Goats

"Last night I was listening to a call-in program on WGN in Chicago. People were calling in, very upset, about the goat's head that was sent to Cubs owner Tom Ricketts at Wrigley Field. Then some guy called in from Indiana and said, "Why are you people so upset 'cause someone sent a goat's head to Wrigley Field? Aren't you Chicagoans the same guys that sent a horse's ass to the White House?" Evidently Tom Manly Mann

First Air Force One

Antique Road Show And yet I find something noble about a time when we didn't feel a need to bronze every thing.  Like maybe we were too busy looking ahead?  cuzzin ricky

Obama's SS

The Senate is Preparing to Investigate Ties between White House and IRS Golly, do you think there's anything to find? I mean— Inquiry Into I.R.S. Lapses Shows No Links to White House ... www.nytimes.com/.../house-irs-inquiry-shows-no-con... Lois Lerner Ahem

Goldonna, Louisiana R US

a major award

“ the sting of political correctness Approved Chances are you’ve never heard of Goldonna, Louisiana. Chances are you might not be able to pronounce the name of the Louisiana parish it’s in. But you can almost certainly believe they’ve felt the sting of political correctness in recent weeks. GOLDONNA –The recent 10-day suspension of a Natchitoches Parish school principal because of a student-led prayer during a Christmas program was the catalyst for 200 or more people gathering here late Monday afternoon for a prayer rally. [...] Natchitoches Parish schools Superintendent Dale Skinner, interviewed separately earlier in the day, expressed support for the rally, but said he hoped everyone understood his decision to discipline the principal was not “personal.” All Natchitoches Parish principals have been reminded on different occasions about the federal law that prohibits school officials from participating in or soliciting prayer at a school event. Skinner fell back on personal experience as the former principal of Natchitoches Central High when he was on the receiving end of a complaint of prayer there. The issue at hand is a Christmas program held at the Goldonna school, in which a student-led prayer was held and items that are symbolic in Christianity were displayed. School administators have been told repeatedly what they can and can’t do with regard to prayer in school. The key rule is that prayer must not be “solicited.” According to Skinner, the prayer was listed in the school program, and therefore violates the rule. See, these rules come up because groups who profoundly misunderstand the meaning of the First Amendment sue schools whenever a prayer is held. And they win. Under the banner of “Thou Shalt Not Offend,” these groups enforce their beliefs on those that they accuse of enforcing their beliefs on others. We have to be politically correct and not offend anyone, despite the overwhelming support for prayer in schools. This brings me to the kids at Vox (trigger warning: actual text from a Vox article): First things first: there’s no such thing as “political correctness.” The term’s in wide use, certainly, but has no actual fixed or specific meaning. What defines it is not what it describes but how it’s used: as a way to dismiss a concern or demand as a frivolous grievance rather than a real issue. [...] It’s understandable that Chait, and the many others who agree with him, find it so upsetting to be on the receiving end of what he refers to as “P.C.” criticism. These critiques basically accuse their targets of being oppressors, or perpetuating injustice, and that’s a deeply hurtful accusation. Indeed, that kind of criticism hurts most if you are someone who cares about social justice, or do think that discrimination is harmful when it’s implicit as well as when it’s explicit. But avoiding that discomfort by dismissing criticism as mere “political correctness” is no way to protect the marketplace of ideas whose fate so concerns Chait. At best, it replaces a relatively weak burden on free speech (Jonathan Chait has to listen to people scolding him on Twitter) with a similarly weak one (other people have to listen to Chait and his supporters scolding them for their “political correctness”). This writer, hilariously enough, proves Jonathan Chait’s point by shutting his argument down and claiming he is simply exercising privilege. Or, rather ... [continue] So much to do; so little time to do it. ”

The Usual Suspects

“ The Usual Suspects 2016 yawn In quick succession these stories crossed my desk yesterday; a cosmic commencement of the  media battle to have their way with us in 2016.  Bloomberg's  "Walker Surging in Iowa Poll as Bush Struggles" was quickly countered by the WaPost's "Jeb Bush has become the GOP front-runner for 2016 — so now what?" Normally it's the New York Times's job to carry the GOP establishment's water by proclaiming a front runner nobody else wants, but someone the Democrats can defeat.  I'm guessing that the Times will try still to carry on in that capacity, but it's reputation by now is that of a 70 year-old crack whore and of little use beyond the city limits.  The newly burnished WaPost is ascendant. The Liberal Canadian Broadcasting Corporation News's "Sarah Palin's scorched-earth plan for the GOP: Governor challenges party to move sharply right" is of little consequence but will be quoted loudly by American Smugs. Sarah Palin, who now says she's definitely interested in "serving" as president next year, made a speech last weekend at a gathering of Republican White House aspirants in Iowa. It was somewhat coarser, and certainly more bitter, than her usual bundle of platitudes and jingoism. At one point she shouted "Screw the left in Hollywood!" And she complained about how even some Republicans are buying into "this unhealthy new obsession … about this subjective income gap that we're supposed to be so obsessed about right now." [...] Under the headline: "Sarah Palin slips into self-parody," Charles W. Cooke called it "the foreordained culmination of a slow and unseemly descent into farce," suggesting she stay out of the race for the good of her party. Charles W. Cooke writes for National Review, one of this country's premier conservative publications. Under another withering headline, "GOP faces its Sarah Palin problem," Byron York interviewed several dismayed audience members: "It was all quite petty," he concluded. [] The Boston Globe, which never forget backed for high office two of the most incompetent twats extant in Deval Patrick and Elizabeth Warren, does it's thing with "Jeb Bush shaped by troubled Phillips Academy years;" or as Powerline puts it-"JEB BUSH, POT-SMOKING BULLY!" The Boston Globe has a long article on Jeb Bush’s high school years at Andover. The Globe piece has been picked up by many other news outlets; the Hill’s headline is typical: “Jeb Bush was a pot-smoking bully, say former classmates.” What about the claim that Jeb was a bully? It is based on precisely two incidents. In one, Bush and some friends sewed another boy’s pajama bottoms shut. In the other, Bush lifted up another boy. That’s the “bullying” tally for his four years at Andover. Pathetic. This is reminiscent, of course, of the Washington Post’s long story about Mitt Romney’s high school days, featuring a decades-ago incident where Romney and others cut another boy’s hair. It’s remarkable: just when you think investigative reporting is dead, another Republican presidential candidate comes along to get reporters’ juices flowing again. Think what doggedness it requires to go back forty-odd years to research a politician’s high school days! I'm tired. ”