Life Imitates Art: Hillary's 21st Century Schizoid Man

Cat's foot iron claw
Neuro-surgeons scream for more
At paranoia's poison door.
Twenty first century schizoid man.

Blood rack barbed wire
Politicians' funeral pyre
Innocents raped with napalm fire
Twenty first century schizoid man.

Death seed blind man's greed
Poets' starving children bleed
Nothing he's got he really needsTwenty first century schizoid man.

Gee, you just don't get good songwriting like this these days do you? Of course as you well know this is the title song from King Crimson's epic progressive rock album In the Court of the Crimson King. Guys like me used to smoke ditch-weed to records like this. Hey, don't judge, life is a journey and stuff like this helped make me the brilliant, self-actualizing guy that I am today. But my what positive images it evokes. It just makes me warm and fuzzy all over, but hey, good art does that. You know this could very well be Hillary's theme song should she actually pull off the nomination (Don't Stop Believing just seems a little too pleading for the consummate bullshit-artist family). 

Yes the Republicans are not the only ones schizoid these days. Media Matters is all in for Hillary lumping in the NY Times with the hated and reviled Faux News (I love it!). Moveon.org is all about "Run Elizabeth Run", which is really funny considering moveon was started to persuade folks to "move on" from all the trim Bill was getting in the Oval Office. "At this point in time what difference does it make" Bill told Hillary at the time (by some accounts). Democratic Underground mentions Martin O'Malley going overseas for some paid speeches, but doesn't hit him too hard, hedging their bets I would imagine. NOW is all Hillary all the time which is to be expected. If you got a penis NOW doesn't want to know about it, in fact you had best be sticking it in another guy's ass otherwise don't come-a-calling (I know, poor choice of words). 

This is so SO good and it can only get better! What you have here is the irresistible force and the immovable object. The Clintons have been at this game a long time. They know everybody. They have long memories and they take no prisoners. The hard left is not that enamored with Hillary but they see no viable alternative waiting in the wings. Warren is their girl but she won't play outside of the Northeast. O"Malley has zero name recognition and no organization. They fear Hillary has so much baggage she will get slaughtered in the general but how in the world do you dump her? The Clintons could take half the party (and money) with them and then the Dems would indeed be in for an ass whipping (remember 2010 & 2014).

So it's all good! Let's just sit back and enjoy Hillary's and (one would hope) the Democrat Party's funeral pyre. Anybody got a light?

Big Fat Friday Free For All

What's got you down, friend?  Everybody asking questions about how your foundation spends its money?  You're little drone assassination program go a bit "awry"?

Share your pain, friends.  Share it.  Right here!

Here's some pain.  Same weight as last week, 169.8.  Good news is, that's 29 lbs. lost.  Bad news is, I have 9 weeks to lose 9.9 lbs.  1.1 lbs per week from here on out.  Gotta...get....going...

Same Old Crap

If you've ever doubted the bias of the "old" media (and much of the new) then please have a look. As you may know (I say MAY) David Letterman, while warming up his audience made a blatantly sexist comment (joke?) when asked by a young college grad for any career advise. Letterman reportedly replied sure, treat a lady like a whore and a whore like a lady. Well, not particularly good advise in my estimation and not particularly funny either. But it happens, and the fact that he said it is not surprising as we all stick our foot in our mouth on occasion.
Also not surprising is the reaction by the MSM: SILENCE. Letterman is in the club and the left protects their own so very few American news outlets have mentioned the story, and no MAJOR news organizations (apart from Fox) have gone near it.
The point is we have a corrupt media that picks and chooses stories and launders the facts to fit their leftist agenda. The next Republican nominee will have to address this reality if said nominee wants to win. I think most of them realize Romney could have won had he called out the oleaginous and aptly named Candy Crowley (apart from Jeb, he's fuqing clueless!). I am seeing some pushback by some prospective candidates, I hope they keep it up.

At this stage I'm favorably impressed with Carly Fiorina. She's smart and she's fearless. Plus just as it took a perceived conservative like Nixon to open up China, and it took a leftist like Bill Clinton to do welfare reform, it will take a minority or woman to do things like immigration reform. A dyed in the wool conservative would be harassed as racist the second he proposed any sort of legislation on the issue. I don't think she'll get the nomination (although she's got my vote) but unless she screws up the VP spot is a lock I would think.

But it all may be a moot point, we may not make it to the next election. Iran is within a couple of months of going nuclear, the North Koreans have an estimated twenty nukes online with delivery systems than can reach California (poetic justice) and both governments are described as "irrational players". Yeah, that's the word, not "batshit crazy friggin' lunatics hell bent on killing themselves and everybody else" but irrational.

We've got to do something to help Hillary. She's getting beat up by the likes of the NY Times for Pete's sake! Bill is calling in favors and her campaign is filled with Saudi and Red Chinese money and she's ready to rock. But she's just not leftist enough for the red diaper babies who took over the party some say in 2008, I would say in 1972. Whatever, but we have to make sure this woman gets her chance. She's owed that don't you think? She stuck by Bill with all his whores and basically gave up her life in the service of leftist causes. She has been a reliable Alinskyite harassing conservatives at every turn up to and including perjuring herself. Theres's not a felony she wouldn't commit in the service of the left. THEY OWE HER and we owe it to our nominee the opportunity to once and for all kill the Clinton machine! If I had one wish in the area of politics it would be to live long enough to see them both in prison.

So, there you have it. Now please, just leave me the hell along!

Day 2 San Diego

My great experiment with remaining on DC time while in San Diego is underway, sort of.  I went to sleep last night at 9PM, after a great episode of "Once Upon a Time".  Had it not been on, I would have been asleep by 8 and awakened at 3AM.  Instead, I lollygagged until 4AM.  I hastened off to the 24hr fitness center (a plus) where I hit the elliptical for a half hour, then came back to the room for twenty minutes with my "Yoga for Inflexible People" video, brought along to begin to add some stretching and movement into my physical therapy regimen.  Then it was off to the breakfast buffet in my hotel (another plus), which cost the same as two eggs and bacon....so having burned 300 calories already, I opted for the bigger breakfast.  It was delicious. 

Dinner last night was a little gem of a place near my hotel.  It was 6PM as I neared where I was staying, and as I was about to make a right turn, I saw just off to the left a small establishment called "Hunters Steakhouse".  I had not heard of it before, and I because I had usually avoided this part of town (not unsavory mind you, just a little more distant), it had not crossed my radar screen of potential eateries.  It had a nice menu and plenty of cozy ambience, and it turned out to be a great move.  Besides, it was 9PM in my stomach and I had had no dinner.  I opted for the NY Strip, as their rendition of the ribeye came with some kind of a bleu cheese butter (yuck).  If I return, I may ask for the ribeye without the butter, but the strip was wonderful nonetheless.

As is often the case this time of year, I left better weather in Easton than we have here in San Diego.  Highs this week will be about 67, perhaps a little gloomy tomorrow (today is lovely).  Consistently though, you can't beat the weather here.

Enough for now. 

Westbound

Here in the hermetically sealed wonder of the United Lounge in Terminal C of Dulles Airport, I am surrounded by the well-heeled gazing numbly at their smartphones or mindlessly watching whatever is on the televisions, audible only to those with owl-like hearing.  Since I have begun this effort to lose a good bit of me, the carb denying aspect of it makes the time spent in posh airport lounges far less posh.  Whereas I used to mow down cup after cup of trail mix and wash it down with diet coke, I now drink water and long for trail mix.

I am headed to San Diego, to which I will return in two weeks and then four weeks after than.  Wedged in between will be a trip to Newport and then a mid-June trek to Norway for a panel I've been asked to anchor.  Presumably, my travel schedule and propensity to overshare means a number of these travel-logue themed posts, but who knows, perhaps I will get lazy.  Not wishing to disappoint fans of my travel rigs, I am of course, betrackpantsed, with trainers and blue blazer.  This time though, I am wearing a golf shirt I purchased several years ago without trying on.  When I did, I realized that it made me look more LPGA than PGA, and so I put it away until I had lost my manrack.  Though it isn't completely gone, it is subdued enough to comfortably wear a nice light blue golf shrt, and so I am.  

Standard trip, three full work days and the red-eye home Wednesday night.  I am trying yet another hotel out there in my quest to find the perfect place.  Of note, I see that Dulles finally opened some food/coffee establishments in the baggage claim area.  This is a great idea, because I find myself landing at 0600 in the morning after a red-eye in great need of a coffee, and unless I am fleet of foot (which has been impossible with my hip maladies) a huge line grows at the single coffee stop open between the gate and exiting the airport.  Now there's one I can hit on the way out to caffeinat for the ritual joining of the Norther Virginia crawl.

There must be an even more VIP VIP lounge, because I often think that I should run into famous people here, but rarely do.  Occasionally I'll espy a member of Congress, but usually nada.  As I look around today, there are no famous people, or at least none that I recognize.  TSA-Pre remains a triumph of the Obama Administration, perhaps the only one.  I used to remove more clothing for airport security than I did for connubial bliss, but no more.  A quick step into the all-body scan and I'm on  my way, after the staff have beheld the wonders of my naked form.  

May I bitch about Dulles again?  Thank you.  Now that I am equipped with two superbly functioning hips, the Bataan Death March from daily garage 1 to the terminal is now manageable.  That said, the last half of the trip remains ridiculous.  I fly out of terminal C or D usually.  If D, then you get on the ridiculous people movers.  If C, you ride a tram to a spot where you are dropped off and then get to walk another ten minutes.  Why build the damn train?  I did see that C terminal has a new Chef Geoffs opening there, which should be nice, as we have discussed here in the past the wasteland that is Dulles dining.

I am going to experiement with remaining on Washington time throughout this trip, going to bed at 8PM and rising at 3AM (Cali-time).  I am wildly productive in the morning as it is, and I've found that when I try and go "full west coast", my post dinner hours are a waste anyway, as I am ready to go to sleep pretty early.  I will report on the results of this great scientific experiment.  I do need to be productive, as things are righteously busy in Bryan-land these days, to the point where I'm going to have to start turning things down with more frequency.  Plus, the War College gig still has a month left in it, and -- like the ideal gas -- expands to fit any given volume of time I have.

Will future generations, hundreds of years from now, view video of CNN and come to the decision that Fareed Zakaria must have served some kind of global authority role?  Let's face it:  you cannot fly these days without seeing his serial plagiarist's face in every airport.  With his East Indian appeararnce and the patois of an Oxford don, he is the ultimate global citizen.  I think they will look back and try to affix some incredibly important role to him in our present day.

Is there anything sillier than the baseball hat with the sunglasses perched on the bill?  I mean, if you're on the golf course or softball field, it's one thing.  But the departure lounge?

Ok--enough kvetching for today.  My plan is to land in Cali, get the car, head to the hotel, eat some dinner and go to bed.  If I execute the plan, I should have time to scribe in the morning.  Fare thee well.  

Big Fat Friday Free For All

What's got your goat, partner?  Your big overture to the Iranians increasingly looking like a big pile of pooh?  Are your grandparents not the immigrants you say they are?  Share, friends.  Share.

Big day. First time under 170 since October 2009.  I was 169.8 this morning, 29 lbs down since 27 December and about 10 pounds from my goal.  Big day.

Sic Semper Tyrannis

On this day 150 years ago Abe Lincoln was shot by John Wilkes Booth. If you were asked to pick the single most impactful event in American history, you could do a lot worse. As a Southerner I think this was the most tragic outcome imaginable to the most tragic period in American history. Lincoln's death gave free reign and moral justification to Southern "reconstruction" (i.e. retribution). Booth, the drunkard and fool, ensured the South would pay a heavy price for decades to come.

Did Lincoln deserve to die? Was he a tyrant? I can't say what he did or didn't deserve, but I can say if I could jump in the "wayback" machine I'd do EVERYTHING possible to stop Booth and his cohorts. But it can't be denied the man was indeed tyrannical. He threw half of the elected officials in Maryland in prison with no due process at all. He closed down newspapers, arrested editors (even "deporting" an Ohio publisher to the South). He issued an arrest warrant for the Chief Justice Roger Taney (author of the Dred Scott opinion), had federal troops intimidate poll workers (sound familiar), "suspended" Habeas Corpus, shut down courts and locked up every duly elected official in the city of Baltimore and took the town over with the military. He, if not ordered at least tolerated the rape, murder and pillage of defenseless civilians on the order of ISIS in Iraq today. He was, in my opinion a fundamentally evil man. So again, did he deserve to die? Probably, I guess. Would I have wished him dead? HELL NO!

Regardless what is is. History is like politics, perception and lies outweigh the truth as often as not. Lincoln preserved the Union even though it was clearly understood by ALL the States BEFORE the Constitution was ratified that they entered voluntarily and could leave voluntarily. Lincoln freed the slaves, although he could give a damn about slavery and was a unreconstructed racist (had to use that word). His claims of defending liberty and the Constitution all the while subverting both ring hollow even 150 years later. Once again, did he deserve to die? You can answer that yourself. Considering slavery was a dying institution, and considering slavery had been abolished in Britain and South America peacefully without firing a shot, my question would be did the 720,000 people who died as a result of Lincoln's megalomania deserve THEIR fate?  

CW Goes to Washington....

This Wednesday at 2PM I will be give testimony to the House Armed Services Committee, Seapower and Projection Forces Subcommittee on the role of Surface Navy Forces in Presence, Deterrence, and War.

If you want to watch in person, the hearing is in the Rayburn Building, Room 2212.  If you want to watch on the web, there is a link on this page.

The other witness testifying is Bryan Clark from CSBA, usually known in Washington as "the smart Bryan".

The Brilliance of Obama

If a begrudging way I admire President Obama. He's not a policy expert, he's not a legal expert or Constitutional scholar. He's not a consensus builder. He's not a leader in the sense we think of American leaders. He doesn't inspire. He's not at all popular with other beltway politicians most especially members of his own party. He doesn't like smoozing or working the phones or any of the stuff that made LBJ so good (if that's the word) at getting his agenda passed. But what he is good at, what he does exceptionally well is retail politics. He's exceptionally good on the stump. He picks ruthless and competent professional campaign people. He realizes his fellow Dems don't have to like him because he's the only game in town and their prospects are tied to his. He's not afraid to go after his enemies with tactics Nixon would have found distasteful (and HIGHLY illegal). He understands that his racial circumstance makes him practically invulnerable to most conservative attacks. Therefore he is constantly on the attack with one outrageous policy shift after another illegal Presidential edict after targeting this group and wiretapping that group. There is so much malfeasance and nefarious dealings going on it's hard to keep up. He doesn't give us or the press time to digest (or investigate) one before another crops up. He's the whack-a-mole President.

I admire him because he gets his way. I admire him because in spite of everything, he refuses to back down. You might say that of course he backs down. Look at all those "lines in the sand". Sorry, I disagree. That is PLANNED weakness. That's weakness as a policy goal.

He is unique in that everything about the Obama Presidency is predicated on race, and he understand that. Although he is nearly (I say nearly) invulnerable to conservative attacks, he is absolutely invincible to liberal attacks. Any Democrat who dares oppose him will pay a heavy price (ask Senator New Jersey) and NO Democrat with national aspirations would dare risk pissing off the block vote of all block votes... the BLACK vote.

So say what you will about Obama, he's played the fiddle and made us dance to it. There's been NO talk about tax reform, welfare reform, entitlement reform ANYTHING in spite of two mid-term elections that should have put the fear of God in any clear thinking Democrat. No, we talk about what OBAMA wants to talk about. His policies are the worst. He is by far the worst President of my lifetime, but nobody sells suck like Obama.

Big Fat Friday Free For All

What's the matter, friend?  Feeling a little down without college hoops?  Disappointed that the guys you think you struck your big deal with keep changing the terms you thought you negotiated?  Share your pain, friends.

Weighed in at 171.2 this week, down 1 lb from last week and 27.6 overall.  I should be happy with the 1 pound loss (because that is exactly what my little diet goal calorie app tells me I am aiming for), but I'm afraid I must pick up the pace a bit to get to 159.9 by 27 June.

Pass the SALT II

Remember SALT l & ll? Probably not...CW was like twelve at the time. Anyway I do. They were the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks between the old (as opposed to NEW) Soviet Union and the US. As I recall SALT l was ratified by the Senate and SALT ll died a quick and quiet death after the Russkies invaded Afghanistan. No biggie. Arms treaties are made by the weak. Reagan didn't need a treaty when he buried the Soviets and brought down their empire. If the Democrats had been in charge the Soviets would have demanded ECONOMIC concessions along with a favorable treaty (a la North Korea) and we'd probably still be dealing with the Soviets today. Damn, what am I saying? After six years of Obama WE ARE dealing with the Soviets today. Funny how Democrats can be so cutting edge hip and still be the most reactionary, regressive, stuck-in-the-mud losers that they are. But weak is too weak a word to describe John Kerry and Baraq Obama. They couldn't negotiate a deal with a Redneck used car salesman for a '78 Pinto with 300k miles and frame damage. They redefine weak, and the only thing more stupid is the American people who fall for their bullshit time and time again.

Here's the deal. The Iranians are NOT under the gun here. They're just having a little fun fuqing with the Americans. There is no downside for them, the sanctions have already been lifted. Their goal, their reason for being, their whole focus is to attain nuclear weapons so they can do things like put the Persian Gulf in a figure four leg lock half nelson and thereby run up the price of oil so as to get cash to buy and develop arms so as to attack and destroy Israel. Nuclear weapons would neutralize the Americans (and everybody else). It's as simple as that.

The Democrats are painting this as either or, treaty or war. Well I have news for our deluded team of Valley Girls and upper-crust dolts at State. We are at war, a slow grinding war of attrition in places like Yemen and Afghanistan and Iraq. This treaty will just about guarantee a quick war in the not so distant future. America's conventional military forces won't mean much when the Fourth Protocol (if there is such a thing) is breached.

But not to worry, gays will be rolling in pizza and wedding cakes so the Democrats came through! Well done! NOW can we get started on the Carbon Tax and finish destroying capitalism and freedom?

Big Fat Friday Free For All

What's got you down, Bub?  Iranian deal making you think Israel and Saudi Arabia just got closer and the world just got a little weirder?  You run out of propane two minutes into grilling your big, thick steak last night?  Share friends, share.

Weighed in at 172.2 this week.  Fourteen weeks into the "150's by 50" diet and I am down 26.6 lbs.  In the remaining 12 weeks, I have to drop 12.3 lbs.  Do-able, but must stay focused.  Good news is I am increasingly more capable of actual exercise. Hip is feeling great.