Welcome to the Finger Lakes! Our theme song:


In a town this size, there's no place to hide
Everywhere you go, you meet someone you know...
In a smokey bar, in the backseat of your car
In your own little house, someone's sure to find you out
What you do and what you think
What you eat and what you drink...

(Kieran Kane)

Monday, July 30, 2012

Nancy Pelosi, antisemite

Pelosi chats with Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad, Damascus, 2007

In an interview with Bloomberg's Al Hunt Friday, millionaire Democrat house minority leader Nancy Pelsoi attacked Jewish Republicans with a classic antisemitic smear.
Pelosi told Hunt that she believes the President will win the Jewish vote in November.
“I think that he will, because the fact is when the facts get out,” Pelosi said. “You know, as many of the Republicans are using Israel as an excuse, what they really want are tax cuts for the wealthy. So Israel, that can be one reason they put forth.”
The elderly, insider trading statist has gotten away with crap like this for what seems to have been hundreds of years.  What the hell was she doing in that murderous Iranian puppet al-Assad's living room, anyway?  

Perhaps there are a few American Jews who will learn of this vicious libel from the web.  Most, however, have long ago forgotten how damn lucky they are that their grandparents risked everything to come here, and have no idea what the Democrats have in store for them in Obama's second term. 

Fortunately, at least one member of the tribe has caught on.  Where are the others?
House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) said in a statement Sunday that Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi's (D-Calif.) suggestion Jewish voters were "being exploited" was "deeply insulting" and "patronizing."

Cantor, who is Jewish, was responding to comments Pelosi made during an interview with Bloomberg TV during which the Democratic leader suggested Republicans were trying to unfairly depict President Obama as having a strained relationship with Israel to further their domestic agenda.

"It is both patronizing and deeply insulting for Nancy Pelosi to suggest any Jew is 'exploited' for their political beliefs or that support for Israel is somehow an 'excuse' for anything," Cantor said. "Such thinking diminishes the importance of issues affecting Jews everywhere."

Sunday, July 29, 2012

It's a Miracle!

Afterburner with Bill Whittle.

German sub found off Nantucket

Surviving crew of U-550 surrenders

On April 15, 1944, the German subamarine U-550 torpedoed the SS Pan Pennsylvania.  The Pan Pennsylvania was a large gasoline tanker that was part of a convoy headed for Ireland, but had straggled behind.  On April 16, the U-550 was located and sunk by three US Coast Guard destroyers, led by USS Joyce, escorting the convoy.

USS Joyce

Last Monday, July 23, a group of private divers located the U-550 off the coast of Nantucket.
Divers have discovered a World War II-era German submarine nearly 70 years after it sank under withering U.S. attack in waters off Nantucket.
The U-550 was found Monday by a privately funded group organized by New Jersey lawyer Joe Mazraani. It was the second trip in two years to the site by the team, some of whom had been searching for the lost U-boat for two decades.


Sonar image of U-550, July 23, 2012

German U-boats operated off the east coast of the US throughout World War II.  Beachgoers on the Jersey Shore often saw smoke from burning ships that had been torpedoed by the Germans.  Dangerous until the last day of the war, 12 U-boats still operating off the Northeast surfaced and surrendered on VE-Day.

Surrendered German subs, Lishally, Ireland, May 24, 1945

Friday, July 27, 2012

I'll Never Smoke Weed With Willie Again

I may discount bungee jump, but... Toby Kieth, Scott Emerick, Willie Nelson

Holder - Corzine connection explains lack of prosecution

Those wondering why the Department of Justice has refused to go after Jon Corzine for the vaporization of $1.6 billion in MF Global client funds need look no further than the documents uncovered by the Government Accountability Institute that reveal that the now-defunct MF Global was a client of Attorney General Eric Holder and Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer’s former law firm, Covington & Burling.
Also providing cover for Corzine may be former FBI director Louis Freeh, recently of the Penn State scandal report.
...the trustee overseeing MF Global’s bankruptcy is former FBI Director Louis Freeh. During Mr. Holder’s 2009 Senate confirmation hearing, Mr. Freeh appeared as a witness testifying on Mr. Holder’s behalf. While Mr. Freeh stated that the two men shared no “social relationship,” the former FBI director praised the legal work Mr. Holder did for him when Mr. Freeh, then the general counsel for MBNA Bank in Wilmington, Del., retained Mr. Holder to represent MBNA Bank. “As general counsel, I could have engaged any lawyer in America to represent our bank,” Mr. Freeh said. “I chose Eric.”
Are your friends and neighbors discussing the Corzine/Obama/Holder/Freeh cabal?  Are they even aware of the MF Global scandal?  Why not?  Many of Corzine's victimized investors are farmers, just like ours here in the Finger Lakes.  And farmer or not, all of us will pass on Obama's debt to our future generations.

Thursday, July 26, 2012

US economic growth ahead of Tonga, but way behind Haiti

Kingdom of  Tonga

Boker tov, Boulder reports on US economic growth under Obama/Biden.
An annual growth rate of 1.5 percent puts us on par with Thailand, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Romania, Lebanon, Jamaica, Fiji, Denmark and Bahrain -- and ever so slightly ahead of the Kingdom of Tonga at 1.4 percent.
In North America, the fastest-growing economies are in Panama (7.4%), Haiti (6.1%) and the Dominican Republic (4.5%).
More on Tonga here

More buyer's remorse

The last word on Chick-Fil-A

The science is settled.  Openly gay rapper Antione Dodson will continue to dine at Chick-Fil-A.

Dr. Andy: now your meterologist, too!

"After the break, I'll raise Thruway tolls!"

Not only is he now your doctor, Andy Cuomo wants to be your weatherman, too.
Governor Andrew Cuomo is urging New Yorkers to be prepared as severe thunderstorms storms pass through the state today. The storms are forecast to bring heavy rain, high winds and possibly tornadoes, and may cause widespread power outages, his office said in a written release.
Hey Andy, want to help out your fellow New Yorkers?  Leave the weather forecasting to Wayne Mahar and do something to lower our sky-high electricity rates.

Buyer's remorse

Michael leaves the plantation.  LA Times, release the Khalidi tapes now!

Monday, July 23, 2012

Saturday, July 21, 2012

Walter Mouton and the Scott Playboys

Walter Mouton at the GrassRoots Festival, Trumansburg, Friday.                                                                                                                                                                        Walter on Amazon.   Walter on iTunes.                

Wednesday, July 18, 2012

What jobs council?

Waiting to hear from the jobs council

Read this, amigos:
Unemployment is still stuck above 8%, and that’s just the official count. Reality is much worse. So, where in the world is President Obama’s jobs council?
Lonely Conservative - the hardest working woman in the blog business.

Solar City in Seneca County?


Will Andy Cuomo force you to subsidize a giant solar panel scheme planned for the former Seneca Army Depot, home to some of the nation's cloudiest skies?
ENTECCO LLC and its team are proposing a renewable power generation project that will be a “Renewable Energy Delivery Hub,” dedicated to the generation of photo voltaic (PV) or concentrated photo voltaic (CPV) solar energy at a size of up to 2,000 MW, to be located in Seneca County, N.Y.
A proposal from ENTECCO was one of dozens offered recently as part of New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s Energy Highway initiative, which is being handled administratively by the New York Power Authority. Comments are being taken on the proposals until July 31, with the Energy Highway task force to then prepare a report for the governor.
While the Rochester-based developers reference a "public private partnership," they forgot to mention how much this venture will cost you, the Finger Lakes taxpayer.
The proposal said about finances: “ENTECCO and its financial partners have done extensive research into a Public Private Partnership (PPP) for CSC. We propose to create a Special Purpose Entity (SPE) to build, own, and operate the facility over a 20 year period. We have also developed mechanisms to share the risk and rewards associated with a project of this type such as specialized and alternative Power Purchase Agreements (PPA).”
We tried to learn more about this ENTECCO outfit, but, like the Rochester D&C, could find no info.  We await swarms of Ithaca-based protesters concerned about the huge energy production operation's effects on the Depot's white deer and Seneca County's vital tourism industry.

DiNapoli to audit Thruway?

Gov. and Mrs. Dewey open Thruway, 1954

While many Upstaters consider New York's economy already dead, billionaire Cuomo donor and Thruway honcho Howard Milstein wants to bury the corpse six feet deeper.  Milstein, an influence-buying  Manhattan tycoon, wants to raise Thruway truck tolls by a "modest" 45 percent.  While we suspect Milstein, Cuomo and their jet-setting pals could care less that about that massive increase in business costs, every penny of which will ultimately be paid by consumers, a handful of drowning New Yorkers are sending up a warning flare.
A major state business group is demanding a thorough audit of the state Thruway Authority before it raises tolls by what the authority called a "modest" 45 percent for larger trucks.
"We will all pay the price for this toll hike if we don't stand up and demand that the Thruway review its own finances before taking money from the rest of us," said Brian Sampson, executive director of Unshackle Upstate.
The toll increase on trucks with three or more axles would threaten distribution jobs and increase the costs of food, clothing and other articles hauled by trucks while slowing New York's "tenuous" economic recovery, he said Tuesday.
In what may turn out to be nothing more that a political smokescreen, Democrat New York state comptroller Tom DiNapoli  is hinting he may just audit the bloated Thruway Authority's books.
State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli opened the door to possibly auditing the Thruway Authority's financial books Tuesday as the agency seeks to push through a controversial 45 percent toll hike on trucks.
The comptroller said the agency failed to thoroughly implement many of the recommendations he made in 2009 when it pushed through a previous toll increase. Had the findings from that audit been followed, he said, "many of the same problems that exist today would have been addressed.''
"Our Thruway system helps sustain the upstate economy. Increasing tolls could have a negative impact on our fragile economic recovery and hurt small businesses and consumers,'' the comptroller warned.
Bold added.  A few surviving Upstate residents may recall that Thruway tolls were supposed to disappear when the bonds were paid off in 1996.
The Thruway was built beginning in the 1950s and tolls were supposed to have paid off the superhighway in 1996.
 Ah, yes, 1996:

Friday, July 13, 2012

Allen West sings Tom Petty!

Florida Republican congressman and vice presidential contender Allen West sings Tom Petty's Running Down a Dream at Lynn Westmoreland for Congress rally, July 25 (video does get vertical!).  Compare and contrast with Scranton Joe.

Thursday, July 12, 2012

Hanna finds fighting for your freedom "tiresome"

US Army Rangers atop Pointe Du Hoc, June 6, 1944

Richard Hanna, US Representative for New York's 24th District, has a pretty cushy deal going.  He works indoors, travels at taxpayer expense, and pulls down $174,000 of the taxpayer's money annually.  Yet, when it comes to repealing Oabamcare, the Republican  from Barneveld finds the task a hassle.
For the second time in the past year and a half, and for the 33rd time overall, the House has voted to fully repeal the Affordable Care Act.

It’s likely to be dead in the water when it reaches the Democratic-led Senate, and Local Congressman Richard Hanna says it’s become tiresome to continually have the repeal brought to the floor.
Hey, Richard, you know what was really tiresome?  Climbing the sheer cliff at Pointe Du Hoc under constant, deadly enemy fire, knocking out those gun positions, and taking the surviving gunners prisoner.  That would really wear a guy out, but it had to be done to protect our liberty.  Stop your whining, Dick.

Right Time of the Night

Jennifer Warnes on "The Midnight Special," 1977.

Wednesday, July 11, 2012

A buy and a bargain



This mansion, former state-provided home to superintendents of the Auburn state prison, was auctioned off today for only $132K.  Click this link and be amazed by photos, especially of the interior!

Monday, July 9, 2012

Trusting your future to Kirsten Gillibrand?

Pals Sharpton and Gillibrand

With the US facing an existential crisis that will make World War II seem like a speed bump, lets' check up on what New York's junior US Senator, the hot Kirsten Gillibrand, has been doing to save our nation.

 First, helping out our masses of unemployed workers.
To encourage investors, a complete exclusion on all capital gains is offered if you hold the stock of a company with under $50 million in gross assets for five years. There is also a provision that allows small businesses to write off up to $500,000 in tangible property, and all in one year, rather than over the lifetime of the equipment.
Yeah, that should help.  Why not a complete exclusion on all capital gains taxes for everybody, period?

Then of course, there's always shrub willow.
U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., toured Eileen Yager’s Dunlap Road farm in Richland Thursday afternoon, announcing support for a $4.3 million federal grant to encourage New York farmers to grow shrub willows as a renewable energy source.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture has earmarked more than $4 million under the USDA Biomass Crop Assistance Program to pay farmers to plant up to 3,500 acres of willow in 2013 and 2014. Land preparation will start this year.
Shrub willow?  Kirsten Gillibrand made big bucks short selling sub prime mortgage companies after she and her pal Andy Cuomo at Bill Clinton's HUD forced banks to make the bad loans.  Now she's spending four million of your hard earned tax dollars to plant weeds. 

If we were advising Wendy Long, we'd suggested she start explaining who Kirsten Gillibrand really is.


The Manchurian Orator

53 seconds that should end a presidency.

Thursday, July 5, 2012

Twin Mustang


While waiting for Mrs. South to finish her shopping in a giant craft supplies store, we killed a little time in the surprisingly well-stocked plastic model kit department.  It was there that we discovered the North American F-82 "Twin Mustang."  The fighter plane looks like two P-51 Mustangs connected at the waist, but is actually a more-or-less original post-WW II design.

Fortunately, a real life example of the aircraft is undergoing a complete restoration.
Truth be told, the North American F-82 wasn't just two mated Mustangs. Most of us who have never gotten our hands greasy on one have assumed the very-long-range postwar twin was simply two P-51 fuselages riveted to a wing center section and horizontal stabilizer. "We've found that there are very few parts common to the World War II Mustang series," says restoration pro Tom Reilly of Douglas, Ga., who has spent three years totally rebuilding the rarest Twin Mustang to survive—the number-two XP-82 prototype—and who estimates he still has a year and a half to go before his airplane flies.
And fly it will, for Reilly is famous among warbirders for putting back into the air projects ranging from Stearmans to B-24s that had been consigned to scrapheaps. Indeed, Reilly's XP-82 came largely from two junkyards—one outside Fair­banks, Alaska, and the other from late Ohioan Walter Soplata's famous back-lot salvage yard of rare warbirds.

Wednesday, July 4, 2012

Independence Day

John Trumbull's "Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776"

Enjoy the Fourth in the Finger Lakes!