Where were these guys a month ago?

Soccer celebration... Icelandic style.

Dare we say, Straight out of Stjarnan.





H/T: Deadspin

Burqa ban?

Lengthy, interesting but odd read in yesterday's National Review Online on banning the burqa where the author goes from against banning the burqa to being in favor of it but ultimately acknowledging that it's nigh impossible now on the grounds of political expediency. Here's the money paragraph towards the end of the article:

Headscarves cannot at this point be banned. It is politically impossible, and it is also too late: The practice is too widespread. But the decision to wear them should be viewed much as the decision to wear Klan robes or Nazi regalia would be in the United States. Yes, you are free to do so, but no, you cannot wear that and expect to be hired by the government to teach schoolchildren, and no, we are not going to pretend collectively that this choice is devoid of a deeply sinister political and cultural meaning. Such a stance would serve the cause of liberty more than it would harm it: While it is true that some women adopt the veil voluntarily, it is also true that most veiling is forced. It is nearly impossible for the state to ascertain who is veiled by choice and who has been coerced. A woman who has been forced to veil is hardly likely to volunteer this information to authorities. Our responsibility to protect these women from coercion is greater than our responsibility to protect the freedom of those who choose to veil. Why? Because this is our culture, and in our culture, we do not veil. We do not veil because we do not believe that God demands this of women or even desires it; nor do we believe that unveiled women are whores, nor do we believe they deserve social censure, harassment, or rape. Our culture’s position on these questions is morally superior. We have every right, indeed an obligation, to ensure that our more enlightened conception of women and their proper role in society prevails in any cultural conflict, particularly one on Western soil.

We think the author pretty much makes the case herself for not banning the burqa beyond merely, it's too late. Is the burqa that, in the author's mind, represents a culture of oppression any more explicitly repulsive than donning white bed sheets or goose-stepping around in an SS uniform which are Constitutionally-protected activities?

Do you know for whom it is too late? The countries of which have passed burqa bans and which are considering them: Europe. Europe, which has insistently refused to address the question of Muslim assimilation and which has acquiesced its culture for fear of Muslim reprisal finds itself in reactionary mode with their burqa bans.

And let's not confuse not wanting to implement targeted laws banning what can and cannot be worn in public with not wanting to engage in a cultural battle. We can sit here and argue the negative merits and implications of the burqa in an attempt to win the battle without passing laws to get our way.

We don't think there are any easy answers for how better to assimilate Muslims into American society nor are there any easy answers for confronting radicalization within the Muslim community but we are extremely confident that banning the burqa is not the way to go about doing it.

Photo image of the day

The persistent marine layer that has been responsible for the record low temperatures this summer here in San Diego had subsided quite a bit yesterday. These clouds, however, which contributed to a great sunset were the result of the monsoon flow travelling north from Mexico and which is characteristic for this time of the year.

Radio KBwD is on the air (Special Edition)

Sir Elton John Appreciation Week is just getting started, folks and for this selection we're staying old school.


There is probably no rational musical explanation for this but the following selection always reminded us of the stylings of Aaron Copland.


Ladies and Gentlemen, from London's Royal Opera House, it's Elton John performing "Burn Down the Mission".



Addendum #1: Temple of Mut is helping spread the word and has her own EJ selection, here. At same post, some great info on the roll back effort of California's job-killing AB 32 and shenanigans Meg Whitman is pulling that is begging for conservatives and libertarians to sit out the gubernatorial vote. Thanks, Leslie!

Something we learned this past weekend

War Planner, scribing over at Left Coast Rebel, has proof that there is indeed a God, here.

The obligatory Pete Stark video post

This does qualify for Nancy's Nuances: a journey of discovery (things we're finding out about ObamaCare after ObamaCare has passed (Letting the Mask Slip sub-set)) not only based upon chronology but also on the merits of Stark's justification for passage of ObamaCare: We won.



Great points all, made by this young lady as it's readily apparent that she is talking at a level way above Stark's pay grade as he has no concept nor interest in understanding how the 5th, 10th and 14th amendments would prevent you from being compelled to sign up for health care just as it would prohibit the confiscation of goods and services from others as is the case when you declare particular goods and services a right.

Stark is a thug. There is simply no other way to put it.

Another memo to our goo-goo (good government) liberal friends: Sure, you would like to see the government play an active role for good in society but does Pete Stark's vision of a Thomas Friedman-esque totalitarianism look like your view of liberalism? Does what Pete Stark is saying sound anything remotely like, "Keep your laws off my body?"

The Democratic Party, which has for years been informed by notions of the limitless power of government dared not actually say it, until now. The passage of ObamaCare has proved to be truth serum to its authoritarian acolytes who now attend town hall meetings and impassively tell their constituents:

I think that there are very few constitutional limits that would prevent the federal government from (making) rules that could affect your private life.

Well, shoot-howdy, that doesn't sound like the bra and draft card burning Democratic Party of dear old Mom and Dad, now does it, gang?



If they can do this, what can't they do?


P.S. We have no idea who the young woman in the video is, however, her identity along with other private details of her life will no doubt be exposed by the Wasilla Dumpster Diving Posse.



Follower Update: Rational Nation USA who also blogs at fellow SLOB site, Left Coast Rebel is in the house.

Re-learning through the centuries

Has socialism finally jumped the shark in Cuba?

President Raul Castro expanded self-employment fields on Sunday, ahead of looming government plans to slash as many as one million jobs -- 20 percent of communist Cuba's work force -- from state payrolls.

The economy, 95 percent of which is currently in state hands, does not have the ability to absorb such vast numbers of jobless. Castro's move aims to try to reduce the socioeconomic fallout, but it will be an uphill battle.

The Council of Ministers "agreed to expand the range of self-employment jobs, and their use as another alternative for workers who lose their jobs," Castro said as he gave a closing address at one of two annual sessions of the National Assembly.

After the crash of the former Soviet bloc, Cuba's cash-strapped government in the 1990s approved a wide range of self-employment. Positions such as beauticians, dog groomers, small restaurant owners and even lighter refillers were legalized as long as workers got licenses and paid taxes.

But social resentment emerged as an issue when some workers, particularly in small private restaurants, achieved dramatic levels of success.

The government began increasing taxation and regulation, and decreasing license-granting, until the self-employed sector was largely rendered paralyzed, like the rest of the economy.

(italics, ours)

Or is it merely jumping it, again?

From the Pilgrims abandoning a collectivist impulse to the collapse of the Soviet Empire, it keeps dawning on us, over and over, that socialism is an unsustainable economic model... yet free market capitalism which generates the inevitable unequal outcomes is viewed as unseemly as the italicized paragraph indicates.

Not because of actual results or empirical data has collectivism survived through the centuries but rather has envy, one of the seven deadly sins, been the life blood of a model and philosophy that never seems to go gently into that good night.

What all this appears to indicate is that as fallible humans, we will probably never completely rid ourselves of collectivism, be it straight-up socialism that we see abroad or the crony capitalism as practiced here in America, currently.

What would be nice, however, is we reach a point where free-market capitalism becomes the coin of the realm, so to speak, rather than the reactionary oh crap, everything else has failed - let's give that capitalism thing a tryM.O..

Being resentful and envious is no way to go through life.

Blog link of the day

So, how much is the expiration of the Bush tax cuts going to cost you?

My Tax Burden has the calculator, here.

Struggling economy, high unemployment and we'll be nearly $1,000 lighter in the britches next year on top of it. Obamanomics... Awesome.

Radio KBwD is on the air (Special Edition)

When we went with Elton John as a our featured artist for our weekly Radio KBwD installment back on Friday, it was due in large part to the fact that he had pulled off a trifecta this summer. In addition to playing at Rush's wedding, he cheezed off the international Left by refusing to participate in an Israel boycott by performing in Tel Aviv and just last week at a concert in Arizona, he essentially told musicians and artists who were boycotting Arizona to pound sand.

We won't pretend to know what John's politics are and frankly we don't care because the man is doing an awful lot right by angering the right people.

With that in mind, we thought a little bit about it over the weekend and decided we should have some fun with this.

Beers with Demo is declaring this coming week as Sir Elton John Week for all he's done in flipping the bird to the left and, of course, making great music.

With that in mind, over the next week, we'll be posting videos of our favorite Elton John songs. If you have a blog, please join in the fun and post some of your own. If you are a reader/commenter, chime in with suggestions.

We'll be more than happy to link to blogs that take up the cause. Having said all that, let's get to it. Here's the man on a BBC special back in 1970 performing, "Take Me to the Pilot".

Messaging problem

Two men carrying Mexican flags in protest of Arizona's immigration law ran into the outfield during the seventh inning of the New York Mets' game against the Arizona Diamondbacks on Friday night at Citi Field.

The men were apprehended by security fairly quickly without much incident.

Prior to the game, about 40 people across the street from the ballpark chanted "Oppose racism!" and "Boycott Arizona!"

Others stationed closer to the subway exit handed out leaflets that requested Major League Baseball move next year's All-Star game out of Phoenix.

Maybe it was a false flag operation as there is no surer way to turn sympathy for your cause into indignation than running around with foreign nation's flag as the crowd's chants of "U-S-A!...U-S-A!" did attest.

But chances are, it wasn't a false flag operation but rather a counterproductive stunt performed by one of the true believers.

Recall when the open borders crowd started ramping up their protests some 4 years ago and everyone showed up with Mexican flags in Los Angeles on the first day but American flags on the second day as leadership, knowing Mexican flags are a P.R. disaster, sent out the word, pleading with the protestors to sport Old Glory.

Just as the messaging veil slips from time to time, it is merely evidence that this isn't about profiling, it isn't about discrimination and it isn't even about Mexico or Mexicans, per se. These messaging hiccups occur because they cannot be helped as setting at the core of the broad umbrella of the open borders crowd beats a heart of race-based identity politics and victimization. Its a philosophy that detests capitalism and American exceptionalism and to which the rule of law is a completely foreign concept.

It is ultimately hostile to our notions of freedom and liberty as these people view freedom and liberty merely as justifications for exploiting the underclass, the victim, as defined by them.

Don't take your eye off the ball. Stick around past the first few minutes of "No justice, no peace" posturing and sloganeering to hear what these tools of the ruling class really think about this country.

Video clip of the day

Len Britton, who is running for Senate in Vermont against Pat "Leaky" Leahy, captures, in this 30 second spot, the essence of Bailout Nation.

Hit'em with the stimulus.