White House Easter Egg Roll to be “Environmentally Friendly”

Updated: Monday, 08 Mar 2010, 2:16 PM EST
Published : Monday, 08 Mar 2010, 2:14 PM EST

(Fox News) - This year’s White House Easter Egg roll will be eggs-actly what the bunny ordered. The environmentally concerned bunny, that is.

A White House announcement Monday said the eggs at this year’s April 5 roll will be made from paperboard that contains no wood fibers from endangered forests, is recyclable and features vegetable-oil based inks and a water-based coating.

What’s more, they’ll come in purple, pink, green and yellow and feature the stamped signatures of both President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama.

The eggs, produced and sold by the National Park Foundation, are given as a souvenir to all children under 12 who attend the annual roll. And if you can’t make it to the White House, the orbs are available online.

This year’s theme for the roll is “Ready, Set, Go”, part of Mrs. Obama’s plan to promote health and wellness in the United States and combat childhood obesity.

H/T to RD of Grouchy Conservative Pundits.

It is all about expanding the scope of government control, at any cost.

The Stimulus Bill’s Hidden Attack On What We Eat, Drink, And Smoke

It’s on pages 66 and 67 on the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, which created a $1 billion “Prevention and Wellness Fund.” Of that, $650 million went to Kathleen Sebelius’s Department of Health and Human Services and has been used to start a new program at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) called “Communities Putting Prevention to Work” (CPPW).

Where does that giant pot of grant funding under the CPPW go? What it calls “MAPPS Interventions for Communities Putting Prevention to Work.” MAPPS stands for “Media, Access, Point of decision information, Price, and Social support/services.” In other words, strategies for changing our behavior, for social engineering on a large-scale, and, it seems, circumventing the normal democratic process. In a 14-page guidance for grant applicants, the CDC details tactics that grant applicants should include in their plans. It includes “counter-advertising” against targeted products, complete tobacco usage bans, limiting “unhealthy food availability” (the really bad stuff like “whole milk, sugar sweetened beverages, high-fat snacks”), and of course taxes (or in CDC lingo: “changing relative prices of healthy vs. unhealthy items”).

A supplemental document explains in more detail what the targets are, including restricting availability of soft drinks “in homes, schools, work sites, and communities.”

Oh, and by the way…since when has there ever been anything wrong with whole milk?

You heard it here first: America is headed toward a future that combines the worst of North Korea with the worst of shari’a law. Truly a fate worse than death.

H/T: Pandora at Grouchy Conservative Pundits

The above photo of protesters at the University of Washington is from Twitpic via Instapundit. Kudos to rickl at Grouchy Conservative Pundits for alerting me to it.

What these manifestly ignorant clowns FAIL to comprehend is that we each have a duty…not a right, but a DUTY…to educate OURSELVES to the best of our ability.

Long ago, I observed that each human being is issued one (1) human head…one cranium per customer.

Given that we don’t all share the same head and brain, it behooves each of us to USE the faculties with which we have been endowed, and NOT put the burden on teachers, parents, the government, or anybody else to do all the work of instilling knowledge and wisdom into us.

In a nutshell, the assertion, “But nobody ever TOLD me that!” is not a valid excuse for failure to cope with life.

Having been given powers of observation and cognition, it’s our job to go out and collect data about the world around us, to distill it into knowledge, and, insofar as is possible, to make a contribution to the wisdom available to humankind.

If we don’t, we have ourselves to blame.

Is central US prepared for a major earthquake?

While earthquakes sometimes kill people directly through mudslides and flooding, most earthquake deaths are actually caused by collapsing infrastructure; hence the oft-repeated statement, “Earthquakes don’t kill people, bad buildings do.” The earthquake body count, and the depth and breadth of hardship and economic disruption, depend on the level of earthquake preparedness. Up-to-date and well-enforced building codes, appropriate infrastructure, and well-equipped disaster response teams minimize the impact of earthquakes.

Windybon recently commented on the Grouchy Conservative Pundits forum, comparing the January 12, 2010 magnitude 7 earthquake in Haiti to the February 27, 2010 magnitude 8.8 earthquake in Chile:

Yes, that’s huge, but you’re going to see the difference between a country that is prepared for earthquakes (Chile) and one that isn’t (Haiti).

I replied:

The central U.S. isn’t.

I’m wondering what will happen when stresses that have accumulated around the New Madrid fault zone erupt again, either directly on the fault itself or elsewhere in the central US.

The central US terrain transmits seismic forces a considerable distance, so that any major earthquake could cause widespread destruction. There are natural gas pipelines, densely populated areas, and busy transportation corridors, including the Mississippi River itself, close to the fault zone. Much of the infrastructure has not been earthquake-hardened.

The 1811-1812 earthquakes were fearsome, but caused comparatively little damage, owing to the sparse population and almost nonexistent infrastructure in the region at that time.

New Madrid Seismic Zone

1812 New Madrid Earthquake

Uncovering Hidden Hazards in the Mississippi Valley

St. Louis University Earthquake Center

Southern Illinois University New Madrid Earthquake Information Pages

Fastac 6’s reply was telling:

Say goodbye to Chicago, St. Louis, and Indianapolis. None built for quakes, whatever that really means.

New Madrid fault is the basis for the 2011 national disaster drill. As a planner, let me be the first to say: we’d all be f—-d. A “Katrina level” event, and then some.

The lessons of history

Indeed, Chile has made the effort to prepare itself for seismic activity following the catastrophic magnitude 9.5 Valdivia earthquake in 1960, which is the strongest earthquake yet recorded. The epicenter of the Valdivia quake was not far from that of the 2010 quake, which was just offshore of the Maule Region.

When it comes to earthquakes, history does tend to repeat itself, though not always on a predictable time frame. There is evidence of a previous severe earthquake and flood in Valdivia in 1575, and of several subsequent, somewhat lesser earthquakes.

“What, me worry?”

It’s human nature to look for excuses to ignore situations that are difficult to deal with. The Cleveland Plain Dealer article, New Madrid fault no problem, geophysicists Seth Stein and Eric Calais say, reports that these two scientists claim that the New Madrid fault is shutting down, so that it isn’t worth the expense to strengthen the infrastructure in the fault zone. But other scientists warn that Stein and Calais base their conclusion on too little evidence:

“Politicians don’t get re-elected spending lots of money on an event that may not happen in the next 50 years — until Katrina,” said geologist Gary Patterson of the University of Memphis’ Center for Earthquake Research and Information, known as CERI. “That absolutely changed the paradigm.”

The New Madrid situation is further complicated by the lack of scientific agreement on what the new findings mean.

“I’d hate to stick my own neck out and say there’s not going to be [another] earthquake” in the fault zone, said seismologist and CERI director Charles Langston. “That’s really a radical statement, based on a piece of data that has other interpretations.”

…

Other scientists aren’t convinced Stein and Calais are right about the New Madrid. Several note that GPS readings in China showed similarly slight intraplate movements before the devastating Sichuan quake last August, which killed 69,000.

Yes, worry!

A careful reading of that same article reveals that Stein and Calais never actually claimed that there is no earthquake risk, but rather, that the seismic action could occur in the nearby Wabash fault zone instead of on the New Madrid fault itself:

Assuming Stein and Calais are right, where might the New Madrid strain migrate? What fault system would be the next to switch on, and when? The researchers don’t know.

“One would think that the most likely place is to move up north into either southern Illinois or southern Indiana,” Stein said. He and Calais are working with other researchers on a computer model that may help show what’s going on.

As the above map suggests, that’s certainly close enough for discomfort to major populated areas and transportation corridors. I am not a seismologist, but I would suggest that the seismic risk warrants further investigation in both the New Madrid and Wabash fault regions.

So any way you slice it, there’s a significant seismic risk in the central US, and residents and business owners in those states need to think about how to cope with it.

Federal boondoggles bleed money and attention away from real priorities

Not long ago, the New Madrid fault enjoyed a brief flurry of attention in the media and the trade press. I remember seeing a very informative show, part of the Mega-Disasters series on The History Channel, about present-day seismic dangers in the New Madrid fault zone. But as of this writing, only a cursory mention of the 1811-1812 New Madrid earthquake - and no mention of the Mega-Disasters episode - is on their website.

The July 2007 issue of TVPPA News, which describes itself as the magazine for electric system management in the Tennessee Valley, featured an article entitled “New Madrid: Is the Valley Quake-Ready?”

When Don Drumm and several of his TVA colleagues dealt with a New Madrid fault earthquake late last year, it was only a drill. The consequence of the real thing, he said, could be described with one word. “I wouldn’t call it catastrophic,” he said. “I’d call it cataclysmic.”

As far as I have been able to determine, earthquake preparedness in the New Madrid zone has departed from the public’s radar screen. Little or nothing is being said about it at present. One obvious reason is that the pre-Climategate campaign against “global warming,” the current economic depression, and the misnamed “economic stimulus” tax-and-spend program, have bled away both attention and available funds.

With all the deceptive fanfare about the “economic stimulus money” that was supposed to be spent on “shovel-ready infrastructure projects” throughout the US, I have heard absolutely no mention whatsoever of any plans to strengthen the buildings, highways, rail corridors, fuel pipelines, and other infrastructure in the vicinity of New Madrid. Taxpayers’ money is being squandered on all manner of ridiculous, irrelevant, and counterproductive causes and beneficiaries - everything from bailing out Wall Street arch-criminals to nonexistent “green jobs” to crippling what’s left of domestic industry by enacting draconian regulations against “global warming.” There was never any intention of allowing states and cities, much less private companies and organizations, to set their own priorities regarding how best to prepare for the future.

Crying wolf

As readers of my other blog already know, the recent “Climategate” scandal has eroded the credibility of the scientific community in general. The long and the short of it is that the “powers that be” in the scientific community have been caught “crying wolf” for several decades. So when scientists tell us to account for seismic risks in our plans to build or upgrade infrastructure in the central US, it’s no surprise that financially beleaguered cities, states, contractors, utility companies, and other corporations and organizations ignore their warnings and go on with “business as usual.”

The answer? State sovereignty and local privatization

We need to oust the federal government from control over our finances, our commerce (including, but not limited to, health care), and our disaster preparedness. At the VERY least, we need a Constitutional amendment to repeal the flagrantly abused “commerce clause.” I do not believe that this is enough. I see the need for dismantling the federal government once and for all, in much the same way as the former Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact was dissolved. The federal government has failed in all of the duties for which it was originally formed. Even the smallest of the individual States are big enough to take care of themselves. It’s time for a new “velvet divorce” - stateside version. The way to get there without bloodshed is by educating people, and that is what this blog aims to do.

Watch this space for more on this topic!

Dixie flag flies as a symbol of liberty as the Berlin Wall comes down

Desperate Unemployed Software Engineer Attacks IRS Office Building

By now, many readers will have heard the news story about pilot Joseph Stack having crashed a small plane into the IRS office building in Austin Texas (for details, see Fox News, Pilot Crashes Into Texas Building in Apparent Anti-IRS Suicide.)

The Inevitable Media Reaction

Whenever anything like this happens, the same kinds of articles tend to appear in the media and on blogs. There are the articles that, often with a self-righteous tone, wax eloquent about the horrific nature of the act, the despicable character of the attacker, and (often) the pristine innocence of the victims. Given that the victims in this event were IRS employees, little has been said about them in the media.

Then there are those other articles that sympathize with the attacker’s motives, ideology, or political stance, but condemn the attacker’s use of violence. Here again, I haven’t seen much of that this time around. Joseph Stack’s manifesto encompassed such a mixed bag of grievances, accusations, and quotations that it is impossible to tell where in the political spectrum he was coming from. I suspect that he himself had no clear idea.

Finally, there are articles calling out for more and more government legislation, regulation, or law enforcement to prevent any similar incidents from occuring in the future. In this instance, there were acknowledgements that it is all but impossible to prevent this type of suicide attack, but no amount of reasoning or common sense ever seems to stop the flood of demands for draconian repressive measures.

The “Powers That Be” Knew Something Like This Was Bound To Happen

No matter where you live in the world, you know that the worldwide economy has been bad for over two years, and there is no improvement in sight. The rot started in the US, largely due to actions on the part of the US government and various corrupt oligarchs, such as George Soros. The collapse and supposed “bailout” were engineered by various corrupt politicians and financiers to take money out of our pockets and put it into their own. Everything done by the US Congress and the Obama administration has served only to deepen the depression. From here, the economic rot has spread worldwide; two notable examples are Iceland and Greece.

Then there’s the issue of the U.S. economy having been hollowed out by outsourcing, offshoring, and the H-1b visa program. This has had a particularly devastating effect on the American middle class in general, and the American IT worker in particular.

Even with the real unemployment rate in many areas of the US matching or exceeding that of the 1930s Great Depression, it is truly scandalous that the H-1b program remains in effect. This insures that any effort on the part of American IT workers to get jobs, or to retrain themselves for future jobs in the industry, are doomed to come to naught.

The H-1b program never had anything to do with aiding the competitiveness of US firms in global markets; that ship sailed away years ago. Instead, the H-1b program is simply a testimony to the power of multinational technology megabusinesses to deceive, corrupt, and intimidate US elected officials. (Please see IT Business Edge: AFL-CIO Report Takes Critical Look at H-1B Visa Program for more on this issue.)

How is this relevant to the story? The attacker, Joseph Stack, was an unemployed IT worker who was also bedeviled by a long battle with the IRS and, apparently, ensuing difficulties with his home life. I would like to point out that the overwhelming majority of people faced with such situations never “go postal” or resort to any form of violence. But the US government has enough statistics and historical data at its disposal to know that, whenever a large group of people is pushed too far into desperation, a tiny percentage of them will go over the edge.

Let me make it clear that I am NOT claiming that anybody connected with the US government knew ahead of time that this particular individual, Joseph Stack, would do what he did. I said no such thing, nor did I mean to imply it. But I do intend to say that the US government knew that it was only a matter of time before someone whose life had been destroyed by government policies would commit a high-profile violent act.

The “Powers That Be” Could Have Prevented It Without Repressive Measures

The US Congress and the Obama administration could cut unemployment significantly just by eliminating the H-1b program, but they do not. Part of the reason why H-1b remains in effect is simply because the Obama administration not only is thoroughly corrupt, but also is engaged in a covert war to disempower, plunder, and eventually eliminate most of the US middle class. In other words, the Obama administration is not going to do anything to help out a segment of the population that does not provide the Democrat party with significant political or financial support.

But that’s not the only reason. Whenever anyone who is not part of the administration’s political support base reacts to oppression by becoming violent, this violent act provides those in power with a convenient excuse both to discredit their political opponents and to increase government control by cracking down on everybody by any means available.

If Violence Is Not The Answer, What Is?

Supposed “democratic election” or no, recent polls in the US have made it clear that neither the Obama administration nor the US Congress enjoy the consent of the governed, in any sense of the word. The US economy remains in free fall with no recovery in sight, and with the levels of debt and irresponsible spending being what they are, little possibility of recovery in the lifetime of anybody old enough to read this blog. Glenn Beck proclaimed that we don’t need a revolution; we’ve already had one. He is correct that we don’t need a “revolution” in that sense, but incorrect that we have already had one. The American Revolution in 1776 was not really a revolution in the usual sense, but a war of secession. What we need now is not revolution, but secession, and not just one secession, but perhaps fifty of them. And if enough people understand what they want, secession need not involve bloodshed.

Keep watching this blog for more about secession.

Here we go again, this time with the “Pentagon Shooter”

Michelle Malkin has the story here: About the Pentagon shooter - Update: Stop playing games, MSM. John Patrick Bedell was a registered Democrat

All NGOs are prone to corruption

The longer NGOs stay in business, the more corrupt they seem to become. The main problem is that NGOs shield themselves from accountability; they provide ways for unqualified and self-serving people to acquire money, influence, and power; and their income depends upon manipulating public opinion, which means garnering support from politicians, other bureaucracies, and the elite.

The Ground Reality blog suggests, “If you are an NGO, it’s time to laugh at yourself.” (Translation appears below the cartoon.) Perhaps it’d be funnier if it weren’t so tragic.

Here we go again…

The jihadi-collaborators in the Netherlands are using the kangaroo-court judicial system in an attempt to silence the heroic Geert Wilders.

Check these news sites for the latest information:

English and Nederlands: Geert Wilders Official Website

English: Wilders on trial: A sledgehammer blow to the freedom of speech

Nederlands: Het Wilders proces: Aanslag op de vrijheid van meningsuiting

What to do?

Read this article and see where to write your letters:

Gates of Vienna: Charlie, Winston, and Geert

Also see:

• Articles about Geert Wilders at EuropeNews
• Articles about Geert Wilders at JihadWatch
• More articles are available at Gates of Vienna

Subject: Banned from BoingBoing with NO notice or explanation?

Dear Mark Frauenfelder,

For all your supposed interest in getting rid of onerous censorship, there seems to be some of it taking place on BoingBoing itself.

I created an account for the purpose of posting a comment on the BoingBoing article having to do with what was purportedly a kid’s lingerie line being sold by Noah Cyrus (but was actually no such thing). I roundly criticized BoingBoing for having run what I deemed to be a hysterically-worded and error-riddled article in the first place. I used NO vulgar language, NO bigoted comments, NO threats, NO libelous accusations, nothing that should have gotten me banned from your site.

My comment was posted for maybe half an hour or so. Then the comment vanished. I saw a notice that my logon had expired, so I tried to log on again to see what had happened. I simply got a message saying “Permission denied.” Then I went to check my email. There was NO notification that my comment had been taken down or that I had been banned from BoingBoing. But apparently that is what happened.

It seems awfully hypocritical that someone at BoingBoing is banning people, WITHOUT notice or explanation, simply for criticizing BoingBoing itself.

It looks as though I need to go back to blogging about censorship issues, as tired of that topic as I am by now, simply because sites such as BoingBoing are failing to do their job. Obviously, just because a site CLAIMS to be in favor of free expression of ideas, does not mean that it actually IS. And in my experience, no site that employs, or is run by, persons of a left-wing bent, ever truly goes to bat for free expression for anybody who DISAGREES with material on the site itself. In other words…it’s always free speech for me, but not for thee!

For obvious reasons, I see no reason to identify myself to you any further. If you don’t trust me to comment on your site, why should I trust you with my personal information?

1389AD

“Hey, it’s their site, and they can do what they want!”

That’s true.

It’s also completely irrelevant.

“Why?”

Here’s why:

If BoingBoing and Mark Frauenfelder want to posture as defenders of free expression on the Internet and everywhere else, that’s their privilege.

If BoingBoing and Mark Frauenfelder want to ban me for making a comment that criticizes them for having run a deeply flawed article on their own website, that’s also their privilege.

But if they choose to do both at once, they’re going to look like a bunch of fools, and it’s MY privilege to point that out!

Oh, and by the way, whether you agree with me or not, you can contact Mark Frauenfelder at mark@boingboing.net and let him know what you think!

Yes, we’re still around…

As I have mentioned elsewhere, we unfortunately no longer have the time, energy, or resources to devote to blogging that we once had in the past. Political blogging takes a heavy, and often a truly staggering, personal and professional toll on anybody who does it. Moreover, I have had some severe health issues and have had to cut back on certain activities, so it is a matter of priorities. Thus, in recent months, we have been blogging on a very infrequent basis.

When the 2008 US presidential election came down to Hillary, McCain, and Obama, followed by the worldwide economic collapse, it became clear to us that there was not much more that we could contribute by blogging at the same rate as we had previously been doing. Fortunately, we had reached the point where all of the points that we have been trying to make are also being made by many other bloggers, and even by a few conservative journalists and other public figures. We do not aspire to be acknowledged as the leaders of any particular movement.

Therefore, at this point, we have decided to post an article only when we have something to say that nobody else is already saying.

We do welcome your comments and feedback.

The American media, once again, is proving that it is nothing more then the propaganda arm of the tyrannical dictatorship in Washington, D.C. True, you do get an election to choose the dictatorship’s figurehead for the next four years, and to pick the 535 power-mad flunkies who have let the real governance of the United States fall into the hands of thousands of unelected federal bureaucrats who are accountable to nobody.

Let’s examine the facts. Nidal Malik Hasan, the shooter, is a radical Muslim. He has been an outspoken supporter of radical Islamic causes. He has been in the US Army for a long period of time and knows the system well. He used that knowledge to kill a number of US troops and wound others. To wear a US uniform and support an enemy cause is a clear act of espionage. Of course, in the heavily controlled US press, no one would dare to point out this obvious fact.

Radical Islam is has been openly at war with the US since 1979, if not before. Yes, it has been thirty years since radical Muslims invaded US soil, namely the US Embassy in Iran, and took over 400 Americans hostage. President Jimmy Carter, one of the most clueless men ever to hold that office in US history, pussy-footed around, so that many of those Americans were not released until Ronald Reagan took office.

Reagan, with his hands firmly on the nuclear trigger, kept radical Islam at bay, but in radical Islamic circles, the hatred of America never ended. Reagan focused on “winning the Cold War.” He did so, but instead of using direct conflict, he pressured and cajoled the Soviets into slowly giving up Communism, thus freeing Eastern Europe from the clutches of left-wing tyranny. (On behalf of all non-Communist Slavic people, Mr. Reagan, please accept a “thank you” from this Czech-American.)

From then on, our position with radical Islam went downhill. The supposed “Third Reagan Term” was a dismal failure. Bush 41, sided with Islamic forces, and chose to help “break up the former Yugoslavia.” What that really meant was that after considerable Islamic violence, which he quietly but wholeheartedly supported, many Christians are now living under Islamic tyranny in the Balkans. Of course, the clueless American media, the abysmally corrupt US State Department, and many gullible Americans still believe that the Christian people of Serbian heritage did some horrible things to these “poor defenseless Muslims.” Nearly two decades of State Department and mainstream media efforts to dig up dirt against the Serbs have unearthed no credible evidence. On the contrary, there is overwhelming evidence that radical Islam and other outside influences not only set up this conflict in the Balkans, but also kept it going until they gained a jihadist stronghold in Europe. Thus, while the Roosevelt Administration helped liberate Europe from the Nazis, and the Reagan Administration helped liberate Eastern Europe from the Communists, the first Bush Administration helped the Muslim terrorists get a foothold in re-conquering the Balkans.

The Clinton Administration continued to coddle radical Islam, going so far as to use the US Air Force to aid and abet the radical Muslim terrorists in Bosnia, Albania and Kosovo. In addition, the Clinton Administration suckered and arm-twisted other nations to contribute their own air forces to aid in the terror-bombing of those who opposed the spread of radical Islam in the Balkans. While the controversy raged about the Clinton Administration’s eagerness to populate the US military with out-of-the-closet homosexuals, the public eye was distracted from the fact that radical Muslims were infiltrating the US armed forces. Of course, during the entire eight years of the Clinton Administration, reports of Islamic attacks on the US, and reports of attempted attacks, continued to trickle into the news.

It is likely that the most successful Islamic attack during the Clinton regime was the bombing of the Oklahoma Federal Building. On the day of the bombing, the US media at first focused the blame on Islamic terrorists. But then, the memo must have gone out to the closely government-controlled US media, so that the blame immediately shifted to US patriots who abide by the original intentions of the Framers of the United States Constitution and support their independent state militia. (No, the Framers were NOT referring to the state police or the National Guard.)

So, what was the payoff for twelve years of coddling radical Islam? What was the real legacy of both Bush 41 and Bill Clinton? The 911 attack, of course! By then, the Muslims had another oilman ally back in the White House, but jihadists have a habit of biting the hands that feed them. Bush 43, being both a former governor of the oil-rich state of Texas, and a close friend of the Saudi royal family and even of the bin Laden family, was not about to admit that we were at war with radical Islam. Instead, he declared war on “terrorism.” At the time, one commentator suggested that this would have been as silly as FDR asking Congress for a declaration of war against aircraft carriers on December 8, 1941. Terrorism is a weapon of war, not an enemy that one can declare war against. Radical Islam has declared war on the US several times during the last 30 years. A fatwa, after all, is an open declaration of war that is also an immediate and ongoing mobilization order. If the Muslim jihadists thought they could fight and win a conventional war against the US, they would do just that. Because they cannot, they use terrorism as their weapon instead.

The current Administration is an abomination. (Perhaps that should be spelled O-b-a-m-a-N-a-t-i-o-n.) A foreign-born immigrant from Africa serves as the United States President, illegally. He is allowed to hide behind his dark skin because all his critics are automatically accused of “racism.” So if you dare criticize his social agenda that is somewhere to the left of Karl Marx, or if you question his coddling of radical Islam, or even if you could not in good conscience vote for him because of his position on abortion, you run the risk of being labeled “racist.” (Note that the author of this article has been much harsher on Obama’s three white processors in this piece, but nevertheless, liberal propagandists with their “bigot” label will be complaining about this article).

Of course, all four of these administrations have used these Islamic attacks as just another pretext to restrict the freedoms of US citizens. Recently, I took my first airline flight since the 911 attack. The way I was treated was totally unbecoming a citizen of the US. Being disabled and unable to walk through metal detectors, I was made to balance precariously while being publicly patted down like a common criminal. The search was so invasive that the lady travelers in my party were aghast.

So, expect more Muslims in the US military to “go postal.” After all, this Nidal Malik Hasan is being passed off as a crazy man who lost control because he was being deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan. Expect the US media to continue to pass off these Islamic attacks on US soil as “random acts of violence.” Expect the US military forces to fight in Islamic countries, supporting one group of Muslims over another. Expect the US media and US government to continue side with Muslim terrorists in Eastern Europe, as they have in both Russia and the Balkans. And, of course, if you are a US citizen, expect to lose more of your rights and freedoms.

The US people should be demanding the following actions:

1. That the United State Congress declare war on radical Islam;
2. That a Constitutional Amendment be ratified declaring that Islam is not a religion, but an enemy ideology, and that it is not to enjoy the protection of the First Amendment or of any other law guaranteeing unabated religious freedom;
3. That no Muslim immigration into the US be allowed until the war against radical Islam has been won;
4. That all Muslims in the US military should be investigated intensively and be required to state publicly that their belief in Islam shall never be used to disobey any order or to commit any act against the US, and that they be required to renounce all individuals, by name, such as Osama bin Laden, who oppose the non-Islamic world and all organizations, such as al-Qaeda and Hamas, who support violence against non-Islamic countries (anyone refusing to do so is obviously a danger to the US military);
5. That dangerous radical Muslims be interned, similar to the detainment of radical Japanese nationals and Japanese-Americans who openly declared their loyalty to the Emperor of Japan over that of the US during World War II;
6. That the rights and freedoms of non-Muslim US citizens be restored;
7. That their respective States each declare its sovereignty; or declare independence from the US federal government.

Not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man; but that which cometh out of the mouth, this defileth a man.

Matthew 15:11 KJV

Dark art

As those who follow me on deviantART may have noticed, I seldom upload dark art, but there are times when I feel the need to communicate something about the dark side of life.

This is one of those times.

Perhaps it is because of the commercialization of Valentine’s Day and the desperation that some people feel as a result of past and present romantic deception. Perhaps it is merely because of my ongoing frustration at the nonsense that seems to pervade so much of the media.

Or perhaps it is because I saw the movie “Sophie’s Choice” last night before going to sleep.

The machinery of evil

There is a reason why lying is deemed to be a sin, a violation of one of the Ten Commandments. Lying is the lubricant that keeps the machinery of evil in motion, and the lubricant that allows it to start. How far would evildoers get without the opportunity to lie to themselves and to others?

A relationship in which one or both parties is a liar, is no relationship at all. If someone lies to you, how much do you really know about that person, other than the fact that they have lied to you?

But there’s more.

As Homer Simpson said, “It takes two people to lie. One to lie, and one to believe.”

After the fashion of Yogi Berra or Casey Stengel, Homer Simpson conveys a truth, seen from an unusual angle. If the rest of us would be less gullible, if we would stop being so ready to believe gossip, slander, propaganda, and politically correct cant, then the liars who bedevil this world would get far less traction.

One can only hope.

Tech notes:

• To see a full-size rendition of the above image, please click on the image once to get to the gallery page on deviantART, and then click on the thumbnail again.
• Thanks to cavia for suggestions made on my previous attempt on this theme, Pierced Lips.
• Image was rendered in Apophysis 2.08 3D Hack using GlynnSim plugin by eralex61.
• Black background and signature added in GIMP.

What a tragic irony!

In case you haven’t heard, Satyam was the fourth-largest IT outsourcing company in India, with 55,000 employees (or so they claimed). The CEO, Ramalinga Raju, recently resigned after admitting massive financial fraud. As of this writing, the company is almost out of cash.

Here we go again…

Satyam has done business with companies and governments in over 60 countries, including the U.S. This scandal appears to be even larger in scope than the Enron/Arthur Andersen scandal of late 2001. Price Waterhouse, the Indian subsidiary of PricewaterhouseCoopers, is facing close scrutiny over having signed off on Satyam’s audits.

Obviously, the much-touted Sarbanes-Oxley law enacted after the Enron/Arthur Andersen debacle did nothing to prevent the recent collapse of the U.S. real estate, stock market, and financial sector. The take-home lesson is that once any corporation becomes multinational in scope, and politically well-connected, no laws, no regulations, no bureaucratic restructuring can possibly keep it honest if its management chooses to do otherwise.

Another reason why outsourcing is wrong

Outsourcing and offshoring are always and everywhere the enemies of accountability. The further away one’s trading partners are located, the harder it is to comprehend what they are up to, and that will never change.

Why corporate cheating is contagious

Whenever one major company in an industry has been “cooking the books” to promote or exaggerate its own success, what effect do you suppose that has? Think about it! Every other executive, every other company in that industry will be pressured to match or exceed the cheater’s inflated results, by fair means or foul, or face the wrath of board members and stockholders.

Some news links and other sources:

• Business Standard: Regulators, government tighten noose around Satyam
• Business Standard: Government supersedes Satyam board
• Wikipedia: Satyam Computer Services Ltd.
• NYT: Satyam Chief Admits Huge Fraud
• IHT: India hears calls for Satyam bailout
• IHT: Auditor in cross hairs over fraud at Satyam
• The Australian: Police arrest Satyam founder, Government sacks board
• Information Week Blog: Satyam And Its 8-Year Ban from World Bank
• Bloomberg.com: Satyam U.S. Investors File Actions Alleging Fraud (Update2)
• TheDeal.com: Enron went bankrupt, but what of Satyam’s future?

Perhaps some of this would be funny if it were not so sad.

Note: The screen capture was taken by 1389AD from www.satyam.com, shortly after the announcement. The pixelated area was blurred in the original.

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As you already know, I had little to say about the 2008 US presidential election because, then as now, I regarded both of the candidates, and all their pomps and all their works, as beneath comment.

Even before the election, it was obvious to me that the winning candidate would someday deeply regret having run for that office. Let me go on record that I stand by that prediction.

It has often been claimed that no one can win a thermonuclear war. Be that as it may, there is no question that it is easy enough to lose one! In similar fashion, becoming president of the US at this time is just as clearly a no-win scenario for the perpetrator and all his retinue.

Despite all the empty promises from both sides, there is simply nothing that any US president could do at this point to effect a recovery. A recovery would have to happen on its own, and every day that goes by, it seems that we have less and less to build on, in terms of civil and industrial infrastructure, a functioning civil society, and an informed citizenry.

The mass media and what we call our educational system seem to be doing everything they can to keep the citizenry from figuring out what their supposed betters are about. Oh, and by the way, everything I have just said about the plight of the US goes double for the EU.

The scope of the problem

See for yourself what already happened to a part of the US that lost its productive capacity:

• detroitfunk.com
• detroitblog
• The Fabulous Ruins of Detroit
• The Motor(less) City

With trees growing up through abandoned buildings, large parts of Detroit have already come to resemble scenes from the grim speculative documentary Life After People.

By now, the US economic decline has spread far beyond Detroit and the Rust Belt.

Think about it: When was the last time you saw the label “Made in USA” on any product, good or bad?

And no, it is not possible to sustain a “service economy” without a viable manufacturing infrastructure. Not that there is a service economy to sustain - the real estate bubble has already burst, the remains of our financial sector are being artificially propped up with money that we do not have and cannot earn, and much of our service sector employment has already been outsourced! It should surprise no one that the unemployment picture is considerably worse than the official figures would lead us to believe (see The really, really bad news about the unemployment rate). Newspapers throughout the US report that state and local tax revenues are shrinking due to declining income and property values.

What is left?

I recently heard yet another self-styled pundit of the US employment scene recommending three areas where there still seem to be some jobs for Americans. The only available jobs are in health care, education, and government work - because they cannot be outsourced.

Wow.

Will someone please explain to me who is going to pay for this health care, education, and government work? Does anyone care to predict what will happen after we go into debt to educate the next generation, knowing that there will be no jobs for them after they finish school?

Where do we go from here?

Good question.

And yes, I do have an answer! My point in posting this is that we need to understand exactly what our problems are, and the true extent of our difficulties, before we can even begin to address them.

What’s the next step? We need to stop wasting tax dollars on bailing out Wall Street. Instead, we need to bring our industrial base back to the US. We need to repeal the tax laws and ever-proliferating regulations that have been strangling US businesses or driving them overseas. We need to make it much simpler and more cost-effective for businesses, especially smaller businesses, to provide jobs for US citizens. That’s the only government “stimulus package” that will work.

No, it is not all under our control. But we can keep the faith and do our best to help each other. As Bishop Antoun of the Antiochian Orthodox Church recently told us, “The Lord will provide.”

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When the image gallery page appears, click again on the thumbnail to see the full-size image.

1389ad.deviantart.com

A large collection of art by 1389, including photography, digital art, and some new fractal images, is available at my online gallery.

Look for free desktop wallpaper, and free tools and textures for Photoshop and GIMP!

Blogrolling.com still experiencing outages

Problems being worked on as of 9:30pm EST 10/16/08

1389 Blog reported earlier that the popular Blogrolling.com link list server site was hacked by Islamists. Since that time, the site’s home page has gone offline repeatedly, and the blogrolls hosted on the site are being served only intermittently.

Status updates from blogrolling on Twitter

Because Blogrolling obviously can’t use its own site to provide status updates, the Blogrolling staff has set up a blogrolling user ID on Twitter. As long as the main Blogrolling.com site is down, it will redirect automatically to the Twitter page, which will display status updates. You can follow it from your own Twitter user ID if you wish.

H/T to Texas Fred for this information.