Category: No More Bullshit!

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Buying a Clue–With Cash

Some folks are finally waking up to “Less is more”. Less use of credit cards, that is. More sensible behavior. So what if Christmas isn’t filled to the brim with crap one has gone (further) into debt to NOT (yet) own? Here’s hoping that more and more Americans–maybe, gasp! even congresscritters–twig to the fact that borrowing money to get things is usually a monumentally stupid thing to do, and that the things thus gotten have been bought and paid for with other people’s money, money that comes more than a few strings attached.

Borrow to buy something new and shiny (when what one has that is old and dull *heh* is still perfectly serviceable)? The act of a fool.

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Nanny State 101

So, a woman throws a newspaper in a trash can marked, “Litter Only” and is slapped with a $100 fine by a nanny-state “Sanitation Cop” (WTF?!? “Sanitation Cop”?!?). Because it hadn’t been found on the ground and thus was “litter”? Cwazy stuff, folks.

I suppose the woman could have avoided the fine by first throwing the paper on the ground, but then the “Sanitation Cop” would probably have cited her for littering, even if she had then picked the paper up and thrown it in the litter receptacle. Or cited her for both actions, I suppose. Anything goes with nanny-state, anarcho-tyrannical bureaucraps.

But worse, the so-called “Sanitation Cop” is reported to have said the citation was for throwing “garbage” in the litter can. The “Sanitation Cop” ought to have a $1,000 fine thrown at her for verbal littering. Blurring useful distinctions of meaning by using a word that’s generally for application to wet refuse–garbage–for something that’s obviously dry refuse–trash–is inexcusable in a public employee and should be punishable by more than simple fines, though.

Oh, then there’s my other gripe with the report. The whiny, useless, stupid argument-from-sympathy invoked by the NY Post writers pushing the “80-year-old woman on Social Security” button. Right is right and wrong is wrong and ad hominem arguments (they cut both ways–appeals for sympathy are ad hominem arguments just as much as attempt to illegitimately impeach a person’s argument by referring to personal circumstances, etc., are) make no difference in whether an act is right or wrong. The “80-year-old woman on Social Security” could as easily have been Donald Trump for all I care. Citing someone with a $100 fine for throwing a newspaper in a litter receptacle is just wrong no matter who they are or what their circumstances.

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Signs Spur Twaddle

I saw this over at The Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiller and went searching for a larger version of the featured sign on the web:

Of course, this commonsense statement of the obvious about The Zero resulted in the Usual Suspects uttering the typical banal racist twaddle (a local CBS station’s site, of course):

And then, there’s [sic*] people traveling through on the Interstate like Greyson Johnston, from Dallas.

He saw the billboard shortly after he saw the Bruceville-Eddy city limits sign.

“I’m not real political, at all, but I mean, he is the first black president, ever, and you know,” Johnston says, “You’re gonna have people that hate him, you’re gonna have people that like him.”

Dumbass racist. Oh, the “[sic*]”? “People” is plural. The dumbass Mass MEdia Podpeople Hivemind “reporter” wrote, “And then, there’s [“there IS”] people… ” instead of “there ARE”–indicating that the writer, typical of Hiveminders, can’t count past one.

There is apparently a superabundance of dumbasses in the Hivemind and its lobotomized sycophants, as the above is typical of “news reportage” on the sign.

Of course, that sign (which has apparently been up since August, though this is the first I’ve seen it) hasn’t drawn nearly the fire that this one did:

Narurally, the Hivemind and assorted leftards, idiots and liars (but I repeat myself) made a lot of hay out of this one by citing it as an example of the lowest of ad hominem attacks, the so-called “Hitler fallacy”. What all that hand-waving and finger-pointing and name-calling was in aid of, obviously, was obscuring the simple fact that if one were to simply state many the social and political policies of Hitler,Mao and Obama in plain English, one would be hard pressed to tell them apart. Indeed, their ideologies and rhetoric (and behavior,come to think of it) all have much, much more in common than they show differences.

But arguing facts is never in the interest of the Hivemind and its fellow travelers.

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Is WilkiLeaks Exacerbating “America Hate”?

Does it really matter? The “America haters” are generally of several, sometimes overlapping, classes. Whether it’s envy, fear, antipathy over real or imagined (or even manufactured out of whole cloth, as most of the “offenses” against the Islamic hate cult) wrongs, hate is hate and pretty much insures that any arguments the “hater” has will make them just as wrong as whomever they feel–rightly or wrongly–has harmed them.

That the wikileaks revelations may make such antipathy a bit more open or vocal for a while, things haven’t really changed much since the 1950s and 1960s in terms of antipathy towards America and Americans. Sure, the Mass MEdia Podpeople Hivemind is trumpeting such antipathy more loudly now, but the fundamental reasons for antipathy towards America and Americans are still the same… and are still pretty much the same reasons that America is such a popular destination for immigrants, both those who respect her laws and society and seek to come here legally, and those who do not.

Frankly, I would agree to a great extent with those whose antipathy toward America is based on the federal government’s interference in the internal matters of other countries, whether in military intervention or economic sanctions (or aid). Sticking our fingers into the Bosnian tarbaby is no better or worse than doing so in Iraq and Afghanistan–or than the Fed bailing out foreign banks. (The “feddle gummint” playing rescue of some select parts of the financial sector it sabotaged with its own policies is a separate, though related, issue.)

But speaking directly to the casuistry employed in the “unofficial WikiLeaks” apologia for its revelations, I find it less than compelling. Firstly, the argument that, “So here’s the rule we will live by: If our action is likely to cause retaliation, and hence murder, we should not commit that action. If we commit it, we should be condemned” is dismissed by “knowledgeempire” on the basis that holding to such a standard would require also condemning, “Noam Chomsky, the BBC, NBC, The Guardian, Amnesty International, and so on,” for being irresponsible. So? How does this support “knowledgeempire’s” argument? It could easily be argued by any rational observer that “Noam Chomsky, the BBC, NBC, The Guardian, Amnesty International, and so on,” do indeed deserve condemnation for irresponsible, and in many cases wittingly disingenuous, dissemination of information and disinformation.

Then, the “Let’s only count civilians” argument fails on its citation of “fact”. The facts it cites are in serious dispute outside the Mass MEdia Podpeople Hivemind, so citing such things as argument is weak.

Two fails in as many points of argument=failed argument, IMO. Making an argument by assertion (backed only by disputed “facts” from organs with past poor behavior with “facts” and suspect motivations and goals) alone should not be enough.

All that said, any condemnation laid at wikileaks’ feet–and I have not yet done so–ought only be condemnation for dissemination of disinformation. If what they reveals is true and factual, perhaps it can lead to more responsible behavior from those the information embarrasses. I don’t have a high regard for the ever more obscurantist behavior of the “feddle gummint” in this most disingenuous (no, make that “dishonest”) and opaque administration since Nixon, so if the opacity is breached and sunlight shone on it, so much the better in the long run.

But, making “America hate” worse? Pull the other one.

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What’s Wrong With This Headline?

Nearly 1 in 5 Americans had mental illness in 2009

What’s with the “had”? Is mental illness something one can catch, like a cold? Something that just happens or is built into one’s DNA like inherited diseases? What?

“Mental illnesses”, unless they have a physical cause, are personal choices made manifest. Period. One doesn’t “have” personal choices except in the sense that one makes personal choices. Period. Oh, one might have options and perceptions, and make one’s choices based on perceived options, thus resulting in “mental illnesses” of one sort or another as sort of, semi-almost “defined” by that ever-expanding excuse for “mental health professionals” to bill insurance companies, the DSM-X. Why! As the p-sych professionals expand those behaviors (often once considered normal or merely perhaps a wee tad eccentric) they want to be paid by insurance companies for “treating” I’ll be surprised if there’s on non-“mentally ill” person left in America.

*feh* I’d say a lack of personal responsibility is the cause of most “mental illness” cited by “mental health professionals” as things they want to get to get paid for “treating”. And failure to accept personal responsibility for one’s attitudes, feelings and behaviors is primarily an ethical and moral illness, not a mental one.

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Moderate Muslims? Pull the Other One

I was recently taken to task by a disingenuous arguer for stating that there simply are no “moderate Muslims”–that by Islam’s definition of “Muslim” such creatures simply cannot exist.

So, what, to a dim-witted, uninformed, Westerner who’s been lobotomized by years of drinking the Mass MEdia Podpeople Hivemind KoolAid, is a “Moderate Muslim”? Well, the “Muslims Against Sharia” blog pretty much details the features of this mythical creature:

(CLICK to embiggen)

Strange that these folks call themselves “Muslims” since every single one of the characteristics they claim for so-called “Moderate Muslims” would cause their heads to be severed from their bodies were Mohamed to be alive and catch them. “Muslim” means “submitted”. Submitted to what? To the word of Mohamed. NONE of those characteristics cited for “moderate Muslims” are compatible with Islam as “revealed” by Mohamed. Any even semi-literate dumbass from the left side of the bell curve can discern as much from a simple read-through of any translation of the Koran. Sure, there are some “peaceful” verses (basically just plagiarized from Christian and Jewish writings) from Mohamed’s early, “Mecca”, days that soi disant “moderate Muslims” refer to in order to claim their religion is peaceful. But Mohamed is the final arbiter of truth in Islam–it’s black letter law to Islam, essential, fundamental doctrine. And Mohamed himself said, unequivocally, that any time two sayings of his conflicted, the latter saying was–not just preferred!–supersedes, indeed abrogates, the former. Period. And what sayings of Mohamed supersede the “peaceful” Meccan verses? Well, of course it is the violent Medinan verses that require the subjugation, torture and/or death of “unbelievers” at the hands of Muslims whenever and wherever possible. And if it is not possible to subjugate or kill unbelievers, Mohamed provided a special little dispensation for the Muslim: lie to the unbelievers.

So, as far as I can tell, from reading translations of the Koran and more from the Hadith and Sunna, there are no “moderate Muslims”. But there may be one or more classes of people who claim to be “moderate Muslims” and profess to believe the things in the graphic above.

1. Heretics against Islam. There may actually be some of these apostates who nevertheless falsely claim to be Muslims. Could be.
2. Genuine Muslims lying to foolish non-Muslims in order to deceive them and take advantage of foolish non-Muslims’ ignorance and stupidity.
3. Subliterate morons who have no idea what the Koran actually says and claim to be Muslims out of their ignorance.

Those are the ONLY classes of so-called “Moderate Muslims”. Period. Full stop. Placing any credence in the professions of any of these people is beyond foolish. It is foolishly dangerous. More, allowing people who, by the mandates of their own central, essential, fundamental religious doctrine, as clearly and unequivocally stated by their own “perfect” prophet, are required to be our enemies, required to subjugate or kill us, to frame the debate is tantamount to assisting them in our own suicide.

I could only hope for some self-proclaimed “moderate Muslim” to attempt debate on this issue (probably citing some Meccan verses in support of their lies). Only the most idiotic would attempt to do so, though, so tearing them a new one wouldn’t be all that much fun. *sigh*

BTW, before the lil piggie raises its head, the ONLY substantive difference between Sunni and Shia Muslims is the question of who should have inherited Mohamed’s authority. On questions of doctrine, there’s no real differences at all. It’s all political. But they’ll kill each other over the political differences and each claim (legitimate!) justification for doing so directly from Mohamed’s mouth.