Quickies

A round up of news items, columns and blog posts that caught our attention this past week.






Clueless: Valerie Jarrett, Obama adviser and confidant orders a wine from a General in uniform at an exclusive dinner hosted Monday by the Alfalfa Club.

Why the surprise? What else would one expect of an administration whose top dog refers to Navy medics as "corpse men"



Not dead but almost dead. At least we thought it was...

From the Wall St. Journal:

The last time these columns were lambasted by a presidential candidate in Iowa, he was Democrat Richard Gephardt and the year was 1988. The Missouri populist won the state caucuses in part on the rallying cry that "we've got to stop listening to the editorial writers and the establishment," especially about ethanol and trade. Imagine our amusement to find Republican Newt Gingrich joining such company.

If support of ObamaCare is an automatic DQer in our eyes then support for ethanol subsidies may be a close second. And if New Gingrich is any indication, we may wind up with quite a bit of idle time on our hands during the Republican presidential primaries.










File this under "Things we've known all along that only now have become 'official'":

A new Senate report on the 2009 Fort Hood shooting blames the FBI and Department of Defense for failing to recognize or act on alleged shooter Army Major Nidal Malik Hasan’s extremist views.

The report, released today by Senate Homeland Security Committee chairman Joe Lieberman and ranking Republican Susan Collins, says the FBI and DOD could have prevented the shooting if they had identified Hasan’s radical Islamist views and disciplined or discharged him before the attack occurred.

“Our report’s painful conclusion is that the Fort Hood massacre could have and should have been prevented,” Lieberman said at a press conference today.

“The fact is that both the FBI and the Army were aware of Major Hasan,” Collins said. “This is not a case where a lone wolf was unknown to the FBI, unknown to the military officials, until he struck – and that is the tragedy of this case.”

The November 2009 shooting killed 13 people and wounded 32 others.

“Although neither DOD nor the FBI had specific information concerning the time, place, or nature of the attack, they collectively had sufficient information to have detected Hasan’s radicalization to violent Islamist extremism but failed both to understand and to act on it,” the senators said in the report. “Our investigation found specific and systemic failures in the government’s handling of the Hasan case and raises additional concerns about what may be broader systemic issues.”

(italics, ours)





We suppose this is what they mean when they talk about the "new civility" in political discourse.









Step away from the salad bar:

They may hope that their love of animals will make them a hit with the ladies.

But vegetarian men are seen as wimps and less macho than those who like tucking into a steak – even by women who do not eat meat themselves, research shows.

The finding will dismay the hundreds of thousands of single men who have given up meat for health, environmental or animal welfare reasons.

If that's the case, how's this for a pick-up line?

Time to get rid of Black History month...?

We tell children that they should not judge people by their color, then confuse them by insisting that they study a person because that person is black. Famous Amos was included in the assignment! Now, I love cookies as much as the next guy, but having kids read about Famous Amos simply because he was a successful black American is nothing short of ludicrous. Many of these same children have never heard of Gandhi, Churchill or even Ulysses S. Grant. And yet we're teaching them about Famous Amos before we teach them about George C. Marshall. This is not only diversity on the cheap, but it's bad educational policy, too.

So the unemployment rate dropped to 9.0% but we only gained 36,000 jobs... what gives? B-Daddy at The Liberator Today has the goods, here.





KT: Elections Were Held In The Confederacy, Too.

A Democracy is only as fit and just as those practicing it.

And do check out the comments at the link provided.



OK, gotta jet - we're on our way to a brewery tour with our boy Max who will, most likely, be regaling you all with pictures and commentary of the visit to Stone, Alesmith and Ballast Point in the next installment of MAXED OUT.



Pax.

Programming Alert

We were out of town just when San Diego Beer Week was cranking up so we've been a little slow to getting out and hitting up some of the events going on around town. As such, we've decided to give the staff the night off and head on over to the High Dive in Clairemont to hook up with B-Daddy of The Liberator Today for their Coronado Brewing Co. night. 6ish. Please join us if you are up for it.

And in other totally related news, Jeff Hammett, reporting for the West Coaster, is confirming that the outfit applying for the liquor license at the location on 30th Street in South Park is none other than Stone Brewery. Sweet. The legendary 30th Street bags itself another prime catch.

Exit question: Will they drop some of the pretension that exists at the mother ship in Escondido and install a TV or two for us sports-loving souls?

San Diego County beers by the numbers

*

From the 2010 World Beer Cup held in Chicago in which 642 breweries from 44 countries and 47 U.S. States entered 3,330 separate beers for 97 categories.

11 and 21... the number of County breweries winning medals and the number of medals those breweries won.

10%... the percentage of County breweries out of American breweries winning medals (204)

8 and 10... the number of medals won by County breweries over those of respected craft brew states, Oregon and Colorado, respectively.

5 and 14... the number of medals won by County breweries over the countries of Germany and Belgium, respectively.

Ballast Point Brewing Company which won 3 gold medals was named small brewing company of the year succeeding 2008 winner Port Brewing Company of Solano Beach.

It's settled. San Diego County is the craft/microbrew capital of the planet and it's not really even close.

Honorable Mentions: Our ancestral hometown of Placentia, California, picked up two gold medals. In the Experimental Beer category, the 100% Brett Autumn Maple and in the Belgian-Style Flanders/Oud Bruin or Oud Red Ale, the Oude Tart courtesy The Bruery.

Shocker: No medals for Stone Brewery of Escondido.

A full rundown of Cup winners, here.


* That's Jack White President and founder of Ballast Point Brewing Co. holding aloft a pint of his Big Eye India Pale Ale.

Outsmarting one's self

We’re big fans of the concept of not overthinking things.

Example #1: The bar and restaurant at Stone Brewery up in Escondido is libations and gastronomic wonder. It carries a tremendous array of not only Stone brews but other local and in-state microbrews as Stone has always been a champion of and down for the struggle. Each menu item has a suggested wine and beer pairing for the best dining experience and the layout and furnishings of the restaurant and patio area is unparalelled here in the San Diego area.

Alas, there are no T.V.s in the bar. Not even a nice simple 19” monitor tucked away un-obtrusively so the men-folk can keep an eye, if not full rapt attention, on the ball game. The bartender informed us after we inquired, “That’s not the sort of atmosphere we want to create here.” Dude, you serve beer, you serve food… don’t overthink things.

Example #2: The Neighborhood in East Village is a chic diner establishment that serves up neveau-comfort food along with its own outstanding beer lineup (yes, it is frequented by black horned-rim glasses-wearing scenesters drinking pints of Pabst Blue Ribbon but the awesomeness of the beer lineup makes up for any lame faux irony factor). They are quite proud of the fact that they do not provide catsup for any of the 4 styles of burgers they make, instead featuring a homemade sauce for each one of the burgers. Those sauces may be the greatest developments in the history of condiments but quite frankly, we don’t care as besting catsup for a hamburger just isn’t going to happen. Besides, we the customer like and want catsup for our burgers. Again… don’t overthink things.

Which brings us to the picture below which is what greeted us in the hallway of our offices when we came into work on Monday and which replaced the standard bulkhead-mounted water fountain unit. After coming back in from the yard or the ship, we have invariably worked up a little bit of a thirst and are looking forward to nothing more than a satisfying quaff from the water fountain.




It’s got some really cool features like a hot and chilled water option and some other buttons we haven’t yet figured out but coming back in from the yard what the heck are we supposed to to with this when carrying around a paper or plastic cup is not part of our uniform? Nice try with the HAL 9000 water dispenser but….. don’t overthink things.

Walk of Shame

We’re not picky as to where we park in a grocery store or strip mall parking lot. If we wind up with a spot out in the nether regions of the asphalt Serengeti because we refuse to stalk other patrons returning to their cars then that’s fine by us.

Imagine though our horror at having to haul this packaging all the way back to our hoopdie and suffering the sidelong glances and sneering of the townies along the way.



Alas, a happy ending....

Buckley, the Birchers and the original Arizona Maverick

Alright, gang. After having been shut out of the beer convention going on here in San Diego (“whaddya mean there’s no tasting room?”) Mr. Styles and ourselves are taking matters into our own hands by paying a visit to the Stone Brewing Company up in Escondido today so blogging will be light.

In our absence, though, we left you all with a little history lesson from WFB describing a critical juncture in the development of the modern American conservative movement… the purging of the kooks. Enjoy.