A recurring theme pervades from television news to Facebook chatter: Republicans are going to retake the House, and very well could retake the Senate, too.
Sure they are. And a Category Five hurricane is going to blast straight through the Narrows and wipe New York completely off the map. But neither event is guaranteed to happen in 2010.
Republicans were not going to lose on Stimulus. They were not going to lose on Justice Sotomayor. They had defeat of Health Care Reform sewed up. There was no way that there was going to be any re-regulation on Wall Street.
If one goes back two years to the primaries, Hillary Clinton was going to be the Democratic nominee. Six years ago, Ryan had been leading in the polls for Paul Simon’s old Senate seat. In other words, we have been hearing about Barack Obama’s imminent doom since he stood up and smoked everyone at the Democratic Convention in 2004.
Six predictions of impending failure have six wins for Barack Obama. It would seem foolish to bet against the President with this much time on the clock.
President Obama is sitting as low on the polls as he ever has. He’s still twenty points up on Bush’s lowest point. He has kept a low profile all summer. This is classic Obama. He’s running the Rope-a-Dope on the Republicans.
For those who may not have had the frustrating pleasure of watching Muhammad Ali fight, the Rope-a-Dope works thusly. Ali would lean back on the ropes and let an opponent pound, pound, and pound some more. Ali was a cerebral fighter. He studied his opponent’s best moves, let the opponent tire himself out, and in the last two rounds, Ali would knock his opponent into the middle of next Tuesday.
At the moment, as the old southernism goes, the Tea Party and the Republicans are (defecating) in high cotton. Someone may wish to remind them where the McCain-Palin ticket stood in the polls on Labor Day, 2008.
The right has been going to the well repeatedly. There is a strong likelihood that a large component of the electorate which wasn’t quite sick of the Tea Party six months ago may have had its fill of screaming white geezers. The party which has been quiet has a strategic advantage.
Democrats will discuss the economy and jobs. James Carville is sitting around, and James Carville is going to be brought back into the game. Nobody has ever crafted as effective a campaign based on the economy like him in the last 50 years. Carville would have been first choice a long time ago, but he was very highly annoyed.
They also have Robert Reich, Clinton’s Treasury secretary, biding his time as a talking head on CNN and MSNBC. As far as the economy and Domestic policy go, the Clinton years are remembered fondly. There are even a few conservatives out there who would be willing to trade places with that woman, Miss Lewinski, if it would reboot the economy to 1998.
This is where the Clinton card gets played. Obama has the Clinton economic team available, and they have very strong credibility, because the economy was strong. The administration is smart enough to realize that it is tough to clean up eight years of mess in less than two. The message has to be Dubya versus Bubba.
The independent center is not going to hear much about the following from Democrats over the next two months: the environment, unless it is linked to green jobs; immigration; LGBT rights; or security (unless it is connected to jobs, jobs, jobs.) This will be extremely frustrating to Liberals and Progressives, but it is also pragmatic. The Democratic Party is not in a position of being the Vegans at the barbecue without alienating the coalition moderates who helped bring them to power.
The base understands that their objectives will be completely and perpetually screwed if Republicans get back into power. It would be the equivalent of choosing Lindsay Lohan for a designated driver.
President Obama’s desires for the next two years are going to be extremely dependent upon voters who have traditionally been more apathetic. Obama’s organization has been strong in keeping a connection to his supporters over the last couple of years. This crucial body may pull the President’s bacon out of the fire in November.
They may very well be the left jab that the Republican Party does not see coming.
02 September 2010
28 August 2010
Understanding Your Haynes Service Manual
A few of us in the automotive hobby have come to know and appreciate our Haynes service manuals. However, these manuals are written in ENGLISH, not AMERICAN. Some of the terms may be confusing to those unfamiliar with British automotive jargon.
As a courtesy to friends who enjoy automobiles, or those curious about the hobby, your Wandering Gentile has prepared a glossary of British automotive terms translated into American.
SPANNER- A tool who sends you unsolicited e-mail.
BOOT- An oversize bit of footwear in the trunk.
SPARKING PLUGS- Someone forgot to remove the bloody ground cable, didn't he?
REMOVE NEGATIVE CABLE FROM BATTERY- If followed to the letter on a Lucas/Prince of Darkness system, and owner leaves the key on, his car will become an Austin/Morris/MG/Wolseley/Riley/Triumph/Rover/Standard Chernobyl upon replacement of cable on positive-ground system.
I.C.E.- The people who will have some question about your immigration status if they hear Shakira on your radio.
WHEELBRACE- Thang whut looks lak uh tar arn.
WING- Hey, Ah tole ya they got them fline cars over in Anglund.
OFFSIDE/NEARSIDE- Not even the British are entirely certain about the rules on this one. It's kind of like Cricket. (RIP, Mr Woolmer)
BONNET- Famous NASCAR driver where the hood ought to be.
HOOD- It's like the English have a different word for everything. It looks like a convertible top to me.
CROSS-PLY TYRE- Apparently the belts don't get along.
SALOON- You got to be kidding. John Wayne wouldn't be caught dead in this thing for all the Rye Whiskey ever distilled. He probably wouldn't even fit.
MINICAR- Roller Skate with an attitude.
MoT- Bureaucrats who have an agenda for the promotion of public transit.
FOUR STAR PETROL- Urine with an attitude.
TWO STAR PETROL- Urine without an attitude.
FORECOURT- Where the gas pumps are.
MULTI STOREY CAR PARK- Parking deck. Expensive.
CITROEN- French word for "lemon."
RENAULT- French word for "(excrement)."
(Repurposed from content originally posted at Opel GT.com, March, 2007.)
Scarier than Stephen King.
This quote was found in the comments section of a Think Progress report on Glenn Beck's 8/28 rally in Washington. The commonality of this rhetoric and that of the Tea Party is disturbing.
"It makes no difference whatever whether they laugh at us or revile us, whether they represent us as clowns or criminals; the main thing is that they mention us, that they concern themselves with us again and again, and that we gradually in the eyes of the workers themselves appear to be the only power that anyone reckons with at the moment. …"
"[O]ne can never count on protection on the part of the authorities; on the contrary, experience shows that it always and exclusively benefits the disturbers. For the sole actual result of intervention by the authorities – that is, the police – was at best to dissolve, in other words, to close the meeting. And that was the sole aim and purpose of the hostile disturbers." [...]
"If through some sort of threats it becomes known to the authorities that there is danger of a meeting being broken up, they do not arrest the threateners, but forbid the others, the innocent, to hold the meeting, and what is more, the run-of-the-mill police mind is mighty proud of such wisdom. They call this a 'precautionary measure for the prevention of an illegal act.'
"Thus, the determined gangster is always in a position to make political activity and efforts impossible for decent people. In the name of law and order, the state authority gives in to the gangster and requests the others please not to provoke him."
Adolf Hitler in Mein Kampf
11 August 2010
Crudcast Cable
“Dear Mr. Gillon.”
Uh-oh. Nobody puts Mr. in front of my surname unless they want money. It’s kind of like being called “Sir” in a truck stop parking lot.
“Crudcast Cable is offering a unique savings opportunity!”
Yup.
“Now you can have 150 channels of crystal-clear Crudcast Cable, packaged with home telephone service and lightning-fast Internet for…”
However dang many dollars a month they wanted. I forgot, not that I cared all that much to start with. I drive a truck. Mrs. Wandering Gentile only likes three channels, and we can get them with rabbit ears for free.
I shudder to think of what viruses are out there with Justin Bieber’s face on them. I suspect that a few are also on the Internet.
“Our premium 150 Channel Package includes all of your local favorites.”
They don’t carry the low-powered digital channel which happens to be TeleCaramba, my wife’s favorite network. We live close enough to the transmitter to pick up the broadcasts in our fillings.
“We also offer great sports programming from….”
I am the only person in the house who really watches sports at all. I drive a truck. I can tell you which newspapers have decent baseball coverage. It’s not doing me any good when I’m in Walla Walla, picking up apples.
“Crudcast’s news and information selection features great choices from CNN and Fox News.”
My apologies. I just threw up a little in my mouth. CNN is on channel 22. Fox is on 20. MSNBC is on another system.
“For the youngsters in the house, we have Disney, Nickelodeon, and the Cartoon Network.”
Okay, the youngster is almost 44…and rarely has impure thoughts about Selena Gomez any more.
“We also offer several convenient shop-at-home services.”
I have no clue what they have on these shop-at-home services, but I bet they are neither economical nor a very good use of bandwidth. Thankfully, this is not a habit of Mrs. Wandering Gentile’s. Shop NBC could easily be replaced with something from the same corporate family. Gee, could I guess what it might be?
“Crudcast home telephone service offers great connections and unlimited calling within the continental United States.”
My prepaid cell phone carrier offers ALL FIFTY states and Canada, and the Internet. For an extra five dollars a month, we can have unlimited land line connections in sixty countries on my wife’s prepaid carrier. My phone works everywhere but Oklahoma and some parts of West Virginia. Her coverage is a bit less nationwide, but better in Metro Atlanta.
I also don’t like telephones enough to want another one of the damn things which happens to be less versatile than what I have already!
“Crudcast Internet offers the lightning fast speed that you want…”
Yeah, except when a whole bunch of my neighbors discover that the Aguilas are playing the Chivas. Then the thing packs up like the Cross-Bronx Expressway on a Friday afternoon. I may as well try to find out what Rachel Maddow was talking about at 8 by smoke signal.
So I called Crudcast to see how much they would charge me for just Comedy Central, the Cartoon Network, and the Internet, just for grins.
It was 10 dollars more a month, I HAD to take Fox news when I didn’t want it, and Crudcast’s customer service department left a little bit to be desired, which is a nice way of saying that they suck.
If Jasmine stands on Sasha’s shoulders, we can pick up Macon with the rabbit ears.
Uh-oh. Nobody puts Mr. in front of my surname unless they want money. It’s kind of like being called “Sir” in a truck stop parking lot.
“Crudcast Cable is offering a unique savings opportunity!”
Yup.
“Now you can have 150 channels of crystal-clear Crudcast Cable, packaged with home telephone service and lightning-fast Internet for…”
However dang many dollars a month they wanted. I forgot, not that I cared all that much to start with. I drive a truck. Mrs. Wandering Gentile only likes three channels, and we can get them with rabbit ears for free.
I shudder to think of what viruses are out there with Justin Bieber’s face on them. I suspect that a few are also on the Internet.
“Our premium 150 Channel Package includes all of your local favorites.”
They don’t carry the low-powered digital channel which happens to be TeleCaramba, my wife’s favorite network. We live close enough to the transmitter to pick up the broadcasts in our fillings.
“We also offer great sports programming from….”
I am the only person in the house who really watches sports at all. I drive a truck. I can tell you which newspapers have decent baseball coverage. It’s not doing me any good when I’m in Walla Walla, picking up apples.
“Crudcast’s news and information selection features great choices from CNN and Fox News.”
My apologies. I just threw up a little in my mouth. CNN is on channel 22. Fox is on 20. MSNBC is on another system.
“For the youngsters in the house, we have Disney, Nickelodeon, and the Cartoon Network.”
Okay, the youngster is almost 44…and rarely has impure thoughts about Selena Gomez any more.
“We also offer several convenient shop-at-home services.”
I have no clue what they have on these shop-at-home services, but I bet they are neither economical nor a very good use of bandwidth. Thankfully, this is not a habit of Mrs. Wandering Gentile’s. Shop NBC could easily be replaced with something from the same corporate family. Gee, could I guess what it might be?
“Crudcast home telephone service offers great connections and unlimited calling within the continental United States.”
My prepaid cell phone carrier offers ALL FIFTY states and Canada, and the Internet. For an extra five dollars a month, we can have unlimited land line connections in sixty countries on my wife’s prepaid carrier. My phone works everywhere but Oklahoma and some parts of West Virginia. Her coverage is a bit less nationwide, but better in Metro Atlanta.
I also don’t like telephones enough to want another one of the damn things which happens to be less versatile than what I have already!
“Crudcast Internet offers the lightning fast speed that you want…”
Yeah, except when a whole bunch of my neighbors discover that the Aguilas are playing the Chivas. Then the thing packs up like the Cross-Bronx Expressway on a Friday afternoon. I may as well try to find out what Rachel Maddow was talking about at 8 by smoke signal.
So I called Crudcast to see how much they would charge me for just Comedy Central, the Cartoon Network, and the Internet, just for grins.
It was 10 dollars more a month, I HAD to take Fox news when I didn’t want it, and Crudcast’s customer service department left a little bit to be desired, which is a nice way of saying that they suck.
If Jasmine stands on Sasha’s shoulders, we can pick up Macon with the rabbit ears.
The Season of Miracles
As this interminable summer of unpleasant confrontations and dreadful poll numbers draws toward its end, be of good cheer, Liberals.
Republicans want to debate extending the Bush Tax Cuts. This is like being a bullfighter in a wheelchair. There is no way this will turn out well.
If the Bush Tax Cuts had worked, it would be logical to expect the following:
1. Full employment.
2. A shrinking deficit.
3. Growth of middle class incomes.
This is, after all, the premise upon which the Tax Cuts were sold in 2001. At the time, the federal surplus was in the neighborhood of half a trillion dollars. The unemployment rate hovered within a few ticks of 5%. The spending power of the median US family was about 20% more than it is today.
Supporters of reinstating the Bush Tax Cuts will argue some points. 9/11 will come up, as will the subprime mortgage fiasco. The suggestion will be made, with some tenuous supporting evidence, that the middle and lower classes are paying less in taxes today than they did ten years ago.
9/11 was certainly an impact upon the American economy and psyche. There are now two wars as a result, at a cost of (roughly) a trillion dollars a year. Our presence in Iraq is questionable, at a cost of having lost bin Laden at Tora Bora.
For those who would suggest that Liberals do not support the armed services, one wishes to query. Starting a war, sending troops without adequate intelligence or correct equipment for the job, and then the whole thing turns out to have been done on crap evidence, well, how supportive is that? Cutting benefits and placing stop-loss orders is not supportive either.
The subprime meltdown is another case of the path to hell being paved with good intentions. Yes, Clinton signed the repeal of Glass-Stegall. Being truthful, quite a few Liberals and Progressives were convinced that the economy would continue its exponential growth. Senator Russ Feingold (D-WI) is among the few who get a pass for not following a dumb, but popular, idea.
For every Conservative who loves Madame Palin’s “How’s that hopey changey stuff workin’ out for ya,” there is a guy, whose residence has a license plate, looking for a deregulation Republican to park his home on. This individual is paying less in income taxes, because 15% of zero is zero.
The Laffer curve was great while we were on the upslope. The downslope is as frightening as anything found at Cedar Point in Sandusky, Ohio. We are facing something that would have a very peculiar interpretation of y=mX+b. A point came somewhere around five years ago when we passed the intersection where lowering the marginal tax rate would result in increased revenues.
What would work is getting back to what we already know works. The pre-Bush economy worked.
President Obama has been holding this move for months. There is no way he does not want the Bush Tax Cut debate to come to the floor of Congress. The population which would be most affected voted something like 90% in favor of Senator McCain two years ago. There is no political downside for Obama.
If the usual litany of Conservatives begins to pontificate on the virtues of this particular tax cut regimen, then the Democrats don’t have to run against individual opponents. They are now running against people who prospered when most people did not and George W. Bush. That works quite well.
The wealthy will cry victim, as with any group which has become dependent upon public largesse. There is something decidedly unsympathetic about any group prospering on somebody else’s dime. Welfare kings from Beverly Hills to Beacon Hill are even less sympathetic when one has faced the loss of a career, a home, or a marriage to economic instability.
Governments cost money to run. A progressive taxation policy is not punitive to producers. It means that those who have prospered under a free, democratic system are also responsible for maintaining the integrity of the system which has enabled their prosperity.
Producers know that debt is not a smart choice. The nation is overleveraged. We can ill afford to dump US$700 billion on people who sat on it the last time. An economically broken government cannot assure the security of the nation it serves.
And if he has to, Obama’s going to veto the Bush Tax Cuts anyway.
Republicans want to debate extending the Bush Tax Cuts. This is like being a bullfighter in a wheelchair. There is no way this will turn out well.
If the Bush Tax Cuts had worked, it would be logical to expect the following:
1. Full employment.
2. A shrinking deficit.
3. Growth of middle class incomes.
This is, after all, the premise upon which the Tax Cuts were sold in 2001. At the time, the federal surplus was in the neighborhood of half a trillion dollars. The unemployment rate hovered within a few ticks of 5%. The spending power of the median US family was about 20% more than it is today.
Supporters of reinstating the Bush Tax Cuts will argue some points. 9/11 will come up, as will the subprime mortgage fiasco. The suggestion will be made, with some tenuous supporting evidence, that the middle and lower classes are paying less in taxes today than they did ten years ago.
9/11 was certainly an impact upon the American economy and psyche. There are now two wars as a result, at a cost of (roughly) a trillion dollars a year. Our presence in Iraq is questionable, at a cost of having lost bin Laden at Tora Bora.
For those who would suggest that Liberals do not support the armed services, one wishes to query. Starting a war, sending troops without adequate intelligence or correct equipment for the job, and then the whole thing turns out to have been done on crap evidence, well, how supportive is that? Cutting benefits and placing stop-loss orders is not supportive either.
The subprime meltdown is another case of the path to hell being paved with good intentions. Yes, Clinton signed the repeal of Glass-Stegall. Being truthful, quite a few Liberals and Progressives were convinced that the economy would continue its exponential growth. Senator Russ Feingold (D-WI) is among the few who get a pass for not following a dumb, but popular, idea.
For every Conservative who loves Madame Palin’s “How’s that hopey changey stuff workin’ out for ya,” there is a guy, whose residence has a license plate, looking for a deregulation Republican to park his home on. This individual is paying less in income taxes, because 15% of zero is zero.
The Laffer curve was great while we were on the upslope. The downslope is as frightening as anything found at Cedar Point in Sandusky, Ohio. We are facing something that would have a very peculiar interpretation of y=mX+b. A point came somewhere around five years ago when we passed the intersection where lowering the marginal tax rate would result in increased revenues.
What would work is getting back to what we already know works. The pre-Bush economy worked.
President Obama has been holding this move for months. There is no way he does not want the Bush Tax Cut debate to come to the floor of Congress. The population which would be most affected voted something like 90% in favor of Senator McCain two years ago. There is no political downside for Obama.
If the usual litany of Conservatives begins to pontificate on the virtues of this particular tax cut regimen, then the Democrats don’t have to run against individual opponents. They are now running against people who prospered when most people did not and George W. Bush. That works quite well.
The wealthy will cry victim, as with any group which has become dependent upon public largesse. There is something decidedly unsympathetic about any group prospering on somebody else’s dime. Welfare kings from Beverly Hills to Beacon Hill are even less sympathetic when one has faced the loss of a career, a home, or a marriage to economic instability.
Governments cost money to run. A progressive taxation policy is not punitive to producers. It means that those who have prospered under a free, democratic system are also responsible for maintaining the integrity of the system which has enabled their prosperity.
Producers know that debt is not a smart choice. The nation is overleveraged. We can ill afford to dump US$700 billion on people who sat on it the last time. An economically broken government cannot assure the security of the nation it serves.
And if he has to, Obama’s going to veto the Bush Tax Cuts anyway.
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