Overnight Open Thread (7 Jun 2013)

Mark Steyn is exactly right. Some are saying we need programs like Prism to catch the Tsarnev's and Major Hassan types (which it didn't). In reality we'd be better off just enforcing existing laws and dropping the pretense of political correctness. Nice way of tying immigration reform to the latest scandal. The Senate is still trying to pass that turd.

How did all these Tsarnaevs-in-waiting wind up living in the United States? They were let in by the Government, and many of them were let in in the years since 9/11, when we were supposedly on permanent “orange alert”. The same bureaucracy that takes the terror threat so seriously that it needs the phone and Internet records of hundreds of millions of law-abiding persons would never dream of doing a little more pre-screening in its immigration system – by, say, according a graduate of a Yemeni madrassah a little more scrutiny than a Slovene or Fijian. The President has unilaterally suspended the immigration laws of the United States, and his Attorney-General prosecutes those states such as Arizona who remain quaintly attached to them. The ID three of the 9/11 hijackers acquired in the 7-Eleven parking lot in Falls Church, Virginia and used to board the plane that day is part of a vast ongoing subversion of American sovereignty with which many states and so-called “sanctuary cities” actively collude.

As for Major Hasan, who needs surveillance? He put “Soldier of Allah” on his business card and gave a PowerPoint presentation to his military colleagues on what he’d like to do to infidels – and nobody said a word, lest they got tied up in sensitivity-training hell for six months.

Is The War On Terror Over Or Not?

So what's the dealio? If the War on Terror is over and the administration views terrorism through a pre 9/11 prism, why is the administration assembling and wielding the most powerful and intrusive systems of surveillance ever conceived?

President Obama is now caught in a trap of his own making. By downplaying the threat and trying to create an atmosphere of peace and normality in the country, he has delegitimated the measures he believes that our safety requires. Having tried and failed to keep these secrets dark and hidden, he must now try to explain what many Americans will find inexplicable. If the terrorists are really on the run, and we can finally go back to a 9/10 state of mind, why are you assembling and wielding the most powerful and intrusive systems of surveillance ever conceived?

Ethical Misbehavior

Yes, it is true, it starts at the top. With all of these scandals (and I do include the Secret Service and military scandals), one has to wonder how much of our Congressional and current Administration behavior is to blame. Why follow the rules, the law, when the Senate blows off completing a budget for years? A congressman tweets his weiner and now runs for Mayor. IRS agents and management flagrantly violate the law but get put on paid leave or allowed to retire with full benefits. Susan Rice lies to the country on national TV and gets promoted to be the President's National Security Advisor. Bad behavior will continue when no punishments are handed out.

What we found was a small circle of certifiably bad actors who acted without regard for the law or for anyone else. Surrounding this inner circle was a culture that gave these employees tacit permission to run roughshod over others and break the law.

While lower-level Enron employees did their jobs honorably, senior management cultivated a malignant esprit de corps that corroded the company's ethics. The C-Suite view was that no one was smarter, faster or more aggressive than these executives. Mortals couldn't possibly understand what they did. That belief created its own closed-system logic, leading to deceptive accounting schemes, self-dealing and, ultimately, a battery of criminal convictions for Enron's top brass.

Cooking with Giada

I don't know why, but I keep getting fascinated with boiling water at the 2:21 mark.

Firearm Nick Names

Peaches mentioned she named her new firearm "Fluffy" so I wondered what firearm nick names were out there. What are your favorite firearm nicknames?

The earliest nicknames I’ve been able to uncover date back to the 18th century. Small, large-caliber pistols were called “Snappers, “Barkers” or “Bulldogs,” the latter term coming down to this day, and along the way achieving trademark status.

AKAs such as “Heater, ” Shooting iron,” “Smoke Pole” and Persuader” are pretty easy to figure out, as are “Saturday Night Special,” “Suicide Special” and “Flyapart ,” the latter a trio of terms to describe cheaply-made, inexpensive handguns intended for limited, somewhat specialized usage.

“Long Tom”, which has generally come to mean an extended-barreled, large-gauge shotgun (it too was ultimately adopted as an official model designation) goes back to at least the 1820s and originally described a large naval cannon. The appellation has since then also been applied to other artillery pieces.

Now how about some shootin' video?

Numbers

It is painfully obvious the government likes to play a shellgame with numbers. How the NSA and the FBI lie with numbers.

Or how about in regard to unemployment? The hidden jobless disaster.

And remember just a few rogue IRS agents turns out to be at a minimum 88.

Bacon

While this is targeted for Father's Day, it really could be for anyone on any given day. Say it with bacon. Smithfield bacon is better though.

Shitty Music Pays

Not too shabby for essentially a one hit wonder. Whoomp! (There it is) still makes $500,000 a year.

The song has been called both the best and the worst of the 90s, spending seven weeks at #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in 1993 and appeas frequently at both sporting events, and parodies. But perhaps the most surprising fact about “Whoomp! (There It Is),” is not that it became famous in the first place, but just how much the song still makes its creators, DC the Brain Supreme and Steve Rolln. Deep within a long interview about the song with 5280 Magazine is this line:

The song generates up to $500,000 in a good year, which is divvied up among the rights-holders and lawyers; DC and Steve might collect up to $70,000 each, DC says.

Dog Video

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posted by CDR M at 10:46 PM

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