Archive for December 30th, 2010
Class vs. Crass Challenge: The Obama Hawaiian Vacation
Here’s a challenge for you…one that I will enjoy doing myself in the next few days.
Just like the Obama Christmas ornaments from 2009, featuring Mao Zedong, Obama’s face on Rushmore, and drag queen Hedda Lettuce, gave us a few Class vs. Crass episodes and the ability to compare past presidents at Christmas to the antics of the Obamas…the lavish, traveling court, depression be damned vacation the Obamas are on in Hawaii is ripe fodder for at least a half dozen Class vs. Crass installments.
Here’s just some of the expenses the Obamas incurred in Hawaii.
(1) Can you find more crass things they did while on the islands?
(2) Can you suggest examples of other presidents/first ladies being a contrast to the Obamas?
(3) What are good examples of first ladies being frugal?
(4) What are good examples of first families acknowledging the times they lived in and showing restraint?
(5) What are good examples of presidents being humble and respectful of others and knowing what is gauge and too showy for the moment?
(6) What are good examples of presidents taking a vacation that does not disrupt others or spend lavishly?
Feel free to look anywhere in history, but since this Hawaii trip involves jet travel and all the expenses of the modern presidency, maybe the most applicable presidencies would be from the Roosevelts forward. I will let it be more nebulous and let you decide which Roosevelts I’m talking about.
Ideas appreciated.
BigGovernment: Charge NY union leaders with negligent homicide for deaths that resulted from their blizzard work slowage/stoppage
This is EXACTLY what needs to be done.
All I keep thinking about the last few days is a friend of mine, Damy, in New York City who has a newborn baby, Gabriel.
Gabe is a preemie, and he had a really rough start in life. He got sick a lot. His first few months of life, he was in and out of the hospital. There was one day when he had a fever that Damy had to rush him to the hospital. She didn’t have time to wait for the notoriously slow elevator in her building. She raced down 17 flights of stairs because she knew that was faster, and she met the ambulance down in her lobby just as it got there. They had to get to the hospital as fast as humanly possible…and thank Heaven the NY unions didn’t decide to turn the city into an unpassable disaster zone that day, because I DO NOT want to think about what would have happened to little Gabe if he had to wait NINE HOURS to get to the hospital because the UNIONS SHUT THE CITY DOWN TO DEMAND MORE MONEY.
If her son had died because the union bosses did this when Gabe needed an ambulance, I think Damy would have snapped and hunted them all down in a yellow track suit like Uma Thurman. And I would have helped her any way I could.
Big Labor killed two people in New York during the blizzard…one of whom was a newborn baby like Gabe.
That baby, and his/her mom, are someone’s friends and family. There are not words to express how much my heart goes out to them, because that baby would have lived if not for the actions of labor unions. The same for the other life lost because of the games unions played with this storm.
Why not charge every single member of the union with negligent homicide? Not just the leaders. Every single union member who went along with this scheme to shake more money out of the city.
Charge them ALL with negligent homicide, and then make them prove they didn’t do anything wrong.
Every last one of them.
Bankrupt the union by making it pay all the legal fees for its 6,000+ members.
How hard is it to drive a damn snow plow or garbage truck?
Fire every last one of these people and hire the thousands of people in the New York area to be the new garbage men and sanitation workers.
No. More. Unions. EVER.
GREAT MERCIFUL ZEUS: Did you see how much money it cost taxpayers for the Obamas to shoot a “Lifestyles of the Wasteful and Extravagant” episode in Hawaii?
If you have something spirited to drink, fix yourself a glass of it before you click on the link above and read just how much taxpayer money the Obamas wasted in Hawaii on their latest vacation.
If you don’t have any beer, wine, vodka, or whatever, put some fruit juice under the radiator and let it ferment a while, because you will seriously need a drink after reading this.
It’s just staggering.
There’s at least a dozen Class vs. Crass episodes in the detailed list of all the Obamas expenses on this trip…none of which would have been incurred by taxpayers if they had just stayed their entitled butts at the White House during Christmas, instead of going to Hawaii.
At a time when tens of millions of Americans are out of work, dozens of states are teetering on the brink of bankruptcy, and the Obamaconomy is forcing privations upon frightened Americans the likes of which haven’t been endured since the 1930s…the Obamas wasted millions of dollars needlessly in Hawaii.
ON YOUR DIME.
These people didn’t need to go to Hawaii.
Staying in the White House, in Washington, or going to Camp David for Christmas was the appropriate and prudent thing to do. When 2013 gets here (not soon enough), these two can spend as much time in Hawaii as they want. They can stay there forever (hopefully). But, they should use Camp David as their vacation spot for the next two years. Winter and summer. That’s what Camp David is for.
Great leaders make themselves personal examples in difficult times. They set the standard. They never ask their people to give up what they haven’t given up, or endure what they themselves don’t endure.
I remember hearing stories about King George and Queen Elizabeth (the Queen Mum) during World War II. They ate tinned food out of cans just as their people did, rationed the same way the rest of the country was rationed. When Princess Elizabeth (now Her Majesty the Queen) prepared for her austere wedding in post-war London, she bought her dress with ration stamps, like every other bride. The royal family kept the heat turned down, maintained curfews, and earned the respect of their people because they did not live lavishly while the rest of the country suffered.
Not so for the Obamas…who aren’t even royalty. But sure as Hell think they are.
I have never in my life known people so oblivious and completely lacking in empathy and common decency.
Just when I think the Obamas cannot be more crass and reprehensible, they pull something like this and remind me it’s the only thing in life they are actually good at.
About those 70 virgins Muslims expect to find waiting for them after committing mass murder for Allah.
I really hope these indeed would be the Virgins awaiting Muslims at Heaven’s gates…the ones imams promise will be there after Muslims commit mass murder and blow themselves up in the name of Allah.
These were the kind of nuns who taught me in grade school and high school, and they were not to be trifled with.
Muslims should think twice about blowing people or things up expecting a non-literal interpretation of their rewards for evil.
I hope in 2011 all of you can encourage more people out there, in the media and in positions of influence, to just stop coddling Islam. Stop being afraid of these medievalist thugs. Stop worrying about offending them. Stop tolerating their sexist, misogynistic, homophobic, hateful garbage.
Stop giving any sort of quarter or credibility to these barbarians and start kicking their collective ass nine ways to Sunday.
They sure as Hell can’t murder all of us.
Pamela Geller takes these people on every day of her life and she is unafraid.
In the 80s when I was growing up, nuns in South American countries stood up to Communists, like the ones in the picture above, and faced down the great evil of their time.
We all need to realize that Islam has declared war on the West, on all of us, and that pretending that’s not true is not going to ever do us any good.
Maybe in 2011, Pamela Geller won’t be so alone in what she does.
She’ll still be a hero of mine, no matter what though.
Wish we could clone her.
Iotacons of US presidents — by Andy Rash
The first 44 US presidents as iotacons -- by Andy Rash
These iotacons are tiny video-game style portraits done by artist Andy Rash.
This one’s of the first 44 US presidents.
Can you imagine a video game featuring all of them?
I can’t be the only one who thinks that would be fun to play.
Can anyone out there with artistic skills make a Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin 8-bit iotacon like the ones above?
It would be fun to make a set for all First Ladies (and future First Dude) as well.
To circumcise or not to circumcise? Which is better in your experience?
There are times when people write into HillBuzz asking us for advice related to the gay community, or on health or dating issues we might be familiar with. It’s touching, actually, because these are people we’ve never met, and might never meet, but who write to us as friends asking for help.
When I read emails or comments from parents, asking questions because they are experiencing some trouble with their sons, in particular, I feel an obligation to make use of HB and its community of readers to open a conversation about whatever the issue is…so that someone out there who feels hopeless or frustrated over some issue could find information or advice that might help that person get through whatever mini-crisis he or she might be having. There are thousands of people who read this site, and the HB archives will hopefully be available for many years to come, so something discussed in a thread could have importance for people far into the future. There’s awesome potential for good in that, so whenever we can address something that will help people, we want to do that.
Yesterday, a thread we ran about a man with a health issue in Sweden prompted lots of discussion on whether or not baby boys should be circumcised. There are clearly a lot of passions about this issue — with many coming from fathers who were circumcised and grew up resenting never having a choice in the matter. I’m going to make this one of those threads where you have to click on MORE to continue, but I want to give you the Boystown take on circumcision, relating personal experiences and anecdotes with guys I’ve known who had something to say on the subject one way or the other.
This might not be a thread for grandmothers sipping coffee wanting some humor or political talk, but it’s here for those of you who would like to have your say on circumcision, or who would like to hear what HB has to say on it.
Don’t read if you don’t want to experience an open discussion on penises…but do contribute something in comments (in a mature and grown-up way) if you have personal experience on the subject that can help parents who might be wrestling with a decision for their son in this delicate area. Emotionally and physically.
New York Public Unions DELIBERATELY fouled blizzard cleanup as ploy to demand more money from taxpayers
Why are public unions allowed to create disasters like the New York City snow removal debacle, just to demand more money from taxpayers?
New York public unions deliberately fouled up the 2010 blizzard cleanup…with union bosses issuing orders to sanitation workers to make as big of a mess of possible of New York City, so that unions could demand more money from taxpayers in the 2011 budget.
The unions decided to punish New York because of budget cuts in 2010, which also included the demotions and firings of bad union workers.
So, the unions stuck it to the people of New York with a work slowage/stoppage that turned New York City into a disaster area.
The end result was a city paralyzed by unplowed streets, garbage piled up, and roads that were unpassable for emergency vehicles.
One informant within the union told the New York Post:
The snitches “didn’t want to be identified because they were afraid of retaliation,” Halloran said. “They were told [by supervisors] to take off routes [and] not do the plowing of some of the major arteries in a timely manner. They were told to make the mayor pay for the layoffs, the reductions in rank for the supervisors, shrinking the rolls of the rank-and-file.”
Tomorrow, demotions and salary cuts are scheduled for high ranking union members in the Sanitation Department, because of budget cuts. The unions deliberately sabotaged snow removal efforts to smack New York City in the face for daring to cut union members’ pay in a time of financial crisis.
QUESTION: Can the unions be held criminally responsible for any loss of life and damage to property that occurred because of their work slowage/stoppage efforts?
There seems to be several instances of people having medical troubles, calling 911, and waiting up to 9 hours for emergency teams to get to them because of the blocked roads…which would have been cleared if not for the unions’ work slowage/stoppage scheme.
Can the union bosses who ordered that slowage/stoppage be prosecuted for manslaughter for the people who died but would have reasonably been saved if not for the deliberately blocked streets?
Is there any sort of precedent for this, anywhere, where someone creates a situation where emergency workers cannot do their jobs and a person dies because emergency teams can’t get to him or her?
Is there any sort of law against obstructing/interfering with a rescue effort?
BETTER QUESTION: Can the Sanitation Department in cities like New York be privatized so that the public unions can be eliminated? Chicago privatized the meter maids, eliminating that swath of public union workers here. The parking rates went up, so it was not the most popular move ever, but it did eliminate union jobs by hiring a private company to do what the City once took on by itself.
Why can’t the bulk of a city’s employees be eliminated by hiring private companies to handle those tasks…where the private companies would be motivated by profit to do the best job they can, or risk facing severe financial penalties when something like this New York disaster happens?
Thoughts?
