Interesting analysis, but I agree with a commenter that the proper analogy for an innate superpower (strength, power blasts, etc.) is not to firearms but rather to martial arts skills, as what we’re talking about is the government attempting to regulate the superhero or superheroine’s bodily functions.
And Hollywood aside, I don’t think any government’s ever successfully licensed anybody’s hands as deadly weapons, etc.
So the new porno-scanners the TSA just loves, can’t find PETN.
Grab a 1/3rd of a kilo, shape it into a pancake, then form it onto your body and the scanner can’t see it. All it looks like is the 5 lbs you put on over the holidays.
While I was trying to get a suitable passing grade in my Calculus and Science courses that last quarter, I wasn’t completely cut-off from the blogosphere or the world of “professional” political writing. I could read a small amount, but I just didn’t have time to post on most of it.
Which is why I have two months of links sitting on a flash drive waiting to be expanded upon. You all will be seeing them over the next couple weeks falling from my keyboard onto the front page along with more current items.
One of the more interesting pieces I read was on the topic of balancing the federal budget by shutting down a list of particular agencies. The piece itself was of average quality and intellect, but it introduced me to a little known State Department agency I had never before knew existed:
Have you ever heard of “OPIC”?
The Overseas Private Investment Corporation offers US government based insurance for private ventures both inside and outside the US.
Are you in Germany and want to open a chain of strudel bakeries? OPIC is your pal. They like that you won’t be importing your workforce and they probably dig them some tasty apple strudel like all good Americans.
Are you a group of American investors who want to open a factory in Afghanistan but are afraid of losing all your money on a bad geopolitical turn? OPIC is there to insure you when no one else would.
And there is a perfectly good reason no one else will insure you: It is a bad risk. In fact, it is a horrible risk. One that should not be taken up by those who are not prepared to lose every red cent they put into it.
Over the last two decades, OPIC has been insuring thousands, if not tens of thousands, of ventures outside the US that pulled jobs previously held by American citizens to factories and offices in foreign countries.
Yes, you read that correctly: Your tax dollars are being spent to insure outsourcing.
The Simpson-Bowles Commission recommended disbanding the OPIC in their highly criticized report. I would only amputate the portion of the office that subsidizes ventures outside the US. I think that, for now, we could keep the portion that insures foreign investment in the US. At least until we get back to a reasonable unemployment rate of, say, 6%.
After that I think we could eliminate the office entirely and take it from there.
They complain about not having enough money or professors.
Then they put classes like this on the schedule.
As the clock strikes midnight, movie theaters everywhere will be full of Harry Potter fans eager to see Harry, Ron and Hermione search for the pieces of Voldermort’s soul on the big screen in the the first of two “Deathly Hallows” movies.
The imaginary Potter world has some real life applications, according to OSU Dean of Students and fellow potter fan Mamta Accapadi.
Accapadi created a Potter-based class called “Finding your Patronus,” a freshman orientation class only offered in the fall.
Co-instructor Chris Van Drimmelen said there’s a lot to learn from the Potter books.
Maybe there is something for a 12 year old to learn. But if you’re in college and haven’t gotten your life straightened out to the point where a children’s fictional series doesn’t offer you help, maybe you should just stick to flipping burgers and/or telemarketing.
And you certainly shouldn’t be teaching if you believe that. Of course, if this course takes two instructors to teach it, I think that tells us quite alot about the quality of OSU’s teaching staff.
Back at it. Finally.
Politics is the conspiracy of the unproductive but organized against the productive but unorganized.
And look at how the productive finally getting organized has frightened them.
Thought those people with RFID wallets were being overly paranoid?
Silly you.
Apropos of my holiday advice to y’all, this weekend, C-SPAN’s BookTV will present the video of a panel on Economic Religion vs. Environmental Religion in America. Folks may recall that panelist and renowned author Steven Hayward was kind enough to autograph several books for donation to the Soldiers’ Angels Project Valour-IT raffles at both Boomershoot and the Gunblogger Rendezvous.
Check it out at 11 AM PST, 2PM EST Saturday December 11th on C-SPAN2.
charities that stop bullies in TX: here ya go. (Link goes to the Texas State Rifle Association.)
Found in a dive bar. Smooooth.
