And a “promise” that it might get into double digits today (finally!). 

Me, too. 

“We trusted the Federal Government to decide what the Federal Government’s powers should be…”

In a remarkable article authors Johnson and Mason correctly detect:

Obama's new "strategy" is no strategy at all. It is a cynical and politically motivated rehash of Iraq policy: Toss in a few more troops, throw together something resembling local security forces, buy off the enemies, and get the hell out before it all blows up.

Much of the excellent article's essence is well outlined in this excerpt available from Reason's post entitled Afghanistan Another Vietnam? You Bet Your Administration It Is, Obama!:

Let's start with the obvious: There isn't the slightest possibility that the course laid out by Barack Obama in his Dec. 1 speech will halt or even slow the downward spiral toward defeat in Afghanistan. None. The U.S. president and his advisors labored for three months and brought forth old wine in bigger bottles. The speech contained not one single new idea or approach, nor offered any hint of new thinking about a conflict that everyone now agrees the United States is losing. Instead, the administration deliberated for 94 days to deliver essentially "more men, more money, try harder." It sounded ominously similar to Mikhail Gorbachev's "bloody wound" speech that led to a similar-sized, temporary Soviet troop surge in Afghanistan in 1986.....

The president offered three reasons why [Afghanistan now and Vietnam then] are different. And all are dead wrong. First, Obama noted that Afghanistan is being conducted by a "coalition" of 43 countries -- as if war by committee would magically change the outcome (a throwback to former President George W. Bush's "Iraq coalition" mathematics). The truth is, outside of a handful of countries, it's basically a coalition of pacifists. In fact, more foreign troops fought alongside the United States in Vietnam than are now actually fighting with Americans today. Only nine countries in today's 43-country coalition have more than 1,000 personnel there; nine others have 10 (yes, not even a dozen people) -- or fewer. And although Australia and New Zealand have sent a handful of excellent special operations troops to Afghanistan, only Britain, Canada, and France are providing significant forces willing to conduct conventional offensive military operations. That brings the coalition's combat-troop contribution to approximately 17,000. Most of the other 38 "partners" have strict rules prohibiting them from ever doing anything actually dangerous....

The president went on to assert that the Taliban are not popular in Afghanistan, whereas the Viet Cong represented a broadly popular nationalist movement with the support of a majority of the Vietnamese. But this is also wrong. Neither the Viet Cong then, nor the Taliban now, have ever enjoyed the popular support of more than 15 percent of the population....

The reality on the ground is that Afghanistan is Vietnam redux. Afghan President Hamid Karzai's regime is an utterly illegitimate, incompetent kleptocracy. The Afghan National Army (ANA) -- slotted to take over the conflict when the coalition pulls out -- will not even be able to feed itself in five years, much less turn back the mounting Taliban tide....

Most critically of all, Pakistan's reaction to Obama's speech was to order its top military intelligence service, the ISI, to immediately begin rebuilding and strengthening covert ties to the Afghan Taliban in anticipation of their eventual return to power, according to a highly placed Pakistani official. There will be no more genuine cooperation from Pakistan (if there ever was)....

See also my posts Killing Them Softly, The Obama Doctrine ... , War Is Peace (2/2), and 37 Seconds to Insult Your Intelligence.

By contrast:

A pillar to my singing group, I am nonetheless bad at remembering the lyrics. Not to worry. I use the same effective technique as the gentleman in the below clip.

After weeks and weeks of watching the talking heads tell us that the old retired guys shouting in political protest at their elected officials were actually violent terrorists, Nazis and hate-filled members of racist militias with ties to the KKK, I wonder if we'll see any coverage of this?

From The Daily Californian:

Eight people have been arrested, including two UC Berkeley students and two UC Davis students, and remain in police custody following an attack on Chancellor Robert Birgeneau's house late Friday night.

Between 40 and 75 people marched to Birgeneau's home near the northwest corner of campus at about 11 p.m. Friday night. Some wielded torches that were allegedly thrown at police, while others broke the outside lighting to the house, overturned planters, damaged "impact resistant" windows on the house and scattered garbage brought from a nearby student housing cooperative, police said.

Apparently the entitlement generation kiddies were upset about rising tuition and fees.

I will concede that If they're paying for an economics education, they are indeed getting a bad deal. A decent Econ 101 class should adequately illustrate that easy government loans will never do anything except drive the cost of tuition up.

But dude! Why waste time and other people's money on that when you can, like, take "Arguing with Judge Judy?" 

Mild He lays His glory by

Born that man no more may die

Born to raise the sons of earth

Born to give them second birth

Hark! The herald angels sing

"Glory to the newborn King!"

Kids had their Christmas program at Church tonight (we provided Mary and a lamb to the cast of characters).  Still trying to figure out how to get the Christmas shopping done—had been planning on visiting the “bigger city” tomorrow, but we’ve got some moisture coming down that is freezing and probably making the roads treacherous.

Tuesday is my last regular class; Wednesday is the final I’m giving (I need to finish getting that written, and grade all of the papers that have been turned in…).  Things should get a little better by the end of the week (she says now, but seems to manage to fill her time regardless) after I’ve gotten grades turned in.

Thanks to Georg, James, Angela, Eric, and Triple Hash who have continued to post and comment.  I promise to come back and to post something of substance soon…

LLE

I have just posted an entry The Obama Doctrine - A New Moral Low, where I offer the below quote in full context. In the clip underneath the quote you may witness a case in point.

Obama, of course, is narrow-minded and unsophisticated enough to think he was a good choice. And, in a devious way, he was; for when "moral" is what an illiterate crowd (illiterate relative to the subjects at hand, e.g. the true state of affairs in an occupied country like Afghanistan) regurgitatingly states is "cool," he does represent the times very well. Everyone is in love with their idea of meddling in the affairs of other people and peoples, and hope their impulse of intrusion will be sanctioned by next election's majority. The West has descended that low, and Obama is an authentic representative of that bestial regression.

A certain potential for consolation may inhere in the observation that the general decline of standards that Obama represents so well is noticeable in the stage-managing of his own show, too.

Via the excellent The Beacon:

The interviewed lady strikes me as very civil and likeable. There are so many nice people amongst the misled. Even those who, like the charming lady from Norway, do not shout when challenged.

The yellow banner held up toward the end of the interview states in German: "We walk over corpses. Your nuclear industry."

If I believed the banner, I'd be shouting.

The Obama doctrine: Just(ified) is any war or other form of aggression instrumental in enforcing what Obama considers politically correct.

Read this post by Lew Rockwell and the links contained in it.

See also my War is Peace (2/2).

And consider an interesting take of the matter with nice pics and links by Mr. Motl from Pilsen.

Obama, of course, is narrow-minded and unsophisticated enough to think he was a good choice. And, in a devious way, he was; for when "moral" is what an illiterate crowd (illiterate relative to the subjects at hand, e.g. the true state of affairs in an occupied country like Afghanistan) regurgitatingly states is "cool," he does represent the times very well. Everyone is in love with their idea of meddling in the affairs of other people and peoples, and hope their impulse of intrusion will be sanctioned by next election's majority. The West has descended that low, and Obama is an authentic representative of that bestial regression.

A certain potential for consolation may inhere in the observation that the general decline of standards that Obama represents so well is noticeable in the stage-managing of his own show, too.

PS

Incidentally: In the face of an apparent (politically correct?) tertium non datur, why is a man with a black father and a white mother a black man, rather than a white man?

In German, "ich sehe schwarz für x," literally "I see black as for x," is the same as saying "I am pessimistic regarding x."

He's ahead in the last poll I saw.  Can we do this?

I have never had the time to follow up on occasional indications that the Galileo story that we are all familiar with is not exactly accurate, perhaps even fundamentally misconceived.

Here is a fascinating lead dealing with

the Enlightenment myth that the Catholic Church brutally oppressed Galileo. Our own time, Nisbet insisted, has seen much worse.

The source, and the source's source.

Also, consider for instance this discussion of myths surrounding Galileo:

The Church Dogmatically Opposed the New Science: In reality, the Church was the leading sponsor of the new science and Galileo himself was funded by the church. The leading astronomers of the time were Jesuit priests. They were open to Galileo’s theory but told him the evidence for it was inconclusive. This was the view of the greatest astronomer of the age, Tyco Brahe. The Church’s view of heliocentrism was hardly a dogmatic one. When Cardinal Bellarmine met with Galileo he said, “While experience tells us plainly that the earth is standing still, if there were a real proof that the sun is in the center of the universe…and that the sun goes not go round the earth but the earth round the sun, then we should have to proceed with great circumspection in explaining passages of scripture which appear to teach the contrary, and rather admit that we did not understand them than declare an opinion to be false which is proved to be true. But this is not a thing to be done in haste, and as for myself, I shall not believe that there are such proofs until they are shown to me.” Galileo had no such proofs.

The source.

###

For those Husker Fans out there and especially for those Sidetrack Sluts, I present the Sidetrack Band on a remote location from Boulder, CO:

Unfortunately for those that have never been to the Sidetrack bar in Lincoln, NE, watching this video does not end your status of being a Sidetrack Virgin.