The husband woke me with the news this morning that the IRA had issued instructions for all its members to lay down arms.

Understandably, I had a hard time believing him.

But, apparently it's true. I wonder how much these women had to do with it.

Moderate Muslims would be wise to learn this lesson. I've read speculation that, given the neighborhoods involved, the attack of 7/7 was as much an attack on the British Government via its citizens as it was on the Muslim population of London. The neighborhoods involved are heavily populated by Muslims and this was, perhaps, a way of trying to terrorize them into compliance with the Islamofascists message. I don't know if this is true, and I don't know if we'll ever find out, but it stands to reason that if Al-Qaeda and its minions thought they could kill two birds with one stone, they would. We don't hear much from moderate Muslims about the civil war that is occurring in their religion (Islamofascists vs. moderate Muslims; those who would advocate a return to the stone age and those who advocate civilization) and, again, it's been speculated that it's because these moderate Muslims are afraid to speak up, for fear that the Islamofascists will turn on them.

Well, it appears that six women---who loved a man as a brother and a fiancee---proved to be the straw that broke the camel's back when it came to the IRA. Robert McCartney, a Belfast Catholic, was murdered for no other reason than he was critical of the IRA and had the guts to speak truth to power. When the IRA offered to "take care of the matter" the women who loved him refused, and instead opted to speak out. The IRA is an organization that used as much terror on its supporters as it did the British.

It should be a lesson to those moderate Muslims we only hear from when they're worried about being attacked themselves that only by speaking out and denouncing the Islamofascists acts---by refusing to play the game the Islamofascists way---will they spare themselves an IRA-like rule of terror. They have got to start denouncing these actions now, and they must do it loudly. They cannot only be worried about the racial profiling of their community, but rather must integrate further into their communities. They must learn that there can only be respect for their faith when they are not silent about the acts that some would commit in the name of it. This will spare them a reign of terror like that of the IRA's. Because, if 7/7 wasn't a message to moderate Muslims to get with the program, it should be said that that message is already being played daily in Baghdad. And that's the message we really don't want to be played in the streets of London or New York or D.C.---or anywhere for that matter.

It's past time for them to choose.

Posted by: Kathy at 10:17 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Wherever that might be.

Like Martini Boy, I find it particularly delicious that the unions are turning on one another. And they deserve it.

After years of horrific mismanagement, corruption and thuggish behavior, they're trying to find a way to make themselves more relevant in this modern age. Problem is, as Martini Boy pointed out, is that everything they're "fighting for" has now been enacted into legislation, with OSHA and other regulatory agencies fighting their battles for them, ergo they're irrelevant.

They've shot themselves in the foot, in other words, and now they're whining about who pulled the trigger.

The husband's family---his father, in particular---have spent their entire lives working in manufacturing and trucking and some of the stories they've told could and will make your hair curl. What happened to Stephen's uncle, while appalling, is hardly uncommon. One of the husband's uncles worked for Maytag for years---in Iowa, which is a Right to Work state---and, in direct violation of the laws of the State of Iowa, was outed to the entire factory as a non-union member in a union newsletter. Which, of course, led to harrassment on the factory floor. Nothing was ever done about it. Another uncle, in the late sixties, ran a trucking operation out of the Quad Cities. He managed a non-union shop that did runs from Moline up to Chicago. This, if you know the history of the Teamsters, was not a good idea. This particular uncle was in Chicago one time and was "invited" to come and chat with a particular individual. That particular individual turned out to be Jimmy Hoffa himself, who told the uncle, in no uncertain terms, that he'd better start hiring Teamsters to do the driving---and only Teamsters---or there would be trouble. This uncle eventually took another job, but found out some twenty years later that "Mr. Hoffa" had put a contract out on his life. And that the contract was still good, all those years later.

Even the father-in-law has had his own run-ins. An apprentice tool and die maker, he worked at the Rock Island Arsenal when he was just starting out and, partly because of the harrassment he'd seen dished out to his elder siblings, he refused to go union. I believe the fact that the arsenal was a federally run institution saved his bacon on union membership, but I could be wrong. What's particularly interesting in the father-in-law's case was that he eventually worked his way up to management, winding up as the general manager of the first car parts manufacturing plant in America that actually shipped parts to the Japanese. He's moved around in his career quite a bit, but he's still a manufacturing manager and he's never worked in a plant that was union since his days at the Arsenal. He always makes sure his employees are safe and well-paid because he doesn't want the unions coming in. He learned the lesson the unions were threatening and coercing people to learn with their tactics: treat your employees well. The father-in-law did so and he's never had to deal with a union ever again. He may bitch about OSHA's lock-out/tag-out procedures, but he follows the law to the letter: he just doesn't want to have to deal with it, so he works hard to make certain he doesn't have to.

Unions, in this day and age, have painted themselves into the corner of irrelevancy. Most people think them corrupt: which is an image the unions have worked hard over the years to downplay. What I find interesting is that the proof is always and forever in the pudding. When I managed the Caribou, it was located inside a grocery store, which was, of course, union, Minnesota not being a Right To Work state. I cannot tell you how many cashiers worked 39.5 hours a week. These employees were union members, yet the union never stepped up to ensure they could get benefits to go with this full-time employment. They never lobbied the management of the grocery stores to list full-time employment at less than forty-hours a week. I, the manager of a non-union coffee shop, hit FT when I worked 36 hours a week. My employees were elgible for health insurance and the company 401K plan when they worked more than 22 hours a week for three months. This, of course, says nothing of the poor stock and bag boys and girls, who were mostly under the age of eighteen, who were excited to receive their first paycheck and yet were dismayed when it actually arrived. Why? Because a big percentage had been automatically deducted for union dues. Dues for a union they were ineligible to join because they were under the age of eighteen, and, more importantly, a union they had never signed up for membership in the first place. When the story became clear---that they could not work at the grocery store without being a member of the grocery union---they came looking to me for a job. Which I couldn't give them because my store was grandfathered into a verbal agreement wherein the grocery store management wouldn't poach my employees and I wouldn't poach theirs. I felt bad for all of these people. They paid money to a union who took money from their paychecks without their permission and who did absolutely nothing for them when it came right down to the nitty gritty of the matter. Mr. H's dad was a Teamster for years. His trucking company offered him early retirement, in part because the math dictated that it was cheaper in the long run to hire younger, less senior labor, and to put the more senior union members out to pasture than it was to solely rely on the more senior union members for this company's workforce. Mr. H's dad took the deal and retired. Now he's working again, driving shipments of gravel for a nursery who supplies landscapers. Why? Because the cost of his Teamster's health insurance went up. He has to work to be able to afford the union health insurance. I could go on, but I think you get the gist: they've made things so expensive, not only for employers, but for their members as well. There is more of a downside to union membership these days than there is an upside.

You'd think the Unions would slap each other on the back nowadays, telling each other "good job," and then move on to other labor causes in other places. But they don't. They stay in highly developed countries, where in the level of living is high---hence the dues they collect are high---and live off of that, whilst bleating on about a cause that has less and less relevance in said world. After all, it may be the AFL-CIO International but international only means the U.S. and Canada. There are plenty of people in Asia, Central and South America, to name a few places home to the world's sweatshops, that could use their help. These workers are truly underpaid, abused and work in unsafe conditions. But the big unions don't go there and organize the labor. They stay here and cause trouble because it's more comfortable.

Makes you wonder what Eugene V. Debs would think of their behavior, eh?

Posted by: Kathy at 12:04 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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I do not like waking up to hear that a city that I dearly love is in the midst of a bomb scare...

...again.

UPDATE: Tim Worstall has more. As does Europhobia. Insty, of course, is on the case, too.

From what little real news I can gather by watching cable news, it seems as if these terrorists either a. had a bad batch of explosives or b. had one seriously incompetent bomb maker in their employ. Whichever it is, thank God for it. This could have been much, much worse than it seems it is.

I also hope that the reporting about what's going down at University College Hospital is correct. If it is, that means one of them is alive and, hopefully, if he's apprehended they might be able to get information from him.

The other observation of the morning is that Christiane Amanpour is seriously annoying. Sheesh. Talk about having a big head. Nic Robertson was doing a perfectly fine job and then Christiane shows up and he gets booted so she can bloviate about how this is because of the UK's participation in Iraq. Sheesh. It took her less than fifteen minutes to bring that up. I suppose you could applaud her for her restraint in waiting that long, but no matter which way you slice it, is presumptous in the extreme. You have a fluid situation, where there is much reporting to be done because no one seems to have the whole story and she injects politics into it. What a little shit she is.

Posted by: Kathy at 09:18 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Have you heard about Tom Tancredo? I'd never heard of him until he said this:

A Colorado congressman told a radio show host that the U.S. could "take out" Islamic holy sites if Muslim fundamentalist terrorists attacked the country with nuclear weapons.

Rep. Tom Tancredo made his remarks Friday on WFLA-AM in Orlando, Florida. His spokesman stressed he was only speaking hypothetically.

Talk show host Pat Campbell asked the Littleton Republican how the country should respond if terrorists struck several U.S. cities with nuclear weapons.

"Well, what if you said something like -- if this happens in the United States, and we determine that it is the result of extremist, fundamentalist Muslims, you know, you could take out their holy sites," Tancredo answered.

"You're talking about bombing Mecca," Campbell said.

"Yeah," Tancredo responded.

The congressman later said he was "just throwing out some ideas" and that an "ultimate threat" might have to be met with an "ultimate response."{...}

So, the guy's obviously an idiot, right? You'd think all sane people would agree that he's an idiot. Well, apparently not. LaShawn Barber thinks he's right on the money.

{...}Congressman Tom Tancredo, the only true conservative in Congress and the only politician on Capitol Hill who takes a hard line against illegal aliens, said that if Islamofascists upgraded to nuclear attacks, we could threaten to bomb Muslim holy sites.

Republicans and Democrats are jumping all over him, mischaracterizing his remarks. They believe Tancredo should apologize. He said he wonÂ’t, and I hope he doesnÂ’t. I stand behind him 100 percent, even as Republicans and so-called conservatives demand an apology. We need tough talk and tough action on global terrorism, and what Tancredo said was actually mild compared to what Islamofascists have in mind for us.{...}

As Doug says:

LaShawn thinks the billion plus Muslims witnessing such an attack would kick their feet and convert to some more convenient religion once Mecca was nuked? Please. The only certainty is that they'd know who NOT to turn to for security. And that would be the nation that nuked Mecca on the basis of simple religious affiliation. The same religious affiliation they personally hold.

As I noted yesterday, LaShawn's position is morally, tactically, and strategically wrong. She cannot explain the benefit, and she conveniently doesn't even try. Her post is barren of substance. She admires the fact that it "talks tough" to terrorists.

Hey LaShawn - then why not threaten them with blowing up the whole planet, you freakin' pantywaist?! That's even tougher!{...}

I'm with Doug. Ignoring the political and social ramifications of such an action---or even threatening such an action---it's pretty clear that LaShawn doesn't have the props to claim she's a hawk as she's lacking in the few simple notions that govern the strategy associated with nuclear weapons, which is if you have them, you generally don't have to shoot them off. The knowledge of said weapons is, indeed, a weapon in itself. It ups the ante.

This strategy is called MAD---Mutually Assured Destruction and any undergraduate political science student knows what it's about. Two countries have nuclear weapons. Does one country fire their nukes on the other, knowing full well that if they do, they'll be blown up as well? No, they don't. The only option to use a nuke successfully is to use it on an enemy that does not have such weapons with which to retailiate, and that is only going to work if said country has not allied itself with a country which will retaliate for it. This is why we invaded Iraq, but not North Korea. This is why it's crucial that Iran not be allowed to develop nuclear weapons. This is why it's a cause for worry every time Pakistan and India start going round after round on Kashmir. But mostly this is why it's not a good idea to ratchet up the rhetoric in regards to what you will bomb with your nukes. With MAD you have a built-in balance; you shoot yours off? Well, the other guy's going to shoot his off at you and you're going to get it just as bad as they did. It's pretty simple stuff, on the whole. But to make sure MAD works, you have to---ahem---keep your mouth shut for the most part. Nuclear weapons are most effective as a weapon when they serve the purpose of deterrance, ya dig?

One could, theoretically, argue that MAD is not going to work with non-nation state aligned Islamofascists. Continuing that argument, one could say that it was a good thing that Tancredo shot his mouth off about Mecca, to let the Islamofascists know just what was at stake. I disagree: first off, we are a nation-state: we will not bomb a target in a country that is our ally because said target has great meaning for the Islamofascists. Leaving aside the question of whether we can really consider Saudi Arabia to be our ally in the first place, it's nonetheless just plain stupid. We will not bomb a target that has meaning for more people---a billion people---than just our would-be attackers. It's not a proportional or rational response. And the last thing anyone wants in such a situation is an irrational response. Second, according to the principles of MAD, if you shoot your mouth off about targeting a certain city which holds great meaning for your enemy, perhaps, just perhaps, you would be encouraging them in their nuclear activities, so that we would think twice about targeting Mecca. Because, you see, MAD swings both ways: they would want to protect their holy city and they could do that if they had their own nukes and let us know about it.

Have no doubts about it, we are not in the cat bird seat when it comes to a rogue nuclear strike. During the Cold War, we did not shoot our weapons off at the USSR, and they did not shoot their back at us because our capabilities were, roughly, the same. On either side of the equation, the end product would be the same: not only the annihilation of our enemy, but of ourselves. There is much to be made of SAC and our capability to strike back in the event of a nuclear attack, but any way you slice it, the end result was the same. In this situation, we would only be able to retaliate: it's one thing to invade Afghanistan using conventional warfare because they are harboring terrorists; it is entirely another to claim that we would use nuclear weapons on Mecca if we were attacked by rogue, non-nation-state aligned terrorists. It ups the ante, which we've already established is not a good thing when it comes to nuclear capabilities. Leaving aside the rogue Islamofascists for a moment, think about Tancredo's remarks in terms of relations with one particular nation-state we consider to be an ally: do we really want Saudi Arabia, of all nations, to think they need to start acquring nukes to protect Mecca? Is that action going to stop the spread of Wahhabism? Would that bring about the changes we would like to see in the way the House of Saud governs that country? Sheesh. Think about it for a minute. Sticks and stones may break your bones, but words, when employed to throw nuclear threats around, really can hurt you. That's not a "weak" response; it's a sensible one.

So, when it comes right down to it, Tancredo is an idiot who knows absolutely nothing about nuclear strategy. He is playing a dangerous game that has serious ramifications to it. And anyone, LaShawn included, who thinks that "talking tough" to the terrorists on a nuclear level is going to get them to back down, or to mend their ways, is not exactly thinking things through. It's a whole different ballgame. It's simply ramping it up to another level---another level which could mean plenty of people would be killed, and not just Muslims. Furthermore, to make the claim that anyone who's "really conservative" should be advocating such an action is ignoring the example set down by Ronald Wilson Reagan, the man who---ahem--won the freakin' war without blowing ourselves up in the meantime. He did not win the war by using inflamed, Krushchev-like rhetoric (Remember the Cuban Missile Crisis? Remember dear old Nikita slamming his shoe on the podium at the UN? Remember the words, "We will bury you"? Did that cool things down? Hmmmm?); he won it by using MAD to its utmost capability: he bankrupted the Soviet Union. If that's not "conservative" enough for you, well, jeez, I don't know what will or could ever be.

Tancredo should apologize for his ignorant remarks and he should do it on the floor of the House of Representatives. That needs to be in the record, lest someone get the wrong idea about what, precisely, the United States' response would be in regards to a rogue Islamofascist nuclear attack on our soil.

Posted by: Kathy at 11:37 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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I'm not the only one who's ticked off by the "health impact fee."

Pawlenty was on Hewitt last night (Not like I listened. Good thing, too, otherwise I would have called in and reamed them both.) and Hewitt backed up Pawlenty and said:

{...}You know, I actually have no problem with that. I don't care what the anti-tax hard core says, I believe in taxing the heck out of cigarettes because of externalities and [unintelligible]. It's good economics.

Good economics? GOOD economics? What the hell is the matter with you, Hugh? You're advocating taxing the hell out of tobacco products to cover up a budgetary shortfall. How, precisely, do you plan on doing that when people will either quit or will buy their cigarettes online, thereby shortcircuiting your tax. How, exactly, is that action going to bring revenue in? And, do remember, Hugh you're trying to balance a budget here. You have to bring in income because you didn't cut or reduce spending and this is your chosen method of balancing the books. You might want to make sure it's guaranteed before you call it "Good Economics." Because it most assuredly ain't good economics to let the State of Minnesota's checks bounce.

Pawlenty then went on to confirm the reasoning I laid out in this post:

{...}Well, you know, I don't, I'm not a big fan of growing revenues through new mechanisms like this as I hope I've proven as governor but the bottom line was we had a historic government shutdown we had to find common ground and compared to the alternatives of the Democrats wanting to tax everything including income and business taxes and a variety of other things. This was the least offensive. And the good news is other states have done it and smoking has decreased dramatically, and so this has a health benefit as well.{...}

Yep. Let's not piss off big business or raise income taxes or even---GASP!---cut or reduce spending. Let's go with the path of least resistance, shall we? Let's raise taxes on nasty people who do things that disagree with our delicate noses---and yes, Tim, it's a tax. Smoking may be voluntary, but the paying of said "health impact fee" most assuredly isn't---because that's the easy way out. Furthermore, let's claim that we didn't raise taxes when we did! It's PERFECT!

As far as the "health benefit" is concerned, well, geez, Tim, I helped to elect you Governor. I didn't elect you to be my freakin' nanny. If I want to pollute my lungs that's my choice. Not yours. Furthermore I shouldn't be taxed to hell and back to make up for your shortcomings as a negotiator.

King Banian of SCSU Scholars has a fantastic post on this. Money quote:

{...}Last, if the budget deficit was as small as Hugh figures out -- and he's right -- why do both of these smart conservatives go right past the other solution, the one the tax pledge was supposed to produce: REDUCE SPENDING. In a $31 billion budget, you couldn't find $400 million of cuts? Why accept the level of spending as fixed??? And they're not cuts, they are simply reductions in the rate of increase in spending. This budget is for $30.5 billion (to be precise); the 2004-05 budget was for $28.2.{...}

Go read King's entire post. It's well worth your time.

Oh, and Lileks, you're on my shitlist, too, for agreeing with Hewitt.

{...}JL: As much as I like the anti-tax pledgers there are some times when you have to bend and if you want to stomp your feet and run away and read your Ayn Rand again, I mean that's fine, but politics is not about purity sometimes it's about getting things done.{...}

Oh, yes, where's my copy of Atlas Shrugged? It must be around here somewhere. Perhaps there's a chapter in there that I missed about "getting things done" rather than letting the state tax me further up the wazoo when the wazoo is pretty darn deep as it is.

Chad knocks some sense into Hewitt, who seems to believe "I mean...it's normal. You have to tax something, tax smoke"

{...}Not only is raising taxes "normal", we really have no choice because, according to Hugh, "you got to tax something." We do? Why exactly is raising taxes the only possible solution? God forbid if we could possibly have gotten by without increasing spending as much as we did. What would happen to the schools if we didn't pour an additional $800 some million dollars into them? A cynic might ask exactly what this additional educational largesse is really going to get us, but it's all "about the children" so it would be rude and unseemly to demand to see reforms or results, wouldn't it?

I'm trying to think of what other things it would be "normal" to tax at higher rates. You know, things that are voluntary and may have negative externalities. Things like, well I don't know, maybe snack foods. How about a Cheeto tax Hugh? Or a Diet Coke tax? A Docker's tax? The burden would fall chiefly on white, middle-aged men, so why not? How about a tax on crappy folk music? Talk about negative externalities.{...}

Negative externalities, indeed. It's a "fee" when it doesn't affect you. When it does affect you, it's a "tax" and geez, THEN, by golly, they've crossed the line.

The Republic of Kathyland---where I, Kathy, would serve as benevolent dictator for life---is sounding better and better every damn day I live in this state.

Oh, and we've already decided that the ciggies will be duty free in Kathyland.

Posted by: Kathy at 04:23 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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For me, when I read a brilliant piece of summation, it feels like I've slipped into a warm bubble bath after a day of mucking about in the mire. All the dirt and the confusion just slips from my body and my brain is much eased because of it.

Thanks to Martini Boy, I just had that experience. He gently hands Sully a brown paper bag to hyperventilate into:

I read earlier this week that, at 42, Andrew has now spent exactly half of his life in America. Maybe by the time he's 63, he'll get it. What I mean is, this is how America once was, and how America is, and how - I hope - America will always be. Let me quote from Walter Russell Mead's "The Jacksonian Tradition":

Indeed, of all the major currents in American society, Jacksonians have the least regard for international law and international institutions. They prefer the rule of custom to the written law, and that is as true in the international sphere as it is in personal relations at home. Jacksonians believe that there is an honor code in international life — as there was in clan warfare in the borderlands of England — and those who live by the code will be treated under it. But those who violate the code — who commit terrorist acts in peacetime, for example — forfeit its protection and deserve no consideration.

You don't have to be a native-born American of Scots-Irish descent to be a Jacksonian American - although it probably helps. However, being a Cambridge-educated Briton living on the East Coast is almost certainly a hindrance. Sully just doesn't get it.

I don't begrudge Sullivan his opinion. It's his, and I've watched him ably create and defend it. However, when he claims that our rough treatment of rough characters "is not the America it once was," he's displaying an almost-willful misunderstanding of America's wartime mores. In WWII, German POWs were accorded proper respect. Those few Japanese who surrendered were largely not.

Why the difference? Germany declared war on us before attacking; Japan didn't. When a German soldier showed the white flag, he usually meant it; a Japanese solider usually didn't. Germany treated American POWs according to the Geneva Conventions. Japan treated American POWs to the Bataan Death March.

Today we're faced with an enemy who never signed onto the Geneva Conventions. An enemy who hides in plain clothes among civilians, who wages war against civilians, and who began this war with a surprise attack. {...}

Martini Boy's right: Sully just doesn't get it. I've often thought that dear Andrew was a bit wrapped up in the romantic notion that is America and is often afraid to look at the hard reality which allows the romantic notions of America to exist: that we are not afraid to defend what is ours when attacked, and we'll do it by any means necessary. Play fair with us, and you'll likely receive the same. Don't play fair, and we won't either. Sully doesn't get that. He just seems to assume, for some strange reason, that America and her soldiers have some obligation to take what's dished out because we're bigger and better than everyone else. It's like we're the rich taxpayer who keeps getting nailed by the IRS: we're expected to pay up and to hand over the cash with a smile on our face. Problem is, this time the IRS isn't just coming to audit us, he's coming to kill us and, if he has his way, our entire way of life, which Sully holds dear, will go the way of the Dodo. Sully, while well-meaning, seems to think that by holding fast to the principles this nation was founded on will alone ensure our victory.

Ummm, no.

That's a nice romantic notion, and I would like to believe it's possible, but it wasn't the thought of "All Men Are Created Equal" that got the besieged 101st Airborne through the Battle of the Bulge. That lovely notion didn't give those men sustenance while they were having the shit shelled out of them in the Ardenne forest. It was the thought that once the weather cleared and they got supplies in, they could go and get the guys who were shelling the shit out of them. See the difference? It's a big difference. Sully would not have us dirty our hands in defense of our nation. He would have us be the bigger, nobler man each and every time and it's not going to work. Sometimes you have to fight fire with fire and, when you do, you can't spend the majority of your time worrying about if you're going to get burned. It's like the enemy is some abstract concept for him, while the concrete is America's principles.

Go read the whole thing. Twice.

Posted by: Kathy at 09:31 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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The shutdown is over. The legislation has been signed.

And Tim Pawlenty is going down.

Because he's a liar.

No new taxes---oops, it's a "Health Impact Fee." My bad---my ass. What's even better is that he admits he's a liar. Of course, though, it's in the fine print.

Pawlenty also proclaimed the budget package that was completed Wednesday a balanced, bipartisan compromise, saying that "the process was ugly, but the product is good."

He claimed victory in a dozen areas, handing out a checklist of achievements led by "Don't raise taxes" and a status box that listed it as "Done." It also had a footnote in which Pawlenty noted the controversy surrounding the health impact fee.

"Some people call it a tax, some call it a fee, I call it a solution," he told reporters.

{my emphasis}

So, here's what I'd like to know Monsieur Pawlenty---who I consider to be so bad he's practically French---if smokers can't, you know, smoke anywhere in the Twin Cities metropolitan area because smoking's been banned in bars and restaurants, how exactly are you going to fund all these WONDERFUL programs with tobacco taxes?

Hmmmm?

Don't you think that you and your cronies---and yes, I include you in their company because you lobbied to take the entire state smoke-free---sort of pulled the rug out from under yourselves on this one? Because, if you want us to buy cigarettes, we have to have places to smoke. You have to keep us hooked, otherwise, geez, you won't have any state funding.

Whoops! That thar's one heck of a "solution," Tim.

I cannot stand politicians who lie and then try to get away with it. I know this includes pretty much all of them, but you'd think the guy would at least have some shame about fibbing so blatantly. But he doesn't. Not one ounce of burning, red shame for lying. He's covering himself with semantics and he's completely unrepentant about it. He didn't have the guts to cut spending, or even to whip the legislature into the least modicum of shape, and the smokers---because we're bad, bad people---are the ones who have to pay for his laziness and inefficiency. He couldn't get a deal and keep everyone happy, so he opted for the "safe" people to tax. The people he didn't think he'd lose with by taxing them. He didn't want to lose support from big taxpayers, like corporations or people with fat wallets, so he taxed the people he just assumed wouldn't vote for him anyway, if they voted at all. Because, let's face it, most smokers are living on the poverty line: they probably vote a straight DFL ticket anyway.

Interesting how one gets pegged because of one's activities, isn't it?

I hate to say this, but at this stage of the game, I want Jesse back. At least he cared.

Posted by: Kathy at 12:12 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Tim Pawlenty just lost my vote.

I remember his 2002 campaign for Governor. I remember promises about cutting government spending. I remember promises about no new taxes. I remember these things. I voted for the man. These things were attractive to me then, just as much as they are now.

So, you know, when he can't get the damn DFL'ers (and the Republicans are to blame here, too) in the legislature to stop spending because he's too much of a pussy to strongarm them into cutting spending, what's, apparently, his only course of action?

To raise taxes. Not on corporations. Not on individual income. No, he chooses to raise taxes by raising the cigarette tax by $0.75.

He's calling it a "health impact fee." So it's not a "tax" in his book. It's a "fee."

Despite the fact that the State of Minnesota and Blue Cross Blue Shield settled a lawsuit against the tobacco companies for SIX BILLION---WITH A 'B'---DOLLARS. They sued because of "increased health care costs due to smokers." The problem with this scenario? The legislature can't touch that cash. Why? Because, after they paid off Blue Cross Blue Shield and these guys, the remaining cash is earmarked for SMOKING PREVENTION PROGRAMS. Meaning the legislature can't spend dime one of the settlement. That's gotta sting, don't you think? All that money and they can't spend it. Sheesh. Talk about hell for legislators, eh? Sort of like Paul Simon being stuck in an elevator for all of eternity being forced to listen to Mrs. Robinson on Muzak.

So, there's a budget shortfall. They need cash to make up the difference. And, let's face it, kids, where do you think they're going to go? Why, to the smokers! Tally-freakin-ho! Smoking is eeeevil. People who smoke are pariahs. Why shouldn't they pick up the tab? After all, they're perfectly willing to pay x amount of dollars now...they'll keep paying it. They're addicted. Of course they will. So, you see, we smokers are easy targets. We're---apparently---asking to take it up the ass. And, boy, when state government CAN'T GET ITS SHIT TOGETHER, we're the ones who, of course, have to pay for it all.

So, my devoted Cake Eater Readers, despite the fact I'm a registered Republican, you will perhaps understand why I am henceforth declaring war on Tim Pawlenty. You will understand why I will do everything in my power to mock, ridicule and, in general, screw the man over as much as he's screwing me over because he hasn't the balls to keep the promises he made when he ran for election.

UPDATE: And Pawlenty, reportedly, likes Bloggers so much he invited a bunch of MOB'ers to the Governor's Mansion. I wonder if I'll get invited sometime in the near future. One can only hope!

Posted by: Kathy at 12:22 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Go read. Really and truly. It's required.

Posted by: Kathy at 08:32 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Courtesy o' the Llamas

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