Change Costs

Especiallly if you want to put an Obama lawn sign in front of your house.

Fret not, though. Mrs. Obama did warn their faithful supporters of such.

(h/t: Hot Air)

At Last

A partial victory for a gun owner who took the District of Columbia to the Supreme Court:

Dick A. Heller, a security guard whose lawsuit resulted in a landmark U.S. Supreme Court ruling favoring gun-ownership rights, was given his handgun registration certificate at D.C. police headquarters this morning. He applied for it last month, a few weeks after the June 26 court ruling, and had been waiting for police to complete a background check.

Heller recently sued the city again, alleging that the registration rules adopted by the D.C. government after the ban was overturned are too cumbersome and violate the spirit and letter of the Supreme Court decision.

Give ‘em hell, Mr. Heller!

Light Blogging For A While

I’ll be busy with work-related demands for the remainder of August. Feel free to peruse the archives or pay a visit to other fine blogs in the right column. As always, comments are welcomed.

Isaac Hayes, R.I.P.

The R&B singer-songwriter, musician, record producer, arranger, composer, and actor died Sunday afternoon in Memphis at the age of 65.

Today’s pop culture generation knew him best as the voice of Chef from TV’s South Park, but to the Old School community, he’ll be remembered for bringing the world a taste of Hot Buttered Soul, composing the award-winning theme music for action hero John Shaft, and guest-starring on The Rockford Files as Gandolph “Gandy” Fitch.

Bernie Mac, R.I.P.

The comedian and actor died this morning from complications due to pneumonia. He was 50.

The comic born Bernard Jeffrey McCullough could cut an imposing figure. He stood 6-foot-3, was built like a fullback and carried himself with a bouncer’s reticence. But perhaps the strongest weapon in the Chicago comedian’s arsenal was that voice, that amalgam of thought and a delivery that could rise like a tidal wave, outpace a Gatling gun and remained, to his last days, loud and unapologetic.

He wasn’t scared, he told us time and again, to tell anyone what he thought, to say what others were afraid to say. That fearlessness wasn’t always welcome, considering Mac didn’t get his big break until his 30s. But when he did, the comic skyrocketed to success in stand-up, television and the big screen.

Bernie was among my favorite comedians. In addition to his tell-it-like-it-is style, he was down-to-earth and a class act off-screen and off-stage. He will be missed by many a fan.

Update (8/11): Although he was a proud, lifelong Democrat, Bernie once quipped, “I’m a Republican at tax time.” Good one!

The Vote Reaper

Alfonzo Rachael takes on Darth Barack:

(hat tip: IMAO)

Speaking of Comrade Obama…

IBD continues its editorials in “The Audacity of Socialism” series.

An excerpt from “Young Obama’s Red Mentor”:

A careful reading of Obama’s first memoir, “Dreams From My Father,” reveals that his childhood mentor up to the age of 18 — a man he refers to only as “Frank” — was none other than the late communist Frank Marshall Davis, who fled Chicago after the FBI and Congress opened investigations into his “subversive,” “un-American activities.”

In a belated story on the relationship, the Associated Press describes Davis as “left-leaning.”

In fact, Davis was a member of the Moscow-controlled Communist Party USA, according to the 1953 report of the Commission on Subversive Activities of the Territory of Hawaii, which labeled him “a bitter opponent of capitalism.” The report was introduced as evidence in the U.S. Senate Internal Security Subcommittee hearings probing the “Scope of Soviet Activity in the United States.”

Also, on the subject of “Obamanomics”:

President Kennedy understood that a growing economy is like a rising tide that “lifts all boats.” Obama, on the other hand, thinks some are lifted and others lowered, as if the economy were a system of locks operated by a cabal of evil capitalists.

He also fails to understand how taxes change behavior. He thinks raising taxes on the most productive members of society won’t “curb incentives to work or invest.” Even TV news anchor Charlie Gibson knows better.

During a primary debate, the ABC host took Obama to task for proposing a doubling in the capital gains tax. History shows, he pointed out, that raising the cap gains rate actually ends up costing the government revenues.

Obama just didn’t get it. “Well, Charlie,” he argued, “what I’ve said is that I would look at raising the capital gains tax for purposes of fairness.”

Forget growth and revenues. Let’s just punish those “greedy” investors. It’s the same Marxist reasoning behind his plan to repeal the Bush tax cuts: The rich must be made to pay their “fair” share, Obama asserts.

The entire series of op-eds are compelling, and definitely worth reading. Check them out.

Thou Shalt Not Ask Tough Questions of The One

Local TV/print pundit Jon Ralston committed a cardinal sin against the Obamessiah: He pitched hardballs instead of lobbing questions of the slow-pitch variety:

Ralston often wears his left-wing biases on his sleeve (and probably might be a closet Obama supporter himself), which would definitely make him a far cry from being a proxy for McCain. however, to his credit, he has a reputation of asking tough (but fair) questions of anyone who signs on to being interviewed by him. No matter what your political stance may be, expect a Ralston grilling.

(thanks to Hot Air)

Bonus: Do Not Taunt Happy Fun Obama

What DCT Learned Today

Today, I learned that I may be a racist.

25 times over, even.

Lo, I have sinned and fallen short of the glory of the Obamessiah! Is there no hope (or change) for the welder’s son?

Pelosi’s Puppet Show

Who in the Hell does she think she’s fooling?

California Democrat Nancy Pelosi may be trying to save the planet — but the rank and file in her party increasingly are just trying to save their political hides when it comes to gas prices as Republicans apply more and more rhetorical muscle.

But what looks like intraparty tension on the surface is part of an intentional strategy in which Pelosi takes the heat on energy policy, while behind the scenes she’s encouraging vulnerable Democrats to express their independence if it helps them politically, according to Democratic aides on and off Capitol Hill.

Pelosi’s gambit rests on one big assumption: that Democrats will own Washington after the election and will be able to craft a sweeping energy policy that is heavy on conservation and fuel alternatives while allowing for some new oil drilling. Democrats see no need to make major concessions on energy policy with a party poised to lose seats in both chambers in just three months — even if recess-averse Republicans continue to pound away on the issue.

In other words, Democrat candidates for Congress can lie and flip-flop in order to save their political hides, just as long as they do what the Puppet Mistress tells them to do after they’ve succeeded in getting the dupes to send them to Washington. Asinine.

At least the Republicans are demanding those very same Dembots to put up or shut up. Feel free to join in.

The Celebrity Strikes Back

I’m not a fan of Paris Hilton, but I have to give her credit: Her energy plan is about the same as McCain’s — and better than Obama’s.

Luckily for the nation, she doesn’t meet the requirements for the Presidency yet.

Well Wishes

Godspeed to Robert Novak, Morgan Freeman, and Bernie Mac.

Update: Thoughts and prayers go out to Venomous Kate and Family.

Obama’s Race-Baiting Rhetoric

It seems that Barack Obama’s “calls” for the end of politics as usual appears to be nothing more than a rehash of Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals. Recently, he blatantly accused John McCain and his supporters of being xenophobic racists, in hopes of rallying Obamatons to his side and urging them to repeat the lie until it becomes “the truth”.

Jake Tapper of ABC News calls him on it:

I’ve seen racism in campaigns before — I’ve seen it against Obama in this campaign (more from Democrats than Republicans, at this point, I might add) and I’ve seen it against McCain in South Carolina in 2000, when his adopted Bangladeshi daughter Bridget was alleged, by the charming friends and allies of then-Gov. George W. Bush, to have been a McCain love-child with an African-American woman.

What I have not seen is it come from McCain or his campaign in such a way to merit the language Obama used today. Pretty inflammatory.

So, who’s the hater here?

For a “rock star”, Barry O is behaving like a spoiled “pop tart”.
Continue reading »

Are the Republicans Screwing Up?

YES. THEY. ARE.

Quite frankly, the national GOPers need to hurry up, GET SOME NUTS, and start standing for fiscal conservative principles quickly before the Obamatopians neuter them for good.

Seriously.

“Is Barack Obama a Socialist?”

YES. HE. IS.

Update (7/30): The link to the IBD editorial is part of a series titled “The Audacity of Socialism”. The second installment is definitely worth reading:

We are citizens of the world, Sen. Obama told thousands of nonvoting Germans during his recent tour of the Middle East and Europe. And if the Global Poverty Act (S. 2433) he has sponsored becomes law, which is almost certain if he wins in November, we’re also going to be taxpayers of the world.

Sailor in the Desert has more to say about Comrade Obama as well.