Overnight Open Thread (6-18-2013)

—Maetenloch

How to Explain Conservatism to Your Squishy Friends

By PJ O'Rourke.

The individual is the wellspring of conservatism. The purpose of conservative politics is to defend the liberty of the individual and - lest individualism run riot - insist upon individual responsibility.

The great religions (and conservatives are known for approving of God) teach salvation as an individual matter. There are no group discounts in the Ten Commandments, Christ was not a committee, and Allah does not welcome believers into Paradise saying, "You weren't much good yourself, but you were standing near some good people." That we are individuals - unique, disparate and willful - is something we understand instinctively from an early age. No child ever wrote to Santa: "Bring me - and a bunch of kids I've never met - a pony, and we'll share."

Virtue is famously lonely. Also vice, as anyone can testify who ever told his mother, "All the other guys were doing it." We experience pleasure separately; Ethan Hawke may go out on any number of wild dates, but I'm able to sleep through them. And, although we may be sorry for people who suffer, we only "feel their pain" when we're full of baloney and running for office.

But what about the old, the poor, the disabled, the helpless, the hopeless, the addled and the daft?

Conservatism is sometimes confused with Social Darwinism or other such me-first dogmas. Sometimes the confusion is deliberate. When those who are against conservative policies don't have sufficient opposition arguments, they call love of freedom "selfish. " Of course it is - in the sense that breathing is selfish. But because you want to breathe doesn't mean you want to suck the breath out of every person you encounter. Conservatives do not believe in the triumph of the large and powerful over the weak and useless. (Although most conservatives would make an exception to see a fistfight between Norman Schwartzkopf and George Stephanopoulos. If all people are free, George Stephanopoulos must be allowed to run loose, too, however annoying this may be.)

But some people cannot enjoy the benefits of freedom without assistance from their fellows. This may be a temporary condition - such as childhood or being me when I say I can drive home from a bar, just fine, thank you very much, at three a.m. - or, due to infirmity or affliction, the condition may be permanent. Because conservatives do not generally propose huge government programs to combat the effects of old age, illness, being a kid or drinking 10 martinis on an empty stomach, conservatives are said to be "mean-spirited."

Read the rest here.

Angry Elves, Internet Mobs, and Eating Your Own

Yet another reason why I'm not a fan of Mark Levin.

Snowden the Celebrity Leaker

Snowden seems to have been a guy who chose to work for two different spy agencies yet has objections to the idea of spying in general and now just wants to hurt the US government as much as possible. How else do you explain his divulging of details of American spying against China and Russia?

He may have rendered a public service by revealing the full depth of NSA domestic surveillance but more and more that seems to have been just a side benefit of his desire to become another celebrity leaker.

Supreme Court: Your Silence Can Be Used Against You

"The Supreme Court ruled in favor of the State of Texas earlier today in a murder trial where the defendant, prior to be taken into custody, had been questioned by the police and chose to remain silent on key questions. This fact was bought up at trial and used to convict him. Most of us have seen at least enough cop shows to know police must read a suspect their Miranda rights when placing them in custody. The issue was a bit murkier here in that the defendant had not yet been detained and while we all probably thought the freedom from self-incrimination was an implicit right as stated in the Constitution, apparently SCOTUS now thinks you have to claim that right or at least be properly mirandized first."

When you voluntarily talk to the police but then refuse to answer certain questions, that selective omission can be brought up at the trial. Reason #59 why you should never talk to the police without an attorney present.

Who Are the Three Highest Paid Employees on the Pentagon Payroll?

Can you guess them without looking?

Answer: The football coaches at Army, Navy and Air Force.

Weirdest Scandal Ever: Foreign Knights Invading America

The Dutch treat verus that 100-year old document:

On April 29, Sir Jay Merchant was knighted by Ambassador Rudolf Bekink on behalf of Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands. Merchant is the "international relations adviser" in the Office of the Administrator of CMS, which is the agency's highest executive office.

While this may seem like just a neat factoid for inside-the-Beltway water-cooler amusement, there's actually a constitutional problem that precludes this gallant story from having a fairytale ending.

To wit Article I, Section 9, Clause 8:

No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States: And no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State.

But of course Sir Jay never got permission from Congress nor has he renounced the knighthood.

Welcome to the new feudalism - in this case literally.

Where All The Rimfire At?

Here Bob Owens by way of WeaponMan's blog explains why .22 has been so scarce.

1. There's a ton of new shooters, and shooters with new guns. Tens of millions have new guns have found new owners, and retailers tell us a high percentage of them are first-time buyers, and another large segment is people long away from shooting or gun ownership that are coming back to it. The entire demographics of shooting is changing, as a visit to a range will show you. These new shooters need ammo, and their mentors and trainers need ammo to train them with. That's not all of it, but it's one factor.

2. Economists know that when the price or availability of a desired good rises, one predictable effect is the consumption of an alternative good in its place. The .22 rimfire is the long-standing alternative to expensive and scarce centerfire calibers like 5.56, 7.62, 9mm and .40. As a result, the shortage of any one of these calibers becomes, in time, a shortage of .22; and to a lesser extent it becomes a shortage of all of these calibers.

3. People who were comfortable buying shooting and hunting ammo day-of or day-before have been spooked by the shortage into carrying an inventory. The longer the shortage continues, the more of these guys there are, the more of an inventory they feel they need. Exercise for the reader: if you shoot 500 rounds a week, how many rounds do you need to weather six months' disruption in supply? Before you say we'll never have six months' disruption, stop and think: we're in about month eight of a shortage right now. People who never stored ammo before are hoarding it now, and people who hoarded it already are hoarding more. This is probably the single biggest factor.

4. People who concentrate on preparedness, for example the readers of Jim Rawles's website and novels, have realized that .22LR ammo is a lasting store of value that has more stability in good times and bad than currency or even gold. (If the rule of law collapses, gold may still have value but may be difficult and risky to exchange). We think this is a larger factor. A lot of people who aren't going to get fully on board with preparedness and move to the mountains like Jim recommends, will still take incremental actions like storing necessities: food, drinking water, and .22 ammo

So You Trapped the Snake in a Closet

Whew. Now you can sit back and relax with a beer until the authorities arrive. Wait - what the fuck was that noise?!

Egypt Decides They're Not Really Into the Whole Tourism Thing

Why else would they put tourist-killing terrorists in charge of the most popular tourist attractions?

On Sunday, President Morsi appointed Adel al-Khayat of the Gamaa al-Islamiyya party as Governor of Luxor, a region home to the ruins of two temples and several monuments, widely known as the "open air museum."  The party, Gamaa al-Islamiyya, not only holds conservative views against sunbathing, women wearing shorts, and alcohol, but is also responsible for the 1997 attack in Luxor that killed 60 tourists.

And of course Gamaa al-Islamiyya just issued a fatwa against building anything for tourism:

"A fatwa, or religious decree, published on the Gamaa al-Islamiyya's Web site advised members of the group not to build tourist accommodations. 'Because tourist villages have aspects that anger Allah, including alcohol, gambling and other forbidden things, building these hotels and villages is considered aiding their owners in sin and aggression, and is not permitted,' the decision read."

Eh - that 11% of Egyptian GDP and 90% of jobs in Luxor was overrated anyway. Allah will provide.

The End of the Road

At least according to Google Street View.

Teh Tweet!

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Close it up

We Need to Give These People Weapons

—Ace

Stat.

Squee: Latest Fad is for Bachelorettes to Strip to Skivvies or to the Raw for a Cute Group Picture!

—Ace

Oh for the love of...

Rhetorical question, because it has no answer: Are people just getting more narcissistic, dumb, and awful, or do we just have more reporting on the narcissistic, dumb, and awful?

I don't really object to this on moral grounds. I suppose my question is simply: Why? Why do you want a semi-nude shot of you and your maids of honor hugging each other?

What does this do for you, inside? What message does this send, what hurt does this heal?

I think people just want to be Movie Stars Like They See On The Covers of Magazines, and such tasteful (?) nudity is common there. So I guess this is some kind of Star Fantasy for brides-to-be.

Or something.

Oh, and there's porny boudoir shots, too. I guess maybe that's... I don't know, marital aid? I guess that's a gift for the husband, so I guess I get that more.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to pop off and kill myself.

A Rope, A Chair & A Rafter

My last remaining comforts in this world.

Piers Morgan: Nannying Mayors Are Needed, Because "People Need Nannying"

—Ace

Remember, Piers Morgan won The Celebrity Apprentice, not The Celebrity Genius.

This is a crap post so I'll add this from @rdbrewer4 and hope that makes it into something.

The Amnesty Shills Have Lied to Us Constantly.
But We Should Trust Them Now.

—Ace

We are supposed to trust them, despite their constant lying to us.

McCain cast himself as a border hawk for 2008 and then again in 2010, and of course voted against the border fence today (which he previously vowed to build).

McCain is particularly proud of his personal honor. So why does he lie so frequently, so casually, and so thoughtlessly to us? Why does he break promises without a hint of remorse?

Well, let me explain: Honorable behavior is only owed to the honorable. That has historically been the rule of martial honor/chivalry -- other honorable knights were owed honorable conduct, but not brigands and ruffians.

Point is, the overly-proud-of-his-personal-honor McCain feels free to break his Word of Honor to conservatives because he considers brigands and ruffians to whom no honor in conduct is owed.

So absolutely, sign me up for your Amnesty Bill, John McCain! As I know your promises to me mean absolutely nothing -- I am too low, socially, to be owed your Word of Honor -- of course I'll happily accept your new promises about your future intentions and about the alleged "triggers" in the bill.

Senator John McCain

He's kept every promise he's made to Chuck Schumer.

Television and Political Correctness' Safe Harbor for the Stupid

—Ace

A recent Matt Lewis column mentioned a book called Amusing Ourselves to Death, by Neil Postman, which was published in 1985. Yes, It's Old (TM). Its central thesis struck a chord with me: That freedom and reason will be lost in America not in an Orwellian way, but in a Huxleyan one. Orwell's vision was of a government ruthlessly suppressing books and changing written accounts of the past in order to change the thinking of the present.

Rick Tempest spoke about this at the end of the most recent AoSHQ podcast. Rick doesn't read much, so when he does finish a book, it's like The Only Thing He Can Talk About.

Anyway, Huxley's vision was that no totalitarian state was needed for such a descent into infantilization and restriction of thought: That all that was necessary was that the means of distraction and infantilization be provided to the population, and the people would voluntarily choose that path, no Mintruth needed, no black-armored thought police required. Orwell's vision was therefore of a forcible lobotomy, conducted by the state; Huxley's was one of a voluntary one, people checking in to an outpatient clinic every day to have bothersome parts of their brains excised.

The idea of the book (which, frankly, is better than the book itself) is an elaboration of Marshall McLuhan's aphorism, "the medium is a message." Which is something Rick Tempest never understood until reading this book. The aphorism stands for the proposition that every medium -- whether it be writing, speaking, song, epic poetry, telegraph reports, news journalism, or television -- has embedded deep within it a preference for certain modes of expression and certain types of stories, and thus each medium contains within it an embedded philosophy of thought which cannot be wholly separated from the actual content of the communication.

Thus, the medium itself, to an extent not appreciated enough, is part of the message it carries.

Now, Postman's book contrasts two different media, print and television. His book documents the long fall of America from a print-based method of political discourse to a television-based one. The early New England colonists, he points out, had a literacy rate of 95%, which was unheard of in the world at the time (and is rather high even today). They consumed printed material -- pamphlets, books, all of it -- and even spoke in that fashion. For example, he notes that Lincoln's speechifying, which may sound overly-complex for spoken argument today, was in fact fairly common of the style of rhetoric at the time, and people had no particular trouble following it.

Nowadays, we've lost our ear for long spoken sentences with lots of dependent clauses, and it's all we can do to make sense of them even in print, where we can take our time parsing them out.

This is part of his point: The method of communication breeds a certain method of thought in a population. To Americans living from 1730 to 1870, Lincoln's speeches were not overly-complicated or difficult to follow. They were accustomed to long complicated thoughts in political speech.

This has all changed since the television became the chief conveyance of not merely pop entertainment but, crucially, of political expression and culture itself. I will not belabor the long litany of sins he lays at the feet of television. Suffice to say that he believes that much of the superficiality and stupidity of the modern world is due to television's promotion of a certain style of thought, which is to say a certain style of thoughtlessness: Fast cuts, short sentences, information stripped of context, a disdain for abstractions -- indeed, a disdain for anything that cannot be filmed occurring in the here-and-now.

And the carnival barking-- Dear Lord, the carnival barking. Everything on TV is the best, the latest, the most spectacular, the weirdest, the most shocking. That sort of endless Hype of the Present Moment seems to give a big middle finger to All History Which Has Come Before.

Now, Postman is a liberal Democrat (or so parts of his book seemed to indicate), and, in 1985, he thought that television and the particular style of stupidity it encouraged was Reagan's secret weapon.

I disagree with that conclusion but I agree with Rick Tempest that most of his other conclusions are spot-on.

Rick Tempest's big disagreement is as to which side of the politico-cultural war television's maudlin, emotional, hot-button-pushing, no-abstract-thought-or-hypotheticals-allowed style of discourse favors. I think that there's a softness of thought to television-based thinking that strongly favors a regime of Political Correctness and thereby strongly favors soft liberalism as a default, risk-free safe harbor for the stupid.

Anyway, interesting idea, I think. I don't know if I'd recommend the book so much as I'd recommend the idea, which I've just shared with you. It's a decent book, though. Although, oddly enough, for a book which rants against superficial analysis, its evidence of TV's dire impact on our thinking is very anecdotal, superficial, and news-clipping-ish. You think that a book about the virtue of rigor and depth would exemplify that itself.

And yet, a fast easy TV-like read.

Gang of 8 Rejects Border Fence Amendment

—BenK

The Senate, by a 54-39 vote, rejected an amendment put forth by John Thune that called for the completion of a border fence between Mexico and the U.S.

Senators on Tuesday rejected building the 700 miles of double-tier border fencing Congress authorized just seven years ago, with a majority of the Senate saying they didn’t want to delay granting illegal immigrants legal status while the fence was being built.

The 54-39 vote to reject the fence shows the core of the immigration deal is holding. The vote broke mostly along party lines, though five Republicans, including Sen. Marco Rubio and the rest of the bill’s authors, voted against the fence, and two Democrats voted for it

[Update] The five Republicans who voted against the Thune Amendment are Flake, McCain, Rubio, Murkowski, and Graham. Two Democrats voted for the Thune Amendment, they are Pryor and Manchin.

Barbara Walters: Bill Maher Probably Just Didn't Know "Retard" Was Offensive When He Called Trig That

—Ace

Yes, I think that's it.

My God.

They're very loyal to fellow members of the Tribe, aren't they?

Flashback: @rdbrewer4 reminded me that Babsy was quick to gently cup Anthony Weiner's package of spin, too.

Breaking: First Interviews with Watergate Burglars Did Not Indicate Any White House Involvement

—Ace

I mention this because Elijah Cummings has released the transcripts of the interviews with the IRS agents conducted so far, and so far, he says, none of them report admit to any White House direction.

Merely that the targeting was supervised directly from Washington, despite Lois Lerner's initial claims that this was all a few rogue operators in Cincinnati.

Elijah Cummings, and Salon, think this is a Big Victory for Team Obama that so far, in the earliest stages of the investigation, before the agents who actually performed the targeting have been questioned under oath and without their supervisor Holly Paz being present during the interview, they have only narked a little bit on the Washington Nexus and the higher-level players there.

So here are the transcripts, part I and Part II.

"11 Million Undocumented Democrats"

—Ace

Like many things, it took a joke to put this into play.

People feel more comfortable discussing tricky subject areas with jokes.

So, apparently Leno mentioned the amnesty bill for "11 million documented Democrats," and now it's being used as a laugh-line among Republicans, and finally people are talking about it for real.

I'll tell you one thing: The Democrats would never be talking about giving voting rights to 11 million undocumented Tea Partiers.

Big: Boehner Promises to Not Bring Comprehensive Amnesty Bill to Floor Unless a Majority of GOP Caucus Supports It

—Ace

House veto?

I kind of don't believe him, and I also kind of think that a majority of our elected Knaves & Fools will support the bill, but at least there's a chance.

“I don’t see any way of bringing an immigration bill to the floor that doesn’t have a majority support of Republicans,” Boehner told reporters following a closed-door House GOP conference meeting…

According to a member who attended the meeting, Boehner argued against the Hastert Rule, but assured his colleagues that he would adhere to it on immigration.

On Monday, Rep. Dana Rohrabacher warned that Boehner should lose his gavel if he moved forward on immigration without majority support, saying it would be a “betrayal” of the party…

Asked by reporters if he agreed with Rohrabacher’s assessment, the Speaker considered the question and replied “maybe.”

I'm not a "US person"...

—Jack M.

I'm a US Citizen, natural-born and raised, dammit. And it's a distinction that makes a difference to me.

Apparently, though, "US citizenship" is an antiquated device; a relic from an earlier age when Obama's "Founding Founders" were all racists who never embraced or never could have conceived of the transnational "world without borders" view favored by our current President and the creepy, neo-totalitarian progressive radicals that prop him up.

Here is the Obama White House attempting to quell concerns over the intrusive reach of his NSA/Prism operations. Note the terminology:

President Obama: "If you are a U.S. person, the NSA cannot listen to your telephone calls and the NSA cannot target your emails."

— The White House (@whitehouse) June 18, 2013

Got that, you US person, you? You're totally safe and all.

Here was my Twitter reaction to it, after spending some time in contemplation of the President's semantic change:

I bet the Founding Founders are proud to have created a country full of US persons. Whoever they are.

— Jack's Not 4 Turning (@jackmcoldcuts) June 18, 2013

Isn't construction "US persons" revealing? I think it's an Obamaism to cater to illegal aliens...an "inclusive" phrase for non-citizens.

— Jack's Not 4 Turning (@jackmcoldcuts) June 18, 2013

That's further proof of Obama's disdain for America/Americans. He'd rather reinvent the language than stand for concept of citizenship.

— Jack's Not 4 Turning (@jackmcoldcuts) June 18, 2013

See, had Obama said "US Citizens" (likely the most common usage which a President would normally employ in a "reassure the nation" statement) he would have done something unforgivable to the left. This transgression would even have occurred if he had used the phase "US residents" (as it could have been interpreted to only include citizens and resident aliens): he would have not been offering reassurances to America's newest privileged class: illegal aliens.

But the construction of "US persons", why that covers pretty much anyone found within the borders! It's about as inclusive as you can get while defending a program operating within the boundaries of the United States. And if we have to sacrifice the concept of "citizenship" to promote "inclusiveness", why that's just a sacrifice we have to make, isn't it?

No.

Hell no.

See, I'm of a mind that the most valuable and precious status a person can hold in this world is that of "US Citizenship". I believe in American Exceptionalism, and I do believe that Americans are different than anyone else in part because we have a common history and unique culture that prizes liberty and elevates individual freedom and governmental restraint (2nd Amendment, anyone?) in a manner that 99% of foreigners simply don't share. The American experiment is different...and it is that innate difference, I would argue, that has long saved America from falling headlong into the depths of Statist tyranny that has long sought favor and refuge in the Socialist halls of 20th Century Europe, or that has expressed itself historically in the Totalitarian/Authoritarian rule of Asian empires (WW2 Japan, Current China), the dysfunctional Banana Republics of Central and South America, or the increasingly Theocratic Islamist spread of the Middle Eastern Mullahs.

"US Citizenship" is a bulwark against those excesses. As long as it stands for something, and carries its historic definition it means that we have a people who have been conditioned to stand guard as the last, shining city on the hill against those who would snuff Lady Liberty's light, or enclose her in a burqa, as soon as look at her. It's also why it should be difficult to obtain in the first place.

And, per Obama's tweet, that, apparently, cannot be allowed to stand.

Make no mistake, Obama's phrasing here is not accidental. It, like the Gang of 8 Amnesty bill has, as a core feature, the intention to water down and overwhelm "American Citizenship" by extending it to tens of millions who have no natural conception of what it means, or what its value truly is. It's about diluting the concept of American Exceptionalism to the point where Americans adopt the Obama approach: where Americans are "exceptional" just like everyone else. Remember his quote on the subject?

I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism.

A world where everyone is exceptional means a world where no one is exceptional. To Obama, that's a feature not a bug. It's a major reason why the Amnesty bill, and all those who embrace it, from lowly pro-Amnesty blog shills to glorified elected Senators, must be both repudiated and defeated.

I will also add this: in my family, there is a strong tradition of military service. I grew up listening to my Great grandfather recount tales of World War 1, my Grandfather recount tales of his service in WW2 and Korea, and my Father recounting his service in the jungles of Vietnam. These men fought, and very often bled, in the service of their fellow countrymen. I am proud of them, each and every one.

They didn't put it all on the line to protect "US persons". They put it all on the line to protect "US Citizens." They understood the difference.

So don't tell me it's a meaningless semantic change, Mr. President. I know better. And I'm convinced that there are still enough of us remaining who do as well. I hope so, anyway, because I shudder to think of how emboldened the left will become once they have convinced themselves that the last remnants of those who understand our unique tradition and history, and our traditional preference for limited government and individual liberty, have finally been overwhelmed.

"Standing Man" Protest in Taksim Inspires Hundreds of Others to Join the Vigil

—Ace

In Istanbul, and around all of Turkey.

As far as protests go, this one is... eerie.

A press report on the protests.

Turkish man inspires hundreds with silent vigil in Taksim Square

Erdem Gunduz – dubbed 'standing man' – stages eight-hour vigil and is joined by 300 people during silent protest

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Reuters in Istanbul
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 18 June 2013 03.30 EDT
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Erdem Gunduz in Taksim Square
Erdem Gunduz stands in Taksim Square during a 'duranadam', or standing man protest, in Istanbul. Photograph: Vassil Donev/EPA

A Turkish man has staged an eight-hour silent vigil in Istanbul's Taksim Square, the scene of violent clashes between police and anti-government protesters in recent weeks, inspiring hundreds of others to follow his lead.

Erdem Gunduz said he wanted to take a stand against police stopping demonstrations near the square, the Dogan news agency reported.

He stood silently, facing the Ataturk Cultural Centre which was draped in Turkish flags and a portrait of Turkey's founder Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, from 6pm on Monday.

By 2am on Tuesday, when the police moved in, about 300 people had joined him. Ten people, who refused to be moved on by police, were detained.

NSA, Intelligence Officials Testifying Before House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence

—Ace

On CSPAN3, livestreamed here (on the left).

Tuesday Morning News Dump

—BenK

• Obama: NSA Spying That We Knew Nothing About Weeks Ago Is Transparent
• Citizens And The State: The Problem Is Bigger Than You Think
• Rise In Illegal Crossings Roils Immigration Debate
• Obamaphone Dealers Okay With People Trading Them For Drugs Or Cash
• Our Modern Day Marie Antoinette Continues Her Spending Spree
• Obamacare's Broken Promises
• Fox Cub Gets Head Caught In A Jar
• Obama Seems To Be The Only Person Who Believe New Iranian Prez Is A Moderate
• False Rape Accuser Ordered To Pay 2.6 Million
• Eighth Grader Who Refused To Remove NRA Shirt Could Face A Year In Prison
• Government Compromises Our Trust
• CNN: 47% Believe The White House Ordered The IRS To Target Conservatives
• Is The Momentum For Gay Marriage Real Or Just Media Hype
• Turkish Protestors Accuse Local Media Of Covering Up For Erdogan
• The Muslim Brotherhood Has Turned Cairo Into A Dystopia
• Five Year Old Cap Gun Offender Can't Expunge His Record
• Feel Good Gun Story Of The Day
• Zimmerman Jury Selection Day Six

Follow me on twitter

Top Headline Comments 6-18-13

—Gabriel Malor

Happy Tuesday.

"It is not clear if Snowden is referring here to the Gang of 8 tackling immigration reform, or some other Gang of 8." Heh. That Q&A was something else.

Meanwhile, Snowden's father urges him to come back to the U.S., not to commit treason.

Both Pew and Gallup find broad majorities opposed to Obama's proposal to arm the Syrian rebels.

While we're thinking about polls, Gallup surveyed public opinion on five potential 2016 GOP candidates. Among GOP voters, Rep. Paul Ryan led among net favorability with 57%. Then it was Sen. Marco Rubio -- 47%, Sen. Rand Paul -- 43%, Sen. Ted Cruz -- 32%, Gov. Chris Christie -- 28%. Among adults (IOW, without the party filter), Christie's net favorable was 32%, followed by Rubio -- 15%, Ryan -- 8%, Cruz -- 6%, and Paul -- 5%.

Now featured on TPB's front page

—Purp

TPB = The Pirate Bay. It would seem our scandals have truly gone worldwide now.

Overnight Open Thread (6-17-2013)

—Maetenloch

Because I'm lazy and kinda sick that's why.

The Geek Menagerie

Sharyl Atkkisson: I Think I Know Who Hacked My Computers

—Ace

Yup.

“I think I know. But I’m just not prepared to go into that. We’re continuing our investigations. There are multifaceted looks at what to do next… Let me just say, whoever did it, to come into a private citizen’s home, whether I’m a journalist or not, and look in my family’s computer and look into my work computer… Well, it’s outrageous.”

She's pretty much almost saying "It was the government."

State Department Whistleblower: The Government Is Attempting to Intimidate Me Into Silence

—Ace

This would only hurt Obama if there was a pattern of this sort of thing in his Administration.

Fortunately for him, there's not at all. Whew.

So, here you go: Another story your media will completely embargo.

For some time, it's been the case that if you want the news, the last place on earth you'd look for it is in the so-called American News Organizations. But it gets worse, more Stalinist, every single day.

The State Department investigator who accused colleagues last week of using drugs, soliciting prostitutes, and having sex with minors says that Foggy Bottom is now engaged in an "intimidation" campaign to stop her.

Last week's leaks by Aurelia Fedenisn, a former State Department inspector general investigator, shined a light on alleged wrongdoing by U.S. officials around the globe. But her attorney Cary Schulman tells The Cable that Fedenisn has paid a steep price: "They had law enforcement officers camp out in front of her house, harass her children and attempt to incriminate herself."
...

Erich Hart, general counsel to the Inspector General, did not reply to a request for comment.

...

Schulman says the purpose of the visit was to get Fedenisn to sign a document admitting that she stole State Department materials, such as the memos leaked to CBS. Schulman says it was crucial that she didn't sign the document because her separation agreement with the State Department includes a provision allowing disclosures of misconduct. Furthermore, none of the materials were classified.

Schulman charged that sending law enforcement officers to pressure her into signing an agreement was heavy handed. "

Meanwhile, here's another part of what State covered-up.

The soap opera in Italy unfolded in the fall of 2010, when Moore became the Naples consul general after serving in the same capacity at the US Embassy in Port au Prince, Haiti. As a senior foreign-service officer, Moore could make as much as $179,700 a year, State Department data says.

Within days, he allegedly bedded a consulate employee, a single mom who fell in love with him.

...

“She informed anyone within earshot that she had had the abortion and had her tubes tied at his instruction,” Howard wrote. “Morale continued to sink as this soap opera played out in our workplace on a daily basis.”

Private personal misconduct? Not exactly:

Kerry Howard says she was bullied, harassed and forced to resign after she exposed US Consul General Donald Moore’s alleged security-threatening shenanigans in the Naples, Italy, office.

...

“It’s cover-up after cover-up. It’s absolutely hideous,” she told The Post. “When our diplomats disrespect the Italians by hiring and firing them because they have seen too much — or use them for ‘sex-ercise’ — we have to question why we have diplomats abroad at taxpayer expense.”

So that's another whistleblower bullied by Hillary's State goons for speaking up about misbehavior.

In addition, the underlying misconduct is about abusing people in the host country of a consulate. Our diplomatic corps is there to make us look good, right?

Arrested Development Arena Fighting Video Game;
Breaking Bad Lego Adventure Game

—Ace

Funny guys doin' some funny things with computers.

They say they will make these games -- so long as they can get the licenses. Now, there's no way Lego is going to license a game that features the cast of Breaking Bad.

But Arrested Development one just needs the producers' blessing.

Oh Here's Something Awesome: When you slow the Theme from Seinfeld down 12x (or whatever), it becomes a chilling theme of existential psychological horror.

I'm not exaggerating. Check it out.

It'll haunt ya, man.

Obama Gurl: Holly Paz, Who Donated $4000 to Obama in 2008, Personally Supervised Tea Party Scrutiny

—Ace

Remember, this is the woman who now claims she thought "Tea Party" could mean "liberal."

$4000 is a lot of money for someone who works for wages and isn't just sitting on a huge pile of wealth.

A Washington-based IRS supervisor acknowledged she was personally involved in reviewing Tea Party applications for tax-exempt status as far back as 2010, Fox News confirms — a detail that further challenges the agency’s initial claim that the practice of singling out those groups was limited to a handful of employees in Ohio.

Congressional sources confirmed to Fox News that Holly Paz, who until recently was a top deputy in the division that handles applications for tax-exempt status, told congressional investigators she reviewed 20 to 30 applications. Some requests languished for more than a year without action.

The account undercuts the narrative that senior officials only learned of the practice after it had already started in the Cincinnati office.

$4000 in 2008.

Holly Paz, a supervisor in the IRS's Washington, DC office that issued rulings on tax-exempt groups, made a $2,000 contribution directly to the Obama for America war chest, and another $2,000 to the separate Obama Victory Fund, both in 2008, according to Federal Election Commission documents.

She has also been named as the attorney who monitored interviews conducted with IRS employees by Treasury Inspector General J. Russell George, as he investigated what would explode in May 2013 as a major crisis for the White House.

And how are the networks reporting this? Simple, they're not.

Remote-Control Helicopter Provides Aerial View of Taksim Demonstrations

—Ace

I'm linking this for two reasons:

1, as a demonstration of how anti-state propaganda is done.

2, Did you know that a video camera attached to a RC miniature helicopter could possibly produce such clear pictures? Or that a little RC chopper could be made, by electronic gyroscopes I assume, into such a stable photography platform? (Update: @comradearthur notes there are twitch-elimination programs people run on video after it's shot, such as VReveal, to produce stable-looking imagery.)

Because I did not. I've got a little bit of tech-shock here: Sure, I knew the government would have access to this level of quality electronics, but I didn't know it was something someone could just buy at the store.

Amusingly, a lot of protesters on the ground keep shooting lasers up at the RC chopper's camera to obliterate the picture. They assume it's a government probe -- they too assume, like me, that Only a Government could afford such a wonder.

Nope. Some citizen owns this eye in the sky. Possibly like this one, which you can have for under a grand. Bye-bye privacy, S. Weasel says.

Meanwhile, one man is staging a Lonely Protest, standing alone in the middle of Tasksim:

That would be interesting, because the military is supposed to defend the secularist vision Turkey.

Turkey's government warned Monday it may deploy the military against protesters who continue to defy officials by taking to the street in what the interior minister called "illegal" demonstrations.

The warning is the first time the Islamist-rooted government has mentioned use of the military to restore public order. The military establishment traditionally has been seen as a bastion of secularism in Turkey and a foe of past Islamist political figures.

"First, if necessary we will deploy the police," Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc said on Monday. "If that's not enough we will call on the (national guard). But if events still require further action, and the governor so wishes, we will resort to calling on the military to contain these protests."

...

Five major unions representing public sector workers, doctors, engineers and architects have called their rank-and-file out on a one-day strike and march in city centers across Turkey. One analyst said it would be a "major move" if the Turkish government were to involve the military in its attempts to control the protests.

Below, video from the government crackdown on the demonstrators from June 15. The aftermath of it -- including children choking on tear gas -- is at around 4:20.

Science: Meet the Whale-Taming Woman Who Swims Butt-Naked With Beluga Whales

—Ace

There are pictures, and she is butt-naked in them, but remember, this is Science, and she's learning about swimming naked with Beluga whales.

Well actually it's not about Science (TM) per se, it's about taming whales, about getting them to be okay with human beings and confinement so they can be carted off to aquariums -- "dolphinariums," this article calls them -- around the world.

She swims butt-naked in arctic ice, by the way.

The average human could die if left in sub-zero temperature sea water for just five minutes.

However, Natalia is a yoga expert and used meditation techniques to hold her breath and stay under water for an incredible ten minutes and 40 seconds.

Not so much "news" as "I can't believe that's a job."

(In which American workers just couldn't cut it, of course.)

via @MTotenkopf

Oh: I know the original expression is "buck naked," but since Eddie Murphy said "butt-naked" in his first HBO special, that's been the way to say it, at least for me.

Holly Paz's Alibi: I Thought "Tea Party" Could Mean "Liberal"

—Ace

So it wasn't partisan targeting, you understand.

When front-line tax agents in Cincinnati used the term “tea party,” they didn’t just mean conservative groups. Instead, a “tea party” case could refer to an application for tax-exemption from any group – including liberal ones – believed to be engaging in political activity, one IRS official told congressional investigators.

“Since the first case that came up to Washington happened to have that name, it appeared to me that that’s what they were calling it that as a shorthand, because the first case had been that,” said Holly Paz, the Internal Revenue Service’s director of rulings and agreements. She said “tea party” could mean any political group, just like “Coke” is often used as a generic term for soda, or people refer to tissues as “Kleenex.”

Uh-huh. Nice try. Telling this blatant a lie after-the-fact is evidence of the guilty mind during the fact.

Holly Paz seems to be one of those workers who, for lack of a better term, just can't cut it.

via @LilMissRightie.

Sharyl Atkisson: My Computer Woke Itself Up in the Middle of the Night for Unknown Reasons; The Only Thing I Was Working on Was... Benghazi and Fast & Furious

—Ace

Given that she's got forensics experts saying she was hacked, the "waking up" business seems to be more than a Windows update, more like unauthorized remote access.

“Whoever was in my work computer, the only thing I was working on were work-related things with CBS were big stories I guess during the time period in questions were I guess Benghazi and ‘Fast and Furious.’ The intruders did have access to personal information including passwords to my financial accounts and so on, but didn’t tamper with those, so they weren’t interested in stealing my identity or doing things to my finances. So people can decide on their own what they might have been trying to do in there.”

Rubio Aide: "There are American workers who, for lack of a better term, can't cut it."

—Ace

What do we do with them, then?

“‘There are American workers who, for lack of a better term, can’t cut it,’ a Rubio aide told me. ‘There shouldn’t be a presumption that every American worker is a star performer. There are people who just can’t get it, can’t do it, don’t want to do it. And so you can’t obviously discuss that publicly.’”

We should discuss this publicly, as this is one of the most important issues in play in the immigration argument.

Restricting the right to work in America to Americans is a form of protectionism towards American workers. Of course it is. It creates, of course, a legal barrier to entry against foreign workers.

Of course. That's the point of it.

Now, the effect of this is the same as any other form of protectionism: The favored class, the American workers, can demand higher wages, and in fact work less hard than they otherwise would, because they know they have some level of protectionism favoring their work. Their work doesn't have to be quite as good as the Very Best in the World, because Very Best in the World aren't all competing for American jobs.

Any form of protectionism creates the ability of the protected to ask for higher prices and/or produce lower quality. That doesn't mean all workers will take advantage of this ability, but surely some will, and the net aggregate cost of production will rise, and/or the net aggregate quality of production will probably fall.

There are some who see this as a bad thing-- that protectionism like this is always bad.

I don't see this as a bad thing. First of all, Americans have got to work, right? Either they are going to get money from wages from a job or -- and this is important -- they are going to get money from the government for not working at a job, and we should not be indifferent between these two options.

For the sake of a hypothetical, let's blow this situation up and talk about if we followed the Amnestias' logic to its natural end-point. We could just go bananas with "Let's just import all-new workers from Third World countries where people are so hungry and desperate that they'll gladly undercut the prevailing American wage and work harder, too" plan and invite, say, 200 million new workers to make their abode in America, thereby displacing virtually all American workers.

At least those workers who aren't willing to work for truly low wages, and those workers who are effectively competition-proof either due to having some difficult-to-replace skill, etc. A certain class of worker will tend to be protected due to having an attribute foreigners don't usually have -- native fluency in English, for example. I don't mean this as a shot against the media, but the media would be naturally protected, at least for a while, under this Go Crazy With It scheme, simply because their own Native English skill is not easily acquired by a non-Native-English-speaking foreign competitor, no matter how hungry he is.

Okay, Big Business sort of might like this idea, because now, of course, they're making their product for less money and are more competitive.

So long as you're looking at just that one side of the ledger -- lowest costs for your products. But there are other parts of the ledger one should look at, too.

For example: In America, Americans are used to some sort of social safety net, and furthermore, can vote themselves a more generous social safety net if they like. If 200 million foreign workers displace 200 million American workers, it's not quite true that our products are now cheaper and more "competitive" in the market, because the money to pay for all these now-permanently-unemployed Americans has to come from somewhere.

Might as well tax Big Business, then. So the actual cost of labor is not just the wages you pay to your actual employees -- the cost of labor is really:

The cost of wages you pay to your employees

plus

The costs imposed by government in taxes, especially those required (in this scenario) to now put 200 million formerly-working Americans on the dole

So when we think about American labor costs, we always have to keep this second factor in mind.

Now some will object, "But that's silly, we're not talking about displacing 200 million American workers."

No, you're only talking about displacing 20 million. So yes, that would be only 10% as bad.

But I'm afraid "only 10% as bad as a catastrophe" still isn't good. I blew the scale of this up to demonstrate that if you'd object to such a plan in Super Size Form, you should also probably object to it in the Value Size. Ten grams of poison is fatal. One gram, while perhaps survivable, is still poison.

Another thing to consider is that as a moral, political, and psychological matter, it is far better to have a country in which most of its voting citizens have the self-worth and natural connection to the economy that a job provides, as opposed to having more and more citizens taking the government dole, knowing they are essentially worthless to the nation, so many useless mouths to feed.

Am I Alive?

—JohnE.

Is this for real? This is earth, right? The place where Harry Reid failed to pass a budget for four freakin' years? I'm not losing my mind here, am I? That all actually happened?

It's been 86 days since the Senate passed a budget. Republicans, stop obstructing us from proceeding to conference. pic.twitter.com/DiQ4oEuNvH

— Senator Harry Reid (@SenatorReid) June 17, 2013

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For First Time, Majority of Public Finds Obama Untrustworthy, According to CNN Poll

—Ace

Plus -- "Who is he?," The Hill wonders, which Instapundit can't help noticing was a damn fine question... five years ago.

“A CNN/ORC survey released Monday shows Obama with a 45 percent approval rating, down from his 53 percent mark in mid-May. Fifty-four percent say they disapprove of how Obama is handling his job. The poll also finds that 49 percent believe Obama is honest to 50 percent who do not, the first time a majority have not found the president to be trustworthy.”

Surprise! The Strongest Rebel Group In Syria Is The One Affiliated With Al Qaeda

—DrewM.

John E. made a very good point on last week's podcast...under the terms of the 2001 Authorization of Use of Military Force, the US has a stronger legal basis for going after the Syrian rebels than it does in helping them.

But help them we will.

Concern about the Syrian al Qaeda-affiliated group Jabhat al-Nusra, also known as the al-Nusra Front, is at an all-time high, according to the analyst, with as many as 10,000 fighters and supporters inside Syria. The United States has designated al-Nusra Front as a terrorist group with links to al Qaeda in Iraq.

That assessment is shared by some Middle Eastern intelligence agencies that have long believed the United States is underestimating the Sunni-backed al Qaeda movement in the country, according to a Middle East source. It is also believed that Iran is running training camps inside Syria for Hezbollah and that other Iranian militia fighters are coming into the country to fight for the regime.

The analyst has been part of recent discussions with the U.S. intelligence community, which is urgently working to understand what is going on inside the war-ravaged country and is consulting outside experts. The analyst, who declined to be named because of the sensitive nature of the information, stressed that all assessments about Syria are approximate at best because of the lack of U.S. personnel on the ground.

The report also says the rebels are trying to get their own chemical weapons. Fantastic.

Victor Davis Hanson is worried.

U.S. influence in the Middle East and North Africa is at a new postwar low. That Iran supposedly plans to send 4,000 fighters to Syria suggests that it is not too afraid of anyone preempting its nuclear facilities or of the supposedly crushing oil boycott.

There is no guarantee that American air support or close training might not end up in some sort of American ground presence — the only sure guarantee that so-called moderates might prevail should Assad fall. Of course, any costly intervention would eventually be orphaned by many in the present chorus of interventionists in a manner that we also know well from Iraq. We are told that dealing a blow to Iran and Hezbollah would be a good thing, and no doubt it would be. But in the callous calculus of Realpolitik, both seem already to be suffering without U.S. intervention.

The last part is key...we should do enough to keep the fight going but not enough to help the rebels win. Let them fight and bleed for another year, two or more. I don't care. Once they are wasted away from killing each other we can figure out what comes next.

Arizona's Voter Registration Proof Of Citizenship Requirement Thrown Out By Supreme Court

—DrewM.

This wasn't part of the illegal immigration enforcement bills from a few years back but rather a voter imitative law put in place in 2004.

The Supreme Court ruled Monday that states cannot require would-be voters to prove they are U.S. citizens before using a federal registration system designed to make signing up easier.

The justices voted 7-2 to throw out Arizona's voter-approved requirement that prospective voters document their U.S. citizenship in order to use a registration form produced under the federal "Motor Voter" voter registration law.

Federal law "precludes Arizona from requiring a federal form applicant to submit information beyond that required by the form itself," Justice Antonia Scalia wrote for the court's majority.

It's a fairly straight forward preemption issue. The federal government has mandated a use of a specific registration* form through the Motor Voter Act and the court is simply saying that states can't add qualifications to it.

What the Court didn't seem to say is that such a requirement would be unconstitutional. So, it's time to press House and Senate candidates to add this to the federal form. Ideally, they'd repeal Motor Voter all together but that's not going to happen so fixing this oversight is probably the best we can hope for. Of course, that's likely a bridge too far.

*Apparently some people are confusing proof of citizenship at the time of registration with being able to vote. Just to be clear, SCOTUS didn't find a right to vote for non-citizens or say states couldn't stop non-citizens from voting.

That's why I said this was more a simple preemption case than an earth shattering voting rights case. Still, I think it's something states should be allowed to do and with political will it's a simple fix.

(I added "Registration" to the title to help avoid confusion)

Transcript Of My Debate With Paul Ryan On “Amnesty”

—DrewM.

As someone who is opposed to “comprehensive immigration reform” of the kind moving through the Senate (though I do support legal immigration and legal immigrants) I was excited to see this from Congressman Paul Ryan.

"Earned legalization is not amnesty," Ryan said during a forum on immigration sponsored by the National Association of Manufacturers. "I will debate anybody who tries to suggest that these ideas that are moving through Congress are amnesty. They're not. Amnesty is wiping the slate clean and not paying any penalty for having done something wrong."

I’m “anybody” and I certainly believe what’s moving through Congress is amnesty, so naturally I accepted the Congressman’s courageous offer and agreed to debate him.

My opening statement:

Congressman you say, "Earned legalization is not amnesty”. Perhaps I’m the wrong person to have this debate with. You should probably take that us with Senator Rubio who has said, “Earned path to citizenship is basically code for amnesty." Of course you’d need a time machine because he said that in 2010 when he was running for office against this very kind of amnesty the two of you are now pushing.

You say it’s not amnesty because illegal immigrants will have to pay a fine (which can be waived), back taxes (which may not actually happen), undergo background checks and wait years to get citizenship.

Well, other than paying back taxes, that’s what anyone who wants to become a legal resident of the United States has to do. That’s EXACTLY why this is amnesty. It’s actually worse than amnesty since the person who broke the law will get to live in the United States while undergoing the same process as the legal applicant who has to wait back home.

But look at all the crimes the illegal alien has committed in the process that won’t be punished.

If an illegal immigrant came here on a legal visa but didn’t leave they are supposed to be removed and barred from the US.

a. The Three Year Bar: Persons who remain in the US after their authorized stay has expired for more than 180 days but less than one year, and who leave the US prior to the institution of removal proceedings, are barred from reentering the US for three years from their date of departure.

b. The Ten Year Bar: Persons who remain in the US after their authorized stay has expired for more than one year, and who leave the US prior to the institution of removal proceedings, are barred from reentering the US for ten years from their date of departure.

Since the Schumer-Rubio bill says the only people eligible for amnesty are ones who were here before 2012, that means that everyone who qualifies should be barred from entering the US for TEN YEARS.

Since staying in the country is the goal, it seems a simple fine isn’t actually a punishment compared to removal and the inability to come back for years, if ever. Instead of being sent to the back of the line for entry to the US, they go right to front. How is that punishment?

As for people who simply cross the border illegally, right now the penalty is jail time.

a) Improper time or place; avoidance of examination or inspection; misrepresentation and concealment of facts Any alien who (1) enters or attempts to enter the United States at any time or place other than as designated by immigration officers, or (2) eludes examination or inspection by immigration officers, or (3) attempts to enter or obtains entry to the United States by a willfully false or misleading representation or the willful concealment of a material fact, shall, for the first commission of any such offense, be fined under title 18 or imprisoned not more than 6 months, or both, and, for a subsequent commission of any such offense, be fined under title 18, or imprisoned not more than 2 years, or both.

I’m sure most Americans who commit a misdemeanor that leads to 6 months of jail time would LOVE to simply pay $500 to get out of it. But that’s a deal only open to non-US citizens under the Schumer-Rubio-Ryan approach to things.

Oh, about those back taxes Congressman Ryan mentioned. In order to owe taxes a person had to have had been employed. In fact, having a job is one of the requirements for amnesty according to Senator Rubio.

Well, to have a job a person have to fill out an I-9 from (pdf) certifying the are eligible to work. Here’s the part where the employee has to sign.

Hmmm, penalties including jail time and fines for providing false information? Signing the form under “the penalty of perjury”? Will every illegal who comes forward and who claims to have worked illegally be prosecuted for those crimes? No? You mean it will be like, “wiping the slate clean”? But don’t call it amnesty!

Well, maybe all the illegals here started their own businesses and didn’t fill out an I-9. Oh, that’s not legal either.

(d) Immigration-related entrepreneurship fraud Any individual who knowingly establishes a commercial enterprise for the purpose of evading any provision of the immigration laws shall be imprisoned for not more than 5 years, fined in accordance with title 18, or both.

To sum up, the "punishment" that illegal aliens will go through involves complying with the the current legal immigration process. The crimes they won't be charged with or punished for include (but aren't limited to) border jumping/visa overstay, perjury and providing false documents to gain employment/illegally establishing a business.

How is that not amnesty Congressman?

Congressman?

Yes, it’s amnesty. Simply making people who came here illegally go through the same process as legal immigrants isn’t a punishment. Hell, that they get to stay here is a reward! That Schumer-Rubio (after 2010)-Ryan and Obama say otherwise doesn't change that fact.

Now I don’t honestly expect Paul Ryan to debate me on this (though I’d be happy to) but he has to debate a couple of credible amnesty opponents otherwise he’s going to sound like a giant gasbag who talks tough but doesn't have the guts to follow through.

Close it up

Monday Morning News Dump

—BenK

• Aldous Huxley And The NSA Leaker
• IRS Supervisor In DC Was Obama Donor, Scrutinized Tea Party Cases
• Senate To Pass Immigration Bill With Over 70 Votes
• Not That It Matters, But Obama's Approval Rating Appears To Be Dropping
• Turkish Protests And Counter Protests Continue
• Boehner Says He Won't Back Immigration Bill Without Majority GOP Support
• Our Masters, The Bureaucrats
• If We Don't Pass An Immigration Bill We'll Never Win The White House Back Says Lindsey Graham And Every Democrat
• Is Hassan Rouhani Really A Reformer?
• Cute Video, Sea Lion Pup Jumps Onto Boat To Cuddle With Driver
• Ammo Made With Jihadis In Mind
• Nobel Peace Prize Winner's Next War
• I Don't Blame Miss Utah, It Was A Stupid Question To Begin With
• Erdogan's Majority Rule
• Yeah, These People Totally Aren't Fascists
• The New American Enemies List
• The Hill Baffled About Obama
• The Search For The Magic Fig Leaf
• Woman Hit In Head With Golf Ball At US Open
• Egypt Appoints 17 Governors, Including 8 Islamists

Follow me on twitter

Top Headline Comments 6-17-13

—Gabriel Malor

Happy Monday.

Can we call Ed Snowden a traitorous crapweasel now? In addition to confirming some of our programs against the Chinese, he spilled the beans on specific operations targeting Russia.

BenK was appropriately skeptical of CNET's report (that was stealth-edited on Sunday, two days after initial publication) on Rep. Nadler's hearsay that he was informed (by Unnamed Official) that NSA listened to the content of phone calls at any analyst's whim. That report has been denied by NSA and walked-back by Nadler.

Some of the companies involved with PRISM have released statistics on their involvement providing governments with information.

There was a punchy op-ed in the NYTimes over the weekend disputing claims that the U.S. has fallen behind Europe in broadband internet tech.

"For the first time in Obama's presidency, half of the public says they don't believe he is honest and trustworthy." His approval rating fell 8 points in the past month to 45%. "The drop in Obama's support is fueled by a dramatic 17-point decline over the past month among people under 30."

Speaker Boehner says he won't bring an immigration bill to the floor if it doesn't have majority support from Republicans.

Overnight Open Thread (6-16-2013)

—Maetenloch

Anthony Weiner: A Grower, a Shower, and an Utterly Worthless Congressman

You might know him for his cock-tweets to young girls and his current campaign for Mayor of New York but there are other less well known aspects to his prickitude as this devastating NYT profile lays out. Here are just the opening paragraphs:

When President Obama needed every Democrat in Congress to back his health care plan in 2009, Representative Anthony D. Weiner threatened behind the scenes to torpedo the package in favor of a more sweeping measure. He backed off after he was promised a bigger share of the spotlight during the highly watched debate.

The previous year, when advocates of immigration reform invited Mr. Weiner to a round-table discussion with business leaders and more senior New York City members of Congress, he demanded to turn it into a hearing, featuring himself in a gavel-wielding role. Rebuffed, he failed to show up.

In 12½ years in Congress, he sponsored and wrote only one bill that he steered to enactment: a measure pushed by a family friend who gave his campaigns tens of thousands of dollars in donations.

Quote of the Day

I don't have to listen to your phone calls to know what you're doing. If I know every single phone call you've made, I'm  able to determine every single person you talked to - I can get a pattern about your life that is very, very intrusive. And the real question here is what do they do with this information that they collect that does not have anything to do with al Qaeda? And we're gonna trust the President and the Vice President of the United States to do the right thing? Don't count me in on that.

  -- Joe Biden, May 2006

Well in Slow Joe's defense he may not even be aware of what the VP's office is up to these days.

Pre-ONT -- Summer foods

—Purp

Summer seems to really be here now. I've found I change my eating habits during the hot south FL summer days. Cold/chilled dishes seems to be the way to go.

This is my summer chilled EZ-prep "diner pasta salad" I've been grooving on for about a month now.

Rotini, about 1/3 of a can of garbanzo's, a small can of diced tomato, 1/2 a small bag of mixed frozen vegetables.

The frozen veggies can be cooked along with the Rotini's. Drain and add in the other stuff. Olives are an optional add if you have them, so is pepperoncini.

The seasoning is what makes it work.

Badia makes some stuff called "complete seasoning". Its awesome. Dump a bunch on. Also dump in a healthy dose of oregano, and some rosemary.

Can you sense the Mediterranean theme starting to show yet?

Now the secret ingredient -- Italian salad dressing. Sprinkle in enough that it'll lightly coat everything when you mix it all up.

Shove the bowl in the fridge for an hour and let it chill down before snarfing.

Anyone got their own favorites? Fire away

CAC's Spaced-Out Challenge: Galaxy Guide (Part 1)

—CAC

Apologies for my late posting of this week's edition, going back to the regular Wednesday schedule this week.

This edition will feature objects best viewed from a dark sky site. To best appreciate most of the features discussed in the Milky Way Challenges, I recommend visiting a site colored at least green zone or better, blue/grey/black preferred, on the map and link below.

Milky Way observing runs by the same rules as deep sky object observing: wait for a new moon, or when the moon isn't up to brighten the sky. Use red-LED lighting to preserve night vision. Allow your eyes to adjust at least thirty minutes before observing. Avoid ingesting alcohol or narcotics as these will interfere with your vision.

Ready? Read on.

The Jshine Dark Sky Finder here is a great google map hybrid with marked dark sky locations for the lower 48 I've used several times in hunting down better skies. Any regions that aren't highlighted on jshine with white-red-orange-yellow-blue-green have pretty much prestine skies. It uses a map overlay though that makes the northeast and midwest "brighter" than they actually are, so keep the above county-level map in mind if you live in those regions.

The Milky Way from our perspective "wraps" around us, with the brighter portion (looking more towards the inside of the galaxy) visible in the summer months and the fainter portion visible in the winter. As we are in summer, we are going to focus on the features in this brighter portion over the next few weeks, and we'll begin from the very heart of our home, roughly midway between Sagittarius and Scorpius.

Interesting objects near the Galactic Center (from our perspective) are the focus this week, and we'll stick with five.

The Galactic Dark Horse

Photo Credit: Tom J Martinez
The "Dark Horse" nebula is actually made up of several smaller "dark" nebulae creating a large horse lined diagonally with the rest of the milky way band, hovering in the constellation Ophiuchus over the midpoint between Sagittarius and Scorpius. The darker and more obvious the "horse", the darker your skies are overall. Some residents of yellow/borderline green Bortle sky zones can spot darker segments of it on clear nights. The darker portion towards it's rear appears in more washed-out skies as a smoking pipe, hence it's alternate name, the Pipe Nebula. The Galactic Horse may be tricky to spot even from a perfect site, but once it "pops" out at you, you'll wonder how you ever overlooked it.

The overview chart should be enough to locate it naked-eye, but if you're having trouble, start over at the red star Antares in the Fish Hook (Scorpius), then "arc" a bit with your eye wandering through the thickest region of the milky way towards Sagittarius. Dark regions should leap out from a good sight, and the largest of these form the bottom of the horse.

The Great Sagittarius Star Cloud

Photo Credit: David Malin
The Great Sagittarius Star Cloud is the deepest galaxy feature that can be seen in visible light, a mere 1800 light years from the center. Unlike much of the rest of the galaxy's bulge, which is obscured by massive dust clouds, "Baade's Window", a gap in the closer spiral arms discovered by astronomy Walter Baade, offers a sizable opening straight into the Milky Way's heart. Through binoculars, it is impossible to resolve the millions of stars tightly packed in the galactic core, but in a moderate telescope you might get some luck, and try for two globular clusters "embedded" within: NGC 6522 and 6528. Small, faint dark nebulae appear here and there (and really pop with binoculars) and give a great sense of depth, shattering the illusion of the milky way's apparent two dimensional appearance over our heads.

As an interesting note on the star cloud, on the chart above there appears a red X just due "west" of it. This marks the physical center of our Milky Way, inside which supermassive black hole Sagittarius A* is quietly humming away.

Ptolemy's Cluster
One of the longest-known clusters in the sky, it was first catalogued by Ptolemy almost 2000 years ago as "the nebula following the sting of Scorpius". It is the brighter of the two open Messier clusters in Scorpius, easily visible from all but the most light-polluted sites. A solid dozen stars jump out at you, but a quick peak through binoculars reveals the brilliance and scale of the cluster:

The stars shown are only about 1000 light years away from us, providing an interesting contrast to the smattering of galactic bulge stars behind it and further expanding our sense of depth when examining the galaxy.

The Butterfly Cluster
Due north west of the bright Ptolemy Cluster is another naked-eye open, slightly smaller but with it's own bit of magic. A collection of mostly blue B type stars (with one bright orange K star exception) about 1600 light years away, historians debate on it's initial "discoverer", as Ptolemy may have lumped it in with the aforementioned cluster as a continuous batch of nebulosity. Regardless who found it first, take a pair of binoculars and enjoy how this particular grouping got it's name:

The False Comet in Scorpius

Our last target is a trick of the eye. Aim your binoculars and the illusion is shattered, but the components of the apparent "comet" are themselves beautiful targets:

At the head or coma of the comet is gorgeous optical double Zeta Scorpii, the star where the tail of the Scorpion begins to curl. To it's north and east, the comet's tail is formed by star clusters NGC 6231, Collinder 316, and NGC 6242. In terms of demonstrating the layers of the galaxy, the False Comet exposes the illusion of stars appearing close to one another: the component stars of the optical double Zeta Scorpii are six-thousand light years apart.

If you can, I seriously suggest you pick up the July issue of Sky and Telescope, which has an incredible guide to the structure of the Milky Way, part one dovetailing well with this week's Challenge: the region between Sagittarius and Scorpius.

Next week, we move our focus to the nebulae from Scutum to Sagittarius, working our way both visibly and physically outwards from the galactic heart and closer to our own backyard. As always, use Ace's Amazon storefront for your astro needs, check out the light pollution object list here, clear skies to you and keep looking up!

Close it up

CAC's Art Thread: defining the undefinable and the MONA

—CAC

It's been a while since I've posted anything about art. Tiny confession: I haven't visited a gallery or museum in a few months. I guess I need to get out there a bit more, what with LACMA dashing itself to pieces. But recently, I've run into a conundrum, one I've hinted at a few times before. I'm turning the floor to the horde to help me out here.

What is art?

Not what isn't art, which tends to be the immediate answer to this question. "I hate x" and "x is bullshit" feels great to say, but doesn't bring us any closer. Blame the relativists I suppose, but even if you ignored the last 125 years of art, you are still left with a surprisingly difficult question: what is art?

Gun Thread - Father's Day Edition

—Andy

I'm going to drop the usual format today and dedicate the thread to my dad, who taught me how to shoot. I'm fortunate to still have him around, and sending lead downrange a couple of months ago when I went turkey hunting with him was really a reminder of all the fun we've had out in the field and on the range.

The first gun I ever shot, if I recall correctly, was his Ruger MK I, .22 auto. Many, many guns and chamberings have been passed between us since. We learned reloading together and spent countless hours tinkering with different bullets and powder charges to wring every ounce of accuracy out of all our gun/cartridge combinations.

My love for the M1911 ... came from dad. The Remington Models 700 & 870. Ditto.

Shooting his M1 Garand a few weeks ago in Georgia finally prompted me to get off my ass and order one from CMP myself.

My two favorite memories of shooting with my dad are probably the following, although it's a crowded field.

First, there was the time he shot a golf ball in midair with his 4" S&W Model 25-5 in .45 Long Colt. My role: thrower of said ball. Now, he missed it a few times too and grazed it once, but when he finally centered it, that thing took off like a rocket. We were able to find it, and if I looked hard enough around his house, I'm sure it's still around somewhere. Hitting that target stationary isn't easy; hitting it in the air ... damned impressive. The man can shoot.

The other top memory is back from when he was the sniper on the sheriff's department SWAT team. They had a custom Remington M700 in .30-06 with a barrel so heavy that the thing tipped the scales at around 15 pounds, IIRC. Felt recoil was about like a .22 at that weight.

The sheriff's department had a 200 yard range, but there was an obstacle course behind the firing points. On the course, there was a large corrugated steel pipe that the ends were capped on to make a tear gas training room, and from the top you could see the target stands on the 200 yard range that were, at that point, now a skitch over 300 yards away.

There was all sorts of debris down at the end of the range from practicing door breaching operations, etc. So we took some little bitty pieces of cinder block that were scattered around, set them on top of the target stands, and proceeded to vaporize them from the top of that pipe with the sniper rifle. That was the first time I had ever shot anything that far, and my love of long-range shooting was cemented right then and there (no pun intended).

The left likes to deride the "gun culture" at every turn, but they mean something completely foreign to my way of thinking when they use that term. To me, guns and shooting have always been synonymous with quality time with dad, and for that I will be forever grateful.

Gun Of The Week

(answer below)

Interesting article on the livability of NYC [CBD]

—Open Blogger

This might validate some of the opinions of the Morons who are less than enthusiastic about the glory that is NYC.

Follow-up article below the jump [courtesy of commenter "Paul"]