The Forgotten Man Blog

Obama’s campaign manager says “Bring home the troops!”

2012-01-13T09:40:00.001-06:00

I just noticed an email I got on Jan 4 from Jim Messina, the campaign manager for Barack Obama’s 2012 reelection bid. Discussing Iowa’s Republican primary he says [my emphasis]

The extremist Tea Party agenda won a clear victory. No matter who the Republicans nominate, we'll be running against someone who has embraced that agenda in order to win -- vowing to let Wall Street write its own rules, end Medicare as we know it, roll back gay rights, leave the troops in Iraq indefinitely, restrict a woman's right to choose, and gut Social Security to pay for more tax cuts for millionaires and corporations.

Now there is a lot of partisan nonsense here but the one that really stuck out was “leave the troops in Iraq indefinitely” I thought that the all the US soldiers had left which is a pretty big deal for Obama to take credit for. Why is his campaign manager so out of touch with what his boss is actually doing?

FCC Chairman makes his wife happy

2011-12-14T10:47:00.001-06:00

It finally happened! The FCC has come down hard on the boogey man that no one else was willing to stand up to. The dreaded loud TV commercial.

"This is an issue people care about. My wife has wondered for years when we were going to do something about this," said FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski during a meeting Tuesday. "Bottom line, the FCC is quieting a persistent problem of the TV age, or loud commercials."

Well if just one man gets a little more peace at home from this, I guess the additional government regulation was worth it.

During their mandated spot checks for compliance (there’s a new job created right there!), what is the criteria for the commercial being louder than the program? What if it’s a commercial for Independence Day comes on during after a hushed Tiger Woods putt?

Krugman uses the D word

2011-12-13T23:25:00.001-06:00

If Paul “we just needed more stimulus” Krugman is finally using the word “depression” you know its bad.

It’s time to start calling the current situation what it is: a depression. True, it’s not a full replay of the Great Depression, but that’s cold comfort. Unemployment in both America and Europe remains disastrously high. Leaders and institutions are increasingly discredited. And democratic values are under siege.

Guns and gold, my friends.

Go McDonalds Go!

2011-12-01T09:58:00.001-06:00

San Francisco decides happy meals are unhealthy and you should not entice children to eat them by including toys. Does McDonalds simply stop selling toys? Do they change their meals to have less fat or salt in order to keep the toy?

No, they just offer the toys for a $0.10 donation to charity if you buy a happy meal.

Sometimes you just plain can’t regulate peoples behavior. Don’t even try. Money, like life, finds a way. That is what capitalism is all about.

PS. Can I count that $0.10 as a carbohydrate-credit? How many toys do I need to buy to offset some happy fat slob who chows down on 3 Big Macs in a sitting? I smell a new therma-geddon type business opportunity!

No Credit? No Christmas.

2011-11-14T14:24:00.001-06:00

That will be the phrase you hear if Chuck Schumer gets his way. It really frustrates me to see the guys who, in the name of poverty, keep impoverished people from getting things they want or need.

U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer is pushing retailers to clearly show how layaway plans can actually cost a consumer more than using a credit card.
Schumer is asking major retail associations to advise their members to more clearly present their layaway fees to customers. The Democrat says the ultimate cost of a layaway with a $5 fee can equal 40 percent interest over two months.
…
Schumer says if retails don't comply, he will ask the Federal Trade Commission whether the practice is deceptive or misleading.

Which ultimately means trying to kill layaway. You know what happens if some of these people can’t get layaway (and they can’t get credit)? They can’t get their items. Period. End of Sentence.

Shut down these sneaky conniving retailers who just want to bilk their customers and instead let the customers deal with the banks instead! The banks won’t try to pull that kind of stuff.

Oh my! Mr Cain! That tickles!

2011-11-07T23:36:00.000-06:00

I’m not necessarily a Herman Cain fan (see my comment here) but did anyone notice anything odd about the latest Cain accuser’s account of the incident?

She said

he suddenly reached over and he put his hand on my leg under my skirt and reached for my genitals. He also grabbed my head and brought it toward his crotch. I was very, very surprised and very shocked.

Now most news outlets left it at that which is quite a shocking statement.

But the way she described her own reaction perplexed me and was left out of many news wire accounts

I said: ‘What are you doing? You know I have a boyfriend. This isn't what I came here for

This is a little stunning. She described his actions as something that is not just harassment but sexual assault/rape and her reaction is not “Hey perv! Get the *#$@ off me!!!!” It’s a more subdued “Hey you know I’m not available. Besides that’s not why I’m here”

and then

I told my boyfriend Mr. Cain had been very sexually inappropriate with me

I’m sorry, randomly trying to grab someone’s lady bits is more than “inappropriate.” In fact it is well beyond “very inappropriate.” Its criminal.

Now I really have no idea what went on in that room 14 years ago, but when the alleged victim describes her own reaction as so disproportionate to the description of the crime something is amiss. Either the instigating event or the response is off. The question is which one?

Libya! Duh!

2011-10-24T10:27:00.001-05:00

To everyone who assumed that the enemy of Gaddafi was automatically the group we should support. Read on

Libya's liberation: interim ruler unveils more radical than expected plans for Islamic law

…

Mr Abdul-Jalil went further, specifically lifting immediately, by decree, one law from Col. Gaddafi's era that he said was in conflict with Sharia - that banning polygamy.

My stars! The muslim nation who ousted their dictator is going to reform into an even more muslim nation? Whodathinkit!?

Plus no alcohol or loan interest. Stick that in your “enlightened” world view and smoke it.

At best we are looking at an emerging longer term struggle between the younger more western leaning populace vs the traditional Islamists. I’ve said it before - You cannot give people democracy who do not understand it. It has to be a revelation from within. Just because there is revolution, doesn’t mean there is revelation.

When does Hendrix go on?

2011-10-14T08:35:00.001-05:00

Seeing the unbelievable mess that is now the Occupy Wall Street movement, I am reminded of Woodstock.

At least with Woodstock there was good music. Plus, the music also provided something else of practical value – when the music stopped, you knew it was time to go home.

Pigeon-Guided Rocket

2011-10-14T07:56:00.001-05:00

Human ingenuity never fails to astound me. During World War II, the US needed to figure out how to guide a missile effectively but the available machinery wasn’t small enough to do the job. The solution? According to B.F. Skinner it was to place 3 pigeons in the nose cone to guide the missile in flight and they gave him $25k to try it out.

He built a nose cone for a missile fitted with three small electronic screens and three tiny pigeon cockpits. Onto the screens was projected an image of the ground in front of the rocket.
“He would train street pigeons to recognize the pattern of the target, and to peck when they saw this target,” says Kidwell. “And then when all three of them pecked, it was thought you could actually aim the missile in that direction.” As the pigeons pecked, cables harnessed to each one’s head would mechanically steer the missile until it finally reached its mark.

The most astounding thing about the project is that it actually worked! But even after a successful demonstration, officials declines to go Skinner’s way.

(for more avian carrier fun check out RFC 1149 – “Standard for the Transmission of IP datagrams on Avian Carriers” or “How to run the internet on carrier pigeons”)

Citizen 1, police state 0

2011-09-08T09:42:00.001-05:00

The mere fact that a SWAT team makes a forced entry creates the dangerous situation the SWAT team exists to deal with. So what happens when the SWAT team executes a no knock warrant and busts into your home in the middle of the night? What happens if they don’t identify themselves? What happens if you shoot two of them and put them in the hospital? What if this happens in one of the most notorious anti-gun regions in the country, Chicago? This happened to Kenny.

[Kenny] was found not guilty on Friday August 26, 2011 by a jury here in Chicago. He was charged with two counts of attempt first degree murder with a firearm, two counts of aggravated battery with a firearm to a police officer, and four counts of Armed Violence.

The whole “castle doctrine vs no-knock-SWAT team-entrance-on-the-wrong-house” problem really worries me at times, but Kenny’s defense attorney lays out all the reasons in his closing statement. The jury agreed.

There is hope after all.

College Schmollege

2011-09-02T10:37:00.001-05:00

We have moved from thinking “I want to do job X, so I need degree Y” to “I want degree Z, what kind of job can I do now?”

You don’t need a college degree. You need a plan which might include a college degree.

Pushing more and more people into college purely for the sake of getting that sheepskin does not solve a problem. It actually creates them.

More applicants drives up the cost of tuition (supply and demand)
More financial aid drives up the cost of tuition (setting an artificial price floor)
More financial aid causes a shortage (because it causes more demand)
More graduates drives down their eventual salaries (supply and demand)
More graduates drives up the unemployment rate (excess supply)
Going to college but not graduating makes it more expensive and difficult to get in for everyone else who could have had your spot. (scarce resource misallocated to you)

Most Americans don’t need a liberal arts degree where they float around for four years and are exposed to the philosophical intellectual vagaries of the world. They need practical skills. What we need is more focused degrees that don’t include unnecessary culture I can get on the Food Network or The Learning Channel.

If you want a broader education, you can pay for it yourself and don’t complain to me when you can’t get a job.

If you want a job. Get an education (college, internship, apprenticeship, etc) that directly supports it. Learn Swahili once you can support yourself.

PS: I’m not saying TV is the answer for getting cultured. Just that in today’s information soaked daily experience, there are additional places to learn that stuff from than the University of My Tax Dollars.

Its new law day!

2011-09-01T10:49:00.001-05:00

Seeing as Texas only allows our legislature to get together every 2 years (it keeps them from doing too much damage at once), we usually have a lot of local press when the new batch of laws go into effect. Some of the new ones happening this week

Texas landowners may now shoot feral hogs and coyotes on their land from helicopters. Anyone have a chopper I can borrow?
You can now legally leave your weapon in your car at your place of business.
Increased speed limits, its only gonna be +5 MPH but hey that’s another 5! (and lifting the night time restrictions)
Easier access to testing of DNA for people convicted already of a crime and new requirements around preserving bio evidence long term. This will help out anyone that the Dallas DAs office hasn’t gotten to yet
Outlawing caltrops, really? Do I need to turn in my spindle of barbed wire too?
New sexting laws – haven't read this one thoroughly but at least it has provisions for near-age or spousal partners.
Newly illegal designer drugs

If you see it, film it!

2011-08-25T16:29:00.001-05:00

The freedom you save may be your own.

Don’t forget the fine print

[HT: PINAC]

Free speech (within certain guidelines)

2011-08-16T14:15:00.001-05:00

Gotta love local government’s support of civil rights. Linton Johnson, a spokesman for the BART police department had this to say

“We are allowed to designate the time, place and manner of free speech.”

Just like the prisoners in Alcatraz were free to assemble in the time, place and manner designated by the warden.

Oh the video? Oops, Sorry.

2011-08-15T20:18:00.001-05:00

Anytime the dashboard camera on a police car shows evidence of a crime – its made available. Anytime it shows nothing (or potentially incriminating evidence against the officer) it can just disappear with no recourse.

“I lost it” is officially a legal excuse to destroy evidence unless you catch them in the act. The camera turns on automatically, the officer should have noted it wasn’t working at shift change and department policy requires all footage to be preserved for at least 30 days and no one noticed it didn’t exist?

“We agree with the state that the record supports a finding by the district court that the police did not act in bad faith,” Justice Bob Pemberton wrote. “The United States Supreme Court has held that ‘unless a criminal defendant can show bad faith on the part of the police, failure to preserve potentially useful evidence does not constitute a denial of due process of law.’”

Unbelievable. Well, If You Haven’t Been Paying Attention. — Trey Garrison

First cel phones, now homes

2011-08-05T09:10:00.001-05:00

Cuba is preparing to legalize private property. This is a fundamental underpinning of free market economies. Here’s to hoping it sticks – but it will be a while before anyone fully reacts to it because of the uncertainty that it could be taken away at any time.

You can’t just tell people they are free. You have to continually successfully publicly thwart challenges to their freedom before they will believe it. Only after they believe it will they act on it. Only after they act on it will they actually be free.

Futuristic (sounding) cars

2011-08-05T08:57:00.001-05:00

Responding to the Pedestrian Safety Act of 2010 Ford has provided some potential sounds they might use for their Focus Electric car because they are “too quiet”

I can appreciate the futuristic George Jetson quality these cars make but it seems absurd to artificially make cars sound like they do in Minority Report just because we’ve been trained by the movies that that is what cars will sound like someday.

Lets get creative instead. Instead of Close Encounters I want mine to sound like

a pouncing tiger
a ray gun
a Sherman tank
hell, just let me pipe my radio to the outside and they’ll hear me coming a block away.

PS – I don’t want my car to sound like it can fly. I want my car to fly.

Debt defaulting to yourself?

2011-08-04T09:18:00.001-05:00

Ron Paul has some good ideas, some crazy ideas, and some that just make you tilt your head and go “Uh… yeah!… wait, uh… no! … huhwhat?”

He recently introduced HR 2768 which is intended to immediately eliminate $1.6 trillion from the federal debt.

The text of the bill isn't available just yet but here is the gist of the idea

The Treasury owes the Federal Reserve about $1.6 trillion
The Fed essentially makes the investment money out of thin air
The Treasury then has the right to make the interest payment money out of thin air and cancel it all out.

Its an interesting idea. It essentially would be a bold statement that the Fed is a fake customer to the Treasury and so we don’t accept any deals with them as real. They sort of are a made up customer since they can make up money to buy things.

Does the treasury bond interest rate crash if we default on bonds, but only on those which were never actually issued to anyone in the real market? Can the Fed continue to use its purchasing power to artificially inflate interest rates?

The big question which relates more to his candidacy – Is that kind of uncertainty better or worse than the kind we have now?

Have a balanced budget amendment? Just ignore it.

2011-07-22T09:25:00.001-05:00

The proposed Balanced Budget Amendment (HJR 1) which is referenced in the Cut Cap n Spend has interesting clause to provide for debt driven war spending

The provisions of this article may be waived for any fiscal year in which the United States is engaged in military conflict which causes an imminent and serious military threat to national security

So when was the last time you remember that we weren’t “engaged in military conflict” because of the imminent threat to national security that drives The War on Terror? At no time in the last 10 years would this amendment have prevented deficit spending.

Notice also this out gives them the authority to ignore balancing the entire budget, not just giving allowances for going over the budget for military needs.

Need to bail out banks and car companies? Just declare a military threat, drop in a SEAL team, and pass any massive new government program you want in the meantime.

Federal “investment” in Chrysler comes to an end

2011-07-21T23:33:00.001-05:00

Announced from the Treasury today

"the U.S. government has exited its investment in Chrysler at least six years earlier than expected," said Tim Massad, assistant secretary for financial stability

Investment?

Treasury provided a total of $12.5 billion to Chrysler and its financing arm after the recession hampered auto sales and sent Chrysler and General Motors to the brink of collapse.

Right, I remember that (*cough* bailout *cough*). Did we make a profit or at least get our money back with this “investment”?

Since then, $11.2 billion of the assistance has been repaid, Treasury said. Chrysler repaid $5.1 billion in loans from the government in May. But the $1.3 billion remaining is unlikely to be recovered, Treasury said.

Oh. Well at least that foreign company that is taking it off our hands got a good deal…

Federal Government Investment Group, providing -10.4% return since 2009.

Balanced budget amendment will help? Nope.

2011-07-20T10:08:00.001-05:00

I’m not sure why the balanced budget amendment is even in discussion right now. Congress has already proven to us that it won’t make a difference.

If you don’t pass a budget, you don’t have to balance one.

Custom license plates

2011-07-14T16:50:00.001-05:00

Since they starting outsourcing custom plates in TX to a private contractor there are more and more options available. You can go on their site and mix and match to see what your plate might look like.

Unfortunately this one is already taken by someone.

as was this one

That was fast…

2011-07-06T10:20:00.001-05:00

Someone wants another unneeded feel good law named for a cute little victim

Criminal Justice Petition: Create Caylee's Law

Bonus laziness points for being an online petition

Dramatic readings from the iTunes EULA

2011-06-10T20:35:00.001-05:00

Pure awesome with whip cream and a cherry.

Richard Dreyfuss reads the iTunes EULA

Don’t tase me, bro! Let me calm down first!

2011-06-03T10:14:00.001-05:00

The National Institute of Justice Finds Tasers Safe

"There is no conclusive medical evidence in the current body of research literature that indicates a high risk of serious injury or death to humans from the direct or indirect cardiovascular or metabolic effects of short-term CED exposure in healthy, normal, nonstressed, nonintoxicated persons," the report concludes. "Field experience with CED use indicates that short-term exposure is safe in the vast majority of cases
[my emphasis]

Of course when was the last time you heard of the police using a taser on someone standing around calmly minding their own business?

By the time the encounter has escalated to tasing, the tasee is likely to already be stressed by the encounter and the argument that led to the tasing.