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A Message From Edward Whitacre Jr. The New CEO Of GM, via Bloomberg.

“I don’t know anything about cars. A business is a business, and I think I can learn about cars. I’m not that old, and I think the business principles are the same.”

I don't know about you but I would have some concerns here.

I know it's just a car business. Bottom lines are bottom lines, and deals are deals.

Still, I would be hard pressed to find any level of confidence, if a CEO of a healthcare facility would say, "I know nothing about medicine, but am willing to learn". (Let me clarify that I do not necessarily think that a physician must be over a medical institution, in fact most of them are not good businessmen. But that person should have some knowledge of how the business works, having worked in it before, at some level.)

From what we are gathering about CEO Whitacre's time in grade, he has none, nada, zilch in the automobile industry. He will have no other knowledge of the intricate details. With this being the case, maybe someone can enlighten me as to what his real function will be, if that's not it.

I will tell you what I think it means. I think this means he is being hired to cook the books. Far too often in our system, this and political paybacks for previous favors are the real objective with these kinds of appointments.

So here is your new Government Motors CEO, a man who by his own admission knows nothing about the challenge he is about to face. Acts like this will eventually cause the American people to soon realize, they really screwed up when they elected this bunch.

Happy Motoring To All.

Of Reasons And Rationales: Explaining The EU Elections

I ran across an interesting op-ed piece from the German publication, Der Spiegel. The second paragraph resonates loud and clear:

There is always a certain amount of risk associated with any election. It is a truth recognized by dictators around the world -- leading them to prefer predetermined results. In the last elections for the North Korean "parliament," for example, the Democratic Front for the Reunification of the Fatherland got 100 percent of the vote and all 687 seats. It was a result that was difficult to misinterpret -- and met the expectations of those involved.

One does not need to read any further to know that the EU elections have yielded a certain level of surprise, among the world's population. Europe has spent the last eight years criticizing the US, for its policies set forth by the Bush Administration. This means that anything economic was ridiculed as favoring the privileged rich; anything related to foreign policy was the subject of some extreme disdain, if not outright scorn. There was this overt display of worry about American imperialism and we heard about it almost daily.

So now comes Obama, who is everything the European intelligentsia could ask and hope for. Finally, here comes a man who understands both the politics and culture, of European-style socialism. Now we have someone that can talk the language of social democrats all over the continent, right?

But wait. Not wanting to be confused with someplace that appears to be in lockstep with America, maybe Europe has had a change of heart?

Certainly there is a shock factor in these results, for some. But I am not surprised at them and frankly, I am having some trouble believing those who live in Europe are as shocked as many would have us believe.

Maybe, just maybe, many Euros have come to a stark realization in the process that has been playing out before them. Maybe they are beginning to see that the practice of allowing immigrants to come into their country and brazenly dictate to the indigenous people the terms of their residency is not the kind of world, they want to create for themselves and their families. Maybe, many are just getting to the point where they are not comfortable with this ulterior objective of subtly transforming Western Civilization into a Middle Eastern caliphate, subjected to whoever the big Muslim Kahuna happens to be at the time..

Note the further prose from the piece:

The European shift to the right, which is being decried across the continent, isn't one. Rather, it is a signal for a return to reality. The established centrist parties -- in Germany, in the Netherlands, in Sweden, Austria and elsewhere -- are busy with crisis management, with the nationalization of ailing banks and bankrupt companies. They are neither able nor willing to attend to other problems.

They aren't thinking about the consequences of immigration, about the loss of cultural identity that many people with "non-immigrant backgrounds" sense -- people who do not want to be labeled as xenophobes, right-wing extremists or neo-Nazis as a result. This omission benefits so-called "populists" like Geert Wilders, who are not afraid to tackle politically incorrect issues and provide answers to questions that nobody else wants to pose.

Europeans are not stupid. They are human and subject to the same weaknesses and frailties the rest of us are. But they are not going to be fooled forever. They have eyes, they have ears, they have minds which can assimilate and analyze data objectively.

They were the Enlightment and Renaissance. They were the leaders of the world in almost everything at one time during history, and for good reasons. I cannot imagine they will allow outsiders to take away their Plato, their Monet, or their Bach. It's just not going to happen. But you can be sure, there will be some who will downplay and demonize the results of this election.

Xenophobia, will be the cause listed on many a blog and mainstream European media agency. Fascism and Nazism will be words frequently tossed around over the next few weeks, as well. What they are not taking into account is fairly simple and not hard to understand, if one has the slightest understanding of the basic fundamentals in the discipline of political science. Like the article says, there is no major shift. It's merely an awakening back to common sense on the part of some, at least enough to swing an election away from apologists and pacifiers.

Another fallacy that will surface in this is the tendency to believe that this signals a return to some pretty bad times. It is a fair assessment that there is a growing sense of nationalism beginning to reappear, or in this case continentalism. The problem with this is how it's interpreted. To say that all nationalism is fascism is nonsense. Not all nationalism is fascism, neither is all fascism, Nazism.

Another fallacy I have heard in the aftermath of the election is that Europe is tired of its socialist policies and it wants to reverse itself. In my lifetime, Europeans have always embraced tax and spend politics. After WWII, it was necessary in order to rebuild the continent into the modern world. As long as the bulk of the populace sees some bang for their euro, they aren't likely to change their approach anytime soon. But they may spurn a continued trend in that direction, or might be willing to reject more of the same. I know the word on the streets in many European nations is that bailouts are not a good thing.

Granted, it's never this simple to analyze the cause of any effect. There is no one reason anything happens in politics. Another rationale was brought up in the article:

The "stupid" voters have recognized that they are supporting a parliament whose primary task is not to oversee the EU's executive arm but to take care of politicians who their parties want to reward for their loyal support. Those who, for whatever reasons, have failed at home, or who need to take a time-out from national politics, get sent to Brussels.

It goes on to cite some examples. But the idea that the EU is essentially meaningless is bound to come up in the course of the explanation. It is one excuse that will be stated and repeated, again and again. But in the bigger scheme of things, the amount of meaning one side chooses for an entity (such as the EU) will depend on whom you talk to at a given point in time.

If a side that has lost must come up with reasons for their loss, it is easier to downplay the entity as meaningless, than to address the reasons behind the failure. If the side that has won is asked the reasons for their victory, they have the luxury of saying it was their message, their ideas, and their worldview that drew the people to them. As a result, the entity becomes extremely important to them.

But in this case, I think the truth lies somewhere in the middle. Just as Europe is split ideologically, so are the people's opinions of the importance of the EU. True nationalists are not too keen on the idea. Many of those people are in the minority right now. More and more Euros are becoming more continentalist and that means the EU will carry more responsibility in the future. It also means that for the purposes of the immigration issue, nationalists and continentalists will find themselves on the same side of the coin.

Another factor in this particular area is Euros may be coming to a realization, the USA is becoming weaker, something many of them wanted earlier in the decade. Obama is not particularly wowing the European leadership right now. Not only is he snubbing them, he is failing miserably to impress them. Many may be showing up for rallies and speeches, many may want to get a glimpse of him for hostorical reasons, and a select few may even think he is the best thing since 24 hour shopping. But under it all, there is some real apprehension.

They see massive deficit spending unlike any other era before. They see a foreign policy weakness, unlike any other seen in American history.

Many alive today, remember the Jimmy Carter days and know that the malaise created by him was felt hard in Europe. I know, I was there.

The dollar's value shrunk so much so fast during the reign of the Peanut Man, he was forced to buy back the dollars that Germany held, to keep the dollar afloat. He may have done the same with other currencies, I don't remember. But with the German Mark being the backbone of the European economy at the time, there was no other choice but to act, there.

If that wasn't enough, Carter's handling of the Iranian crisis was not impressive either. The botched rescue mission and the generalized state of inaction, didn't exactly reassure Europeans of American ability to assist them, should the Soviets decide to send up the balloon. These are things many of Europeans my age may very well remember clearly. These are things that many of MY countrymen have surely forgotten.

Obama should remind us all of those days. It's like deja vu, all over again.

News In Brief (And The Usual Opinionated Commentary)

US Debt, Dollar Making China Nervous

Wait a minute, didn't Tim Terrific the Tax Cheat just go to China, and say they had confidence in us?

Now we have a discrepancy. Timmy says one thing, US Rep. Mark Kirk (R-IL) is saying another. Obama's team will not like this, look for them to dig up dirt on Kirk to divert attention from his claims.


California To Do Away With Welfare?

Yeah, right.

There will be riots in the streets of LA, SD, and SF, not to mention Oakland and Fresno. Crime will raise exponentially. Phoenix and Las Vegas will become the largest cities in the country. There are many people in California who know no other way of life.


WSJ: Media Falling For Obama Rhetoric

Say it isn't so.

I know the official start of summer isn't until the weekend after next. But the kids are now out of school, pools are open, summer festivals and activities are in full swing, and we still see no results from the stimulus package. That package was only designed to pay off political favors, nothing more.

Any of you that believe otherwise, I know of a mountain cabin in Central Florida at the base of Mt Dora, that you can buy for the right price.


Stay Issued In Chrysler Deal

I wonder why more actions like this haven't been taken, with all of the trashing of the US Constitution we have seen in the last five months. As we would expect, Chrysler is playing the fear card. They claim that delay will cause Fiat to back out.

I am no economic scholar, but it seems to me that Fiat is getting Chrysler for next to nothing. With that kind of factory pricing, I think they'll wait.

Ask LA

Let's dig down into the mailbag and see what poor sould we can help, this week. Shall we?



Dear LA,

We have a problem that is unique and have never seen it addressed, on your world-class advice column.

Please allow us a moment to explain it. We are several families that share a hefty strip of land. We are bewildered and hurt by a recent chain of events which have unfolded before our very eyes.

Recently, we helped a man who said he needed our help to build a better relationship, between his people and ours. He said that others who came before him had alienated us from his people. He wanted to rectify that injustice and if we would help him do just that, he could/would heal the rift. He claimed he would close the gap between us both, promising to consider us and our thoughts, when making vital decisions which would affect us all.

The man was successful in achieving his goals and we all felt much better about the world, for a little while. When he began his quest to fulfill his promises, we were surprised to learn some things about him and have become confused by his recent behavior.

For example, he was visiting one of our family's area recently (for a ceremony) and stayed right down the street from the leader (of that area). The leader invited him to dinner, but was rejected. In another case, one of the leaders of another family's area, living just off the coast of our hefty strip of land, visited the land of the man we helped, and was snubbed not unlike the other leader. (And the family whose leader is a lady, isn't faring much better either. They don't seem to like each other and the press has published much about their rift.)

Keep in mind that we are used to this chasm, we feel that the previous leader totally disregarded our opinions in many of his decisions. (He was not our favorite and we even worked hard against him in 2004.) This would not be such a big deal, except that the man we speak of today, sought us out and by all accounts, appears to have used us to get what he wanted.

Help us LA, for we are about to sink and drown in a sea of humiliation. What can we do?



Signed,

Europe



Dear Europe,

Learn to swim.


Hope this helps,

LA

Sunday Reflection - Vulnerability and Illusions

You will rarely find me spending much time discussing Carl Sagan. Astronomy, physics, and astrophysics were not my best subjects, so there's not much I can offer to the mix even if I wanted. But every now and then, someone like Sagan says something that rings true in any other science or discipline. The same can be said for life in general.

Here is one quote that is appropriate for this week's reflection, it comes from the chapter entitled The Fine Art of Baloney Detection in Sagan's book, called The Demon-Haunted World:

One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we've been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. The bamboozle has captured us. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back.

Have you ever known a pathological liar? I mean a person that when the truth does them just as good, they will choose the lie, anyway? With no vested interest either way, they will simply seek and elect to lie no matter what the outcome may be. They do it so much that after many instances of telling it, they soon begin to believe it to be the truth.

The same holds true in reverse. That is to say, the more some people are lied to, the more they begin to believe the lie is really the truth. And even when confronted with solid proof it was a lie, they are not able to see the reality because the lie has become so deeply rooted into their psyche, it has become a part of their daily thought processes.

The more they are fooled into believing falsehoods, the easier it is to lead them astray and sway them with deceits. The "Bush lied, people died" group comes to mind immediately, when pondering this little quote. Add to this group, a new generation that has bought into the entire "hope and change" mantra. This garbage is still being fed to the people now that the election has been over, for seven months.

How easy is it for those of us who see through the rhetorical fallacies, to convince them that the current government isn't any better? Not very, and it may be doing more damage in a shorter amount of time than any other in history.

If you can see and understand this, you have a strong conceptual understanding of what Mr Sagan was saying in this quote. And it is likely that you are difficult to fool, because like me, you are skeptical at every turn. You see, I have been lied to on many occasions and have responded quite differently than the people I have described.

It doesn't mean that I believe no one, ever. This means that I do not count things I run across newly, as fact, until I verify them with others who know. This is true of every subject. There is a stark difference between that attitude and approach, and one of pure cynicism.

Another Blast From The Past

This week we depart just a little from the usual.

You see, this is called "Another Blast From The Past" - "past" being the operative word. We have covered the 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s, and even some 90s, but I cannot say with any real certainty if I have ever covered the new millennium yet. Rest assured, I am not going to search them all, to find out; so for all intents and purposes, we will assume this is the first time and be done with it.

This week, I want to feature one of the great young new musicians/song-writers of this decade, one that may very well become a legend before his career is over. If you haven't heard Jason Mraz, now is a good time to hear something I think is special. He's quite talented, well worth a look, and versatile with many different influences and styles. Count these songs among my favorites.

First up is from a concert in South Korea. This little tune doesn't need much to spark some interest. Two guys with acoustic instrumentation, innovative vocals, and some stellar lyrics make this one happen.



Next up is another brilliant tune from the same concert. How could anyone not like this one?



This one sounds a little alternative, but it's catchy.



I'll close this week's installment with my favorite song by Jason.

This one is one was his first hit. He wrote it for his best friend who was diagnosed with (and subsequently beat) the often deadly Ewing's Sarcoma. It is truly one of the best songs I have ever heard, written and performed by anyone, anytime - much less in this decade. The words are so astounding, they could only have come from the heart.

Sample:

Well it kind of makes me nervous
To say that you deserve this
And what kind of God would serve this
We will cure this dirty old disease
Well if you you've gots the poison, I've gots the remedy

The remedy is the experience, this is a dangerous liaison
I says the comedy is that it's serious
This is a strange enough new play on words
I said, the tragedy is that you're going to spend
The rest of your nights with the light on
So shine the light on all of your friends
Well, it all amounts to nothing
In the end

Some medical information for your edification, it takes chemotherapy (a poison) to stop cancer. Thus, the remedy. Those who have had it can well know and attest, it is both an experience and a dangerous liaison anytime you kill good cells, to kill the bad ones.

Double entendre? Sure, but it makes much sense either way; especially when you consider the underlying message of this song, found in the chorus:

I won't worry my life away.

Check it out.



Enjoy.

Friday Funnies

Based in Indianapolis and nationally syndicated, The Bob and Tom Show has been running hard and fast since 1983. They have promoted and helped advance the careers of many up and coming comedians, throughout those years.

Here is one named Greg Morton, shamelessly stealing a melody from Sammy Davis Jr. It's called the Obamaman:



(Hat Tip: Kris at Truth Be Told)

Here's the same song, with different lyrics and a better packaged video. I actually like this version better, but it's a matter of taste. Warning, this one may contain images that are disturbing to some people:



Enjoy.

Recommended Reading (Again)

It's not WND. It's from Mother Jones, noted liberal progressive publication. Here is an article that is critical of Sonia Sotmayor's writing skills.


Some disturbing news in the world of states' rights is coming from the Georgia Secretary of State. Apparently the Justice department is meddling in the affairs of a state that has a constitutional law, requiring people who wish to vote, to prove they are citizens.


Biden tells us what most of us already know. Hope we all feel better now that we know we were right. I know I do.

Recommended Reading

Busy, busy. So this means another half-assed effort on my part.



Mustang has a post up to read and consider. Note the source and what they see, something that Americans apparently do not.



AC at Fore Left gave me the impression was suspicious of the disappearance of the Air France flight. Speaking of Sarkozy's statement immediately after the disappearance from radar, he had a thought.

Sarkozy said:

“It’s a tragic accident. The chances of finding survivors are tiny.”

AC said:

"That's pretty strong language without knowing yet exactly what happened..."

Today, we hear about a bomb threat a few days before the plane went down without as much of a warning. This may not be something other than weather-related and French officials are not saying much about it now. The media hasn't even picked up on it until Drudge did some digging.

Hypocritical Reactions

Most of my readers disagree with my views on abortion, so I figure it's usually best left alone most of the time. But this Tiller murder has some far-reaching implications, it is not without some potentially serious consequences, and they need to be made known so we can fully understand the reality of the matter.

Let me say first that while I am pro-choice for some purposeful reasons, I don't like late term abortions at all and think they should be illegal. In spite of the reprehensible nature of this procedure, I also deplore cold-blooded murder.

Two wrongs never make a right. I don't care what the wrongs are, they never cancel the other out. I cannot get happy about the man getting killed, no matter how objectionable his acts were. It is not our place to play judge, jury, and executioner, nor is it our place to play God.

The fallout from this heinous act does nothing to further the cause of eliminating late-term abortion. None.

What it does do is give the Left more ammunition to label those who disagree with them, as domestic terrorists. Daily Kos wasted no time in trying to tie Sarah Palin into the mix and HuffPo certainly used the opportunity to paint average abortion foes as fomenters of this kind of senseless violence. HuffPo's Feldman wasted no time in his opening parargraph:

The violent killing of yet another American doctor at the hands of yet another right-wing political activist forces us to ask a crucial question: Why does the right-wing anti-abortion movement in America repeatedly give rise to people who see murder as a legitimate form of protest?

Maybe he didn't hear the instant condemnation of this act, by mainstream abortion foes. The National Right To Life organization immediately issued this statement. How many rabid political spin artists who support late-term abortions even bothered to read it? Probably very few.

As you may guess, these are not the only instances of illogical rhetoric. There are simply too many to link to in one post and still keep a cogent flow to it. And so it is, we can only conclude the intense irrational backlash is hypocritical in nature.

Here, we have a group of people who (simply as a matter of moral conscience) oppose the killing of a viable fetus in the last trimester, counting me as one. Similarly, we have a group of people who oppose war (for the very same reason).

Most of the time the ones who are against war are NOT against abortion. So, I am at a loss to explain this, except that there are two different standards in play, for those on the Left. The reason is plain and simple, those who go to war knew the possibility when they enlisted, aborted fetuses have no choice.

Not only that, if we are going to make an argument that abortion foes are terrorists because their rhetoric inspired the murder of Dr. Tiller, shouldn't we equally make the connection between those who oppose war and this senseless murder, which is having significantly less coverage from the media?

Note the difference in the way this is portrayed:

A man with "political and religious motives" killed a soldier just out of basic training and wounded another Monday in a targeted attack on a military recruiting center, police said. The shootings were not believed to be part of a broader scheme.

Note how the political and religious motives were mentioned, but immediately downplayed in the next sentence. One man, acting on his own and not part of a larger conspiracy, killed an innocent man for political reasons. The largest majority of anti-war activists would never condone such a thing, would they?

But Kos didn't mention it, neither did HuffPo (at least not that I could find). Here we have an instance where the moment a whacko kills one of their heroes, the toxic waste flies unabated.

This is another prime example of the worst kind of hypocrisy, called political motives and intentions.