curtsey of Jack Dunphy over at Ricochet

911 Operator: 9-1-1, what is your emergency?

Caller: I’m calling from 1324 Elm Street. I’m upstairs hiding in a closet, and some men with guns just broke in downstairs and they’re robbing my family.

Operator: Hmmm. 1324 Elm Street. I don’t think we have anyone in that area.

Caller: What?

Operator: Well, that’s pretty far from the police station. I don’t think we can have anyone get there in time.

Caller: But they’re downstairs right now!  I can hear them!  They’re threatening to kill my family!

Operator: And besides, we can’t send officers into harm’s way without knowing what’s going on.

Caller: But I just told you what’s going on! There are men downstairs with guns robbing us and threatening to kill my family!

Operator: Are you sure you didn’t do anything to bring this on? Have you angered these men in some way? Does your family have a history of disrespecting their faith traditions, perhaps?

Gunshots and screaming are heard in the background.

Caller: They’re shooting them now! They’re killing them! Are you sending anyone?

More gunshots and screaming, then silence.

Caller: Hello?  Are you there?

Operator: Yes, I’m here.

Caller: I just heard the men leave. I think my whole family is dead. Is anyone coming?

Operator: What difference, at this point, does it make?

Caller: What?

Operator: We’ll send someone out in a couple weeks to investigate.

 A click is heard as the line goes dead.

Bob Murphy has a piece at The American Conservative documenting Krugman’s slipperiness on austerity. The stunning conclusion:

So there you have it folks: When European “austerity” leads to a rising unemployment, a double dip in GDP, and a collapsing budget situation, Krugman says he told us so; austerity is stupid. And when US “austerity” leads to falling unemployment, relatively strong GDP growth, and a vastly improved budget situation, Krugman says he told us so; austerity is stupid.

No wonder Krugman is so good with predictions.

I can't help but feel some pity for the liberals at home and their leftoid compadres in Europe and elsewhere. Everywhere we look we see the lefty house of cards imploding, caving in, crashing to the floor in a disorganized heap. All of their fantasies and self-delusions seem coming apart.

We see this disintegration in:

-- the bomb blasts by Muslim terrorists ripping through the Boston marathon;
-- the smoke of Stockholm in flames thanks to its Muslim immigrants;
--the blood of a young British father and patriot butchered by jihadis on the streets of his capital city;
-- the EU's growing disarray and absurdities;
-- the disappearance of "global warming";
-- the evident bankruptcy of Keynesian (and Kenyan) economics;
-- the failure of the gun grab in the US which included a secret war against Mexico;
-- the turning of the Arab spring into the debacle of the Arab farce and its Benghazi nightmare;
-- the inability to find employment for the idiots produced by the idiot-run education industry;
-- the sound of Chicago and Detroit crashing into walls under the guidance of liberals;
-- the use of the IRS to target conservatives;
-- the effort to stifle investigative journalism;
-- the growing revolt against Obamacare as its ruinous nature becomes increasingly apparent;
-- and, of course, the revelation that the Obama misadministration has proven precisely as the conservatives and the hated Fox News Corporation have reported for years: an intolerant band of totalitarians who use the powers of the bloated government to suppress dissent and freedom of expression.

For any thinking liberals out there--Do they exist? The world wonders--it must feel akin to the pain felt by the Aztecs or the Incas when a handful of Spaniards brought down their mighty empires, or by that of the Japanese imperialists when the USS Missouri steamed into Tokyo Bay.

Are liberals capable of learning? Or will they instead develop new myths and fantasies, new gods to replace the ones with feet of clay? I think we all know the answer to that, but we can always hope for change.

above from the Diplomad

He LOVES the straw man and the false choice.  Can't go a day without dropping them all over the place.  Now we add the partial out of context quote.   In last week's speech on counterterrorism at the National Defense University, President Obama said: "We must define the nature and scope of this struggle, or else it will define us, mindful of James Madison’s warning that ‘No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.’”

The Madison line is from a pamphlet dated April 20, 1795. A fuller version of the quotation offers insight into Madison's thoughts not only on war, but on debt, taxes, and government power:

Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes; and armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few. In war, too, the discretionary power of the Executive is extended; its influence in dealing out offices, honors, and emoluments is multiplied; and all the means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing the force, of the people. The same malignant aspect in republicanism may be traced in the inequality of fortunes, and the opportunities of fraud, growing out of a state of war, and in the degeneracy of manners and of morals engendered by both. No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.

 Wonder why he omitted the rest of it?

From Lois Lerner.

Under oath she: a) stated, "I have not broken any laws... and I have not provided false information to this or any other congressional committee."; and b) then refused to answer any questions at all on the grounds that, in anything she might say, she could incriminate herself.  

Remember the refusal was not to answering a specific question, but any question. It was unequivocal -- every conceivable answers to every conceivable question would put her face to face with self-incrimination.  

Remember also that the statement denying lawbreaking was also unequivocal. She could have said, "I believe I broke no laws." She didn't. She said it was a fact that she had broken no law.  That leaves only two options.

Option #1:  She had indeed broken no laws. Then, refusing to testify at all on the basis of self-incrimination when there was no danger of self-incrimination must have simply been a dodge, a way of avoiding inconvenient questioning. It was a lie.

Option #2:  She had broken a law. Then offering testimony that she had broken no law was a lie.  

In other words, in her testimony to the committee, Ms. Lerner made two assertions so categorical and so contradictory that she had to be lying one way or the other. What's more, either way, she was at that moment providing false information to the committee.

Matthews: GOP the Party of Jefferson Davis

except he was a Democrat.  MOST of the slaveholding South was Democrat.  My students are always suprised to learn that.  They run to their pluters to confirm this mystifying factoid and come back shocked.  Is it any wonder THEY don't know when even the talking heads get it wrong?

If the headline sez:

Congressional Budget Office says US carbon tax will generate $1.2 trillion

read

"Congresional Budget Office says US Carbon tax will suck #1.2 trillion out of the economy."

I've written this in my head three times.  Each was quite different in approach.  Not sure how to present all three, but here we go.

I went to a small rural all white high school.  You know the type - red neck.  Many of my classmates spoke with a WV or N Ky accent.  You know.  Red neck.  But my mother was a 3rd grade teacher who STILL teaches.  My father is a better public speaker in his 80's than most speakers you will hear in any given 30 day period.  Education was important in our house.  I learned grammar.  I learned how to communicate affectively.  Then I went to college.

I found myself immersed in accents.  The Northern Cities accent (Cleveland), Mon Valley (Pittsburg). Philly/NY, NYC.  So I worked hard at eliminating mine.  It's still there, but not much, an NEVER when I'm paying attention.  And I had learned that bad grammar was a sign of bad breeding and an improper rearing an education.  So when I find myself surrounded by colege grads with advanced degrees who make lots of money I try to speak well.

Imagine my surprise last night when, trying to speak well around a dining table with five Bachelor's Degrees, one masters and one JD, I was rediculed for being correct.  Of course, my hosts were willing to overlook my precision because at least I wasn't speaking like "those stupid southern people."

Needless to say I remained quite most of the rest of the evening.   My parents had asked me to ivite my hosts for dinner soe time in the future.  I forgot to extend the ivitation.  It will not be remembered.