The D’oh* Factor In D.C. & ‘The Washington Compost’

Barack Obama, Intelligence, Left-Liberalism And Progressivisim

OMG, Dana Milbank of “the Washington Compost” (radio Mouth Mark Levine’s apt moniker) has written a column titled “Obama, the Pariah President.” Not that you’d know it from this column, but it would appear that the love-fest is over. Paraded under the “opinion banner,” the Milbank column is a simple report, the sum total of which is, “Obama went here to campaign and then this bad thing happened to him, and then he went to another place where more shit happened, and ‘people began to trickle out’ on him, but this could have been because they were running to catch a shuttle.”

Pretty much.

The news here is not the diminishing support for the president, which is, presumably, the veiled message embedded in Milbank’s unprepossessing piffle, but, rather, it is that a prestigious newspaper not only mislabels Milbank as an “opinion” writer, when he writes reportage festooned with a suggestion or two.

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal is a tad more creative on Twitter, following the New York Times’ report today “that Obama is seething about the Ebola response.” What Jindal calls the Barack Obama School of Crisis Management is better termed BHO’s Standard Operating Procedure (SOP), because the president’s pattern is all sleight of hand; nothing but a self-serving production.

Stage 1: Don’t worry, I got this.
Stage 2: I’m so mad.
Stage 3: More money will fix it.
Stage 4: Republicans are obstructing.

* “Doh is an exclamation popularized by the fictional character Homer Simpson.” (Wikipedia)

Bob & Carol Dawson’s Parrot Paradise

Environmentalism & Animal Rights, Ethics, Human Accomplishment, Morality

An uplifting couple of hours were spent today, Sunday, at the “Macaw Rescue and Sanctuary,” a magical parrot oasis, built and operated by the best of Western Washington, Bob and Carol Dawson. (Make that the best of the best.) Not since Sean and I visited Christy Hensrude’s Zazu’s House Parrot Sanctuary have we been so inspired. (We endorse both rescues unequivocally.)

In preparation for the first of many such future volunteer visits, we made toys galore from non-toxic wood Sean had cut in the garage. (Reluctantly, Oscar-Wood donated some of his colorful stash of beads.) Mounds of fresh, organic greens, assorted vegetables and fruits were washed (very thoroughly) and tossed with organic seed (pumpkin, sunflower, hemp and flax) as well as nuts, smashed in-shell with a meat pounder, so that the smaller birds could enjoy Brazil, pecan and walnut.

The food we served in Bob’s high-quality dishes, which required hardly any scrubbing. Yes, down to the smallest detail, these people are driven by devotion. So too were the toys hung. But most inspiring was taking in the totality of Bob and Carol’s creation, all 22 acres of it. Situated in beautiful rural western Washington and ranked #16 of 290 charities in the region; “Macaw Rescue and Sanctuary” is a glorious, well-kept and smartly run haven—a home to hundreds upon hundreds of free-flying flocks of happy, thriving parrots.

“Macaw Rescue and Sanctuary” is truly a labor of love.

DONATE!

With Bob Dawson in front of the small-bird enclosure:

Yummy:

The same enormous enclosure snapped from the outside:

This man is the real deal:

From The Parrot Archive:

“Oscar-Wood, Non-Stop Naughty”
“‘Dead Birds Flying’: Help Steve Boyes Help The Cape Parrot”
Precious Oscar-Wood Pacifies Himself

Sobering Look At The Threat Of Ebola

Healthcare, IMMIGRATION, Science

“Six Reasons to Panic,” at the Weekly Standard, offers a sobering, scientific look at the threat of Ebola:

1. According to the New England Journal of Medicine, … this Ebola is related to, but genetically distinct from, previous known strains, and thus may have distinct mechanisms of transmission. … Not everyone is convinced that this Ebola isn’t airborne. Last month, the University of Minnesota’s Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy published an article arguing that the current Ebola has “unclear modes of transmission” and that “there is scientific and epidemiologic evidence that Ebola virus has the potential to be transmitted via infectious aerosol particles … even if this Ebola isn’t airborne right now, it might become so in the future. Viruses mutate and evolve in the wild, and the population of infected Ebola carriers is now bigger than it has been at any point in history—meaning that the pool for potential mutations is larger than it has ever been.

2. General infection rates are terrifying, too. … despite the fact that Duncan was a lone man under scrupulous, first-world care, with the eyes of the entire nation on him, his R0 [“‘reproduction number’ … how many new infections each infected person causes”] was 2, just like that of your average Liberian Ebola victim. One carrier; two infections.

4. … The worst-case scenario envisioned by the [CDC] model is anywhere from 537,000 to 1,367,000 cases by January. Just in Liberia. With the fever [is] still raging out of control. …

5. … Marine Corps General John F. Kelly talked about Ebola at the National Defense University two weeks ago and mused about what would happen if Ebola reached Haiti or Central America, which have relatively easy access to America. “If it breaks out, it’s literally ‘Katie bar the door,’ and there will be mass migration into the United States,” Kelly said. “They will run away from Ebola, or if they suspect they are infected, they will try to get to the United States for treatment.” …

6. … it’s a straw-man argument to say that a flight ban wouldn’t keep Ebola fully contained. No one says it would. But by definition, it would help slow the spread of the virus. If there had been a travel ban in place, Thomas Duncan would have likely reached the same sad fate—but without infecting two Americans and setting the virus loose in North America. … Ebola has the potential to reshuffle American attitudes to immigration. If you agree to seal the borders to mitigate the risks from Ebola, you’re implicitly rejecting the “open borders” mindset and admitting that there are cases in which government has a duty to protect citizens from outsiders …

It is quite something when an “elite institution” like the Weekly Standard concedes that, “We have arrived at a moment with our elite institutions where it is impossible to distinguish incompetence from willful misdirection.”

All The President’s Women II

Barack Obama, Feminism, Gender, Government

Departing Secret Service Director Julia Pierson, Marie Barf, the sibilant spokeswoman at the State Department, Lois Lerner of the IRS, Martha Johnson, head-honcho for the General Services Administration, and the heavy hitters, Susan Rice, Hillary Clinton and Samantha Power: In “All The President’s Women,” we chronicled the qualities that make some of the president’s women such smashing successes.

But there are more. A “hell of a job” did Sylvia M. Burwell do, as head of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), at preventing Ebola from reaching the US. Two young women have been infected and are fighting for their lives. “We know how to do this, and we will do it again,” boasted House Homeland Security adviser Lisa Monaco, who has also shown great promise, you’ll agree, at executing the one and only duty the feds should legitimately be doing: protecting innocent Americans from the invasion of an exotic killer.

UPDATED: Bar one man, all HHS Regional Leaders are women.