Citizen Kane and the Constitutional Crisis

       In the wake of an obvious terror attack in San Bernadino, CA, our Attorney General, Loretta "Worse than Holder" Lynch vows to infringe the First Amendment rights of Americans on behalf of Muslims.   Gee, it's not like Senate Republicans knew Loretta Lynch would ignore the law, or anything.  Loretta Lynch admitted she would ignore our current immigration laws during her confirmation hearings.  Her predecessor ignored DOMA and the federal narcotics laws by allowing states to ignore Federal laws banning marijuana.  Lawlessness is the defining characteristic of the Obama Justice Department.  Yes, the responsibility partly lies with the Obama Administration.  But if "Republican" Senators like Illinois' Mark Kirk would do their job of judicial oversight, the Obama Administration would not be so audacious in ignoring not only the statutory law, but even the Constitution itself.   There are three basic branches to the government, but current constitutional practice is turning the legislative branch into an irrelevance, and the judicial branch into a puppet of the executive branch.  As for the regulatory branch (e.g. EPA, etc.) the legislative branch has ceded so much of its involvement that the presidency is, in fact, becoming the liberal dream of an elected monarchy.
       Unfortunately, GOP front runner Donald Trump seems also to be totally on-board with the presidency being an elected monarchy.  One of the side effects of The Donald's having no knowledge of politics is that he has no political theory at all.  He doesn't know the Constitution from a hole in the ground, and thus he is not making an issue of how the balance of powers has been perverted in this country since 2001.   Citizen Kane is a total fraud who is taking advantage of how bland and boring his competition is.  If Scott Walker and Bobby Jindal had more stage presence, they might be on their way to the Oval Office.  We aren't electing a host for the Tonight Show, people.  Get a grip, and realize that a time of great national danger is no time for an amateur president.

Seventy Mayo Surnames

       This is a first for Q.E.D.  Estase thought about creating a separate blog just for genealogy, but doesn't intend that this should be material presented more than just occasionally.  The following is a miscellany of surnames from church records of Kilcoman, County Mayo.  These names were noted either because they seemed unusual in spelling or unique to me in some other way.  The dates of the records they were found in were approximately 1820-1840.

Aylesand/Begly/Beylagh/Birmingham/Bisgood/Bohan/Bourke/Cleary/Connelly/Conway/
Costelloe/Cribben/Cuddy/Cunningham/Donelan/Doude/Egan/Fahey/Farrington/Finn/
FitzGerald/FitzMorris/FitzPatrick/Foraker/Flaherty/Gafney/Galligan/Gilmore/Gissian/
Glynn/Gready/Greene/Griffin/Healey/Jordan/Keach/Kelikelly/Kogan/Korigan/Lavelle/
Lardner/Lawer/McGonagle/McGragh/McManus/Millet/Moffitt/Morrifsy*/Mortimer/Newd/
Newlon/Nicholson/Niland/Noone/Prendergast/Quire/Rahgan/Rabbitt/Rieby/Riely/
Rochefort/Shaugnefsy*/Shortcoate/Shower/Steed/Sylk/Tighe/Tuohy/Varrey/Vancil

*These names were entered into the records using the habit from the elegant eighteenth of writing or printing a double-S as "fs".

Bill O'Reilly Agrees With Salon

          Going to Reagan White House malcontent Donald Regan and Kitty Kelley for research about Ronald Reagan seems like bad journalism to me.  But it is just what Bill O'Reilly did with his new book "Killing Reagan," which should have been called "Killing Reagan's Reputation."  When comparing the attitudes of conservative pundits towards Ronald Reagan, William F. Buckley was considerably more impressed with the Gipper than was George Will, who tended to think Reagan left something to be desired as a statesman.  (This is a Will ideosyncracy.  Will loves conservatism, and thinks few exemplify it.)  So for Bill O'Reilly to act as though Will is an uncritical apologist for Reagan, going so far as to call Will "a hack," shows that not only is O'Reilly a poor journalist, he is also a hypocrite of the worst kind.  The same guy who thinks it's all right to act as though his audience are the only American patriots, selling "American Patriot" merchandise off his website, now has the temerity to insult George Will?  Now O'Reilly has the same verdict on Will as ueber-leftist Salon magazine.  Let's see how this partnership works out, folks.

Lose Control

Refrain:Lose control
             With increasing pace
             Watched and bewitched
             Intent to erase
             Whatever they say
             These people are told
             Wan and bereft
             And set to explode

First Verse:  War is overdue
                    The time has come for you
                     To shoot your leaders down
                     Join forces underground
------------------(Refrain)---------------------
Second Verse:  Oppose and disagree
                       Destroy demonocracy
-------------------(Repeat Refrain)-----------




Performed by MUSE

Political Idealism from Lord Monmouth

       "I have for a long time looked upon the Conservative party as a body who have betrayed their trust;  more from ignorance, I admit, than from design;  yet clearly a body of individuals totally unequal to the exigencies of the epoch, and indeed unconscious of its real character. . . .Power has left our order, this is not an age for factitious aristocracy. . . .Let me see property acknowledging, as in the old days of {Catholic} faith, that labour is his twin brother, and that the essence of all tenure is the performance of duty."  Benjamin Disraeli, Coningsby, Chapter Three

Political Idealism

     "But I cannot find that it is part of my duty to maintain the order of things, for I will not call it system, which at present prevails in our country.  It seems to me that it cannot last, as nothing can endure, or ought to endure, that is not founded upon principle;  and its principle I have not discovered. . . .Every session of that Parliament in which you wish to introduce me, the method by which power is distributed is called in question, altered, patched up, and again impugned. . . .Our morals differ in different counties, in different towns, in different streets, even in different Acts of Parliament.  What is moral in London is immoral in Montacute;  what is crime among the multitude is only vice among the few. . . .I see nothing in this fresh development of material industry, but fresh causes of moral deterioration.  You have announced to the millions that their welfare is to be tested by the amount of their wages.  Money is to be the cupel of their worth, as it is of all other classes.  You propose for their conduct the least ennobling of all impulses.  If you have seen an aristocracy invariably become degraded under such influence;  if all the vices of a middle class may be traced to such an absorbing motive;  why are we to believe that the people should be more pure, or that they should escape the catastrophe of the policy that confounds the happiness with the wealth of nations?"- Benjamin Disraeli, Tancred, Chapter Seven 

Whig Church

"Tadpole was wont to say in confidence, that for his part he wished Sir Robert had left alone religion and commerce, and confined himself to finance, which was his forte as long as he had a majority to carry the projects which he found in the pigeon-holes of the Treasury, and which are always at the service of every minister."

The Trump Narrenschiff

       Nothing vital has changed in the last two weeks on Citizen Kane.  Other than Rick Perry and Scott Walker, two actual conservatives, having left the GOP field, little has transpired in the presidential race.   Large numbers of highly deluded conservatives still regard Citizen Kane as the nation's only hope.   This group includes Rush Limbaugh, Mark Levin, and Michael Savage.   Ann Coulter, the pundit for those who lack a gag reflex, has not only joined this group, but has led the pack in pure stupidity.  Coulter asked "how many f*cking Jews" were in the country, making (in her view) Israel an issue for no good reason.  Anti-semitism. . . .check!   Then she went on a tear about Pope Karl.  Those who have read Q.E.D. know that Estase is far from enthusiastic about the direction Pope Karl has taken the Church.   All the same, when Ann Coulter opined that it was right for nativists to deny Catholics the vote, and went further to say that Catholicism only became acceptable when it stopped being Roman and started being American, Estase wanted to chuck it all and register as a Democrat.  Really?  Leaving aside the character of the current pontiff, this is just about as Jack Chick a thing as I've ever heard anywhere.  The Catholic Church is led by a Pope.  The Pope's home is Rome.  The political structure of the Catholic hierarchy is based on ancient Rome.  There is no such thing as American Catholicism, just as there is no such thing as German Catholicism or Italian Catholicism.  Look up the word "catholic," Ms. Coulter.  "He had catholic interests."  "His sympathies were catholic."  Catholic means universal, dumbass!  Now that Ann Coulter has appealed to bottom-feeding troglodyte Catholic-haters, what more needs to be done to quash Republican hopes for 2016?  Maybe Coulter can say that blacks need to be shipped back to Africa?  Are you kidding me?  How will Citizen Kane get elected, now that his acolytes have insulted hispanics, Jews, and now Catholics?   Kiss the pro-life Catholic vote goodbye, Donald.

         On a lighter, and completely different topic, Estase has been thinking of a horror movie that could also be considered film noir--the 1960 Alfred Hitchcock classic Psycho.  It starts out as a crime caper, where Marion Crane leaves her husband and steals a fortune from her employer.  Thus, you have the film noir theme of a bad guy versus a horrible guy.  Crane thinks she has the monopoly on dirty dealing, but doesn't realize that her motel is run by someone with and Oedipal complex and a split personality.  Then you have the private dick Arbogast, who was pretty hardboiled, but completely unprepared for Norman Bates.

Vlad Typische

       The Saudis refuse to accept any Syrian refugees, but offer to build 200 mosques in Germany.  That's big of them.  Assuredly, they will also provide Wahabi clerics to staff them.  Germany--once the home of Nazi Jew-haters, soon to be the home of Muslim Jew-haters.  Some things never change.

Thought for the Day

"I would only wish that equality in politics consisted of everyone being equally free and not, as one hears so often in our days, of everyone being subjugated to the same master."
                                                    Alexis deTocqueville

Legislative Nostalgia, Part Six

From the Carthage (IL) Republican, (which, ironically, favored the Democratic party):

RECROWNING OF THE CZAR

The nomination of Hon. Thomas B. Reed for speaker by the republican caucus was forseen a year ago, and only a languid interest can attach to that circumstance.  What he would say in accepting the nomination, equivalent to an election, could not be anticipated.  Reed is a humorist, as well as a despot, and is, or has been, capable of surprised.  It was, therefore, by no means certain that a man of his nimble wit might not say something readable in his speech.

        Power, however, brings responsibility, and responsibility begets conservatism.  There is little of the flavor of the Romanoff in the czar's latest utterances.  Not only has he a lively recollection of the manner in which he wrecked his party in the session of congress which began six years ago, but he is now {1896}a candidate for the presidency.  Somehow it has come to be a sort of axiom among the theological disputants of a former age, in their frank and free ecclesiastical billingsgate, called "dumb dogs," are available for presidential nominations.  When it is not possible for them to be wholly dumb, they open their mouths to enumerate platitudes or deal in generalities that are absolutely unintelligible in their application to current problems.

       Mr. Reed was Delphic from the beginning of his speech.  Returning thanks for the honor was purely prefunctory, and it was lukewarm, as became a man who knew that no real opposition could have been offered, and who also doubted in his heart whether this nomination would make or mar him.  But his next sentence was constructed with admirable art to leave the hearer in doubt.  "History," said he, "will accord us praise for what we did in the 51st congress, and it may accord us praise in this for what we do not do."

       This is not the note of the Reed of six years ago.  "High-reaching Buckingham grows circumspect."  He talks now of a divided government, of small results, and warns his party of the danger of crude and hasty legislation.  Can this be the man who thanked God that the house of representatives was no longer a deliberative body?  But what does Mr. Reed mean by "history?"  Has not the 51st congress already passed into history?  Has not the judgment of the people been passed upon it over and over, and always in condemnation?  Does Mr. Reed desire to appeal from the judgment of 1890, 1891 and 1892 to that of the next century?  He cannot appeal to 1894 and 1895, for the work of his congress was not then in issue.

       When Mr. Reed said that if the republicans had possession of all branches of the government they would possibly not create a perfect world, but that they would make a world more fit to live in than the one we have at present, we recognize a touch, faint, indeed, of his old humor.  But even back of the humor there is a suggestion, not quite so faint, of that partnership with God which the republicans have always claimed as the peculiar characteristic of their party.  Every intelligent man in the country knows full well that if this part of the world is not so pleasant to live in as it once was, the difference is due to the legislation of the 51st congress to a greater extent than to any other cause.

       It would be interesting to know for what Mr. Reed thinks the country will accord praise to the 51st congress?  Is it for the McKinley bill?  If so, Maj. McKinley is the logical candidate for 1896, and Mr. Reed's aspirations to the presidency are an impertinence.  Is it for the Sherman silver purchase act, which by confession of republicans brought on the panic?  Then why did Mr. Sherman and Mr. Reed urge its repeal?  Is it for the passage of the force bill by the house?  If so, why do republicans now say there will never be another force bill?  These were the measures which occupied most of the time of the 51st congress, and if they give it a standing in history, then history will be singularly deaf to contemporary evidence.
       As to the question of revenue Mr. Reed is equally enigmatical.  He says that all parties will maintain the rigor of the house to initiate taxation, which is true in a general way of everybody but the senate, which has frequently provoked remonstrance by originating measures of taxation under the pretext of proposing amendments. He then says that no man can doubt that the majority of the house will furnish adequate revenue for the government, "according to our sense of public duty."  This last clause makes the whole sentence ambiguous.  Unfortunately, there are a good many men who not only can but do doubt whether the house will furnish revenue according to the sense of public duty of the majority.  Many of us would move to strike out the words and substitute "according to their sense of personal or party interest."-- Louisville Courier-Journal

Tory Manifestos

       "The Aristocracy of England have had for three centuries the exercise of power;  for the last century and a half that exercise has been uncontrolled;  they form at this moment the most prosperous class that the history of the world can furnish:  as rich as the Roman senators, with sources of convenience and enjoyment which modern science could alone supply.  All this is not denied.  Your order stands before Europe the most gorgeous of existing spectacles;  though you have of late years dexterously thrown some of the odium of your polity upon that middle class which you despise, and who are despicable only because they imitate you, your tenure of power is not in reality impaired.  You govern us still with absolute authority--and you govern the most miserable people on the face of the globe.  Disraeli, Sybil ,p.195
       "Here too was brought forth that monstrous conception which even patrician Rome in its most ruthless period never equalled--the mortgaging of the industry of the country to enrich and to protect property;  and act which is bringing its retributive consequences in a degraded and alienated population.  Here too have the innocent been impeached and hunted to death;  and a virtuous and able monarch martyred, because, among other benefits projected for his people, he was of opinion that it was more for their advantage that the economic service of the State should be supplied by direct taxation levied by an individual known to all, than by indirect taxation, raised by an irresponsible and fluctuating assembly.  But, thanks to parliamentary patriotism, the people of England were saved from ship-money, which money the wealthy paid, and only got in its stead the customs and excise, which the poor mainly supply.  Rightly was King Charles {I.} surnamed the Martyr;  for he was the holocaust of direct taxation.  Never yet did man lay down his heroic life for so great a cause:  the cause of the Church and the cause of the Poor."  Disraeli, Sybil, p.198
       "But we forget, Sir Robert Peel is not the leader of the Tory party;  the party that resisted the ruinous mystification that metamorphosed direct taxation by the Crown into indirect taxation by the Commons;  that denounced the system that mortgaged industry to protect property;  the party that ruled Ireland by a scheme which reconciled both Churches, and by a series of Parliaments which counted among them Lords and Commons of both religions;  that has maintained at all times the territorial constitution of England as the only basis and security for local government, and which nevertheless once laid on the table of the House of Commons a commercial tariff negotiated at Utrecht, which is the most rational that was ever devised by statesmen;  a party that has prevented the Church from being the salaried agent of the State, and has supported through many struggles the parochial polity of the country which secures to every labourer a home.
       In a parliamentary sense, that great party has ceased to exist;  but I will believe that it still lives in the thought and sentiment and consecrated memory of the English nation.  It has its origin in great principles and in noble instincts;  it sympathizes with the lowly, it looks up to the Most High;  it can count its heroes and its martyrs;  they have met in its behalf plunder, proscription, and death.  Nor, when it finally yielded to the iron progress of oligarchical supremacy, was its catastrophe inglorious.  Its genius was vindicated in golden sentences and with fervent arguments of impassioned logic by St. John;  and breathed in the intrepid eloquence and patriot soul of William Wyndham.  Even now it is not dead, but sleepeth;  and, in an age of political materialism, of confused purposes and perplexed intelligence, that aspires only to wealth because it has faith in no other accomplishment, as men rifle over which Bolingbroke shed his last tear, to bring back strength to the Crown, liberty to the subject, and to announce that power has only one duty--to secure the social welfare of the PEOPLE." Disraeli, Sybil ,pgs. 233-34.
       "The great object of the Whig leaders in England from the first movement under Hampden to the last most successful one in 1688, was to establish in England a high aristocratic republic on the model of the Venetian, then the study and admiration of all speculative politicians.  Read Harrington;  turn over Algernon Sydney;  then you will see how the minds of the English leaders in the seventeenth century were saturated with the Venetian type. .  . .George I. was a Doge;  George II. was a Doge;  they were what William III., a great man, would not be.  George III. tried not to be a Doge, but it was impossible materially to resist the deeply-laid combination.  And a Venetian constitution did govern England from the Accession of the House of Hanover until 1832."  Benjamin Disraeli, Coningsby , Book V, Chapter Two 

Lord Shelburne, Part Three

       "That age of economical statesmanship which Lord Shelburne had predicted in 1787, when he demolished, in the House of Lords, Bishop Watson and the Balance of Trade, which Mr. Pitt had comprehended;  and for which he was preparing the nation when the French Revolution diverted the public mind into a stronger and more turbulent current, was again impending, while the intervening history of the country had been prolific in events which had aggrevated the necessity of investigating the sources of the wealth of nations.

       It was to be an age of abtruse disquisition, that required a compact and sinewy intellect, nurtured in a class of learning not yet honoured in colleges, and which might arrive at conclusions conflicting with predominant prejudices."  Benjamin Disraeli, Coningsby Book II, Chapter One

Citizen Kane Intervention

       Suppose a liberal was very rich, and a close personal friend to the Clintons.  He has made himself a recognizable celebrity with a no-nonsense reputation.  Suppose also that he has never said anything that would be classified as conservative more than two years in the past.  Is it reasonable to think that he might spout some incendiery pseudo-conservative bunk about illegal aliens as part of an attempt to divert attention away from credible conservatives with a real chance of winning?
          Some conservatives need an intervention when it comes to Citizen Kane.  Unfortunately, this group includes talk show hosts like Michael Savage and Mark Levin.  Donald Trump has never been elected to a school board.  He has never been mayor of a town.  He certainly has never been in Congress or the Senate.  What makes anyone think his policy ideas are worth 2 cents?  Trump's supporters have focused their attention on Fox News and Megyn Kelly, as though they are involved in some kind of left-wing plot to get Hillary Clinton elected.  Bullshit!  There's no nicer way to put it.
         Is Dr. Ben Carson a liberal?  Is Rick Santorum a liberal?  Is Rand Paul a liberal?  Is Ted Cruz a liberal?  Estase just listed four candidates, all with conservative reputations extending further back than two years.  Two of these men are members of the Senate.  Another is a veteran Congressman.  All but Dr. Carson have actually made laws and policy.  It isn't a credible claim that there are two Republican choices, Jeb Bush and Donald Trump.  That's an absurd false dichotomy.  It's also a prevalent theme of Trump supporters.   Donald Trump is a liberal buffoon who is taking well-meaning conservatives for a ride by pretending to be something he isn't.

Lord Shelburne, Part Two

       "Such was the man selected by George the Third as his champion against the Venetian party, after the termination of the American War.  The prosecution of that war they had violently opposed, though it had originated in their own policy.  First minister in the House of Lords, Shelburne entrusted the lead in the House of Commons to his Chancellor of the Exchequer, the youthful Pitt.  The administration was brief, but it was not inglorious.  It obtained peace, and, for the first time since the Revolution, introduced into modern debate the legitimate principles on which commerce should be conducted.  It fell before the famous Coalition with which 'the Great Revolution families' commenced their fiercest and their last contention for the patrician government of royal England.
       In the heat of that great strife, the king, in the second hazardous exercise of his prerogative, entrusted the perilous command to Pitt.  Why Lord Shelburne on that occasion was set aside, will perhaps always remain a mysterious passage of our political history, nor have we space on the present occasion to attempt to penetrate its motives.  Perhaps the monarch, with a sense of the rising sympathies of his people, was prescient of the magic power of youth in touching the heart of a nation. Yet it would not be an unprofitable speculation, if for a moment we paused to consider what might have been the consequences to our country if Mr. Pitt had been content for a season again to lead the Commons under Lord Shelburne, and to have secured for England the unrivalled knowledge and dexterity of that statesman in the conduct of our affairs during the confounding fortunes of the French Revolution.  Lord Shelburne was the only English minister competent to the task;  he was the only public man who had the previous knowledge requisite to form accurate conclusions on such a conjuncture;  his remaining speeches on the subject attest the amplitude of his knowledge and the accuracy of his views;  and in the rout of Jena, or the agony of Austerlitz, one cannot refrain from picturing the shade of Shelburne haunting the Cabinet of Pitt, as the ghost of Canning is said occasionally to linger about the Speaker's chair, and smile sarcastically on the conscientious mediocrities who pilfered his hard-earned honours."  Benjamin Disraeli, Sybil,p.16-17 (Wordsworth ed.)

Lord Shelburne, Part One

      " It could no longer be concealed that, by virtue of a plausible phrase, power had been transferred from the Crown to a Parliament, the members of which were appointed by an extremely limited and exclusive class, who owned no responsibility to the country, who debated and voted in secret, and who were regularly paid by the small knot of great families that by this machinery had secured the permanent possession of the king's treasury.  Whiggism was putrescent in the nostrils of the nation;  we were probably on the eve of a bloodless yet important revolution;  when Rockingham, a virtuous magnifico, alarmed and disgusted, resolved to revive something of the pristine purity and high-toned energy of the old Whig connection, appealed to his 'new generation' from a degenerate age, arrayed under his banner the generous youth of the Whig families, and was fortunate to enlist in the service the supreme genius of Edmund Burke.

       No sooner had a young and dissolute noble{C.J. Fox}, who, with some of the aspirations of a Caesar, oftener realised the conduct of a Catiline, appeared on the stage, and after some inglorious tergiversation adopted their colours, than they transferred to him the command which had been won by wisdom and genius, vindicated by unrivalled knowledge and adorned by accomplished eloquence.  When the hour arrived for the triumph which he had prepared, he was not even admitted into the Cabinet, virtually presided over by his graceless pupil, and who, in the profuse suggestions of his teeming converse, had found the principles and the information which were among the chief claims to public confidence of Mr. Fox.

       To understand Mr. Pitt, one must understand one of the suppressed characters of English history, and that is Lord Shelburne.  When the fine genius of the injured Bolingbroke, the only peer of his period who was educated, and proscribed by the oligarchy because they were afraid of his eloquence, 'the glory of his order and the shame,' shut out from Parliament, found vent in those writings which recalled to the English people the inherent blessings of their old free monarchy, and painted in immortal hues his picture of a patriot king, the spirit that he raised at length touched the heart of Carteret, born a Whig, yet sceptical of the advantages of that patrician constitution which made the Duke of Newcastle, the most incompetent of men, but the chosen leader of the Venetian party, virtually sovereign of England.  Lord Carteret had many brilliant qualities:  he was undaunted, enterprising, eloquent;  had considerable knowledge of continental politics, was a great linguist, a master of public law;  and though he failed in his premature effort to terminate the dogeship of George the Second, he succeeded in maintaining a considerable though secondary position in public life.  The young Shelburne married his daughter.  Of him it is singular we know less than of his father-in-law, yet from the scattered traits some idea may be formed of the ablest and most accomplished minister of the eighteenth century.  Lord Shelburne, influenced probably by the example and the traditionary precepts of his eminent father-in-law, appears early to have held himself aloof from the patrician connection, and entered public life as the follower of Bute in the first great effort of George the Third to rescue the sovereignty from what Lord Chatham called 'the Great Revolution families.'  He became in time a member of Lord Chatham's last administration;  one of the strangest and most unsuccessful efforts to aid the grandson of George the Second in his struggle for political emancipation.  Lord Shelburne adopted from the first the Bolingbroke system;  a real royalty, in lieu of the chief magistracy;  a permanent alliance with France, instead of the Whig scheme of viewing in that power the natural enemy of England;  and, above all, a plan of commercial freedom, the germ of which may be found in the long-maligned negotiations of Utrecht, but which, in the instance of Lord Shelburne, were soon in time matured by all the economical science of Europe, in which he was a proficient.  Lord Shelburne seems to have been of a reserved and somewhat astute disposition:  deep and adroit, he was however brave and firm.  His knowledge was extensive and even profound.  He was a great linguist;  he pursued both literary and scientific investigations;  his house was frequented by men of letters, especially those distinguished by their political abilities or economical attainments.  He maintained the most extensive private correspondence of any public man of his time.  The earliest and most authentic information reached him from all Courts and quarters of Europe;  and it was a common phrase, that the minister of the day sent to him often for the important information which the Cabinet could not itself command.  Lord Shelburne was the first great minister who comprehended the rising importance of the middle class, and foresaw in its future power a bulwark for the throne against 'the Great Revolution families.'  Of his qualities in council we have no record;  there is reason to believe that his administrative ability was conspicuous;  his speeches prove that, if not supreme, he was eminent, in the art of parliamentary disputation, while they show on all the questions discussed a richness and variety of information, with which the speeches of no statesman of that age except Mr. Burke can compare." Benjamin Disraeli, Sybil, Pgs. 13, 14,15-16. (Wordsworth ed.)

The Death Cult

       Now that it has come to light that not only does Planned Parenthood sell abortions, they sell body parts, the morally deficient among us are either ignoring the revelations or making banal excuses for the eugenic organization.
       Has Citizen Kane (i.e.--Donald Trump), who we are all told is so conservative, so much as mentioned this disgusting practice?  In spite of the fraud's non-position on harvesting fetal body parts, fellow reality-show star Sarah Palin calls him a "hero."  Trump is a hero for pandering to those who are hysterical about illegal immigrants?
       Bowling-for-abortion CNN host Sally Kohn complains that these complaints about the Margaret Sanger cult are the result of "patriarchy" and "white supremacy."   Let me get this straight:  75% of black pregnancies end in abortion, but those who object to this statistic are white supremacists?  I know that Atlantic magazine thinks that pro-lifers are racist, but it still beggars my mind how reducing the black population is pro-black.  Is it simply that racism is the favorite cri de coeur of CNN, or does Sally Kohn actually believe such an outrageous claim?  It is often hard to discern, in this age of sound bites and Twitter accounts, whether people are in earnest when they say things, or whether they simply need attention from an easily distracted public.
       It was something of a scandal a few years ago when a mortician and a dentist ran a scam selling bone and tissue from dead bodies for use in plastic surgery.  At least the victims of that scam were already dead.  Profiting from death not once, but twice, looks morally abominable to those with a sense for such things.  Sally Kohn just sees feminism and non-racism.

Price? No man can say!

    In the classic 1940 Orson Welles movie "Citizen Kane", a fictionalized life of William Randolph Hearst, the main character Charles Foster Kane inherits a massive fortune.  Kane uses this fortune to become a crusading newspaperman.  Kane runs for office, even though he has no political principles.  He romances beautiful women, one of whom he has the bad judgment to try to make an opera singer with his money, even though she has no talent.  Kane spends a lifetime unsuccessfully trying to buy himself happiness, always failing because he has no real identity.
        If Donald Trump is anything, he is a real-life Charles Foster Kane.  He is a man with enormous wealth, which he has put to no good use.  He is a chronic womanizer (remember Bill Clinton?).  He has a record of being a Democratic supporter and abortion rights advocate, which he now seems to have conveniently forgotten.  And as savvy an observer as Michael Savage actually supports this buffoon because now he says he opposes illegal immigration?  Trump should go back to building Xanadu for himself, because the man has no business in politics.
       Update:  Assclown Donald Trump insults the service of Senator John McCain by suggesting that draft-dodging (which is what the Donald did) is better service than being tortured by Communists for five years.  Citizen Kane just keeps getting worse.

Protecting Atavism

       Estase has a theory about why the Obama administration is reluctant to damage the Daesh (ISIS/ISIL).  1)  Obama's best friend in the region is Erdogan of Turkey.  Erdogan is the most likely beneficiary of a new caliphate.  2) Obama was supportive of rebels fighting Bashir al-Assad three years ago.  These rebels are what we now know as ISIS. 3) Under Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton deliberately destabilized the governments of both Egypt, under Hosni Mubarak, and Libya, under Muammar Khadafi.  Obama and Clinton, however, have avoided responsibility for the chaos that has engulfed both countries in the absence of Mubarak and Khadafi.  What's more, Estase read a book on the Yugoslav civil war in the 90s that pointed out that Khadafi was a voice for moderation on the part of Muslims in Yugoslavia, a voice that, unfortunately, was ignored.  The one-time backer of terrorism had apparently mellowed with age, which is probably why he was a target for politicians looking to strengthen the hand of radical Islam.  The Benghazi debacle was a modest price to pay for helping the Daesh.
      In the wake of the Tunesia attack, Obama tried to prevent military action by the United Kingdom against the Daesh.  Is there any more telling evidence that Obama strengthened this group?  When Egypt and Jordan attacked ISIS, Obama opposed that action, too.  At the risk of being called a conspiracy theorist, why would a group of premodern butchers find a protecting hand in the White House?

Update:  Petasus tip to Rick Wells.  Lt. General Michael Flynn (USA, ret.), former head of the Defense Information Agency, opines that ISIS were fostered by the U.S. government.

Cokie Roberts Praises King's Bench

   Hat tip to Grabien.

       The Supreme Court is for our inability to self-govern, says Coked-Up Cokie Roberts.  The pundit says that the court exists "to take over from" the democratic process.  Because, you know, democracy just doesn't work fast enough for Ms. Roberts.
        Many of us realized that the Court of King's Bench can justify any ruling when we studied Griswold v. Connecticut/Roe v. Wade.  I mean, when the black-letter Constitution counts for absolutely nothing, what can't the King's Bench find a right to?  Abortion--just invent a Right to Privacy.  Gay Marriage--just say that everyone has a Constitutional right to do most anything they feel like.  It isn't about law.  It's about politics.  Ms. Roberts admits the same.  And if the electorate aren't advanced enough to get it done, do it by Praetorian Edict.  Because democracy, it just doesn't work fast enough!