President Barack “Net Worth $11.8 million” Obama Gives Not Quite $17,000 to “Share in Sacrifice”

In order to “share in the sacrifice” with furloughed workers, President Obama is going to give 5% of his salary back [link].

The voluntary move would be retroactive to March 1 and apply through the rest of the calendar year, the [Obama Administration] official said. The White House came up with the 5 percent figure to approximate the level of automatic spending cuts to non-defense federal agencies that took effect that day.

Over a ten-month period, that’ll work out to $16,666.67.

“The president has decided that to share in the sacrifice being made by public servants across the federal government that are affected by the sequester, he will contribute a portion of his salary back to the Treasury,” the official said.

The President makes $400,000 a year, and has for the last 4 years. In addition to books sales and other income his net worth is approximately $11.8 million [link].  That’s like me sharing in the suffering of the homeless by giving $2 to the guy on the corner before I duck into Ruth’s Chris for a steak.

But nevermind those pesky facts.  Look!  Solidarity!  Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!

Updated – CA Bill Would Classify Pedophilia as a Sexual Orientation

Here’s the link to the updated article that originally inspired this post.

Here’s the link to their correction and apology.

 

More From the Mental Dark Ages: Interracial vs Gay Marriage

Over at Mediaite.com there’s a post [link] that attempts to cast gay marriage opponents in a ridiculous light by equating them with people who opposed interracial marriage in the past. The idea is that since people said things objecting to interracial marriage that are obviously wrong, and people make the same sounding arguments against gay marriage, they too must be wrong.

The problem with their argument is, as usual, logic:

• Frank makes argument X about subject A
• It turns out argument X doesn’t hold up when applied A
• Later Bob makes argument X about Subject B
• Whether or not the argument, X, holds up in this case doesn’t depend on X…it depends on whether A and B are the same.

The post over at Mediaite fixates on how the arguments are similar but ignores the obvious:  Sex and Race are two different things. Sex implies desire, behavior, and natural function. Race is all physical appearance.

Therefore, just because the arguments sound the same, or even are the same is irrelevant. The question is do they apply in this particular case? The writer never comes close to rationality, but ends with an appeal to fear:

Don’t deny it. For every single one of these quotes you could easily switch out intermarriage for same-sex marriage, and vice versa. Just as how most people no longer regard interracial marriage as unseemly and revolting, most will eventually cease viewing homosexual relationships in such a negative light. The times are a-changin’, and the likes of the Family Research Council, National Organization for Marriage, American Family Association, and Fox’s Todd Starnes’ views on homosexual relationships will meet up with anti-miscegenation beliefs on the dust-bin of history.

Essentially the writer’s argument boils down to: “Agree with me or you’ll look stupid when history is written!” Or to be more precise: “When the progressives write history they’ll make you look stupid!”

And unfortunately, this is what passes for “enlightenment” for leftists.

 

Shocker: DNC In The Red

In an email to supporters, Debbie Wasserman Schultz says they spent all they had and then some [link] to get Obama re-elected.

“We spent every last penny” – and more – Wasserman Schultz says:

“The cardinal sin in campaigns is to sit on money — which is why we spent every last penny we had in 2012 (and then some) to make sure the election went our way.”

As a result, she says “Democrats are in the White House – but we are also in the red.”

Spending what you don’t have to get a man elected who spends what America doesn’t have? It’s like poetry.

Or an epitaph.

While Existing Gun Laws Go Unenforced, More Laws Pile On.

Areas with the most restrictive gun laws least likely to enforce them.

These cities also have some of the nation’s most restrictive gun laws, as well as the most active mayors in championing gun control. New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa are all members of the national Mayors Against Illegal Guns campaign.

D.C., which also has tough gun laws, was in the lower half of the list in 2012, coming in at 78th.

My own theory is that those in power are so detached and isolated from real world cause and effect, that they think that simply passing laws fixes real world issues. Apparently monitoring the real world effects doesn’t play much into their legislation anyway, so this is actually pretty consistent with their line of (un)reasoning.

Drone Strikes in the US?

NBC reported that the US has made the case for drone strikes on American citizens.

The one aspect of this story that stands out is this part containing a quote  from White House counter-terrorism adviser John Brennan:

Brennan was the first administration official to publicly acknowledge drone strikes in a speech last year, calling them “consistent with the inherent right of self-defense.”

Just to clarify our Government’s position on the application of the concept of “self-defense”:

1. The right is inherent to the government to use lethal force as a preemptive strike against it’s citizens.
2. Self-defense does not apparently include stopping potential threats from entering the US via the Mexican border by sufficiently enforcing current laws or closing the border altogether.
3. The White House believes the government has the right to use deadly weapons to defend itself, while at the same time advocating much stricter gun control laws. Laws that, should be noted, only really affect the law abiding (i.e. those that wish to defend themselves.)

So to sum up, 2nd Amendment supporters are mocked for believing that they would ever need their guns to defend against tyranny.  The question no one seems to ask is, 100 years from now, who will be in the White House with their finger on the drone trigger?

And that’s the purpose of the 2nd Amendment.

A Summary of Obama’s 2012 SOTU Address

“It’s not my fault.”

Leftist Intolerance and Hate-mongering.

Regardless of your political/religious leanings, this is vile:

http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/01/09/google-and-others-embrace-vile-attack-on-santorum/

Or it should be, but leftists seem to see this type of personal attack as justified.  Ignore the intolerance and hatred, shutting up the other side is all that matters, I suppose.

Although this story is primarily political in nature (and my point here isn’t to endorse Santorum or anyone else) the reason Santorum is being attacked is because of his view on same-sex marriage.  If this is the pattern for how dissenting views on the subject  are treated (ignoring the fact that same sex marriage is the dissenting view)  welcome to public discourse in the 21st century.

The spirit of Nero and Diocletian are alive and well.  Only instead of lions and fire we have the internet.

Also, I may do all my searching through Bing now.

Thomas Sowell on the “Vision of the Anointed”

Thomas Sowell on the  his book “Vision of the Anointed.”    Sowell has some interesting insights into affirmative action, and the self-declared elite in academia.

 

BBC News Shows Its Hand on the Value of the Unborn

I was listening to NPR the other night when the BBC news came on to report about the defeat of the Mississippi “Personhood amendment”.  The announcer said that the law in effect would outlaw abortion and went on to add “even in cases of rape or incest.”

First of all, I understand the point.  Those are extremely hard circumstances to deal with as the victim or family of a victim.  But the fact that he had to explicitly say that betrays a confused philosophy of the unborn on the side of the news agency.  By virtue of even saying it, it implies the unborn is not valuable.

Just like we don’t kill infants and toddlers who were concieved through such unfortunate circumstances, if the unborn is a human being then it is equally unjust to kill them because they remind us of those circumstances.  In other words, we don’t kill children for the crimes of their fathers.

I know the objection: “But a woman shouldn’t have to bear that burden since it was forced upon her against her will!”  But here again, like the objections I’ve already mentioned, this finds a moral difficulty and tries to remedy it by setting the unborn’s value to zero.  But that doesn’t tell us anything about the unborn.  It avoids the question entirely.  And if that answer is wrong, it is catastrophically wrong.  The question is, is a child already in the world?

And that can only be answered by looking at the child and what he/she is, not by looking at the circumstances of their origins.