Oh, yes, the Whip has been on the shelf for quite a while, hasn't it? Well, don't expect a lot of regular whippage, but this is the stuff that accumulated in my browser's tabs over about the past week:
What We Believe: A Primer, Part 1. Well worth ten minutes of your time, especially if you think "teabaggers" are wacko raaaaacists: An Ethics Meltdown at the Justice Department [*1] -- Harper's Magazine. One more thing the Tea Party movement will need to clean up.
[*2] -- From Richard Fernandez' "Belmont Club," featuring this horrifying video from the BBC:
Terror warnings: Be specific or be quiet [*5] -- Washington Post's Anne Applebaum states the obvious about the moronic "terror alert" issued last weekend for Europe . . .
Taxes and Presidential Math [*7] -- Wherein Veronique de Rugy attempts to school our economically illiterate President on tax cuts . . . featuring this entertaining chart:
Obama will not sign foreclosure-friendly bill [*17] -- This is, I think, "even a blind squirrel finds an acorn once in a while" sort of news . . . of course, comparing Obama at this point to blind squirrels may be an injustice to sightless rodents . . .
Casting Call: Obama's MTV Open Town Hall [*20] -- The Democrats aren't even bothering to hide the fact that their whole act is, in fact, an act. Staged. Not real. They're auditioning actors to play the part of "citizens" for an Obama town hall meeting. Pathetic.
Mao and Later: How Markets Benefit Well-Being[*24] -- The price of collectivism, in dollars. This doesn't take into account the lives wasted or destroyed by well-intentioned authoritarianism. Nobody starts out wanting to be a monster. It just sorta happens. Over and over and over again, throughout history. At some point, you'd think we would learn.
The Constitutional Oath [*29] -- But if you don't think the Constitution means anything, then your oath doesn't really mean anything either, now does it?
Atlas Shrugged, Hayek Wept [*31] -- One fundamental thing that leftists don't understand is that people on the right actually do understand people on the left, whereas people on the left are utterly mystified, bewildered, and terrified by people on the right, because they do not understand why the right believes what it does and why it behaves the way it does.
You Are Required To Buy A Musket [*32] -- If one federal judge can decide that you are required to buy health insurance, why can't another decide that you're required to buy a gun? Or a pony?
Fed Officials Mull Inflation as a Fix [*33] -- Bend Over, America. Here it comes . . . the people who are "supposed" to know what they're doing don't have a clue. They're repeating ALL of the worst mistakes of the past, while telling us all thwe while that this time it will be different, because, you know, they are smarter. Yeah. Right. Bend over. It's coming.
Progressive Feudalism [*36] -- Thomas Lifeson at American Thinker. I've been calling the society that the Democrats and the "progressives" have been working towards a kind of feudalism for some time now. And guess who's the lords of the manor? Here's a hint: Not You. Guess who's the serfs? Go look in a mirror. Bend Over, America, it's coming.
Uh, Wee Problem Here On Grains..... [*37] -- The economic illiterates in charge of this country are playing with fire. Weimar Republic-style fire. Watch commodity prices, especially food. Bend Over, America, It's Coming.
OK. We need a humor break:
Oh, we are so screwed. But, onward!
The Colbert Democrats [*38] -- Charles Krauthammer in the Washington Post. Did I mention We Are So Screwed?
Which Obama Will Emerge After the Storm? [*39] David Paul Kuhn at Real Clear Politics. My strong preference would be the Obama that would emerge, see his shadow and become frightened, then go back underground for two more years and leave the rest of us the hell alone. Probably won't happen, though.
Revenge of the Hillary Voters [*40] --Rich Lowry at Real Clear Politics, engendering this further commentary from Kevin Dujan at HillBuzz: The Revenge of the Hillary Voters [*41] . Dujan, being one of the aforementioned Hillary Voters, speaks with some authority on the topic.
This Stock Market Rally Has Everything To Do With The Turn Against Obama [*46] -- Actually, I personally think it has more to do with the Fed continuing to artificially inflate the money supply, which is paradoxically keeping prices up because it's making the actual value of everything decline in dollar terms. That's what inflation is. That's why you need to watch commodity prices carefully. They're going to go up, I think. Way, way up. I think we're set up for double-digit inflation--at best, in the fairly near future. All of the "experts" will act like we're in a boom, but it will just be another bubble. And when that bubble bursts, the game will be over. So will the entire world's economy. The dark age will begin.
Cool as Ice [*48] -- Robert Costa at National Review Online, writing about Joe Miller, the Alaska libertarian (small-L) Republican, trying to fight his way through the special interests and into the U.S. Senate