The anti-Rand Pauls, Sen. John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, took to the Senate floor this morning to defend killing American citizens at presidential discretion. Graham is doing so live on C-SPAN2 right now, saying that everything you do is a danger to America no matter who or where you are, as long as the U.S. government has decided you have “joined al-Queda,” whatever the hell that means.
(Read more)
Monthly Archives: March 2013
The F35 Is Too Heavy and Slow, So the Pentagon Made Its Performance Tests Easier
Military procurement is the most holy, and therefore the most corrupt government procurement.
The Pentagon’s pursuit of the Lockheed Martin F-35 stealth fighter jet has been a heartbreaking one. If you’re a tax payer, the program’s estimated $1 trillion price tag probably breaks your heart a little bit. If you’re an aviation enthusiast, the constant whittling away of the do-it-all aircraft’s features, which in many cases actually amounts to adding weight and taking away maneuverability, must hurt a little bit, too.
. . . .
To put it bluntly, the Pentagon’s new trillion-dollar fighter jet doesn’t go a fast as it should, doesn’t turn as sharp as it should and doesn’t handle as nimbly as it should. This is bad news, explains Wired’s David Axe. For the pilots who will eventually take the F-35 into combat, the JSF’s reduced performance means they might not be able to outfly and outfight the latest Russian- and Chinese-made fighters,” writes Axe. “Even before the downgrades, some analysts questioned the F-35′s ability to defeat newer Sukhoi and Shenyang jets.” That all sounds like bad news, doesn’t it? If our expensive new jets can’t beat the Russians or the Chinese, who can we fight? I’m pretty sure al Qaeda doesn’t have an air force. (Read more)
“except for the number of speeches nothing grows [in the EU].”
Bild reports that Germany’s European Commissioner Günther Oettinger yesterday acknowledged that Brussels interferes in too many policy areas, adding that “except for the number of speeches nothing grows [in the EU].”
Hour 8: Rand Paul filibusters Brennan nomination for CIA director
Sen. Rand Paul took to the floor of the U.S. Senate just before noon Wednesday and vowed to stay there “at length” in order to filibuster John O. Brennan, whom President Obama has nominated to be the next CIA director.
The Kentucky Republican said he will hold up the nomination until he gets more information about the U.S. drone execution program, which has become a major sore point for many lawmakers on Capitol Hill.
“I will speak today until the president responds and says, ‘No, we won’t kill Americans in cafes. No, we won’t kill you at home at night,’” Mr. Paul said early on in the filibuster, that began at 11:47 and showed no signs of slowing more than four hours later.
Five hours into the filibuster, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid came to the floor to try to end it. He asked if Mr. Paul would agree to limit himself to another half-hour of remarks, and then the chamber would vote on the Brennan nomination — which likely has majority support.
Mr. Paul said he would be glad to end his filibuster immediately, but only if the administration would promise not to make Americans in the U.S. the subject of targeted killings.
Mr. Reid said he wasn’t in a position to speak for the administration and stalked off the floor.
“We’re through for the night,” he said, releasing senators who had stuck around thinking they might still vote on the Brennan nomination.
Speaking from his corner desk Mr. Paul, in red tie and gray suit and with a glass of ice water — within reach but rarely touched — spoke about political history and the origins of key constitutional precepts.
The role of the euro as debt disease carrier
Patrick Barron: Contrary to the euro-federalists’ claims, the euro does not help the sick countries of Southern Europe get healthier. It is more instructive to think of the euro as the carrier of the debt disease of the southern tier countries in Europe to the healthier northern tier countries. A fiscal union would enshrine this process as a classic socialist policy with classic socialist results; i.e., capital will be plundered in all eurozone countries until it is exhausted.
Climate Change in 12 Minutes – The Skeptic’s Case
By Dr. David M.W. Evans
“We check the main predictions of the climate models against the best and latest data. Fortunately the climate models got all their major predictions wrong. Why? Every serious skeptical scientist has been consistently saying essentially the same thing for over 20 years, yet most people have never heard the message. Here it is, put simply enough for any lay reader willing to pay attention…”
Protests against erection of phallic monument besides vagina-bench monument in Montreal Park. (not the Onion)
Chris Dorner (LAPD vigilante) Executed
“Leading role” in Promoting Multicultural Europe
I don’t know what to make of this. Most likely, she’s just an idiot. An idiot funded by the Swedish government. An idiot who seems determined to deliver to Europe the “blessings” of multiculturalism.
Interview with former Minister of Employment in Sweden, Sven Otto Littorin
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I make the argument against Sweden as a socialist paradise quite often. It usually goes like this:
4 Arguments against Sweden as an example of socialist success
1) Sweden’s wealth can be attributed to the fact that it has been peaceful longer than any other country in Europe, including Switzerland. It used to have a radically free economy. Completely free trade. It even had competing currencies until 1903.
2) Sweden’s welfare state ballooned in the 50s and 60s. Since then, Sweden’s economy has slowed considerably. In one albeit controversial study published in the Swedish Economics Association’s journal Ekonomisk Debatt in 2009, Ratio Institute economists Bjuggren and Johansson found that there has been NO JOB CREATION AT ALL in the private sector from 1950 to 2005.
3) Sweden is still has some economic freedom. Their corporate tax rate is considerably lower than the US’s. They rate extremely well on Heritage’s scale (18th).
4) Even if you think these argument are BS (which they aren’t), you have to ask yourself why the Swedish people elect politicians who call themselves conservative and cut taxes. In 2010, they re-elected politicians who cut taxes on everybody, including the super rich.
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Side note: My libertarian friends in Sweden are outraged that the reforms in Sweden which pass for free-market reforms are thinly veiled corporatism and other corruption.
Shadow Stats
Love this website.
Great expose on bullshit gov’t statistics: www.shadowstats.com/
The Drones Are Watching and Waiting
For the moment, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has blocked the use of unmanned aircraft for surveillance purposes, due to concern about clogging the skies with flying robots that crash more often than piloted aircraft.
The folks at the FAA are being pressured to lighten up and permit the use of drones by government agencies. The result of that pressure is HR 658, which authorizes appropriations for the FAA through fiscal 2014, and buried in it are the provisions to begin a “drone-apalooza” with 30,000 unmanned aircraft.
According to Jay Stanley of the ACLU, “This bill would push the nation willy-nilly toward an era of aerial surveillance, without any steps to protect the traditional privacy that Americans have always enjoyed and expected.”
Among other things, HR 658 will require the FAA to streamline its process within 90 days for government agencies to operate drones. The bill requires the FAA to allow government public safety agencies to operate drones weighing 4.4 pounds or less, as long as certain other conditions are met. The agency will be required to establish a pilot program within six months to create half a dozen test zones for integrating drones “into the national airspace system.” (Read more)
Struggling Caribbean Islands Selling Citizenship
Hadi Mezawi has never set foot on the Caribbean island of Dominica, has never seen its rainforests or black-sand beaches. But he’s one of its newest citizens.
Without leaving his home in the United Arab Emirates, the Palestinian man recently received a brand new Dominican passport after sending a roughly $100,000 contribution to the tropical nation half a world away.
“At the start I was a little worried that it might be a fraud, but the process turned out to be quite smooth and simple. Now, I am a Dominican,” said Mezawi, who like many Palestinians had not been recognized as a citizen of any country. That passport will help with travel for his job with a Brazilian food processing company, he said by telephone from Dubai.
. . . .
It’s such a booming business that a Dubai-based company is building a 4-square-mile (10-square-kilometer) community in St. Kitts where investors can buy property and citizenship at the same time. In its first phase, some 375 shareholders will get citizenship by investing $400,000 each in the project, which is expected to include a 200-room hotel and a mega-yacht marina. Others will get passports for buying one of 50 condominium units. (Read more)