Mark Steyn on Toasters

If you don't read Mark Steyn (you can find his syndicated columns on the internet), you should.

 

In this week's National Review (print edition), Steyn pens a typically funny and despairing at the same time, picture of America, circa, 2020 or so… against the backdrop of the overregulation that has brought us, in California, the Bureau of Electronic and Appliance Repair, Home Furnishings, and Thermal Insulation.  And, yes, it's real.

 

As Steyn says, "By the time you've got a Bureau of Home Furnishings, you're getting awful near the limit."  I also like his lampooning the liberal rant to "stay out of our bedrooms" as they regulate the size, type, and cost of the bed you can perform those immoral and illegal acts on.

 

It's so real, that as part of Governor Arnold's cost cutting, they are closed 3 Friday's a month, saving Californian's millions of dollars in unenforced regulations and public servant salaries!  Just imagine what California could save if they were closed the other 20 or so days of the month.

 

Anyway, you probably can't read all of Steyn's gems, but I'll share a few:

 

·         Back in January, Steyn noted that "Europe's somewhat agreeable decline had been cushioned by America, and that the problem with American decline is that this time round there's no rising power volunteering to do the cushioning.  Because of the American security blanket, countries like Germany were able to transfer military spending to social programs.  Lacking that option for Obamacare, Democrats propose to 'control costs' by refusing to acknowledge them: Medicare reimbursement levels will be 'capped,' which means an ever greater number of doctors will cease to perform services for which they are not properly renumerated."

·         "The Age of Entitlement Insolvency will hit sooner, rather than later, and pimply burger flippers will rebel or flee rather than prop up entire Florida retirement communities.  Faced with a choice between unsustainable entitlements and an armed forces of global reach, the United States will, as Europe did, choose the former, and toss the savings into social spending.  That will make for a more vulnerable America that will wind up having to fight them over here, because we no longer can fight them over there."

·         "From the state-licensed, SEIU-staffed bake sale to Armageddon – in nothing flat."

·         "We have regulated our bed, and we will have to lie in it."

 

As always, pure genius.