North Korea’s New Fuhrer

I’ve seen his face before — On cans of generic chow mein.

 

Now They Tell Us

Editoral in the Star:

‘Nuclear option’ for KC schools: a weapon of mass delusion

Anything termed “the nuclear option” ought to give pause. Especially when generations of children are at stake. And politicians are in charge. For the Kansas City School District, the nuclear option is doling out its schools to surrounding districts. Admittedly, it’s more apt to be called nuclear by detractors. One version of this idea is already proposed in legislation, and other forms of it are in the works. This is a bad idea that won’t go away easily. Legislators need to recognize that the soon-to-be-unaccredited school district’s greatest problem is achievement. And low-income students from struggling families do not perform remarkably better in any of the surrounding districts. The instability of their homes won’t magically change if they attend the same school, just tacked onto a new district.

Yet, that was the rationale for forced desegregation, that low IQ blacks would magically do better if they were placed in the same classrooms as high IQ whites.  The infamous Kansas City experiment was the deseg mentality in reverse, that Kansas City’s low IQ blacks would get better if olympic swimming pools and model UN theaters lured in high IQ whites from the suburbs and got them in the same classroom as the resident blacks.

Achievement Gap, Seattle Style

The ESL children of immigrant non-English speaking blacks > The “English” speaking children of domestic black households where “English” is spoken.

Not hard.  The reason immigrant blacks do a little better than American blacks is that immigrant blacks tend to have some measure of ambition and intelligence.  Why do you think they left Africa?  It does not follow that all Ethiopia, Eritrea, Kenya and Somalia is really any better than domestic American blacks.

Yeah, Those “Young Americans”

I’m sure most of the “young Americans” being arrested look like those in this article.

Not sure about Britain, but an arrest by itself cannot hinder employment prospects, because potential employers can only ask about adult felony convictions.  They can’t ask about misdemeanor convictions or any arrests.  And, even at that, more and more black cities are chipping away at the ability of employers to ask about adult felony convictions.

The Critics Aren’t Pleased

Chez Michelle gets zero stars.

Part of the reason why all these schools just have to start serving nothing but rabbit food is because the students are supposedly so fat.  First off, every time I see high school students, most of them are so damned skinny that if they get any skinnier, they’ll spontaneously disppear.  But if there is an adolescent obesity problem, it’s because, for a lot of reasons, mainly budgetary, safety, lawsuits, feminists and NCLB, sports and PE have been cut back drastically, and a lot of young people spend too much time behind a screen.

Worthy of a Chapter

Sick.  Just.

Boston Globe:

Teacher’s aide pleads not guilty to charge of lewd and lascivious behavior with student

A Boston public school teacher’s aide pleaded not guilty today to a charge of lewd and lascivious behavior in an incident involving an autistic student.

The teacher’s aide, LaShawn Hill, was accused of unzipping his pants and those of the Harbor Pilot Middle School student so he could teach the child about masturbation, according to a Boston police report filed in Dorchester Municipal Court.

One of Hill’s colleagues came upon the scene Monday afternoon, according to the report. When the colleague demanded to know what was happening, Hill told her that he was “showing him [the student] things,’’ the report said.

(snip)

Mary Hill, a cousin of Hill, was in court today to show support for him. She told reporters that Hill was sexually abused by an older relative when he was between the ages of 7 and 12 years old. The relative who allegedly abused Hill has since died, Mary Hill said.

Yeah, how convenient.  He was the victim of unsubstantiated abuse at the hands of a relative that just so happens to be dead.  Sounds to me like a “get out of jail free” card.

Since when is masturbation on the middle school pedagogic menu?  It wasn’t brought up during any of my middle school’s “health” or “personal growth” classes, and while that was some time ago, I didn’t exactly attend middle school during the Paleolithic Era.

News to Her

Maya Angelou shocked to find out that rappers often use the N-word in their lyrics.

Welcome back from Antarctica, Maya.

Food Inflation

CBS Charlotte:

Police: Man Celebrated 45th Birthday With $283 Worth Of Food Stuffed In Pants

SALISBURY, N.C. (CBS Charlotte) – Shrimp, rib-eye steak, baby back ribs and smoked turkey. One Salisbury man celebrated his 45th birthday by trying to stuff all of it — almost $300 worth of food — down his pants.

Ronald Broadway, 45, was arrested Thursday night in the parking lot of his local Food Lion supermarket, packed with enough meats and fish intended for a birthday and holiday celebration, police said.

I’ve heard of augmenting your meat, but this is ridiculous.

Though at today’s food prices, it doesn’t exactly take a full cart to get up to $283.  Hell, I dropped 178 clams the last time I went to Soulard Market (!), and that was just me spending for my little ole lonesome self.  I should add that about fifty of that was at the coffee shop.  Flavored coffee isn’t cheap, you know.

The Only Place to Go Was Up

Considering what else has taken place in Penn State locker rooms.

Read all about it.

I only need one guess.  Drake was upset that McGloin didn’t throw him the ball enough.

Hamming It Up

The moral of this story?  Hamline University in Minnesota is not a good place to go to school, if you expect tolerance.

Several years ago, a Hamline Law School student was suspended for advocating for CCW on campus and against affirmative action.

Now, the university’s undergraduate business school reneged on hiring one Tom Emmer for a non-tenure track teaching position.  If you’re a political junkie, then you recognize Emmer as the Republican nominee for Governor in 2010 who turned now-Governor Mark Dayton’s insurmountable lead through the spring and summer of 2010 into what was only a narrow victory that wasn’t declared in DFLer Dayton’s favor until a few weeks after election day.

Everywhere You Go

Smart is Dumb.  Or should that be Dumb is Smart?

5:

Mo. university chief sorry band played ‘Dixie’

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (AP) – Missouri State University is apologizing after its band performed “Dixie” at a site where three black men were lynched in 1906.

Interim President Clif Smart tells the Springfield News-Leader the song was an “unfortunate selection” and won’t be played again in a public venue. The Confederate anthem has come to represent the ideology of the Old South. The school’s Pride Band played “Dixie” at the Nov. 18 dedication of Park Central Square in Springfield, the southwest Missouri city where the university is located.

A plaque identifies the square as the location where three black men were lynched more than a century ago. Smart says the band director didn’t understand the significance of the song. The local NAACP president says “Dixie” was an inappropriate choice and sparked community complaints.

What community?  About the only blacks in Springfield are a few black students at MSU.

If you can’t play “Dixie” at a place where blacks were lynched, then that means you can’t play “Dixie” anywhere.  For I’m sure the civil rights cabal will find something “historic” about every square foot of land in America.

 

In My Wildest Wettest Dreams

Holder:  They’re picking on President Obama and myself because we’re black.

One can but hope.  I know I am, but I also know most Obama and Holder critics are not, unfortunately.

Writer for The Nation magazine defends SNAP/Food Stamps.  Yes, she hauls out the R-word, but amazingly, only twice.

Food stamp racism.  How to react?  I wonder.

Oh yeah.  Like I usually do.  With what is arguably called “music.”

In a Welfare State of Maine

Maine Gov. Paul LePage:  More welfare recipients in the state than taxpayers.

What could help explain this?  Lewistown, Maine is the new Mogadishu.

What Happened to “It’s Just Iowa?”

TPTB were going rely on the “Iowa never gets anything right anyway” tactic to explain a potential Ron Paul victory.  Now, the new conventional wisdom is that All the King’s Horses and All the King’s Men come out with the long knives, just as they did after PJB won New Hampshire in 1996.

I agree that the Republocratic left-right establishment did come out with the long knives after PJB after NH.  The problem is, I think PJB himself, far more than the establishment vendetta against him, was responsible for his campaign largely sputtering after New Hampshire; His only win after NH was the Missouri caucuses, yours truly had a part in that.  PJB campaigned on the wrong issues in the wrong states, didn’t put aside enough money for the later primary states, and pissed all over his own die-hard supporters and senior staff in reaction to the establishment vendetta.

PJB has a long history of making a lot of grandiose promises, insinuations and implications, then getting too scared of his own shadow to pull the trigger, metaphoroically speaking.  Once he’s on the precipice of being able to win real power and make real positive change, he steps back and goes running right back to the Republican establishment that wouldn’t give him the time of day, or he panders to the media that would probably prefer him dead to being President, or he does something hare-brained and stupid, like Ezola Foster.

The historical analogy will fail, IMHO, because Ron Paul’s money situation for the long haul is a lot better, and when the media vendetta starts, he’s not going to throw his loyal staff and supporters under the bus for their “extremism,” and he will campaign on the same issues in every state.  Ron Paul doesn’t have a media career to go back to once the campaign is over; PJB always had to think about that.  Hell, RP is retiring for Congress, so he’ll either be in the Oval Office or on a porch swing on January 21, 2013.  In other words, he can’t and won’t make the same mistakes PJB did, so he won’t be any worse off than he otherwise would be.  I can easily see RP winning more states in 2012 than PJB did in 1996.  I doubt that’s enough to win the nomination, though.

Be of Good Cheer

They were still in Britain committing violent crimes.  But take heart — They should have been deported.

Real comforting to know.

Meanwhile, Theresa May STILL hasn’t lifted the ban on Michael Savage.

Need I say it again?  Vote BNP.  If you don’t, you must be out of your mind if you had one to start.

Seek And Ye Shall Find

Allvoices:

Authorities are still unable to find the motive of the man who killed two of his colleagues and left two others injured in a deadly shooting at Southern California Edison on Friday. Soon after the man shot him self as well and his identity was disclosed as Andre Turner of Norco, 48.

All five people shot worked in the same area of the building in Irwindale and Turner had been working at the place for the past seventeen years. Turner’s death has been ruled as a suicide by the authorities. However, the motive behind the killing remains a mystery. Turner’s real estate agent, Shane Tucker told the media that though he lived in an upscale neighborhood near a golf club, his house was about to be short sold in a few days time, and he was moving to a smaller place with his wife.

“He seemed like a real stand-up guy,” Tucker told KABC-TV while sitting in his car that stood out side Turner’s home. “I know he did put a lot of the money into the house, it’s really nice. I don’t see why short-selling the house would trigger anything negative, so it has to be something else.” However, according to a source, “Turner did not like the management”. He had told some people to quit there jobs but they had refused. The source also said that Turner acted very deliberate about who he shot.

The persons shot included, 53 year old Robert Lindsay and 57 year old Henry Serrano who died on the spot. The injured were Angela Alvarez, 46 and Abhay Pimpale. There’s no word on the condition of Alvarez but Pimplae was discharged from the hospital after being kept under medical observation for one day. The authorities say that they are interviewing the employees to figure out a possible reason for such a deadly shooting, but there are more than 1100 who work at the Edison, and hence the process is taking time.

Today, Dec 18th, 2011, more than 250 employees gathered to give memorial services to remember those who were killed in “one of the most horrific events the company has experiences in its 125-year history.” “We’re like a family. We’re all grieving,” said Lois Pitter Bruce, an Southern California Edison employee. “There is no happiness for us. No matter how much you explain it, you can’t understand it.”

“Still unable to find the motive.”  Translated into English, that means they found a motive, and that is racial enmity on the part of a protected minority.

More “Senseless Violence” That Makes Sense

Linguistic Linguine alert.

Bill McClellan’s latest in the P-D.

You have to read the whole thing to get the full effect; I just can’t give you snippets.  The problem is, it names a sitting judge, and I ordinarily don’t link to source material that does that.  But I’ll have to now, because I don’t want to blockquote an entire P-D article without linking back to it.  So, kindly avert your eyes when you get to that point.

McClellan calls this particular murder “senseless,” but as you can read in the article, it’s isn’t senseless.  There is a perfectly logical, if wholly unagreeable, reason why this murder happened.  It is because the now multiple murderer was unable to control his passions and emotions.  Yet, this now multiple murderer has the blood of two human beings on his hands, but did not get a guaranteed life sentence for either.

Someone on AR made a great point awhile back — Our legal jurisprudence has this bassackwards notion that someone who commits murder on a whim or as an outgrowth in uncontrolled passion is less dangerous than someone who commits murder after planning and deliberation, such that we don’t imprison the former for life, while we do the latter and on occasion execute them.  In reality, the man who can’t control his passions and emotions and winds up killing someone for it is more dangerous in a way than a man or woman who would premeditate a murder.

Two ordinary unremarkable plainly dressed men who never met each other before now are alone at a bus stop, waiting on the bus.  There is no credible circumstance where man A would want to premeditate a murder against man B, because there are no grounds.  However, if they strike up a conversation, and man B says something cross or untoward that offends man A, and man A chokes man B to death in reaction, then man A is going to prison, but not for life.  He will get out after a few decades.

Let’s say man A and man B aren’t random strangers, but instead business partners.  Their business is on hard times, and man B has a life insurance policy which names their business partnership as a beneficiary.  Man A plots a scheme to murder man B for the life insurance money and make it look like man B was in the ghetto buying drugs and the deal went horribly wrong, in order to pin it on one of the neighborhood drug dealers.  Man A goes through with it, but the police detectives figure out the ruse, and slap the cuffs on man A.   Man A is at least going to prison for the rest of his life, and he could get the death penalty.

Does the first circumstance sound that much “better” than the second circumstance such that the murderer in the first circumstance should get out of prison in 20 years and the murderer in the second circumstance is dying in prison for sure?  Why is the second man B’s life insurance policy plausible grounds for premeditation, while the first man B’s insulting words not?  Did not the first man A premeditate the murder of the first man B after man B uttered the insult?  Why is short term passion not legally considered the same kind of premeditation as the long term planning for the insurance money?  In the first circumstance, man A started to choke man B to death a few seconds after man B’s verbal indiscretion, while in the second circumstance, man A took a month to plan out the murder of man B.  Why is a few seconds not premeditation and a month is?  It doesn’t take long for the human brain to form a thought.

More people are more likely to be murdered as a result of whimsical, second-degree murder, than premeditated, first-degree murder.  But they’re just as dead anyway.  That’s my fear — I have a snarky personality, and it’s just as present in real life as it is in this medium.  I try to control it, but not always successfully.  Carrying a gun around has served to keep my smart trap shut for the most part.  However, I can’t think of any reason why anyone would want to murder me as a matter of long term premeditation — Maybe I chatted up some woman who was still in a committed relationship, or the relationship was far more over in reality than her last boyfriend thought it was, but I am always on the lookout for wedding ring tans.

I Finally Agree With Bill Clinton

He is the worst ever.  Then again, Bill Clinton said it, and every President since Reagan has made a serious run for the title of “worst ever,” with each one getting worse than the previous.  This has to stop at some point.

Yeah, supermarket rag.  All of them are assembled in the same office park in South Florida, and I sometimes think their real agenda is to smear controversial truths by intertwining them with 90% obvious tabloid bullshit.

But my common sense is telling me there is at least a grain of truth to this advertised Clinton-Obama contretemps.

 

Sunday Wrap-Up

LOCAL AND REGIONAL

*  Red meat for urbanists:  A tall Phillips 66 sign at a ’66 station near Downtown was about ready to fall over.

I have always said that tall gas station/restaurant/establishment signs are not appropriate for an urban area.  You’ll see a BP station in the same picture with a vertically appropriate sign — That’s more like it.

Hell, it’s gawdy enough when you’re buzzing by some prominent exit on a rural interstate, and on one or both sides, there are dozens of gas station and hotel and restaurant signs that are a couple hundred feet tall.

When I was a kid, and did the frequent Six Flags trips, the McDonalds and Burger King in Eureka were very close to each other on Fifth Street (North Outer Road).  I swear, each time I went by there, it seemed like the McDs and the BK were raising their signs higher and higher, as if they were in competition with each other.

*  Springfield is now the largest public school district in Missouri.  I bet its yearly budget is smaller.

*  Yeah, sure Albert.  I’m sure the decision between 10 for 254 and 9 for 198 was so agonizing.  Those of us here in the real world who sign contracts for 40 years for $2 million in total (if that) really do feel sorry for you.  Poor baby.

NATIONAL

*  Hmmm.  May I hazard a guess?

*  Now that Iraq is “over,” (when it really isn’t), we can officially call it an expense of 4,474 members of the American Armed Forces.

The stat that grabs me is that thirty-three eighteen-year olds (presumably, mostly men) were KIA.  During Vietnam, we were whipped into a panic about Uncle Sam “drafting all these 18-year olds in order to kill them.”  The number of men drafted at age 18 that were ultimiately KIA in ‘Nam was seven.  Now, that doesn’t count the volunteers.

*  Call yourself “Slim Dunkin,” and sign on with something called “Waka Flocka Flame,” and gettin’ kilt is bound to happen to ya, G.

I know, that didn’t quite sound right.  My Ebonics is a bit rusty.

*  Craig James for Senate?  Puke gag.  But the Rickroller’s fundraising machine seems to be warm on him.  Though that’s another reason to find someone else.

*  WSJ pours cold water all over Statehood for Southern Illinois, by suggesting instead:

Illinois Republicans would be better off spending their time devising a strategy to win the statehouse and governorship. The first step would be to educate the public about the state’s problems and about how Republicans and Democrats differ in their proposed solutions. And while Chicago might be a lost cause for them, Republicans would do well to target their message at the Cook County suburbs, where most statewide elections are won and lost.

Tell that to Bill Brady.

*  The open borders loudmouths are going to drop their challenge to the citizen initative to repeal the state version of the DREAM Act.

I can see the ballot initative passing, and the DREAM Act being repealed, but unfortunately, the voters of Maryland have no direct access to enforcement mechanisms.  As long as these very same people keep voting for open borders kooks, it won’t much matter.  Then there are the judges.

*  Proof again — Opposition to terrorism and an open southern border mixeth not.

*  The New York City Public Schools prohibits its students from sexting, even when they’re not in school.  The leading school for sexting suspensions?  A junior high school in Brooklyn.  You read that right, a JUNIOR high school.  I would have expected an actual high school.  But no, it was a junior high school, ages 11-14.

Lemme guess — This school has the condom bowl and “comprehensive sex ed” things going.  Then they get upset when their students have virtual sex.

INTERNATIONAL

*  Nice segue.  Sex ed in schools isn’t “good enough,” so they’re learning about TB&TB online with porn.

I guess they want us to think that the solution is to have a porn class in school.

*  Now there’s a great cracker jack idea — Run down to some Central American banana republic to start Libertarian havens.  When they get “too” successful and stir up the crab-in-the-bucket racial jealousy and hostility of the Chicano/Indoamerican natives?  One word:  Expropriation.

That’s a pandemic problem with white libertarians — We don’t grok race.

*  The problem with white people, encapsulated in one article.

*  Don’t like the cops in Oslo?  Don’t come to Oslo.  I’m sure the cops in Uganda are perfect paragons of ethics and of the judicious use of power.

*  Duh, one would think.  Unless Oxford and Cambridge want to turn themselves into nothing more than third rate ghetto community colleges, there better be very few blacks admitted.

HISTORY

*  The first human exploration to reach the South Pole happened a hundred years ago this week.

*  Think our football is dangerous?  The other football, the supposedly non-dangerous one, used to be a lot more dangerous.

MISC

*  Beggars can’t be choosers, but robbers sure can.

*  If teachers really could do it and get away with it, I know someone who would spend all day writing “STUPID” on her student’s foreheads.  The whole damned school would be full of teenagers running around with “STUPID” written on their foreheads.  OTOH, if you didn’t have “STUPID” written on your forehead in a school full of students that did, it wouldn’t be a good scene for you.

*  Yeah, you’ve seen it all before.

*  As the old saying goes, old quangos die hard.

*  “Carrying on with a married woman” used to be an arrestable offense.  (Frank Sinatra once got nailed for it, but the charges were dropped when it couldn’t be proven that he knew that she was married.)  I’m sure it’s still a UCMJ violation.  And, we know she’s married — Her husband can’t stop reminding us.

That, and even if I gravitated toward that particular hue, I don’t think she’s so hot.  Then again, to each his own.

*  $1.6 million at today’s exchange rates.

They ask, who would buy this?

Easy, there are plenty of blingmeisters in a certain well-tanned “community” who would love to buy this gawdy tacky status symbol, instead of saving money for their middle and old age, thinking about the financial future, setting aside an annuity for the child support for their 10 kids by 9 women they’re on the hook for for the next few decades, ect.  That’s how they roll.

*  Plax picked up a reading habit while on Rikers Island.

Good for him.  But that begs the obvious question — Why didn’t four years of high school and three years at Michigan State inculcate a reading habit into him?

See also:  Kemba Walker.

Oh God, You Really Didn’t Say That, Did You?

I keep seeing the video clip, but I still don’t want to believe he actually said it.  I watch Leno most nights, but obviously not on Friday nights, unless I’m sick, or out of town, or going out to chase tail isn’t a viable possibility.

Once I kept asking myself, who was I going to believe, him or my own lying eyes, I had to choose sanity.

Poor ole Rand Paul must be pulling his curly blond hair out of his head.  I’m starting to think the wrong Paul is running for President.

CNN:

TRENDING: Paul claims Bachmann ‘hates’ Muslims

(CNN) – A day after a GOP presidential debate, White House hopeful Ron Paul upbraided rival candidate Michele Bachmann for disliking Muslims.

“She hates Muslims,” Paul said on NBC’s “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno” on Friday. “She wants to go get ‘em.”

I can make excuses and partially defend his Iran position (see below).  But this, well, it jumps the shark.  Not enough to keep me from voting for him, because even counting this, I’m closer to him than any of the other credible candidates on stage.  (Note:  I started this season for Bachmann mainly for immigration, but she became non-credible when she turned into an instrument of Romney’s campaign.)  But Ron Paul seems to be doing his best to beg me not to vote for him, while Newt Gingrich is doing his best to beg me to vote for him.

It’s just that I know both have life long records.  That’s why I’ll be pulling the lever for Ron Paul in early February.

As an aside, while we’re broaching Iran, I’m starting to think that everyone, Ron Paul included, is misreading Iran.  Everyone is going on the assumption that Iran is enriching uranium for an eventual conventional nuclear weapon, and everyone save RP is then making the further assumption that out of some Islamist megalomaniacal/prophetic insanity, Ahmadinejad and/or the Mullahs use it the moment it’s done.  What if they’re not thinking conventional nuke, but instead thinking about using their enriched uranium to construct suitcase bombs?  It would be just cute if they smuggled one into Mexico, then got it across our non-existent southern border, then set it off in whatever big city.  Two words:  Plausible Deniability.

I would rather have Iran have a conventional nuke than salami slice their enriched uranium into suitcases.  Better the devil you know and see than the one you don’t and can’t see.  And no, Ron Paul, no amount of diplomacy or talking will stop it.  There is nothing anyone can do to stop it, all we can do is hope to contain or isolate Iran once they go nuclear, in whatever way they go nuclear, and contain it in ways that do not involve conventional warfare or covert operations.  I can only hope they choose to go the conventional nuke route, then when Ahmadinejad gets the big red button on his desk, it will do for him what getting my first CCW permit did for me.

Pictures Are Deceiving

Chicago magazine has this long spread about the slow fusion between black and Hispanic gangs and black and Hispanic politicians in the city.  Of course, they show you a white-looking gang banger and a white man in a suit.  Go figure.

Some interesting tidbits:

Baskin isn’t a slick campaign strategist. He’s a former gang leader and, for several decades, a community activist who now operates a neighborhood center that aims to keep kids off the streets. Baskin has deep contacts inside the South Side’s complex network of politicians, community organizations, and street gangs. as he recalls, the inquiring candidates wanted to know: “Who do I need to be talking to so I can get the gangs on board?”

I’ve warned out about this cottage industry of “former” gang bangers pretending to “go straight” and then running around and preaching to kids about “doing right” (implicitly recruiting for their “former” gang, and running interference for their “former” gang’s criminality with superficially legal methods, IMHO).

The gang representatives were former chiefs who had walked away from day-to-day thug life, but they were still respected on the streets and wielded enough influence to mobilize active gang members.

Then they’re not really “former” gang chiefs.  You don’t really leave a gang, unless it’s in a pine box, or you just get so damned old that the world passes you by.

The gang representatives were interested in electing aldermen sympathetic to their interests and those of their impoverished wards. As for the politicians, says Baskin, their interests essentially boiled down to getting elected or reelected. “All of [the political hopefuls] were aware of who they were meeting with,” he says. “They didn’t care. All they wanted to do was get the support.”

Getting black politicians to advocate for black interests.  There’s something that hasn’t been tried before.

During the meetings, the politicians were allotted a few minutes to make their pitches. The former gang chiefs then peppered them with questions: What would they do about jobs? School safety? Police harassment? Help for ex-cons? But in the end, as with most things political in Chicago, it all came down to one question, says Davis, the community activist who helped Baskin with some of the meetings. He recalls that the gang representatives asked, “What can you give me?” The politicians, most eager to please, replied, “What do you want?”

The irony is that these same politicians oversee the Chicago Police Department, whose officers aren’t supposed to have any sort of link to any sort of ne’er-do-well.  Now you know why I don’t want local control of the SLPD.

Most alarming, both law enforcement and gang sources say, is that some politicians ignore the gangs’ criminal activities. Some go so far as to protect gangs from the police, tipping them off to impending raids or to surveillance activities—in effect, creating safe havens in their political districts. And often they chafe at backing tough measures to stem gang activities, advocating instead for superficial solutions that may garner good press but have little impact.

Couldn’t have said it better myself.

The 46th Ward is one of Chicago’s most diverse communities, home to the well-heeled and the downtrodden. Throughout her career, from 1987 until she stepped down last year, Helen Shiller was known as a fierce advocate for the latter. Few aldermen on the City Council have been more resistant to gentrification or more likely to embrace social welfare programs. In Uptown, large public housing complexes were a source of pride for Shiller, who trumpeted how they added diversity to the ward and provided a rare commodity on the North Side’s lakefront: affordable housing.

Shiller is white, some would say “arguably so.”  Important because virtually all the other politicians involved in this narrative are either black or Hispanic.  This one will get her comeuppance when the diversity she loves so much votes her out office and replaces her with another low grade black.  At least she’ll be able to take pride in Chicago City Hall becoming more diverse.

Allowed such free rein, our lawmakers operate in an ambiguous moral universe that seems as lawless as some of the street corners in their districts. “No wonder corrupt pols here fear only one person: U.S. Atty. Patrick Fitzgerald,” said a Chicago Tribune editorial a few years ago.

But guess who is Fitzgerald’s boss, has been since January 20, 2009 and will be until at least January 20, 2013?

For better or worse, gang members are constituents, the same as businesspeople in the Gold Coast. Says Aaron Patterson, an imprisoned gang member: “It ain’t like gangs come from another planet.”…(snip)…Though estimates vary, most authorities and criminologists agree that there are 70,000 to 125,000 gang members in the city. In the numbers game of Chicago politics—in which, as the old joke goes, a one-vote victory constitutes a landslide—a constituency of that size gets noticed. (Keep in mind that in Illinois convicted felons can vote once they are released from prison.)

Now you understand why most states prohibit convicted felons from voting while they’re in prison or jail or on probation, and a few extend it to lifetime.  Now you know why Eric “My People” Holder, Thomas “Hate White People” Perez, and President Obama, want convicted felons to be able to vote even while they’re in prison.

And though gangs are anything but a monolithic voting bloc…

I’m sure a lot of gang bangers vote Republican.

Many politicians who enlist gang members try to cloak the relationship in the rhetoric of political empowerment or social activism. They’ll say they want to get troubled youth involved in the political process in constructive ways: doing things like circulating nominating petitions, passing out campaign literature, or registering voters. They’ll say that for many of these men and boys, participating in politics is one of the few positive things they’ve done in their lives.

The problem is the way the politicians reciprocate.

A high-ranking Latin King claims that a Latino elected official, still in office, and a member of his staff routinely buy drugs from the gang. “They do PCP, coke, smoke weed, drink, everything,” he says. Several gang members call such actions common. “That shit that goes on behind closed doors is outrageous,” says a Latin King from another part of the city.

Like I said…

Consider the case of Radames DeJesus. A convicted cocaine dealer who was sentenced to seven years in prison for shooting and seriously wounding three rival gang members in 1989, DeJesus, 45, is currently active in the Latin Kings, according to three Chicago gang investigators and a well-placed Humboldt Park gang member. At his 1990 trial, a gang investigator testified that DeJesus was an enforcer in the gang. DeJesus admitted he was a gang member but not an enforcer, according to court documents.

Sometime around 2006, sources say, a political insider told DeJesus he could start up a minority-owned business and reap lucrative city contracts. He then opened SewerTech Services, a sewer maintenance company on the city’s West Side. SewerTech has received a total of $31.1 million in subcontracts from Kenny Construction, the politically connected firm that has won hundreds of millions of dollars in sewer lining and repair business under the Daley administration.

This “minority owned business” is probably a regular business with DeJesus as a front in order to cash in on the affirmative action contract gravy train.  I doubt a street cocaine dealer has the mental mojo to start a sophisticated above ground above board legit business like that.

Anti-gang activists, police, and political insiders say that elected officials show how serious they are about tackling the gang problems in their districts by the public safety actions they take or don’t take and by the services or favors they provide. For example, many politicians in high-crime districts regularly offer help to ex-offenders who want to get their criminal records expunged—treating such favors as a constituent service, like garbage pickup, rather than a legal process best left to practicing lawyers.

The only person in Illinois who can expunge a criminal record full of state charges is the Governor.  Remember, this current Governor won only because of Crook County.

A brief survey of the City Council’s recent actions on gangs reveals mostly empty posturing and symbolic gestures, some worthy of a Second City sketch. Other than an anti-loitering law that’s been on the books for nearly two decades and various gun restrictions that apply to all city residents, the city’s efforts to combat gangs have gotten increasingly absurd. Over the years, the council has targeted pagers and telephone booths, which are the street offices of choice for drug dealers, and banned the sale of spray paint, which Alderman Edward Burke once called “weapons of terror,” to cut back on graffiti. In 1997, aldermen considered cracking down on residents who put up basketball hoops in their alleys, saying they were magnets for gang members. Soon afterward, Mayor Daley proposed an ordinance making it a crime simply to shout the words “rock,” “blow,” or “weed”—street slang for crack cocaine, heroin, and marijuana.

But the absurdity of the City Council’s efforts to deal with gangs reached a zenith in early 2008, when aldermen considered banning the tiny plastic bags commonly used in drug sales. As silly as this proposal was to many people—“Our elected officials are addicted to symbolism,” wrote Neil Steinberg in the Sun-Times—the reaction by opponents was equally ridiculous. Aldermen Freddrenna Lyle and Helen Shiller, for instance, argued that little girls or women who used the bags to carry small beads for their braids could be arrested. Ditto for someone caught with a bag holding spare buttons for clothing, said Alderman Walter Burnett.

Now you know why most Chicago politicians were so opposed to the Heller decision, and why they’re fucking around and being as restrictive as possible hoping the Federal judiciary doesn’t notice.

Remember, the Wall Street Journal just came out against partitioning Illinois into Chicago and non-Chicago — It somehow thinks that Illinois Republicans can win these people over.  Yeah, right.  What kind of gang is dealing which sort of substance to people that write for the WSJ?

Who Is the Most Irritating Host on Conservative Talk Radio?

 

Strangers

Daily Mail:

Obama bans daughters from Facebook – because he doesn’t want strangers prying into family affairs

He relied heavily on social media to get him elected in 2008.

But Barack Obama has admitted he has banned his daughters from using Facebook – because he doesn’t want ‘strangers knowing our business’.

(snip)

His admission seems somewhat ironic, given that he made full use of Facebook and other websites to encourage the young to vote for him in the presidential election – and to raise millions of dollars for his campaign.

As a result, he became known as the ‘First Social Media President’.

Strangers, Mr. President?  Strangers?  This coming from an open borders President.

On top of that, he doesn’t seem to want the daughters letting “strangers” pry into the Obama dirty laundry.  But every time you turn around, the Obamas are peddling the daughters for one pet cause or another, from obesity to peace to social justice or whatever.

Methinks a certain somebody needs to brush up on his Buber.

It’s February 2013

President Romney and Vice-President Bob McDonnell just assumed office weeks ago.

In the weeks between his election and inauguration, President-Elect Romney stated that he would appoint Mark Levin as U.S. Attorney General.  However, Levin’s controversial nature and attitude has caused his Senate confirmation to be anything but a formality.  Conventional wisdom states that the vote could very well be 50-50, with the Vice-President casting the vote in favor of confirmation.  In essence, 50 yea votes from the Senate equals confirmation, 49 equals not confirmation.

As the Senate takes its final confirmation vote, 99 Senators have already voted, and the tally is 49 yea 50 nay.  There is only one more outstanding vote; this person essentially has the sole power to decide whether or not Mark Levin is the next USAG.

His name?

Rand Paul.

Wouldn’t you just love to see that?

Mo’ Mo’ Mo’

AFP:

US mayors decry rise in poverty, homelessness

US mayors sounded an alarm Thursday over deepening economic woes after a survey of 29 cities from Los Angeles to Washington showed worrying rises in homelessness and poverty-related food aid.

“Here is the richest country in the world (and) we have people who cannot find a place to live,” said Kansas City Mayor Sly James, who co-chairs a task force on hunger and homelessness for the US Conference of Mayors.

“We are failing” to address critical issues of homelessness and the use of food stamps, which is “increasing, not decreasing,” he told reporters on a conference call to discuss the survey.

And these mayors’ solution to poverty and homelessness?  Immigration amnesty and open borders for non-whites, in order to import more permanent poverty and homelessness.

“Address the critical issues of…the use of food stamps?”  You mean elected Democrats are against welfare?  Hell, to most of them, welfare dependence is a feature, not a bug.  Employment security, n’est pas?

Before We Freak Out

They weren’t suspended for “Tebowing” for the sake of itself.  They were suspended because they were obstructing the hallways during the three-minute stampede between classes.  They would have been suspended just as much if their obstruction was the Condom Dance.

Yeah, you know.  MUSIC.

Stream of Debate Consciousness

I don’t need to write an actual blog post about my thoughts last night on the debate.  All I have to do is cut and past my Tweets.  I didn’t do Twitter during the debate, to avoid snarky neo-cons.

***

Romney is anti-gun. Proof is that he used the phrase “gun lobby.” That’s a left wing weasel phrase.

This debate is almost over but I have to hit the hay soon, so I’ll give you my thoughts now.

Everyone played to their own strengths and were true to their own selves.

Rickroller and Huntsman were unusually spry tonight.

Huntsman trotted out his H-xB visa hobby horse as usual.

I don’t support subpoenas of sitting judges into Congress to query about rulings. It sounds too star-chamber-ish to me.

The judges either write their opinions or endorse the written opinion of bench mates. They make their reasoning clear.

I can’t form a complete opinion on Iran b/c I don’t have enough reliable information.

And, if Newt Gingrich winds up winning this nomination, then we’ll look back and call tonight the night he clinched it.

I’m not surprised someone pulled out the Tebow card, but am surprised that it was Rickroller. Huntsman is from UT, next to CO, thought he

Not that I’d like his answer, but Ron Paul got passed over on the immigration issue.

Rickroller had a good immigration answer but too bad I know he’s a total phony.

And I’m still voting Ron Paul.

I don’t think anyone particularly helped themselves because everyone played to their own strengths and reputations.

I don’t think anyone lost any of their own voters, but among the undecideds, I think Newt and Ron Paul will gain the most (Blogmeister’s Note:  Someone in Eritrea RTed that)

This Fox News post game show, the way it hates Ron Paul’s FoPo, might as well be coming from Tel Aviv. #SBOT

And when did Ronald Reagan ascend to the status of a demigod?

I noticed save the Bachmann-Paul contretemps, there was little sniping. I think they don’t want to create soundbytes for Obama.

Hell, I missed all the zaniness tonight! #SBOT

1980 was 32 years ago. 1980 is as relevant to 2012 as 1948 was to 1980.

Were there any Presidential candidates in 1980 longing for Harry Truman?

I’m just scared the next Fox News debate pre-game and post-game show will feature Greg Gutfeld and Kevin Eder.

***

 

“Nimrata” Endorses “Willard”

If I didn’t know better, I would think it had something to do with anime.

Seven Come Eleven

Daily Mail beside itself:

Betrayed by schools, the 50,000 bright seven-year-olds who fail to shine at 11

The devastating extent to which primary schools are failing bright pupils was revealed yesterday.

Up to 51,000 11-year-olds who achieved top grades at age seven have effectively gone backwards after being left to coast in maths and English.

Four in ten youngsters who were above average in the three Rs at seven are failing to fulfil their early promise, official league tables show.

Around half of primary schools – more than 7,500 – have failed to get each of their brightest pupils up to the highest grades in Key Stage Two tests at 11.

As usual, “it’s the fault of the schools,” yadda yadda.

May I be so presumptuous as to advance a few alternate theories?

No?  Okay, here goes.

1.  Kids that young tend to change a lot when they get four years older.  I’m sure you can find 50,000 seven-year old outstanding Pee Wee League football players who aren’t so good in Pop Warner when they turn eleven.  Mainly because their competition’s level of marginal improvement from age 7 to age 11 was greater than their own.  Great middle school players sometimes don’t pan out in high school, great high school players sometimes wash out in college, great college players are sometimes pro busts.

I have told you in this space in the past that while I was one of the the best ten-year olds on my Boys Club summer baseball team, the very next year, while I know I improved, some of the boys who were my teammates both years improved a lot more.  That’s when I knew I would never be in the major leagues.

2.  Yeah, white elephant.  Race, and racial differences in brain maturation.  I bet a lot of these 7-year olds that are doing well in school are black,  but between ages 7 and 11, their mental maturity levels out, while their white and other peers are still developing, zooming by them in that age range, usually in the latter end of that age range.  This theory actually depends on the first theory quite a bit.

 

“It’s Not About Political Correctness”

Except when it is.

I guess there is nothing sacred or special in this holy war of jihad that Official America has against sugar, as a direct outgrowth of Blackie O latching onto the “everyone’s too fat” crusade in order to assemble a reputation.