QC Examiner

George Will had an editorial a while back about the value of beer. In his words, “No beer, no civilization”.

Will goes so far as to say that “Beer is a health food. And you do not need to buy it from those wan, unhealthy-looking people, who peerng through rimless Trotsky-style spectacles, seem to run all the health food stores.”

But better still, Will quotes wise old Benjamin Franklin: Beer is living proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.”

My personal favorite is Stella Artois, but Dave thinks it’s “severely overrated.”

Maybe Stella is just a girly beer, but hey—I’m a grrrl!

In what is obviously a case of projection, Nancy Pelosi called President Bush a “total failure” who was “losing all credibility with the American people.”

What a hoot! Bush’s approval rating is around 26% while Congress’ approval rating is around 14-9%

But let’s look at the facts, not just Democrat talking points. What has the Democrat Congress accomplished? A raise in the minimum wage? Some fringe thing about Medicaid? What else?

What has Bush accomplished? Troop funding for the war in Iraq, FISA, etc.

Pelosi promised a program to lower gas prices, to end the war in Iraq, to have the most ethical congress in history, etc.—all the Democrat promises were broken within the first six months of Democrat rule of Congress. But of course, it’s not their fault—-it’s Bush’s!

OK, sure, whatever.

I’m convinced that when further study is done about DNA it will be proven that all Democrats lack an “accountability gene”!

In yet another liberal “World Ends, Women and Minorities Hurt Most” story, taxpayer funded NPR has a story about Ohio residents Gloria Nunez and her daughter Angelica Hernandez and how they are coping with the economy.

Neither are employed and depend on the government for assistance. The caring, compassionate NPR delivers the obligatory cliche that “low-income families in Ohio say they are particularly hard hit by the changes in the economy.”

But unfortunately for the NPR agenda, 19 year old Angelica has NEVER had a job.

As usual in these pieces, the kicker is at the end when NPR says that the rising cost of food means that Nunez’ money gets her about 1/3 fewer bags of groceries (since when, they don’t say) so she and her daughter are cutting back on meat and don’t buy ice cream anymore.

Now if this was just radio you might be inclined to feel some sympathy for Nunez/Hernandez. But thanks to the wonders of the internet, we get to see what Nunez and her daughter look like—and it looks like a vegetarian diet with less ice cream might be a good thing!

. . .he found out he was a lobbyist.

Disabled veteran Max Cleland, a former Senator from Georgia, was invited by Obama to join him at a fundraiser in Atlanta on July 8—-until Obama found out Cleland was an eeeeevil lobbyist.

You might be asking what evil endeavor Cleland is now lobbying for? An eeeevil company whose products are aimed at helping soldiers recover more quickly from battlefield injuries. There otta be a law!

Here’s the lame@ss excuse an Obama shill had for disinviting Cleland: “If we make exceptions, we will open ourselves to criticism.”

Sheesh!

I have never seen a politician so afraid and paranoid of criticism. I predict if Obama is elected, he will have a nervous breakdown within 6 months of inauguration.

No matter how purdy he talks, he just does not have the temperament to be POTUS—-and he’s proving it every day.

According to a press release, our specially selected congressman is holding a press conference today in Moline to discuss Congress’ recent extension of unemployment benefits.

I thank the gods every day that I have never been on unemployment, even though I have been unemployed. You see, I always made sure I had money saved to pay 2-3 months of bills. But let’s get real, saving money and being responsible is for suckers.

A more typical example would be my hapless sister, who after receiving months of unemployment benefits, didn’t bother to start looking for a job until AFTER her unemployment checks stopped coming. Of course she asked me for money to tide her over while she searched for employment. I gotta say, I felt like the little red hen.

And so it goes—-the responsible finance the irresponsible and the politicians prance and preen and boast that they are doing good works by “helping” the irresponsible—with other people’s money!

The Dispatch used the occasion of the recent death of Archie McCardell to revisit the travesty of the IH Farmall strike that ultimately brought down the company and caused the loss of tens of thousands of jobs nationwide.

The article is pretty balanced considering it is heavily slanted to the union side, but even the union acknowledges they made mistakes. Of course they blame McCardell more.

The strike began in November of 1979 and at that point I had not lived in the QCs very long. Before moving here I had always lived in right to work states and that shaped my opinion of unions. Moving to pro-union Illinois did nothing to dispel my negative opinion of unions—it reinforced it.

This strike was the first domino to fall. When the new contract was signed in 1980 “a national recession was under way, interest rates were high and farm income had plunged.” By l986 IH no longer existed. It was the wrong time for the unions to clash with farm equipment manufactures but as one former UAW official said “(t)hat strike could have been avoided with a little better relations (between the union and the company). . .But in those days we were all too willing to lower our heads and kick each other’s asses.”

The result of this “kick ass” attitude was divorce, bankruptcy, suicide, lost homes and more.

I never have and never will join a union, but the one thing I remember from that time is some wild-eyed union activist shrieking on TV that the union was “gonna shut ‘em down”.

He got his wish.

. . .because I have a John McCain kinda humor.

McCain is always getting in hot water over comments and jokes he makes that are un-PC. I takes a man whose character wasn’t forged in the touchy-feely ’70s to make jokes about waterboarding, using cigarettes to kill our enemies and ugly jokes about a Democrat’s daughter.

It would be easy enough to dismiss his biting, sharp humor as just being from another era, but Ronald Reagan was from another era too; the difference is that Reagan wasn’t a Navy pilot and McCain was. While the US military has become kinder and gentler, that was not McCain’s era.

Former Nebraska Senator Bob Kerrey sees McCain’s jokes as a “healthy irreverence for the stuffy, politically correct ‘You can’t say that’.” He also adds that “It’s a lot harder to tell jokes than it used to be.”

I’d say The New Yorker would second that.

The Dispatch has another story about the sorry saga of the Democrat controlled Illinois government.

In what the Dispatch characterizes as an “empty gesture”, the Illinois House left Springfield yesterday after voting to restore $480 million in budget cuts that Blago had imposed. The Illinois Senate is “not expected to concur”, so our state remains held hostage by the oversized egos of the Democrat Axis of Evil: Blago, Jones and Madigan.

But the real kicker is at the very end of the article. Since he has no political opponent in the November election (and never has had) and therefore has nothing to lose, the Democrat Politburo trots out Rep. Pat Verschoore to deliver the Democrat’s message:

“Our taxes are much lower than surrounding states. People want great services, but they don’t want to pay for them. The state needs more money.”

Uh, no the state doesn’t need more money, it needs to use the money it has more wisely.

We don’t mind paying for “great services” but we DO mind paying for state waste, fraud, corruption, cronyism, undeserved raises, etc.

Verschoore is just softening us up for what will obviously be coming after the November election—Democrat controlled government doing what Democrats love to do best—-tax the bejeebus out of us!

Here’s a novel concept: rather than raise taxes, why don’t our elected/selected officials just do their damned job.

OK, this is hilarious in a sick, tacky kind of way.

If you’re one of those easily offended humorless Obama worshipers, I’d advise you not to go to the link—the rest of you enjoy the hoot!

Terronez says officer was justified in East Moline shooting.