The Greatest Love of All

Not to interrupt the well-earned momentum of the Host's recent Presidential posts, but if I may, I'd like to take some time away from the intense political banter - and to let the Host wipe Romney's spunk off his lips, if only for a moment - and announce the birth of the Boston area's newest young conservative. I'm talking about my newborn son, [redacted]. [Redacted] was born a diehard fiscal conservative, with "moderate" social views, on November 20, 2007. If he could talk, he'd tell you how much he hates Hillary Clinton, and fears for the socialist dystopia that she'll usher in if she's elected. But he can't, so I'm telling you instead. Because children are our future.

The Religion Question

Over the last week we've heard so much from the Republicans about whether religion, and specifically religious denomination, is a good test for Presidential fitness. Some have pointed out how defensive Romney gets when asked to outline the specific differences between Mormons and other denominations. Frankly, I don't think he handles the question very well, but I don't blame him either. (The Huck handled it a bit better, but also declined to get specific.) The LDS folks are definitely a bit weird, but so what. I don't see them threatening to cut women's heads off over the name of a teddy bear or anything. Nor do I really think there's a situation where a President Mitt makes a major policy blunder because of his fidelity to a "kooky" religion. I've said for some time now that Romney will not only get the GOP nomination, but will also win the general election in '08. I continue to believe that's true, and the recent weakness of Hillary is a good sign that the competition is not as tough as most have made it out to be.

First things first, though, Mitt has to get by Rudy and Huckabee. The recent insights by Gingrich show how brilliant Newt can be, but they also show how little people know about The Huck. Sure Huck got things done regarding health care in small state Arkansas - he got very liberal things done regarding health care! Now that this goober is out in the public arena, he's going to have to defend his actual record, and I doubt the Republican base will like him as much once they get to know his record. I'm a bit fearful that this process may not happen before Iowa, and with the 2nd chance voting process inherent in the caucuses, The Huck might just win Iowa by taking Thomson and McCain votes and make the whole deal a big mess just in time for New Hampshire. If Mitt doesn't lead after those two states, he's toast and Rudy probably gains tons of support back as the "electable" candidate.

I don't buy it, I think Mitt has enough time to crush The Huck and salvage the lead in the GOP race. I also think Hill is imploding and very soon will start to show her true weakness - nobody really likes her.

Give Thanks for Blessings and Freedom

Too often we find ourselves giving thanks during November and December for either the bounty of our lives or the freedoms we enjoy, but not paying enough attention to the interconnection between freedom and prosperity. John Stossel does a nice job putting the original Thanksgiving feast into this perspective. (Hat tip to Lisa Schiffren at The Corner)

Let's not forget that the freedom to work hard for our rewards is why we have so much to be thankful for - and let's continue to fight to hold onto to that premise lest our country perish from within.

Boras Eats Crap Sandwich

Whether you love 'ol purple lips or despise him, you've got to be happy at the way he's trashed his agent Beelzebub Boras this week. I've felt for many years that for all the greed in professional sports, the true culprits were the agents who generally have no idea what it takes to be happy as a pro athlete and instead are simply using the players (who they see as malleable idiots) for personal gain. I don't know if A-Rod will actually end up signing with the Yankees (though it looks like he will), but I am tickled that Boras got his comeuppance.

P.S. I am also tickled that I got to use the word comeuppance.

Taxing the Rich Boilerplate

As someone who has a vested interest in the pay rates of investment managers and the tax treatment of that pay, I have paid fairly close attention to the debate over the taxation of carried interest. Much of the argument has focused on two competing views of carried interest: either it's seen as simply another form of direct compensation (thus it should be taxed as income) or it's viewed as a key incentive for private equity (and real estate) investors to put time, energy, and reputation into deals since they will benefit if the deals pan out or lose valuable time, energy, and reputation if the deals fail (thus carried interest should continue to be taxed as capital gains).

I find lots of truth in both viewpoints, and can't find it in my heart or head to choose one over the other. But I don't think it really matters. The argument not being made in this case is whether taxation itself is effective. I really wish we had one prominent conservative out there (in an election year no less!) who would step forward and say, "I don't think we need to raise taxes on carried interest simply because it would only give more money to a bloated government that repeatedly proves its inability to properly allocate funds for the general good. I'd rather savvy investors decide what to do with the capital - their track record is better than Washington's."

Where the hell is that voice?

Congress Steps Up

Wow, with all the discontent over our current president I can't believe it's taken until now for Congress to override a veto. This might be just what we need though. In fact, I'd tell Bush to start throwing the veto around like it's going out of style and force the Congress to go on record and get the votes to override. Let's put some accountability back on the law-makers and see if they hold up to public scrutiny come next year's elections. Whether the particulars of this bill warrant a veto or not, I like the fact that the excutive branch is forcing the legislature to put its cards on the table.

This is one tactic that could help the Republicans take back Congress and win the White House next year. Hopefully I'll get some time to put a full list down in a post that isn't sloppy and hurried.

Piece of SCHIP

Having accepted the fact that my expose on grammatically incorrect rock songs was, er, a little too fringe for mass consumption (read: the four participants of this blog), I thought it best to move on to other, more mature topics. Tomorrow, Congress will vote on whether to override President Bush's veto of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (S-CHIP), a $35 billion subsidy that would be partially funded by federal tobacco taxes. In addition to increasing the price of a can of Skoal to upwards of $8 dollars - like I don't spend enough on my vices already - S-CHIP essentially would provide health care coverage to children and adults in families making up to 300 percent of the national poverty level, or about $81,000 a year. Rather than offer you my thoughts on the questionable wisdom of the S-CHIP proposal, I thought I'd instead refer you to these two articles at NRO by Michelle Malkin and Diana Ernst, which nicely summarize the pitfalls of this leftist pre-election legislation and do much to show why Bush's position is the right one. And while you're at it, if you have time, check out this little ditty about the Left's failed S-CHIP poster family, the Frosts. Like my old upstairs neighbors, their part-time employment is enough to support three vehicles and (unlike my old neighbors) two properties now valued at over $400,000. Awwww... doesn't that just break your heart?

Update: Override Fails

Congress failed to secure enough votes to override the President's veto of the expanded S-CHIP legislation on Thursday. Score one for fiscal conservatism. I'll refrain from discussing my observations or providing any further input on this subject, because no one actually reads this blog, which is fast becoming a failure.

Songs for You and I....

Okay, so I kind of took today off for family-related purposes (the good kind; no one died), so I have some time on my hands to post something completely and utterly frivolous. So I got to thinking: I've always loved Top Ten Lists, Top Five Lists, or any other "Top" lists, even when the subject matter of the list is completely uninteresting or inane. So it's probably fitting that I was struck with the urge to create a "Top" list that has crossed my mind intermittently for years, waiting for the proper forum in which to make its debut. I'm talking, of course, about the Top ___ List of Rock Songs With Egregious Grammatical Errors. The blank in the list's title denotes my hope that this list will grow with your contributions.

The criteria for inclusion are simple: to be eligible, the song must prominently feature an egregious grammatical error in one of its primary verses. Garden variety double-negatives do not qualify. After all, we're dealing with rock stars, here, so the odd "ain't got no," "didn't do nothin'," etc., are simply expressions of the artists' hard-life inspired passion and down on their luck perspective, and as such, are acceptable usage in the gritty world of rock 'n' roll.

Anyway, without further ado, here is a starting list of songs whose grammatical gaffes have irked this self-professed grammar monkey for as long as he can remember. As usual, they're in no particular order of prominence:

1. Paul McCartney, "Live and Let Die."

• Egregious grammatical error: "...But if this ever-changing world in which we live in... ." By needlessly tacking on a superfluous "in" to the end of this clause, Paul commits the oft-encountered error of ending a clause with a preposition. Granted, he needed that extra syllable to fill out the rhythm of that verse, but such a bush-league error should not appear in the bridge to the chorus where the discerning and grammar-conscious listener is forced to endure it repeatedly throughout this already mediocre song.

2. Paula Cole, "I Don't Wanna Wait..[something or other]."

• Egregious error: "Open up your morning light/And say a little prayer for I... ." This is just terrible. As with the overuse of prepositions (see #1, above), it seems like people are overeager to use "I" instead of the correct "Me" in order to sound more well-spoken. It's like using "myself" for anything other than the reflexive object... ridiculous! Anyway, even college sophomores from state schools who inexplicably pay to see Dane Cook perform know that "I" is NEVER an object. Paula's obvious willingness to sacrifice her grammatical integrity merely to round out a cheap rhyme is despicable. But she's not the only one to commit this cardinal sin:

3. Kenny Loggins, "Meet Me Half Way."

• Egregious error: "Meet me half way/Across the sky/Out where the world belongs/To only you and I." See comments to #2, above. However, because this is the same guy who brought us such Top Ten hits as "I'm All Right" (Caddyshack), "Nobody's Fool" (the only bright spot from the otherwise abysmal Caddyshack 2), "Danger Zone" (Top Gun), and "Footloose" (from the eponymous movie), to name just a few, I think I'll give Kenny a free pass on this one.

4. Boston, "Peace of Mind."

• Egregious error: "Yeah, yeah, yeah/I understand about indecision... ." As a huge fan of the late Brad Delp's powerful tenor pipes and the equally powerful guitars of this once-prominent band, it breaks my heart to have to point out this nonsensical verse-filler. Again, it's in the choral bridge, so the listener gets plenty of chances to spot this easily-detected error. This is yet another example of how a few seconds' worth of sober reconsideration could have easily yielded a grammatically correct alternative; for example, "I am familiar with indecision" would have filled out the verse nicely, and preserved Boston's grammatical street cred. Instead, Delp was forced to take this easily-avoided gaffe to his grave. Sigh.

5. I could only think of 4...

She's Making Me Dizzy

Saw this link on Rob Neyer's MLB blog on ESPN. I'm definitely a right brained guy. I've been trying like the dickens to reverse this broad, but she's only going clockwise for me.

Too bad I'm not reality based, I guess I can't be a Democrat. Impetuous and risk taking are fine with me though.

Chester in Da House - Word!

Huge hat tip to SI.com's Hot Clicks for pointing me to this list of rap songs white folks love.

I started bouncing while chopping the air and hugging myself immediately upon reaching The Humpty Dance, and it only got better from there.

Nobel Gore-iat?

Nobel Prizes ain't what they used to be. Word is that Al Whore may win the Nobel Peace Prize. What's unclear is exactly what Mr. Whore did to deserve this once lofty but now decidedly watered-down honor. According to the article, Big Al was nominated thanks to his "worldwide campaign to bring attention to the dangers of global warming." The lynchpin of that "campaign," of course, was "An Inconvenient Truth," Gore's stunning work of unscientific fantasy that warns of the imminent, glacier-melting apocalypse caused by modern civilization and first world economies, and more specifically, for which the conservative citizens of the United States are solely responsible.

There is much that is distressing about the prospect of this clown winning the Nobel Peace Prize and giving the Dems a world stage on which to sermonize their guilt-ridden and self-loathing message (of which the gospel of global warming is but one component). But let's not ignore the initial question: What the hell are those secretive scandanavians in charge of awarding the NPP thinking? Since when does someone get the world's highest honor for "Peace" for spreading a message about the global physical environment - a message transparently driven by a political agenda, no less? Could this - Al Whore winning the Nobel Peace Prize - actually signal the apocalypse that he so fervently asserts is nigh, and if so, would that be ironic, or paradoxical?

Discuss.

10/10/07 The Birth of a Blog

Welcome everybody to the newest blog in all the land. Oops, by this second sentence this blog is already old news, Oh well, it was fun to be on the cutting edge while it lasted. Since that's not a reality anymore, let's get down to the nitty gritty. This pseudo blog is a collaboration of a select group of assholes that are dedicated to some simple tenets, a partial list follows:

• The USA is the greatest force for good in the community of nations
• English is our national language
• Taxes are a destructive force
  
• Fart jokes are funny
• Hillary is evil

This list is likely to be updated and expanded over the weeks and months to follow, but for now at this late hour I believe it should suffice. Let me end by introducing the cast of characters who will most likely only serve to amuse themselves with this blog. I am Chester Quinn, faithful yuppy defender of a world that is not fair. I am joined by Messrs. Hoggin It, Jasper Jhons, Cal "Cochise" Crosby, and White Running Back.

I'd like to thank WRB for getting this group together. He is the glue that holds this fragile coalition together and I raise a glass to him and all God-fearing men this evening, especially the boys in uniform serving to keep us free to blather about nonsense on blogs.

God Bless America.

Let's rumble.