3D printed guns scare progressives, so of course they want to ban them

Because the future is frightening.

First, a BBC news video to show you what the fuss is all about:

The Telegraph describes it thus:

Instructions for making The Liberator, a plastic handgun that could escape detection by conventional airport security, were today made freely available to download from the internet by anti-government activists in the US.

It was created by a group in Texas that aims to make “WikiWeapons” that can be reproduced with a home computer and a $1,000 (£644) 3D printer that uses heated plastics instead of ink.

“It’s a demonstration that technology will allow access to things that governments would otherwise say that you shouldn’t have access to,” Cody Wilson, the leader of Defense Distributed, told The Daily Telegraph.

Emphasis added. And that scares statists like Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY), who’s first, knee-jerk reaction is to ban it:

The Liberator may look like a toy, but “this gun can fire regular bullets,” Schumer said, calling for legislation outlawing the technology’s weapons potential.

The bill was drafted by Rep. Steve Israel (D-L.I.).

“Security checkpoints, background checks and gun regulations will do little good if criminals can print their own plastic firearms at home and bring those firearms through metal detectors with no one the wiser,” Israel said in a statement.

To Schumer, the ramifications of make-your-own untraceable and undetectable weapons are “stomach-churning.”

“Now anyone, a terrorist, someone who is mentally ill, a spousal abuser, a felon, can essentially open a gun factory in their garage,” Schumer said. “It must be stopped.”

Apparently Chuck (and Rep. Israel) have never heard of improvised firearms, before, such as the Sten gun, meant to be made in home workshops. And Loyalist militias in Northern Ireland practically made a hobby out of homemade submachine guns. (So did the I.R.A., from what I’m told.)

But it’s not what the terrorist or criminal might do with the weapon that truly scares progressives, though I doubt even Schumer realizes this. Look again at the bolded quote above — Wilson nails it. What truly scares the progressive statist is the loss of control.  The ideal, for Schumer and those like him, is the administrative state run by bureaucratic experts who decide what’s best for everyone. Life is too complicated for the “average Joe,” so we need ever more legislation and regulation to keep everyone safe and prosperous in line. That includes access to firearms, which have advanced beyond anything the writers of that dear, but now obsolete Constitution could imagine.

What frightens them is that it makes their precious regulations powerless. Like I wrote before on this issue:

But now think about the effect on gun control: this (3D priting) is the discontinuous innovation. Statists and gun-banners and those standing on the graves of children can scream as loud as they want for ever more laws controlling firearms, maybe even get them, but, as long as you can download the plans and have access to a printer… All those laws are useless. They’re the modern buggy-whips.

An idea once conceived cannot be un-thought, and technology once discovered cannot be undiscovered. Even the secret of making an atomic bomb is out there, in spite of all our efforts to keep it classified;  only the difficulty of obtaining the materials and constructing it have slowed its spread.

But combine 3D printers (which are only going to get smaller, cheaper, and more portable) with easy information distribution — hello, torrent sites! – and, well, Schumer and his wise, progressive control-freak buddies can write all the laws and regulations they want; it just won’t do any good. People will ignore them.

And that’s what scares the pants off progressives.

PS: I can see one potentially big benefit to the advent of 3D firearms: by showing how useless gun-control regulations are, it might actually spur us to deal with the real problem behind mass shootings, such as at Aurora and Newtown — mental illness and the lousy state of mental health care in the US.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

NYC Mayor @MikeBloomberg gets taste of his own medicine, but no pizza UPDATE: Sadly, it’s just satire.

I love it!

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg was denied a second slice of pizza today at an Italian eatery in Brooklyn.

The owners of Collegno’s Pizzeria say they refused to serve him more than one piece to protest Bloomberg’s proposed soda ban,which would limit the portions of soda sold in the city.

Bloomberg was having an informal working lunch with city comptroller John Liu at the time and was enraged by the embarrassing prohibition. The owners would not relent, however, and the pair were forced to decamp to another restaurant to finish their meal.

Witnesses say the situation unfolded when as the two were looking over budget documents, they realized they needed more food than originally ordered.

“Hey, could I get another pepperoni over here?” Bloomberg asked owner Antonio Benito.

“I’m sorry sir,” he replied, “we can’t do that. You’ve reached your personal slice limit.”

Hey, Mikey! How does it feel to have someone telling what you can and can’t eat, you pint-sized statist tyrant?

Read the rest, with a language warning: Hizzoner doesn’t like being told “no.”

Makes me want to go to New York, just to give Collegno’s some thank-you business. 

via The Jawa Report

UPDATE: Just found out it was satire. Darn it. It’s one of those things that just should be true.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

The greatest issue facing America: a cruise-ship passengers’ bill of rights

And Chuck Schumer is on the case:

Sen. Charles Schumer is calling on the cruise ship industry to adopt a “bill of rights” to guarantee passengers certain protections while aboard their ships.

The New York Democrat says Sunday he’ll be asking industry leaders to voluntarily adopt the guidelines which include guarantees that ships have sanitary conditions, back-up power, medical staff and other standard procedures.

Schumer’s plan would also include the right to a full refund if a trip is abruptly canceled due to mechanical problems.

And thus we see the modern Democratic Party’s priorities in action: no budget from the Senate in more than 1,400 days? Bah! The threat of a nuclear-armed Iran or North Korea? Don’t waste my time! Food-stamp usage at an all-time high while labor force participation is at a record low? Small potatoes, friend.

No, as we see from the senior senator from New York’s example, what really matters is grandstanding whenever possible and wherever cameras and mics are available, so that you can pretend you’re fighting for the little guy and convince enough saps to vote for you again.

This also shows the different mindset of the limited government advocates on the one hand, and the statists on the other.

Limited Government Advocate:

“A company that provides poor service will eventually put itself out of business, and those who feel harmed by it have access to the civil courts. Annoying as these incidents are, it’s really none of the federal government’s business, and we should get back to tending to what properly is.”

Statist:

“This is an outrage! People need our protection against evil corporations; the government must do something! What? They already have redress under the law? They can take their business elsewhere? Insufficient! We must pass new laws, because that’s what we’re here for — to pass laws! Not in our purview? Nonsense! We’ll pass a law to make it our business! Call a press conference!”

Is it any wonder people are disenchanted with our political class, when so many of them ignore the real problems we face and instead go chasing butterflies?

via Liberty Unyielding

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

A Warning from Ronald Reagan

Reblogged from International Liberty:

If you want some inspiration from Ronald Reagan, these brief remarks reveal his understanding of both economics of history (especially with regards to the other great president of the 20th century).

And this short video excerpt also gets me fired up to fight big government.

But maybe it's also time to share a warning from the Gipper. Here's a quote (which…

Read more… 129 more words

Spot. On. And while I don't think the administration is Socialist (though I'm convinced Obama himself is), their nanny-state progressivism is different only by degree. And the same can be said for New York and California.

#GunControl: California Democrats aim for de facto ban via stifling regulations

“Never let a crisis go to waste” was Rahm Emanuel’s famous dictum from 2009, and California’s legislative Democrats, giddy at having a super-majority in the legislature, are showing they’ve taken that to heart. Last Thursday, they debuted a package of ten bills aimed at curbing a putative crisis in gun violence (1). As Josh Richman reports in the San Jose Mercury, these bills would create such barriers to firearms ownership that they would amount to an effective ban.

Put forward by a group lead by notorious progressive nanny-stater and State Senate President Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento), these measures would:

• Require anyone wishing to buy ammunition to first get a permit by passing a background check, as Los Angeles and Sacramento already do.
• Ban the possession of a magazine holding more than ten rounds. (2)
• Ban  the sale, transfer, importation, or manufacture of any semiautomatic rifle that includes a detachable magazine. (Are there any that don’t?)
• Update the definition of a banned shotgun with a revolving cylinder to include the new technology of a shotgun-rifle combination.
• Prevent unregulated gun loans, with some exceptions, including hunting, in order to keep weapons from those who haven’t passed background checks.
• Require all handgun owners obtain a safety certificate every year, rather than the every-five-years requirement for purchases of new handguns.
• Prohibit anyone barred from owning a weapon from living in a home where weapons are kept and to expand the list of crimes for which convictions result in being barred from gun possession.
• Let the state Justice Department use money from the state’s Dealer’s Record of Sale system to eliminate the backlog of people identified as no longer allowed to own guns but not yet investigated and contacted by law enforcement.

I guess we can’t let New York have all the rights-trampling fun.

While I can see some point to the last item, I get the feeling most of these provisions would be overturned in court in the wake of the Heller and McDonald decisions for being so onerous as to be a violation of the Second Amendment. Surely, if passed, they’ll face court challenges and initiatives to overturn them at the ballot box.

And it should be obvious that none of these measures would have done a thing to prevent, for example, the Newtown school massacre. The Democrats are just standing on the graves of the dead of Newtown and elsewhere and waving a bloody shirt to claim moral authority. Disagree with them, and you must want people dead. The massacres are only an excuse, a cover for them to do what they’ve always wanted: advance the gradual disarmament of the citizenry in defiance of their natural rights. (3)

Senator Steinberg should ask General Gage how that worked out.

Footnotes:
(1) Hysterical leftist shrieking about gun violence aside, here are some facts. Oh, and here are some about gun violence in California that I recommended to Senator Feinstein. Senator Steinberg might want to read them, too.
(2) Don’t worry, David Gregory. We’ll never prosecute you, either. Besides, you can always print your own.
(3) Some, I’m sure, have the best of motives, thinking that gun bans really work and falling for the logical fallacy of “if it saves just one life, we must do it.” These people are just well-meaning fools trying to drag us all down that road paved with good intentions.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Another reason to like Tim Scott

Aside from the fact that the current representative and senator-designate from South Carolina has a good character, the right politics, and a clear-eyed view of our real problem, he worries all the right people:

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People isn’t too excited about the appointment of Rep. Tim Scott to South Carolina’s soon-to-be-vacated U.S. Senate seat.

(…)

Hilary Shelton, senior vice president for advocacy and policy at the NAACP, told The Daily Caller Monday afternoon that the group welcomed diversity in the Senate, but expects the new senator to work against the NAACP’s agenda.

“It is important that we have more integration in the U.S. Senate,” said Shelton in a phone interview. “It’s good to see that diversity.”

“Mr. Scott certainly comes from a modest background, experience, and so forth, and should be sensitive to those issues,” he said, referring to Scott’s impoverished single-parent upbringing in Charleston, SC.

“Unfortunately, his voting record in the U.S. House of Representatives raises major concerns,” Shelton said.

Shelton explained that the NAACP platform is crafted through an annual voting process which engages grassroots-level delegates who vote on the group’s national agenda. That agenda calls for an expansive role for federal government spending in black communities.

Because federal intervention has done such a bang-up job for Blacks. Just ask any beneficiary of the Great Society’s urban policies. And that War on Poverty? We fought it, and poverty won.

While Ms. Shelton does have some nice things to say about Congressman Scott, it’s clear her views are trapped within the statist, dependent, and identity-group paradigm that dominates the Democratic party. And yet Blacks are far worse off under Obama, who is pursuing those very policies the way an alcoholic chases a beer wagon.  But, to be honest, the NAACP stopped being an organization seeking the best interests of African Americans at the same time they entered into a monogamous relationship with the Democratic party. (Helpful tip: if you’re an interest group and you give yourself wholly and forever to one political party — they no longer have to take you seriously, because they know they have your votes no matter what they do.)

Meanwhile, here’s hoping that Mr. Scott has a long and fruitful career in the Senate and that, rather than coming round to the NAACP line, he encourages NAACP members to realize there’s another, better way to help Black Americans prosper.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

In the EU, you may not say water fights dehydration

Caution. May not cure thirst.

Yes, you read that right:

Drinking water does not ease dehydration, the European Union has ruled – and anyone who disagrees faces two years in prison.

The decision – after three years of discussions – results from an attempt by two German academics to test EU advertising rules which set down when companies can claim their products reduce the risk of disease.

The academics asked for a ruling on a convoluted statement which, in short, claimed that water could reduce dehydration.

Dehydration is defined as a shortage of water in the body – but the European Food Standards Authority decided the statement could not be allowed.

The ruling, announced after a conference of 21 EU-appointed scientists in Parma and which means that bottled water companies cannot claim their product stops people’s bodies drying out, was given final approval this week by European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso.

Yesterday, Tory MEP Roger Helmer said: ‘This is stupidity writ large. The euro is burning, the EU is falling apart and yet here they are worrying about the obvious qualities of water. If ever there were an episode which demonstrates the folly of the great European project, then this is it.’

As the trapped-within-the-EU friend who alerted me to this pointed out:

Just wait, in four or five years you have the same stupidity.

Hey, with our EPA and Obamacare now being implemented… less than a year, tops. Obama’s that good. 

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

The hypocrisy of elitist twerps, such as Bob Costas

Armed protection for me, but not for thee:

Bob Costas’ gun control rant was bad but made worse by one key point — he lives much of his life with the benefit of armed security. (i.e., men with guns).

If you’ve ever been to an NFL game this point is academic. The number of armed policemen you pass between the gate your seat is incredible. And if you get behind the scenes, in certain corridors, the armed presence can be just as strong (or stronger).

Those policeman and security personnel are there to preserve order and to protect their assets, be they football players, football coaches, or the celebrities and news anchors in attendance.

In this, Costas is much like other elitists who’ve recklessly criticized guns in past, all the while living behind a wall of guns for the benefits it brings.

So, it’s a-okay for Costas (or his NBC bosses) to pay hired guns to protect  him, but not for the average American to own one to protect himself? Check. Got it. (And isn’t he worried one of them might snap under the pressure of the “gun culture?”)

Limousine liberals. From inside their bubble, they know what’s best for you, peasant.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Food-Stamp Nation: another proud moment for Barack Obama

Currency of the Obama economy

Here’s something that jumped out at me over the holiday weekend — there are more people on food stamps than the  total population of 24 states combined:

In November, the U.S. Department of Agriculture reported that a record 47,102,780 individuals receive food stamps.

According to US. Census Bureau data, that figure exceeds the combined populations of: Alaska, Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Hawaii, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Utah, Vermont, West Virginia, and Wyoming.

Since January 2009, the number of individuals on food stamps has skyrocketed from 31.9 million to the current record high 47.1 million. By comparison, in 1969 just 2.8 million Americans received food stamps.

Wynton Hall’s article also points out the hundreds of millions in revenue (tax dollars or borrowed money) being made by companies such as J.P. Morgan that handle the processing of EBT cards, the meteoric rise in the program’s cost (more than double from 2008), and the inevitable corruption.

Meanwhile, it was noted earlier this month by the Republican minority (1) on the Senate Budget Committee that, since 2009, the number of people on food stamps has grown at a rate 75 times that of  job growth.

But then, what do we expect from a president and a party (that would be the Democrats, for those of you without a program) who are obsessed with reform and redistribution, rather than on creating the conditions for economic recovery and growth, which would in turn create productive jobs and help people get off food stamps and other forms of welfare?

Ah, the light goes on!

The whole point of getting as many people on food stamps as possible is to create dependency on wealth redistributed by the government, that dependency then making the “beneficiaries” more likely to vote for the candidates and party that promises to keep the crack money coming. Clients and dependents, in other words, as opposed to free citizens. It’s a time-honored Democratic strategy, as LBJ made clear when he mentioned one of the benefits of the Great Society. For the more radically-inclined among the Democratic leadership and its allies on the Left, this vast expansion of the food stamp program could also be seen as an implementation of the Cloward-Piven strategy.

Whichever is true (and both can be at the same time), this nauseating milestone really is a gold-star achievement for the Obama Administration. Well done.

Footnote:
(1) In the “to be fair about it” department, the libertarian Cato Institute points out the Republican role in expanding the food stamp program in the 2002 pork fiesta farm bill. In short, the “Party of Stupid” sold the Left the rope they’re using to hang us all. There’s also an interesting chart there illustrating the growth in food stamp use.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

And if that last chart didn’t convince you…

Here’s another, this time of the growth in food-stamp recipients under Barack Obama:

(Click the image for a larger version)

There are now nearly 20 million more Americans on food stamps now that there were when Obama took office. Gee, do you think it could have anything to do with the fact that, since Obama’s inauguration, ten times as many people gave up looking for work as those who found jobs?

This is disgraceful, and yet the Obama administration’s Department of Agriculture celebrates and encourages people to get on food stamps, and rewards states for signing up more. I have no problem with a small welfare state that helps the truly needy; it’s a mark of our compassion as a society. But I have a big problem with government policies that a) have the net effect of encouraging people not to look for work; b) encourages them to become long term dependents on welfare (no matter how they brand it, the dole is what it is); and c) acts as if this is a good thing.

It isn’t. In fact, it’s a record the Democrats should be ashamed of (rather than suggesting people hold parties), and it is an outstanding reason to vote Obama out of office. Depending on welfare is nothing that should ever be praised — it should be a mark of shame and embarrassment for those on it; shame is a healthy emotion that pushes us to correct what’s wrong, such as by looking for work as much as one is able to do, trying to be productive and a net contributor.

But the biggest shame is the government’s, for encouraging freeborn, productive citizens to become infantilized, dependent clients — and then acting as if that’s a good thing.

Come to think of it, to the Progressives it is a good thing.

This chart, and the one in the preceding post, represent an assault and danger to the character of the American people by Leftists obsessed with redistribution. On Election Day, we need to redistribute them out of power.

via Gaius at Blue Crab Boulevard

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

(Video) Mitt Romney vs. The Incredible Shrinking President

Bill Whittle nails it in this video: In 2012, the candidates at the top of their respective tickets have made very different bets about the nature of the American people, and that difference is revealed in the choices each has made about who they pick for their running mate and how they run their campaigns. Romney has bet everything that Americans are still responsible adults who can face facts and make intelligent decisions as free citizens of a democratic republic. President Obama, on the other hand, assumes we are now nothing but infantilized wards happy to live in a super-sized European nanny state, concerned only that the “free pie” keeps coming.

PS: Romney-Ryan 2012, because too much free pie is only going to make us sick.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Tales of the Nanny State: Bloomberg commands breastfeeding!

Call me crazy, but isn’t the choice whether to breastfeed one’s baby one the mother should make, perhaps in consultation with her doctor?

Not when Mayor Mike is in charge!

The nanny state is going after moms.

Mayor Bloomberg is pushing hospitals to hide their baby formula behind locked doors so more new mothers will breast-feed.

Starting Sept. 3, the city will keep tabs on the number of bottles that participating hospitals stock and use — the most restrictive pro-breast-milk program in the nation.

Under the city Health Department’s voluntary Latch On NYC initiative, 27 of the city’s 40 hospitals have also agreed to give up swag bags sporting formula-company logos, toss out formula-branded tchotchkes like lanyards and mugs, and document a medical reason for every bottle that a newborn receives.

While breast-feeding activists applaud the move, bottle-feeding moms are bristling at the latest lactation lecture.

“If they put pressure on me, I would get annoyed,” said Lynn Sidnam, a Staten Island mother of two formula-fed girls, ages 4 months and 9 years. “It’s for me to choose.”

Under Latch On NYC, new mothers who want formula won’t be denied it, but hospitals will keep infant formula in out-of-the-way secure storerooms or in locked boxes like those used to dispense and track medications.

With each bottle a mother requests and receives, she’ll also get a talking-to. Staffers will explain why she should offer the breast instead.

Lovely. So not only will Mike Bloomberg and his merry band of statists play hide-the-bottle to force one to breastfeed, but those who don’t get with the program will be nagged until they do — “We know what’s best for your baby. You don’t. Why do you insist on a bottle? WHY DO YOU HATE YOUR BABY??”

That’s the essence of liberal fascism, of the nanny-state, of arrogant would-be Czars like Mike Bloomberg: there is no limit, no point at which they say they control enough. Every minute aspect of your life –how much salt you use, how much soda you drink, how you feed your baby– is subject to the state’s direction.

Every. Single. Bit.

via David Freddoso

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

The Dependency Agenda is the Democrats’ Agenda

To promote the publication of their latest Broadside, Encounter Books has released the following video that illustrates the real reason behind the welfare state and, especially, Johnson’s “Great Society:” the creation of a permanent class of voters dependent on federal largesse who, in order to keep those checks coming, would also be reliable Democratic voters.

Cynicism, defined:

Think I’m just a foaming at the mouth right-winger? Consider: As the video points out, the so-called War on Poverty not only stopped the decline of poverty in its tracks, it increased it by keeping people dependent. The poverty rate under Obama is the highest it’s ever been since the Census Bureau started measuring it. Welfare reforms passed under Clinton, meant to encourage people to get off welfare as quickly as possible, have been gutted. Food Stamps are no longer a temporary, emergency measure to help the most needy, but something you encourage as many people as possible to get on, even throwing parties to celebrate dependence.

While I’m sure some liberals supported these measures out of a genuine (and genuinely misguided) desire to help people, the real goal is to create a patron-client relationship that will ensure Democratic majorities for generations to come, just as the New Deal did from 1932 to 1994. Or, as LBJ put it, when speaking about his Great Society program:

“I’ll have those niggers voting Democratic for the next 200 years.”

Cynical? Nah…

The Dependency Agenda is available in both paper and Kindle formats.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Because Nanny Bloomberg is too nice

The New York City Board of Health is considering whether to approve Mayor Nanny Michael Bloomberg’s ban on soda drinks larger than 16 ounces. Bloomberg’s proposal generated some controversy at a recent board meeting, because many members don’t think it goes far enough:

At the meeting, some of the members of board said they should be considering other limits on high-calorie foods.

One member, Bruce Vladeck, thinks limiting the sizes for movie theater popcorn should be considered.

“The popcorn isn’t a whole lot better than the soda,” Vladeck said.

Another board member thinks milk drinks should fall under the size limits.

“There are certainly milkshakes and milk-coffee beverages that have monstrous amounts of calories,” said board member Dr. Joel Forman.

Oh, why stop there? At steakhouses, waiters should pre-cut steaks and chops into Board-mandated bite sizes to reduce the danger of choking, and then watch to make sure you chew enough times and don’t eat too fast. Or maybe ban red meat altogether? Hot dogs should be strictly vegan, and cheese and meat banned from pizza. Stores should only sell non-fat milk, and deep-fryers should require a license to buy. (But don’t include Mikey in any of that.)

Aside from the raging nanny-ism, there’s something else disturbing here: the members of the Board of Health are appointed by Bloomberg, presumably because he likes the way they think. Other than a public comment period (and how much good do we really think that will do?), there is no check on their power to regulate the most basic behaviors of NYCers; the elected representatives of the residents of New York City, the city council, apparently have no say. It might take an act of the legislature to tell Mikey to “knock it off.”

(And you know it’s bad when the NY legislature denounces government overreach.)

Are the people of the Big Apple happy with this? Do they want government dictating the finest, most petty details of their lives? Because it won’t stop here. I guarantee it. Bureaucrats will always want to expand their tin-pot empires, and nannies will always find new areas in which we can’t be trusted to make our own choices.

This is how liberty is lost: not in sudden coups, but in little regulatory usurpations, each of which, on its own, might seem reasonable and “for our own good,” but, when added up, turn the freeborn citizen into an infantilized ward of the State.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

"We Have You Surrounded. Drop the Big Gulp and Come Out with Your Hands Up"

Reblogged from International Liberty:

Mayor Bloomberg is a wretched human being. He's an ultra-rich limousine liberal who wants to impose his views on ordinary people.

I've previously written about his statist efforts to ban bake sales, and I've noted with mixed feelings his proposal to tell food stamp recipients what they're allowed to buy.

Now he wants to criminalize large sodas. Holman Jenkins writes about this silly idea…

Read more… 489 more words

Next, Mayor Bloomberg has police make sure you cut your meat into small pieces...

California’s government spends millions to put people *on* foodstamps

Sometimes I really do think this state is hopeless. Now we have Sacramento re-branding the food-stamp program with the happy-face “CalFresh” and spending public money to convince people to become dependent on Nanny State.

That’s the last item in this video from the California branch of Americans for Prosperity. Earlier segments include Governor Brown’s admission he has no clue what he’s doing, and Obama’s insistence (1) that we get busy with our high-speed railroad boondoggle.

*sigh*

PS: Suggestion to the presenter, Jessica Headley. Think about dropping the “cute” hand gestures. They’re not funny and they only distract and annoy. Otherwise, nice job.

Footnote:
(1) Dear Mr. President: We don’t need any encouragement to spend like a drunken sailor in a brothel on payday. In fact, we wrote the book for you guys.

Moving from tragedy to farce, the UN condemns the evil that is… Canada

Well, at least they’re on the same wavelength as South Park.

No, seriously. The “Special Rapporteur on the right to food” for the UN Human Rights Council (We’ve met them before) has decried the lack of “a national right to food strategy” in one of the wealthiest, best-run democracies on the planet:

“Canada has long been seen as a land of plenty. Yet today one in ten families with a child under six is unable to meet their daily food needs. These rates of food insecurity are unacceptable, and it is time for Canada to adopt a national right to food strategy,” said Olivier De Schutter, the UN Special Rapporteur on the right to food, on the last day of his official visit to the country.*

“What I’ve seen in Canada is a system that presents barriers for the poor to access nutritious diets and that tolerates increased inequalities between rich and poor, and Aboriginal non-Aboriginal peoples. Canada is much admired for its achievements in the area of human rights, which it has championed for many years. But hunger and access to adequate diets, too, are human rights issues — and here much remains to be done.”

The UN human rights expert was nonetheless confident that the country could move towards establishing food systems that deliver adequate and affordable diets for all, and called upon the Canadian government to convene a national food conference that would clarify the allocation of responsibilities between the federal level, the provinces and territories. “All political parties have expressed support for the establishment of a national food policy, and the engagement of citizens through food policy councils across the country is truly impressive. But in order to address them, Canada must first recognize the reality of the challenges it faces,” he stated.

And, at the same time that Canada is heartlessly letting people starve, De Schutter covers all his bases by warning an even great number are obese:

Second, more than one in four Canadian adults are obese, and almost two thirds of the population is overweight or obese, costing at least 5 billion Canadian dollars annually in health care costs and in lost productivity. “This is also a result of poverty: adequate diets have become too expensive for poor Canadians, and it is precisely these people who have to pay the most when they live in food deserts and depend on convenience stores that charge higher prices than the main retailers.”

Over-fed, under-fed, wrongly-fed… Canada just can’t win.

Of course, the UN bureaucrat’s recommendation is… Wait for it… more government intervention in the economy, including (he hints) price regulations and income guarantees for farmers. And, of course, it’s a shame that school meal policies are left to the locals. National planning is the answer.

And it’s not just for access to food. When complaining about the lack of access to nutritious diets, De Schutter subtly suggests a need to control what Canadians eat, too. This guy would be right at home in a North Carolina preschool. Or maybe De Schutter, Mayor Bloomberg, and Michelle Obama could get their own FoodTV show, “Nanny cooks — and you’ll like it!”

Gosh, I don’t know. Call me crazy, but it seems to me that the democratically elected governments of Canada –federal, provincial, and local– can decide for themselves what kind of food policy Canadians need. If Canadians need any at all, since they’re perfectly capable of deciding for themselves what they want to eat and whether they have access to what they need.

Though I’ll grant it’s a bit much to expect a transnationalist statist bureaucrat from the mack-daddy of transnationalist statist organizations to grasp that simple concept, since it means he’d have fewer opportunities for globe-hopping, expenses-paid  trips to hector other people.

Naturally, the Canadian government wasn’t amused, as Reuters reports:

After De Schutter complained in a newspaper interview that no federal cabinet minister had agreed to meet him, Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq, from Canada’s aboriginal Inuit population, met him on Wednesday.

But the meeting did not seem to go well.

“I met with the individual this morning and I found him to be an ill-informed, patronizing academic studying, once again, the aboriginal people, Inuit and Canada’s Arctic from afar,” Aglukkaq told Parliament.

Looks like DeSchutter’s report will get the reception it deserves — a trip to the ash can.

via Nile Gardiner, to whom I give the last observation:

One would think the United Nations would be concerned with real deprivation and hunger, in places like North Korea and Zimbabwe, instead of focusing on one of the richest countries in the world, with among the highest overall living standards on the planet. Even the UN’s own Human Development Index (HDI) ranks Canada sixth in the world out of 187 countries. But then again, De Schutter represents the discredited UN Human Rights Council, which includes in its membership some of the world’s worst human rights abusers, such as China, Cuba, Russia and Saudi Arabia. Its bar has been set so low that even Libya under Colonel Gaddafi was elected to membership. The HRC is a farce, and their latest report on Canada is further proof of it.

Indeed.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

De Tocqueville foresaw Obama and the Progressive State

My friend Michael Ledeen has a great essay at PJMedia arguing that Obama’s shocking remarks about the Supreme Court and his apparent questioning of judicial review the other day had nothing really to do with the Constitution, since it was all just politics to him, as his walk-back the next day and Eric Holder’s essay for 5th Circuit Court of Appeals showed.

What it was really about, Michael says, was power. Power and freedom:

Power, because the president and his people think that, since they are smarter and better than the rest of us, anyone who tries to limit their power is bad, and has to be brought into line.  Thus, the tough words of warning to any justice contemplating voting against Obamacare.

Freedom, because the accumulation of power in the hands of the executive branch comes at our expense, bit by bit and law by law, precisely as Alexis de Tocqueville feared.

I’ll leave you to read the rest of Ledeen’s essay; it’s worth your time. But I must swipe repeat his quote of de Tocqueville:

That power is absolute, minute, regular, provident and mild.  It would be like the authority of a parent if, like that authority, its object was to prepare men for manhood; but it seeks, on the contrary, to keep them in perpetual childhood: it is well content that the people should rejoice, provided they think of nothing but rejoicing.  For their happiness such a government willingly labors, but it chooses to be the sole agent and the only arbiter of that happiness; it provides for their security, foresees and supplies their necessities, facilitates their pleasures, manages their principal concerns, directs their industry, regulates the descent of property, and subdivides their inheritances: what remains, but to spare them all the care of thinking and all the trouble of living?

(Emphases added.)

Sound familiar?

RELATED: I know I push this a lot, folks, but Goldberg’s “Liberal Fascism” really does clarify so much. Remember, fascism won’t come with jackboots and rifle butts, but with a reassuring smile and a warm, comforting embrace.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Thought for the day

Roger Kimball quoting pollster Scott Rasmussen on the B-side of the entitlement mentality:

All this is true, and it deserves our constant attention. But Scott Rasmussen shifts his focus to the other side of the equation, one which I tried to adumbrate last week in my column “Wards and Warders.” In order to work, the dependency agenda needs not only to cultivate the sheep, a population of dependents. It also needs to foster a population of controlling bureaucrats, the shepherds or warders of the system. And this brings us to what Rasmussen calls “the real entitlement mentality that threatens to bankrupt the nation: A political class that feels entitled to rule over the rest of us.”

(Emphasis added)

One of those things that’s so obvious once said, you wonder how you never realized it before.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)