Mad at the internet (as usual) and looking for hosting

I've decided that social media is not trustworthy. I've been forming this opinion for quite some time and have decided that I no longer want to be a part of it.

As such, I have suspended my accounts at Facebook, Twitter and LiveJournal. I assume they'll auto-delete after a while.

For now, I'll be keeping this blog, in case I see stuff I want to share with the world.

Unfortunately, Google is far too entrenched in my life for me to turn it off at this time. That's going to require a bit more planning.

When I get the time (yeah, I know, I know), I plan on purchasing my own hosting account somewhere where I can host my own web site (including blog and photo pages) and mailboxes. Once that's in place, I will be able to get out from under Google as well.

If you have experience with low-cost hosting companies and have some recommendations, I'd love to hear them. (But note that I'll ignore any message that doesn't come from someone I know - I'm not going to accidentally give money to a spammer!)

I am not interested in any kind of "free" or ad-sponsored hosting service. Those are no better than Google and all the rest. They can't be trusted with personal information. As many have said before, if you're not paying for the service, then you are not the customer, you are the product. Well I'm sick and tired of being everybody else's product.

My view on climate change

In a completely unrelated blog, I posted the following comment, describing my opinion on climate change, the politics thereof, and citing two books that I think summarize my opinion better than any other source has. (I've cleaned up the grammar a little, so it doesn't read like a reply to someone else's blog post, but the content is otherwise unchanged..)

I realize that my opinion is far from the majority opinion (at least according to the news media), and I am aware of the fact that most of my friends disagree. If you'd like to comment, please don't use this message as a soapbox to present opinions I've had shoved in my face a zillion times over. Such replies will be deleted. If you want to convince someone of your political opinions, there are dozens of forums where such discussions are welcome.

That being said, my message:....

Supreme Court upholds individual mandate. The US is now a dictatorship.

Supreme Court upholds individual mandate, ObamaCare survives | Fox News

As of this moment, the United States of America is officially a dictatorship.

The US Supreme Court, in upholding the individual mandate, has stated that Washington has the right to order individual people to enter into contracts against their will, under penalty of fines and imprisonment.

This decision goes far beyond health care. If all they wanted was socialized medicine, they could've done what all of Europe does - pay for everybody's treatment and raise taxes to pay for it. But the individual mandate goes far beyond that - it says that you must contract with a third party to buy a product you don't want and that they don't want to sell you. And if either party refuses for any reason, you can be fined and jailed.

Now that the precedent has been set, they can order anyone to do anything and the Supreme Court says it's OK. The Constitution, and any concept of individual liberty no longer has any relevance in this country.

Even if Obama loses the next election, and even if Republicans sweep Congress and repeal Obamacare, this Supreme Court decision will remain. Washington has been permanently granted the right to order you to do any damn thing they want you to do, and if you don't like it, your only recourse is to leave the country.

Welcome to the brave new world.

Arab Apartheid Against Palestinians :: Gatestone Institute

Arab Apartheid Against Palestinians :: Gatestone Institute

And yet the media still continues to accuse Israel of mistreating the Palestinians. Never mind the fact that Israel is the only country in the region that doesn't confine them to concentration camps, and nevermind the fact that Israel is the only nation to attempt to let them integrate into the rest of society. Nevermind the fact that in exchange for countless efforts of good will, Israel has gotten nothing but rocket strikes and other acts of terrorism in reply.

But I'm sure the media will come around sooner or later. They're just going to wait for Israel to be destroyed first. This way they won't sound biassed when they report what has been happening for the past 100 years.

Democrat’s Blood Libel Against Sarah Palin Bears Fruit As Left Wing Loons Call For Violence Against Her

Democrat’s Blood Libel Against Sarah Palin Bears Fruit As Left Wing Loons Call For Violence Against Her
By Gary P. Jackson

We seldom [as in never] discuss the volumes of death threats Sarah Palin gets from nut-bags. But it’s gotten to the point that it needs to be out there, and the hate filled left needs to be exposed in all of it’s glory.

We’ve been writing about the violent rhetoric from the left all week. From a sitting democrat Congressman calling for Republican Florida’s Governor to be “put up against the wall and shot” to left wing icon Francis Fox Piven calling for violent revolution. We’ve proven the once somewhat respectable democrat party has been hijacked by violent, rabid loons. Not that these loons haven’t been part of the party all along, it’s just that now they are driving the bus.
...

Read the complete article and prepared to be shocked at how much the mainstream media has failed to report. Death threats, arson, attempted murder all against Sara Palin. And they have the gall to accuse her of inciting a psychotic to murder a congressman?

This is absolutely blood libel, and these people in the press and the blogosphere are not going to stop until someone succeeds in murdering her and her family.

A Conspiracy Against the Mind, Against Life, Against Man–and the Virtue of Sarah Palin - Big Government

A Conspiracy Against the Mind, Against Life, Against Man–and the Virtue of Sarah Palin - Big Government
By Pamela Geller

Wednesday Sarah Palin responded to the vicious blood libel leveled against her and millions of right-thinking Americans by the army of destroyers. The ferocious, relentless attacks on Sarah Palin are a testament to her greatness, proof of how deathly afraid of her they are, like Dracula to the silver cross.

...
The left was waiting for such an atrocity as the Arizona shooting. It didn’t matter who, what, where, when — fill in the blanks. The ghouls were waiting for Arizona to smear the right and those that best represent us.

Global Warming Panic explained

Atlas Shrugs: More Muslim Propaganda Debunked: NY Report, Hate crimes against Jews: 251. Hate crimes against Muslims: 11

More Muslim Propaganda Debunked: NY Report, Hate crimes against Jews: 251. Hate crimes against Muslims: 11

I think the subject line says it all. So when CAIR gets on the news and demands special government protection for Muslims, tell them to blow it out their collective ears.

Dane-Geld

Literally, "Danish tax", Dane-Geld refers to a tax used to pay off Viking raiders in order to avoid them destroying the land. [Wikipedia]. It is also often used to refer to any act blackmail

This poem by Rudyard Kipling describes what happens what nations think it's better to pay off evil than to stand and fight. It is quite appropriate for this day when nations routinely pay off other nations because they don't have the stomach to fight for what they know to be right.

---

Dane-Geld

by Rudyard Kipling

It is always a temptation to an armed and agile nation
  To call upon a neighbour and to say: --
"We invaded you last night--we are quite prepared to fight,
  Unless you pay us cash to go away."

And that is called asking for Dane-geld,
  And the people who ask it explain
That you've only to pay 'em the Dane-geld
  And then you'll get rid of the Dane!

It is always a temptation for a rich and lazy nation,
  To puff and look important and to say: --
"Though we know we should defeat you, we have not the time to meet you.
  We will therefore pay you cash to go away."

And that is called paying the Dane-geld;
  But we've proved it again and again,
That if once you have paid him the Dane-geld
  You never get rid of the Dane.

It is wrong to put temptation in the path of any nation,
  For fear they should succumb and go astray;
So when you are requested to pay up or be molested,
  You will find it better policy to say: --

"We never pay any-one Dane-geld,
  No matter how trifling the cost;
For the end of that game is oppression and shame,
  And the nation that pays it is lost!"

Rationalist Judaism: The Prince of Egypt

Rationalist Judaism: The Prince of Egypt
By Nathan Slifkin

... there is one major theme in the movie which, while it probably grates on the sensitivities of some Orthodox Jews, is an important part of the story ...