► Show Top 10 Hot Links

Posts Tagged ‘Texas’

RIP Johnny Winter (1944-2014)

by Bunk Five Hawks X ( 102 Comments › )
Filed under Music, OOT at July 19th, 2014 - 8:00 pm

Johnny Winter 1944-2014

Johnny Winter, legendary guitarist and one of the most recognizable icons of Texas blues and rock passed away at the age of 70 earlier this week after a long career.

In a documentary released this year entitled “Johnny Winter Down and Dirty,” he laughed, “Made my first record when I was 15, started playing clubs when I was 15. Started drinking and smoking when I was 15. Sex when I was 15. Fifteen was a big year for me.”

According to Wiki, at age 10 he and his 8 year old brother Edgar played on local TV in his hometown of Beaumont Texas. Johnny Winter performed for an astounding 60 years, and he died while on still on tour.

httpv://youtu.be/–Asd6Pq5gk


RIP, Johnny. You made our roadtrips hellalotta fun.

Let’s turn up the volume and put the pedal to the metal for this Saturday Night Edition of The Overnight Open Thread.

[Update: After scheduling this I see that Coldwarrior beat me to it, so consider this a continuation.]

The thrill of tyranny.

by Guest Post ( 290 Comments › )
Filed under Anarcho-Capitalism, Communism, Conservatism, Libertarianism, Marxism, Progressives, Tea Parties, The Political Right at April 22nd, 2014 - 1:00 pm

Guest Blogger: The thrill of tyranny.


Lois Lerner may be gone, but her legacy looms large in the minds of Marxist tyrants pretending to be Democrats.

IRS revokes conservative group’s tax-exempt status over anti-Clinton statements

The Internal Revenue Servicehas revoked the tax-exempt status of a conservative charity for making statements critical of Hillary Rodham Clinton and John Kerry, according to a USA Today report.

The Patrick Henry Center for Individual Liberty, based in Manassas, Va., “has shown a pattern of deliberate and consistent intervention in political campaigns” and made “repeated statements supporting or opposing various candidates by expressing its opinion of the respective candidate’s character and qualifications,” according to a written determination released Friday by the IRS.

The IRS said the center acted as an “action organization” by publishing alerts on its website for columns written by its president, former FBI agent Gary Aldrich, the Washington Free Beacon reported.

The IRS pointed out a column that appeared to be published by Townhall on April 2, 2004, in which Mr. Aldrich wrote, “if John Kerry promises otherwise ill-informed swing-voters lower gas prices at the pump, more than a few greedy, registered ignoramuses will follow him anywhere,” the Free Beacon reported.

Another article cited by the IRS was a 2005 piece titled “Stop Hillary Now!,” which rallied “Clinton haters” to inform voters of Hillary Clinton’s “atrocious conduct,” USA Today reported.

IRS Commissioner John Koskinen said in an interview with The Washington Post last week that the IRS and Treasury Department are likely to rewrite controversial draft guidelines to better define “candidate-related political activities.”

“My bottom line is that it’s in everyone’s interest to have clarification,” he said. “My position since I started more than four months ago is that we ought to have clarity, and that any rule that comes out ought to be fair and easy to administer.”

Conservatives have argued that the proposals are just another way for the Obama administration to target right-leaning groups.

A Fox News poll published last week revealed that 49 percent of American voters believe the IRS intentionally targeted conservative organizations.

What is important to note here, is that at this particular point in time, neither John F’ing Kerry nor Hillary Clinton are declared candidates for anything. Thus rending the IRS act’s preemptive at best, and an illegal suppression of free speech at the barest of minimums. In short, this action by the IRS is nothing less than a expansion of the tyrannical overreach of the federal government that the Obamanation Administration has nurtured. Just as with the recent case witnessed in Nevada at the Bundy Ranch, these actions fly in the face of every word written by America’s Founding Fathers, not only in the Constitution itself, but in every one of their written documents in which they went to excruciatingly pains to make their position crystal clear on.

Oh, and just in case anyone thinks that the dust up in Nevada is a one off exception to the rule event for the BLM, think again.

BLM Eyes 90,000 Acres of Texas Land

After the recent Bundy Ranch episode by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM), Texans are becoming more concerned about the BLM’s focus on 90,000 acres along a 116 mile stretch of the Texas/Oklahoma boundary. The BLM is reviewing the possible federal takeover and ownership of privately-held lands which have been deeded property for generations of Texas landowners.

Sid Miller, former Texas State Representative and Republican candidate for Texas Agriculture Commissioner, has since made the matter a campaign issue to Breitbart Texas.

“In Texas,” Miller says, “the BLM is attempting a repeat of an action taken over 30 years ago along the Red River when Tommy Henderson lost a federal lawsuit. The Bureau of Land Management took 140 acres of his property and didn’t pay him one cent.”

Miller referred to a 1986 case where the BLM attempted to seize some of Henderson’s land. Henderson sued the BLM and lost 140 acres that had been in his family for generations. Now the BLM is looking at using the prior case as a precedent to claim an additional 90,000 acres.

Congressman Mac Thornberry (R-TX) represents the ranchers in this region of north Texas. According to Thornberry’s legislative analysts, the issue of the ownership of this land dates back to the Louisiana Purchase of 1803. When the BLM made the claim on Henderson’s land, their position was that Texas never had the authority to deed the land to private parties and therefore it would fall under federal control.

In 1922, the U.S. Supreme Court attempted to settle the boundary dispute in Oklahoma v. Texas and declared the boundary to be defined by wooden stakes set on the river bank. That boundary apparently lasted no longer than anyone could expect wooden stakes to last in the shifting sands of a meandering river. In 2000, Texas and Oklahoma’s legislatures agreed to a “Red River Boundary Compact” which defined the border between the states as the southern vegetation line. However, Congress must ratify agreements of this kind between the states according to Article 1, Section 10 (Clause 3) of the U.S. Constitution. Congressman Thornberry introduced House Joint Resolution 72 during the 106th Congress to codify the compact into U.S. Law.

The matter became somewhat of a national question drawing the attention of Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, “The U.S. Supreme Court has tried twice to settle this dispute, which at one point brought the governor of Oklahoma to the border in a tank…However, true to the slogan ‘One Riot, One Ranger,’ the good governor of Oklahoma and his tank was held off by a lone Texas Ranger on his horse.”

Tanks aside, the Texas Farm Bureau has produced a video that explains the problems left open by the current border definition from north Texas ranchers’ perspectives. This issue reportedly centers on Oklahoma’s definitions on the various forms of movement with the river.

Is is really any wonder, with the Federal government consistently acting with such a blatant disregard for the United States constitution, that so many American’s are getting fed up? And then, to add insult to injury, we have a Senate Majority Leader calling those who object to the Federal governments illegal and unconstitutional action “Domestic Terrorists”?

‘I blame both sides,’ Oklahoma militia members join fight against feds

OKLAHOMA CITY – A land dispute in Nevada between rancher Cliven Bundy and the federal government began decades ago.

The Bureau of Land Management says Bundy was allowing his cattle to graze illegally which triggered a round-up of about 400 head of cattle last week.

Bundy claims his family’s cattle have grazed on the land since 1870 without interference from the government.

However, the Bureau of Land Management says Bundy hadn’t paid his grazing fees since 1993.

Over time, officials say those fees have amounted to more than $1 million.

As authorities herded the cattle, a standoff was sparked with members of the militia.

Organizers with the Oklahoma Militia say they have members in Nevada who claim Bundy’s cattle were unlawfully herded by the bureau.

The Oklahoma Militia says it is made up of nearly 50,000 volunteers.

Members say they are taking Bundy’s side and fear this practice could spread to the Sooner State.

Scott Shaw said, “Evidently in America we don’t actually own the property anymore if you ever did.”

Shaw says Oklahoma Militia members are ready to take up arms against the federal government if needed.

He said, “It’s up to the feds. The ball’s in their court! You can do this legally or if you want to try to do a land grab violently, you can do that. We’re going to resist you!”

Shaw says the militia has not had to defend Oklahoma from the government yet but members are becoming concerned.

Shaw said, “Just look around the country, they are doing it everywhere. If they can do it in Nevada, they can do it in Colorado, Texas. I mean, what’s to stop them from coming to Oklahoma? The only thing to stop them is ‘We the People’.”

However, not everyone agrees.

Sen. Jim Inhofe said, “You’ve got a bunch of people there trying to take the law into their own hands and they shouldn’t be doing that. And the Bureau of Land Management is not government-owned, it’s publicly owned. There’s a big difference there. I blame both sides.”

I should like to point out the blatantly and painfully obvious to Scott Shaw, the moment any State enacts a property tax, it has illegally seized all privately held property in that state, since the penalty for failure to pay a property tax is seized and forced sale of the property in question the act of enacting a property tax instantly transforms the property owner into a tenant leasing or renting the property from the State.

As to Sen. Jim Inhofe’s bullshit, it is really no surprise to see a member of America’s self anointed Aristocracy aligning himself with the Federal governments Brown shirts against the average American citizen, while simultaneously berating American’s for being offended by the acts of a tyrannical government that has long since lost it’s moral or legal authority to govern.

That Congress can and does pass legislation that violates the United States Constitution and then uses the judicial branches and various Law Enforcement Agencies to apply it’s monopoly on violence to enforce those Unconstitutional laws is nothing new. Slavery was after all once legal as were all of the Jim Crow and Blue Laws.

What is relatively new, is the American People standing up and saying, NO, you have gone to far.

(Cross Posted @ The Wilderness of Mirrors)

Rick Perry challenges Andrew Cuomo to a debate

by Phantom Ace ( 3 Comments › )
Filed under Conservatism, Democratic Party, Libertarianism, Progressives, Republican Party, Special Report at April 22nd, 2014 - 12:19 pm

The Libertarian leaning Governor of Texas Rick Perry has issued a challenge to NY’s Fascist Governor Andrew Cuomo. In a trip to NY, he wants to debate ideas for job creation. He wants to use stats showing Texas has economically outperformed NY in recent years.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who will be arriving in New York this afternoon for a trip trying to lure businesses to the Longhorn State, offered a Texas-sized takdown of Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s record on job creation this morning and challenged him to a debate.

“I’d be more than happy to sit down and have a thoughtful conversation, a debate with Gov. Cuomo over the issues that face us as a state and talk about the economic policies and compare New York to Texas,” said Mr. Perry, speaking on New York Post columnist Fred Dicker’s Live from the State Capitol radio show. “I think that would be not only interesting and fun, but a thoughtful way for us as a country to have a discussion between two of the major states in America, talking about which one of these policies are actually better for our people.”

Mr. Cuomo has made a point of emphasizing tax cuts and job growth as he runs for re-election, but Mr. Perry quickly brushed aside those efforts. Asked about a campaign Mr. Cuomo has been running advertising the state’s new tax-free zones to lure new businesses, Mr. Perry ran through a list of companies that had relocated or expanded into Texas recently, and also pointed to New York’s high net migration rate.

Man up Andrew and take Perry up on his offer.

 

 

Fauxcahontas Two: Lone Star Edition – The Joys Of Honesty Relativism

by Flyovercountry ( 23 Comments › )
Filed under Democratic Party, Marxism, Progressives at January 23rd, 2014 - 7:00 am

Political Cartoons by Eric Allie

So, in the race for Texas Governor, it would seem as though the political party most commonly associated with the left side of the aisle has once again come up with that, “charismatic 15 minutes of fame for pulling some form of protest shtick,” candidate, without of course bothering to vet the true life story of said candidate. Going back just the past four years, we have Richard Blumenthal who remembers a trip to South East Asia that he not only never took, but that his true life’s story included a massively orchestrated effort and some political favors by well connected family friends to avoid having taken. That however is just a warm up act for the top two contenders in the fuzzy life story sweepstakes.

This is especially fun for me to point out to those who belong in the, “women are superior to men types,” so eagerly and constantly pointing out that if women ran the world, we’d have no problems because women are less contentious, more honest, more willing to listen, less egotistical, than men. Then we all got treated to that viral video of the left’s next darling, Elizabeth Warren who gave an eloquent while also moronic case for hard core Marxism. She got to where she was because she was able to tout herself as a Native American, a true recipient of the wondrous gift of Affirmative Action. The trouble of course is that she literally is the poster child for what, “white as a snow flake,” means, and stole that slot meant for an actual Native American who might otherwise have filled it were it not taken by Warren. Her defense once found to have been lying was that she actually believed some grand parent’s story that an earlier predecessor had been a member of a tribe from somewhere near Kansas City, and that she might have actually been one thirty-second Indian. Even if every word of her defense, thin gruel that it is, were true, we can call that, “myth busted.”

Now we get Wendy Davis. Her particular 15 minutes came about because she filibustered a done deal vote in the Texas Senate, not having sufficient numbers of her own party win elections to do a darned thing about what it was that she wished to oppose. I am not going to fault her for that. If it were those of us on the other side of an issue, we’d be cheering on who ever it was that filibustered, and indeed many of us have. Rand Paul and Ted Cruz come to mind. I just do not believe that this one action in and of itself qualifies one for the Governorship of a State. Such is the state of the Texas Democrat party though, clinging to any ray of hope, no matter how thin that light seems to be. Davis, in case you haven’t figured it out yet is a sacrificial lamb, put there because she was dumb enough to take this beating for her party, and because the Democrats in general do not wish to have a State where they don’t even bother running a candidate.

A couple of months ago, I read some article at Slate where one of the Democrat Apparatchiks was boasting that they had turned Texas purple, and were working feverishly on blue. They pointed to Wendy Davis as that up and comer who was making all of this possible. (Quit laughing, there’s more to this than Ms. Davis’ boobs, which as we’ll see later on, are what got her those spiffy Harvard degrees.) I partially believed the whole purple thing then, and I can still see it somewhat now. Not because of Wendy Davis, who is what she is, but because of the droves of former Californians who are fleeing the State that they voted into malaise, and looking for work in Texas, which is suddenly in ample supply because Texas had the good sense to be Red for a while now. The problem for the Democrats is that the true narrative of why Texas might have a sudden shift to purplish in election night hue does not exactly paint a complimentary picture of their politics. They need their story spruced up a bit, which is why Wendy Davis was suddenly touted as their darling.

Wendy claimed to be a victim of all things unfair to our young urban youths, who somehow overcame her obstacles and make good for herself, and a family. She threw off the chains of oppression forced upon her by an unfeeling and uncaring society, at least according to the way that she told it, and made it all the way to a Harvard Undergrad, and Law Degree. The truth of her situation, while technically didn’t quite rise to the level of making her a flat out liar, has at least raised some eyebrows and will doubtless be the subject of late night comedic monologues for weeks to come. She had help, not from the state, but from a sucker, whom she convinced to take that matrimonial plunge with her. She let him have the privilege of babysitting her children, and paying in full her tuition, room, and board, while she matriculated a couple of thousand miles away. The day that he wrote the last check for her bills, she gave him the good old, “we’ve grown apart,” speech. She must have looked simply stunning in a bikini for her former husband to have been that stupid, and looking at her wearing that bikini would be my guess as to the full extent of marital satisfaction received for his money.

I can’t help but feel that there is something deeper here though. There must be some other lesson that I can take from all of this. I’ve heard this theme a lot recently, that Democrats go for the jugular, and Republicans are prone to writing strongly worded letters. We on the political right hold truth to be an objective thing, and absolute, while the political left seems to feel that truth is itself a subjective sort of phenomenon, and one that can differ for each and every person alive. You see, if Wendy Davis believes that she is something other than a gold digging prostitute who found a freakishly gullible sugar daddy with more money than brains, who are we to see it other wise? Don’t point any of this out to Wendy however, she’ll demand that some paraplegic walk a mile in her shoes. That’s what you might call the morally superior toleration of the political left.

Without diminishing Wendy Davis’ adversity, which she did over come, (even if it were by a method that you wish the angels of Karma would force the progenitor of to wear some sort of sign around their neck for utilizing,) it should be noted that Greg Abbott also had to overcome adversity in his life. He after all went on to become a Supreme Court Justice in Texas, and the Attorney General of that State after he lost the use of his legs. Somehow, I believe that Abbott would be willing to trade shoes for that mile walk of Wendy’s. (A wheelchair bound bikini wearing babe might not have been able to sucker such a wealthy sugar daddy, capable of sending her to matriculate in Boston.) I have yet to read a single article however about how Greg Abbott has utilized his handicap as a campaign device.

The reason for this is simple. For those of us on the right, we seek to sway opinion through battle in the arena of ideas. Our weapons are fact, logic, debate, evidence, and thought. For those who live life on the left, they seek to sway opinion through spin, narrative, emotion, envy, and fear. Enter the candidacies of Wendy Davis, Elizabeth Warren, and Richard Blumenthal, nothing if not consistent with the values of those whom they represent.

Cross Posted from Musings of a Mad Conservative.