Mimsy Were the Borogoves

Editorials: Where I rant to the wall about politics. And sometimes the wall rants back.

BlogCon 2011

Jerry Stratton, November 10, 2011

cold gear: Getting ready for BlogCon 2011, because it’s cold in Denver!; Jerry Stratton

Are you ready for that? Checking into a Denver hotel under a phony name with intent to commit capital fraud and a head full of acid? I sure hope so.

“I was just outside of Denver, on the edge of the Rockies, when the drugs began to take hold.”

In this case, the drug will be alcohol from the hotel bar and tobacco from Tosa Cigars by way of Tony Katz, but since the last time I had tobacco was when I barfed up my dad’s chewing tobacco at five1 the results will probably be similar.

I’ll be at BlogCon 2011 this weekend to pick up my check from the Koch Brothers. Hopefully, I’ll be able to live blog the check as I deposit it into my Swiss bank account. If not, I’ll at least get some blogging tips from a bunch of more successful bloggers.

Also, it’s been unseasonably cold here in San Diego, so I’m looking forward to the warm weather of sunny Colorado.

November 13, 2011: CNN Jeopardy in Occupy Denver

It is 6:06 AM and I’m waiting in the airport for my flight back to San Diego. CNN is on the tv. Apparently a Denver police officer was injured in the Occupy Denver confrontation last night.

The CNN reporter, talking to Lt. Robert King, asked “Is it fair to say the trouble-makers are not necessarily affiliated with the Occupy movement?”

If a tea party event had resulted in injured police officers, would CNN try this hard to (a) degrade the injury to the result of ‘trouble-makers’ and (b) deflect the blame away from the movement? That wasn’t even a real question. It was a telegraphed answer disguised as a question. Even if Lt. King had not followed CNN’s cue, anything other than a flat denial1 would be spun by the question into the desired answer: police acknowledge possibility, police: possible that, or my favorite, police theorize that, ignoring who was doing the theorizing.

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November 12, 2011: Blogcon Saturday Night
photo for Blogcon Saturday Night: photo from Jerold Stratton for Blogcon Saturday Night

“Politics goes to those who show up.”—Kristina Ribali

If yesterday was a strong day, today was serious. Jim Pethokoukis told a story about giving a talk in front of a bunch of workers at a military bunker, and at the end one of the guys told him that if they got the warning he wouldn’t bother going into the bunker. Because the future Pethokoukis warned of was too depressing.

He pretty much gave us the same speech. Rather than let the United States recover from the 2008 financial crisis, we have instead spent too much money we don’t have, and added too many regulations that weigh down economic recovery. Which means that we are completely unprepared for the next crisis, which will come when European Union states start to fail.

If he were given a magic economic wand that gave him three wishes1 he would

  1. Implement the Ryan plan, accelerating it.
  2. Eliminate taxes on investing.
  3. Eliminate all public sector unions.

But public unions aren’t the only ones lobbying for money that then gets funneled back to politicians. Venture capitalist John Doerr was called out for getting millions in Obama “stimulus” money for green energy projects while serving on the president’s jobs panel, and also steering donations to Democrats. Tom Borelli called on us to also expose crony capitalism2

Borelli is especially critical of General Electric’s Jeffrey Immelt, calling him “the king of crony capitalism. For the Ayn Rand fans, he is James Taggart.”

Ed Morrissey touched on something I’ve got a post for in the works. A candidate’s record and positions need to be on the table. Thoroughly vette them. Engage in analysis, advocacy, and activism. But don’t paint yourself into a corner you’re going to regret. My own post is going to be “your candidate sucks” and mentioning it now before it’s finished paints me into a corner I don’t want to be in.

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November 11, 2011: Occupy Blogcon in Denver

So, the the late morning topic was YouTube and other social networking tools. After lunch, there was a loud noise outside the meeting room, that kept going on, so the organizers announced a break to talk to the hotel management and let the hotel clear the tables of lunch plates.

With a room full of bloggers, of course everyone went out to take pictures and video of the “occupiers”. At the back of the crowd all I got was some video of a sea of cameras.

“Once you figure out that Hollywood hates you, everything makes sense.”—John

“We have to play by the rules here, we can’t be like them.”

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November 11, 2011: A fish called Blogcon

The morning was about tea parties, what they stand for, and why they don’t have rapes, shootings, and urinating in food carts. Matt Kibbe described the tea party ethos as

  1. Don’t hurt other people.
  2. Don’t take their stuff.

OWS’s transgressions fall under either hurting other people or taking their stuff, or hurting them because they won’t let you take their stuff,

What do we do?

We are an actual movement that does stuff.

That was from Stephen Kruiser, who added that what that stuff we do is is kneecap the Republican Party. The folks who gave us “Ron Paul and the TARPettes.”

The Democrats are attempting to steal the tea party thunder, but they took the slogan “we the people” and turned it into “we’re the people, they’re not.” It’s an especially frightening slogan delivered from the mouths of kids.

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November 11, 2011: Good morning!

Good morning from the Grand Ballroom in Denver’s lovely Crown Plaza hotel. Check-in went smoothly except that they can’t find all of the plastic holders so I went back to my hotel room to get my hat.

OOR1 : I’ll bet the White House wishes it were this easy to replace Holders.

Don’t forget to tip your waitress, we’ll be here all day.

photo for Good morning!: photo from Jerold Stratton for Good morning!

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November 10, 2011: “I might be in Colorado…”
photo for “I might be Colorado…”: photo from Jerold Stratton for “I might be Colorado…”

January? 2002? WTF?

It’s been a long time since I’ve traveled on a trip short enough not to have checked bags. Normally, if I’m going on a short trip, I drive, because the hassle of flying isn’t worth it.

It is a pain in the ass to pack without checked bags. No toothpaste, no aftershave, no deodorant. They’re all above 3.4 ounces. My travel nail clipper set? The TSA prohibited items page doesn’t mention them. Leave them.

No water, unless I buy it at the airport, but since I’m going to have to hit the local supermarket for deodorant, toothpaste, and aftershave, might as well wait to get water, too. If I’m lucky the hotel will provide it.

Over-the-counter vitamin pills. Nothing on the TSA site about them. Apparently they’re fine and still cause trouble. I’m not taking the entire container for a three-day trip. Into a plastic bag they go, and hope there’s no trouble over them.

Safety razor, prohibited. Does this include my Atra? The list is unclear. Disposable razors and their cartridges are okay, but what about the disposable cartridges of non-disposable razors? Well, in it goes, and hope for the best.

Thought I’d bring a flag pin, too. It’s Veteran’s Day on Friday, and I have a flag pin that I got at my grandfather’s funeral; he was a WWII vet. It’s just a cheap lapel pin, nothing special, except that it is the flag pin I got at my grandfather’s funeral. I don’t want to have to dump it. Four-inch metal blades on scissors are apparently okay, but smaller knives and razor blades are not. That’s a weird one. But also a digression. Do I risk the flag pin? I’ll bring it in the bag along with the note that came with it, and hope.

I’m sure everything’s fine, except… not absolutely sure.

So I guess the Glock is out of the question.

Update: made it to the airport without a problem.

It helped that I made great time. Left the office without “meeting Lumbergh”. Ran into no traffic on the way to the park-and-ride, and because I got here faster than I expected there was literally no line for security. I thought I was in the wrong place.

Then when I looked at the time at the gate, I thought I was here at the wrong time. Then I looked at the date and realized the clock was wrong. Fortunately, modern navigation doesn’t rely on knowing the right time, month, or season…

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  1. He was apparently very good at hiding the fact that he spit it out after chewing it.

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