RedStateEclectic

And Yet Another Candidate Enters Florida's Senate Race

Florida's congressional election might get even more exciting. When Crist decided to skip the primary and run as an independent, the obvious conclusion was that he would split the Republican vote and possibly hand the election to a Democrat. 

Now it looks like another Democratic candidate might enter the race, too.

Money will not be an issue for (Jeff) Greene, listed in Forbes magazine as one of the 400 richest people in the world. He says he will refuse campaign contributions from special interests and limit individual donations to his campaign to $100.

Greene will challenge once long-shot Democratic Rep. Kendrick Meek for the nomination. Now that Crist and Republican Marco Rubio will split votes, the Democrats naturally have a better shot of winning the seat. Meek is generally seen as a weak candidate, and Greene’s thinking appears to be that he can mount a well-funded campaign against Crist and Rubio.

Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2010/04/30/florida-high-roller-jeff-greene-enters-senate-race/#ixzz0mb4El1iS

You know, I kind of like this idea of having more than 2 candidates to pick from.

Kelsey Grammer's New RightNetwork Has A Show...

that looks to be right up our alley. (Either YouTube, Typepad, or myself is having technical difficulties, so here's a link just in case the embed doesn't fix itself.)

It totally made me want to go donate to my favorite candidates.

Even though the candidates aren't ours, this is a brilliant concept from Grammer's new RightNetwork.

Manifestations of Bach

 
Jacques Loussier featured on this blog in Tour de France and Canon in D Major, here is another of his performances:

Capitalism Kind to Consumers, Tough on Capitalists

The policies practiced in the name of protecting the people against evil capitalist businesses are largely the result of (a) businesses using the political system as an alleviating alternative to the rigour of the market, and (b) consumers not comprehending that the free market forces businesses to dedicate themselves to the needs and wishes of the consumer, a discipline that only politics can remove.

See also my Capitalism is Hated Because It Is Strictly Moral and The Fear of Learning the Truth about Capitalism.

You are familiar with the notion that businesses support the free market, while concerned citizens demand some sort of “regulatory oversight” by government.

It’s a canard.

[...O]n the whole, the major support for a regulatory regime, or for subsidies and tariffs, for almost any scheme of government control of business, is usually business itself.

Like individuals, businesses too often turn to government for special advantages — over other businesses, or over taxpayers.

That’s why the United States Chamber of Commerce gave Congressman Ron Paul such low marks. You could hardly find a more pro-free-market gentleman in Washington. But, as Timothy Carney notes in the Washington Examiner, 90 percent of Democrats got higher marks on the Chamber’s 2009 congressional scorecard than did Paul, who also got the lowest marks of any Republican.

Why?

Rep. Paul opposed the recent stimulus bill. And he opposed subsidizing the tourism industry as well as solar energy.

The Chamber is a typical business lobbying outfit, favoring an inefficient, mixed economy because some of its leading members hope to milk the taxpayers.

The source.

Hat tip to Cafe Hayek's Don Boudreaux who in his post Chamber of Horrors argues:

Free markets overwhelmingly benefit, not businesses, but consumers.  Alas, we as consumers, unlike we as producers, are so diverse and numerous that we as consumers are rationally ignorant of the too-often negative effects visited upon us as consumers by government policies – policies often supported by businesses.

There's Something Wrong With Harrison Ford

Mentally and politically. I waited until this late in the day to post this because I kept falling asleep while watching it. I am totally amazed that any one human being can talk this slowly and not lose his train of thought.

In short, meet an environmental activist who owns 7 planes, and will start walking when his critics start walking.

The Dangers of Power Point

Hah!  Power Point Rangers!

Alternative Children’s Literature

Via Andrew Sullivan, I hadn’t seen these before today, but they’re really kind of darkly hilarious—if you’ve read the originals, you’ll appreciate them more:

 

 

 

For those who are Madeline fans, here’s another one.

Media still clueless about Tea Parties

The Tea Party is a popular, not a populist, movement, a grass-roots uprising against the cost and expansion of government power. It fears that the debt has become unsustainable. Do not expect Dionne or Beinart to recognize this.

Don't expect from New York magazine's John Heilemann either, who told a panel on Chris Matthews' program that the protesters' motives were all Greek to him. "What is the focus, what is the cause of this? You think back to 1994, there was Ruby Ridge. There was Waco. There were triggering incidents. There's been nothing like that.

"The only thing that's changed in the past 15 months is the election of Barack Obama. As far as I can see, in terms of the policies that Obama has implemented, there's nothing," he said.

Under the heading of "nothing" would be debt in the trillions, Greece going bankrupt, California tanking under the weight of public service unions and their extravagant benefits, other states foundering, and massive entitlements being added on in the midst of a recession.

Other than that, of course, there's nothing to see here. Nothing. Nothing at all.

via www.washingtonexaminer.com

There's much about some in the Tea Party movement that is a bit concerning to me (SOME of the Tea Party groups have been coopted somewhat, by the GOP)--but on the whole, this piece seems to get at some of the motivation--big government, reckless spending, unsustainable deficits.

A Joke Of A Constitution

When Allgyer asked why the agents wanted to inspect his farm, FDA investigator Joshua C. Shafer said, “We have credible evidence that you are involved in interstate commerce.”

The interpretive arm of the bureaucracy (affectionately called the Supreme Court by some) determined long ago that anything we do is considered interstate commerce. Some day, in the not-too-distant future, the felonious act of breathing will probably be included on the list.

The Temple of Ted

The man who occupies the Senate seat Kennedy once held seems to have the right idea. Senator Scott Brown devotes a wall in his Washington office to remembering the man who held his seat for 47 years. This voluntary tribute for the benefit of visiting constituents, rather than a forced tithing of his constituents to benefit the late senator's reputation, preserves the senator's memory in a dignified manner that contrasts with to the crass, cultish manner in which Senator Kennedy's votaries have chosen to honor him.

Worried about the form of government in store for Massachusetts, Abigail Adams wrote her husband a few months before George Washington, from his perch atop Dorchester Heights, drove the British permanently from Boston. "I am more and more convinced that Man is a dangerous creature," the matriarch of the first family of Massachusetts politics noted, "and that power whether vested in many or a few is ever grasping, and like the grave, cries give, give."

via spectator.org

Daniel Flynn notes the bilking of American taxpayers for purposes of the "Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the U.S. Senate"--a legacy building effort not totally unheard of, but certainly not common.