This is my president.

This is my Savior.




One of them is wrong on Life.

The Other gets to judge.

Choose your side.

Secular Humanists against Innocent Humans

How else do you explain Obama's embryonic stem cell research decision wherein human embryos, or as The Anchoress calls them, “lives less obvious”, become the enemy? I just want someone who agrees with Obama's decision to explain why this is necessary given:

1. Bush's policy did NOT prohibit privately funded embryonic stem cell research (ESCR), it simply limited federal funding to pre-existing stem cell lines. Bush was actually the first president to order federal funding for human ESCR. In fact, Obama de-funded research on alternatives to ESCR.
2. While there have been NO therapies developed from embryonic stem cells, there have been 72 therapies - which are actually helping patients right now - developed from adult stem cells or umbilical cord stem cells. The “promise” of ESCR doesn't seem to be panning out.
3. Technologies allowing stem cells to be developed from adult cells have made the destruction of “lives less obvious” gratuitous even if you don't find the practice morally repugnant. And, what did our president say about “respecting” the opinion of those who do? He will say anything.
   
4. If ESCR is so promising, private companies would be eager to finance the research, which they're not. Besides, Californians have already committed six-billion tax dollars to the effort, including cloning.

The only answer seems to be that embryos – and even older in-utero children – are the enemy. Enemies to be destroyed at every opportunity – in the petri dish, in the womb and up to and including infanticide in the form of partial-birth abortion. The argument that only government can afford to fund projects leading to “miracle cures” is becoming – ahem – more difficult defend with each new trillion dollar “stimulus” package. I don't think the feds can afford the paper our money is printed on anymore. And I can name plenty of innovations and cures that weren't funded by the feds. Did you know the research leading to the polio vaccine was funded by the private charity, the March of Dimes?

Tookie Williams viciously murdered a Korean family - but, but (whine) he wrote children's books in prison!

While we're critiquing secular humanists for their anti-human positions, how about their sympathy for killers of all persuasions – terrorists and murderers? I hear the lawyers arguing for “fair” trials within the American judicial system for the Guantanamo “detainees”. We need to send 900 million dollars to Gaza to “rebuild” Hamas? Because common sense tells us that even if we don't send the money directly to Hamas, the fact that they won't need to fund repairs to roads, schools and hospitals means they'll have, oh, approximately 10 million to rebuild “defensive” tunnels they can use to import 890 million dollars worth of rocket parts. And what's with the candle-light vigils for murderers about to be executed? And now New Mexico and soon Colorado are overturning their death-penalty laws. The sympathy is always for the murderers, never for the maimed and murdered.

Or how about the humanists advocacy of population control for the purposes of saving the planet? “For whom?” one is tempted to ask. People are pollution. Haven't you heard? For any youngsters who need convincing, just have them watch Wall-E or read the Dr. Seuss rip-off “The Wumps”. Even the Barbie movies offer the new enlightenment. Barbie's new 'Thumbelina' is a morality tale about stopping a factory from being built to save Thumbelina's people (non-humans). Break out the magic unicorns! The only human progress humanists are interested in is human progress toward extinction.

And thanks for all the utopian dreams in complete denial of the human condition and the related policies which strangle the life out of the ambition and human endeavor of formerly free people. Don't you see, it's the “vision thing”? It's all in the Vision, man.

*BAM*! *THWACK*! *KAPOW*!

More strikes against the American republic by Democrats today:

U.S. to blame for much of Mexico violence: Clinton
(Reuters)

As if violence perpetrated by Mexican drug cartels isn't because Mexico is a failed state run by corrupt politicians and their enforcers. Mexico can't or won't even keep large portions of it's population from migrating to America to find work. Only the dying American economy can do that! Oh, and you won't miss the rationale in the article for the coming massive federal gun control. Apparently the cartels having taken to terrorist style beheadings - using smuggled guns, night-vision goggles and body armor?

Dollar dips on Gheitner's 'loose talk'
(Financial Times)
Here's an idea! Let's "reduce our reliance" on Gheitner to be able to head up the Treasury and fire his "grad student" a**! He should take his boss' advice and not say anything until he knows something about it.

Clinton: N. Korea Plan to Fire Missile 'Provocative'
(FoxNews)
While the North Koreans are loading up the launch site, Hillary says, "This provocative action in violation of the U.N. mandate will not go unnoticed and there will be consequences." I'm sure she's drafting a strongly worded letter as she speaks! And you know, the North Koreans are weally weally afwaid of Pwesident ("missile defense an unproven technology") Obama and Hillawy. I'm sure Dear Leader doesn't want to displease the Dear One.

As always, don't forget. Democrats love America just as much as you do!

Today's Body Blows

As in - what have the Obama administration and Democrats hit the American Republic with today.

U.S. Seeks Expanded Power to Seize Firms
(Washington Post)
But no, no - Obama isn't a socialist! Pah! You conservatives are just a bunch of Nazi fascist, homophobic, sexist, blood-thirsty, imperialist, intolerant name-callers!

U.S. bill seeks to rescue faltering newspapers
(Reuters)
Gee - think there's any conflict of interest in the government propping up news agencies responsible for reporting on the government? Actually, this may not be as bad as it sounds. It would be more honest if most newspapers operated under the same rules as NPR. They wouldn't have to keep up this absurd pretense of objectivity.

EPA Raises Heat on Emissions Debate
(The Wall Street Journal)
That's right. The EPA is recommending the government regulate CO2 as a pollutant. That's the same CO2 you release into the atmosphere every time you exhale. Hm. The new green bumper sticker: People are pollution!

Oh. And don't forget. Democrats love America just as much as you do!

The Lost Presidency of Barack Obama

It is tragic really. I know it is early to be making such a claim. But, the missed opportunities and lost potential are so disheartening.

Let's do a little John Lennon imagining...

Imagine if, during the transition phase, Obama's team laid out a plan to address the banking crisis. Let's say they planned a way to get the banks' toxic assets off the books. I'm not an economist, but I've heard and read several speaking on this as key to stabilizing the banking industry. I'm not saying the economy wouldn't have taken a dive. I'm saying a restoration of confidence by virtue of a plan to address the heart of the problem might have made the dive shallower and shorter term.

Imagine if, rather than allowing the widely despised demagogues Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid to devise a spending package having almost nothing to do with stimulating productivity and economic growth, Obama's team had proposed a package including a tax holiday and supportive of small businesses. And then imagine the bipartisanship!

Imagine Obama proposing a quick-response regulatory agency which would have the job of assessing innovative financial instruments and advising Congress. Contrary to the claim Democrats love to make about this crisis being the fault of Republican deregulation, the real problem is virtually no regulation on new-fangled loan instruments devised by, shall we say, “creative” bankers. As the joke among economists goes, “a good regulator is only one crisis behind”.

Imagine if Obama had warmly welcomed Gordon Brown and kept the protocols of past presidents when greeting one of our strongest allies. How about a celebratory state dinner? How about gifts that were thoughtful? How about keeping the bust of Winston Churchill in a still prominent place if Obama didn't want it in the Oval Office? How about some graciousness – let alone common decency. Giving a nearly blind man a box of DVDs incompatible with British DVD players is appalling.

Imagine a president standing up to our long-term enemies in Russia, North Korea, Iran, Syria and China? How about securing Poland from Russian tanks rolling across her plains? How about working with the Chinese to convince them of their self-interest in containing and eventually dismantling the North Korean concentration camp, rather than begging them to continue funding our ever expanding debt? How about loudly proclaiming our permanent alliance with Israel and warning anyone who messes with her that they will feel the full force of American wrath?

Imagine a president restraining his impulse to fix the environment, education and health care until the financial sector stabilizes, rather than “taking advantage of the crisis.”

Well. I guess we can imagine anything, but in this case, we're imagining a Republican president. Not Barack Hussein Obama.

The New Greed Problem?

I touched on greed versus self-interest in my post about Confidence and Objective Moral Standards, but Sheldon Richman is much more thorough in his piece The Goal is Freedom: All About Greed at the Foundation for Economic Education. And his commenter William Reed provides great clarity:

I have what I believe is a working definition of greed. It is sort of a Taoist definition. A Yin-Yang sort of phenomenon which is largely dependent upon one’s personal prosperity vantage point.

When someone who has more than you wants more, they’re greedy.
When someone who has less than you wants more, they’re ambitious.
The two phenomena are actually one.

As was brutally and irrefutably proved in the USSR, when you try to socialize your way out of greed, you inevitably end up destroying ambition into the bargain.

I love Mr. Baird’s definition of greed as pursuit of self-interest through involuntary exchange. As noted by George Washington, “…Government is force!…” What a fertile environment for this type of exchange!

The greed/ambition yin/yang phenomenon may be visualized as a magnet in the shape of a coin. Heads is the positive side, in this case ambition. Tails is the negative side, or greed.

The difficulty arises when governments, over-privileged due to duped voters or oppressed peasants, is granted a sufficiency of power to attempt to separate greed from ambition in order to dispose of greed, while leaving ambition to thrive. As any student of physics can tell you, no matter how finely you slice our imaginary coin, every resulting slice will still have both a positive and a negative pole. But they sliced away with abandon in the good ol’ USSR, resulting in an ever weaker market force, until finally, greed and ambition had been decimated to such an extent as to be utterly ineffective as a wealth creator in what remained of the market. Ultimately the only meaningful expression of greed remained in the political apparatus, where greed for political control destroyed millions of lives. In a free market greed loses its bestiality, as described by Mr. Richman. In an all-powerful government it is given free rein. In any event, it is, as Mr. Richman so eloquently states, an inseparable, eternal characteristic of human nature. It may be largely tamed by a free market, but can never be excised from humanity. If it finds expression in our government, exercising powers beyond those expressly enumerated by our constitution, may God help us.

//William Reed
27 February 2009 at 10:36 pm

Paying Taxes is Patriotic...

Our vice president (Joe Biden for the majority of Obama voters who don't know) told us so.

Finally! Conservatives can legitimately claim liberals aren't patriotic - by their own standard. See Obama's list of nominees/appointees who don't pay "their fair share of taxes":

Timothy Gheitner - Treasury Secretary
Nancy Killefer - Performance Czar (withdrawn)
Tom Daschle - Director of Health and Human Services (withdrawn)
Hilda Solis - Labor Secretary
Ron Kirk - U.S. Trade Representative (pending)

Did I miss anyone? I'll keep a space open for future appointments/updates. No wonder Democrats don't mind raising taxes on the rich - only rich Republicans pay them.

Oh yeah - Charlie Rangel (D - NY) - Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, which writes the tax code. Lovely.