Mob rule in Wisconsin - climbing the building

Union thugs climbed the outside of Capitol building and harassed officials inside. They tell us the protesters are state employees and teachers. What do you call a teacher who is shown on video to be vandalizing property?

Gateway Pundit has video.

How can we get a state budget?

There had better be serious people trying to get state expenditures to match actual revenues. But where are they?

I attended a district meeting held by my two state representatives and senator this morning. I got there late and just heard "we can't cut this" and "we can't cut that" plus an update on local development.

I asked people who were there for the full event and that's what I missed: "we can't cut here/there" plus "how can we close loopholes and get more tax revenue?" One representative admitted that closing loopholes is raising taxes and cannot be done without 2/3 majority and that won't happen. But that was the only budget reality in the two-hour session.

They had negative words for every proposed cut in spending that was mentioned. Did they have ideas for the huge cuts needed? They did not try to prepare their constituents for today's reality for the budget.

So they are not part of the solution. Who is?

Chris Gregoire? She led the increase in spending for the 2009-2011 budget when revenues had already decreased!! And she hardly got an inch in controlling the cost of benefits for state employees represented by unions when she knew she needed 10 yards.

The ball is in the Democrats' hands. But their team is not helping.

Wisconsin progress

The Wisconsin Senate and Gov. Walker finally found a way to get some progress on their budget deficit. Despite the Democrats who refuse to do their jobs.

They removed the elements that had fiscal impact which required the super-majority which required at least one Demo. They waited a long time for the Demos. They could have done this after two days and knew it.

It's shameful that elected reps fled the state rather than do what they promised to do. "Fleebaggers."

Washington Workers Compensation Reform

Washington Workers Compensation system is a mess. It is $360 million in the red and still digging. Christine Gregoire proposed some reasonable changes. Some got dropped, but the bill would still improve the situation greatly.

House Majority Leader Frank Chopp should let it go for a vote. It has already passed the Senate with about half the Demos voting for it.

The key changes that remain: - There is to be a state-managed network of doctors, so that the state can cull out the ones who run their practices as disability mills.

- There is to be a program subsidizing the wages for workers who go back to work on light duty, which will reduce permanent disability claims.

- And an option for certain workers to take their benefits in lump sums, which in the long run will save the state money.

Seattle Times

Without changes it will dig deeper and deeper in debt. Opponents only offer a tax increase - a tax in every job. Such a tax discourages job creation. Fewer jobs! No, pass this bill.

Sebelius admits double counting in Obamacare

We saw this before Obama's monster passed Congress. It spends $500 billion twice. When asked, the most powerful woman in the US, Sec. Kathleen Sebelius, admitted the lie, I mean, error.

Big Government

Yesterday [Friday] the House Energy and Commerce Health Subcommittee heard testimony from Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. Representative John Shimkus (R-IL) asked about the double counting of the $500 billion of savings which seemed to still helping the bottom line of Medicare and contributing to the funding of Obamacare.    He asked Sebelius which program was supposed to receive the benefit of that Medicare cut, she answered, “Both.”

WOW ! Maybe Obama is “the one” he can spend $500 Billion Dollars, and the spend the same exact money on something else, that is magic of biblical proportion. ...

Libya blocked internet traffic

How do we know Libya blocked internet traffic? A New Hampshire company continuously tests for internet connectivity:

Renesys Blog

Update 00:00 UTC Friday 4 Mar 2011

After a quiet week, we received reports tonight that Libyans in Tripoli were suddenly unable to use various Internet communications utilities. Examining the BGP routing table, we saw nothing unusual --- all Libyan routes up and stable.

But our traceroutes tell a different story (no responses from Libyan hosts). All of the Libyan-hosted government websites we tested (i.e., the ones that are actually hosted in Libya, and not elsewhere) were unreachable.

Google's Transparency Report seems to confirm that their Libyan query traffic has fallen to zero as well (click for latest):

The Youtube plot is interesting, suggesting that Google's Youtube traffic from Libya has grown steadily all week. Tonight, however, we suspect that someone has turned off the tap on the Libyan Internet again, this time leaving the routes in place.

Judge tells Obama to stop ignoring order to stop Obamacare

Mark Levin says the order by Judge Vinson in Florida is a reprimand to Obama's lawyers. Obama has refused to obey Judge Vinson's order of January 31. Vinson says "get moving."

Mark Levin

The Obama administration got a well-deserved rebuke today from Judge Roger Vinson in the Florida lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of Obamacare (aka the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act as big government types insist). Judge Vinson issued a new order in response to a bizarre and obtuse “motion to clarify” that the Department of Justice (DOJ) filed on February 17.

Vinson’s original order on January 31 could not have been clearer: He declared the entire law unconstitutional and specifically said that because he presumed that officials of the executive branch would adhere to the law as declared by a court, his declaratory judgment striking the law down was the functional equivalent of an injunction. Judge Vinson wrote then that he presumed that the executive branch would follow his order, which any lawyer (including a lawyer President) would know requires them to cease implementing Obamacare with respect to the 26 states that are plaintiffs and the National Federation of Independent Business. That turned out to be a faulty presumption, indeed.

So Vinson said "don't try to stall. Get moving."

John Hayward at Human Events

Thursday was a tough day for ObamaCare.  In the most spectacular news, Judge Roger Vinson clarified his earlier ruling on Thursday, explaining that he did indeed strike down the entire law as unconstitutional, so it can’t be implemented against any of the 26 states that were party to the suit he ruled on.  Vinson was brutally dismissive of the Administration’s delaying tactics, and their attempts to ignore his ruling, questioning their comprehension and legal skills with dry wit.  He gave the Administration seven days to file its expected appeal.

Testing line breaks

My posts were the victims of blank line insertion; most of the time one extra blank for every paragraph, but sometimes two. And if I modified the post more were inserted.

Illiminex product support responded to my request for help. I changed a setting in Blogger - not in Ecto.

Looks good. And I feared older posts being messed up. But they look good also.

Wisconsin is out of control

Wisconsin is allowing adults who act like children to prevent elected representatives from entering the capitol building.

Why does the government of Wisconsin allow this lawlessness? Watch the mob:

YouTube

No right to public-employee unions

Don't fall for the "Constitutional argument" of those saying mean Republicans are violating the right to union representation. It is not a right, but a privilege endowed by legislation.

State employee unions arrived in Washington in 2002 by an act of the legislature. Did public employees have a right to unionize before then? No, they didn't have that privilege before and never had a right.

If it is a right then why didn't FDR protect it?

Pres. FDR opposed public unions. Even ace labor organizer George Meany opposed it. Source: Heritage in NY Times

“It is impossible to bargain collectively with the government.”

That wasn’t Newt Gingrich, or Ron Paul, or Ronald Reagan talking. That was George Meany -- the former president of the A.F.L.-C.I.O -- in 1955. Government unions are unremarkable today, but the labor movemen thinkers once thought the idea absurd.

The founders of the labor movement viewed unions as a vehicle to get workers more of the profits they help create. Government workers, however, don’t generate profits. They merely negotiate for more tax money. When government unions strike, they strike against taxpayers. F.D.R. considered this “unthinkable and intolerable.”

So ignore claims it is a right. No, respond that it is a privilege we can't afford.

This entry looks so terrible because I am using Ecto from Illuminex to write it. They decided to enter lots of blank lines.

Wisconsin children rant

The Wisconsin House of Representatives passed the bill that limits the power of public-employee unions. The children, I mean Democrats, reacted with a temper tantrum. This video at this link shows them in their childish behavior.

Washington Examiner

Idaho and home

In a hurry to find a place in Twin Falls ID picked a cheaper no-name place. Never again. They closed the office around 7 pm and wouldn't answer the phone. I never got the wifi password.

Pleasant thru Idaho. Threat of snow in Oregon mtns. But none.

Chains required on Snoq pass so spent night in Ellensburg east of Cascades. It was snowing there at 5:30 am so we took off. Bad at first in dark and no snow plowing. Better higher where plowed. We used our chains because traction tires required. Mostly blue skies over the summit.

Fresh snow all the way home. Home at 10 am.

I posted this using blog software on my IPhone.

Nevada

The evening in L Vegas with a long-time co-worker. After living there a year they have a long list of complaints - hit&run accidents because people don't get car insurance because it is very expensive. Of course thats because people drive lousy and drunk. That's one of a long list.

Nevada is long. But the day was beautiful and mountains visible every mile.

After we entered Idaho we got a little snow. Night in Twin Falls.

Obama gave us an opening

In his own words Obama "acted stupidly." He took sides with the well-paid public union workers against the public who pay their bills.

James Capua at American Thinker

... the Obama gang seeks to exploit an opening that is actually much smaller than it appears, while underestimating the soundness of their opponents' position in the battle over collective bargaining for public employee unions in Wisconsin. This miscalculation exposes the Democrats' weak fiscal management flank to a crushing blow from the opposition if the national Republicans and their eventual presidential campaign can manage and sustain it.

He gave an opening to those trying to balance state budgets. Take it!

Chandler, Gilbert and Phoenix

We spent 9 days in Chandler and Gilbert, Arizona with trips to Phoenix and Scottsdale. Our hosts planned to take us to high, cool Paysan, but the appointed day was rainy below and snowy above it was a poor day to go and we didn't.

The streets in Chandler-Gilbert are unbelievably wide. Wandering side streets easily carry one lane with parking on both sides. The arterials are mostly six lane plus turn lanes at major intersections. Speed limit is often 45.
Housing: We are staying in a 2300 square-foot home with high ceilings and triple garage and back yard about 25 feet deep. It has "Arizona style" with adobe and tile roof. I like it. A house with the same characteristics on a nearby quiet street is for sale by the bank - asking $209,000. Real estate brochures list NEW homes for UNDER $100,000.
Empty houses: yes. New and old. And there are large, vacant tracts waiting to be developed.
Malls: Large, grand ones; smaller ones; strip malls. Everywhere.
Walking: Not so good. Where we are the distances are too large to get anywhere in less than a mile, except for small private parks between the houses, which are owned by the neighborhood association; they are always set low because they receive the runoff of heavy rainfalls. I sure like being half a mile from shopping and three blocks from a major walking/biking trail, the Burke-Gilman Trail.

On the road: to Las Vegas today. Different route home to see old work friend Marc.
Photo: House built the same as the one selling for $209,000. Click to enlarge.

Cairo-like demonstrations move to Wisconsin but opposite purpose

Madison, Wisconsin, is a mess now. The teachers are on an illegal strike, so they can go harass the now-Republican Governor and Legislature. But they don't want representative government, like in Egypt. They are against it. They are fighting in opposition to the outcome of the November, 2010, election.

The Hill

Protests that have consumed Wisconsin's state Capitol are similar to the heated pro-democracy demonstrations in Cairo, Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan (R) said Thursday.

Large crowds of public workers have descended on Madison, the state capital, to voice their opposition to Republican Gov. Scott Walker's plan to make them pay for their health insurance and pension benefits. Ryan said the demonstrators are reminiscent of the crowds that forced Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak out of power, even though he praised Walker's plan.

"He's getting riots. It's like Cairo's moved to Madison these days," Ryan said of Walker on MSNBC. "It's just — all of this demonstration. It's fine, people should be able to express their way. But we've got to get this deficit and debt under control."

Threats against Wisconsin governor and class warfare

Newly elected Governor Walker of Wisconsin has received death threats. Also Lieutenant Governor Rebecca Kleefisch and two State Senators. From right-wingers? After all they are the only group who would do such a thing and CNN said so.

But no one is speaking about the source. Strange. If it were the right they would be shouting from the rooftops.

But the battle out in the open is public employees demanding maintaining or raising spending levels and not having to pay more for their generous benefits.

WKOW TV

I could not find any follow up, but the following item. I couldn't find any active conservative blogs in Wisconsin.

Public employees held a demonstration on the lawn of Gov. Walker's home, while he was at work. And the Milwaukee teachers held and illegal strike Wednesday; so many called in sick that they had to close the schools. Milwaukee Journal Sentinal

More: The public-employee unions are threatening "class warfare." Source: The Cap Times, which says it's progressive.

See also: The thugs come out in Wisconsin - Jay Nordlinger at National Review Online- And: Which side are you on? - Scott Johnson at PowerLine Blog

Indiana controls; Washington spends

Austin Jenkins for Public Radio compared Washington to Indiana since they are about the same size at his web site/blog.

Budget: Indiana has a $270 million budget problem this year. Wow! Our leaders (all Democrats) got us into a huge hole.

Employees: He found that state employment outside education has shrunk about 20 per cent in Indiana since 2005, while it has grown in Washington. The only number he gives for Washington is since 1985 - up 46% - but our employment has continued growth in recent years, not shrunk. But Indiana's state employee number has shrunk to the same as 1975!

Employee unions and contracting: Washington State employees were allowed to organize and bargain in exchange for an increase in private contracting. But the bargain has been severely one sided - limited by the employees. Washington Policy Center - Columbian Newspaper They have been allowed to stop the contracting - by their collective bargaining!

The Legislature should either enforce the bargain or end it - end both sides. The one side was never allowed to develop, so this will mean stopping collective bargaining.

The Washington Ledge

A small step for nuclear power

Obama's minions are taking a small, bold step toward nuclear power. If they are so concerned about greenhouse gases and global cooling, I mean, warming, they need to use this nonemitting power source

NY Times

The Obama administration’s 2012 budget proposal will include a request for money to help develop small “modular” reactors that would be owned by a utility and would supply electricity to a government lab, people involved in the effort say.

The department is hoping for $500 million over five years, half of the estimated cost to complete two designs and secure the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s approval. The reactors would be built almost entirely in a factory and trucked to a site like modular homes.

In promoting the reactor, the administration’s immediate goal is to help the Energy Department meet a federal target for reducing its carbon dioxide emissions by relying more on clean energy and less on gas and coal. Like other federal agencies, the department is required by an executive order to reduce its carbon footprint by 28 percent by 2020.

Yet the longer-term goal is to foster assembly-line production of the small reactors at a far lower cost than construction of conventional reactors. The reactors could even replace old coal-fired power plants that are threatened by new federal emissions rules and sit on sites that already have grid connections and cooling water.

Wisconsin teachers accept reform

The teachers' union in Wisconsin has endorsed real education reform - rewarding teachers based on performance and the evaluation system that supports it...

Wisconsin State Journal

WEAC President Mary Bell...

Calling the current pay model, which rewards longevity and educational degrees, "outdated and not connected to quality outcomes," Bell announced support for a new model that rewards teachers based on performance, national certification, taking leadership roles, more difficult assignments such as bilingual or special education, and working in poorly performing schools.

Utah to Arizona

We took a side trip in Utah to a treasure - Bryce Canyon National Park. It's a 20x2 miles side trip, but we had been there before and knew it was worth it (especially for one lucky to have a National Parks senior pass). The hoodoos are amazing. Differential erosion caused thousands of little castles and/or featureless people. Just 20 minutes viewing the "silent city" at Inspiration Point is worth the side trip. And it was a beautiful day and a foot or two of recent snow made it more beautiful.

Utah maintained its reputation. There were mountains visible from border to border and it was always beautiful to a mountain lover like me. After we got into Arizona we had 20 or so dull miles, then mountains again most all the way to Phoenix. Phoenix has mountains, but only one really big one - Camelback.

And our first day was bright sun and near 80!


The photo: A typical view: Because Bryce is amphitheaters on the edge of a plateau, most viewing is looking down like this, unless you hike down into it. Click to enlarge.

Big Rock Candy Mountain Utah

I have memories of the song "Big Rock Candy Mountain" from the 1950s. On the other hand, here in Richfield, Utah, big Rock Candy Mountain is a few miles south. On reading the words to the song in their local tourist slick magazine, I see that my memory of the song is very vague.

Big Rock Candy Mountain is heaven for hoboes. It is for bums who don't (or minimally) support themselves. It's the place where every box car has room for another illegal hitchhiker and the railway security "bulls" are blind. It has all a hobo's needs. A cigarette tree. Liquor flows down the cliffs. There is a pool of stew and one of whiskey too, which you can traverse in a canoe.

And for decades I thought the song was about a mountain of candy.
[photo coming]

Idaho and Utah

Through NE Oregon. The night by Boise airport. Detour to see the bridge in Twin Falls ID. Nearing Utah at noon.

Expanding on that IPhone post done at 75 mph. Central Idaho had some dull, flat areas, but always with distant mountains visible. But Utah! Utah has been beautiful every mile. The view got real good while still in Idaho and there have been good looking mountain all the way. The only negative was construction south of Salt Lake City. The freeway was under construction for at least 20 miles - lower speed limit, narrower lanes, but not much work going on. Why degrade 20 miles of freeway when only working on a few spots?

We stopped at Richfield, Utah about 2/3 down the state.

To Boise and

On the road seeking sunshine and some warmth. Wednesday to Boise, Idaho; Thursday to the middle of Utah; Friday to Chandler, Arizona - the SE side of the Phoenix area.

Posted from my IPhone.

Containing Islamic Radicalism

United Kingdom has a wise leader. David Cameron expertly separate the radicals from mainstream Islam at a conference in Munich this week.

...

Real Clear Politics

Social psychologists create "tribal" hostile climate for non-liberals

"... social psychologists are a “tribal-moral community” united by “sacred values” that hinder research and damage their credibility — and blind them to the hostile climate they’ve created for non-liberals."

Jonathan Haidt, a University of Virginia psychologist - one of their own - called out his professional colleagues for their narrow thinking, an accusation that they use on everyone else, but couldn't imagine being applied to themselves. But he first showed them by a demonstration within his audience that day.

He polled his audience for political leaning. At least 80% identified themselves as liberal, a few dozen as center or libertarian, and 3 bold individuals publicly admitted to being conservative. That is a huge departure from the US population as a whole - about 20 per center liberal and 40 per center conservative.

Whenever the social psychologists see that kind of difference they look for bias and the cause of the bias. Touché!

What will they do? Shun him like Daniel Patrick Moynihan was in the 1960s for telling the truth about black families? Get him fired like Larry Summers who was President of Harvard University when he asked the off-limits question "Are fewer women math professors because men have a higher percentage at the high end (also at the low end) of mathematics ability? Question not allowed.

(The sex-difference assumption was again contradicted in a study released this week by two Cornell U psychologits.)

To overcome taboos, he advised them to subscribe to National Review and to read Thomas Sowell’s “A Conflict of Visions.”

They were nice to him - acted nice - and gave him a very small token. They changed two letters on their organization "diversity initiative" page.

John Tierney at NY Times

President Reagan

Remember our great 40th president, Ronald Reagan.

I am trying a blogging tool on my IPhone.

Bipartisanship in Olympia!

There was a tectonic shift in Olympia yesterday. The Senate Democrats allowed the Republicans to take part in crafting state policy. Elections do have consequences. Their margin is smaller - and the problems are larger.

They put together relief for businesses on unemployment and the state budget - together. Now are the Democrats in the House ready to move ahead with the bipartisan bills? Or will they insist on taking the full burden, credit and blame on themselves?

Erik Smith Washington State Wire

What happened on the unemployment bill was most dramatic. Lawmakers rejected a move by the state’s labor unions that would have increased their leverage later in this year’s legislative session. The Senate passed SB 5135 in the form originally proposed by Gov. Christine Gregoire, providing a $300 million tax break for businesses, and allowing the state to use federal money to provide extended unemployment benefits for 69,000 of the state’s long-term jobless.

At the same time, the Senate passed a spending-cut bill that is remarkable for the fact that it was crafted by both Republicans and Democrats. Until this year, Republicans have been shut out of the process.

Those are the broad strokes of what lawmakers did Friday – but it took plenty of arm-breaking to get them there.

...[On unemployment] The real fight in the Senate came two days ago, when Republicans and centrist Democrats teamed up and shot down an unemployment bill that had been crafted to labor’s liking in the Senate Labor and Commerce committee. It was a moment of high drama, as Senate Democratic leaders urged members to stay in line and six Democrats said no.

The Budget

The budget measure, House Bill 1086, didn’t provoke the same sort of fight – mainly because Democratic leaders knew it was coming and reached across the aisle in advance. Lawmakers this year are struggling to cut projected state spending by a whopping $5 billion, and Senate Ways and Means Chairman Ed Murray, of Seattle, brought in the Senate Republicans’ budget guru, Joe Zarelli of Ridgefield.

This one takes a modest step toward the goal, closing the gap by $394 million through a combination of fund transfers and spending cuts in the current 2009-11 budget. The big debates come later.

But because Republicans were included, the result was a spending-cut bill that incorporates a number of ideas the GOP has advocated. Among other things, it maintains the state’s Basic Health Plan for the working poor, but it imposes a freeze on new enrollments and an eligibility requirement. It also cuts state stipends for the disabled under the state’s “Disability Lifeline” program, but maintains medical benefits. The measure passed the Senate 38-9

Can the House work together also? Obama wants Bipartisanship. Read Smith for the full account.

Obama corruption - cronyism on global warming

Obama forced through strict law on greenhouse gas emissions. Then let his political helpers off the hook a month later. This is corrupt, crony government.

The new way is the Chicago way.

Washington Examiner

Last month, the Obama EPA began enforcing new rules regulating the greenhouse gas emissions from any new or expanded power plants.

This week, the EPA issued its first exemption, Environment & Energy News reports:

The Obama administration will spare a stalled power plant project in California from the newest federal limits on greenhouse gases and conventional air pollution, U.S. EPA says in a new court filing that marks a policy shift in the face of industry groups and Republicans accusing the agency of holding up construction of large industrial facilities.

According to a declaration by air chief Gina McCarthy, officials reviewed EPA policies and decided it was appropriate to "grandfather" projects such as the Avenal Power Center, a proposed 600-megawatt power plant in the San Joaquin Valley, so they are exempted from rules such as new air quality standards for smog-forming nitrogen dioxide (NO2).

There's something interesting about the Avenal Power Center:

The proposed Avenal Energy project will be a combined-cycle generating plant consisting of two natural gas-fired General Electric 7FA Gas Turbines with Heat Recovery Steam Generators (HRSG) and one General Electric Steam Turbine.

Maybe GE CEO Jeff Immelt's closeness to President Obama, and his broad support for Obama's agenda, had nothing to do with this exemption.

What a coincidence. Strict rules for everyone but Obama's political friend.

Peters: No Muslim Brotherhood takeover in Egypt

Col. Ralph Peters on Michael Medved tells why the MB is unlikely to takeover the government. The people you see in the streets are wearing jeans and windbreakers - Westernized people - not full beards and ankle-length robes of fundamentalists.

Family Security Matters "Denial on the Nile"

Chicago! Oh!!

They know how to handle snow in Chicago. But Tuesday's storm overwhelmed even the tough Chicagoans.

Lakeshore drive was filled with abandoned cars (and some whose drivers spent the night in place). The first photo looks routine, until you realize that those cars are sitting - the freeway full.


The second photo shows the same scene. Well, they don't seem to have the same number of lanes. But the latter does show what the first scene was like, according to a woman who spent 13 hours in her car!

CBS Chicago

Nisqually Wildlife Refuge new boardwalk

It's a good day for wildlife enthusiasts and all-around explorers, like me. They broke the dikes at the Nisqually River, just north(and east) of Olympia. Doing so took away one great walk. Now they took the next step and built a new boardwalk.

Olympian Newspaper


I am still learning the new ecto - inserting a photo I have. "Error: Flicker failed;" probably didn't try very hard. The old, cumbersome way still works.

Ferry workers defend triple overtime and pay for driving to work

Monday in OlympiaFerry union representatives defended overpaying workers with triple overtime and pay to drive to work in Legislative hearings. HB 1511 and SB 5405 would end practices that allow ferry workers pay that makes no sense; both had hearings.

Source: Radio news, Tuesday morning

King TV exposed this corrupt mess last year. See Washington Ferries and Political Decisions by Hammond.

See Warnings of pay-check padding ignored by state ferries

See Broke ferry system paying huge salaries to fortunate few

More Union News

Many state-worker labor unions get paid for collective bargaining. We, the taxpayers, are being taken. We are paying for work they are not doing while they are demanding more money - from us.

Source: EFF WA

When Harry Reid's lips are moving

You know he is lying When Harry Reid's lips are moving.

He claims ObamaCare saved $4 billion in health care fraud during 2010. But, Harry, it was voted in, but didn't take effect yet. And Fixcal 2010 ended September 30, so this effect is from earlier actions.

In deed the part of HHS that released the number says this is the result of a new program started in 2009.

Fact Checker at Washington Post

Visualize this data - Hans Rosling

He animates 200 years of development in income and health. "200 countries, 200 years, 4 minutes." It is an amazing visualization.

On the BBC Four program "The Joy of Stats" with video at Flixxy. Watch it!

…And the same data you can work with at GapMinder World. There are a dozen or so sets of data that can be scatter-plotted against each other.

And he has more data and tools at GapMinder.org.

Click to enlarge the image.

Ecto versus Blogger

Ecto is the blogging tool I have used for several years. It is a good tool; I like it.

But version 3 does ridiculous things for those of us using Google's Blogger. It puts in extra line breaks, then more, then more. Until you have one paragraph per screen.

Fix it? This version has been out - I just discovered - for close to two years. And Blogger is very popular. Fix it? They have not.

Nancy, this is serious

Nancy Pelosi forced ObamaCare through despite its unpopularity and concerns that parts of it were unconstitutional. When asked about unconstitutionality she responded, "Are you serious?" From her perch in San Francisco only a nut would follow the constraints of the US Constitution, which Boss* Nancy swore to uphold.

Betsey McCaughey on the court ruling against Nancy's monster at NY Post

... But there's a solid chance that the whole ObamaCare law may be null and void.

Just minutes after the president signed the law on March 23, 2010, Florida filed a lawsuit challenging its constitutionality. Now 26 states have joined that challenge, with more coming on weekly.

Vinson ruled yesterday that Congress can't compel people to buy health insurance. More important, he found that -- in clear keeping with the intent of Congress -- that makes the whole law void.

Typically, complex laws contain a "severability clause," saying that if a court strikes down one part, all other parts remain enforceable. But ObamaCare's authors insisted that without mandatory insurance, the law's other provisions wouldn't work -- and removed the severability clause before the law was passed.

Vinson relied on what Congress members and the administration said in defense of the mandate to reason that without it, the rest of the law won't work. He compared the 2,600-page law to a precision watch whose many parts operate in tandem: If one part can't work, none can. Another metaphor would be a house of cards.

So the judge followed what the Democratics said - ObamaCare would fall apart if the insurance mandate were removed. They made their bed; now they must sleep in it.

* We call her "Boss" because she learned from her father who was a political boss in Baltimore. She knows raw power. Period.

I am using a new version of ecto, the blogging software, so I have some surprises about formatting. And it crashes repeatedly.

Hiring during Gregoire's "hiring freeze"

Gregoire calls it a hiring freeze - hiring 1700 more state employees. Not all are union members.

The Olympian

... The paperwork piles up so quickly, officials justified another hiring exemption just to process the forms. That exemption - one of 39 for the governor and her budget office - allowed OFM to change Duane's position. In her new job, she spends about half her time processing freeze exemptions.

After all, you have to keep hiring during a Gregoire hiring freeze.

Obama exempts his buddies from ObamaCare

Obama forces his healthcare dream on you and me. But it's requirements are too onerous for his buddies. So he exempts them. This is cronyism. Special favors for the favored.

Washington Times

Backroom deals and cover-ups may be business as usual for Washington, but understanding why the Obama administration protects its friends from Obamacare offers special insight into what the purveyors of the mandate themselves think about their own law. This is key: The waivers aren’t meant to protect victims from unintended consequences of Obamacare; they are meant to exempt them from the very intentional increased costs of health insurance that the law causes. 

Under Section 2711 of the Public Health Service Act, Obamacare increases the annual cap of insurance benefits, which sounds great - as does everything else in big government - until the bill comes due, in this case, in the form of higher insurance premiums.

In short, the administration has decided that you will face increased health insurance premiums, but special friends in the unions will not.

Bai Tong - best Thai restaurant

My friends can be proud. They got a big recognition by Seattle Met Magazine - best restaurant among the dozens and dozens of Thai restaurants.

Seattle Met Magazine

Bai Tong has locations in Redmond/Bellevue and Southcenter.

China has big problems

Gordon Change has been following China. China has big problems. It is a strange combination of wealth and poverty. Its per capita GNP is a small fraction of ours.

China's government is fragile. It is very centralized and inflexible, which leads to being broken - shattered. He wrote an entire book on it:

The Coming Collapse of China

He also has a blog at Forbes.

Terrible idea - state bank of WA

Everything they do wrong will be multiplied with this idea: State Bank of Washington

Liberty Live

School districts managed their money then Gregoire grabbed it

School districts have to maintain a reserve in their budgets for a "rainy day" and to preserve their bond rating when they borrow. They have to fight to maintain this reserve. There have even been strikes when school employee unions tried to get the reserve money. So? Well, they say "no good deed goes unpunished." Christine Gregoire took it. She was desperately looking for money. So Superintendent of Public Instruction Randy Dorn helped her to force the school districts to eat into their reserve. In her one-day special session of the legislature on December 11, 2010, one of the few things they passed was a reduction in school funding that was retroactive to 1/1/2010 - over eleven (11) months back. Five months of the funding had already been spent spent in the 2009-10 school year. The rest was for the level committed to in the school year started in September. Three months of that were already spent, but all of it committed. How do you manage your budget when money is taken away eleven months after you spent it? You are forced to use up your hard-gained reserve. Source: Bob Hughes, member of State Board of Education Also State Line

What the media hid during Obama's SOU speech

Zoom your TV cameras out just a little. What do you see?

"In God We Trust" is above the speaker's rostrum. Wonder why it's engraved in the stone!

Credit to Dennis Prager

Massive March for Life in DC

The news media didn't notice it Monday January 24, 2011. ABC? NBC? CNN? Didn't notice several hundred thousand people? Before the march they warned about traffic and busy trains. Hometown Annapolis

D.C. March for Life expected to crowd trains

But no news about the massive number of people who participated. And people who were there say the crowd is pretty young.


Click photo to enlarge.

King tides January 21 to 24

The highest tides of the winter. Many people's property are threatened when these high tides are combined with the low pressure and the wind-driven waves of a storm. But some people get damage from the tide alone. They should be making plans to correct their situation.

Our waterfront property doesn't have this problem - with or without a storm. At least the cabin doesn't. We have had minor erosion behind our bulkhead in past storms.

Look at water in yards, parks and over roadways; the latter in La Connor and Port Orchard. On January 22 most of the photos were dates 1/21/11 or 1/22/11. Someone has named the highest tides of the year "king tides."

Wash Dept. Ecology

P.S. I got a very good view of a mature bald eagle at sunrise in Lake Forest Park this morning. He landed high in a cottonwood tree half a block from Bothell Way NE aka Highway 522.

GE Rent seeker vs. competitiveness

Obama will appoint Jefrey Immelt of GE to head his "jobs" panel. Immelt is certainly the wrong person to help create jobs for you and me. But he is the right person for Obama because he put aside trying to be competitive in the open field to do his playing on Obama's field of favoritism. Economists call this activity by business "rent seeking" This is like when Obama called out Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm on his end-the-recession effort because she is an expert in recessions. She sure is an expert: While she was governor Michigan had its own recession when the rest of the US was booming. Wall Street Journal GE has a long track record of innovation in products and processes - for being very competitive. But Immelt has reoriented GE to get sweet deals from the government. Why else would Obama like him? Immelt is playing by Obama's rules. Marc Gunther tells about how GE has changed: [quoting] GE’s Washington operation is a case study in Washington’s revolving door. Nancy Dorn, who runs the office, worked for Dick Cheney at the Pentagon and the White House and was deputy director of the Office of Management and Budget during Bush II. At OMB, she suceeded Sean O’Keefe, who became NASA administrator and is now vice president, Washington operations, for GE Aviation. GE also has Linda Hall Daschle, wife of former Senate Majority leader Tom Daschle, lobbying on its behalf. Meanwhile, Mr. Daschle is on the board of advisors to GE’s HealthyMagination initiative. Last summer, [2009] a leaked email from GE Vice Chairman John G. Rice, soliciting donation’s to GE political action committee, laid out the GE-DC connections. According to Steve Milloy, a right-of-center anti-environmentalist who obtained the email, Rice wrote:

The intersection between GE’s interests and government action is clearer than ever. GEPAC is an important tool that enables GE employees to collectively help support candidates who share the values and goals of GE. [emphasis added] On climate change, we were able to work closely with key authors of the Waxman-Markey climate and energy bill…If this bill is enacted into law it would benefit many GE businesses. And so forth. You won’t be surprised to learn that GE’s “values and goals” were more aligned with Republicans betwen 2000 and 2008, when most of its donations went to the GOP. Now they mostly go to Democrats. To be sure, this business-as-usual in Washington, but it’s revealing.

[And Marc Gunther has much more.] WSJ

GE has high hopes for the [Washington] strategy. It says that over the next three years or so it could bring in as much as $192 billion from projects funded by governments around the globe, such as electric-grid modernization, renewable-energy generation and health-care technology upgrades.

Obama dictates end of secret union ballot

The unions couldn't force an end to secret ballots in representation elections (known as "card check" or Employee Forced Choice Act) through Congress. No problem. Obama will overrule Congress by decree. And his hand-picked National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) will take it to court. Right Wing News ... Recently the NLRB announced its intentions to sue Arizona, South Carolina, South Dakota and Utah because those states had the gal to implement constitutional amendments to their state constitutions guaranteeing that workers have a right to a secret ballot in union elections. With this the Obama administration is moving to deny workers their right to a secret ballot, a right that has been sacrosanct in democracies for hundreds if not thousands of years. Why does Barack Obama want to take away the right to a secret ballot? Because his union pals don't want workers to feel safe voting against a union. How can the Obama administration justify its efforts to eliminate the centuries old right to a secret ballot election? Why, because Obama's regulatory agency wrote a new "rule" that says so, of course. You see the problem as Obama sees it is that Congress has not passed the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) that would take away by law the right to a secret ballot. The reason Congress won't pass it is because our representatives and senators know that their voters don't support this idea. The failure of the EFCA to pass is the one plum that the Obama administration has not been able to give to its funders in Big Labor. So, because Congress won't act, Obama used his power to simply write new regulations to just take away the secret ballot by presidential fiat. And now his NLRB is about to start suing states to push his anti-democratic ideas. So what can we lovers of democracy do? We can call our representatives and tell them to support HR 1176, the Secret Ballot Protection Act. This bill would stop Obama's NLRB from taking way worker's right to a secret ballot. If you want to protect the ages old right to a secret ballot, tell your congressmen to support HR 1176.

Baltimore school CEO at Washington Policy Center this morning

Washington Policy Center's Education Breakfast - Update at bottom WPC had a good crowd at the Seattle Westin Hotel this morning for their breakfast featuring Baltimore CEO of schools Dr. Andres A. Alfonso. They spent little time on prelims - just a short video overview of their activities - so they could give the time to Dr. Alfonso. He immigrated from Cuba when he was 12, went to public schools in New Jersey, then Harvard Law School, then a career change to education with a Dr. of Education. After serving as #2 in the New York City schools he went to Baltimore three years ago. His first school board meeting was picketed and the unions had a vote of "no confidence" before schools started! His big sin? Calling for collaborative planning. But that was an aside. He arrived with a track record of success in getting changes in NYC. He was schocked to learn that Baltimore's enrollment was declining by over 3% per year. Some of that might be the population aging, but most of it was families leaving and kids dropping out. He set out to work with the Baltimore educators to find ways to turn around that enrollment decline. He repeatedly emphasized "having a conversation" His changes got more resources to the kids who needed them - to prevent dropouts, etc. And he gave the principals more control over the resources in their schools. But this was not a positive sum situation. When one school gained $1 million another lost - maybe as much. He also reorganized central services to be more responsive. He didn't get much into how they (not he) reallocated their resources, but we were given a WPC Policy Note by Liv Finney that describes "Fair Student Funding" which did the redirection. Fair Student Funding involves empowering the school principal and giving him/her control over most of the budget and the people who work in the school. Aside: Some of those "conversations" must have been arm wrestling… How is he doing? The enrollment decline ended the first year and growth has returned. Test scores are up, drop outs are down. Due to the limited time he showed only a few slides of his presentation. You can view or download the entire presentation at WPC [PDF]. Update: Speaking with Bob Hughes, a member of the State Board of Education who attended, he pointed out some things. First, Dr. Alfonso said that teachers get ten days of inservice training per year, which is a lot. Hughes says that that much training makes a big difference: it is treating the teachers as professionals and it improves their classroom skills. Second, Alfonso's presentation shows charts of student performance on state assessments over six years. Student performance was climbing before Alfonso arrived. Credit for him for showing this: he gets credit, but not all of it.

Brand-new lighthouse in Washington

Light houses have been closing for the past almost 100 years. But there is a new one. And this is not a 15-foot skeleton, but what anyone would say is a lighthouse.

In my old home town of Kennewick, Washington, on the Columbia River in Eastern Washington. On Clover Island, it is about 62 feet tall.

Tri-City Herald

Some say it is the first new one since 1962. I doubt that. But still...

Via Visit Every City in Washington

Photo from Lighthouses of the US

My blog software choked

Slow blogging because my once-excellent blogging S/w won't save a post and therefore won't put any thing. ARGH

5-mile ride for surfers in Alaska

Yes. Five miles. I love Turnagain Arm, just south of Anchorage. Take a look at it in Google Earth. It is a long arm with huge, mostly brown mountains on both sides for miles. It has the right long, narrow enough shape for tidal bores to form. A tidal bore is the tide coming in fast enough that you cannot outrun it, given that you are on sand or rocks on the tidal flat. So it makes sense that a surfer might be able to ride it. They are doing it. This is a beautiful piece of film that includes both close-up and aerial shots: Surf on Grind TV Here is more details from the same people: SurfAlaska

Time for correction from Stephanopoulos, NY Time, Wash Post and CNN

Many media people rushed to judgment on the Tucson shootings - they the murderer was motivated by right-wing radio talk. They were wrong. Jared Lee Loughner was not political and did not listen to news radio or TV. He was mentally ill. Where are the corrections? Daily Caller

ABC News host George Stephanopoulos refuses to admit fault or issue a correction for implying politics had something to do with accused Tucson tragedy shooter Jared Lee Loughner’s motives. On ABC’s “This Week,” Stephanopoulos, a former Democratic White House press secretary, asked Rep. Chris Van Hollen, Maryland Democrat: “The rhetoric definitely got ratcheted up all thousand [sic] the course of the campaign. Going forward, what do you think you, other members of Congress, Democrats and Republicans and the like can do to help bring the temperature down?” When The Daily Caller asked Stephanopoulos if he would air a correction for the error, he asked, “What’s false in that question?” ... TheDC also asked the Washington Post, the New York Times and CNN if they were going to run corrections for the mistakes their reporters, anchors and columnists made. An editorial page assistant at the New York Times said it was up to columnist Paul Krugman whether he was going to run a correction for his mistakes. Krugman asserted that the Tea Party movement factored into Loughner’s shooting of Giffords and 19 other people on Saturday. The Post and CNN failed to respond to TheDC’s requests for comment.

Snow in 49 states

This is why Al Gore is a saint. Global warming has now caused snow in 49 states today.

Photo map from Telegraph UK. Click to enlarge. The link also has reporting about NY City's big snow and where Mayor Bloomberg was during the mess.

Snow for almost everyone

Snow across the country and frigid weather down to south Texas and Louisiana.


Map from Wunderground.com. Click to enlarge

Atheists don't have no songs

Steve Martin: A bit of humor about atheists at YouTube

Removing the trucking barrier to trade

Obambi is going to turn around and stop violating the trade agreements with our third-largest trading partner, Mexico. He changed. Only because he lost the 2010 election. The Republican gains in Congress make the difference. Investors Business Daily

That's a good thing, because it will restore U.S. trade ties with our third-largest trading partner to normal. And it won't be tough for Mexico to measure up. Contrary to common perception, legal Mexican trucks have consistently passed U.S. safety inspections, outperforming even U.S. trucks. Since 2003, just 1.2% of Mexican truck drivers on U.S. roads were not out of compliance; for American drivers, the figure is 7%. As much as the Obama administration may tout the tiny changes in the truck program as real improvements, it's window-dressing. The new program is pretty much the same one that Congress, in a fit of protectionist pique, halted in 2008. What changed is Congress. Restoring the truck program will help restore U.S. trade to its normal pre-recession vigor, with a freer flow of goods and services between the U.S. and Mexico. It gives the U.S. a fighting chance of doubling exports in the next five years, one of President Obama's goals. For U.S. companies, that means transport costs will fall by some $400 million. They won't have to pay two trucking companies for a single shipment to Guadalajara, with all the added cost that entails. It will also make U.S. companies more competitive, because they'll be able to take better advantage of the shorter distances between factories and consumers and pass on the savings to consumers. This will be an advantage for both countries over their Asian rivals. Perhaps best of all, the truck program restoration opens the door to ending $2.4 billion in punitive tariffs that Mexico slapped on 99 U.S.-made products in retaliation for the truck shutdown. And it helps Mexico, too. Restoring the truck deal will help Mexican businesses at a time when some see the drug trade as their only opportunity. More U.S. goods there means more choices and more buying by Mexican consumers. So why was the truck program cut in the first place? Democrats did it as a favor to Big Labor. It should never have happened.

No evidence of Obama corruption? Here are seven Obama actions

Jonathan Alter of Newsweek was speechless. He stated that there was no evidence of corruption in the Obama administration. But young Tim Carney, a Washington Examiner columnist, immediately gave two: Newsbusters

• Ex Google lobbyist Andrew McLaughlin working as the No. 2 tech policy guy in the White House discussing net neutrality with Google lobbyists (registered and unregistered) while Google stood to profit from the administration's Net Neutrality rules.

• Former H&R Block CEO Mark Ernst being hired by Obama's IRS and then writing new regulations on tax prep -- regulations that H&R Block has endorsed, and that will help H&R Block.

This was on MSNBC's Dylan Ratigan shows. And Carney later extended that list to seven corrupt Obama actions on his blog at Washington Examiner.

• Obama officials meeting off campus for official business for the sake of avoiding the Presidential Records Act.

• And this nugget from the same NYTimes piece: "Two lobbyists also cited instances in which the White House had suggested that a job candidate be “deregistered” as a lobbyist in Senate records to avoid violating the administration’s hiring restrictions."

• The firing of AmeriCorps Inspector General Gerald Walpin. As my colleague Byron York has explained: "The method of Walpin's firing could be a violation of the 2008 Inspectors General Reform Act, which requires the president to give Congress 30 days' notice, plus an explanation of cause, before firing an inspector general."

• Giving a car company (Chrysler) to a political entity that spent millions to get you elected. This deal involved alleged threats by a since-indicted car czar to knee-cap investors who didn't want to agree to the White House's deal.

Kudos to Tim Carney!!

Rep. Inslee is confused about the US Constitution

Honorable Jay Inslee made a big fuss about the reading of the US Constitution in the House of Representatives Thursday. He had a question: Which version of the Constitution would be read? Seattle Times He was complaining about "... edited, redacted and incomplete version..." And he couched it in very friendly language. They read the version of the Constitution that he, Honorable Jay Inslee, swore to uphold the day before. He should be up on it since he swore that oath on January 5, 2011. Bothell Reporter Did he complain then? Apparently he wanted a history lesson of all the original text and the amendments to show the dirty laundry of George Washington and Thomas Jefferson. The floor of Congress is not the place for the history lesson. But it is the place to keep in mind the Constitution that rules - is supposed to rule - their proceedings. The Constitution as amended. History And he needs a history lesson. He joined the chorus about slaves being counted as 3/5 of a person. That was a compromise. The slave states wanted full counting of slaves when determining representation; the abolitionists wanted zero. There were so many slaves that full counting would give the slave states a very large say in running the US, which would prevent the needed changes. The states like Massachusetts wanted to end slavery. Not allowing the slave states control would make it more possible. But there would be no United States of America unless all the thirteen colonies agreed and 3/5 was the compromise that made it possible. When they were able to end slavery they removed the 3/5 and gave former slaves full representation.

Obama opposes -- opposed -- increasing US debt limit

Obama now proposes raising the US debt ceiling. Four years ago he opposed it. He said it was a result of leadership failure.

The Corner The Corner

Obama: Not Always a Fan of Upping Debt Ceiling - National Review Online

I posted this with the Drudge app's interface to Blogger. Oh my, the editing window was less than two lines. Very hard to work with.

Company follows greens' law. Greens fight company

The greens got the voters to approve I-937 in 2006 which requires renewable energy sources provide an increased portion of Washington's electricity. So a company is taking steps to follow the law's requirements. Adage announced a biomass power plant near Shelton and expects to create 400 jobs.

So the greens are fighting tooth and nail against Adage developing a new "renewable" power source as their law requires. First they attacked the enforcer Olympic Region Clean Air Agency (ORCAA). The Olympian reported that they glued the locks shut and threw a brick through a window.

Why do they put their dream in law then attack those obey the law?

They claim that the biomass plant will cause CO2 emissions. Wrong. Biomass energy is CO2 neutral because long-term decomposition releases the same amount of CO2 as burning. And burning it produces energy and reduces the need for another energy source that releases CO2.

They claim acid rain. But Evergreen Freedom Foundation says:

... The EPA tracks acid rain causing emissions. You can see the amounts of sulfur and nitrogen measured by the EPA here. Both levels are extremely low - some of the lowest in the nation. As for smog, the EPA reports there were exactly zero (0) unhealthy days for "asthma and other lung disease" in Mason County in all of 2009.

Particulate matter? We have laws for that! Don't you know?

Gordon Lance, the engineer for the Olympic Region Clean Air Agency assigned to determine if the project meets EPA air quality standards, said "The only way the application will be approved is if Adage meets the air quality standards."

Explain that to me. Why do they put their dream in law then attack those obey the law? And even those who enforce it?

Malthusians lose bet for higher oil price

Are we running out of fossil fuels and minerals? Will we use them up and be grounded next year? Or in ten years? The answer is "Yes. Obviously" to the followers of Malthus.

Prof Paul Erlich of Stanford University predicted starvation around the world in the 1970s and 1980s. He said was obvious that India would not be able to feed 200 million more people. But India's population of 400 million in 1960 has tripled.

Prof Julian Simon took Ehrlich on. He bet that natural resources used in industry would get cheaper over the years. He challenged Ehrlich to put up real money. In 1980 they bet $1,000 and Ehrlich got to choose the resources. He chose a group of five minerals. In 1990 when the bet was up Simon won easily. Not only was the group lower in price, but each mineral in it was cheaper.

John Tierney of the New York Times took up the mantle of Julian Simon, who died in 1998, and challenged for a bet that the price of oil would not sky rocket. Matthew R. Simmons worked in the oil industry and knew better. They made a bet to be decided on January 1, 2011, and the Malthusian lost again.

Here is John Tierney's update in NY Times:

Five years ago, Matthew R. Simmons and I bet $5,000. It was a wager about the future of energy supplies — a Malthusian pessimist versus a Cornucopian optimist — and now the day of reckoning is nigh: Jan. 1, 2011.

The bet was occasioned by a cover article in August 2005 in The New York Times Magazine titled “The Breaking Point.” It featured predictions of soaring oil prices from Mr. Simmons, who was a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the head of a Houston investment bank specializing in the energy industry, and the author of “Twilight in the Desert: The Coming Saudi Oil Shock and the World Economy.”

I called Mr. Simmons to discuss a bet. To his credit — and unlike some other Malthusians — he was eager to back his predictions with cash. He expected the price of oil, then about $65 a barrel, to more than triple in the next five years, even after adjusting for inflation. He offered to bet $5,000 that the average price of oil over the course of 2010 would be at least $200 a barrel in 2005 dollars.

I took him up on it, not because I knew much about Saudi oil production or the other “peak oil” arguments that global production was headed downward. I was just following a rule learned from a mentor and a friend, the economist Julian L. Simon. ...

... When I found a new bettor in 2005, the first person I told was Julian’s widow, Rita Simon, a public affairs professor at American University. She was so happy to see Julian’s tradition continue that she wanted to share the bet with me, so we each ended up each putting $2,500 against Mr. Simmons’s $5,000.

Just as Mr. Simmons predicted, oil prices did soar well beyond $65. With the global economy booming in the summer of 2008, the price of a barrel of oil reached $145. American foreign-policy experts called for policies to secure access to this increasingly scarce resource; environmentalists advocated crash programs to reduce dependence on fossil fuels; companies producing power from wind and other alternative energies rushed to expand capacity.

When the global recession hit in the fall of 2008, the price plummeted below $50, but at the end of that year Mr. Simmons was quoted in The Baltimore Sun sounding confident. When Jay Hancock, a Sun financial columnist, asked if he was having any second thoughts about the wager, Mr. Simmons replied: “God, no. We bet on the average price in 2010. That’s an eternity from now.”

The past year the price has rebounded, but the average for 2010 has been just under $80, which is the equivalent of about $71 in 2005 dollars — a little higher than the $65 at the time of our bet, but far below the $200 threshold set by Mr. Simmons.

What lesson do we draw from this? I’d hoped to let Mr. Simmons give his view, but I’m very sorry to report that he died in August, at the age of 67. The colleagues handling his affairs reviewed the numbers last week and declared that Mr. Simmons’s $5,000 should be awarded to me and to Rita Simon on Jan. 1 ...

The greatest country

What is the greatest country? Let's limit ourselves to the era of national states - the last 400 years. There is a second place, but no third.

Rich Lowry at NRO

... Britain? Getting warmer. It invented the rights that are the bedrock of liberal democracy. More than most European powers, it lived by Adam Smith’s formula for prosperity: “peace, easy taxes, and a tolerable administration of justice.” From a tiny island, it came to govern an enormous extent of the globe in a relatively benign colonialism. It was a bulwark against the dictatorships of the Continent, from Napoleon, to the Kaiser, to Hitler. And it spawned the countries that have made the English-speaking world a synonym for good governance and liberty: Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and America.
Which brings us to the U.S. We had the advantage of jumping off from the achievement of the British. We founded our nation upon self-evident truths about the rights of man, even if our conduct hasn’t always matched them. We pushed aside Spain and Mexico in muscling across the continent, but brought order and liberty in our wake. Our treatment of the Indians was appalling, but par for the course in the context of the time. It took centuries of mistreatment of blacks before we finally heeded our own ideals.

The positive side of the ledger, though, is immense: We got constitutional government to work on a scale no one had thought possible; made ourselves a haven of liberty for the world’s peoples; and created a fluid, open society. We amassed unbelievable wealth, and spread it widely. Internationally, we wielded our overwhelming military and industrial power as a benevolent hegemon. We led the coalitions against the ideological empires of the 20th century and protected the global commons. We remain the world’s sole superpower, looked to by most of the world as a leader distinctly better than any of the alternatives.

Read the whole thing for the also-rans.

Slow blogging

My blog software is not hooking up to Google's Blogger, slowing me down. And Ecto is having trouble saving my posts, as well.