Author: Mark Noonan

Veteran’s Day Open Thread

Mark Noonan1 Comment

Just got to thinking about my father and grandfather for a moment.

I learned not too long back that my grandfather, all seven of his brothers and two of his sisters served in France during World War One (the sisters as nurses – as back in that uncivilized time those barbarians wouldn’t think of allowing a woman to go to the front lines to be blown to pieces by heavy artillery or eviscerated by a machine gun…they had some silly notion that it was precisely the duty of men to spare women from that.  I know; freakishly strange!).  One of his brothers had actually joined early – in contrast to the cowardice 50 years later, he had gone to Canada not to avoid service, but to join the Royal Flying Corps before the United States even entered the war (the cousin has a picture – all dressed up in scarf and leather helmet, ready to fly away in his Sopwith Camel, for all the world to see).  From what I understand, all 8 of the brothers were wounded in action – some of them severely, though all survived the war.  I think that explains the run of bad luck in the family for the past 100 years…Grandpa and his brothers used it all up in one shot.

My father’s tale is different – one of three brothers, but only dad was old enough to fight.  If 17 is “old enough”.  Talked grandma in to letting him go shortly after his 17th birthday in January of 1944.  Amazing that these days a 26 year old is considered a little kid who still needs mommy’s health insurance…at 17 my dad put his life in hock to the most fearsome of American military forces:  the United States Marine Corps.  No mommy to look after him on Saipan.  Wonder how he managed to take it?  His younger brother’s turn came in Korea.  My late uncle Mike said that he got his VA benefits at a little ridge called “Heartbreak”.

Take some time to remember our veterans today – and say a prayer for those still out there in harm’s way.

Making a Deal With Iran

Mark Noonan41 Comments

It is hard to say what the real goal here is – it is clear that no matter what Iran does, while Obama is President we won’t go to war to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons.  Come what may, no amount of non-military pressure on Iran will succeed in convincing the Iranian government to give up their nuclear ambitions.  Given this, why make a deal, at all?  What is it that impels Obama and Kerry to seek a deal?

By making any sort of deal, all we do is increase Iranian legitimacy in the eyes of the world, alienate Israel and lower our prestige among both friends and enemies – the world will see that, in the event, we daren’t attack Iran…that we are, in some sense, afraid of them.  The Gulf States will either make the best deal they can with Iran, while Saudi Arabia and Turkey obtain nuclear weapons of their own to counter the Iranian force.  Can it be that Obama and Kerry, ignorant academics that they are, simply believe that a deal is better than a non-deal?  That the results don’t matter so much as the process, itself?

And here’s the bad news – an Iranian nuclear force is an existential threat to the life of Israel…just how long will the Israeli government hold off from saving themselves from extermination?

Random Ramblings Open Thread

Mark Noonan27 Comments

There is nothing Obama has said about ObamaCare which is either relevant or true.  He was lying about it when he campaigned in 2008; lied about it to get it passed in 2010; lied about it, again, when he campaigned in 2012.  He’s lying about it today.  From all appearances, he’ll never stop lying about it.  This is rather astounding – he could still get 90% of what he wants if he’ll just allow some of the worst aspects of it to be lopped off and/or reformed.  But he won’t allow that – his rhetoric that he’s willing to accept suggestions from the opposition is just more lies.  Anyone with even a bit of political skill and sense could salvage ObamaCare and them move on.  More and more, I’m just convinced that Obama is stupid.

Some people are getting a bit worried about the number of senior officers in the armed forces that Obama has forced out.  Dark visions of oppression are starting to sprout.  I wouldn’t go that way, if I were you:  Obama just wants generals and admirals who will obey his liberal stupidity…some generals and admirals were unwilling, and so they got the boot.  The main thing to remember about this is that our senior military ranks are ever more populated with officers who will agree to any stupid, old thing in order to get another star on their shoulder.  Should we win in 2017, we’ll have to ensure that the new President clears out this careerist deadwood which is taking over the military.

And, yes, Obama’s military bureaucrats are harassing Christians in the military – but this is really no different than what Obama’s IRS did.  Its not part of a grand conspiracy – its just liberals being their little, fascist selves…with the added “benefit” that in the military, the troops gotta obey.  Makes it easier for asinine things to get done faster.

I’ve been having an argument with some fellow conservatives over at a different message board and I’m a bit perplexed – am I really the only conservative out there who realizes that as long as we’re tagged with defending the rich, we’re never going to win sufficient power to change things?  Remember, liberals have got us in the minds of low info voters as being the people who defend the likes of George Soros, even though Soros is a money-bags for the left.  We have to break away from that – and we can only do it in the minds of low info voters by attacking some of the rich: that species of rich (like Soros) who don’t make money by producing worthwhile goods and services, but by manipulating our corrupt, controlled financial markets.  Arguing for tax cuts and cuts in government is all well and good – but it won’t get us much support in a nation where less than half pays income taxes and more than half gets some sort of government benefit…we’ve got to show the people that a corrupt alliance of Big Government and Big Corporation is robbing us blind for the benefit of the liberal governing class and liberal financial sharks like Soros.

Anyone argue with a liberal lately?  I got in to a Twitter argument and it came out that the liberal really, honestly felt he was helping the poor by paying his taxes.  This came out when I made the Tweet:  “want to help the poor? Ok, there’s a Catholic Charities near  you”, and then provided a link for Catholic Charities USA.  The guy got a bit miffed with me – he pays his taxes and that helps the poor plenty so he doesn’t have to go and help the poor.  It is a very weird mindset – but it does explain a lot. All you have to do is pay your taxes and you’ve discharged your duty to your brothers and sisters…

Discuss whatever you wish!

Insanity, Thy Name is Harry Reid

Mark Noonan10 Comments

The stupid – it just hurts!

U.S. Rep. Sam Johnson, R-Texas, left, wants to end the practice of giving illegal immigrants tax credits for kids, but U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., won’t let the House-approved measure H.R. 556 through the Senate.

“The System is Working Fine” says Senator Harry Reid, even though the Joint Committee on Taxation calculates that enactment of H.R. 556 would save taxpayers $24.4 billion over the next decade.

Here’s the real kicker – illegal aliens can claim the $1,000.00 tax credit even if their kids aren’t in the United States.  I mean, come on!  Any illegal who doesn’t claim at least one kid back in the home country is now a certifiable idiot!  How in heck would we possibly be able to check on something like that?  But to Harry Reid, its just working fine…which, I guess, is true from Harry’s perspective…it provides yet more taxpayer money for the undocumented Democrats.
As you all know, I’ve been in favor of amnesty since 2007 – but I’ve now decided to put on hold my support for the idea until such time as Harry Reid and Barack Obama have no further say in American law.  They are just too stupid to be trusted on such an important issue…and by being so stupid, they risk us never being able to get to rational immigration reform.

Spying, What is it Good For?

Mark Noonan12 Comments

Mostly absolutely nothing.  In light of recent revelations that we have spied on the leaders of friendly foreign States, I’d like to put my two cents in:

We should never spy on anyone except when vital, national security interests of the United States or our allies are at stake.  Given this, we should never spy on any friendly nation as they never threaten our vital interests.  And we should be wary of spying on any nation unless we really have to.  We have, right now, a vital interest in spying in Syria, Iran, Iraq, Turkey, China and a few other nations – either the nations, themselves, threaten us or what is going on in them threatens to become a serious problem for the United States.  We need to know what is going on behind the scenes.  But, Germany?  What could Germany possibly be hiding from us that is a threat to our existence?   Germany is a United States ally.  If they wish to keep something secret from us, then simple decency should compel us to respect that.  Do you pry in to your friend’s affairs uninvited?  No, you don’t – because that is indecent.  Well, morality applies to States as well as individuals.

Aside from the morality of it all, spying doesn’t really work very often.  To be sure, there have been a few intelligence coups which have been put to good use – the British breaking of the German naval codes in WWII is the prime example of this.  On the other hand, there wasn’t too much use in our breaking the Japanese codes pre-WWII as we still got caught with our pants down at Pearl Harbor (to be sure, that capability was put to good use at Midway in 1942 – but, think about it, the boneheads in charge only started properly using it after we had been wiped out in the most well-advertised “surprise” attack in human history).  Knowing the enemy’s plan ahead of time can be useful – but far more useful is for you to just be prepared for all contingencies.  If you’ve reviewed the possible threats and deployed your forces properly, then it doesn’t fundamentally matter what the enemy is going to do.  One need but consider McClellan and Grant in the Civil War.  McClellan at one point pretty much had Lee’s battle plan and still couldn’t beat him…because Lee was deployed for all contingencies.  Grant didn’t have Lee’s plan and, indeed, was put in a bad position by one of Lee’s adroit battlefield gambits…but he still beat Lee because Grant was ready for all contingencies.

To me, there is something nauseating in this whole spying business.  Cloak and dagger and dirty deals to get the goods.  I’d rather we had very little to do with it – and best of all, nothing to do with it.  If we are prepared for all contingencies and have let potential enemies know in advance that we’ll destroy them as soon as they look crossways at us, that would be better than all the spies in the world…especially all the peeping-Tom sorts of spying we do with electronic surveillance. I don’t necessarily want to know what nastiness the Mullahs of Iran are planning – I just want us to have the capability of putting Iran’s leaders six feet under at need and their clear understanding that this is precisely what we’ll do, if they challenge us, anywhere.

Leave off spying.  Build the right military force and be prepared to use it against all comers in all possible circumstances – that is the path to security and peace; not routing through someone’s private telephone conversations or picking through their trash for dirt.

Welfare Outnumbers Full Time Workers

Mark Noonan11 Comments

They want to make beggars out of us because beggars are easier to please:

Americans who were recipients of means-tested government benefits in 2011 outnumbered year-round full-time workers, according to data released this month by the Census Bureau.

They also out-numbered the total population of the Philippines.

There were 108,592,000 people in the United States in the fourth quarter of 2011 who were recipients of one or more means-tested government benefit programs, the Census Bureau said in data released this week. Meanwhile, according to the Census Bureau, there were 101,716,000 people who worked full-time year round in 2011. That included both private-sector and government workers

Note that – the number of workers only gets up to 101.7 million because of government workers; which means when you add up total government dependency, it outnumbers self-sufficiency even more.  This is the terrible result of economic policies which reward crony capitalism and social policies which encourage dependency.  In a rational world, those who are dependent should be no more than 10% or so of the total population, not rising above 50% because – point blank – one man producing wealth cannot support one man consuming wealth.  Almost everyone should be self sufficient, or your nation is in terminal decline.

This is why I say we’ve only got a few years left – if we don’t halt and reverse this soon, America will collapse.  There will be no United States of America any longer as each section breaks free – especially among the areas with the least amount of dependency who will no longer wish to tax themselves in to penury to pay for the dependents.  It is change or die.

This Time, the Jews Aren’t Sticking Around

Mark Noonan32 Comments

Instructed by what happened after 1933 in Germany, modern Jews, it appears, are not waiting around to see what the New New Order will be like:

Some fifty years ago, a mass migration transformed Judaism in France and in other countries of Western Europe. Algeria, a French colony in North Africa, was granted independence in 1962. Over one million French residents — European settlers and natives that had opted for French citizenship and culture — had no choice but to flee across the Mediterranean to the mother country, and ten percent of them were Jewish. Overnight, the Jewish community in Metropolitan France grew from 300,000 to over 400,000 souls…

…Now, a reversal is taking place. Today Jews are migrating out of France, and this is occurring in increasingly larger numbers.

This migration starts within France, as a mere change of locations. In Greater Paris, middle-class Jewish families are deserting neighborhoods that have been engulfed by more recent immigrants from Africa and the Near East. These new immigrant populations have proven prone to violence, and as radical Muslims, many entertain negative views about Jews and Judaism. Harassment, arson, and assault are frequent. There have been several murders. Even the liberal-minded Imam Hassan Chalghoumi of Drancy, who advocates friendly relations with Christians and Jews, was threatened and assaulted.

“I did not leave Morocco for France to be confronted by Morocco again in France,” a Casablanca-born Jewish physician confided to me…

Get out while the getting is good.  As the Muslim population surges in Europe the Muslim radicals grow in number and strength and start making demands – demands which are, for the most part, immediately accepted by the Ruling Class of Europe.  This acceptance is because the Ruling Class of Europe (like the Ruling Class everywhere in the West, including the United States) is cowardly – cowardly because they are not Christian, not Jewish, not anything…just rulers with lots of money and power and a determination to hang on to both as long as they can…and if they can buy a little peace for themselves by grovelling to Islamists, they’ll do it.  The Jews, though, are seeing the writing on the wall and aren’t sticking around until the cattle cars come ’round to pick them up.

As in all forms of descent, momentum takes over – from a mere fearful desire to appease the Islamists comes a desire to be as anti-Semitic as the Islamists.  There are moves afoot in Europe to ban the kosher preparation of food as well as circumcision of children (no, not much effort to ban the Islamic preparation of food).  Its easier, you see?  To stand up for the Rights of Man (which France, once upon a time, claimed loyalty to) takes courage and, in the end, a willingness to kill or die for the cause.  That can disturb the sweet deal you’ve got where the money pours in and you get to attend swank conferences on the taxpayer’s dime.

For the moment, Jews can find refuge – in Israel and the United States.  But even the United States is not absolutely secure, because if the American left does emerge completely triumphant in our current battle, if they are able to marginalize us and thus obtain full power to do as they wish, then it will become uncomfortable for Jews in the United States, as well (which just makes it even more amazing that so many American Jews vote for the people who are already turning on them).  We already see in the more liberal areas of the United States a kowtowing to Islam, which is just how it started in Europe…but kowtowing isn’t enough.  Eventually, such actions lead a person to joining the other side…to become anti-Semitic (some on the left have already made this journey).  And, so, in the end, if I were to advise a foreign Jew where to go, I’d say Israel…and pray the IDF is, indeed, up to the task of taking out Iran’s nuclear weapons program (American Jews, you’re not off the hook – you have to stick around and help us defeat this nonsense).

And, of course, it isn’t just Jews under threat.  In Europe there are also plenty of Christians who no longer feel that Europe is safe for them.  While Europe is ostensibly filled with Christians, my guess is that the number of Europeans who actually live as Christians is in the 10% range (some countries have a higher number – Ireland and Poland, for instance; but even in those places, it is probably just a bare majority…in some places of Europe, especially the power centers, there are hardly any Christians, at all).  I’ve read stories of Europeans emigrating to the United States simply because they feel they can’t raise their children to be Christians in Europe – the whole of society is weighted against them.  A two-track destruction of European civilization is going on – hammering the Christians who built it, welcoming in the Muslims who wish to end it.

Say what you will, but this is a fight to the finish – Western, Christian civilization has been under attack for centuries (I’d date it to the misbegotten – and entirely misnamed, as it’s proponents were amazingly ignorant – so-called Enlightenment of the mid 18th century).  Point blank, we are already living in what amounts to a post-Christian era, but which is still a Christian framework of society (such concepts as individual liberty, the worth of the individual, etc, are Christian concepts alien to all other civilizations on Earth).  Now, it seems, the ignorant and cowardly heirs of the so-called Enlightenment are essentially calling in Islam to finish the job.  It makes more sense than you might think – Enlightenment thinking is very Determinist in view; fatalistic, as it were: and so is Islam.  The modern, Western Determinist figures everything happens because of what has happened before, no human free will.  The Islamist figures everything happened because of God’s will, no human free will.  It is Christians (and Jews) who actually hold that humans have a part to play independent of God’s will…that we can choose our fate.  This conception built our civilization, and the end of our civilization is built around the end of such a concept.

How it will come out remains to be seen – though, as a Christian, I’m absolutely assured that my side wins, in the end.  But this doesn’t mean we have no role to play – that we cannot or must not fight.  The only question is: will we fight?  The Jews are (wisely) starting to flee an increasingly anti-Semitic Europe – but you can only flee so far.  And there is no place for the (at least) 150 million Americans who believe in the Judeo-Christian West to flee to.

UPDATE:  The left goes to ever more extreme lengths to attack Israel – now the fact that IDF soldiers don’t rape Muslim women is “proof” that IDF soldiers don’t think of Muslim women as human beings.  On the flip side, this must mean that the Muslim men who rape Christian women are paying them a compliment those nasty IDF soldiers never could…

Maybe a Third Party?

Mark Noonan44 Comments

I’m not one of those who is overly worked up over the pending resolution of the CR/Debt issue – given we only hold the House, we never were going to get much out of it and the sole purpose of the fight, for me, was to have a fight.  There were (and are) two reasons to fight:

1.  You never win a battle on defense.  You must attack in order to win.  MacArthur once was asked what his formula was for defensive war – he gave the one word answer:  “defeat”.

2.  To clarify things.  Fights make people pick sides.  Might as well know clearly who is with you and who isn’t.

But now that we have had the fight and we have started to go on offense and we have clarified things, I’m starting to wonder if the GOP is worth saving.  Boehner’s a good guy and mostly with us, but he seems to have flunked out on what should have been the basic strategy – pass the necessary legislation with a defund of ObamaCare and then done NOTHING until the President broke down.  Every GOP leader should then have been on TV morning, noon and night saying only this:  we’ve passed the necessary legislation to keep government open, we’re just waiting for Harry Reid’s Senate to pass it and Obama to sign it.  If Reid did bring it up for a vote,  and it was killed – then pass it, again.  If Obama got it and veto’d it, pass it again.  Until they break, we give nothing.  Eventually, they break and we end up with much less than we asked for – but they broke, not us.  But, the GOP leadership wasn’t up to that – and the reason appears to be that most of the GOP leadership is afraid of the Ruling Class.

They were looking at polls – some of which were, as usual, completely bogus – and the chattering classes getting all mad and, of course, some GOPers actually attacking the GOP and the leadership got scared…they started to surrender almost the moment the government was shut down.  They believed, that is, the nonsense story that shutting down the government was going to crush the GOP.  They believe this because that is what the Ruling Class believes – honestly, folks, they actually believe that the 1990’s government shutdown was a disaster for the GOP…even though we retained our Congressional majority in the election held just after the shutdown.  Its absurd, but it is what they believe…and so the GOP leadership was frightened that we’d lose in 2014, and so quickly lost heart.  And here’s the thing where I get to wondering if we need a new party:  even if it could be proved that a particular action on principal would cause a defeat, it is still the thing to do.  You don’t decide to do the right thing only because it is politically popular; you do the right thing because it is the right thing to do.  ObamaCare is an utter disaster – we disagree with it in general and in particular…in general because Big Government is a fraud and in particular because this law is just hideously bad on its own.  This is what we conservatives are supposed to fight against and the only leverage we’ll have short of a GOP majority in the Senate in 2015 is the debt ceiling and spending.  It wasn’t a matter of fighting against it some other way – this was the only way to fight against it.  Those who said we must not shut down and we must increase the debt were essentially saying, “don’t fight against ObamaCare”.  Screw that.

So, the question remains – should we form a new party?  A party which won’t have Beltway squishes and tools of the Ruling Class who will cut us off at the knees?  Now, remember, one thing a Third Party guarantees is President Hillary Clinton, and probably for a full 8 years.  A new party might be able to get a majority by 2024, but the chances of getting it sooner are very, very small.  Or should we still work on the GOP and see if by “primarying” a few more squishes the rest might get the message?  Might understand that the GOP is either the party to dismantle Big Government, or its nothing?

Discuss.

Columbus Day

Mark Noonan18 Comments

I wasn’t planning on writing anything to mark Columbus Day, but having been around the ‘net a bit this morning and seeing the ignorant comments about Columbus, I feel I just have to say something.

First off, what did Columbus do?  He set off in to the unknown in three tiny ships with only minimal navigational aids and yet struck land in the place and in the time he thought he would.  That, as anyone familiar with sailing can attest, is a remarkable achievement.  That it wasn’t the land he was looking for is neither here nor there because no one in Europe knew about the Americas.  It took incredible bravery for Columbus and his crew to do what they did and a remarkable amount of sheer seamanship.  It is an achievement comparable with going to the Moon – but in some respects more difficult because they didn’t know what they would encounter, while our voyages to the Moon were without surprises on route, timing and what we thought we’d find when we got there.  To make snide remarks about how Columbus thought he’d found Asia is asinine – its as if we found out there was a star 10 light years away with intelligent life on it and set out to see it…and on the way bumped in to a different star with intelligent life 5 light years away; it would still be a remarkable discovery.

Secondly, what didn’t Columbus do?  First off, he didn’t bring war, death and slavery to the Americas – they already existed in the Americas.  Why?  Because humans lived there.  And here’s a newsflash for ya, folks: the natives of the America were just like us.  Full of anger and jealousy and greed and fear and stupidity, just like we have…and, of course, also full of dignity and courage and generosity, just like we have.  People are people – Columbus did not discover Eden; that Garden we were all kicked out of long before Columbus came along…and we won’t get back in to it until the End, Columbus or no.  It is just stupid to think that Columbus did something wrong – he did something and whenever anyone does something, it will have effects, and often effects never foreseen by the original doer of the deed.  Columbus is not responsible for what happened to the natives of America.

Thirdly, just what was found in the Americas?  Well, aside from primitive peoples, there were also civilized peoples…people so civilized that they had advanced to the point of massacring people in great, big bloody batches.  The Mexica were not nice people – they were looting, enslaving and murdering their subjects.  It is true that Columbus didn’t stop that, but he set in train the events which would eventually bring proper retribution to the Mexica for their crimes…and when they were overthrown, it was with the eager help of the native people the Mexica were oppressing.  Should we instead wish that Columbus had sunk to the bottom of the sea and maybe the human sacrifices of Mexico continued for a few more centuries?  Would that have been good?  Oh, but what about all the natives who died of disease – what of it?  It was terrible, but it wasn’t a crime on anyone’s part.  No one knew how disease was transmitted…the Europeans hadn’t the foggiest notion that they were bringing disease.  Given the nature of things, eventually the natives of America were going to be exposed to disease environments they were not resistant to…it was going to happen.  If it hadn’t been Columbus then someone – either east or west of the Americas – was going to come to the Americas at some point…and the diseases would have still struck down the same number.

Columbus was a man of great courage and intelligence who played a man’s part in the world.  Good and bad, he brought the Americas in to the mainstream of world history and set the stage which eventually allowed the United States of America to emerge as the greatest nation in human history.  He is worthy of honor and emulation in his willingness to dare greatly.  And, so, Happy Columbus Day!