Mid-Week Post

For all your middle of the week needs.

Oh, I see. The reason why the State Department ignored requests for help, why Obama watched four men die in his situation room, lied about a video on Youtube for two weeks and went to Las Vegas for a fundraiser the day after the attack was because of some sort of love pentagon. 

Right….

What escapade explains the gun-running?

A comparison between two waning empires:

“In August 1914,” wrote the historian A. J. P. Taylor, “a sensible, law-abiding Englishman could pass through life and hardly notice the existence of the state, beyond the post office and the policeman. He could live where he liked and as he liked. He had no official number or identity card.” A century later, he does not even expect to have to tend to his own family’s garden. That’s some shift in the Overton window.

I quite earnestly believe in all of the stuff that I’m not supposed to. I believe that America is exceptional; that it is an objectively better nation than any other that has ever existed; and that it is, as it was explicitly designed always to be, the last, best hope for mankind. As Winthrop’s sermon poetically put it, America is the “Shining City upon a Hill,” there so that men without liberty have somewhere to turn and a light that they might follow. I followed that light — 3,500 miles from my friends and my family — because I believed that my life would be better here, because I wanted to be free, and because I felt that under American liberty I would be able to be myself more honestly and more fully. There is nowhere else I could have gone. …

On Tuesday, America took another giant leap away both from its revolutionary mission and from the classical liberalism that it has successfully incubated for so long. This is a rotten thing for America, and also — though it might not realize it — for the world; for, like Anthony Blanche, Evelyn Waugh’s “aesthete par excellence,” should the United States descend into the mire, it will “take something away with it.” If America ceases to be America, it will “[lock] a door and hang the key on a chain.” And then? “All [its] friends, among whom [it] had always been a stranger,” will realize they need it. I know I do.

It takes an immigrant to know what America was and what it is becoming, something that makes for a sad commentary on both the British and American empires. At one stage, Great Britain, like Rome long before it, was the World. Whatever its faults were, it transformed everything. Its near-domination of the globe gave the East and the West a common language, civil services and many institutions we still use. Now, it’s a socialist whisper of what it was. America, too, is becoming that. Where its people were once independent and exceptional, Americans now wear government subsistence like a badge of honour. They exalt their leaders for their empty words and overreaching actions. They had overthrown a monarchial dictator and began a great experiment in liberty, something that was both admired and envied around the world. 

How far they have fallen.

This is the left and this is what they stand for- no tact, no discretion, no taste and no shame:

It was spitting in the faces of Canada's 158 Afghanistan war dead and the thousands who fell in wars before them.

And done on the very day families were tearfully remembering them. It was also grossly disrespectful to a group of veterans — aged 80 to 90 — from both World War II and the Korean War.

It was disgusting.

But freedom can be as ugly in what it must tolerate as this protest on Remembrance Day at Old City Hall was crass. Interesting that much of this disrespect came from, seemingly, some of the very people who should have been at this ceremony saying thank you. Instead they attempted to ruin it.

"I cannot, and will not, be silent in a ceremony used to glorify Canada's mission in Afghanistan, where many of my fellow Afghans were detained, tortured and killed because of the Canadian military," explained Suraia Sahar in an e-mail to Newstalk 1010 reporter Siobhan Morris, as well as Showgram host Jim Richards and producers Jessie Lorraine and Jordan Whelan.

Sahar wrote she and friend Laila were protesting because "there is no honour" in Remembrance Day. "As an Afghan Canadian my anger can be justified," she wrote. "But I faced enough verbal abuse by racist, angry old white people telling me to go back to my country, and that the Canadian military should kill more Afghans."

As it is clear that the trouble-making liar Miss Sahar’s parents have never instilled in her a measure of decorum, respect or gratitude and that the left finds these things intolerably priggish, imagine for a moment playing their game. Show up at their little occupations or happenings or whatever they want to call them with signs supporting our troops, calling for the public hanging of unrepentant murderer Omar Khadr and demanding a compulsory serving of bacon with every meal (I think I can get support for this) all the while eating Cajun sausage on a bun. Is that too boorish or beneath one? Look who crawled out of the sewers. Being Mr. Nice Guy isn’t going to cut it anymore.

The city of Los Angeles has passed a resolution urging citizens to abstain from meat every Monday, a measure they feel they must stress is not subject to law enforcement interference and has all the hallmarks of special-interest groups’ manifestos:

The Los Angeles City Council is urging all residents to observe "meatless Mondays" from now on.

A resolution adopted on Oct. 24 reads: "Be it resolved, that the Council of the City of Los Angeles hereby declares all Mondays as 'Meatless Mondays' in support of comprehensive sustainability efforts as well as to further encourage residents to eat a more varied plant-based diet to protect their health and protect animals."

Councilwoman Jan Perry, who introduced the resolution, also wants to ban new fast-food restaurants in South Los Angeles.

"While this is a symbolic gesture, it is asking people to think about the food choices they make. Eating less meat can reverse some of our nation's most common illnesses," press reports quoted Perry as saying.

The resolution makes 15 points in support of meatless Mondays, including U.N. recognition that "livestock are one of the most significant contributors to today's most serious environmental problems."

And if that's not enought, the resolution also mentions the growing obesity epidemic, the importance of reducing "our carbon footprint," health disparities in low-income communities, and animal cruelty.

The resolution plugs a vegetarian diet, noting that a nonprofit group in Los Angeles called Compassion Over Killing "encourages people to choose vegetarian foods as a way to help build a kinder, cleaner, and healthier world, and works with businesses throughout Los Angeles County to ensure vegetarian meals are readily available to consumers."

That a city council would even entertain the idea of imposing such a food regulation is evidence of how easy some are willing to let the state impose its will. Is there no one willing to enjoy a good bowl of Cambodian ginger chicken, lamb madras or bulgogi?

Moving on….

The great state of Texas wishes to secede from the Union:

Citizens from more than 20 states have submitted petitions to the WhiteHouse.gov website requesting that their states be allowed to peacefully secede from the United States of America. The first petition was filed on behalf of Louisiana; however, it is the state of Texas that - as of approximately 2:35 p.m. CST - reached the threshold first of the required 25,000 signatures.

I know how you feel, Texas, but the inevitable jokes about you and Quebec are just not worth it.

My Canada includes Texas, America's Quebec.

(With thanks to one and many)