January 6th, 2011
It is well known that one of the biggest reasons for columnist David Brooks’ otherwise inexplicable swoon over Obama was his natty dressing style. “I remember distinctly an image of—we were sitting on his couches, and I was looking at his pant leg and his perfectly creased pant, and I’m thinking, a) he’s going to be president and b) he’ll be a very good president.”
However, Obama may have just lost the all-important Brooks vote due to this image:
Can David Brooks possibly love an Obama that can’t even button a jacket correctly? Sure, you and I may think “Eh, it happens.” But we’re not hyper-fashion-aware columnists for The New York Times.
Also, does anyone doubt that if Bush misbuttoned his jacket, it would have instantly been proclaimed a sign of mental deficiency across the lefty blogosphere?
Tags: Bush43, Buttongate, David Brooks, George W. Bush, MSM, Obama
Posted in Democrats, Media Watch | 14 Comments »
January 4th, 2011
This is not good news. Imagine if the governor of California or Texas were assassinated in broad daylight by his own bodyguard. Well, that’s what happened to Punjab Governor Salman Taseer in Pakistan. Of course, former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto was also assassinated, and Indian PM Indira Gandhi was assassinated by her own bodyguards, in large measure due to policies regarding Sikhs in the Indian portion of Punjab.
As for who is responsible, who knows? It could be a freelance jihadist, it could be al Quada, it could be Taliban, or it could be some of the Islamist elements of the Pakistani ISI. (Given the circumstances, I’m assuming it wasn’t Kashmiri nationalists, though stranger things have happened.) In any case, it’s bad news for a nuclear-armed nation that always seems to be inching ever closer to become a failed state.
I don’t have any particular insight into Pakistani, so I direct you to the odd piece by the ever-interesting Christopher Hitchens, which are long on insight and short on hope. Sometimes, as in the Middle East, there are simply no good options.
Tags: assassination, Christopher Hitchens, Islam, Islamist, Jihad, Pakistan, Pakistani ISI, Punjab, Salman Taseer, Sikh
Posted in Foreign Policy, Jihad | 1 Comment »
January 1st, 2011
This year is the hundredth anniversary of John Moses Browning’s Colt M1911 automatic pistol, the basis of pretty much every automatic handgun. The design is so successful that, to the untrained eye, a .45 automatic manufactured today will look very much the original 1911. Here, for example is my own Kimber .45, purchased in the mid-1990s:
Compare this to the original M1911, and the even closer (and only slightly revised) M1911A from 1926:
The M1911 deign has really stood the test of time. You’d be hard-pressed to find a device of similar complexity still in common use today that hasn’t undergone radical modification. Hats off to the far-sighted shade of John Moses Browning.
Tags: Guns, handguns, John Moses Browning, Kimber .45, M1911, M1911A
Posted in Guns | 6 Comments »
December 30th, 2010
One last batch of Jihad news to tide you over until the New Year:
- Smoking and guns, no, but Jihad, yes: Mayor Bloomberg is working behind the scenes to get the Ground Zero Mosque built.
- Seven anti-slavery activists head to prison. Sadly, this is not a repeat from 1859.
- Speaking of repeats, yes, Islamists are still pissed over those Danish cartoons. Molly Norris unavailable for comment. And of course, this is obligatory:
- And speaking of Danish cartoon riots, Syria helped foment them.
- And speaking of Molly Norris, here’s an interview with Karen Lugo on why there should be a Molly Norris Day.
- Iraq’s banned Ba’ath Party is getting back together, an idea that should prove to be as popular as reuniting the 2008 Detroit Lions…
- Sharia law comes to Thailand.
- I’m no longer surprised at Muslim “honor killings.” But most killers don’t off their own mother in a courtroom.
- Speaking of honor killings, Iraqi man kills his daughter because she was recruited by al-Qaida as a suicide bomber. Ummm, you’re still doing it wrong…
- This week’s weird thing for Muslims throwing a hissy fit over is (rolls dice) Top Gear hosts wearing burkas.
- The true meaning of Kwanzaa. I knew Kwanzaa was a naked attempt to promote Marxism in the black community, but I never realized the guy who invented it spent four years in prison for torturing a woman with a soldering iron.
- “Food. I need food.” “Here, have a grenade instead.” BOOOM!
Tags: al Qaeda, cartoons, Ground Zero Mosque, honor killing, Iraq, Jihad, Karen Lugo, Kwanzaa, Michael Bloomberg, Molly Norris, Ronald McKinley Everett, slavery, This Week in Jihad, Top Gear
Posted in Jihad, Media Watch | No Comments »
December 29th, 2010
This post by Ann Althouse (and the ensuing comments) got me thinking about just what is the worst liberal song of all time? Being a man of action, I went ahead and created a poll:
A few notes on my criteria:
- It had to be a popular song people would actually recognize (which meant everything by Rage Against the Machine was right out)
- It had to suck (so things like the Sex Pistols’ “God Save the Queen” and many Dead Kennedys songs were exempt because they kicked ass)
- Only one song per artist (I mean, I really could have used just about everything off Pink Floyd’s The Final Cut otherwise)
- It had to have a certain self-righteous pretentiousness about it, so anything that was actually funny was exempt.
So go ahead and vote for your favorite musical slice of Suckitude.
Tags: Fail, music, poll, Suckitude
Posted in Uncategorized | 7 Comments »
December 29th, 2010
The Massachusetts Criminal Justice System seems to be especially unclear on the idea that, if a career felon is in jail on “three concurrent life sentences,” you don’t let him out on parole. Their lack of clarity on that issue cost 35-year police veteran John “Jack” Maguire his life.
(Hat tip: Say Uncle.)
Tags: Crime, Dominic Cinelli, John "Jack" Maguire, Kevin Dingwell, Massachusetts, murder, Scott Hanwright, Woburn
Posted in Crime | 1 Comment »
December 28th, 2010
Last week I mentioned that China’s Housing bubble is already worse than America and Japan’s respective bubbles.
Today the Wall Street Journal provides even more confirmation:
It’s impossible to say definitively that a market has strayed into bubble territory until after the collapse. But prices rising out of the reach of average buyers is one indicator. Housing prices in the U.S. peaked at 6.4 times average annual earnings this decade. In Beijing, the figure is 22 times.
The figures get even worse when you consider that the “shadow market” (i.e., banks making “off book” loans) means the bubble is even worse than it seems:
Local governments and banks have set up off-balance sheet vehicles to conceal loans and keep the spending boom going. Fitch Ratings estimates that not only did banks exceed the central bank’s 7.5 trillion yuan ($1.1 trillion) cap on lending for this year, they made an additional three trillion yuan of these shadow loans.
Something that can’t go on forever won’t. That’s especially true of a housing boom in a country aging as rapidly as China (which Mark Steyn famously said “will get old before it gets rich”); and don’t forget that a rapidly aging populace was also a factor in Japan’s own “lost decade.”
The big question is whether China’s housing bubble or Europe’s Sovereign Debt Crisis pops first. The aftershocks of both will certainly be felt in our own economy…
Tags: bubble, China, Economics, Japan, Mark Steyn
Posted in Economics, Foreign Policy | 2 Comments »
December 26th, 2010
Guess which one is the better place to live?
When the Internet economy allows an increasing number of people to live anywhere, low costs win. Texans spend 8.4% of income on state and local taxes compared with 11.7% for New Yorkers. Dollars that would rent a fifth-floor walk-up in New York City instead can buy a small ranch and maybe even acreage in Texas’ suburbs, where prairie begs to be paved for another Applebee’s.
Texas creates jobs like a fiend, in part because businesses large and small have no worry of obstacles such as plaintiff-friendly courts, consumer-friendly regulators or oversight-friendly lawmakers. Pro-business isn’t just a mantra; they put it in the water.
Oil and gas still play a huge role here, but are increasingly overshadowed by technology, medical and defense jobs. Texas has more Fortune 500 company headquarters than New York.
Tags: Economics, New York, Taxes, Texas
Posted in Economics, Regulation, Texas | No Comments »
December 26th, 2010
Meet Lance Mitchell, the man who runs speedtrapahead.org. He not only founded a website to warn people about speed traps, he actually stood up the road from one in his home of speedtrap-crazy Lakeway in his bright orange “Speed Trap Ahead” t-shirt…and got arrested for his troubles. The charge? Among others: illegal signage. For wearing a t-shirt.
Federal courts have pretty regularly held t-shirts to be a form of free speech (see Boroff v. Van Wert City Board of Education, for example), so it’s no surprise that all the charges were dismissed, and Mitchell has reached a settlement with Lakeway on his own lawsuit.
(Hat tip: Fark.)
Tags: Free Speech, Lakeway, speed trap, Texas
Posted in Austin, Crime, Texas | No Comments »
December 24th, 2010
From Belmont Club. Covers not only the recent Korean artillery exchange, but also the strategic implications of China’s shipping lanes. Worth a read.
Tags: China, Foreign Policy, Japan, North Korea
Posted in Foreign Policy | No Comments »
