Regulation, government and big business

Love this analogy from Dooley Womack:

"I’ve always thought that regulatory risk is a lot like having Tony Soprano for a business partner. The U.S. government, our stand-in for Mr. Soprano in this analogy, may not have interests that are directly congruent with that of the business owner (as David Scatino found out in season 2 of The Sopranos), but there’s no better ally to have if you want to discourage competition."

Tuesday notes

A couple of things that caught my eye in yesterday's reading:

James Taranto makes a great point about the prolific smear campaign against Tea Parties: if the journalists, bloggers and politicians were really worried about political violence and incendiary rhetoric, they would tone down their own rhetoric out of fear. The very fact that they have ramped it up is de facto evidence, as well as an admission, that they know that there is nothing to fear from Tea Parties.

Another story in Monday's BOTWT noted yet another in the endless line of global warming frauds. Taranto's comment nails it:

Those of us outside "the scientific community," meanwhile, wonder how it can get away with continuing calling itself "scientific" when its conclusions are impervious to empirical testing.

Proposed Constitutional Amendment

I can't imagine why anybody, except of course the members of Congress, would not be in favor of this:

"Congress shall make no law that applies to the citizens of the United States that does not apply equally to the Senators and/or Representatives, and Congress shall make no law that applies to the Senators and/or Representatives that does not apply equally to the citizens of the United States."

Especially timely since Congress just got through passing an abominable health care law from which they specifically exempted themselves, their families, and their staffs. Which shows you how they really feel about the coming effects of this law.

The state of state education

Why do we need school choice? Check out this comment from a Volokh post:

My fourth grader has been assigned four essays so far this year. They were on MLK, Michael Jordan, Dr. Charles Drew and his mother. He knows who Eleanor Roosevelt was, but not FDR. He identifies Albert Einstein as “a famous immigrant”. He knows who Rosa Parks was, but not Abe Lincoln.

This despicable school has moved from education, right past indoctrination, all the way to brainwashing. Have they no shame?

It ain't about choice

Fascinating quote from Bart Stupak, on the mindset of Democrat leaders with respect to publicly funded abortion in a health care takeover bill:

[Democrat leaders are saying] "If you pass the Stupak amendment, more children will be born, and therefore it will cost us millions more."

What is fascinating is that it lays bare the lie that the political movement for abortion is about "a woman's right to choose." In fact, it is about keeping children from being born. Especially, as Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg put it, the wrong kind of children.

You always feel a little queasy when the curtain is pulled back and you find out that they really feel the way your worst fears conjured.