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Welcome, one and all to the most intense nightly read anywhere on the sphere… The BitsBlog Nightly Ramble.
This is the BitsBurger edition.
- Letters, we get letters: One of the questions I get about every other week, here at CasaDeBit, is where I get all these photographs I run. How is it they all refer to the Blog? And, what do I mean when I name each day’s Ramble as an ‘Edition’? Well, I guess I can take a moment to explain this to the newcomers. It’s just a bit of editorial fun I started about a year ago. I grab a picture… either off the net, or one I’ve taken myself, and I edit the thing, to make use of the signage in the picture. In today’s case, I grabbed this one off the net, and tossed it into MS PAINT to sort of ‘white out’ bits of the signage to allow me to place my own text on the sign. Then, I use either Photoshop, or even Powerpoint, to put the new text on the sign. What text? Why, referring to BitsBlog, and the Nightly Ramble. Somehow, I always manage to get that reference in. And I’ll identify the day’s Ramble by means of a reference to the picture. In this case, this is the BitsBurger edition. Yesterday, it was a sign in front of a high school I altered, and so yesterday was the Back to School edition.Now, sometimes, I’ll reuse the graphics I create, particularly if I’m writing from the road, as I often do. It’s not easy to manipulate graphics on that scale from a Palm Treo, after all.The idea is to liven up the page a little, to make each day’s ramblng graphically unique, and to give the reader something to look forward to… (I wonder what Bit’s gonna come up with today). Some are crazier than others, some a bit more complex than others. The idea is to raise a smile. So now you understand that bit of BitsBlog trivia, let’s get busy, here. There’s a lot of ground to cover.
- Crisis creation and management for Political ends: I remarked the other day that the coverage of the Swine Flu bit was just a bit overdone and wondered if there wasn’t something political behind it. Turns out, I was right, as Jeannie DeAngelis of The American Thinker explains:
The present pandemic sized health scare is a made-to-order crisis, which could serve to make palatable to the public an unpopular policy proposal. If Obama can successfully exacerbate apprehension in the public, as he has done in the past, his health care bill can pass on the wings of nationwide alarm. The swine flu epidemic presents him with an excellent opportunity to use crisis as a springboard to replace what he considers a flawed market driven health care system, with a government controlled socialized version.I figure there’s a whole mess of long faces among the Democrats that the Swine Flu didn’t really take off. there’s a great deal more to Jeannie’s article of course. Go and read.
- The President sends to Arlington for a Burger: Can someone please explain to me why GE owned NBC was all over the president and the VP sending out for a burger to Arlington, yesterday? And why was NBC busy painting this ‘as something real guys would do’? Is there any other explanation, than this was a scripted hype event, and GE Owned NBC was given Obama a tongue bath, as a return the favor gesture for the billions of taxpayer dollars GE’s been getting of late?
- Empathy and the rule of law: The courts simply cannot have both. That’s a point I made yesterday by quoting Doctor Krauthammer extensively. I note, by way of [2]The Conservative Grapevine [2], Doctor Thomas Sowell at TownHall [3], putting a little meat on those bones.
- Silencing the opposition: Ah, yes, another Labor government, another typical labor ploy; Silence those you don’t agree with. [4] Now, look, I think Savage to be a little more than over the edge.I’ve stated that point many times. At the same time, he’s clearly hitting some nerves, if the Labor Government reacts this way. He’s clearly asking questions and making points that expose the Labor party (And the left here in the US) as the intellectual frauds they are. Let’s consider this. The PM bans Savage from stepping foot in what’s left of England. Have any radical psalmists been so banned? Has Alex Jones… arguably a bigger crackpot than Savage… been banned? No? Anyone from Stormfront? No? Well, now you see the problem.
- Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water: You thought the Tea Party stuff was all done? Think again. [5] And, again. [6] Good for us.
- Parental supervision: Glenn Reynolds [7]links Amy Alkon [8], who says:
“If any of us posting or commenting here were growing up today with the parental supervision we had when we actually did grow up, our parents would very likely be in jail for child neglect and we’d be in foster care.”
Funny that should come up. I was just writing a piece for release come Christmas time, that related that same issue. I pity the kids growing up today, that they lack that freedom. I wonder if the losses because of this trend won’t be more pronounced and more serious than just an inability to go exploring when the mood strikes. A lower level of confidence as adults strikes me as one probable result.
- Boy, that was close: Kathleen Sebelius apparently got out of Kansas just in the nick of time [9]. Something about this doesn’t bode well for the Democrats in the next couple of cycles.
- Enough, already: Someone tell Colin Powell to shut up [10].
- Specter has his non-senior moment: Look, let’s state this right at the off… any enviroment where Jack Murtha can get re-elected given his misdeeds is bound to be a major foulup from the word ‘go’. So, along with about everyone else, last night, James Joyner noted the movement [11]of the Democrats to strip Arlen Specter of his 30 years of seniority. And now for their next magical trick, they’ll likely try to convince him to drop out of the running before a primary gets called for. Specter having his seniority was one of the few remaining reasons Specter had any kind of edge at all in the upcoming cycle. That gone, it’ll be interesting to see how the rest of this falls out. Certainly, the polling data will shift… The most recent was taken prior to his losing that promised promised seniority. The Dems now take on the image of people who break their promises at need. Ask Bush 41 how that game gets played out.
- Meanwhile, in the Maryland Hills: Tom Ridge…. the guy the Republican leadership is pushing for over local favorite Toomey… You know… Tom Ridge.. the guy who actually voted for the ‘Fairness Doctrine’… Turns out he’s actually a Maryland resident, these days [12]. OK, that’s no showstopper. Ridge obviously moved to Maryland to be closer to DC, since he’s becoming more of a Washington insider of late. So, are the Republicans working for a Washington insider to get Specter’s seat? Yeah, that’s gonna fly, huh? That Senate seat and it’s foibles appears to me to be an issue of who can appear more out of touch with reality. Frankly, I’m hard pressed to tell you who’s winning that race.
- Stress tests? So, now, we’re supposed to understand that a number of banks didn’t pass their stress tests, and will likely need further federal funding to stay afloat [13]. Forgive me, but I ahve some problems with the reports. First off, let’s remember that the Administrationw as lothe to allow banks to return Tarp money… mostly because they didn’t want to lose control of the banks they’d loaned money to. On what basis are we now to assume that the Administration isn’t making the case for continued or extended control of those banks under false pretext? Seriously, is there anyone outside of government who understands these tests and if they’re biased in some way?