Category Archives: Politics

Mr. Omega to Alpha Male Obama: ‘Quit Your Cr-p!’

Barack Obama, Business, Democrats, Education, Elections, Political Economy, Politics

“If I am not for myself, then who will be for me? … And if not now, when?” said Rabbi Hillel the Elder.

At last a fabulously rich, self-made man has awoken to the fact that it’s time to fight for his life’s work; stand up for his achievements, take pride in his intelligence and graft. Quit pretending an agitator from Chicago, who has lived off the public teat for his entire life, is better than a billionaire who has built a business from scratch. Billionaire investor Leon Cooperman has “made public his letter to the President.” Read it on Gerri Willis’ Fox Business blog.

I like the part where he shows president ponce what real work means, although I am sick of the give-back fallacy or the pleas about divisiveness. That the president is divisive is secondary to the fact that he’s an ass with ears, ignorant of economics and oblivious to rights.

To the letter (I think Cooperman is far more eloquent than Peggy Noonan, Court Courtesan to Bush, whom Cooperman praises):

Just to be clear, while I have been richly rewarded by a life of hard work (and a great deal of luck), I was not to-the-manor-born. My father was a plumber who practiced his trade in the South Bronx after he and my mother emigrated from Poland. I was the first member of my family to earn a college degree. I benefited from both a good public education system (P.S. 75, Morris High School and Hunter College, all in the Bronx) and my parents’ constant prodding. When I joined Goldman Sachs following graduation from Columbia University’s business school, I had no money in the bank, a negative net worth, a National Defense Education Act student loan to repay, and a six-month-old child (not to mention his mother, my wife of now 47 years) to support. I had a successful, near-25-year run at Goldman, which I left 20 years ago to start a private investment firm. As a result of my good fortune, I have been able to give away to those less blessed far more than I have spent on myself and my family over a lifetime, and last year I subscribed to Warren Buffet’s Giving Pledge to ensure that my money, properly stewarded, continues to do some good after I’m gone.

My story is anything but unique. I know many people who are similarly situated, by both humble family history and hard-won accomplishment, whose greatest joy in life is to use their resources to sustain their communities. Some have achieved a level of wealth where philanthropy is no longer a by-product of their work but its primary impetus. This is as it should be. We feel privileged to be in a position to give back, and we do. My parents would have expected nothing less of me.

I am not, by training or disposition, a policy wonk, polemicist or pamphleteer. I confess admiration for those who, with greater clarity of expression and command of the relevant statistical details, make these same points with more eloquence and authoritativeness than I can hope to muster. For recent examples, I would point you to “Hunting the Rich” (Leaders, The Economist, September 24, 2011), “The Divider vs. the Thinker” (Peggy Noonan, The Wall Street Journal, October 29, 2011), “Wall Street Occupiers Misdirect Anger” (Christine Todd Whitman, Bloomberg, October 31, 2011), and “Beyond Occupy” (Bill Keller, The New York Times, October 31, 2011) – all, if you haven’t read them, making estimable work of the subject. …

Read more.

Super Politburo: Teflon Politics at its Best

Debt, Democrats, Economy, Politics, Republicans

The more pertinent point to make about the Super Committee, and its failure today to come up with “$1.2 trillion in deficit-reduction measures,” is not that it is unelected. Unelected and unaccountable is the hallmark of the shakers and movers of our Managerial State.

A soviet-style, souped-up politburo is making decisions that are generally entrusted to the people’s representatives. That’s the mundane and obvious complaint that has been lodged against the Super Committee.

But who in his right mind still believes that elected representatives in this democracy of ours carry out the will of the majority and protect the minority? (A point belabored in “Into the cannibal’s Pot” is that democracy gives “the People’s representatives carte blanche to do exactly as they please.”)

The people’s business in the welfare-warfare managerial state is relegated to unaccountable, usually faceless bureaucrats, ensconced in enormous bureaucracies. Nothing unusual about that. We’re lucky to know the identity of the “twelve members of Congress, six from the House of Representatives and six from the Senate,” who’re officiating.

Of course this committee was destined to fail. There is no climbing out from under a government debt of $15 trillion when the pols and the people don’t want to downsize their taxpayer-sustained life styles. (Let’s see some leadership from our men and women in uniform; join the civilian workforce.)

The point about the Super Committee is that it has only ever been about Teflon politics: make sure nothing clings to the culprits, members of both Houses and the president. Its achievement—also its aim—is that it puts distance between the debt, on the one hand, and the Congress and the president on the other.

UPDATED: Newt Gingrich Slithers Around in Jacksonville

Conservatism, Elections, Morality, Political Philosophy, Politics, Republicans

He was supposed to be courting the tea party in a town hall meeting in Jacksonville, Florida. But Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich did everything but. Google reflects the focus in the media on a single question one toadying attendee asked the speaker; she was bemoaning media bias against Newt, who is the consummate insider. They’ve all neglected Gingrich’s reply to a preceding and very poignant question from a tea partier.

For this reason, I am unable to bring you the question and the answer arrogant Gingrich gave. But the speaker, in essence, told this hard-core fellow that he had asked the wrong question with respect to the candidate’s fidelity to conservatism. He, Newt, would be governing an enormous country and he would, therefore, tailor and aim his policies to holding a 60 percent majority.

Can anyone locate the snake’s exact words?

UPDATE (Nov. 19): Kerry, unless I missed it, the link you provided doesn’t feature the question to which I was referring. It was from a pissed-off tea-partier. He wanted to know how faithful NG would be to tea party principles. Not at all was the sum of the arrogant Gingrich’s reply.

Daughter Dominatrix

Feminism, Gender, John McCain, Politics, Relatives, Republicans, The Zeitgeist

What is it about the Republican presidential- and vice presidential contenders that they sire and celebrate the most brazen of tarts as daughters?

I am referring to the clone of a woman whose genetic material should not be replicated. The clone is Elizabeth Huntsman, daughter/dominatrix to Jon Huntsman. The real McCoy is Meghaaaann McCain. IQ-wise, the Huntsman valley girl, whose voice also sounds as though it has been squeezed from the other end of her anatomy (to use a Greg-Gutfeld analogy I’ve refined)—is better endowed, no doubt. Meghaaan is mega-dense.

Otherwise, the two females share more than puffy, painted mugs, and the extra pounds they carry with such in-you-face, “You-go-girl” pride. (“I’m like, a real womaaaan.”)

Meghan is still the greatest ditz to date to emerge from that big tent that Republicans keep touting. But in contemporary America, where youth is imbued with mythical qualities, and Rousseau’s Noble Savage is applied to small savages—both E. Huntsman and M. McCain are destined for “greatness.”

Huntsman’s other two daughters, Abigail and Maryann, are rather refined, lovely young ladies, And they don’t need a voice coach either. Their propensity for mind-numbing political banalities is another matter entirely.

The new “Jon” on the block (as opposed to the old political pimp, John McCain) doesn’t look good when he lets a tasteless tartlet p–sy whip him in public.