Free In Idaho!

So, Fred’s out of the race.  Now there are NO conservatives running for the office of President.  (And don’t try to sell me on that tinfoil cowboy hat from Texas.)

Notice to the RNC:  DON’T send me any letters asking for money this time around.  Save your postage.

The Brits have big problems.  No, not the spread of radical Islam.  Replica guns, you ninny!  Thousands of them being brought in every month!

Though some are sold on legally, police fear most are falling into the hands of criminals who use them to intimidate victims.

Many imitation weapons can be converted into real guns in a matter of hours, although police say this is not the case with the guns brought in through Felixstowe.

Half of all gun crime, including street robberies, involves imitation weapons that have either been converted to fire deadly live ammunition or look so realistic that even police cannot tell they are fakes.

So, what are they going to do about it?  Why, make them illegal, put people in jail, and have anonymous turn-in programs, what did you think?  The same things that were so damn effective when they did them for REAL guns.

Scotland Yard yesterday started a month-long ’surrender’ scheme, urging young men and boys or their relatives to hand in replica guns at police stations anonymously, in an attempt to stem rising gun crime.

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The maximum sentence for carrying a replica gun in public has been increased from six months to a year. Ball bearing guns, cap guns, blank-firing pistols, airguns and ‘airsoft’ guns - which fire plastic ball bearings and are used at accredited game centres - are all included in the laws.

Nobody can make this up.  This is a real article.

The Met will also crack down on the market stalls and shops where replica guns are mainly sold. Officers will carry out test purchases on companies selling them on the internet and prosecute suppliers.

Commissioner Sir Ian Blair said: ‘Imitation weapons cause fear and distress on our streets and I would urge our communities to take this chance to get rid of them.

I’m shocked, shocked I tell you, that replica guns have been allowed to become such a tremendous problem in otherwise peaceful and civilized Great Britain.  Well, they don’t let the cops have weapons,  they outlawed real guns, they outlawed hunting, and still the people are under a reign of terror perpetrated on them by the evil gun culture

‘While overall crime in London has significantly decreased, this campaign is aimed at young people whose lives are being blighted by gun culture and imitation firearms are an intrinsic part of that.’

By golly, if we have to take every picture and every movie and every gun show off the telly, we’ll do it.  No more guns.  Anywhere.  And you Americans, quit laughing at them, because you’re worse than the British and you’re next.  Just wait and see.  What are you going to do about it?
  

I notice that the Dow Jones Industial Average futures this morning are down more than 500 points, which is the biggest drop since 9/11… and of course, the MSM is laying it all at the feet of a “staggering economy and high oil prices, and the need for further rate cuts and a big stimulus package.  Really?  I think Wall Street is also reacting to the poor quality of Presidential candidates, particularly on the Republican side, and the definite possibility that we’ll have, at best, a populist, and at worst, an outright socialist in the White House one year from now.

Take Hillary.  This is from the NYT

Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton said that if she became president, the federal government would take a more active role in the economy to address what she called the excesses of the market and of the Bush administration.

In one of her most extensive interviews about how she would approach the economy, Mrs. Clinton laid out a view of economic policy that differed in some ways from that of her husband, Bill Clinton. Mr. Clinton campaigned on his centrist views, and as president, he championed deficit reduction and trade agreements.

Reflecting what her aides said were very different conditions today, Mrs. Clinton put her emphasis on issues like inequality and the role of institutions like government, rather than market forces, in addressing them.

“Differed in some ways”?  Yeah, Bill just wanted to play with the economy a little bit.  Hillary wants to own it.

“If you go back and look at our history, we were most successful when we had that balance between an effective, vigorous government and a dynamic, appropriately regulated market,” Mrs. Clinton said. “And we have systematically diminished the role and the responsibility of our government, and we have watched our market become imbalanced.”

She added: “I want to get back to the appropriate balance of power between government and the market.”

The definition of “appropriate” being entirely up to Hillary. 

 Although the two Clintons share similar views on a wide range of economic issues, she has long been more skeptical about the benefits of freer trade and other aspects of a free-market economy. While he peppered his 1992 campaign speeches with both populism and calls for personal responsibility, including welfare reform, she talks less about irresponsibility among individuals and more about irresponsibility in corporate America and the government.

Perhaps the bigger difference, though, is that Mr. Clinton was running for president when the federal budget deficit was much larger than it is now and the United States seemed to be falling behind Western Europe and Japan in economic competitiveness. Mrs. Clinton is running when the economy has grown at a healthy clip for six years but incomes for most Americans have barely outpaced inflation.

Republicans say that her tax increases on the affluent and her spending proposals would increase the deficit, but Mrs. Clinton’s advisers respond that she, like her husband, is a fiscal conservative. They add that reducing the deficit is no longer sufficient, because today’s problems have less to do with the size of the economic pie than the way it is divided.

“Inequality is growing,” Mrs. Clinton said. “The middle class is stalled. The American dream is premised on a growing economy where people are in a meritocracy and, if they’re willing to work hard, they will realize the fruits of their labor.”

Mrs. Clinton’s approach involves programs narrowly focused to deal with specific problems, a strategy that economists say has pluses and minuses. Her proposal for short-term economic stimulus, centered more on home-heating and mortgage subsidies than a broad tax rebate, has generally received lower marks from economists than Mr. Obama’s plan, which emphasizes immediate tax rebates to most workers.

You don’t think Wall Street isn’t paying attention when socialists with a chance of actually grabbing the reins of power are threatening to take control of the free economy and kick Wall Street’s butt?  Meanwhile, back on Wall Street, it was just announced that the panic of the herd has moved the Fed to cut rates ahead of its scheduled meeting by another 3/4 point (that’s the first 3/4 cut since 1984 when the prime rate was near 12%!)… yeah, that’ll fix it.  Pour the drunk another drink.  We’re gonna do Jimmy Carter again it appears… Iran, populist Dem President, high inflation, stagnant economy, high oil, and a “give up” attitude. I think Wall Street is hiding the money in the mattress until this stuff gets sorted out. There is too much uncertainty ahead politically… THAT is what Wall Street and the other world markets are reacting to.