And illegals and their allies worry about photo-id laws here

Venezuela to require fingerprint scanning at grocery stores to ration bread consumption. The rulers ran out of toilet paper more than a year ago, so perhaps they should install hand washing basins near the scanners to ensure a clear image.

If the glove don’t fit, you must acquit

Global warming models don’t jibe with actual historical temperature recordings, so scientists blame errors in collecting the data.

When you have trillions of dollars at stake, all being funneled to your friends and into your own pockets, you can’t exactly admit that the models supporting all that spending (and, far more important to some, the centralized control it gives governments) are fucked up, can you?

Well otherwise they’d have to pay more for their maids and gardeners, dummy

Well aren’t they ALL Americans?

Poll: Liberals and Democrats prefer illegals over American workers 

Thirty-four percent of liberals, and 26 percent of Democrats, said either that immigrants should be preferred over Americans for jobs, or that they did not know if anyone should be preferred.

And Democrat Chairman Debbie Wasseran-Schwartz called illegals today “part of the backbone of our economy”. 140 millions americans hold jobs, compared to 8 million illegal aliens, but from the perspective of their estates in Vail, Beverly Hills and Palm Beach, it’s easy to see how liberals could be confused. For Wasserman and her crowd, the little brown ones they see tending their gardens, raising their children and cleaning their pools are indeed the backbone of the good life.

Think about those numbers: these liberals and Democrats believe that “immigrants” should be preferred over Americans. Preferred! What have they got against the poor folks already here?

And they complain that conservatives are heartless racists who wage war on the poor. 

Doubling down

Tell it to someone who cares

Responding to criticism that he’d displayed callousness yesterday by leaving immediately to the green after mumbling regrets for James Foley’s beheading,Obama spent today playing golf.

Here, again, is what Obama said when he was running for office:

The future president was talking about how those running for president need to be prepared to “give their life to it.”

“The bargain that any president strikes with is, you give me this office and in turn my, fears, doubts, insecurities, foibles, need for sleep, family life, vacations, leisure is gone,” Obama said. “I am giving myself to you.”

Obama went on to say that “the American people should have no patience for what’s going on in your head because you’ve got a job to do” and that people should only run for president if they’re willing to make that sacrifice.

When asked by the host if he could imagine himself making that kind of commitment, he said, “Sure.”

Forget the broken promise; there are lots of those, but the brazenness about this partying is amazing. Beheadings of American citizens, riots in the heartland, his own Secretary of Defense warning today that ISIS is coming;  Barry wants to play golf, so he does.

Bloomberg called Obama “the most arrogant man I’ve ever met”, and I think he’d be seconded on that by everyone who’s ever watched this man in action.

But the law stopped mattering to Democrats a long time ago

 

Thank you, Hussein

General Accounting Office: Obama broke the law when he exchanged Bergdahl for terrorists.

President Obama violated a “clear and unambiguous” law when he released five Guantanamo Bay detainees in exchange for Army Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl, the Government Accountability Office reported Thursday.

“[The Department of Defense] violated section 8111 because it did not notify the relevant congressional committees at least 30 days in advance of the transfer,” the GAO report said. “In addition, because DOD used appropriated funds to carry out the transfer when no money was available for that purpose, DOD violated the Antideficiency Act. The Antideficiency Act prohibits federal agencies from incurring obligations exceeding an amount available in an appropriation.”

The GAO rejected the idea that the action was legal and sidestepped the Obama team’s suggestion that the law is unconstitutional.

“It is not our role or our practice to determine the constitutionality of duly enacted statutes,” the report says. “In our view, where legislation has been passed by Congress and signed by the President, thereby satisfying the bicameralism and presentment requirements in the Constitution, that legislation is entitled to a heavy presumption in favor of constitutionality.”

Five terrorist generals for one deserter. This is not by accident.

RELATED: U.S. Judge doesn’t bother holding Argentina in contempt because he that country will just ignore him anyway. All that held Argentina in check was the rule of law, which it has decided to dishonor. Congratulations, Obama, you’ve turned us into a Banana Republic.

I understand the stupidity of the litigant, but what kind of lawyer takes this case?

 

Jessie Nizewitz and her naked date frolic in anonymity

Model who appeared on “Dating Naked” television program sues producers because they showed her naked.

“I think they owe me a huge apology,” [Jessie] Nizewitz said.

She added that the show cost her a “budding relationship” with a man she had been seeing for a month.

“He never called me again after the show aired. I would have hoped we could have had a long-term relationship. He was employed, Jewish, in his 30s and that’s pretty much ideal,” Nizewitz said.

It does appear that Jessie’s going to need someone in her life who is gainfully employed if she is to stay out of the homeless shelters. A job, and a few functioning brain cells wouldn’t hurt, either.

But I won’t get the credit, damn it, or the commission

The Little Cottage That Could, at the right price

David Stockman’s 15,000 sq.ft. castle at 105 Conyers Farm has languished on the market since 2010, when he brought it on at $23.5 million. That price barely budged through the years and as recently as just a few months ago he still had it at $19.750, This July  he dropped it to $13.4, and I complemented him for his sagacity. Today, it’s reported as pending.

I’m a little cheesed that Stockman chose to return to his original broker when he decided to lower the price, because it was that broker and agent who persuaded him to price it so ludicrously in the first place. But I imagine he might still be miffed at me, for accurately appraising his home and crushing his delusions in the NYT back in January. 

“For $9 million, it’s a nice little house,” [Mr. Fountain]  said. “But these types of houses don’t age well. There is just too much horse crap out there on the polo fields.”

 

Ah, but for the low information voter, the sound bite’s the (only) thing

Funny, he consistently opposed the idea until just last year, when election day approached

Governor Malloy has been running around the state boasting that his forcing through a hike in the minimum wage has increased employment. Today, the WSJ debunks that obviously absurd claim, using logic and, gosh, looking at the actual numbers.

Logic first:

Why would firms hire more workers when government raises the cost of hiring workers? The progressive answer is that hiking the minimum wage raises the incomes of poor workers, causing them to spend more. This additional spending, in turn, is so great that firms hire even more workers. When you raise the minimum wage, as Mr. Obama said in Denver, “that money gets churned back into the economy. And the whole economy does better, including the businesses.”

This theory is dubious for many reasons, not least because minimum-wage workers make up about 2% of the workforce, a percentage much too small to have such an effect.

And the numbers:

[I] f  this theory were valid—and if these data reveal useful information—then job growth should be greater the higher the minimum-wage boost.

Not so. Of the 13 states that raised the minimum wage, Connecticut, New Jersey and New York were the three that raised it most, with increases ranging from 5% to 14%. These three states also experienced the worst job growth between January and May, an average of 0.03% compared with an average 1.28% for the other 10 states. Indeed, job growth was worse in each of these three states than it was, on average, in the 37 states that did not raise their minimum wage at all. Moreover, in New Jersey, the state that hiked minimum wage the most—to $8.25 an hour from $7.25—employment actually fell by about 0.56%.

Consider also that between December and May the price of gasoline rose by more than 20 cents a gallon, according to Gasbuddy.com. Minimum-wage workers would need a big chunk of their higher pay to cover the increased cost of driving. There’s no way there was enough left over to spark extra job growth.

We conducted a statistical analysis of the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ data called a two-sample “t” test for comparing two means. We found, for this time period, no difference in the job-growth trend in the states that raised their minimum wages from states that did not. In other words, the correlation cited as debunking the economic case against the minimum wage is not statistically significant.

In short, there is no sound basis in this Labor Department report for rejecting the fundamental economic understanding that raising firms’ cost of employing low-skilled workers makes firms less willing to employ such workers.

 

Then you have Malloy’s assertion that his policies are responsible our meeting, even exceeding our CO2 reduction goals, all as cheerfully parroted in this CT. Patch article.  To its credit, Patch  does provide a link to the actual document that “supports” that claim so that, if you’re curious, you can see the numbers behind it. (Pp. 6-13).

It probably won’t surprise you to learn that, if you go past the hype spewed by our DEP, the only reduction of significance in CO2 emissions comes in the energy sector, and for exactly the same reason the US’s CO2 emissions have dropped 20%, more than all the Euroweenie nations combined: switching from coal to natural gas (yes, that would be from fracking). Nothing else: not solar beanies, Teslas, or even student bottle recoiling jobs have done squat.

So is Malloy calling for tracking? For construction of new gas pipelines? No, it’s casinos and a high speed train from New Haven to New Britain, for him. It sounds good to the sheeple, and that’s all that counts.

Well of course it is

Bye bye

BI: Sears business strategy is doomed.

“The world does not need a place to buy a wrench and a blouse and a toaster oven,” Steven Dennis, former Sears executive says.

Back in April, 2013,  Forbes columnist David Trainer predicted (“Overvalued at Any Price” )that Sear’s stock would eventually reach its true value of zero, and the numb nuts writing this blog has been predicting the same thing since at least 2010, and probably longer.

Why my fascination with this doomed corporation? Partly because Eddie Lampert used to live here in Greenwich, which gave the company a local flavor, but mostly because I’m always intrigued by Wall Street trading. If someone with absolutely no financial expertise can see where Sears is headed then anyone can, so how has its price been sustained so high, for so long? I assume it’s all about the momentary trade, not the underlying value – nil – but it does make me question the traditional apology for Wall Street, efficient allocation of capital.

That doesn’t seem to be happening here.

Just to remind you

There’s just about no real estate news being reported this week (or last), and I expect activity will be light next week too, as people get ready for the new school year. I’m checking the MLS hot sheet during the day and I’ll post anything of interest but don’t count on much until after Labor Day. If you’re looking for real estate news, I’ll see you then.

Color me skeptical

 

Our chief warrior, age 3

Business Insider: Obama’s tough words on ISIS mark a turn toward a tougher stance 

President Barack Obama surprised many observers Wednesday with his brevity and anger  [both of which are attributable to his golf game being delayed because some stupid advisors insisted he pretend to be interested in the topic] when he spoke about the brutal murder of American photojournalist James Foley at the hands of militants from the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS or ISIL).

It was Obama as “you’ve never seen him before,” as The Huffington Post put it on the site’s banner.

“It’s a clear escalation of rhetoric — and will lead to an escalation in policy,” geopolitical expert Ian Bremmer, the president of Eurasia Group, told Business Insider in an email.

Obama made it clear on Wednesday he was not going to [withdraw US involvement]. Michael Cohen, a fellow at the progressive Century Foundation, tweeted immediately after Obama’s speech that the implicit takeaway was that the U.S. was “at war with ISIS.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever heard Obama make a statement like that,” Cohen told Business Insider in a subsequent interview.

“It was unusually tough, but to the point I made below when you describe ISIS as a cancer and evil and a nihilistic actor you’re kind of locking yourself into a policy of full versus half-measures. It will be very hard, now, for Obama to finish this mission with anything less than the defeat of ISIS, which is not something that is going to happen overnight.”

“It also puts the fight in the context of Obama’s successful record against al Qaeda and the killing of Osama bin Laden, rather than the failed war in Iraq. All of which will embolden the president to take a much tougher line.”

Obama’s good at drawing lines, as he’s shown:

Red Line in Syria, 2012

Red Line in Iran, 2013

Red Line in Ukraine, 2014

As all of those lines have been crossed, with no noticeable reaction from Obama, the chances that (a) he means what he says about ISIS and (b) that ISIS wet its collective pants when he said it, are nil, Huffington Post and Chris Matthews notwithstanding.

And yet another reason to keep your children out of public schools

 

Officer Friendly says down or you die!

Compton, California  city has armed its school police with AR-15s. That’s the same gun used by Adam Whasthisname at Sandy Hook, although the ones issued to the crossing guards might be fully-automatic; the article doesn’t say.

I don’t know the training level of school guards out there in Compton but I doubt it’s very high and I doubt there’s much range practice and hostage-rescue training going on. Regardless of training, however, handing cops weapons capable of hosing down hallways with lead (non-lead substitutes, in California) seems every bit as stupid as what those same authorities are teaching in the classrooms themselves.

It all comes down to this

 

Those poor souls in inner city schools, we love them so!

Carol Sutton, head of Greenwich teachers union, in opening day statements to her subordinates:

Other subjects discussed included the state of the profession of teaching itself, including debates in California over teacher tenure and Teach for America, a program that trains high-achieving college graduates for six weeks and then places them in disadvantaged classrooms — a program Sutton described as “insulting.”

“Like it or not, our profession is political,” she said. “And to care for it* we must be political too.”

* By “it”, she’s referring to their tenured, over-paid jobs, not the students she’s indoctrinating. Which, in turn, means keeping charter schools and “untrained” teachers from threatening her hegemony.

We have met the enemy, and it is Carol Sutton and the NEA.

What good will education reforms do if the teachers and administrators are complete, drooling idiots?

 

When Dinosaurs Ruled South Carolina (and still do)

Cautious teacher alerts supervisors and the police after student writes short story about killing a triceratops.

SUMMERVILLE, SC (WCSC) –

A 16-year-old Summerville High School student says he was arrested Tuesday morning and suspended after writing about killing a dinosaur using a gun.

Alex Stone said he and his classmates were told in class to write a few sentences about themselves, and a “status” as if it was a Facebook page.

Stone said in his “status” he wrote a fictional story that involved the words “gun” and “take care of business.”

“I killed my neighbor’s pet dinosaur, and, then, in the next status I said I bought the gun to take care of the business,” Stone said.

Stone says his statements were taken completely out of context.

“I could understand if they made him re-write it because he did have “gun” in it. But a pet dinosaur?” said Alex’s mother Karen Gray.”I mean first of all, we don’t have dinosaurs anymore. Second of all, he’s not even old enough to buy a gun.”

Investigators say the teacher contacted school officials after seeing the message containing the words “gun” and “take care of business,” and police were then notified on Tuesday.

Summerville police officials say Stone’s bookbag and locker were searched on Tuesday, and a gun was not found.

Dinosaurs were last heard from about 65 million years ago, but suppose one were still around? It would be an endangered species, and we certainly don’t want to take the chance that a deranged psychotic like Alex Stone could hurt it.

In related news, as your daughters prepare to return to gun-free college campuses this month, the Democrats are ramping up their “War on Women” trope to remind us of their claim that your kid has a one-in-five chance of being sexually assaulted this year. Of all the spurious “facts” propounded by the left, this one is probably the most thoroughly debunked piece of horse shit since blaming George Bush became popular, yet the Democrats keep using it because the sheeple believe it, and it’s good theatre.

So keep your kids out of public schools, and for God’s sake don’t let your girls go off to college to be raped.

Good thing for Kent Bradley (and all of us) that the Donald doesn’t run the country

 

Dr. Kent Bradley and wife

Dr. Kent Bradley, one of two Americans flown home from Liberia to be treated for Ebola over Donald Trump’s vehement objection has fully recovered and will be released from the hospital today.

My guess is that Trump was worried that, had Dr. Bradley somehow infected Americans here, the Donald’s own source of illegal alien casino workers might be jeopardized by stricter enforcement efforts along our borders.

Best use of laconic understatement of the day, so far

 

Sung to the tune, “Come away, with me”

The WSJ reports on a crackdown on corrupt officials (by other corrupt officials, but that’s Chinese politics for you) over in the Middle Kingdom.

Mr. Wang already has an impressive bunch of scalps. He has fingered for investigation Zhou Yongkang, a one-time head of state security and member of the Politburo Standing Committee; Xu Caihou, one of the army’s top-ranking generals; and Jiang Jiemin, a top executive in the Chinese state-owned oil industry. All three have been detained but not charged. They couldn’t be reached for comment.

I would imagine not.

What does Drew Marzullo know about Joe Biden that we don’t?

 

Barry Bozo came to town,  but headed off to Gay Head…

Joe Biden arrives in Greenwich, and Drew is beside himself with excitement.

“If he wasn’t late for Stamford, I bet if asked he would have spent the night,” Marzullo gushed.

Dream on, Drew; Joe’s boss might have gone home with you, but from all reports, Joe swings from the other side of the plate.