the only solution. (No, it's not. See response to 5, supra).

7. The current government solution isn't working because bank participation is not mandatory. (Failure of the program has nothing to do with the fact that it ignore bedrock precepts of economics, such as supply and demand).

8. We must change the laws that apply to, essentially, 30 year bonds (mortgages) in order to require banks to offer modifications before foreclosing. (If you rewrite 30 year contracts by fiat in the middle to early stages of their terms, you have created huge potential losses in banks that will further depress their ability to capitalize adequately).

9. Democrats from Rhode Island and Ohio are leading the charge, which is great. (Rhode Island and Ohio are economic basket cases caused by years of Democrat fiscal mismanagement. In fact, both states just elected Republican governors to repair the years of ruinous Democrat rule).

That's the NYT's positions. Have the government game the market to achieve the ends you want, and ignore any foreseeable negative consequences of your actions.

If the NYT's preferred policy is implemented, the following things will happen in quick succession:

1. Banks will stop lending except to all but the most creditworthy at anything resembling today's terms and conditions.

2. Home equity lines of credit will almost completely dry up.

3. Bank stocks will plunge, as their loan portfolios have been unilaterally recast on significantly less favorable terms.

4. The market for any derivative or equity based on real estate backed debt will freeze, as valuation of the assets will be difficult if not impossible until the rules are written.

5. The government will have effectively nationalized the residential real estate lending market, not that it hasn't done so already.

The elephant in the room that liberals steadfastly ignore is that the housing market under the best of conditions is destined to deflate or at best hold level over the next twenty or so years. Why? Because demographics are destiny.

Baby boomers outnumber Generation X by slightly more than 3:2 (76 million versus 51 million). Assuming similar home ownership rates over time for the generations, at any given point there will be 1/3 more existing homes than existing buyers. And yet we think that new home building is a great industry that just has to rebound, because it always has. Just as housing prices always went up, right until they didn't.

Of course, there are good reasons for building new homes, such as functional obsolescence of the old housing stock, development of new areas in growing communities and redevelopment of older communities. But it seems unlikely that these legitimate reasons will ever be sufficient to see a return to the heyday of spec building that occurred during the housing boom years. This, coupled with demographics, lead 'Puter to believe two things are likely:

1. America is currently oversupplied with housing.

2. Demand is not going catch up with supply for some time.

These two factors show the folly of any government attempt to game the market in homeowners' favor. If there is no demand for existing supply, prices will continue to fall, regardless of what government does, short of buying existing stock and plowing it under (ed. -- this would actually be preferable, as it would address the oversupply issue, and likely cheaper in the long run).

The New York Times is calling on King Canute --er, President Obama -- to stop the tide. It can't be done. And to make matters worse, anything the government does will make matters worse.

There's your daily dose of Little 'Puter Sunshine.

Reupholstering the Castle

A typical email, but one we chose because it seems really flattering:

Do my eyes deceive me, or is there new wallpaper in the background on the blog? What is it, and who picked it out?
It looks very nice on the retina display.

Well, thanks. But this is asking for some inside baseball, and you taunt us to reveal some of the deeper and darker secrets of the ferocity that goes on behind the scenes here. So here we go.

There are a number of sites using a largely similar or wholly similar look and feel to ours. Remember, we have been doing a website since they were done with paper and pencil, so we get a bit ornery when people show a lack of imagination and creativity, and simply use the same public domain template that we did.

Your Czar got a little tired of the repetitive late 1960s wallpaper look, and suggested to 孔夫子, the Œcumenical Volgi (The Notorious ŒV), that we should maybe go with something a little better. So the Volgi found a nice leather ink blotter pattern. The Czar adjusted the colors until ’Puter said “Used Brawny!”* and we knew we had it.

But that might be the most obvious cosmetic change if you are an IE, Firefox, Safari, Chrome, or Opera user. Readers using the Yapchari browser will note the three-dimensional hyperchrominance effect when you drag objects forward and back through layers. Users of the Empyrion 5 browser will find that they can now read the site in cuneiform with a single i-click, and that the Print button now works. Users of the DOS 3.1 browser will find their screen consists of green flashy text on a slate screen.

Glad you all seem to like some of these features. One more tidbit: Yapchari users should rotate the ఖ icon 90° to z-color the ఆ frame. That is very cool. Users of other browsers should really upgrade, once it becomes available in ఠctob౬r 2254.

Other features we are looking into include an ability to dediacriticize Volgi’s posts so they render on most systems without extensive language packs installed, the ability to flag essays that are basically re-treads of our usual tropes about unions, Democrats, liberals, and journalists, a radio button that puts more commas into the Mandarin’s rants, and a button that automatically removes all links to Wikipedia and puts in properly researched references.

Thanks for all the thumbs up (or whatever body parts you have been sending us photos of in various defensive postures)! Some of us treasure every one of them.

*Don’t get it, eh? Just like Dad!

Mail: In Which We Can Cross-Link Like Crazy

Fake Herzog does what more of you should do, and write in:

1. ‘Puter hit the ball out of the park (was it perhaps a tee ball?) today with his post on E.J. Dionne and the Catholic Church’s position on economics versus abortion. Out. Of. The. Park. However, something he forgot to mention that is even more supportive of his argument than Father Sirico’s excellent thoughts on the kerfuffle concerning Catholic University and Speaker Boehner, is the letter from the USCCB on the Republican budget.
2. Concerning your last mailbag, please pass this note onto the good Dr. J. –

   Do not confuse illicit with elicit. Illicit means ‘ not allowed by law or rules ’ (illicit drugs), whereas elicit means ‘ draw out a reply or reaction ’ (I tried to elicit a smile from Joe).
   
   - from the Oxford Dictionaries website

3. Finally, whenever the subject of Rush’s song “The Trees” comes up, I am forced to mention the early Vonnegut short story “Harrison Bergeron” (which captures the theme of the song just as well as Orwell or Twain.) I know that Vonnegut was a crazy lefty at the end of his life, but some of his stuff (particularly the science fiction) is quite good.

As always, to all the Gormogons, keep up the good work!

Thanks, Know-It-All! You know, if we started editing properly around here, and fixing grammatical whoopsies, you might not like ‘Puter’s posts all that much.

Also, it is critical to remember that most of our errors, including the good doctor’s, by the way, are intentional. You spotted one, so we will throw that out to the crowd. Keep track of them, because at the end of the year, they will spell out a special message from us to all of you!

Now we’ll all go over to I’m Not Herzog and see how your work looks. But on the other hand, your note was some of the highest praise our dear Ghettoputer has ever received. Thanks, buddy!

Folsom Prison Blues, California and the NYT

The New York Times editorial board gets something partially correct today!

This editorial lauds the Supreme Court for upholding a Ninth Circuit decision requiring California to remedy intolerable ("cruel and unusual") prison conditions.*

Based on the decision, the conditions inside the California penal system appear horrendous, and these horrendous conditions seem to be the rule, not the exception. 'Puter can see how a majority of the Court could reasonably find these widespread conditions to constitute cruel and unusual punishment, thereby violating prisoners' constitutional rights.

'Puter believes that prisoners deserve to be treated with basic human dignity while incarcerated. This includes adequate space, ventilation, medical care and nutrition. It also includes preventing and harshly punishing all inmate violence, including most pointedly prison rape. Prison rape is not a joke. It is a horrendous crime and should be treated as such. Failure of the penal system to protect inmates is a violation of basic legal rights, and diminishes us.

Tangentially, 'Puter has a full riff ready to go on "this is what happens when you focus on the public union worker and not the customer (e.g., prisoners, students, taxpayers)," but that's not his intent for this post.

Where the NYT errs is in its reflexive berating of Justices Scalia and Thomas' dissent. The NYT attempts to paint Scalia and Thomas as extreme, yet in so doing underline the mainstream nature of the Justices' position.

Scalia and Thomas stated that it is not the duty of the Court, indeed it is beyond the authority of federal courts, to substitute their judgment for that of the Legislature. That is, judges are not to make policy, they are to determine law and leave any required policy adjustments to legislators. 'Puter agrees with the Justices that the slow usurpation by unelected lifetime appointees into policymaking is beyond any reasonable reading of the Constitution.

A prime example of this overreach is Roe v. Wade. The Court could have held there exists a right to privacy, and that abortion falls within such right to privacy (leaving aside the myriad reasons this holding is wrong on its face and constitutes impermissible judicial policymaking in itself), so therefore an absolute ban on abortion is impermissible. Such a decision would have left the policy decisions to the elected representatives of the people, where such decisions properly reside.

Similarly in this instance, even had the majority disagreed with Justices Scalia and Thomas as to whether procedurally and substantively California's prison conditions constitute cruel and unusual punishment, it could have simply held the specific conditions unconstitutional and ordered California's lawmakers to remedy the situation. Instead, we have a federal court setting itself up to run California's legal system for the next 50 or so years. And that's the real problem here, greater than violation of individual prisoners' rights, because legislating courts are an attack on our entire form of government.

Maybe the NYT should change its motto to "The Ends Justify The Means" and be done with it.

*For those of you interested in reading the entire 91 page opinion, here's a link to Brown v. Plata from the Supreme Court's website.

Cafeteria Catholics Unite!

Speaking for the "Catholicism = Whatever My Personal Beliefs Are At Any Given Time" wing of the faith, E.J. Dionne pens another Washington Post op-ed.

Regular readers of your Gormogons know 'Puter's opinion of Mr. Dionne regarding matters of Catholic faith. 'Puter thinks Mr. Dionne purposely misleads Catholics and non-Catholics alike as to the Church's true and consistent positions.

This week, Mr. Dionne sets out to equate Catholic politicians supporting abortion with Catholic politicians reforming welfare programs. Mr. Dionne's theorizes the Church (and media) is quick to jump on pro-abortion Catholic politicians, yet the Church (and media) is unwilling to hold welfare restructuring Catholic politicians to the same standard. Mr. Dionne uses Speaker Boehner's commencement address as a jumping off point for his seemingly thoughtful piece.

First, 'Puter refers back Fr. Robert A. Sirico's discussion of this ginned-up controversy over at NRO. Fr. Sirico patiently and in great detail discusses the Church's teachings on the Church's teachings on the poor and our Catholic duty to aid the poor. Fr. Sirico explains the notions of preferential matters and subsidiarity in detail. It would benefit anyone regardless of faith to brush up on these concepts.

Fr. Sirico's piece is important to 'Puter's discussion for two reasons.

First, it proves that E.J. Dionne's position is farcical. Speaker Boehner's beliefs and actions comport with his Catholic faith. Indeed, Speaker Boehner's reliance on the principle of subsidiarity is more in keeping with Catholic teachings than Mr. Dionne's preferred solution: let the government worry about it.

Second, Fr. Sirico's piece disproves Mr. Dionne's secondary postulate. Namely, the media has ignored the brouhaha around Speaker Boehner's commencement speech at Catholic University. This piece was published nearly two weeks (a fortnight for all you leftist Euroweenies out there) prior to Mr. Dionne's screed. 'Puter's assuming Mr. Dionne's ignorance of arguably the most important conservative opinion magazine in the country (i.e., National Review) results from the Kael-esque insularity of inside-the-Beltway liberal elites. Perhaps Mr. Dionne's notion is better restated as follows: Liberal media ignored the Boehner "controversy" because to publicize it would be to call greater attention to liberal Catholic politicians' hypocrisy.

'Puter now moves on to a foundational document based critique of Mr. Dionne's nominal "Catholicism."

The Church's position on social justice is, for lack of a better word, squishy. You can see from the good Father's article above that both Mr. Dionne's and Speaker Boehner's positions are (arguably) in keeping with Catholic teaching. Here's the Catechism of the Catholic Church on economics, the subject on which Mr. Dionne critiques Speaker Boehner.

§ 2425 The Church has rejected the totalitarian and atheistic ideologies associated in modem times with "communism" or "socialism." She has likewise refused to accept, in the practice of "capitalism," individualism and the absolute primacy of the law of the marketplace over human labor.

§ 2449 Beginning with the Old Testament, all kinds of juridical measures (the jubilee year of forgiveness of debts, prohibition of loans at interest and the keeping of collateral, the obligation to tithe, the daily payment of the day-laborer, the right to glean vines and fields) answer the exhortation of Deuteronomy: "For the poor will never cease out of the land; therefore I command you, 'You shall open wide your hand to your brother, to the needy and to the poor in the land.'" Jesus makes these words his own: "The poor you always have with you, but you do not always have me." In so doing he does not soften the vehemence of former oracles against "buying the poor for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals . . .," but invites us to recognize his own presence in the poor who are his brethren:

When her mother reproached her for caring for the poor and the sick at home, St. Rose of Lima said to her: "When we serve the poor and the sick, we serve Jesus. We must not fail to help our neighbors, because in them we serve Jesus.

All good stuff. Help your neighbor, because in so doing you affirm Christ's presence in each person, no matter their station in life. Note well, communism and socialism are rejected by the Church, as is unfettered capitalism. There seems to be a big, squishy middle into which one's behavior may fall, where such behavior is acceptable under Catholic doctrine.

Oddly, 'Puter cannot help but to note the conspicuous absence of "government" anywhere in this portion of the Catechism. It speaks to"you." You, 'Puter. You, parishes. You universal Church. The Catechism speaks to Catholics, individually and in groups. It does not command governments, nor does it commend Catholics to shirk individual and collective moral obligations by foisting them onto government.

For Mr. Dionne to claim his position on economic social justice, or whatever other catch phrase he chooses to hide behind, is the only acceptable Church position is uninformed. Or willfully ignorant. Couldn't it be both, 'Puter wonders? Perhaps not. Let's assume uninformed.

The Church's positions on abortion is, unlike its teachings on economic matters, is remarkably clear and absolute. Perhaps Mr. Dionne could acquaint himself with the following sections from the Catechism of the Catholic Church. It's even available online these days, what with the internets and the Google and all.

§ 2270 Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception.

§ 2271 Since the first century the Church has affirmed the moral evil of every procured abortion. This teaching has not changed and remains unchangeable. Direct abortion, that is to say, abortion willed either as an end or a means, is gravely contrary to the moral law ... .

§ 2272 Formal cooperation in an abortion constitutes a grave offense.

§ 2273 The inalienable right to life of every innocent human individual is a constitutive element of a civil society and its legislation.

And so on and so forth. 'Puter'd be happy to quote Catechism to you for hours, but it's boring what with its absolute and categorical condemnation of abortion and its perpetuation.

To conclude this too lengthy diatribe, Mr. Dionne is wrong. Not only wrong, but a couple of weeks late to the party. He is wrong that there is only one Church approved path on economic matters (his preferred path). He is further wrong in implying there are multiple acceptable Church approved positions on abortion, for there are not.

Mr. Dionne should stop treating his politics as a matter of faith. One could say he puts his faith in government ahead of his faith in God, but that would be hurtful and un-Christian.

Professional Tee-Ball

So the Czar found himself coaching a tee-ball game today.

Due to a variety of scheduling conflicts, only a single assistant coach showed up. So the Czar, dropping off the Царевич (who won the game ball for some outstanding defensive work, as well as a Fabergé egg from the Czar), realized we were about, oh, three coaches short.

And lo, verily did the Czar straddle the field with his wondrous girth, initially coaching first base because, frankly, with tee ball, it’s the easiest thing to coach. You only need to know two words: “Run!” and ’Stop!” Later, the Czar moved to short center and began to coach defense, whereupon the other coach and we engaged in conversations like this:

Czar: Hey, we’re short a center fielder. Do you want to pull the pitcher back about six feet to stop stuff going up the middle?

Coach B: Uh, I dunno. Think that could work? Hell, whatever. Pitcher! Back up!

The Czar was also rewarded with listening to Coach B’s instructions in the dugout, which sounded every bit like this:

“Hey! You gotta bat with a helmet on!”

“Next time, Joey, throw to first, okay? That’s the parking lot, that’s first base.”

“No, it was a great throw. I didn’t think anybody here could hit the Porta-John from third base. But I think you really scared the grandma who was in there.”

“Then don’t sit next to him.”

“Glove on the hand, not on the head.”

“I don’t know what the snacks are; why not worry about that after the game?”

“That isn’t your hat, Vinnie.”

“No, you can’t bat again. This is the line up, and you already batted. You come after Tommy. No, after Tommy. Then forget it; you can sit out the game.”

The Czar realized that there is probably very little difference between coaching tee ball and actually managing a major league team.

MC Hammers Music

MC writes in to discuss music.

Dread, awful, and sometimes lyrical Czar,

Rush (the band) are not the most conservative rock band out there, but these lyrics have some relevance during this second term of Jimmy Carter's presidency (this song was written in 1978 during Carter's first term).

From the song "The Trees" on the album Hemispheres:

So the maples formed a union
And demanded equal rights.
"These oaks are just too greedy;
We will make them give us light."
Now there's no more oak oppression,
For they passed a noble law,
And the trees are all kept equal
By hatchet, axe, and saw.

That's exactly what we're getting - we're all gonna be equal, and Obama will make sure if by keeping us about three inches tall.

All trees are equal, but some trees are more equal than others. Who knew George Orwell wrote for Rush? Evidently, Mark Twain wrote for them as well.

DT: Thoughts on Liberalism, Pre-Rapture

DT responds to BG and Dr. J:

For some* reason, reading this epistle of yours brought to mind the Billy Joel (pbuh) song “Angry Young Man” to mind:

There’s a place in the world for the angry young man

With his working class ties and his radical plan

Specifically, that place would be out of my fucking face, and preferably getting a real job.

XOXO,

DT, Myrmidon Wrangler Extraordinaire

*the reason being 4 glasses of Malbec-Shiraz

“I’ll Fly Away” —Johnny Cash

Premillennial dispensationalism and scriptural crypto-mathematics? No, thanks. The elderly Johnny Cash from the haunted heart of American low-church Protestantism, oh, God, yes.









All but the last of these (and some even better tracks not on YouTube) are available on My Mother’s Hymn Book, placed for your convenience here in the Emporium Gormogonicum.

Trimming the Male Bag

BG writes in to ask Dr. J:

Your Czariness -

You write, "The Czar is curious that members of San Francisco lefty lefts think that surgical and safe removal of the foreskin is detrimental to the child, but that cutting out the rest of the baby before birth is perfectly acceptable. Hey, maybe if this law passes, all the abortion clinics in the Bay Area should be shut down because of it?"

I don't think that should be a problem, except for those abortion clinics which kill the fetus by cutting off its foreskin. Fortunately, the preferred method of killing a fetus possessing a foreskin is to jam an icepick into its skull. So it's all good.

Liberals see nothing inconsistent in defending this kind of nonsense. She who must not be named - oh, what the heck, her name is Ann Coulter - once wrote that liberals want a woman to have the right to kill the child a rapist put into her, but not to carry a gun that she could have used to kill the rapist.* We can now modify that to read, liberals want her to be allowed to kill her rapist's baby, but not circumcise it or carry a gun to prevent its creation in the first place.

Every time I try to point up this kind of insanity to a liberal, they try to change the subject to something like why I hate women.

—BG

* I can't find the quote on the web, so it may be apocryphal. But if Coulter didn't say it, she should have.

And the good doctor replies:

Dear BG of the Castle G:

As Dr. J. has said in the past. Liberals cannot be reasoned with. There is two things that drive them.

First and foremost they think of their own material and sensual pleasures. The liberal elite are wealthy, like nice things, and like feeling good (through food, drink, sex, and perhaps more elicit activities). They also feel that there should not be consequences for feeling good. Pregnant? Kill the baby. Cheat on the wife with a hooker? Who cares, I shouldn't have to resign my post. Hate on President Bush during a concert overseas? You should still buy my damned records.

Second, they like telling other how to live their lives. Remember the bumper sticker, "live simply so that others can simply live?" They believe that you should live simply while they simply LIVE IT UP. Look at Al Gore's ungreen lifestyle. They do this to deal with their guilt about doing things that they know mommy and daddy would disapprove of. Others can live as I say they should so I don't have to live as I say they should. The circumcision issue relates to that. Don't cut your son's foreskin off because sex won't feel as good for him. The liberal is mad because his foreskin was cut so his uncut pals feel better knocking boots than he does.

Who cares about the disease protective upsides (HIV is a mixed bag because gay men probably catch HIV differently than straight men do), or other people's primitive religious beliefs because we, the Liberal Elite (TM) are smarter than them.

Best,
Dr. J.

Castle Lost & Found Item

Guys, I found this when I came in last night after a few pops at the Leapin' Peacock.  Which one of you two does it belong to?

Either someone broke into the motor pool…

…or Dat Ho or Sleestak has been selling some vehicles for cash. Because I’m pretty sure the Czar and ’Puter own or have owned at least three of these vans. We took their keys away.

Also, because Vince over there at Film Drunk seems to be on fire today, do check out this purported NC-17 collection of Burt Reynolds fan mail. And then try to argue that the ’70s weren’t the nadir of American history.

Tech Up!

I realize it's been a while since I've chimed in on tech news, so I thought I'd drop a few nuggets here:

1. Apple is going to be facing some serious challenges soon.  iTunes is the defacto standard for music collections.  However, Apple really hasn't added any have-to-have features to the software in a long time (don't even try to argue Genius on this - it's bloated and slows the whole thing down - and really, how often do you use it?).  Well, keep an eye on Spotify.  It's growing in Europe and once it clears a few hurdles in the U.S. it'll be challenging iTunes.  WiFi syncing with devices (no more USB tethering of your iPhone, iTouch, etc.), a free plan that allows for Pandora-like streaming of music, and integration with Social Media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter.  The music industry needs to get into the modern day - the technology impacting their industry is eventually going to cause a revolution.  Cassette tapes, CDs, DAT, MP3/4, etc. were all pushing them and the online streaming is only going to grow.  Apple is going to try to counter this with iCloud - the iTunes cloud offering.  (Insert stupid "Yeah! Cloud!" or "To the cloud" phrase from the recent Microsoft campaign that was a freakin' joke).  APple is behind Google and Amazon launching their cloud music offerings...but it's Apple who has been the king of online music for the last decade.
2. The next iPhone (5?) better be kick ass as the Android side of the industry is going gang-busters.  This is largely due to the more open nature of the platform as mentioned here before.  Want to "find my phone"?  Well, you can quickly create your own App that you can initiate with a SMS (text) message - it will even "covertly" turn on GPS and WiFi to get a fix on it's location, it can text you back with that info, lock the phone, play an annoying sound, show a message, etc.  It's nice to be able to remove (and replace or upgrade) your battery and memory.  I have a 8G SD card in my Android phone...plenty 'o room.  Custom desktops - much more so that the iPhone, include widgets for weather, to-do lists, etc.  It's got Adobe Flash - although as technology moves forward, this will be more moot, I think.  HTML5 will likely eclipse Flash.  You can also remotely control your phone via a web browser interface.  On a side note, Android is so flexible and open, I've been able to create $250 "Android iPads" using the B&N Nook.  It was really quite simple and the result is awesome.

More soon.  Have to recharge the flux capacitor.

Dr. J: Cutting Away The Gristle

Dear The Czar,

Very briefly, two news items to keep an eye on.

Remember when we discussed the attempts to place a ban on male circumcision in San Francisco? Well, it's made the ballot in November. It would become a misdemeanor 'to circumcise, excise, cut or mutilate the foreskin, testicle or penis of another person who as not attained the age of 18.' The penalty would be up to a $1,000 fine and up to 1 year in jail. There do not appear to be a religious exemption for Muslims or Jews, nor does there appear to be a proviso for medical necessity (stricture/infection). It's interesting that testicular mutilation is part of the misdemeanor, because if the testes are mutilated, it's called 'MISSING THE FORESKIN BY A MILE, or more affectionately, MALPRACTICE.' No word as to what can or cannot be done to an innocent scrotum. Dr. J will be following and reporting back on this story in November because it represents the overlap of two of his favorite issues, religious freedom and bureaucratic interference in healthcare.

In other news from the People's Republic of South Oakland, Congresswoman Pelosi's (that feels so good) district received 20 percent of the Obamacare waivers. If the principal driver of the healthcare Titanic onto the iceberg is getting 20% of the lifeboats for a district that represents 1/435s of the American population, that must tell you that the Healthcare ship is sinking and the rats need to get off as well. This type of cronyism should outrage the public. Hopefully enough of these stories will sink into the collective consciousness of freedom loving Americans everywhere such that a sufficient number of congressmen, senators and a new president can repeal this Trojan horse that will lead to a single-payer system after medicine collapses under the weight of bureaucratic expenses.

On this note, have a pleasant evening.

Best,
Dr. J.

The Czar is curious that members of San Francisco lefty lefts think that surgical and safe removal of the foreskin is detrimental to the child, but that cutting out the rest of the baby before birth is perfectly acceptable. Hey, maybe if this law passes, all the abortion clinics in the Bay Area should be shut down because of it? Technically, speaking.

Obviously, we must remember that Liberals are ultimately contrarians: whatever you think is okay, they are against. This why there will never be a truce on social issues, as Gov. Daniels requested, and why conservative acceptance of social liberalism will never be enough: as soon as the majority becomes for something, the 18-20% who are liberals will immediately be against it, demand government intervention to stop it, and make Hollywood films about how horrible we all are.

Sigh.

Easy Predictions About The Media

The election season has (let’s be honest) already begun. We are already seeing some of the familiar patterns re-emerge from the media, many of which have already been identified and reported here. But let us condense a short list of what you can expect to see as well as what you are already seeing in the press:

• Turmoil! Republicans cannot agree! Gingrich admits Ryan plan is a disaster! Everywhere Ryan goes, he is verbally attacked (attacked!) by throngs of angry Americans! Goal: convince the public that the GOP is in trouble, and you want to vote for Democrats. Public reaction: the average person really does not know who Paul Ryan is, but is aware that the GOP has some sort of proposal or plan or something that seems to work, and that the Democrats have absolutely jack that competes with it.


• John Kerry is one of the best and brightest guys. It is a shame, really, that he was not elected President in 2004, because he really proves how smart and capable he is. You can bet you will see him more and more as a leader in foreign policy, and he would make a great VP, cabinet members, or advisor for a second Obama term. Goal: show the public that the Democrats have real assets, and not just asses. Public reaction: Kerry is a dizzy tool, and nobody is interested in his crap.


• Sarah Palin! Sarah Palin! Sarah Palin! Gosh, look what she did today. She tweeted that the Revolutionary War ended in 1789! Hah, the silly bimbo: everyone knows America won the war in 1776! Can you believe she might run for President! Wait, she isn’t? Okay, then, whatever we just said applies to Bachmann. Goal: Isolate and ridicule strong horses on the GOP. Public reaction: the average person does not think about Sarah Palin at all. The media has been wasting their time following her around since 2008.


• The conservatives are all in a tear about something. Who knows what it is: something about tax exemptions or waivers or something. Don’t listen to them: they were racially wrong on the birth certificate, and wrong on the President’s social security number, and wrong about Osama; why should we listen to them, now? Goal: Convince people that most Americans do not think like the majority of Americans. Public reaction: we tend to listen to conservatives in this country...at least, those of us who avoid echo chambers like the media, Hollywood, and academia.


• The President just did the funniest thing! Or else, he just did the most brilliant thing! Or perhaps he just did the most courageous thing! Maybe even he just did the most touching thing. Well, he did something, and gosh darn it he is so likeable. Goal: free campaign commercial. Public reaction: his polling is at toxic levels. For a reason.

Teacher Evaluations

Governor Andrew Cuomo has fast-tracked new, test score based teacher evaluations. Teachers' unions have predictably reacted by saying, "ZOMG! OH NOES! UR KIDZ IZZ GUNNA BE TEH DUMMER BCUZ WE R BING EEVALYOOATED!!1!eleventy!!"

'Puter was listening to his local NPR station while running errands and lunch yesterday and heard the City of Rochester teachers' union leader Adam Urbanski ('Puter refuses to sycophantically refer to Urbanski as "doctor" like the host-- an Ed.D is a bullshit degree) bemoaning the unfairness of it all. Urbanski and his ilk have given up hope that they can stop the imposition of some sort of data-driven teacher evaluations. However, the union thugs are still trying to bend things in their favor.

Urbanksi, when pressed to provide his thoughts on an acceptable teacher evaluation system, thought it should be based on GPA, teacher assessment of student progress, whether the child passes, etc. Sure, that'd be great Adam. Except that your union members control every single rubric you mention.

Jimmy needs a higher GPA so Mrs. Happypants makes the grade? Jimmy with the 75 IQ is now an A student. No potential for gaming the system here, is there?

The sad thing is that there are already reams of test data on these kids. 'Puter's kids are constantly being tested. There's already a fairly good and reliable benchmark for where these kids stand. And it would be relatively simple to establish a correlation between a kids' test performance and a teacher's proficiency. If the entire class does better than it's done before, then the teacher is probably good. The opposite is also true.

If the union were smart, which it isn't (greedy and thuggish, yes), it would use these data for its own purposes. If 'Puter were a NYSUT honcho, he'd be correlating test scores to the following: (1) income level; (2) census tract; (3) crime rates in neighborhood; and (4) single parent/no parent household. 'Puter's betting that in general, that the higher the income, the better the neighborhood and the greater parental involvement, the better the outcome generally. This would be a good argument for paying inner city teachers a ton more money. It's also an argument for paying suburban teachers less, but 'Puter doesn't expect the union to make that argument.

'Puter's greater point is that the teachers' union, particularly NYSUT, will stop and nothing, including cratering your child's education and bankrupting the state, in order to enrich itself and its members.

Remember that the next time you hear "it's for the kids."

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Dr. Boli is teh awsum.

Maybe it's this summer?

Remember the Summer of 2010?  It was the Obama Administration's self-proclaimed "Summer of Recovery" that, well, wasn't.  In recent months the economy has ticked up a bit but I wouldn't be holding your Summer 20102011 of Recovery party just yet.  There are signs that the economy is weakening again:

1. Housing Double Dip - the housing prices dipped in 2009 and recovered somewhat in 2010, however, the trend line for percentage change year-over-year is tracking downwards again.
2. The original Q1 GDP was estimated at 4% - it's been downgraded to 2.3%
3. Inflation is on the rise (yes, we're looking at you Bernake) - cheap capital is going away and that's not going to help recovery.
4. The U.K. is issuing austerity warnings.
5. What happens in Vegas...Gaming revenue is down which is not a good sign as gamblers are tightening up the purse strings.  There is a strong correlation between this and the economy.

Maybe Say It Ain't So is so busy with all the other important intiatives that he forgot about the recovery.  Maybe we should check on recovery.gov again?  Remember that site?  It shows that we've paid out:

• $84.1B to states for Medicaid grants because the states are broke.
• $60B in Unemployement insurance
• $22B in Food Stamps
• $2.5B to states to enforce child support and provide other family support, foster care and adoption benefits
• $13.2B via the Social Security Adminsitration for those one-time $250 checks

This is in addition to the federal budget funding for many of these programs.

All The News That's Fit To Make Up

A New York Times columnist dissembles on an important issue today regarding the hotly contested House race in New York's 26th district in order to promote the official party line on Medicare and Republican vulnerability thereon. Of course, the New York Times being in the Democrats' thrall is a bit of a "dog bites man" story.

'Puter knows a little something about this race, since he's local and not writing a column based on DNC talking points from a cushy chair in the Gray Lady's Manhattan headquarters.

Here's the NYT's Timothy Egan:

Look at the special Congressional election of next Tuesday. What was supposed to be a shoo-in for Republicans in a very safe district of upstate New York is now a tossup. For that, you can blame the Medicare radicals now running the House.

Mr. Egan's hypothesizes that the Republicans' Medicare reform proposal is so outlandish it's nearly ruined their chances to hold a safe seat Upstate. 'Puter calls shenanigans on Mr. Egan's unsupported allegations. A simple Google search for "NY 26 poll" gives lie to his claims.

According to the Democrat candidate's polling, the race currently stands R-31%, D-30%, TP-26%. The same Politico article notes that the well-respected Siena College pollsters have the race at R-36%, D-31%, TP-23%.

To 'Puter's simple mind both the independent and the Democrat sponsored polls show conservative candidates overwhelmingly favored by a nearly 60%-40% margin. But the New York Times isn't interested in fair, or even accurate, is it?

The truth is a Democrat candidate has a chance of squeaking through in a Republican district because (1) the Republican has a Tea Party candidate to her right and (2) Chris Lee, a Republican, had to resign the seat because of his Craigslist sexcapades, thereby tainting (understandably) the Republican brand.

In sum, the Republican Medicare reform proposals have little to no impact on the outcome of NY 26's special election. In a two candidate race, the Republican wins going away, and the polls reflect that. Mr. Egan's allegation otherwise are at best an error, and at worst an outright lie in service to his Democrat cronies.

Correction, or at least a clarification, please.

Political Recap

A nod to Huckabee: he realized that he would be wasting millions of Americans’ donation dollars, and for what? He doesn’t stand enough of a chance to survive a primary, and will only suck votes away from someone who could.

Also, Trump is out. Apparently, some aide worked up the courage to tell him what a President does, and that he is responsible for the American people. We jest: he never had a real belief he could be elected, and was largely a distraction in likely cahoots with the Democrats to end the birth certificate fiasco and make the President look better. Doubt it? Well, which party is better at being the Bill Veeck of politics?

So far we have only two real possibilities for the GOP presidential candidacy: Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich.

Mitt is proudly announcing that he raised $10 million in funds in a single day, when he only expected $2 million! Wow, huh? Actually, he expected to raise well over $10 million, but put out a press statement saying the opposite because it makes him sound like the dynamic, popular powerhouse salvation that he is absolutely not. Mr. Romney must know by now that his opponent will eviscerate him on RomneyCare with the easiest lawyer trick in the world: simply ask “If government healthcare is so bad, Governor, why did you roll out a substantially similar approach in your own state?” See? The President never has to admit the federal plan is a disaster, or point out that it doesn’t work: he merely has to beat the hypocrisy drum. Any counterattack Mitt Romney uses will come back in the exact same form: “If it’s so bad, why did you do basically the same thing?” or “If RomneyCare is so good, why do you oppose the federal plan?” He’s completely trapped: and for Romney to continue thinking he has a way out—a way out none of us has seen a glimpse of, by the way—indicates he is either foolish or stubbornly proud. Neither is a particularly desirable attribute in a candidate right now. Mitt Romney could probably beat Barack Obama in an election, but he will be damaged goods out of the gate.

Speaking of which, there is Newt Gingrich. Newt apparently has not been told that the 1990s are over, and that voters absolutely detest government spending. Regardless of his personal baggage (seriously bad, though considerably less than the average Democratic politician), he indicated to voters everywhere that he is oblivious to the current political landscape. You know that we are speaking only about his defamation of Paul Ryan’s proposed Path to Prosperity—making horrifyingly out-of-touch comments about its effect on Medicare…comments that demonstrated that Gingrich (a) thinks that the GOP will be doomed again by entitlement reforms, which hasn’t been the case for 20 years, and (b) he hasn’t read the plan at all, since the Ryan plan merely sets up an eventual taskforce committee to reform Medicare without touching the existing or pending participants. Simple as that. And just as simply, Newt indicates that he just got here, has been out for a while, but somebody will catch him up on whatever the issues are. No surprise that a heckler shouted that Newt was embarrassing himself.

Things are very simple for the GOP: read the news. Whatever the President is saying or is planning to do, stick with the complete opposite. You will get 60% of the voters right there. Neither Romney nor Gingrich seem to understand that they represent a GOP the country frankly doesn’t think much of, anymore.

So who is left? Mitch Daniels and Tim Pawlenty are still in the possible category. Jon Huntsman and Michele Bachmann are outliers, but really need to start building name recognition fast. All four of these candidates lack the disastrous backgrounds and missteps the others have, but need to start convincing people they have charisma. Pawlenty (what a nice guy) and Bachmann (wow, she’s smart!) score much higher in the charisma department than Daniels (a high school principal) and Huntsman (was he an ambassador or governor?), but Daniels and Huntsman have powerful executive experience and considerable influence in the GOP, not just the Tea Party.

The important element here is that things are starting to happen. It will be a fun next few months to watch; the good news is that despite a clear candidate that appeals to everyone, the GOP is avoiding a lot of in-fighting (Gingrich notwithstanding) and has a golden turkey in Obama to take on. It will be a fun ride.

Fanmail: Some Days It Gets Really Weird

First some thoughts on Thor from BG:

Great and Terrible Czar -

Our neutered female cat likes to hang around my wife while she's getting dressed. Is Thor an appropriate movie for cats that like to watch naked women?

Is Thor an appropriate movie for men who like to watch naked women?

Is Thor an appropriate movie for men who like to watch cats watching naked women?

Do you have any naked women chained up at Castle Gormogon? Or do you just kinda let them, you know, roam free and all?

No, no special reason, just curious.

You seem to be quite, um, obsessed with—dare we say it—well, frankly, you seem to be obsessed with cats. That could be a Freudian thing. Dunno. Hated Freud. Met him twice, once at a party. He was a real pain in the dink. The Czar wound up pushing him into a dessert table; trust me when we say that a German psychiatrist from that era cannot fight. The second time was at a police station, a week later.

Oh, and this from Dr. J, not that it’s any better:

Dear The Czar,

Dr. J. and the lil med student saw Thor this weekend. Grandpa was astounded with the lil med student's vast knowledge regarding Marvel's interpretation of Norse mythology including wondering (far too out loud for a movie theatre in a good neighborhood) why in Niflheim Odin had two eyes in his first appearance in the film and screaming, 'Daddy, that's Hawkeye!' when the unnamed 'eye in the sky' sniper grabbed a bow instead of a gun.

Dr. J. and the lil med student both gave it two thumbs up as the best of the Avenger prologues to this point, including Iron Man. Dr. J. enjoyed the Shakespearean overtones that J. Michael Strazinski's (Babylon 5) screenplan and Branagh's direction brought to the film. It was structured very much in the manner of a Shakespearean history, rather than a comedy or a tragedy. The lil med student loved watching Frost Giants' heads shatter when smashed by Mjolnir.

That being said, the lil med student's favorite part of the movie remains the Green Lantern trailer ('Daddy, Tomar-re is in it!

Dr. J. has a question for the all knowing and all seeing Czar, and it's a simple one. Sif, or Jane Foster? Dr. J would have to go with Sif on that one, but he respects dissenting opinions.

Best,
Dr. J.

Jeez, it’s a freaking movie. Obviously D&D Club wrapped up early, and they all wandered in here to geek the place up. Yeahhhh. The Czar ain’t going to get into which fictional character is hotter.

Okay, the Czar will agree openly on one point: Branagh did a smart job of directing the movie, but not as Shakespearean, really, as Miltonian. Did you know the Czar once met John Milton? Poor guy couldn’t see, but evidently he thought he was deaf, too. All he did was holler and shout. He was, incidentally, planning a sequel with a whole bunch of expanded universe things. He dictated about three-quarters of it before he died, but his daughters would always leave the room about ten seconds in and never wrote a bit of it down. He just thought they did, and they would hand him blank sheets of paper to fool him. Sad, really.