8th Grade Syndrome

Newt Gingrich was pontificating the other day, as is his wont, about the just completed midterms, giving the Republican party spin that it wasn’t all that bad, got control of the House, yadda yadda, but had to admit the much anticipated ‘red wave’ turned out to be nothing more than a slightly higher tide than usual. Seemed to surprise him and he concluded that maybe, just maybe, he needs to reevaluate his political thinking. 

‘Bout time.

It’s been rather clear to those of us not blinded by party and politics that a goodly portion of the American people have reached a fatal level of self-absorption and illogic, what I like to call “8th grade syndrome.” ‘Why can’t we all get along?’ is the central core of their social and cultural stance and they firmly believe material goods and security and recreation are freely and deservedly provided by dufus parents who Just Don’t Understand Me. So, they vote accordingly, for anyone who promises to give them anything for free; against anyone they think is mean i.e., anyone who talks like a dufus parent, i.e., conservatives; and for anyone they feel sorry for, i.e., Fetterman. The result? Over the past twenty years, there has been an increasing Balkanization of the populace, somewhat along the same lines that split the Romans and the Visigoths, with about as much chance of compromise.

Newt and the other Republican party mavens have, of course, missed this. Having moved from one civilized environment to the next - middle class family to middle class college and career - they developed a logical and common-sense view of human behavior. Maslov’s Hierarchy of Needs and western civilization’s inspirations and motivations for family, relevance, and prosperity form the convictions and subsequent voting patterns of the populace. In normal times those are givens and the various political parties set their platforms based on them, the Republicans for an orderly society in which anyone can participate by exertions of their own efforts, the Democrats for more assistance to those who have somehow missed the chance to participate, the one-off lunatic fringe parties for their various single issues, such as the environment or anarchy.  

That was then, this is now.

Pocketbook issues and common sense are now only the province of a rapidly dwindling boomer generation, which was the last one raised with individuality, respect, and optimism. We now have the Nietzsche generations ascending, and they have far more loyalty to themselves than they do to social structures. Anything that promotes their own well-being and the advantage of their friends over others has their attention. They are far more akin to the 18th Century aristocracies than they are to the American yeoman class, seeking power and wealth and control over yon peasants who still cling to those outmoded concepts of individual rights and sacrifice and responsibility.

Which is why they vote for Fetterman. Because a brain-dead pseudo-Marxist is far more likely to help install the neo-corporatist state that they feel will bring about the eight-grade world they have long dreamed of than will some fussing farmer boy spouting self-reliance and more police.

Which means, of course, that all former bets are off. So, Newt, and everyone else who still thinks elections will save us, y’all best re-evaluate.

Starring Cheech and Chong

Today's AP (the All Propaganda news service) headline: "Police: Suspects Planned NYC Attack." (http://news.yahoo.com/police-boston-suspects-planned-attack-york-182015679.html. My local paper's version was a bit different. Sue me). Seems the Chechen brothers were bent on mayhem and murder again, this time along the Great White Way! Oh no!

But, then you read this:  "...in what they portrayed as a chilling, spur-of-the-moment scheme that fell apart when the brothers realized the car they had hijacked was low on gas."

In other words, this "plan" had all the highlights of stoners piling into a 1973 Pinto at two o'clock in the morning in an effort to score some pizza. Hijinks ensue. As if you needed any more evidence of the hubristic, self-absorbed my-life-is-a-movie character of these two idiots, it was both of them thinking that they, in a stolen vehicle, with their faces plastered all over the world, could actually pull something spur-of-the-moment like this off.

But according to Mayor McSoda of New York City: "We don't know if we would have been able to stop the terrorists had they arrived here from Boston," the mayor said. "We're just thankful that we didn't have to find out that answer."

What?

You mean, the overwhelming resources of the best anti-terror unit in the country, the NYPD, along with the sophisticated technologies, theories, and capabilities of the entire Federal Counterterrorist apparatus, all mobilized since the Marathon bombings, wasn't sure it could handle a couple of half wits?

Oh. Good. God.

And these very same people want to take care of your health, your education, your retirement, your job. They assure us, with magical words written on parchment so therefore it must be true and real, that we do not need our guns, our own doctors, nor to concern ourselves with what is taught in our classrooms or amass savings to stave off destitution because they, with degrees from Harvard, have developed a superior ability to handle every aspect of you peasants' lives.

But, yet, two morons with homemade hand grenades baffle them.

Okay. Thanks, anyway. But I think I'll take care of all this stuff myself.

Chickens Coming Home to Roost

So, Chechens. With pressure cooker bombs.

What do you think caused it? Well, let's follow liberal logic: while walking innocently down a Wal Mart (corporation! grrr!) aisle, they accidentally brushed against a display of cookware and were filled with rage and the urge to commit mayhem. So they bought the pressure cooker weapons of mass destruction and went after the Boston Marathon. Ban pressure cookers! Ban Wal Mart! And universal background checks for all caterers!

Because, you see, it is the object, not the person.

Or, how about this? Enraged by the racist patrimony of the white male overlord capitalist running dog lackey class, the two peace-loving legal immigrants decided to show eeevil conservatives that they, as immigrants, were just as legal as illegal immigrants. Take that, Boston Marathon, which is a real white person event!

Because, you see, racism justifies any kind of response. Any kind.

Or, maybe they were showing solidarity with their illegally detained Guantanamo brethren, or protesting the waste of funds that should go to the poor instead of elite privileged marathon runners flaunting their prosperity (poor people can't run marathons, man! It's a race just finding food!), or maybe they didn't like the exploitation of police dogs and every other desperate leftist Marxist liberal Democrat excuse you can muster.

Or maybe, let's try this: they are a couple of evil bastards, filled with the contempt for human life that only Islam seems to generate, and in their hubris, decided to kill and maim others.

And hey, Barack, when you tell Medyedev that you'll have more flexibility, America gets bumped up the Chechen enemy list.

Poll-lite conversation

Stop it with the polls already. I'm talking to you, AP, Fox, MSNBC, ABC, M-O-U-S-E. We just don't believe them. And you're starting to sound pathetic.

Don't you understand that all of us, every single one of us, have already made up our minds? There isn't going to be any real movement, up or down or sideways, for Romney or Obama or Virgil Goode or whoever, at all, of any kind, between now and the election. The election is set. Romney is going to clean Obama's clock.

Pish posh, you snort, our polls say...your polls are wrong. Dead. Wrong. You're simply not talking to the right people. The ones you are talking to are lying. And you are lying to yourselves. And to us.

Need proof? Okay. How many of you predicted Chik-Fil-A Tuesday?

We're done here.

15 inches of global warming in the driveway

Hey, hippies of Oregon and Washington:

If you get a spare moment between bong tokes, please explain this.

Reckless Endangerment II

On a lark, Schlub checked out Gretchen Morgenson's home page at the NYT and followed the link to Reckless Endangerment. Then I checked out some comments there and at other places, like Huffpo. Lots of deserved praise for the book, but, curiously, a lot of it was misplaced. Most of the commenters were railing against the banks and Wall Street and eeeevil capitalism. Morgenson, herself, seems to be in sympathy with them.
 

Did they read the same book I did?

Because, as was quite clear to Schlub, the banks and Wall Street were merely playing a dealt hand. Our much loved, benevolent and sincerely wonderful government had, through the Community Reinvestment Act, pretty much told the banks to hand out loans to anyone with a pulse, or else. So, they did what you’d do, complied, and turned to Wall Street for "creative" investment instruments that turned a pretty sorry situation into short term profits; like when a tree falls on your house, you sell firewood.  So blaming the banks and Wall Street and eeevil capitalism is a lot like blaming the house owner and his chain saw.

But that’s understandable. Liberals always have problems with the origin of things.

Where do these people come from?

Some dude on the Chris Plante Show the other morning was bewailing the narrow vision of the Founders: they had no idea this would be a country of 300 million, and their quaint notions of individual liberty, while fine for an agrarian society of a few hundred thousand, doesn’t cut the mustard today.

Uh, wrong.

Concepts of individual worth are universal and eternal. You matter. The state does not. The state can be organized in any configuration necessary for proper management, ideally for maximum efficiency and economy. You, though, are organized around your own existence, and that carries a ton more weight than any deft or elegant governmental structure. When that is ignored, you get monarchy and oligarchy and the accompanying oppression and abuse. But when the individual is paramount, you get freedom and prosperity.

No matter how many people are involved.

And then some guy on Fox News was shaking his head sadly over the coming rise of health care costs. “How are we going to pay for this?” he wailed. “We’re just not able to give people the best treatments possible through their last days.”

‘Give’ people?

Pardon me, your premise is showing. You don’t “give” people their health care. We sort of get it for ourselves. Maybe that should be your first operating principle, that of personal responsibility. Here’s a thought- if you and the rest of the statists would butt the hell out of health care, the prices would fall so far all of us could afford it.

Idiots.

So, what went wrong?

Let's see:

1. The American electorate chose as their leader an empty-suited, inexperienced naif whose foreign policy consists of ridiculous conflict-resolution concepts only found on universities and late night TV. Why can't we all just get along?

2. This same naif, though his nincompoop Attorney General, let it be known that nothing harsher than a mild interjection would ever be directed towards anyone harboring ill will towards the nation, and if any of our intelligence personnel deigned to go much past that, then off with their heads!

3. Napolitano for DHS, Clinton for DoS.

And you wonder why the Panty Bomber got through?

Not a lot of confidence

Explain, if you will, what it is that convinces so many that an organization which has completely bollixed up Social Security, Medicare, the Vietnam War, Pentagon procurement, the Post Office, relations with Iran, energy development, car companies, swine flu, elections, getting your tax refund to you, passports, control of the border, bridges and airports and roads and traffic lights and air traffic control and port authorities and Amtrak, can take care of your life and death decisions?

The bubble bursts

Somewhere around 2005, 2006, I watched the houses on my street go from about 200k to 600k. 'For Sale' and 'Sold' signs popped up and down like spring mushrooms. "Maybe we should sell," I said. "Nah." Wifey said, "let's wait a few years. Then it'll be 700-800k."

There seemed a flaw in that, so I asked "You know anybody can buy an 800k house?"

She didn't. Neither did I. We didn't know anybody who could buy a 400k house, much less a 6. Yet, they were being sold. Whole developments of giant 5000-6000 square foot houses with about 1 or 2 feet between them were offered at 750k and were sold out in a matter of weeks, which is about how long it took the developers to put them up.

"What did I miss?" I asked her.

"Durned if I know," she said. But we both must have missed something. What wrong turns had we taken in our lives that we could not, also, snap up a 750k house as easily and quickly?

Who were these people?

Demi-gods, I concluded, savvy sophisticates from already prosperous families who rode some new tech wave into riches and consumption and who negotiated wonderful deals with equally sophisticated, savvy realtors. They had all found something that evaded me. I was left behind, scratching my Neanderthal ass and staring into their giant plate glass windows at slim, smart COO/CEO wives who were home schooling their five prodigy children while sloshing expensive wine with their CFO/Senator/NFL husbands amidst the admiration of their Admiral/Startup/Corporatist neighbors.

That is, until a couple of months ago, and I discovered they were all really a bunch of deadbeats who wanted to LOOK like CFO/quarterback/vineyard-owning/Pulitzer Prize winners.

Who's the Neanderthal now?

And you know the best part? My wife admitted she was wrong.

Blue moon, fellahs, blue moon.

Cognitive dissonance

There seems to be a deep disconnect between smarmy, jackass ideas and their implementation:

"Oooo, global warming! We have to have cap and trade!"

"Uh, we still need to drive."

"Uh, well, you need to drive electric cars!"

"The ones that exist wouldn't move a slightly overweight midget and cost five times that of a Cadillac."

"Don't care! It's global warming! And we're going to have to stop using oil and natural gas and coal!"

"What will we use instead? Solar?"

"Yes! And wind!"

"We're at least twenty years away from viable solar and wind energy. Are we to freeze to death in the interim?"

"It'll work! We just have to do it!"

"Okay. Who's paying homeowners the million dollars apiece it's going to cost to convert their homes to solar and wind?"

"They're just going to have to pay for it themselves! It's global warming! Oooo!"

The appropriate symbol for the Democratic Party

Fox News on Saturday runs a lot of financial shows and they always include a couple of smarmy jackasses to present the confiscatory side of economic management. Jackassery appears to be the main criteria for this viewpoint, because the three or four crapheads enthusiastically supporting the Marxist's efforts to destroy capitalism use the most jackass arguments to back him up. Por ejemplo, cap and trade, which is probably one of the most jackass ideas to emerge from the septic tank of Marxist economics in quite some time. Asshat #1, some punk from New York City, was all for cap and trade and was very, very proud that, every day, he rode the bus to work and saved money and carbon credits and the rest of the country should just do the same. Sniff.

Jack. Ass.

I guess we're supposed to build subways and interlocking metro routes in, oh say, Davenport, Iowa; Dothan, Alabama; Lawton, Oklahoma. Yeah. That'll work. Catch a bus in Brooklyn, couple of changes to the metro, next thing you know, you're in Omaha.

Let's shut down all the truck traffic into New York City for about a week. When Asshat #1 runs out of argula and mojitos, I'm bettin' he'll review his position on cap and trade.

No, you don't get it

Barry, get a clue. Only your voters are mad at the banks. The rest of us, who got past third grade, aren't. We're mad at you, Barney Frank, Chuck Schumer, that Dodd guy, the Pee-Reid, and the rest of you corrupt, slope-headed handjob Democrats for putting a gun to the banks' heads and making them give out those stupid loans.

That crap you spouted plays well in Trailerville, Illinois, but the rest of us can read.

Choose your venues carefully

Elkhart, Indiana. Lots of people out of work because the RV plants have closed.

And why have the RV plants closed?

Because no one's buying RVs.

And why is no one buying RVs?

Because the price of oil went sky friggin' high after the Dumbocrats savagely opposed any and all attempts to get our own domestic supplies of oil which would ensure CHEAP and PLENTIFUL gas to run those RVs, and because the Dumbocrats and their enviroterrorist buddies assaulted the RV and the SUV as terrible carbon footprinted vehicles which are murdering the environment and anybody who drives them hates puppies and Jesus…

That's why.

They Might be Midgets

Hilary Clinton as Secretary of State. She brings her wealth of experience having tea with Queen Noor. Putin must be salivating. I wonder if he'll make her cry?

Geithner for Treasury. Doesn't pay his taxes. Or his maid's social security. You try that, see what happens.

Holder for AG. He gets criminals pardoned, for the right price. And sends kids back to Cuba. What a guy.

Browner for energy czar. Member of Socialist Internationale. Of course.

What a group of clowns. What a bunch of lightweights, the Not Ready for Prime Time Players.

I feel so safe.

We the unqualified...

Leon Panetta for CIA director.

This is a joke, right?

Talk about a guy completely unworthy and unable...

uh...

...well,

should fit right in, then.

Caroline Kennedy's first day

So, this Senate, it's like, this place. You know? You go in and there's all these old guys and, you know, there's a gavel and a looooooot of talking! Real snore fest. Tee hee!

But it's interesting, it is, it really is. You know, like you get to hear all these briefings about stuff. Like, did you know Bin Laden's valet is working for the CIA? Oops! I wasn't supposed to say that! Tee hee!

And we get to help people a lot. I mean, a lot. I mean, we take money from the bad people, like the oil makers and that plumber guy from Pennsylvania. I don't have plumbers making that kind of money in my neighborhood, either! Tee hee! And we give it to really worthy causes. Like the Met. I like the Met.

Oops, gotta go! We're voting on some kind of medical coverage thingy. I'm not really sure what it's about but Teddy told me to just vote yes. Okay! See ya!