2016 the film

It’s doing very well at the box office.  Here from Patriot Post is a summary of Dinesh D’Souza’s film.

D'Souza's film is based on his books, "The Roots of Obama's Rage" and "Obama's America," in which he asserts that Obama's worldview was shaped most directly by the anti-colonialist views of his father, and that Obama is now intent on unmaking American so that he can remake it according to his worldview.

In a 2010 Forbes Magazine editorial on Obama, D'Souza concluded: "[Obama] is trapped in his father's time machine. Incredibly, the U.S. is being ruled according to the dreams of a Luo tribesman of the 1950s. This philandering, inebriated African socialist, who raged against the world for denying him the realization of his anti-colonial ambitions, is now setting the nation's agenda through the reincarnation of his dreams in his son. The son makes it happen, but he candidly admits he is only living out his father's dream. The invisible father provides the inspiration, and the son dutifully gets the job done. America today is governed by a ghost."

Watch for it tomorrow night. . .

 

“Sky & Telescope magazine has traced the history of the term in at least two articles and it has even been part of the change of how the term is used.

Here is a summary of what the articles describe:

• The original usage of the term was like the modern statement “When pigs fly.”
• Another described an infrequent event related to volcanic eruptions. The dust ejected high into the atmosphere, can give the moon and sun and bluish hue when see through the dust. While infrequent, blue moons do occur.
• A usage closer to the popular modern concept can be traced to the Maine Farmers’ Almanac that related the term an extra full moon during a season. The seasons normally have three full moons. When a season has four, the third one is called “Blue Moon.” Historically, the months had names, such as Harvest Moon, Egg Moon or Lenten Moon. Because those full moons were related to specific events related to the seasons, there came a time when a season had an extra full moon without a name; the third month in that series was named “Blue Moon.”
• Sky & Telescope also stated that it contributed to the popular notion with articles in 1946 and 1950 that cited the Maine Farmers’ Almanac, but added that a second full moon in a month was a “Blue Moon.”

http://jeffreylhunt.wordpress.com/2012/08/30/august-31-blue-moon/

Does Congress know about this? 200 Marines have landed in Guatemala

"Guatemalan authorities say they signed a treaty allowing the U.S. military to conduct the operations on July 16. Less than a month later an Air Force C-5 transport plane flew into Guatemala City from North Carolina loaded with the Marines and four UH-1 "Huey" helicopters."

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/L/LT_GUATEMALA_US_MARINES?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2012-08-29-18-33-58

Don’t blame the Democrats for these creeps

http://redalertpolitics.com/2012/08/29/leftists-say-murder-ann-romney-via-twitter-call-mia-love-house-ner/

Whose war on women?

Communist Party of the USA endorses Obama

President Obama--get over it

Man up and stop blaming others for your failures.

Love from the Republican convention in Tampa

What a great poster to replace a fading Obama poster

The Democrats big lie about Katrina

The first line of defense in a hurricane, tornado or earthquake is the city, county and state authorities. During Katrina and Rita the mayor of New Orleans, Democrat Ray Nagin (Chocolate city Nagin) and the Democrat Governor of LA Kathleen Blanco failed in their responsibilities. Nagin thought they were prepared up to category 3 (it was a 5) and Blanco dithered about 2 days despite Bush’s urging before she did anything. So who do Democrats blame for 1800 deaths? President Bush. So far with Isaac there has been one death. Let's see if they will give Obama the credit or Governor Bobby Jindal who's been on top of this from the beginning.

How many “hot button” racialist words can you find?

“The Americas Before 1900 Working Group fosters comparative and transnational approaches to the cultures and histories of the early Americas in both research and teaching. Conceptualizing connections across the hemisphere’s cultures and languages is especially crucial for understanding the kinds of colonial encounters and transitions to modernity that proliferate from the pre-Columbian era to the advent of industrialization. We bring historians and literary scholars of both Latin America and Anglo-America together to discuss hemispheric questions such as how narratives across cultures address the legacy of slavery; how colonial encounters influence modern forms of jurisprudence; and how systems of quantification develop across different imperial spaces. Convening in Spring 2013, we anticipate broadening these questions as we create a space for ongoing dialogue about the interconnectedness of the Americas to each other and the rest of the globe. “

It’s just a guess, but research on pre-european cultures with groups killing and sacrificing each other is probably not a part of this Ohio State University Working Group’s conceptualizing connections.

You’ve bought a lie

Wellness exams, electronic records and preventive care do not save money or lives. But that's how Obamacare has been sold. Well trained doctors free of government red tape and payment schedules do. I know a woman who needs surgery tomorrow and is in constant pain, but it may be 4-5 months; I called in July for an appointment with a common specialty and couldn't get in until December. We are Medicare. Welcome to our playpen, all you who thought Obamacare would be so terrific.

Ask you doctor about PPACA

Go ahead, ask your physician at your next visit what she or he thinks of current Washington-directed reform and its impact on the doctor-patient relationship. What you hear will likely surprise you, because it will likely be markedly different from what you hear from Washington. The policy theorists are simply too far removed from the reality of front-line patient care. Health reform, whether via the implementation of ObamaCare or the GOP's "repeal and replace" plan, should no longer ignore the input and counsel of experienced, front-line, practicing doctors.

http://theweek.com/bullpen/column/232510/what-my-doctor-thinks-of-obamacare

Dog whistle or whistling in the dark?

Apparently dog whistle racism is when the slurs, slams or words are so subtle, so coded, so obscure, that only Republican politicians say them and only black people and Democrats understand them, if indeed they can hear them. Therefore, calling Obama the food stamp president is racist not because with his failed policies more Americans are using SNAP than ever before, but because he is black and to criticize him is code racism. Hello. He has criticized Romney for telling students to borrow from their parents rather than the government! Most people using food stamps are white. 40% of black women are having abortions.  Do the math. Americans elected him in 2008; he couldn't have been elected without the white vote. But what was historic and post racial in 2008 is now racist as millions try to abandon him because he has failed. He has broken his promises, and minorities particularly have been hurt. That's not code--that's the truth.

Sacred places

I think it's just so "special" (and transparent) that Brian Williams of NBC is so hurt that he can't go into the Mormon Temple in Salt Lake, even though he could go into any Mormon church for public worship if he so desired. It seems it's been a while since he's gone to church--any church. There are off limits and sacred places in all denominations, faiths and churches. I'd like to see Brian walk down the aisle at our church and decide he wants to stand at the pulpit and tell jokes during one of the sermons, or serve the elements during communion or crash a children's Sunday school class, or sign up to attend a women's retreat. Even the most liberal and Open churches would probably stop him. And that little aside about polygamy? Did he preface it with Barack Obama's father was a polygamist and he has a number of half-sibs and extended family members he's not taking care of?  Did Williams ever do a piece on Obama’s pastor, Rev. Wright’s, Black Theology?

Obama is far more extreme than Akin on abortion—he supports infanticide

“Missouri has recently been at the center of the conversation on abortion thanks to controversial comments from its U.S. Senate candidate Todd Akin concerning women, abortion and rape.

But pro-life advocates say Obama is more extreme than Akin on abortion because of his record as a state senator from Illinois, when he refused to support a law that would provide medical protection for survivors of late abortions.”

http://www.lifenews.com/2012/08/28/abortion-survivor-rips-obama-on-infanticide-support-in-new-ad/

Rape discussion is good for politics, but. . .

Not much action in tracking down rapists.  But we can be sure if they do impregnate the women they violate, that the little suckers will be snuffed because feminists and politicians are really tough on products of conception.

“Rape-kit pileups [11,000] aren’t a problem just in Detroit. In recent years, cities across the country have reported mountains of kits—11,000 in San Antonio, 1,200 in Albuquerque, 4,000 in Houston—according to Sarah Tofte, who has studied the national debacle for the advocacy group Human Rights Watch. Experts estimate that hundreds of thousands of kits are languishing in police warehouses.”

“In one especially horrific case, Worthy says, a convicted rapist named Shelly Andre Brooks had raped and murdered five women after raping a woman whose kit was just recently entered into the database through Worthy’s initiative. If that rape kit had been tested and entered into the database sooner, the man could have been caught sooner—and five women’s lives could have been saved. “That’s why it’s so horrible, this whole thing,” Worthy says.”

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/08/28/rapists-beware-detroit-prosecutor-ids-21-attackers-in-rape-kit-probe.html

Romney in Michigan

Obama is hoping Michigan voters will trade religious freedom for the union bail out of the auto industry. But his lead in the polls is shrinking according to this WaPo opinion piece. " the Romney campaign has also been highlighting two other issues that have particular resonance in Michigan. One is the administration’s contraception and abortifacient mandate, which hurts the president with the socially conservative Reagan Democrats in such places as Macomb County. There are 2.4 million Catholic voters in Michigan, and Obama’s assault on religious liberty has alienated many of them. In May, the Michigan Catholic Conference filed suit against the Obama administration over the Health and Human Services mandate — and Catholic priests will be preaching against it in parishes across the state between now and Election Day. Look for Romney to underscore his opposition to the HHS mandate — and his endorsement by Lech Walesa — with these Catholic voters, many of whom are of Polish and Ukrainian descent. The second issue is welfare reform. . . . "

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/marc-thiessen-romneys-play-for-michigan/2012/08/26/383e8a56-ef9e-11e1-adc6-87dfa8eff430_story.html?socialreader_check=0&denied=1

Sometimes it drives me crazy

that there are middle class career women who seem to know so little about food. . . about money. . . about politics.

Today I was reading a blogger discussing “food insecurity” which in government speak means that at some point during the past week or month, you were unsure about whether you’d have enough food. It doesn’t mean the gut pinching hunger that Haitian children experience unless they are eating at school.   She mentioned that there have been times in her life when she ate only cereal and milk.

Eeek!  For the same price for a box of cereal she could have made enough potato soup to feed a family, or scalloped potatoes, or maybe macaroni and cheese, or perhaps beans and rice. Cheaper and goes further.  Processed cereal in a box may be the worst buy per ounce and poorest nutrition available. 

E-books and public transportation—by Jeff at the Fluffington Post

I like to strike up conversations in coffee shops about the books people are reading, which may be a thing of the past with the e-book becoming so popular. Jeff liked looking at the covers. . .

“Public transportation has many pains and too few pleasures, but among the latter was the opportunity to anticipate burgeoning best sellers by observing how frequently certain books emerged from totes and backpacks. Books like How Stella Got Her Groove Back, Infinite Jest, Devil in the White City, Who Moved My Cheese, Freakanomics, Girl With the Dragon Tattoo.

I considered it my CTA Browsing Library. Occasionally, an obscure title even prompted my next read, such as Michael Ondaaje’s Coming Through Slaughter.

But the E-reader Age is shutting the curtains on this peeking-tom pastime. A Kindle, Nook or iPad means no book jackets. No book jackets mean the only way to determine if those over-pierced commuters in combat boots are reading The Goebbels Diaries or The Nanny Diaries is to – *gulp* – ask them.”

You can read the whole piece here.