Saturday, April 23, 2016

The Smug! It Burns!

“The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.” ― F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Crack-Up

Today’s topic is smugness: a potent combination of hubris and envy

smug - adjective \ˈsməg\- having or showing the annoying quality of people who feel very pleased or satisfied with their abilities, achievements, etc.

synonyms:
self-satisfied, self-congratulatory, complacent, superior, pleased with oneself, conceited

Go ahead - Google  “smug” Images and see what you get.

barry smug

If you are smug enough you can confidently disregard the stuff you don’t know as unimportant/irrelevant.

Things Obama doesn’t know:

  • He doesn’t know that his pastor of 20 years is an anti-American racist
  • He doesn’t know that he was running assault rifles to Mexican drug lords
  • He doesn’t know that he was using the IRS to attack political opponents
  • He doesn’t know that he has been wiretapping the press
  • He doesn’t know that he let Ambassador Stevens die, and then lied to the victims’ families
  • He doesn’t know that he has tripled the deficit
  • He doesn’t know that he is the most divisive president in US history

Because if you’re smug enough it’s really only what you DO know that counts.

Things Obama knows for sure:

    CO2 is going to kill us all. And he can stop it.

But shoot, what do I know about smugness? Let’s hear from an expert; perhaps the last self-aware liberal on earth, a man by the name of Emmett Rensin who writes for just about every liberal publication still in print. His latest offering, The smug style in American liberalism appears in the uber liberal Vox. It’s important not because it contains anything new, but because it recognizes that our mutual survival requires some mending of the rent in our cultural fabric.

fabric glue

In 2016, the smug style has found expression in media and in policy, in the attitudes of liberals both visible and private, providing a foundational set of assumptions above which a great number of liberals comport their understanding of the world.

It has led an American ideology hitherto responsible for a great share of the good accomplished over the past century of our political life to a posture of reaction and disrespect: a condescending, defensive sneer toward any person or movement outside of its consensus, dressed up as a monopoly on reason.

Rensin notes a major shift of America’s liberal movement,

A movement once fleshed out in union halls and little magazines shifted into universities and major press, from the center of the country to its cities and elite enclaves. Minority voters remained, but bereft of the material and social capital required to dominate elite decision-making, they were largely excluded from an agenda driven by the new Democratic core: the educated, the coastal, and the professional.

Wow! If anyone is marginalizing minority voters then it is the elitist liberals.

And dismayed by the loss of what used to be their base – working people in fly-over country – liberals concluded that these rubes had been conned by conservatives and were too stupid to even know what was best for them.

Finding comfort in the notion that their former allies were disdainful, hapless rubes, smug liberals created a culture animated by that contempt.

And the smugness just bred on itself:

Over 20 years, an industry arose to cater to the smug style. It began in humor, and culminated for a time in The Daily Show, a program that more than any other thing advanced the idea that liberal orthodoxy was a kind of educated savvy and that its opponents were, before anything else, stupid. The smug liberal found relief in ridiculing them.

obama smug

The article is a bit long and rambling but worth wading through for insights that explain more than they are intended to, such as this,

Abandoned and without any party willing to champion their interests, people cling to candidates who, at the very least, are willing to represent their moral convictions. The smug style resents them for it, and they resent the smug in turn.

which explains perfectly why Trump commands huge crowds wherever he goes.

silent majority trump

And I’d also recommend James French’s take on the article for a conservative’s point of view. He notes that meaningful conversation cannot occur in an atmosphere where “the burden of proof tends to run one way — only the conservative has to prove his compassion, knowledge, and civility. I have to prove I’m worthy of the conversation. For the leftist, all the relevant virtues are presumed.”

At the risk of sounding smug I will note that Rensin’s article isn’t all that well written but even so you’ll want to read the whole thing. Or as Mr. French put it:

I pass along his essay not to proclaim that conservative-world is culturally superior (Indeed, this entire election cycle has served as a heaping helping of humble pie for conservatives who believed our tribe was developing a healthy, thoughtful political culture), but rather to note that thoughtful liberals may be starting to wake up. So are thoughtful conservatives. Mutual loathing and contempt are spiraling out of control, and if each side can’t check their own worst impulses, then I agree with Rensin — “the divide, the disdain, the whole crackup are inevitable.”

If I may quote F. Scott Fitzgerald again, this time with the follow-on quote:

crackup

“The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.
One should, for example, be able to see that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise.”
― F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Crack-Up

And one last warning regarding smugness, allegedly from Mark Twain:

mindfulness

Smug “knowing” - a sure impediment to conflict resolution

Linked By: Larwyn’s Linx on Doug Ross@Journal, and BlogsLucianneLoves, and Free Republic, Thanks!

Cross-Posted on Patriot Action Network

Friday, April 22, 2016

Sovereignty In An Age of Bondage

Imagine you’re the Queen of England, celebrating your 90th birthday:

GTY_queen_elizabeth_great_grandchildren_jef_160420_4x3_992

and the President of the United States and his lovely bride show up

1EEF9CD4

to have a birthday lunch with you, albeit a day late because they’re very important people and had  previous engagements. 

Britain ObamaAs you can see Lady M is honoring both the Queen and The Artist Formerly Known As Prince by wearing her Purple Reign frock.

And as long as he was there, President Barry used the occasion to lobby you and your subjects to stay in the European Union. He even had an editorial written for him to address the royal subjects directly:

Obama invoked the interlinked history of the United States and Britain and the tens of thousands of Americans lying in European war graves as his reason for speaking on a June 23 referendum.

"The European Union doesn't moderate British influence - it magnifies it," he wrote under the headline: "As your friend, I tell you that the EU makes Britain even greater."

Some Brits however did not appreciate what they considered meddling on the part of President Barry. The Mayor of London took special offense:

Writing in The Sun newspaper, London Mayor Boris Johnson recounted a claim that a bust of former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill was removed from the Oval Office after Obama was elected and returned to the British Embassy.

Johnson wrote that some said removing the bust “was a symbol of the part-Kenyan president’s ancestral dislike of the British Empire, of which Churchill had been such a fervent defender.” Seattle Times

Apparently many Brits agree with the Mayor, and think Obama should keep his nose out of their affairs, and feel his advice is just a tad hypocritical.

Johnson said Obama’s advice was “paradoxical, inconsistent, incoherent” because Americans “would never contemplate anything like the EU for themselves.”

True dat, Mayor Johnson, at least BO – Before Obama. Now days we’re more than happy to hand over our sovereign power to the United Nations to determine America’s economic and energy future. 

Today at United Nations Headquarters in New York City, Secretary of State John Kerry and representatives of over 130 nations will sign the Framework Convention on Climate Change agreement that was negotiated in Paris last December.

The White House has also acknowledged that the agreement contains “legally binding” provisions designed to create a “long-term framework” that will force the United States and signatory countries to reduce carbon emissions for decades to come.

In fact he believes in letting them shape our future so much that he’s willing to violate the Constitution in order to accomplish it.

Despite these facts, President Obama has already announced he will not submit the Paris Climate Agreement to the Senate for advice and consent. Instead, the White House claims the signature environmental achievement of the president’s tenure is just an “international agreement” not meriting Senate attention.

So just as he believes "The European Union doesn't moderate British influence - it magnifies it,"  he likewise believes that “the United Nations doesn’t moderate America’s influence – it magnifies it.” If by “magnify” you mean “diminish”.

un wealth redistribution

If nothing else, it will certainly magnify the redistribution of America’s wealth. And isn’t that what Earth Day  in the Age of Obama, is really all about? Redistributing the green?

earth day

What the heck, while we’re at it, why not replace real trees with forests of artificial trees that could serve as CO2-reducing air fresheners? They would be much more efficient.

680x510xartificial-trees.jpg.pagespeed.ic.7C42Vh4yFwOne synthetic tree can capture 10 tons of CO2 per day. Each tree would cost $24,000 (plus shipping and handling).

And the United Nations could pay for them! With your green!

green-red

Hang tough Britain: sovereignty in an age of bondage is always a better idea.

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Cross-Posted on Patriot Action Network

Thursday, April 21, 2016

Les Enfants Terribles Part II, The End of History

NOTE: This is Part II in the Les Enfants Terribles series in which we explore how and from where the Special Snowflakes (SS) came to be. Today we look at how the End of Education set the stage for what I like to call “The End of History.”  I’m drawing from Res Idiotica, a post by Patrick J Deenan, Professor of Constitutional Studies and Political Thought at the University of Notre Dame, which was forwarded to me by Blonde Gator.

mayfly2_large

                                         Watching those lifelong dancers of a day 
                                         As night closed in, I felt myself alone
                                         In a life too much my own,
                                         More mortal in my separateness than they -
                                         Unless, I thought, I had been called to be
                                         Not fly or star
                                         But one whose task is joyfully to see 
                                         How fair the fiats of the caller are
.Mayflies, Richard Wilbur 

In his post, Res Idiotica, Deenan describes what the end of education looks like:

My students are know-nothings. They are exceedingly nice, pleasant, trustworthy, mostly honest, well-intentioned, and utterly decent. But their minds are largely empty, devoid of any substantial knowledge that might be the fruits of an education in an inheritance and a gift of a previous generation. They are the culmination of western civilization, a civilization that has forgotten it origins and aims, and as a result, has achieved near-perfect indifference about itself.

Deenan notes that although they know how to take tests, get A’s, respect “diversity” and comport themselves with studied non-judgmentalism they are otherwise “masters of systematic ignorance.”

Our students’ ignorance is not a failing of the educational it is its crowning achievement. Efforts by several generations of philosophers and reformers and public policy experts whom our students (and most of us) know nothing about have combined to produce a generation of know-nothings.

Only it wasn’t just any group of well meaning but misguided philosophers and public policy experts that created this educational morass. It was an amalgamation of the old Left’s anti-modernist sophistry and the “new” Left’s socialist delusion. Together they created a new political vanguard with a shared animosity for capitalism and a deep-seated disdain for the philosophical roots of Western thought, especially the individualism inherent in its principles.(h/t DFD) And since both these camps were heavily populated with elite intelligentsia, they were well-positioned to pursue their objectives through the education system; thus subjectivity, relativity, and pragmatism became keystones of the new education philosophy, replacing logic, ethics and empiricism.

They are not to be blamed for their pervasive ignorance of western and American history, civilization, politics, art and literature. It is the hallmark of their education. They have learned exactly what we have asked of them – to be like mayflies, alive by happenstance in a fleeting present.

Mayfly-3Mayfly, hitting headwinds

Deenan tells us that his students, for all of their apparent academic achievement, are woefully uninformed  both philosophically and factually, about the civilization that birthed them when you drill down a bit with questions:

Who fought in the Peloponnesian war?... Who taught Plato, and whom did Plato teach? How did Socrates die? Raise your hand if you have read both the Iliad and the Odyssey. The Canterbury Tales? Paradise Lost? The Inferno?

What were the 95 theses… what was their effect? Why does the Magna Carta matter? How and where did Thomas Becket die?...Who was Guy Fawkes - [ed. This one they might know, because…the movie]

V for Vendetta2

What happened at Yorktown in 1781? What did Lincoln say in his Second Inaugural? His first Inaugural? How about his third Inaugural?...

You get the gist of it, they know none of these things except - as in the case of Guy Fawkes - by accident. Because the intelligentsia has examined the culture of the West and found it lacking, students know very little about Western Civilization because it’s barely taught anymore.

The educational elite, having determined Western values to be paternalistic (i.e. misogynist), chauvinistic (i.e. non-inclusive) and clearly racist, have issued a fatwa on Western Civilization. And unlike Francis Fukuyama’s rather optimistic proclamation of the “end of history,” the end of history that Deenan sees is not quite as  hopeful:

The pervasive ignorance of our students is not a mere accident… It is the consequence of a civilizational commitment to civilizational suicide. The end of history for our students signals the End of History for the West….Broadly missing is sufficient appreciation that this ignorance is the intended consequence of our educational system, a sign of its robust health and success…

The inability to answer basic questions about America or the West is not a consequence of bad education; it is a marker of a successful education. 

In other words the educational cartel consisting of progressives, leftists and flat out communists - who despise the Western values of self-reliance, independence and capitalism - have won. They’ve dictated the terms and conditions of education for decades and have gradually and systematically replaced “Western” and “American” values of independence, self-reliance and capitalism with collectivism, social justice and government regulation. Students’ ignorance is not a failing of the educational system – it is its crowning achievement.

What our educational system aims to produce is cultural amnesia, a wholesale lack of curiosity, historyless free agents, and educational goals composed of contentless processes and unexamined buzz-words like “critical thinking,” “diversity,” “ways of knowing,” “social justice,” and “cultural competence.”

Our education system excels at producing solipsistic, self-contained selves whose only public commitment is an absence of commitment to a public, a common culture, a shared history.

So you see, we can’t really blame the SnowFlakes for their pathetic world view, or even the teachers. While we weren’t looking the Left has embedded the politics of civilizational suicide into the entire educational experience. All that’s left now is to clean up the mess.

mayflies all that's left after the night of lustMayfly carcasses: the morning after the night of debauchery, lasciviousness and dissipation.

“Mayflies, alive by happenstance in a fleeting present.”

Perhaps Pink Floyd had it right all along,

                                                     We don’t need no thought control
                                                     No dark sarcasm in the classroom
                                                     Teachers leave them kids alone
                                                     Hey! Teachers! Leave them kids alone!
                                                     All in all it's just another brick in the wall.
                                                     All in all you're just another brick in the wall.

“They are perfectly hollowed vessels, receptive and obedient, without any real obligations or devotions. They have been taught to care passionately about their indifference, and to denounce the presence of actual diversity that threatens the security of their cocoon.”Res Idiotica

I will vote for anyone who promises to eliminate the Department of Education.

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Cross-Posted on Patriot Action Network

Wednesday, April 20, 2016

“That Thou wouldst spare us from mutually assured destruction, oh Lord hear our prayer.”

I interrupt my Les Enfants Terribles series to report on the results in the New York primary: Clinton won.  Trump won. No surprises.

Here are a couple more interesting takes on the results:

Patrick Buchanan is taking a victory lap alongside Trump. He notes that The Donald’s thus far successful campaign has vindicated his own 1992 presidential platform of opposition to globalization, unfettered immigration, and the move away from social conservatism. Actual vindication however would require a majority of Americans to climb aboard the Trump bandwagon which isn’t a given at this point. And even if they do, Mr. Buchanan tells us the West is still doomed.

So I guess what difference, at this point, does it make?

the immutable hillary clinton“Exactly what I’ve been telling you all along!”

Roger Simon believes that the Republican race now comes down to the People v. The Delegates. In the Camp of the Democrats this issue was settled long ago with The Delegates having won by a mile. Their delegate buying system seems to be far more effective than their opponents. I don’t know if that’s due to greater skill or greater experience; either way it has paid off big time for their president-in-waiting.

hillary_clinton boyish eyebrows“Let me be clear: I’ve been lying to the American people since the Watergate hearings and therefore I am clearly the most qualified candidate.”

And Roger asks us to remember who the real enemy in this not-so-little morality play is:

I have written before that the real ideological separation between the Republican candidates is closer to what Freud called "the narcissism of small differences." In other words, not a lot.

The #NeverTrump crowd and the #NeverCruz crowd should take a breather. Besides doing the right thing and democratizing Republican Party rules for future generations, they should keep their eyes on the ball in this one.

The real enemies are not each other or even the the evil establishment…It is that other winner of Tuesday night's primary -- Hillary Rodham Clinton -- now the presumptive nominee of the Democratic Party, health and legal issues permitting. She is the one who will extend and expand the policies of Barack Obama that are changing the essence of our country. If you want that, keep fighting with each other.

We may be well served to take a tip from Roger, a self-described elitist:

roger_never_trump_never_cruz_article_grid_4-19-16-1

So let’s be careful out there…and try not to do anything stupid.

art of self destruction “That Thou wouldst spare us from mutually assured destruction, oh Lord hear our prayer.”

Linked By: Larwyn’s Linx on Doug Ross@Journal, and BlogsLucianneLoves, and Free Republic, Thanks!

Cross-Posted on Patriot Action Network

Tuesday, April 19, 2016

Les Enfants Terribles: Part I

NOTE: Today begins a series of posts in which I will attempt to explain where the Special Snowflakes came from. Future posts will provide a multi-part analysis of everything that’s wrong in the world and how the cultural morass has given us an education system that has resulted in the end of history, the end of science and ultimately the end of Western civilization. Doesn’t that sound better than primary coverage?

I will begin at the end and work my way forward. Today’s installment examines what happens when the Snowflakes finally make their way out of the cocoon and stumble into the workforce as fully formed butterflies. Still made of snow, butt butterflies nonetheless.

3077318-christmas-dark-blue-background-with-snowflake-butterfly-vector

These, mind you, are the smarter Snowflakes who didn’t major in social ecology, theatre or gender studies and actually landed a job following graduation. In fact, many of them have STEM degrees and are making good salaries in Silicon Valley. Alas, they’re still aren’t happy:

Nearly 200 Bernie Sanders supporters gathered last night with pots and pans outside Shervin Pishevar’s star-studded Clinton fundraiser, co-hosted by George and Amal Clooney. The Sanders supporters argued corporate interests were buying Clinton that night – tickets for Pishevar’s dinner started at $33,400 (for a seat at the Fairmont hotel) and went up to $353,400 (for a seat at his house). Most of those in the streets were young, and many were in tech. – Guardian

041616_protestors

Many of the protestors were Millennials, Bernie supporters – quelle surprise! – who have already grown disillusioned with the greedy capitalists that pay their salaries:

920x920

“Tech workers are workers, no matter how much money they make. The investors are what’s wrong in this city,” said 24-year-old Tom Sliwowski, one of the Bay Area Movement For Bernie.

pots and pan demonstrationsAnd what better way to protest than with pots and pans?

Banging pots and pans, the protesters blocked off the intersection of Washington and Jones streets (including the cable cars) with chants of "Hey hey, ho ho! Corporate greed has got to go!" and "Citizens United has got to go!" Many carried signs indicating their support of Clinton's opponent for the nomination, Bernie Sanders, chanting "Feel the Bern!" Hoodline

“Hey hey, ho ho! Corporate greed has got to go!”? Four or more years of college at a minimum of $100K and this is the best they can come up with? That’s really pathetic, even if you didn’t major in protesting.

Butt what, precisely, are they upset about?

“They sell you a dream at startups – the ping-pong, the perks – so they can pull 80 hours out of you,” said Quirk, a 26-year-old software engineer. “But in reality the venture capitalists control all the capital, all the labor, and all the decisions, so yeah, it feels great protesting one.” - Guardian

OMG! They expect their new hires to work long hours! I mean, it’s like a house of horrors, or something.

google campus

Just because they provide you with perks like free gourmet food, on-site laundry, dry-cleaning, and alterations, and an outdoor sports complex (featuring a soccer field, basketball court, two tennis courts, two bocce ball courts, two horseshoe pits, a putting green and a roller hockey rink) and pay you outrageous salaries doesn’t mean they own you. Nobody’s ever worked 80 hour weeks before! Oh, and their bosses all make more money than they do; how is that fair?

So that’s that; having had their safe places replaced with corporate sponsored play spaces the Special Snowflakes still feel aggrieved. The chickens raised on 16-20 years of brainwashing at the hands of “educators” have finally come home to roost. The Snowflakes now believe that the playing field should not only be leveled - it should be free and available whenever they feel like playing.

Unfortunately overlooked in the education of the Snowflake butterflies was the quaint truism that life’s not fair and they need to deal with it. So when the harsh winds and snow of winter arrive the butterflies, having lost their instinct to migrate, will likely fall to earth and die,

chincua_snow0008

while the eagles will live to fly another day.

bald-eagles-in-the-snow-28980-1920x1200

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Cross-Posted on Patriot Action Network

Monday, April 18, 2016

Tax Day 2016

There’s no need to complain about Tax Day.

tax increases

All the money you donate to the federal kitty goes to good use. Well okay, maybe some of it is questionable:

ANOTHER TAXPAYER-FUNDED RENEWABLE-ENERGY COMPANY FAILS...

Renewable energy giant Abengoa SA filed for bankruptcy protection in the U.S. as the Spanish energy company continues talks with its banks and bondholders to agree on its plan to restructure billions of dollars in debt.WSJ

Last November, the Washington Times reported Abengoa had received at least $2.7 billion in federal loan guarantees since 2010 to build several large-scale solar power projects in the United States. There was no certainty any of the government loans would be paid back amid a collapse that dwarfed the $530 million loss to the U.S. taxpayer with the collapse of Solyndra in 2011. – WND

maxresdefaultLiterally tilting at windmills

What difference at this point does it make? Just another failed green energy venture that Barry and the Boys decided to invest your tax dollars in. Who’s even counting anymore?

Oh what the heck, I will.

    • Solar Trust of America: FAIL! – Filed Bankruptcy in Oakland, CA, April 3, 2012
    • Bright Source: FAIL! – Bright Source warned Obama’s Energy Department officials in March 2011 that delays in approving a $1.6 billion U.S. loan guarantee would embarrass the White House and force the solar-energy company to close. Bright Source lost billions of dollars but is getting more money to keep trying. Can you say, “This isn’t working Mr. President?”
    • Solyndra: FAIL! – Obama gave $500,000,000 (that’s a HALF BILLION!) in taxpayer money to Solyndra who shut its doors and laid off 1100 workers in August 2011 after billions in losses due to failure to make a solar product that works! Barack Obama was not vetted before being elected President and neither was Solyndra before Mr. Obama threw that taxpayer money down the drain of unproven technology.
    • LSP Energy: FAIL! – LSPEnergy LP filed bankruptcy protection and a sale of its assets in Feb 2012
    • Energy Conversion Devices: FAIL!On February 14, 2012 Energy Conversion Devices, Inc. and its subsidiaries filed for bankruptcy
    • Abound Solar: FAIL! – Abound Solar received a $400 million loan guarantee from Barack Obama then announced in June, 2012 that it would file for bankruptcy. Many of these failed corporations, such as Abound, donated MILLIONS and continue to donate to Barack Obama’s campaign. Can you say, “Democrat Slush Fund”? Yes this is illegal. But Democrats are being protected from being prosecuted, for now.
    • SunPower: FAIL! – SunPower stopped producing solar cells in 2011 at near bankruptcy then restructured with the help of, get this, oil giant TOTAL, Inc. who owns 60% stake in SunPower. Irony? The company is still struggling.
    • Beacon Power: FAIL! – Beacon Power Corp filed for bankruptcy protection in October, 2011 just a year after Obama approved a $43 million Government loan guarantee. They remain barely in business, still struggling to make energy that makes sense or that works at all.
    • Ecotality: FAIL! – ECOtality, a San Francisco green-tech company that never earned any money and remains on the verge of bankruptcy after receiving roughly $115 million in two loan guarantees from President Obama, who wants to do some more of this kind of Democrat Slush Fund Guarantees after he is elected to a 2nd term.
    • A123 Solar: FAIL! A123 Solar received $279 million from taxpayers thanks to President Obama’s Department of Energy loan guarantees even after the Solyndra bankruptcy and is getting another $500M from Obama after a loss of $400M.A123 has filed for bankruptcy after receiving $249 MILLION in taxpayer support. A123, maker of rechargeable lithium-ion batteries For electric cars, filed for bankruptcy in August of 2012 and was later sold for pennies on the dollar to a Chinese company.
    • UniSolar: FAIL! – Uni-Solar filed for Ch 11 bankruptcy in June 20, 2012 after laying off hundreds of workers. UniSolar received even more Obama money after showing now progress, no profits and is still failing… yet they still remain in business with Obama’s help.
    • Azure Dynamics: FAIL! – Azure Dynamics filed for bankruptcy in June , 2012 wasting millions in Obama “Stimulus” money and received abatement on taxes owed and and several tax credits.  Azure Dynamics LLC filed for bankruptcy protection in Canada and the US.  Azure laid off 120 of its 160 employees in Oak Park; Boston; Vancouver, British Columbia; and the UK.
    • Evergreen Solar: FAIL! – Evergreen Solar received $527 Million in Taxpayer money from Obama and filed bankruptcy in late 2011. Evergreen, which closed its taxpayer-supported Devens factory in March, 2011 cut more than 1800 jobs. Evergreen’s $450 million factory, turned out to be a colossal “waste” of taxpayer money.
    • Ener1: FAIL! Ener1 Inc. received a $118 million U.S. Energy Department grant from President Obama to make electric-car batteries but filed for bankruptcy protection January 2012 after defaulting on bond debt.
    • A123 SYSTEMS: FAIL! A123 has filed for bankruptcy after receiving $249 MILLION in taxpayer support. A123, maker of rechargeable lithium-ion batteries For electric cars, filed for bankruptcy in August of 2012 and was later sold for pennies on the dollar to a Chinese company.

We’ll keep investing your tax dollars in solar and wind energy companies even though they continue to fail the test of basic economics, and sometimes even basic physics:

a big wind blew it overA big wind blew it over

"The bolts on the base could not withstand the wind and as we are a very windy part of the country they [the energy company] have egg on their face," she said. "There are concerns about safety." – Telegraph

Yup, a big wind blew it over; oh, the irony! And like Socialism, with absolutely no evidence that it actually  works, your government will keep doubling down on the failed ideals of green energy. With your money!

green fairyAnd then the Green Fairy Godmother takes your money and makes it all disappear!

So - a toast to tax day!absinthe-green-fairy-drink

After a couple you won’t care whether you paid your taxes or not.

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Cross-Posted on Patriot Action Network

Sunday, April 17, 2016

Everything was going along fine until a big wind blew it over.

Bernie Sanders released his 2014 tax return last Friday.

Bernie-Sanders-Is-The-Most-Dangerous-Man-In-America

He did so just ahead of Tax Day 2016 which is April 18th this year because April 15th is a federal holiday. No you didn’t miss anything, it’s a holiday celebrated only in Washington D.C., like so many things.

ARABIA_SAUDITA_-_Gran_mufti

Not to be confused with the day President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation which declared slaves in southern states free, April 16th marks the day Lincoln signed the District of Columbia Emancipation Act which freed all of D.C.’s slaves.

tax-slaveWell, not ALL slaves; because not all slaves are equal

Since the law dictates that IRS tax deadlines be adjusted according to DC holidays we all get till tomorrow to cough up what we owe the overlords and pay our way to prosperity.

deadline - Copy

Butt Bernie took the occasion to release his previous year’s taxes and it was revealed that the little man of the little people made $205,217 in 2014 and paid $27,653. That’s an effective tax rate of 13.4% which is considerably less than the average 28% that most of us pay. In fact, it’s even less that the 14-15% that Romney paid, which outraged many of our liberal brethren. No surprise there, selective outrage and hypocrisy being the grist of Progressivism.

outrage all day longSelective Outrage Served All Day Long!

Mind you, if Bernie somehow manages to become Chief Overlord he wants the rest of us to pay 90% of our income to pay for the free tuition he’s promised the Snowflakes, along with all the other free stuff.

Meanwhile he’s taking deductions of $8,946 for Unreimbursed Employee Meals and Entertainment Expenses. A true man of the people right there.

sharpton bernie sandersGetting some tips on selective outrage, and paying taxes, from the master

Does anyone else find it ironic that Washington D.C. celebrates the Emancipation Day holiday on what would otherwise be the IRS deadline for paying taxes?

SLAVERY

Butt don’t worry, Bernie’s got a plan to end our slavery too:

bernie's free shit trees

What could possibly go wrong?

wyoming funnel clowd a big wind knocked it overn-MONEY-UNHAPPY-628x314Everything was going along fine until a big wind blew it over.

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