Obama, Birthers and Batman

Posted: December 4, 2009 by datechguy in internet/free speech, opinion/news
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I started collecting comics around 1975 when I was 12. Unlike the “cool” comic collectors I was a DC guy and one of the things I enjoyed was a lot was Batman. One story always stuck with me and that was in Batman 283.

The story “Omega Bomb Target: Gotham City” was a neat story about a blackmail attempt on Gotham city. A Hungarian nuclear scientist is kidnapped by a group who anchors a ship supposedly containing a nuclear device in Gotham harbor. They demand a ransom of 1 billion dollars. (As you can see they were way ahead of Dr. Evil).

Batman manages to rescue professor Nagy he is out of it but keeps muttering “Nembomba”. Batman then boards the ship and catches the baddies because “Nembomba” means “No Bomb”.

Batman explains to Commissioner Gordan that it was all a bluff saying:

What’s the next best thing to having the bomb? Convincing everyone else you have the bomb.”

Although Saddam might disagree that line stuck with me all these years and brings to mind the whole Birther issue.

I have already said that President Obama was born in the US, his overseas travel (passports requires birth certificates) and the birth announcement from the paper all in the days before his prominence are to me strong and the Clinton’s non action with the presidency at stake make it conclusive.

One question often asked is why doesn’t the president just release the original records? Hotair’s explanation:

The biggest reason? It wouldn’t work. The same people who believe that Obama forged a Certificate of Live Birth twice corroborated by the state that issued it will insist that Obama got someone to forge any new records produced by Hawaii as well. It’s the same reason that having Palin produce her gynecological records won’t satisfy Andrew Sullivan and why producing the phone records from United 93 families to prove that they haven’t been in contact with the supposedly still-alive-but-hiding passengers on the 9/11 flight won’t change Truther minds. The conspiracy theorists have far too much invested in their argument to retreat.

Good argument but WRONG! The president isn’t holding back because it is futile, he’s holding back because it is not.

It a bluff. They WANT this stuff to suck as many people into it as possible. Every day that people are talking about “Birth” stuff is a day they don’t have to talk about every dumb this president is doing. I said this back on July 28th and it’s even more true today. Today’s 1-2 punch on MSNBC is a great example of this. This is Longstreet waiting for the last Union reserves to go in before using his artillery to break them at 2nd Bull Run.

If the truthers are confined to cranks like Philip Berg who is just out to con people out of a buck, then the Obama administration gets no political capital out of it. If by suspicious behavior and omissions they can arouse interest in the general conservative movement then it can be a winner. This can only be done if people think there is something being hidden, or to paraphrase Batman above:

What’s the next best thing to having a hidden smoking gun? Making everyone THINK you have a hidden smoking gun.

The best part about it is they can wait till there is a big fish deep in the net before landing them and can play it any time in the next 3 years or beyond as needed.

The entire birther business is a trap and conservatives, would be smart to avoid it.

Palin is discrediting “Science”…

Posted: December 4, 2009 by datechguy in internet/free speech, opinion/news

…by going after Copenhagen, says Morning Joe. Apparently according to Dr. Jeffery Sacks their guest is saying that we on the right are “politicizing science”.

I must admit I’ve very surprised, I expected to a very different direction. The primary target is the Wall Street Journal:

Surely there must have been serious men and women in the hard sciences who at some point worried that their colleagues in the global warming movement were putting at risk the credibility of everyone in science. The nature of that risk has been twofold: First, that the claims of the climate scientists might buckle beneath the weight of their breathtaking complexity. Second, that the crudeness of modern politics, once in motion, would trample the traditions and culture of science to achieve its own policy goals. With the scandal at the East Anglia Climate Research Unit, both have happened at once.

the Journal is a serious paper so they are using the fact that Palin has spoken out on it they are using it to discredit the people who are bringing up these objections.

Apparently the Jon Stewart situation was too critical to ignore!

What is going on here is generally known as “projection”.

I didn’t get to Morning Joe right away so I see the plan, Politico first hits the Palin interview story. This allows the use of one to discredit the other, smart move by NBC, the Green Network. (At 7 a.m. they plugged the Palin interview so that must be the plan.

With new speculation and confidence collapsing publicly they have to move quickly this is their move to stem the tie.

Funny they didn’t have much to say about the journal when they talked about dissenters on the subject SIX MONTHS AGO:

The collapse of the “consensus” has been driven by reality. The inconvenient truth is that the earth’s temperatures have flat-lined since 2001, despite growing concentrations of C02. Peer-reviewed research has debunked doomsday scenarios about the polar ice caps, hurricanes, malaria, extinctions, rising oceans. A global financial crisis has politicians taking a harder look at the science that would require them to hamstring their economies to rein in carbon.

Credit for Australia’s own era of renewed enlightenment goes to Dr. Ian Plimer, a well-known Australian geologist. Earlier this year he published “Heaven and Earth,” a damning critique of the “evidence” underpinning man-made global warming. The book is already in its fifth printing. So compelling is it that Paul Sheehan, a noted Australian columnist — and ardent global warming believer — in April humbly pronounced it “an evidence-based attack on conformity and orthodoxy, including my own, and a reminder to respect informed dissent and beware of ideology subverting evidence.” Australian polls have shown a sharp uptick in public skepticism; the press is back to questioning scientific dogma; blogs are having a field day.

Why not? Because they didn’t have the Palin combo to hit them back with and Jon Stewart pushing the scandal to the fore.

BTW you will not I didn’t label this one Palin derangement syndrome in tags, that’s because the interview is a legit story.

Rufus the Airdale dead at 14

Posted: December 4, 2009 by datechguy in oddities, personal
Tags: , ,

We interrupt this blog to announce the death of my Brother’s dog Rufus at the ripe old canine age of 14.

My brother lives just over the 5th street bridge in the 2nd floor of the house that my wife and I lived when we first got married (we were in a tiny 3rd floor attic apt that was smaller than my kitchen and den put together) it’s even a tougher neighborhood than mine but he would still take long walks with Rufus that would occasionally take him across the bridge and by the house.

There is something about dogs, they are a pal in good times and bad, When a dog dies it’s an odd feeling. Earl Hammer and Rod Sterling said it best…

Funny about that.

Lets take a Sarah Palin media quiz…

Posted: December 3, 2009 by datechguy in Uncategorized
Tags: ,

There were two interesting Sarah Palin stories that took place today:

The First was contained in a clip from a Radio interview where she says this:

Q: Would you make the birth certificate an issue if you ran?

A: I think the public, rightfully, is still making it an issue. I don’t have a problem with that. I don’t know if I would have to bother to make it an issue ’cause I think there are enough members of the electorate who still want answers.

and the Second is a facebook post on Copenhagen where she says this:

Policy decisions require real science and real solutions, not junk science and doomsday scare tactics pushed by an environmental priesthood that capitalizes on the public’s worry and makes them feel that owning an SUV is a “sin” against the planet. In his inaugural address, President Obama declared his intention to “restore science to its rightful place.” Boycotting Copenhagen while this scandal is thoroughly investigated would send a strong message that the United States government will not be a party to fraudulent scientific practices. Saying no to Copenhagen and cap and tax are first steps in “restoring science to its rightful place.”

Which one do you think the media is going to focus on and which one do you think they will ignore?

All pols make mistakes and I suspect Palin’s unartful answer is going to be a weapon used against her. One could easily say that all she means is: It’s not an issue for her but the public has a right to know and ask if they wish to. If that is what she meant to say it wouldn’t be a bad idea to get that out pretty quickly. The real danger of this is the birthers jumping all over it, any retreat will annoy the most fanatical of them, but conspiracy theorists are easily annoyed anyways.

There is no way that the left will not jump all over this and the media desperately needs to keep the subject off of the many things that are big trouble for this president and the democratic congress. However the media has cried wolf so much and has thrown so much phony dirt at her that her fans are unlikely to pay any attention. That is the fruit of shoddy reporting.

If I’m a member of team Palin I do the following: If When the press refuses to take her explanation I would hit back at once saying: “Of course youthey don’t, this is the same press that pushed all those phony ethics complaints the latest of which has just been dismissed like all the others. I note the press isn’t reporting that for some reason.

Governor Palin has been subjected to 24 ethics complaints, several lawsuits, and dozens and dozens of public information act requests, few of which raised even a scintilla of a good faith issue, and most of which were simply done to garner a headline or promote opposition research for political gain.

Recently we learned that two more ethics complaints against Governor Palin have been dismissed—complaints that were filed after the Governor announced her plans to step down. One complaint asserted that it was unethical for the state to follow its own per diem regulations and pay per diem to the Governor as set forth by law. Of course, the complainant conveniently overlooked that the Governor and her family received less per diem than they were entitled to under State law—why let such details stand in the way of an ethics complaint? The other complaint that was dismissed asserted that the Governor, through me, supposedly violated the constitution because we informed a person who falsely implied that the Governor was “under investigation” by the FBI, that such statements are defamatory.

Every time they try to ask the “birth certificate” question I would counter with the News the media is unwilling to report. In fact I’d even consider putting the governor out there to do it herself. I think she is much brighter than a lot of these people, particularly in a quick interview format. For example if Morning Joe covered it in the 6 a.m hour I would have her call in before the 8:00 hour and offer a Q & A, but ONLY if they take her right now since she has “limited time”. If they take her then they have to think on their feet, while she is prepared, if they refuse her then THAT is the story.

Hey but what do I know, I’m just the fat bald guy on the couch.

Update: What a typo, egg on my face there. Thanks Milhoose for catching it. I have a bad habit of hitting post too soon.

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