Long time passing – interesting article over at First Things on the connections between American communism, folk music and other cultural events of the mid 20th century.

Interesting:

…The special election will take place on January 19. It’s accepted political wisdom now that, despite the rush to vote before Christmas in the Senate, the conference and reconciliation between the House and Senate versions of the national plan cannot occur in time to allow a vote on the reconciled bill prior to February. That means that a referendum in Massachusetts on the subject could have an interesting effect on wavering votes in both the House and the Senate. There is no margin for error in the Senate, where the health care bill got exactly the sixty votes needed to pass, and a slim one in the House.

If a Republican running against ObamaCare managed to pick up the seat of Ted Kennedy, or even come close to doing so, it would be a political earthquake of Richter 8+. What would that say about the popularity of the bill if it wasn’t even a winning issue in the state that had the most first-hand experience with it, not to mention in the election to replace the senator who had been a leading proponent of it?…

A GOP victory would be an absolute game-changer in American politics – but if the GOP even comes close, its going to be a major warning shot across the bow, as it were. Massachusetts is very blue and Democrats pretty much run the whole show. If public anger over ObamaCare can propel a GOPer to victory – or even close to it – in a State like Massachusetts, then only a complete reversal of course by the Democrats will spare them a drubbing in November.

Here is Scott Brown’s website. Donate if you can. If you live in the area, volunteer. Lets see if we can bury ObamaCare in Ted Kennedy’s back yard.

Not to be a total downer here at the start of the year, but there are some issues we need to pay attention to. Mish gives a quick list:

Global Imbalances Mount

* Global imbalances are cropping up like weeds in places like Greece, Iceland, Vietnam, Latvia, and Lithuania.

* There are massive property bubbles in China, Canada, the UK, and Australia.

* Japan is in a foolish fight against deflation and sinking further in debt

* Commercial real estate in the US is on the verge of bringing down hundreds of regional banks.

* Cities in the US are under massive pressure because of unsustainable pension plan promises.

* Global terrorism is on the rise

How long this mess hangs together without a huge crisis in a major currency is the question everyone should be asking. Sadly, most are oblivious to the widening structural cracks.

I’ve heard it said that some are predicting that fourth quarter 2009 GDP growth will be about 4%. If we see such a number, it is because the government is flat out lying to us about what is going on in the economy.

This economy is so bad that Nevada has lost 1% of its population – which is unheard of for us. Once upon a time, 6,000 people a month were moving in to the Las Vegas area. I’d guess that thousands are moving out, now. The school district had a shortage of teachers two years ago – now we’re sitting with empty class rooms. My commute time has gotten faster.

There’s just nothing here – to no fanfare at all, our final monument to profligacy (City Center) opened up in December and I’m wondering if anyone is making book on when it will file for bankruptcy (my guess: by June). A family in my neighborhood has been trying to short sale their house for 8 months – they’ve sold it three times, but each time the appraisal has come in lower…and the bank appears to prefer non-paying residents to selling the house at an ever increasing loss. My guess is that my one-time $400,000.00 house is worth $110,000.00, at best. I’m betting its just as bad in California, Florida and Arizona and heading that way just about everywhere else.

The structural problems all stem from fiat money and usury-based finance. The whole world has bought this poop sandwich and now everyone’s going to have to take a bite. The longer our government and governments around the world put off the day of reckoning, the worse it will be when it finally arrives. And it will arrive, sooner or later.

Yes, indeed:

When freedom does not have a purpose, when it does not wish to know anything about the rule of law engraved in the hearts of men and women, when it does not listen to the voice of conscience, it turns against humanity and society. – John Paul II

Interesting:

Fifty-eight percent (58%) of U.S. voters say waterboarding and other aggressive interrogation techniques should be used to gain information from the terrorist who attempted to bomb an airliner on Christmas Day.

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that just 30% oppose the use of such techniques, and another 12% are not sure.

Men and younger voters are more strongly supportive of the aggressive interrogation techniques than women and those who are older. Republicans and voters not affiliated with either major party favor their use more than Democrats.

Ok, liberals, you claimed that we needed to elect Obama in order to remove the stain of the evil Chimpy McSmirk BusHitler – including his heinous “waterboarding”, which you on the left actually consider to be torture. What say you to a strong majority of your fellow Americans figuring that we should go right ahead and do it? Are we all evil, too?

Or is there any chance you out there will realize that the whole waterboarding issue was manufactured? You know – liberal leaders needed something to get your juices up about – get you donating, get you willing to back Democrats, that sort of thing – and so worked up a physically harmless but rather effective interrogation technique as if it were something right out of the Nazi/Communist play book. That is what this was, dear liberals – just a technique to get very hardened terrorists to come clean on information we needed. It was used very sparingly and only against the worst of the worst of our enemies.

Do you feel like a bunch of suckers, now?

Just amazing what a liberal can accomplish when you allow him to cling on to power for 40+ years.

Good news

Tests that were performed on Rush Limbaugh after he was admitted to a Hawaii hospital for chest pains “found absolutely nothing wrong,” the conservative talk show host said Friday.

“It was a blessing,” Limbaugh told reporters at The Queen’s Medical Center where he was admitted Wednesday.

Doctors gave Limbaugh an angiogram Thursday that revealed no evidence of arterial or coronary disease, he said. The cause of his pain – which he called “very real” – has not been determined.

Liberals will be disappointed.

UPDATE: And President Obama starts off 2010 -18 in the polls.

The idiocy of liberalism gets worse and worse:

…logic is hard to come by in skin-deep-only-diversity-obsessed bureaucracies.

… Berkeley High’s School Governance Council, a body of teachers, parents, and students, proposes to eliminate before- and after-school science labs at Berkeley High School (BHS)… According to the East Bay Express, an alternate parent representative on the council said “information presented at council meetings suggests that the science labs were largely classes for white students,” although black students take science classes. One teacher said she has 12 black male students in her Advanced Placement classes, and black and Hispanic students account for a third of her four environmental science classes.

BHS purportedly has the widest racial academic achievement gap in California, which the council deemed “unconscionable.” Depriving students of science lab instruction because the labs benefit mostly white students apparently isn’t unconscionable.

What is unconscionable is our continued willingness to allow liberals to have any say, at all, in education.

Should auld acquaintance be forgot,

And never brought to mind?

Should auld acquaintance be…

blah, blah and..auld lang…

blah blah blah Blah!

CHORUS:

For auld lang syne, my dear,

For auld lang syne,

We’ll take a cup of … blah, blah blah,

For auld lang syne!

Yeah, like any of you knew the lyrics, either.

New Year’s is a harmless annual institution, of no particular use to anybody save as a scapegoat for promiscuous drunks, and friendly calls and humbug resolutions. – Mark Twain

Youth is when you’re allowed to stay up late on New Year’s Eve. Middle age is when you’re forced to. – P. J. O’Rourke

The object of a New Year is not that we should have a new year. It is that we should have a new soul and a new nose; new feet, a new backbone, new ears, and new eyes. Unless a particular man made New Year resolutions, he would make no resolutions. Unless a man starts afresh about things, he will certainly do nothing effective. Unless a man starts on the strange assumption that he has never existed before, it is quite certain that he will never exist afterwards. Unless a man be born again, he shall by no means enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. – G. K. Chesterton

What a year, huh?

I can’t say that it was all peaches and cream for me and my family. Losing my father and mother-in-law were just the two hardest parts of a year filled with troubles. On the other hand, my step-daughters wedding was an exceptionally grand and joyful event. As always, we have to take the good with the bad.

If I’m to have a resolution for this year it is to be more patient with everyone – from wife to family to friends to perfect strangers, I want to be much more patient than I’ve ever been before. A gentle answer turneth away wrath.

My hope for the year is that we secure victory in Afghanistan so that we can start to bring our troops home from there. I pray the economy turns around so that people will no longer bear such a burden of worry about the future. I hope that our government changes course and realizes that, just perhaps, the desires of academics and Europeans are not necessarily suitable for the United States.

I hope you all have a very fun and safe new year and I wish to thank you all for coming here and bearing with us here at Blogs for Victory.