I don't think you understand the meaning of "fairly"

This is a hilarious passage from an AP story:

One in eight people earning at least $1 million annually was audited by the Internal Revenue Service last year, making them far likelier to be examined than those making below $200,000, according to IRS data released Thursday.

Just 1 in 100 individuals earning less than $200,000 had their income tax returns examined, the IRS said.

The 12 percent of millionaire earners audited in 2011 was appreciably higher than the 8 percent who were audited in 2010. IRS officials said the high ratio was part of an effort to demonstrate that tax laws are applied fairly.

Of course, what it actually demonstrates is that tax laws are applied unfairly, extremely and ludicrously unfairly. The only fair application would be for no individual to be any more likely to be audited than any other, regardless of income or any other factor.

Truth in advertising

Jay Nordlinger tells it as Cuba trip promoters would tell it if they were honest:

"A friend sends me this notice: The University of Michigan Alumni Association is preparing a trip to the Castros’ Cuba! Take advantage of the segregated beaches, restaurants, and hotels! (“Tourism apartheid,” some call it.) Enjoy a place where a single party rules! Where the media have only one point of view! Where dissenters are jailed and tortured! Where American aid workers are held hostage! And don’t forget the underage prostitution!

Oh, you’ll love your trip. Totalitarian Cuba is in some ways even better than Ann Arbor, which after all has a Republican party. Go Blue!"

What he said (neo segregation)

Jay Nordlinger at NRO echoes a thought I often have:

The other day, I was reading about “the first Latino fundraiser for Obama’s candidacy.” The president was talking to “about 120 mostly Latino contributors.” And I thought, “Even our fundraisers are segregated now? Must everything in American life be divided up by ethnicity and race?”

I have an idea: How about separate drinking fountains and toilet facilities? Has anyone ever thought of that?

E pluribus unum — a great principle. We ought to think about adopting it and living it someday . . .

While on the subject, his Impromptus column is one of my favorite reads, hitting issues most pundits ignore.

Carbon emissions are more dangerous than I thought!

Thanks to James Taranto for the pointer to this beautiful piece from the Guardian:

Aliens may destroy humanity to protect other civilisations, say scientists
Rising greenhouse emissions could tip off aliens that we are a rapidly expanding threat, warns a report


It may not rank as the most compelling reason to curb greenhouse gases, but reducing our emissions might just save humanity from a pre-emptive alien attack, scientists claim.

Watching from afar, extraterrestrial beings might view changes in Earth's atmosphere as symptomatic of a civilisation growing out of control – and take drastic action to keep us from becoming a more serious threat, the researchers explain.
[...]
"Green" aliens might object to the environmental damage humans have caused on Earth and wipe us out to save the planet. "These scenarios give us reason to limit our growth and reduce our impact on global ecosystems. It would be particularly important for us to limit our emissions of greenhouse gases, since atmospheric composition can be observed from other planets," the authors write.

It's science! Little green men are green in more ways than one.

Mid August overflow

A few things I've run across that are too long to fit on Twitter, which has all but killed my blogging:

James Taranto: “Times have changed. In the 1930s, government was small. Expanding it massively in order to solve problems might or might not have been a good idea, but there's no denying it was innovative. Today government is sclerotic. Those who believe more government is the solution to America's problems are at best unthinking reactionaries. The Tea Partiers, having clearly identified this problem, are today's true progressives (to employ the term in its literal rather than ideological sense).”

I have long made variations on this same theme, especially with regard to Social Security.

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More Taranto: “Obama's failure is the failure of the liberal elite, and that is why their ressentiment has reached such intensity. Their ideas, such as they are, are being put to a real-world test and found severely wanting. As a result, their authority is collapsing. And if there is one thing they know deep in their bones, it is that they are entitled to that authority. They lash out, desperately and pathetically, because they have nothing to offer but fear and anger.”

Watching leftists try to explain away the failure of their policy ideas has served as a bit of dark comedy, but it hardly takes away the sting of having to live under said policies.

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Jack Kelly: “Boiled to its essence, Progressivism is the belief that government knows best. More specifically, that government in the hands of such wise and public spirited people as Progressives imagine themselves to be knows better how to run businesses than do the men and women who own them; knows better what's good for ordinary people than the people do themselves….

The failure of their policies to improve the lives of most Americans didn't trouble Progressives much, because their focus changed. What was good for teacher unions became more important than what was good for students. What was good for public employee unions became more important than whether bureaucracies were serving the public well. To Progressive politicians, the votes of minorities became more important than their economic well being.”

I think this is exactly right: trying to argue specific policy ideas with them based on the results they produce is fruitless, because they do not care what the outcome of policies are. What is important to them is feeling like you are doing something good, and more importantly being able to convince interest groups that you mean them well. Feelings vs results is the “Mars and Venus” aspect of so much political discussion in this country, why neither side even understands the other.

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Richard Miniter: "Obama is not the new FDR, but the new Gorbachev: a man forced to preside over the demise of a political system he desperately wants to save,"
Indeed, the line has been going around about how ironic it would be if Obama is the guy who finally discredits socialism (don’t hold your breath, that people still believe in it today shows that it is more religion than reasoned worldview).

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Jay Nordlinger: “Question: If a state votes for lions of early-’70s liberalism, Jerry Brown and Barbara Boxer, over such forward thinkers as Meg Whitman and Carly Fiorina — not to mention those challengers’ entrepreneurial credentials — doesn’t the state kind of deserve what it gets?”

Indeed it does, Jay.

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The dishonesty of Chris Matthews knows no bounds. He correctly quoted a 1987 Reagan speech:

"Congress consistently brings the government to the edge of default. ... This brinkmanship threatens the holders of government bonds and those who rely on Social Security and veterans benefits. Interest rates would skyrocket, instability would occur in financial markets, and the federal deficit would soar. The United States has a special responsibility to itself and the world to meet its obligations."

Without quoting the rest of the passage, making clear the meaning:

"For those who say more taxes will solve our deficit problem, they are wrong. Every time Congress increases taxes, the deficit does not decrease, spending increases. It's time for a clear and consistent policy to reduce the federal budget deficit. ... You don't need more taxes to balance the budget. Congress needs the discipline to stop spending more, and that can be done with the passage of a constitutional amendment to balance the budget. ... But I ... will not permit Congress to dismantle our national defense, to jeopardize arms reduction or to increase your taxes. I am determined that will not happen."

Until next time...

Wait, who's in office now?

Hypocrisy busts are too easy, but this one is so devoid of principle I cannot resist (hat tip @jamestaranto):

* "This theory of presidential power argues, in essence, that when the President acts in his capacity as Commander-in-Chief, he may make his own rules and cannot be bound by Congressional laws to the contrary. This is a theory of presidential dictatorship. These views are outrageous and inconsistent with basic principles of the Constitution as well as with two centuries of legal precedents. Yet they were the basic assumptions of key players in the Bush Administration in the days following 9/11."--Jack Balkin, Yale Law School, March 3, 2009

* " 'At the point at which the economy is melting down, who cares what the Supreme Court is going to say?' Professor Balkin said. 'It's the president's duty to save the Republic.' "--New York Times, July 25, 2011

He was against dictatorship before he was for it!

Don't stop there, NY

David Burge aka Iowahawk was on fire with some suggestions for the state of New York to pursue if they really give a damn about civil rights on his twitter feed (@iowahawk) yesterday, with some additions from his followers:

I think NY's married gay couples should be able to carry handguns legally.

I think NY's married gay couples should be free to smoke within 30 feet of a public building.

I think NY's married gay couples should be free to smoke, drink sugared soft drinks, and eat salty snacks with transfats.

I think NY's married gay couples should never have to pay more than 20% of their income to government.

I think NY's married gay couples should be able to open businesses without paying for 800 permits and licenses.

(From @KurtSchlichter) I think NY's married gay couples should be free of the burden of trillions in deadbeat-subsidizing federal debt. #Caring

(From @KurtSchlichter) I reckon that none of NY's married gay couples should have to pay one plum nickel to fund cowboy poetry slams. #Caring

(From @KurtSchlichter) I think NY's married gay couples should be able to protect themselves from homophobes by lawfully carrying concealed handguns

I think that If NY's married gay couples adopt kids, they should have a choice where to send them to school.

I think NY's married gay couples shouldn't be forced to pay for the fat pensions of NY's army of overpaid government time-wasters.

(From WAMK) I think that NY's married gay couples shouldn't have to gaze at their new marriage certificates under a CFL bulb.

(From @jtLOL) NY's married gay couples should be able to eat their own wedding cake without Bloomberg slapping it out of their hands.

I believe married gay couples in NY have the right to buy a gas-guzzling SUV.

A CFL mea pulpa

Glenn Reynolds aka Instapundit was one of the first vocal supporters of replacing incandescent light bulbs with CFL's. It didn't turn out quite as well as he had hoped:

I have to say I’m deeply, deeply disappointed with CFL bulbs. I replaced pretty much every regular bulb in the house with CFLs, but they’ve been failing at about the same rate as ordinary long-life bulbs, despite the promises of multi-year service. And I can’t tell any difference in my electric bill. Plus, the Insta-Wife hates the light. I’ve had somewhat better luck with LED bulbs, of which I have a couple, but though the longevity is better, the light is still inferior.

So, to review...inferior light, higher up-front cost, no savings during usage, no savings from lasting longer.

Oh, and he forgot to mention the hazardous waste methods of disposing of broken bulbs, hope you don't have kids or pets!

How is it that this gratuitous transfer of wealth from consumers to major light bulb manufacturers has been allowed to stay on the books?

The despicable UN

Nice catch by James Taranto, excerpting comments praising Libya's human rights record from some of the gallery of murderers that is the UN Human Rights Council:

Sudan noted the country's positive experience in achieving a high school enrolment rate and improvements in the education of women. The Syrian Arab Republic praised the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya for its serious commitment to and interaction with the Human Rights Council and its mechanisms. . . . North Korea praised the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya for its achievements in the protection of human rights. . . . Palestine [sic] commended the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya for the consultations held with civil society in the preparation of the national report. . . . Saudi Arabia commended the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya's achievements in its constitutional, legislative and institutional frameworks. . . . Venezuela acknowledged the efforts of the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya to promote economic, social and cultural rights, especially those of children. . . . Cuba commended the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya for the progress made. . . . Myanmar commended the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya for its economic and social progress.

Why do we continue to pretend that the UN is a legitimate geopoltical organization? Why do we fund it? Isn't it time it joined the League of Nations in history's dustbin?

Jew baiting in The Guardian

James Taranto catches a hilarious correction in London's Guardian:

A quote by Tzipi Livni, Israel's former foreign minister, within a panel that formed part of the Palestine papers, was cut in a way that may have given a misleading impression. The quote appeared as: "The Israel policy is to take more and more land day after day and that at the end of the day we'll say that it is impossible, we already have the land and cannot create the state." To clarify, the full quote is: "I understand the sentiments of the Palestinians when they see the settlements being built. The meaning from the Palestinian perspective is that Israel takes more land, that the Palestinian state will be impossible, the Israel policy is to take more and more land day after day and that at the end of the day we'll say that it is impossible, we already have the land and cannot create the state." (What they said ... 24 January, page 4.)

See, the actual quote is a Livni describing Palestinian propaganda, but the paper edited it to present the Palestinian propaganda itself! Hilarious (in a macabre sort of way) example of the fundamental anti-Semitism that is so matter of fact on the European left.

The issues and implications of START

Great stuff from the scrupulously nonpartisan intelligence consultants Stratfor on START and the issues of nuclear proliferation/disarmament/defense. Read the whole thing, but there's a particular point I wanted to highlight:

The number of weapons may affect budgetary considerations and theoretical targeting metrics, but the danger of nuclear war does not derive from the number of weapons but from the political relationship between nations.

This cannot be overstated. Nuclear war will not be one iota less likely if the US massively disarms. It will, on the other hand, be at maximum likelihood if it completely or near completely disarms, or if rogue nations gain nuclear power of their own. The idea that nuclear arms reduction has any effect on the possibility of nuclear war is anachronistic at best; more accurate adjectives would include childlike, unserious.

Continuing on that theme:

New START is therefore as archaic as the Treaty of Versailles. It neither increases nor decreases security. It addresses a security issue that last had meaning more than 20 years ago in a different geopolitical universe. If a case can be made for reducing nuclear weapons, it must be made in the current geopolitical situation. Arguing for strategic arms reduction may have merit, but trying to express it in the context of an archaic treaty makes little sense.

Busted

James Taranto does a great job of exposing media hypocrisy, usually (but not always, as today) under the heading of "Two ___ in One!" Today he caught the execrable Cynthia Tucker describing herself as taking the "Rovian low road":

* "McCain and his running mate, Sarah Palin, have themselves followed the Rovian low road by questioning Obama's patriotism."--Cynthia Tucker, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Oct. 26, 2008

* "There is simply no modern precedent for the behavior of Republicans in the U.S. Senate. They are not only hyper-partisan, but they are also petty, petulant and unpatriotic."--Cynthia Tucker, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Dec. 20, 2010

Chamber of Commerce data

Common sense told me the Chamber of Commerce attack was all BS, but I never was sure how much so. Thanks to Jack Kelly, now I do:

Led by President Barack Obama, Democrats are trying to make campaign finance an issue, by charging — without a shred of evidence — that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is funding its advertising campaign in part with foreign money.

The flimsy basis for this charge is the Chamber has overseas affiliates for which it charges dues. Revenue from these dues amounts to less than $100,000 a year. The Chamber's budget this year is about $200 million. The Chamber plans to spend about $50 million on independent advertising this year, mostly on behalf of Republicans.

So calling it BS was an undersell; this was a fairy tale of epic proportions.

Foreign revenue amounts to only 0.0005 (1/20 of 1%) of their overall budget, and .002 (1/5 of 1%) of their advertising budget this year (not all of which is on Republicans, so that overstates it some).

The president has established himself as a hyper-partisan attack dog, but even in that context this fable diminishes him and the office. This level of sleaze is best left for the Alan Graysons of the world.

Mr. President, you're better than that.

The entire column is worth a read, as he also addresses special interests and influence buying in elections. The, ummm, money quote:

The funding of our politics chiefly by special interests is one big reason why we're falling off a fiscal cliff. For an expenditure of millions, special interest groups — be they labor unions or Wall Street bankers — reap billions in taxpayer subsidies.

Our politicians respond more to the special interests which provide them with money than they do to constituents who can provide them only with votes.

This is the problem with the Leviathan state, and why it is the biggest threat to our freedom. It is way too easy to bribe politicians into stealing our money to pay back the bribers.

1994 v 2010

James Taranto opens his Tuesday BOTWT with an insightful comparison of the 1994 and 2010 political environments.

I was especially struck by this Gingrich-Obama parallel:

Speaker Newt Gingrich, meanwhile, had something of an Obama problem: Having run a stunningly successful campaign, he was too full of himself, overambitious and insufficiently disciplined to do his new job well.

Spot on.

Also, the obvious theme:

Some of the Democrats' biggest mistakes of 2010 have been the result of "learning the lessons of 1994." That year, the Dems failed to enact a ruinous and unpopular health-care "reform" package, and they got trounced in midterm elections. Somehow this year they convinced themselves that if they succeeded in enacting a ruinous and unpopular health-care "reform" package, things would turn out differently.

There is a staggering level of cognitive dissonance, and lack of self-awareness, in thinking that there is something wrong with the voters or their understanding of Obamacare.

The problem is the very idea. Americans would prefer to make their own medical and health decisions, not have them imposed by force by an overbearing federal government. That is something that is unlikely to change, given that decades of propaganda gone into selling the idea to multiple generations has failed.

Although I guess trying to make future generations dumber by giving teachers' unions free reign over education policy is a solid back up plan.

The UN regains relevance

The UN has fallen pretty far in recent decades, having gone from a legitimate geopolitical organization to a recurring Jew-bashing conference.

But don't despair, they are working their way back to usefulness, as the Times of London reports:

The United Nations, tackling head-on the problem of what to do if an alien says "take me to your leader," is poised to designate a specific individual for the task. . . .

the UN is set to select an obscure Malaysian astrophysicist who is head of its little-known Office for Outer Space Affairs (Unoosa).

Mazlan Othman will describe her potential new role next week at a scientific conference at the Royal Society's Kavli conference centre in Buckinghamshire. . . .

The UN has tried previously to contact alien life. The two Voyager spacecraft launched in 1977 carried a message from Kurt Waldheim, then secretary-general, saying: "We step out of our solar system into the universe seeking only peace and friendship."

However, scientists are now embarrassed by Mr Waldheim's deployment as an interstellar envoy because it later emerged that he had been an enthusiastic member of the Nazi party.

Hat tip: James Taranto, whose added comment (end of column) is worth a look in addition.

Legal only in the sense of not being against the law

Here is a hilarious passage from a typical regurgitation of DNC talking points by the New York Times wing of the party, in this case on Tom DeLay:

Mr. DeLay, the Texas Republican who had been the House majority leader, crowed that he had been "found innocent." But many of Mr. DeLay's actions remain legal only because lawmakers have chosen not to criminalize them.

Well, the Times editorial board certainly nailed this one.

I had grilled chicken breast for dinner. It is only legal for me to eat grilled chicken breast because lawmakers have chosen not to criminalize eating grilled chicken breast. Indeed, you might as well say that I am guilty of a crime, when you really think about it. For me to claim to be "innocent" would not really be honest, now would it?

Not to the editors of the Times, anyway.

A rare bit of candor

In case you missed it, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs got caught being honest in an article that appeared yesterday:

"I hear these people saying he's like George Bush. Those people ought to be drug tested," Gibbs said. "I mean, it's crazy."

The press secretary dismissed the "professional left" in terms very similar to those used by their opponents on the ideological right, saying, "They will be satisfied when we have Canadian healthcare and we've eliminated the Pentagon. That's not reality."

Of those who complain that Obama caved to centrists on issues such as healthcare reform, Gibbs said: "They wouldn't be satisfied if Dennis Kucinich was president."

Not surprisingly, he was blistered by the, uh, professional left for his apostasy. Interesting that he was not there today, I guess they are trying to decide whether or not to cave in to the hard left's desire to Shirley Sherrod him.

Much ado about nothing?

Andrew Enum in the NYT:

“Anyone who has spent the past two days reading through the 92,000 military field reports and other documents made public by the whistle-blower site WikiLeaks may be forgiven for wondering what all the fuss is about. I’m a researcher who studies Afghanistan and have no regular access to classified information, yet I have seen nothing in the documents that has either surprised me or told me anything of significance. I suspect that’s the case even for someone who reads only a third of the articles on Afghanistan in his local newspaper.”

I don't even pretend to have looked through the paper mountain that WL dumped, but I was already familiar with the things Enum cites in this piece, so maybe there really is no "there" there.

Not that it would excuse the extreme lack of ethics and general sleaze of the whole exercise, mind you.

Quick hits

Some political quickies:

I’m sorry, I just fail to see how the exposure of a group of major media figures coordinating efforts to suppress news damaging to the Obama campaign and to propagandize in an attempt to get him elected is news. Are people seriously surprised to hear that this was happening? Could anybody have thought it was not?

***

Looks like one Obamacare lie has been exposed pretty quickly:

The Obama Administration will give Pennsylvania $160 million to set up a new "high-risk" insurance program under a provision of the federal health care legislation enacted in March.

It has quietly approved a plan submitted by an appointee of pro-abortion Governor Edward Rendell under which the new program will cover any abortion that is legal in Pennsylvania.

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How perfect is it that the president of a former civil rights organization which, having become obsolete, devolved into a garden variety hate and grievance group is named…Ben Jealous? It’s downright eponymous.

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Tom Sowell echoes my feelings on said organization: “[T]hat an organization like the NAACP, after years of fighting against genuine racism, should now be playing the game of race-card fraud is especially painful to see.”

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More Sowell: “[Voting for Obama thinking that he would be a post-racial president] was an honest mistake of the kind that decent people have often made when dealing with people whose agendas are not constrained by decency, but only by what they think they can get away with.”

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Jack Kelly on Obama’s curious decision to object to al Qaeda because, of all things, racism:

Objecting to al Qaida mainly because its leaders may harbor racial prejudices is kind of like objecting to Hitler mainly because he gave preference to tall blondes with blue eyes.

Al Qaida is objectionable because of the many murders it commits in pursuit of its Islamo-fascist ideology, which is objectionable enough in itself. The president's comments -- and more so those of his aide -- give the impression he'd think better of these terrorists if they had a diversity officer and an affirmative action program.

Barack Obama pledged to be America's first "post-racial" president. But in office, he's been more obsessed with race than any president since Woodrow Wilson, who imposed segregation on the federal government.

Quick hits 5/5

Items of note from my stack of reading material:

The individual who wrote "Dear Lord . . . this year you have taken away my favorite actor, Patrick Swayze, my favorite actress, Farrah Fawcett, my favorite singer, Michael Jackson, and my favorite salesman, Billy Mays. . . . I just wanted to let you know that Chris Christie is my favorite governor" in a New Jersey teacher’s union memo still has a job. Why is that, exactly?

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Larry Elder on Michael Steele’s unfortunate decision to play the black victim card as excuse for his own incompetence:

Steele blames his difficulties on the "African-American … slimmer margin for error" — the same hazard that Obama deals with. Honestly. From the traditional media to the punditry class to academia to the monologues of late-night comics, never has any president enjoyed a more groveling, fawning, obsequious, hear-no-evil, speak-no-evil, see-no-evil quasi-deification.

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Charles Krauthammer on Obama’s nuclear foolishness:

Under President Obama's new policy, however, if the state that has just attacked us with biological or chemical weapons is "in compliance with the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT)," explained Gates, then "the U.S. pledges not to use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against it."

Imagine the scenario: Hundreds of thousands are lying dead in the streets of Boston after a massive anthrax or nerve gas attack. The president immediately calls in the lawyers to determine whether the attacking state is in compliance with the NPT. If it turns out that the attacker is up to date with its latest IAEA inspections, well, it gets immunity from nuclear retaliation. (Our response is then restricted to bullets, bombs and other conventional munitions.)

However, if the lawyers tell the president that the attacking state is NPT-noncompliant, we are free to blow the bastards to nuclear kingdom come.

This is quite insane. It's like saying that if a terrorist deliberately uses his car to mow down a hundred people waiting at a bus stop, the decision as to whether he gets (a) hanged or (b) 100 hours of community service hinges entirely on whether his car had passed emissions inspections. […]

This administration seems to believe that by restricting retaliatory threats and by downgrading our reliance on nuclear weapons, it is discouraging proliferation.

But the opposite is true. Since World War II, smaller countries have forgone the acquisition of deterrent forces — nuclear, biological and chemical — precisely because they placed their trust in the firmness, power and reliability of the American deterrent.

Seeing America retreat, they will rethink. And some will arm. There is no greater spur to hyper-proliferation than the furling of the American nuclear umbrella.

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Mickey Kaus: “It’s getting highly annoying to hear Obama and Senate Democrats pretend that to have effective border control we have to take a package deal that includes amnesty. They’re worse than the cable company when it comes to package deals.”

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Phil Jackson, on the silly decision by the Suns to alienate more than half their fan base by making a heavy handed political statement tonight:

“I don’t think teams should get involved in the political stuff. And I think this one’s still kind of coming out to balance as to how it’s going to be favorably looked upon by our public. If I heard it right the American people are really for stronger immigration laws, if I’m not mistaken. Where we stand as basketball teams, we should let that kind of play out and let the political end of that go where it’s going to go.”