Booze privatization is an measure an overwhelming majority of Pennsylvanians support, and Republicans are supposed to be all about free markets and free enterprise, if you believe that kind of thing. So you think there’d be no way in hell, with the House, Senate and Governor’s mansion in GOP hands, the GOP could possibly foul up the privatization of the state liquor system, but you’d be wrong.
Month: June 2012
Bloomberg’s Nanny State Continues
They want to go after more than just soda, including milk shakes, movie theater popcorn, and other milk beverages. This is why Tam’s latest effort is more important than ever.
Cutting The Cord
Les Jones is becoming a cord cutter. We did it about two and a half years ago, and haven’t looked back. I don’t miss flushing more than 100 dollars a month away on 557 channels and nothing’s on. I don’t even use rabbit ears. Our TV is idle most of the time. I think TV reached its zenith (no pun intended) with the baby boomer generation, and it’s going to be downhill from here for any industry that makes its livelihood of selling people traditional television programming.
Fast and Furious About to Blow Wide Open?
Apparently there’s a new whistleblower from DOJ. John Richardson speculates this could mean Holder is gone sooner rather than later.
Fantastic Activism: MAIG E-Mails FOIA’d
Sean Caranna over at the All Nine Yards blog has obtained copies of Linda S. Vaughn’s e-mails, showing MAIG is definitely pulling the strings, and possibly endangering their related foundation’s tax status. This should be a template for all other MAIG funded public employees.
More on the Shellie Zimmerman Perjury Charges
The Descent Into Madness
Josh Horwitz has plenty of reasons to be a sad panda these days, but his latest tirade about how the NRA is just another part of the vast right-wing conspiracy takes the cake. I’ve been a pretty outspoken about NRA not inbreeding with the D.C. right-wing establishment, and staying true to it’s mission. NRA should be as welcoming to liberal gun owners as it is to conservative ones, and indeed, I believe many of the advances we’ve seen on the social front lately is because lefty gun owners are willing to come out of the closet in greater numbers. David Keene comes from the conservative D.C. establishment, and presents opportunity to our opponents to smear NRA as part of the VRWC because of his former role with ACU, which puts on CPAC. The take they are trying to weave, is pretty thin, however.
Horwitz’s rant is ludicrous, even given Keene’s background. Among the accessions are that Keene moderated a CPAC panel, which had an author on it, who wrote a book which wasn’t completely about the Second Amendment. He then proceeds to go after Keene for being “giddy” about the Wisconsin recall election results. Considering Walker was carrying an NRA endorsement, and signed Concealed Carry and Castle Doctrine in Wisconsin, I’d hardly call that surprising or stepping outside of his role as NRA President. It’s funny how they didn’t mention that Keene, in his former role as ACU President, was advocating for inclusion of gay conservative groups into CPAC, standing against the family groups who spoke against it, and who eventually won out once his presidency was over. Keene is someone I’m happy to have on my side in an issue, and I’m happy he’s NRA President. He doesn’t fit a lot of the stereotypical molds of people in the right-of-center establishment in D.C.
There is a more general risk, however, with this kind of mixing of issues, and dilution of NRA’s core mission with other right-wing causes. I’ve always been a bit uncomfortable with NRA’s participation in CPAC for that reason. But there’s a good argument to be made that such participation, if it is the evil I think it, is a necessary one. In order for any organization to be successful, it has to attract a following, which means marketing itself, and marketing is pretty much what CPAC is about. More importantly, for NRA, it’s marketing to young people, which NRA desperately needs outlets for. The question is whether NRA can long mingle with the right-of-center DC establishment without being wholly consumed by it.
Scott Walker’s New Political Opponents
Sure, he survived a tough recall election with better numbers than 2010, but Scott Walker has a new political opponent that’s so tough and determined, they once got a federal Constitutional amendment passed. They are now speaking out against his actions, and I’m sure he’s cowering in fear. It’s the Women’s Christian Temperance Union. No, I’m not kidding.
The Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, which successfully lobbied for Prohibition in the 1920s and whose 5,000 members continue to spread its antidrinking message nationwide, criticized the serving of alcohol at the event.
“I don’t think it’s cool at all,” said Rita Wert, president of the group. “It sets a very poor example.”
Actually, the really sad news isn’t the fact that there are still a group of 5,000 women pushing for prohibition again. It’s the fact that Gov. Walker hosted a bi-partisan beer and brats event to promote the idea that lawmakers can, in fact, have a civil discussion about issues, even if they disagree. The event drew protesters who won’t settle for anything less than having their political opponents (Walker & the GOP) indicted.
A Ginned Up Controversy
Tam laments the firestorm created by two olympic swimmers posing with guns on a trip to California, and the ridiculousness peddled in the media as a result. Apparently they are being punished for this by being forced to return early, and even other shooters don’t really want to stand up for them:
“They all used them [the guns] responsibly and I think that’s where the line in the sand is here, that these guys allowed stupid photographs to be taken of them, one depicting criminal activity, and second of all unsafe activity with a firearm,” he said.
How about a nice “Have you people in the media all lost your bloody minds?” But then again, I suppose no one wants to risk the powers that be coming down on them. I don’t for a minute believe that the majority of Aussies have collectively lost their marbles. I’m sure if you polled people on this controversy before the media parade, the reaction would have been somewhere between “Meh,” and “So What?” This is a media and establishment generated outrage if I ever saw one. This is the establishment telling the little people how they need to think. So maybe the establishment needs to be taken to the woodshed and roughed up a bit.
One thing I’ve noticed is that the shaking of the bowcaster is a bit of an American thing. You don’t really see horizontal interpretive communities popping up, at least not that I can see, in other countries. I’m not speaking here of guns specifically, but where is the Aussie, British or Canadian equivalents of the Dan Rather takedown? I’d note that it was an American that took down the Canadian Government. Perhaps it is because we’re a culture that was born from revolution, or perhaps it’s that this country has exceptionally strong speech protections by world standards (defamation and libel suits are next to impossible to win here, whereas in other English speaking countries, that is not the case). Perhaps there is a whole community of bloggers, forums, tweeters and the like, forming all manner of interpretive communities that I’m missing, but if there is, I don’t notice it. If that’s the case, I’d say it’s time to start taking down some media figures that peddle this kind of nonsense.
Shelly Zimmerman Arrested & Charged with Perjury
UPDATE: A very long, but worthwhile analysis. Bob Owens has a summary if you don’t want to read through all of it. Maybe this isn’t as it appears at first.