Considerettes

The long-running political satire podcast that I was a contributor to and that I’ve recently been hosting has come to an end. The creator of the show, who goes by the pseudonym Tom Paine, is a journalist by trade, and he’d had a deal with his employer that he could do SNN as an outlet for his political views. Those views had taken a lurch to the right after 9/11. However, his employer has altered the deal and now says that "Tom" can’t do SNN, pseudonym or not.

So it’s with great sadness that SNN ends its run. But for the final show, we brought together current contributors as well as those from the past for a big windup. We hope you like it.

Podcast Goes Out in a Blaze Of Glory

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I’ve been on something of a sabbatical with regards to blogging and news-reading in general. I have, however, saved some links during that time, so here’s a bunch of them.

If even the Dutch have fallen out of love with windmills (by which I mean, they can’t afford to keep subsidizing them), you gotta’ wonder.

Right after Alabama’s illegal immigration law kicked in, unemployment dropped in a big way. Yeah, those jobs you keep saying Americans won’t do? Turns out they just might.

Spain has apparently had enough with the failed policies of socialists. They voted them in to appease terrorists back in 2004 following the Madrid bombings. But since then, Spain has been tanking economically along with the rest of Europe, and what seemed like a good idea at the time has now been revealed to be a huge mistake. This past weekend, conservatives won a landslide victory.

Iranian Christian pastor update: "Yousef (also spelled Youcef) Nadarkhani, sentenced to death a year ago after a court of appeals in Rasht, Iran, found him guilty of leaving Islam in September 2010, is in deteriorating health, according to a member of Nadarkhani’s denomination, the Church of Iran, who requested anonymity. "

"Who would Jesus protest?" According to Jimmie Bise, working from the New Testament, He wouldn’t be protesting government. He’d be changing hearts, one individual at a time.

Iran with nuclear weapons capability. This shouldn’t surprise anyone, but I’m certain many on the Left will be shocked, unfortunately.

And finally, the oldest social network is new again. (Click for a larger version.)

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The same people who will make excuses for Roseanne Barr’s call for the beheading of the rich — who say she’s a comedian and was just joking — also seem to be the same people to reject the idea that Rush Limbaugh is a satirist and take 100% of what he says seriously. Just sayin’.

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Submitted for your amusement, from a friend’s Facebook status.

I do not like this, Uncle Sam, I do not like this health care scam.
I do not like these dirty crooks, or how they lie and cook the books.
I do not like when Congress steals, I do not like their secret deals.
I do not like ex-speaker Nan, I do not like this ‘YES WE CAN’.
I do not like this spending spree, I’m smart, I know that nothing’s free.
I do not like their smug replies when I complain about their lies.
I do not like this kind of hope. I do not like it. Nope, Nope, Nope!

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Relative bias in the media vs actual bias. A new book from a UCLA political science professor demonstrate how, because the media is so generally slanted to the left, outlets like Fox appear more right-slanted, when in reality they’re far more centrist.

Rosalina Gonzales had pleaded guilty to a felony charge of injury to a child for what prosecutors had described as a "pretty simple, straightforward spanking case."

Trevor Phillips, chairman of Obama’s Equality and Human Rights Commission accused Christians, particularly evangelicals, of being more militant than Muslims in complaining about discrimination, arguing that many of the claims are motivated by a desire for greater political influence. Hmm, define "militant".

What if Charles Schultz had done cartoons of Doctor Who characters? The result would probably have looked like this.

"Smart" diplomacy; cozy up to dictators, snub our friends.

Democrats pilloried George W. Bush for "not listening to his generals" when he made decisions counter to the Pentagon. When Obama does it, not so much.

Would ID requirements for voting amount to a Jim-Crow-style poll tax on blacks? E. J. Dionne thinks so. James Taranto wonders if ID requirements for Amtrak, hotels, air travel and employment are equally as "racist"?

Nancy Pelosi said that they had to pass the bill before we could find out what’s in it. Apparently, some surprises are buried in there.

President Barack Obama’s health care law would let several million middle-class people get nearly free insurance meant for the poor, a twist government number crunchers say they discovered only after the complex bill was signed.

The change would affect early retirees: A married couple could have an annual income of about $64,000 and still get Medicaid, said officials who make long-range cost estimates for the Health and Human Services department.

Whenever there is a budget shortfall, taxes are always on the table. How about we take them off just this once?

Medicare spending is unsustainable, and the CBO itself admits that its tools for determine any consequences from Obamacare are flawed. Yeah, that should "fix" health care.

And finally, define "emergency" (click for a larger version):

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Proving that he indeed was born in Hawaii, President Barack Obama finally released his long-form birth certificate today, taking one huge bit of ammunition away from the so-called “birthers”, sabotaging Donald Trump’s main campaign issue, killing sales of a forthcoming book on the subject even before its release, and probably doing absolutely nothing to keep someone somewhere from continuing to drum up controversy over this. I imagine now we’ll need a photograph of President Obama’s parents standing in front of Kapiolani hospital with a copy of the August 4, 1961 edition of the Honolulu Star Advertiser in one hand and a complete genome in the other. Personally, I’m still waiting for authentication from Dan Rather.

However, we also now know what he’s been spending all that money on lawyers trying to hide. Under “Favorite Band”, he listed “Backstreet Boys”. So now that this thorny issue is behind him, he can concentrate on not doing anything about Syria.

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Kenyans have been winning marathons all over the world. The Dutch have decided to try and keep them out by only giving 1% of the prize money to any foreigners who win the Utrech Marathon. I don’t think that’s racism, but I do believe it’s wrong anyway.

Don’t bet your life on outrageous claims by proponents of embryonic stem cell research. Someone  has, though.

Civility Watch: The Left has been sending death threats to the eeevil Koch brothers. The wrong Koch brothers.

Civility Watch 2: Who said, "Civility is the last refuge of scoundrels" and "Let’s not be civil"? (And said it in the same paper that blamed the Giffords shooting on incivility from Republicans.)

Civility Watch 3: If a Republican had said this, he would have been called "racist" or "Islamophobic". But a member of the Obama administration said it, so no outcry.

Do iPads cause unemployment? Does Jesse Jackson, Jr. think we should have banned cars to keep the buggy builders in business?

Hanging a small cross inside your company van is a firing offense in the UK, apparently.

A death panel in Canada pronounced their sentence on a baby in Ontario by saying that life support should be removed, against the parents’ wishes. Instead, they brought him to a country that, so far, does not have a fully socialized system (that would be America), and the child did so well that he was weaned off the ventilator and is now back home.  It’s still touch and go, I imagine, but critics said he’d never get off mechanical breathing. Way to go, baby Joseph! (Which begs the question; if the US goes fully socialized, where will Canadians go for good health care?)

And finally, the same old song. (Click for a larger image.)

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I’m hosting another episode of Shire Network News, as we watch the turmoil in the Middle East. Well, more turmoil than usual. Click here to go to the show page and listen there, where we also have podcast subscription links, via your podcatcher of choice or in iTunes.

Here are the shows notes:

Shire Network News is back with a look at the historic events in the Arab world and what may yet be coming. Mubarak is gone, and Muammar Gaddafi told the Palestinians and Israel “Let’s you and him fight”, trying to avert attention from his own dictatorship. The dominos are falling.

SNN alum Andrew Ian Dodge would have thrown his hat into the ring for the race for US Senator from the state of Maine, if he wore a hat. So with some other article of clothing, he’s going to give Olympia Snowe some Tea Party competition. Find out the latest on his campaign at his website:http://www.electthedodge.com/

Is multiculturalism working? Is it helping to keep us safe from extremists? British Prime Minister Paul Cameron thinks not. Islamic groups, for some reason, take offense at this.

A large portion of the United States had to shovel itself out from up to 2 feet of global warming.

Julian Assange nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize? Pretty soon they’ll give those things out even before you even done anything remotely peace-bringing, right Mr. Obama?

And Ronald Reagan’s 100th birthday came and went, though you may have missed it, at least in the US. Another sporting event with fouled-up national anthem lyrics and expensive commercials overshadowed it. But I think Ronnie would have smiled watching people rising up to overthrow their oppressors.

Give us a Like on our Facebook page or stop by our website at www.snnsite.com.

Closing song “Tom Paine’s Bones” by The Shee: http://www.theshee.com/

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If you didn’t hear anything, or very little, about thousands who attended the March for Life last weekend in DC, that’s understandable. The media routinely ignores it.

And speaking of a liberal media, Jay Carney, who used to write for Time magazine, is now Obama’s new press secretary. His new job description — putting Obama in the most positive light possible — is very much like his old job description.

And still speaking of a liberal media, they’re getting rather disappointed that Obama is not doing what he said he would. Well, they’ve just joined those of us who have been paying attention for 2 years.

Headline from USA Today: "When unwed births hit 41%, it’s just not right". But it’s OK at 40%? Seriously though, look at the graph showing how fast the out-of-wedlock births have jumped since the notorious "Sexual Revolution" of the 1960s.

Civil Discourse Watch:

“They’re going to hang themselves,” said Belknap [New Hampshire] Democratic Chair Ed Allard of Republicans. “And we’re going to help them.”

Allard’s threat came during a meeting of despondent Democrats in Belknap County on Thursday evening. The meeting was hosted by President Obama’s Organizing for America.

The IPCC said that the glaciers in the Karakoram mountain range would be gone by 2035 due to climate change. The latest word? "Researchers have discovered that contrary to popular belief half of the ice flows in the Karakoram range of the mountains are actually growing rather than shrinking." Um, who’s popular belief are they talking about?

And finally, a shorter version of the State of the Union speech, from Rick McKee:

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The latest Shire Network News podcast is out. I’m hosting again, and we have segments from King George the III (pleading for a civil discourse in the American colonies), a listener contribution (Top 10 things that didn’t happen in 2010), and Gandalf. Lots of Gandalf. If you like political satire from a right-of-center point of view, you’ll enjoy this.

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A verse I found highlighted by a friend on Facebook:

Proverbs 26:18-19 (New International Version 1984, ©1984)

¹⁸ Like a madman shooting
   firebrands or deadly arrows
¹⁹ is a man who deceives his neighbor
   and says, “I was only joking!”

The Left seems to forget their own hateful rhetoric when they start to point fingers at Sarah Palin. “…a big mashed-up bag of meat with lipstick on it.” “I’m just saying if he did die, other people, more people would live. That’s a fact.” “Somebody’s going to jam a CO2 pellet into his head and he’s going to explode like a giant blimp.” Indeed. These and other gems at Q&O.

On the (much) lighter side, I have finally been convinced that you should only put 1 space after a period, not two. I’m endeavoring to do so in this post, but it’s a hard habit to break.

Living up their promises, the Republicans have put forth a proposal for $2.5 trillion of spending cuts. Since it’s that amount over 10 years, it’s still only a drop in the bucket. But it’s more than they have suggested in the past (as far as I know) and certainly more than Democrats ever have. If the Dems want to criticize the choices of where to cut, let’s just see them propose their own.

I grew up in the Salvation Army denomination. (Yes, it’s a denomination.) Representatives from around the world are currently meeting to elect the next General, the administrative head of the Salvation Army. You can follow events on their web page, get e-mail updates, or even follow them on Twitter.

Cutting sugar, sodium and trans fats. Buying more produce locally. Cutting price premiums for healthier food options. That’s Wal-Mart for you. (Yeah, that Wal-Mart).

In Houston, it’s apparently safer for the homeless to go hungry than to get a meal that hasn’t been government certified.

Reason TV asks, what happened to the antiwar movement? It gives a serious look at the disappearance of a group that was so huge while Bush was President. Glenn Reynolds notes, they were useful idiots until they stopped being useful.

Charles Krauthammer:

Suppose someone - say, the president of United States - proposed the following: We are drowning in debt. More than $14 trillion right now. I’ve got a great idea for deficit reduction. It will yield a savings of $230 billion over the next 10 years: We increase spending by $540 billion while we increase taxes by $770 billion.

He’d be laughed out of town. And yet, this is precisely what the Democrats are claiming as a virtue of Obamacare.

Some say that if spending $X saves us $Y down the road(where Y is greater than X), then the government should spend it. But ObamaCare is much more a behemoth than simply judicious spending on road repairs before they get much worse. The claim that repealing ObamaCare will cost us money is ridiculous for Krauthammer’s reason.  Amazing.

And finally:

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A very clever rendition of the Hallelujah Chorus performed by The Silent Monks.

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Shire Network News #180 has been released, and I’m guest hosting again. Tom Paine’s feature about a project he’s working on that you can help with.  There’s also a big boatload of Blog News.  Click here for the show notes, links, and ways to listen to the show; directly from the web site, by downloading the mp3 file, or by subscribing with your podcatcher of choice.

Below is the text of my commentary.

It’s my turn to ask you to “Consider This!”

Comedy Central stands on the bedrock of free speech and will mock anyone. Their show “South Park” has left no stone unturned in being an equal opportunity offender. Of course, this is just as long as there’s no chance of getting beheaded for it. The network decided to not show an episode where the Prophet Mohammed was depicted as a lovable bear. This self-censorship was intended to not offend Muslims. But this is a special exception, given how many other religions and groups have been skewered by the network. Yes, their brave, until they aren’t.

Which puts a new show they’re developing in a whole new light. It’s called "JC," and it’s a half-hour show about Christ wanting to escape the shadow of his "powerful but apathetic father" and “live a regular life in New York." Ooh yes, putting those Christians in their place; that’s exercising those First Amendment whachamacallits! I bet there’s a series called “PM” in the future from those wacky Comedy Central execs; the Prophet Mohammed, each week, gets some advice from the angel Gabriel, seeks out infidels, hilarity ensues. Yes, well, no, it’s not. Anyone want to hazard a guess why?

One reason may be something that Penn Jillett, of Penn and Teller fame – magician and religious critic – recently discovered. He has a program on Showtime where, among other things, he pokes fun and mocks all sorts of religions. In an interview with George Lopez, he confessed that American Christians are "the most tolerant people worldwide", and admitted that he was shocked by that discovery. He must have been listening too closely to his own propaganda.

The irony of all this is that, as much as liberals claim to venerate “tolerance” as a concept, it’s only those who are indeed truly tolerant that they feel free to ridicule and taunt. Christians can take it, so the Left gives it. That’s bravery? That’s courage? C’mon, that’s cowardice of the lowest order; no more brave than the bully on the playground. The thing about the bully is that he typically stays away from the kid who will bloody his nose, or blow him up.

Hey, Comedy Central. This is what tolerance really looks like. If you want to exploit it, just consider this.

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From Chuck Asay (click for a larger version):

A bit of selective outrage.

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From Chuck Asay (click for a larger version):

Just a bit of perspective before tossing around the "racist" or "Nazi" labels.

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