Americans are the fattest, dumbest people on earth . . . and because being fat and dumb are remediable given the proper motivation, it’s fair to say that Americans are also the most unmotivated people on earth. This is not to say that all Americans are fat, dumb and unmotivated. There’s a subset of Americans who get up every morning, brush their teeth, go to work, excel at what they do, come home, set the alarm and get up and do it again tomorrow. And take care of their families. These people are carrying the rest of the country on their backs. But for the average American, the best explanation for his or her life being the way it is is likely to be “I’m fat, dumb and unmotivated.” That’s a pretty tough admission to spit out though so most of us look around for something more palatable to sell… Read more →
EppsNet Archive: Election 2012
Berkeley Voters Leave Something to be Desired as Parents
According to a new survey, just over 10 percent of Berkeley High ninth and 11th graders reported carrying a weapon onto school property, while about 35 percent of 11th graders reported attending class drunk or high. If I had a kid at Berkeley High, I’d be moving out of town yesterday, but I’m reading in the Daily Californian that this news has been “met with surprise and joy from administrators,” the reason being that a similar survey two years ago reported about 17 percent of ninth graders and 16 percent of 11th graders carrying weapons onto campus, and 48 percent of 11th graders attending class drunk or high. Progress! “We’re very pleased with the survey results all around,” said Director of Student Services Susan Craig, “and at the same time we’re not at all complacent.” If by “pleased” she means “horrified,” I couldn’t agree more. In other news, Barack Obama… Read more →
No Surprises in Berkeley
Final election counts are in for Berkeley, CA, the most liberal city in America. Let’s start with the presidential election, where Mitt Romney was able to edge out Jill Stein for second place: Barack Obama, Democrat – 90.3% Mitt Romney, Republican – 4.6% Jill Stein, Green Party – 3.2% California ballot proposition results included: Proposition 30, a measure to increase state income tax rates for the wealthy – 90.7% Yes (passed statewide at 54.6%) Proposition 34, to abolish the death penalty in California – 86% Yes (lost statewide 52% to 48%) Proposition 37, requiring labeling of genetically engineered food – 92.4% Yes (lost statewide 52% to 48%) Read more →
The Audacity of 51%
“Maybe peace would have broken out with a different kind of White House, one less committed to waging a perpetual campaign–a White House that would see a 51-48 victory as a call to humility and compromise rather than an irrefutable mandate.” Yeah, well, shut up, you Republican losers. Obama won, which means a majority of Americans support his policies. Stop being obstructionist and get with the program. Oh wait, sorry. That quote wasn’t from a Republican but from a recently elected Democrat. It was referring not to Obama but to George W. Bush after the 2004 election. The author: Barack Obama, junior senator from Illinois. The book: The Audacity of Hope. — James Taranto, Best of the Web Today Read more →
Thomas Jefferson’s Election 2012 Wrapup: Tired of the Bulls**t
My fellow Americans — The first headline I saw this morning was Obama Victory Speech Urges Unity in Facing Challenges. In case you haven’t seen it, here’s an ad run by President Obama in Ohio in the closing days of the campaign: A few days ago, it was Us vs. Them, whoever you imagine Us and Them to be. Now it’s Obama Urges Unity. “Not one of us” is an ugly sentiment in itself, but coming from a man who not long ago promised us Hope and Change and Inclusiveness, it betrays a complete absence of character. Four years ago, I said what I thought I needed to say to get elected, and I’m doing the same thing now, even though what I’m saying now is the exact opposite of what I said then. Obama has been nothing if not divisive. On class and income, he speaks contemptuously of “millionaires”… Read more →
Summary of Campaign Spending on California Ballot Propositions
I found this table from Ballotpedia rather interesting. It shows how much money has been donated to each side of the California ballot propositions. Proposition Donations in favor Donations against Proposition 30 $67,100,000 $53,400,000 Proposition 31 $4,400,000 $573,700 Proposition 32 $60,500,000 $73,300,000 Proposition 33 $17,100,000 $275,700 Proposition 34 $7,400,000 $391,900 Proposition 35 $3,700,000 $0 Proposition 36 $2,700,000 $119,900 Proposition 37 $8,700,000 $45,600,000 Proposition 38 $47,800,000 $42,300 Proposition 39 $31,400,000 $45,000 Proposition 40 $601,100 $2,300,000 Read more →
HW’s Election Previews: Proposition 37
From the Offical Voter Information Guide: Requires labeling of food sold to consumers made from plants or animals with genetic material changed in specified ways. Prohibits marketing such food, or other processed food, as “natural.” Provides exemptions. Fiscal Impact: Increased annual state costs from a few hundred thousand dollars to over $1 million to regulate the labeling of genetically engineered foods. Additional, but likely not significant, governmental costs to address violations under the measure. Notice this phrase: “Provides exemptions.” In other words, the statute requires certain things and prohibits certain other things — except when it doesn’t. Not that it matters because $1 million a year isn’t going to buy you a lot of enforcement anyway. Who wrote this proposition, Dr. Evil? Prop 37 is supported by people who hate freedom and having to think for themselves. Read more →
Presidential Endorsements
Ross Perot endorses Mitt Romney. Honey Boo Boo endorses Obama. Read more →
Following the Debate on Twitter
Typical Romney supporter: “Five million jobs doesn’t even keep up woth [sic] our population growth.”–Romney. Obama’s solution: free contraceptives! #2012 Typical Obama supporter: IF ROMNEY GETS ELECTED AND TAKES AWAY MY FOOD STAMPS IMA SEND SOMEONE TO MURDER HIS ASS Read more →
The Real Obama
What we saw last night was the real Obama–a bright but incurious and inexperienced man who four years ago was promoted well beyond his level of competency. The Obama that guys like [Chris] Matthews and [Andrew] Sullivan expected instead was a character in a fairy tale–a fairy tale written by guys like Matthews and Sullivan. — James Taranto Read more →
“Creating Jobs” and Other Fallacies
Almost everything appertaining to the circumstances of a nation, has been absorbed and confounded under the general and mysterious word government. Though it avoids taking to its account the errors it commits, and the mischiefs it occasions, it fails not to arrogate to itself whatever has the appearance of prosperity. It robs industry of its honours, by pedantically making itself the cause of its effects; and purloins from the general character of man, the merits that appertain to him as a social being. — Thomas Paine, Rights of Man (1792) My fellow Americans — I’m hearing in the pre-debate analysis that voters are looking for the candidate who’ll help them have a better life. Speaking as someone who was there at the beginning, I can tell you that helping you have a better life was not America’s original value proposition. Everyone was welcome to come here and try to make… Read more →
Self-Reliance: Another Idea That Never Caught On
One of the TVs at the gym this morning was tuned to a political panel discussion . . . someone named Roland Martin, a black man with an enormous forehead, said that voters are asking themselves which candidate will help them have a better life. Yes — that’s the 47 Percent. Someone once said, “Ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country.” It’s a shame that never caught on. Read more →
Randy Newman: “I’m Dreaming”
Randy Newman has a new song and video out — “I’m Dreaming” — about a voter who casts his ballot solely based on skin color. I listened to it . . . it’s great, like every other Newman song I can think of, but didn’t this train leave the station in 2008? We already have a black president. (Yes, his mother was white, but “mixed-race” doesn’t get you 12 percent of the electorate.) Will some people not vote for Obama because he’s black? Yes. Will some people only vote for Obama because he’s black? Yes. As Geraldine Ferraro said in 2008, “If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position. And if he was a woman of any color, he would not be in this position. He happens to be very lucky to be who he is.” Naturally, she was denounced as a racist by the… Read more →
The Lives of Julia and Paul
David Henderson says — accurately, I think — that Mitt Romney’s “47 percent” remarks can be paraphrased as “People who are dependent on government will vote for the candidate who credibly (to them, at least) promises to keep the programs that have created that dependence.” Do you think President Obama disagrees with that? He doesn’t. If you think he does, please see The Life of Julia on the president’s web site. It lays out a “typical” woman’s cradle-to-grave dependence on government assistance and describes how Obama will keep those programs going while Mitt Romney won’t. The most insulting thing about it is that as you read about Obama funding this and Obama funding that, it sounds like he’s doing it all out of his own goddamn pocket. What a prince! There’s no acknowledgement that Obama is taking from some and giving to others, and that all of Julia’s “free” stuff… Read more →
The Obama Bounce Fades
And through it all, there is no presidential leadership. He’s too busy raising money to run ads so he can tell us what a great leader he is. Everywhere we see, in ruins, Obama’s plans for our country. His foreign policy has encouraged revolutions that have brought our worst enemies to power in the Middle East . . . His education reforms have no teeth and he sits by passively as they are challenged by his own local teachers union. Credit much of the quick end to his bounce to Romney’s ads which, right off the bat after the Democratic Convention closed, rapped Obama for trying to convince us that we are better off than we were four years ago. Obama’s campaign essentially poses the question: What will you believe — your own eyes or my speeches? — Dick Morris Read more →
Euphemisms from the DNC
Progressive = Liberal Investing = Spending Choice = Abortion Bodies = Abortion Healthcare = Abortion Who they love = Gay marriage Read more →
Bill Clinton at the DNC: Good Lawyer, Guilty Client
I’ve always said if I were ever in trouble and if I were guilty, especially if I were guilty, I would want Bill Clinton there to defend me. Nobody does it better. He’s the most talented politician I ever covered and the most charming man I’ve ever met. And no one in my view can mount an argument more effectively than he can. — Brit Hume Read more →
Everyone in America Can Go to College
This morning I heard President Obama call for universities to lower their tuition rates so that “everybody in America can go to college.” I am virtually certain that the President is not stupid enough to think that if tuition rates fell to zero, there would magically be enough room in the colleges for everybody in America. So I’ve got to believe that he’s purposely saying stupid things in order to appeal to stupid voters — the sort of voters, in other words, who probably don’t belong in college. — Steven Landsburg Read more →
Rand Paul at the RNC
Highlights When I heard the current president say, “You didn’t build that,” I was first insulted, then I was angered, and then I was saddened that anyone in our country, much less the president of the United States, believes that roads create business success and not the other way around. Anyone who is so fundamentally misunderstanding of American greatness is uniquely unqualified to lead this great nation. In Bowling Green, Kentucky, the Tang family owns The Great American Doughnut Shop. Their family fled war-torn Cambodia to come to this country. My kids and I love doughnuts, so we go there frequently. The Tangs work long hours. Mrs. Tang told us they work through the night to make the doughnuts. The Tang family have become valedictorians and National Merit Scholars. The Tangs from Cambodia are an American success story, so Mr. President, don’t go telling the Tang family that they… Read more →
Condoleezza Rice at the RNC
Highlights You see, the essence of America, what really unites us, is not nationality or ethnicity or religion. It is an idea. And what an idea it is. That you can come from humble circumstances and you can do great things, that it does not matter where you came from, it matters where you are going. My fellow Americans, ours has never been a narrative of grievance and entitlement. We have never believed that I am doing poorly because you are doing well. We have never been jealous of one another and never envious of each others’ successes. And on a personal note, a little girl grows up in Jim Crow Birmingham. The segregated city of the south where her parents cannot take her to a movie theater or to restaurants, but they have convinced her that even if she cannot have a hamburger at Woolworths, she can be… Read more →