"If we can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people, under the pretense of taking care of them, they must become happy." --Thomas Jefferson
The government's "Cash for Clunkers" program may have only added 125,000 vehicle sales, according to Edmunds.com, which said the rest of the units sold would have happened regardless of the program.
In total, the car-shopping Web site said about 690,000 vehicles were sold during the program. Edmunds.com said that based on the actual sales gained from the program, the Cash for Clunkers program cost taxpayers $24,000 per vehicle sold.
"Our research indicates that without the Cash for Clunkers program, many customers would not have traded in an old vehicle when making a new purchase," said Edmunds.com senior analyst David Tompkins. "That may give some credence to the environmental claims, but unfortunately the economic claims have been rendered quite weak."
Edmunds.com Chief Executive Jeremy Anwyl noted that while sales are up in October from September, growth would have been even better without the program. He said that suggests the auto industry's recovery is gaining momentum.
Sales surged in late July and most of August as the program was in effect, giving certain new-car buyers up to $4,500 in rebates if they traded in a gas-guzzler. But U.S. auto sales slid in September absent clunker-related deals. Other countries still have so-called scrappage programs in effect.
-By John Kell, Dow Jones Newswires; 212-416-2480; john.kell@dowjones.com
I'm sure they are just honest mistakes. At least these government bureaucrats don't anyone’s lives on the line with these decisions... Yet...
WASHINGTON — The federal government sent Bob Bray $26,174 in stimulus aid to fix a fence and replace the roofs on public apartments in Blooming Grove, Texas, a town of fewer than 900 people outside Dallas. He hired five roofers and an inspector to do the job.
But the number of jobs he reported to the government looked very different — 450 jobs.
Oh, no," said Bray, who runs the local public housing authority part-time with his wife, Linda, when asked about the discrepancy. He said that he told the government that he had created six jobs but that a federal official told him that wasn't right. So he reported the number of hours the roofers worked instead. The Department of Housing and Urban Development caught the mistake, but he couldn't fix it before the jobs figures were published. "The money was great, but the reports are really confusing," he said. "I've been fighting with it for over a month and a half."
The police department in Plymouth, Conn., claimed in its report that a $15,355 grant used to buy new computers had created or saved 108 jobs. The department had 22 law enforcement officers last year, according to the FBI. Mayor Vincent Festa said that the town has resorted to "counting paper clips" to save money but that it had no plans to lay off any of its police officers, even without the stimulus. He said he could not explain the report, and the town's police chief did not return telephone calls Monday.
•The Southwest Georgia Community Action Council, which employs about 500 people in its Head Start preschool program, reported creating or saving 935 jobs with about $1.3 million in funding. Beverly Wise, the group's fiscal officer, said she followed the advice of federal officials to come up with the number. "I thought it was high," Wise said of the number she reported, adding that the process was confusing. The group is using its stimulus money to give a 1.84% pay raise to its employees and pay for other needs such as playground equipment and training for the teachers who serve 2,300 low-income children.
•Teach for America, which helps place recent graduates in teaching jobs in urban and rural districts, reported that a $2 million grant created or saved 1,425 jobs. Spokeswoman Kerci Marcello Stroud said officials used that money to pay part of the salaries of 125 employees; a separate $6 million allowed it to expand the training program to include 1,300 more graduates.
I'm sure they are just honest mistakes. At least these government bureaucrats don't anyone’s lives on the line with these decisions... Yet...
I am not a particularly big fan of Peggy Noonan. I believe she is part of the NE country club elite Republicans. But, even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in while.
The most sophisticated Americans, experienced in how the country works on the ground, can't figure a way out. Have you heard, "If only we follow Obama and the Democrats, it will all get better"? Or, "If only we follow the Republicans, they'll make it all work again"? I bet you haven't, or not much.
We are governed at all levels by America's luckiest children, sons and daughters of the abundance, and they call themselves optimists but they're not optimists—they're unimaginative. They don't have faith, they've just never been foreclosed on. They are stupid and they are callous, and they don't mind it when people become disheartened. They don't even notice.
Congress has never before required citizens to purchase any good or service, but that is what both House and Senate health bills would mandate.
While this debate has been overshadowed by other issues involving the plan's nearly $1 trillion cost and its government-run option, the constitutional argument strikes at a pivotal part of the health care plan's finances.
In 1994, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office noted that a "mandate requiring all individuals to purchase health insurance would be an unprecedented form of federal action."
"The government has never required people to buy any good or service as a condition of lawful residence in the United States," the CBO said. The statement was part of an analysis of then-President Clinton's ill-fated health care reform plan, which also required that all Americans purchase health insurance plans.
...Randy Barnett, a professor at Georgetown University Law Center, asks, "Where in the [Constitution] is the power to mandate that individuals buy health insurance?" His answer: Nowhere.
"The business of providing health insurance is now an entirely intrastate activity" beyond the regulatory sway of the federal government, he said.
Washington lawyers David B. Rivkin Jr. and Lee A. Casey argued in an Aug. 22 column in The Washington Post that Congress has no constitutional power to tell people what they must buy.
I would hope that more people would begin to question the constitutionality of all this healthcare reform business.
Transparent nonsense
Obama hinders public's right to know
By Quin Hillyer
The Washington Times
The candidate whose most identifiable promise was to provide open and transparent government instead is leading an administration rife with secrecy, stonewalling and prevarication.
The administration repeatedly has stiff-armed Congress, the media, outside organizations and even a prestigious independent government commission. It has raised "none of your business" from an adolescent rejoinder to a public policy - to keep the public in the dark.
Before examining examples of this alarming trend, let's remember what newly inaugurated President Obama said in a big press conference on Jan. 21, his first full day in office. His words and tone could not have been more clear:
"The way to hold government accountable is to make it transparent so that the American people can know exactly what decisions are being made [and] how they're being made. ... Starting today, every agency and department should know that this administration stands on the side not of those who seek to withhold information, but those who seek to make it known. ... The mere fact that you have the legal power to keep something secret does not mean you should always use it."
Fine sentiments. But this is the same president who promised to abide by campaign spending limits - until the time came actually to do it. Likewise, these pledges were quickly tossed into the sewer of power politics.
Consider the president's unfathomable decision to support the radical leftist, anti-American, would-be dictator Manuel Zelaya when all the lawful authorities in Honduras removed him from office for subverting the clear text of the Honduran constitution. Even the American Law Library of Congress concluded that the Honduran Legislature and courts acted lawfully, yet the Obama administration actually has imposed sanctions on the Honduran people, who long have been our allies.
Since July 8, 16 senators have been asking the State Department to explain the legal rationale for its stance. They received no substantive response. When Sen. Jim DeMint, South Carolina Republican, and three House members traveled to Honduras, U.S. Ambassador Hugo Llorens urged them to read a memo by State Department counsel Harold Koh explaining the administration's analysis. On Oct. 6, the senator's staff specifically requested that memo from the department. No response.
Twice this month, I requested the memo. State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley refused, saying the memo officially is "classified" because of "the nature of the information used in the analysis" and that it also is subject to "attorney-client privilege." Finally, he said it is privileged because it is a "pre-decisional" and "internal deliberative document."
It goes on to give more examples, but do we really need more? Come on, this administration and congress make the secretive Dick Cheney look like he was shouting from the mountain top!
I’m House Republican Leader John Boehner. At the beginning of this year, I told President Obama and Speaker Nancy Pelosi that Republicans would be ready to work with them whenever possible to address the nation’s biggest challenges. I also said that where there are differences, it was our obligation as a party to explain to the American people how we would do things better. And on the "stimulus," the budget, the energy bill, and health care, we have done exactly that.
As a matter of fact, only Republicans have offered solutions to lower health care costs and make it easier to obtain quality, affordable coverage without imposing a massive burden on the American people.
We first released our health care plan in June, and over the last six months, we have introduced at least eight bills that, taken together, would implement this blueprint. You can go right now to healthcare.gop.gov and get all the details, but for now, I just want to share with you four ideas Republicans have proposed:
Number one: let families and businesses buy health insurance across state lines;
Number two: allow individuals, small businesses, and trade associations to pool together and acquire health insurance at lower prices, the same way large corporations and labor unions do today;
Number three: give states the tools to create their own innovative reforms that lower health care costs; and
Number four: end junk lawsuits that contribute to higher health care costs by increasing the number of tests and procedures that physicians sometimes order not because they think it's good medicine, but because they are afraid of being sued.
These are four smart, fiscally-responsible reforms that we can implement today to lower costs and expand access at a price our nation can afford. Again, you can learn more about these and all the health care initiatives Republicans have supported by visiting healthcare.gop.gov.
The best way to get a sense of what Speaker Pelosi’s takeover of health care looks like is to actually look at it. Just shy of 2,000 pages, it runs more than 620 pages longer than the government-run plan Hillary Clinton proposed in 1993.
This 1,990 pages of bureaucracy will centralize health care decision making in Washington, DC. It’ll require thousands of new federal employees. It’ll put unelected boards, bureaus, and commissions in charge of who gets access to what drug and what potentially life-saving treatment.
And it won’t come cheap. Speaker Pelosi’s health care bill will raise the cost of Americans’ health insurance premiums; it will kill jobs with tax hikes and new mandates; and it will cut seniors’ Medicare benefits.
We now have a choice: we can come together to implement smart, fiscally responsible reforms to improve Americans’ health care or we can recklessly pursue this government takeover that creates far more problems than it solves.
It’s clear where the American people stand on this issue. They‘re frustrated and fed up. The ‘stimulus’ bill isn’t working. Unemployment is rising. The debt to be paid by our kids and grandkids is exploding. And now, Speaker Pelosi’s 1,990-page government takeover of health care.
Enough is enough. Breaking the bank and taking away the freedoms Americans cherish is not the answer to the challenges we face.
This coming week, Republicans will continue to stand on principle, defend freedom, and fight for our better solutions to make health care more affordable and accessible for American families.
Thanks for listening.
Huh. Who knew that the Republicans had proposed anything? Where's the coverage of the Republican bills? Have they made it out of committee? If not, who is blocking them? Where are the journalists covering this story?
WASHINGTON (AP) - It's alive.
The Medicare end-of-life planning provision that 2008 Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin said was tantamount to 'death panels' for seniors is staying in the latest Democratic health care bill unveiled Thursday.
The provision allows Medicare to pay for voluntary counseling to help beneficiaries deal with the complex and painful decisions families face when a loved one is approaching death.
WASHINGTON (AP) - The health care overhaul bill produced by House Democrats would impose an array of new taxes, fees and government mandates on major players in the health industry, including insurers, doctors and drugs and medical devices makers.
Among the industries targeted in the bill are medical device makers—one of the few that failed to cut an early behind-the-scenes deal with Obama and Democrats to help pay for an overhaul. The House added $20 billion in taxes on sales of medical devices like artificial hips and heart stents to the legislation Democratic leaders unveiled Thursday.
The measure is less kind to drug makers, an industry that did strike a deal with Obama and key senators to hold down its costs. Pharmaceutical companies agreed to cough up $80 billion in the health overhaul. While precise figures were not immediately available, it appeared the House legislation would target the industry for much more. And it would give the government power to negotiate drug prices on behalf of Medicare beneficiaries.
Health insurers, who would gain tens of millions of new customers under the health plan, nonetheless would be ensnared by some potentially costly new measures, including eliminating their long-standing antitrust exemption.
They voiced particular concern about Democrats' inclusion of the government-run insurance plan. Karen Ignani, the chief of the insurers' main trade group, America's Health Insurance Plans, said the so-called public option would "bankrupt hospitals, dismantle employer coverage, exacerbate cost-shifting from Medicare and Medicaid, and ultimately increase the federal deficit." She said the result would be that many people, including seniors, would lose coverage or face higher costs.
Seriously, what's next? Is global warming is a hoax? Obama actually didn't do anything to justify a Nobel Peace Prize? Democrats really are the party of big socialized government? How did these slip through the editors at AP-Obama?
Just one year ago, would you have believed that an unelected government official, not even a Cabinet member confirmed by the Senate but simply one of the many "czars" appointed by the President, could arbitrarily cut the pay of executives in private businesses by 50 percent or 90 percent?
Did you think that another "czar" would be talking about restricting talk radio? That there would be plans afloat to subsidize newspapers-- that is, to create a situation where some newspapers' survival would depend on the government liking what they publish?
Did you imagine that anyone would even be talking about having a panel of so-called "experts" deciding who could and could not get life-saving medical treatments?
Scary as that is from a medical standpoint, it is also chilling from the standpoint of freedom. If you have a mother who needs a heart operation or a child with some dire medical condition, how free would you feel to speak out against an administration that has the power to make life and death decisions about your loved ones?
Does any of this sound like America?
He goes on to make some amazing points. I strongly encourage you to read the entire article. Actually, I strongly encourage you to read everything ever written by this man. Thomas Sowell is what MLK, Jr. was talking about in the "I have a dream" speech. God Bless him!
Many years ago, at a certain academic institution, there was an experimental program that the faculty had to vote on as to whether or not it should be made permanent.
I rose at the faculty meeting to say that I knew practically nothing about whether the program was good or bad, and that the information that had been supplied to us was too vague for us to have any basis for voting, one way or the other. My suggestion was that we get more concrete information before having a vote.
The director of that program rose immediately and responded indignantly and sarcastically to what I had just said-- and the faculty gave him a standing ovation.
After the faculty meeting was over, I told a colleague that I was stunned and baffled by the faculty's fierce response to my simply saying that we needed more information before voting.
"Tom, you don't understand," he said. "Those people need to believe in that man. They have invested so much hope and trust in him that they cannot let you stir up any doubts."
and later:
...it seems as if so many people have invested so much hope and trust in Barack Obama that it is intolerable that anyone should come along and stir up any doubts that could threaten their house of cards.
I recieved this as an email (one of those fwd:fwd:fwd's). I found it to be unusually cutting in its distinction of the double standard we are witnessing in the United States of America today.
I am not sure whether this is an incrimination of the American public or the American press.
If George W. Bush had been the first President to need a teleprompter installed to be able to get through a press conference, would you have laughed and said this is more proof of how he inept he is on his own and is really controlled by smarter men behind the scenes?
If George W. Bush had spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to take Laura Bush to a play in NYC, would you have approved?
If George W. Bush had reduced your retirement plan's holdings of GM stock by 90% and given the unions a majority stake in GM, would you have approved?
If George W. Bush had made a joke at the expense of the Special Olympics, would you have approved?
If George W. Bush had given Gordon Brown a set of inexpensive and incorrectly formatted DVDs, when Gordon Brown had given him a thoughtful and historically significant gift, would you have approved?
If George W. Bush had given the Queen of England an iPod containing videos of his speeches, would you have thought this embarrassingly narcissistic and tacky?
If George W. Bush had bowed to the King of Saudi Arabia, would you have approved?
If George W. Bush had visited Austria and made reference to the non-existent "Austrian language," would you have brushed it off as a minor slip?
If George W. Bush had filled his cabinet and circle of advisers with people who cannot seem to keep current in their income taxes, would you have approved?
If George W. Bush had been so Spanish illiterate as to refer to "Cinco de Cuatro" in front of the Mexican ambassador when it was the 5th of May (Cinco de Mayo), and continued to flub it when he tried again, would you have winced in embarrassment?
If George W. Bush had mis-spelled the word "advice" would you have hammered him for it for years like Dan Quayle and potatoe as proof of what a dunce he is?
If George W. Bush had burned 9,000 gallons of jet fuel to go plant a single tree on Earth Day, would you have concluded he's ahypocrite?
If George W. Bush's administration had okayed Air Force One flying low over millions of people followed by a jet fighter in downtown Manhattan causing widespread panic, would you have wondered whether they actually get what happened on 9-11?
If George W. Bush had failed to send relief aid to flood victims throughout the Midwest with more people killed or made homeless than in New Orleans , would you want it made into a major ongoing political issue with claims of racism and incompetence?
If George W. Bush had created the position of 32 Czars who report directly to him, bypassing the House and Senate on much of what is happening in America, would you have approved?
If George W. Bush had ordered the firing of the CEO of a major corporation, even though he had no constitutional authority to do so, would you have approved?
If George W Bush had proposed to double the national debt, which had taken more than two centuries to accumulate, in one year, would you have approved?
If George W. Bush had then proposed to double the debt again within 10 years, would you have approved?
So, tell me again, what is it about Obama that makes him so brilliant and impressive? Can't think of anything? Don't worry. He's done all this in 5 months -- so you'll have three years and seven months to come up with an answer.
Have you heard the news? President Obama inherited an economic mess from the Bush administration.
You say that's hardly news? But it's been the message sounded over and over by the White House. Top Obama adviser David Axelrod said on one of the Sunday news shows, "He walked in the door, we had the worst economy since the Great Depression." In San Francisco, Obama talked of being "busy with our mop." White House heavy hitter Rahm Emanuel used the worst-economy-since-the-Depression line on a public TV news show.
You'd think it's October 2008, the final month in the Obama presidential candidacy, rather than October 2009, nine months into the Obama presidency. Yet the Obama White House is in full campaign mode -- maybe because it needs to mask the shortcomings of the Obama presidency.
Take, for example, all the talk of inheriting the worst economy since the 1930s crisis. That came in response to the news that the federal deficit hit $1.4 trillion.
Yet just a few months ago, the Obama camp was singing a little different tune. It was under criticism for the $787 billion stimulus package it bulldozed through Congress on grounds that massive spending was needed to keep the unemployment rate from breaching 8 percent. When joblessness hit 9.5 percent in June, Vice President Joe Biden said, "We misread how bad the economy was."
They inherited the worst economy since the Great Depression, or the economy turned out to be worse than they thought. Which is it? It can't be both -- unless your brain is completely addled by the Obama charisma.
Ouch! It is pretty tough on Obama and Mr. Huntley even takes a whack at CNN & MSNBC. How far left do you have to be when the CHICAGO SUN-TIMES implies you are in the tank for BHO?
Just some of the musical highlights of the Obama's first 10 months in office:
But the Obamas are demonstrating a commitment to use the White House to promote the arts in a huge way. And they're not just tapping safe, living legends: Fresh faces like bachata band Aventura and Mexican pop sensation Thalia (who lured Obama on to the dance floor briefly) shared a stage with gray eminence Jose Feliciano at last week's Fiesta Latina.
The Obamas' musical push started on Day One, when the Wynton Marsalis Quintet played for a private inaugural celebration party of 100 at the White House.
A month later, the White House brought in Earth, Wind and Fire to entertain visiting governors. And days later, the Obamas hosted an East Room tribute to Stevie Wonder that featured Tony Bennett, Martina McBride and Wonder himself. The president called it "the most accomplished Stevie Wonder cover band in history."
Since then, the lineup has zigzagged all over the musical spectrum.
The first installment of the Obamas' ongoing White House music series was a June day devoted to jazz that included daytime workshops for 150 young musicians and an evening concert headlined by Paquito D'Rivera.
That was when Michelle Obama let it be known she wants her daughters, Malia and Sasha, to be "aware of all kinds of music — other than hip-hop."
In July, self-proclaimed "city boy" Barack Obama presided over an evening of country music that brought together Alison Krauss and Union Station, Brad Paisley and veteran Charley Pride.
Next up: classical music in November. And beyond that, the White House is exploring events to feature opera, dance and perhaps film.
It's nice to know BHO can fit in a few concerts between his rounds of golf. Too bad he has only made 25 minutes in the last 80 days to talk face to face with his commander on the ground in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal. I guess this is why it is taking so long to make the decision as to whether to send more troops to Afghanistan or not.
Typical limousine liberals.... Playing the fiddle (or in this case, watching the fiddle player) as Rome (or in this case, Afghanistan) burns....
More than $2.3 million in federal economic stimulus grants have gone to eight Tampa Bay area cosmetology and massage schools to pay tuition for the hairdressers, masseuses and nail technicians of tomorrow.
That's swell news for those who see the beauty trades as a way to gain a firmer footing in the job market. But is there truly demand for more beauty school graduates at bay area salons?
Not really, said Monica Ponce, owner of Muse The Salon in Tampa.
"Instead of encouraging more people to go to beauty schools," Ponce said, "they should probably help the stylists who are unemployed."
Some area salons are hiring in this economy, but even industry lobbyists say beauty school is rarely a ticket to a thriving career.
Only 1 to 2 percent of beauty school graduates will be working in the field five years from graduation, said Bonnie Poole, treasurer of the Florida Cosmetology Association.
Nice... At least our tax money is not being wasted.
SURPRISE, Ariz. — An Arizona sheriff known for cracking down on people who are in the country illegally launched a crime and immigration sweep in northwestern metro Phoenix on Friday, a half day after officials in Washington limited his powers to make federal immigration arrests.
Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, whose sweeps have led to allegations of racial profiling, said the rebuff from Washington won't stop him. He said he can still arrest immigrants under a state smuggling law and a federal law that gives all local police agencies more limited power to detain suspected illegal immigrants.
"It doesn't bother me, because we are going to do the same thing," said Arpaio, whose deputies had arrested 16 people by Friday evening on unspecified charges. "I am the elected sheriff. I don't take orders from the federal government."
Why do we not have more Joes in the U.S.? Why is it so hard for people to do what is right and not what is Politically Correct? We just need more Joes...!!!
I wonder what kind of press this story would be getting if we had a Republican controlled congress and a GWB in the WH....?
U.S. troop funds diverted to pet projects
Study finds $2.6 billion taken from guns and ammunition
By Shaun Waterman
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Senators diverted $2.6 billion in funds in a defense spending bill to pet projects largely at the expense of accounts that pay for fuel, ammunition and training for U.S. troops, including those fighting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to an analysis.
Among the 778 such projects, known as earmarks, packed into the bill: $25 million for a new World War II museum at the University of New Orleans and $20 million to launch an educational institute named after the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, Massachusetts Democrat.
While earmarks are hardly new in Washington, "in 30 years on Capitol Hill, I never saw Congress mangle the defense budget as badly as this year," said Winslow Wheeler, a former Senate staffer who worked on defense funding and oversight for both Republicans and Democrats. He is now a senior fellow at the Center for Defense Information, an independent research organization.
The administration's budget requested $156 billion for the regular O&M account and $81 billion for O&M for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The bill passed by the Senate cut $2.4 billion from the regular account and $655 million from the war O&M fund.
Senate appropriators insisted that the O&M accounts, despite the cuts, do not shortchange the troops.
"The operation and maintenance title is fully funded," Appropriations Committee Chairman Daniel K. Inouye, Hawaii Democrat, said during the debate on the bill....
$20 million for Humvee maintenance at an Army National Guard installation in Maine, sponsored by Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia J. Snowe, Maine Republicans. The senators said cuts in the maintenance program proposed by the administration would result in the "layoff of 175 employees in a region already suffering" from the recession.
$20M to Snowe & Collins in Maine...hmmmm... I wonder why.....?
I feel like I just saw Walter Cronkite declare "The war is unwinnable" and LBJ say, "If we lost Cronkite, we've lost the American people. We're finished"
When you loose the libs at AOL, I think it means the worm is beginning to turn... I mean, what could be next? The New York Times....?
This is what happens when liberal democrats control a city & state for many, many decades. This is what the democrats want us all to become. The people interviewed are "model citizens" according the democrat party. They are the people sucking on the teat that is the American taxpayer..... Sad, sad, sad.... There are a lot of founding fathers, Revolutionary War Veterans, Civil War Veterans and dead Civil Rights Leaders like MLK who are rolling in their graves.
WAKE UP PEOPLE!!!!
More sick pathetic selfish sociopaths here (note these selfish b*****ds are saying the city needs to be held accountable). THE CITY? What about looking in the mirror?
Here is a rough draft of a great video by Bob Goshen, motivational speaker.
He is starting a new movement called "I'm Mad 2". This is the video that will be on their new website (www.immad2.com) when it gets up and going. Bob is straight shooter recommended by Zig Ziglar.
And as you will see, he is very persuasive. Let's pray the right people are watching....Watch the video here...
My Administration is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government. We will work together to ensure the public trust and establish a system of transparency, public participation, and collaboration. Openness will strengthen our democracy and promote efficiency and effectiveness in Government.
Government should be transparent. [Yadda, Yadda, Yadda...]
Government should be participatory. [Yadda, Yadda, Yadda...]
Government should be collaborative. [Yadda, Yadda, Yadda...]
I direct the Chief Technology Officer, in coordination with the Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and the Administrator of General Services, to coordinate the development by appropriate executive departments and agencies, within 120 days, of recommendations for an Open Government Directive, to be issued by the Director of OMB, that instructs executive departments and agencies to take specific actions implementing the principles set forth in this memorandum. The independent agencies should comply with the Open Government Directive.
Apparently, San Fran Nan and Dingy Harry did not get the memo....
Reps. Brian Baird, D-Wash., and Greg Walden, R-Ore., are circulating a petition among House lawmakers that would force a vote on the 72-hour rule.
Nearly every Republican has signed on, but the Democratic leadership is unwilling to cede control over when bills are brought to the floor for votes and are discouraging their rank and file from signing the petition. Senate Democrats voted down a similar measure last week for the health care bill.
"The leaders use it as a tool to get votes or to keep amendments off a bill," said one top Senate Democratic aide.
But Baird warned of public backlash.
"Democrats know politically it's difficult to defend not doing this," he said. "The public gets this. They say we entrust you with the profound responsibility of making decisions that affect our lives, and we expect you to exercise due diligence in carrying out that responsibility."
Have they no shame....?
That is a rhetorical question:
1) They are politicians
2) They are Democrats.
So, the answer is, of course they have no shame when it means more consolidation of power in Washington D.C. The more power they can consolidate in D.C. the more people will depend on them to dole out gifts like "free" healthcare, "free" tax credits toward new cars, "free" {insert desire here}. That is what Democrats have been doing for 70+ years. Ever since the implementing the "Raw Deal" by FDR. They want the people sucking off the teat that the government sow. That is how Dems get elected.
And in the process they have destroyed the black family making this the fourth generation of blacks to grow up in families where the father was replaced with a government welfare check. Where kids learn to beg and ask for handouts rather than going out and working for a living.
Government run healthcare is game, set, match. It is the end of us even pretending to have freedom & liberty. This will make you beg the government for the basic freedom such as your right to life, your right to liberty and your right to pursue happiness. It will all be controlled by the government machine....
This is why they cannot have the American people, the citizens of this once great nation, reading the bills they write and maybe even imposing their own opinions on the GREAT AND MIGHTY, THE ALL POWERFUL AND OMINPOTENT, THE CONGRESS THAT IS SUPPOSED TO REPRESENT US! How dare them! How dare them!
I call on each of you to call your representatives, hell, call ALL the representatives and remind them they are they to do our bidding, not the other way around! Here is a list. Call now & call often.
His name alone makes be bristle with disdain. It's not so much that I hate him, it’s just that, well I kinda hate him.
He is an absolutely untalented hack, made famous by the smarmy fringe media (Note to new readers: Fox News Channel is main stream. The rest are fringe lackeys...) propping him up through undeserved attention. Yuck!
Here is a guy who charges from $25,000-50,000 per speaking engagement, makes millions on movies (not his latest, but on some of them) and by any ordinary measurement he is exploiting capitalism in his attempts to destroy capitalism. If he actually lived in a country like the ones he looks up to (Cuba, Venezuela, etc...), he would be making propaganda films or be in jail. (Likely he would be in jail, as he is not a good enough filmmaker to actually get away with making films in any other country).
So here we are:
His latest movie is box office failure (big surprise - though, I'm sure it will become required viewing in schools)
I have to admit, being someone who has a fair amount of experience with sexually broken men of all sorts (all back grounds, all colors, all shapes & sizes), I find this particularly offensive. It frightens me that a man like this could be thought in high enough regard to be advising our president. It saddens me that we have finally come to this point. If we are not now Sodom & Gomorrah, we can certainly see it from here…<br> Obama's 'Safe Schools' Czar Admits He Poorly Handled Underage Sex Case
Kevin Jennings was teaching high school in 1988 when a gay student confessed an involvement with an older man. Rather than reporting it, he told the boy, "I hope you knew to use a condom."
By Maxim Lott
FOXNews.com
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
[Note emphasis mine]
President Obama's "safe schools czar" Kevin Jennings said Wednesday he "should have handled [the] situation differently" when he didn't report an underage student told him that he was having sex with an older man.
Jennings, the founder of the Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network, was teaching high school in Concord, Mass., in 1988 when a sophomore boy confessed an involvement with a man in Boston. He told the boy, "I hope you knew to use a condom."
In a statement, Jennings said: "Twenty one years later I can see how I should have handled this situation differently. I should have asked for more information and consulted legal or medical authorities." [Really? Legal or medical authorities? Really? He still doesn't know which one he sould call? Really? And this monster is advising the president?]
Jennings insisted that he believes his office could help keep other new teachers from making the same mistake.
His defense comes amid additional discoveries about his past statements on his interaction with the gay high school student, referred to as "Brewster" in his 1994 book "One Teacher in 10," and a speech he gave in 2000.
In his 2007 autobiography, "Mama's Boy, Preacher's Son: A Memoir," Jennings discusses nearly the same story but calls the student "Robertson."
On page 162, Jennings writes: "Robertson soon told me the tale, about someone he'd met in Boston, how he thought he loved him, how heartbroken he was when his calls never got returned..."
On page 169, he continues: "As the fall wore on, Robertson continued to drop by my office to chat, often updating me on his latest 'adventures.' Sometimes these startled me, and I began to underline the importance of safe sex to him. One day he snapped back, 'Why should I use a condom? My life isn't worth saving anyway.'"
[How many times did he have to discuss his stupid irrational self-centered decision before someone finally said, "Hey, dude, you screwed the pooch on that call"? Is there no one in his life to aadvise him, at the very least, "Hey, man, shut up about that story. You blew it, man. You should be embarassed, not proud of that decision."?]
Jennings was appointed to the position largely because of his longtime record of working to end bullying and discrimination in schools, but critics say he's not qualified for the job.
Peter Sprigg of the Family Research Council says Jennings' past remarks about the incident call into question the sincerity of his new statement.
"It's not as though, 'oh, this was a youthful mistake I made as a brand-new teacher, but now that I'm an adult I realize that I handled it wrong.' Because he has told this story as recently as last year, in another book, and has not expressed any regret until now. So that indicates to me that this is more out of political necessity than it is about genuine remorse," Sprigg told FOX News.
Department of Education spokesman Justin Hamilton declined to comment on Jennings' statements about the incident, since it took place in 1988. [Apparently, as long as you were wrong 20-30 years ago, it doesn't count.]
But, Obama's Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, dived into the fray, saying he is "honored" to work with Jennings, whom he defended as "uniquely qualified for his job" -- a sign the White House is digging in against the mounting criticism. [THIS is the battle they are choosing? THIS is the gay man they are deciding to take a stand on? Really?]
Jennings also released a statement on his past writings on drug use.
"I have written about the factors that have led me to use drugs as a teen. This experience qualifies me to help students and teachers who are confronting these issues today."
On page 103, discussing his high school years in Hawaii in the early 1980s, Jennings wrote:
"I got stoned more often and went out to the beach at Bellows, overlooking Honolulu Harbor and the lights of the city, to drink with my buddies on Friday and Saturday nights, spending hours watching the planes take off and land at the airport, which is actually quite fascinating when you are drunk and stoned."
Sprigg said he would like to see a more specific statement from Jennings.
"We still haven't heard a clear and explicit statement from him that no one of any age should use illegal drugs, including marijuana. That would seem to be a prerequisite for the position he is in," he said.
He also said that the whole situation reflected poorly on the vetting procedures of the Obama administration.
"I suspect that the vetting procedure for Jennings was fairly superficial... This controversy about the possible statutory rape was raised in 2004 when he received an award from the NEA. So it's not like it's been a secret. So I think it shows yet another failure of the Obama administration's vetting process." [Well, if he's good enough for the NEA, then by God he is good enough for this administration!]
WASHINGTON -- A tiny car company backed by former Vice President Al Gore has just gotten a $529 million U.S. government loan to help build a hybrid sports car in Finland that will sell for about $89,000.
DOE officials spent months working with Fisker on its application, touring its Irvine, Calif., and Pontiac, Mich., facilities and test-driving prototypes.
I'll bet they did....
Matt Rogers, who oversees the department's loan programs as a senior adviser to Energy Secretary Steven Chu, said Fisker was awarded the loan after a "detailed technical review" that concluded the company could eventually deliver a highly fuel-efficient hybrid car to a mass audience. Fisker said most of its DOE loan will be used to finance U.S. production of a $40,000 family sedan that has yet to be designed.
Does He Lie?
By Charles Krauthammer
Friday, September 18, 2009
The Washington Post
I remember Rush Limbaugh once saying that if he had to trade his brain for any other brain, he would trade for Charles Krauthammer's. Having said that, I want you to note how the afore mentioned Mr. Krauthammer finishes his column:
Obama doesn't lie. He implies, he misdirects, he misleads -- so fluidly and incessantly that he risks transmuting eloquence into mere slickness.
Slickness wasn't fatal to "Slick Willie" Clinton because he possessed a winning, nearly irresistible charm. Obama's persona is more cool, distant, imperial. The charming scoundrel can get away with endless deception; the righteous redeemer cannot.
Isn't it funny that both Krauthammer & I default to eluding to Clinton. I guess it's true, great minds do think alike.
By commutative property of association I think Rush may be willing to trade for my brain as well…
President Obama said this week that his health care plan won't cover illegal immigrants, but argued that's all the more reason to legalize them and ensure they eventually do get coverage.
He also staked out a position that anyone in the country legally should be covered - a major break with the 1996 welfare reform bill, which limited most federal public assistance programs only to citizens and longtime immigrants.
"Even though I do not believe we can extend coverage to those who are here illegally, I also don't simply believe we can simply ignore the fact that our immigration system is broken," Mr. Obama said Wednesday evening in a speech to the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute. "That's why I strongly support making sure folks who are here legally have access to affordable, quality health insurance under this plan, just like everybody else.
I like it. He's proving to be very Clintonesque, don't you think? "I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Monica Lewinsky."
I suppose technically being the beneficiary of a 'Lewinsky' is not sexual relations, but telling the joint session of congress, "My bill will not cover illegal immigrants..." ("um, because we are going to legalize them"), is technically true, but...
With Barack Obama's arrival at the White House, Fox has emerged as the voice of conservatism in exile. Fox touts itself as the one media outfit brave enough to hold the new administration accountable. Everybody else is "in the tank." That message finds an audience. During the second quarter of 2009, Fox's prime time ratings soared 34%, according to Nielsen Media Research. Compare Fox's average 1.2 million viewers with CNN's 598,000 and MSNBC's average audience of 392,000.
I strongly encourage you to go read the body of this article. It would be hilarious if it weren't so completely 180 degrees wrong.
So, in the interest of being fair and balanced, let's dispense with this dated fiction about a scrappy upstart and all, and acknowledge the reality: For better or for worse, Fox is undeniably a player in the world of big television media. Welcome to the MSM, guys.
BTW - My response to this article was as follows (not that any one on the left cares...):
by an80sreaganite September 17, 2009 11:11 AM EDT Let's see:
A White House advisor (or "czar") resigns at 12:05 pm on a Sunday morning and yet the MSM fails to even mention it. I don't care who you are, the sheer timing of the resignation is enough to report, yet all I heard where crickets from the likes of CBS, ABC, NBC, CNN, MSNBC, NYT, WP, etc... (aka: the MSM)
The largest (leftist) community organizing group in the U.S. fires employees on 3 consecutive days, the census bureau cuts ties with them, the senate votes to suspend (housing only) funding from them and yet all we get from the left wing media (re: MSM) is crickets or at best maybe a story on a block. Charlie Gibson was too busy sailing off the coast of Maine to know anything about it. The only place this in mentioned on the ABC website is Jake Tappers BLOG! I wonder what would happen if the NRA were advising people on how to evade gun laws??
So, as per usual, the drive-by gets it wrong even in their opinion pages. Reading this blog only confirms what the rest of us in "fly-over-country" already know. The MSM (as defined above) are operating as media consultants for the liberal elite, the inside the beltway liberal democrat-socialist party and more importantly this administration.
If they (the MSM) can build a case to prove otherwise, I would think now would be the time to start, before they go broke. Maybe that is what Rupert Murdock is waiting for. As the players in the MSM go broke, he can just buy them one by one out of bankruptcy, dust them off, hire some actual journalists, and make real news organizations out of them once again.
How can we ensure that those who need medical care receive it while also reducing health-care costs? The answers offered by Democrats in Washington all rest on one principle: that increased government involvement can solve the problem. I fundamentally disagree.
Common sense tells us that the government's attempts to solve large problems more often create new ones. Common sense also tells us that a top-down, one-size-fits-all plan will not improve the workings of a nationwide health-care system that accounts for one-sixth of our economy. And common sense tells us to be skeptical when President Obama promises that the Democrats' proposals "will provide more stability and security to every American."
Now look at one way Mr. Obama wants to eliminate inefficiency and waste: He's asked Congress to create an Independent Medicare Advisory Council—an unelected, largely unaccountable group of experts charged with containing Medicare costs. In an interview with the New York Times in April, the president suggested that such a group, working outside of "normal political channels," should guide decisions regarding that "huge driver of cost . . . the chronically ill and those toward the end of their lives . . . ."
Given such statements, is it any wonder that many of the sick and elderly are concerned that the Democrats' proposals will ultimately lead to rationing of their health care by—dare I say it—death panels?
The next article is from another favorite of mine, Karl Rove, also in the WSJ 10/10/09:
Millions of Americans watched President Barack Obama's speech last night to a joint session of Congress. Much of it was familiar, having been delivered in at least 111 speeches, town halls, radio addresses and other appearances on health care. But his most revealing remarks on the topic came on Monday, at a Labor Day union picnic in Cincinnati.
There Mr. Obama accused critics of his health reforms of spreading "lies" and said opponents want "to do nothing." These false charges do not reveal a spirit of bipartisanship nor do they create a foundation for dialogue. It is more like what you'd say if you are planning to jam through a bill without compromise. Which is exactly what Mr. Obama is about to attempt.
Team Obama is essentially asking congressional Democrats to take a huge gamble. The White House is arguing that ramming through a controversial bill is safer for Democrats than not passing anything. This is based on the false premise that the death of HillaryCare is what doomed Democrats in 1994. Mr. Obama told a reporter in July that the defeat of HillaryCare "Helped [Republicans] regain the House." Former President Bill Clinton echoed that thought recently by saying "doing nothing" today is "the worst thing we can do for the Democrats."
Actually, attempting to pass HillaryCare is what brought down the party. Voters rejected a massively complicated, hugely expensive government takeover of health care and the Democrats who pushed it.
These are both great well thought out articles and it has got to unnerve the left when these two are able to have such an impact with us, the "little people" out here in "fly-over country".
WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama used only-in-Washington accounting Wednesday when he promised to overhaul the nation's health care system without adding "one dime" to the deficit. By conventional arithmetic, Democratic plans would drive up the deficit by billions of dollars.
The president's speech to Congress contained a variety of oversimplifications and omissions in laying out what he wants to do about health insurance.
You know BHO is losing the Healthcare Crisis battle when the people who elected him begin to expose his lies. What are they thinking? The next thing you know, ABC News will start reporting the facts. I swear if I start seeing MSNBC doing stories critical to Obama, I may have to uncork a champagne bottle.
Robert Fogel won the Nobel Prize for Economics in 1993. He wrote a piece last week in which he explained the two reasons why Americans spend more money on health care than everyone else in the world.
First, Americans have had more money to spend.
"Between 1875 and 1995, the share of family income spent on food, clothing, and shelter declined from 87 percent to just 30 percent, despite the fact that we eat more food, own more clothes, and have better and larger homes today than we had in 1875," Fogel wrote.
If we limit the basics to these three items, that means spending on non-basic items rose from 13 percent of income in 1875 to 70 percent in 1995.
That is a fivefold increase.
Some of it went to entertainment, some of it went to government (taxes are much higher), and the rest went to other things, including health care.
So we have had more money to spend on health care.
The second reason we spend more is because spending more money on health care works.
"It is important to emphasize that medical interventions have not only contributed to the decline in prevalence rates of chronic conditions but also to the reduction in their severity," Fogel wrote.
"Advances in both surgical and drug therapies have significantly reduced the rate at which chronic conditions turn into disabilities that severely impair functioning.
"Such interventions have been especially effective in genitourinary, circulatory, digestive, and musculoskeletal conditions.
"However, many of the surgical procedures are quite expensive, and the cost of the new and more effective drugs is increasing sharply, mainly because of the large investments in developing these drugs."
The United States, overall, has both the most expensive and the best health care in the world.
The socialist argument that somehow spending more on health care makes our health system inferior is absurd.
This argument is based on life expectancy tables.
But life expectancy has many factors, including average weight, homicide rates, suicide rates, genetics and traffic fatalities.
The emphasis in America is on saving lives, not money.
In every socialist country, the opposite is true. The only way to save money on health care is to ration it.
When socialists toss around a number such as 18,000 people die because they lack health insurance, I remember that 14,802 people died in France in August 2003 because of the French health system.
There was a heat wave, and instead of calling doctors back from their month-long vacations to tend those people, the French government decided to save money.
Adjusted for population, that would be like 70,000 deaths in America, or roughly 35 Hurricane Katrinas.
In England, the Taxpayers Alliance estimated that an extra 17,000 people die each year because of the quality of the National Health Service.
That is no big deal to many British people.
"An extra 17,000 deaths might seem high, but that figure needed to be set against annual mortality, which was between 750,000 and one million deaths every year," the liberal London Guardian reported.
"The countries with which the UK was being compared spent more of their GDP on healthcare."
The extra deaths are OK to liberals because, hey, look at all the money the government is saving.
Ms. Snowe,
I read that you are now working with the president on a "compromise" for healthcare. Should a bill, any bill supported by the majority of Democrats, manage to get out of committee with your assistance, I and thousands more will be contributing large sums of money to defeat you in your next election attempt.
Sadly, however, once ousted from office, you will still not be required to be subjected to the same pitiful healthcare you will thrust upon the rest of us.
Enjoy your power while you still have it, for it will likely be fleeting....
Sincerely,
Xxxx Xxxxxx
www.an80sreaganite.blogspot.com
Here is a sample of where we are headed:
Note: All bold, emphasis & [notes] added by me.
All from the UK Telegraph [not exactly a "right-wing" newspaper]
Sentenced to death on the NHS
Patients with terminal illnesses are being made to die prematurely under an NHS scheme to help end their lives, leading doctors have warned.
By Kate Devlin, Medical Correspondent
Published: 10:00PM BST 02 Sep 2009
In a letter to The Daily Telegraph, a group of experts who care for the terminally ill claim that some patients are being wrongly judged as close to death.
Under NHS guidance introduced across England to help doctors and medical staff deal with dying patients, they can then have fluid and drugs withdrawn and many are put on continuous sedation until they pass away.
Professor Peter Millard, Emeritus Professor of Geriatrics, University of London, was among a group of medical experts who wrote to the Telegraph warning that patients with terminal illnesses are being made to die prematurely under an NHS scheme to help end their lives.
The new guidelines "are a guide to students about the art of medicine but not the application of medicine," he told the BBC today.
"I have concern about that sort of tick-box medicine. Medicine cannot be done by ticking boxes. You can't just follow guidelines blindly to get results," he said.
Under NHS guidance [re: death panels] introduced in a number of hospitals to help doctors and medical staff deal with dying patients, they can then have fluid and drugs withdrawn and many are put on continuous sedation until they pass away.
But wait there's more:
Number of NHS patients given wrong medicine doubles
The number of incidents in the NHS where patients have been given the wrong medicines has more than doubled in two years, official figures show.
Published: 10:37AM BST 03 Sep 2009
A report from the National Patient Safety Agency (NPSA) found a ''significant'' rise in the number of errors and near misses reported by NHS staff.
In 2005, 36,335 incidents were reported, rising to 64,678 in 2006 and 86,085 in 2007.
'Cruel and neglectful' care of one million NHS patients exposed
One million NHS patients have been the victims of appalling care in hospitals across Britain, according to a major report released today.
By Rebecca Smith, Medical Editor
Published: 12:01AM BST 27 Aug 2009
In the last six years, the Patients Association claims hundreds of thousands have suffered from poor standards of nursing, often with 'neglectful, demeaning, painful and sometimes downright cruel' treatment.
The charity has disclosed a horrifying catalogue of elderly people left in pain, in soiled bed clothes, denied adequate food and drink, and suffering from repeatedly cancelled operations, missed diagnoses and dismissive staff.
The Patients Association said the dossier proves that while the scale of the scandal at Mid-Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust - where up to 1,200 people died through failings in urgent care - was a one off, there are repeated examples they have uncovered of the same appalling standards throughout the NHS.
But wait there's more!!!
Patients more likely to go hungry than prisoners
People are far more likely to go hungry in an NHS hospital than in a prison, researchers from Bournemouth University said.
Published: 8:00AM BST 31 Aug 2009
This is despite prisons spending less per person on meals than hospitals do.
Experts from Bournemouth University have been studying the food offered to inmates and across the NHS.
They believe hospital patients face barriers in getting good nutrition, including not receiving assistance with eating and nobody monitoring if they are well fed.
Professor John Edwards said around 40 per cent of patients going into hospital were already malnourished but this situation did not tend to improve while there.
Patients are visiting their GPs on average almost six times a year – up from almost four times in 1995 – while 34 per cent of consultation were undertaken by a nurse, figures from the NHS Information Centre showed.
The percentage of telephone consultations trebled from three per cent to 12 per cent while the number of home visits fell from 9 per cent to 4 per cent.
Complaining patients could end up with worse treatment
Disgruntled patients who complain about their GPs could end up with worse treatment as a result, doctors have warned.
By Rebecca Smith, Medical Editor
Published: 7:00AM BST 30 Jun 2009
Under new government rules, for the first time patients’ opinions of their family doctor will be used to cut their surgery’s funding.
If patients complain that GP services are failing, then the amount of money supplied by the Department of Health could be cut by tens of thousands of pounds.
GPs have launched appeals to try and avert the income reduction, warning they will have to reduce the number of appointments on offer, cut nurses’ hours or delay the expansion of services.
And of course, no story regarding government run healthcare would be complete without a story of the government run healthcare system will "save money" and "be cheaper" than the current system....
1 in 10 NHS jobs 'would have to be cut to meet efficiency targets'
A tenth of health service jobs need to be cut within five years to meet planned £20bn efficiency savings, ministers have been told.
By Kate Devlin, Medical Correspondent
Published: 6:00AM BST 03 Sep 2009
The Government should also reduce the number of places in medical schools, a newly released report advises, and consider dropping some operations, including to remove varicose veins.
In a report commissioned by the Department of Health, McKinsey and Company, the consultancy firm, recommends that 137,000 NHS posts should be shed.
Although ministers say that they have comprehensively rejected the ideas critics claimed that they revealed the scale of the financial problems facing the NHS.
The Government aims to make between £15billion and £20 billion in effeciency saving between 2011 and 2014.
Stll think your life, your parent's lives, your children's lives, your unborn grandchildren's lives won't become just a number, just another governmental budget line item?
Given the current state of our healthcare system, is this REALLY where you think we should go?
Anthony "Van" Jones (born September 20, 1968) is the Special Advisor for Green Jobs at the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ).
Jones is an environmental advocate, civil rights activist, attorney, and author. He founded the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights in 1996, a California NGO working for alternatives to violence and incarceration.] In 2005, Jones co-founded Color of Change, an advocacy group for African Americans. Formerly based in Oakland, California, Jones founded Green For All in 2007, a national NGO dedicated to "building an inclusive green economy strong enough to lift people out of poverty." His first book, The Green Collar Economy, released on October 7, 2008, was a New York Times bestseller.
Again you ask, why should I care...?
Read this again: Anthony "Van" Jones (born September 20, 1968) is the Special Advisor for Green Jobs at the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ). br>
And of course there is this (Beware of strong language.):
I wrote the following in response to so linguini spined moderate who said she basically didn't care one way or the other on the healthcare issue, but said, "From my own point of view: Undecided voters are watching, particularly young ones. There is nothing 'interesting' or 'inspiring' about fits of rage. The 'screaming mobs' are now inextricably associated in the public mind with 'Conservatives'
ACK!
I have no time for moderates, especially on the healthcare reform issue. I do not look at it (or any issue) from Democrat/Republican point of view. I look at things my government does as either expanding our liberties, as our founding fathers envisioned, or infringing on our liberties, which the government excels at as our founding fathers predicted they would.
I know this: If the government (this one or some future one) takes over healthcare, all pretense of liberty is destroyed. You cannot have freedom and liberty if you depend on the government for your health. They will use "healthcare" as an ever expanding reason to slither their way into your formerly great American life. Their tentacles will reach into your refrigerator and cupboards by telling what you can & cannot eat (too keep healthcare costs down – lower the obesity “crisis”); they will slime their way into bedroom (by telling you how many children you can & cannot have); they will infiltrate your mind by telling what is & isn’t good for you to read, watch or listen to (no mental healthcare coverage for you!)
Our founding fathers warned us of this day and, in fact gave us the perfect verbiage to describe what to do when this happens to us: "That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."
We may not be there yet, but we are getting closer everyday this government exists....
Earlier this month the Chairman of the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee "amended" his 2007 financial disclosure form—to the tune of more than a half-million dollars in previously unreported assets and income. That number may be as high as $780,000, because Congress's ethics rules only require the Members to report their finances within broad ranges. This voyage of personal financial discovery brings Mr. Rangel's net worth for 2007 to somewhere between $1.028 million and $2.495 million, while his previous statement came in at $516,015 and $1.316 million.
When you're a powerful Congressman and working diligently to increase tax rates to pay for President Obama's health-care plan, we suppose it's easy to lose track of one of your checking accounts. That would be the one at the federal credit union with a balance somewhere between $250,001 and maybe as high as $500,000. And when you're crunched for time and pulling together bills to pass in a rush, we guess, too, that you might overlook several other investment accounts, even if some of them are sizable, such as the ones Mr. Rangel missed at JP Morgan, Merrill Lynch, Oppenheimer and BlackRock.
Oh, and those vacant properties in Glassboro, in southern Jersey? Everybody in Manhattan tries not to think much about New Jersey, so those lots and their as-much-as-$15,000 value must also have slipped down the memory hole. (The New York Post reported yesterday that Mr. Rangel failed to pay property taxes for two of the lots, according to the county clerk's office.
The Chairman probably isn't doing a lot of dining at KFC, Pizza Hut, Taco Bell or Long John Silver's, either, which may explain why he didn't disclose the $1,001 to $15,000 in stock he owns in Yum Brands, the conglomerate that runs those chain restaurants. Compared to his undisclosed portfolio stake in PepsiCo—$15,001 to $50,000—that's practically a rounding error.
All lawmakers amend their financial reports from time to time, though rarely are the errors this extensive. Via email, a Rangel spokesman declined to offer details about how the errors occurred, noting that "Once the Ethics Committee completes its work, then we can answer questions in more detail." He added that Mr. Rangel is now "confident that his records have been subjected to an exhaustive and complete review, and that the amendments accurately reflect his financial interests."
Among other issues, Mr. Rangel is currently under investigation regarding his use of four rent-stabilized apartments at New York City's tony Lenox Terrace and soliciting donations with his official letterhead for the Charles B. Rangel Center for Public Service at City College of New York, which was itself built with a $1.9 million earmark. Yet another part of the probe is his failure to report $75,000 in income from a rental villa at the beachfront Punta Cana Yacht Club, in the Dominican Republic.
Mr. Rangel blamed that last one on the language barrier because he doesn't speak Spanish. We can only imagine what language he speaks with his accountants and tax attorneys.
Yeah, I know how he feels. Unfortunately, I suddenly discovered my net worth has gone the other way. It is roughly half what it was in 2006 when these left leaning liberal knuckle heads took over congress. Instead of being worth between, of say $500,000 - $3,000,000, I'm now worth between $0.00 and $1.5 million. Jackasses!!
I wish I were kidding when I said our President wants to be a Fascist Dictator, but I am beginning to see that I have no choice in the matter. Here are the facts:
1. Obama "bailed out" Wall Street by taking equity stakes in some of the largest financial institutions in the country and then turned them over to his buddies, the unions.
2. Obama took over GM & Chrysler, fired the CEO of GM (where is that authority in the constitution?), gave majority ownership, not to the share holders to whom GM owed, but to the unions, even giving them seats on the board of directors.
3. Obama has appointed a former union member to head the New York Bank of the Federal Reserve.
4. Obama, or at the very least, his supporters, are sending “paid” volunteers (the SEIU thugs) to town hall meetings to “show support for healthcare” and to harass and intimidate citizens showing up wanting answers. Does anyone remember your history? Didn’t Mussolini send his “brown shirts” out to do exactly the same thing, quash resistance to his fascist regime? These are SEIU “purple shirts”.
5. Obama is pushing as hard as he can to assume control of the U.S. healthcare system, which represents not only 16% of GDP, but also represents an avenue into controlling EVERY aspect of our lives all in the name of keeping down healthcare costs. Coke and Pepsi ought to be fighting this right along side Blue Cross Blue Shield!
6. Obama wants to start a federally funded police force saying in Colorado earlier this month, "We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives we've set. We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded." Huh? Is that in the constitution? It sounds unbelievable, right? Here it is:
7. Obama wants to take over the energy sector by basically making it too expensive to expand power plants, specifically coal fired plants which supply over 50% of all the electricity in the U.S. Tell me, "How do you grow a country & an economy without more power plants?"
8. And now Obama wants to have the authority to take over the internet! Are you kidding me? When are people going to wake and shut this party down once and for all?
Internet companies and civil liberties groups were alarmed this spring when a U.S. Senate bill proposed handing the White House the power to disconnect private-sector computers from the Internet.
They're not much happier about a revised version that aides to Sen. Jay Rockefeller, a West Virginia Democrat, have spent months drafting behind closed doors. CNET News has obtained a copy of the 55-page draft of S.773 (excerpt), which still appears to permit the president to seize temporary control of private-sector networks during a so-called cybersecurity emergency.
The new version would allow the president to "declare a cybersecurity emergency" relating to "non-governmental" computer networks and do what's necessary to respond to the threat. Other sections of the proposal include a federal certification program for "cybersecurity professionals," and a requirement that certain computer systems and networks in the private sector be managed by people who have been awarded that license. (emphasis mine)
If you aren't quaking in your boots, I don't know how you can consider yourself a liberty loving citizen of the United States of America. This administration is systematically dismantling the foundation of our nation, as we all sit by and watch "So You Thought You Can Dance", "American Idol" and other crazy mind numbing shows.... Who will fight these people?
Remember the words of our own Declaration of Independence:
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security....”(emphasis mine)
Are we there yet? I don't know. But, I do know we are a lot closer today than we were on January 20, 2009.....
I love it when people who actually know what they are talking about finally get so fed up they fight back! It is about time someone stop the insane degradation of the American food producers. What the American food supply chain accomplishes year after year is nothing short of a miracle given the history of mankind's plights with famine. These companies ought to be lauded for providing nourishment for EVERY American and having so much left over we can literally GIVE IT AWAY to the rest of the world. This TIME article is as despicable as it is predictable from leftist rag run by a bunch of granola crunching Birkenstock & burlap wearing vegans!
I am so proud that FINALLY an executive spoke up! He actually isn't backing down! He's taking it right back at 'em. Why don't we have more people like J. Patrick Boyle running trade organizations and corporations in this world? Read J. Patrick Boyle's response here. It is awesome!
As someone who was worked in and out of the food processing business for over decade I can tell it is nothing truly amazing how much work goes into producing for people safe food as cheaply as it is being provided. You all ought to thank God in heaven you live here in the USA in the 21st century. You are the best fed and healthiest humans in all of human history and you spend less money as a percentage of your income and spend even less time thinking about food than at anytime in all of human history. GET REAL, PEOPLE!
So now we have a Fed Chairman of New York who is a former Union Boss. This is a puzzling and alarming development for several reasons. Union watchers, those concerned with the tyranny of card-check and eliminating the secret ballot, are wondering what kind of signals this is sending. Secondly, the public is going to see this as nothing more than bringing Jimmy Hoffa into the money printing business. Thirdly, they have to circumvent law to get the guy in.
I would like to say this is a total shocker, but nothing this leftist president, Barack Hussein Obama does surprises me anymore. This is INSANE! Unions now own GM & Chrysler and are sitting in control of one of the most powerful monetary positions in the world. BHO is paying them back for electing him and is trying to secure and entrench the socialist leftist policies via political appointments and takeovers like this nation has never seen.
"America will fall without a shot being fired. It will fall from within." -
Taken from a speech Nikita Khrushchev made before the U.N. in the early years of the Cold War.
Official government measurements show that the world's temperature has cooled a bit since reaching its most recent peak in 1998.
Proposals to combat global warming are "crazy" and will "destroy more than a million good American jobs and increase the average family's annual energy bill by at least $1,500 a year," the Heartland Institute, a conservative research organization based in Chicago, declared in full-page newspaper ads earlier this summer. "High levels of carbon dioxide actually benefit wildlife and human health," the ads asserted.
Of course, they have to throw in the typical talking points...
Many scientists agree, however, that hotter times are ahead. A decade of level or slightly lower temperatures is only a temporary dip to be expected as a result of natural, short-term variations in the enormously complex climate system, they say.
The Obama administration is proposing to scale back a long-standing ban on tracking how people use government Internet sites with "cookies" and other technologies, raising alarms among privacy groups.
Supporters of a change say social networking and similar services, which often take advantage of the tracking technologies, have transformed how people communicate over the Internet, and Obama's aides say those services can make government more transparent and increase public involvement.
Some privacy groups say the proposal amounts to a "massive" and unexplained shift in government policy. In a statement Monday, American Civil Liberties Union spokesman Michael Macleod-Ball said the move could "allow the mass collection of personal information of every user of a federal government website."
Even groups that support updating the policy question whether the administration is seeking changes at the request of private companies, such as online search giant Google, as the industry's economic clout and influence in Washington have grown rapidly.
Two prominent technology policy advocacy groups, the Electronic Privacy Information Center and Electronic Frontier Foundation, cited the terms of a Feb. 19 contract with Google, in which a unnamed federal agency explicitly carved out an exemption from the ban so that the agency could use Google's YouTube video player.
The terms of the contract, negotiated through the General Services Administration, "expressly waives those rules or guidelines as they may apply to Google." The contract was obtained by EPIC through a Freedom of Information Act request.
