Back to Basics

In 2008, then-candidate Obama praised China’s “vastly superior” infrastructure and expressed a desire to rapidly bring that style of high-speed rail system and other infrastructure “improvements” to the United States.

Later, the administration even dubbed Joe Biden as the “Conductor or the train to the future” (if that isn’t disturbing, nothing is).

So how’s China’s high speed rail system working out?

The collision is the latest setback for China’s bullet- train program. The $34 billion Beijing-Shanghai high-speed rail line, the world’s longest, has suffered major delays from storm-related electrical breakdowns at least three times since it opened on June 30.

“In so many areas, there is the lack of an adequately trained — and perhaps more importantly, experienced — workforce, along with tried-and-tested management oversight at the operational level,” Bill Barron, a visiting scholar at the Division of Environment at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, said in an e-mail. “Given the pace of expansion, how could there be?”
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In addition to technical faults, China’s spending on its railways has generated accusations of graft.

Liu Zhijun, an advocate of bullet trains, was fired as railway minister in February for “severe” disciplinary violations as part of a corruption probe, Xinhua said. Su Shunhu, deputy chief of the transportation bureau of the Ministry of Railways, is under investigation on suspicion of taking bribes, the 21st Century Business Herald reported on July 22, citing an unidentified ministry official.

“I don’t think China should develop this high-speed, high- cost system,” Jiaotong University’s Zhao said. “The last railway minister did not follow any scientific development approach and this is the result. This is not only a technical problem but a management problem.”

Sure, let’s bring this superior transportation system to the states!

Actually, among too many politicians, the potential for graft is a selling point instead of a liability, which makes it an even worse idea.

Speaking of graft, there’s one thing American politicians will never import from China, and that’s their method for dealing with corrupt public officials.

No, I do not ask the question without knowing the answer. Government is too big when the lack of government actually prevents people from living their lives. Our founding fathers wanted government to be there to protect people from encroachments to their lives, liberties and pursuits of happiness. When government instead turns from protector of these rights to an arbiter of how we must go about enjoying them is when things go all wonky.

Case and point; The Ugly Mug. This establishment is a bar in Minnesota near the Twin’s baseball stadium. But it has a problem. What problem you ask? Well, The Ugly Mug is running out of beer.

Why is it running out of beer? Does it not have the money to purchase beer? Is there no beer to be purchased? Not quite. The Ugly Mug is running out of beer because the government in Minnesota is shut down. And because the government is shutdown they cannot renew their state liquor purchasing card which the state requires for them to purchase beer.

Now with the government at an impasse over spending and budgets since July 1st, the business is unable to continue with its business. Although recent reports as of this article are that Gov. Mark Dayton is finally backing away from his hardcore stance of demanding more liberalism and progress is finally being made. Hallelujah! Guess without booze even liberals were able to see clearly.

Pretty screwed up right? But this is unfortunately not all that uncommon from sea to shining sea here in America. From coast to coast governments and across the fruited plains from the federal monstrosity in Washington on down there are so many onerous regulations that the lack of government actually prohibits people from living their daily lives.

It is a far cry from what our founders envisioned and government meant to protect the rights of citizens. Today we indeed instead have governments, big and small, that control our lives so much that any interruption in government interrupts our lives.

Seriously, is there any legitimate reason why a bar cannot buy alcohol just because the government has decided to take a hiatus while liberals throw a little temper tantrum over not being allowed to spend money they do not have? Not really. That is, unless you are a bureaucrat trying to justify your meaningless life as a government employee and siphoning off a publicly funded salary because you have no skills to offer the private sector.

Its not just bars like The Ugly Mug that suffer from government’s intrusion into realms it never belonged in the first place. Every time a government somewhere shuts down we hear stories that just make you have to wonder. The most common seems to be about travelers arriving at public parks for long planned vacations only to be turned away by a park ranger who no one ever recalled seeing ever before and shuttered gates.

Really? It’s a park for crying out loud! It is a bunch of trees and grassy fields and dirt trails with the occasional woodland creature dropping piles excreta. But when the government bureaucrats decide it is time to remind the people who is really in charge what happens? These places get boarded up and put off limits, that’s what.

There is an old military saying, “don’t wait for orders. Ride to the sound of the guns!” Since the Tea Party is a leaderless organization, there is no one to give the orders, but regardless, we all need to ride to the sound of the guns and the guns are in Minnesota.

What is going on and why must we win this fight?

The fight in Minnesota is the first skirmish as the left tries a technique to fight back against the gains made by real Americans as we fight back against socialism.

Minnesota has now gone into a government shutdown. It is a war between the Republican controlled legislature and the extreme left wing governor Mark Dayton. Dayton is one of those useless individuals who has never worked a day in his life. He is an heir to the Dayton department store fortune. He is a far left lunatic who believes in massive government spending and confiscatory taxes on the wealthy (i.e. anyone with a job).

Dayton got his job the old fashioned way. He bought it. With his massive fortune, he did not waste his time doing fundraising. He self funded his campaign. In 2010, Republicans swept the legislature in Minnesota. Tom Emmer came within 9,000 votes of giving the Republicans complete control of the Minnesota government, but the RINOs bolted and 11,000 of them voted for a “moderate” named Tom Horner.

The Minnesota state legislature offered a reasonable budget this year. It would increase spending by 6% and all of that spending would be covered by growth in revenue so there would be no tax hikes.
This was not good enough for Dayton who demanded a 15% budget increase, which would have to be paid for by increased taxes. Dayton’s tax hikes would have hit everyone but he said they were for the “wealthy.”

Dayton had plenty of time to negotiate with the legislature and legislative leaders even signaled their willingness to sit down with the governor. According to sources in Minnesota, the differences between the governor and the legislature on most of the bills were not that great and the legislature even offered a bill to keep the lights on as they worked on resolving the differences.
The governor said no and shut the government down.

In Minnesota, the friendly media and liberal non-profit groups are dominating the airwaves, blaming the shut down on the GOP.
Some are pointing out this may well be a strategy to try and defeat the Republicans in 2012. In 1995, Bill Clinton triggered a government shut down. Thanks to a friendly media, Newt Gingrich and the Republicans got the blame.

We have to help conservatives in Minnesota.

We have to bypass the regular media and use social media to get the word out. Use Facebook, Twitter, websites, any social media that you have available to you to spread the word that this shut down is a power play by a liberal Democrat governor to try and get a liberal Democrat legislature elected in 2012.

Many people, particularly those in Minnesota are only going to get their information from the media.

We had about ten updates and several hundred comments on the other budget/shutdown watch thread, so we’ll move to a weekend version for more discussion.

One of the greatest tragedies this nation has ever encountered was narrowly averted last night. I speak of course of the devastation a government shutdown would have wrought on the cherry blossom festival.

As you have probably heard, a temporary budget deal has been reached:

With little more than an hour to go before a midnight government shutdown, President Obama and congressional leaders said Friday night they struck a tentative deal to give themselves more breathing space as they finalize a long-term bill to cut $37.7 billion in spending.

Early Saturday morning, when the government technically had run out of money, Congress passed and sent a short-term spending bill to the White House that keeps the government open until the end of next week. During that reprieve, the House and Senate are expected to pass a broader bill that funds the government for the rest of fiscal year 2011, which ends Sept. 30.

The leaders said the cuts are “historic,” and congratulated each other for reaching a deal, but a small rebellion was brewing among conservative Republicans who said it does not make the kinds of deep reductions they were seeking and that the House passed earlier this year.

“Tomorrow, I’m pleased to announce that the Washington Monument as well as the entire federal government will be open for business,” Mr. Obama said at the White House late Friday, minutes after House Speaker John A. Boehner announced the deal at the Capitol.

Who “won” this thing? Opinions will vary. Harry Reid called it “historic,” which isn’t exactly a confidence booster. Yesterday Reid accused Republicans of wanting to kill women and today he made history with them? Did they find middle ground and decide to only make them slightly ill?

More:

Under the terms of the agreement, the six-month bill will slash $38.5 billion from current spending levels, which is $23 billion less than the reductions Republicans originally demanded but $30 billion more than what Democrats had initially offered to cut.

Here’s a little perspective: That’s some $38 billion in proposed cuts through the rest of the fiscal year ending in September. The federal debt has increased $54.1 billion in the past eight days.

Simply slowing the meteoric increase in deficit spending is like choosing between going to hell in a fast handbasket or slightly slower gas can, so to that degree my fellow conservatives might feel like the Republicans lost this round (you’ll notice that the debt clock is still going up, not down).

At the same time though, according to the Washington Times, there is $78.5 billion less spending than what the president had requested for 2011, and the Democrats agreed to it. As Ed Morrissey at Hot Air pointed out, that’s not bad for a party that only controls one chamber of Congress and doesn’t occupy the White House. Not bad for a flea either, eh, Chuck?

I do not care if the government shuts down. Despite the dire warnings from the leftists nothing is going to happen. Sure you might not be able to visit your favorite government tourist attraction but mostly life will go on. The sun will come up. The coffee will brew. Your kids will still want to play. It will be amazing to (re)-discover how useless the government really is to your life. The statists will be sad but screw ‘em, I look forward to a shutdown.

It wasn’t that long ago when the government created their own shut down of their own. Thousands of jobs were lost, a few businesses went bankrupt and the economy was decimated in the Gulf states when the greenies of the administration decided no more Gulf drilling.

People have begged the government to open up the drilling permits but they continue to stonewall drilling in the Gulf. They are happy to spend money to drill in Brazil but let’s not drill here in the States. It’s a helluva shut down. A lot more costly than a bunch of bureaucrats shuffling papers across the desks.(Understand that more oil is not exactly the solution lower fuel costs. We can at least partially blame The Bernake for destroying the dollar. If we had a stronger dollar, oil would not be as costly.)

Anyway, tonight the government may shut down. I don’t care if it does or doesn’t. What we need are leaders that are ready to lead fiscally. Obama thinks that a shutdown will be good for Democrats. He is assuming a lot. People are a lot more aware of the bullshit going on than they were. The children in Congress can play politics but the people are ready for some damn spending cuts. The Dems had all last year to create a budget and they decided it was best to do nothing because of the elections. Now here we are.

Planned Parenthood is one of the issues the Democrats are using to scare folks. The Democraps want federal funding for baby killing. The Republicans prefer if people want to kill their unborn babies then they should do it on their own dime. It’s a woman’s decision in my opinion. But I’ll be damned if I want to pay for another woman’s decision to destroy her baby. But mostly Democrats do not want to cut spending.

The Republicans are trying to hold firm with their pitiful spending cuts. As pathetic as they are they have to hold firm. No debt ceiling increase. Stop the damn spending. Austerity for all!

The budget process is about as political as it can get. On one side, you have the politicians fighting for special interest projects in their states and districts. On another side you have government agencies fighting for personnel and project funding. And, on yet another side, you find the unions mixing it up in the media to insure that their “members” are protected against the consequences of budgetary cuts. And in the melee, the American taxpayer is nowhere to be found.

Pretty much why the budgetary process is neither rational nor employs commonsense.

If the American taxpayer and legal citizens would elect honest brokers to serve “We the People,” perhaps we would see a budgetary process that can be easily and quickly simplified.

It is all about prioritization …

As an illustration, let me show you how the decision-making should be implemented.

First pass: Gentlemen and ladies – submit your budget requests …

The list is prioritized – is the program in the number one slot more important than the program in the number two slot; if not move it down to the next slot – keep repeating the process until you have a prioritized budget.

Second pass: Gentlemen and ladies – justify your budget requests by either cutting out non-essential services and people or risk being prioritized out of business …

The list is once again prioritized using the same methodology – is the program in the number one slot more important than the program in the number two slot; if not move it down to the next slot – keep repeating the process until you have another prioritized budget.

Third pass: Gentlemen and ladies – justify your request by using constitutional authority, not case law, but the actual constitution and once again justify your budget requests by either cutting out non-essential services and people or risk being prioritized out of business …

Preference is given to the defense of our homeland and maintaining critical infrastructure, much of which is in immediate need of repair or replacement.

The list is once again prioritized using the same methodology – is the program in the number one slot more important than the program in the number two slot; if not move it down to the next slot – keep repeating the process until you have another prioritized budget.

Fourth pass: Gentlemen and ladies, please attach your name to the budget items you support – you may do anything you wish, but you will be accountable to the people of the United States in the next election.

You keep doing this until the budget is prioritized.

Let’s say you’re a liberal with a lot of garbage who is facing a looming halt in trash pickup and you just can’t wait until the next inauguration of your favorite environmentally friendly president to dump it at a National Mall. What do you do?

Washington (CNN) – If the federal government shuts down come Friday, House Speaker John Boehner may be in for quite a mess at his Washington, D.C. residence if some Facebook users have their way.

A Facebook event, entitled “If Boehner shuts down the government I am taking my trash to his house,” has popped up and is gaining steam as the shutdown showdown ramps up on Capitol Hill. If the federal government shuts down, one of the District’s services that will stop is trash pickup.

“Speaker John Boehner is ready to shut down the government, including District of Columbia city services like trash collection,” it says on the page. “Well, if he won’t allow us to use OUR TAX DOLLARS to pick it up, maybe we should just BRING IT TO HIM.”

As of 2:30 p.m. EST there are 1,476 attending; 126 are listed as maybe; 156 aren’t showing up; and 4,652 are still making up their minds (much like Congress, apparently).

The trash-a-thon is scheduled for Saturday and apparently will last through June 30.
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Goodman is listed in the Democratic National Committee network. Treadway is the political and logistics director for the liberal group Netroots Nation.

Netroots… the “new civility” police. Glad to see they’re practicing what they preach.

So in other words, they want to make Boehner’s front yard might look like the DC Mall after the coronation of The One:

If these people are experts in anything, it’s garbage.

Here’s the Facebook page:

Just imagine if a Tea Partier had a “dump trash at Harry Reid’s home” page.

Oh, but here’s the funniest part. They say they’ll go ahead with the “event” even if there isn’t a shutdown, but their garbage dump will be done in a “respectful” way:

Organizers of the event – Jonah Goodman and Nolan Treadway – write on the page that even if the government shutdown doesn’t occur, they will “move forward with this event, we’ll provide details on location(s) and we’ll make sure it’s done in a sanitary and respectful way. Please don’t list any personal addresses for members of Congress on this page.”

How exactly you respectfully dump your trash on somebody’s lawn is anybody’s guess.

I hope Boehner has a couple of pitbulls who haven’t been fed for a while.

Update: Somebody Twittered me that Boehner’s 3rd in the line of succession (2nd in line, but 3rd in this administration — see comments), so it might not be any dogs that get would-be garbage dumpers, but rather the Secret Service or other security.

Given how all the DC has benefited from the huge increase in Federal government spending, it would be nice to think that there is some cosmic payback. In any case, the bottom line is that these Federal workers are likely to be OK.

In the event of a government shutdown, some 800,000 federal employees who are furloughed without pay may collect unemployment insurance.
Government workers are covered under the Unemployment Compensation for Federal Employees Program, which is funded by the federal government, but administered by the states.
Generally, unemployment claims are filed in the place where you work, not where you live. The states are reimbursed by the federal government for the funds they pay out.
The Washington, DC, area would likely feel the brunt of a shutdown. The U.S. Department of Labor told Virginia that 171,000 workers in the state could be eligible. Maryland has 252,000 federal workers in the state.
Maryland and Virginia are preparing for a shutdown; their state labor departments plan to post information on their websites tomorrow, if there is a shutdown, with instructions for workers on how to file. . . .