Life’s Mysteries

- Why is Kim Kardashian famous ... there are lots of women with big butts?

- If kneeling is a sign of obedience and respect, why, when done during the playing of the national anthem, is it just the opposite?

- Why is Donald Trump’s hair orange?

- Why 72 virgins for martyred jihadists  ... why not 83 or 37?

- If all life is sacred to Hindus, how can they eat anything?

- Who killed Seth Rich? And why?

- Why are there no pictures of a pregnant Michelle Obama?

- If aliens are visiting us in UFOs, how come they don’t land and say hello?

- Where has all the comedy gone?

- How many push-ups can Joe Biden do?

- Who was the first person to eat an oyster?

- Is rap really “music?”


STAND UP FOR AMERICA!

Headlines

Giuliani: Kim Jong Un got on his hands and knees and begged for the Trump meeting

Trump has cost the stock market an estimated $1 trillion in value with tough trade talk

Mueller demands witness [smart] phones ...

Blue Wave fail: California  Democrats spires their own vote in L?A.

Poll: 29% if U.S. voters have favorable opinion of Giuliani

Short sellers betting against Tesla lose more than $1 trillion in one day as stock pops

Manafort [witness] tampering evidence 'almost nonexistent' ...

Pit in: Xi and I celebrated my birthday with vodka and sausages

Ryan backs Gowdy on FBI's use of informant to contact Trump associates

Stormy Daniels sues former lawyer, accusing him of being a 'puppet' of Trump and Michael Cohen

Trump issues new commutation after Kardashian meet ...

Ben Rhodes: Saudis gave Obama officials suitcases full of jewels

Baby Steps

There is a schism brewing in the Republican Party over the Paul Ryan-Patty Murray budget deal … just at the wrong time … see: Business Insider Article.  This revolt revolves around the fact that this “bipartisan” deal raises taxes (“fees”) and also increases spending (through sequester rollbacks).  The tea-party branch of the GOP rankles at this Democrat-lite solution … while the establishment Republicans believe that this deal will remove this budget issue from the table for the 2014 elections.  In other words, "take what we can get and move on (baby steps … or incrementalism) and we will have more leverage after the elections."

I am sympathetic to both positions. However, one argument that has caught my attention is that Democrats have used incrementalism for generations to get us into the dire predicament in which we find ourselves today … a debt abyss from which it is almost impossible to extract ouselves.  So, if the Republicans now try to adopt incrementalism as their solution, they are once again playing the Democrats’ game. Yes, I realize that not playing this game jeopardizes Republican chances in 2014, but then I strongly suspect that our Kardashian-obsessed American electorate will not wake up to our real fiscal peril until confronted with the cataclysm that awaits if we continue down the fiscal path blazed by the progressives among us.

Being babied is seldom an effective cure for self-indulgence.