Clipping blog

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• Clearing the Browser Tabs – Will Sarah Run Saturday Edition
• On July 1, I Will Become an Unwilling Contributor to the Public Sector Union Menace.
• I Don’t Even Think The President Looked Up the Word “Fight” in a Dictionary
• Clearing the Browser Tabs – I Really Am Here Friday Edition

Clearing the Browser Tabs – Will Sarah Run Saturday Edition Posted: 18 Jun 2011 03:10 AM PDT According to a source who spoke under condition of anonymity to Stacy McCain, a number of people who make their living working on political campaigns expect to know within a week if Sarah Palin will run for President. Sarah didn’t exactly deny the story, though she did pour out a small amount of snark onto it. His brief report made the national news and even picked up some lengthy commentary from Rush Limbaugh. I mention this because I may write more about a part of Stacy’s report that didn’t get much notice (though Jim Geraghty caught it). I also have some thoughts about whether Palin actually will run or not. I short, I don’t think she will and the biggest reason for that comes down to friends and the fact that, right or wrong, she has precious few people with political influence willing to publicly go to bat for her during the primaries. There’s more to that last thought and it involves the difference between being an establishment politician and being a politician who can get along with enough people in the establishment to eventually be its leader. There! That was a tease, wasn’t it? And now, links! Yeah, I’ll bet Joe Biden and his merry band of big government nanny staters “scoured” the budget. Coincidentally, the Saudi Government announced that today was “Beat a Few Saudi Women Day” and the American left announced the “Cheer From the Relative Safety of Twitter” Day. Liberal media? Why I have no idea what you’re talking about! Dear GOP, do not screw up this election. I don’t know what it means that more than one new blog is born every second, except that it takes a ridiculous amount of hustling for traffic and outright begging from fellow bloggers for links to get more than a trickle of traffic. The old way of creating quality content on a regular basis with the certainty that a large number of people would find you in time are dead. We are definitely in a different Harry Potter world now. I’m actually looking forward to the finale of the series.

On July 1, I Will Become an Unwilling Contributor to the Public Sector Union Menace. Posted: 17 Jun 2011 09:53 PM PDT I received a notice in the mail today that informed me that the State of Maryland will steal an undisclosed amount of money from my paycheck starting on July 1 on the behalf of AFSCME Maryland. I have no option but to pay the “service fee”, whether I’m a member of AFSCME or not. Indeed, the fee appears to be the same amount as I would pay if I were a member (a rather heavy-handed way of “encouraging” me to be a full member of the union). The notice included a link to this web page that informed me: Approximately 30,000 Maryland State government employees have collective bargaining rights. What this means is that union organizations certified as the exclusive bargaining representatives are entitled to negotiate with the Governor or his designee(s) regarding wages, hours, and working conditions. These exclusive representatives act on behalf of bargaining unit employees. The collective bargaining process typically results in a labor agreement that is reached between the State and the exclusive representative. Once the parties reach agreement, bargaining unit members are called upon to vote to “ratify” the agreement. A majority of votes cast determines whether the agreement will be implemented. During the FY 2011 negotiations, the State of Maryland and the various exclusive representatives bargained for the right to charge a service fee. The philosophy behind a service fee is that all individuals who benefit from the services performed on their behalf by exclusive representatives should pay to support those services, which include activities related to enforcement of agreements and negotiation of future agreements. Again, let me stress that I did not ask for collective bargaining rights. I did not ask for any union representation, which is mandated by those “rights”. Indeed, no union representative has contacted me in person about my membership nor about my opinion on the manner in which they “represent” me. I have no way, short of quitting my job, to escape AFSCME. The negotiation for this fee, as the state’s own web page points out, occurred between the union and state officials. No one asked me if I wanted to pay anything, nor if I was willing to forego the alleged benefits of collective bargaining in exchange for a waiver from the fee. Indeed, the representation I receive from the union has been nothing short of pathetic. I’ll spare you a long tirade about why police dispatchers who work shift work, experience as much stress as police officers, and are prone (for various reasons) to several debilitating medical conditions, aren’t paid enough to live in many of the counties in which they work. I will say that the unions have given me nothing I didn’t receive before Governor Glendening instituted collective bargaining Now let me tell you about another little piece of news I received about two weeks ago. Thanks to AFSCME, I am due to receive a $750 bonus . It goes into effect on July 1 — the same day as these new fees. Unlike normal bonuses, which I’d get as a lump sum, I’ll get this bonus over the course of the year, in taxable installments. It’s worth noting here that Maryland is still in pretty dire fiscal straits; lawmakers are looking down the barrel of a $1.6 billion dollar deficit in fiscal 2012 and the Governor will close non-essential state facilities for several extra days this year as one of many cost-saving measures. So how do I, or any of the other 30,000 Maryland state employees, rate a $750 bonus? The short answer is that we don’t. However, I bet that if you add up the new “service fee” I and many other state employees will pay over the course of fiscal 2012, you’ll get a number very close to $750. Anyone want to take that bet?

I Don’t Even Think The President Looked Up the Word “Fight” in a Dictionary Posted: 17 Jun 2011 08:09 PM PDT We have a law called the War Powers Act. It says, essentially, that the President can hop in that boss muscle car we call the United States Military and take it for a spin pretty much any time he wants, but if he’s going to take it on a long trip, he has to come back and ask us (where “us” is represented by our elected representatives in Congress). Now, President Obama has taken out military into Libya. He didn’t ask us before he did it. Heck, he wasn’t even in the country when he gave the order. But we were willing to extend him a slight benefit of the doubt because he is the Commander-in-Chief and we owe any man who holds that title at least that much. Since then, Congress has asked him, in increasingly irritated and serious tones as the days have passed, to clue them in on what, exactly, he’s doing with our brave soldiers. President Obama has flatly refused. Not only has he not asked us for permission once in the almost three months since he turned control of the US military over to NATO, he hasn’t even given us a coherent summary of his plans. Until Wednesday. The President sent Congress a 30-page explanation for why he will not seek its blessing that is, and I’m not even kidding when I say this, the most stunning display of Presidential chutzpah since Bill Clinton looked into a camera and lied his hamburger-eating tail off about his dalliances with Monica Lewinsky. The paper boils down to two points. 1) We aren’t actually engaged in “hostilities”, which would trigger the War Powers Act, because while we’re dropping bombs and shooting missiles at Libyan forces, they aren’t actually shooting back. 2) Screw you. Seriously. Those are the two pillars that hold up his entire case. What’s worse, he actually overruled the general counsel at the Pentagon and the head of the Office of Legal Counsel (whose entire job it is to give the President advice just like this) to do it. Instead, he leaned on the bizarre counsel of the White House lawyer and a far-out left-winger named Harold Koh to give Congress, and the entire nation, one giant kiss-off. So now our President,  just 2 1/2 years ago pilloried George W. Bush as a warmonger for taking us to war in Iraq even though Bush got the overwhelming approval of a Democrat-controlled Congress of which he was a member, has taken us into war on the rationalization that it’s not really a fight if the other guy isn’t fighting back. But if it’s not a fight — if you don’t consider a guy hostile who is beating you senseless with a pipe wrench while you lie on the floor unable to even raise your hands to ward off the blows — what is it? I don’t expect we’ll get an answer from the White House to that question because the very second he answers it, Congress is going to come down on his head like a ton of very ticked-off bricks. The President is indeed the Commander-in-Chief, and that title gives him a great deal of latitude in what he can do, but he does not own the military. We do. And before he treats our soldiers like his personal possessions, to do with as he will, he owes us an explanation for what he is doing and why he is doing it.

Clearing the Browser Tabs – I Really Am Here Friday Edition Posted: 17 Jun 2011 10:28 AM PDT What’s this? A Clearing the Browser Tabs post in the afternoon? Have I gone mad and turned everything topsy-turvy? Nothing that exciting, I’m afraid. Besides, I can’t go mad. I don’t have the proper lab coat and welder’s goggles to complete the Evil Outfit. I had a pretty long evening last night, when I usually write the early morning post, and didn’t have two working brain cells to rub together. The morning has involved paperwork at work and giving blood at the doctor’s office…well, that’s not accurate. The doc visit mostly involved waiting around an office for nearly an hour to get a five-minute poke with a needle. Not to worry, though. I’m okay. It’s a routine visit thing. But I’m back and the post is here. All the links are good and hot, so dig in! And now, links. I guess Montgomery County needed to pay for its new supply of jackboot polish more than it needed kids to sell lemonade to pay for a cancer charity. Ace, just drop the banhammer. You’ve already decided not to make as much money from your work as you can to create a website with which you’re happy. I don’t see any sense to agonize further over a hand full of idiots. Throw them out. No, Moe, I don’t think Jane Hamsher is as smart as you think she is. This may be the best Ann Coulter column I’ve read in months. The theme is Ron Paul and Ann, who is pretty darned libertarian-minded, is not at all a fan. Be sure not to miss Matthew Sheffield’s interview with Andrew Breitbart. I was especially interested in what he had to say about the opinions of the Republican establishment toward new media. It very much matches my experience. I have no idea how Cato published this blog post without a picture of Trodgor. This may be my favorite Tea Party group, because it blends grassroots activism and space travel. Choir geeks are everywhere. FYI, if you want to buy one of those “choir geek” t-shirts he’s selling for me, I won’t argue at all.

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