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Showing posts from 2015

A Quick Opinion on the Patriot Act

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As many of you may know, I, T. Hyphen Asterisk, was in the Navy for over 30 years both active and reserve. The entirety of my career was spent "behind the green door" in secure spaces. In my case, the green door was entire buildings, but for many of my fellow sailors, it could have been a cramped, closet sized compartment on a ship or a sub. Nevertheless, the intelligence which we gathered gave the US and our allies the edge in putting the Cold War to bed (despite the best efforts of traitors such as Aldrich Ames, Ronald Pelton and the Navy's scourge, John Walker .) After joining the Navy Reserve, my assignment was to a unit which worked in and around the NSA in this iconic building. One of the missions which our organization was assigned to prosecute was Own Force Monitoring or OFM. If you have ever been on a military base, you certainly saw the stickers on every telephone reminding you that your conversations may be subject to monitoring. Well, guess who did the mon

Bad messaging, that's all it was

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All of the brouhaha here , here , here , here and here , about  Indiana over the Religious Freedom Restoration Act is really much ado about nothing. First, one thing I can say without reservation is that conservatives SUCK at messaging. SUCK! Conservatives care about the end result, not the journey to get there. Liberals know how to spin and are willing to spend years in the wilderness as they slow chip away at the edifice of social norms. George Stephanopolous' well orchestrated attack on Gov. Mike Pence on This Week, last Sunday was no accident. Pence had to have known that he would be punching the tar baby. Why he chose to subject himself to such a set-up is puzzling. As George kept baiting him with the question "Under this law, is it legal for a florist to deny service to a same-sex couple citing religious reasons?" and later "So, answer yes or no, is it OK to discriminate against gays in Indiana?", the governor was not going to take the bait, so he

Could I Possibly Be Agreeing with Frank Underwood???

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For those of you without a Netflix account, shame on you! That means that you likely have never watched House of Cards . Kevin Spacey's exquisitely played character, Francis J. Underwood, is the protagonist of this series, now in its third season. Caution: Spoiler Alert. Plot twists ahead. To call Frank Underwood "ambitious" would be like calling Donald Trump "an achiever." Underwood grew up poor in rural Gafney, South Carolina, went to college at The Sentinal (Citadel, anyone?), then ended up running for Congress in South Carolina's 5th District after marrying Claire, a young, well-to-do college girl from suburban Dallas. In Season 1 he was the House Majority (Democrat) Whip. Denied his promised Secretary of State position after helping with the election of President Garrett Walker, and feeling double-crossed, he and Claire went on a conniving and scheming (and somewhat murderous) tear in Washington DC. In Season 2, as a classic manipulator and pul

Does Obama Love America?

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I will probably "step in it" on this one, but I wanted to comment on former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani's recent, rather un-PC comment that President Barack Obama doesn't "love America". It was quite a dumb thing for a seasoned politician to say even if it was a private event (ask Mitt "47%" Romney about that) unless he really wanted to evoke comment and controversy. When Giuliani attempted to walk his comment back last week, he really didn't say what I think he really meant. Let me see if I can "help" him with that effort. President Obama loves America. He would just love it to be different and it is his love for the country he knows America could be that he twice ran for, and was elected as its President. Less than a week before his election in 2008, Barack Obama told the world, “We are five days away from fundamentally transforming the United States of America.” Certainly, no one can argue that he has not been rathe

Je Suis Iowa

I just read this insightful piece  (not inciteful , well... maybe a tiny bit inciteful) by Kurt Schlichter. It is entitled, "Ignoring Conservatives = President Hillary" It is about how Republican presidential candidates will ignore conservatives at their own peril. My takeaway from the article, though, is what he wrote in the second part of the piece under Lessons Three and Four. It is about how candidates need to use social media for more than 140 character fluff pieces. I would have titled the article "Je Suis Iowa", but since the Townhall.com editors didn't choose that name, I took it! I have followed Kurt on Twitter for many years and he has followed me since way back in the day. His acerbic wit and biting commentary make following him fun, and his ability to toy with trolls like a cat plays with a wounded field mouse never fails to entertain. He knows Twitter and knows how to use it, so his suggestion on how candidates can connect with potential voters i