Month: March 2012

This is how it all turned out . . .

by asmwizard

(This, for obvious reasons, was never published in the Leavenworth Times.  It’s how I see things as of March 25, 2012.  Of course, things could change, but I doubt they will.)

OK, I’m a historian, writing fifty years from now.  My subject is how things worked out for the nation and the candidates after Super Tuesday in 2012. 

Ron Paul, who was 76 in 2012, never changed.  He ran again five more times in presidential primaries, before finally retiring from politics.  At the age of 100, he ran in the New York marathon and finished second. Shortly after that, Libertarianism was recognized as a mental illness, and he spent the rest of his life in a low-security mental hospital, where he taught classes on the Constitution to his fellow inmates.

Herman Cain never participated in politics again.  His continual hang-dog look was a result of incessant nagging from his wife, who never forgave him for the indiscretions revealed during his candidacy. 

Rick Perry ran for the Senate in 2018.  He was well liked but was always in the minority side, and had few real accomplishments in his three terms there.

Michelle Bachmann remained a gadfly in the House of Representatives for another few years before retiring.  She spent the next twenty years as a little old lady in Minnesota.

John Huntsman spent the rest of his life just being rich.  He eventually bought a vacation home in Roatan and lived there most of the time.  He did visit China several more times.

Newt Gingrich was the first of the remaining four to drop out of the race after Super Tuesday.  He won a total of two southern states, but did miserably everywhere else.  After that, he wrote and lectured extensively, and became the de facto intellectual leader of the Republican Party for several years.  His reform ideas were admired by many, but none were ever really tried. 

Rick Santorum fought on, but the Romney snowball eventually overwhelmed him.  Afterward, he served as Secretary of Health and Human Services during Romney’s presidency.  He retired after that, and devoted his life to writing and lecturing about social issues.  

Mitt Romney won a close, heavily contested election and became President of the United States in 2013.  He lost in the popular vote but won the Electoral College by a few votes.  This re-energized the Popular Vote advocates, but they never quite managed to pass the amendment.

As President, Romney was made ineffective by a Senate which remained under Democrat control.  Although he rescinded many of Obama’s regulations and fired the many czars Obama had appointed, he was unable to balance the budget, have Obamacare repealed, or make any serious reforms in entitlements.  Thus, during his term, the balance of people on government aid — as opposed to those earning wages and paying taxes — finally tipped so that there were more takers than taxpayers.  No Republican or fiscal conservative could win as long as this situation lasted.  Romney was defeated in his bid for re-election, and Michelle Obama became President in 2017. 

Barry Obama was content to be “First Husband” in the White House.  He founded and ran his centers for Islamic Studies, and traveled extensively on Air Force Two – at public expense — while his wife ran things.  She was no more competent than he had been.

During Michelle’s third year in office, the United States suffered a financial collapse similar to that of Greece when China suddenly stopped loaning money to the American government.  The United States could no longer pay Social Security, extend unemployment, hand out food stamps, provide medical care, or employ anyone. No one in the world offered bailout money.  Michelle ordered a lot of money printed, but it was almost worthless. So, millions of older folks starved to death, as did all those depending on the government for their living.  Only people with private sector jobs survived.  It was the greatest catastrophe in world history.

We now have a leaner, meaner America.  Much meaner, and much less crowded.  On the bright side, there’s no unemployment.    

   

  

Fed up with Islam

by asmwizard

I’m totally fed up with Islam, and I doubt I’m the only one who is.  They take “Holier than Thou” to a whole new level.  They have no tolerance whatever for anyone who doesn’t believe their 6th century dogma.  They hate “unbelievers” and think it’s OK to kill or mistreat them. In some Islamic countries, It’s a felony punishable by death to convert away from Islam.  The Q’uran burning riots in Afghanistan, and the senseless killings of six American soldiers are just the latest in a long series of outrageous acts by radical Islamists.  We have apologized, but their murders deserve far more apology, and they haven’t apologized.

I’m tired of all the political correctness we’ve been constrained to observe.  My baser instincts say we should bomb radical Islamists back to the stone age, if not out of existence.  I know, there are good Muslims, many right here in the United States.  We get along well with many Muslim countries, but in some cases they teach their children anti-Americanism in their schools.  Radicals exist among their populations.  We have to be careful with all Muslims. 

Their websites are converting some of our own people here to radicalism.  It’s a frightening thing when Americans take up their beliefs.  We could have bombings and terrorism here.  The Islamists are like Communists: they want to take over the entire world, and no action is too horrible for them to employ.

Radical Islamists don’t fight fair. They employ bombings, kidnappings, assassinations, and ambushes. We, on the other hand, are “civilized.” We don’t shoot them on the spot, as we probably should, but instead we bring them to Club Gitmo, where we’ve just finished a soccer field for them to play on. It cost the American taxpayers $750,000.00. We allow them Q’urans, allow them to pray, and try to treat them with respect.  They must laugh at us a great deal.  I’d give them a ping-pong table, at most.

In Afghanistan alone, we’ve been fighting the second longest war in our history.  We’ve been there since November 2001, just two months after 9-11.  We’ve been protecting them from the Taliban, effectively fighting on one side of a civil war, for more than ten years now, and have lost nearly 2000 American lives, as well as many lives from other UN forces.  Are the Afghans grateful?  A percentage of them possibly are.  But many are not.  We’re trying to train them to protect themselves, but a few of the very people we tried to train turned on us and murdered our men.

It’s hard to see why we should stay there.  It’s hard to see what American interests are served. Obama wants us out, except for a token force, this summer, conveniently just before the presidential election, and before winter ends the “fighting season.”  Reluctantly, I’m beginning to think, pull out completely, now.

If I were in charge, I think I would isolate several Muslim countries completely.  Iran, Syria, Pakistan, and Afghanistan are examples.  I’d put several others on probation, including Egypt, Lebanon, and Iraq.  The probationary countries would have to shape up or be isolated.  For the isolated countries, I’d stop all commerce with the United States.  Some of these things are already in effect, but here’s what I’d do: pull our embassy; stop all nationals from the country from visiting America (including their representatives to the United Nations); cancel visas for their nationals already in America and deport them; confiscate all their financial assets in this country; forbid all trade with them; stop all air, sea, telephone and internet service (if stopping internet is technically possible) between our country and the isolated countries; place stiff sanctions on any other country that trades with them; forbid American citizens to travel to them; and finally, add their major cities to the target list for our missiles in case they attack us in any way.

Islam is fortunate I’m not in charge, and that our President was educated as a Muslim and has a soft spot in his heart for them.  A big soft spot.

       

 

The IQ of the public

by asmwizard

(As published in the Leavenworth Times, February 28, 2012.  This is personal bias — I have long believed the general public is effectively stupid, as are most subsets of it.)

Psychologists have long argued about intelligence testing in humans.  Various tests, such as Stanford-Binet, attempt to measure it, and scores are reported around an average of 100.  Some populations have a higher average, some lower, but 100 is the assumed value.  You might think that the IQ of the public itself (taken as a sort of multi-celled animal) is the same.  I maintain the IQ of the public as a whole is closer to zero.  Why?  The smart and the stupid cancel each other out. 

The behavior of the public is  like that of an amoeba, which has no brain, but reacts to stimuli.  For the public, stimulus is information and propaganda, and response can be measured through opinion polls and elections (the ultimate polls).   The information the public receives is a bewildering mixture of truth and lies.  The public has no organ to determine the validity of the information, but various portions of the public respond well to certain sources – Democrats tend to believe anything whatever said by other Democrats, for example.  Almost no logic is involved.

An amoeba follows a pattern.  It swims, or at least moves, slowly through still water.  It encounters particles from time to time.  It absorbs, then either digests or expels them.  The public doesn’t swim – information flows to it, is ingested.  A very small portion is retained, the rest rejected.   

Amoebas reproduce by dividing.  The public can be subdivided too, and the various parts continue to resemble an amoeba.  Consider the United States Congress: made up of very smart people, it gives the impression that it is collectively stupid.  Ideology cancels out the good that either side might do.  I won’t mention the arrogance and ignorance of politicians, and the difficulty of the problems they seek to solve.  

Consider Democrats:  the good some of them would do is offset and hindered by the destructive ideas of the far left: Communists and Socialists.  Republicans are similarly split and hampered.  Establishment Republicans resist change, while the more conservative want reform. 

I have a point to all this: the Republican public – the brainless amoeba — has a knack for choosing the wrong candidate for president.  They are doing so again.  What America needs is a determined reformer: Gingrich.  The Republican amoeba appears to be selecting either Santorum or Romney.   All three candidates are smart, but one is smarter and has specific plans for reform.  Check their websites for detail.  Santorum has offered some plans, Romney almost none.  Gingrich has extensive and rather detailed plans to reform America.  Gingrich is a PhD, has long legislative experience, a record of success, and a very high IQ.  He has long thought about and written several books on how to improve America’s future.  Romney and Santorum can’t match that.  Gingrich, after a long career, has more baggage, but his faults do not lessen the abilities he would bring to the presidency.   

The Republican amoeba eventually preferred Gingrich, but when negative (mostly erroneous) information dominated the stimulus, it turned away.   Debates provided a boost in South Carolina, which preferred Gingrich, then the Florida public selected Romney after a flood of negative ads.  The public has elevated five different candidates (Perry, Cain, Gingrich, Romney, Santorum) to first place, only to let them fade.  Where’s the intelligence? 

Do you need absolute proof that the public has no intelligence?   Obama’s approval rating is climbing.  Nearly 50% now say they approve of the job he’s doing as president.  The amoeba strikes again.