Mental Maps

In 2005 I posted the piece below, titled Three Strikes and You’re Out or Third Time’s the Charm?

In either case, please note which direction they’re traveling every time.

Back in February of last year I posted Love that Detroit Iron! which I will repost here in its entirety:

You have to give them an “A” for effort, or at least persistence. What a way to reimport the classics!

Marciel Basanta Lopez and Luis Gras Rodriguez have again attempted to sail from Cuba to Florida, but once again have unfortunately been intercepted by the Coast Guard short of their goal. Back in July they made the journey in a specially modified 1951 Chevy pickup.

Yes, really. Here’s a picture of it:

Well, they just nabbed them (and eight of their friends and relatives) trying again. This time in a specially modified 1959 Buick!

They must have a lot of that funky green paint.

What’s next? A 1955 Ford?

Well, they must’ve run out of green paint, and instead of a ’55 Ford, they used a ’48 Mercury:

Migrants’ ‘taxicab’ boat stopped at sea (Link broken)

The Coast Guard halted a homemade craft about 25 miles off the Keys that looked like a taxi. The boat was loaded with Cuban migrants.

BY JENNIFER BABSON
[email protected]

KEY WEST – A blue, 1948 Mercury automobile loaded with Cuban migrants made it within 25 miles of the Keys late Tuesday before being stopped by the U.S. Coast Guard.

The unusual, homemade ‘boat’ — described by federal officials as possibly a ‘taxicab’ and sporting a white top — was stopped south of Summerland Key in the Lower Keys. It was the third time in nearly two years that Cuban migrants have tried to make it to the United States using trucks or cars specially rigged to operate as boats.

One of the men aboard the Mercury tried to make the voyage in February 2004 in a Buick but was sent back to Cuba, according to Luis Grass — the brainchild behind similar attempts who made his way to Miami this year.

I wonder what Luis “drove” on his successful attempt?

BOARDING THE CRAFT

Television footage from NBC 6 in Miami on Tuesday night showed Coast Guard officers boarding the vehicle, which appeared to have been modified with a boat prow in front.

As many as 12 Cubans voluntarily left the car late Tuesday and moved onto a Coast Guard cutter, according to numerous federal sources. It was not immediately known if they would be returned to Cuba.

The interdiction unfolded just before dusk Tuesday.

“A U.S. Customs and Border Protection aircraft detected it just before 8 p.m.,” said customs spokesman Zachary Mann. “According to our guys, it looked like a floating taxi.”

Citing U.S. policy, Coast Guard spokeswoman Sandra Bartlett said she could not immediately comment on the incident or whether the migrants would be returned to Cuba, a process that could take several days.

Under the U.S. wet-foot, dry-foot immigration policy, Cubans who reach U.S. soil are almost always allowed to remain in the country, while those caught offshore are generally returned to Cuba unless they can convince a U.S. immigration officer they have a ‘credible fear’ of persecution if returned to the island.

‘DRIVING’ THE WAY

It was the latest in a series of recent attempts by Cubans to try to ‘drive’ their way to the Keys.

In July 2003, a group of Cuban migrants — dubbed “truckonauts” and heralded for their ingenuity — attempted to flee Cuba in a retrofitted, green 1951 Chevy truck. The group was stopped off Islamorada — their truck-boat floating on a pontoon bed and powered by propellers that had been attached to the vehicle’s drive shaft.

The vessel was sunk at sea as a hazard to navigation.

Returned to Cuba, several of the Cubans tried again in February 2004 using a similarly rigged 1959 Buick sedan. At least some of those who attempted that voyage, however, were taken to Guantánamo Bay in Cuba for resettlement in a third country.

Among that group was Grass, an enterprising mechanic credited with converting the classic vehicles into seaworthy escape vessels. Grass, his wife and young son were among 20 Cuban migrants resettled in Costa Rica last November.

ANOTHER TRY

Grass said late Tuesday that one of his pals — who may have subsequently received a U.S. visa after failing last year to reach Florida by Buick — made Tuesday’s voyage with his two sons and his wife, who was having difficulty leaving Cuba because she is a doctor.

“He finally made a taxi from Havana to Miami,” chuckled Grass, who told The Herald he spoke with the man’s friends in Havana late Tuesday.

The group, he said, was from San Miguel Del Padron in Havana.

Grass and his family finally made it to the United States in March after crossing the Mexican border and requesting political asylum.

You have to admire their ingenuity and doggedness.

Bill Whittle noted once that if your map of idealism matches up with reality, you take note of which way the rafts are traveling when determining whether capitalism or communism works better. I can’t remember the last time anyone risked their lives getting on a raft made of an antique car, much less flotsam and jetsam, and set sail for Havana to join the People’s Paradise of Cuba.

How do you go about having a productive debate with people disconnected from reality? How do you reason with people who’ve abandoned the practice? How do you even discuss first principles with people who think words mean only what they want them to mean, and can change their definition at any time? For whom “winning” is the only priority, and are unparalleled masters at psychological projection?

Everything Old is New Again

This time?  The “Two Americas” meme. 

If I’m not mistaken, this is the motto that John Edwards ran for President under in 2004, but now, after eight years of Obama’s Presidency – unexpectedly! – it’s a new claim and somehow all Trump’s fault.

Apparently Obama wasn’t much of a uniter after all.

Either that, or the Ctrl-Left and its media mouthpieces can’t come up with a new idea to save its life.

I guess it all goes back to that other fallback meme:  We’re ungovernable.

Quote of the Day: Ctrl-Left Edition*

Via Instapundit today:

It’s important to understand why liberals are so angry and so scared. They are angry because they believe they have a moral right to command us, apparently bestowed by Gaia or #Science or having gone to Yale, and we are irredeemably deplorable for not submitting to their benevolent dictatorship.

They are scared because they fear we will wage the same kind of campaign of petty (and not so petty) oppression, intimidation, and bullying that they intended to wage upon us.

Kurt Schlicter

(* As far as I know, the exquisitely accurate expression “Ctrl-Left” was coined by Jonathan Sullivan.)

Quote of the Day – Southern Edition

So I spent some time earlier this week at a gold mine under construction in South Carolina.  Part of that time was spent in “site specific” safety training, said training being administered by the head of site security.

Now, I grew up in the South, my parents are from Appalachian coal country, so I’ve heard a few “Southerinisms” in my time, but this one:

“Some folks in this county would steal the yeast from a biscuit without touchin’ the crust.”

This one was new.

I Chuckled

Just got this via email:

News Update from Canada

The flood of Trump-fearing American liberals sneaking across the border into Canada has intensified in the past week. The Republican presidential campaign is prompting an exodus among left-leaning Americans who fear they’ll soon be required to hunt, pray, pay taxes, and live according to the Constitution.

Canadian border residents say it’s not uncommon to see dozens of sociology professors, liberal arts majors, global-warming activists, and “green” energy proponents crossing their fields at night.

“I went out to milk the cows the other day, and there was a Hollywood producer huddled in the barn,” said southern Manitoba farmer Red Greenfield, whose acreage borders North Dakota. “He was cold, exhausted and hungry, and begged me for a latte and some free-range chicken. When I said I didn’t have any, he left before I even got a chance to show him my screenplay, eh?”

In an effort to stop the illegal aliens, Greenfield erected higher fences, but the liberals scaled them. He then installed loudspeakers that blared Rush Limbaugh across the fields, but they just stuck their fingers in their ears and kept coming. Officials are particularly concerned about smugglers who meet liberals just south of the border, pack them into electric cars, and drive them across the border, where they are simply left to fend for themselves after the battery dies.

“A lot of these people are not prepared for our rugged conditions,” an Alberta border patrolman said. “I found one carload without a single bottle of Perrier water, or any gemelli with shrimp and arugula. All they had was a nice little Napa Valley cabernet and some kale chips. When liberals are caught, they’re sent back across the border, often wailing that they fear persecution from Trump high-hairers.”

Rumors are circulating about plans being made to build re-education camps where liberals will be forced to drink domestic beer, study the Constitution, and find jobs that actually contribute to the economy.

In recent days, liberals have turned to ingenious ways of crossing the border. Some have been disguised as senior citizens taking a bus trip to buy cheap Canadian prescription drugs. After catching a half-dozen young vegans in blue-hair wig disguises, Canadian immigration authorities began stopping buses and quizzing the supposed senior citizens about Perry Como and Rosemary Clooney to prove that they were alive in the ’50s. “If they can’t identify the accordion player on The Lawrence Welk Show, we become very suspicious about their age,” an official said.

Canadian citizens have complained that the illegal immigrants are creating an organic-broccoli shortage, are buying up all the Barbara Streisand CD’s, and are overloading the internet while downloading jazzercise apps to their cell phones.

“I really feel sorry for American liberals, but the Canadian economy just can’t support them,” an Ottawa resident said. “After all, how many art-history majors does one country need?

Do I Know Anybody in South Carolina?

I’m going to be there all next week.  Got to get up at O’mygod-thirty tomorrow morning to make an 8:15 flight out.  I arrive in Charlotte about 4:30PM, and then I have to drive to Lancaster, SC to get to my hotel.  I’ll be working ~10 hours a day all week, but I ought to be free for dinner at least one night.  Anybody live in the general vicinity and want to get together?

Subverting the Electoral College

So the Left wants to subvert the Electoral College:

Last-Ditch Effort Underway to Elect Hillary Clinton, Block Donald Trump Presidency

The number of electoral votes per state is determined by the number of congressional districts plus one for each senator, for a total of 538.

But there is nothing in the Constitution that prevents any of the electors from refusing to support the candidate who won their state, or from abstaining. Twenty-nine states ban the “faithless elector” practice.

A petition on Change.org is pushing for electors to vote for Clinton instead of Trump. It had more than 175,000 signatures as of Thursday morning; by early evening, it had more than 1.4 million.

Part of the petition reads:

Mr. Trump is unfit to serve. His scapegoating of so many Americans, and his impulsivity, bullying, lying, admitted history of sexual assault, and utter lack of experience make him a danger to the Republic.

Secretary Clinton WON THE POPULAR VOTE and should be President.

Hillary won the popular vote. The only reason Trump “won” is because of the Electoral College.

But the Electoral College can actually give the White House to either candidate. So why not use this most undemocratic of our institutions to ensure a democratic result?

SHE WON THE POPULAR VOTE.

There is no reason Trump should be President.

“It’s the ‘People’s Will'”

No. She won the popular vote.

“Our system of government under our Constitution says he wins”

No. Our Constitution says the Electors choose.

“Too many states prohibit ‘Faithless Electors'”

24 states bind electors. If electors vote against their party, they usually pay a fine. And people get mad. But they can vote however they want and there is no legal means to stop them in most states.

I have one thing to say to that:

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