Random Thoughts for January, 2013
Robert A. Hall
You want budget cuts? Let me at the Federal Budget with the authority to cut, a team of accountants and a couple of hill staffers from Sen. Tom Coburn’s office, and watch the blood flow. Afterwards, of course, I’ll have to go into hiding.
Forty years ago, you could talk about things in the office they wouldn’t dare show on TV. Now they show things on TV that you don’t dare talk about in the office, unless you want a lawsuit.
My latest random thought is that progressivism us another word for Munchausen's Syndrome by proxy... they create a problem so that they can get admiration for attempting to fix it. Actually fixing it is not just unimportant, it's against their interest. –Alison
It’s okay to knock the rich, as long as you plan to apply to a poor person for your next job.
Funny how the Democrats think the “rich” making over $250k can get by spending less, but the government can’t spend any less. (No, my wife and I never made over $250k combined. And won’t unless the lotto lady picks better numbers.)
Foreign Aid: Welfare for oppressive oligarchs.
Now that Obama has nominated John Kerry instead of Susan Rice for Secretary of State, it will be fun to watch liberals call us racists and sexists for opposing a rich, old white guy.
When we brought our small Chicago-area condo in 2009 (for about $40k more than it’s worth now, thank you Fannie Mae and the CRA), it was summer. We had trees outside our bedroom window, so my wife bought sheers to hang, letting in lots of light. Then winter came, and the trees shed. There was a clear view of the neighbor’s window. “I need to buy drapes,” she said. “Why,?” I asked. “So the neighbors can’t see us when we’re dressing.” “Honey.” I said, “If the neighbors don’t want to see us, let them buy drapes!” Made sense to me, but we got drapes anyway. Sigh.
Add to my pet peeves: Store clerks who put price stickers on the front of things like picture frames, where they must be laboriously removed, instead of on the back, where they don’t matter. Dumb.
Nothing is more indicative of the irreversible decline of America than the re-election of a president after foreign policy disasters, a failing economy, a soaring debt, a decline in the percent of Americans in the workforce to 1980 levels indicating that real unemployment hovers at 14%+ and the breaking of almost all of his promises. A majority of Americans said Romney would do better on the economy and foreign policy, but found Obama more likeable. That, the sycophantic media and his race was enough. The price is going to be terrible.
I think if you had video footage of all Obama’s past political dealings, such as his discussions with convicted influence peddler and Obama fund-raiser Tony Rezko over how Rezko paid full price for the lot next door, and Obama got a $200k discount on the price of his home, thus legally transferring money from the pocket of a lobbyist to that of a US Senator, you could impeach him, probably put him in jail. (Chicago Tribune columnist John Kass calls Rezko Obama’s Real Estate Fairy.) But I’m not sure any public official could survive such retroactive transparency, conservative or liberal. If there wasn’t criminal conduct, there would certainly be political-incorrectness and shocking cynicism over issues and voters. Such is life.
The local news announced that Chicago was hiring 75 laborers for the public works department. They were giving preference to Veterans and Graduates of the Chicago Public School System. So, basically. They want people who have been under fire.
Life is unfair. When it hits the fan, you will often get more than your “fair share.” Don’t complain—clean up!
They say “adversity is character building.” And they say that I’m a “character.” Must be a correlation.
When I was a Republican state senator, I found that I could trust the two Democrat senate presidents I served under to honor confidentiality, and not hang me out to dry if I met them half way on compromises to protect the public. That isn’t true of GOP legislators dealing with Obama, Reid and Pelosi. They will reward your efforts as would a pet viper.
If you are reading this, the Mayans were wrong. That’s a good thing. I would be really pissed if I spent seven months depriving myself to lose four stone in weight, only to vanish in a meteor strike or polar switch or fiscal cliff or something. A “stone” is 14 pounds in Scotland, for you stay-at-home types.
I interact with so many incompetent people with various businesses, I often wonder how they have jobs in this economy.
If you think humans are the dominate species, ask yourself how often you see dogs following people around with plastic bags to pick up their crap.
All monopolies are, by their nature, inefficient. The worst, of course, are government monopolies, because to the usual inefficiency, they add in politics and perverse incentives. Government agencies know they have to spend all their budget this year to get funding next year. I don’t budget that way in the associations I manage. I budget money for committees and programs for next year, even if this didn’t spend it this year, so they won’t feel the “got to spend it all” pressure. Maybe that’s why, in 30 years as an association executive, good times or bad, I’ve never operated a full year in the red. (Couple of years I came in after the start of the fiscal year and didn’t have time to turn things around before the end.)
No matter how much I cut back, my association leadership still beats me up for sending them too much e-mail. But in the far distance, I can hear the angry question, ‘Why wasn’t I informed about this matter?”
A people must be worthy of freedom and independence to get it and to keep it. It is no longer clear to me that the American people, taken as a whole, are worthy.
Just because I disagree with their views on politics doesn’t mean I hold any animosity towards Progressives. In fact, if I met Michael Moore, I’d be happy to buy him a double bacon cheeseburger, supersized fries and extra large shake for lunch.
Police in the Chicago area are looking for a serial bank robber who is 6’3” and weighs 150 pounds. I suspect he may be disguised as a clothes pole…
My wife currently lives in Madison, WI and I in Chicago. (She is looking for work there, with an eye on my eventual health-forced retirement, as we have a condo there and it’s close to my doctors and our granddaughter.) When she and my granddaughter were in town for the USMC Birthday Ball, Britnye asked me if I was afraid to live alone? "No, Britnye," I said, "I'm a Marine. Anyone who comes through that door with evil intent needs to be afraid of your grandpa!"
One person’s “tax loophole,” is another’s “legitimate tax break.” Depends on whose wallet is gored.
Since trees for paper are grown as a crop, if you stop using paper to “save the trees,” you should also stop using ethanol and corn flakes to “save the corn.” In fact, stopping eating entirely saves lots of plant and animal life for the environment.
If you are job hunting, you know that employers are not supposed to discriminate. And you know they often do discriminate on race, age, gender, religion, ethnic heritage, etc. No one is free from bias. But you may not know that some discriminate on weight. Rightly or wrongly, they view obese people as lazy, undisciplined, unmotivated, likely to be out sick often and likely to drive up the company’s healthcare costs. The latter is a huge factor for companies today and is going to get worse, so if you are over-weight, and can’t lose it, projecting good health is important.
Speaking of weight… What the doctor says: “Mr. Smith, I’m not willing to do this procedure on you. Your BMI is 42, and all the scientific studies show that obese people have poorer outcomes, higher risk of complications and an elevated mortality rate.” What the patient hears: “You’re a fat slob, I don’t like you and I won’t treat you.” What the patient says: “See you in court, doc.”
Most decisions that you make under the influence of alcohol are bad decisions. Unless the decision is to go to bed. Alone.
Few people get as angry when their religious dogmas are challenged as secular humanists who hold progressivism as a religion.
People who read my blog who want to attack me make up things to attack. I’m bitter, I’m rich, I have great retirements from the Marines and the senate (I get zero from them). And a surprising number of tolerant leftists, who, following Obama’s call for a new, more civil tone, tell me how much better off the world will be when I’m dead.
People who read my blog are, I suspect, among the minority who believe strongly in TANSTAAFL. (There ain’t no such thing as a free lunch.) The country is going to learn it, very painfully. TANSTAHEA is also true. (There ain’t no such thing as happily ever after.) Nothing is forever.
I may not sell many books as a writer, but I notice that free, signed copies are always in demand.
Cause and effect are powerful forces. Unfortunately, understanding that seems beyond a majority of voters. So they go on voting for free stuff, the electoral equivalent of touching the hot stove over and over.
I used to smoke a pipe, occasionally, which, like our former president, I didn’t inhale. I took it up in high school more or less to avoid the peer pressure to smoke cigarettes. I decided the risk of mouth or throat cancer was too high and gave it up 10-12 years ago, I figured when I got old and got a terminal illness, I’d take it up again. So I get a lung disease and they warn me not to be around any smoke if possible. Someone has a sense of humor.
Everyone’s unique—we all deteriorate in our own way.
Life has a lot of happy interludes, but few truly happy endings.
Some people come in the house with stuff and put it away. Others just put it down. They live with clutter and chaos, and work twice as hard because they can’t find stuff when they need it.
Even things that appear to stay the same are constantly changing in ways we don’t notice.
Historically, ever dollar in tax increases has led to more than a dollar in new government spending. But I’m sure this time will be different…
If the GOP gave Obama everything he wanted, the media would still blame them for everything that went wrong, because they gave it to him.
If we discover that an asteroid is going to strike the Earth and destroy all human life, in the last issue, the New York Times will blame George W. Bush and Republicans.
On my way to Chicago from Madison in December, I saw a trooper had pulled over a car in the color we describe as “goose shit green.” I assume he was getting a ticket for bad taste.
Anyone why buys stocks, medications or anything else because of a Spam e-mail deserves to be ripped off. “If he play, though young and unskillful, For shekels of silver and gold, Take his money, my son, praising Allah, The kid was ordained to be sold.” –Kipling. (If memory serves.)
If I had the energy, I'd become apathetic.
As far as I can tell, the purpose of “climate talks” is for the oppressive, regressive economically un-free countries to try to extract money from the successful countries. That’s largely the purpose of the UN as well.
As I understand it, all the unions are fighting for is the basic human right to force everyone to join a union and pay them union dues they can spend to elect pro-union politicians. And to provide big salaries and perks for the union leaders, of course.
On my blog, I’ve tried not to engage in the inter-party Republican bashing. I can’t see how that helps our desperate situation. It’s not like we have friends to spare.
When I was nine, I unwisely took it upon myself to educate an 8-year-old friend to the sad fact that Santa Claus didn’t exist. He didn’t believe me. I pointed out that in the real world, there was no evidence of magic like flying reindeer. He insisted there was. I called on math, describing the impossibility of traveling that many miles, to that many homes with that many toys. His faith was unshaken. I used physics, comparing the load to deliver presents to tens of millions of homes to the lift power of eight tiny reindeer. He hotly declared I was wrong. I gave up. Now, 57 years later, we are still friends, though we live far apart. And he’s still a liberal, and still believes in Keynesian Economics.
If George Bush had just been smart enough to call his tax cuts a “stimulus” for the economy, or a “bailout,” Democrats would have loved them. Funny how they condemned them as “tax cuts for the rich,” but now want to keep most of them.
Travel Tip: If the media describe an area as “restive,” don’t go there. People will try to kill you. You won’t get much “rest.”
If you want to reason with union members, you better go armed and armored.
Say you’re an employer reviewing resumes. You get one that looks possible, but have three or four that look better. You guess from the name, address or some content that the applicant is black. You’d like to give this person a shot to come in and impress you. But you know you are more likely to hire one of those with better qualifications, and that could result in a discrimination lawsuit. Safer just to pass on the interview. Thus the race baiters hurt black folks most while using racism to amass power and money. They care not at all about the harm they do.
People worry about guns. But in a crisis almost anything can be a weapon. As they taught us at Parris Island, there are no dangerous weapons. Only dangerous people. Marines are very dangerous people if you are on the evil side.
Am I just getting old, or have substandard ethics become pretty much the standard? Real ethics seem as rare now as common sense.
Add to the idiots list: People who come up to an intersection signaling for a right turn, because they are turning into a driveway after the intersection, tempting you to pull out in front of them. Twice this morning. I didn’t pull out—it’s happened too often.
Christmas is when you buy gifts for the grandkids, then you buy gifts for the grandkids to give you.
Our problem with Christmas shopping is that when we finish, we don’t stop.
I asked my wife for a ski mask for Christmas. She asked why. I said because if the credit card goes much higher, I’m going to have to knock over a few liquor stores or gas stations.
When I have a problem with Comcast and get their technical people on the line, they drip empathy. “Oh, I know how frustrating that is, Mr. Hall.” I don’t want empathy. I want the problem fixed.
We need to outlaw guns, because outlawing drugs (or alcohol during prohibition) worked so well.
Some people would let your house burn down, if calling the fire department was an inconvenience.
People have lots of addictions, drugs, alcohol, tobacco. For my wife, it’s nick-nacks and dishes. Mine is books.
With pulmonary fibrosis, a disease that kills more people than breast cancer, though is little known or funded, I’m sure I’m going down. With the debt, unfunded liabilities and challenges like the Jihadists, illegal colonizers and China, I’m pretty sure the country is going down as well. But in both cases, I intend to go down fighting. It’s what Marines do.
Recently had a beer after my seven month diet. Might be the best beer I ever tasted.
I’m inactive for the lung transplant list, as my functioning has been pretty stable. That means I might get to old for a transplant, but with a terminal illness, getting old doesn’t seem to be my major worry.
The Democrats motto seems to be, “Why not loot future generations? What have they ever done for us?”
If you want to know what liberals have done for black folks, you only have to look at the murder rate, high school drop out rate, unemployment rate and non-marital birth rate for blacks in Democrat-run Chicago. But it does keep them dependent on government and voting Democrat. Race doesn’t matter, culture is everything. But to keep blacks dependent and voting right, liberals have encouraged this inner-city, dependency, victimization culture that is destroying the black community and America with it. They aren’t racists, though. They encourage the same culture among lower class whites and Hispanics.
We either break the unions, or the unions break the country. Despite some recent progress, I’m betting on them breaking the country, as the unions are a huge part of the Democrat loot-the-future alliance.
I’ve noticed that politicians of both parties, liberal or conservative, talk about how wonderful their home states are, but once they retire or are defeated, they tend to stay in Washington as lobbyists or bureaucrats. Very indicative of the corrupt, power and wealth driven culture we have become. Arkansas was good enough for the Clintons before they hit the big money on the book and speaking circuit, but not afterwards.
I appreciate all the people who keep endorsing or recommending me on Linked In, Skill Share, Google, and similar programs. I hope in my next life to have the time to go on these programs and learn what they are about. As for right now, I barely have time to delete the e-mails that come in about them
If a “gun free zone” make liberals feel secure, nothing is stopping them from putting a “gun free zone” sign on their front door. Or they could move to Mexico to feel safe—I understand it has tough gun laws. As I write, a US Marine veteran is in jail for taking an old hunting rifle into the country. (Update: I read he will be released!)
I’m not against all gun control. For example, I think there should be a law prohibiting Eric Holder and the DOJ from selling guns to Mexican drug Cartel members. And Obama from selling modern fighter planes to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt.
If “gun free zone” signs work, we could make the Internet free of bad words by posting a “profanity free zone” notice on all portals.
Few of the folks with strong opinions on guns and gun control would know how to load and fire one.
Two liberals in a mall: “A man just opened fire with a gun!’ “Thank God we can’t shoot back!”
You’ll know we are getting to racial and gender equality when white males aren’t the butt of 90% of the jokes in TV commercials. I note a little progress here. Sometime a black female makes a fool of a black male.
When a political web-feed you subscribe to, conservative or liberal, sends you the same e-mail over and over, you can be sure they are trying to get money from you.
They keep pounding on TV about women making less than men, and needing equal pay. What they don’t say is that as a group, women have fewer years of experience, less education and/or work fewer hours than men. I read of one study that reported never-married women with the same level of education and experience made slightlymore money than men. So they want equal pay for less experience, fewer hours and less education. Sounds fair, right?
The country needs to restore the federal assault weapons ban that expired, because the Connecticut ban, which is the same as the expired federal law, worked so well at Newtown.
Food label translation: “Low Sodium” means “Needs Salt.”
Cheap cameras used to say they were “fixed focus.” Then some marketing weasel changed it to “focus free,” to make dumb consumers think it focused for you, thought it meant the same thing.
The collapse of the Progressive Pyramid Scheme isn’t here yet. But we can see it from here.
Liberals are still chortling over how dumb Sarah Palin was to say she “could see Russia from her back porch,” even though she never said it, an imitator did, but excuse Obama’s “57 states” remark” as a glitch in the head of the brightest guy in the world.
Too many people on both sides don’t get that there is a huge difference between fact and opinion.
Here's my solution on guns. Americans should have the right to own any weapons to protect their families that taxpayer-supplied guards will have to protect the Obamas for the rest of their lives. Fair enough?
You can always learn, no matter how old you are. Recently I learned that taking a 5-pound pup for a walk in 12 inches of fresh, wet snow while pulling an oxygen tank isn’t worth the effort. See?
I’m pro-choice. I think people should have the choice to own guns if they want, the choice not to pay union dues to hold a job, the choice to send their kids to a charter school if they wish, and the choice not to pay for someone else’s birth control or buy health insurance. It’s those anti-choice liberal that are the problem.
Once socialists get total power, examples being both the international socialists in the USSR after the 1920s, and the National Socialist German Workers Party in German after 1933, they soon turn their attention to a “final solution” of the Jewish Question. That Jews don’t pay any attention to the vile anti-Semitism of black nationalists, black Muslims, CAIR, the Muslim Brotherhood and other key groups in the leftist base stuns me. Once the Progressives have full power—not far off—they will seek to make America Junenrein. Watching one’s family being stuffed in the box cars might make one wish for an Assault Rifle.
Eric Holder refers to blacks as “my people,” because to leftists, race matters. To me, culture matters, not race. So Thomas Sowell, Tim Scott, Mia Love, Allen West, Clarence Thomas, Walter Williams, and other black patriots who love America are “my people.” Yes, this includes center-left black folks like Senator Ed Brooke and Colin Powell. It certainly includes black Marines and most black military vets. It does not include black racists like Eric Holder, Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, Lewis Farrakhan, Maxine Waters and, I believe, Barack Obama. Not my culture, so not my people in the way the former are.
I take my wife to Marine veteran events so she’ll know I’m not crazy—we’re all like that.
My wife is amazing. She can get by on four hours of sleep a night. As long, of course, as she gets another eight hours during the day.
I think America is lost, and with it the political and economic system that has given freedom and prosperity to tens of millions for two centuries. I do not see how the Republic survives the huge debt, the far larger unfunded liabilities for Social security, Medicare, Medicaid, Public Pensions and, now Obamacare, while dealing with the challenges of a rising China, violent, growing Islamic Supremacism, and colonization of illegal immigrants who want to feed off our economy while replacing our culture with the failed and corrupt cultures they left. But we must fight on as best we can. First, because I’ve been wrong before. Second, because there could be an unforeseen game changer. But, mostly, because every year we can delay the collapse is a year our families, friends and many decent Americans can live in some freedom and prosperity.
In Rome, they used to throw traitors off cliffs. In America, we throw them fame, power and wealth.
Most of the self-righteous environmentalists I see are “green” when they can feel good or make a nice public display, but draw the line when costs rise or convenience goes away. But they have no problem imposing costs and inconvenience on you—and the poor—so they can feel all green and fuzzy. Like bad meat.
A lot of people hold strong principles and cling stubbornly to them. As long as they aren't inconvenient in any way, of course.
I notice that gas in South Beloit, IL on the Wisconsin border is usually 30 or 40 cents a gallon cheaper than here in Cook County. Same Illinois taxes. Higher shipping costs from the ports to there. Doubtful that all the Cook County gas station owners meet every week to decide the price to stick us with So I conclude that it's the result of much higher costs here, including higher Cook County taxes to support the Democrat political machine and their vote buying, and the hidden tax that crime and corruption add to every transaction in Cook County. We pay for the crime by the mostly-white "Outfit," as they call the mob here, and the mostly black and Hispanic street drug gangs.
If I was President, my Secret Service code name would likely be “Pissed Off.”
“I came into this would kicking and screaming and covered in someone else’s blood, and I have no problem leaving it the same way!” (This was an Internet joke, not original with me, but I thought it amusing enough to pass on.)
The Internet is full of lies created by the unethical to amuse themselves or to reinforce a belief and passed on by the gullible, who don’t bother to check. An example is the myth that members of Congress receive full salaries for life after one term. Not that their pensions are bad. Alas, the gullible have from time to time included me, when something seemed plausible, though I try to check.
One of the major problems in Muslim countries is that the Shi’a think the Sunni are biased against them, hate them and want to kill them. The Sunni think the same of the Shi’a. What makes it a problem is both are right.
*****
Robert A. Hall is the author of The Coming Collapse of the American Republic.
For a free PDF of the book, e-mail him at tartanmarine(at)gmail.com.
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