Birth Control Mandate is Just the Beginning

You could be a stone-cold atheist or a fervent pro-choice secularist with low opinion of organized religion and still be outraged about the Obama administration's latest effort to trample on religious liberty guaranteed by the First Amendment. Now comes reports that the administration may revamp its birth control mandate policy after the uproar.

In an excellent editorial Wednesday, The Wall Street Journal warns Americans to get used to such  ObamaCare dictates that will be imposed by U.S. Department of Health and Human Services bureaucrats:

The country is being exposed to the raw political control that is the core of the Obama health-care plan, and Americans are seeing clearly for the first time how this will violate pluralism and liberty....

Practicing this kind of compulsion is routine and noncontroversial within [HHS Secretary] Sebelius's ministry. That may explain why her staff didn't notice that the birth-control rule abridges the First Amendment's protections for religious freedom. Then again, maybe HHS thought the public had become inured to such edicts, which have arrived every few weeks since the Affordable Care Act passed...

HS tried to sell it as a compromise when it was announced, and in any case HHS would revive this coercion whenever it is politically convenient some time in Mr. Obama's second term. Religious liberty won't be protected from the entitlement state until ObamaCare is repealed.

 The Journal also notes that "The Catholic left was one of ObamaCare's great enablers."

Here is Next Media Animation's take on the controversy:



Regardless of your opinion of sometimes erratic Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann, the former GOP presidential candidate, she was right on target when she said that government control of healthcare is the crown jewel of socialism.

Help Wanted: The TSA is Looking for a Few Good Gropers

The spring/summer travel season is right around the corner, and the TSA--the U.S. Transportation Security Administration--has a new recruitment video for airport security officers.

Actually this video is satire by "Health Ranger" Mike Adams and naturalnews.com.




According to many passengers, TSA also stands for "thousands standing around" or "total sexual assault" among other nicknames.

Did Tim Tebow and Tom Brady Vote for Rick Santorum in Minnesota?

GOP presidential candidate Rick Santorum won last night's Minnesota caucus. A caucus requires people to show up in person in contrast to an actual primary or general election.

Coincidentally, James O'Keefe's lastest video on vote fraud shows how Tim Tebow and Tom Brady and anyone else can register to vote absentee in Minnesota with no verification.

Minnesota is, of course, the state that narrowly "elected" Stuart Smalley to the U.S. Senate after a shady recount.


 

Police Taser Non-Compliant McDonald's Drive-Thru Customer

                                  photo credit: Manila Daily Photo via photopin cc

The lull in fast-food freakouts was only temporary. A North Carolina woman who cut in line at a McDonald's drive-thru last Friday apparently resisted arrest and was Tasered by police.



And in Pennsylvania, a man allegedly stabbed his brother with a steak knife in a dispute over a McDonald's brownie.

The Oscars Broadcast--Must Miss TV?

                                         photo credit: cliff1066™ via photopin cc

The Academy Awards ceremony is coming up later this month, but other than the fashion police who will be working an overtime detail, does anyone really take the Oscars seriously anymore?

For one thing, as is usually the case, hardly anyone went to see the films nominated for Best Picture. One could also argue that in general the content--as well as the box office--is also anemic. And many of today's actors seem to lack a commanding presence on the screen.

At PJMedia, author/screenwriter Andrew Klavan provides some perspective about how the Oscars are "sinking into irrelevance."

It’s also true that Hollywood’s left-wing and feminist agendas alienate the industry from the mainstream..But low-watt stars, dishonest leftism, and hectoring feminism may be the symptoms of the art form’s decay rather than the causes. Technology and time may have killed the business and leftists and feminists may be the maggots feeding on its corpse — all that remains after the best writers and actors have headed for television, and the brilliant visual guys go into video gaming and apps.

In an unrelated article on National Review Online, historian Victor Davis Hanson notes that Hollywood movers-and-shakers are among the biggest supporters of what he calls "Obamaism," despite the fact that "Hollywood predicates much of its production on the basis of non-union locations."

While dwindling, the Oscars still get decent TV ratings, but the trend is not their friend. Will you be watching this year?

Happy 101st Birthday, Mr. President

Ronald Reagan, the nation's 40th president, would be 101 years old today:

Watching Something Other Than The Super Bowl

                                                            photo credit: .criga. via photopin cc                                            
Last night's Super Bowl got huge ratings, but unlike most Americans, we were watching something else: episodes of the TV series Breaking Bad on Netflix instant download.

We're late to the party since the series premiered in 2008, but the episodes are addicting--if that's okay to say about an edgy show about drug dealers.

Situational ethics gone wild, Breaking Bad has to be one of the best shows that has come along in a long time. The subject matter is not for everyone, but the writing, acting, cinematography, editing, etc., are all first rate.

Bryan Cranston, the crazy dentist from Seinfeld (see below), plays Walter White, a straight-laced high school chemistry teacher in Albuquerque, New Mexico, who jumps into meth manufacturing to create a nest egg for his family after he's gone. (The White character has lung cancer). With one horrendous and dangerous mishap after another, the show is intense, but it also contains some very dark humor.

The actors, starting with Cranston as the show's top meth chef anti-hero, do a wonderful job, and the writing and the generally unpredictable plotting gives the characters a fuller dimension. This includes White's relationship with his wife (who he must constantly lie to to keep his meth moonlighting under wraps) played by Anna Gunn, and his contentious quasi-father-son relationship with his meth-lab partner Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul). The sleazy criminal defense lawyer played by Bob Odenkirk is another great character.

Perhaps the most interesting dynamic is supplied by White's brother in law, Hank Schrader (Dean Norris) who just happens to be a DEA agent. The Schrader character comes across as an oaf, but he is also a solid, loyal friend as well as a crafty law enforcement operative (whose investigations, at least through the end of season two, have yet to make the connection between meth kingpin "Heisenberg" and a member of his own family.

You have to watch the show from the start; it's not the kind of series that you can pick up in the middle. But remember; it's easy to get "hooked."