The former a rather sad end, the other a complete surprise.

That is the number of Tea Party demonstrations planned thus far for July 4th.

Having one in your area? I hope so – the more, the better…we have to let the Powerful know that we’re on to them and we’re not going to take it, anymore. The above link has a list of demonstrations by State – so, either gin one up on your own, or participate in one already planned.

Uh, liberals, please take note:

The real destroyer of the liberties of the people is he who spreads among them bounties, donations and benefits. – Plutarch

Its all BS – a manufactured crisis designed to allow liberals to put us under their control. Obama had his infomercial. Discuss here, if you have a mind to.

UPDATE: Seems that not too many people care – Obama’s infomercial was a ratings bust.

…would you accept it?

LOS ANGELES/NEW YORK (Reuters) – California’s controller said on Wednesday that he would have to issue IOUs in a week if lawmakers can’t quickly solve a $24 billion budget deficit, and the state’s treasurer plans to tap a reserve fund to meet debt service costs.

The measures came as a budget crisis deepened in the most populous U.S. state and the gridlocked legislature failed to pass a proposed $11 billion in cuts.

“Next Wednesday we start a fiscal year with a massively unbalanced spending plan and a cash shortfall not seen since the Great Depression,” Controller John Chiang said in a statement announcing that he would be forced to use IOUs to pay the state’s bills beginning on July 2.

Me, personally, I wouldn’t accept them – I’d head straight to court and demand payment in kind, if I could not receive payment in cash. Gold, silver, land, oil leases, other mineral rights…something other than a bankrupt liberal government’s promise to pay at some later date. I’m not exactly impressed with the word of the State of California – especially when they can’t cut $11 billion to make up a $24 billion shortfall…they’re so stupid they can’t even get within 40% of a balanced budget.

This is what comes from tax and spend liberalism – and it is what is coming to our national government if Obama and his Democrats aren’t stopped.

• Twitter Updates for 2009-06-23 http://tinyurl.com/macn9q #
• Why Liberals Want to Shut Down the New Media http://tinyurl.com/l8towk #
• What a Real President Says About Oppressors http://tinyurl.com/ku7bzg #
• Phrase of the Day http://tinyurl.com/n88dku #
• House Dems Ready to Go Forward on “Soak the Poor” Climate Change Scam http://tinyurl.com/n2o795 #
• The Most Absurd Justification for Moral Abdication, Ever http://tinyurl.com/n777ec #
• Governor Sanford, Resign http://tinyurl.com/l2cwel #

You blew it, Governor – you had position, prestige and the White House was a possibility…and you thew it all away because you couldn’t keep your oath, registered in Heaven, to be loyal to your wife – not in your heart, not in your body.

Its a hard thing, and I forgive you – but it is time for you to quit the scene. Only thus can we start to restore respectability to American politics. Those who presume to lead us must be held to a high standard – certainly while they are in office.

Showing support for Iran’s demonstrators makes you a tool of Kristol’s nefarious plot? I’ve re-read this, and I don’t think the gentleman is joking:

So folks on Twitter have been turning their avatars (little profile photos) green to show solidarity with the protesters in Iran. There are websites to help you do this. But why do this? How does it help? I want the Iranian people to live in freedom, just as I want all people to live in freedom. But the point of the gesture eludes me…

…When people feel pressure to signal, and it’s free, they’ll signal. But sending the signal creates a small emotional investment in the overt message of the signal — solidarity with opponents of the ruling Iranian regime. As every salesman knows, getting someone to make a big, costly commitment is best achieved by getting them to first make a tiny, costless commitment. The tiny, costless commitment of turning Twitter avatars green is thin edge of the persuasive edge for the neocons who would like to sell the public a war in Iran. Since I would rather not be Bill Kristol’s useful idiot, I will conspicuously leave my avatar as is, and continue hoping for the best.

And this doesn’t appear to be a kook leftist – he’s from Cato and is thus Libertarian, if not truly conservative. If he’s joking, I’d really like to hear that confirmed – to think like that is to have a whole sting of absurd ideas rattling ’round one’s brain with it all coming out as “I just want this to go away, so I can get back to issues which don’t require me to be a known as a man, or a coward”. There is a strong inclination to strenuously debate what are actually trivial issues, while leaving the central facts of our times alone, because a clear, moral decision is required. Much more safe to debate levels of taxation or health care (which is what Obama would very much prefer to talk about right now) than to discuss what one is supposed to do, as a man, when a young woman is gunned down by thugs…

And so – “I really hope the freedom fighters win”…hope, hope, hope and hope some more. With perhaps a bit of “change” thrown in, too? Where is the hope that when one is faced with the stark choice between good and evil, that one will choose good even if it appears that immediate death will result? What about the hope that the men and women of the United States Armed Forces are not the only representatives left of true, courageous humanity? We need, perhaps, a few less well-wishers and a few more doers. We certainly need far less of people who will abstain from their duty out of an alleged opposition to the supposedly nefarious machinations of, well, real men who see their duty.

And if it passes, GOP House prospects will immeasurably brighten for 2010:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has scheduled a vote Friday on a sprawling climate-change bill, signaling the Democratic leadership’s confidence that it can overcome objections from Farm Belt Democrats.

Opponents and supporters of landmark climate legislation are ramping up their public-relations campaigns ahead of the planned vote. The Obama administration is pushing the measure as a job-creator, while critics, including many Republicans, are portraying the bill as an energy tax that could slow the economy.

Any GOPer who says it will “slow” the economy needs a stern talking to – this is an economy killer; might as well decree that we’re going to spend trillions of dollars to make ourselves rich…oh, criminy, we’ve already done that. Guess this bill makes sense in light of that…outside of Liberal Land, however, this is insane.

Go for it, Donks; we want very much for you to commit political suicide, and this will do the trick very nicely.

Our objection to Obama and his Democrats:

But we assure the socialists that we repudiate only forced organization, not natural organization. We repudiate the forms of association that are forced upon us, not free association. We repudiate forced fraternity, not true fraternity. We repudiate the artificial unity that does nothing more than deprive persons of individual responsibility. We do not repudiate the natural unity of mankind under Providence. – Frederic Bastiat

And, via a reader of NRO’s The Corner, a relevant quote:

Tabulae vero novae quid habent argumenti, nisi ut emas mea pecunia fundum, eum tu habeas, ego non habeam pecuniam. – Cicero

The translation given is, “What is the meaning of a ‘clean slate’, except that you purchase a farm with my money, that you still have the farm, but I no longer have my money?”