Sweet Irony

Really, did Woman's Day magazine really give Bill Clinton their "Red Dress" award?

Had it been the "blue dress" award, they could have had Monica present it!

Where is the justice?

Eight Police Officers Fire 103 Times At Two Unarmed Women Delivering Newspapers . . . Commission Rejects Calls For Any Officer To Be Fired Or Even Suspended

Let’s recap what these officers did and will now only be required to take a little more training. Police were searching for Dorner. Two women happened by the police delivering newspapers in a blue Toyota Tacoma pickup truck. (Dorner was driving a charcoal Nissan Titan pickup truck). Without clear identification and without any appearance of a weapon, the police fired 103 times at the truck. 

A Commission has now completed its investigation of the officers and found that the officers were not a serious fault in trying to kill two innocent unarmed women and unleashing a wall of lead on a vehicle.

So, it is perfectly legal for the police to fire repeatedly at completely innocent and unarmed citizens for no justifiable reason.

I am not sure which is worst. That all eight officers don't even get a slap on the wrist or the fact that they fired 103 times and managed to hit one person, once.

These are the "highly trained professionals" that are to be trusted with guns over me? Really? Oh, and look, the commission found that they did nothing wrong. 103 bullets at innocent people and they did nothing wrong. As others have noted, if a citizen pulls a gun on a cop, even when the cop does not announce themselves, WATCH OUT but they can shoot at citizens with impunity.

So what that they were in an intense situation, that is their job! They voluntarily put themselves into harms way for the privilege of wearing that badge. They are trained to deal with intense situations. This is inexcusable. They should not only be fired but likely brought up on charges for attempted murder.

What a country...

Firms must swear Obamcare not a factor in firings

Is the latest delay of ObamaCare regulations politically motivated? Consider what administration officials announcing the new exemption for medium-sized employers had to say about firms that might fire workers to get under the threshold and avoid hugely expensive new requirements of the law. Obama officials made clear in a press briefing that firms would not be allowed to lay off workers to get into the preferred class of those businesses with 50 to 99 employees. How will the feds know what employers were thinking when hiring and firing? Simple. Firms will be required to certify to the IRS – under penalty of perjury – that ObamaCare was not a motivating factor in their staffing decisions. To avoid ObamaCare costs you must swear that you are not trying to avoid ObamaCare costs. You can duck the law, but only if you promise not to say so.

And

Administration officials dispute that this is happening on any large scale. Further, Treasury officials said Monday that businesses will be told to "certify" that they are not shedding full-time workers simply to avoid the mandate. Officials said employers will be told to sign a "self-attestation" on their tax forms affirming this, under penalty of perjury.

So, either a business must keep on full time workers that no longer make economic sense, due to Obamacare or they have to lie and say that these workers were not fired or had their hours reduced as a result of Obamacare.

The government is saying "nudge, nudge, wink, wink, we know you cut staff due to Obamacare but as long as you say that is not the reason, all is good". This way, businesses can't publicly claim that these workers lost their jobs due to the ACA.

So, what is the actual "penalty" for a business that cuts staff due to the ACA and does NOT sign "ze papers"? Gulag for you?

Treasury, IRS, HHS Conspired To Create An Unauthorized, Half-Trillion Dollar Entitlement.

Heads should roll. And I’m not even sure I mean just figuratively, if this is true. It seems as if this sort of thing should be prosecuted as a crime.

Last week, two congressional committees issued a little-noticed report detailing how Treasury Department, Internal Revenue Service, and Health and Human Services officials conspired to create a massive new entitlement not authorized anywhere in federal law.

Yes, but you know they won't. No one will get fired and for the most part the media will ignore...

New "oldest star" discovered and it is in our backyard!

It Is in the Milky Way and Is 400 Million Years Older Than the Previously Identified 'Oldest' Star.

An actual moment of clarity and truth!

This is from an older article but that does not diminish its truthfulness...

Frankly, I don’t know what it is about California, but we seem to have a strange urge to elect really obnoxious women to high office. I’m not bragging, you understand, but no other state, including Maine, even comes close. When it comes to sending left-wing dingbats to Washington, we’re number one. There’s no getting around the fact that the last time anyone saw the likes of Barbara Boxer, Dianne Feinstein and Nancy Pelosi, they were stirring a cauldron when the curtain went up on “Macbeth”.

The three of them are like jackasses who happen to possess the gift of speech. You don’t know if you should condemn them for their stupidity or simply marvel at their ability to form words.

I think all citizens deserve the government they have but it really isn't fair that California feels that they have the right to impose these three on the rest of the country.

School officials are no fans of gun ban signs

The image can be frightening, Byrne said, “but if it keeps the world safer, that’s OK. The No. 1 thing we do for kids in general is keep their school safe. We don’t want schools to become like airports but we should make some reasonable efforts. If it’s reasonable to tell people this is a safe, no-gun zone, then we’ll do it.”

Sorry, what is really frightening is that:

1. An adult is afraid of a safety sticker that is designed to indicate a gun free zone.


2. That a adult feels safer in a specifically marked gun free zone and thinks that a sticker that he is afraid of will actually cause someone that is intent on causing mayhem to view the sticker and go "Oh, this is a gun free zone. I best take my mayhem elsewhere!".


3. Since they brought it up, Sandy Hook was also a "safe, no-gun zone" and everyone knows how that worked out.

What stops people with guns that are intent on causing harm is generally other people with guns. I wonder what these folks will say when their "magic" stickers fail to keep bad people away. Likely, they will continue to blame the guns.

A different take on "Coexist"...

What more need be said?

The truth about the liberal "coexist" message...

What if the rest of the universe was afraid of us?

never have so many had so much and complained that they had so little while being so dependent on government — and yet they are so whiney and angry over their lack of independence

Each week I leave at sunbreak, and slowly enter a world of Pajama boys in BMWs and Lexuses, with $500 shades and rolling stops at intersections as they frown and speed off to the next deal. Somehow these techies assume voting for Barack Obama means that they are liberal. They are not. By proclaiming that they are progressive, they feel good about themselves and do not have to worry about why their janitorial staffs are not unionized, or why no one but they can buy a house, or why they oppose affordable housing construction along the 280 corridor, or why they fear the public schools as if they were the bubonic plague. Their businesses don’t create many jobs in the area; they don’t live among the Other; they seek to get out of paying income tax as they praise higher taxes; and they use money to ensure their own apartheid. And so they are “liberal.”

Read the rest...

Branco Cartoon – Media Whiteout

iOptik contact lenses and glasses projects images onto your eyes

DID SOMEONE LEAVE A DOUCHE UNDER THE CHRISTMAS TREE?

Now that is just plain funny, I don't care who you are...

President Selfie

via Legal Insurrection...

Epic levels of fail

Even by the extremely low standards set by Government, this has to be seen as a new watermark of fail: Oregon signs up just 44 people for Obamacare despite spending $300 million. So, roughly $7 million per signup.

Obamacare weekend wrap-up

“We reduced Japan to a pile of radioactive smoking rubble in 1,346 days. It’s now Day 1,355 and, despite promises to do likewise to the healthcare system, they’re still working on it. The FDR administration built almost a hundred working aircraft carriers faster than the Obama administration has managed to build one working website.”


As others have noted, Obamacare can't even do paper any more: “Federal health officials have been advising ObamaCare counselors this week to stop using paper applications to enroll people — out of fear that the applications wouldn’t be processed in time.” We are in actual technical regression with this monstrosity!

To quote Glenn Reynolds this roll-out, this law and this administration is "an onion of fail".

Reason TV: If you like your plan you can keep it - rap

Another ObamaCare security breach reported in Vermont

It’s increasingly clear that Healthcare.gov won’t meet the promised November 30 deadline for relaunch with near-total operating capacity. But if the online system ever does improve enough to allow a surge of applicants to get past the front end of the system, they’ll be walking into a data security nightmare, made all the worse by the incontrovertible fact that none of the hasty last-minute fixes could possibly have been tested for either hacker protection, or the kind of self-generated data integrity breach administrations don’t want to discuss, until freedom of information laws force them to.

This same Government that did so well with Benghazi, Fast & Furious, running the VA and managing the TSA. What makes anyone think that they would be doing so much better with this?

Obamacare and related thoughts

The Indiana school districts claim that they'll have to reduce working hours or lay off workers in order to shoulder the increased costs - or financial penalties - the employer mandate would impose upon them.

Sorry but it couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of people. Teachers overwhelmingly voted for Obama and they overwhelmingly supported Obamacare (ACA). They wanted this, they own this!

In a related article, this part is spot on:

The idea that an insurer like Regence can, or will, spin on a dime and revive our ol’ $587 Woody within the next six weeks is absurd.

True, Obama's "dictate" that insurance companies can continue to offer their older, non-qualifying plans for another year was (as is most things Obama) pure BS. He knows that there is NO way the insurance companies can re-tool their plans and get state commissioner approval to offer the older plans in time. Not to mention that those already cancelled are still cancelled. Done is done.

All I can say is, you voted for it, you own it and you sure are starting to get it! With his closing paragraph, this rube guarantees that he will not only get it, but he will get it hard and continue to get it repeatedly as this particular old dog refuses to learn a new trick.

We’re willing to suck it up and pay our fair share for health insurance. We want the exchanges to work.

What is so funny about this piece is that he still thinks himself so smart, enlightened and righteous but he is none of those things. This was a designed disaster. It may be running ahead of schedule but it is and has been on the projected path. He is a rube of the highest order as even after being shown the truth, he continues to willingly and gladly drink the Kool-Aid.

In a related note, is it just me or do you also want to just scream at everyone that dares utter the meaningless phrase "fair share". What the HELL is your "fair share"? It is liberal fairy dust. It is unicorns. It is whatever the person uttering it thinks it means at that time and place. The is the apex of empty gestures. It is a sliding scale of demand for more. It comes from the same suitcase as "living wage", "give back" and "social justice". These are the things that liberals utter when they can't bring themselves to tell you what they really think either because they aren't thinking or they know what they are thinking will get them laughed out of the conversation so they dress it up with these "oh so PC" catch phrases hoping to slide past logic.

President "asterisk"

Census ‘faked’ 2012 election jobs report. That along with the IRS intimidation of the opposition, the asterisk on Obama’s re-election gets bigger. . . .

Obamcare item(s)

I love this quote:

If you can’t take some joy, some modicum of relief and mirth, in the unprecedentedly spectacular beclowning of the president, his administration, its enablers, and, to no small degree, liberalism itself, then you need to ask yourself why you’re following politics in the first place. Because, frankly, this has been one of the most enjoyable political moments of my lifetime. I wake up in the morning and rush to find my just-delivered newspaper with a joyful expectation of worsening news so intense, I feel like Morgan Freeman should be narrating my trek to the front lawn. Indeed, not since Dan Rather handcuffed himself to a fraudulent typewriter, hurled it into the abyss, and saw his career plummet like Ted Kennedy was behind the wheel have I enjoyed a story more.

And this part is a keeper:

During the government shutdown, Barack Obama held fast, heroically refusing to give an inch to the hostage-taking, barbaric orcs of the Tea Party who insisted on delaying Obamacare. It was a triumph for the master strategist in the White House, who finally maneuvered the Republicans into revealing their extremism. But we didn’t know something back then: Obama desperately needed a delay of Healthcare.gov. In his arrogance, though, he couldn’t bring himself to admit it. The other possibility is that he is such an incompetent manager, who has cultivated such a culture of yes-men, that he was completely in the dark about the problems. That’s the reigning storyline right now from the White House. Obama was betrayed. “If I had known,” he told his staff, “we could have delayed the website.”

This is how you know we’re in the political sweet spot: when the only plausible excuses for the administration are equally disastrous indictments.

Nice graphic with the article too!

In addition to stories/opinion pieces like this, "old" news continues to leak out. Items like:

"what neither Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius nor WebMD mentioned at the time was that the company, which millions of Americans regularly read for health news, also stood to earn millions of dollars from a federal contract to teach doctors about Obamacare."

With a revelation like that, how much can you really trust WebMD?

In related news, the White House says that 26,794 Americans selected insurance through the Obamacare web site in its first month.

What the heck does "selected" mean? If they "bought" insurance or "paid" for insurance, they would surely say that. Instead they use the word "selected". Well I selected a car I want, a Maserati but as I can't afford it, I don't think the local dealer will be able to count my "selection" in their quarterly sales report. Only the government can say or do things that citizens and businesses would be locked up for.

Obamacare, the gift that keeps on giving...

Per PJMedia (read the whole thing):

• Non-citizens are eligible for Medicaid and CHIP (Children’s Health Insurance Program). This is not a new development. However, the documentation and verification process for such enrollments was significantly eased by regulations in the Affordable Care Act.
• Getting fraudulent applications for Medicaid or CHIP approved is now easier, and thus more likely.
• Applicants attempting to register for Medicaid as non-citizens by using Healthcare.gov will have their identification checked in real-time by the SAVE (Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements) database. But if SAVE verification fails, the applicant is not prevented from enrolling in Medicaid/CHIP.
• In fact, the opposite occurs: the applicant is likely enrolled in Medicaid immediately.
• The applicant is then given a 90-day period to clear up the identification problem.
• This “enroll first, confirm later” regulation, combined with the ACA’s easing of verification requirements, allows anyone, from a computer anywhere in the world, to successfully auto-enroll for 90 days of Medicaid by entering fraudulent information about being a certain category of legal alien living in the United States.
• There is no guarantee that state governments will take action to cancel these enrollments at the end of each application’s 90-day period if identification is never provided. The cancellation of unverified enrollments is left to each state’s available manpower and political will.
• At the end of the 90-day period, if states do indeed ask the applicant to produce identification or to have the enrollment canceled, the applicant is allowed to ask for an extension of the 90-day period. The applicant can get the period extended for significantly longer.
• Obamacare does not allow any information entered into Healthcare.gov to be used for legal action against illegal immigrants. Like “catch and release,” an applicant could attempt to fraudulently enroll repeatedly.

So Obamacare has been designed to allow ANYONE (citizen or not) to apply for insurance and likely register to vote. They have at least 90 days to verify that they are citizen or legal immigrants but if not, oh well, no big deal.

To add insult to injury, the latest Obamacare ad campaign takes condescension and insults to an entirely new level, though as the target demographic (young adults) overwhelmingly voted for Obama, the agency releasing the ads may "know their market" all too well...

There is the "Brosurance" ad:

Then the "Hosurance" ad:

And finally the "Young, Single, Pregnant" ad:

One needs to ensure that these young folks understand how important insurance is in terms they will understand. How not having insurance can affect your budget (cutting into beer money), your recreational activities (slutting around is easier with "free" birth control) and if that should fail, dealing with the resulting wanted or unwanted pregnancy.

The funny thing about all of this is that this generation is the one getting royally screwed by Obamacare. They are the relatively healthy folks that would normally only have a catastrophic coverage plan as they don't go to the doctor much, get sick much or have minor (doctor visiting) injuries much. They ALL now have to have plans that contain maternity, pre-natal, birth control, etc., etc., etc. Now they have to have a full coverage plan with higher than expected premiums to help pay for everyone else's insurance.

You all like trolling for strange? Well Obama has definitely given it to you good and hard with "sloppy seconds" by Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid. Hope you enjoyed it and just be gone by morning...

Obamacare realities

Well it looks like the "new reality" is starting to sink in and even those that chose to be willfully blind are starting to notice.

• Former MSNBC Host’s Health Plan Cancelled, New Plan Costs 3.5 Times More

But don't worry because the exchanges are working so very well!

• In NC "only 1,000 people had filled out applications as of October 15th. In fact, only one person was able to successfully use Healthcare.gov to enroll in the new exchange." but "even that single person has not paid, which means the enrollment is not complete"

I am sure that they will run this program so much better than their "free cell phone" program. The size of Obamacare makes the cell phone program look like a lemonade stand and look how well they have been managing that program!

• The government spent $2.2 billion on the program last year alone, and a review of the top five providers by the FCC for the Wall Street Journal showed that 41 percent, or six million of their free-phone subscribers, couldn’t demonstrate eligibility or failed to respond to requests for certification.

So, with this as typical Government competence in running large programs, I am sure we don't have anything to worry about. The "glitches" will be worked out any day now and then it will be all smooth sailing!

It is getting to the point that the most frightening words you can ever hear are: We are from the Government and are here to help.

Post Obamacare America

Welcome to the new post-Obamacare America where the constitution and individual liberty is just a quaint relic of the past.

Virginia Democrat Calls For Forcing Doctors To Accept Medicare And Medicaid Patients

In this new America, we all are property of the Government and it (the Government) is free to allocate us (resources) as they see fit. This includes requiring doctors to see patients. You can't have people reacting to government incentives, can you? Screw with the healthcare system, reduce the patient / doctor relationship, set disbursement rates below the cost of care and remove doctor choices. This all results in doctors exercising their rights as citizens and business owners to choose who to service.

Democrat delegate candidate Kathleen Murphy said that since many doctors are not accepting medicaid and medicare patients, she advocates making it a legal requirement for those people to be accepted.

She did not recognize that the payments are inadequate to cover the doctors' costs. She also did not recognize there is a shortage of over 45,000 physicians now and that it is forecast to be 90,000 in a few years.

Democrats appear to want to make physicians slaves of the state, but Democrats don't admit they would just drive more doctors out of practice into retirement and other occupations.

The land of unicorns and rainbows (Obamacare) continues its slow motion crash into the granite wall known as reality with more and more stories like this: a patient with stage-4 gall bladder cancer had great doctors and health insurance until his plan was cancelled and now worries about how long he will live.

He is not the only one: The 84-year-old widow, whose husband worked at now-defunct Wheeling-Pittsburgh Steel, saw her payment for out-of-pocket expenses go from $3,400 to $6,700; the co-pay cost for a hospital stay went from zero to $200 a day. “I think it’s terrible. They shouldn’t be canceling what I have,” she said. “They are raising my prices and taking away privileges.”

“It is highly alarming that Obama repeatedly claimed that everyone could keep their doctor and their insurance plan and that now appears to have been – how to put this? ... A lie,” said Iowa State University political science professor Steffen Schmidt. “People by the millions are and will have their current policies cancelled, period.”

Despite all of the evidence that Obama did not speak the truth: White House senior adviser Valerie Jarrett tweeted on Monday night: “FACT: Nothing in #Obamacare forces people out of their health plans. No change is required unless insurance companies change existing plans.”

Really Valerie? Tell that to all of these people that have had their current policies cancelled. You and the likes of James Carville might consider their existing insurance plans "fake plans" or "not really insurance" because they don't support things like maternity coverage or birth control but it was working just fine for these people.

When Obama made all of those great healthcare speeches, he said "If you like your plan you can keep your plan." and "If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor". and "Nothing on the ACA is going to change what you have now." At no time did he ever say, unless (as it happens every year) your plan changes IN ANY WAY no matter HOW SMALL. Rates are always adjusted year to year. Plan details are always being tweaked. Most people did not expect business and usual to result in their current plans no longer being eligible for grandfathering. No one that is except for the Democrats that wrote and jammed this mess through Congress and onto the President's desk. They knew this. The Republicans knew this and tried to stop it but all of the Democrats 100% voted to keep these restrictions in the law forcing YOU to loose your current plan.

Some would argue that this entire Obamacare fiasco is going according to plan. President Obama is on record saying he is in favor of single payer and Obamacare looks like the perfect tool with which to destroy the American medical system. This is such a mess that people will demand a solution and team Obama will say they need to move to single payer to "fix this mess". They will blame "this mess" on Republicans, the Tea Party, insurance companies, doctors, and anyone and anything else they can think of but will always advocate doing more instead of doing less. More government, more intervention, more rules and more regulations. That is all they know, that is all they can see and most importantly, that is all they want.

Obama and the Democrats OWN Obamacare lock stock and barrel

Senate Democrats voted unanimously three years ago to support the Obamacare rule that is largely responsible for some of the health insurance cancellation letters that are going out.

The citizens overwhelmingly did not support Obamacare. The Republicans did not support Obamacare. The President and the Democrats not only completely, 100% own this mess but lied about it just about every step of the way. From Nancy's "We have to pass it to see what is in it." to Obama's "If you like your plan, you can keep your plan." and crap this this. It is ALL on them. Don't let anyone forget or spin their way out of this.

Obamacare enrollment numbers are finally being "found"

"the government said there were 4.7 million unique visits in the first 24 hours...six enrollments have occurred"

By the next day enrollments were up to "approximately 100"

No wonder they "don't have any figures".

How much did they spend on this site again? How long have they been pushing this site again? If this were the private sector, not only would the company have fired those responsible but the Government would be holding 24/7 hearings and demanding accountability, refunds and heads.

Don't forget, Sebelius said to Congress that she did not have any figures. If CBS News could get them, how come she couldn't? Did she lie to Congress? To quote another Obama appointee "What difference does it make"?

"You will be able to keep your healthcare plan PERIOD".

That is what he said: "You will be able to keep your healthcare plan PERIOD". Not "You can keep your [what we say is a] healthcare plan". Not "You can keep your healthcare plan [if it is are REAL - in our eyes - healthcare plan] period".

That my friends is a lie. No two ways about it. A lie. He new it was a lie at least by the time he signed the bill and most definitely by last week when he was still saying it.

Another Obamacare success story!

Cupcake Store Among Wrong Businesses Listed on State Obamacare Signup Site

This is just another recent example of the incompetence of this administration and the totality of the people involved in the Obamacare program and roll-out. These will also be the people that will have control over YOUR data. Your health records, your tax/payroll records, all of it. If they can't get the little things right, what makes you think they will do better with the big things?

These are the same people (the Government) that has been so successful with:

• The IRS (targeting conservative groups while green-lighting liberal ones)
• BATF (fast and furious anyone?)
• State Department (remember Benghazi - "a video did it")
• The VA (understaffed and over budget)
• Homeland Security
• TSA
• NSA
• etc., etc., etc.

Has this government really done ANYTHING recently to earn your trust? Obama himself said many times over many, many months "If you like your health insurance, you can keep it." Well 16 million people [so far] have learned what the shelf life of that statement was AND even Obama knew it was a lie. He may not have known it the first time he said it but he surely knew by the 40th. He surely knew last month when he was still saying it!

Welcome to the new America where the disaster that is the Obamacare web site and roll-out is merely a "glitch". Where the president can lie. Where the Attorney General can lie. Where the speaker of the House can lie. Where no one, not the media, not the opposing party, no one will call them on it.

And the fleas continue to bite at the dog...

End of an era: Last U.S. lead smelter to close in December

Doe Run made significant efforts to reduce lead emissions from the smelter, but in 2008 the federal Environmental Protection Agency issued new National Ambient Air Quality Standards for lead that were 10 times tighter than the previous standard. Given the new lead air quality standard, Doe Run made the decision to close the Herculaneum smelter.

What is clear is that after the Herculaneum smelter closes its doors in December, entirely domestic manufacture of conventional ammunition, from raw ore to finished cartridge, will be impossible.

This will drive up ammunition prices, there is no way it can't. US manufacturers will have to rely on lead from recycling and imports which will be more expensive than domestically smelted lead. Other businesses that rely on lead will be affected too. Car battery prices will increase.

The industry has tried to switch from lead to alternate materials but most of these do not have enough of the properties and characteristics of lead to be a viable long term substitution. Government agencies at all levels rely on the biolistic properties of lead projectiles as part of their CSI programs. The substitutes do not match and will need to be studied and their behaviors coded.

There will be ripples...

Durbin Amendment Costs Consumers $22 Billion

All in all, consumers took it on the chin for $22 billion and possibly more. That $22 billion is the present discounted value of the losses to consumers, starting in October 2011 when the caps went into effect, and off into the future.

...

The fact that the Durbin Amendment resulted in a wealth transfer to retailers from consumers and banks is not surprising. The regulations shifted more than $7 billion of money from the annual income of banks to the annual income of merchants. There is no reason to believe that merchants would give this windfall back to consumers or that the banks could absorb the full loss in their profits. A wealth of economic studies shows that does not happen in the real world. But, the bill to consumers over time will add up to at least $22 billion, and potentially more.

It is hard for me to believe that Congress could not see this coming. You take away profit from a business and they have to replace it somehow. In this case, banks lost revenue due to interchange caps and as a result profits. Those profits needed to be replaced and so banking fees to consumers increased and other free services were cut to reduce costs.

One of the scariest things a person can say is "I am from the Government and I am here to help!"

AWK Musings

I like AWK and have used it for years. I feel that it is an elegant language that does what it was designed to do quite well. I don't use it very much at all anymore due to how what I do has changed over the years. It is still in my toolbox and every now and then I like to pull it out, dust it off and use it even if I really don't have a need.

While thinking about this on my way to work this morning, I wondered if there was a web hosted version of AWK (figured there had to be as everything is on the internet) and lo and behold there is! It is an implementation of AWK in JavaScript and is available here. Have not used it much so can not say what (if any) the limitations are but it has worked for the simple things I have thrown at it.

There is also an AWK PDF manual available here (as well as many other places).

Additionally there is also an online "run anything" web site here that supports a great many languages including ADA, AWK, C#, COBOL, Fortran, etc. It has a nice editor and it has worked on the C and AWK that I have submitted. Very nice!

Get the door Chad...

Why it is always 1984, example 1

Here is a perfect example of why it will always be "1984" (the land of double-speak) in this country.

Someone in the White House was briefing Democrats on a meeting that took place involving the President and high ranking members of Congress.

That someone described the meeting to Sen. Dick Durbin and here is what happened next: Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., wrote Sunday on Facebook that “Many Republicans searching for something to say in defense of the disastrous shutdown strategy will say President Obama just doesn’t try hard enough to communicate with Republicans. But in a ‘negotiation’ meeting with the president, one GOP House Leader told the president: ‘I cannot even stand to look at you.”

It turns out, no Republican actually said that. Here is how ABC describes what happened: White House Bungles Leak About GOP Leader Trashing Obama

Not sure what journalism school Arlette Saenz went to but a LIE is not the same as a LEAK. The definition of a leak is: an intentional disclosure of secret information. The definition of a lie is: a false statement made with deliberate intent to deceive; an intentional untruth. See how they are different? There is an expectation that a leak is factual. Arlette even states in his article "Turns out, it never happened". Why does he call it a leak then? The headline should have read: White House Bungles LIE about GOP Leader Trashing Obama. Is it because it was done by a Democratic administration and involved a Democratic Senator?

Obamacare “Navigators"

"Application assisters listed on this page may still be completing federal and state certification requirements. They are obligated to let you know if they are certified or not if you contact them. If they are not certified, they cannot help you."

If you choose to call an entity from this database, the only action Healthcare.gov has taken — or the only action you are permitted to know about — towards preventing fraudulent actors/identity thieves from taking part in a process involving your private information is this: they have been told they are “obligated” to turn you away.

So the Obamacare web site that asks you every manner of personal question to ascertain what insurance plans you might want and what subsidies you might be entitled to (to help pay for it) has a database of "navigators" to help you through the process except the site warns you not all of the people the site shows you and has made available to you to pick from, have been "certified". Don't worry though, they are OBLIGATED to let you know if they are not yet certified! Why worry? They only have access to ALL of your personal information!

Why not just show those who have completed the certification process? Could it be because so few have?

Obamacare - the gift that keeps on giving.

President Barack "Sgt. Schultz" Obama

Sgt. Schultz of Hogan's Heroes was famous for his "I hear nothing, I see nothing, I know nothing!" refrain and appears to be the guiding mentor of our current President, not Rev. Jeremiah "God Damn America" Wright as you might have expected. It seems that President Obama and his handlers go to great lengths to give him plausible deniability for every government failure and scandal.

A partial list is available at Legal Insurrection and includes:

• Obamacare web site issues
• IRS targeting of non-liberal groups
• The Petraeus extramarital affair
• Benghazi

But also includes other gems like:

• Fast and Furious
• The AP taps
• GSA 2010 scandal
• Solyndra

There are others but you get the picture. This President has raised "not knowing" to an art form. You have to ask, if Obama really doesn't know anything about what is going on - who is really running the country?

No really! Voter fraud is a myth!

The former chief of staff of a Democratic Florida congressman will serve 90 days in jail after admitting to a voter fraud scheme during the 2012 election.

But again, election fraud is a myth!

Christina Ayala also wouldn't talk about the state panel's recommendation that her mother, Democratic Registrar of Voters Santa Ayala, be criminally investigated for fraud and conspiracy for allowing her daughter to use a false address on Noble Avenue as her place of residence between 2009 and 2013. The investigation revealed evidence that Santa Ayala knew of and may have cooperated in the fraud.

An elections commission investigation found that Ayala voted in nine different elections using that address, when she actually resided elsewhere.

"There is evidence that she ran for elected office twice from this false address during the period, including for the office she currently holds," said the report of a commission attorney. "There is evidence that she also applied for funds from the Citizens' Election Program using this false address.

So, she not only listed her "not address" on her election papers, she also voted from her "not address" at least nine times and she applied for public funds to help her run for elected office for the district of her "not address".

It only took till the 8th paragraph to learn her mother is a Democrat and not till the 13th paragraph do you learn that Ayala is a Democrat. Have to wonder why they bothered mentioning it at all.

Says it all...

Via Legal Insurrection...

New Kid at School

Congressional Republicans act like the new kid at school who has a self esteem problem. They will do whatever the other kids (Democrats & MSM) say in order to be accepted and to fit in. Every once in a while they remember who they really are and try to resist but in the end they always surrender to peer pressure.

It is like an after school special. You always root for them hoping this time they will stand firm. That they will finally realize the cool kids will never like them but if they take a stand for what is right, for their convictions, they just might get some respected. Alas it is not to be. We have been down this road before and it is to the point where you know, in your heart that they will let you down.

The Republican party can't seem to understand why support from the base is so low. Why voters are just not turning out. This is why. You take the right road and we think maybe this time will be different but as soon as you see the first pothole you turn the car around and go the other way.

As a fiscally conservative voter I feel like I am being played for a sucker and I am tired of it. Based on the turn-out for the last election, I am not the only one. Apparently the national Republic party is happy to be "Democrat Light", fine. You can have it. I am tired of going into the voting booth, holding my nose and pulling the lever for the "lesser of two evils". That road has gotten us here, where we are today. I might as well have just stayed home the last few election cycles. If this is the best that the Republican party can do then in the future I will. The Republican party has spend years making this bed with the Democrats, I hope you enjoy sleeping in it.

Republicans Surrender

Looks like the Republicans have once again snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. They agreed to reopen the government, not defund Obamacare, to extend the debt limit, and publicly say to the country that they are very, very sorry (that last one is not officially in the deal but is the result of this capitulation).

As a country, we can not get rid of this bunch of spineless losers fast enough. They are a disgrace to what once was the Republican party. They were winning, again. The government was shutdown and NO ONE noticed! They could have at least passed a CR with funding levels per last year, no increases and let the Democrats pick what to reduce but NO, they have to be total wimps and give away the entire farm.

Sad and pathetic, AGAIN...

Another Obamacare "rube" self identifies...

My wife and I just got our updates from Kaiser telling us what our 2014 rates will be. Her monthly has been $168 this year, mine $150. We have a high deductible. We are generally healthy people who don’t go to the doctor often. I barely ever go. The insurance is in case of a major catastrophe.

Well, now, because of Obamacare, my wife’s rate is gong to $302 per month and mine is jumping to $284. I am canceling insurance for us and I am not paying any fucking penalty.

What the hell kind of reform is this?

It is EXACTLY the kind of reform you were warned it would be BUT the warning came from those evil Tea Party people, those evil Republicans and those evil libertarians SO you would not listen. Plus like all of the rest of you progressives, you agreed with Nancy and just wanted SOMETHING passed. You did not know or care what was in it and figured it would be anyone else's problem but yours. Sorry to point this out but you were EXACTLY who this was aimed at. Young people who did not really need insurance. Congratulations, you get to be forced to have more coverage than you want and much more expensive insurance than you need (to also help pay for grandma's policy). Well Merry Friggin Christmas to you!

Government Shutdown, 2013 - Day 16

The default that wasn't...

[T]here is no such thing as default unless there is an actual evil attempt from the administration. When you have 18 percent of GDP coming in in cash, less than 2 percent going out in debt coverage—I’m stunned you all fall for it in the press. None of you were math majors, were you?”

We are all (well most of us) are being played for suckers, again, with a complicit press dutifully playing their part. Remember, if this were past shutdowns like when Republicans were in charge this would all be the President's fault for refusing to compromise. With the press, it is ALWAYS the fault, no matter what it is, of the Republicans.

By the way (and because I KNOW you did not hear this from the MSM) the House GOP voted 11 times to reopen the government.

As Obama is fond of saying "Never let a crisis go to waste".

If you are really serious about wanting to fix things (which most politicians on both sides are not) here is a plan that would actually work: An across-the-board cut of 5% in every government department's budget line. (You can't convince me -- and you'll certainly have a hard time convincing voters -- that there's not 5% waste to be found in any government program.) Then a five-year freeze at that level. Likewise, a one-year moratorium on new regulations, followed by strict limits on new regulatory action: Perhaps a rule that all new business regulations won't have the force of law until approved by Congress.

As has been noted here (earlier) and elsewhere, this may have started with (the train wreck known as) Obamacare but this issue is bigger than that and the GOP really NEEDS to draw a line in the sand here and now. No more. Enough is enough. We are bankrupting this country and enslaving our children for generations to come. The debt is too large and is growing every day. The government is printing money as fast as they can to prop up this mess of an economy while they continue to regulate what is left of it to death. Quantitative easement (fancy talk to printing more money than is needed to replace money physically destroyed) is flooding the economy with paper that is melting the buying power of your current earnings as well as your retirement account. Wages are flat, growth is flat, more people are out of work (officially unemployed as well as having just given up looking for work) at levels not seen for decades. The country is burning and while Obama plays the fiddle.

Government Shutdown, 2013 - Day 15

And the insanity continues!

I hear tell that the great powers that be are in heated negotiations with the hope of bringing this civilization destroying government shutdown to an end (even if only temporarily). I have to ask, why? We have gone on now for 15 days with the government "shutdown" (in reality it is a "slowdown" as many workers have continued to work based on the designation of being critical to the country) and truth be told the impact for everyone but government workers has been so inconsequential that the Obama administration has been forced to make the shutdown more public by using the parks and recs service to strong arm and bully citizens and tourists.

Instead of the GOP snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, they should instead press on with the shutdown and continue to submit department by department funding measures with each department being funded at 2005 levels (as a start) for those that have to be continued while saving for last (or not at all - even better) those less critical departments like the Department of Education. There is NO government department that can not survive a 15% budget cut (or more). The real fear in Washington is that the longer this shutdown goes on the more obvious it becomes how little we the people need our current, bloated government. That is what those in Washington are really afraid of and that is what all of this blatant disregard for their parks shutdown theater is showing everyone. People are beginning to wake up to how little the government impacts their daily lives, how little we need them. So GOP, if you want to have any hope of staying relevant and preserving any chance of regaining your political clout, DON'T BE STUPID and DON'T CAVE. Stand firm and keep the breaks on.

Government Shutdown, 2013 - Day 14

Round-up:

Not long ago, the conventional wisdom in official Washington held that the so-called sequester spending cuts would be a disaster for the Republican Party. They were expected to rise up in vehement protest once the “cuts” went into effect.

Instead, nobody outside of Washington noticed.

And

Reid and other Democratic leaders Saturday rebuffed Collins’ proposal to fund the government through March and lift the debt ceiling through January. In return, Collins’ plan would have delayed for two years a tax on medical devices implemented through Obamacare and created income-verification measures for those receiving subsidies under the new health law.

And don't miss...

On Sunday, protesting the barricades placed at memorials around Washington D.C. by the vindictive Obama administration, veterans removed the barricades and proceeded to take them to the White House.

Obamacare - tick, tick, tick

The American public is being hooked on a plan being implemented without planning which has a timebomb set to expode in 2015.

This goes far beyond RI. It will affect every state that has setup an exchange. Come 2015 the infrastructure funds from Washington end and each state will have to come up with another way to fund it. Won't that be fun!

Aren't you glad we had to pass it in order to find out what was in it?

Government waste - "You can't make this stuff up" department

USPS to Destroy ‘Just Move’ Stamp Series Over Safety Concerns

"the USPS will be destroying the entire press run after receiving concerns from the President’s Council on Fitness, Sports & Nutrition over alleged “unsafe” acts depicted on three of the stamps (cannonball dive, skateboarding without kneepads and a headstand without a helmet)."

Headstand without a helmet? Who the heck wears a helmet to do a headstand? What the heck are these people doing to this country? If that is an issue, why no complaints about skipping rope without a safety harness?

Obamacare web site news...

Taxpayers Shelled Out $634,320,919 To Build Obamacare Website…

Government Shutdown, 2013 - Day 10

Really? Has it really come to this?

National park goons remove handles from trail water fountains...

and

Shutdown-busting gardener tells how he was ordered off Lincoln Memorial by 'bully robocops'

How much money is the government spending, trying to make everyone understand what happens when they don't have money? Only in a truly partisan liberal mind does any of this make any kind of sense.

That everyone can not just agree (regardless of how you feel about the shutdown) that these kinds of antics are just plain wrong, stupid and petty is an example of just how far this country's politics has fallen. No one in the Obama administration has pointed out how ridiculous these kinds of theatrics are?

Government Shutdown, 2013 - Day 9

Well here we are at day 9 and the pettiness of the current administration continues...

• You can't recreate here.
• Maybe people are beginning to wake up and remember that this is THEIR country, it does not belong to the government...
• Obama’s goons trucked in barricades to keep out World War II vets and other visitors. By one estimate, the barricades and workers cost $100,000.

At least many people understand where the issue really is...

• #PresidentStompyFoot: Obama’s shutdown snit fits inspire another ‘nails it’ hashtag
• The Spite House
• OBVIOUSLY, THE PRESS HASN’T BEEN DOING ITS JOB

As has been noted elsewhere, this may have started over Obamacare (which has been a disaster so far to businesses and the shiny new exchanges don't work) but it now appears to be growing into a general government spending movement!

If the republicans were smart (which they usually are not) they would [daily] send department specific spending bills to the Senate and report far and wide which ones they submitted and that Reid is not moving on them. They should also take the time to review each department budget and adjust the appropriations bill according to NEED verses desire. These auto-budget increases NEED to stop. Most should be slashed, The longer this "shutdown" continues, the more people will realize just how little they need the government at its current size and scope.