Mailbag: Kitties and Cookies Edition

Dr. J. is emptying out his inbox and finally has a moment to respond to these missives from earlier in the week.

Operative RKB writes in:

I did not know you had a kitten, but apparently he(she ???) is putting videos up on youtube. At least, since it is a force wielding kitten, I have to assume it is yours.

Dr. J. has two cats, both of which are older than the kitten in the film. He also has Lady J., a  Cavalier King Charles Spaniel with whom our twitter followers are well acquainted.

Since then, she's grown quite a bit and is pictured below wearing her Hoth invasion uniform.

Begin landing your troops! Rebels taste like BACON!!!!!

 Jedi Kitten with the Force:



Dr. J.'s cats know the power of the dark side, and a more reasonable facsimile can be seen in this clip:


Any appearances to kittens, living or dead is purely coincidental, but thanks for writing in!

The Castle Archivist, Marie who can be followed on twitter @MbernadetteE sent Dr. J. this birthday message earlier in the week:

Dear Dr. J., 

Joyous anniversary of your exit from the womb into the world! 

Best, The Archivist

We apologize for the late thank you!

Thank you for the well wishes and the cookies, Marie! We enjoyed the cookies on liqueur night at the Leaping Peacock. They were excellent for dipping in our absinthe. 2-1B was kind enough to pick them up and deliver them to us post-haste. The other minions are unreliable with food runs, as is well established from our prior writings.

Life Imitates Art

...or something like that.  Maybe a more apropos title for this post would be, "Life Imitates Popular Soap-SitDramaComs".  Where is GorT going with this, you ask?  Two days ago, I was watching The Five on FoxNews and Greg Gutfeld made a passing comment in one of the segments that people seem to go along with President Obama because he's the "cool kid in school" and it's like we're in high school still.  I've long believed that the younger American voter, by and large, can be swayed by popular opinion.  Popular opinion can be largely steered by the media.  After all, the media, in this case, including marketing and advertisers, influence popular culture from clothing, styles, they way people speak, things that are "in" and "out".

Consider the following analogous high school drama archetypes with current political figures:

	President Obama as the popular, handsome, jock that expects everyone to fall in line and do what he wants to do.  Generally hides behind blustery and boastful talk but when push comes to shove, doesn't really act or follow through.
	Hillary Clinton as the queen bee steering her posse of wanna-bes in whatever direction she goes.  People fawn over her and treat her with kid gloves hoping she doesn't explode and ruin their reputations (to whatever degree that matters) and publicly embarrass them.
	John Kerry as the rich kid who owns all the cool cars, big houses, and fancy yachts.  Usually throws a great party and doesn't really care what happens.
	Nancy Pelosi, Elizabeth Warren, and Debbie Wasserman-Schultz as the wanna-bes who follow around the queen bee, doing what she says and imitating her attitudes towards people and pop culture as she does without thinking about it.
	Rahm Emmanuel, Jay Carney, Tim Geithner, Joe Biden, and Chris Matthews as the jock's posse.  Ineffectively sticks up for what the big guy does or says.  Sometimes tries to explain away what he did or didn't do in order to keep the big guy's image fresh and popular.
	Paul Ryan, Sarah Palin, Marco Rubio, etc as the foils to the popular group's success. They must be put down, embarrassed, and teased all the time lest their real message gets out and sways the rest of the school.

You get the point, I think.  It would be easy to add in a few more archetypes that we've all seen from these movies.  There only remains two questions:

1. Will the conventional storyline play out where the underdog hero overcomes the trendy, popular clique and shows the audience and the rest of the school why the popular group isn't the one to follow and emulate?
2. Will American voters clue in that the manipulated image of the popular group isn't what we need and is nothing more than smoke and mirrors?

Shooting Skeet, Or Shooting Bull

RKB writes into the Czar with an appropriately supplicating tone:

Oh great and dreadful Czar,

She isn’t using a pump shotgun, which tells the Czar she knows about shooting clays. Bet she knows the President lied about his experiences based on his wording.

Forgive my insolence in even thinking such an issue would be unknown to you being as you are all knowing and all wise. I thought I would bring the actions of one of your ever faithful minions to light of your ever august presence. the Indomitable Borepatch has created a petition regarding your antithesis asking that President Obama to invite Congresswoman Marsha Blackburn to Camp David to go skeet shooting.

Indeed, the Czar is not only aware but recommends folks read Borepatch every single day.

The story is that, a few days back, the President announced he totally understands people who cling to their guns; after all, he has done a fair amount of skeet shooting himself up at Camp David. Incredibly, some members of the press actually asked for proof of that. The White House changed the subject, and later announced they could not necessarily find any pictures of the President shooting clays because with photographers taking continuous pictures of him relaxing, playing golf, billiars, basketball, and other recreational activities, any other photos of him would be invasive of his privacy.

The explanation here is quite simple. He lied.

His intention was to convince people that he does understand the Second Amendment, particularly the part where the word “hunting” is underlined three times. As a result, you have to admit his proposed gun control ideas are not all that crazy. He likes them, and he’s a shooter himself.

Except that he lied. The President betrays his ignorance by even calling it “shooting skeet.” This is a term rarely used by people who do it, who tend to refer to it as “clays” or “trap,” depending on the layout of the throwers. It’s the same type of not-quite-insider terminology when people refer to lawn bowling or bocce as “bocce ball,” Or a hockey sweater as a “jersey.” You can get away with it, but insiders know you’re not one of them.

Just like when the President praised his favorite baseball team, the White Sox, as playing in “Comiskey Stadium.” Ignorance, in some people, reveals itself right away.

The President makes a ridiculous amount of mistakes, including confusing clips and magazines, thinking duck hunters use “six shooters,” and other not-so-subtle clues that for a guy who surrounds himself with well-armed bodyguards and who commands the most powerful military on Earth, he doesn’t much talk to those types about their tools.

Turns out, as the Czar writes this, that an update to the story has happened. The President has used a shotgun: just twice, the first time for five minutes, and hated it. The second time allegedly did happen at Camp David; the results are not known. But “all the time?” No, that’s a lie.

The petition, winking though Borepatch obviously is, will not go anywhere if the media themselves were unable to press the issue. It will be another example of the President openly lying about something and getting away with it. He’s been at it a while, of course.

Of course, if any of you readers like shooting clays and trap, and you refer to it as “skeet shooting,” ask yourself if the Czar really wants to hear about it. The answer, of course, is no. If you like shooting clays and trap, yes: the Czar wants to hear about it.

P.S. You should see the Mandarin shoot clays. He’s freaking awesome at it.

He needed the level...

I'm 10,000 XPs away from 18th level. I've got this!

R2DT and R2E2 host the Second Annual Geleophysic Dysplasia Webathon

R2DT pictured here with R2E2 and R2C2, now get charitable, y'all!

Operative R2DT writes in from the Outer Rim Territories regarding his niece, R2E2's ongoing efforts to raise money and awareness for a rare illness that took the life of her younger sister, R2C2 called Geleophysic Dysplasia:

Dear Dr. J. 

Just an update ... 

Niece R2E2 continues her American Heart Association fund raising efforts, even after a move from TX to OK. 

In 2011 she raised $5,700. 

In 2012 she raised $11,000. 

This year, her goal is not monetary. She's trying to get 1,000 supporters. I don't know if I'm more proud of her for the success she's had or because she's setting ambitious goals and working hard toward them. 

If you could send out a supportive tweet or blog post, we would very much appreciate it. 

Relevant links are: 

For background and information ...   

AHA donations page for Ella ...   

Facebook  

Thanks, Dexter Turner

Dear R2DT,

Thanks for the update, Dr. J. couldn't be more proud to see a young lady work hard with a purpose. This bodes well for her future. Dr. J. also thinks that it is smart to concentrate on increasing awareness and grow her support base, rather than focus on a dollar value. If more people give a little bit, the result is both a more stable and eventually larger, charitable donation source.

Best,

Dr. J.

George Ryan: SOB Story

The other Illinois governor still behind bars, George Ryan, ended his stay in a federal prison and is now in what criminal justice types curiously term a Halfway House, deep into Chicago.

About the only bipartisan thing Illinois government does is periodically send governors of either party to prison. Ryan, 79, is in poor health. What he did depends largely on which attorney is speaking.

Ryan’s attorney will tell you that he spent 5-and-a-half years in a tough federal prison for a victimless crime involving bribery. He should had his sentence commuted and maybe should have spent a year or two in a minimum security prison; during his incarceration with killers and rapists, his beloved wife and his brother died. Many Illinois residents think he was over-sentenced, and that a Democratic governor would have been let out much earlier.

On the other hand, the Czar—and a heck of a lot of people—remember George Ryan differently.

He was horribly corrupt at a time when Illinois could least afford it. And people literally died because of it.

A pastor and his wife were driving with their six young children in Wisconsin, when an incapacitated truck driver from Illinois slammed into their vehicle. All six children were burned to death as their helpless parents watched. Police quickly found the truck driver was utterly unqualified to drive any vehicle, and wondered how he got his license.

A subsequent investigation found his driver’s license was issued through official Illinois channels, even though he should never have received it. Cooperating with authorities, the driver said he paid a small amount of cash to the Secretary of State’s office (Illinois’ DMV) and got it, no questions asked. He heard about it from a friend.

Eventually, investigators found an ungodly amount of illegally issued licenses were issued—and not just driver’s licenses. An entire ring of licenses, permits, contracts, and so on, were being handed out by various Illinois officials for cash. It took very little time for authorities to trace this all back to George Ryan’s office.

And then the bombshell: an involved employee offered to testify against the others, and another agreed to testify in exchange for immunity. Ryan was collecting the cash and putting it into his campaign funds, which in turn were being used for personal, rather than campaign, purposes. The nearly 80 employees involved were all compensated for their efforts.

And that’s why George Ryan went to jail. At the next election, the inept Illinois GOP decided to run a surprisingly qualified and squeaky clean candidate for governor; unfortunately, his name was Jim Ryan. Anyone with a brain would have advised running a candidate with a different name, but not these morons. Jim Ryan was indeed quite superb as a candidate, and had enough horse sense to put JIM on his campaign posters rather than his last name. Democrats ran Rod Blagojevich, who never hesitated to remind people that “Ryan” was being investigated for bribery and corruption. Voters who hate politics never realized these were two different guys and elected Blagojevich. You know what happened to him; you also know that Barack Obama wound up in a better position to advance up the political ladder because of Blagojevich’s fallout with the Chicago political machine.

So when people weep that perhaps the law was too harsh on poor old George Ryan, the Czar tends to think about those six children and their tortured parents, who suffered an unbelievable pain because George Ryan was a greedy bag of crap who knowingly, persistently, and massively betrayed the public trust with utter disdain for the law, the people of Illinois, and ultimately the entire nation.

Sorry he had to see his wife and brother die of old age while he rested in prison. There are a couple of parents who got to watch their children burn to death in a minivan because of Ryan. Count your blessings, Governor.

Why Liberals Hate Boy Scouts. And Football.

Ah, well, it looks like the liberal whackjobs are after the Boy Scouts again, and are fostering the idea that Scouts might consider allowing gays to lead scouting programs. True? False? Actually, these things do not matter to the liberals; the important thing is that the media are claiming that the BSA is considering this.

Simultaneously, we are seeing another renewed attack on football. Yes, the NFL, not that Euro-nonsense. Liberals have always hated football, and every couple of years continue to attack it.

Radio host Mike Gallagher wrote a popular book a while back listing 50 things that liberals repeatedly attack. Some of them are an obvious stretch, but quite factually there are a bunch of things you see time and again from liberals: firearms, scouting, football, Mormons, evangelical Christians, NASCAR, and so on. The media obediently reports each of these attacks with gusto—and then, after a few months when the dust settles, the media go report on another round of attacks on these same groups.

Theories differ as to what it is that liberals hate about these things. In Gallagher’s book, he cites that liberals hate scouting because it segregates girls and boys and resists change; they hate football because the sport is emulative of war, and so on.

The Czar has a different theory: liberals hate a lot of these things because they are perceived as conservative institutions. They have little idea what goes on at these events—not that any of it is secret—because they cannot be bothered to look. Simply to look.

Instead, it is assumed that the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts are all brainwashing the kids to conservative morals. Football and NASCAR must somehow promote Republican voting. And don’t get them started on whatever weird rituals the Mormons and Evangelicals are doing. But the smarter you get about religion, the more likely you vote Republican, so those religions tend to be bad. Hard-working, legally documented immigrants tend to vote Republican as well, which is probably why Republicans fight blanket amnesties so much.

And have you ever been to a gun show? The liberals, neither, but you can easily imagine all sorts of conservative wackiness there with Confederate flags, Don’t Mess With Texas bumper stickers, and survivalist nonsense. Or something. Notice how nearly every gun control argument reduces down to “We hate the NRA” in some form or another. It isn’t guns that liberals hate, because liberals are quite good at using them; it’s conservatives with guns that scares the hell out of liberals. Conservatives might shoot back.

And when you are in a war for your life, as liberals perceive everything, each of these institutions represent some sort of resistance front. Quick: name a Boy Scout who voted for Clinton; they can’t, either—you see?

And curiously this is somewhat self-fulfilling: because liberals refuse to participate in these American iconic institutions, they tend to be dominated by, well, conservatives. And the last thing they can tolerate is giving conservatives any sense that they represent a majority.

So there you have it. Liberals see certain groups as pockets of conservative resistence. Every person they had who tried to infiltrate one of these institutions never came back: so powerful is this resistance that infiltrators wound up liking it and joining its ranks. Joining en masse and reforming the organization from within takes too long, so the simpler plan is to destroy that institution with a barrage of ridiculous lawsuits and relentless negative press: give the conservatives no place to hide.

So when you hear that the Boy Scouts are under attack again, you know full well that football will be next. And since all of these attacks are based on phantom arguments and imagined assumptions, they quickly fizzle into wasted time.

This is why progressive liberalism is in its final days: the public is slowly getting tired of this warlike repetition.

What Does Our Future Hold?

GorT's second offspring celebrated her birthday over the weekend.  As part of it, we had a number of young teenage girls over at the house for cake and ice cream (that got 'Puter's attention).  As they got ready to sing Happy Birthday and then after the candles were blown out, I noticed that four of the seven were obsessively toying with their smartphones.  It was all innocuous - watching goofy YouTube videos, taking "selfies", and other goofiness.  The remaining three, including my own daughter, continued to carry on conversations sometimes with the electronically addicted.  This is not to say that my child doesn't have her bouts of electronic addiction but she is usually controlled when in group situations.

I have trouble forecasting what my daughter's 18th birthday will be like.  Will there be real, personal conversation?  Will they be conversationally challenged (lest we use some non-political correct term for it as I'm sure there will be such a term int he future)?  Don't get me wrong, I'm not bemoaning change and the adaptation of our children to different ways of processing information.  I think there will be some - for lack of a better word - evolution of how we process information and communicate in both volume and methodology.  I just hope that there is some semblance of manners and mutual respect that will persist.

Be careful what you wish for...

Look, I was an ensign in Starfleet! That counts as military service, right?

Dr. J. saw this post over on NRO's Corner. In summary, Democratic Party PACs are looking to engage in a little Operation Chaos™ in the Kentucky Republican Primary. They are looking to throw financial support behind a very conservative candidate in hopes of primarying Minority Leader McConnell. Should Sen. McConnell lose his primary race, they hope that the conservative candidate will alienate Kentucky voters, creating an easy waltz to Washington for candidate Ashley Judd, where she can sit next to celebrity senator Al Franken in the well of the Senate.

Lest the Democrats be confused, unless they run a Manchurian Candidate against McConnell, their strategy will backfire. Kentucky, despite close proximity, is neither moderate Indiana, nor is it the bellweather that is Missouri. Kentuckians are by and large conservative, and if a bona fide right-winger, rather than the faux right-winger that attempted to primary Jon Runyon in New Jersey a while back, that candidate will rather ably beat the Ms. Judd. She is far to liberal to run in the great state of Kentucky.

So, before you Democrats start cutting checks for McConnell's opponent, Dr. J. has two words for you:

Rand Paul

She has us right where we want her...

How far astray we've gone...

Simple Immigration Reform: What Could Go Wrong?

A bipartisan group of eight senators—including some conservative Wunderkinder—has met and put together a large bill for immigration reform. Rumors are that both Democrats and Republicans understand the immigration system is broken and could be easily fixed with some common sense measures.

It calls for a means to identify and naturalize millions of illegal immigrants here who want to work and live (Democrats) while removing threats to our safety (Republicans); it creates a new agricultural guest worker program (Democrats) but streamlines the green card process for non-Hispanics as well (Republicans). The plan is comprehensive reform (Democrats) but is so straightforward the entire bill fits on four sheets of letter-sized paper (Republicans).

One thing it does not do is award blanket amnesty. All in all, it sounds like a pretty good deal.

So here is our prediction: the President will hate it, argue that it makes too many conservative concessions, and threaten to veto it where it stands. He will then proceed to blame Republicans for failing to get anything done.

After all, it awards no amnesty.

In re the alleged serial killer in Oxford

Quoth the Czar:

With any luck, Confucius* will write in with some of his copious collection of pet peeves in writing. 

Don’t get me started. But here’s one: One pet peeve is people who fail to realize that the Oxford comma and the serial comma (not to mention the Harvard comma) are the same thing.

One kids the Czar. It is, however, Cambridge, not to mention the New York Times, who as a rule omit the serial/Oxford/Harvard comma.

The Chicago Manual of Style, being the grammatical authority geographically closest to Muscovy, is also firmly pro-serial comma (anti-serial killing?), which won’t warm the cockles of the Czar’s icy black heart, but could save some editors’ heads at the UC Press.

Literally.

The Oxford, Serial Killer

One thing all of your hosts share here is a love of writing. Except, of course, Mandarin; he prefers shouting at the computer, especially when he reads Drudge. But he’s actually a skilled writer as well.

Our site has the best advice anywhere.

Recently on Twitter—where you had best be following us—we had a delightful exchange about commas. Commas are a tremendous nuisance, frankly, and they cause no end of irritation for the Czar. For example, which of the following two sentences is correct?

I, for one, think the problem is Sleestak’s inability to control his bowels.

I for one think the problem is Sleestak’s inability to control his bowels.

The answer depends; if you are speaking, the first one is more preferable because it puts a parenthetical pause around for one as if you were calling attention to your own opinion. You can hear yourself pause at each comma.

In writing, an astute editor would likely strike out those commas and go with the second one. The commas and their verbal pauses are unnecessary for a reader.

So the rules are often iffy. But, as a rule, people tend to put too many commas, into their writing, as the Czar is showing here. One can usually take out most of the commas and the writing becomes more compact.

If you don’t write as a profession or follow this stuff, you may not know that there is even a long-standing feud about commas, and writers will bicker about the Oxford comma and the serial comma.

Which of the following sentences do you prefer?

Serial—The company has offices in New York, London, Houston, and Toronto.

Oxford—The company has offices in New York, London, Houston and Toronto.

Do you see the difference even? In the Oxford version the comma has been removed after Houston. This preference is the official style of Oxford University although you will find it enforced in many locations, especially here in the States. Many corporations and law firms require the Oxford construction.

Like many rules of style that originate in England, they are based on nonsense. Split infinitives come to mind: there is nothing wrong with them, and the chief objection to their use originated in the late 19th Century when Latin was the craze. In Latin, one does not split infinitives (because one cannot: amāre, “to love,” cannot be split because it’s one word); hence, one does not split “to love” in English. This is pure tripe; splitting infinitives was previously and always allowable in English. In some cases splitting becomes necessary.

The Oxford comma is another; the thought is that one does not need the comma before a conjunction (and); therefore one should omit it.

Here is the problem with it: which lunch would you rather eat?

Serial—Today’s lunch consists of pizza, fruit cup, broccoli, and chocolate ice cream.

Oxford— Today’s lunch consists of pizza, fruit cup, broccoli and chocolate ice cream.

The Czar eats weird things, but broccoli mixed with chocolate sounds awful to him. The Czar and indeed most of the other Gormogon writers here prefer the serial comma; it is far too easy to trick a reader into misunderstanding the Oxford style, and thus it has no place in writing.

Does this sound stupid? Certainly it is, but writers get into loud yelling matches over the Oxford versus serial comma debate.

However, the Czar will remind his fellow writers that when you refer to a location like Boston, Massachusetts, you always put the comma after the state’s name, as well as the city’s. That’s non-negotiable.

With any luck, Confucius* will write in with some of his copious collection of pet peeves in writing. You think the Czar is tough? Try having him edit something of yours sometime. Which he will do. For a fee.

P.S. The Czar participated in a lengthy and enjoyable exchange with follower Mark Spahn concerning the a sentence construction the Czar used in a post quite a while back and whether it was correct. The Czar maintains he was correct, but Mark provided a lot of good evidence to the contrary just as the Czar provided possibly good evidence in support. Writers do that stuff all the time with each other.

*For those who came in late, Confucius is the Gormogons’ Œcumenical Volgi.

Dr. J. forgot the obvious...

The 'R' is for rich guy!

Dr. J. forgot to mention the most obvious example of economic slut-shaming from 2012. Governor Mitt Romney, who was pilloried for his success by the media, the Obama campaign, (ed. Oxford comma) and their surrogates...

Mitt was a wholesome, hard-working American success story, and a pretty nice guy to boot, and he was portrayed as C. Montgomery Burns. Your loss, America!

Well Done Disney!

ERMAGERD! LRNZ FLRZ!1!!El@vEntY!

It is official. J.J. Abrams will be directing Star Wars: Episode VII! Screenwriter Michael Arndt (Little Miss Sunshine, Toy Story 3) will be drafting the script.

Dr. J. is excited about this. He is the most successful to helm a Star Wars film (Ervin Kirshner's high point before Empire was Eyes of Laura Mars, or Raid on Entebbe (Yaphet Kotto was great in that!) which was a made for TV movie.

J.J. no red spheres, no time travel, and no disintegrations!

Economic Slut-Shaming

The 'A' is for affluent.

Slut shaming (also hyphenated, as slut-shaming) is defined as the act of making someone, usually a woman, feel guilty or inferior, for engaging in certain sexual behaviors that violate traditional gender expectations. These include, depending on culture, having a large number of sex partners, having sexual relations outside marriage, having casual sexual relations, or acting or dressing in a way that is deemed excessively sexual. This is often done by name calling (often using the word "slut" itself) as well as covert shaming. - WIKIPEDIA - Source of all things true and accurate.

When Dr. J. was searching for a picture for this post under the term 'Slut Shaming' all he found were lefties protesting being 'slut-shamed' rather than examples of true slut-shaming. While there were some protests overlaying cut-and-pastes from Facebook pages, Dr. J. could not verify the veracity of the underlying examples.

Dr. J. was driving back to work from his midday puppy run when he heard news of the continuing drama revolving around Phil Mickelson's desire to reduce his tax burden by possibly moving from California to a friendlier tax environment. He spoke of 'drastic changes' and as a consequence the so-called mainstream media had a field day.

As a consequence he's had to apologize for expressing his views on the unfairness of America's horribly progressive tax code. One that punishes financial success and drives individuals away from tax heavy environments (geographic and financial) into tax havens. Not only that, Dr. J. suspects that Phil feels that now he has met Sauron's gaze and will probably only quietly take action to protect the fruits of his labor, and even take a hit in order to appear in good standing in the guv'mint-media industrial complex's eyes.

This is just the latest in a series of economic slut-shamings to happen in the wake the Occupy Wall Street/Obama 2012 Campaign Class Warfare double whammy that began last year.

Now that Obamacare has begun to kick into high gear, several high profile businesses, including a Denny's Franchise, Papa John's, have at least explored, if not implemented cost saving measures in light of the added cost of doing business brought by Obamacare. Boeing tried to open a plant in business friendly South Carolina that in NO WAY affected the jobs and livelihoods of its Seattle based employees. These efforts were met by vociferous slut-shaming by the same harpies, banshees and harridans that cried foul when sexual 1%ers were shamed for publicizing their questionable choices. Denny's HQ distanced itself from the franchisee who backed down, Papa John's walked back its initial trial balloon. Boeing ended up making concessions after pressure by the NLRB.These 'economic-sluts' were effectively shamed. Probably out of fear of the IRS coming knocking, and possible economic downsides more than anything else.

Indeed the fact that the so-called 'sluts' wear that title as a badge of honor, organizing 'slut-walks' and the like tells Dr. J. that they know how to combat criticism, perceived and real. One lesson conservatives need to take from the left, is that rather than walk back what we see as our values, believes and ideals to avoid criticism, like the liberal 'sluts' we need to wear our beliefs on our sleeves and not be afraid to stand up and defend them.

Wear that $carlet Letter proudly Phil!

Jindal Agrees With The Czar

Have you read Governor Bobby Jindal’s kick-in-the-pants speech from Charlotte? Read the whole thing, especially if you want to have a really good day.

In the speech, Gov. Jindal lists seven things that Republicans need to do to win elections. Some of them may sound familiar:

1. Stop looking backward.
2. Expand inclusiveness.
3. Demographics are not destiny.
4. Stop being the Stupid Party.
5. Start controlling the message.
6. Change the perception of what Republicans are.
7. Focus on getting the job done.

Sigh. You Gormogon readers always get to read the good stuff first.

Women in Combat? More Obama Time Wasting

First, let us be perfectly in sync: the entire idea of women serving in active combat roles is a distraction, pure and simple, by the Obama administration.

Second, like most of these awesome, super-cool ideas by the Obama administration, this one will be slowly pulled back until things are as they were. This administration is great at making announcements but really bad at thought-out execution. Marketing as opposed to operations, and all.

Third, the Czar is on record as opposing women in active combat roles. You can read the story about how we reached our decision.

But it comes down to this: all of the people—on both sides of the right-wing/left-win spectrum—who think this is a good idea has never served in active combat. All this nonsense about equal pay for equal work and selective service and safe zones and so on means nothing when bullets fly. Curious yet again how armchair opining does not match up with what combat troops are openly and actively warning.

Well, the upside is that now we’ll know for sure whether this is a good idea. However, the Democrats will be humiliated if the casualty rates climb. Any dead soldier is a bad thing, regardless of gender and if that’s what transpires, it will be yet another horror of the Obama administration that will cause historians to shake their heads in wonder.

If you’re asked about women in combat, you know what you should say? Ask “Whatever; how about the 15 million Americans who can’t find a job here at home? When is that going to be corrected?”

How the Illinois GOP Wounded All America

When experts reconstruct disasters, they continually highlight how a series of minor events can compound into a gigantic collapse later on. A safety switch is left off a day before an unusual cold snap occurs; an inspector calls in sick, and then pow, a building implodes. That kind of thing.

And many of us know today’s story, but incredibly many of us do not: how a goofball decision by the Illinois GOP may have badly damaged America forever.

The year is 2004, and Illinois is generally a red state: although Kerry got the nod from the Illinois electoral college, Illinois folks had a Republican governor and a Republican US senator about to retire.

The Illinois GOP ran a pretty solid candidate to replace the outgoing senator: Jack Ryan was pro-business, for tax reductions, tort reform, and a bunch of things that made him pretty much unstoppable. He was also once married to then-red-hot actress Jeri Ryan, which gave him superb name recognition.

So much so that the Illinois Democratic party ran a long-shot candidate named Barack Obama. Obama was a no-show state senator, who had a mixed record when it came to elections. Obama was, however, attracting attention by making some shrewd personal moves but frosted some members of the Illinois Democrats. Run him against Ryan, they figured, and then when he gets blown out of the water, we’re done with him.

Suddenly, the Jack-and-Jeri Ryan sealed divorce papers became public. Although popular myth is that the evil David Axelrod somehow got hold of them, the sad truth is that the Illinois GOP screwed this up. That something bizarre had occurred prior to the divorce was well-known rumor and innuendo, and not exactly secret. The Illinois GOP, during its primaries, was all for releasing them. Eventually, a judge ruled they could be opened in the event there was anything in there essential for the public to know given Ryan could be a US Senator.

Let the record show that candidate Barack Obama, who may have privately learned of the contents, urged that they be concealed: what was in there was Ryan-family-only information and of no consequence to the election. Rumors persist that Obama secretly was peddling information to the press, but (a) no evidence of this ever turned up and more importantly (b) you can see why candidate Obama did not want anyone snooping around in his personal history, either.

Unfortunately, the press did get hold of the information—possibly from a Ryan Republican primary opponent—and the public heard some strange accusations from Jeri Ryan: namely, that Jack Ryan was involved in some very unusual sexual practices. Although there was no proof of this other than Ms. Ryan’s say-so, and although Ms. Ryan has never repeated nor affirmed her original statements, Jack Ryan never contested her claims after the public release of information, believing she should be left alone.

As word came out that something incredible and salacious was in those papers, Ryan plummeted in the polls: Obama was now ahead. Humiliated and embarrassed by the press, Jack Ryan dropped out of the race. Had the Illinois Republican party protected the confidential and legally protected record, Ryan should have won the US Senate seat handily.

Of course, the story does not merely end there. His original primary opponent, Jim Oberweis, was a well-funded, well-known, and highly successful businessman who could have returned to the race and run a solid campaign against the now-rising Barack Obama.

But the Illinois GOP decided he had already lost one election; they needed someone to come in during the 11th hour, someone who could really challenge Barack Obama in the one key area that Illinois Republicans could fathom: that he was black.

So they decided to find a black Republican with some notoriety. Never mind that Obama was completely beatable on his paper-thin record and that his popularity had nothing to do with him being black (there were dozens of black politicians in Illinois), and never mind that the Illinois GOP had made a couple of stupid decisions regarding Jack Ryan: they decided to make one more.

They picked novelty candidate Alan Keyes, who was famous for little more than trying to run for every office he could in some quixotic quest for power. Even by 2004, he was known as a whack-job, prone to making outrageous statements on his MSNBC chat show, and announcing himself as a candidate for whatever election was next.

He wasn’t even from Illinois, but no matter. He was the guy the Illinois GOP put against Barack Obama because Keyes was black, well-known (but not by Illinois Republicans), and basically said yes when they asked him; remember, Keyes never turned down a candidacy.

Needless to say, Keyes did what Keyes does and embarrassed himself throughout the short campaign. He ran at the mouth, made comments about homosexuality (bad) and reparations (maybe good), and basically stood against everything that had make Jack Ryan popular.

He was crushed in the election by Obama—not because voters came out to support Barack Obama, but because millions of solid Republican voters simply left the checkbox blank.

The Czar filled in his checkbox, but will admit he started for a few seconds wondering if he really, really, really wanted Alan Keyes representing his family in the United States Senate. Ultimately, he filled in that box because he was worried a blank box would cause another Illinois voting machine to hang up and erase his vote for George W. Bush for president.

Needless to say, Obama was a no-show US Senator who immediately announced his bid for presidency in 2008.

Imagine what might have happened had the Illinois Republicans said “The Ryan divorce papers are sealed; we have to respect that.”

Look at the headlines today to see where their actual decision has led.

Did they do the rectal examination too?

The Doctor is definitely in!

LTC Dan sent this Forbes article.

Dr. J. loved the point about swimming pools being far more dangerous. His insurance agent is quite aware of this statistic, and thus Dr. J. will NEVER get a swimming pool. Besides, his kids could easily make the one mile bike ride to New Atlantis Country Club, anyway, so it's a moot point.

The take home point is here:

Instead, physicians should not routinely ask patients whether they own guns, because it could compromise the integrity of the doctor-patient relationship.

Indeed Dr. J. agrees with the author, the therapeutic alliance is sacrosanct if you are going to be able to provide the best care. Unnecessarily creating mistrust is the best way to to disrupt that relationship, as happened recently in Chicago.

The Volgi serendipitously slipped a copy of today's Chicago Tribune into Dr. J.'s stack-of-stuff™, and asked him his thoughts on this article.

The short version is  that a 16 yo strapping young Chicago young man was admitted to Advocate Hope Children's hospital in Oak Lawn, Chicago back on the 4th for what sounds like getting IV antibiotics for a swollen tonsil. A resident and two medical students walk in the room to take a history and do a physical exam. During the history they ask the parents if they would excuse themselves so that they may ask some personal questions.

Mom thought they were going to ask about alcohol and drugs.

The patient later reveals to the mother that they asked him about firearms in the house. Despite the fact that they do not own firearms, the mother and son felt violated and confused as he was admitted for tonsillitis, not for psychiatric reasons, or anything remotely related to firearms. Advocate spokesman Mike Maggio told the mom that asking about guns is not standard practice but the pediatric residency program director Dr. Mark Butterfly said it was.

So, Dr. J. is going to filter through the BS to give you the real scoop.

Advocate's spokesman is right, it isn't standard practice hospital-wide, but the Pediatric residency program director is equally right that it is standard practice in his corner of the kingdom.

If you are a medical student, your hospital rotations are your first opportunity to develop your newly minted history taking skills. You are expected to ask anything and everything with an exausting level of detail. You are then asked to formulate your differential diagnosis (Ddx), and develop a plan.

A Ddx is the list of all the things it could be organized by likelihood and system. In other words you don't say Mr. Jones has tonsillitis, you say that your differential diagnosis includes bacterial tonsillitis, mononucleosis, lymphoma, head and neck cancer , HIV, sarcoidosis, lupus (it's never lupus), and a bullet lodged behind the tonsil from a previously unknown gunshot wound to the neck. The medical student then states that it is most likely bacterial tonsillitis because of this element of the history of present illness, those findings on the physical exam, these lab and imaging findings, etc...etc...etc...

This medical student, wanting to get an A+ and recently made aware of the AAP recommendations, probably asked every question possible under the sun, including those about firearms. The history and physical has a standard template. Despite this, however, the students are typically asked NOT to do a full physical exam, deferring unnecessary rectal, genital, pelvic, (Oxford comma, Czar) and breast exams lest they be considered harassment.

They are the chief complaint, history of present illness, past medical history, past surgical history, medications, allergies, family history, social history, review of systems, physical exam, lab data, imaging data, assessment and plan.

The social history is the part where firearms were presumably asked about. In this section, we ask about education, occupation, smoking, alcohol, drugs, sexual activity, etc...

Before beginning the social history, Dr. J. would have said, "These are questions we are asked to ask everybody in order to make sure we aren't missing anything. Some of them may not be relevant in your case, but to be fair to everyone, we ask everyone." That usually puts the patient at ease that Dr. J. was checking off some check box for some useless bureaucrat, rather than being a nosy parker.

Dr. J., now a seasoned specialist takes a fairly focused history and does a focused physical exam in most patients. But when he was a medical student he would take a thorough history and exam, but he would steer clear of any irrelevant areas, sometimes to the annoyance of his professors. He would gloss over the sexual history, unless it was absolutely relevant.

Now if this medical student were appropriately thorough, however, he would have taken a rather pointed and personal and possibly offensive sexual history on this young man, leaving virtually no stone unturned. This tonsillitis, while most likely to be streptococcus or staphylococcus could have been neisseria gonococcus, the germ behind gonorrhea, and requiring a different antibiotic strategy, conceivably. This young man should have been asked, in private, regarding his sexual proclivities, especially with regard to oral sex. Now he may have been asked, but that wasn't mentioned in the article. It's embarrassing enough being asked those personal questions as a teen, but even more embarrassing for the patient to answer, either in the affirmative or in the negative for that matter (uh, yeah, I'm still a virgin #headdesk).

Asking about firearms in this case is irrelevant. And while the medical student (or resident) was probably being thorough for the sake of being thorough, he should have been more sensitive. After all, he did upset and confuse the patient. He also made the patient distrust him when trust was the most essential of all elements in this therapeutic relationship. When a patient is admitted to the hospital, the residents and medical students act on behalf of the patient's outpatient and inpatient attending physicians.

On more than one occasion, Dr. J. has had to do significant damage control. One time he admitted a patient for multiple expensive and invasive tests in a run up to a possible valve replacement. Addressing code status was in vogue, and Dr. J. got a phone call from the cath lab saying, "why did you send us a patient who is 'do not resuscitate?'" Dr. J. was stunned, his patient was not DNR, as we say, especially given we were thinking about open heart surgery. He went to talk to his patient, and asked him why he was listed as DNR, and the patient said, "The residents made it sound so good!" SIGH! Those residents were re-educated on the difference between discussing code status and 'giving up' on relatively healthy individuals.

At a time where doctors need to be thoughtful, thorough yet efficient, asking about guns is irrelevant 99.9% of the time. Furthermore, young doctors in training need to learn to be more politic and judicious regarding guns in the inpatient setting just as they typically defer unnecessary personal parts of the physical exam. In this case, these young doctors have hopefully learned a lesson that will last a lifetime.

Can't we all just get along?

Remember all of those articles likening President Obama to a Vulcan (e.g. Spock from Star Trek to those not in the know)?

Well George Takei posted this picture of Michelle Obama on his Facebook page:

Michelle, apparently, has taken to emulating Romulan fashion sensibilities.

If a Vulcan and a Romulan can make things work, can't we all just get along?

Signs of Life: the GOP Getting Smarter?

Democrats are currently high-fiving each other, not just because President Obama issued empty promise after empty promise to his Progressive Liberal base during his Inauguaration speech, but because Democrats have a foot on the throat of the Republican Party—and the mercy strike is scheduled to arrive any moment.

After all, visit any conservative website or blog and you see a bunch of grumpy people bitching about how awful everything is, and how nothing is going to work, and how the Stupid Party screwed themselves yet again...possibly this time into oblivion. The feedback that the Democrats are winning is coming completely from the Right.

Some signs the GOP is starting to remove the clown makeup.

Conservatives should take heart. The GOP is getting a bit less stupid; in fact, there are signs that a brain is starting to awaken.

First, the Senate is very precarious right now; even Senator Harry Reid is reluctant to discuss any gun legislation for fear that it will cost him his leadership there. Remember: the Democrats have only a five-seat majority, and signs are that nine or even ten seats will be strongly contested in 2014. And the GOP is starting to realize it.

The first major test of this awareness is coming soon: Republicans have made it clear that they will approve a debt-ceiling increase (which, to be fair, they ought to since they helped approve the spending that necessitated this last year) on the condition that the Senate vote on a budget. This, as you know, is something the Senate has intentionally failed to do since forever simply because a budget would expose how badly the Democrats have managed your money.

You might disagree that the GOP will hold to this condition. That question may be moot: the fact it took the GOP more than three years to realize this is itself a massive signal. And the position is pretty serious: obey the GOP and pass a budget, or we all forfeit our pay. After the Boehner boner, you might think this risky; word is, all House Republicans are signed on.

Second, the GOP has actually listened to the Czar and poached Patrick Ruffini, an independent consultant who attended numerous Obama re-election strategy meetings. He is now assisting the GOP and has produced a motherlode of information on how the Obama campaign did what they did, and successfully won the swing states initially tilting Republican. The Czar has not seen this information, mind you, but hears the GOP discovered a lot of its assumptions were way off about how the Obama campaign worked. Ruffini mentioned that the 2016 Republican campaign cannot be a simple re-tooling of 2012: the 2016 campaign must look and be entirely different. The GOP is learning it could actually beat the Democrats at their own game, and have learned how badly they would have blown it again.

Third, the GOP is learning that it pretty well has the answers to the 2014 quiz. The President has made it quite clear what his agenda now is and where the next big fights will be. For example, the GOP is discovering that early 2012 comments about immigration cost them dearly (losing nearly all the Hispanic votes that Bush won in 2004). Newt Gingrich’s softer position on immigration was, in a sense, the smarter play. With immigration certain to be a battle into 2014, the GOP can better position itself. Condi Rice, for example, has openly stated the GOP handled this issue pathetically and that no more mistakes like that should ever happen.

But forget about immigration per se for a moment: our point isn’t that the GOP can win re-election by somehow beating the President on immigration; the point is that the GOP is learning that Americans have forgotten what conservative beliefs are. It isn’t that the GOP has been running the wrong candidates since 1992, but that the voters are not associating the Republican Party with what it is they want in a candidate. Instead of looking for the next Reagan, they ought to be looking to the original Reagan—who steadily and carefully crafted a message well before 1980 that conservative government was an American government. It took time, but Reagan did it. Use what he taught you.

Now that the GOP knows where the fights are going to be, they can start nudging the American people and whispering “Yeah, we don’t agree with that, either.”

So far we have seen three positive signs that the GOP is awakening from a long slumber. It may not happen by 2016, but in some respects it’s happening right now.

Obama Gives Condoleezza Rice A Shout Out In His Inaugural Address

Tough as nails, smart as a whip
and beautiful, to boot. Thanks,
President Obama, for reminding us
what competent government officials
look like!

In President Obama's oddly angry and confrontational Inaugural Address yesterday, he spoke the following lines:

We are true to our creed when a little girl born into the bleakest poverty knows that she has the same chance to succeed as anybody else, because she is an American; she is free, and she is equal, not just in the eyes of God but also in our own.

'Puter immediately thought of Dr. Condoleezza Rice.  Dr. Rice was born in Birmingham, Alabama in 1954, the heart of the segregated South and the height of Jim Crow.  Sure, as the only child of a reverend and a teacher, Dr. Rice may not have been poor, but she certainly contended with institutional and state-enforced racism every bit as bleak and soul crushing as the bleakest poverty.

And, like President Obama's fictional raceless little girl (let's call her Julia), Dr. Rice not only knew that as an American she was free and equal before God and law, she acted on it.

Dr. Rice is an accomplished pianist on par with professional orchestra musicians. Dr. Rice holds a Ph.D. in political science, writing her dissertation on military policy and politics in Czechoslovakia.  She was a tenured professor at Stanford University, earning promotion to Provost of the university, in which position she turned a $20 million deficit into a $14.5 million surplus in two years.

Not to mention that Dr. Rice was George W. Bush's National Security Advisor and later, his Secretary of State.

How's that for making the most of one's "chance to succeed?" Ironically, Dr. Rice's "chance to succeed" was freedom from oppressive and immoral government rules and laws.  Freed from Jim Crow and blessed with a supportive family, Dr. Rice succeeded spectacularly.

'Puter bets that President Obama thinks his fictional Julia's "chance to succeed" would never come without the benefit of a high cost, freedom reducing, ultimately ineffective government program.

So thanks, President Obama, for reminding 'Puter of one of America's greatest success stories, thereby distracting him from the remainder of your angry, partisan speech.

Swing Voters = Low Information Voters

The Czar despises trendy phrases to describe concepts in psychology or sociology. He still does not use “sound bite,” for example and that phrase is older than many of our readers. However, he is inclined to think there is merit to the phrase “low information voter.”

The term was largely established by Samuel Popkin in 1991 in a political science book; however, his original term was low information signaling: giving off perceptions or clues about who you are that individually mean very little but can add up to a big marketing problem. Only later did others apply it to individuals and voters. Interestingly, the term is used as an insult by conservatives and liberals alike as a way to explain why people vote the way they do.

In some respects, this usage is incorrect. A person does not vote Democratic or Republican because he or she is stupid; the concept is that people vote one way or another for the strangest reasons.

This past summer, the Czar encountered an individual who confessed she voted for Barack Obama in 2008 because he was handsome. And that Mrs. Obama and he make a gorgeous couple. Great. This is how people buy shoes, but not select presidents. See? Very little useful information about his then-predicted presidency, but enough for her to cast a vote.

Since November, the Czar—and many other conservative figures—have quietly begun watching the people who voted for Barack Obama in 2012. It has been interesting.

Among many on the Right, there is a perception that Barack Obama won a huge majority over Mitt Romney, and that most of the country just wants to sit back and collect welfare and fall apart like Europe. Certainly, that was a natural reaction and probably a good one, because the pollsters took note.

And the polls continuously suggest that most Americans want smaller government, want spending reduced, and want very conservative things for the country.

How then do you explain the voting from the voters?

First, both sides must remember that Obama’s electoral win was big, but his popular victory was very small. That is of little consolation, but basically means that he has none of the mandate he is deluding himself about in his speeches and tough-guy posturing he offers lately.

Secondly, and most importantly, the answer between the voters’s expectations and the election results can now be explained: the average Obama voter has no idea who he is.

Surprised? Us, too. But despite the hours of adulation offered each day by the news media, the lifetimes of commercials about him (good and bad) from the respective parties, and the millions of megabytes being written about him on the web, folks just do not know who Barack Obama is.

You hear this in interview after interview: people who still see him as some bizarre bipartisan ideal—the way he was presented in 2008. During the Inauguration’s mandatory vox populi pieces, attendees were excited to see the President re-Inaugurated because he is such a glamorous figure, because they like healthcare, and because he is important to history.

All three of these things are true; but not one of them stated they favor his liberalism, his big government spending, his hatred and demonization of the successful or of Republicans, and his extra-Constitutional activities. And this is because they likely know nothing about it.

Recently, on the Glenn Beck show, individuals were selected at random and asked to identify who uttered specific quotes. The callers were asked to conceal their political preference; however, all the quotes were by President Obama. Not a single caller, to our observation, had any idea who said the quotes.

And there is a major problem and the complete explanation.

51% of the country voted for Barack Obama; probably only 21% knows anything about him.

Of course, this goes both ways: the Czar likely suspects the same 30% remainder of voters knew little or less about Mitt Romney, too. They certainly did not know, as polls strongly suggest, that they shared Mitt Romney’s views on government and the economy.

The bottom line is this: there is a growing call that the Republicans need to stop talking about themselves, and start talking about their conservative values. We need to get voters to associate Republicans with things they actually want, rather than try to get them to love a particular candidate.

Because the candidates aren’t doing the job of selling themselves. Their arguments and positions clearly aren’t important to 30% of the voters.

The Czar has long maintained that there are no independent voters; he also believes that swing voters are a myth.

Indeed, this seems to be true. The coveted 30% of voters are independents or swings: they are low information voters who select presidents like they select shoes. And that’s a big problem.

Say One Thing, Do Another...

Your Mandarin is a long-time student of psychology and has something like fifteen or sixteen degrees in it; it’s tough to remember exactly. One of the more weird things you’ll encounter is the McGurk Effect. Watch this video:



That is not your Mandarin speaking in the video, otherwise you would all be obeying. But the point is that not all illusions are optical; some are auditory, although in this case it is more an illusion caused by fooling sensory integration in your brain.

For example, one of the more prevalent examples of the McGurk Effect is that when someone points out the President screwed up for the umpteenth time, the media simply hears it was the Republicans’s fault. Same thing, exactly. Your brain knows better but it still can’t figure it out.

Revealed: Media Lying About Assault Rifle (Maybe Not)

Essential Update at the end

Well, now that Americans have forgotten about Sandy Hook and are all excited excited excited for the President’s inauguration tomorrow (Obama 2.0? More like Obama 1.1), okay, well, now the story is getting out that Adam Lanza did not use an assault rifle during his attack; in fact, it now appears he didn’t have one at all. Four handguns were used.

This is exactly what the Mandarin predicted, by the way, and what a pain that he didn’t post that but mentioned it to us in person about a month ago. Normally, the press is keen to splash pictures of the weapons all over the place to shock people, and their absolute inability to do so was most revealing to him.

As the Czar watches the video (around the :10 second mark), you can see someone clearing rounds out of a long gun with an action not unlike a 12-gauge semiauto shotgun; we cannot tell the weapon make from this distance, but you can see whatever ammunition it has dropping out in to the trunk—you could easily see shotgun shells from such a distance but not .223 bullets. At 0;11 seconds, you can see a barrel on top of a magazine tube:

Either way, that’s no Bushmaster .223, which takes on many shapes and sizes but looks often like this:

So. What it comes down to is this: the media are lying.

One cannot possibly accept that the media are ignorant on this issue. While that is a probability on most issue, one month has passed in which media types were given every conceivable explanation for the distance between AR-15s and other rifle platforms, why AKs are not ARs, why a .223 is not a monster bullet, the difference between semi-automatic and fully automatic, and so on.

The smallest amount of fact-checking would have cleared this up in no time.

Instead, you have active suppression of evidence followed by an informed distortion of the record. In fact, the Czar would suggest that Bushmaster (terribly libeled and slandered by the media) turn this over to their legal team for a couple million in brand damages.

Also, the Czar would very much like to own a Bushmaster AR-15; if they would kindly donate one to him for keepsies, he would write a very thorough and thoughtful review explaining, in very balanced fairness, what an awesome product they have and why everyone should own one and why it is superior to every other AR-15 manufacturer models.

At least the Czar admits that he would be in the bag. If, of course, you work for a rifle manufacturer that makes AR-15s and would rather see the Czar write a favorable review of your rifle, keep in mind that about 1500 people per day read us. And, well, the Czar would be well inclined to make your latest product(s) look superior to Bushmaster.

See how refreshing honesty can be?

Update!

Alert reader Bill Godbold notified us that on Friday, police formally identified the weapons used in the shooting; indeed, there were two handguns (Sig Sauer P226, a Glock 20), a Bushmaster XM15-E2S, and the Saiga Canta-12 shotgun the Czar spotted.

The Czar is curious how two handguns, a shotgun, and an assault rifle were, for weeks, repeatedly identified as four handguns and a Bushmaster. And that the confirmation didn’t happen until a different story leaked out. Not that the Czar is conspiratorial enough to suspect items were intentionally hidden or revealed or somehow invented. This is still a big screw up. And he does not accuse the State of Connecticut or subsequent law enforcement of anything questionable: the Czar still squints at the media.

However, the Czar will concede the media was not wrong about the Bushmaster. It is, however, of great interest why they knew about the rifle before the public received confirmation of it.

Mailbag: Plez Rite Moar Bout Gunz

Well, a lot of our mailbags have been filling up with gun talk, but not because any of us wanted to go there, but because once again the Left dragged us there so they can replay another failed lecture on why we’re too stupid to overlook how idiotic they are.

This past week, the Czar was writing about how incredibly foolish the President is to push gun control when by all accounts it is ruining his popularity and exposing how weak the Democrats really are (at least how they view themselves internally). Within that essay, we observed

But we have seen numerous attempts by the President to ignore Congress, do end runs around them, and basically wheedle that they are ineffective to his aims. He even attempted to cajole the Supreme Court on the issue of political speech, but he has not—to our recollection—attempted to order a different branch of government to risk their very positions and jobs simply for his own benefit. Until now.

Our very own Dr. J. nodded to the Czar in the Castle elevator to the Lido Deck and asked whether we thought Obamacare might fit that description. While it was certainly railroaded through over the objections of the other party, by all accounts large amounts of Democrats supported Obamacare. No order was necessary, although the backlash wound up costing the Democrats the House.

On the other hand, the gun control bill omnibus or whatever it will be called (doubtless with a forcibly euphemistic acronym that will underscore its own ironic pathos) enjoys very little support among the Senate and House, and yet the President is demanding his own party vote for it anyway, at any cost. And that cost appears to be even more seats in the House and the especially dear Senate.

On a related note, long-time reader BW writes in with a perfect explanation as to why the President is being so nuts:

Dear Czar:

I greatly enjoy your writing and want to offer up a quote from Animal House that is completely appropriate for the régime's latest attempt at gun control:

Otter: Dead! Bluto's right. Psychotic... but absolutely right. We gotta take these bastards. Now we could do it with conventional weapons, but that could take years and cost millions of lives. No, I think we have to go all out. I think that this situation absolutely requires a really futile and stupid gesture be done on somebody's part!

Best wishes,
BW

Umm... yeah! You know, that almost seems to be sole explanation anyone has offered us that makes any degree of sense. The Czar has re-read this quote now about six times and it keeps making more sense.

Brilliant association, BW! You may have the rest of the day off so that you may think of other remarkable observations.

And thanks for the kind words: in your honor, we might write another post in the next couple days. For your own safety, we shall not identify which post it will be, but you can sorta pick one. Or any two.

Mailbag - Run and Gun Edition

Dr. J.'s pediatrician would give the little girl on the left, a thumbs up. The little girl on the right, not so much. 

Dr. J. received a couple of missives regarding his post about federal law as it applies to President Obama's Mediguntastic™ executive order.

Operative '.38 Special' BG writes in:

Okay, I get it. My doctor can’t be required to ask me if I own a gun. Of course, if he doesn’t and I turn out to be the next mass murderer, it seems to me he’s setting himself up for a big lawsuit, and you have to figure the Department of Justice will do its level best to see if they can lodge some kind of criminal charge as well. I figure a doctor would have to be crazy not to ask about a patient’s gun ownership these days. 

So what is the non-psychotic, law-abiding gun owner to do when asked if he owns a gun?

If he answers “yes,” the doctor has to instruct him on gun safety even if the patient has responsibly taken an NRA basic gun safety course. We are assured that the patient’s gun ownership will not go into any database. Am I to believe the doctor would make no written note of my answer? 

If the patient refuses to answer the question, will the conversation end right there? Or will the doctor note, “Patient refused to discuss gun ownership,” as if that’s some sort of red flag. And will the doctor conclude that the patient probably does own a gun? And that his evasiveness and mendacity bears watching? 

Can you think of any good reason that a sane, law-abiding gun owner should not lie, and answer that he does not own a gun? 

-- Operative (.38 Special) BG

In addition, LTC Dan writes in:

Dr. J, 

I hesitate to write to the esteemed Gormogons again so soon, but this is a topic that is important to me, as it obviously is to you. 

Your missive "Take Two Glocks And Call Me In The Morning" reminded me of a form I had seen in the past. It is linked to this page.  I have never been asked by a physician about gun ownership. I'm not sure if I would answer at all. But I would be sorely tempted to produce this form if the physician pressed the issue. 

I await your thoughts, 

LTC Dan

Dear BG and LTC Dan:

Thanks for writing.

Here are the forms LTC Dan asked Dr. J. to peruse:

Those forms are a doozy! Dr. J. is grateful that he is a specialist, rather than a primary care provider. Beyond a bullet or pellet resting somewhere in the mediastinum, it really doesn't fall on his radar. He thought of forwarding it to a friend in risk management at NAITMC but then thought against the fallout. His friend might suspect that someone actually sprung the form on Dr. J. in the patient setting. Besides he didn't want to pull his friend off the golf course. 

The US Preventative Services Taskforce gather all of the preventive recommendations with the science behind them in one place. 

There are presently no recommendations regarding preventive screening and firearms for adults. 

They are mentioned in the AAP guidelines for accident prevention. 

This states:

"Firearm Safety: In addition to removing firearms from the home environment where children explore and play, it is important for parents to ask whether there is a gun in any home that their child visits. If the parents choose to keep a firearm in the home, the unloaded gun and ammunition must be kept in separate locked cabinets."

So, Dr. J. thought about this from the patient perspective. 

Dr. J.'s kids go to a pediatrician, who by all outward appearances, is no handwringing liberal. At the Lil Resident and Lil Medstudent's checkups he goes through age appropriate screening to remind Clan J. to make sure the environment we are raising our children in is safe. It's pretty cursory but age appropriate. Does it include firearms, sure, but it is pretty clear he following the AAP guidelines for accident prevention. In fact, Dr. J. doesn't think he even asks if we possess firearms, or a pool, but speaks entirely in the subjunctive. "If you have a pool, pool locks are recommended, if you have a trampoline, you are the worst human being in the world, if you possess firearms...etc., etc, etc." Frankly he spent more time informing the Lil Medstudent that parking lots are the most clear and present danger to him and that Dr. J. gets one free swat on the Lil Medstudent's ass if the Lil Medstudent breaks Dr. J.'s grip and runs ahead. 

Dr. J. doesn't recall him asking us to ask whether there is a gun in any home the child visits. Dr. J. can't speak to the merits of separate locked locations for guns and ammo, nor does he recall the pediatrician opining. Dr. J. does have friends who have firearms and did make sure they're stored appropriately before the Lil Medstudent comes over for the first time. That's called parenting. Fortunately Dr. J.'s friends who pack heat are the ones he wants teaching him and the Lil Medstudent.

Again, all of this shows the impotence of the President's executive order for physicians. Only pediatricians have guidelines that recommend discussing firearms. Your doctor can ask you anything, but in the case of guns, it's not guideline driven, and thus not germane to the encounter (unless you are seeing him for powderburns or a through-and-through in your calf). It really is laughable in this context.

Even pediatric guidelines are for the purpose of reducing risk of accidents, not reducing risk of death in a home invasion. You, as a liberty loving American, must weigh the risks and benefits both, do what you think is right to mitigate the former as you address the latter. Gun safety courses for all appropriately aged family members strikes Dr. J. as the most sensible approach.