DEBT: McConnell’s Fallback Plan Gains Steam.
But: House GOP Seeking Alternative Debt Plan. “With House Republicans leery of a backup debt plan that is gaining steam in the Senate, GOP leaders are pushing ahead with White House talks aimed at striking a deficit-reduction deal that can pass Congress.”
THEY TOLD ME IF I VOTED FOR JOHN MCAIN — OH, HELL, NEVER MIND: DOJ Argues to Keep DADT Repeal In Executive Branch’s Control, Out of the Courts.
WHAT IF THE PRESIDENT TOLD A JOKE, and nobody laughed?
YA THINK? Debt Worries Drag Down Stock Market.
HAVING READ JEAN AUEL’S BOOKS, I KNOW THAT THIS GIVES US SUPERIOR SPIRITUAL INSIGHTS: Non-Africans Are Part Neanderthal, Genetic Research Shows.
MESSAGE TO ANTHONY WEINER: You Should Have Listened To Glenn Beck. In Weiner’s defense, he was distracted . . . .
MIKE MOLLENHOUR ON TENNESSEE GUN POLITICS.
AT AMAZON, Top Deals In Electronics.
THE LAW OF SACRIFICE.
MICHAEL WALSH: What’s Really Behind The Debt Fight. “The debt-ceiling cage match is the culmination of the Democrats’ 75-year-long fight to establish a voting bloc of dependents under the false flags of ‘compassion’ and ‘social justice.’ It’s sapped our strength, created a welfare mentality and, if unchecked, will reduce us to a nation of aging, resentful beggars with eyes cast permanently toward Washington.”
Like the song says, They’ll turn us all into beggars ’cause they’re easier to please.
JEFF SOYER: “Doesn’t this idiot, Nocera, realize just how ridiculous and hypocritical it is to complain about the Wall Street Journal when he himself is working for a liberal, Democrat-shill newspaper?” Nope.
SUSANNAH BRESLIN: How Your Journalism Sausage Gets Made, Part Seven: Interview with a Stripper. “I retired three times. The last time I thought it stuck. I was off the stage for almost eight years. And then when the recession hit in ’08 … A lot of times, it’s not that they’re coming here for dances with the topless women. I think, more or less, it’s for them to be able to sit down and just say, hey, this is what’s going on, and not maybe feel — we’re nonjudgmental.”
ERIC S. RAYMOND on Robert Heinlein and the right to arms. “Now, based on what Campbell’s writings reveal about him, I would be astonished if his position on firearms rights was much different from Heinlein’s. Both partook of a strain of flinty, deeply American individualism that regarded the Second Amendment as a central article of the national covenant – a folk wisdom which was common across the American political spectrum until the late 1960s, and not before then associated specifically with libertarian or conservative politics as it later became. But for Campbell this does not seem ever to have became a foreground issue. Heinlein, on the other hand, was a vocal and consistent advocate of civilian weapons ownership both during and after his association with Campbell.”
HEY, DON’T KNOCK HERMAN CAIN ON THE FIRST AMENDMENT. Sure, the Framers believed in free exercise, and there’s even evidence that they explicitly meant for it to include Muslims. But who cares what a bunch of dead white men — some owned slaves! — thought in a document that’s over a hundred years old anyway?
The Constitution isn’t a dead letter, but a living document that changes with the times. Religious freedom made sense back in the 18th Century, perhaps, but this is the 21st Century, the era of Facebook and smartphones and other new stuff that wasn’t around in the Framers’ time of over a century ago. So things are different now! Cain’s just acknowledging the reality, and one day those stuffy courts will follow along, at least if the right justices are appointed.
Rigid constitutional doctrines from dusty bookshelves will have to adapt to the modern needs of a modern people. The Constitution was never meant to be a straitjacket.
E. COLI’S GENETIC CODE HAS BEEN HACKED: “Genetic engineers have invented a new way to quickly, precisely and thoroughly rewrite the genome of living bacteria. The technique could make drug-producing bacteria immune to viruses, prevent laboratory engineered organisms from genetically contaminating wildlife and enable scientists to construct proteins that do not exist in nature.” It could do some other things, too, not so desirable.
WELL, REMEMBER, THEY’RE MOSTLY DMV EMPLOYEES AND THE LIKE: Moe Lane: The Hysterically Outdated SEIU Intimidation Manual. “The font alone is a dead giveaway that nobody’s critically thought about this thing in over a decade and a half. . . . Big Labor groups like SEIU are still mired in a purely analog rut like so many reactionary Luddites, grimly pursuing a public relations and media strategy that may have worked perfectly well from 1950 to 1990… which is to say, one that is woefully out of date. Entertainingly, this is pretty much on par with the rest of their organizational model.”
A SCUBA-MASK wearable video camera. Very cool.
HEH. Love the photo.
BEACH-READING DISASTERS: What to Do if Sand Gets in Your iPad or Kindle.
READER STAN BROWN DOESN’T LIKE OBAMA’S LEGISLATIVE MODEL:
The president says he doesn’t want a simple, short term agreement on the debt limit. He says he wants to put together a big, all-encompassing deal. And he wants it rammed together in emergency fashion. Sounds familiar — massive legislative package passed in short order without any input from the people or even most of Congress.
Stimulus, Obamacare, now the debt limit …. ummm, what was that definition of insanity?
Well, it worked for him before. On the other hand, this time he may want to trigger a debt-limit crisis, so that he can blame the Republicans for the economy in 2012. Idiotic as that sounds, the press will go along.
KEITH HENNESSEY: Understanding “Cut, Cap, and Balance.” “The key to understanding this bill is that it focuses on government spending, rather than on taxes or deficits. The bill would achieve significant deficit reduction through cutting and limiting spending, and all of its mechanisms use spending rather than deficit targets. . . . I recommend supporting this bill even with its significant imperfections. I place enormous value on the creation of an enforceable cap on total government spending.” If Obama wants to veto it, let him.
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