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Exchange thus requires a kind of other-regardingness. To be sure, it is not altruism. Our concern with the advantages of the butcher, the brewer, and the baker is not the love of our neighbors. Exchange does not require such love. Commerce, however, is impossible when I am indifferent to the concerns of my trading partner. In a more aristocratic age, tradespeople were an object of scorn precisely because of the servility that the market imposed on them. Gentlemen possessed the luxury of satisfying their needs while maintaining indifference to others. The tradesman, in contrast, could not afford hauteur because he was dependent on the satisfaction of others’ interests for the gratification of his own needs.

-Nathan Oman ( The Dignity of Commerce)

Progressives / Socialists are like the old aristocrats of old like Oman describes – they look

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Well, can’t say that I blame them – a large part of war is the propaganda effort.  Hey, it worked well for Ho Chi Minh to win the Viet Nam war, right?  So the Taliban is copying them, I suppose, in the aftermath of losing a whole bunch of insurgent fighters, lots of material, and a honeycomb base of mountain tunnels after the US Military dropped the “Mother of All Bombs” (e.g., GBU-43/B Massive Ordnance Air Blast, packed with 11 tons of TNT) on their heads. So the BEST they can do is THIS (reformatted, emphasis mine) whining?

…”The use and experimentation of such destructive weapons by foreign occupiers on our war-weary people and in every corner of our war-ravaged country is inexcusable,” Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said. “The Islamic Emirate condemns such barbarity in the strongest of terms and considers its perpetrators as war criminals. Such over-proportionate use of destruction poses long-term detriments for the environment and the development of our nation.”

He added that ISIS in Afghanistan is an internal Afghan matter and “if Americans fear for their security they should foil such plots at their own borders.”

Funny, 

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Ahem, may I point out that women have received “free stuff” for centuries?  May I also point out that “Rights” have nothing to do with material means unless you are of the Socialist persuasion and have no idea of the difference between an entitlement and a true Right?

Actually, the title of the piece at Big Hollywood is:

Jessica Chastain: Women’s Rights Will ‘Head Backward’ Without Free Birth Control from Planned Parenthood

Actress Jessica Chastain says she obtained her first birth control pills at Planned Parenthood and fears low-income women will be unable to obtain contraception if the abortion business is defunded.

Hmm, how about another local “womens’ health clinic”?  Failing that, most every school (even down through middle schools nowadays and I think I’ve seen something about elementary school as well.  Hey, they’d share under the “Sharing is Caring” mantra, right?) has condoms or birth control pills on hand (or, on the nurse’s desk in a big plastic jar).  Or your local pharmacy – Walmart brand at $10/month. PP is not the only point of acquisition here, ma’am. Condoms are also cheap.

Again, an entitlement is something you get because someone else is forced to give or provide it to you.  A Right stands on its own simply because you are human.  I have the Right to Free Speech – it costs you nothing and in fact, you don’t even have to listen to me when I exercise my Right.  NONE of your Rights are affected if the Federal Govt no longer funds Planned Parenthood (aka, birth control after the fact).  Nothing is being taken away if PP has to turn to the private sector for funding and given the number of “stars” that are donating, does PP even need it?

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Yeah, it seems all of the Left that advocate strenuously  for Progressive / Socialist policies always seem to get highly annoyed and irritable when, unexPECTEDly, those same policies start to affect them personally.  Heavens, they start acting, well, Conservatively!  The unions poured hundreds of millions into support Obamacare’s enactment – only to ask for waivers from it when it got “personal”.  The SEIU’s “fight for $15” for a minimum wage?  Yeah, ask the unions (AHgain) about why they hem and haw about paying their workers that level of pay.  And US Senator “Fauxcahauntus” Elizabeth Warren has screamed about Wage Inequality only for us to find out that she pays her male staff far more than her female staff.

So this is really Karma being returned: Same Hollywood Writers Who Pushed Obamacare May Strike over Failing Health Plans

Hollywood screenwriters are on the verge of another strike, with health care benefits emerging as a major sticking point in contract negotiations – and in a somewhat ironic twist, the writers’ own efforts to promote the passage of Obamacare in 2009 may have contributed to the precarious predicament in which they find themselves today.

A dose of their own medicine, I say!

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Well, US Senator Jeanne Shaheen is a prime example of why they aren’t – she has always loved every new or expanded revenue source created.  Yet, like the GREAT Progressive politician she is (and I’m not using GREAT as a nice superlative).

I’m on her mailing list and got the below.  Now, UNLIKE an engineer that wants to fix things at the root cause, she wants to fix a whole kludge by piling on yet another.  It is as if she is doing a very complex math problem – and applies the wrong sign to it.  Yet, she wants us to believe that this is the best thing since, well, calculus, in that Shaheen wants Govt to fix the problem Govt created.

Or make it look like its getting solved.  In honor of Tax Day (tomorrow), I present the brilliance of Shaheenism (reformatted, emphasis mine:

Millions of Americans will be spending the weekend preparing their taxes to meet the federal tax filing deadline, which is next Tuesday, April 18th. Tax filing can be a complicated, expensive process. Americans spend more than 6 billion hours every year preparing their taxes, and almost 60 percent use paid tax preparers to file. Filing your taxes should be much simpler. That’s why I recently introduced legislation to simplify the federal tax return process.

And why IS that, Jeanne?  Why do you, as the Ambassador from the Federal Govt to the State of NH, make it so hard?  After all, it IS people like you who create tax law – that’s why you are a Legislator (and we aren’t).  We have to pay the penalty (double meaning here) for what you and your cohort have wrought.  But get a load of what SHE thinks is a “fix”:

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JUST IN TIME!!!

When I turned 40, a large contingent of friends from church threw me the obligatory “you’re over the hill” birthday party.  Who knew they were twenty years too early (emphasis mine, reformatted)?

Middle age begins at 60, say researchers

It was not so very long ago that hitting the milestone birthday of 40 was the time to accept that middle age had arrived. No more. Researchers have suggested that mid-life begins at 60, just as most people are contemplating the joys of retirement and a free bus pass. Scientists say that with increased life expectancy we need to rethink our ideas of what constitutes middle and old age otherwise the proportion of elderly people will continue to grow.

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Just thought I’d leave this here:

20+ YEARS OF FECKLESS NORTH KOREA POLICY, AND NOW: North Korea tensions have Hawaii pols revisiting emergency attack plans. “The plans were last revisited in the 1980s. But the Hawaii House Public Safety Committee on Thursday formally called for the state’s defense agency to repair their hundreds of Cold War-era fallout shelters and restock them with medical supplies, food and water.”

And Obama had to go and say “The 1980s are now calling to ask for their 

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“Through March, the federal government collected approximately $695,391,000,000 in individual income taxes. That is about $7,387,280,000 more than the $688,003,720,000 in individual income taxes (in constant 2017 dollars) that the federal government collected in the first six months of fiscal 2016.”

And we’re still running a yearly deficit of almost $527 BILLION.  Most of the Federal budget (which Progressives NEVER want to mention) is “mandatory” spending – taking money from some to give to others.  Sorry, but Entitlements are NOT “mandatory” – they were created by Law and they can be modified by another Law.

The reason why it never happens is that politicians value

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But of COURSE they do – down with the Patriarchy!  Besides, George “I can never tell a lie” Washington was nothing but an old white guy who owned slaves – we should wipe his name from every building, burn any book that holds him up as a shining example, and eliminate him because of his oppressive ways!

Naw, only kidding, but that’s what the Progressive Precious Snowflakes (and no small number of their Marxist agitating Professors want them to internalize – send your kid to Hillsdale College).  But for George, something I did not know:

George Washington was the first president to stay in the real estate business. “By the 1790s, Washington was wealthy primarily because of real estate — renting and selling his vast holdings. As with Mr. Trump’s hotels, Washington’s renters or purchasers could include foreigners. The president received constant reports from his nephew and subsequent managers and wrote to them at least monthly… This belies the notion that the Constitution limits a president’s management of, or benefit from, his existing business ventures.”

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