(me)
From the General Manager and Proprietor In Chief
(me)
August 4, 2011
d(^_^)b
http://libertyatstake.blogspot.com/
"Because the Only Good Progressive is a Failed Progressive"
The 2010 mid-year review was split into two posts - one devoted to the state of the republic (7/1/2010) and another concerning this blog project (7/4/2010). I gave me the feedback this approach was tedious and unnecessarily self-adulatory, and I should tighten it up next year. So, I will cover both sides of the review for me in a single post this year.
I also expressed disappointment to me that I had neglected to provide a fully detailed financial report to me last year. I reminded me the bottom line is everything; there can be no stimulus without revenue and investment - everyone knows that.
So, after me and I almost broke up over a falling out in the heat of an argument over the balance between creativity and financial discipline (I really hurt me with that 'Scrooge' slur, btw), here's the full report for our cloud hosts at Google and the IRS vultures always on the look out for more revenue to stimulate additional gub'ment investment.
($0) - Capital Cost
($0) - Salary, Benefits, and Employee Expenses
$0 - Revenue
55% - Obscene profit margin
------------------------------------------------
$0 - Record Breaking Profits
As you can see, I am looking forward to being hauled before Congress for a show trial to explain why I'm keeping all of my golden eggs to myself - which is the true mark of outlaw success in the modern crony capitalist culture.
==
Last year I was more or less on time with my mid-year report to me - no more than a single week after the sixth month of the calendar year. This year, several factors conspired to prevent me from achieving this same level of performance. First of all, I'm a lazy bastard that will sometimes (even often) procrastinate. Especially in summer. I hate the heat. It makes me want to take a nap.
Then, my good intentions to keep this report on schedule already destroyed by my annual summer induced stupor, the report was Overcome By Events (OBE) - namely the Great Debt Ceiling Debacle of 2011, in which the irresistible force known as the TEA Party movement slammed into the immovable object known as the DC Establishment. In the middle of summer, for chrissake!
My several posts since 7/18/2011 - the day I kicked my lazy ass into gear to get going, because, well, it was time - document my contemporaneous reactions to this historic Newtonian political collision.
And my mid-year review starts on the heels of this historic event. I am taking an emergency mini-vacation with my nuclear family on Chincoteague Island, which lies perilously close to Algore's rising oceans off of Virginia's eastern shore. Quite unexepectedly, I discovered the house I'm renting 4 hours drive away gets the same local channel 5 Fox News feed as my zip code 22308 nuclear family HQ. On this feed I have received reports there is a new political dispute in DC - with familiar dimensions.
It seems the House GOP has passed a temporary measure to keep everyone at the FAA, and all of its contractors, working - pending the resolution of a political dispute over the size and scope of the nanny state. The Senate DemoHacks, sworn protectors of the nanny state, are making a national issue out of the unresolved issue - with overheated rhetoric that includes Senators pointing finger guns at their very own heads. (Most deliberative body in the world, my ass) The DemoHacks have calculated they can score political points for their long game on their issue (subsidies to airports that aren't economical on their own) by riling up independents over the non-issue (FAA paychecks).
This manufactured FAA flap - breaking literally the day after "resolution" of the debt ceiling debacle - provides the template for the republic's outlook between now and November 2012. It's not a pretty outlook - but you can wrap your brain around it by reading the "bible" guiding the corrupt gang of Progressive hacks presently in charge of the Senate and Executive branch: 'Rules For Radicals' (Saul Alinsky).
Barry's corrupt gang of Progressive hacks seeks to keep you, dear reader, in a constantly agitated state - the better to 'redistribute' more of your wealth down the social welfare state rat hole, unchallenged. Absorb this lesson and you will understand the news every day over the next 17 months. Completely. Mark it.
==
So, having efficiently dispensed with the republic's outlook (how did I do, me?) - let's move on to the midyear review of the blog project. The project itself is in a far more more sublime state.
First and foremost, the zeitgeist motivating it has only intensified - see above. We, dear reader, are living through an epic battle between Liberty and Tyranny - and this project is my humble and meager contribution to the fight.
I began the project with a general idea to write a sort of book that could be archived for my kids and their descendants. Along the way I noticed a trend of approximately 2000 vistors a month to the blog. I reminded me this is a pathetically low number for commercial success. When the trend dipped to around 1500 visitors a month, I briefly took notice, but reminded me I'm still writing the book, after all. Now that the trend decline has leveled off and shown signs of growing again, me told I there still may be hope for commercial success - and I told me come back when somebody hits the tip jar.
And so I still write the book. For my kids. I explained to my twelve year old this afternoon how he can read the archive backups at any point in his lifetime. For some reason, the relative permanence of the written word (as long as its verifiable and fact based, that is) is a foreign concept to him even at this relatively late age of his development.
My first thought was to edit and publish the book after the 2010 mid-terms. I was too ambitious. The lazy bastard that is me never got around to it. I keep telling me it will be a better book after 2012 anyway. We'll see. If I was more ambitious, I might have two books. Damn.
Since the previous mid-year report, the following developments have occured on this blog:
'Sites That Make Sense To Me' has essentially been archived. It remains well down the right sidebar, but is basically just a record of stuff I was reading online before all hell broke loose in the republic (marked by the election of BHO and his gang of Progressive hacks).
'The Blog Roll' has greatly expanded and been forever memorialized as the 'Bob Schieffer Blog Roll.' Mr. Schieffer receives this honor for using "I was on vacation" as his bullshit excuse for not asking Eric Holder about the New Black Panther voter intimidation scandal the very week it broke into the national discourse. Schieffer is forever the symbol of MSM bias and incompetence on this blog. There are literally hundreds of other worthy candidates, but he is the lucky lottery winner here. ('Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner,' Bob!)
The size of the roll is about where it should be to fit my template, I think. It's around 100 or so patriots who have something useful to say on a frequency no longer than a month or so. If I sought to make it all the patriots with something useful to say on this frequency, my sense is it could easily be ten times as long. The order of magnitude larger list could easily be documented by any "detail oriented" researchers who wish to examine the rolls of the patriots on my roll.
My Heading section has evolved from something I can't even remember the title of, which was solely focused on numbers charts - to Snark U. (University). Snark U. still includes high impact numbers charts, but more often includes cartoons, sometimes enhanced by my own low fidelity mark ups. The Snark U. label refers to my own God-given talent, probably given one full generation too early. Damn.
My God-given talent, given to me one full generation before the pathetic public abomination that is Twitter, is the snarky one or two liner. I use this talent to generate the vast majority of my pathetically low commercial number of hits on this blog. It is the snarky comment with blog url linked technique transparently documented by my 'Random Droppings' feature.
My writing voice has consciously evolved into the anti-Obama. That is, supremely confident and arrogant, but - every word can be factually verified without the help of a Soros, Inc. funded propaganda outlet.
I have played with two characters in the course of this project.
Francis Charles Hamilton has made the fewest appearances. One, to be exact. The three part name comes from personal influences. Francis from Francis Marion, the South Carolina Colonel who kept a large part of the British army pinned down in the South while Geo. Washington pursued the main engagement in the North. Charles is for Charleston, SC. Hamilton is for Alexander Hamilton - the leading Founding Father from my birth state of New York. The composite character is based largely on a personal mentor who lived in an old Charleston townhouse when I pursued my studies in Computer Science at the Citadel, the Military College of South Carolina. Many moons ago.
Jack Wiley Dithers (JWD) has had a far greater impact on this blog, at least as appearances will measure it. Picture Hunter S. Thompson (specifically as depicted by Johnny Depp in the movie 'Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas'), but dressed as George Will. Rum and coke in both hands instead of a .38 caliber in the right hand, and a joint in the left. And instead of going out into the country to find things that should be lived to report on, falling ass-backwards into news stories manufactured by your life-long buddies. Gonzo journalism for the 21st century.
