Obamas: $4 billion to End National Security Threat of Fat Kids, $135 million For National Guard on the Border

Michelle Obama got her pet project through. It will cost us over $4 billion and put the president in charge of what snacks go into each school's vending machine. Unconstitutional, but when has that ever mattered to him.

Meanwhile, the funding for the paltry National Guard presence at the border $135 million, has run out. Troops will be withdrawn in February rather than July as planned.

Michelle Obama says that fat kids are a threat to national security. Obviously the Obamas think overweight children are more threatening than drug cartel assassins, threats to local law enforcement, gang infiltration of the Southwest, etc.

The Washington Examiner story is here: http://washingtonexaminer.com/world/2010/11/obama-administration-plans-pull-back-national-guard-much-border

13 Rue Madeline

Liberals have launched a stunning new offensive against Dick Cheney and the idea that the United States ought to defend itself.

You have to just shake your head. After 9/11 the United States intelligence community mulled over the idea of assassinating known terrorists. The Bush Administration refused to implement the program and therefore never told Congress about the program that never happened. Democrats are so desperate to pin something on Bush that they now want to bash Cheney for not telling Congress what the president did not do.

Liberals misunderstand the public. We grew up on James Bond and our kids grew up on 24. Most of us assumed we had been doing this all along! The unpleasant shock is that we had not been hunting down and assassinating terrorists at close range, not the non disclosure of a non program.

Just watched a great James Cagney movie from about 1946 called 13 Rue Madeline. It was the story of US intelligence operations in World War II. James Cagney trained a group of operatives to attack Fortress Europe from the inside. He told them that they needed to forget ideas of sportsmanship and fair play. Trickery, lying, and killing at close range were all parts of war. This reflected the assumptions and reality of warfare against Nazi Germany.

At what point did we get so soft that this is considered unacceptable even by hawks?

A Comment on National Stability

This was addressed earlier in the week, but I really cannot help commenting more upon the study that rated the United States as growing more unstable.

The twentieth century saw regimes that were much more stable than the United States at that time or now. Stalin's Soviet Union in peacetime and Saddam Hussein's Iraq had little crime (outside of those committed by the government.) People did not act out or make waves. In large countries, such stability comes with a heavy price.

Smaller countries have an easier time maintaining social stability. Switzerland is also one of the most stable nations of the twentieth century and managed to avoid involvement in both world wars. The key to their stability and survival lay in the fact that they have a heavily armed population. Like the United States and Britain in an older day, an armed citizenry was seen as crucial to national defense against invaders and internal tyranny.

Speaking of stability, probably one of the most politically and socially stable regions of the United States is the Appalachian region. Crime rates remain extremely low despite other social problems. Violent crime is rare compared to other areas such as Washington DC. DC has experienced destructive riots as well as gang rule over entire neighborhoods. DC has the most restrictive gun laws anywhere while West Virginia has the most permissive. I meet young people from these urban areas all the time who come from law abiding families. They are often as strident in their defense of Second Amendment rights as we are. Who is going to protect them if a crazed crack addict tries to break into their house? An overworked police force? Suburban liberals who live behind walls and bars? Nope, just the individual and his or her weapon.

Stability is not always a good concept. Our nation is experiencing a less than stable political cycle. Poll questions constantly ask "who will best unite the country?" The fact is that we are at our most free when we are not united (except in extreme emergencies.) The sign of a healthy body politic and a free society is a little instability. Hard fought political debates over issues between knowledgable individuals is positive, not negative. Crime is something we must live with unless we want unrestrained government power monitoring and guiding our lives (parents of schoolchildren are enduring this more and more every year.) A little instability is a positive sign that we still enjoy the freest society on earth.