Democratic Socialism, A Cuban American Explains

https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/voices/2018/08/28/democrat-family-escaped-socialism-ocasio-cortez-worries-me-column/1106307002/

This column by the son of Cuban immigrants is worth the time. I think this paragraph gives us a look at the only "benefit" of "Democratic Socialism" ...

Like those of yesteryear, today’s socialists believe the government should nationalize major industries, propose eliminating private ownership of companies, and reject profits. In other words, democratic socialism is a lot like the system my family fled, except its proponents promise to be nicer when seizing your business.

What I disagree with the columnist on is that what "Democratic Socialism" really is would be "Democratic Fascism" ... Hitler with a smiley face. This is well covered in Jonah Goldberg's book "Liberal Fascism". 

Today's millenials are ripe for fascism ... certainly not students of history, very easily taken in by the slick pitch about "greatest good for the greatest number", no theological of philosophical grounding.  Lambs to the slaughter.

#FakePartisan, Enemy Of The Deep State

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/president-non-grata-trump-often-unwelcome-and-unwilling-to-perform-basic-rituals-of-the-office/2018/08/28/302b60ee-aa16-11e8-a8d7-0f63ab8b1370_story.html?utm_term=.d8d61dac61b6&wpisrc=nl_most&wpmm=1

Understanding "politics" in BOistan 2018 is very simple:

1. There is ONE party, "The Party" (TP-D) that you must be a member of if you want to be "elite". It owns the Deep / Administrative State, the MSM, all of the legal system except for the SCOTUS, education, and corporate BOistan except for a few energy companies.
2. There is a #FakeParty that uses an elephant as a symbol -- see below to understand this party IS NOT "the opposition" to TP ... it is the adjunct cutout.
3. TP and it's stooges in the #FakeParty are completely beholden to the Deep / Administrative State as well as the international Davos crowd. Follow the money ... in BOistan it is in DC and government workers. 

What is the proof of this for this week? Read on ...

In addition to being pointedly not invited to McCain’s funeral and memorial service later this week — while former presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush will both eulogize the Arizona Republican — Trump was quietly asked to stay away from former first lady Barbara Bush’s funeral earlier this year.

If our "politicians" where truly "partisan", rules like Ronald Reagan's 11th commandment  ("Thou shalt not speak ill of a fellow Republican") would be in effect. While supposedly "in power", W was never accepted as a legitimate president by TP. He was "appointed by the SCOTUS", he was too stupid to read, he was castigated because it was claimed he wasn't a very good fighter pilot in the TX National Guard (nevermind that Slick Willie and BO never put on any sort of uniform for even a day).

Now however? The Bushes are fully alingned with TP to discredit and remove Trump! "Partisanship" stops at TRUMP ... because Trump threatens the Deep / Adminstrative / Davos TP State! It's been 30 years since Reagan left the White House, and since that time we have had nothing but TP controlled "presidents" up to Trump!

HW was a former director of the CIA -- you don't get much more Deep State than that. Slick Willie was a nothing from Arkansas, but he had spent time at Oxford including taking part in anti-Vietnam war protests off shore, and a week long foray into the USSR. Slick was somewhat a "citizen of the world" as well (hick of the world?).

W was and is clearly part of the TP controlled state apparatus. Sure, he "played a role" as being something different during the early '00's, but unsurprisingly, he and BO were on the same page relative to the massive government bailouts of Wall Street and the banks in '08. I'm sure they will enjoy getting together and comparing notes on the joys of being an ex-president member of TP in good standing!

Isn't it convienient that John McCain was the cutout for the coronation of BO? Then Mittens Romney with his "binders of women" and his arcane thinking that Russia, RUSSIA! Was an enemy! This was 2012 folks ... BO proudly put poor Mitt in his place with "The 1980's called, they wanted their foreign policy back!". Hey, "the Cold War is OVER" ... those Russians are GOOD GUYS, they even take our astronauts to space!

The TP controlled media has told you the Russians are our friends, up to enforcing BO's "Red Line" (pink line?) in Syria in 2013 AND our sworn enemies over a period of less than 6 years. Are you a marionette or a thinking person?

As we watch the TP controlled State cannonize one of the true RINO weasels of all time this week, watch and LEARN. **ONLY** when we ALL bow and scrape to TP can we be "one nation of BOistan, under Satan". There is zero room for diversity of thought in BOistan. Learn to be comfortable in the "way of the weasel" if you want to be a "Republican" ... run on one thing, then do the opposite! THEN, be cannonized by TP as a "great man".

If you want to stand up and be what used to be called "American", Trump is the only current leader around with those credentials. Imperfect as hell, YEsssss! One can dream of a time with better leaders that stand for something other than fealty to TP, but that time is not yet! If we don't support this one, be ready to stand in socialist lines and do without!

No Virtue To Signal

Virtue & Democracy -- The People We Deserve | National Review:

I've been blogging for 13 years now and thinking critically (meaning reading history, philosophy and theology) rather than buying into the "flavor of the day" from ANY news source ... left or right for 40years. I have no need to virtue signal -- I have no virtue, I am the most filthy of sinners, completely unworthy of the mercy that I pray and believe that Jesus Christ bestows on me without the least shred of merit.

In the "80's", I believed that our society had been heavily damaged by the "sick sixties", and if we merely saw the error of our ways since then, we would return to a virtuous society. Now I know it is MUCH deeper than that ... William of Occam, the Reformation, the "Enlightenment", the advance of technology (ease, mass communication, birth control, etc) and a few other things ALLOWED (not "caused") the decline of not only America, but "Western civilization" in it's entirety.

To talk of "school shootings" or "gun control" is like a 95 year old terminal cancer patient seeking treatment for acne compared to what the fact of mass shootings, massive addiction, massive death by overdose/suicide, and the utter hopelessness that most of the population of our broken excuse for a "cutlure / civilization" are experiencing . It is COMPLETELY meaningless given our plight. I covered the idiocy of concern for shootings after Vegas. Just look at FB -- lots of virtue signalling from many ... signifying exactly nothing except "this is my tribe, please agree with me, lots of people in my tribe agreeing with me gives my life the illusion of meaning".

As I posted on one friends FB lament, in 1974 when I graduated HS, we took our guns to school to go hunting after school or to work on them in shop. The idea of a "school shooting" was just as far from our minds as the idea of "texting" ... it simply didn't exist. M-16's however DID exist -- guys used the full auto versions in "Nam" and some of them started hunting with the semi-auto versions of them because they were light and accurate, and since the body mass of a deer is pretty much exactly like a person, they were of course great deer guns.

"Made for one purpose only" is one of the zanier lines out there relative to guns. It is true that guns are single purpose items ... they are built to send projectiles downrange as accurately as possible. The VAST bulk of projectiles hit PAPER or some similar sort of target, because that is what they are used for. The best comparison for me is golf -- correct, nobody NEEDS to have multi-thousand dollar clubs to put a white ball in a hole on a field, but humans OFTEN do MANY things that nobody "needs" to do. Here is Robin Williams on the sense of golf (many f-bomb warning)

Oh, "but golf balls don't kill people" ... but certainly they do, and no doubt clubs are used as weapons, carts crash, etc, etc. If it were not so sad it would be extremely ironic that it was William of Occam that declared that objects have no inherent purpose / meaning as in being "sacred", but are rather mere objects with any meaning only assigned by man -- "nominalism".

The fetishization of guns is a pretty good proof that something in the nature of man wants to imbdue objects with purpose and meaning.

So our lives are FILLED with all sorts of things that we "don't need", many of which are even explicitly harmful (like cigarettes).  However, we DO need to feel virtuous as part of our human nature, so thousands of people signalling their virtue on FB by declaring that "nobody NEEDS an "assault rifle"", when probably 1% of them could tell you what the difference between an "AR" and some other gun was. The answer is of course "nothing but style". I have a nasty looking "black gun", a .223 Bushmaster, and a nice wooden stock Remington 742 Woodsmaster 30-06. I can put a 30 round magazine in either one of them and shoot those rounds as fast as I can pull the trigger, because they are semi-auto.

I'm not much in the shop, but given a not too huge amount of time, if I need to convert 5 or 10 round mags into 30, 60 or whatever, I can ... however the time would likely be better spent working on mag change dexterity which with even a klutzy guy like me a medium level of skill can pretty much make magazine size moot -- "wait till he changes mags then rush him" is wishful thinking if the shooter is even moderately skilled at a mag change.

Short of ceasing to honor the 2nd amendment (which just makes it REALLY clear that there are no "laws" in BOistan), or actually repealing it -- legal, but unlikely, all the virtue signalling about "Assault Weapons" is just virtue signalling. Preventing car companies from putting "SS" (Super Sport) on ttheir cars ... or wide tires, or dual exhausts, etc because "it makes them seem like Race Cars" is of similar use.

"This highlights the problem with capitalism. As Irving Kristol observed in one of his greatest works, “When Virtue Loses All Her Loveliness,” there is a difference between a “free society” and a “just” or “bourgeois” society. The Founders worked on the assumption that the people themselves would be the guardians of virtue, probity, norms, and even public safety in their own communities. And, as Kristol notes, for the first century or two of capitalism’s existence, it was largely synonymous with a just/bourgeois society."

In the 20th century, we did away with "just" step by step until we ended up with a mass of individuals with no idea of right or wrong ... and even less of the eternal consequences of "wrong".

Trade, DOW, No News

https://www.actionforex.com/live-comments/125175-dow-breaks-26000-as-nafta-announce-is-almost-certain/

I knew the market was on a tear yesterday, I did a google of "market breaks 26K", and the articles were sparse ... the linked was the only one on the first page of hits (rest were first 26k break in 2017). Dow news was totally absent CNN, and on my Google News, the first semi-related story was from Bloomberg ... "Trump's Mexico Trade Deal Looks Like a Lemon". Wow, is it yellow?

So the president proimises a new trade deal during the campaign, DELIVERS, and the MARKETS surge as business finds it to be very good news, but virtually the entire US media finds the economy to be a non-story! I DID actually go over and look at Fox on the web, which I rarely do -- OMG, what a total tabloid! Fox is no longer "news" at all, fake, or otherwise ... when this is your "below the fold" on the web, you don't deserve to be clicked by sentient humans ...

"Mysterious Appearance"! And yes, ESPN and CNN are out on a Tiger hatefest because he refused to go make disparaging remarks about the President! I suppose at least 50% of BOistanis find this to be ""news", but this is really NOT "a country", let alone "my country" at this point!

Socialism, Communism, Fascism, Hate

https://www.newcriterion.com/blogs/dispatch/socialism-as-a-hate-crime-9746

Good article. As I've said a thousand times if I've said it once, why is it that even though the nominal "fascists" in Hitler's Germany called themselves "National Socialists", nobody believes them??? They were complete amatuers at killing compared to our "friends" (at least NPR's friends) the Communists, easily responsible for over 100 million deaths, and likely as many as 250 million!

“in sum, the communists probably have murdered something like 110 million, or near two-thirds of all those killed by all governments, quasi-governments, and guerrillas from 1900 to 1987. Of course the total itself is shocking. It is several times the thirty-eight million battle-dead that have been killed in all this century’s international and domestic wars. Yet the probable number of murders by the Soviet Union alone—one communist country—well surpasses this cost of war.”

I think this meme is helpful ...

In theory, the GOAL of the USSR, Cuba, China, North Korea, etc is "Communism" ... no private ownership of ANYTHING, all owned by "the collective". Socialism is what one gets when the idea is government control of the economy with a big safety net until the economy fails and it can no longer be paid for. Then you get Venezuala, and to some degree USSR (thus the ending), North Korea and Cuba.

While Churchill called Russia a "Riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma", China is at least as inscrutable. Of all the modern states, it is really more Fascist than anything -- strongly nationalistic, lots of government deals and control of supposedly "private" companies that indeed have some level of autonomy. That is the core of Fascism ... some big players make a lot of money, investors ostensively "own" companies, people own real estate, cars, etc, yet the CALL themselves "Communist".

It also sounds like in China the main mark of Socialism ... the massive "safely net" is threadbare at best. China is too interested in getting wealthy -- something either Communists or Socialists at least claim to eschew. The thing they DON'T eschew is POWER ... so if they get it, they KEEP IT!

Socialist policies, moreover, are always going to fail because it is impossible for central planners efficiently to allocate capital, goods, and services across a large economy. Socialism, after all, was always a political doctrine and never a plausible economic theory. When there arose shortages of food or housing or military equipment—when socialist policies failed—leaders were faced with a choice of admitting failure and abandoning the socialist path or doubling down on their policies and preserving their power. It was in their nature to choose the latter course, and thus to press forward with more extreme measures, which typically involved the identification of scapegoats and counter-revolutionary elements as causes of failure. From here it was but a few steps to the catastrophic outcomes described above: show trials, terror famines, mass starvation, cultural revolutions, “killing fields,” and democide.

To some extent, the whole class of "isms" ... Communism, Socialism, Fascism, are death worship ideologies that discount human creativity, ingenuity, and growth. ("The Creator" is not somebody they worship) They are about dividing up a basically fixed pie, and inevitably create an increasingly powerful central government that forces adherence to a set of economic rules "for the good of all". Naturally, the "dear leader", central bureaucracy and military have to be a good deal more "equal" than the rest of the population. The elite goes about "preserving their power" to the detriment of the many.

Much as in "Avengers Infinity Wars", half the population may need to die "for the good of all", ALL depends on your meaning of ALL, and for the elite, the "all" is very small!

The answer to why Socialism is not a "hate crime" is that in a godless entropic accidental universe, killing even 9/10ths of the people may well be judged to be "the good" by "the few".  To the extent that anyone even thinks or cares about such an abstract concept in a cult of meaningless universal death -- the cult of "secular humanism".

She Was Game, So They Shot Her

https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2018/08/next-stop-the-trump-organization.php

If there was ever any doubt that the whole purpose of the "Russian Collusion" witch hunt was about anything other than overturning the results of the 2016 election and inflicting as much pain as possible on Trump and anyone associated with him, that doubt is LONG past at this point! As the meme shows, "The Party" (TP-D) is living in the Twilight Zone, and they will do ANYTHING to get out ... even fake that it wasn't THEM who colluded with a foreign power!

I'm reminded of the story of two male hunters of Polish descent -- we used to make fun of the polish, maybe we still can because they are white and Poland is pretty pro-Tump. Anyway, they were out hunting, ran into a pretty girl who said she was game, so they shot her.

So Mueller went out hunting for Russian campaign meddling, found Stormy Daniels and shot Paul Manafort.

If there was anyone  actually worried about "Russian election meddling", they  would be pretty pissed about getting bogged down in tax evasion and payoffs to women when "the real issue" was the "sanctity of our elections". (you know, the ones where you don't even need an ID to vote in) Talk about "taking your eye off the ball"!

A person with a brain can get quite a laugh out of how wonderful a person "Stormy" is portrayed as right now.  "An adult film star!" ... no doubt soon to be an "artist". In the old days,  all of the Clinton women were "bimbos, trailer trash, lying sluts, etc, etc". Back then, "sex" was completely private, and we couldn't afford to risk the economy on something so "personal". My my how times have changed!

We all know that nobody on the left actually cares about "Russian meddling" ... why, up to two weeks before the election, BO assured us that the elections were completely fair and reliable, and anyone that said otherwise (Trump) was "treasonous"! Hey, BO himself said it! It just doesn't get much more "reliable" than that! As was proven by the Roy Moore election, where TP assured us whe was a  "child molester" up to the day he was defeated, and then, rather than prosecute this cretin, he was forgotten. Obviously, those making the charges ONLY made the charges to defeat him, and the fact that they didn't continue to agitate to prosecute a "dangerous child molester" proves it! 

All the virtue signalling, about "I'm a Republican, but I can't support a child molester" was actually shouting "I'm a Republican, but I'm so gullible I believe TP when they tell me what to think"!

Now, what "The Party" (TP-D) is working at is taking over the House, after which they will impeach Trump -- that plus making it clear that if you are not a member in good standing of TP who kneels before their every pronouncement, you are in danger of being audited, prosecuted, and jailed! Possibly for life! Get with the freaking program -- TP still has the Administrative / Deep State and most of the judiciary! They can wipe you and your family out and put you, your friends, and your loved ones in JAIL!

Can Trump find a way to seriously put some HURT on TP and all their illicit sources of power? I can't imagine how -- but I keep cheering for him -- it isn't like those of us that still care about tired old forgotten things like "limited government" have much of anyone else even nominally on our side. Certainly not the bulk of the "traditional Republican party", just as indebted to the special interests which are more and more ALSO just other arms of TO connected tot he Administrative / Deep State!

I know it is just fantasy, but I like to visualize Trump in the role of Riggs, and TP in the role of the folks sure "it's over". It brings a smile to my face.

Rhyming Memory Time

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/brett-kavanaugh-memo-detailed-explicit-questions-for-clinton/2018/08/20/c0854616-a488-11e8-8fac-12e98c13528d_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.49041306d5b8

For those of us alive during the staining of the oval office by Slick Willie, the "connections" to the current time are sad and funny.

Back in the late '90s, the whole MSM kept the beat of "It's the economy stupid" up like a mantra. We were in the throes of the internet bubble, and the MSM found Slick Willie to be a major cause of this frothy "emanation" (emantor in chief?). Matters of "just sex" were clearly private, and all the women that Slick had whatever kinds of "relations" he had to provide sperm samples on dresses obviously "asked for it". It was the age of "Move On", the time before "Me Too". The idea that we would even CONSIDER any of these issues in a growing economy was ridiculous. Hey, the French didn't understand what all the fuss was about!

As an NPR listener in those days, beyond the prudishness of the Republicans -- and of course their "hypocrisy", there really wasn't much news about "Monicagate". It was politicizing a clearly private matter with no impact on the workings of the country.

Fast forward to today. Is the economy growing? (4.1%) WHO CARES! Manafort! Cohen! Stormy! Arcane campaign finance laws that BO trampled like trash and paid a measy. $350K that pretty much nobody knows or cares about are now IMPEACHABLE! Hey, did you hear that the Steele Dossier says that hookers peed on a bed in Trumps presence! Wow, that is SICK!

The "law" in BOistan is whatever the Deep / Administrative State + MSM says it is! If there is an "R" next to your name, you could go to prison for "perjury" for getting a date wrong in a case about nothing (Scooter Libby, Valerie Plame, the "secret agent" that drove into Langley every day). If you are a "D", "I can't recall", "I take the 5th", "I never had sex with that woman", "there was nothing top secret on that server", etc, etc.

We don't have "laws", we have excuses for TP ("The Party"-D) to put Rs in jail!

I assume the WaPo wrote the linked column as a comedy. Kavanaugh is damned for saying that Clinton ought not be treated softly because he was president -- a pov they disagreed with then.

Now they are worried based on a paper he wrote for a law review that he may have changed his mind -- thus thinking that he may now agree with what they thought THEN, but now DISAGREE with and want Trump roasted over a spit. See, this is the "unbiased" press. Who knows if they are enemies of the people. What is really clear is that they are friends of the Democrats!

Maybe the worst thing they are worried about is that Kavanaugh might be "partisan" in the same way that they, Ginsburg, Sotomayar, Breyer and Kagan are -- having it make a difference whose ox is being gored. A position that the MSM takes pride in -- if you have a "D", you get a pass, if you have an "R", throw at least "the book" at them, if not make up some new items!

The odd part is that at least Scalia and Clarence Thomas clearly were/are not "partisans" in the D and R sense. They are "partisan" in favor of the Constitution, the Constitution as written and understood by the founders who also left us with a process to amend it if that was required. Thus, women gained the right to vote with the 19th amendment and nobody even thought to have the SCOTUS check "the prenumbra" of the Constitution to discover if the founders had really put such a right in but failed to make it clear.

Abortion is a nearly identical case to women voting -- the Founders knew all about babies and unwanted pregnancies and abortion was known and practiced from ancient times. Since the original Constitution had no bill of rights at all, and the Federalists were against there ever being one since it would seem to enumerate specifie rights, when ALL rights not explicitly given to the federal government were reserved to the people and the states, the idea that the federal government would have ANYTHING to say about abortion would have been nonsense to the founders.

When you leave principles behind, all becomes political as it has increasingly been in this territory since at least FDR, possibly Wilson, and certainly since Roe -- BOistan is a nation of politics, no laws.

History doesn't repeat itself, but it certainly rhymes!