You have to think comedians everywhere are praising God for the comedy gold these Presidential campaigns has brought forth. Although most of the gold has come from the Republican side, you have to wonder if Hillary Clinton’s current advisers are the same ones who signed off on the private email server idea. Who thought it was a good idea for her to bark at a Presidential campaign event? Are there any adults in the room? Am I the only one who remembers that Howard Dean’s scream doomed his presidential campaign? Since political missteps have consequences here is Greg Gutfeld taking advantage of this comedic gold mine. Let the piling on begin.
Author: bill
DIRECTV Error Code 771 And Snow
When I arrived home yesterday I was surprised that Fox News was not on the television. My wife is a big fan. Occasionally we have problems receiving the Direct TV signal in rain storms but today we had a light snow and it stopped hours ago. Was this was this manna from heaven or the first step of some conspiracy to shut down Fox News? After completing the Direct TV Error Code 771 recommendations, we called Direct TV and set up an appointment. Later that night while I was giving the horses their nightly hay, I thought about the problem and decided to take a look at the antenna. Yup, the dish was full of snow. It is surprising we got any channels at all! So I pulled out the step ladder and using a brush we use to clean ceiling fans, brushed the snow out of the dish. By the time I got upstairs my wife had already noticed that Fox News was back on the air. As Red Green once said,
If the women don’t find you handsome, they should at least find you handy.
Can We Get Rid Of The Selective Service Now?
My Draft card from 1972
The recent brouhaha over requiring women to register with the Selective Service System reminds me that this government agency’s reason for existence disappeared in early 1973 when Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird said that no further draft orders would be issued. As you can see by my draft card, I was happy with his decision. Over the next couple of years I was even happier that the all-volunteer military concept seemed to be working and America was steering clear of stupid wars. Then President Carter issued Presidential Proclamation 4771 and re-instated the requirement that young men register with the Selective Service System. This was scary and confusing. I was probably too old to draft but I had to wonder what were they thinking? For some time the military had been replacing support positions with civilian contractors so where does a group of inexperienced, unskilled, unmotivated draftees fit in? It looked like a recipe for disaster but for 36 years it has been just another annoying anachronism. When I look back at the draft it makes even less sense today than it did in 1980. So why are we keeping up the ruse that we need to register men or women for a draft we never plan to use? Wouldn’t this be a good time to issue a Presidential Proclamation to end the Selective Service System once and for all?
Are You Capable Of Using A Weapon To Shoot Or Kill An Attacker?
In the comments for the post, 5 Questions Women Should Ask Before They Get a Gun, JayWye asked the question, “are you capable of using a weapon to shoot or kill an attacker?” Most of the comments focused on guns but the interesting question is how comfortable are women with using self-defense weapons other than guns? Europe provides us with a few alternatives with mixed results. Recently a Danish teenager who said she was sexually assaulted now faces a fine for using pepper spray against her attacker. Over in Sweden Stieg Larsson in the book, The Girl Who Played with Fire, has Lisbeth Salander saying,
There were not so many physical threats that could not be countered with a decent hammer.
I carried pepper spray in the past and when I decided to test it, it would not spray. Oops! Tasers have a similar problem. What happens if you forget to check the battery? Hammers are reliable but down right brutal. In my humble opinion when it comes to a choice between pepper spray, tasers, hammers, or guns, I think most woman would be more comfortable carrying a gun. It is simple, reliable, and effective with a minimum of maintenance. Since art frequently imitates life I will leave it to Leigh Anne Touhy to have the final word. Here is one of the best quotes from the movie, The Blind Side.
Alton: You hear me, bitch?
Leigh Anne Touhy: No, you hear me, BITCH!. You threaten my son, you threaten me. You so much as cross into downtown, you will be sorry. I’m in a prayer group with the D.A., I’m a member of the N.R.A. and I’m always packing.
Alton: Whatchu packin? .22? A little Saturday night special?
Leigh Anne Touhy: Yep. And it shoots just fine every other day of the week too.
Anybody But Carly
It is too bad the folks at ABC used questionable judgement to exclude Carly from the debate. She is definitely one of the best debaters this election cycle and belongs on the stage as much as Kasich and Christie. Including here would make the debate more interesting and probably help the ratings. The easy choice for ABC was to have eight people on the stage. Oh, well! Maybe in the next debate CBS News can show us what fair and balanced really looks like. 😉 In classic fashion the Carly for President campaign fired back with some humor. For those who have not seen the Anybody But Carly parody here it is.
Anybody But Carly from CARLY for America on Vimeo.
Cooking Flank Steak With The Anova Sous-Vide Cooker
There is nothing more disappointing to a foodie than to screw up a nice flank steak by either over or under cooking it. Part of the problem is that the flank steak varies in thickness so the thin part will end up being well done while the thick part is still raw. My solution was to use the Anova Sous-Vide Cooker to cook the steak to 120 degrees for about an hour and then finish it off in a pre-heated cast iron skillet at medium high temperature. That way you get a consistent pink meat to go with that great sear. We like to serve the steak with oven roasted red potatoes that have been brushed garlic olive oil and green beans.
The Most Invalid Belief of American Conservatives
Mike Bowerbank said that the most invalid belief of American conservatives is that “FOX News is news and not ideologically-driven entertainment” because it is not registered as a “news agency”. Now that is an interesting statement! One of the things I noticed is when people complain about the Fox News journalism style, they rarely check to see if what they have written makes sense. Since I went down this path before in the post, The Changing Face Of Journalism, I decided to do a little fact checking on his statements and here is what I said.
Like Joe I was curious about the registered news agency statement. When I look up news agencies I find that Wikipedia lists only two new agencies in the United States, Associated Press and United Press International. If we use the logic you used to condemn Fox News than you are condemning New York Times, Washington Post, and all of the major news networks, too.For those of you who are unfamiliar with the news agency concept, subscribers to the Associated Press can use stories written by the AP unchanged in their publications. Since 1999 UPI has largely left the news agency business. For business news you will find a lot of stories that originate at Dow Jones and Bloomberg. They are not news agencies either but I respect what they have to say.The point you made about exaggeration and failed predictions in 2012 is not unique to Fox News. The same statement can be made about some broadcaster or newspaper in every election. Are you trying to tell me that NBC, ABC, and CBS predicted every election correctly and never exaggerated? How many of these broadcasters correctly predicted the rise of the Tea Party?The biggest difference between Fox News and the other broadcasters is that Fox News listens to its viewers and gives them what they want. In business we used to say that the first rule of business is that the customer is always right. The second rule is that when in doubt re-read the first rule. So if you want to hear about the collapse of the Affordable Care Act exchanges, Benghazi, the IRS scandal, Ms. Clinton’s indictment for espionage, or government run amok then Fox News is your only source. The news editors at the other broadcasters have already decided that these are not news stories. They call it editorial discretion. I call it bad for business and their ratings show it.News has always been ideologically-driven entertainment because it sells newspapers or attracts viewers. Look up the history of Yellow journalism. The idea that a story from the New York Times, Washington Post, or Fox News is thoroughly vetted is ridiculous. If they are reporting the news and not ancient history, they are going to make mistakes and the Internet is going to tell them quickly.Considering all of the evidence I have gathered the most invalid belief of conservatives is still up for debate.
One thing the original question presupposes is that we have a consensus on what constitutes a conservative, liberal, or evangelical belief. In an election year filled with the demagoguery, I am not sure that consensus exists.
The Health Exchange Transformation Is Almost Complete
I am a firm believer that the health insurance exchange concept as envisioned by the Affordable Care Act was a bad idea that was poorly implemented. In a masterstroke of stupidity, the Affordable Care Act combined health exchanges with “high-risk pool” plans. Health exchanges work reasonably well as long as the individuals are relatively healthy and health insurance from the exchanges is affordable. Since the exchanges are market-based they are fragile and largely depend on cost, trust, and goodwill for their survival. “High-risk pool” plans have been offered for many years by states to provide coverage if you have been locked out of the individual insurance market. People who purchase health insurance from high-risk pools are actually purchasing charity health care from the government. This is a completely different product than the health insurance being purchased by healthy people. The only way this combination of health exchange and high-risk pools could work is if the unsubsidized health insurance from the exchanges continued to be affordable despite the addition of high-risk pool individuals. This is where the Affordable Care Act really screwed up. The individual insurance market is a small market and the addition of high-cost individuals has already caused health insurance premiums to soar and for the cost sensitive, healthy people to start seeking a lower cost alternative. We have already begun to see the beginning of a death spiral in the health exchange as more and more healthy people leave in response to higher insurance premiums and out of pocket costs. At some point the only people left are the high-cost individuals and the exchange is transformed back into a high-risk pool. It was when I was reading this article, Obamacare’s Cost per Beneficiary Explodes with Shrinking Enrollment, that I realized that the transformation is almost complete and the exchange in its present form will never be a properly functioning, broad-based, market for health insurance. There is no way the Affordable Care Act supporters can argue that the high-risk pool version of the exchange is a step forward. We spent a lot of money and time making an exchange that does not work and will likely never work. In order to re-establish the cost, trust, and goodwill we had before the Affordable Care Act, we have to go back and humbly offer a health exchange where healthy people matter again.
Movie Review: 13 Hours
13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi
Last Sunday my wife and I caught the matinee performance of 13 Hours. As a war movie buff it reminded me of Black Hawk Down. It shares a lot of the same themes and is action packed. Although my wife and I liked the movie, it is not without its detractors. Washington Post columnist Ann Hornaday complains that the movie is political and then spends most of her movie review contrasting it with the recent Iran prisoner swap. I guess she misses the point that when the consulate is under attack, political negotiations like the Iran prisoner swap are no longer an option. When the security guards ran away during the firefight at the consulate, you are officially in the soldier’s world and that is what the movie is about. The writers at Hot Air were not impressed with her “political” argument either. Surprisingly I found the movie to be less political than I expected. If the movie included a cameo of either the President or the Secretary of State asleep during the battle or Susan Rice on the talk shows blaming a movie for the consulate attack, it would have strayed from the script and become political. Instead it focused on the courage of six men to save the Ambassador and his staff despite a lack of State Department and military support.
Steelers Versus Bengals – I Would Not Want It Any Other Way
If the Bengals are going to win their first playoff game in a long time I want it to be against the Steelers. If the Bengals play mistake-free football and get a few big plays they can win. The Bengals will never be a Super Bowl contender until they beat the Steelers in a playoff game. The Bengals have to earn the respect of the Steelers before they can take the next step. If they beat the Steelers, they can beat anyone. I am hoping for a great game by both teams.