My new Prius Hybrid is two months old and I am pleased to report: It performs as advertised. Your eco-friendly Octopus gets 50 miles/gallon on average, about 40% more fuel-efficient than my last car. There is one more benefit I did not anticipate: Fewer traffic violations. That’s right!
According to a recent survey, hybrid drivers get 78% fewer speeding tickets, 75% fewer violations for running lights and stop signs, 82% fewer violations for failing to yield, and zero citations for driving the wrong way down a one-way street. Zero. Zip!
For years, I have been a PhD candidate in the Professor Henry Louis Gates School of Driving, earning myself a perfect grade-point average of four violations per swear word. What I have learned: A beer and a teaching moment can turn careless drivers into instant law-abiding citizens.
All is not perfect, however, in the world of hybrids. Driving one will not dissuade bloggers from posting too much text or replying “me too” in response to a “me too” comment. Furthermore, if you are “recklessly clueless,” chances are your posts will have 400% more reader comments than if you are “cluelessly reckless.”
One caveat - the bipartisan model (pictured above) has been discontinued … Octopus got the last one. However, Toyota has announced a GOP model that will be even more fuel-efficient. It has no engine but two trunks, which means you will have to get out and push.
Dealing with the morning e-mail hasn't been a pleasure for a long time and it is certainly getting worse now that Obama is in office. Yesterday was something of a record for Obama Derangement Syndrome messages but remarkably, I got the chance over lunch to confront the jovial fellow who sent me a number of them. I had already sent detailed refutations of all of them and I asked him why he didn't bother to check out the fantastic claims before sending them to his large mailing list -- particularly after I had debunked virtually 100% of what he'd sent me over the last few months.
"I just don't like what this administration is doing,"
said he. Of course I don't either, but I'm sure we're talking about different things.
"Oh well, I've never heard of a N*gger keeping a job for 4 years anyway."
said he with a smile as we parted. I've known the man for years, a retired engineer for GM. You wouldn't think him a stupid man or in any other way unusual. Well anyway, I thought I knew him. What evil lurks in the hearts of men? If the Shadow knew, he'd commit suicide.
Among yesterday's viral outbreak was the story warning me about the "secret" House bill: HR1388 "they don't want you to know about." Shortly afterward the outraged notice that it had just passed (back in January) "behind our backs" and that Obama had added on (what?) a provision providing tens of millions to settle thousands of Hamas terrorists in the US. Of course it wasn't broadcast by the Liberal media, always trying to pull one over on us.
It's a small matter to look up the bill which actually was signed in April and read that it has to do with summer jobs for teens and veterans benefits, but who looks? Not the ODS sufferers.
Then there was the one about the millions and millions and millions "Queen" Michelle was wasting on various repugnant and narcissistic projects.
Next came the one on Henry Louis Gates, whose CV was blended together with W.E.B. DuBois' to show that Gates is a Communist Insurgent bent on a black takeover of the United States and of course the conclusions -- why should we care about his civil rights or the Constitution at all and why does Barak Obama love this man so much?
Then there is the nefarious Page 425 of the Obama health care bill which forces every citizen to undergo forced counseling about the suicide option so as to reduce the surplus population.
The rest of it? Well I have my limits. I deleted it all but I can't delete the feeling that The United States of America cannot survive. Certainly the party that creates this psychotic mythology and refuses to disown it doesn't deserve to survive, but what force can counter this kind of well funded and fanatical evil?
One of the favorite targets of libertarians and "smaller government" arguments is the FDA. The market should, could and would preserve us from tainted, unsafe and worthless products, just the way it didn't in the 19th century. Perhaps there's some truth to that, but the store window where the idea is sold doesn't contain a display of all the poisoned, sickened and fleeced consumers waiting to be redeemed or resurrected while the market forces grind on in the darkness of unregulated capitalism.
Of course the FDA, or what remains of it after years of Republican misrule can't do much better it seems and the free press that's supposed to be an agent of illumination in a libertarian utopia doesn't care to try. Witness today at CNN.com an article telling us that products widely being sold as steroid free, body-building aids do actually contain dangerous synthetic steroids and can, in several ways, kill you. Thanks CNN.
Of course prominently displayed on the home page is a photo of a grotesquely, steroidal male torso which links to an ad for the very things the FDA is telling people to avoid like the plague they apparently are. "Safe, natural, legal!" Never mind that little liver failure thing.
The solution is clear. We really need to get rid of the FDA and that damned government regulation - bad for business, don't you know.
It's the biggest thing in America and Fox News is the dominant purveyor. Their sole purpose is to select, modify, slant and sometimes create stories to make you angry at people or things selected by their owners and sponsors.
Using animatronic devices like Britt Hume, whose synthetic skin hangs from it's metal underpinnings which in turn no longer have the ability to mimic human facial expressions, Fox sells anger and unlike our automobile industry they can come out with a finished new product in minutes.
The current angertainment opera has to do with President Obama's seemingly hasty and harsh comments about the Cambridge Massachusetts police force. That occurrence has been welded together with another twisted work of fiction in which he has been touring the world "apologizing for America" to come up with the logically contradictory premise that he is "arrogant" and too arrogant to apologize even though he apologizes too much.
The subtext is that the country never has done anything it shouldn't have and we are always perfect because of our military strength and number of privately owned Hummers and that of course is a position broadcasting megawatts of arrogance like some annoying beacon.
Of course that Obama actually has apologized and in addition arranged to mediate between the two contestants goes unnoticed by the corpse-faced Hume and to the Fox Flock who only listen to the Fox product, that never happened and so presto chango, the wimp Obama becomes the arrogant Obama all at the same time. It's all angertainment.
Who cares that self contradictory arguments based on little but manufactured tribal anger are by nature false and in effect are crippling and disuniting our country? It's angertainment and it makes money and it takes power and it feels so good to be part of an angry tribe with an enemy to be attacked!
“The president could have said ‘that was a stupid thing for me to say,’ but he can’t say that for some reason"
said Hume yesterday. It could also be that Obama's actions speak louder than Obama's words and it could also be tragically humorous since he follows the most arrogant president in our history who admitted no fault while dragging us all to ruin and lawlessness. Of course Hume and whoever runs his software never wanted you to be angry at Bush who apologized for nothing. They wanted you to be angry at his critics and they remain far too arrogant to sum up their entire malignant war on truth by saying "that was a stupid thing for me to say."
The call for CNN to fire Lou Dobbs has been spreading, from SPLC to Media Matters and of course The Swash Zone. Although there have been a few encouraging signs, like a memo from CNN President John Klein to Dobbs' staffers saying that:
"It seems this story is dead- because anyone who still is not convinced doesn't really have a legitimate beef."
Dobbs is still far from being dead and far from being fired.
As Greg Sargent writes in Plum Line, Klein's position is that CNN is off the hook since they've already reported the truth on other programs -- and even on Dobbs' show while he was gone. What he's apparently saying is "we report, you decide." As at Fox News, it appears that the technique is to give you some lies, some distortions and some truth - just enough to make the political point of view seem valid -- and then "let you decide." In short it's just fine to broadcast anything, even if proved false, even if it jeopardises the country and aids it's enemies. They don't feel they have to side with honesty at all. You decide. Enquiring minds want to know.
John Klein pals around with terrorists and Lou Dobbs was born in Guatemala and is not a citizen and both are registered agents for North Korea -- I can't be sure they're not, after all. You decide.
In an interview with Klein, Sargent was told the objection to CNN's repeating scurrilous, unfounded lies with respect was all political.
“I understand that people with a partisan point of view from one extreme or another might get annoyed that certain subjects are aired.”
Truth is an extreme position and truth is partisan and so lies should be equally respected. Maybe it's not enough to fire Dobbs. I'm taking advantage of my television's ability to block channels and as of now CNN is outta here. I also think it's worth writing everyone that advertises there.
I picked up my new truck today at the dealership. Due to a defective wheel, we ended up at the dealership most of the day and finally made it home at 7 pm, but that's another story...
The story in this post is about :
This pristine 1953 Buick Roadmaster 2 door Skylark. It is all original..
And the reason both the interior and exterior are in such great, original condition is that this car has only 11,000 original miles!
It belonged to a woman whose family owned a Buick dealership in Greensboro, NC. It was kept on display in the showroom and only driven by her in parades or on certain holidays.
When she died and her children took over the dealership, the car continued to be kept in the showroom but once the grandchildren took over, they sold the dealership to the owner of the dealership I patronize and threw in the Buick for a song.
Needless to say, it is not for sale, but we can dream about it!
There was a time not long ago when broadcast news was considered fair and impartial, when news anchors did not abuse their positions of trust to advance a personal or partisan agenda. No longer.
These days, news stories are no longer reported with objectivity but shrink-wrapped inside the bias of reporters and their corporate employers. News is editorialized, politicized, and hyped by talking heads eliciting the phony hysteria of a game show. The news, and our supposed responses to the news, are pre-packaged upon delivery as if citizens can no longer be trusted to make their own judgements.
In recent days, Lou Dobbs has joined the ranks of birth certificate conspiracy theorists, alleging that President Obama is not an American citizen and may even be undocumented. Of course, other CNN reporters have investigated these claims and found the infamous birth certificate exactly where it is supposed to be … on file in the State of Hawaii … along with birth announcements in the local press.
But these are not enough to dissuade die-hard conspiracy theorists, who will not be deprived of any opportunity to undermine Obama’s legitimate claim to the presidency. Like all conspiracy theorists and delusional nutcases hearing voices in their heads, Lou Dobbs dismisses the evidence (even the investigative reports of his own colleagues who have confirmed the existence of a valid birth certificate). Worst of all, Dobbs infers that Obama’s actions as president may be deemed illegal and therefore null and void.
Yesterday, Dobbs called his critics:
"limp-minded, lily-livered lefties"
... who attacked him only because he "had the temerity to inquire as to where the birth certificate was and why the president of the United States would not turn over that birth certificate to the national media and end the noise."
Dobbs’ epithet is an insult to the 69,456,897 Americans, a 53% majority, who voted for the President. This goes beyond crazy. This is a prelude to inciting insurrection, not the province of ethical journalism. And that is why it is time for Lou Dobbs to go.
If you feel as I do, please take a moment to write a letter to CNN calling for Lou Dobbs’ dismissal, names and an address below:
Jon Klein
President
Richard Davis
Executive Vice President
News Standards and Practices
CNN Worldwide
190 Marietta Street (1 CNN Center)
Atlanta, GA 30303
I sent my letters via registered mail – return receipt requested.
--------------------------------
Update (4:00 PM): The Southern Poverty Law Center has written to Jon Klein, President of CNN, demanding that Lou Dobbs be removed from the air. Here is the published letter reproduced in full:
Dear Mr. Klein,
As an important and respected news organization, CNN has a special responsibility to ensure the accuracy of its reporting. We have written to you before about our concern that Lou Dobbs repeatedly fails to live up to this standard in his reporting on immigration. Now, Mr. Dobbs is again trading in falsehoods and racist conspiracy theories, questioning President Obama's American citizenship.
On the July 15 edition of "Lou Dobbs Tonight," Mr. Dobbs questioned the official certificate provided by the president and the State of Hawaii and complained that President Obama has not made public the "original document." On his radio program, Mr. Dobbs has repeatedly questioned the president's fitness for office, demanding he "show the documents" and, at one point, jokingly suggesting President Obama may be "undocumented."
The truth about the president's birth is not in dispute. It has been verified by Factcheck.org, among many other serious news organizations, and his official birth documents have been made public. CNN itself has repeatedly reported on the falsity of the claims of the "birthers," and the network's esteemed legal analyst, Jeffrey Toobin, recently called those claims "a joke." As you know, even Mr. Dobbs' frequent fill-in anchor, Kitty Pilgrim, debunked the birthers on the July 17 edition of Mr. Dobbs' own CNN show. The fact that Mr. Dobbs suggests otherwise on CNN -- while real CNN reporters tell the truth -- is both deplorable and an embarrassment to all serious journalists.
As he has in several other instances, Mr. Dobbs, in taking up the birthers' claims, is adopting an unsubstantiated conspiracy theory that originated on the radical racist right. As Gawker.com has reported, this particular conspiracy theory was first developed by an open anti-Semite and circulated by right-wing extremists who cannot accept the fact that a black man has been elected president of the United States. Among its adherents was neo-Nazi James von Brunn, the alleged murderer of a security guard at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., this June. Von Brunn had helped spread the birthers' claims on the Internet and attacked the "dishonest & conspiratorial Media" for not taking them up.
This is not the first time Mr. Dobbs has pushed racist conspiracy theories or defamatory falsehoods about immigrants. We wrote you in 2007 to bring to your attention his utterly false claim that 7,000 new cases of leprosy had appeared in the United States in a recent three-year period, due at least in part to immigrants. (The real number, according to official statistics, was about 400. Mr. Dobbs took his spurious information from the late right-wing extremist, Madeleine Cosman.) In addition, Mr. Dobbs has reported as fact the so-called Aztlan conspiracy, which claims that undocumented Mexican immigrants are part of a plot to "reconquer" the American Southwest. He has suggested there is something to a related conspiracy theory that claims the governments of Mexico, the United States and Canada are secretly planning to merge into the "North American Union." He has falsely claimed that "illegal aliens" fill one third of American prison and jail cells. And Mr. Dobbs has routinely disparaged, on CNN's air, those who have had the integrity to point out the falsity of these and similar claims.
Respectable news organizations should not employ reporters willing to peddle racist conspiracy theories and false propaganda. It's time for CNN to remove Mr. Dobbs from the airwaves.
"marijuana is “dangerous” and “has no medical benefit,”
says our new "Drug Czar." What the hell our Republic is doing with Czars at all mystifies me, but no more than these baseless statements made contrary to evidence. He's not a doctor, he's not a historian, he's not a toxicologist or statistician: he's a cop.
Former Seattle, Washington police chief Gil Kerlikowske seems to me to be the worst of President Obama's appointments and it leads me to wonder whether he put any thought into the matter, or chose him to appease the gigantic, bloated and quasi-fascistic anti drug industry. If it's the latter, then the irony of the observation that it was in large part to keep the gigantic anti-alcohol industry employed that Cannabis was made illegal in 1937 with forged medical testimony and fabricated stories about brain damage published by William Randolph Hearst who hated the hemp growers because they were lowering the price of wood pulp that he was heavily invested in.
Back when it was fashionable to be logical, or at least it wasn't proof of criminal intent and religious heresy, arguments based on first principles could be challenged by petitio principii or "begging the question." Just how does this sneering Barny Fife know there is no medical benefit when Physicians insist there is -- or that it is dangerous when physicians say it isn't? What makes it so dangerous that it is the most restricted substance in America -- more than botulotoxin or Plutonium or nitroglycerin?
We're back in an age of faith however, but at risk of sounding like an infidel, I'd like to ask our Czar here for a shred of peer reviewed evidence and I don't mean the opinions of Cops. I'd like to ask Mr. Obama just what the hell he was thinking about or whom he was bowing to when he decided to put some cop in charge of public morality as well, but the chance of getting any answer is so remote it isn't worth wasting time on --especially in a country where you get a knock on the door if you ask too much.
Why does Ron Paul have to sound so damned reasonable? Why does he sound so much like I did in the late 60's? The party he somehow belongs to has been telling us we can't afford anything but wars for as long as I can remember and most of them, including the metaphorical war on drugs have produced no discernible benefit to our security or prosperity. Since much of the equipment we bought at irrational prices isn't suitable for any threat facing us, why the hell don't we stop doing that and spend the money on health care?
“Even though I have my ideal system I would like to see, with the government out completely — because that would be a much better system — that’s not going to happen. I’m realistic.”
Pragmatic, realistic, flexible and non-dogmatic? Stop it Ron -- you're killing me!
"I would cut from these trillions and trillions of dollars that we have spent over the years and bring our troops home so that we can finance it [health care].” Said Paul on CNN
Is that Dylan I hear in the background? No, not really, but it's about time that someone from the GOP, even if he's not really one of them, mentioned those trillions and trillions when complaining about the Democrats' big spending, and it's stunning to hear approval for Obama's curtailment of the F-22 fighter program at least as a first step. Of course he believes we can eventually wean ourselves away from such government health care programs and says "freedom" will produce better coverage than a bureaucracy.
Having worked for many years for insurance companies I see their bureaucracies as more expensive, less honest, more reckless and sometimes quite malignant, so I'm not so sure I agree. Still Dr. Paul is certainly not a war lover, has the courage to say it out loud and that's novel. All in all, when he described RonPaulSingles.com (”We put the ‘love’ in revolution”) the dating website for Paulistas on American Morning yesterday:
“It sort of fits a famous slogan that I sort of liked, which says ‘Make love not war,’"
I was inspired to dig out the John Brown gladiator sandals I used to wear back in the day. The times they are a'changin' you know.
Here we go again. Some group called the Violence Policy Center has released statistics showing that in a 23 month period 44 US residents were killed by people legally carrying concealed weapons and therefore "the violence" is too much to bear and we must ban the practice of allowing private citizens to bear weapons. Perhaps my math is faulty but I think in a country of 300 million people, this translates to a 0.0000075% chance of being shot and killed in any given year by someone with a legal concealed weapon permit. That's quite a bit less likely than an innocent person being killed by the police either as a victim or a bystander and it suggests that private permit holders have a safer record than the police.
No figures were given with regard to the number of lives saved by legally owned guns, but in my small county of 130,000 people several have been this year so far by thwarting home invasions, and of course shooting deaths in Florida have declined steadily since the State started issuing licenses and instituted the "castle doctrine." Overall, shooting deaths have declined over the decades and that includes shootings of police officers in the line of duty. Yet the beat and the myth of escalating violence go on.
I don't feel like doing all the work, but I'd like to see how many people die in ER waiting rooms every year because they can't get insurance. I'd like to see how many people are shot by drug gangs and more than anything I'd like to see how many innocent people are shot by the police. I'm willing to bet that more people are killed by MADD members driving SUVs while talking on the phone.
Of course the Flu claims about 36,000 lives every year and cars even more. Cigarettes and alcohol? Well, you know. More people are killed every year by lightening in Florida alone and we're not closing the golf courses in a hysterical panic.
At the risk of being called a "gun nut" I take a vastly higher risk of dying or of killing someone else every time I take the boat out -- or the car for that matter and I have to conclude that our friends at the Violence Policy Center are proceeding from the conclusion that guns are so frightening to them that the right to self defense against violent criminals is washed away by their phobia and so they must grasp at these self contradictory arguments and fallacious conclusions like a drowning man at straws.
Yes, yes, the NRA -- the Gun Lobby. Everything including the ancient right to self defense is the fault of "the gun lobby." Forget not that that worn out straw/bogey man only exists because people are tired of being forced to accede to other people's phobias and it has such clout because it has so many individual, dues paying members. Much more of this twaddle and they'll have one more.
