Mothers Against Drunk Driving is asking for DUI checkpoints in Minnesota:

Mothers Against Drunk Driving gave Minnesota low marks in its new state-by-state evaluation of DWI laws.

To be fair and accurate, MADD will dock points from any state that doesn’t allow law enforcement to perform random no-knock breathalyzer and urinalysis raids in the middle of the night.

No, almost:

MADD, in particular, calls upon state lawmakers to legalize sobriety checkpoints, writing that they “will give law enforcement the tools needed to cut drunk driving fatalities.” (The organization also recommends requiring ignition interlocks for all convicted DWI offenders.)

Minnesota is currently one of just 12 states that doesn’t allow law enforcement to conduct sobriety checkpoints.

Clearly there’s a drunk driving crisis in Minnesota.

Well, no.  There’s not.  Minnesota is well below the national average in the percentage of automobile deaths related to alcohol and alcohol impairment.

And despite MADD’s blandishments, there’s considerable evidence that random checkpoints aren’t especially effective at getting drunk drivers off the road, much less saving lives, as compared to the perfectly effective roving patrols.

Alcohol-related deaths on the road are down nearly 50% in the past 25 years.

But if MADD thinks shoving the police state’s foot in the door up to the knee by gutting the Fourth Amendment even more is the answer, maybe it’s time for America’s voters to send them off to political happy hour.

Joe Doakes from Como Park emails:

Of the 501 (c)(4) organizations selected by the IRS for scrutiny, 83% were right-leaning.  Of those selected for audit, 100% were right-leaning.

This is known in Democrat circles as “coincidence.”

Joe Doakes

Indeed, a “random act of Goddess”.

Just a couple of things from the news.

Crises, Crises Everywhere:  Some libs claim that conservatives are “paranoid” for planning ahead against massive public dislocation in the event of major crises.

I say “it’s only paranoia if it’s not fully justified by the minor crises“.      

On Your Neck Forever: Some libs claim that conservatives are “paranoid” for not trusting government – especially government’s intentions toward dissidents.

I say “it’s only paranoia if it’s not absolutely accurate and true“.

Imperious:  Some libs say conservatives are “paranoid” for concerning themselves with Barack Obama’s expansion of presidential powers.

I say “it’s only paranoid if it’s not playing out righit in front of us as we speak“.     Or if our country weren’t developing a two-tiered law-enforcement system – one for the political haves, one for the political have nots – before our very eyes.   

On  Your Neck, Forever – Part II:  Some libs claim that conservatives are “parnaoid” – or  even “traitors” – for believing that government and its agents need to be strictly limited, lest it run amok. 

I say “it’s only paranoia if it’s not virtually a physical law.  And if this is treason, then it’s the same “treason” our Founding Fathers engaged in.

No, you heard me right – virtually a physical law.

Yes, it is.

Joe Doakes from Como Park emails:

The federal government has rules on who gets a pilot’s license. Most pilots think the rules set the standards too high, especially for little planes used in recreational flight.

Minimum 40 hours behind-the-wheel lessons, a medical exam, written exam, oral exam, and a flying test to demonstrate not just ordinary flying, but also emergency maneuvers and navigation over unfamiliar territory, all for a private pilot’s license to fly a little Cessna. The requirements for lessons and testing get harder the bigger your airplane, or what purpose you’re flying for.

If we applied the same standards to other recreational vehicles such as boats, motorcycles and 4-wheelers, nobody would ever use one.

The feds claim they only want to ensure safety. Setting the standard so high nobody can meet it means nobody takes off, so nobody crashes, so perfect safety is achieved.

I guess that’s how they’ll pay for Obama-care . . . nobody will ever get hurt again so it won’t cost anything to heal them.

And all we’ve lost is . . . our freedom.

Joe Doakes

Obama is betting long on the idea that the only “freedom” anyone really cares about anymore is “from want”.

Am I the only one struck by the bitter, almost depraved, irony of the Vatican being attacked over a child sex abuse scandal and cover-up…

…by the United Nations?

Joe Doakes from Como Park emailed:

Congress foolishly passed laws that allow payday lenders to help poor people make it from one paycheck to the next.  President Obama – who vowed before God to faithfully execute the laws enacted by Congress – doesn’t like that one (never has; when he was in the Illinois legislature, Obama backed legislation to ban payday loans).

Suddenly, federal bureaucrats have set about to undermine the law allowing payday loans and now to stonewall Congressional questions about it.

President Obama will learn of the operation by reading the newspapers and begin blaming “rogue” agents in 5 . . . 4. . . .3 . . . .

Joe Doakes

The definition of totalitarian; everything that isn’t mandatory is “rogue”.

Joe Doakes from Como Park emails:

Operation Choke Point?  Never heard of it.  But it sounds believable, for this bunch.

You think that because we’re in America, you can do business with any other legal business you like?  No, the government will TELL you who you can do business with, and on what terms, or you’ll never do business again.

Sound like something you’d hear from a Chicago gangster?  Hmmm, I wonder why?

Joe Doakes

It’s the Washington way.

I’m going to commit to you this longish piece by Jason Harrington, “Dear America: I Saw You Naked“, from Politico.  It chronicles his time as a grad student marooned as a TSA screener at O’Hare. 

Of course, if you’re reading this blog, it’s likely as not you aren’t a huge TSA fan.  And for all that, there are probably things in Harrington’s piece that’ll still get you mad.

But I am linking to this because it’d seem Mr. Harrington and I must have met. 

Because this person:

Every now and then, a passenger would throw up two middle fingers during his or her scan, as though somehow aware of the transgressions going on.

That’s me. 

Every time I fly.

Joe Doakes from Como Park writes:

The First Amendment protects the freedom to speak on political subjects, if you say liberal things.

The First Amendment also protects religious freedom, unless you’re a Catholic nun.

The Second Amendment protects the right of the people to keep and bear arms, assuming you’re a Liberal.

The Fourth Amendment protects us from government snooping, except for electronic snooping.

The Fifth Amendment protects us from government taking our property without compensation, unless it can’t deliver?

Hey wait a minute, we skipped one.  What about the Third Amendment?  The Third Amendment says citizens can’t be forced to provide room and board for government troops – no “quartering” is allowed without my consent.  The way things are going in Washington these days, Obama probably will assign me troops and if I decline, he’ll make me to pay the cost of putting up the troops in the Ritz.  And it’ll be legal, as a tax.

I better get started on that basement apartment.

Joe Doakes

“If you like it, you’ll be able to keep your spare bedroom”

Joe Doakes from Como Park emails:

I was thinking of changing careers to become a writer but the Blue section represents an income of zerowhereas the $100,000 group is the sliver of Green.  Odds not looking so good to be a paid professional.  I think I’ll keep pelting Mitch with emails; he can publish what he likes and delete the rest.

The crazy thing about American copyright law is they assume nobody will write or sing or paint without guaranteed income from the performance.  But my experience is you can’t stop people from writing and singing and painting, just for the pleasure of it.  Sure, it’d be nice to make a few bucks to support the hobby, but artistic spirit is wholly unrelated to business management.  Mitch couldn’t stop writing even if he had to pay out of his own pocket for the privilege of keeping up the website to post his writings. [Wait, he does?  Well there you go, proves my point].

Which, by the way, is how I know Barak Obama didn’t write his own books.  He’s not a writer.  He’s a talker.  A very good talker, yes, but oral storytelling is a completely different artistic ability from writing.  Mitch can’t stop writing.  Obama can’t stop talking.  That’s just in their character.

And that makes me wonder . . . Hilary will be the next President.  What’s in her character?  What is it that she just can’t stop doing?

Joe Doakes

I was thinking of changing careers to become a writer but the Blue section represents an income of zerowhereas the $100,000 group is the sliver of Green.  Odds not looking so good to be a paid professional.  I think I’ll keep pelting Mitch with emails; he can publish what he likes and delete the rest.

The crazy thing about American copyright law is they assume nobody will write or sing or paint without guaranteed income from the performance.  But my experience is you can’t stop people from writing and singing and painting, just for the pleasure of it.  Sure, it’d be nice to make a few bucks to support the hobby, but artistic spirit is wholly unrelated to business management.  Mitch couldn’t stop writing even if he had to pay out of his own pocket for the privilege of keeping up the website to post his writings. [Wait, he does?  Well there you go, proves my point].

Which, by the way, is how I know Barak Obama didn’t write his own books.  He’s not a writer.  He’s a talker.  A very good talker, yes, but oral storytelling is a completely different artistic ability from writing.  Mitch can’t stop writing.  Obama can’t stop talking.  That’s just in their character.

And that makes me wonder . . . Hilary will be the next President.  What’s in her character?  What is it that she just can’t stop doing?

Joe Doakes 

Oh, what difference does it make?

Joe Doakes from Como Park emails:

Does this decision seem over-broad to you?

It doesn’t matter that the gun is in somebody else’s locked safe and you don’t have the key.  You’re still in possession because you could have burgled the safe.  How about the house next door?  He could have burgled that, too, or the gun store in Minneapolis.

And since when does the strength of the container determine who has possession of the contents?

Yes, I know, the guy’s a crook and the weapon is illegal.  So why bother with procedures? Just go ahead and punish him.  He’s probably a TEA Party member anyway, and a Christian besides.

Unless, of course, we actually care about limitations on government and due process and Rule of Law and all those other shyster lawyer loopholes that don’t mean a thing until suddenly the IRS, ATF, NSA and FBI are knocking at your door.

Joe Doakes

As the Obama Administration has shown us, sometimes it’s just easier to get forgiveness than permission.

Obama continues to work through his enemies list.  Historian and author Dinesh D’Souza is being indicted today on a piddly campaign finance charge:

D’Souza first learned he was being investigated in the middle of 2013, several months after 2016 had earned $33 million at the box office and become the second-most-popular political documentary in U.S. history. The film included an interview with Obama’s half-brother, George Obama, who was mildly critical of the president.

Molen says D’Souza is being singled out for “an alleged minor violation” in the same way the IRS reportedly targeted conservative Tea Party groups for retribution. “In light of the recent events and the way the IRS has been used to stifle dissent, this arrest should send shivers down the spines of all freedom-loving Americans,” Molen says.

D’Souza was in San Diego working on his next film and book, each to be called America, when he was informed he was about to be indicted and that he should fly to New York and turn himself in to authorities. The indictment came late Thursday, according to those with knowledge of the situation.

Look for a lot more of these political prosecutions in the next two years.

When people say “there’s no difference between the parties”, just answer “George W. Bush didn’t sic the IRS and the FEC on their opponents.  And I really doubt Mitt Romney would have, either”.

UPDATE:  The WaPo reminds us that John Edwards donor, accused of the precise same crime for the exact same amount, was prosecuted for a misdemeanor. 

Straw-donor cases have been brought against prominnent individuals from time to time. For example, in 2011, a prominent Los Angeles attorney, Pierce O’Donnell, pleaded guilty to misdemeanor chargest of making $20,000 in donations to the presidential campaign of former Sen. John Edwards and reimbursing straw donors.

Just saying.

UPDATE 2:  John Hinderaker at Power Line – an actual lawyer – on the Obama Administration’s larger pattern of gangster behavior.

Joe Doakes from Como Park emails:

If you speak out against Chris Christie for Governor, you get stuck in traffic for a while.

If you speak out against President Barak Obama, you get audited by the IRS, even if you’re dying of cancer.

Joe Doakes

In politics, people who think their ends justify their means are pretty much at the root of every evil, from planned traffic jams to the Holodomor.

Who did the best job of flensing Jamie Steihm’s bigoted and logically vapid attack in USNWR on SCOTUS justice Sonia Sotomayors’ siding with the law in allowing the Little Sisters of the Poor to define their own perspective on, um, Catholicism, faith and religion? 

Was it Elizabeth “The Anchoress” Scalia?

Was it Ed “The Captain” Morrissey? 

Why choose.  Read them both. 

The only thing I want to add to the whole flap?  Let’s not Catholicize this mess.  There are plenty of us Protestant goyim who object to having the state define the boundaries of our fath too.

“Affordable Housing” and “Diversity” are big chanting points of blue-state liberals.

Provided that the affordable housing, and the diverse people who pay for it, aren’t actually anywhere near you.

Upper West Side Manhattanites recoil at people living in RVs among them:

Farther uptown, on Central Park West — where the neighborhood’s most expensive rental, a town house with a pool, fetches a cool $75,000 a month — stands a 19-foot, 1975 Dodge Sportsman with gold rims and two cameras affixed to its exterior.

“It looks like it would fit more in the mountains of West Virginia than on the Upper West Side,” said area resident Ron Hoffman.

The Dodge owner, who only gave his name as Robert, refused to answer any questions.

Neighbors are puzzled by the RV’s windows, which are covered by gold curtains.

“He once told me he just uses it to store things — but if that’s the case, why would you have everything blacked out so you can’t see the person inside!” said longtime resident Bill Smith.

“I don’t think it should be here,” added Mario Parisi, 86. “We’re all waiting to park. Sitting there all the time is not a good idea — it’s a monster.”

Diversity is a wonderful thing.

Just not near us.

Janet Napolitano’s Department of Homeland Security; keeping us safe from pro-lifers, Second and Tenth Amendment activists, tax reformers…

…and purveyors of counterfeit sports paraphernalia.

Joe Doakes from Como Park emails:

Mathematics – particularly statistics – are racissss

A buddy of mine worries about the implications.  He says “Rahm Emmanual knows that to lower crime, he needs to alter the racial makeup of his community.  So Chicago – the hotbed of anti-gun libs and ground zero of violent crime in the US – will step up the efforts to ship Blacks to welfare-happy Minnesota, with Governor Deer-in-the-Headlights only too happy to meet them at the border with the key to the treasury.”

Nah, couldn’t be.

Joe Doakes

What the Czarist Russians did with Siberia…

Joe Doakes from Como Park emails:

This law purports to require society to be structured around the lowest common denominator but discriminates against people in comas, and those in an iron lung, and quadriplegics. Why are Canucks such haters?

Do they also require keys to be huge, like the key to a medieval church door, so frail hands get more leverage to turn them?

Is there no limit to societal engineering downward?

Joe Doakes

I’d suggest “dealing with crappy software” as one counterexample.

Remember – Berg’s Seventh Law has no known exceptions. 

When you have people like Heather Martens – who has never made a substantive true statement in her entire career – and Michael Paymar saying they feel intimidated by gun owners bringing legaly-owned, permitted firearms into the Capitol, you may be certain it’s to draw attention away from the American Left’s inherently thuggish approach to, well, everything. 

And you’d be right to assume it. 

Otherwise, it’d be called “Berg’s Seventh Theory”. 

The Select Committee on Capitol Security met yesterday. 

They moved to hire some new State Patrol and rent-a-cops.   There wasn’t a whole lot of controversy there, although Representative Woodard and Senator Ingebrigtsen noted that security in the parts of the Capitol that need it is already pretty good. 

But the reason reason people paid attention to yesterday’s meeting was because Rep. Michael Paymar intended to push his proposal to ban legally-carried firearms in Capitol complex buildings (the Capitol, the State Office Building and the Judicial building). 

 More than 800 Minnesotans have filed with the DPS to indicate that they have a permit to carry a firearm and may bring their pistol into the Capitol. Originally, the draft recommendation would have required gun owners to update that notification annually; at Ingebrigtsen’s urging, that timeframe was adjusted to renewing the notification every five years, and was adopted by the committee.

In other words, you renew your notification as often as you renew your permit.  Truth be told, I already thought I had to do that…

…if, hypothetically, I had a carry permit and desired to carry at the Capitol. 

After that bit of fairly sensible legislation, it was looney-time:

Paymar argued that the fact that the Capitol had so far been spared any violent altercations was not evidence that current safety measures are adequate.

“Having a ‘cross your fingers’ kind of policy coming out of this entity, which is charged with making recommendations about public safety on the Capitol complex, to me, is irresponsible,” said Paymar, who chairs the House Public Safety Finance and Policy Committee.

Mijnnesota’s carry-permit holders are the single constituency in Minnesota least likely to cause a problem , at the Capitol or anywhere else.  Ever  Period. 

No, seriously – Minnesotans at large commit murder at the rate a little over 2 per 100,000 people per year.  There’s been one unjustified homicide by a carry-permittee in ten years; the math breaks down to .1/5 million Minnesotans/year, or .002/100,000 annually.  That’s right around three orders of magnitude safer. 

Mr. Paymar would more aptly worry about one of his Saint Paul constituents – perhaps the many supporters of terrorist-accomplice Kathleen Soliah, who live in Paymar’s neighborhood and tacitly condoned her activities in the seventies – freaking out and killing people in the Capitol than the state’s legal carry permittees. 

No, this wasn’t done because of any danger, real or perceived or even fabricated.  This was done to try to try to salvage at least a smidgen of “Protect” MN’s narrative from this past session – the addlepated notion that legislators were “intimidated” by gun owners who carried openly and legally during last spring’s epic waste of taxpayer time hearings on Rep. Paymar, Hausman and Martens’ various gun grab bills.  The staff at Capitol Security refute that idea with prejudice; ask them for yourself. 

Emphasis added in this next bit:

Ingebrigtsen pushed back, and pointed out that Gov. Mark Dayton had already said publicly he does not favor a move to ban firearms in the Capitol.

“We’ve also got the governor saying the same thing,” Ingebrigtsen said. “[Dayton] doesn’t see anything wrong with law-abiding citizens carrying handguns on the Capitol complex.”

The vote fell, 2-2 (ties are counted as defeats); Lt. Governor Yvonne Prettner Solon (there’s a trivia question for you) and Paymar voted for it, Ingebrigtsen and Woodard voted nay, SCOM justice Lori Gildea abstained (she might have to hear a court case on the issue someday…)

…and Ann Rest, a DFL Senator from Plymouth who is as electorally bulletproof as an Armored Humvee, didn’t show up. 

Don’t think for a moment that was an accident.  Even safe DFLers are nervous about the Metrocrats’ insane obsession with disarming the law-abiding. 

Not that they’re going to stop them. 

No, that’s our job.  At the ballot box. 

(NOTE TO DFL LEGISLATORS:   If I had a carry permit, I doubt I’d ever carry openly.  It’s not my style.  But feel free to be intimidated – not by any gun I’d hypothetically carry, but by the fact that I can shred through every single actual factual assertion that Heather Martens and Richard Carlbom make about the gun control issue like a riding mower going through a daisy patch, and not break a sweat.  Be intimdated by the fact that if either Martens or Carlbom debated me, or any of 500 other gun rights advocates, in a face to face, open debate, I’d fold them up like origami swans and make them scamper away like scared bunnies.  Be intimidated by the fact that I, myself, have convinced liberal Democrats that you are wrong, and I’m just getting started.  Ignore any gun I might hypothetically be carrying.  Be intimidated by the weapon between my ears.  On this issue, your side is carrying a pellet pistol; I’ve got a .44 Magnum, and I don’t mean one of those wimpy four inch barrels, either)

John Edwards was right – there are Two Americas.

In one of them, people of means can get healthcare whenever and whereever they need to.

And in the other?  All the poor mopes who are jammed into Obamacare like Tokyo subway straphangers h take whatever they can and say “please, sir, may I have more?”:

As of this week, not one of the plans for sale on New York’s health benefit exchange would cover treatment at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, one of the world’s largest and most respected cancer hospitals.

That could mean that the 615,000 individuals and 450,000 small business employees expected to eventually get their insurance through the exchange would have to go someplace else for treatment, or pay the bill out of their own pockets.

Other premier city hospitals are in the networks of just a few of the new plans.

Now, if you voted for Obama, you should be Happy To Die Pointlessly For A More Level Healthcare Playing Field, and not bitch about it.  This was what you wanted.

For everyone else?  I’d rather keep my “substandard” plan, which doesn’t provide me prenatal care, but does, y’know, cover diseases I could conceivably get, if that’s OK.

And I’m sure it’s not.

I was going to title the piece “Rep. Heather Martens:  Her Lips Are Moving” – but now that Protect MN has hired Richard Carlbom, the PR father of gay marriage in Minnesota, I have to upgrade my approach.

Because while Representative Martens has never made a substantive true claim in all her years of working for victim disarmament in Minnesota, it’s time to start tracking Carlbom by the same standards.

An email went out to “Protect”MN supporters the other day.  Here was the money quote:

Click here to sign the petition urging our lawmakers to renew the Undetectable Firearms Act before it expires on December 9…

… Guns without a certain amount of metal can slip by metal detectors in public places. There is no reason responsible gun owners would need to have unconventional weapons like these. The Undetectable Firearms Act keeps guns that evade critical security measures off the streets. The law is set to expire on December 9. We urge legislators to renew the Undetectable Firearms Act to keep these dangerous guns away from airports, courtrooms, and other public places.

Now, the fact is that no such weapons have ever been produced.

And not only does every single gun owner know it, but so do the Feds.  Neither the Departments of the Treasury or Justice have ever enacted any regulations pursuant to the “Undetectable Firearms Act”…

…because there’s nothing to regulate.

Zilch.

The “Undetectable Firearms Act” is an utterly empty gesture.  It affects no crime.  It affects no manufacturing.  It is yet another empty gesture that groups like “Protect”MN flop in front of their ill-informed followers to give their shapeless concerns some rallying point.

I responded to the petition:

It’s not. This is empty legislation – even the feds have not bothered to enact any regulations due to this “act”, because *it refers to weapons that don’t exist*. There ARE no “undetectable firearms”.

“Protect”MN is lying. Again.

I think that sums it up.

Joe Doakes from Como Park emails:

The Obama Administration sicced the IRS on TEA Party-related fundraising groups so they couldn’t raise money to get the Conservative message out to voters for the 2012 elections.   It was voter suppression at the front end, by muzzling First Amendment rights.

 

Wisconsin Democrats are applying the same principle on the local level, harassing and intimidating Conservative groups to suppress their fundraising.  Expect Dog Gone to screech about the Koch Brothers any minute now, under Berg’s Law.

 

Joe Doakes

Sad to say, I do expect it.

Time was, people on both sides valued a vigorous debate.

That was before the Democrats were taken over by Alinskyites.

From the Declaration of Independence, with emphasis added :

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.–Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government.

From the Journal – again, with emphasis added:

Copies of two subpoenas we’ve seen demand “all memoranda, email . . . correspondence, and communications” both internally and between the subpoena target and some 29 conservative groups, including Wisconsin and national nonprofits, political vendors and party committees. The groups include the League of American Voters, Wisconsin Family Action, Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce, Americans for Prosperity—Wisconsin, American Crossroads, the Republican Governors Association, Friends of Scott Walker and the Republican Party of Wisconsin.

One subpoena also demands “all records of income received, including fundraising information and the identity of persons contributing to the corporation.” In other words, tell us who your donors are.

Oh, yeah – and since the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel may be one newspaper that might occasionally take its lips off of the Democrat party’s boy parts long enough to worry about that whole “holding government accountable” thing…:

The investigation is taking place under Wisconsin’s John Doe law, which bars a subpoena’s targets from disclosing its contents to anyone but his attorneys. John Doe probes work much like a grand jury, allowing prosecutors to issue subpoenas and conduct searches, while the gag orders leave the targets facing the resources of the state with no way to publicly defend themselves.

And hey, just in time for campaign season!

I’ve always tried to stay hopeful for the future of this country.  But it gets harder and harder every day.

Joe Doakes from Como Park emails:

It’s nice to have a modern leader in office.

In the olden days, Congress passed the laws and the President faithfully carried them out. Nowadays, Congress passes laws and the President does as he chooses. He faithfully carries out those parts of the law that he likes, when he feels like it, exempting friends and delaying implementation at whim. And if a problem arises, no need to go back to Congress for amendments, he changes the law of the land by press conference.

President isn’t really a fitting title for that sort of leader. King? Supreme Leader?

I’ll go with “Czar”.

They should give the Beltway media really snazzy uniforms. Like the Swiss Guard.