Remember All Those Who Voted For ObamaCare?

Notice how many of them are no longer in Congress? And We the People still hate it, more now than before it was passed. It’s time for Republicans and those Democrats who like their cushy perks of Office to abort ObamaCare.

“I’m An Israeli Soldier, Proud To Be”

All you anti-Christian, anti-Semites, you can kiss my puwet. Tell your lies. They’re from Satan. I stand in solidarity with Israel, the Jews, Jesus, Providence and against Satan, who calls himself Allah among other names.

Eight Days Of Hannukah

What else can you say about a song written by a Mormon Senator from Utah with the music written by a Jewish writer of Christian Contemporary music and sung by a Syrian woman from Indiana with backup vocals by Jewish children and the Mormon Senator other than take a listen and be uplifted?

We here at Truth Before Dishonor are Conservative. We are predominantly Christian. That means beyond any shadow of a doubt we are pro-Israel and pro-Jew. This uplifting Hannukkah song is merely a representation of our love for the Jews and for Israel, and a gift to all who visit, Jew or Gentile.

The Sad Thing Is…

Our media, our Colleges, our public education are the most depraved, anti-American they have ever been in the history of the US. And the sad thing is…

In 15 years, I’ll be able to say the same thing with complete accuracy.

Let’s #Compromise!

Now that Republicans have won, the Democrats are no longer saying “we won” but have switched to that all-familiar refrain of theirs when they lose: let’s compromise! I agree. Let’s compromise. To compromise, both sides need to give up something they want to get something else they want.

Let’s start the compromising by forcing the Democrats to finally live up to their past agreements.

For the Reagan 100 billion dollar tax hike, the Democrats must now provide the 300 billion dollars of non-defense budget cuts (in 1986 value dollars).

For the George Herbert Walker Bush tax hike, the Democrats must now provide the agreed upon non-defense budget cuts (in 1990 value dollars).

For the Reagan amnesty, the Democrats must now secure the southern border.

Once the above 3 compromises are finally met, we can talk… about other compromises the Democrats have not yet followed through on. There should be no further offers of compromise until the Democrats actually follow through on old promises they made and, to this point, welched on.

The Difference Between 1994 And Today Is Democrats Have Obama

I have been told that the GOP has a larger advantage in the US House than any Party since World War II. That is decidedly untrue. The Democrats have had a larger majority many times since World War II ended. But this is indeed the largest Republican majority since World War II. But let’s examine Baraka Obama’s infamous quote, shall we? And his impact on Democrat elections.

US HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
The Democrats have Obama
2009 Democrats 257 Republicans 178
2011 Democrats 193 Republicans 242 Republican gain of 64
2013 Democrats 201 Republicans 234 Democrat gain of 8
2015 Democrats 179 Republicans 243 13 seats currently undecided with 5 Republicans currently leading

That’s a Republican gain of 65 at a minimum, and a possible Republican gain of 70.

The Clinton years
1993 Democrats 258 Republicans 176
1995 Democrats 206 Republicans 228 Republican gain of 52
1997 Democrats 207 Republicans 226 Democrat gain of 1, Republican loss of 2
1999 Democrats 211 Republicans 223 Democrat gain of 4, Republican loss of 3

That’s a Republican gain of 47.

The difference between the Clinton years and the Obama years is Republicans gained a minimum of 18 more House seats under Obama, possibly as many as 23 more seats.

Source: US House of Representatives
Source: Real Clear Politics

US SENATE
The Obama years
2009 Democrats 60* Republicans 40* (see below-noted source)
2011 Democrats 53* Republicans 47 Republican gain of 7
2013 Democrats 55* Republicans 45 Democrat gain of 2
2015 Democrats 45* Republicans 52 Republican gain of 7, with 3 to be decided. Likely Republican gain of 8 or 9.

That’s a Republican gain of 12 to 14 Senate seats.

The Clinton years
1993 Democrats 57 Republicans 43
1995 Democrats 48 Republicans 52 Republican gain of 9
1997 Democrats 45 Republicans 55 Republican gain of 3
1999 Democrats 45 Republicans 55 No gain

That’s a Republican gain of 12 seats.

The difference between Obama and Clinton in the Senate? Obama hopes it’s a wash, but it’s much more likely that Republicans will gain more Senate seats under Obama than under Clinton.

Source: US Senate
Source: Real Clear Politics

Clearly, the difference between the Obama years and the Clinton years is Republicans gained more seats overall under Obama. And the reason is very clear. When Clinton got shellacked in 1994, he learned. He triangulated. He moved toward the center. He stole Republican agenda items for himself, even items Republicans had to force onto him. And he made the Democrats sound less Socialist and anti-American in the process. Furthermore, Clinton was a much better showman, a much better politician, a much better salesman than Obama could ever be.

Obama learned at the feet of a man who dedicated his book to Satan, a man who set off bombs inside the US in order to attempt to get the US government to bend to his will, two Ivy League professors who suggested the total overburdening of the freebie system to collapse the government budget and usher in Socialism. Obama and Clinton both have been shown incapable of telling the truth, but Clinton can actually make people buy his lies.

Clinton blinked, moved away from the Big Government Socialism he came in with, and the Democrats recovered better than Obama’s “I can’t learn anything from these elections” approach.

The difference between the Clinton years and the Obama years? Americans are not, in general, Socialist.

Taking Their Chains Off

HT OLLPOH

Surely they have been called Uncle Toms, Race Traitors, Oreos, House Ni**ers, Tokens, etc by the Left already.

The Burka Cannot Cover Perry

No, I am not talking about Perry Hood, the (near?) octogenarian insane socialist from Lewes, Delaware, although I would pay a Philippine Peso to see him in a burqa. No, this is about Texas Governor Rick Perry and the completely out of control, criminal, corrupt, Left-Wing lunatics in Austin. (There’s a reason “they” say “Keep Austin Weird.”)

In case you have been living under a rock, Travis County DA Lehmberg got busted driving on the wrong side of the road with a BAC of .238, or nearly 3 times the legal limit. She then tried to use her position of authority as a bludgeon to get out of her criminality. Among other things, “get me your boss”, spitting at people, kicking things, having to be placed in full restraints while seated all describe Travis County DA Lehmberg’s activities while drunk.

“You’re going to ruin my political career.” Yeah, I think you did that yourself, you belligerent fool, other than the fact you work in Travis County. Keep Austin Weird. “I’m a District Attorney, I’m a District Attorney.” Continuous power-play by the drunk criminal DA of Austin.

And Travis County DA Lehmberg refused to resign her position as chief Law Enforcement Officer in Austin, and head of the “kill the political corruption” unit for the whole of Texas. Governor Perry declared she needs to go, or her office will not get the money for the “kill the political corruption” unit that is normally sent from the budget of the State of Texas to the budget of the DA of Travis County. Imagine that. A convicted criminal is ordered to step aside or money from all the taxpayers of the entire state of Texas won’t be sent to the convicted criminal. And since the convicted criminal doesn’t like when the Governor tells her she is in no position to judge whether other politicians are corrupt, she decides to work to file bogus Felony charges against the person who thinks a convicted criminal is not the type of person who should be looking for corrupt politicians.

I have come up with a solution of my own. Move the “investigate corrupt politicians” unit to neighboring Bell County. It’s right next door to Travis County. And it’s growing rapidly. And it’s not hyper-Left-Wing. Just take the power completely away from those who destroyed Tom DeLay for purely political reasons, and is trying to destroy Rick Perry for purely political reasons. There are multiple years of evidence Travis County (Keep Austin Weird) cannot be expected to have integrity or Honor in their investigations.

So, how did I come up with the title of this article? Where does the Burka come in? Well, now that you asked, Paul Burka is an editor of a dead-tree magazine in Travis County, more notably called Austin, Texas. Keep Austin weird. Two years ago, Paul Burka wrote an amazingly dishonest and agenda-fed article attacking, among others, Governor Rick Perry. Rick Perry, who was the Texas campaign chief for Algore’s campaign to be President. Rick Perry, who just a few short years ago was a card-carrying Democrat. Rick Perry, who dead-tree-magazine editor Paul Burka declared a radical Right-Wing insurgent with no civic interest.

And here’s how I fisked Paul Burka’s article two years ago:
______________________________________

Editor/Journalist/Pundit Paul Burka ( @paulburka ): Research 0, Integrity 0, Propaganda 100

 

(This article made “Post of the Day” for Monday, July 9 at Le-gal In-sur-rec-tion.  Professor Jacobson called it “What’s under that Burka?”)

 

Paul Burka is the Senior Executive Editor of Texas Monthly, a dead tree magazine with an online footprint. And Paul Burka likes to think of himself as better than us plebes. I’ll show you that very clearly throughout this article. But first, let’s quantify Paul Burka just a wee bit, shall we? In writing about the Ted Cruz/David Dewhurst debate in which Burka declared Dewhurst the winner, Burka had this little gem which gives everyone a glimpse into his heart and soul:

[I just want to point out here that the bailouts worked extremely well, that they kept the American automobile industry alive through the worst of the recession, that most, if not all, of the money has been paid back, not only in the auto industry but also in the financial industry, and that the opposition to them is an example of how ideology can be blinding, even when we know all of the facts. Isn’t it clear to everyone by now that the bailouts saved the international financial system?–pb]

That is indeed the position of the radical Leftist establishment, Liberals, Progressives, Socialists, Communists, Fascists, Mainstream Media, and propagandists (brought to you in triplicate by the Redundant Department of Redundancy). That is not at all the position of Conservatives, mainstream Republicans, or even Ruling Class Republicans. It is also not at all true. Ford did not take any Government bailout and it’s doing just fine, thank you very much. The fact Obama threw the entirety of the bankruptcy Laws in the trash heap in order to feed the United Auto Workers Union meant that grandma and grandpa lost a lot of their retirement investments, permanently. And it is a stone-cold fact that GM paid it’s Government loans with Government money and not its own. And the Government still has tens of billions of dollars stuck in GM today. And, no, these bailouts did not at all “save the international financial system”. It is still a mess, and will be an even bigger mess since Government is still getting in the way of Free Market corrections and eliminations of wasteful and failed agendas. The bailouts only made matters worse.

Now that we’re a bit more clear on just who this clown Paul Burka is (he’s clearly a Liberal), let’s get down to Fisking his article in the July, 2012 print edition of Texas Monthly, which I have in my currently nicotine-stained fingers. *crinkle*crinkle*crinkle* It is available online if you’re registered. I’m not registered, so I’ll use the print version. (I trust it more, anyway, because lamestream media outlets are notorious in stealth changes to their articles, or memory-holing them in their entireties.)

Pro-Life? Can’t Vote Democrat

The Editor of The First Street Journal found another lying Democrat. There are some rules of writing that say when a word is defined in part by a qualifier, the qualifier is unnecessarily redundant; therefore, it is unnecessarily redundant to add the qualifier “lying” to the word “Democrat”. Democrats win elections by lying. There is a good chance that Democrats would never have more than a small minority position in most State Legislatures and the US government without their lies. Republicans want to throw granny over the cliff. Republicans have a war on women. Republicans are all racists. Heck, the race card has been so overplayed as to not mean anything anymore. Democrats have fought for all the Civil Rights Laws we have in this country. The long list of proven Democrat lies could go on forever. So what’s so important that the Editor of The First Street Journal would point out another Democrat lying? It’s the Pro-Life nature of the Democrat. Or, rather, it’s the lie that he’s in any way Pro-Life at all.

Well, we have just found out how pro-life Senator Casey really is. The pro-abortion forces introduced S. 1696, the Women’s Health Protection Act, which is designed to eliminate state restrictions on abortion, through the entire nine months of pregnancy. It was in response to restrictions imposed in states like Texas, where abortion clinics are required to meet rigorous safety and health standards. The Texas law¹ is designed, unquestionably, to reduce the number of abortion clinics in the Lone Star State, but it was also in response to “Dr” Kermit Gosnell’s little shop of horrors. When it came time to actually vote on S. 1696, the devout Roman Catholic, pro-life Senator Casey, who represents the state in which “Dr” Gosnell was “practicing,” voted for the bill, as did every other Democrat in the Senate.²

With that vote, Senator Casey just told us, through deeds, that his words are nothing but lies. Senator Casey could have attempted to provide some “moderation,” some bit of pro-life sentiment, which he claims to have, by voting against the bill, because, in the end, the bill is both symbolic and meaningless: its chance of passage by the Republican-controlled House of Representatives is infinitesimally small.

If you’re Pro-Life, you cannot vote Democrat. Because Democrats are only Pro-Life to get your vote. Afterward, they are pro-abort in every sense of the word. But you also have to be careful which Republican gets your vote. Because there’s more than one Republican who is pro-abort. And no Democrat wants you to see the photos to the left, because that might make you vote against the Democrat and against abortion on demand.

Wisconsin Democrat Prosecutors Not Having Fun

HT Hogewash

Wisconsin, known as “The birthplace of Progressivism” (view with a grain of salt), had recall elections that didn’t work out so well for Democrats after Governor Walker and the Republicans passed sweeping reforms that severely cut into the slush money Public Employee Unions (and their off-shoots) got out of their subjects — reforms the Democrats tried to stop by fleeing the state instead of doing their jobs.

Then came the highly partisan, highly secretive, highly unconstitutional, highly intimidating raids and political rectal exams of Conservative groups fighting the Leftist recall attempts and Leftist big money (which have never been investigated). Followed by Conservative legal pushback to protect the rights of all individuals from Fascist tyranny.

And the Democrat prosecutors, not used to having to defend their heavy-handed partisan intimidation tactics, are losing court battles and not liking it one bit.

O’Keefe and his Wisconsin Club for Growth have turned their civil rights lawsuit — a complaint many legal experts believed would be an uphill battle at best — into ground-breaking litigation to be reckoned with.

It certainly has demanded the attention of John Doe prosecutors turned defendants: Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm, the Democrat who launched the secret probe into dozens of conservative organizations in the summer of 2012; two of Chisholm’s assistant DAs; John Doe special prosecutor Francis Schmitz; and Dean Nickel, a shadowy investigator contracted by the state Government Accountability Board.

Some say the prosecutors, not used to being on the defensive, are sounding a little nervous these days, maybe even hostile. Their filings in federal court of late come across as condescending, and testy.

Who could blame them? There’s much at stake for Chisholm and crew – beyond the forced termination of the probe they’ve pushed for nearly two years.

In comes Wisconsin’s Attorney General, who has declared that, according to State Law, the Government Accountability Board doesn’t have to be accountable to the general public. Orwellian barely covers what Wisconsin’s law, written by Progressives, does to actual word definitions.

MADISON, Wis. — It appears the state Government Accountability Board will be able to keep its secrets from the public eye.

In an opinion [pdf] issued Thursday, Wisconsin Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen said the GAB “may not” turn over its confidential investigative records to the Legislative Audit Bureau because “there is no specific authorization for it do so.”

Now the leaders of the Legislature’s audit committee say they might change the law to open up the records.

The Legislature has provided specific authorizations of confidential information in other circumstances, Van Hollen wrote, but the audit bureau’s right to access documents under Wisconsin statute only provides a “general right” access, and no specific authorization to access confidential records.

So, according to Wisconsin’s Attorney General, Wisconsin law states that the Government Accountability Board is not accountable to the Legislative Audit Bureau or the people who elect their government officials. Once the Federal judge who demanded the total destruction of the material unconstitutionally taken in hyper-partisan raids finds out the GAB is not releasing information, he’s going to have something to say about that.

This is Progressivism trying to hang onto its Fascist tyranny and avoid being accountable for its wholly unconstitutional intimidation of all who stand against Government Control of everything.
__________________________
For more information of who was involved in the protests, including information destroying the Leftists’ Godwinning of Walker and Republicans, see Restoring Honor Now.

Also read the 96 articles (so far) by Watchdog.org in this surreal unfolding tale of overreaching government and pushback by regular citizens.

Obama and a Presentment of Englishry?

This Incredible Slinking Men of the Obama Administration never cease to amaze.

Not just in their leftoid, parasitical on the productive class effrontery, but in their lack of logical acumen; their inability to recognize that in breaking legal bonds in one direction, they are broken in the other.

Or perhaps they don’t believe that there is a reciprocal dynamic between leftist conqueror and the American conquered.

As the Obamanaughts phrased it: “We rule now”.  The operative term here being rule, not govern or administer. And if the legislature, that is the American Congress, will not give the Little Imperator what he wants, why he will do it by Executive Order, he threatens.

So why should we be surprised by this report which states that the Obama Administration is proposing what is basically an ethnic based regime of law in Hawaii?

AOL didn’t bury this report

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Just a few years ago no one would have believed that such a report could be credible. But now, with what we have already seen out of this administration, our natural skepticism is reduced.

Law is the embodiment of the moral sense of the people,  Blackstone is alleged to have said.

Now it is proposed we accept the notion within our polity of different laws for different moral moieties; which implies, though the advocates no doubt wish to ignore it, that we have fundamentally different peoples with irreconcilably different moral sensibilities, jostling in the same political space.

This doesn’t seem to line up with leftist moral rhetoric.

But, as we have seen in the past, leftists seem incapable of grasping simple deductive inferences, so caught up are they in their “world-creating” fantasy existence.

 

Yeah, I remember law just like that from my school days.

 

“Such of the crimes as might be prosecuted by an appeal, and for which the criminal’s lands were forfeited to his lord or to the King, and his chattels taken, or for which he lost life or member, or was outlawed, were called felonies. Misdemeanours, such as were subsequently known under a fully developed common law, were practically ignored by the justices of Henry the Third’s reign, and on the eyre rolls of that period may be said not to appear. Homicide and rape are the crimes that here pass before us. The former is the only one that need be considered. In some few cases homicide was held to be justifiable, and when such happened the slayer suffered no punishment.

Neither did he where death was caused by misadventure or in self defence.

Every other case of homicide, that is, that which was neither justifiable nor excusable, was felonious.

The difference between murder and manslaughter was then unknown.

In Glanvill’s day secret homicide, which is murdrum, had to be distinguished from homicidium, but the distinction soon died away.1 The term murdrum however survived as the name of the fine paid by the hundred when a person was slain and the slayer not produced.

The law presumed that everyone killed was a foreigner unless his English birth was proved. Possibly the origin of the doctrine is to be found in the statutes of William the Conqueror, which decreed that all men whom he brought with him or who had followed him should be in his peace.

And if one of them were slain the lord of his murderer was to seize the slayer.

But if he could not do so then the lord was to pay forty-six marks of silver as long as his possessions held out, and on their exhaustion the hundred in which the killing took place was to pay in common the balance owing.

The presentment of Englishry (Englescheria), that is proving the slain to be an Englishman by birth, was at first one of the few formal badges of distinction between the conquering and conquered race. Its practical need could not have lasted long, for at the end of the twelfth century it was impossible, except in the very highest or very lowest ranks, to distinguish Norman from Englishman.” [Pleas of the Crown for the Hundred of Swineshead and the Township of Bristol by Edward James Watson]

Looks like the Obama Administration does in fact believe itself quite capable of distinguishing Saxon from non-Saxon. At least when they see a political gain in it for themselves.

So much for any notion that the left believes or ever really believed in the first place, that mankind constituted one moral species … no matter how rhetorically useful they happen to have found the spouting of Christian and natural law doctrines in order to advance their cause – at least far enough along to subvert and displace the same.

 

 

 

Like The Days Of Sodom And Gomorrah

Jesus’ return will be like the days of Lot and Noah, so Jesus proclaimed. Like the days of Sodom and Gomorrah, with their absolutely evil sexual immorality. When two angels of the Lord visited Lot, the entire town came out and raised a ruckus. Lot offered to let the town rape his two virgin daughters. They refused. They demanded to rape the men who came to visit.

1 Corinthians 6:9-11

9 Or do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men[a] 10 nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.

Footnotes:
a.1 Corinthians 6:9 The words men who have sex with men translate two Greek words that refer to the passive and active participants in homosexual acts.

Every “church” leader who declares homosexuality to be acceptable will find himself separated from the Kingdom of Providence. Every last one of them.

Take a look around the US. People are being fired from their jobs for standing up for righteous marriage and against the sexually immoral crapola that is being forced down our throats today. The US has fallen deeply into its Sodom and Gomorrah stage, and Providence will punish the US for it. We are in the End Times, just as it was prophesied, and the coming of the Lord (and the 7 year Tribulation) are close at hand.

Got a problem with that? Take it up with the man you now mock, but whom you will bow down and prostrate yourself before, while declaring him Lord over all. (Philippians 2:9-11)

Harry Reid’s Koch-Addled Asininity Debunked Here — 21 Months Ago

That’s right, folks. Harry Reid’s Koch-addled asininity was debunked here, a full 21 months before his rectological rectory on the Senate Floor.

Let me give you a chart from those 21 months ago:

With Unions pushing that much money around, Dingy Harry has the gall to claim the Koch Brothers (who are Libertarians and not Conservatives) are the biggest danger and biggest source of outside money? He could’ve just come to my site and done a little research before looking stupid. But then again, he’s too stupid to actually, you know, do any research.

Want more information on where Unions stand in political spending, such as rankings?

From 21 months ago:

3. Public Employee Union
5. Public Employee Union
7. Public Employee Union
9. Union
10. Public Employee Union
11. Union
12. Union (that I was a forced member of, twice)
13. Union
14. union
17. Union
18. Union
20. Union
29. Union
30. group of Unions

14 of the top 30 biggest political spenders are all Unions, and yet, Unions represent less than 12 percent of the workforce. But the Union spending doesn’t stop there.

40. Union (that I was a forced member of for nearly 9 years)
43. Union
44. Union
49. Union
52. Union
57. Union
58. Union
59. Union
65. Union
75. Union
85. Union
117. Union
119. Union
128. Union
133. Union

Oh, and I had information on the Koch Brothers back then, too.

Again, since 1989, Unions have spent 667.3 million (over 2/3 of a billion) dollars on politics. How much has the Left’s bogeyman, the Koch brothers, spent? A paltry 12.7 million dollars. So, next time some radical Leftist complains about the Koch brothers, remind that person that Unions are outspending the Koch brothers nearly 55 to 1. And while you’re at it, remind them that Unions are outspending their representative proportion more than 2 to 1.

By the way, those evil Koch Brothers tried to influence me once. One of the political type organizations they’re tied to sent me an email talking about the successful recovery of a community that rejected Federal aid and the floundering of another community that took the aid. I didn’t write about it because I was too lazy to do so, not because the Koch’s are evil (which they clearly are not).

So, the continued hate-filled attacks on Libertarians Who Provide Jobs To The Middle Class are all the Socialist, Fascist, Statist Democrats have to try to scare people into a serf-state.

It didn’t take gobs of research to destroy Hairy Reed’s demagoguery which took place this week on the Senate Floor. All it took was looking up an article I wrote 21 months before the Hairy logorrhea.

You’re welcome.

The Perfect Martini

 

Anyone who has drunk, or imbibed since we don’t want to sound as if we are alluding to intoxication, a sufficient number of martinis to use the term “perfect martini” also knows that there is really no such thing as a perfect martini. Even martinis made to your favorite recipe will obviously vary to some significant degree with the care which one takes – or doesn’t – in making (proportioning) the drink and with the particular brands of ingredients used.

That rocks glass in your hand on the patio in July, the glass sloshingly filled with cubes and gin and vermouth and a couple of olives, and which you hold in the one hand as you flip steaks on the grill with the other, holds the same nominal drink as that carefully proportioned vodka and vermouth mix poured from a shaker into a coupe glass, and then garnished with a twist of lemon zest.

In the name of decency, there are some limits though.

For example, although either gin or vodka (or both together, Mr. Bond) may be used or substituted, most people would agree that no matter how stingy the application may be,  a “martini” made without any vermouth is just not really a martini as most of us understand it.

Not so much vermouth!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Speaking of vermouth, many of us, myself for instance, had become comfortably accustomed to Noilly Prat only to discover a couple of years ago that something awful had happened. I first though I had gotten a bad bottle. Instead of the usual clear liquid I was used to seeing, out came a yellow-greenish fluid with a more pronounced taste, smell, and what seemed to me to be oily character. It tasted like the abominable Gallo vermouth. It made my martini undrinkable. Until recently I could not come up with a satisfactory explanation as to what went wrong. Abandoning my theory of a heat spoiled bottle at the second disappointment, I figured my memory of what I like must have been off … very off somehow.

Turns out that the company had been bought out, and the new ownership of Noilly Prat decided that Americans would henceforth receive the European version of their “dry” vermouth; which was distinctly heavier in scent and taste than that to which we were accustomed. Apparently Noilly had for some years, and long before I ever approached a martini glass, been offering a specially dry version for the North American market. After grimacing my way through those last unwitting purchases of the Euro-style and highly scented version of their “dry”, I dropped any pretense of brand loyalty and grabbed a bottle of Martini & Rossi off the shelf the next time out. According to the blog “The Gray Report” (and Gray himself actually prefers the Euro-version), many others did as well. I certainly hated it. Enough people agreed with me implies Gray, to cause sales to plummet sufficient to get management’s attention and to promise to bring back the American version to this market.

So far, I haven’t seen it. Though I can’t say I have looked very hard.

As far as the mix portions go, I for one, have over the years developed a preference for what some web sites, Vermouth101.c0m for instance, are calling a 1950’s mix … basically 3 measures of gin or vodka to one half measure (I’m not using the technical term for “measure” here) of dry vermouth. So for example, a measure might be one of those ounce-and-a-half shot glasses. Then, three full shot glasses of gin, and one half of that ounce and a half shot glass, of vermouth.

You will notice too that as Mr. Niven above protectively recoils from that bottle of vermouth proffered by the cheerfully smiling pixie, he is simultaneously cradling an almost fishbowl sized snifter, which he’s using as the martini mixing glass.

He obviously wants his martini as dry as possible. And I agree to some extent as I mentioned just above.

But I would not go so far as the version of martini supposedly liked best when I first started drinking them during that late 1980s and 1990’s era sometimes credited with the return of the cocktail to prominence. That version, was reportedly almost pure gin or vodka, and I found it as objectionable to my palate as the early 20th century version said to be preferred by FDR: a two gin to one vermouth mix with plenty of brine added. I tried it. Yech. No wonder FDR had a stroke.

Well, no accounting for the taste of certain statist liberals who smoke cigarettes from holders.

We’ve already addressed what are from my point of view the preferable proportions of the two main ingredients in the mix. How they are mixed together is another matter.

The phrase “shaken not stirred” has become a painful cliche that causes me to actually wince when hearing it. But, that doesn’t mean that I don’t prefer the drink mixed that way. In fact, while doing research – well, while idly scanning various books and other websites for confirmation of my own prejudices – I read that martinis were originally meant to be made that way: shaken.

By the time the James Bond novel Casino Royale was published for Ian Fleming in 1953, in the very year Mr. Niven was saving his bowl of gin in “The Moon is Blue” from the debasement of too much, or almost any vermouth, the mixing process seems to have changed from shaking to stirring. Or at least swirling the mix with cubes.

Which leads us to another painful cliche: one which expresses alarm over the possibility of “bruising the gin”.

I have no idea what that is supposed to mean, so I can’t explain it to you. And when I hear it, I can only picture some dissipated country club type given to the pointless regurgitation of current mythologies as a way of cementing his image as one who is in need of constantly cementing his image. Out of respect to our early 1950s motif here, I’ll include an image of just that type of fellow as portrayed by actor Louis Calhern, in yet another William Holden movie of that same era, “Executive Suite”.

Better not be bruised!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In any event, I not only have a fictional spy on my shaken side, I apparently have the British medical establishment. You may be thinking I am referring to a recent series of articles based on the premise that James Bond liked his martinis shaken and not stirred because had he been a real person who drank as much as seemingly recorded in the spy novels he, would have had a case of the shakes which made stirring impossible … or something like that.

However, that particular bit of politically motivated kill-joy posturing by the PC crowd is not what I am referring to. What I am citing here is an article in the British Journal of Medicine titled “Shaken, not stirred: bioanalytical study of the antioxidant activities of martinis”.

Shaken martinis were more effective in deactivating hydrogen peroxide than the stirred variety, and both were more effective than gin or vermouth alone (0.072% of peroxide control for shaken martini, 0.157% for stirred v 58.3% for gin and 1.90% for vermouth). The reason for this is not clear, but it may well not involve the facile oxidation of reactive martini components: control martinis through which either oxygen or nitrogen was bubbled did not differ in their ability to deactivate hydrogen peroxide (0.061% v 0.057%) and did not differ from the shaken martini. Moreover, preliminary experiments indicate that martinis are less well endowed with polyphenols than Sauvignon white wine or Scotch whisky (0.056 mmol/l (catechin equivalents) shaken, 0.060 mmol/l stirred v 0.592 mmol/l wine, 0.575 mmol/l whisky).

 

With authorities like that behind you, who needs some comic book spy on your side?

How’s it to be served then?  In what kind of glass? A “martini glass” obviously?

Well, there are different theories. I always specified a rocks glass in restaurants. Occasionally a self-confident middle aged waiter in the tonier kind place would good naturedly admonish me with an “Oh sir! Not really!” and I’d give in and have it in a stemmed glass. I’ve kind of gotten used to them by now. The design is supposed to have a certain logic, and I admit that the drink may taste somewhat better in one. Or at least more like an aperitif to be savored, than a concoction to be guzzled.

Still, I like a squat tumbler  in some situations. Summer evening grilling is good time to load up with ice, in my opinion; and a double old fashioned glass works really well for that.

But the classic martini glass is making a bit of comeback without any assistance from me. That is to say, when I say “classic”, a sub 7 ounce capacity glass with a short pulled stem, rather than one of those 12 ounce glass funnels ill balanced on a 6 inch pillar, which has been the popular version for the last 30 or so years.

As an admirable return to basics, take this well proportioned glass sold this Christmas season as an example. Not a pulled stem coupe with that little extra cusp in the bottom (that is to say not one obviously shaped like a mold of Marie Antoinette’s left you know what …) it’s nonetheless pretty appealing all the same.

Short stemmed, made in Poland, and called “True martini” glass

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And, you can still get the champagne coupe/cocktail glasses common in the early 60’s as well. From Germany, just for you: at two for sixty or seventy dollars a pair.

Coupe type glass

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So, what’s the perfect martini? I don’t know really, and haven’t the authority to say. Make it 6 to one.  Vodka or gin depending on mood. Rocks or Martini glass depending. Two cubes with the former, or just a bit of cracked ice in the latter.  Mix shaken, well, with ice. Poured over a stuffed olive, and a twist of zest added last. Let sit about a minute. Then …

That’s perfect enough for me.

You, are entitled to your own opinion of course.

 

A satisfied customer

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gettysburg Address Travel

Yesterday was the 150th Anniversary of the Gettysburg Address. For Lincoln to get to Gettysburg from Washington to Gettysburg, he had to travel to Baltimore and switch to yjr Northern Central RR which headed north to York, PA. But before reaching York, Lincoln had to transfer to a Railroad to Hanover, PA and then to Gettysburg.

But his transfer before York was done at a little switching station called Hanover Junction. It was there, Brady took a picture supposedly with Lincoln in the picture.

National Archives.

The building at Hanover Junction in 1863 still stands, and has been refurbished and brought to what it looked like in 1863. Last week, the Group “Steam into History” http://steamintohistory.com/ re-created this scene.

a href=”http://www.journal14.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/IMG_9565c1.jpg”> My photo

(This happened near where I live)