Clearing Tabs

Steyn: We're too broke to be this stupid

You know how it is when you’re at the mall and someone rattles a collection box under your nose and you’re not sure where it’s going but it’s probably for Darfur or Rwanda or Hoogivsastan. Whatever. You’re dropping a buck or two in the tin for the privilege of not having to think about it. For the more ideologically committed, there’s always the awareness-raising rock concert: it’s something to do with Bono and debt forgiveness, whatever that means, but let’s face it, going to the park for eight hours of celebrity caterwauling beats having to wrap your head around Afro-Marxist economics. The modern welfare state operates on the same principle: since the Second World War, the hard-working middle classes have transferred historically unprecedented amounts of money to the unproductive sector in order not to have to think about it. But so what? We were rich enough that we could afford to be stupid.

Timmer: Another, Really?!! Moment

On the White House Blog, the title of the post that announces the release of the strategy is, and I couldn’t make this up myself if I wanted to:

“A BLUEPRINT FOR PURSUING THE WORLD THAT WE SEEK.”

What amazes me is that we all know that there were meetings about this. There was brain-storming. If nothing else, this administration knows the value of a well-turned phrase so they WORK at it. THIS is what they came up with. It’s the best they could do. So basically, they’re not even doing the image thing very well anymore.

Sgt. Mom: Tales of Texas: Lexington on the Quadalupe

Farcical, anticlimactic and slightly ridiculous as the “Come and Take It Fight” was – it was still the spark that set off serious and organized resistance among the Texians. And within six months, the war which threatened would become all too real and all too tragic, especially for Gonzales – which eventually suffered the loss of a good portion of leading citizens - and even the physical town itself.