Quote of the Day - Government Competence Edition

Reader J. in the first comment to yesterday's QotD:

I am 100% convinced at this point, that if you asked the US Federal Government to come into your kitchen and make you a peanut butter sandwich; it would cost $100 Million, they would burn down your house, and you would be handed two roofing shingles with a dog turd in between.

I'm not sure they'd get the "shit-on-a-shingle" part right.

Holy Crap, the Chicago Tribune?!?

Did someone drop acid in my iced tea?  Just let me leave this here:

Stop digging. Start over.

The Americans manhandled by this exercise in government arrogance now find themselves divided into warring tribes: Those with chronic ailments who have found new plans on Obamacare exchanges and are pleased. Those who don't want or can't afford the replacement policies Obamacare offers them. Those whose new policies block them from using the health providers who have treated them for many years. The estimated 23 million to 41 million people whose employer-sponsored plans are the next to be imperiled. And on and on.

Most of these tribespeople only wish their big problem was a slipshod Obamacare website. On Thursday, their plight grew more frightful. With even Democratic members of Congress storming the White House over the cancellations, Obama declared — by what legal authority is unclear — that he would overrule the law he signed in 2010 and allow insurers to extend those canceled policies for a year.

--

We understand why the president and leaders of his party want to rescue whatever they can of Obamacare. On their watch, official Washington has blown the launch of a new entitlement program ... under the schedule they alone set in early 2010.

What we don't understand is their reluctance to give that failure more than lip service. Many of the Americans who heard their president say Thursday that "we fumbled the rollout of this health care law" would have been pleased to hear him add: So we're admitting it. This law is a bust. We're starting over.

(Bold emphasis mine.)  RTWT.

Wow.

Who knew the editors of the Trib were racists?

Quote of the Day - Og the Neanderpundit Edition

From a comment to Tam's post If schadenfreude had calories, I'd weigh 300 pounds:

I would be inclined to believe you are correct, and that this whole debacle is purely incompetence, and had no reason or logic behind it, but that isn't what concerns me. Have you seen what liberals can do with incompetence? Incompetence is their milieu; the left can build shining towers out of incompetence while the sane and competent are barely keeping a roof over their heads. However this breaks, it will break bad for us.

Quote of the Day - Angelo Codevilla Edition

Democracy has no cure for a corrupt demos. Politicians’ misdeeds taint them alone, so long as their supporters do not embrace them. But when substantial constituencies continue to support their leaders despite their having broken faith, they turn democracy’s process of mutual persuasion into partisan war. -- Lies Corrupt Democracy

RTWT - most especially the comments.

And this is a good place to repeat one of the quotes up on the masthead:

The cult of the left believes that it is engaged in a great apocalyptic battle with corporations and industrialists for the ownership of the unthinking masses. Its acolytes see themselves as the individuals who have been "liberated" to think for themselves. They make choices. You however are just a member of the unthinking masses. You are not really a person, but only respond to the agendas of your corporate overlords. If you eat too much, it's because corporations make you eat. If you kill, it's because corporations encourage you to buy guns. You are not an individual. You are a social problem. -- Sultan Knish

What About That Quaint Idea of "Separation of Powers"?

So the Democrats ram through - without a single Republican vote - the "Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act," and Obama signs it into law on March 23, 2010.  Before passage, Nancy Pelosi laid this one on us:  "We have to pass it so you can find out what's in it!"


Well, now we know what's in it:


About 11.5 million words of regulations from the 906 (PDF) page law (2700 pages as published for the consumption of Congress) that, again, apparently nobody read prior to voting for. (Thanks, Nancy!)

And, in direct contrast to Obama's promise that the legislative negotiations behind this law would be aired on CSPAN...


...the actual negotiations took place away from cameras, and with major influence from the lobbyists that Obama told us would not stain his presidency.  Even the Daily Kos objected. 

And then he told us that the "penalty" for non-compliance with the ACA requirements was NOT. A. TAX.

Then it survived a Supreme Court decision which said it was only constitutional if the "penalty" WAS. A. TAX.

And in July of this year when problems with implementation began to become apparent, Obama unilaterally gave businesses a one-year extension on their legal mandate to conform with the law.

Wait a minute. This is a LAW. Part II, Section 1511 specifies what "Employer Responsibilities" are, effective "calendar years beginning after 2013."

Congress has not voted on this change.

And today, after his repeated promise that "If you like you plan, you can keep your plan. If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor" turned out to be as false as his CSPAN transparency promise and his "not a tax" declaration, he's done it again with respect to the individual mandate.

Even Howard Dean wonders where he gets this amazing power:


It's not like this is anything really new, though. The Justice Department certainly isn't going to go prosecuting anyone that Obama doesn't want prosecuted.

But this isn't rule of law. This is Obama granting "special dispensation" - a power not given to the Office of President under the Constitution. The Legislative branch passes the laws, the Executive signs or vetoes them, and the Judicial branch tries and punishes violators of those laws.

But we've reached a point where the President can just say "never mind," and nobody calls him on it.

What do you call that form of government again?  Because it's certainly not a Constitutional Republic.

Quote of the Day - Joe Biden Edition

From Politico, Biden: Don't let immigration die like gun control:

This kind of reminds me of the gun control kind of fights we had, and gun safety. You know, the people who don't want anything changed to have a more rational position, they're the ones who show up in large numbers.

(My emphasis.)  Thanks for noticing, Joe!  Oh, and we have the "more rational position."  That's why we show up in large numbers.

People Policing the City on Their Own

A few days ago, I blogged about a bystander attempting a citizen's arrest on two armed robbers as they exited the convenience store they'd just stuck up.  The robbers pointed their guns at the citizen, and he killed both of them.

The families of the perpetrators were outraged.  "So how about if people start policing the city on their own?" one asked.

Well, you could get this:

Small Georgia Town Forms Posse, Corners Armed Robbery Suspect

Criminals take note; You're taking a chance if you try to ply your trade in the Dodge County town of Rhine. Local law enforcement is praising townspeople for some de facto community policing, after tracking down and helping catch an armed robbery suspect.

For 60-year-old Ken Lowery the commotion began around 2:30 Thursday afternoon as he stepped inside Aden's convenience store and encountered the store clerk in distress.

"The lady screamed at me and said 'I've been robbed, he's got a gun, and I gave him all the money,'" Lowery recalled.

Lowery says he saw the suspected gunman, identified as 24-year-old Damien Durham of Wilcox County, walking down the street making a nonchalant getaway. Witnesses say it was a bizarre sight, but what happened next was even more unbelievable.

"People just kept coming around and they were mad, people in Rhine were mad," Lowery said. "Here we had an armed robbery in the middle of the day at Aden's and they wanted to form a posse."

Lowery says more than 20 people, many of them armed, spread out looking for the gunman, in trucks and on foot.

"We didn't have no leader of it all, we just went all our separate ways and the people in Rhine they knew they were going to get that rascal," Lowery said.

And they did. He's in jail.

"Here Lies Lester Moore...

...four slugs from a .44.  No Les no more."

(From a headstone at Boot Hill in Tombstone AZ.)

Until this time I have resisted purchasing anything chambered in any of the various .44 calibers.  I have .22's, .223's, 6.5mm, 7mm, .30, 8mm, 9mm, .40 and .45, but nothing in .44.

That just changed.  Or, well, it will on 11/22 when I can pick it up.

I dropped by to visit my favorite Merchant O'Death this morning just to see what they had on the shelves (the AR-15 drought is most definitely over, and ammo is beginning to turn up again - even some .22, though it's limited to 100 rounds per customer).  "So, what's on your 'must have' list these days?" he asked.  I responded "Nothing, really.  I've got all the 'must haves' and now I'm down to the 'kinda wants.'"

"So what do you kinda want?"

"Well, I'll eventually get something chambered in .44."

We discussed the various Specials and Magnums (of which he had a pretty good selection of the latter in the case), then he said, "I've got something interesting!" and headed over to the display case where they keep the special stuff.

This is never a good thing to hear when it comes to my wallet.

What did he have?  This:

That's a pre-2000 629-5. According to the Smith & Wesson forum it is:

a Lew Horton Model 629 S&W Hunter Competitor, 200 were made, only 90 in the US.

The cylinder is unfluted with a brushed finish, the frame and 6" Mag-Na-Ported and weighted barrel slab sides are polished, barrel and frame top are bead-blasted, smooth trigger, no lock, floating firing pin. The serial number supports the "200 were made" claim.

 It's freaking beautiful. I almost hurt myself whipping out the plastic. Can't pick it up until the 22nd because it's used and the shop has to hold it while the Tucson Police ensure it's not stolen property.

I think I stole it.

UPDATE:  Smith & Wesson customer service says it shipped to Lew Horton in 2000, but that's all they have on it.

UPDATE II:  Lew Horton says they're sending me a letter about my gun.

Final update:

Lew Horton Distributing got back to me:

Thank you for your interest in Lew Horton Distributing. Your Smith & Wesson Performance Center Model 629 (S&W #170049), serial number MHR0XXX, is indeed a Lew Horton Special Edition. This model was unique in the market place at that time. It was fitted with a six inch slab sided barrel that had an integral variable weight system, and featured barrel cut outs. The barrel had an integral Weaver style scope mount, and was Mag-na-Ported. The cylinder was unfluted and the cylinder edges were beveled. It was fitted with the then new style Performance Center thumb latch. The action was hand tuned by the craftsmen in the Performance Center. This gun is one of several different variations of the PC 629 Hunter that we did over the years.

This gun is one of 457 units produced in that configuration. This run Model 629 was manufactured by Smith & Wesson and delivered to Lew Horton Distributing from 1999 to 2001.

This Lew Horton Special Edition is listed in the Bluebook of Gun Values under the "Lew Horton Distributing" section.

Best of luck!

So not one of 200, but one of 457 ain't bad!

Bleg

OK, I want some help here.

Awhile back I linked to a post at Rick's Notes that stated that:

The Brits count and report crimes based on the outcome of the investigation and trial.

  This was based on a post at Extrano's Alley which cited a report from Chief Inspector Colin Greenwood to the House of Commons in 2000. The inspector states:

Homicide statistics too vary widely. In some developing countries, the statistics are known to be far from complete. Figures for crimes labelled as homicide in various countries are simply not comparable. Since 1967, homicide figures for England and Wales have been adjusted to exclude any cases which do not result in conviction, or where the person is not prosecuted on grounds of self defence or otherwise. This reduces the apparent number of homicides by between 13 per cent and 15 per cent. The adjustment is made only in respect of figures shown in one part of the Annual Criminal Statistics. In another part relating to the use of firearms, no adjustment is made. A table of the number of homicides in which firearms were used in England and Wales will therefore differ according to which section of the annual statistics was used as its base. Similarly in statistics relating to the use of firearms, a homicide will be recorded where the firearm was used as a blunt instrument, but in the specific homicide statistics, that case will be shown under "blunt instrument".

Many countries, including the United States, do not adjust their statistics down in that way and their figures include cases of self defence, killings by police and justifiable homicides. In Portugal, cases in which the cause of death is unknown are included in the homicide figures, inflating the apparent homicide rate very considerably.

(My emphasis.)

In 2001, Dave Kopel, Dr. Paul Gallant and Dr. Joanne Eisen wrote a column which included this statement:

More recently, a 2000 report from the Inspectorate of Constabulary charges Britain's 43 police departments with systemic under-classification of crime – for example, by recording burglary as "vandalism." The report lays much of the blame on the police's desire to avoid the extra paperwork associated with more serious crimes.

Britain's justice officials have also kept crime totals down by being careful about what to count.

"American homicide rates are based on initial data, but British homicide rates are based on the final disposition." Suppose that three men kill a woman during an argument outside a bar. They are arrested for murder, but because of problems with identification (the main witness is dead), charges are eventually dropped. In American crime statistics, the event counts as a three-person homicide, but in British statistics it counts as nothing at all. "With such differences in reporting criteria, comparisons of U.S. homicide rates with British homicide rates is a sham," the report concludes.

This backs up what Inspector Greenwood asserts, but I can't find that specific report.

What I have found is an document from the Home Office dated April 2013 on their official "counting rules" (PDF) that does not mention convictions or even prosecution.

That's all.

I'd REALLY like to find something definitive on this question, but I'm coming up blank. Help?

No Right to Feel Safe

I've written about this before.  Colion Noir on "The Right to Feel Safe"

Bill Whittle - Silent Saturday

Bill knocks this one out of the park (no pun intended):

New Playground

Apparently, some time ago I became a member of the website Quora.com.  I recently discovered that they discuss gun control there.

I've been spending some quality time there, rather than here.  I figure the TSM audience is what it is after ten years, so I'm spreading the love to a new group.  So far it's been kinda fun, since most of my research is already done, and all I have to do is dig through my archives for the data and quotes I want to use.  It appears that most of what I post is new to people there.

(*sigh*)

My work is never done.

"...there will be different people who benefit and different people who don’t."

Do tell.

A reader sent me an email early this morning with a link to this Pro Publica story - Loyal Obama Supporters, Canceled by Obamacare. It's hard to resist schadenfreude when you read stuff like:

San Francisco architect Lee Hammack says he and his wife, JoEllen Brothers, are "cradle Democrats." They have donated to the liberal group Organizing for America and worked the phone banks a year ago for President Obama's re-election.

Since 1995, Hammack and Brothers have received their health coverage from Kaiser Permanente, where Brothers worked until 2009 as a dietitian and diabetes educator. "We've both been in very good health all of our lives – exercise, don't smoke, drink lightly, healthy weight, no health issues, and so on," Hammack told me.

The couple — Lee, 60, and JoEllen, 59 — have been paying $550 a month for their health coverage — a plan that offers solid coverage, not one of the skimpy plans Obama has criticized. But recently, Kaiser informed them the plan would be canceled at the end of the year because it did not meet the requirements of the Affordable Care Act. The couple would need to find another one. The cost would be around double what they pay now, but the benefits would be worse.

Awwwww. Sucks when karma runs over your dogma, doesn't it?

Hammack recalled his reaction when he and his wife received a letters from Kaiser in September informing him their coverage was being canceled. "I work downstairs and my wife had a clear look of shock on her face," he said. "Our first reaction was clearly there's got to be some mistake. This was before the exchanges opened up. We quickly calmed down. We were confident that this would all be straightened out. But it wasn't."

Do tell. I guess he was in favor of Obamacare before he found out that he, personally, would be paying for it.

But wait! It gets better!

In a speech in Boston last week, President Obama said those receiving cancellation letters didn’t have good insurance. "There are a number of Americans — fewer than 5 percent of Americans — who've got cut-rate plans that don’t offer real financial protection in the event of a serious illness or an accident," he said.

"Remember, before the Affordable Care Act, these bad-apple insurers had free rein every single year to limit the care that you received, or use minor preexisting conditions to jack up your premiums or bill you into bankruptcy. So a lot of people thought they were buying coverage, and it turned out not to be so good."

What is going on here? Kaiser isn't a "bad apple" insurer and this plan wasn't "cut rate." It seems like this is a lose-lose for the Hammacks....

What's going on here? Obama LIED. Again. And it is a "lose-lose" situation.

But here's the pullquote for me:

"In a few cases, we are able to find coverage for them that is less expensive, but in most cases, we're not because, in sort of pure economic terms, they are people who benefited from the current system ... Now that the market rules are changing, there will be different people who benefit and different people who don't."

"There's an aspect of market disruption here that I think was not clear to people,” (Kaiser Permanente spokesman Chris) Stenrud acknowledged. "In many respects it has been theory rather than practice for the first three years of the law; folks are seeing the breadth of change that we're talking about here."

In theory, there's no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is. For the Left, it isn't results that matter, it's intention. Read on:

So what is Hammack going to do? If his income were to fall below four times the federal poverty level, or about $62,000 for a family of two, he would qualify for subsidies that could lower his premium cost to as low as zero. If he makes even one dollar more, he gets nothing.

That's what he's leaning toward — lowering his salary or shifting more money toward a retirement account and applying for a subsidy.

Wait - a LIBERAL is threatening to "Go Galt"? And I have to object here. Earlier in the piece the author states that Hammack and Brothers make not much more than four times the federal poverty level, or "about $62,000 for a family of two." In San Francisco. And he's an architect. One: How does a couple live on $62k in San Francisco, and Two: If he's an architect, what does he design, playground equipment?

"We're not changing our views because of this situation, but it hurt to hear Obama saying, just the other day, that if our plan has been dropped it's because it wasn't any good, and our costs would go up only slightly," he said. "We're gratified that the press is on the case, but frustrated that the stewards of the ACA don't seem to have heard."

Or care.  And you're lefties from San Francisco.  I wouldn't expect you to change your views if Obama himself put the muzzle of a re-educator to your skull and pulled the trigger.  Or as one commenter put it:

...they would follow Obama off a cliff, then thank him when at the bottom, he finished them off with a bayonet.

There you go talking about "death panels" again.  Perhaps they should donate $500,000 to Organizing for America. Maybe then they can get a waiver, too.

Oh, and by all means, read the comments to the piece.

So How About if People Start Policing the City on Their Own?

So a couple of thugs commit an armed robbery on a convenience store in Reading, PA and are confronted by an armed citizen outside the store who orders them to stop and stay still until the police arrive.  They don't.  Said citizen shoots and kills both robbers.

The families of the criminals are outraged, and want the citizen charged for "taking the law into his own hands."  Says one:

How about if people just start running around here, policing the city on their own? How much worse is it going to get?

I guess he's never heard of Sir Robert Peel and his Nine Principles of Modern Policing, number seven of which is:

Police, at all times, should maintain a relationship with the public that gives reality to the historic tradition that the police are the public and the public are the police; the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full-time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.

How much worse? Wrong question. How much better?

...the Magic Fairy Dust of Government Authority

Today's Failure to Fire:



Just another illustration of Moshe Ben-David's observation up there on the masthead.

So, I Was at the Used Sports Equipment Place Today...

Never mind what I was there for.  One of the salesguys was helping me out, and I looked around the place and snorted.  He asked why. 

"You've got stuff for everything but my sport," I said. 

"What's your sport?" he asked. 

"I'm a shooter," I replied.

He looked around for a second (guy's in his VERY early twenties at a guess) and confided with a smile on his face, "Until a month ago, I'd never shot a gun."

"Fun, isn't it?" I asked.

"Yeah, I keep trying to get them to take me again!!"

This is why we're winning.

A View from the Inside

I received an email yesterday afternoon from a reader who did not want to leave it as a comment because his name and email might be attached to it by Disqus.  Here it is:

I'm long-time reader and sometime commenter. I wanted to comment on your post on "Government is Magic", but for reasons which will become obvious I didn't want my name or e-mail associated with my comment publicly. If you believe any of this is worth sharing feel free to do so, without my name or e-mail address associated of course.

I work for the company responsible for the Obamacare web site fiasco. I don't work for the Federal division, but a different one. I can tell you from personal experience that the problems that caused the web site to fail are institutional.

If you or I were going to embark on a project we'd try to get the most competent people in each area of expertise required in an effort to make the project a success. That's not the way this company does things. First, especially if the project is highly visible, they make sure that the people assigned to the project are the "right" people. Not "right" as you or I would understand it, namely competent, with a strong work ethic, and capable of delivering. Oh no, the "right" people are politically connected, they belong to the "correct" groups of people, or they're people who others wish to see advance (often despite their incompetence). So it's more important that the project leader be a Hispanic woman than that the project leader have any actual experience with the technology, or even be capable of doing the job. Just as it was more important to give the project to a company whose VP was a black woman than that it have a proven track record of getting similar projects done successfully. All the better if that VP went to Princeton with a certain FLOTUS. Even better if money went to a certain re-election campaign.

A dozen competent developers could have delivered a functional web site, their compensation would have cost one or two percent of what the contract brought in. Doing so, however, would have required an acknowledgement that such people were required for the success of the project, or that a functional web site had anything to do with such success.

I used to think the problems I saw were localized to my little corner of the company, but it seems the problems are with the company mentality. Worse, as far as the company is concerned this was a big win. They made a TON of money, and they're managing (so far as the media is concerned) to foist the blame off onto others. They'll now make a ton MORE money fixing a system that should never have been broken in the first place.

I've been doing this for over 25 years, I've worked for a bunch of companies, and this is the first time I've ever been ashamed to have my name connected to the company that writes my paycheck.

Shame? I thought the Left had effectively destroyed that concept.

TSM on Opera

I noted in a previous post that I'm not a fan of Opera (the music, not the web browser).  A couple of respondents took issue.

Dogbert took up this topic awhile back:

Quote of the Day - Culture Edition

Once again from Sultan Knish - Government is Magic:

Competence is the real modernity and it has very little to do with the empty trappings of design that surround it. In some ways the America of a few generations ago was a far more modern place because it was a more competent place. For all our nice toys, we look like primitive savages compared to men who could build skyscrapers and fleets within a year... and build them well.

Those aren't things we can do anymore. Not because the knowledge and skills don't exist, but because the culture no longer allows it. We can't do them for the same reason that Third World countries can't do what we do. It's not that the knowledge is inaccessible, but that the culture gets in the way.

--

The idea that we should go by results, rather than by processes, by outcomes rather than by appearances, was revolutionary. For most of human history, we were trapped in a cargo cult mode. We did the "right things" not because they led to the right results, but because we had decided that they were the right things. There were many competent people, but they were hamstrung by rigid institutions that made it impossible to go from Point A to Point B in the shortest possible time.

And we're right back there today.

RTWT.

Not a Shotgunner

But I like the sentiment!