Thoughts after Christmas

The Pope's midnight mass homily stressed the concept of "no room in the inn," as he exhorted everyone to accommodate those truly in need, as I have always maintained should be the main function of the church.

I have never understood how a pregnant Mary would not be honored.  Wasn't that before the time of Islam and other religions repressive to women?  One would think that some gentleman would have given up his room, or someone would have walked the neighborhood with her and her presumed impregnator until some family welcomed them to come in out of the cold.  .  .  presuming it was December, and snow falls on the palm trees in the land of sun, sand and camels.  Manger, indeed.

(Will I be excommunicated from the church with the lovely rituals I don't attend, and with members who are situationally spiritual?  Should I be insulted I was never invited to be an altar boy?  Dominus vobiscum.)

BY THE WAY:  In a few days, everything will cost more exponentially.  Welcome to 2013; enjoy your triskaidekaphobic future.  Gloria tibi Obamum.

Thoughts before Christmas

I am completely convinced that President Obama doesn't care about anyone except himself.  His cold recitation of the names of the dead Connecticut children, rendered with no emotion, sealed the deal.  Now, I've had a bit of acting experience, but, even if I were president, I couldn't have given such a dispassionate performance.  The president should be the most empathetic of all citizens, and when he says something must be done about such violence, I would suggest he  resign in favor of someone who cares, even a little bit.

 But wait, we don't want Joe Biden either.  Soon he will be blabbering about gun control, a liberal talking point without any basis in fact.  Of course, you know the next person in the line of succession  --  Speaker John Boehner.  At least we know he can cry.

Apropos of current sentiment, yesterday I dug  my old Waffenfabrik Bern 1878  M.78 rifle out of the closet, and am considering having it refurbished and tested at the local gun shop.  That is, if the large .41 caliber shells it takes are available.

BAD CHOICE:  John Kerry is being considered for Secretary of State.  You will remember how he came back from service in Vietnam and threw away his medals.  His selection would just be another way for President Obama to be insensitive.

Solved

I have the ideal solution to the current "fiscal cliff" dilemma.  The Republicans could accede to the Democrats' class envy and desire to punish the people who provide the jobs, and let them raise their taxes.  In exchange, the Democrats could permit Congress to repeal Obamacare, an action supported by 60% of the American people.

To mollify the Democrats, early next year, Congress should begin reconstructing the health care system one provision at a time.  That way, all the hidden taxes, repressive regulations and unelected commissions will see the light of day, and the Democrats will have the opportunity to justify each one of them.

Now that's true negotiation.  .  .  each side giving up some cherished tax scheme to achieve agreement.

Tweaked

As per the Constitution, I have frequently stated that the only purposes for federal government spending are to maintain an army to protect the citizens from foreign enemies, to assist state and local authorities in combatting crime at home, to help protect citizens from fire and the damage from natural disasters, and to build and keep in good repair the infrastructure, most notably, the roads, bridges, railroads, and sea and air ports which facilitate the necessary movement of people and goods.  Naturally, government must also encourage the production of conventional power to operate the machinery of modern society.

I have always felt that every other government function should be administrated by state and local entities or eliminated as unnecessary to a population whose predecessors founded the nation on the principles of self-reliance and personal responsibility.

Recently, however, I have been prompted to add education to my list.  Some such money should be allocated with no bureaucratic mandates in exactly equal amounts to each student, and be distributed only by local school boards.

You may notice I make no reference to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, and the proliferation of health insurance, all of which were ill-conceived at inception and should be phased out.  Likewise, we should eliminate much of welfare and other programs now known as "entitlements," and any and all distribution of funds which robs citizens of the will to provide for themselves, and encourages indolence and sloth.  True compassion lies solely with the family, the church and established charitable organizations.

P. H. Day #71

After the U.S. war started by the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor, I bought a German car (VW) in 1964, and a Japanese car (Toyota) later in the '60s.  You see, unlike some hyphenated Americans,  I don't hold a grudge against the innocent descendents of those whose earlier relatives were less civilized.

DILBERT 12/5/12:  A conversation between Pointy Haired Boss (PHB) and Dilbert, our hero (DOH)

"PHB:  I need you to assemble a huge amount of totally incomprehensible data.  Make it boring so no one looks at it too closely.  I'm aiming for quantity over quality.

"DOH:  I have a bad feeling about this.

"PHB:  No one would pay you to feel good."

The definition of work.

Bad news

On Thursday, November 29th, while our inept president was lunching with Mitt Romney on leftover turkey doctored up to taste like chili, and something called Southwestern grilled chicken salad, down the road, the UN administered a slap to his face by recognizing the state of Palestine.  It was a sharp rebuke for Israel and the U.S.  It didn't help that Germany, Britain and many other Western nations abstained.  All that pandering and those millions of dollars we invested in keeping that organization afloat, and the president couldn't exercise enough authority to support the will of the American people.

I will not pretend to understand the full scope of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.  All I know is that our government has always been allied with Israel who opposes Palestinian statehood, and our president, the officer formerly known as the leader of the free world, was unable to fulfill the promise we made to them.

Also, on Thursday, the leader of our country of religious diversity was lunching when Egypt, now under the control of a dictatorial leader we helped to install, approved a purely Muslim constitution without the participation of a single liberal, secular or Christian member of the panel. 

In the meantime, the president was talking economics with Mitt Romney, an acknowledged business expert.  I suspect he understood Romney about as well as I would a discussion of string theory with Stephen Hawking.  Do you suppose President Obama realizes yet what a boob the world sees him as?