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COMMENCEMENT 2008 |
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Written by Dr. Jack Wheeler
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Tuesday, 10 June 2008 |
[This commencement address was originally published three
years ago. We rerun it annually at
college graduation time. Feel quite free to send this to any recent college
graduate you may know.]
Mr. Chancellor, Members of the Board of Regents, Members of
the Faculty, Honored Graduates, Families and Friends:
It's funny that they call this ceremony a Commencement, for
you've all reached the finish line:
college, goodbye, we're outta here.
Yet of course, "commencement" means a beginning, not an end.
But one is supposed to at least start - commence - a talk
such as this by saying funny things. So
I'll start by talking about Clark Gable movies. If you've heard of Clark Gable at all, you know he was the
biggest movie star in Hollywood a long time ago. His most famous movie was of course Gone With The Wind.
He made a movie in 1955 called The Tall Men with Jane
Russell as his girlfriend and Robert Ryan as the heavy. It's a pretty ordinary Western flick with
outlaws and cowboys and Indians - and at the end, Ryan, the bad guy, and his
henchmen get the drop on Gable, the good guy, and all seems lost. Suddenly, surprise, Gable outfoxes Ryan and
triumphs. Gable makes his exit, and
after he does, Ryan delivers a line that I want you to never forget.
Serendipity is funny, a very funny thing, finding something
where you least expect it. Out of the
blue, out of a movie awash with pedestrian dialogue, comes a line so profound
it detonates inside your brain. Ryan turns to his men and says:
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OBAMA THE ZAVUA |
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Written by Jack Kelly
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Monday, 09 June 2008 |
The half life of a Barack Hussein Obama campaign pledge is
getting shorter.
Last Wednesday (6/04), Sen. Obama spoke before the American
Israel Public Affairs Committee. Though the group is predominantly
Democrat, Sen. Obama wanted to reassure it, because many AIPAC members know he
has chosen as his foreign policy advisers and spiritual mentors people who have
said unkind things about Israel.
Reassure them he did. "Jerusalem will remain the
capital of Israel, and it must remain undivided," Sen. Obama told AIPAC.
The next day, however, after receiving criticism from,
among others, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, Sen. Obama's
campaign issued a "clarification."
And that is just the start of his hypocrisy regarding Israel.
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THE VAPID MESSIAH |
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Written by Jack Kelly
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Thursday, 12 June 2008 |
Sen. Barack Hussein Obama celebrated clinching the Democratic nomination
with a speech from the convention center in St. Paul. Future generations,
he told his adoring audience, will look back upon that night and say:
"this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our
planet began to heal..."
Canute the Great (995-1035), the Viking king of England,
Denmark and Norway, is reputed to have waded into the ocean and ordered the
waves to recede. Canute, who was actually a pretty modest guy for a king,
didn't really expect the water to obey. He staged the scene to teach a
lesson about the limits of a king's powers to sycophantic courtiers.
But Sen. Obama apparently wasn't kidding.
It'd be hard enough for a President Obama to bring
peace to the Middle East and carbon free energy independence to the United
States without regulating sea levels too.
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IPHONES AND WIKIS |
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Written by Mark Gilligan
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Thursday, 12 June 2008 |
Apple announced
Monday June 9th at the World Wide Developer Conference that the new iPhone would be released for sale on
July11th, 2008. While the original iPhone release was slick and had a great
touch interface, it missed the business niche market. The new device should
fill those missing elements nicely. Here is why.
The new phone
has GPS, which is a big plus for the business traveler. It also will provide
metadata to an image captured with its built-in camera to provide your exact
location where the image was taken.
Lets talk 3G. The iPhone with 2.0 software will
cruise nicely on 3G networks which the rest of the world has been doing for a
while. AT&T, the iPhone's exclusive carrier in the US has bumped up their
networks to 3G levels in all major markets. The effect of this is downloading
files, watching UTube videos, and email attachments will now be quicker.
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OBAMA FAN |
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Written by To The Point News
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Thursday, 12 June 2008 |
A teacher in Elmira, New York asked her 5th grade
class how many of them were Obama fans.
Not really knowing what an Obama fan was, but wanting to be liked by the
teacher, all the kids raised their hands.
Except for Johnny.
The teacher asked, "Johnny, why did you
decide to be different from the rest of the class?"
Johnny explained, "Because I'm not an Obama fan."
The teacher asked, "Well, Johnny, why aren't you an Obama
fan?"
Johnny explained, "Because I'm a Republican."
The teacher asked, "Why are you a Republican, Johnny?"
Johnny answered, "Well, my mom's a Republican and my dad's a Republican, so I'm a Republican."
With a smirk that made the class giggle, the teacher asked,
"Johnny, if your mom was a moron and your dad was an idiot, what would that make you?"
A huge smile broke out across Johnny's face.
"That," he happily replied, "would make me an Obama fan!"
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THE MCCAIN-HILLARY PACT TO SCREW OBAMA |
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Written by Dr. Jack Wheeler
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Thursday, 05 June 2008 |
The Democrat Circus continues to be the zaniest show in
town. Obambi exults the nomination is
barely his while Hillary the Loser angrily demands she be his
running-mate.
Angrily demanding something is rarely the most effective
negotiating technique to get what you want.
A smart person will use it only when both the anger and the demand are a
pretense, when you want your demand rejected, not accepted.
Yes, intimidation often works when your opponent is a pussy.
Obambi is indeed a pussy, and voters'
suspicion that he is would only be confirmed if he capitulated to Clinton
intimidation - which is why he has to reject her, even though he knows she
wants to be rejected.
It's not complicated once it's understood what Hillary's
game plan is now - and the pact she's making with John McCain to achieve it. So the plan works like this.
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O = ZERO |
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Written by Dr. Jack Wheeler
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Thursday, 05 June 2008 |
To The Point is proud to present its candidate for
Best Bumper Sticker of 2008:
The O-man, Barack Hussein Obama, is an eloquently tailored
empty suit. No résumé, no
accomplishments, no experience, no original ideas, no understanding of how the
economy works, no understanding of how the world works, no balls, nothing but
abstract empty rhetoric devoid of real substance.
He has no real identity.
He is half-white, which he rejects.
The rest of him is mostly Arab, which he hides but is disclosed by his
non-African Arabic surname and his Arabic first and middle names as a way to
triply proclaim his Arabic parentage to people in Kenya. Only a small part of him is African Black
from his Luo grandmother, which he pretends he is exclusively.
What he isn't, not a genetic drop of, is "African-American,"
the descendant of enslaved Africans brought to America chained in slave
ships. He hasn't a single ancestor who
was a slave. Instead, his Arab
ancestors were slave owners.
Slave-trading was the main Arab business in East Africa for centuries
until the British ended it.
Let that sink in: Obambi
is not the descendant of slaves, he is the descendant of slave owners. Thus he makes the perfect Liberal Messiah.
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HALF-FULL REPORT 06/06/08 |
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Written by Dr. Jack Wheeler
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Friday, 06 June 2008 |
It's pretty obvious what most needs to be celebrated this
week: that unless she manages to have
Obambi rubbed out in the next few months, the nightmare of President Pantsuit
has been postponed to at least 2012...
... We need to celebrate something else that crashed
and burned like the Clintons this week:
the greatest piece of fascist legislation since the 16th
Amendment, the Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act...
... We need to follow this victory up now with a Pro-CO2
Movement, extolling the extraordinary benefits of more CO2 in
our atmosphere - such as wiping out hunger.
As we discussed in Solar Warming
back in September 2005...
... The best way to produce more CO2 is to produce more of
what we need more of most: oil, oil and gas,
oil and gas and coal. Thus the HFR is
grateful to the US Geological Survey and the Minerals Management Service
(USGS/MMS) of the Interior Department for releasing its current
assessment of our country's oil and gas resources...
... One thing the world needs a lot more of is Moslems
converting to Christianity. Which is
why a shocked HFR hoists an amazed glass to the Church of England, which announced
it is launching a campaign
specifically targeting Moslem for conversion...
... and the HFR has lots more this week.
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FIRE AND NICE FOR MCCAIN'S VP |
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Written by Jack Kelly
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Wednesday, 04 June 2008 |
Who? When? Republicans, including Sen. McCain himself I would imagine,
are asking these questions about his selection of a vice presidential
candidate.
Ideally, a presidential candidate wants a running mate who
will help him win the election, and (maybe) to govern afterwards. But
most will settle for a veep who isn't a drag on the ticket, as Dan Quayle was
for the first President Bush.
Traditionally, a presidential nominee has chosen a running
mate to balance the ticket geographically, or to appease a faction of the
party. The most successful example of this was when John F. Kennedy
picked Lyndon Johnson, though neither liked the other, and LBJ joined the
ticket only because he thought Kennedy would lose.
Bill Clinton broke with this tradition when he chose another
young (purported) moderate from a neighboring southern state. By picking
Al Gore, he hoped to reinforce his campaign theme of generational change.
Which way will Sen. McCain go? The potential running mates
most often discussed have downsides nearly as great as their upsides. There's an exception, however, who has virtually
no downside. Those conservatives who've heard of her - yes, her - were
delighted to learn that McCain advance man Arthur Culvahouse was in Alaska
recently, because they surmised he could only be there to discuss the vice
presidential nomination with Gov.
Sarah Palin.
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THE RIVER'S EDGE |
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Written by Neal Asbury
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Friday, 06 June 2008 |
As I stood on the balcony of my 17th floor hotel
room in Jakarta, Indonesia, I was fixated on a sea of orange clay roofs stretching
several blocks. These roofs covered shacks with dirt floors and no running
water.
A putrid brown river swerved
through the kampong (shanty-town). I could see bubbles frothing on the surface
as the garbage below decayed. Skimpily dressed children waded in and splashed
each other. At times they would fall and disappear underneath the brown
murkiness then quickly reappear laughing uncontrollably.
Mothers crouching over tin basins
washed clothes while others built small fires from dried wood to cook their
evening meals in stock pots filled with water from the river. This open
cesspool was both life and death.
The countless millions of mothers
I have seen on Third World river edges have no chance for a better life. The resources
needed to provide clean water, sewerage, healthcare, education and nutrition
are being sucked out of the economy through the enormous cost of corruption.
Poverty and corruption are one in
the same. So let me tell you
about the one way we as Americans can alleviate both.
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DOING BUSINESS WITH THE FRENCH |
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Written by Mercury Traveler
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Friday, 06 June 2008 |
Traveling to Paris in search of business for a Belgian steel mill, after trying 14 days to find the
responsible person in the ministry of energy, I sent a telex to the
"Director General of the ministry of Energy, department Coal Mines",
even though I hadn't a clue what his name was.
Arriving unannounced the next morning at the ministry I
bluntly show my telex to a clerk with a pretentious uniform, and, miracle of
miracles, he calls somebody who calls somebody and another uniformed clerk
appears who guides me through the portals of heaven.
I am ushered in a palatial office, compared to which the Oval Office is a
cubicle, and I am introduced to a rotund gentleman behind a massive desk:
Director General Vautran of the French Coal Mines. My telex had specified why I
wanted to see this Emperor of the French Mines.
He looks at me and my young face, asks me my age and:
"Do you drink wine?" I admit that I like a glass from time to time and let slip
that my father-in-law is a wine merchant. He ducks behind his imperial desk and
hauls a 5 liter (1½ gallon) belly bottle of wine, fills two glasses, hands me
one, says "santé" and gulps his down. It is not quite 9 o'clock in the morning.
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TWITTER |
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Written by mg
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Friday, 06 June 2008 |
Have you heard
of the service on the web called Twitter? It's a service for you, your
friends, and co-workers to stay connected by exchanging quick frequent answers to
one simple question, such as WHAT are you doing?
It's marketed as
social networking and "micro-blogging," but is also useful for other
communications. It is usually limited to 140 characters per string of
communication, which keeps it short and simple.
Let's say that
you and group of colleagues are working on a project that has you scattered
over the continent. With Twitter it's possible to update everyone or request a
quick answer, pertinent to all with a "tweet." To find out more or actually use
Twitter go here: Twitter
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LIFE IN CHINA |
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Written by To The Point News
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Friday, 06 June 2008 |
With the news that any group of folks incurring the
displeasure of the Chicom government during their coming-out party this summer
will be subjected to LRAD - incredibly painful bursts of sound from a Long
Range Acoustical Device for crowd dispersal - can't you just hardly wait to
attend the Beijing Genocide Olympics?
In addition to LRAD, you could get beat up, your computer
confiscated, money and credit cards stolen, and have other enjoyable
experiences at the hands of government goons if you do something they don't
like. The Chicoms call it Olympic
Hospitality.
Best of all, you'll get to experience Life in China Today. Like taking a commuter train ride with all
these up-and-coming Chuppies, Chinese young urban professionals transforming their
country. Here's a video of what it's
like to be one of them. Aren't you glad
you're not?
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BLUE PLANET IN GREEN SHACKLES |
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Written by Vaclav Klaus
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Thursday, 29 May 2008 |
[Vaclav Klaus is President of
the Czech Republic]
It is a great pleasure to
announce the English translation of my book Blue
Planet in Green Shackles, published by the Competitive Enterprise
Institute.
Authors often claim their books
speak for themselves. I cautiously agree and will, therefore, speak not about
the book itself but about my motivations to write it.
My thinking today is
substantially influenced by the fact that I spent most of my life under a
Communist regime which ignored and brutally violated human freedom, which
wanted to command not only people but also nature itself.
To "command wind and rain" is
one of the famous slogans I remember since my childhood. This experience taught
me that freedom and rational dealing with the environment are indivisible. It
formed my views on the fragility and vulnerability of free society and gave me
a special sensitivity to all kinds of factors which may endanger it.
I do not, however, live in the
past and do not see the future threats to free society coming from the old and
old-fashioned communist ideology. The name of the new danger will undoubtedly
be different, but its substance will be very similar.
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HALF-FULL REPORT 053008 |
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Written by Dr. Jack Wheeler
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Friday, 30 May 2008 |
Wasn't it just a couple of weeks ago that the HFR was trying
to shake a couple of drops out of its far-from-even-half-full glass? Well, fill up the flagon, barkeep, we're
going to hoist a few this week.
We have a selection of heroes to toast. Let's start with a tankard of Pilsner
Urquell for the President of the Czech Republic, Vaclav Klaus...
We follow that with a chalice of Brennan 2006
Viognier with its bouquet of bluebonnets and West Texas crude to that good
ol' boy from Wichita Falls, Rex Tillerson, chairman of Exxon-Mobil...
Finally, a tumbler of Glen Morangie
single-malt (no defiling it with ice or water - the Scots consider that a
"mixed drink") to a spy coming in from the cold, CIA Director Michael Hayden...
That's the last of the good stuff for now. The HFR pours instead a cup of contempt for
bimbo-airhead actress Sharon Stone...
Here's the fun episode of the week. The HFR guzzles a goblet of glee over
Obambi's latest embarrassment, Father Michael Pfleger...
Let's close with a potpourri of good news, because if drank
to each one we'd get seriously wasted...
One last item.
Your humble HFR author takes personal satisfaction in the new movie, Indiana
Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
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