A Citizen Takes Matters Into His Own Hands

From Powerline Blog: Article Here

I wrote here about the ineptitude of the Toronto Police Department in containing the criminal element that turned out for the G-20 meeting there. Some think I was a little harsh, in that the Toronto PD meant well, but was outsmarted by the rioters. I'm not sure that's a great defense, but it is noted. Meanwhile, civilization's first and principal line of defense isn't the police department, it is the citizenry. So let's all sing 'O Canada' in honor of the young man you see in this video, confronting a looter:

There is a serious point here. The collective power of the citizenry is always far greater than that of any police department. Glenn Reynolds has written that in any 'shooter' incident, there is one group of people who, by definition, are present: the victims. Only they don't have to be victims. They can be armed and dangerous, or, as in the case of this young man, unarmed but still dangerous. A pack, not a herd. All of us need to be ready to fight for civilization, in our own way.

Step Into the Ring - Mike Pence

Why Do We Have Police Forces?

From Powerline: original article

I mean, really? The question is prompted by the riots going on in Toronto, in connection with the G-20 meeting. The same crowd of knaves and fools that always turns out for such events has descended on Toronto and has run riot through much of the city. The criminals have burned a number of vehicles (maybe some of them are from France), as shown in this photo:

Strangest of all is that the burning vehicle in the background is a police car. How does that happen? Didn't it contain policemen? Were they unarmed? I really don't understand the school of police work that apparently considers it good practice to stand by futilely while criminals seize your car and set it on fire.

It wasn't just vehicles, either. Roving bands of criminals smashed windows and looted stores up and down the streets of downtown Toronto:

Again, I simply fail to understand. Are Toronto policemen not armed? Does it not concern them when rovings bands of criminals smash windows and loot stores? People who engage in public, violent crime are asking to be beaten with clubs and, if necessary, shot. I always thought that was the main reason we keep policemen on the payroll.

To be fair, the police have made some arrests. But all too often, they have been mere spectators:

I've spent very little time in Toronto over the years. Last time I was there, it reminded me of an American city of the 1970s--dirty, with a menacing street population and a whiff of violence in the air. That was only an impression, but it may be that inept police work didn't start with the G-20.

At the Corner, Mark Steyn comments on 'spectators in body armor.'

I may have to revise my old line about the British police being 'the most monumentally useless in the developed world'. For the G20 summit, the Toronto coppers ordered up a ton of new body armor, weaponry, gas masks, etc - and then stood around in their state-of-the-art riot gear watching as a bunch of middle-class 'anarchists' trashed the city. Streetcars were left abandoned, and even police cruisers were seized, vandalized and burned. ...

The Toronto PD are your go-to guys if you want a fetching police escort for the Queers Against Israeli Apartheid float in the Pride Parade, but they don't otherwise seem to perform any useful function.

Not this time, anyway.

Sharia Comes to Michigan

From Powerline Blog

Under Sharia law, it is forbidden to proselytize to Muslims, and no Muslim can leave the faith. Dearborn, Michigan, is home to a substantial Muslim population, and there is strong evidence that local authorities now enforce sharia in preference to the Constitution of the United States. Thus this Associated Press story about the arrest of four Christian missionaries that took place on Friday:

Police in the heavily Arab Detroit suburb of Dearborn say they arrested four Christian missionaries for disorderly conduct at an Arab cultural festival.

Police Chief Ron Haddad says his department made the arrests Friday. The four are free on bond.

Here is video of the arrest. The 'disorderly conduct' consisted of handing out copies of the Gospel of John outside the festival. Note the police demand that one of the group stop filming the arrest:

Many people seem to believe that concerns about creeping sharia are exaggerated or misplaced. This incident demonstrates, I think, the contrary.

Dennis Prager – Great Words

If you haven’t followed him you need to…

Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey refuses to be intimidated by the powerful union forces arrayed against him. He has not backed down from his campaign promises (Unlike Scott Brown in Massachusetts) of smaller government and fiscal responsibility. If you have not paid attention to him, you should.

Of course being a man of “size” myself… I am partial to a public figure who casts such a “large” presence….

 

Letter to Gov Christie – 12 Jun 2010

Governor Christie,

On behalf of the 500 plus members of our group I would like to extend a message of thanks to you for your efforts. You have some admirers and friends here in the heartlands that are watching your work with respect and much heartfelt appreciation.

We are fortunate here in Indiana that we have had responsible leadership over the years that have kept our ship of state in somewhat good order. However we fight the same forces you do when it comes to our pubic unions, entitlements and school spending.

You are an inspiration to us all. Of all the public officials your message of accountability has been clear, concise, and consistent, three qualities that seldom come together in words and deeds of contemporary government officials.

We wish you the best and pray for your efforts sir. And should you ever consider seeking a “higher” office know that you have supporters all across this great land.

Godspeed Sir,

Michael Yancey

Trading Oil for Snake Oil

Gun Bans Are Totally Effective... Yeah Right, Daley...

We’ve been talking a lot about the NRA today, and that brings to mind this video from my colleague at the Heartland Institute, Zach Christenson, posted over at Freedom Pub. Watch the whole thing, but particularly the part with Otis MacDonald, the man behind the Chicago gun case, explaining why he needs to own a gun:

MacDonald’s story is moving, and it certainly makes me frustrated. The man just wants to protect himself:

He came to Chicago from Louisiana when he was 17, as part of the Great Migration of blacks. He worked his way up from a janitor to a maintenance engineer, a good job that allowed him and his wife to buy a house on the city’s far South Side in 1972, where they raised their family.

In recent years, McDonald, now a grandfather, has watched the neighborhood deteriorate, the quiet nights he once enjoyed replaced by the sound of gunfire, drunken fights and shattering liquor bottles.

Three times, he says, his house has been broken into — once the front door was wide open and the burglars still out front when his wife and daughter came home from church. A few years ago, he called police to report gunfire, only to be confronted by a man who told him he’d heard about that call and threatened to kill him.

As a commenter over at the Pub writes in response: “Gun bans are 100% effective. You just have to know the actual intent of the gun ban, which is not to lower crime.”

Rudyard Kipling - 1919

This is an interesting poem that Glen Beck is using a stanza from to promote his newest book, “the Overton Window”. Its touched off a firestorm amongst liberal bloggers as to its meaning… read for yourself and see what it says to you:

The Gods of the Copybook Headings

by Rudyard Kipling

AS I PASS through my incarnations in every age and race,
I make my proper prostrations to the Gods of the Market Place.
Peering through reverent fingers I watch them flourish and fall,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings, I notice, outlast them all.

We were living in trees when they met us. They showed us each in turn
That Water would certainly wet us, as Fire would certainly burn:
But we found them lacking in Uplift, Vision and Breadth of Mind,
So we left them to teach the Gorillas while we followed the March of Mankind.

We moved as the Spirit listed. They never altered their pace,
Being neither cloud nor wind-borne like the Gods of the Market Place,
But they always caught up with our progress, and presently word would come
That a tribe had been wiped off its icefield, or the lights had gone out in Rome.

With the Hopes that our World is built on they were utterly out of touch,
They denied that the Moon was Stilton; they denied she was even Dutch;
They denied that Wishes were Horses; they denied that a Pig had Wings;
So we worshipped the Gods of the Market Who promised these beautiful things.

When the Cambrian measures were forming, They promised perpetual peace.
They swore, if we gave them our weapons, that the wars of the tribes would cease.
But when we disarmed They sold us and delivered us bound to our foe,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "Stick to the Devil you know." 

On the first Feminian Sandstones we were promised the Fuller Life
(Which started by loving our neighbour and ended by loving his wife)
Till our women had no more children and the men lost reason and faith,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "The Wages of Sin is Death." 

In the Carboniferous Epoch we were promised abundance for all, 
By robbing selected Peter to pay for collective Paul; 
But, though we had plenty of money, there was nothing our money could buy, 
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "If you don't work you die." 

Then the Gods of the Market tumbled, and their smooth-tongued wizards withdrew
And the hearts of the meanest were humbled and began to believe it was true
That All is not Gold that Glitters, and Two and Two make Four
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings limped up to explain it once more.

As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man
There are only four things certain since Social Progress began. 
That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire, 
And the burnt Fool's bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire;

And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world begins
When all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins, 
As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will burn, 
The Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return! 

Better Late Than Never: Rachel Maddow Taken to Task From Unlikely Quarter - The Huffington Post

It's not often I see something on The Huffington Post I look forward to reading. Here's an exception.

In a post ungrammatically titled "Why Has the New York Times and Rachel Maddow Misled Us?", novelist and essayist Richard Greener on Thursday wrote a stinging rebuke of a Times' June 8 editorial and Maddow's coverage on her show the following day of the Supreme Court emergency order intervening in Arizona's political matching funds law.

The specifics of Greener's criticism of the Times and Maddow can be found by following this link to his post. (A video clip of the Maddow segment in question can be found here).

Greener laid it on thick when it came to Maddow, initially describing her as "always intelligent, smart and savvy and usually 100 percent credible" before going after her assertions about the court's action.

He concluded that "only two explanations remain for Rachel's bad behavior" --

One is, she's just another TV entertainer, another pretty face in a long-line of million-dollar talking heads. She shows up, gets her make-up on and she performs her 'show' for the camera. Unsaid, is that she hasn't a clue what the program's about and perhaps doesn't care very much. After all, it's show business and it's her living we're talking about. It's only 'acting' isn't it? Second is she read the order. She knows perfectly well what it says. But she had a reason to do what she did, the way she did it.

I don't want to believe the first possibility. Don't ask me why. I don't know Rachel Maddow and I never will. But I kinda like her. I think she's cool. And, I admit it -- I usually agree with her. But I really don't want to believe the second because its (sic) so fundamentally dishonest, deceptive and downright creepy that it makes me a little queasy.

Greener deserves credit, as does The Huffington Post, for publishing this, knowing full well that many if not most of the readers on the site are also inclined to agree with Maddow. Where I part company with Greener is in his description of Maddow as "usually 100% percent credible."

Leaving aside the many examples on NewsBusters that undermine this claim, one need not venture far from the Maddow segment that Greener criticizes to see further evidence of this.

The day before Maddow's take on the Supreme Court action, Maddow interviewed Las Vegas Sun columnist and cable-show host Jon Ralston. The interview ended with a minor but telling error on Maddow's part when she thanked Ralston for coming on her show (click here for audio) --

MADDOW: Jon Ralston, columnist for the Las Vegas Sun, host of 'Face to Face with Jon Ralston,' and as a political dean of the press corps in Nevada you've got one of the best jobs in American politics.

... Except that Ralston works in journalism, not politics. Unless the person saying this sees no distinction between the two.

What followed from Maddow on Wednesday and Thursday, however, was egregious.

On Wednesday's show, the same one featuring the segment criticized by Greener, Maddow revisited her verbal jousting with John Birchers at last winter's CPAC gathering in her attempt to tar GOP Senate nominee Sharron Angle with guilt by association (audio here) --

MADDOW: Seeing the John Birch Society back in the heart of the conservative movement has been sort of a trip. I mean, once they got over the impulse to try to pretend that they are not now and never were crazy about stuff like fluoride, they then got right back into the business of being super-paranoid, highly-imaginative conspiracy theorists about stuff like fluoride.

These guys really believe if we're going to get serious about stopping communist mind-control plots, we must oppose the dreaded Bolshevik fluoride in the water. Here's the most amazing thing, though. The John Birch Society now, in that view, has a very highly placed champion, the Republican candidate for Senate in Nevada, Sharron Angle -- fighter against fluoride! Really!

In 1999 the Nevada state assembly passed a bill requiring the fluoridation of water in two Nevada counties. Then-assemblywoman Sharron Angle tried to block fluoridation in one of those counties. According to an account in the Las Vegas Review-Journal, 'Angle said she simply does not like fluoride.'

A day later, Maddow embellished on the basis for Angle's opposition to fluoridation (audio here) --

MADDOW: Now that Sharron Angle has won the Republican nomination for Senate to run against Harry Reid in Nevada, now the fun part. Now the fun part is watching the national Republican political establishment try to figure out what to do with Sharron Angle. Try to figure out how to balance that national Republican frothing, clamoring, heart-racing desire to beat Harry Reid with the fact that their candidate against Harry Reid thinks that fluoride in drinking water is a conspiracy and recently suggested that beer should be illegal. Sow's ear, can you become a silk purse? Can you?!

To recap: Maddow on Wednesday -- Angle's opposition to fluoridation, according to the newspaper Maddow cited quoting Angle, is personal distaste. Maddow on Thursday claims as "fact" that Angle believes fluoridation is a "conspiracy" -- as in Bolshevik.

Sharing Angle's concern, by the way, is that scurrilous right-wing rag Scientific American, which ran an article titled "Second Thoughts on Fluoride" in 2008. Guess they're in on the conspiracy too.

Maddow is "usually 100% percent credible"? Hardly. More like, slippery as an oil slick.

Louisiana Congressman Smacks Down Chris Matthews: If Titanic Sank Today Obama Would Blame It On Bush

Chris Matthews on Friday got himself marvelously smacked down by a Louisiana Congressman.

In an at times heated discussion about energy policy with Reps. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) and Steve Scalise (R-La.), the "Hardball" host continually bashed the GOP.

"The smartest move for your party is to screw things up for the next couple of years, right through November, get the country completely bollixed up, and they will vote Republican out of desperation, and you will have more power," said Matthews. "Is that the strategy of the Republican Party this year?"

When Scalise refuted this claim, Matthews added, "If the Titanic sank today, you know what the Republicans would be saying? Don`t be telling the shipping lines they need more life rafts or life preservers."

Scalise marvelously responded, "If the Titanic sank today, I`m sure the president would try to blame it on George Bush" (video follows with partial transcript and commentary):

CHRIS MATTHEWS, HOST: Here`s Mitch McConnell`s position, which I think is not a position. He said: "What I believe most of my members, if not all of them, will not be interested in is seizing on the oil spill in the Gulf and using that as a rationale, if you will, for passing a national energy tax referred to down here at the White House as cap and trade."

Now, that`s a negative position. What is the positive position in terms of moving forward? And do you support some kind of negotiation with the Democrats, which never seems to get done in this presidency? You guys -- McConnell from day one has said you guys` platform is no. That`s your platform.

REP. DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ (D), FLORIDA: That`s right.

MATTHEWS: That`s what...

(CROSSTALK)

REP. STEVE SCALISE (R-LA), ENERGY & COMMERCE CMT: Well...

MATTHEWS: Is he right? Is McConnell right? The smartest move for your party is to screw things up for the next couple of years, right through November, get the country completely bollixed up, and they will vote Republican out of desperation, and you will have more power? Is that the strategy of the Republican Party this year? Because McConnell says it is. [...]

MATTHEWS: What I see here...

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: What do I see? If the Titanic sank today, you know what the Republicans would be saying? Don`t be telling the shipping lines they need more life rafts or life preservers. Don`t get involved with industry telling them what to do. At some point, the government has to intervene, because the private sector is not doing the job. The private sector is what we`re seeing on that live bug every night on television. By the way, Congressman, that`s the work of the private sector without regulation. That`s what it looks like without being taxed heavily.

Actually, what we're seeing in the Gulf of Mexico right now indeed IS the result of an over-regulated industry. If our oil companies were allowed to drill in Alaska AND set up more rigs closer to the coast, they wouldn't be drilling in mile-deep seas.

For some reason folks like Matthews just don't get that! But I digress:

SCALISE: Well, but the federal government is the regulator, Chris.

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: Your oil patch people have been getting away for centuries without paying taxes.

You have had the biggest tax breaks in the world because you have controlled the Ways and Means Committee. You have controlled the Finance Committees and the regulating committees to the point there is no regulation of safety.

This is either astonishing stupidity or an out and out lie. The Democrats have controlled both chambers of Congress -- and therefore the Ways and Means Committee as well as the Finance Committees - since January 2007! That's approaching three and a half years.

In fact, Democrats have mostly controlled Congress since oil exploration began in this country. As such, any suggestion to the contrary is absurd.

Fortunately, Scalise had the best line of the night:

MATTHEWS: You have had your way. So, that works. And we`re seeing it every night on the air.

(CROSSTALK)

SCALISE: If the Titanic sank today, I`m sure the president would try to blame it on George Bush. And we have seen where that has gotten us.

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: Well, that`s not useful.

Actually, it's quite useful -- and spot on!

Bravo, Congressman! Bravo!

Marlin Stutzman gets the nomination

Marlin Stutzman received the caucus nomination in Indiana’s third congressional district to be the Republican candidate to replace Mark Souder.

Congrats Marlin!

You have GOT to be kidding me…

This is found in every copy of the “United States Constitution” printed by “Wilder Publications”…

Read more about it at the CATO at Liberty…. here

Wait a minute. Wait just one minute on this.

We’re heard the quote from the President. Now read it.

“I don’t sit around just talking to experts because this is a college seminar. We talk to these folks because they potentially have the best answers so I know whose ass to kick.”

No seriously. Read it again.

“I don’t sit around just talking to experts because this is a college seminar. We talk to these folks because they potentially have the best answers so I know whose ass to kick.”

He is talking to experts not to find out how to solve the problem but to find out whose ass to kick? Seriously?

That is the President of the United States in his own words.

There is one well leaking caused by the collapse of one platform owned by one company.

Not only has Barack Obama not once talked to the CEO of that company, his big donor British Petroleum, he overreacted and shut down every company’s offshore drilling — every single one. He put, effective immediately, tens of thousands of people on the unemployment line.

And in the President of the United States own words, he’s not talking to experts to figure out how to solve the problem, but to figure out who to assign blame to.

This is not leadership. Heck, this isn’t even bullying.

This is failure.

Bye Helen, can’t say we will miss ya…

A picture is word a thousand words…

Nothing I have heard explains how liberals view our illegal immigration problem as this screen capture from MSNBC does: