Surprise Surprise Surprise

Remember Gomer Pyle?

I was reminded of his "Surprise Surprise Surprise" shtick when I heard the news that hillary beat the rap in her email case.

Statement by FBI Director James B. Comey on the Investigation of Secretary Hillary Clinton’s Use of a Personal E-Mail System

Our investigation looked at whether there is evidence classified information was improperly stored or transmitted on that personal system, in violation of a federal statute making it a felony to mishandle classified information either intentionally or in a grossly negligent way...

Notice there is no mention of intent when discussing the federal statute. Mishandling classified information is a violation - period.

Yet later on Comey states:

Although we did not find clear evidence that Secretary Clinton or her colleagues intended to violate laws governing the handling of classified information... (emphasis added)

"intended to violate" - so hillary gets a pass based on her intentions. I guess the next time I break a law I can just say I didn't intend to. If it's good enough for hillary, it should be good enough for you and me. Right?

Yeah, sure...

There is evidence to support a conclusion that any reasonable person in Secretary Clinton’s position, or in the position of those government employees with whom she was corresponding about these matters, should have known that an unclassified system was no place for that conversation (e-mail chains concerning matters that were classified at the Top Secret/Special Access Program level when they were sent and received). (emphasis added)

Wait a minute! Did Comey just say that hillary is not a reasonable person? That's just about the only thing in this load of BS that passes the smell test.

In addition to this highly sensitive information, we also found information that was properly classified as Secret by the U.S. Intelligence Community at the time it was discussed on e-mail...

None of these e-mails should have been on any kind of unclassified system, but their presence is especially concerning because all of these e-mails were housed on unclassified personal servers not even supported by full-time security staff, like those found at Departments and Agencies of the U.S. Government—or even with a commercial service like Gmail.

Classified information stored and transmitted on personal private e-mail servers less secure than Gmail - sure sounds like a violation of the 'mishandling' federal statute to me. But then again, I'm not the FBI Director.

It's enough to make me wish that J. Edgar Hoover was back in charge - feathered boa and all...

More:

FBI Rewrites Federal Law to Let Hillary Off the Hook

There is no way of getting around this: According to Director James Comey (disclosure: a former colleague and longtime friend of mine), Hillary Clinton checked every box required for a felony violation of Section 793(f) of the federal penal code (Title 18): With lawful access to highly classified information she acted with gross negligence in removing and causing it to be removed it from its proper place of custody, and she transmitted it and caused it to be transmitted to others not authorized to have it, in patent violation of her trust. Director Comey even conceded that former Secretary Clinton was “extremely careless” and strongly suggested that her recklessness very likely led to communications (her own and those she corresponded with) being intercepted by foreign intelligence services.

Yet, Director Comey recommended against prosecution of the law violations he clearly found on the ground that there was no intent to harm the United States.

In essence, in order to give Mrs. Clinton a pass, the FBI rewrote the statute, inserting an intent element that Congress did not require... (emphasis added)

It seems to me that this is what the FBI has done today. It has told the public that because Mrs. Clinton did not have intent to harm the United States we should not prosecute her on a felony that does not require proof of intent to harm the United States. Meanwhile, although there may have been profound harm to national security caused by her grossly negligent mishandling of classified information, we’ve decided she shouldn’t be prosecuted for grossly negligent mishandling of classified information.

Two more things:

First, if hillary and her clown posse can't handle simple things like email and fax systems, how on earth can she serve as leader of the free world?

click to embiggen

Second, if, as she claims, she never sent classified info over her private server, and never used the official State Dept. system, how in God's name did she do her job as Secretary of State?

Bottom line - whatever shred of respect or allegiance I might have once had towards our federal government is now a thing of the past. It has gone from a minor annoyance to an out-of-control threat to freedom and the rule of law.

A pox on all three of its branches.

And a huge pox on hillary rodham clinton and her enablers.

One More Reason To Love America

Yesterday we celebrated our country's independence. Many of us chose to have a beer or two (or more...) as part of that celebration. But not many of us know the role beer has played in shaping America.

The Mayflower took off from England on Sept. 16, 1620, bound for the area that is now New York City, on the journey that would lead to the founding of the United States of America.

Filled with just over 100 Pilgrims and their supplies, the vessel was blown north. As a rough voyage brought them closer to Plymouth Harbor, the Pilgrims decided to disembark and make a new life there.

One essential factor in their decision to land where they did?

They had run out of beer.

“We came to this resolution,” wrote future Plymouth governor William Bradford, “to go presently ashore to take a better view . . . or we could not now take much time for further search or consideration, our victuals being spent, especially our beer.”

One of the settlers’ first projects in the new world was the attempted establishment of a brewhouse. Little was accomplished at first, as fewer than half the Mayflower’s passengers survived year one and the grains they had brought from England either failed to grow or produced crops “not worth gathering.”

They were forced to drink water instead of beer — a significant and strange adjustment from their usual routine — but by the late 1620s, they had learned how to grow barley on American soil and adjusted their planting schedule accordingly.

I abhor drinking water. Fish do nasty things in it.

The first shipload of hops arrived in 1628, and by 1630, beer brewing and consumption was a force in the colonies.

By the time of the Revolutionary War, the colonists viewed beer as a necessity for their fighting men, with each soldier receiving “1 quart . . . beer or cider” per day.

When I was in the military, we also viewed beer as a necessity. But the brass didn't share that viewpoint.

Independence was won, but the war took a dire toll on the young nation’s brewing industry, which the founders realized would need to be rapidly revived to help boost the country’s economy and morale.

“It is to be hoped, that the Gentlemen of the Town,” said founding father — and, later, beer namesake — Samuel Adams, “will endeavor to bring our own beer into fashion again . . . so that we may no longer be beholden to Foreigners for a Credible Liquor.”

For all their legendary disagreements, the founding fathers supported the industry’s revival. Thomas Jefferson ... became a brewer in retirement. Benjamin Franklin — who is rumored to have once said, “Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy” — spoke of its importance, as did others.

Beer is as all-American as the Fourth of July and beauties in bikinis.

By 1911, the US had overtaken Germany to become the largest beer producing nation in the world, with an output of 63 million barrels. Prohibition halted this growth, as some brewers found alternate revenue sources — Anheuser-Busch sold ice cream, and “Schiltz, Miller and Pabst turned to cheese, chocolate and other confections” — while many others closed for good.

While the beers, the people who make them and the way we prefer to drink them have changed, America’s love affair with beer is as passionate today as it was when the first settlers arrived here on the Mayflower.

“Take a glance at the drinking habits of the early colonial period or the Industrial Revolution,” Huckelbridge writes, “and one simple and undeniable fact emerges: America is a nation of beer drinkers. We always have been, to varying degrees, and we most likely always will be.”

Independence Day 2016

Today we are celebrating 240 years of America's independence.

Today, however, I truly believe we are also in the midst of another, albeit more subtle, insidious, and undeclared war of independence.

Like the original, today we are fighting for our independence from an oppressive and overbearing government that no longer listens to its citizens, but cares only about expanding its powers.

In 1776 our forefathers weren't standing around waiting for someone else to do something. Now it is time once again to stand up and proclaim our independence from a government that presumes to know better than we what is best for us.

Speak out. Make your voice heard. Take back your independence. Live free and enjoy the blessings of Liberty for yourself and your posterity.

And enjoy some BBQ and beer while you're at it...

Sunday Funnies 2016.07.03

July 4th Weekend - yay America!!!

The Fourth of July weekend was approaching, and Miss Pelham, the nursery school teacher, took the opportunity to tell her class about patriotism. 'We live in a great country,' she announced. 'One of the things we should be happy is that, in this country, we are all free.'

Trevor, who was a little boy in her class, came walking up to her from the back of the room. He stood with his hands on his hips and said loudly, 'I'm not free. I'm four.'

Message from Her Majesty The Queen

    To the citizens of the United States of America from Her Sovereign Majesty Queen

    In light of your failure in recent years to nominate competent candidates for President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective immediately.

    Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchical duties over all states, commonwealths, and territories (except Kansas, which she does not fancy).

    Her Majesty will appoint a Governor for America without the need for further elections. Congress and the Senate will be disbanded. A questionnaire may be circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed.

    To aid in the transition to a British Crown dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect:

    1. Look up aluminium, and check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it.

    2. The letter 'U' will be reinstated in words such as 'colour', 'favour', 'labour' and 'neighbour.' Likewise, you will learn to spell 'doughnut' without skipping half the letters, and the suffix '-ize' will be replaced by the suffix '-ise'. Generally, you will be expected to raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels.

    3. Daily Tea Time begins promptly at 4 pm with proper cups, with saucers, and never mugs, with high quality biscuits (cookies) and cakes; plus strawberries (with cream) when in season.

God Save the Queen!

Q: If you crossed a vegetable with our first president, what would you get?
A: George Squashington

Q: If you crossed a rooster with the first signer of the Declaration of Independence, what would you get?
A: John Hancock-a-doodle-doo

Q: If you crossed a Patriot with a curly-haired dog, what would you get?
A: Yankee Poodle

Q: If you crossed the American national bird with Snoopy, what would you get?
A: A bald beagle.

Q: What protest did dogs hold in 1773?
A: The Boston Flea Party

Q: What did one flag say to the other flag?
A: Nothing. It just waved.

Q: How come there's no Knock Knock joke about America?
A: Because freedom rings.

First Brexit, Then Texit

In the wake of the Brexit vote, resulting in the future withdrawal of Great Britain from the European Union, the issue of Texas exiting the United States - Texit - is once again making waves.

Huzzah for Great Britain, a sovereign nation that saved its own sovereignty by the skin of its own teeth; a nation that, with the ongoing flood of illegal immigrants, was just a year or two away from losing the #Brexit vote, and with it their country forever. Power to the people!

If they can do it, why can't we Texans?

Just a few years ago, the idea of seceding from my beloved United States of America sounded preposterous, unthinkable, ridiculous, the stuff of tinfoil hats...

But in just a few years, so much has changed, and I don't think that change is within me. In just a few years, right here in my beloved U.S. of A., through the federal government, some state governments, and most especially the mainstream media and Supreme Court, what was once unthinkable is not only thinkable and a real threat, but in some cases actual reality.

Real Freedom is sovereignty, self-determination… the right of man to choose his or her own leaders and by extension the laws they live under. The primary job of a righteous government is to protect our freedoms -- the freedom for me to swing my fist in any way I please and to protect your right not to get hit by that fist. During the Obama-era, there has been a sea change in this thinking, and to say that it has been aided and abetted by an increasingly corrupt news media would be the understatement of all time.

Stop and think. Can you name one area ... one topic ... one issue ... one damn thing where we have more freedom now than we did eight years ago?

I didn't think so.

If you believe that I can do as I damn well please until it gets in the way of you doing what you damn well please, then you are an American. If you do not believe in imposing your morals and values on me, then you are an American.

And there aren't many of us left.

Despite persistent rumors to the contrary, it is technically illegal for Texas to secede. Neither the Texas Constitution, nor the Ordinance of the Convention of Texas (aka the Terms of Annexation) provides for the secession of Texas. However, one might argue for a "Texit Laboratory."

For the good of humanity, why not try an experiment where an American state is allowed to decouple itself completely from the federal government. Maybe we'll discover that despite its many flaws, the Left is correct and we are in fact better off with a centralized federal government.

But maybe we'll discover that without all the federal red tape and oversight and mandates that a smaller sovereignty is more dynamic and prosperous and free; that poverty and crime and unemployment will decrease, that the air and water will be cleaner, that people will be happier and freer.

And anyone who doesn't like #Texit is free to leave and move to America.

Sounds pretty damn good to me!

Birthdays Of Note

Yesterday was our daughter's 20th birthday. She's growing up much too fast.

Yesterday was also the 215th anniversary of the birth of the great French classical liberal economist Frédéric Bastiat (liberal in the good old-fashioned sense - that is, what today we would call libertarian.

Bastiat was one of the first economic theorists in the libertarian vein, who warned of the evils of big government and over-regulation. His definition of "legal plunder" - aka crony capitalism - is a classic example.

Legal plunder can be committed in an infinite number of ways. Thus we have an infinite number of plans for organizing it: tariffs, protection, benefits, subsidies, encouragements, progressive taxation, public schools, guaranteed jobs, guaranteed profits, minimum wages, a right to relief, a right to the tools of labor, free credit, and so on, and so on. All these plans as a whole—with their common aim of legal plunder—constitute socialism.

But how is this legal plunder to be identified? Quite simply. See if the law takes from some persons what belongs to them, and gives it to other persons to whom it does not belong. See if the law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime. (emphasis added)

Here's a few more Bastiat quotes.

“When plunder becomes a way of life for a group of men in a society, over the course of time they create for themselves a legal system that authorizes it and a moral code that glorifies it.”

“Everyone wants to live at the expense of the State. They forget that the State lives at the expense of everyone.”

Sound familiar? Too bad nobody reads the works of dead white males anymore.

Here's two more that are particularly relevant as we near Independence Day.

Dress Code

I'm still busier than a one-armed paper hanger in an ass-kicking contest (or whatever that saying is), but I did want to vent about a couple of things in the recently released House Select Committee on Benghazi report. There's plenty in there to get upset about, especially since the end result of all the bungling, incompetence, and CYA crap was four dead Americans. But what really caught my eye were two things.

First, there appears to have been a tug of war between State and Defense over how the 'rescue forces' should dress.

The report highlights the military's failure to carry out Defense Secretary Leon Panetta's order to deploy forces to Benghazi and the lengthy delay that prevented the military assets from arriving at the embassy in Tripoli until 2 p.m. the day after the Benghazi attack. 

"What was disturbing from the evidence the Committee found was that at the time of the final lethal attack at the Annex, no asset ordered deployed by the Secretary had even left the ground," the report states. 

Previous accounts blamed the "tyranny of time and distance" plus the failure to have airplanes ready for the significant delay in moving military assets. But the report states conflicting orders from State Department and Pentagon officials over whether Marines should wear military uniforms or civilian attire also played a role. (emphasis added)

In a newly revealed two-hour secure video conference on the night of the attacks led by White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough and attended by Clinton and others, State Department officials raised concerns about the diplomatic sensitivities of the attire to be worn by assets launched.

Really? People are dying and the Foggy Bottom boys (and girls) are worried "diplomatic sensitivities"? Let's put them in a position where they're getting shot at and see if they care what the rescue team is wearing.

According to one commander, the report states, as forces prepared to deploy, "during the course of three hours, he and his Marines changed in and out of their uniforms four times." (emphasis added)

GMAFB.

Another thing which raised my hackles was this tidbit.

The report also finds that then-Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral James Winnefeld, did not participate in the secure call because "he had left to return to his residence to host a dinner party for foreign dignitaries." He received one update during the dinner on the attacks.

If true, and if there isn't a damn good reason behind his failure to participate, then his military career needs to come to a schreeching halt. I wasn't there, I don't know all the details, I'll give him the benefit of the doubt, but it just sounds wrong.

Of course, barry and hillary screwed the pooch seven ways from Sunday on this one, but it sure looks like there's plenty of other blame to go around. Regardless of how much ineptness is at the top of the food chain, people need to figure out some way to do their job - or find another one.

I'm so disgusted by everyone involved I need to stop typing now before I blow a gasket...

Wordless Wednesday - 2016.06.29

It's the dog days of summer...

Offensive Post - Follow Up

Following up on yesterday's post regarding the perpetually offended class - and especially those spineless wimps who think they need a 'safe space - here's some advice. Man up, put on your big boy undies, and grow a pair.

Offensive Post

I'm going to be busy for the next several days. Expect lots of pictures and very few words.

This first batch is dedicated to all the whiny little twerps out there who are perpetually offended by ... something ... I have no idea what.

To all you who take offense at this - bite me!

 

Sunday Funnies 2016.06.26

It officially became summer this week (Monday, June 20 was the Summer Solstice).

I was lounging by the pool the other day when I noticed that my sun screen was better than what the old lady next to me was using. But I didn't say anything.

I didn't want to rub it in.

 * * * * * *

X Factor: The original Roman sun cream.

  * * * * * *

I applied for a job at a sun cream factory. I wasn't hired, but I'm going to reapply.

 * * * * * *

Two psychics meet on the street. One says “it sure is hot this summer”.

The other says, “Yes, it reminds me of the summer of 2019″.

 * * * * * *
“With school out, teens are looking for jobs, things like lifeguards. But L.A. public pools do not have lifeguards. We have life coaches. If they see you struggling in the water, they say, ‘Are you happy with the decisions you’re making?’ Then they give you a pamphlet for a yoga studio.” – Craig Ferguson

  * * * * * *

When summer comes, a lot of parents pack up their troubles. Then they send them off to summer camp.

 * * * * * * 
The NBA finals are over. But the players still can't go on vacation.

They’ll get called for traveling.

 * * * * * *
Several slices of bread went on summer vacation. They didn't do anything special. They just loafed around.

 * * * * * *
Charles: Why did Humpty Dumpty have a great fall?
Ray: Why?
Charles: To make up for his miserable summer.