Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 662 34.0 miles. sunny
101 recordings of 31 types.
Rasmussen: -12 (THERE's that blip! It's all Democrats, though.) 49/51.
I spent most of the day just hanging out, but partway through the day we went down to order our season tickets to Music Circus. We're doing it early this year because we're hoping to get the aisle seats. Our two lady neighbors weren't there last year, so those seats are now open. We hope. We also got our season tickets for the Cabaret. I had gone out to hover near the car with another quarter for the meter if I saw a meter maid, but Rich called me back to answer a question so I shoved the quarter in. The question was on the last Cabaret show, did we want the preview tickets. Yes, why not, it might be fun.
Then I'd noted a couple of caches nearby, and noticed there might be a digitalfish in one, still. So we went to the Capitol grounds for one, then home down N street and indeed did get a digitalfish. That's 99 I've found and logged.
Scott Ott President does extraordinarily well without TelePromTer (perhaps thanks to low expectations). However, the GOP lawmakers erred by staying on pre-scripted questions, stacking questions with talking points, and failing to follow up and challenge the president's overriding worldview that if there's a problem, then the federal government is the best way to solve it.
Brad Morgan This looked and felt like the first step of a mediation process - which usually involves both paries airing their grievances first before they actually start communicating. I found it curious that the President said he was there to listen - and then proceeeded to lecture and talk. That said - they blew-it by answering in kind with talking points and campaign slogans. Neither side took advantage of the opportunity in my view.
Anthony Rogers I don't think either "party" can right now. It's all about Obama. He makes it all very personal with direct attacks on people. As such, a person has to defend themself, personally.
Harry Bell "There's a story of an exhausted tenor at La Scala who, facing repeated cries of "Encore," responded that he couldn't go on. A man rose in the audience to say, "You'll keep singing until you get it right." That seems to be the defining principle of the Obama administration -- whose response to every problem, every setback, every hiccup and challenge has been, simply, "more Obama."
Patti Campbell Now THERE'S a State of the Union Address! Notice how he said "We" and "Let's" and not "I, I, I" like Obama. And the tone was uplifting and not condescending. Reagan truly loved our country and wanted to make it strong and free. The Progressives don't think that it's special, apologize for it, and want to run it down in favor of a "global order".
The View Women say 0bama's Presidency is Traumatic for Whites. No, Matthews is just a racist. I *don't care* what color 0bama's skin is! So I don't "forget," I just don't notice one way or the other, it's not important.
If there is a camera running, but no one is watching, did this conversation actually take place?
Health Care. On this issue, elected Democrats are desperate for leadership. They want to avoid total defeat on last year’s highest legislative priority, while pivoting swiftly to the economy. Obama gave no indication of how this feat will be accomplished. Instead, he called attention to his own virtue, foresight and tenacity in pursuing the issue. His approach was entirely self-centered. Democrats in tough races can only conclude that the president is indifferent to their political needs. On health care, it is every Democrat for himself. ... After a series of political humiliations, Obama called on Republicans to change their course. Facing a general revolt against Washington, he proudly took credit for posting the names of White House visitors online. Promising to change the tone in Washington, he managed to be petty, backward looking, defiant and self-justifying.
Barack Obama has lost his promise. He has lost his momentum. He has lost his touch. He has lost his filibuster-proof Senate majority. He has lost his first year in office.
Tonight, he lost his grip on reality.
Michael Ledeen "As a friend of mine put it, the leaders [in Iran] have to chain their children at home when anti-regime confrontations start."
The attorney general might get involved in the BCS? Why doesn't he do something about actual crime, voter intimidation, etc.?
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 662 33.8 miles. (should be 80. I'd better lower my expectations!) some rain, partly cloudy
94 recordings of 26 types.
Rasmussen: -17 (not so much of a bump as I figured!) 47/53.
The director of polling for ABC attacked automated polling yesterday after a Democratic firm released numbers showing Fox News is trusted more than ABC. However, it’s not just a case of shooting the messenger and it’s not about the details of one polling approach versus another. The real issue is new media versus old media. New media outlets like Rasmussen Reports view ourselves as a source that can be used by our visitors. The old media mentality sees itself as a gatekeeper who determines what information is appropriate to share.
This week I lost a half pound. My blood pressure is low borderline.
It was my scheduled tooth-cleaning today. I asked the tech to completely avoid the sore tooth (it's not the tooth, it's the nerve, but touching the tooth really hurts). I need to brush and floss more, she tells me. Afterwards I asked about tooth whitening, how long it takes, how much it costs: I ended up getting impressions. I should get the molds next week and get started. Apparently I can keep drinking coffee. Which, of course, is why I need the whitening.
Then we went to the Home Show. Look, we just spent $25K on a heating system. Then we need to do the roof. AGAIN. It took 10 years to finally get the ceiling in the back room done, and now it needs fixing. It's taken over 2 years to get as much of the painting done as we have. At this point, the home show is just frustrating: we can't afford or won't do any of this stuff, anyway, why tease me? BORing. I was interested in the dual-flush toilet, and in the steam mop, and I do think I will want a garlic grater plate, but on the whole, it was just a very tiring day.
Afterwards we stopped at Sears but didn't see any Yo Gabba Gabba stuff. There were footie jammies with dinosaurs on clearance, though. Then since we were so close we found a couple of caches.
We can't expect the American People to jump from Capitalism to Communism, but we can assist their elected leaders in giving them small doses of Socialism, until they awaken one day to find that they have Communism. - Nikita Khruschev
Scott Ott Toyota checks 1.4 million gas pedals. 8 were slow to return to idle. Company recalls 2.3 million cars. Amazing.
Steven White actually i find the irony in the fact that they didn't have any major recalls in years until they started making cars IN the us using laid off ford an GM Union employees.
The central fact of the speech was the contradiction at its heart. It repeatedly asserted that Washington is the answer to everything. At the same time it painted a picture of Washington as a sick and broken place. It was a speech that argued against itself: You need us to heal you. Don't trust us, we think of no one but ourselves. .... I hope we have big changes in 2010," the friend said. Only significant loss will force the president to focus on spending. "To heal our country we need to get the arrogance out of the White House and the elitists out of the Congress. We need tough love. We need a real adult in the White House because we don't have adults in the Congress."
After President Obama finished delivering his State of the Union speech in the House chamber last night, it was evident that the Democratic loss in Massachusetts on January 19 had taught him nothing. He still attacked the free market, talked of raising taxes, pushed for the passage of ObamaCare, and continued blaming President George W. Bush for every economic woe that couldn’t be pinned on a sitting Republican.
In fact, Obama did everything but the one thing citizens wish he would do: take the will of the people into account somewhere in the midst of his decision-making process. ... While only a fool would argue that Bush doesn’t deserve some criticism for spending money like a Democrat while in office, there’s absolutely no way to blame him for the approximately $12 trillion deficit Obama has racked up in just one year’s time.
Kathryn Lopez I officially apologize to Bill Clinton for viewing him as a narcissist overly concerned about his legacy.
Michelle Malkin RT @jimmiebjr: I thought the President went to meet with Republicans to listen to them. so when do they get to talk?
Mandy Morello: When you have 40% of Americans saying they are part of the Tea Party Movement less than one year after it started .... I would have to say "The Party is Far from OVER!!!!
YOUTH IS WASTED ON THE PRESIDENTIAL SPEECHWRITING TEAM Why is no one talking about the president’s speechwriter and the fact that he’s 27 years old, while the president’s speeches have been sounding like mediocre faux-high minded speeches (that would be sort-of OK for a freshman rhetoric class) for a year? I don’t understand how it is that the administration hasn’t gone out looking for someone who has been communicating as an adult for at least 10 years. Our ability to respond to the challenges we face is primarily dictated by our life experiences, and there is no way the president’s speechwriter could write for what average Americans are now going through right now.
Also note that it is the mistake of the inexperienced to think that when they are disagreed with it is simply enough to restate their case. The administration’s attitude seems very much derived from the youth and inexperience of both the POTUS and his boy-wonder speechwriter.
John Reeder
William Bailey: "The budget should be balanced, the Treasury should be refilled, public debt should be reduced, the arrogance of officialdom should be tempered and controlled, and the assistance to foreign lands should be curtailed lest Rome become bankrupt. People must again learn to work, instead of living on public assistance." Cicero , 55 BC
Roni called from Las Vegas. Lexi's cheerleading team got 3rd place in the Nationals! (There were 3 teams, but the girls haven't realized that. They didn't make any mistakes.) They'll still be in LV tomorrow, so I suggested the Children's Museum. (Apparently they no longer have the sharks. It's been renovated and expanded.)
Reading: Rousseau and Revolution, What If? edited by Robert Cowley, the Bible (Zachariah), Liberal Fascism by Jonah Goldberg, Monstrous Regiment, Terry Pratchett, Common Sense, Glenn Beck, Don Quixote, Miseducation: Preschoolers at Risk, David Elkind, Low-Carb Dieting for Dummies, Katherine B. Chauncey.
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 662 28.2 miles. sunny
96 recordings of 25 types.
Rasmussen: -17: 46/54
Heh. "Pop goes Pelosi."
William Bailey has a number of sayings from the '50s:
I'll tell you one thing, if things keep going the way they are, it's going to be impossible to buy a week's groceries for $20."
"Have you seen the new cars coming out next year? It won't be long before $5000 will only buy a used one."
"If cigarettes keep going up in price, I'm going to quit. A quarter a pack is ridiculous."
"Did you hear the post office is thinking about charging a dime just to mail a letter?"
"If they raise the minimum wage to $1, nobody will be able to hire outside help at the store."
"When I first started driving, who would have thought gas would someday cost 29 cents a gallon. Guess we'd be better off leaving the car in the garage."
"Kids today are impossible. Those duck tail hair cuts make it impossible to stay groomed. Next thing you know, boys will be wearing their hair as long as the girls."
"I'm afraid to send my kids to the movies any more. Ever since they let Clark Gable get by with saying 'damn' in 'Gone With The Wind,' it seems every new movie has either "hell" or "damn" in it.
"I read the other day where some scientist thinks it's possible to put a man on the moon by the end of the century. They even have some fellows they call astronauts preparing for it down in Texas."
"Did you see where some baseball player just signed a contract for $75,000 a year just to play ball? It wouldn't surprise me if someday they'll be making more than the president."
"I never thought I'd see the day all our kitchen appliances would be electric. They are even making electric typewriters now."
"It's too bad things are so tough nowadays. I see where a few married women are having to work to make ends meet."
"It won't be long before young couples are going to have to hire someone to watch their kids so they can both work."
"Marriage doesn't mean a thing any more; those Hollywood stars seem to be getting divorced at the drop of a hat."
"I'm just afraid the Volkswagen car is going to open the door to a whole lot of foreign business."
"Thank goodness I won't live to see the day when the Government takes half our income in taxes. I sometimes wonder if we are electing the best people to congress."
"The drive-in restaurant is convenient in nice weather, but I seriously doubt they will ever catch on."
"There is no sense going to Lincoln or Omaha anymore for a weekend. It costs nearly $15 a night to stay in a hotel."
"No one can afford to be sick any more; $35 a day in the hospital is too rich for my blood."
"If they think I'll pay 50 cents for a hair cut, forget it."
It's fascinating to me that up till Brown took Massachusetts, all the close calls went to the Dem -- Specter's defection, Franken's questionable win, etc. -- and yet even with overwhelming majorities in both houses and control of the White House, the narrative for most of this year has been embattled Democrats.
Posted by: JM Hanes | January 27, 2010 at 12:35 PM
The best thing politically for the Republicans is if the Dems force the Senate down the reconciliation path — sort of like a four month Bataan Death March — for Senate Dems up in 2010 and 2012. Republicans, unlike the first time, will be vigorous in their amendment strategy.
And the Dem negative political feedback loop they worked so hard to create and perfect, would immediately reboot, but with more force.
As before, the Dems would be performing the equivalent of natural political selection — those stupid enough to do it will die off.
For those who like to see an enemy vanquished, in detail, with their fields sown with salt, their horses dead, carts burned, wagon trains of food and ammunition destroyed, leadership dazed, troops wounded, supply lines broken and who are trying to fight in a “difficult environment” but whom will ultimately surrender — then you should be rooting for the Speaker and the White House and the Senate leadership to continue to act irrationally.
Because even if they do, ObamaCare still will not pass.
I went in for the blood test and again they didn't have any paperwork. My appointment is in a week, so I went upstairs to ask, and sure enough, they sent the permission right along. The whole thing only took about 20 minutes.
Then we took advantage of the good weather to go caching out at Mather. We initially had planned to go into "Splinterville", a big open space where there are lots of caches, but it turns out the parking is $5, and with Rich's bum knee we didn't know how far we'd get. So we went to the Vernal Pools and then to others in the old Mather area. In the end, we found 9 caches, had one no-find, walked 5.6 miles, had a happy dog. We stopped at Carl's Jr. on the way home. (I had a grilled chicken/apple/walnut salad. Yum.)
Chaucer Cdog Ellison The Obama administration has created or saved millions of Republicans!
Lisa McAtee Huffman What I find interesting is: 1. How come we were trying to get a vote on the healthcare bill BEFORE session broke for Christmas vacation, and everything was RUSH RUSH and now that Massachusetts has voted in a Republican, all of a sudden, there is no immediate need for action on this bill, we should 'take time' to consider all, etc. ?? Hm.. how interesting. 2. If we are going to implement a don't ask don't tell, why are we not getting feedback first from the military and those already serving and getting their opinion on it? (It certainly wouldn't be the first government study or research project.) What exactly is wrong with this policy?! I personally think it prevents a lot of hate crimes and dissention within our military, and no, I don't hate ppl that are gay. I have many friends that are. I also have much respect for our military and I don't think that we need to fix something that hasn't been broken for this long. Are the people that are gay (and I'm asking here, not being argumentative, because I really don't know) that are asking for this policy change serving already in the military or is it those that are just asking for this on a civil rights issue or are they those who are wanting to go in but refuse to unless they can openly serve? From what I heard on the news, it sounds like there is a large gay community that is upset because they "supported" the president and his campaign and are upset that something has not already been done. Are they all going to join the military (if they are not already serving) if they repeal "don't ask don't tell" and allow people to openly serve? As I said, I am not judging, I am asking. Maybe repealing it would take away the challenges of finding enough people to serve if it would benefit that many people or change their willingness to join and serve. What would be the benefits/risks of changing this policy and how would it affect our military? Would we see a significant change in the amount of people joining our highly esteemed military? Is that in the amount of people that would then sign up or those that would then not sign up? A lot to consider. And again, I would like to reiterate that I am not prejudice against those that are gay or even think differently than I do, but I think it merits much consideration. I am asking (not telling) because I honestly don't know how it would affect things, if it would end up being a positive or negative change. To me what is more important is your willingness to serve, not your sexual preference/orientation. I personally think it's a rather personal choice and don't see the need to know who the person next to you is sleeping with when you are in a foxhole or in the meal tent, in war time or in peace time.
AP lists 10 lies from the State of the Union speech. "Let me add at least one other whopper that the AP doesn’t mention. Obama repeatedly insisted that he inherited massive budgetary problems from George Bush, but the Con Law professor may want to retake his high-school civics class. Congress passes budgets, not the President, and the last three budgets came from Democrats. In three years, they increased annual federal spending by $900 billion, while the admittedly profligate and irresponsible Republican Congresses under George Bush increased annual federal spending by $800 billion — in six years. And during the last three years before taking office as President, Obama served in the Senate that passed those bills, and he voted for every Democratic budget put in front of him."
Pathetic is the word you’re looking for. I would guess that almost 40% of the speech was focused on whining about how tough he has it and how people don’t understand all the great things he has done. The short shrift given to international issues was telling. This is not a president it is a Chicago street pol who has no idea of what it means to be a president- dissing the Supreme Court in a forumn where he could not be contradicted was a cheap shot but in keeping with this man.
My Facebook friend Beth posted: "Hector Alexander, born still on January 28, 2010. We will love him forever." So sad. When I first met her, she was convinced she'd never marry, never mind have children, and now she and her husband have a 2.5 year old girl. She sounded so happy announcing her pregnancy on the first of the year. I believe she's in her 40s, this may well be it. I'm so sad for her. (Update: she had to stay in the hospital for sepsis: it would seem the baby died in the womb.)
It was the hurt and confusion of an academic who doesn’t understand how his B+ term paper could have become such a disaster when implemented in the real world, and insists it will still work, if everyone pays closer attention to the extensive footnotes. ...Praise for the resilient spirit of the American people rings hollow, coming from a man who doesn’t think they can be trusted to manage their own health care without government supervision. ...The party of George Soros, and the candidate who turned his campaign website into a Swiss bank account by disabling its basic identity checks, have nothing useful to say about keeping “foreign money” out of politics. ...Government is force, and the larger its programs become, the more it becomes fixated on compliance. The belief that we can let the government control some portions of our lives and industry, while the rest remain vibrant and creative, is a childish fantasy that should have died for good last night, before the spectacle of a man who doesn’t understand why his declared capitalist enemies aren’t producing enough jobs to boost his approval ratings. When he urged Americans to begin removing the obstacles to their success, he was too disconnected to understand that process already began in Massachusetts last week.
Presidents should feel free to criticize important Supreme Court decisions with which they disagree. It's bad form, however, to do so at an event where Justices are in attendance by invitation. And it is unconscionable to do so by blatantly misrepresenting what the Court has said.
It was more than bad form. It was a deliberate attempt by Obama to intimidate the Court. A coach yells at the referee not out of an expectation that the completed call will be changed, but in the hope of influencing the next call.
It also was a cowardly act, because Obama knew that the Justices would be constrained in responding, both then and later. Indeed, a mere grimace and alleged mouthing of a few words has brought the legal apparatchiks down on Alito's head.
One problem ... is that upturned chin. Just as a matter of angles, it looks wrong on TV. So it would be a problem for Hillary or McCain or Ron Paul or whoever would have won. But it's worse for Obama because it plays into the aloof-and-arrogant meme. I don't know why he does it. Are the prompters notched up a hole too high? What's the deal? Why doesn't one of his supersmart advisers get out the wrench and lower them?
Oh, it's supposed to be "Rescue, Restore, Rebuild"? (Not America, 0bama's adulation numbers. At least he has my daughter-in-law.) Let's just say that Christopher Buckley will be hard to recover.
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 662
26.6 miles.
fog, then finally sunshine!
110 recordings of 30 types
Rasmussen: -15: 46/53. I imagine he'll get a blip, but will it endure?
So, he had a hatchet on Monday when he wanted headlines praising his return to austerity in the wake of the GOP’s Massachusetts Senate victory; a scalpel on Tuesday when he needed to mollify the big government Left. What will he wield at the State of the Union address on Wednesday night? A variable-speed Dremel rotary tool?
...
who believes this freeze will last for the entire, cynically-timed three-year period that the White House announced less than 72 hours ago? McDonald’s French Fries have a longer shelf life than Obama’s pledges of fiscal accountability. All it’ll take is one more bad jobs report, one Chicken Little Congress-induced panic, to drop the budget restrictions faster than reality dad Jon Gosselin’s ex-girlfriends.
...
One year after riding into town on a wave of adulation and ambition, Obama has lost his “swagga.” His pre-State of the Union appearances have been listless and perfunctory. His dependence on a teleprompter – even for a standard, 6-minute stump statement at an elementary school — is now the butt of universal mockery. And his political machine has been forced to lay down enough fake Astroturf support to cover a football field. This is the time to nail the phonies in the White House, not to beg for meetings in hopes of bipartisan problem-solving. There’s little triumph in Obama’s empty “concessions” on the need to cut spending. They are fueled not by sincere commitment to reining in Washington’s appetites, but by craven political self-preservation. The president has lately regressed into his “I will fight for you” campaign sloganeering — by which, of course, he means, “I will fight for me.” There will be no hands reaching across the aisle. Obama’s too busy using them to point fingers at everyone else for his own political meltdown.
The American people don't need a narcissistic, snake-oil salesman, dressed up as President of the United States, namely one Barack Obama, to tell them why they are angry and frustrated. This is just sheer, unadulterated arrogance. It is condescending, patronizing, and alienated from mainstream American. This buffoon Gibbs is just pouring oil on a fire that was kindled during the 2008 election and stoked all of 2009 as the charlatan-in-chief was found to be as naked as a jaybird on a spring morning with nothing to sell but his song. And you know what, we don't even like the sound of his voice anymore.
You ain't seen nothin' yet Gibbs ol' baby, you ain't seen nothin' yet !
On January 27th, 2010 at 10:17 am, Savage24 said:
We will get another hour of lies from Obama, 15 munutes of the State of the Union,and 45 minutes of his insufferable ego. Then another two hours from the media pundits telling us what he said. All you have to remember is the “you got me” attitude of this clown.
On January 27th, 2010 at 10:27 am, NC BLUE said:
I—-I—–I—–I—–I—-I—-I—-I—-I—-I—-. and George Bush sucks. Thank You and —-Bless America. Fill in the blanks. I can’t stand seeing or listening to this lying sack of s###.
Betting pool: which Democrat will scream "you lie."
The American people have a very American world view. The God of the Bible is real. Mom, the flag, apple pie, and American exceptionalism are the hallmarks of the American world view. A majority of American embrace this world view.
Voters want a guy in office who shares that world view.
But there is a growing sense among independents and even some Democrats that Barack Obama does not share that world view.
...
Obama was not Bush and independents and Democrats could not imagine electing a guy who did not share their world view. Obama was “one of us,” so to speak. He had to be.
Except he is not. He never was. When voters begin to think and then realize that the President of the United States does not share the prototypical American world view, they will turn on the President.
The last line sums it up
bk Wednesday, January 27th at 5:31AM EST (link)
For the first time in his life, Obama has an actual record to be judged on. He can run a great election campaign with all the right promises, but as president he’s failed to deliver no matter whether you look from the left or from the right.
Now that the people are judging him on results instead of on promises and don’t like what they see, what does he do? Does he admit he blew it and try to change direction? No not really. Does he continue to blame Bush for everything bad and take credit for anything good? Yes, and since November elections we’ve seen that has gone over like a lead balloon. But even worse, instead of trying to get better results he goes into a cocoon, bringing in yet another campaign expert and retreating more into campaign mode where speeches matter more than anything. People don’t want to hear more carefully worded lies, like a “spending freeze” that really means “second stimulus” once you dig past the carefully chosen focus-group-driven soundbites.
The bloom is off the rose, and he has no idea how to proceed since he’s never been told “no” before. The magic of saving the day by giving a good speech has evaporated. The days of voting ‘present’ are over.
.......
"You never get a second chance...
ex_scientia_vires Wednesday, January 27th at 6:05AM EST (link)
…to make a first impression.”
I only take issue with your post in the next-to-last paragraph: With an entire year of, ahem, achievements behind him (archived permanently in the interwebs) BHO has already made his impression, and the cement is dry.
....
kathrynlopez this is a very bad moment for the president 2 be playing social experimentation in the military. but that's how desperate he is w/ the left.
Michelle's Dress is actually nice tonight.
jaketapper A craven of Senators just walked in -- too many to mention. of note: seatwarmers Kirk and Kauffman were together. HA!
5:54PM Maybe it’s just the low-def webcast, but don’t you think Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid look especially lifelike tonight?
5:56PM Usually, one Supreme Court justice, like one cabinet official, stays behind in a secret location. But today they couldn’t locate any long straws.
6:14PM “I know these anxieties are out there…” Should have said, “I know you are anxious.” Even his wording is distant, disconnected.
6:44PM “Let’s clear a few things up.” “I didn’t take on health care because it was good politics.” And that, said Yoda, is why you fail.
6:47PM “I will not walk away from these Americans.” That, Mr. President, is what we’re afraid of.
7:12PM OK. Now I’m mad. That rat-f*cker just claimed to support the protestors in Iran? He said maybe ONE thing since June of ‘08, and did nothing to actually help? I used to just disdain Obama. Now I hate him.
7:21PM We’re into the Big Finish… but there’s no new here. For a guy who got his bottom handed to him in three big elections, he’s strangely reluctant to change course. In fact, he’s not even willing to change tone. Which means, whatever you thought of Bush’s lousy last three years, Obama has already outdone him in being tone-deaf.
At Frank Lunz's opinion panel, one woman called 0bama a "gifted orator and the country's best conservationist." By which she means he keeps recycling the same tired arguments.
After Van Jones, Anita Dunn, the Skip Gates mess, the "tea-bagger" slurs, the attacks on Fox News, the Copenhagen dashes, the bowing, the apologizing, the reordering of creditors, the NEA obsequiousness, the lackluster overseas-contingency-operation front, the deer-in-the-headlights pause on Afghanistan, the pseudo-deadlines on Iran, Guantanamo, and health care, the transparency and bipartisanship fraud, and dozens of other things, Obama simply does not have the popularity to carry unpopular legislation forward. Indeed, he is reaching a point where he may poll more negatively than his agenda does. "Let me be perfectly clear" and "make no mistake about it" are now caricatures.
So where are we at twelve months? Obama showed the country his vision of where he wanted us to go; he had both houses of Congress, a toady media, and enormous personal popularity — and he is getting nowhere. Why? Because most Americans are vehemently opposed to taking their country in the direction that Obama, Pelosi, and Reid would prefer.
Since Obama is both inexperienced and apparently a stubborn ideologue, I think all we will be left with when the novelty wears off is rhetoric and euphemism.
Poor widdle prwesident Bawack Obama. Nobody woves him anymore.
Obama to ABC News: “I’d rather be a really good one-term president than a mediocre two-term president.”
Mediocre is aiming high after his first year.
By the way, none of our two-term presidents (and yuck, I’m including Nixon) was mediocre. ... Jim says: January 25, 2010 at 11:58 PM I believe he has a long way to go to work himself up to mediocre for his first term. Piss poor is what comes to my mind when I think of o.
This is about local hoarders. I think we would be about a 2. We have clutter, we have far too much STUFF, but we are able to get rid of it. GoE was definitely in the upper level.
Today Bernadette and Gareth came over to go to the Discovery Museum. Since it doesn't open till noon we had 4 hours to play. Gareth asked for Djadja. He's beginning to put together some simple phrases though he doesn't talk much. He played with the Yo Gabba Gabba toys and the bus again, and we tried to get him to take a napkin to Djadja. This took two stages, but he was pleased when he completed the job and everyone said what a good boy he was. Every day he's growing. He danced with Brobie, too, and really loves the "you are AWESOME!" line. And Nana had some wonderful new toys, a couple of Marie Callendar pie tins which should have been in the car. They make noise! They stack! He had a great time with them.
The museum was full of an Elk Grove school, but they were leaving as we came. I saw one other family come in, but they disappeared, so it was the three of us. Gareth had two places he really liked, the toddler area which was full of dinosaur toys and nobody told him he couldn't move them all to the floor; and the glass door between the animal room and the rest of the museum. There's a dinosaur puzzle which roars when the pieces are put back which he liked, and he was intrigued by the magnets. We stayed about half an hour, which was about twice as long as I thought he would last.
Then this evening there was a members' night (Wings and Wine: only it was meatballs and wine) at the Aerospace Museum. They are getting heavily into education, and I found out about the California Aerospace Academy charter school. (160 students). It sounds great. We got hit up for money, and enjoyed the rest of the evening. Now I have to fast for tomorrow, a blood test.
We saw someone who used to teach at Loretto, and she, too, had read this article.
Some people traced the beginning of Loretto’s end to Sister Helen’s decision, several years earlier, to halt many of the school’s signature events: the auction; the family barbecue, a “fun- and friend-raiser” that brought people together; weekly liturgies at the school. “Somewhere along the line, these things started to disappear,” said Julie Mietus, a Loretto parent who also worked as the school photographer. Mietus and others believe the loss of these community-building events fatally weakened the school.
Fall about laughing. "JAKARTA — Indonesian authorities said Monday they are considering a petition to tear down a statue of US President Barack Obama as a boy, only a month after the bronze was unveiled in Jakarta."
@politicalmath: Obama proposing spending freeze is like promising to slow down from 250 mph to 249.9 @Doc_0: If Eric Holder's not going 2 investigate anything, how about spending freeze 4 DOJ? Kathryn Lopez the president is, in his way, a uniter: left and right are trashing freeze gimmick; left and right unhappy about health-care ....
After his first year on the job, America is sliding backwards, into grave danger at home and around the world. So much so that I now believe either of his rivals, Hillary Clinton or John McCain, would have made a better, more reliable and more trustworthy president.
They warned us he wasn't ready.
Yes, we're stuck with him, but we're no longer stuck with his suffocating conformity. The second Boston Tea Party opened the door to new ideas and new people of both parties.
Obama's reactions were predictable. More self-pity, blaming George W. Bush, and claiming that the voter revolt is due to ignorance about the health-care plan they hate.
Blah blah blah. Hasn't he heard? The magic is gone.
I turned him off this morning after Biden's blather. Michelle Malkin watched, though, so I didn't have to: Don't know what all this talk of a "new tone" is about. O-blah-blah-blah-ma was as listless & perfunctory as ever.
Jona Ford Giammalva This sounds like part of the 10 minute speech I gave to the gal from the RNC who called asking for money the other day. I told her I had already given my money straight to Scott Brown and that worked out just fine so I'll keep doing it that way. I also told her that if they start playing nice we might let them share in some of the fun this year.
Scott Ott DAVID AXELROD, Pres. Obama's senior adviser, inadvertently nails why people reject the health care reform bill: "...people will never know what’s in that bill until we pass it, the president signs it and they have a whole new range of protections they never had before." SCOTT OTT NOTES: This from a president who promised that we would always know what's in the bills, and that negotiations would happen on C-Span.
THE EIGHT-YEAR JOKE Good read on Obama's reaction to Scott Brown (your column this week). Obama's Bush blame reminds me of the old vaudeville joke that goes something like this: "The guy ahead of me was so bad, the audience booed during my entire act."
Bob Wukitsch St Louis, Missouri
"a marvel of obliviousness, obtuseness, and unbelievably condescending arrogance" ---Krauthammer on the Democrats' reaction to Massachusetts.
"I'd rather be a really awesome one term President than a mediocre two-termer." How about a mediocre one-termer? He says the big difference between now and '94 is "you've got me." Hahaha! Arrogant? You think??
The Anchoress asks what 0bama likes about America.
Now that the glory and adulation have passed, now that the pageant has ended, and the presidency has become a real job, requiring real maturity and a bit of real (not faux) open-mindedness, Obama seems unhappy with most Americans (except the unions) and the feeling of unhappiness and distrust is quite mutual. ... We need better than this, and we deserve better than this. We need a president who seems to understand who Americans are. We need a president who wants to be the president, and not the prince. We need a president who seem to actually like his country.
We need a president who…well…actually…we need a president.
.comments:
Your post is not over the top. These past few days Obama has been like a petulant child. He isn’t getting his way and, lately, this “being President” gig is way too much work for someone who, in recent history, hasn’t really worked like most Americans.
I question whether he really knows how angry the American people are with his policies. In listening to his recent rhetoric, he seems oblivious to that anger. Let’s just keep on pushing those unpopular policies!!
I pray the American people do not doze off again. Our liberty and freedom is too important. -- Obama never wanted to “be” President. He wanted to be “elected”. He wanted to run. He wanted the adoring crowds, the fame, the international acclaim, etc. But not the actual job. -- The only think Obama – either of them – like about America is that it voted him president.
Otherwise, as several commenters have pointed out, he doesn’t like us very much. Too many people clinging to their God and guns instead of the government.
Where from here? As you say, Obama has ceased to enjoy being president. The question is whether he can turn things around for himself.
Don’t count him out. Bill Clinton rebounded from 1994 magnificently and trounced the GOP in 1996.
But if Obama continues to fail, he’ll turn on America. His contempt for us will become obvious, and soon he won’t even hide it. It won’t be a pretty thing to watch, especially with so much at stake here and around the world.
Sarah Palin suggests he listen instead of lecturing: "Candidate Obama over-promised; President Obama has under-delivered. We understand you, Mr. President. We’ve listened to you again and again. We ask that you now listen to the American people."
We went to see "The Producers" in Davis today. They did a good job, but it's not all that wonderful a play. Bev liked it better than I did, but Andy Hyun was over-the-top fantastic.
The odds against convincing an increasingly self-absorbed culture to make sacrifices on behalf of unplanned children are formidable. It’s interesting that our political class is comfortable demanding all sorts of other sacrifices from us, laid on the altar of our collective good under the guns of our huge, complex government. We are forever told that we must pay our “fair share” and accept the control of the State to achieve social justice… while absolute sexual liberty, including the inconsequential relationships promised through abortion on demand, are offered as a relief valve for the pressure of the State’s demands. We’re told to accept a sexual freedom that bypasses reason, in exchange for Constitutional freedoms which transcend the designs of government. ... Measured against the vast and frigid sweep of existence, the odds that you would be sitting here, reading this, are absurdly small… and yet, here you are. We owe our children the same fighting chance to be miraculous. ... The alternative to the awful extremity of abortion is the indispensable joy of introducing this flawed world to someone who might make it better.
Get Out of the Way While we Clean Up Your 0bama-mess. Another Black Conservative has more. Well, Ms. Dobson, apology not accepted. Instead I offer you a big fat “F*ck you”! Your colossal stupidity has doomed millions of Americans, who were ten times smarter than you, to the same fate of unemployment you now endure. You and your ilk run around pretending you are the smartest things on two feet, yet you could not see a dime store con artist standing right before you!
A man may fall many times but he won't be a failure until he says someone pushed him.--Elmer G. Letterman
The superior man blames himself. The inferior man blames others.--Don Shula
Hahahaha! (Even though he seems to think that Bush stole two elections and that 0bama negotiated with Republicans. And that Republicans are the worst threat to the country.) "you'll also want to take the most important power the president has - the bully pulpit - and totally piss it away. Appear everywhere at once, all the time, saying lots of nice words, about a thousand different issues. But never with passion, never with compelling simplicity, never with repetition, and never with urgency. Pretty soon you'll turn being everywhere into being nowhere. Everyone one will tune out your ubiquitous self. "
Krauthammer, What Scott Brown's win means for the Democrats
The reason both wings of American liberalism -- congressional and mainstream media -- were so surprised at the force of anti-Democratic sentiment is that they'd spent Obama's first year either ignoring or disdaining the clear early signs of resistance: the tea-party movement of the spring and the town-hall meetings of the summer. With characteristic condescension, they contemptuously dismissed the protests as the mere excrescences of a redneck, retrograde, probably racist rabble. ... "If you lose Massachusetts and that's not a wake-up call," said moderate -- and sentient -- Democratic Sen. Evan Bayh of Indiana, "there's no hope of waking up."
I say: Let them sleep.
Michelle Malkin Obama is campaigning on my TV *again* ?!?! Am I in a time warp?
Lisa Waldeck Ritter he is doing a mass clean-up! after the mass election, he is desperate! he is just blaming the prior administration and the economic catastrophe he was handed. he wants to do this for you! ha,ha he is making the repubs look downright evil! who wouldn't want what he is peddling??
Michelle Malkin GM-truck-bashing Obama now trying to channel Scott Brown populism. Droppin' his gs talkin' 'bout the hard-workin people.
@jimgeraghty: I'm watching a man who has steadily expanded govt...try 2 get crowd 2 chant, "we want r money back!"
Cheryl Lewis Michelle, why is it the president of the U.S. can't seem to be bothered with a tie when every other man there has one on? And he even remarked to the man he took the 2nd question from how sharp he looks in a tie. Argh!
Something Went Wrong in Jet Crash, Expert Says Police Begin Campaign to Run Down Jaywalkers Panda Mating Fails; Veterinarian Takes Over Miners Refuse to Work after Death Juvenile Court to Try Shooting Defendant... See More War Dims Hope for Peace If Strike Isn't Settled Quickly, It May Last Awhile Cold Wave Linked to Temperatures Couple Slain; Police Suspect Homicide Red Tape Holds Up New Bridges Man Struck By Lightning: Faces Battery Charge New Study of Obesity Looks for Larger Test Group Astronaut Takes Blame for Gas in Spacecraft Kids Make Nutritious Snacks Local High School Dropouts Cut in Half Hospitals are Sued by 7 Foot Doctors Typhoon Rips Through Cemetery; Hundreds Dead
For long-suffering conservatives, Christmas arrived about a month late this year. But considering all the presents we got this week, it was like coming downstairs and finding the Budweiser Clydesdales under the tree, instead of that crummy used Radio Flyer your dad managed to find on eBay for twenty bucks. ... Brown ran hard on the selling point that he would be the 41st vote in the Senate against Harry Reid’s and Nancy Pelosi’s screwball tax-and-wreck “health care” plan, a Rube Goldbergian contraption that would have made Elbridge Gerry weep with envy at all its cut-outs, set-asides, bribes and special-interest stroking. He also campaigned on the notion that taxpayer dollars would be better spent fighting terrorists instead of paying for lawyers for them. So, naturally, the first questions he got yesterday from the press corps in Washington were all along the lines of: “You’re not really a Republican, are you?”
Conrad Black: Incompetent Obama teeters on the edge. “He is increasingly perceived as having credibility problems and of being cold, cocksure, narcissistic and intoxicated by what he modestly called ‘the gift’ of his own articulation. And as president, he has been quite, and quite surprisingly, incompetent. . . . It has been a year of fecklessness, amateurism, and posturing. Less that is useful has been accomplished by this president in his first year than by any president since Herbert Hoover. ... When A Democratic president has lost Ms. Dowd and the Kennedys' Senate seat, it is time to return to the drawing boards."
"He gave only (according to CBS News' Mark Knoller) 158 interviews and 411 speeches in his first year. That's more than any previous president – and maybe more than all of them put together. But there may still be some show out there that didn't get its exclusive Obama interview – I believe the top-rated "Grain & Livestock Prices Report – 4 a.m. Update with Herb Torpormeister" on WZZZ-AM Dead Buzzard Gulch Junction's Newstalk Leader is still waiting to hear back from the White House." --Mark Steyn.
More. "Denial, arrogance and self-pity are ingredients for a pretty toxic cocktail. And yet it seems that the occupants of the White House bunker, shell-shocked by Scott Brown, are coping by mixing all three with a little Kool-Aid."
[comments]
First we demanded that zero reveal his birth certificate to prove he's not a Kenyan.
Now we should be screaming to see his school records to prove he's not retarded.
Bush's fault??? My God, the man is omnipotent!!! (thanks, Krauthamer)
And thank you, Barry O. for continually reminding us what a humble and decent man your predecessor was. He made a lot of mistakes but unlike you, W could learn and adjust, always keeping our interests and security in mind.
Arrogance and contempt: These clowns are more like the Soviet Politburo each day. Regardless of how many Russians were starving to death, every year the official Soviet crop reports would declare greater abundance than the year before.
It's much like how in the face of an economy that is hemorrhaging jobs, Obumble can proclaim the millions of jobs he's "saved or created," in spite of all evidence to the contrary.
Or how Robert Gibbs can inform us all that Obama didn't actually bow, in direct defiance of what we all could plainly see with our own eyes.
Or how our Dear Leader can declare that it was a failure to enact his agenda and anger at Bush that got Scott Brown elected in Massachusetts.
They have contempt for those they govern and clearly think that whatever they say will be uncritically accepted by the teeming masses. Sadly, far too many are still buying what these clowns are selling.
As a Catholic, I comfort myself with the knowledge that only two perfect people ever walked the earth. And when I am down about making mistakes, I pray to St. Joseph because he had to live with both of them.
That's it. "He was trying to fix the economy with a massive stimulus of personal pronouns."
We need another speech. We need another speech. We need another speech.
But wait never fear Obama is going to make another speech.
Who’s panting for Obama speech number 412? Exactly no one.... Got it. People are so angry and frustrated at George W. Bush that they’re voting for Republicans. In Massachusetts. Boy, I can’t wait for that 159th interview.
Presumably, the president isn’t stupid enough actually to believe what he said. But it’s dispiriting to discover he’s stupid enough to think we’re stupid enough to believe it.... Howard Fineman, the increasingly loopy editor of the increasingly doomed Newsweek, took it a step further. The truck wasn’t just any old prop but a very particular kind: “In some places, there are codes, there are images,” he told MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann. “You know, there are pickup trucks, you could say there was a racial aspect to it one way or another.”
[I'm so glad I gave up on Newsweek years ago. And Olbermann is a nut-case TOO.]
Whenever aspiring writers ask me for advice, I usually tell ’em this:
Don’t just write there, do something. Learn how to shingle a roof, or tap-dance, or raise sled dogs. Because if you don’t do anything, you wind up like Obama and Fineman — men for whom words are props and codes and metaphors but no longer expressive of anything real.
America is becoming a bilingual society, divided between those who think a pickup is a rugged vehicle useful for transporting heavy-duty items from A to B and those who think a pickup is coded racism..... fine, have it your way. Tuesday’s vote was really a plea by a desperate people for even more Obama. We’re going to need even more Obama teleprompters, even more Obama speeches, even more sonorous banalities unrelated to action, even more “Let me be clears” prefacing even more tinny generalities, on even more reams of even more double-spaced paper.
Obama finds himself in a position where the public likely won’t buy him as a populist, even as investors overwhelmingly find him too anti-business and lack confidence of his ability to handle a financial emergency. Well played, sir.
comment:
The strongest sign that Emperor Arugula has learned nothing?
Watch the upcoming State of the Union Address.
I will bet that it’s actually nothing but “The State of Obama” address, that he will spin, spin, spin, shake his fist, say “let me be perfectly clear” a half-dozen times and then scamper off stage to the scattered applause of the duller of the MSM sycophants and a handful of “last-ditchers” who are so wedded to this imbecile that they have no other options.
Watch. He’s so much smarter than all of us. There’s nothing to improve!
heldmyw on January 23, 2010 at 2:46 PM
Patterico, 0bama's Big Sellout and What the Right Can Learn From It
Moving forward, the Left — from Pres. Obama on down — should not be allowed to whine about having inherited a bad economy from the Bush administration. By their own admissions, Clinton-era Democrats were among the “very people who caused the crisis in the first place” — and they now hold high offices in the Obama administration.
Just for a change, let's diss someone who ISN'T the President! "There's unpopular, there's widely loathed, there's despised, and then there's John Edwards. Americans are a tolerant people, but they have a line, and evidently, when you cheat on your cancer-stricken wife, lie about it to everyone while running for president, and then decline to acknowledge fathering a love child for two years, you've crossed it."
Back to dissing 0bama. This is just plain stupid and very dangerous.
It’s more fun to do the SOTU here at Hot Air. I don’t have to listen to him and you all can keep me entertained by your blow by blow account of this man-child. I have been sick of him since before the election. Actually since before the primaries. This week has been the greatest week since—I don’t know when. We have been beat down since the inaguration when the fool actually got power. One thing I have learned is that nothing is forever in politics. It’s as changable as the weather. Who knew that Massachusetts would be the state that would change the world for us? Never in a million years did I ever see those patriots rising up. CT maybe, but MA? Wow! Just wow.
BetseyRoss on January 23, 2010 at 4:24 PM
He’s going to crack, folks. More and more now, and often multiple times per day, he’s getting his buttons pushed (including some of which he probably was not aware) and he does not liking it in the least.
Your new tilting at windmills ploy,errr, bad mouthing Wall Street, just blew up my 401(k), not to mention my other investments. Again. Right after they were just about even with the pounding they took a year or so ago. What a stellar job this administration is doing. Riiiight…
About now, I’m thinking if I wanted something screwed up, I can trust the Chicago boys to come through.
If I want something done right, the high school kid down the street who is always looking for work around the neighborhood would be a far better choice.
He’s prompt, cleans up after himself, does whatever work we give him with a smile on his face and sincere gratefulness for what he gets paid.
ARGH. I was fairly agnostic on this topic but the fanatics have pushed me right.
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 662 23.5 miles. rain, then clearing
108 recordings of 30 types, yesterday. Today it's 101 of 28 types. Some of the Law & Order episodes are ones I've seen, so I was able to skip them. (I'm trying to see the whole series.)
Rasmussen: -18: 45/54 yesterday and -19(!): 44/55.
Rich is painting the doorframes all over the front of the house. Spooky apparently looked at the paint lid: there's a yellow spot on his nose and his whiskers.
This morning we went to a 7AM Mass to see off the bus for the West Coast March for Life. It's so nice to have a priest who is pro-life! It was a good Mass and we talked to some friends before going off to breakfast at the nearby waffle house. Yummmmm.
Then we had an appointment for someone to come make an estimate on the closet door. He's Russian and the prices astounded Rich, though they were about what I figured. He gave us a unit price on the three doors (front door, kitchen, and closet) that seems reasonable. Besides, I like seeing our immigrants doing well.
The sun came out and we walked over to the nearby cache, which we found right away. Oh, well.
There's no way out for these Democrats. They made a Faustian bargain 40 years ago with the public unions. For the outlays alone, they'll get some version of the Obama health-care bill. They'll also go to the same old "populist anger" well.
Scott Brown's victory has given the GOP a rare, narrow chance to align itself with an electorate that understands its anger. Now the GOP has to find a way to disconnect from a political legacy that smothered governments at all levels and is now smothering the Democratic Party.
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 662 22.5 miles. cloudy, rain
I'm 1.6 pounds down this week, with my blood pressure borderline.
I meant to post this stuff as a second entry yesterday and ran out of time/energy.
(Yesterday), Rasmussen: -15:47/52
It was a day that kept going south. Pharoah still needs to be manhandled down to wipe his paws, and you would think by now that he'd have the idea. Abby has been spending nights in the bathroom and doing well, so Wednesday night I left her able to get around. She did urinate in the box, but I discovered a pile near the closet. ARGH! I don't know if it was during the night or the morning, but I'm sometimes ready to wring her neck.
Gareth had a pretty good day, though he had to be in time out for playing with the light wire and switch twice. Then he only had an hour nap and was really crying afterwards. He's got the snuffly noise and appears to be teething.
He played with the bus again, and he's also doing well with putting the Megablox together. He gets a big stack of them together and then gets all frustrated that they don't fit into the toy microwave. He's learning stuff all the time. Today he brought his big penguin toy, so fluffy and I saw him give Penguin a big hug (and then drop it on the floor, of course.)
In a final time of the day going south, baby crying, dog impossible, I had to start dinner, and I didn't read the recipe all the way through so put the corn starch in too soon. Also, I seem to have no sugar. I used powdered sugar instead, but I was convinced the pork-and-cranberry recipe would be terrible. It turned out great, despite my best efforts.
0bama didn't talk to us enough! (158 interviews, 411 speeches and statements) We didn't hear him. He sure doesn't hear us. Don't speak to me about what my core values are. I don't think you KNOW what our core values are!!
Michelle Malkin John Kerry looks extra Lurch-ish at his press conference with Scott Brown. Body language field day.
Politico: Democrats say 0bamacare talks are Collapsing (comments)
A Senate staffer told TPM yesterday that the feeling among the Democratic caucus at Brown’s victory was actually relief that in Brown’s victory they finally had an excuse to step back from the ledge.
I’ve also been wondering what in the world will Obama say in his State of the Union next week.
INC on January 21, 2010 at 10:30 PM
Over\Under Let me be clear: 5 Last eight years: 3 Clean up this mess: 3 Deficits we inherited: 4
Meanwhile, an interesting passage from Clarence Thomas’s partial dissent, regarding disclosure requirements for donors:
"The success of such intimidation tactics has apparently spawned a cottage industry that uses forcibly disclosed donor information to pre-empt citizens’ exercise of their First Amendment rights…..
I cannot endorse a view of the First Amendment that subjects citizens of this Nation to death threats, ruined careers, damaged or defaced property, or pre-emptive and threatening warning letters as the price for engaging in “core political speech, the ‘primary object of First Amendment protection.’ ”
The witchhunts continue to ramify. Meanwhile, President Obama wants legislation to undercut the opinion. Good luck with that.
Anyway, this is nothing new. We’ve already seen citizens subjected to barrages of political opinion and electioneering from corporations that use their stockholder money to advance political positions held by management without regard to good business judgment. You know, corporations like The New York Times. More on that here.
Posted at 10:48 pm by Glenn Reynolds:
SAY, DO YOU THINK BARACK OBAMA IS STILL “unaware” of the Tea Party protests? (Thanks to reader Jason Mart for the reminder. Mart writes: “Last April 15th, after taking the day off to protest, I remembered how angry I was to hear that our president was ‘unaware of the tea parties…’ I guess maybe he is aware now.” Heh.)
Ooh. Health care done (maybe): The Supremes start killing McCain-Feingold and about time, Copenhagen slipping away: Air America finally gives up. Who knew this was a house of cards, or a row of dominos? Wow.
Yesterday we drove down to San Francisco in the storm and the wind and the rain (scary) to see the Tutenkhamen exhibition. We had seen the one in 1979 (when the price was an unheard-of $4.50) but this one has different artifacts.
I was trying to remember the last time: I think this is the time I took my friend Colette, and Rich, the girls and my Mom went later. That happened at one event or another. We had the tickets ahead (and when I went to Country Club Center to get them there was a huge line for a concert, and people thought I was jumping the line. A girl could get killed that way. Colette and I drove over the Golden Gate Bridge (which is why I think maybe it was the Palace of Fine Arts instead) and it was windy. I was driving a huge van: first time I referred to a white-knuckle ride.
We also stopped at a Chinese Restaurant in the Sunset District that was great. We figured it might be since the place was full of Asians. That's the first time I had hot-and-sour soup, which I've loved ever since.
But I don't remember the exhibit. I do remember Tut's mask, which didn't come to this exhibit.
This time I'd wanted to take BART and the culture bus, but they stopped the culture bus, and it's a bit of a hike from the regular bus stop. Never mind. So we drove, and it didn't matter that the weather was dreadful, we didn't want to lose our tickets. The worst of the rain was at Fairfield and Vallejo. The wind was worse around Vacaville and over the Causeway between Sacramento and Davis. I was worried that the Golden Gate bridge would be awful, but it wasn't too bad.
We found parking just down the street from the museum and went on over. Picked up our tickets without trouble. All I can say about the entirely-rebuilt museum is WOW. I liked the old building, but they sure did wonders with this.
We were too early for our time through the exhibit, so we made a quick trip through the first floor galleries. ObGoe: "Cathedral of Santa Guerra", a model made of bullets and other ammo. I also really liked a glass work that was on a mirror, and a mobile (wind chime) made of burnt wood from an Alabama black church, and a big stainless steel rock.
Then it was time for Tut! We had a 90 second film and then went into the galleries. We were with one school group and caught up to the earlier, noisier, one. But the kids, while kids, were well-behaved. There are many beautiful artifacts from the tomb and the information was easy to read and understand.
We had an excellent lunch at the cafe. I had a vegetable cassoulet, Rich had a cordon bleu sandwich. Very elegant. We had a good view of the new Academy of Science building. We also saw the safety pin in the front. I remember when there was a pond with turtles there. Then we went up the observation tower, really nifty, and then saw the African and New Guinea art. Then we planned to find a couple of caches on the way back to the car and maybe do some more caching... only then the skies opened. Rich said "abort" and I said "what kind of wimps ARE we? It's only 88 feet away. We found that and found another one near the car. The second one was all decorated up with pyramids and mummies. Neat!
We stopped by to see Roni's mother-in-law who seems much happier than last year. She seemed glad to see us. We were there about 90 minutes and got a great story of a "romance" (long time friend who thought she'd be really great to wait on him hand and foot, so asked her to marry him. So funny the way she tells it.)
Then, near Vacaville, a field of crosses with a sign that this is the number of abortions *every day* in the USA. I wish I'd had my camera out! We got home just about dark, the dog was so muddy he went through two towels, and the cats were glad to see us.
Schadenfreude is such an unattractive quality: but it's oh such fun!
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 662 22.5 miles. rain, wind, cold
98 recordings of 26 types.
Poe's toast didn't happen. I guess it will always be a mystery.
Barry Jantz Massachusetts: 86 years between World Series titles. 57 years between GOP Senators. What could possibly be next?
Gregory B Hahn I like the song, but let's not count our chickens before the eggs hatch. We've got a long way to go still. I feel our number one priority must be to elect candidates that will bring Congress back down to our level. They must be willing to be our servants, not our rulers. They must remove all special privilages that Congress has (Retirement, health care and etc) and be put on the same systems that we are. They must be willing to take the cushions out from under their own bottoms so we can get back on a level playing field, where they share in ours victories as well as our hurts.
The fact that the President can't find a single Republican vote out of more than 200 potential supporters is a strong indication that this is a bad bill. The only people willing to vote for it are people who share with the President interests that are unrelated to health care. The biggest shared interest is their political livelihood: Democrats sink or swim together. But that's a horrible reason to vote for a bill that will affect so many people in such a profound way. ... [The people] can take it all away in a single instant - so the smart approach is not to give them a reason.
This Congress and this President seem hell-bent on ignoring that maxim. It started last year with TARP. It continued into this year with the pork-laden, wasteful stimulus bill. It moved to the auto bailouts, reckless deficit spending, and coziness with Wall Street. And now, it has moved to health care "reform." The people are taking notice, they don't like it, and they're starting to blame the government for the weakened state of the union.
Voters are sick and tired of a terrible year of big spending and big deficits — especially the sight of Obama and his congressional allies almost daily talking breezily about spending what we do not have. ... The problem was not just that Obama made promises that he broke, but that he made them so frequently and so vehemently — and so cavalierly broke them. That brazen campaign deception is problematic for a politician, but proves fatal for a self-appointed messiah. ... We went from a Republican “culture of corruption” to a liberal cesspool of corruption. Sen. Chris Dodd lectures Wall Street while he gets sweetheart loans and vacation-home deals. Few could make up a story that the nation’s top tax lawmaker, House Ways and Means Chairman Charles Rangel, is a tax dodger, and the nation’s top tax enforcer, Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner, is an even more egregious tax dodger. When the Democratic Senate leadership started buying health-care votes at $300 million a clip, our Congress became little more than the praetorian guard, auctioning off its support to any wannabe late Roman emperor. The idea of a muckraking Obama nominating Tom Daschle as his Health Secretary — the liberal populist who skips out of thousands of dollars in taxes on his free corporate limousine service — was the stuff of satire. ... No one likes a serial whiner. It has been a year now — and Obama still blames George W. Bush ad nauseam. He did it in Massachusetts again — and on the eve of the election, no less. Blaming the past for the mistakes of the present gets old quickly. And when one adds in the constant What’s the Matter With Kansas? brand of condescension about naïve yokels not knowing what’s good for them, it gets even worse. ... Devotees turn on false prophets with a special vengeance. Obama is beginning to grate. .... LIKED BY ALL, RESPECTED BY NONE Obama thought the antidote to “smoke ’em out,” “dead or alive,” and “bring ’em on” braggadocio was bowing to the Saudis, promulgating new and undiscovered great moments in Islamic history, and reaching out to Ahmadinejad as he rounded up and beat down reformers in the streets of Tehran.
It’s one thing to accuse Bush of shredding the Constitution, quite another to adopt his anti-terrorism protocols like tribunals, renditions, Predators, intercepts, and wiretaps. Somehow Obama offended his base by such duplicity, and then his opposition by his tokenism of trashing Bush, promising the architect of 9/11 a show trial a few blocks from the former World Trade Center, and using touchy-feely euphemisms to suggest we are not in a war against terrorism emanating from the radical Islamic world. ... The best thing that could happen to Barack Obama is more Democratic losses in hodgepodge elections that might yank away our young transfixed Narcissus from his mesmerizing reflecting pool.
Almost immediately after Obama showed his ideological cards last spring, I suggested in the first weeks of his presidency that the bait-and-switch president would soon face a Carter/Clinton moment in which he could either press on with his polarizing ideology, damage his party for a generation, and eventually end up churlish and sneering at the electorate, who did not appreciate his exalted morality and genius — or triangulate and follow the Dick Morris/Bill Clinton model of talking and acting sort of centrist.
[Well, Axelrod says they're pushing on, as Glenn Beck predicted.]
Get me Rewrite (Steyn) '"The leader of the free world is talking about my truck": Bullseye. It underlines the David-vs-Goliath nature of the race, and also reminds you that, by having to intervene to prop up his flailing candidate, the president of the United States demeaned himself.'
Robert W. Franson "If they can’t get their full “public option” Trojan Horse through the gates, they’ll settle for Trojan Ponies." .... Trojan Ponies: excellent.
Alfred Scharinger- "Government take-over of our lives does not come overnight, it seeps in and spreads like a cancer without you realizing it. They will never give up, but will introduce the same ideas over and over again under different names and forms. We need to be forever vigilant"
Heh. I posted this on Facebook and someone said "it's racist." You know what? I DON'T CARE.
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 662 19.2 miles. rain, cold
103 recordings of 25 types.
Scrappleface: "It was really a triumphant visit, without gloating of course," said White House press secretary Robert Gibbs, "The president packed nearly 75 percent of a 3,000 seat hall. Meanwhile, a similar rally for Scott Brown couldn't even provide seats for everyone, and left some out in the cold ... another illustration of the bankruptcy of Republican ideas and the insensitivity of a party that wants to keep health care decisions in the hands of a bunch of sick people and greedy doctors."
Gareth was over today. His newest accomplishment is with the Yo Gabba Gabba toys. I put one into the Fisher-Price school bus and said "look, Muno is going for a ride" and from then on, he played giving his toys a ride. He's definitely pretending, not just putting things together.
His hair looked appalling through much of the day. It was OK finally in the afternoon, but I hope Bernadette leaves it alone for awhile and maybe even lets a professional have at it next time. The kid was also blowing snot bubbles much of the day, so we decided not to go out in the wind and rain to take him to the museum. Another time.
When he turned the TV on I yelled "NO!" at him and went to pick him up for a time-out in the playpen and he was slapping his own hand. He's learning. He had no real nap.
Rich annoyed me by erasing Genevieve's "hi nana" on the answering machine. He asked if he should, I said "no" so he did. Grumble.
Scott Ott just read: “If a man is called to be a street sweeper, he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted or Beethoven composed music or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to say, ‘Here lived a great street sweeper who did his job well.’” – Mart...in Luther King, Jr. Jean Calvin smiles, opens book to Colossians, chapter 3, verse 23.
Bev Sykes My heart goes out to the families of the American students still trapped in the fancy hotel (alive or dead), but going on TV every day and angrily saying nobody is doing anything to save them and demanding Obama send "thousands of troops" to the hotel to rescue them reduces my sympathy. (I missed this, but it's like New Orleans, isn't it?)
For Boxer, a favorite Republican target, a GOP win in Massachusetts would be a particularly dark sign representing "not just the canary in the coal mine," said Wade Randlett, a leading Silicon Valley fundraiser for Obama. "It's the flock of dead ravens landing on the lawn."
Steyn, the Scott Heard Round the World: I was surprised at how incompetent the Democrat machine was. On Sunday, the president veered between dull and really, really lousy. He did what he did with his Olympics pitch in Copenhagen — he took the extraordinary step of flying in to save the day, and then when he got there thought he could wing it. He, or at any rate his minders, should know by now that his rhetoric is seriously underperforming — "incoherent without his teleprompter and a bore with it."
Michelle Malkin There are more long faces at MSNBC than an aardvark convention.
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 662 19.2 miles. rain, cold
104 recordings of 24 types.
Dreadful weather... no way we're going to Stockton to geocache!
Scott Ott thinks the good people of Massachusetts on Tuesday may just restore the name of the Commonwealth -- from an imprecation to the seedbed of revolution that established our nation. History's hinge has turned there before. May the song of liberty resound from her once more.
Sara Myers Burns: He holds all things together! [Kind of like duct tape, was my blasphemous thought.]
As we close in on the anniversary of President Obama’s inauguration (remember the nearly two million folks that showed up in the freezing cold, thrilled to be a part of the hopey-changey thing?), but even by the kindest standards of judgment, it is clear that he is utterly clueless in an over-educated way that reeks of condescension. ... In the midst of the worst financial crisis this nation has faced since the 1930s, how stupid do you have to be to try to “reform” Medicare in ways that slash billions from it while adding more people to its rolls? By what stretch of the imagination does Congress think it has the power to require people to buy insurance they do not want? And, it turns out, exclusively from the government. ... I grew up in an era before television when newspapers, radio, and the Movietone News were the main sources. This may seem odd to today’s generation, but during World War Two the media did not compete with one another to be the first to tell the Nazis when and where D-Day would occur or which island in the Pacific would be invaded next.
The only thing the Dems are teaching the public writ-large by the constant health care cram-down — is that if you want Washington to listen, vote us out of office.
And the public will — they will return the cram-down strategy right back at the Dems — see every poll known to man on the independent voter. ... It is too now late to change the bill to make it palatable. Like Senator Dodd found out, and all those Democratic Senators and Representatives now retiring, it is too late to fix what has gone predictably wrong. They have squandered their chance at health care reform. The public, the independents are at a hard NO — don’t do anything.
It is time for the Dems to walk away from their toxic health plan and its politics of self-destruction.
But their leaders will not listen, and unless there is a Dem leader who will force defeat on their own leadership to save themselves and their colleagues — the Dem ObamaCare politics of burn-my-own-house-down will continue.
Hey, anyone gotta a match?
(there's a similar effort by one of the conservative groups because Brown isn't perfect. Bipartisan cutting one's nose to spite one's face.)
HotAir: Imagine the contempt you’d have to have for voters’ intelligence to spin a Republican win — in Massachusetts — as some sort of business-as-usual victory for entrenched interests. Hey, champ? In case you haven’t heard, Republicans don’t win in New England anymore. Or at least, they didn’t until you launched Project Never Let a Crisis Go to Waste. This victory belongs to you as much as it does to Scotty B; take credit for it.
Neoneocon says: "Coakley is the female John Kerry-- without the charm" Ouch.
Reading: Rousseau and Revolution, What If? edited by Robert Cowley, the Bible (Zachariah), Liberal Fascism by Jonah Goldberg, Monstrous Regiment, Terry Pratchett, Common Sense, Glenn Beck, Don Quixote, Miseducation: Preschoolers at Risk, David Elkind, Low-Carb Dieting for Dummies, Katherine B. Chauncey.
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 658 19.2 miles. rain, cold
115 recordings of 24 types.
I didn't feel well and slept in this morning, missing Mass. Then this afternoon we had a few errands to run. We took the dog with us, a win-win: that way he didn't have to stay out in the cold and we didn't have a wet dog when we got home. We won't be able to do this when it gets hot.
First stop, Davis. They hadn't answered my plea for different tickets so we thought we'd head over and trade them in person. Steve knew what I wanted and printed them up on the spot without even asking. Second, the metal recycling. There were some junk scavengers there... who knew the center of a water heater was a twisted piece of metal? They also had oven racks and a washing machine door. Interesting. Other things they'd gathered looked like they might be for an art piece.
Back in town where we wanted to get season tickets for the Cabaret, but it turned out they aren't open on Sundays. Grumble. And to the store where we got a lot of veggies and some pork. And so home where the veg-out continued.
Scott Ott By appearing with Martha Coakley in Massachusetts, what kind of voters does Pres. Obama draw in that Coakley didn't already have? Doesn't he simply raise viability questions about her candidacy, and attract attention to himself -- to his attempts to shore up his crumbling effectiveness and popularity?
and
Anyone who persists in referring to a president or his administration as "the Bushies" would be more at home posting vitriolic comments on HuffingtonPost.com or DailyKos.com than writing a column in such an esteemed publication as The New York Times.
Rasmussen: -12: 48/51
Scott Ott: ("Tyranny cometh not with a fang-baring snarl, but with a smirk.")
0bama went to church! The second time in his Presidency! He MUST be desperate, needing the photo op. Oh, and he got a chance to give a big speech and tout health care.
0bama in Massachusetts : But Sunday's rally was not the typical Obama function. The hall where they gathered was only partly filled, and supporters standing behind the guests of honor appeared caught off guard as an abortion protester and a young boy accompanying him were removed from the building.
Kathryn Lopez this obama speech is a classic example of why i can't listen to obama. so condescending. like is too short to put up with it.
Optima Mater:
Some observations about the Messiah/Coakley come to Jesus meeting: -half the audience was the Kennedy Clan -some of the audience did not support the Messiah... See More -parts of his speech were lackluster, and reports are that all of Coakley’s was -the mother in me wanted to hug that young guy behind the Messiah because he reacted with absolute shock that anyone/hecklers would disagree with his Messiah, and to tell him the true history of our country and the founding fathers and mothers -that the Messiah’s ego is so fragile that dissent in any order shakes his confidence -that he wants the MA voters to vote in Coakley for HIM, so he owns the defeat lock, stock, and barrel -the venue with the fewest number of seats still could not be filled -the only inspiring moments were when he went Wright and that tired old, Fired Up thing
I've seen something similar from the other side. This could turn into a bipartisan Purity Test.
Yes, Bush looks happy. Making his first trip to the White House since his term ended, Bush also told CNN's John King: "I frankly don't miss the limelight. I'm glad to help out, but there's life after the presidency is what I've learned, and I'm going to live it to the fullest, and this is part of living it to the fullest, to help other people."
Reading: Rousseau and Revolution, What If? edited by Robert Cowley, the Bible (Zachariah), Liberal Fascism by Jonah Goldberg, The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate DeCamillo, The Christmas Treasury, Common Sense, Glenn Beck, Don Quixote, Miseducation: Preschoolers at Risk, David Elkind, Low-Carb Dieting for Dummies, Katherine B. Chauncey.
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 658 19.2 miles. foggy
112 recordings of 27 types.
Did I hear Bill Clinton say everyone knows he doesn't tolerate corruption?
Rasmussen: -13: 49/51. A good day for him.
The big activity today was the geocaching event at a Chinese buffet in Carmichael. About 100 people, all over the restaurant, a successful showing. The food is mediocre, but OK and varied and plentiful. It was too crowded to see anybody, but at least we had it. Rich didn't get any information about his iTouch. I'm more and more sorry about that, such a disappointment.
Scott Ott will coach the boys basketball game this morning. The gym floor is linoleum with a fine layer of dust, making it like an ice rink. Whoever designed the "all purpose room" must be tried and punished. It's a noisy cafeteria, a dangerous gymnasium and an uncomfortable auditorium with lousy acoustics. No surprise that thousands of government-run schools nationwide have one.
Scott Ott Writing ScrappleFace for 7.5 years now, the biggest challenge continues to be staying ahead of the mainstream media and politicians. It seems no absurdity remains long in the domain of satire. Last week I wrote that Harry Reid was adding 'skin-lightening therapy' coverage to the health reform bill. Today's NY Times has a story on the dangers of skin-lightening creams. My satire story had Reid saying: "Skin-lightening therapy will open the corridors of power to a new generation of African-American leaders. And thanks to my amendment, this treatment will be free at last." (http://www.scrappleface.com/?p=4480)
The NY Times said: "...advertisements connect happiness and success and romance with being lighter skinned...there’s a clear connection between skin color and socioeconomic status. There is prejudice against dark-skinned people.”
If "the educated class" is for it – "health" "care" "reform," cap-and-trade, Miranda rights for terrorists – Joe Six-Pack and his fellow knuckledragging morons are reflexively opposed to it. This almost exactly inverts what really happened over this past year. "The educated class" turned out to be not that educated – if, by "educated," you mean knowing stuff. They were dazzled by Obama: My former National Review colleague Christopher Buckley wrote cooing paeans to his “first-class intellect” and “temperament.” I used to joke that “temperament” was for the Obammysoxers of “the educated class” what hair was to Tiger Beat reporters.
(comment) Other than Ted the Toad’s widow and Jug Ears, has *anyone* endorsed Coakley? Every time I turn around, Brown’s snagging some new endorsement….
the world is turned upside down. i mean, consider: our best hope to avoid a government takeover of the entire medical industry requires that massachusetts elect a conservative to the u.s. senate.
and if that were not enough — there's a good chance massachusetts will do it!
What is at play here is that Obama is a man for whom all other issues are marginal when compared to his own agenda. Thus he has not yet learned how to respond to crises other than the ones theatrically crafted by him and his minions as vehicles to accomplish this agenda. When it comes to a real crisis like a domestic terror attack, Obama is a man in a perennial holding pattern, waiting for his media-savvy advisers to prod him to address things inimical to the progressive milieu he inhabits. ... The great leader has emerged, and he has been found wanting. Except perhaps for the barely-sentient Obama groupie, sooner or later everyone will come to realize that it takes more than just proper diction to be an effective leader.
The White House press pool is being given the mushroom treatment; and they know that they’re being given the mushroom treatment. But they don’t want to respond appropriately – which is to say, stop letting Robert Gibbs define what are or are not appropriate questions to ask. Until that happens – and the press corps internalizes the notion that Gibbs and the administration needs them a hell of a lot more than they need Gibbs and the administration – they’ll keep getting the mushroom treatment.
I’d be sympathetic, except that elections have consequences.
Arrogant, sensitive to slights, bored with his job in the senate, and someone with a messianic self-image; a cold, calculating Chicago pol – all of this is of no interest to the MSM?
The Gatekeepers have been working very hard to ignore this.
comment: "if I were Bush,, it would be a challenge for me to face that lying, ruuderless and spineless leader named Obama who speaks like a 5 year all too often… "It's not my fault! It's Bush's!" A real loser of a man! Takes a big man to overlook Obama and realize he is doing this for the Haitians!"
Yeah, I miss him. (He looks so relaxed and happy, though. I'm glad for him.)
Reading: Rousseau and Revolution, What If? edited by Robert Cowley, the Bible (Zachariah), Liberal Fascism by Jonah Goldberg, The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate DeCamillo, Common Sense, Glenn Beck, Don Quixote, Miseducation: Preschoolers at Risk, David Elkind, Low-Carb Dieting for Dummies, Katherine B. Chauncey.
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 658 19.2 miles. My EYES!! (sunshine!)
104 recordings of 25 types.
Rasmussen: -14: 47/53.
I signed up for this year's retreat last night, so of course I had a dream about it. Some really obnoxious (and tall -- 6'2", she said) kicked me out of my room just as I was settling in. Hmmm.
I'm .3 pound up, with a low borderline blood pressure.
So I babysat at Gareth's today. He wasn't very hungry at lunch and was a bit subdued, but he's feeling a lot better. In the course of playing with him, I sorted the blocks by color. He doesn't understand that concept at all yet. Wait till next week.
In the afternoon we went to see Avatar. In 3D which is the only way this kind of movie should ever be seen in the future. I'd heard that the anti-capitalist/anti-conservative message was heavy-handed and I'd hate it. Au contraire, it's a fast-paced 3 hours of sheer entertainment. The world swallows you. It was a definite ObGoe.
And tonight we used a gift card from Monica (supposed to be $25 but was $13.20) at Chevy's, which was nice.
It's prosecutors like this woman and Nifong who are eating out America from the inside. They cause people to lose all respect for the law.
Scrappleface: Harry Reid says Coakley is more than just my 60th Yes Man.
Get ready for the spin: Coakley was a bad candidate — it has nothing to do with national policy. You’ll be hearing that a lot if Brown wins on Tuesday, and it’s at least somewhat true. Coakley is a bad candidate. But even bad candidates win elections in Massachusetts, as John Kerry’s continued presence in the Senate demonstrates. There’s a lot more going on here than Coakley’s incompetence, and every Senate Democrat that has to vote on ObamaCare knows it.
[comment] The only true “Kennedy seat” in Massachusetts – the front passenger seat of Teddy’s 1967 Oldsmobile Delmont 88 on July 18, 1969 – is one The Swimmer took great pains to disavow during the remainder of his illustrous life. He certainly owns that one and his family is welcome to own it, too, if they so choose.
ya2daup on January 15, 2010 at 9:51 AM
Michelle Malkin RT @jimgeraghty: If Coakley loses, Obama will have turned into late-2006 Bush w/i 1yr of taking office.|#fullspeedahead
Jason Smith Obama is amazing... he also became Jimmy Carter faster than Jimmy Carter.
Michelle Malkin Heh. RT @Doc_0: Mass. looking so bad that White House is now talking about having only a 56-state electoral strategy
Bill Clinton: if we elect Scott Brown, the earthquake wins.
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 658 19.2 miles. cloudy, gray again
104 recordings of 25 types.
Rasmussen: -15: 46/53
This is a Facebook bucket list. Mine would be a bit different, but let's play:
Things you have done during your lifetime: ( ) Gone on a blind date [He never turned up.] (x) Donated Blood (x) Skipped school (x) Watched someone die [And found someone dead, too.] ( ) Been to Alaska (X) Been to Canada (x) Been to Mexico (X) Been to Florida (x) Been to Hawaii (X) Been on a plane ( ) Been on a helicopter (X) Been lost [Naaah, just exploring.] (x) Gone to Washington, DC ( ) Hugged a homeless person (X) Swam in the ocean ( ) Swam with Stingrays ( ) Been sailing in the ocean (x) Got poison ivy rash (X) Cried yourself to sleep (x) Bitten by a snake. [fortunately, not a poisonous one.] (X) Played cops and robbers (x) Recently colored with crayons ( ) Ran a marathon ( ) Sang Karaoke (x) Volunteered at a soup kitchen (X) Paid for a meal with coins only (x) Been to the top of the St. Louis Arch (x) Seen a moose in the wild (x) Seen the Northern Lights ( ) Been Parasailing ( ) Been on TV (X) Done something you told yourself you wouldn't ( ) Made prank phone calls (x) Been down Bourbon Street in New Orleans ( ) Laughed until some kind of beverage came out of your nose (x) Fed an elephant (X) Caught a snowflake on your tongue (X) Fired a gun (X) Slept in a sleeping bag all night outside. ( ) Stayed up for more than 2 days without sleep. ( ) Danced in the rain ( ) Been to the Opera (x) Written a letter to Santa Claus ( ) Serenaded someone (x) Seen a U.S.President in person (x) Been kissed under the mistletoe (X) Watched the sunrise with someone ( ) Driven a race car (X) Been to a National Museum (x) Been to a Wax Museum (x) Eaten caviar (X) Blown bubbles (x) Gone ice-skating (X) Gone to the movies ( ) Been deep sea fishing (x) Driven across the United States half way [or all the way] (x) Been in a hot air balloon ( ) Been sky diving ( ) Gone snowmobiling (x) Lived in more than one country (X) Lay down outside at night and admired the stars while listening to the crickets (X) Seen a falling star and made a wish (x) Enjoyed the beauty of Old Faithful Geyser (x) Seen the Grand Canyon (X) Seen the Statue of Liberty (x) Gone to the top of Seattle Space Needle ( ) Been on a cruise (x) Traveled by train ( ) Traveled by motorcycle (X) Been horse back riding (x) Ridden on a San Francisco cable car (x) Been to Disneyland OR Disney World [both] (X) Truly believed in the power of prayer (x) Been in a rain forest (x) Seen whales in the ocean (X) Been to Niagara Falls ( ) Ridden on an elephant ( ) Ridden on a camel ( ) Swam with dolphins ( ) Been to the Olympics ( ) Walked on the Great Wall of China [really want to. Hey, I've walked on Hadrian's Wall!] ( ) Been water-skiing ( ) Been snow-skiing (x) Been to the Louvre ( ) Been to the Taj Mahal ( the one in Atlantic City :) ) ( ) Swam in the Mediterranean (x) Been to a Major League Baseball game (x) Been to a National Football League game ( ) Swam with sharks (x) Swam with sea turtles. [kinda. This was the disastrous snorkeling day.] (x) Flown in small plane. ( ) Piloted a plane. ( ) Got a tattoo. (X) Met a big celebrity. [Milton Caniff (who?), Eva Gabor, lots of authors including Terry Pratchett.] ( ) Been in the military. [Well, as a dependent spouse.] (X) Did volunteer work. ( ) Saved someone's life.[Maybe.] ( ) Been hunting. ( ) Seen a wolf in the wild. (x) Built a fire to keep warm ( ) Came in 1st Place in a sport or tournament. ( ) Walked in snow with snow shoes. ( ) Get a piercing other than your ears. ( ) Won more than $500.00 in the lotto. ( ) Been White Water Rafting ( ) Written a book or screen play
I got a surprising "friend" request today, from one of the neighbor boys in Blytheville. He tells me there are only three white families left in our neighborhood. That must have been an interesting transition: the people threatened his mother, our realtor, when a black family came to look at our house. One of the neighbors kept different candy for when They came trick-or-treating. Apart from the realtor and family, and the second-grade teacher down the street (another of the remaining white families), I didn't much like the neighbors.
Gareth cried and fussed all last night. We thought at first it was the mac and cheese I fed him, and I feel awful. Instead, it turns out to be a cold.
We went back digitalfishing along Challenge Alley and picked up the three we didn't get before. I apparently dropped one. So I have 18 now.
The date that Senator Scott Brown showed up at the Capitol backed by several hundred thousand armed American citizens would rank up there with April 19, 1775 and April 12, 1861. You can count on it.
(alternate title: Gareth's No-Good, Very Bad, Terrible, Awful, Day)
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 658 17.8 miles. sunshine!!
106 recordings of 28 days. Rasmussen: -15 (who are these "Strongly Approve" people??) 46/53.
Babysitting didn't go quite as well today, though mostly it was pretty good. In the morning I thought we should take a walk. He kept saying "byebye car car" and I kept saying "walk" but when we didn't get into the car he flipped out. Eventually (when we turned away from the sun) he started walking. I pointed out a worm to him, which was interesting.
When we got back to the house we drove to Capital Aquarium and looked at fish and turtles, which was interesting. For a very short while.
Macaroni, cheese, and franks for lunch. Apparently it gives him gas (probably the plastic cheese) because after only 40 minutes he woke up screaming and I could hear his innards gurgling. He cried and cried. Finally he felt a little better. However, according to Bernadette, he had a terrible night, too.
Gareth whistles, but I can't anymore. Numb lip.
It's Bernadette and Rob's anniversary. I've gotten over my disappointment that they had the wedding in Junction City (Rob's dad and grandfather too ill to travel, and both have since died) but yes, I'm still a little bitter because Rob's mother pretty well took over. She acted like the mother of the bride as well as of the groom. I didn't like travelling to Oregon in January (they really could have waited till April, really) and I wasn't thrilled with the arrangements. Bernadette herself was in a daze. However, the wedding was beautiful, the reception was very nice, and it's all worked out well. And there's Gareth, too!! Happy anniversary, kidlet!
Well, I locked Abby in the bathroom about 4 AM, and later took her in some food, and she actually performed in the litter box. (And on the bathroom floor, but that's a lot better than she's been doing.)
Today Bernadette had work, so I babysat. We got along fine. He says "Djadja" now (sometimes "zaza" sometimes "tsatsa"). Rich and I took him to St. Philomene's to get our parish directory, at last. The best thing for him was playing with the Yo Gabba Gabba toys. (this is the only picture that wasn't too fuzzy because I defeated the flash.) They're too small to play with unsupervised... he especially could choke on Muno... so I watched him carefully. He is actually role-playing with them. He grows every day!
He needs to be cuddled for his nap. He wasn't getting to sleep so I put him in the playpen, and he started to fuss. When I said "it's nap time, lie down and take a nap" he really freaked out. I cuddled him to sleep and then he slept about an hour.
Scott Ott: Check out the screen shot of the email the Dems are sending out. Particularly the 3rd paragraph from the bottom that states: "..., or Republican Scott Brown, whose allies in the right wing dream of holding a "tea party" in Kennedy country?"
Wasn't there already a pretty famous Tea Party in Kennedy country, um, I mean Massachusetts already. Maybe in the Boston vicinity a couple hundred years ago?
Hot Air: Not only is he [Reid] crashing, he’s taking his kid down with him, which is why I still think there’s a fair chance he’s going to retire — especially if Brown shocks the world in Massachusetts. Via Greg Hengler, here’s Obama reassuring an interviewer that Reid’s a “good man,” notwithstanding his (a) insinuations during the campaign that McCain was unstable, (b) denigration of townhall protesters as “evilmongers,” (c) belittling of Petraeus as an incompetent liar while the surge was starting up in Iraq, and (d) aspersions cast upon the intelligence of Clarence Thomas. And that’s the tip of the iceberg. He’s a cheap, nasty demagogue, but he’s also politically useful to The One, ergo he’s a “good man.” I can’t wait for November.
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 658 17.0 miles rain
105 recordings of 24 types.
Eat less, exercise more, gain weight. Grumble.
I was trying to start the new book for Liturgy of the Hours, but my page directions led to Ash Wednesday and the first Monday of Lent. Confusing. Of course, I was supposed to be in book III (ordinary time), not book II, Lent.
Today was Library Day! Bernadette came over with Gareth, who is talking more and still a happy baby. At the library he spent the whole time running around and around and around and around. I finally realized I should take a movie just as he began to slow down, at last.
He also now has the idea of "ramps" which was foreign to him before. We did have to protect other kids (there were at least 12 there today!) from him but he was easy to distract.
All that activity. He fought it, but at last he had a nap.
We were talking about Yo Gabba Gabba and he went over and turned on the television. Oh. He also likes the YGG soft ball I got from Jack in the Box.
We're dealing with the place in the living room where Abby misbehaves. We have to stop that before we get a new carpet. I thought if we locked off the front of the house at night she wouldn't make it worse, but discovered she used the bedroom closet today. What am I going to do with her? The other day I kept smelling cat pee then realized it was my shoes. That took two trips through the washing machine.
Meanwhile, Rich took the old carpet up and threw it away there. The padding stinks and is bonded to the floor. We tried some bleach on part of it... ooooh, look at the foam! This particular chemistry experiment is probably not a good idea. Next he read to try a heat gun. Great, burning the house down...
This is the deal: if you’re assisting in the redistribution of wealth to its “rightful owners,” you get a pass on telling an unflattering racial truth. If you’re “doing something to for black people,” you get to let a “racist” thought slip through your lips or out of your word processor. It’s why old Klansmen like Senator Robert Byrd can even use phrases like “white n*gger” and still sit in the US Senate.
You're allowed to "abuse" black people with one hand if you’re giving them things out of the other.
Obama hasn’t distinguished himself as an executive. His Afghanistan policy-making process was tortured, and he has outsourced much of that policy making to Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid — who proceeded to junk up the stimulus and come up with the worst-of-all-worlds health-care bill. He flunked the 3 a.m. telephone-call test on the Christmas Day bombing. But it’s in his personnel selection — from the hapless and ethically challenged Tim Geithner to the decidedly unwise Sonia Sotomayor to the goofy James Jones — where he has demonstrated his utter lack of executive competence. And the prime example is the man who sits the proverbial one heartbeat away from the presidency.
I think I have this book. I know I have "Manners Can Be Fun" and "Arithmetic Can Be Fun." Back in the dark ages, Munro Leaf had a cartoon in "Ladies' Home Journal" about manners... "this is a Watchbird watching a {Whiny, or whatever the month's subject was} ... this is a Watchbird watching YOU." I loved it.
ROGER KIMBALL: Obama’s Broken C-SPAN Promise: A “Read My Lips” Moment? “That hissing noise you hear is the air going out of the Obama bubble. It will be interesting for some future historian to mark the date when his administration became posthumous, a ‘dead man walking.’ I suspect that the name ‘CSPAN’ will enter into the calculation.”
Reading: Rousseau and Revolution, What If? edited by Robert Cowley, the Bible (Zachariah), Liberal Fascism by Jonah Goldberg, The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate DeCamillo, The Christmas Treasury, Common Sense, Glenn Beck, Don Quixote, Miseducation: Preschoolers at Risk, David Elkind, Low-Carb Dieting for Dummies, Katherine B. Chauncey.
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 658 (3 more mentions of Voltaire!) 17.0 miles. gray
103 recordings of 24 types.
Rasmussen: -18 (mighod) 45/54
Michael Yon Cold here in Florida! Was sleeting yesterday in Polk County. Very rare here. Three young girls had an umbrella turned upside down and were catching the ice and jumping up and down. I hollered out the car window to them, "Go get a jar and save it in the freezer!" and one girl waved and ran off for a jar.
In my digitalfish stalking, I discovered he had done a whole bunch of caches along "Challenge Alley", the trail along the old route of the Sacramento Northern Railroad where there are a whole slew of challenge caches. We've found most of these but decided to go back and pick up the fish. We took Pharaoh and off we went.
The very first one we looked for, we couldn't find. A discouraging start, but then we looked for another, found it, and yes! it had a digitalfish in it! We went back to look again at the other, but no luck. Then we drove to another location and found more. We looked and looked for one on the bridge but couldn't find it... there was a note written at the coordinates saying "can't find it." Of course. When I read the stuff at home, this one was a puzzle cache and a little distance away. We'd found the first half of a multi, so had to drive to the second part. All told, we walked 5.5 miles and got 7 fish. When I went to log them, I discovered digitalfish the cacher had left fish with notes at two others, so maybe one day we'll go back to those and the puzzle and get three more fish. My school is 19 fish now.
Mark Steyn points out that the illusion of security makes you less secure.
I chose the proclaimed importance of Obama’s Cairo speech for countering terrorism because, coming fast on the heels of the undy-bomber attempt, it illustrates that Obama still thinks that he possesses an almost supernatural ability to smooth talk the world’s worst into giving up their nasty habits. It demonstrates the imperviousness of his self-delusion and narcissism to reality, and is completely incomprehensible in light of his hardball political tactics domestically. I’m beginning to think he’s a bit of nutter, actually.
ProfessorMiao .... Each one of these choices has so many merits that they could each qualify for OOTY and we are only in the first week of the year.
I had to go with the Cairo speech mostly because he thinks it was a winner. It goes with the B+ self-evaluation. He does think he can “sell” this crap sandwich to anyone and everyone.
It’s been a horrible, terrible, no good, very bad year for most Americans because of this nut job. What really boggles the mind is that only 52% of the voting populace disapproves of him. Those numbers should be in the 85-90% range.
BetseyRoss
Instapundit: PROGRESS: John Scalzi finds an old floppy disk and observes: “The real irony of this disc is that the amount of memory you can write to it (1.44 MB, if memory — heh – serves) isn’t enough to store the jpeg of the picture of it which came out of my camera (1.49 MB). That’s progress for you.”
Glenn Reynolds says: "Reid is an inspirational figure, proof that one needs neither personal appeal nor political skill to rise to Senate Majority Leader."
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 653 11.5 miles. gray
103 recordings of 26 types
Rasmussen: -17: 46/53
I drove over to the fabric store to get a ball of peach yarn (for all of 69 stitches for Cinderella's arms and face) and while I was there I got some crystal beads that look like stars, a beading needle, sequins, and star-shaped buttons. I didn't, then, do anything at all with it. My mistake appears to have been to do the back first, as I'm about 6 rows short and will have to work them in.
While Rich was catching up with the football games I took Pharaoh for a walk. I wanted to check out a nearby church, since I noticed a plaque in their yard. Sure enough, it is a memorial for a kid who was killed (only a little over 2 years ago) at that intersection.
The military (and Tricare, my provider) will be hit first by 0bamacare. Of course. We always get it first.
The election of Barack Obama was a fundamentally unserious act by the U.S. electorate, and you can’t blame the world’s mischief-makers, from Putin to Ahmadinejad to the many Gitmo recidivists now running around Yemen, from drawing the correct conclusion.
For two weeks, the government of the United States has made itself a global laughingstock. ... Again, to be fair, it isn’t just Obama. Last November, the electorate voted in effect to repudiate the previous eight years and seemed genuinely under the delusion that wars end when one side decides it’s all a bit of a bore and they’d rather the government spend the next eight years doing to health care and the economy what they were previously doing to jihadist camps in Waziristan.
Joe Biden. Obama’s first executive decision. (hepcat on January 9, 2010)
Reading: Rousseau and Revolution, What If? edited by Robert Cowley, the Bible (Zachariah), Liberal Fascism by Jonah Goldberg, The Christmas Treasury, Common Sense, Glenn Beck, Don Quixote, Miseducation: Preschoolers at Risk, David Elkind, Low-Carb Dieting for Dummies, Katherine B. Chauncey.
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 653 8.8 miles. gray, rain, cold
I've lost 1.2 pounds this week, and my blood pressure is borderline. That's what I get for sleeping in, it was great.
105 recordings of 25 types.
How can our people elect such contemptible, self-seeking poltroons and scoundrels to the Congress? ---George Washington to Anthony Wayne at Valley Forge, as written by F. van Wyck Mason, 1946.
Rasmussen: -14: 46/54
We went by to feed the cats and take in the mail, even though we knew Bernarob was coming home today. Rich took out the recycling while I picked up a bit and left "GARETH" written in the blocks.
Kathryn Lopez people should quit giving the president such a hard time about taking a year to realize this at-war thing. this is his first go as an executive.
John Tant Unfortunately, I don't think the presidency should be an entry-level position...
The wealthier, better educated, and more Westernized the radical Muslim, often the greater the sense of shame, alienation, and anger that he and his religion are not shown proper deference. We knew all that in 2001, but have apparently forgotten it during eight years of relative calm.
Hasan hated American soldiers not because our system had discriminated against him, much less because of “secondary post-traumatic-stress syndrome,” or any of the other wacky excuses that followed his crime. Instead, in part he sensed that the American military had bent over backwards for him and accommodated his extremism — and was therefore, in his own distorted worldview, weak, decadent, and deserving of what he would dish out. ... The year 2009 saw the greatest number of foiled terrorist plots against America since 9/11. Indeed, one-third of all such attempts in the last eight years happened last year — the time of the Obama Al Arabiya interview, the Cairo speech, the bowing to Saudi royals, the promises to close Guantanamo Bay, and the ritual trashing of the Bush anti-terrorism policies. ... the Western world said very little about the Danish-cartoon threats, the killing of Theo Van Gogh, and various premodern Muslim actions like rioting after the Pope’s Byzantine exegesis and the false stories of Koran burning in Guantanamo. Had Europe and the United States shown a united front on behalf of freedom of expression, rather than a fear of Islamic reaction, such incidents would have been written off as the lunacy they were.
POLL: 45% WOULD REPLACE CONGRESS WITH NAMES DRAWN RANDOMLY FROM PHONE BOOK. Only 45%?
UPDATE: From the comments: “Preferably the Yellow Pages!!! At least they can run a business.” Heh.
Why heads should roll. (Unfortunate turn of phrase when dealing with these barbarians.)
Instapundit: Reader Josh Dunn writes: “Here’s betting that a lot of Democrats in the House and Senate secretly want Brown to win so Obamacare can be euthanized.” Yeah, it would get a lot of folks off the hook.
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 653 8.8 miles. This does NOT bode well for trying to go 1000 miles this year! fog, gray, cold
103 recordings of 25 types.
Scott Ott COULTER CLIP: "If liberals really want to keep people from hearing about God, they should give Him his own show on MSNBC."
Keith Brooks: [on Arnold's State of the State speech] 30 minutes? How long does it take to say California sucks because everyone here is a touchy feely lunatic and the legislation is driving every single business out of the state? I just did it in 12 seconds...
Rasmussen: -12: 48/52
Kathryn Lopez: we are at war --- might that be "shocking"?
Will Sasser It took him 345 days to figure that out?
No wonder his School records are closed....he flunked math
Julian Krasta Has it been obvious to anyone else that, since BO has been in office, terrorists are stampeding all over creation? Is it my imagination?
Beverly Babcock Sounds like someone did not pay attention to the briefing sessions he had after Nov. 4, 2008!
Glenn Conley Wow we're at war Mr. President? Thanks for telling me. I had no idea. Reason #2,496 of why I didn't vote for you.
Today we went after digitalfish in West Sacramento. The first two caches we went to had fish, so we were feeling good. Then we started to see logs by "Allseekers" and no fish. Sulk. That went on for three caches, and then we caught up with him. "Are you Allseekers? We've been trying to get ahead of you before you get the fish." So he handed me the one he'd just removed. Unfortunately, he'd gotten a lot of the others, too, but I ended up with 6 for the day anyway.
A couple of these we were muggled out of to begin with, and that may have happened to our archnemesis, as well. One had a guy constructing a driveway. He packed up just as we passed the fourth time. Then, when we'd found the cache, another guy came over from the nearby building to check on us. He claimed it was to compare light pole skirts, but we know better. Rich talked to him so I could sneak the cache out of my pocket and back in its place. Total, 15 caches, one no-find. Not bad at all. Pharaoh seemed to have a good time, too.
Archibald Bunker And to think Joan Rivers had a harder time getting on a plane than this lunatic. What the hell did they think she was going to do ... blow up the plane with Botox?
I can’t believe I find myself rooting for Obama at all, but he needs to succeed somewhere, somewhen. This never-ending Mr.Toad’s-Wild-Ride of a presidency is scaring me. ---cane_loader on January 7, 2010 at 8:50 PM
Obama did the right thing saying he is ultimately responsible. Obama and all his cronies seemed to thing Bush was faking the war on terror.
Well now he knows–nobody put the thermometer on a light bulb to stay home from school!
The war on terror is real. And if people die it is Obama’s policies and attitudes that allowed it.
Two major attacks since he came into office. And zero for the nearly eight years prior.
I miss Bush.
We aren’t safe with Obama in the whitehouse.
I thought he sounded just like Bush. Only not as sincere.
petunia on January 7, 2010 at 9:09 PM
Y’all should have heard my 36-y.o. doctor today – he saw me reading the Wall Street Journal and a picture of Pelosi and then spent 15 minutes going OFF on ObamaCare BEFORE we discussed my medical issue! I gave him this website and others – he said every time he thinks about it he gets so angry he doesn’t know what to do. I told him to spread the word at how angry he is and to vote out all Democrats. We both agreed to put on our hoods and throw Mary Landrieu in the bayou. ---cane_loader on January 7, 2010 at 9:21 PM
Political correctness is a doctrine, fostered by a delusional, illogical minority, and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a turd by the clean end --- R. J. Wiedemann LtCol. USMC Ret.
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 653 7.0 miles gray, cold
Christopher Dodd will retire!!!! That's the good news. The bad news is these guys who are leaving have no reason to vote the way their constituents want.
Obama was intended by Democrats to be the post-partisan leader who would energize and inspire Americans. Instead, he seems to flounder when confronted with actual decisions. He surrounds himself with incompetent fans like Desiree Rogers and Janet Napolitano rather than serious administrators. Obama has charm, but he has overused that charm, and now it bores and irritates rather than delights. ... In either house Republicans control, adopt a new rule which would prohibit voting on any bill unless the entire language of the bill has been made public at least thirty days prior to the vote. End all hidden dealings on federal legislation and last-minute amendments, and allow a real national debate on any new federal legislation in the exact form of its ultimate enactment. Adding pork into crevices of vast bills is simply a way to buy votes. Obama vaguely promised to oppose this, and then he broke his word. Republicans must absolutely guarantee uncluttered congressional bills.
Scott Ott Here's troubling, and telling, sentence: "The president is finding that the reshaping of his security policy to deal with threats from al-Qaeda is leading to difficult decisions as he seeks to balance his own intentions with the security realities." Scott Ott says: One would think that our commander in chief would not have intentions at variance with reality when it comes to security.
S. Epatha Merkerson in an earlier Law&Order before she became Anita Van Buren, and I recognized her.
Not much to report today. I went over to church, had a nice chat with Father and with the lady who decorates the altar. We took Pharaoh in for his checkup and shots. He weighs a tish over 50 pounds and doesn't have worms. I crockpotted a sort-of goulash. Yum. Farmville is broken again. Grumble. I had lots of Christmas gifts yet to sort out (in Farmville).
President Obama is a man of breathtaking self-regard and self-absorption. As many have noted, he can hardly give a speech without eulogizing himself and intimating that his Presidency marks a watershed in American, if not world history. In the same fashion, he seems to take a certain malicious — one might even say, childish — pleasure in humiliating his rivals and underlings.
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 653 7.0 miles fog, cold
103 recordings of 27 types.
Rasmussen: -13: 49/51 and it'll probably go up tomorrow after his speech because people will feel safer. Bleck.
Father wants to change daily Mass on Thursday to 5:30, and have Monday Mass again. (What with the return of 7:30 Mass, he's about dismantling all of Father H's changes. I spoke up, forgetting I never go at 8 on Thursday anyways. I'll have to fix that tomorrow.
We went over to Bernadette's to feed the cats and take out the trash. Their driveway was all torn up because of sewer work (which they knew about: they'd had it looked at and the city needed to fix a slipped joint.) We walked past, picked up the mail and the paper, and then I couldn't find where the food was. When I went to call, my phone was almost dead. I couldn't get B's phone (it was dead too) so I tried Rob's and mine kicked out. Rich remembered the car cable, so I went out to the car, and with a few missed calls we finally connected. The cat food is in the freezer. Gareth is having a hard time because there are lots of people and his playpen is just too small for him to sleep comfortably in.
I semi-cleaned the toys, but there's a missing bin so I couldn't really corral the blocks. We found almost all of the puzzle and I put the playhouse stuff together. I also picked up a lot of cheerios. Since we're trying to discourage ants, I thought that was probably a good thing. The black cat came out to check us out, but the other one isn't showing herself.
We went for a geocache at Chick-Fil-A when we left.
At home I was checking out the freezer looking for hamburger, and I realized when I froze the pumpkin bricks I never took them out of the container once they were done. Oops. So I balanced it upside down on the edge of the sink so the bricks would come out when it warmed up a bit. I thought it would take about a half hour but in the event it took about 90 minutes, by which time I'd forgotten all about it. Suddenly, *crash* what was THAT?? I couldn't blame the cat because he was in my lap at the time. I went out and couldn't see anything out of place till I finally noticed pumpkin bricks in the sink. Ah.
When Rich was at Sharing God's Bounty, the phone rang. Apparently this morning during the kerfuffle with the phone, I accidently rang Vince (or the phone did) and hung up. Niki was a little worried that maybe it was Rich having a stroke. Thank goodness, no.
REALLY, THESE PEOPLE ARE PATHETIC: Chris Matthews: Every single “teabagger” in America is white. From the comments: “Every single MSNBC host in America is white.” Heh.
I've decided if someone uses "teabagger" it's like the N-word or "kike" or "chink"... if they are that rude, they don't deserve to be listened to.
I took the dog for a walk. Actually, I'd planned to walk over to Presentation this morning, but was too far behindhand and hadn't even changed my clothes 15 minutes before I would have had to leave. So I missed Mass and missed my walk. At least this way the dog got to come. I saw someone from church and talked to him, then later I saw our old mail carrier. She remembered Pharaoh's name!
Comment here: "This meme won’t fly – the president isn’t an incompetent arrogant narcissist because he’s black. Pelosi isn’t arrogant and idiotic because she’s a women. Reid isn’t moronic because he’s an older white guy."
The Obama administration has gone out of its way to poison relationships with traditional allies with Great Britain, and it seems that the favor is now being returned, as the Prime Minister's office has disclosed publicly that British intelligence, MI5, warned the US about Umar Abdulmutallab.
So, I hear the dog whining, his usual reaction to Abby, and I look over at the Kit Mahal. Abby's in the box. I call the dog over to me and she slowly pokes her head up through the hole. She looks like a cat jack-in-the-box.
Explanations of Obama’s low-key reaction in the face of a terror attack include the characteristic caution of a president who resists jumping to conclusions and being pushed to action. They also include the White House’s belief – disproven repeatedly in 2009 – that it can evade the clichéd rules of politics, which include a suspicion of Democratic leadership on national security.
Mad About Movies blog: top films of the 2000s: "Film critic Shawn Levy has seen 2,463 new films since Jan. 1, 2000. Having gone back to pour over his spreadsheets and folders and best-of-the-year lists, he came to the conclusion that a lot of good movies were made and released during the past ten years."
Argh. "Pour"? Now THIS person is educated and should know better, but at least isn't supposed to be a journalist...."emotional outburst done...on my way to level headed...seeing some incite."
Yesterday I went to see Casey. Whatever happened to the little boy who liked me to read him stories, and enjoyed the finger plays and songs? Where's the kid who counted slug bugs? He's taller than I am and his voice is down three octaves. I started to tell him about the movie I liked, "the back side." Sigh. "The Blind Side."
Rich went to a meeting with Father and the unhappy ushers. Apparently it went well enough.
Steyn: "by then the president of the United States had also taken to the airwaves. For three days, he had remained silent – which I believed is a world record for the 44th president."
Duh. Now that they can't cudgel Bush with it, suddenly it isn't credible.
Today we went up to Roseville and Rocklin to chase digitalfish. These are the little signature items put out by a Bay Area geocacher who was apparently in our area just before New Year's. He keeps track of the little fish, and I like to take them far away, like to Hawai'i or Pennsylvania. There were 10 caches where he'd left fish, so I ran a pocket query that included them. We took Pharaoh, which he loves, and off we went. The first two caches we visited had already been raided and the fish were gone, so I thought it might all be wasted. However, in the end we got 15 caches, 6 digitalfish, a geocoin and only one DNF. (Which may have been gone anyway.) We left the dog in the car when we had a fast-food lunch. He behaved beautifully, eventually lying down for a nap. He did get to go out twice. One of the trips was in a little park with a cache next to the freeway. At this one I spied some cachers, then saw they were, oh no, boys about 12. This is a nice age but they tend to ruin caches if they find them, and they always find them. However, they turned out to be caching! We gave them our wooden nickels and I got a digitalfish there. Nice kids after all.
Two of the caches were at Fry's, so we went in and Rich got a shield for his iTouch screen. The Roseville Fry's has a railroad theme with tracks on the floor and a train breaking through the wall. I must go back with my camera.
I started experimenting with the Google Chrome browser. Mind you, I think Google is evil. The browser, though, seems to work fine except with Farmville.
0bama's make believe life. (I don't agree that Sarah Palin was a mistake, she was the only thing keeping McCain up.)
Now, nearly a full year into his first term, all of those gilded years leading up to the White House have left him unprepared to be President. Left to his own instincts, he has a talent for saying the wrong thing at the wrong time. It swiftly became a joke that he could not deliver even the briefest of statements without the ever-present Tele-Prompters.
Far worse, however, is his capacity to want to “wish away” some terrible realities, not the least of which is the Islamist intention to destroy America and enslave the West. Any student of history knows how swiftly Islam initially spread. It knocked on the doors of Europe, having gained a foothold in Spain.
The great crowds that greeted him at home or on his campaign “world tour” were no substitute for having even the slightest grasp of history and the reality of a world filled with really bad people with really bad intentions. ... The pattern repeats itself. He either blames any problem on the Bush administration or he naively seeks to wish away the truth.
Knock, knock. Anyone home? Anyone there? Barack Obama exists only as the sock puppet of his handlers, of the people who have maneuvered and manufactured this pathetic individual’s life.
When anyone else would quickly and easily produce a birth certificate, this man has spent over a million dollars to deny access to his. Most other documents, the paper trail we all leave in our wake, have been sequestered from review. He has lived a make-believe life whose true facts remain hidden.
We laugh at the ventriloquist’s dummy, but what do you do when the dummy is President of the United States of America?
An uncomfortable pivot from the audacity of hope to buyer's remorse.... The ferocity they applied to the Republican vice-presidential candidate, Sarah Palin, in contrast with the timidity they brought to his campaign, will in time come to be seen as one of the most shameful episodes in American journalism. Not so much for what they did to Ms. Palin, but for what they neglected to do in examining the candidate for the office that really counted. In some curious way, the U.S. media's bulldogging of Ms. Palin was kind of an inverted compensation for what they weren't doing to him. .... The great “cool” of Mr. Obama – essentially all those qualities that marked him as the non-George Bush, the anti-George Bush – is wearing a little thin now that Mr. Bush is really no longer a figure in play. That cool now is seen as a troubling lack of affect, an unsettling passionlessness. What really, in his public role, captures or commands the fundamental energies of Mr. Obama? What are his core convictions and aspirations? It's very hard to tell.
this is the first real job he’s ever held where he couldn’t turn over the real work to others while sitting back and reaping credit and glory from his adoring public. When you think about it, this is the first job he’s ever had that actually involved real, unavoidable accountability for him. He can’t handle the pressure, and the MSM’s chants of “Behold,a god, not a man” are finally becoming ineffectual.
That, and the picture here, indicates how much the press has lost their leg-tingles.
Kathleen Parker asks what it takes to get a rise out of Barak Obama. Something personal: laugh at his teleprompter or his high opinion of himself, and watch the cool dissolve. Threaten the country? Eh.
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 644 .5 miles fog
92 recordings of 27 types.
2009 summary: Ah, well, the mess got a little better. I caught up with the journal (finally. Last week!) but have a hard time staying current. I stalled out on Bernadette's book, but am finishing it. I'm hoping to make more of a dent in things, especially the paper boxes and the photographs (I still have to copy pictures from the former Ofoto before they kill my account. I got sidetracked cleaning up Geocities last year.) I also want to do more walking and exercising.
For me, 15.5 miles in December (267.8 total, ~80 less than last year, grumble. I'm going in the wrong direction... I blame Bush Farmville), .8 pound up for December but 5-7 down for the year, 33 pages in December, 400 total. Ouch: I should have finished this volume in January last year.
For myself in December, I read 2 books (38 year) (again, I blame Bush Farmville), 1 movie (4), 2 plays (25), 15 Masses for 108 in the year.
We found 20 caches last month, for 839 in the year, and we were at 6551 at the end of 2009. We're 173rd in the world, and 12th locally. (Down overall 16 places, down a rank locally.)
I did no proofing at all last month. This is another NY resolution (which I managed yesterday but not today.) I'm in 904th (out of 28607 proofers) place in the first proofing round, with 861 pages proofed (50 for the year), 12th (out of 3309) in P2 with 23495 pages, (1681 year. Disgraceful!), 469th (of 782--they added 100 even this year!) in P3 with 467 (6 this year) pages.. I need to cross ranks/pages again! and formatting 477th place (2646) with 1000 pages, (20 this year). Needless to say, I didn't qualify for F2.
In Flickr I have 32129 pictures, with 75650 views, and 120 sets to work on (putting pictures into groups they fit into, etc.) Not to mention getting the Kodak/Ofoto pictures captured. Also, this year I'd like to deal with Scanyourphotos.com to get some of the boxes and boxes of photos organized. Yeah.
In Netflix, I saw As Time Goes By (series 1) the second disc, VeggieTales "The Star of Christmas", Julie & Julia and the original Cheaper by the Dozen.
(Maybe I could go with Lemony Snicket Titles for awhile!)
Durant's Rousseau and Revolution, p. 644 .5 miles rain
91 recordings of 26 types.
Last night Farmville did me in. The New Year's Ball that was supposed to be so special didn't do what it was supposed to. I'm so disappointed and mad that I'm going to stop playing the game. I can use the time much more constructively and my computer is bound to work better. (Actually, I'm just removing most of the stuff and "moving to Antarctica" so I can keep the penguins.)
The iTouch isn't working as I'd hoped, either. Rich has a lot of gripes about it.
TSA is picking on bloggers because they don't like being laughed at. The bloggers picked up the "new security rules" which, as usual, don't address security, they just make passengers' life miserable. The idea is not to let the bombs ON the plane, not to deny bathroom privileges and blankets and books (!) to passengers. So when people started ridiculing the new stupid rules, they decided they are "secret." Huh? Why aren't they figuring out who posted the manual online a couple of weeks ago? Because, folks, that would be HARD.
We went to church this morning. The unhappy usher came to talk to Rich at the end and the two of them were chatting (as they do at the back of the church on Sundays) before the Mass was really over. If they were my kids, I'd punish them!
Then we went to pick up our wetlands cache. There were lots of trumpeter swans. Wow they're noisy. I took a movie not because of the movement but because of the noise.
Close to the levee is the cache we decided to use for our New Year's Day cache, which we walked to. Then as it began to rain, we went into West Sac for four more. At the first one, (and again the third) this huge group of cachers (well, 6 of them) from San Joachin Valley came up. Their goal, which I'm fairly sure they met, was 100 caches for the day. They were at 35 at our first, and at least 37 by the next one. We thought we might see them again, but didn't. When it began to rain hard, we headed home.
Then this evening we went to Bernadette and Rob's where we had a great salmon meal and tested the new dining table. Very pleasant, good food, good company. Gareth sat at the table with us and talked. He's talking more and more, and mimicking, and he recognizes "B" on Bernadette's t-shirt. Not anywhere else, yet, but not bad for 19 months. He also learned "hole" while in the high chair. We took the blue hippo, and he seems to like it, though he pushes it backwards on the head instead of using the handle.
Invite
