Money for Nothin'

Here's a story that tells you everything you need to know about why so many people distrust government and its ability to manage anything well. Be sure you've taken you blood pressure meds before watching the video:

 

Seven hundred dollars per card per month. Why is it that this system was not designed to prevent converting benefits into cash? Why are the recipients able to get anything they want with these cards instead of being limited to necessities like food and clothing? Why even ask why? The answer is that it's a government program and one shouldn't expect government programs to actually make sense or be frugal.

Perhaps, though, we're not looking at this correctly. Perhaps these ATM cards are not a symbol of bureaucratic waste and stupidity but rather a reflection of the magnanimity of the taxpayers of California, at least the few who are left, who are eager to do what they can to subsidize the recreational habits of the indigent. This would account for the dismay so many of them feel at Arizona's decision that it can no longer afford the millions of dollars it costs to have hordes of illegal aliens crossing its borders. Such niggardliness would certainly have no place in California, which, despite the fact that it teeters on the brink of bankruptcy, nevertheless feels a moral obligation to facilitate excursions to casinos by those who couldn't afford such visits on their own.

If Arizonans can't pay for their illegals they should send them to California. Californians will gladly turn their state into Zimbabwe, apparently, in order to accommodate them.

RLC

Not Good People

Another Democrat shows that he's either a bigot or lacks a basic understanding of the rules of logical implication. In the video Rep. Paul Kanjorski (D, PA) is holding forth on how his office is helping people get through the recession. The people he's helping, he declares, are not irresponsible, they're not minorities, they're not "defectives." On the contrary, they're average, good American people.

Does Mr. Kanjorski really mean to imply that minorities and "defectives" are not good Americans? Is he unwittingly revealing something about his own underlying racial attitudes that perhaps we should know?

At Hot Air they're wondering if the media will give Mr. Kanjorski's bigotry the same sort of attention they lavished on George Allen's use of the word "macaca." Silly boys. Don't they know that Allen was a Republican and that Kanjorski's a Democrat? Don't they know that Democrats are allowed to say racist things and that only Republicans get punished for their unfortunate breaches of racial etiquette?

RLC

Fundamental Freedoms

I hardly know what to make of this report. I can't believe that the Michigan cops would be so stupid as to arrest a bunch of people just for passing out religious literature. Perhaps there's more to it, but if so, it hasn't yet come to my attention.

Tom Gilson at Thinking Christian explains:

Yesterday I found out friends of mine had been arrested for sharing the gospel in Dearborn, Michigan. I've shared some meals with Nabeel Qureshi, and I spoke at an apologetics conference he organized. I've had some shorter conversations with David Wood, who was also taken away from there in handcuffs. David has been featured and has commented on this blog. (I do not know Negeen and Paul Rezkalla, who were also arrested.)

Their cameras were confiscated for a time. What were they doing to deserve this? They were sharing the love of Jesus Christ at an Arab ethnic festival. The first YouTube video I saw on it when I checked in this morning called them liars, saying they went there to stir things up, and they were more interested in creating a scene than in preaching the gospel. This video tries to support this with a few out-of-context, unreferenced quotes from David Wood. I can assure you emphatically David and Nabeel's heart really is to share the good news of Jesus Christ. So what did they do to deserve a night in jail?

Apparently nothing:

They tell us here they handed out no printed materials, they approached no one, they spoke only with people who approached them. They went out of their way to avoid even the appearance of being disruptive. I've seen no evidence in other news sources to contradict any of this. They had "amicable" conversations and "made friends" with many there. The police took them away just as they were closing up another such amicable discussion. They told the officers they had video to show they had done nothing provocative, and asked them to sit down and watch it with them, but the police refused to look at the evidence.

It's important to note that this was not a Muslim festival. It was not a religious event. It was an ethnic festival...

There's more at the link. Perhaps the young evangelists will sue the Dearborn police for violating their first amendment rights. I hope so. It's apparently the only way this type of harrassment is going to stop.

I can't imagine that the police would have made these arrests had the young people been Muslims talking to the curious at, say, a fourth of July fireworks celebration, or if they had been Young Democrats talking to people at a Tea Party rally. Why does being Christian make them targets for arrest?

Update: Allahpundit has some commentary and video on this travesty at Hot Air.

RLC