I’m guessing USW is still swamped, so posting open mic and a few topics. First a question for all, if we look at what events are taking place today, what is the most important one(s)? Watching FOX this AM, they are talking about Obama and his employment plan, the tragic car crash, the prisoner exchange in Israel (One for one thousand).
I still think the Middle East is a powderkeg.
I think the world and US economy may be the biggest story.
Greece heads for standstill before austerity vote
By George Georgiopoulos and Renee Maltezou
ATHENS | Mon Oct 17, 2011 8:14am EDT
(Reuters) – Prime Minister George Papandreou appealed for unity on Monday as Greece braced for a 48-hour general strike timed to coincide with a vote on a deeply unpopular package of austerity measures demanded by international lenders.
“This is maybe the most crucial week for Greece and Europe,” Papandreou said during a meeting with the head of state, President Karolos Papoulias.
“It is very important on our part, that the entire Greek political class shows a sense of unity and responsibility.”
His comments came as Greece’s two main unions, representing about half the four million-strong workforce, prepare for one of the biggest protests since the crisis began two years ago, likely to hit food and fuel supplies, disrupt transport and leave hospitals run by skeleton staff.
The 48 hour general strike is scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday to coincide with the vote in parliament, expected to take place in two stages on both days.
Memories are still fresh of the battles between riot police and stone-throwing protesters at anti-austerity demonstrations in June and sporadic signs of trouble were reported on Monday with a petrol bomb hurled at a garbage truck in a northern suburb of Athens.
Papandreou, trailing badly in opinion polls, has defied a wave of protests, pledging to push through a deeply unpopular package that includes tax rises, pay and pension cuts, job layoffs and changes to collective pay deals.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/10/17/us-greece-strikes-idUSTRE79F2XD20111017
Berlin dampens summit hopes, banks under pressure
By Matthias Inverardi and Steve Slater
DUESSELDORF, Germany/LONDON | Mon Oct 17, 2011 8:49am EDT
DUESSELDORF, Germany/LONDON (Reuters)- – Germany lowered expectations on Monday of a breakthrough in the euro zone’s sovereign debt crisis, saying a weekend summit of EU leaders would not produce a definitive solution, in comments that pushed down the euro and European stocks.
Financial markets have risen in the last week on hopes that the 27 European Union leaders will agree on a comprehensive plan to draw a line under the two-year-old crisis, which is weighing on the world economy.
But German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said in Duesseldorf on Monday that while European governments would adopt a five-point platform to address the turmoil, it was wrong to expect miracle cure from the summit.
“We won’t have a definitive solution this weekend,” he said.
Schaeuble said the plan would have to include a reduction in Greece’s debt mountain. He repeated at the weekend that private bondholders would have to accept steeper voluntary write-downs on their Greek holdings than the 21 percent agreed last July.
A lead negotiator for the banks said this could only happen if policymakers addressed the “full range” of sovereign debt issues in Europe. Charles Dallara of the Institute of International Finance (IIF) declined comment on reports that the private sector might have to take a 50 percent loss.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/10/17/us-eurozone-idUSL5E7LG0LK20111017
Nearly two years in, Europe’s leaders bid to draw a line under the debt crisis this week and deliver a “lasting” solution to ring-fence their money and prevent EU disintegration.
The stakes are high, in the run-up to marathon Brussels talks amid global pressure to end in-fighting and avert the “scary” future US President Barack Obama fears otherwise awaits us all.
But Europe remains steadfast. “The results of the October 23 summit will be decisive,” insisted French Finance Minister Francois Baroin after chairing weekend talks with G20 counterparts in Paris.
In a nutshell, the European Union must:
- — micro-manage how much Greece can default on its massive loans, striking a delicate balance between debt write-downs that reflect actual market values, and perceived bankruptcy;
- — plug the consequent hole in banks’ balance sheets, a job the International Monetary Fund reckons could cost 200 billion euros, and that ratings agencies suggest could result in a downgrade for France;
- — and nail down safeguards against any repeat of the present mess, to begin with by enhancing the eurozone’s existing financial “firewall” to convince doubtful investors that Italy and Spain won’t fall into the same desperate spiral.
Culminating in that ‘mother-of-all-summits’ on Sunday, one that could run right through the night, finance, foreign and finally prime ministers, presidents and Germany’s chancellor will each troop in.
All, even Angela Merkel, are under international orders to cater for every potential side-effect of their decisions, and deliver “comprehensive” defences aimed at turning the gaze of market wolves elsewhere.
These talks were meant to climax on Tuesday, but were put back in the hope the EU can end perennial internal squabbling before its key figures meet the United States, Japan and upstart rivals at a G20 summit on November 3-4.
The preparatory talks in Paris left European participants with burning ears — and bruised egos.
For instance South Africa, a fast-rising economy two decades after apartheid fell, dismissed Europe as operating “behind the curve.”
Pivotal as his eight-year tenure as head of the European Central Bank draws to a close, Jean-Claude Trichet told the Financial Times that Europe would rise to the challenge once governments cede fully to market-economy realities.
But even the most pro-EU among seasoned observers prefer caution.
“The limits will be set by the people,” Hans Martens, who heads the leading Brussels think tank, the European Policy Centre, told AFP.
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=CNG.715616ea4aad03bd010ff592cdbabc08.241&show_article=1
So what say you SUFA, what’s on you mind?
Stand Up For America 
I’d comment more but I don’t know how to fix this situation. And I don’t think the elites know how to fix it either. The people are gonna be hurt-bad I think- just how austere are these measures-and what choice do they have? They made the mistake of living off the government to make their lives easier-obviously that idea has an expiration date -we are making the same mistake. Got people on wall street and around the country screaming for their right to make the elites be fair-Fair-what they are doing is making them stronger.
A funny from Judy. My fav., *** Law of Logical Argument – Anything is possible if you don’t know what you are talking about. You and I don’t know how to fix the situation. Sadly, neither do the supposed “leaders”. Basic’s of economics do apply, don’t spend more than you can afford. Good intentions will only serve to repay the pathway to Hades. The government’s manipulations have caused this situation. Take Greece, they have created a welfare state and now have run out of other people’s money, and it may take down the Euro!
** Law of Mechanical Repair – After your hands become coated with grease,
your nose will begin to itch and you’ll have to pee.
** Law of Gravity – Any tool, nut, bolt, screw, when dropped, will roll to
the least accessible corner.
** Law of Probability – The probability of being watched is directly
proportional to the stupidity of your act.
** Law of Random Numbers – If you dial a wrong number, you never get a busy
signal and someone always answers.
** Variation Law – If you change lines (or traffic lanes), the one you were
in will always move faster than the one you are in now (works every time).
** Law of the Bath – When the body is fully immersed in water, the telephone
rings.
** Law of Close Encounters – The probability of meeting someone you know
increases dramatically when you are with someone you don’t want to be seen
with.
** Law of the Result – When you try to prove to someone that a machine won’t
work, it will.
*** Law of Biomechanics – The severity of the itch is inversely proportional
to the reach.
**** Law of the Theater & Hockey Arena – At any event, the people whose seats
are furthest from the aisle, always arrive last. They are the ones who will
leave their seats several times to go for food, beer, or the toilet and who
leave early before the end of the performance or the game is over. The folks
in the aisle seats come early, never move once, have long gangly legs or big
bellies and stay to the bitter end of the performance. The aisle people also
are very surly folk.
*** The Coffee Law – As soon as you sit down to a cup of hot coffee, your
boss will ask you to do something which will last until the coffee is cold.
*** Murphy’s Law of Lockers – If there are only 2 people in a locker room,
they will have adjacent lockers.
*** Law of Physical Surfaces – The chances of an open-faced jelly sandwich
landing face down on a floor, are directly correlated to the newness and cost
of the carpet or rug.
*** Brown’s Law of Physical Appearance – If the clothes fit, they’re ugly.
*** Oliver’s Law of Public Speaking – A closed mouth gathers no feet.
*** Wilson’s Law of Commercial Marketing Strategy – As soon as you find a
product that you really like, they will stop making it.
*** Doctors’ Law – If you don’t feel well, make an appointment to go to the
doctor, by the time you get there you’ll feel better.. But don’t make an
appointment, and you’ll stay sick.
Murphy’s instructions for repairs:
If it jams, force it! If it breaks, it needed replacing anyway.
Jubal Harshaw’s Law of Democracy:
Democracy can withstand anything but democrats. (Robert A. Heinlein)
*** Wilson’s Law of Commercial Marketing Strategy – As soon as you find a
product that you really like, they will stop making it. Or just stop selling it at the stores you go too. I swear they watch what I buy, what I like to watch on TV and get rid of them just to irritate me.
Economics is definitely relevant but in this country-it is also the stupid way we debate. Lets take regulations-I don’t think there are very many people who actually believe there should be no regulations-but that ends up being the argument. Are you for regulations or not. Total craziness-that leads to people passing a bill of, what was it 1500 or 2500 pages of regulations. And other people having to say, hell no, to all the regulations because they don’t want to support the unknown in a bill that size. No common sense-our party system kills common sense.
” Are you for regulations or not.” Politico say Dodd/Franks does not kill jobs….
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2011/jan/21/mike-pence/mike-pence-says-dodd-frank-financial-regulation-bi/
Reality says…..
http://www.gop.gov/press-release/11/07/21/hensarling-op-ed-on-one
Ahhhh…you forgot some of Murphy’s laws of combat,
(1) Tracers work both ways.
(2) Remember, in the American Army, your weapon was made by the lowest bidder.
(3) If your attack is going really well…it is probably an ambush.
(4) Four second grenades always go off in three seconds.
(5) The wind always changes when a flare is fired and you are the one not in the shadows.
(6) When hot “A’s” are brought to the field, it is always raining.
(7) Friendly fire – isn’t.
(8) Never share a foxhole with anyone braver than yourself.
(9) Never draw fire; it irritates everyone around you.
(10) Killing for peace is like screwing for virginity.
(11) Beer Math: 2 beers times 37 men equals 49 cases.
(12) The bursting radius of a hand grenade is always one foot greater than your jumping range.
(13) There is no such place as a convenient foxhole.
(14) Odd objects attract fire – never lurk behind one.
(15) Whenever you drop your equipment in a fire-fight, your ammo and grenades always fall the farthest away, and your canteen always lands at your feet.
(16) Don’t be conspicuous. In the combat zone, it draws fire. Out of the combat zone, it draws sergeants.
(17) A free fire zone has nothing to do with economics.
(18) There is only one rule in war: When you win, you get to make up the rules.
(19) Military Intelligence is not a contradiction in terms, “Light Infantry” is!
(20) War does not determine who is right, war determines who is left.
And…Murphy is an optimist.
ROTFLMAO
Good one my Texican friend.
Best o’ mornins to ya Colonel.
Seems your border situation is growing in public attention. Despite the administrations best efforts to portray border cities as “safer than ever”.
Yes sir…getting pretty hot down here. We sure do have the Feds pissed because word is getting out. heh heh
V.H.
What do you mean by “fix”?
A painless way to reverse decades of bad economic policy? Impossible!
If you, personally, spend your way into bankruptcy, what is the “painless” way out of that?
You lose your wealth – that is painful – but what else is there?
That is the problem – believing that there is a painless way to avoid negative consequences.
The longer one avoids the inevitable, the harsher the consequences.
I didn’t say there was a “painless ” way. But they have ignored the inevitable longer than we have(at least so far) . So tell me BF-just how painful do you think it is going to be-are we talking deaths or just economic hardship.
V.H.
There is no predicting human action – some go nuts over verbal insults – others won’t act even if their kids are being killed …. so who actually knows?
However, the Greeks are facing decades of poverty – consider Spain.
Spain in 1556 was the wealthiest nation the world had ever known.
By 1598, it was essentially bankrupt.
It has yet to recover, it is called the “Poor man of Europe”…..
The Greek default will create a series of domino tipping events that will echo over the whole world.
The Greeks -who have repeatedly suffered hardships from war and revolution – will face them again – but they are used to it.
It’s the rest of the world that isn’t ready.
.
BF
You: “The Greek default will create a series of domino tipping events that will echo over the whole world. ”
I have read and listened to many experts lately explain how GREECE is no big deal, in terms of REAL financial impact. That is if it were left to its own devises.
In their view the impact is more “psychological” than financial.
Greece has ALREADY defaulted as the debt holders have taken a huge haircut.
JAC
Unfortunately, it is not as trivial as that.
The Greek default will bankrupt a number of Euro-banks – which will trigger default insurance covered by US banks – which will risk the viability of them all.
Government (ie: taxpayers) will have to step in, or let them fall.
IF they step in, Spain, Portugal, then Italy will all follow Greek default … as it is obvious that the pain is not as great on the local people as trying to pay it all back.
When Italy goes default, Europe falls over and will not be able to get up.
When Europe goes, the US is not far behind.
If government does not step in, Euro-banks will fail massively, ending the Euro over night – a monetary disaster unknown in modern history.
CHALLENGING QUESTION
You are on a Horse, galloping at a constant speed.
On your right side is a sharp drop off.
And on your left side is an Elephant traveling at the same speed as you.
Directly in front of you is a galloping Kangaroo and your horse is unable to overtake it.
Behind you is a Lion running at the same speed as you and the Kangaroo.
What must you do to safely get out of this highly dangerous situation?
See answer below……
GET YOUR DRUNK ASS OFF THE MERRY GO ROUND.
from our BirdMom
🙂
Meant to post this yesterday-wonder what he was really laughing at?
The Austerity Myth: Federal Spending Up 5% This Year
By JOHN MERLINE, INVESTOR’S BUSINESS DAILY Posted 08:05 AM ET
When Republicans took control of the House in January, they pledged to make deep cuts in federal spending, and in April they succeeded in getting a bill advertised as cutting $38 billion from fiscal 2011’s budget. Then in August, they pushed for a deal to cut another $2.4 trillion over the next decade.
Some analysts have blamed these spending cuts for this year’s economic slowdown.
But data released by the Treasury Department on Friday show that, so far, there hasn’t been any spending cuts at all.
In fact, in the first nine months of this year, federal spending was $120 billion higher than in the same period in 2010, the data show. That’s an increase of almost 5%. And deficits during this time were $23.5 billion higher.
These spending hikes haven’t stopped many analysts from claiming that the country is in an age of budget austerity, one that’s hurting economic growth.
A July article in USA Today, for example, claimed that “Already in 2011, softer government spending has sapped growth.”
Jared Bernstein, former chief economic adviser to Vice President Biden, wrote over the summer that “government spending cutbacks have been a large drag on growth in recent quarters and have led to sharp losses in state and local employment.”
Economist and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman argued in September that “the turn toward austerity (is) a major factor in our growth slowdown.”
If government spending is related to growth, as these and others claim, then the economy presumably should be growing faster, not slower, given the current higher rates of federal outlays.
Nor does the claim that state governments sharply cut spending stand up well to closer scrutiny.
Overall state spending continued to climb right through the recession, when all money from state general funds and other funds, federal grants and state bonds is combined.
Total state spending in 2010 was almost 10% higher than in 2008, according to the National Association of State Budget Officers’ annual State Expenditure Report.
And general fund spending — which makes up about 40% of total state spending — is expected to climb 5.2% this year and 2.6% next year, according to the association’s latest survey.
NASBO says that states were able to sustain spending growth through 2010 only because the federal government was pumping more money in via the $830 billion stimulus, and that these funds are now all but exhausted.
As the survey report notes, the tapering off the stimulus “combined with a slow recovery in state revenue collections, will continue the tight resource environment for states in fiscal 2012.”
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article/588254/201110170805/The-Austerity-Myth-Federal-Spending-Up-5-This-Year.aspx
MIKA BRZEZINSKI, CO-HOST: I want to ask Sam Stein about the Occupy Wall Street protests which are now one month old, and they took a global turn over the weekend. 951 cities in 82 countries were scheduled to take part in demonstrations after online organizers called for a worldwide rally. The mayor of Rome said $1.4 million in damage was caused after rioters who broke away from a peaceful protest smashed windows and torched vehicles around the city.
JOE SCARBOROUGH, CO-HOST: Now, see, that will help with the construction industry in Italy.
BRZEZINSKI: Oh, lord.
SCARBOROUGH: So, they, no seriously.
BRZEZINSKI: Stop it. Just stupid.
SCARBOROUGH: No, you have to rebuild Rome because people burned it down. That’s actually a plus up. This Occupy Wall Street group, look at that, they are creating new jobs.
Read more: http://www.newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2011/10/17/scarborough-rome-riots-occupy-wall-street-creating-new-jobs-forcing-r#ixzz1b3HW1MxY
http://www.newsbusters.org/all-you-can-eat-buffet-occupy-wall-street.html
🙂 Seriously, eat the rich. Is that suppose to make some kind of sense?
Something I read on a bathroom stall years ago…reality is a concept for people who can’t cope with drugs…..Yhep, that kind of sense. Or, to music…
Given all that is going on around us, sometimes we just need to take a moment to remember.
I will probably anger those on the left but this isn’t pointed at all democrats but to those who talk down Capitalism-they are not Americans-they do not have any idea of Who WE ARE!!!
V.H.
Back to back to hits.
🙂
🙂 I certainly like both of them!
Opinions-don’t have enough knowledge to speak to the accuracy of the claims. Wasn’t paying a lot of attention in the 60’s. I do see where supporting this movement beyond the “people have a right to be upset comments” by the politicos is dangerous. Although with all the democrat organizations backing it-it may be enough to hurt the democrat party. But whether bad things happen or not, I don’t think it is going to help them. The I hate capitalism signs are too abundant.
October 17, 2011
Occupy Wall Street and the Chicago ’68 Riots
By J.R. Dunn
As the man said, those ignorant of their history are condemned to repeat it. How much worse are those who deliberately ignore it?
Deliberately ignoring their own record is a liberal specialty. The ideology could not exist without it. There is scarcely a major event of the last century that matches what liberal mythology has to say about it — the Depression, WWII, the civil rights movement, the Cold War… They have suppressed, ignored, and hidden the facts about each of these events and more, instead constructing a glittering façade in which liberals are always right, always heroic, and always victorious.
One episode they’re ignoring today — and a particularly ignoble one — occurred from August 23 to 29, 1968. Known variously as the Chicago convention riots, the Chicago protests, or simply “Czechago” (a reference to the contemporaneous Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia), it comprised one of the key events of the ’60s. Some would go so far as to say that it marked the decade’s climax.
The Democrats met in Chicago, supposedly under the benevolent control of the Daley clan, to nominate their presidential candidate. It had been a strange and brutal primary season. An uprising by the party’s far left, led by Sen. Eugene McCarthy, challenged incumbent Lyndon Johnson on an anti-Vietnam War platform. McCarthy effectively won the New Hampshire primary, coming in second in the vote but bagging most of the delegates and prompting Johnson to bow out in March. Vice President Hubert Humphrey ran instead. Seeing his chance, Bobby Kennedy leaped in, soon outlapping the lesser-known McCarthy. It appeared that that the Kennedy dynasty was in the process of seizing its legacy when RFK was shot by Palestinian gunman Sirhan Sirhan. The path appeared clear for Humphrey. (All this time, the sole GOP candidate, Richard Nixon, was alternately chuckling and shaking his head.)
For several years, liberals had been attempting to co-opt the kids, to take control of the youth revolt of the ’60s — the youthquake, the counterculture, whatever — and use it for their own purposes, much as they had done with the civil rights movement earlier in the decade. Giving lip service to the kid’s concerns, intoning that “we must listen when the young people speak out,” mouthing approval of demonstrations, wearing paisley ties, the liberal Democrats did their level best to nudge the kids into becoming part of the liberal voting bloc.
What they couldn’t grasp (and in large part still don’t) was that the ’60s revolt was aimed as much at liberalism as anything else. In the 1960s, liberalism was in control. It was the Establishment the kids were revolting against. There was no organized political opposition, and there hadn’t been since the McCarthy debacle in the mid-’50s. (Barry Goldwater, the first conservative Republican presidential aspirant since Calvin Coolidge, had been routed in 1964 by being transformed into Joe McCarthy, Jr.) Liberals had effectively run the country since the days of the New Deal and had been in complete political control since JFK took office. They had their plans — not at all different from those of our current incumbent. At the time, it was expressed in the form of the “Great Society,” an LBJ brainstorm that, like every other social-democratic attempt at governing, amounted to a soft form of totalitarianism. In exchange for cradle-to-grave welfare, the Great Society would run everything in the country for you without you having to bother your head about it. All you had to do was keep voting Row A.
American kids weren’t having any of it, and throughout the latter half of the decade, they carried out what amounted to a massive, universal strike aimed directly at the liberal superstate. (Many conservatives operate under the assumption that it was aimed at them. But conservatism during the ’60s was still a coterie phenomenon, as far from the levers of power as it’s possible to get. The Reagan Revolution was a decade and more in the future.) This was helped along by the fact that the Vietnam War, yet another liberal project, had been dumped on the backs of the very kids that the liberals were trying to seduce. Very few Ivy-educated liberals were dying under Vietnam’s triple-canopy jungle.
By 1968, in large part due to hostility against the war, the New Left had succeeded in taking the driver’s seat, but that’s another story. Suffice it to say that at the time of the convention, Americans in their teens and twenties, whether left, right, or indifferent, had a serious grudge against the Democratic Party. They had no compunction about tearing down and stomping flat the liberal façade, and in Chicago ’68, that’s exactly what they did.
The Chicago convention is unquestionably the most wild-eyed political convention ever held in this country. Demonstrators came early and stayed late. While many were organized by the SDS, the Yippies, and the Mobe (National Mobilization Against the War), the larger number were freelance, showing up for the fun that was in it. They proceeded to put the Democrats on the grill. The lakefront area of Chicago was placed under siege. Several pitched battles were fought for Grant Park, and the crowd tried to storm the convention center. Jerry Rubin and Abbie Hoffman showed up to goad people into fighting the cops from a safe distance (Abbie wearing a psychedelically painted GI helmet). Hundreds of arrests were made, beatings were rampant, and a curfew was declared to no avail. At last Mayor Richard J. Daley ordered the cops to open fire.
Cooler heads prevailed before a massacre could occur. All the same, the media portrayed the police, the mayor, the city, and by extension the Democrats as the villains. Walter Cronkite, at the peak of his influence, dismissed the cops as “thugs” on the air. The papers screamed of a “police riot,” which was a little difficult to comprehend — the police, after all, belonged in Chicago. They hadn’t traveled thousands of miles to tear the place up.
As for the public, the conclusion was straightforward: the Democrats had for years declared themselves Spokesmen for the Youth, the buttoned-down allies of the hippies, Yippies, protestors, and demonstrators of whatever breed. And yet here they were trying to annihilate each other on national television. Voters wished a plague upon both, and that was the end of the Democrats for that election. Richard Nixon coasted to an easy win, setting the country on the road to Watergate, impeachment, and the election of Jimmy Carter. (Humphrey, the last honest old-school liberal ever to run for president, might well have done a better job. He’d have been a Truman figure, easing the wilder aspects of the liberal agenda and acting as a conciliator. There’s one thing for sure — nobody outside Georgia would have ever heard of Jimmy Carter.)
So here we are forty-odd years along, and what has changed? Nothing, if you’re a Democrat. The same exact chain of events is occurring with the Occupy Wall Street gang. The 99ers are the Chicago mob with the addition of iPhones and minus the seriousness. Their appearance is similar — high-priced boho rags, to-hell-with-it hair. Their rhetoric is indistinguishable. (“Power to the people, man!”) Their behavior is identical: show up, hang out, yell, and posture for the cameras. The goal is the same — take down the power structure. And so will be the result — the destruction of the Democratic Party.
The media has carefully nurtured the 99ers as an alternative to the Tea Parties, despite the fact that they can scarcely muster 1% of the latter’s numbers. The Democrats have been quick to jump on the bandwagon. Obama has made encouraging noises. Nancy Pelosi has offered direct praise. Rep. John Lewis showed up in Atlanta and got himself made a fool of. According to the New York Times, “[t]he Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the party’s powerful House fund-raising arm, is circulating a petition seeking 100,000 party supporters to declare that ‘I stand with the Occupy Wall Street protests.'” (Hat tip: Peter Wehner.) Clearly, the Dems have adopted the movement and are going whole hog over it, with the media doing their best to assure that the connection is not overlooked.
The paradox here is, of course, is that the Wall Street moguls that the demonstrators are so eager to get at were Obama’s most crucial supporters in 2008. A large chunk of the stimulus funds went to the financial houses that the mob wants to shut down. (Much of the rest went to the unions, which have now come out in support of the 99ers — so now we have Obama’s two biggest allies at each other’s throats. That, in a nutshell, is liberal logic at work.)
There’s no way this can end well. Yet the Democrats act as if it’s all destined to work out according to their requirements of the moment. When it goes off, as it will — the attacks on the cops in New York, the riot at the National Air and Space Museum in D.C., and the appearance of hardcore anarchist contingents reveal that clearly enough — they will own it, just as they owned the Chicago riots. The voting public will derive the same lesson as they did in 1968.
The Democrats have been dodging the bullet since the late ’60s. They have repeatedly danced up to the edge of the political abyss and then danced back again. Time after time — with Chicago, the Nuclear Freeze, the Sandinistas, and 9/11, to mention just a few instances — they have gotten away with it. Eventually, by the simple factor of odds, they will go over the edge and go splat. And the world will go on, unvexed by yet another form of organized dementia.
That may not happen this time either. They may get away with it once again. But at the very least, the 99ers will help take Obama down. That’s good enough for me.
http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/10/occupy_wall_street_and_the_chicago_68_riots.html
I am not at all impressed with American Thinker today. Not one single author there points out the obvious, which is that our “system” is not “capitalism” but mercantilism, and that BOTH the TEA Party and the OWS protestors are against it.
Authors at American thinker could have scored a lot more points by pointing out that the TEA Party is against mercantilism but FOR REAL CAPITALISM; whereas the OWS protestors are against mercantilism, against capitalism, and for socialism.
I guess that would have been too much work for them.
The BEST piece I saw on the OWS was early last week (I think) on Anderson Cooper. I NEVER watch CNN, but I happened to be flipping channels and saw that he was interviewing a representative of the TEA Party and they were talking about the OWS protests. The TEA Party person stated that “Crony Capitalism” is NOT a free market, and is therefore NOT capitalism, so the OWS protestors protesting against bank bailouts (clearly NOT a capitalist idea) while simultaneously protesting against capitalism were failing to make sense.
At that point, Anderson Cooper got an actually thoughtful look on his face, and decided to end the interview with the TEA Party person. He did thank her for her participation (and even sounded kinda sincere).
I think that Anderson Cooper thought that had he continued that interview he might have been in danger of converting quite a few CNN viewers to TEA Party members.
Of course, immediately afterwards he interviewed an absolute nutjob professor who was voicing full support of the OWS “movement” and not questioning anything about their claims or agenda at all. He sounded like a fanatic… which was perfect after the no-nonsense common-sense interview that had just taken place. The contrast was AWESOME. I wish I had a link to the video of the two interviews, but I forget which day this was precisely.
Usually I like American Thinker quite a bit, but they are REALLY dropping the ball on some economic definitions and issues which should be crystal clear to at least some of the contributors over there….
Peter
I share your thoughts on American Thinker lately. Although I did read an article a couple of weeks ago that captured your concerns.
I saw Stossel last Thursday and he did a good job of showing the different groups involved in the OWS effort. His criticism was with the “right” portraying this as a uniform anti American violent movement. Noting that MOST of the demonstrators are NOT VIOLENT or trying to provoke the police.
Good morning JAC…….was rereading commentary on here and saw your post. concerning the Tea Party movement and Stossel. I get tickled every time I see them interview a young 22 year old protestor holding a sign against big business and capitalism,,,,,and this young person has no idea what the sign means and when asked….they cannot answer a simple question. I then see the hippie bracket, strumming their guitars, trying to relive the 60’s, still messing around with modern chemistry, saying f**k the USA and America, people defecating on police cars and calling them “pigs”, violating their permits of assembly, trashing the parks and then protesting the cleanup, using terms such as nigger and jew boy and Kyke on signs and all the time claiming that this is not racist..it is 2nd amendment…and they want their movement taken serious.
I went to the Dallas OWS rally and actually saw a peaceful movement….their complaints were the same as the Tea Party…..against the favored treatment of business in Washington. I saw them set up in the downtown Dealy PLaza area with their tents and porta potties.,,,,with their signs. All 30 of them. I then went to Burnett Park in downtown Fort Worth to see their rally…..all 12 of them….Six were not peaceful and 6 were. The non peaceful (their violation was blocking a sidewalk and pushing brief case carrying business men off the sidewalk into the street) were arrested….of the six…three were from Chicago and 2 from Houston and 1 local. The media shows the signs and the violence and does not show the non violent. So…in my book, the protesters are getting no sympathy from me because they have been hijacked. Texas, for the greatest part, laughs at them.
But……OWS is getting the reputation of violence and comparisons to Europe with the riots and the protests over there calling it a “global” movement which is bullshit. It is a bunch of pansy ass slackers that want a nanny state and they have no concept of what real economics is about. THIS is what I see and not some major movement.
Then I see a spoiled little Obama trying to jump on the band wagon that has a broken wheel saying…”this is what I am talking about”……..He had already lost my respect anyway, but I was willing to give “some” benefit of doubt…but he has lost that from me and a whole host of others as well. The only “change” that I saw from him was more of the same but Chicago style. I mean the SOB has offensive ground combat troops in three times the countries that any other President in history. Sorry, but the man is evil and not by BF’s definition…..worse.
So, my good friend…..how in the hell are ya? And how are the minions doing? I know that you do not have control but think you do….but how is the fam?
Left Wing Irony of the Day
The left cries about the woes of global population. We are killing the planet, humans can not survive. We need to reduce our population by billions.
We need National Health Care because without it……….. people will die.
Health Care is a right because we all have a right to live. We should be able to kill the unborn to prevent overpopulation or suffering.
Can you say………..CONTRADICTIONS??
So how about this SUFA?
Controversial Therapy for Pre-Teen Transgender Patient Raises Questions
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/10/17/controversial-therapy-for-young-transgender-patients-raises-questions/#ixzz1b3mr3Km5
Kathy
Cardinals vs Rangers.
Nice of you Cheese Heads to give up at least one sport championship so the rest of us could participate.
Spreading the Wealth?????????????
Second Left Wing Irony of the Day.
It is OK to use chemicals to “fix” a child’s sexual identity but it is “criminal” to allow circumcision.
WTH? The left is truly a sick group. This is unbelievable.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2011/10/17/brzezinski_make_rich_known_publicly_to_put_pressure_on_them_to_give_back.html
STIMULUS CHECK
Sometime this year, we taxpayers will again receive another ‘Economic
Stimulus’ payment.
This is indeed a very exciting program, and I’ll explain it by
using a Q & A format:
Q. What is an ‘Economic Stimulus’ payment ?
A. It is money that the federal government will send to taxpayers.
Q.. Where will the government get this money ?
A. From taxpayers.
Q. So the government is giving me back my own money ?
A. Only a smidgen of it.
Q. What is the purpose of this payment ?
A. The plan is for you to use the money to purchase a high-definition TV set, thus stimulating the economy.
Q. But isn’t that stimulating the economy of China ?
A. Shut up.
Below is some helpful advice on how to best help the U.S. economy by
spending your stimulus check wisely:
* If you spend the stimulus money at Wal-Mart, the money will go to China or Sri Lanka .
* If you spend it on gasoline, your money will go to the Arabs.
* If you purchase a computer, it will go to India , Taiwan or China .
* If you purchase fruit and vegetables, it will go to Mexico , Honduras and Guatemala ..
* If you buy an efficient car, it will go to Japan or Korea ..
* If you purchase useless stuff, it will go to Taiwan .
* If you pay your credit cards off, or buy stock, it will go to management bonuses and they will hide it offshore.
Instead, keep the money in America by:
1) Spending it at yard sales, or
2) Going to ball games, or
3) Spending it on prostitutes, or
4) Beer or
5) Tattoos.
(These are the only American businesses still operating in the U.S. )
Conclusion:
Go to a ball game with a tattooed prostitute that you met at a yard
sale and drink beer all day !
No need to thank me, I’m just glad I could be of help.
Oh, I forgot one last thing, the stimulus money you get is considered INCOME and therefore you will have to pay taxes on it.
I’m on it! You can count on me to do my patriotic duty…
But, er, I don’t think the missus would be so happy with me spending time with tattooed prostitutes. Can I just spend it all on (cheap domestic) beer instead?
Kegger at that g-man compound!
Mathius
What the hell????
Prostitutes are people to ya know!!!
More “selective sympathy” from the left wing. Your spouse is obviously NOT a liberal.
No, Emilius is *sob* a conservative.
Nobody’s perfect.
But I’m working on her – maybe I’ll wear her down after a few decades.
Hahaha! You know what’s funny? We are Cubs fans and are so sick and tired of the rah, rah Brewers’ fans that surround us! We were (quietly) cheering for the Cards – which is a big no, no for Cubs fans!
We are really fortunate to follow such talented teams. Here’s what we did this weekend: Friday – watched our son’s HS team complete an undefeated season, won a 9th straight league championship, preserved a 13-year home game winning streak and now will be working toward a 3-peat state championship. Saturday – went to the Badger game and watched the ranked #4 team in the country (although our very weak non-conference schedule puts us at #6 in the early BCS standings) and on Sunday, my husband (and his Fantasy Fanatic Friends) went to the undefeated, defending Super Bowl Champions Packer game.
Our sports life is good!
Kathy
Yep, BCS has your Badgers at #6, RIGHT BEHIND BOISE STATE……….Bwahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.
Want a Mountain West rematch this year? Bwahahahahahahahaahahaa
OK, I’ll stop now. Don’t want the Jix the Broncos.
Looks to me like the Badgers are out to avenge their Rose Bowl loss in a VERY BIG WAY this year. They look like a team with a “mission” to me.
Sorry Anita, but I’m taking the Badgers and giving up the points.
BAH! Three straight over Wisky, momentum from the win over little brother, homecoming, DE-FENSE, Spartan Stadium, Sparty by 10!!
Anita
YOUR ON!!!
What is the bet?
Got any Silver Eagles over there? Ting! There’s mine! Otherwise the winner’s fight song goes up on SUFA 🙂
Fight Song it is.
Sorry, no eagles here.
Along the lines of the NON DECLINING — Declining Budgets.
I thought SUFA might like a look into one of the ongoing political battles that act in total to create EVER INCREASING FEDERAL BUDGETS.
By Dennis Richardson
If you aren’t hungry or worried about your next meal as you read this, be grateful. One of every five Oregonians is now receiving food stamps.
If you aren’t checking Craigslist for a job or sending out résumés, be thankful. Almost 10 percent of Oregon’s workforce is in the unemployment line.
Somber statistics, but the deepest devastation lies in Oregon’s rural counties. And it’s about to get worse, much worse. U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack predicted during his recent visit to Oregon that the federal program that provided as much as $253 million a year in payments to rural Oregon counties, the Secure Rural Schools Act, will not survive the Congressional supercommittee’s work to cut $1.5 trillion from the federal budget deficit.
If you live in an urban area and you still have a job and a home, maybe you don’t care that this will likely bankrupt at least two Oregon counties. Maybe you don’t have time to worry about rural unemployment rates that have hovered near 20 percent for almost two decades.
But if you do care, then before you leave for work or go out for lunch, take a close-up look at poverty in our state; take a moment to google Coos County or Curry County, or for that matter just view the sweeping satellite image of our state – nearly half of which is blanketed with deep green forests — Oregon’s richest natural resource.
And yet these are Oregon’s poorest areas, where methamphetamine destroys already broken lives, where hopelessness evicts the young and ambitious, where urban idealism has outspent and outlawed rural initiative. Where generations of hard-working timber families once labored and thrived, depression now is a way of life.
Imagine if you lived in the midst of the natural resources necessary to save yourself and your family, and were ordered to abandon your tools, your dreams, and your community.
Rural Oregonians acted in good faith and believed in their elected leaders when they helped negotiate President Clinton’s 1994 Northwest Forest Plan, but since then teams of environmental lawyers have blocked the timber sales, closed the mills, and thwarted alternative recreation plans, leaving rural Oregon underemployed and dependent on government hand-outs.
How could the urban elected officials who set the agenda for our federal forests turn away from our most plentiful renewable resource? How could they ignore our comparative advantage over other states? Who is responsible for Oregon’s rural poverty, high unemployment rate and declining income? How did this happen?
During the 1980s and ’90s timber revenues from federal forests in rural Oregon counties plummeted. Well-funded eco-elites shut down Oregon’s timber harvests by obtaining federal court rulings over the endangered species listing of the spotted owl. More than 100 mills closed. Thousands of family-wage jobs were eliminated, drying up incomes and businesses in small mill towns across our state. Annual timber harvests now hover at around 10 percent of levels associated with a more thriving Oregon. Rather than correcting the misuse of the Endangered Species Act, Congress approved the Secure Rural Schools Act. Instead of continuing to fund county services from timber harvest revenues, rural counties were paid hundreds of millions of dollars in federal welfare payments.
The counties were ordered to develop alternative economic plans. Having achieved their goals of making Oregon’s rich forests of renewable timber legally off-limits and unavailable to be managed or harvested, Portland’s urban eco-elites promptly turned their backs and abandoned the counties to fend for themselves with meager resources.
For the past decade, politicians and the environmentalists have allowed rural Oregon counties to deteriorate and become ever more dependent on government handouts. Now, in the face of massive federal deficits, nobody wants to defend any longer what are essentially welfare payments to counties in 40 states.
Portland and Oregon’s other major cities should wake up. The last federal timber welfare payment checks are being issued, and they will mark the end of the primary source of revenue to some of Oregon’s rural counties. There will be consequences felt in Portland, Salem and Eugene from the bankruptcy of Oregon rural counties. As the urban eco-elites watch placidly from the sidelines, they should realize this rural economic meltdown will financially affect their schools, their county services, and their tax rates. State government is already being asked to intervene. What will be the cost and how should we respond?
The solution is clear. Ignoring Oregon’s vast timber resources is a failed policy and must be reversed. Democratic leaders now must “man-up” and face their coalition of environmental supporters and say, “No more lawsuits. Our neighbors are suffering; our rural communities are collapsing; our rural counties must be saved. We must moderate our forest policy.”
Action is needed now. Words are not enough. The federal government controls 53 percent of Oregon land, and rural counties depended on effective and productive management of those resources. They have been abandoned and betrayed.
The truth stares rural folks in the face day and night. There are no alternatives. There is no replacement economy. There is only the forest — one of the richest, greenest, fastest-growing forests in the world.
There is only one solution — it’s vast, green and sustainable. The particulars of a new Oregon timber policy must be hammered out in Salem and in Washington, D.C. Management and control of Oregon’s federal forests should be placed with the counties in which they are located. And, safeguards must be included that will stop the use of our federal courts as an eco-elitist weapon against responsible timber harvesting.
The time has come to reopen Oregon’s forests in a responsible manner. The time has come to reclaim our bounty, our birthright, and rebuild Oregon’s natural resource-based economy. The economic future of both rural and urban Oregon depends upon it.
Dennis Richardson is co-chair of the Oregon House Ways & Means Committee, and co-chair of the Oregon Transformation Project. In his Oregon House District he represents two Southern Oregon counties that would be affected by the cessation of federal timber payments.
the urban elite thinking they know what is better for the rest of the country? Never seen this scenario played out before.
How about one more along the lines of “remember”.
Go ahead V……. hit one out of the park.
Not sure I can do that 🙂
But this says a lot!
Defending Our Freedom
* “[I]t is a common observation here that our cause is the cause of all mankind, and that we are fighting for their liberty in defending our own.” –Benjamin Franklin
V.H.
I would call that a “hard line drive into the left field bleachers”.
Well done!
No comment necessary:
http://theulstermanreport.com/2011/10/17/wall-street-insider-the-obama-white-house-wants-us-gone-all-of-us/
I’ve been listening to “right wing radio” this morning and I am a little ticked off at the attempt to portray the OWS crowd as “anti-Semitic” and “anti-Israel”.
While it is legitimate to question why the MSM is not reporting on this type of rhetoric, after reporting on any moon-bat at a Tea Party, it is nothing but HYPOCRITICAL to do the same thing to this group that they decried being done to the Tea Party.
And NOBODY seems able to question whether being anti- Zionist is the same as being anti- Semitic or anti- Israel. They are NOT the same thing. There are many anti-Zionist Jews who live in Israel. That is proof, for those who want proof.
OK, venting over. Please return to your normal programming.
I wasn’t listening, but I’m guessing they are hitting it hard because the MSM has a blackout on any of this behavior.
Just like the blackout on details of Solyndra (and the other greens) and Fast & Furious and the subpeona on the administration. Would’ve been major headlines if this would be Bush & Co. I continue to be amazed at the media’s willingness to aid and abet.
BTW, why are we speaking in Italics today?
Kathy
Must be you. All looks normal here.
😐
Is this OK? Had heard of this when it first happened and certainly didn’t think school district was in the wrong for declining the request of a new teacher for this leave. Again, I misjudged the fear of going against Muslims. What a bunch of crap.
http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/2011/10/obamas-department-of-justice-sues-forces-school-district-to-pay-75000-to-hajj-tripping-muslim-teache.html
Not just no but HELL NO!
Crap is far too kind.
What JAC said.
From The Desk Of Buck The Wala:
Can you post this link: http://volokh.com/2010/12/14/department-of-justice-enforces-the-sharia-sues-illinois-school-district-for-muslim-teacher-hajj/
I’m tired of this encroaching sharia law, pro-Muslim bias BS already
Also, “when I hit reply, the comment box pops up but there is no way for me to submit my comment” – has anyone experienced this problem before?
Also, I (Mathius), heartily second Buck’s opinion of being tired of this encroaching Sharia law, pro-Muslim bias BS already. This whole country is skewed for Christianity and… screw it, I’m wasting my breath.
Yeah? I’m tired of people thinking the world revolves around them. The next guy can do the job full time. Want time off for the hajj? Go work for a muslim.
I thought the Hajj was required once in a Muslim’s lifetIme, she couldn’t just do it next year? This DoJ is a joke.
Ron Paul gets my vote. Best I have seen yet coming from the republican field, and with plenty of specifics. His plan would be a great first step to getting spending under control.
http://www.ronpaul2012.com/the-issues/ron-paul-plan-to-restore-america/
Ya beat me to it! I was just setting this up. Good plan, too bad it probably won’t get too far.
Bachmann could have beat Ron Paul to it, if she could have answered my question this past July/August on ” what did she plan to cut?” when she claimed she would not raise the debt ceiling under any circumstances. She never did give a straight answer.
V.H.
OK…………….That was a definite home run. DEEP into the third deck in Center Field.
JAC gives a standing ovation.
Anyone else having trouble posting? It seems Buck the Wala is blocked..
I knew this place was hostile to lawyers, but isn’t this taking it a bit far?
I’ve looked in comments and don’t see anything. He’s not in spam, so something must be blocking him, like you said.
It’s a vast, right wing conspiracy!
No third parties!
http://vastleft.blogspot.com/
************************WAR WARNING***********************
************************WAR WARNING***********************
************************WAR WARNING***********************
There has been a serious attack on US soil. The president has ordered our defenses set to defcon four. The Dept. of Defense is responding to this threat.
http://www.nbc12.com/story/15716468/thieves-steal-truck-with-presidents-equipment
WTH??? The Dept of Defense is in charge of the Presidential teleprompter????????
I just couldn’t help myself…It was an opportunistic moment, so I decided to go all Rahm….It was just a harmless prank!
I hate that stupid liberal media..
Link.
Hmm…so it seems I can comment as a new thread, but not under an existing thread. Very interesting.
I agree with Mathius — this is evidence of anti-lawyer bias and a vast right-wing conspiracy…
Bwahahahahahaha
Left Wing Irony of the day.
We can not allow any hint of Christianity in our Govt. But we use Christianity to rationalize/justify our scheme of “Social Justice” and the “Welfare State” to implement it.
I don’t know who is arguing social justice is justified by Christianity (though I have no doubt there are people out there saying this). I’m saying “social justice” (what a BS term), is justified by a theory of social contract and a secular duty of man to his fellow man as well as a greater-good argument. As for the “welfare state” (another BS term), I think welfare is in need of some serious, major reform, but I think welfare is justified by both greater-good and humanitarian grounds.
I don’t want to get into it today – we’ve covered this ad nausium.
But Christianity is not the official religion of the US. Yet we bow to it left and right (hell, the birth of your savior (who was, by the way, a Jew) is a national holiday!). There are laws allowing them exemptions from noise laws (I used to get woken up by church bells every Sunday morning at 8 AM). There are laws restricting the sale of alcohol on the sabbath. Though it’s starting to break down, marriage is defined by the Christian definition. “One nation under God.” “In God we trust.” And on, and on, and on.
Yet every single roll-back of this privileged status, or every advancement of other religions to a comparable status, is greeted as a war on Christianity or the advent of Sharia Law. I’m sick of the hysterics. Seriously, are you people incapable of gaining perspective?
::sigh::
Mathius
Yes, we have covered this ad nausium. And you have still NOT presented a rational argument.
You base a theory of social justice on a theory of social contract, which is a fallacy.
Of course, as most on the left, you then make an argument against “Christian control” by violating your own theory of “social contract”.
The USA was a Christian nation before it was the USA and has remained so until now. It may change but that is the “cultural” heritage of this country. Cultural norms are a key component of the “theory of social contract”.
You seem to confuse “cultural norms” with some STATE RELIGION.
Slavery was also a cultural norm.
Ooh, so was dying of dysentery.
We also traveled by horseback instead of those newfangled horseless carriages.
Dueling was popular.
We drank a lot more tea than we do today.. probably because we were British.
We used kerosene lamps because he hadn’t figured out electricity yet.
We liked to kill Indians without provocation and steal their land.
Women were basically property of their husbands.
Should we preserve these norms?
I’d love to discuss this with you, but you’re a woman. And according to the cultural norms on which this country was founded, women can’t possibly have anything worthwhile to say on a serious subject like this.
Why don’t you go make yourself look pretty for your husband instead?
(please don’t hurt me, I’m just being facetious)
JAC IS FEMALE? I never knew…..
Anita
Neither did JAC.
Got mixed up.. thought I was talking to Anita for some reason..
Oh well.
Buck,
I’ve had that problem too. Try right-clicking on the “Reply” button, and then click on “open”.
The screen will jump around a bit, but you should get a valid window to post your comment.
Worked! Thanks for the tip!
Late last week the Obama administration revealed it had sent U.S. troops on a humanitarian mission to the central African nation of Uganda, a move called an “invasion by press release” Monday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.”
Host Joe Scarborough expressed shock that the Obama administration isn’t making any efforts to justify the mission.
“Yeah, we’ve invaded another country on another continent,” he said. “We’re dropping drones on like 28 countries that we’re not declared war with. Syria — and by the way also, also and I find this, Sam Stein, absolutely stunning — No, we are killing Americans. Not terrorists, suspected terrorists, but we are killing Americans with drones.
“We killed two Americans with drones. I bring this up only to say that 85 percent of Americans are probably glad we killed those two Americans. But — no due process, no declared war — and here’s the kicker, no rationalization from the White House. They won’t even come out and describe the legalities of that.”
Scarborough also laid out a scenario where the same late-Friday announcement had come from the George W. Bush White House.
“I will just say a few words and then do a dot, dot, dot, dot,” he continued. “Had George Bush done this, dot, dot, dot, dot — could you imagine The New York Times editorials? Could you imagine the Sunday spreads? ‘We killed two Americans, we’re invading countries all over. I mean this has run amok.’ And you know what Code Pink’s doing right now? They’re in Ft. Lauderdale. Where is the anti-[war] left movement? No, they’re playing shuffleboard … the hypocrisy is stunning.”
Ultimately, Scarborough said, the Obama administration is just continuing policies from Bush and former Vice President Dick Cheney — only with none of the backlash.
“I think actually it’s an acceleration of Bush and Cheney,” Scarborough said. “When you look at the drone attacks into more countries where we haven’t declared war and, Jeffrey Sachs, I want us to think about the legality first of all, of dropping drones into whatever country you want to drop them into and vaporizing two Americans sitting in a car with a – again, two very bad Americans, mind you. But you can’t have it both ways. You can’t run as a crusader against Bush/Cheney’s war on terror and then amp it up the way they have.”
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2011/10/17/scarborough-asks-where-is-the-left-wing-anti-war-outrage-of-obamas-uganda-mission/#ixzz1b8ydy2bZ
Anita: “Yeah? I’m tired of people thinking the world revolves around them. The next guy can do the job full time. Want time off for the hajj? Go work for a muslim.”
Do you believe employers should be forced to give leaves of absence to Christian employees for religious purposes?
PS – Sorry, had to post down here as I still cannot reply to existing threads.
NO. Further, employers will now think twice before hiring muslims. Unintended consequences.
Buck,
I’ve looked at this as much as I can, but it does not seem to be wordpress. Wonder if you should check you system, anti-virus, etc?
Meanwhile, off the darkened waters of the Texas coast, it is rumored that the same engineers that have replicated and created The Colonel’s Raptor force have been secretly resurrecting the following:
(1) Bartholomew “ Black Bart “ Roberts and his ship The Royal Merchant (Frigate Class).
(2) Edward “ Blackbeard” Teach and his ship Queen Ann Revenge (Frigate Class).
(3) William “Captain” Kidd and his ship Adventure Galley (Galleon Class with 40 guns).
(4) John “ Calico Jack “ Rackham and his ship The William (Sloop Class).
(5) Henry “ Long Ben “ Avery and his ship The Fancy (46 gun Privateer Frigate Class).
(6) Henry Morgan and his ship Satisfaction (Frigate Class).
It is further rumored that these hand-picked pirates are under the command of the notorious and infamous Captain “Dread Pirate” Mathius and his laser guided frigate Thor’s Hammer. Further rumors have it that all ships are outfitted with the latest in laser guided night vision depleted uranium cannon manned with an experienced crew and a contingent of Sea Borne Raptor marines (weapons unknown) to join the Colonel’s bid for the return to the Republic of Texas. It is said that the Sabine, Red River, and the Rio Grande have been modified to support the sea going Navy and Dread Pirate Mathius will have the responsibility for the patrolling and plundering east of the Sabine and north of the Red, the Gulf of Mexico and the Southern border while a special contingent of Desert Raptors hold the Western Border. Full Privateer authority has been granted to the Dread Pirate.
This is only rumored, of course. Meanwhile, mysteriously, all grog seems to be disappearing from all areas of Obamaland. Rick Perry has been kicked out and an APB issued for Buck “the Walla”. Charlie, the Stella, is reported on the lam.
Again, do not be afraid….these are merely rumors….
Meanwhile…..”John has a long mustache.” Arrrgggh!!!
I reject your “privateer status.” I do not acknowledge the authority of anyone to confer upon me such a status. I am naught but a humble pirate.
Oh, and my cannons don’t use depleted uranium. They use regular Uranium. Except for my cannon “tracer” rounds which fire Polonium.
Y’AAARGH!
D13 rethinks and concedes that bestowing Privateer status does implicate that it can also be taken away indicating a boss relationship……not a befitting position for a Dread Pirate. So, D13 (bowing ever so humbly with sweeping hat gesture) concedes that the Dread Pirate maintains full control of his fleet.
However, D13 would like to suggest depleted uranium as it requires no shielding while stored…and is not traceable by satellite intrusion.
D13 also suggests that since Polonium is a decayed form of uranium and is highly toxic if ingested, it is not his first choice. While it is very efficient in eliminating static discharge the smoke residue can be ingested through the skin or nasal passages. Thereby, reducing said gunner and loader to blithering idiot status. Since we have too many blithering idiots already on this planet,it is recommended that tracer status not be used…..remember tracers work both ways.
remember tracers work both ways. Amen.
Fortunately, when the target of the tracer starts glowing in the dark, they become far easier to hit.
As for the rest, it’s worth noting that my gunners are all velociraptors (kept under control with bribes of In ‘n’ Out burgers). I’m pretty sure they have good resistance to radiation – and if they don’t.. well, who cares?
D13,
Ah, it is good to see you did not notice the Black Flag Nuclear Submarine, sitting quietly in stealth mode on the bottom of the Ocean, loaded with Intercontinental Ballistic Cannon Balls, and supercavitating grape shot.
But I did sir….(nothing escapes my sonar activated bottom stealth dwelling rapto-sharks) however, I was not publicly acknowledging your presence because you have not yet accepted your position as resident anarchist supreme.
D13,
If given, I would immediately resign. 🙂
Well said…….you saw it……you might be fun to play poker with after all.
They’re only offering to to you because I resigned immediately after they gave it to me.
NOt true sir….you were not offered Commission status..only free reign as a privateer…however, said offer has been revised to no offer but an understanding of the free floating fleet. (D13 hiding grog key).
But I do like your supercavitating grape shot….nice touch…..inquiring minds want to know if the shot is highly polished stainless steel 60 ball bearings or the ever present rust covered 15 mm black iron…..
My guess is stainless…..as supercavitating would not work as well with 15mm….
D13,
The specifications are highly classified….. as you know 🙂
LOI, who knows – for now, I will continue to start new threads much to the consternation of everyone else here…
Anita, it sounds like your problem is with the federal law itself, requiring employers to provide reasonable leaves of absence to employees for religious grounds. I may disagree but that is a sound position. Then you go a step further and say employers should not hire Muslims because of ‘unintended consequences’ – this is where you completely lose me. The Muslim employee is making the same use of a federal law as Christians are. Where was your outcry when the gov’t stepped in to sue on behalf of the Christian employees who were denied such leaves of absence by their employers?
My declared religion of Pastafarianism (Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster) states that I am required to spend Fridays in observance. Every Friday is a sloth-filled holy day – no work is permitted. Typically, the day is celebrated with the eating of a pasta dish and the consumption of grog, while dressed in traditional pirate paraphernalia.
rAmen.
I look forward to my eternal reward: drinking from the cool runoff of the beer volcano in heaven.
———
I wonder if the law will make my company give me every Friday off in observance.
Buck
She did not say that employers “should not” hire Muslims but that because of this action they probably wouldn’t. Thus an “unintended consequence” of the govt action is an “increase in discrimination”.
And exactly when did the Justice Dept sue anyone for not letting a Christian take a religious holiday?
Years ago there was an attempt to sue Major League baseball by 7th day adventists (I think) because a few players of this religion were forced to work on Sunday or lose pay. The court ruled with the employer.
That’s why we need fewer laws. Personally, I have never heard of a problem like this with Christians, and I’m not about to look for a problem. I would still side with an employer vs a Christian. Maybe the religion itself should be flexible (which it is in this case anyway). For instance, as a Catholic I’m supposed to attend mass on Sunday. The Catholics have gotten up to speed by allowing parishoners to attend Saturday evening services. No govt necessary. I thought you were a separation of church and state guy anyway.
I am. I’m just giving you a hard time.
I don’t think you should get x-mas off (by law, anyway, if the company wants to, that’s fine). I don’t think you should get a hajj paid vacation. I don’t think you should get the Sabbath. I don’t think you should get Easter. I don’t think you should get a Yom Kippur. I don’t think you should get Ramadan. I don’t think you should get special consideration if you’re cranky because you’re fasting for Yom Kippur or Ramadan. I don’t think the cafeteria should be required to cater to your inability to eat red meat on certain days. I think government should STAY OUT OF IT.
But if they’re not going to stay out of it, they should treat all religions equally.
Mathius
There are no Govt IMPOSED holidays.
The Govt declares a holiday, and the private sector can decide whether to work or not. But where did these holidays come from. Partly cultural norms and partly from special interests.
As for me, there should be only ONE Federal Holiday. And that should be about 5 days long.
But “you”(not necessarily you) do believe that the religious should be forced by law to do many things that goes against their religious beliefs. And the religious believe they should get to do or not do things based on freedom of religion that interferes with the rights of the business owner.
Let’s face it-we have many freedoms and the enforcement of one can endanger another one. It is a tricky business trying to balance those rights under law.
My thoughts on this are not completely clear-but part of the problems arise from the fear that we are going to be forced to comply to a cultural change-so it’s a battle for our culture as much as a battle for our religious freedom. Like I said my thoughts are still muddled 🙂
V.H.
“Let’s face it-we have many freedoms and the enforcement of one can endanger another one. It is a tricky business trying to balance those rights under law.”
This statement is TRUE under our CURRENT system.
This is EVIDENCE of the CONTRADICTIONS within the philosophy that supports our current system.
“RIGHTS” should NEVER be on conflict under the law, as they are NEVER in conflict without the law.
This is EVIDENCE of the CONTRADICTIONS within the philosophy that supports our current system. True
“RIGHTS” should NEVER be on conflict under the law, as they are NEVER in conflict without the law. In your humble opinion. Throw in the competing concept of duty to your fellow man and watch the conflicts blossom all over the place.
Of course, you reject that concept entirely, so you wouldn’t see this. Those of us who disagree are, thus, simply wrong in your opinion.
Mathius,
Why throw something in that does not exist?
Why don’t you also throw in the competing concept of fairies and fire breathing dragons and equally watch the conflict…..
There is no such thing as an implied “duty” to your fellow man.
It is a tricky business trying to balance those rights under law. TRUE!
the religious should be forced by law to do many things that goes against their religious beliefs. Such as? Just curious here..
Like I said my thoughts are still muddled That’s how you know you’re not a fanatic. Flag, for example, has 100% certainty that he is right and you and I are wrong. His thoughts on this and every subject are crystal clear. His mind can never be changed. That kind of thinking terrifies me. The fact that you see shades of gray and are just trying to balance things out is, whether we ultimately agree or not, the best way to have a debate.
Mathius
…on some things – there is no “compromise” between a truth and a lie.
I wasn’t always this way. I was muddled once a long time ago. It takes hard work to unmuddle one’s self.
Not true.
Give me fact, reason and logic and the truth.
What is the shade of gray between right and wrong?
from John Lott
Assuming everything works out OK, it will only cost $87,500 to preserve each state and local job for one year
$35 billion for 400,000 jobs?
Republicans and two Democrats filibustered President Barack Obama’s $445 billion jobs package last week, forcing Democratic leaders to break the legislation into pieces. Reid indicated he’d like to hold a vote on a different piece of the jobs package each week.
The $35 billion bill would create or save 300,000 teaching jobs and 100,000 first responder jobs, Reid said. It would be paid for with a 0.5 percent surtax on those earning more than $1 million a year, similar to Reid’s proposal to pay for the entire Obama jobs plan.
Mathius:
Only if:
1) it is reasonable – in terms of the burden imposed on the employer and
2) if you genuinely believe this – that is, if it is a sincere belief on religious grounds
I fear you will fail on #2. After all, I am your employer’s star witness on this point.
The official CotFSM website says, if you want to join, “Great. Consider yourself a member. You’ll notice there’s no hoops to jump through.”
Also, have you tried restarting your computer or zooming in or out on the browser? Alternatively, try using Firefox – it’s better than Explorer anyway.
OK, once again, hate to even go here…..
But, I am having the same problem as Buck – can’t reply under a post as there is no “Post Comment” button – have to start a new thread.
Also, I am still in italics and it is annoying!
On the religion and employer issue.
There have been cases (through the EEOC — the reason the DOJ is involved is due to some partnership between the EEOC and DOJ to assist in the enforcement of such civil rights laws) involving Christians requesting time off for religious reasons. The Christian employees have won in some cases, and have lost in others. The reason for the MLB ruling for the employer is because of the burden the request imposed upon the employer and other employees; it failed the reasonable accomodation test.
JAC, I fear you are right and I misconstrued the intent behind Anita’s comment. But let’s remember, employers cannot refuse to hire someone due to their religious beliefs.
I hate being misconstrued 🙂 You know as well as I do Buck that it would never be known if the employer refused to hire because of religion.
Buck
Any law that requires a subjective determination by a third party as to the “burden” placed on another party is an UNJUST LAW.
Yet the DOJ found that a school losing its primary lab teacher during the key testing period as NOT and UNREASONABLE BURDEN???????????
As I said last night. HELL NO!!
JAC,
Did the school even attempt to make reasonable accomdation? Could they have been able to obtain a substitute teacher? I don’t know and neither do you. This is the problem with taking the headline of a case, a very brief concise description of the issue and the outcome – based on this alone, it cannot be said precisely what the teacher’s argument was nor what the school’s argument was in terms of being able to make reasonable accomodation.
Buck
I assumed we were both operating from the information presented. Per that article, the argument from the school was the “importance” of this particular teacher at this particular time. The request did not leave them enough time to replace the skill set in time for the testing period.
So lets assume this is the argument by the school. My point is that by what basis does DOJ or anyone have to declare this a false argument. You know as well as I, that rulings on this statute are very subjective.
Note that under your link the author pointed out that this suit was the result of a “pilot project” designed to increase cooperation between Justice and EEOC. So could it be that DOJ selected this case partly on their desire to test their pilot?
Don’t laugh to hard. I have personally seen this type of behavior in the Fed Govt. so I do not dismiss the possibility out of hand.
Also ignored in this is the existence of the employment contract and the “holidays” negotiated with the union. This again goes to the “subjective” nature of prosecutions under this law.
This whole notion of “religious accommodation”, or any “accommodation”, in the work place is pure B.S..
I offer you a job and tell you that you must work 260 days a year as shown on the attached calendar. You agree to take the job. Then you later ask for time off for some “religious” reason and sue me when I say no.
Maybe the Muslims should move their holiday to the NON-School year so their members can better infiltrate our education system without being so “noticeable”.
Muslim holidays are on the lunar calendar (like the Jewish holidays). As such, they move around. If it’s during the school year this year, it might not be next year. This woman wanted to take the hajj, which only has to be done once in a life-time (and only if it doesn’t present toooo much of a hardship (it’s unclear, exactly, what the guidelines for this are)). No reason she couldn’t have waited. Hell, she could have waited until retirement. There is no reason of which I am aware that would mean she has to do it immediately.
Now, I can’t comment on the legal end of it, but from a religious standpoint, I can say she’s full of it. There was no compulsion to go this year, so the school wasn’t trampling on her religious duties in any way.
Just my humble opinion.
Oh the irony! OWS: “we want free stuff” “take from the wealthy” “redistribute”! Just not our stuff!
Celebrated redistributionists discover healthy respect for private property
http://hotair.com/archives/2011/10/18/celebrated-redistributionists-discover-healthy-respect-for-private-property/
Hi SUFA – when you have time please go check this link out:
http://www.marriott.com/hotels/travel/myrgd-myrtle-beach-marriott-resort-and-spa-at-grande-dunes/
“Myrtle Beach Marriott Resort and Spa at Grande Dunes”
Look nice?
I think it does.
So does the Maryland National Guard – yes – those folks who are funded from your money (both State and Federal) are having a week long training conference here (mostly the civvies) – this week. I can confirm it is one of the nicer places you could stay in Myrtle Beach.
Times aren’t tough I guess.
#wtf
Bet you a dollar to a choc donut…there are no M day soldiers there…..full time guard which are Federally paid.
Huh, what?
Jesus redistributed wealth from the rich to the poor/needy.
Jesus was brown skinned.
Jesus supported socialized medicine.
Jesus was Arab.
Jesus rebelled against the establishment Jewish-theocracy / Roman rule.
Jesus was a pacifist.
Jesus believed in a duty to your fellow man that trumped individual rights.
Jesus was poor/lower-class.
Jesus was an intellectual.
He wasn’t Christian – he was a Jew
And the “liberal court that found him guilty” (I generally disagree with capitalizing the H in reference to Jesus, as he is not God) was liberal in what way, exactly?
Oy Gevalt!
Look, Cain is better than some, worse than others, but this is just annoying. Not only is it revisionist history, completely biased and deliberate, but I hate it how the Republicans seem to have hijacked the “God is on our side” concept. If Jesus were alive today, he would vote radically far left – Kucinich would be too far right. And there is no way he would ever win the Republican nomination.
Then again, Saint Regan wasn’t anything like he’s made out to be either..
Also, this is just a thought – if I was Jesus, come back to Earth, I wouldn’t want to see all the crucifixes everywhere. Who wants to be constantly and graphically reminded of the way you were ruthlessly tortured to death?
HArumph……how little you know……Jesus was a white anglo saxon protestant from a Louisiana Parish….
The liberal court found Him guilty of false offenses and sentenced Him to death
Adding, what “false” offenses? The crime was blasphemy. He was clearly guilty.
Don’t blame the court. Blame the law, not the court.
Mathius
You need more Grog. You are getting more irrational by the moment.
Jesus redistributed wealth from the rich to the poor/needy. WRONG. He asked others to give according to their own heart. HE did not redistribute anything, as he was NOT Govt.
Jesus was brown skinned. PROBABLY.
Jesus supported socialized medicine. WRONG. He healed others and asked those of means to care for those without. He did not support “force”.
Jesus was Arab. WRONG! HE WAS A JEW, SEE YOUR LAST POINT.
Jesus rebelled against the establishment Jewish-theocracy / Roman rule. YES, HE WAS AN ANTI GOVT KIND OF GUY.
Jesus was a pacifist. YES. WHICH CONTRADICTS YOUR FIRST AND THIRD POINTS.
Jesus believed in a duty to your fellow man that trumped individual rights. WRONG! He supported and preached about “voluntary” actions, which is a basic human right.
Jesus was poor/lower-class. WRONG. He was born of a middle class family of the time and held a middle class job…..carpenter.
Jesus was an intellectual. NOT SURE BUT HAVE SEEN LITTLE PROOF.
He wasn’t Christian – he was a Jew. TRUE.
And of course, none of your points undermine Cain’s statement. The only real issue here should be his use of the term “liberal” and “conservative”. But then what do you expect in a world where the left has obfuscated the meaning of words.
Jesus was Arab. WRONG! HE WAS A JEW, SEE YOUR LAST POINT. Arab is an ethnicity. Judaism is a religion. He was both.
Jesus’ threat wasn’t that he would inflict violence on you, or force you. It was that you would not go to heaven and have eternal life at the right hand of God. Religious scholars have asserted that the stick (as opposed to the carrot) is an eternity spent in a lake of fire. This can certainly be construed as a threat of violence to coerce “good” behavior. As to whether Jesus made this threat personally, I cannot say. As such, if true, his “suggestions of voluntary actions” are actually demands made under very serious threat (worse, even, than being hit by nuns with rulers).
Jesus redistributed wealth from the rich to the poor/needy. WRONG. He asked others to give according to their own heart. HE did not redistribute anything, as he was NOT Govt. Jesus preached that if you are starving, you can steal from your neighbor’s fields. He further preached that the neighbor has no right to recourse and that this is right and proper. This, sir, is wealth redistribution, pure and simple.
And of course, none of your points undermine Cain’s statement. The only real issue here should be his use of the term “liberal” and “conservative”. But then what do you expect in a world where the left has obfuscated the meaning of words. My point is that he doesn’t meet the current mold of a “conservative” and is, in fact, far closer to the current mold of “liberal.”
Plus, he drank wine, not beer – this is clearly an elitist yuppy trait.
Where did he say this?
If you go into your neighbor’s vineyard, you may eat as many grapes as you like until you’re full. But never put any in your basket.
Deuteronomy 23:24
At that time Jesus went through the grainfields on the Sabbath, and His disciples became hungry and began to pick the heads of grain and eat. (this is not followed by a rebuke)
Matthew 12:1 (also told somewhere in Luke, I think)
In other words, you can steal from your neighbor what you need, but you cannot take more than that.
Mathius,
This is Jewish, not Christian (ie: Old Testament stuff)
No, that is not at all what he said.
He was challenged by the Pharisee on Jewish Law, to which he pointed to Jewish Law.
He did not condone the act – he was mute about it.
Qui tacet consentire videtur.
Mathius,
Perhaps – however, I do not use Jesus as a “proof”, regardless.
But good job – re: Jesus and grain…..
I don’t use Jesus as proof either (I believe he was a historical figure, but I personally do not believe he was a prophet/son of god/divinity/etc). But I just take objection when people like Cain completely misinterpret religion (deliberately in many cases) and claim the mantle of being the party that represents the will of God. I resent it when anyone claims the mantle of representing the will of God, but if they’re going to do it using Jesus, they should at least get their facts right.
Amen!
😉
Actually in Matthew 12:1 after Jesus and His disciples eat from the grain field the Pharisees do rebuke their behavior – accusing them of breaking the sabbath.
Mat 12:2 But when the Pharisees saw, they said to Him, Behold, your disciples do that which it is not lawful to do on the sabbath day.
It leaves mute the issue of eating the grain from the field of another beyond the breaking of the sabbath.
accusing them of breaking the sabbath. But not of theft (which is, after all the whole point). I’ll admit, I’m slightly hazy on this particular story.
It seems to me though, that if I break into your house and steal your TV and you accuse me of getting mud on your carpets, implicit in that accusation is that the other action is not recognized as a crime.
That’s how I read it, anyway.
However – there is an implied stance on the legality of taking from the field of another when hungry. Having said this though you would need a clearer passage supporting this implied stance to argue the point.
Plainly,
I am willing to admit that this point may be somewhat murkier than I first asserted. Generally speaking, Jesus’ silence, coupled with the old testament assertion, coupled with the accusation of breaking the sabbath but not theft, and the Arab tradition of permitting the hungry to eat from fields they do not own (presumably rooted in this story), seems to combine in my head to a fairly safe conclusion.
That said, I suppose there is room for doubt, and I am willing to concede this much.
The fact that “permitting theft” is a big claim does require substantial proof. I think this clears the hurdle (just barely), but I recognize that rational minds can disagree.
Mathius,
Let me scare you, I can agree with your thinking as well. I’m not saying you’re wrong, just that stronger and clearer evidence would need to be shown to solidify your thinking.
I read many discussions on the intentions and teachings of Jesus and what it makes me most wish for is the He was here to ask directly and clear up the debates. 🙂
Strong stances on Jesus and the bible are based on far, far less.
But I agree.. it’d be nice to have him around to clear some things up.
I would disagree with you. I believe Jesus would not vote at all, confining himself to religious matters – as He did during His life – even though some of what He taught has strong social implications.
“Do you know what a “code red” is?…. Pity.”
The silent re-institution of code red, normally restricted to Marines, is back in force in all services…thanks to the repeal of DADT. The military was well on its way to solving the issue and the forced implementation has created huge problems. The soldiers are handling it their own way now.
Sigh………it is now out of the hands of officers.
d13
I was wondering if that would happen. The DOD made it sound like the military was ready. But that simply didn’t seem to match up with reality. I suspected political interference in the process.
By the way, this Administration is forcing new “racial targets” on those agencies it doesn’t feel have reached “parity”. I can’t wait for this bunch to be run out of town.
Since you asked, my family is doing fine. Oldest is getting married next spring, second is now a Boise State Bronco, Lil JAC is adapting to his new school, and Spousal Unit Leader is very happy in her new job. Four out of Five is a pretty good average. 🙂 🙂 If you know what I mean.
I will take that average.
JAC….as to the “code Red” …..sigh.
It will stay underground for a much longer period of time now and, as officers, we will not know of anything until after code reds are performed. We had it solved and the DOD said that the military was ready……it was not. Now, it has been set back 20 years..
d13
Kind of like what happened with abortion.
My memory of the 70’s is somewhat hazy – care to elaborate?
Mathius
There have been scholarly works done on the effect of Roe v Wade showing that the country was working towards a “socially acceptable solution” to the Life/Choice issue. This centered on a state by state solution. Some allowed and some outlawed. But abortions were available, just not convenient in all locations. But due to American’s traditional value of State Rights, the solution was “acceptable” and growing more so. There was far less open anger in the debate at that time.
This Socially derived solution was turned upside down by the Supreme Court in its entirely “activist”, and legally twisted, ruling. It immediately alienated the pro life side and is the source of the vitriol and anger you still see today on both sides.
The court “broke the social contract”. 🙂
Colonel,
Do you have some link to public information on this occurring or is this “private” knowledge? The recent public information I have read speaks to the opposite – no problems coming out.
http://lubbockonline.com/filed-online/2011-10-16/gay-military-share-stories-first-national-convention-say-coming-out-non#.Tp261rLc-I4
No sir…nothing public.
Looks like Michelle is channeling Black Flag!
http://michellemalkin.com/
This reg, itself, is not new to me, but the fact that it was passed as part of the 2008 Energy Act is.
What? Why should something like this be included in an energy bill? How does that make sense? It annoys me how this happens – these things should be in their own bills.
BAH!
I think Buck and I had this out over ObamaCare, that the new law would add complexity to everyone’s tax returns and require the IRS to hire thousands to deal with the additional workload. And here we have you and I in agreement, energy laws should only deal with energy, health with health. If the tax codes need adjustment, that should be done with a tax bill, so you don’t need ten different accountants, or one for every federal agency!
LOI,
Please refrain from agreeing with me. It causes terrible headaches. Last time, I blacked out and woke up in a seedy motel in Tijuana next to some internal organs formerly belonging to a drug kingpin, and a pile of cocaine that would Scarface would call “excessive.”
I do not wish to repeat the experience.
Sorry Matt, but I do love when a plan comes together! Something to consider, take a permanent marker and everywhere you don’t want a tattoo, write boldly,
DO NOT TATTOO ME HERE, NO MATTER WHAT I SAY!
I may be drunk, but my lawyer won’t be!
Let me know how things go……
I wish I’d thought of that before…..
Well, let’s just say there’s a Sudoku in a very unusual place..
I bet I’m the only one here that gets that reference….1,000 Mathius points to me!
Yes, I award my own Mathius points these days. Don’t like it? Too bad.
Hey! That’s not allowed!
Are we about to start another war? Would someone please call Code Pink!
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/8834040/US-forces-massing-on-Afghanistan-Pakistan-border.html
LOI
That should work really well, now that we broadcast it to the world.
Good lord!!!!!!!!!!!!
I’m still not big on conspiracy theories, but if Obama were a secret Muslim wanting to destroy the US from within, starting a bunch of conflicts where his re-election seems doubtful would play to that theory very well. And when is the last time we attack another nuclear power?
V.H.
More feel good stuff. From the good doctor this time:
Written by Rob Natelson on 16 October 2011
“Criminals!”
“Frenzy!”
Does this sound like the abuse that apologists for Big Government fling at the modern Tea Party?
It should. Tea Party activists have been the victims of some incredible verbal smears—especially considering that (unlike the “Occupy” demonstrators) they have been almost uniformly peaceful and law-abiding. But modern Tea Partiers can point with pride to the fact that the patriots who stood up for freedom before the American Revolution were rewarded with the same kind of mindless abuse.
In some ways, the situation in the British Empire before the American Revolution resembles that in the United States today. On the one side were the American patriots and their British Whig sympathizers, who insisted that under the British constitution colonists were entitled to certain rights and freedoms, and that the corrupt central government in London had extended its power far beyond constitutional limits.
On the other side were British and American Tories, who often were the direct or indirect beneficiaries of cushy privileges from the British government.
Well before the Revolution, when the Patriots were simply seeking redress of grievances, they became victims of an incredible campaign of Tory abuse. This was the sort of abuse hurled by people who know deep down the privileges they enjoy are undeserved, and therefore cloak that knowledge with the bravado of moral superiority.
Among many other names, Tories called colonial American patriots “zealots of anarchy”. . . “Those who . . . hate[] their country” who “multiply with the fecundity of their own rattle-snakes” . . . “blusterers” and “criminals.”
Patriots’ ideas were characterized as “seditious” . . . “falsehood maintained by fraud” . . . “Madness. . . misrule, uproar, violence, and confusion” . . . “airy bursts of malevolence” . . . “insolence” . . . “frenzy.”
Tory Samuel Johnson (who was then receiving regular payments from the Crown) came up with this gem: The views of the colonists, he said, were “antipatriotric prejudices [which] are the abortions of folly impregnated by faction.”
If Americans like John Adams, John Dickinson, George Washington, and Benjamin Franklin could take this kind of calumny simply because they stood up for freedom, then modern Tea Party activists can be proud to join them.
Wow-“abortions of folly impregnated by faction” Not even sure what that means but it sounds really bad. 🙂
Listened to this video earlier-I’m interested in your thoughts. I was moved by the Treason comments. This is the first of 5 but only two are posted so far.
http://tv.nationalreview.com/uncommonknowledge/post/?q=Y2QzMTBlYjllYzJmNTFkYTQ5OWNiZTdhNGViODI1Y2Q=
V.H.
I can’t get it to run this morning. Nothing on Nat. Review is working for me. I will try again later.
V.H.
Finally got the 1st to run.
He raises a point that I guess I had thought of but not put to hard form before. His clarity is cause for thought on this point.
Namely, that the ultimate sovereign (The People) could not act directly but MUST ACT THROUGH GOVT. This places a damper on the passions of the people and requires a more deliberative thought process, as our only means of acting is via. VOTING.
I think many of the founders, NOT ALL, clearly recognized the threat of Govt but they equally feared the concept of NO GOVT. They tried to construct a system of checks and balances. But they lacked the firm philosophical foundation needed to support the bigger concepts. This allowed the rot to seep into the Constitution and Govt laws passed in the two decades following our Independence.
If you recall, the founders felt the ULTIMATE guardian against Tyranny (by govt or the people through govt) is THE PEOPLE themselves. They failed to recognize that a free people would become so complacent and soft minded regarding the freedom and liberty they inherited.
We MUST NEVER FORGET that those brave men AND women who created this great nation were TRAITORS to the Govt Power under which they lived at the time.
I have mentioned here before, that during our early history you see the term Patriot used differently that we do today. They were called Patriots to Liberty, not patriots to the USA. I think this puts a different perspective on how people are called “traitors” or “patriots” in the modern debate. A traitor is now considered, by the left, as someone who does not want to pay more taxes.
See any similarity between that view and the one held by the King of England?
If that is the definition then you can CALL ME TRAITOR.
Buck the Wala, and of course all of SUFA
Obama Jobs Bill Defies Both the Constitution and the Supreme Court
Written by Rob Natelson on 02 October 2011
A section located deep in President Obama’s proposed “American Jobs Act” would suspend part of the U.S. Constitution. The proposed law would violate not only the Constitution’s actual meaning, but even the watered-down version of the Constitution now applied by the U.S. Supreme Court.
You might be surprised to learn that the Obama bill seeks to “create jobs” partly by punishing anyone who seeks to create them. Specifically, the bill would impose a new mandate on employers: prohibiting them from favoring applicants who already have jobs.
Why an employer would, without good cause, favor an employed person over an unemployed person is not clear, and the bill’s findings do not suggest this is really a widespread problem. But the mandate is there nonetheless, and it would add significant compliance costs and litigation risks on anyone hiring people.
Of course, the mandate is flatly unconstitutional under the Constitution’s actual meaning. But it also is deeply suspect under modern Supreme Court jurisprudence. Its purported basis is the Commerce Power, but the connection it recites to interstate commerce is well short of that required by the court in cases like U.S. v. Lopez (1995). The bill would impose mandate-related litigation on states as the price of receiving federal aid, but in many cases this would violate rules the Court enunciated in South Dakota v. Dole (1987).
But the bill’s biggest problem is its bald claim to suspend the Eleventh Amendment. That Amendment generally prohibits suits by individuals against states in federal court. Section 376(a) provides, however:
Abrogation of state immunity—A State shall not be immune under the 11th Amendment to the Constitution or otherwise, to a suit brought . . . under this Act.
What? Is abrogation of the First Amendment next?
In my book, The Original Constitution: What It Actually Said and Meant, I tell the story of the Eleventh Amendment. During the debates over the Constitution’s ratification, opponents pointed out that the instrument would give federal courts jurisdiction over “Cases . . . between a State and Citizens of another State.” Through a series of expensive lawsuits, opponents argued, a state and its taxpayers might be bankrupted. In response, proponents of the Constitution such as John Marshall (the future chief justice) pointed out that a suit by an individual against an unwilling state was not properly a “case” or “controversy” as the law used the term, and the Constitution gave the federal courts jurisdiction only over “cases” and “controversies.” On such representations, the Constitution was ratified.
Nevertheless, just a few years after ratification the Supreme Court tore up the bargain by authorizing such suits. (Justice James Iredell, a leading ratifier, dissented.) To restore the ratifiers’ understanding, Congress quickly proposed—and the states rapidly ratified—the Eleventh Amendment. Note that the Amendment was designed to reinforce rather than change the original meaning of the Constitution:
The Judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States by Citizens of another State, or by Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign State.
Although the amendment does not specifically address suits against a state by its own citizens, the Supreme Court has properly recognized that a ban on such suits was also part of the constitutional bargain.
During the 20th century, the Court did punch a few holes in the Eleventh Amendment. Perhaps the most important is that Congress may authorize individual suits against states under the power the Fourteenth Amendment gives Congress to protect individuals from state oppression. I’m all for protecting people from state oppression, but the Court has never explained how it can be “appropriate legislation” for Congress to violate another specific constitutional guarantee. Could, for example, Congress override the First Amendment in the process of enforcing the Fourteenth?
The Obama bill never mentions the Fourteenth Amendment. But presumably its supporters will justify suspending the Eleventh Amendment as part of enforcing the Fourteenth. If so, that argument flies in the face of some very recent Supreme Court rulings.
In University of Alabama v. Garrett (2001) and Nevada Dep’t of Human Resources v. Hibbs (2003), the Court made it clear that Congress may override the Eleventh Amendment only when dealing with certain kinds of discrimination (race, gender, and a few others), of which unemployed status is not one. Moreover, Congress must show a pattern of state discrimination of that kind. The Obama bill meets neither of these criteria.
In other words, this part of the “American Jobs Act” is a straightforward, “in-your-face” defiance of the Constitution and of the Supreme Court. One wonders what goes through the minds of those who promote it.
My knowledge of the 11th Amendment is a bit fuzzy, especially inasmuch as it intertwines with the 14th Amendment. I know its not as simple nor as straightforward as Natelson suggests, but he may be right on the abrogation issue. I know just enough on this area of constitutional law to be dangerous.
On the issue of the constitutionality of the so-called ‘mandate’ (no discrimination against the unemployed), I do disagree with Natelson’s conclusions that this would be unconstitutional. However, as I’ve said in the past, it would be difficult to prove and is probably not the best means of solving this problem.
But all of this is just academic — Obama’s bill is DOA regardless.
Buck
I find the notion that one section of the Constitution can be found in conflict with another and thus requires the SCOTUS to make the decision as to which governs, ridiculous.
Matt,
… it’d be nice to have him around to clear some things up.
Oh, please, please, please post the date and time of this conversation. I would love to see it go down. Pass the popcorn!
On the eve of the World Series, four Democratic Senators Dick Durbin (IL), Frank Lautenberg (NJ), Tom Harkin (IA) and Richard Blumenthal (CT) have sent a letter to the Major League Baseball Players Association calling on it to ban the use of all tobacco products on the field, in the dugout, and in the clubhouse at MLB ballparks.
And the hits keep on coming………more regulations.
The SAGE is back!
My wife and I are watching this Republican debate and shaking our heads (literally cringing at times). What a dog and pony show; what a collection of clowns. What is sadder is the guy in the White House (currently running around the country campaigning because Lord knows, 4 more years of Fredo will solve all our problems)?
Leave the political party, take the cannoli.
OOOOHHH–Gotta admit-the first 35/40 minutes of that debate were painful to watch-I have discovered one thing-I know why the sitting President usually gets a second term.
V.H. I’m way left of Obama and the Dimocrats, but you’re right. He does not deserve to be rewarded for what he’s done to labor in this country. I keep saying it, the Republicans should just sit back and let him run another four years unapposed. He did more for corprorate America (those the GOP is on their knees for–not what they say, what they do), than any Republic since I’m alive. He deserve to be fired, no unemployment, never mind lifetime pension and healthcare.
The problem is the collection GOP is putting out there may be too scary for independents to risk a vote on (not that their vote means anything, or any of our votes—the entire process is owned by big business … or they’d let Ralph Nader debate — something neither party has the balls to allow).
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_REPUBLICANS_DEBATE?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2011-10-18-16-54-25
All against Cain: Upstart targeted in GOP debate
By KASIE HUNT Associated Press
— Republican presidential contenders attacked upstart Herman Cain’s economic plan as a tax increase waiting to happen Tuesday night, moving swiftly in a fiery campaign debate to blunt the former businessman’s unlikely rise in the race for the party’s nomination.
Old animosities flared, too, as former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and Texas Gov. Rick Perry swapped criticism in unusually personal terms. “You have a problem with allowing someone to finish speaking,” Romney declared as the two men interrupted one another repeatedly in a disagreement over immigration, one of several vigorous clashes they had.
It was Perry who instigated the confrontation over immigration, saying that Romney had no credentials on the issue because he had once hired an illegal worker, the “height of hypocrisy.”
Romney denied the charge, saying he had hired a company to mow his lawn and did not know that it had an illegal immigrant on its payroll.
The two men talked over one another, and at one point, Romney placed his hand on Perry’s shoulder.
“It’s been a tough couple of debates for Rick. And I understand that so you’re going to get testy,” he said.
As Perry continued to speak, Romney stopped him: “You have a problem with allowing someone to finish speaking, and I suggest that if you want to become president of the United States, you’ve got to let both people speak,” he said.
Romney’s Mormon faith also came up, and Perry said he disagreed with a pastor and political supporter who described the religion as a cult. “I can’t apologize any more than that,” the Texan said.
“That’s fine,” responded Romney.
On a more substantive level, Perry said he opposed repealing the portion of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution that says anyone born in the United States is automatically a citizen.
Bachmann, Santorum and Rep. Ron Paul of Texas all sidestepped the question.
Perry said it was “time to have a very serious discussion about defunding the United Nations.”
In a bow to Nevada voters, who will be among the first to choose among the candidates early next year, no one said he wanted to open a proposed nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain in a remote part of the state.
The fifth debate in six weeks ranged over familiar and contentious territory – from immigration and health care to the economy and energy, often in antagonistic terms. The candidates engaged each other more directly and sometimes more heatedly than in previous debates.
But Cain’s unlikely rise from asterisk in the polls to contender was clearly on the minds of his rivals on stage in a hotel along the Las Vegas Strip.
Rep. Michele Bachmann of Minnesota led the verbal assault moments after the debate began, saying his call for a 9 percent federal sales tax would only be the beginning, with the rate rising later.
Former Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania wasn’t nearly as gentle, citing one analysis that found that taxes would go up for 84 percent of the nation’s households if Cain’s proposal went into effect. “We’re talking about major increases in taxes,” he said, adding that a single person and a couple with children with the same income would pay the same tax under Cain’s proposal.
Undeterred, Cain insisted the charges were untrue. He said he was being criticized because lobbyists, accountants and others “want to continue to be able to manipulate the American people with a 10-million- word mess,” the current tax code.
Cain’s proposal is for a 9 percent personal income tax, a 9 percent corporate tax and a 9 percent national sales tax.
The former pizza company CEO is the latest and unlikeliest phenomenon in the race to pick a Republican rival for President Barack Obama. A black man in a party that draws few votes from Africans Americans, he had bumped along with little notice as Romney sought to fend off one fast-rising rival after another.
That all changed in the past few weeks, after Perry burst into the race and then fell back in the polls. However unlikely Cain’s rise, Tuesday night’s debate made clear that none of his rivals are willing to let him go unchallenged.
“Herman, I love you, brother, but let me tell you something, you don’t need to have a big analysis to figure this thing out,” Perry said to Cain. “Go to New Hampshire where they don’t have a sales tax and you’re fixing to give them one,” he said, referring to the state that will hold the first primary early next year.
Cain found himself on the defensive on two others issues during the two-hour debate.
He apologized for earlier remarks about building an electric fence on the Mexico border that could kill people trying to cross illegally.
And he said he wouldn’t be willing to negotiate with terrorists, even though he suggested he might be in an interview earlier in the day.
Not only Republicans, but Obama was also critical of Cain’s economic plan during the day.
In an interview with ABC News, Obama said it would be a “huge burden” on middle-class and working families.
This one statement disqualifies Rick Perry as POTUS, in my way of thinking. That is because it exposes what I think is a “simpleton career politician’s view of the world”.
““Herman, I love you, brother, but let me tell you something, you don’t need to have a big analysis to figure this thing out,” Perry said to Cain. “Go to New Hampshire where they don’t have a sales tax and you’re fixing to give them one,” he said, referring to the state that will hold the first primary early next year.”
This is a play on the “emotion” of New Hampshire and the “stupidity” of the American audience. If you don’t stop to think you will suddenly think…Hell yeah, 9% is bigger than 0%, SOB is going to raise my taxes.
But if you stop to think, something Mr. Perry and Mr. Obama hopes you won’t do, you will realize that you pay a combined 40% of your gross income on federal, state and local taxes. Of this about 30% is Federal.
The Cain proposal eliminates an average 30% tax on “gross” income with a 9% tax on gross income. He adds a 9% tax on “new retail purchase”. How much do you spend each year on “new retail purchases”??
Last data I saw showed somewhere around 30% of gross income went to basic living that could be called new retail (food, clothes, etc), other than housing. So 9% of 30% of gross income is 2.7% on gross income.
So now your FEDERAL tax on gross income is 9% plus 2.7% which equals 11.7%.
Compared to the 30% you pay NOW.
Now lets look at the effect on the total tax.
11.7% Federal plus 10% State/Local equals 21.7% TOTAL TAX.
Compared to the 40% you pay NOW.
Now, I am NOT a fan of the 9-9-9 plan of Mr. Cain. It has one “fatal” flaw. It would authorize a NEW tax and the 2/3 majority to change it would not pass. Thus Congress would have the ability to raise all three taxes in the future. Ms. Bachmann wins on this point.
If the 2/3 threshold can be met in Congress then we would have the votes to go directly to a flat tax or fair tax and pass a Constitutional Amendment to put it in stone.
Assuming you spend every dollar you earn. If you, like most rich people, do not, you are not subject the the sales tax on that money, in which case your rate just goes down.
And you ignore that almost half of all Americans pay no federal income tax – for all of them, you’re actually raising taxes from 0-ish to 9%. You assume most people are paying near the top marginal rate, which is simply incorrect. Your estimate of an “average 30% tax on “gross” income” is implausible.
See this: http://taxpolicycenter.org/numbers/displayatab.cfm?DocID=3221
Mathius
You are guilty of the same thing as most who are arguing about this topic. Not just the 999 plan.
You changed the debate, probably not on purpose but you did change it.
You use Marginal RATES to make the comparison. I used the TOTAL Federal taxes paid. I posted the graphs and data on this a few weeks back.
Why is my comparison more correct? Because, if Cain is telling the truth, his 9% replaces ALL other FEDERAL taxes.
Now lets address the POOR.
The pay somewhere between 8% and 16% of their Gross Income in FICA taxes. So a 9% tax on gross income would be an increase ONLY if their contribution is less than 9% TODAY. Studies have concluded that if FICA taxes were eliminated, employers would return about half of their portion to the employee in higher wages. If this is true then the current POOR person’s tax is 12%. Making 9% a savings of 3%.
Poor people spend most of their money, but the distribution is about the same as the average. THEY DO NOT SPEND 100% on NEW RETAIL. Remember, the sales tax only applies to NEW RETAIL, not previous retail (used).
The break even point for POOR people spending on NEW RETAIL would be 33.3333% of their gross income.
Now there is one unknown in my simple analysis. Does the 9% income tax apply to Welfare or other Govt payments, like SS/Medicare/Medicaid? If not, then the whole argument about the very poor falls apart because their income would still not be taxed.
Now in fairness, I understand Cain has admitted taxes would increase for some. Lets assume those paying ZERO tax would now have to pay some tax. I say HELL YES!!! POOR or RICH, I don’t care. EVERYBODY should be paying taxes for basic Govt services.
I was under the impression that the 9% replaced only federal income taxes, leaving FICA, etc, untouched.
If this is the case (and it’s entirely possible), then shouldn’t this result in a MASSIVE loss in tax revenue? Where does this shortfall get made up, or is the government just supposed to shrink at the same time (I recognize this comes off as glib, but it’s a serious question).
If the poor go from 8 to 9, and the rich go from 35 to 9, FICA etc disappear, then it’s a de facto (massive) tax decrease on everyone. Ignoring the fact that it will NEVER pass, and ignoring the GW philosophy that the economy will rapidly grow to make up the difference, how does this play out?
Mathius
To know the answers we have to know the details, which I don’t have at this time. But I think it save to assume that some HUGE SHRINK in FED GOVT is inherent to the overall plan. There are some gross assumptions that the economy will rapidly expand. I am not so sure that will happen, but am absolutely sure whatever the predictions are, they are wrong.
But the proper analysis would look at “effective” tax rates and revenues compared to the simpler “gross tax”. The effective Fed Income Tax rate, for example, is somewhere around 18% for those making less than 1 million and about 20% for those over.
I also understand Cain wants Cap Gains at 0%. This would be a huge tax revenue decrease, unless the “definition” of Cap Gains is changed. For example, lets assume a 1 year qualifying date, or perhaps the sale of stocks and bonds as a “trade” is no longer qualified as Cap Gains.
As Ms. Bachmann said, the Devil is in the Details.
All of this is just another reason why I think a FLAT TAX would be a far better option. The rates could be significantly lower if ALL deductions were removed.
Mathius
One other thing. It is my understanding that the tax policy inst.’s report ASSUMES that the BUSH tax cuts are EXTENDED.
This VIOLATES the baseline assumptions, that you should use “current” law to form your baseline. The Bush Tax cuts EXPIRE under current law.
Also take a look at the last column of the table you linked. It looks like they are claiming that the FED TAX RATE, with 9-9-9, will be greater than 18% for most income levels. So just how does 9 + 9 (worst case) exceed 18????
Mathius,
No time to really get into it as I’m completely bogged down here today, but you are absolutely correct about Cain’s plan — it makes no sense and winds up raising taxes on the poor and middle class while resulting in a massive tax decrease on the wealthy. For your reading pleasure:
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/10/13/cold-pizza-from-herm-cain/?scp=2&sq=egan&st=Search
http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/10/11/inside-the-cain-tax-plan/
Buck
You are not entirely correct, and neither are your citations. As with all such claims, it all depends on the “assumptions”.
But I did find this little gem in one of your links to be ……….. well supportive of my view.
“Veterans of tax reform attempts in the United States know reform is very difficult and time-consuming even once. If the Fair Tax is a good idea, Mr. Cain ought to just do it, without confusing the issue with his unnecessary and highly complicated 9-9-9 plan. After all, one of the prime selling points of the Fair Tax is its simplicity, and the 9-9-9 plan is far from that.”
Notice again Ron Paul gets the least media coverage……
Foreign policy took a secondary role in the debate, and the new strain of Republican isolationism quickly surfaced.
Paul said U.S. troops should be withdrawn from Korea – where they have been stationed for more than 50 years – and foreign aid to Israel cut.
Paul is crazy.
Brilliant.
But crazy.
That said, I could see myself voting for him over Obama. The Dread Pirate portion of me, though he would refuse to vote, is a fan, too.
Why?
Let’s take an example you can understand.
He knows that government is violence and evil.
Yet he is participating in that system, in fact expending a huge amount of time and energy to try to become the leader of that organization.
How’s that for starters?
Mathius,
When you label one out of a crowd as “crazy”, you are making him an exception.
Yet, he is no different from the crowd he is in – he is a politician.
So, I still do not understand why he is “crazy”, and why you specifically point him out as such?
Because he’s smart enough to know better.
Bachmann is an idiot. She (probably) doesn’t see any conflict between her beliefs and the idea of being President. Paul is smart. He sees this, but wants it anyway.
Bachmann probably believes that, if she were President, she could make a “real change.” Paul knows it’s hopeless. He knows this, but wants it anyway.
—-
And, by the way, since when are you a shades of gray guy? He’s not crazy because he’s like the rest of the politicians? Either he’s crazy or he’s not. There are other people running who are crazier, but that doesn’t make him any less nuts.
Mathius,
You made a statement that he is crazy – as if there is a thing he has done or said to make him so.
So far, you have provided nothing to establish such a claim.
This is typical about many people who think about Ron Paul – they call him nuts, but not one thing can they say about him shows how they figured that statement.
I am confused by your argument-neither Paul or Bachmann define themselves as anarchist.
http://mlkshk.com/r/1P1L
http://radio.woai.com/cc-common/mainheadlines3.html?feed=119078&article=9273355
Col., Know anything about this?
Top O’ th’ moanin’ to ya sir. Hope you and yours are doing well. I am very surprised that this is out on the news. Very surprised. This is something that is not new…..which is why I am surprised. Quite frankly, we have caught several “Muslim Teams/Cells/groups” like this before crossing the border or already in country. I am not aware of this particular incident as yet but am sure that I will be briefed on it. Anything that is not classified, I will certainly post. Thanks for the heads up and I will look into it….as soon as I hit post.
C ya.
‘Willpower’ and the Suckiest Generation
September 26, 2011 – 7:02 am – by Andrew Klavan
I often joke with my wife that I wish my generation — the Baby Boomers — could die without taking me with them. I’d sure as hell like to be around to see them go. They ruined the culture of this country, threw away the untold riches bequeathed to them, betrayed and undermined centuries of wisdom, spread the use of drugs, legitimized divorce and abortion, and even managed to screw up the civil rights movement that might otherwise have been their signal achievement. On the other hand, they did give us pre-faded jeans, so I guess that’s something.
All this misery they (we, I fear I should say) heaped on America and the west while retaining a sense of arrogant self-satisfaction and self-justification that, were it not for our knowledge of sinful human nature, would defy understanding. The television show Mad Men is excellent drama, I admit, but it fairly drips with the Baby Boomers’ overriding notion that America used to be nothing more than a desert of falsehood, bigotry, and oppression before the Sixties cavalry arrived to rescue us from ourselves. Which, not to put too fine a point on it, is crap.
A book called Willpower has been making a splash lately and will, I’m told, appear on the New York Times bestseller list next week. I have not read the book yet, but while in New York last week at the behest of the Manhattan Institute, I attended an MI-sponsored presentation by the book’s authors, psychology researcher Roy F. Baumeister and science writer John Tierney.
Willpower surpasses even intelligence as a predictor of success in life. And Baumeister has performed a number of experiments that convinced him that willpower is something like a muscle: it can be strengthened, conserved, and fatigued. Like a muscle, it also needs to be fueled. Baumeister’s assertion that glucose in the blood is essential to willpower has featured in the headlines about the book.
But in the question period after the presentation, I asked Baumeister how else, aside from eating well, could willpower be strengthened. His response was this: Exercise strengthens willpower just as it strengthens muscles. Even a meaningless exercise of will — training yourself to use your left hand for a task instead of your right, for instance — can make the will stronger over time. He added — I quote from memory: “When I was a boy, I used to be baffled by the idea of profanity. I used to wonder why there should be all these words that everyone knew but nobody used. But now I understand: that strengthens willpower.”
Well, right. In other words, behaving well, behaving responsibly, learning the norms of politeness and refusing to abandon them without good reason tend to make you a more self-controlled, successful, and finally better person.
This is precisely the wisdom my generation threw away. Their promiscuity, adolescent foul-mouthedness, bad manners, and disregard for tradition — all of which they claimed were a new kind of freedom — were in fact the precursors to the very oldest kind of slavery: slavery to one’s own impulses and desires. This slavery, packaged in the Sixties as “identity” or “culture” or “the right to be yourself,” ultimately leads to enslavement by others as it makes you indolent and irresponsible and in need of protection and restraint by the powers that be. A poor black man’s journey from hip hop culture to prison is a perfect example. So is a middle class white man’s journey from moral license and unwarranted praise to his sniveling need for an all-providing — oh, and by the way, all-powerful — state.
A government that wants more power knows well it can acquire that power by stripping the citizenry of every need and opportunity to provide for and take control of themselves — every reason to exercise their will. Welfare, unending unemployment benefits, “free” health care, business bailouts, the “right” to live off your parents’ insurance until you’re 47 or whatever: these, not religion, are the true opiate of the people.
My generation, using the loftiest possible language, destroyed the loftiest possible image of man — his image as God-made creature endowed with the right to be left alone. Instead, they declared him a weak collection of needs with some mysterious right to have those needs paid for by other people’s earnings. They told us government had to provide the citizen’s material needs even if it hampered his ability to live free.
Instead they should have asked: “What does it profit a man to gain the whole world, if he forfeits his own soul?”
http://pajamasmedia.com/andrewklavan/2011/09/26/willpower-and-the-suckiest-generation/?singlepage=true
You think your generation is/was bad? You should take another look at my generation.
Oooooh boy…
As an 85 year old, who just so happened to have been born in 1983, I can tell you that my fellow Gen X’ers are steaming piles of hedonism, narcissism, greed, sloth, and entitlement.
And the music they listen to these day? Forget about it!
Ahhh…Mathius…..my good bloggin’ friend……you are always good for the soul…..
Nope, can’t criticize our music-our music was great!!!
Yep….see this……….watch very carefully, VH……..
&*&(*&(*&*&*(&(*&(*&(*&&%^&^%^$^%$*&^(*&*)(**)(&&*&^&$%
THAT is criticism of your music. 🙂
🙂 Guess I should have put an “I” before that can’t, but seriously you didn’t like the music of the 60’s and 70’s.
I love the music of the 60’s and 70’s, classic rock of the 80’s, some rock of the 90’s and 00’s, techno/house/etc, some older stuff (Sinatra / Carole King / etc). I find Adele very interesting, and am currently listening to Dave Matthews Band. I guess you could call that eclectic.
But things like Justin Bieber make me want to stab myself in the ear with an awl.
Adding, the TV I grew up on (all stuff from the 50’s / 60’s / 70’s) is substantially better than the stuff my peers grew up on (from the 80’s / 90’s) and that is HUGELY better than the stuff my sisters grew up on (from the 00’s). Seriously, a show about a sea sponge with rectangular pants? I’ll take Mr. Ed any day.
Early 60’s yes and…no to the 70’s. But you must understand something. I was not a Woodstock person, and I was not a hippie….nor did I have long hair. I was not a redneck either. I did not wear red hexagon tinted glasses and smoke the “weed”. I did not protest nor burn buildings or my draft card. I went to college on a golf scholarship, drank my portion of beer ( Mathius’ portion as well), made good grades (3.6), and groped young ladies in the back of my 1967 Firebird 400 that ran a 13.5 in the pure stock class, with an 8 track stereo system that played 50’s and early 60’s rock n roll (But absolutely no Beatles) loud enough that three cars on either side of me at the local drive in Arnold’s type could hear it. I wore the latest fashions in leisure suits, bell bottoms, and Nehru jackets and I could dance. So…………….this was pre-Vietnam war of course. I might mention the Rebel Flag license plate on the front of the car that said “fergit hell”.
You always make me smile D. I wasn’t a Woodstocker either-I was too young-my parents wouldn’t have let me go-if I had wanted too-which I didn’t. But I do love a lot of the music that came out in that time period.
I wanted to go to Woodstock, but I wasn’t born yet.
My father was just a few mines away at the time, but didn’t go because he thought it “wouldn’t be a big deal to miss it.” He tells me he was busy with law school, but I suspect it had more to do with his long hair and the glossy appearance of his eyes in photos I have seen.
Adding, the Beatles are one (if not The) greatest band of all time. How you could opt not to listen to them is beyond me. In fact, I penalize you 10 Mathius Points.
Just, fyi, I keep my iPod on shuffle – George Clinton just came on, so now it’s cranked up and people are looking at me funny.
Such is life.
A nice change – I get top agree with the Colonel. 🙂
The Beatles have never been on my playlists (and never will be).
Guess I’m going to be in negative Mathius point land from now on.
-20 Mathius Points for Plainlyspoken.
Been saying this myself for years.I’d like to slap people my age for wanting everything, then that carries on to their kids. Yesterday was my son’s birthday. He wanted any iPod Touch sooo bad because all the kids have them. He was disappointed to not get it. I took him and 4 friends to a skatepark, we bbq’d and I gave him $60 and told him to earn the rest.He was not amused. But last night he made up some flyers for John’s yard service..raking leaves and shoveling snow. Atta Boy!
Today is my little brother’s birthday – he turns 24.
He’s living in a condo paid for by my parents.
He’s driving a car paid for by my parents.
He fills it with gas paid for by my parents.
He’s eating food paid for by my parents.
He “runs his own business” that makes no money.
He does no actual work for this “job.”
I work my butt off.
Maybe I’m doing something wrong?
Or maybe your parents are doing something wrong?
That or tell me how I get adopted by your parents (and don’t say by listening to the Beatles)? 😉
Sure, all you have to do is be unemployable, live in LA, and be willing to sycophant.
Unfortunately, I don’t meet any of these qualifications. 😦
Durn, I don’t qualify…….
I was voluntarily deported back to the USA from California by Border Patrol years ago……..
I spent my life working and earned my retirement……………..
I can’t be a sycophant – it’s against my secular beliefs………….
Mathius,
No, you are not doing a darn thing wrong.
When one lives off the grace of others, you are a slave to them.
When they end their grace, it is the end of you.
My older brother (age 29) has a similar situation. Both drive nice cars (a Lexus and an Audi), both live in expensive condos. Etc etc. My sister is in college, but when she graduates, I’ll lay good odds that she finds herself in a similar situation.
Maybe they are “slaves” to my parents, but it sure would be nice if they paid for my house – I don’t especially enjoy my mortgage payments.
Gives you grit boy, gives you grit. The other three are unfortunately not worth the powder to blow em to hell.
@T Ray,,,,here is the scoop…..so far. The news media is doing it usual PC crap. However, my non classified sources say that (1) They are French Moroccan decent and considered Muslim due to the prayer carpets they carried in their vehicle (2) They have several blueprints and documents from various courthouses around the country depicting the following: (A) Emergency frequencies of the fire and police departments and military bases within each area, (B) Emergency traffic routes and maps, (C) bridge over lays, (D) Radio Stations and addresses and emergency frequencies, (E) blueprints of electrical grids and water systems and classified emergency numbers and frequencies, (F) blueprints of underground subways and sewer systems in those cities where they are applicable, (G) all traffic control sequences (Stop lights etc), (F) all weather emergency system frequencies and broadcasting guidelines, (G) Civil Control operations plans, (H) Airport emergency entrances and numerical codes for gates and airport frequencies and blueprints of underground electrical grids and tunnels….You get the picture. Very intense intelligence gathering.
They got caught here because being on the border, we are used to extra surveillance techniques and have employed same statewide. Besides……..is it not unusual that a recreational vehicle parked in a downtown San Antonio street with the engine running, in front of the courthouse, with a out of state license plate reported stolen at 0100 hours would draw some attention? It goes to show how lax security is in the United States that these idiots/fanatics/foreign nationals were not very cautious because they had gotten away with it for so long. They had information from over 30 cities. It is suspected that they were going to the border to cross into Mexico.and Texas was the last stop.
One must remember that the country and city courthouses have all the classified information and control frequencies and routes and over lays and construction blueprints, etc…..of their entire area because it is well known that the courthouse is command central for most civilian operations.
Congrats to the 22 year old patrolman that became curious.
Damn-wouldn’t want to tell the whole truth-people might become a little more serious about finding out -just who is coming into our country.
Wait.. I thought our government was the only terrorists. Shakin my head……
Col., thanks for the response. It is disturbing information. I would like to see these individuals tried for espionage. We need to come up with a set of laws that covers the non-state sponsered groups/individuals that conduct war type activities.
It’s not who they are that determines charges of espionage – anyone can be charged with the offense.
It is the activity – in the case of espionage they must be gathering information of the national defense. Court houses and law enforcement/criminal justice radio frequencies etc does not apply.
The link to the espionage law:
http://codes.lp.findlaw.com/uscode/18/I/37/793
Actually Plainly, it is a matter of National Security AND National Defense. All local police and fire are responsible for securing highways and byways for the rapid movement of men and materials. In addition, electrical grids are part of National Security as well. Emergency evacuation routes are also National Security when not tied to weather events. Command and Control in the cities are also directly linked to the Airports to facilitate additional requirements of the military and have the responsibility for security and logistics.
Actually Colonel you can call it what you wish it doesn’t change the espionage law application. It is not national defense information under the law.
Unless of course we need to prosecute all those people with scanners who have the frequencies of public agencies (as I have for my area) and those who can spend a bit of time on the net and gather a lot of this information from different open sources. If you like I could demonstrate some of this by providing a link to lists of frequencies for different San Antonio and Bexar County frequencies?
Of course though these terrorists are on the battlefield so…………………….
Durn those dangerous terrorists in San Antonio…….
laying out their tourist cover alibi…………….
with all that dangerous data they collected……
(emphasis added)
The potential damage to the floor from beer stains could have ruined national security…………
http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/local_news/article/FBI-investigating-break-in-at-county-courthouse-2225724.php
Oh the high crimes and misdemeanors……………..
T-Ray…….late development. They also had a complete power grid layout for the four corners area. That power grid controls all of Southern New Mexico….including White Sands and the border.
GRRRRRR!!! Opinions
Reid says government jobs must take priority over private-sector jobs
By Pete Kasperowicz – 10/19/11 10:16 AM ET
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on Wednesday said Congress needs to worry about government jobs more than private-sector jobs, and that this is why Senate Democrats are pushing a bill aimed at shoring up teachers and first-responders.
“It’s very clear that private-sector jobs have been doing just fine; it’s the public-sector jobs where we’ve lost huge numbers, and that’s what this legislation is all about,” Reid said on the Senate floor.
Reid was responding to recent comments from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who accused Democrats of purposefully pursuing higher taxes as part of the teacher/first-responder bill, S. 1723, so that Republicans would oppose it. McConnell said the bill was meant to fail in order to give Democrats an issue to run on in the 2012 election, but Reid said the Republicans are simply trying to defeat President Obama any way they can.
The legislation Reid is defending is part of Obama’s jobs package. Vice President Biden was in Pennsylvania, an important election state, on Tuesday to push for the administration’s plan on increasing the number of teachers.
Reid reiterated his emphasis on creating government jobs by saying Democrats are looking to “put hundreds of thousands of people back to work teaching children, have more police patrolling our streets, firefighters fighting our fires, doing the rescue work that they do so well … that’s our priority.” He said Republicans are calling the bill a “failure” because they are “using a different benchmark for success than we are.”
Private-sector jobs have increased over the last 19 months, while government jobs have lagged. They’ve also seen cuts in several states that are struggling to balanced their books.
Reid also said a majority of people polled support the bill, and that the tax hike needed to fund the $35 billion spending program is minimal.
“My friend, the Republican leader … is complaining about a tax of one-half of 1 percent … on people who make more than $1 million a year to pay for a program that would stop teachers from being laid off and rehire some of the teachers that have been laid off,” Reid said.
Democrats who support the bill have said it would help save 400,000 teacher jobs and thousands of first-responder jobs that have either been cut or could soon be cut. Reid said Wednesday that these layoffs are “rooted in the last administration,” but did not explain further.
Senate Democrats are hoping to pass S. 1723 as early as this week, although votes could be delayed until early November, depending on the progress made on passing a 2012 spending bill.
Reid also dismissed efforts by the Republican House to ease environmental regulations as a way to create jobs.
“The Republican response has been cutting back environmental health safeguards, I guess hoping that a sicker, more polluted country is a better place to create jobs, and it’s not,” Reid said.
http://thehill.com/blogs/floor-action/house/188443-reid-says-public-sector-jobs-must-take-priority-over-private-sector-jobs
My view of the new tact.
The Federal version of the same old story we here from local lefties everytime a budget cut is proposed. OH my; lions, tigers and bears, we are going to lose our teachers, firemen and police, lions, tigers and bears, OH MY!
What irritates me the most -is the complete refusal to even consider doing things that would actually help raise the unemployment rate and increase revenue-but they are more than happy to spend those people’s money to help just a small segment of the society. A segment that they seem to want to continually increase in size.
That would be “decrease” the unemployment rate.
SUFA,
Just to share…
I spent my weekend on the same ridge, approx. 1/4 mile from where someone took THIS PICTURE —> http://www.pbase.com/uloo/image/120115941&exif=N
I would describe Red River Gorge as a pristine “Eden”-ish wilderness that is something of a smaller thickly forested grand canyon in Appalachia.
It’s absolutely beautiful. I recommend it to anyone that enjoys the outdoors.
While there with my friends, we discussed the idea of traveling/camping deeper into/around the park and taking a couple of weeks or so to do it, instead of just a weekend…maybe even the idea of taking maps, a radio and/or GPS device, and going at it with one or two people.
One key concern when contemplating appropriate gear, especially in the more secluded areas, is BEARS.
The park has a black bear population, and probably a cougar or two, and god only knows what else. And the idea of being unprepared and unable to properly defend myself against an animal attack or “Deliverance” moment, by not having a fire arm, is basically a deal breaker for such an adventure. A gun is a must.
So, I went researching gun regs in the park and found that they are allowed by state, as well as federal law.
Here are their rules regarding fire arms(from the Daniel Boone National Forest website’s “Law Enforcement and Investigation Rules and Regulations” page):
~Use of fireworks or other explosives is prohibited within campgrounds and other recreation sites.
~Firing a gun is not allowed: (1) in or within 150 yards of a residence, building, campsite, developed recreation site, or occupied area; (2) across or on a road or body of water; or (3) in any circumstance whereby any person may be injured or property damaged.
I interpret this to mean that so long as you are responsible and don’t shoot it in the wrong areas, or otherwise do something stupid to endanger people, the park service is okay with bringing guns.
This means that I can plan a trip for the spring time without worry of vulnerabilities to certain dangers.
Cool.
BL
If you want to carry a gun then fine. But BEAR SPRAY will be good enough to fend off the four legged critters. Probably most two legged kinds as well.
Let me know if you can’t get it back there. I am headed to Mt and Id next week and could pick up a can or two for you.
“BEAR SPRAY” is an excellent idea as it is a way to avoid unnecessarily killing an animal in a national forest. I think I know where to find it.
One other thing to consider, however, is that the two legged kind may be armed.
Unfortunately, there are crimes that take place in/near the park. It isn’t exactly a common thing, and usually amounts to vehicles being broken into while parked for a few days. I know a few people who’ve spent a considerable amount of time there, and I’ve heard stories of a bear attack and/or some strange, possibly dangerous, encounters with humans.
I know that the odds are relatively low that I would ever have an issue. But it is nice to be prepared in such case.
There are a lot of places, where because of cliffs, there is only one way in and one way out(unless you count diving off of cliffs onto rocks and tree tops), …which is a potential for a scared cornered animal or yourself being cornered by an animal or looter/armed robber/whacko.
What I don’t want is to be on a ridge, a day’s hike through rough terrain to anything that resembles civilization, my radio broken over a cliff, and half my body mangled by a scared momma bear with cubs ….or robbed of precious gear/supplies/food/water, etc…
Not good.
Better to have one and not need it, than to need one and not have it.
Good Grief-now some idiot is outlawing Cash.
Second Hand Dealer Law
Posted: Oct 18, 2011 4:58 AM CDT
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Second Hand Dealer Law
Cold hard cash. It’s good everywhere you go, right? You can use it to pay for anything.
But that’s not the case here in Louisiana now. It’s a law that was passed during this year’s busy legislative session.
House bill 195 basically says those who buy and sell second hand goods cannot use cash to make those transactions, and it flew so far under the radar most businesses don’t even know about it.
“We’re gonna lose a lot of business,” says Danny Guidry, who owns the Pioneer Trading Post in Lafayette. He deals in buying and selling unique second hand items.
“We don’t want this cash transaction to be taken away from us. It’s an everyday transaction,” Guidry explains.
Guidry says, “I think everyone in this business once they find out about it. They’re will definitely be a lot of uproar.”
The law states those who buy or sell second hand goods are prohibited from using cash. State representative Rickey Hardy co-authored the bill.
Hardy says, “they give a check or a cashiers money order, or electronic one of those three mechanisms is used.”
Hardy says the bill is targeted at criminals who steal anything from copper to televisions, and sell them for a quick buck. Having a paper trail will make it easier for law enforcement.
“It’s a mechanism to be used so the police department has something to go on and have a lead,” explains Hardy.
Guidry feels his store shouldn’t have to change it’s ways of doing business, because he may possibly buy or sell stolen goods. Something he says has happened once in his eight years.
“We are being targeted for something we shouldn’t be.”
Besides non-profit resellers like Goodwill, and garage sales, the language of the bill encompasses stores like the Pioneer Trading Post and flea markets.
Lawyer Thad Ackel Jr. feels the passage of this bill begins a slippery slope for economic freedom in the state.
“The government is placing a significant restriction on individuals transacting in their own private property,” says Ackel.
Pawn shops have been forced to keep records of their clients for years. However under this bill they are still allowed to deal in cash.
Doug MacDiarmid
http://www.klfy.com/story/15717759/second-hand-dealer-law
V.H.
While this is pure BS let me offer a simple solution to anyone in LA who is watching.
Exchange goods for an IOU of some type. A debt instrument. Then exchange CASH for the IOU. Use the IOU as a receipt.
Treasury Notes are legal tender for ALL DEBTS FEDERAL OR PRIVATE, per FED GOVT LAW.
This means LA law loses the fight.
They are always “hidden” in academia, aren’t they?
Behind OWS? Meet the Marxist spawn of Frances Fox Piven who wants a ‘militant’ revolution
http://www.therightscoop.com/behind-ows-meet-the-marxist-spawn-of-frances-fox-piven-who-wants-a-%e2%80%98militant%e2%80%99-revolution/
Anita,
A special that you’ll want to tune into tonight to see what you are up against Saturday!!
ESPN’s ‘Depth Chart’ offers inside look at Russell Wilson, Wisconsin
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/campusrivalry/post/2011/10/russell-wilson-wisconsin-espn-depth-chart/1
Drag! I have some family coming for dinner. I’ll try to catch it.
Charlie Stella
Here ya go. I hope you live happy ever after in your new land. Just curious though. Which planet you going to try this “new” idea?
http://www.thevenusproject.com/en/the-venus-project/resource-based-economy
I think Herman Cain’s 9-9-9 Plan is absolutely brilliant.
Anyone want to venture WHY???
Bonus points for what his next move “should” be.
JAC,
I am against the 9-9-9 plan. Would love to hear your thoughts on it. Some words from FOX.
“It was such a dart board,” economist Stephen Moore said Wednesday of the proposal.
Cain weathered a storm of complaints over his tax plan at the Republican debate in Las Vegas. Virtually every candidate took turns accusing the businessman of pushing a scheme that would introduce new streams of revenue and hit the middle class hardest.
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The plan calls for throwing out the old tax code and replacing it with an across-the-board 9 percent income tax, 9 percent corporate tax and 9 percent national sales tax.
Though Cain parried point-for-point with his opponents and stood by the plan, Moore said the debate further confirms his belief that the candidate should strip the sales tax out of his plan, and replace it with a 9 percent payroll tax.
The payroll tax isn’t necessarily popular — but it’s also not new.
“They wouldn’t be able to attack it,” Moore told FoxNews.com. “If he had done that a week ago, then they wouldn’t be able to attack the plan last night.”
Moore said he just wrote a “note” to fellow economist Art Laffer, who helped design the plan and continues to defend it, explaining his position. Moore is also an editorial writer for The Wall Street Journal and clarified that he is not actively advising the Cain campaign.
Moore said he likes the sales tax idea and thinks it would be “rocket fuel for the economy,” but explained that it’s just too much of a punching bag. Ideally, he said, he would lift the cap on income subject to the Social Security component of it, so “LeBron James would pay 9 percent tax” on his full salary.
Moore first raised the idea of changing the Cain plan during an interview over the weekend on economist Larry Kudlow’s radio show. He said he was “surprised” at how “hostile” people were to the sales tax component.
“I’ve come to the conclusion that the American people and the voters do not want a national sales tax,” he said.
Currently, employees pay a combined 7.65 percent payroll tax to cover Medicare and Social Security while the employer matches it with another 7.65 percent. Moore said his proposed 9 percent payroll tax would be split evenly between employers and employees.
Cain’s easy-to-understand tax plan helped him gain attention on the campaign trail and at recent debate, and helped fuel his rise to frontrunner status alongside former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. But now that Cain is at the front of the field, his tax plan is coming under intense scrutiny.
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/10/19/adviser-backs-away-from-cains-sales-tax-plan-as-candidate-endures-barrage/?test=latestnews#ixzz1bKN4NAdK
LOI
The plan was brilliant because, as the author noted:
“Cain’s easy-to-understand tax plan helped him gain attention on the campaign trail and at recent debate, and helped fuel his rise to frontrunner status alongside former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. But now that Cain is at the front of the field, his tax plan is coming under intense scrutiny. ”
This was a classic campaign launched by someone who understands marketing.
Keep it Simple. Repeat it, repeat it, repeat it……………………………….. repeat it, until everyone is talking about it.
But now that he has our attention he needs to pivot to “concepts” instead of details. While the media wants details, because it makes their feeding frenzy easier, the POTUS should be more about concepts. That is because NO President is going to IMPLEMENT HIS/HER plan.
There is that little thing called CONGRESS that must develop and approve the plan.
So in my opinion, Cain should now start talking about the “sideboards”, or “principles”, of Tax Reform that he is willing to accept from Congress.
So in my opinion, Cain should now start talking about the “sideboards”, or “principles”, of Tax Reform that he is willing to accept from Congress.
Primary voters aren’t interested in compromises.
They’re looking for absolutism. If he wants to win the primary, he has to stay on message and act as if, as President, he would never compromise.
Then, after the primary, he will need to convince everyone in the middle that all those things were said by his evil twin and that he actually believes the opposite.
Mathius
I didn’t say COMPROMISES.
I said CONCEPTS.
What are the concepts that support 9-9-9??? What other proposals could be developed within these principles?
Primary voters are more flexible than you believe. But that is regarding the details, not the foundational principles.
Maybe there is real HOPE in America after all.
Seems the American public is smarter than all the ass-hats in D.C. and all their horses, er I mean economists.. Here me Krugman??? I am talking to you.
Sorry, I forgot the punchline.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
I present Small Government Conservative Jim DeMint (R – Bellevue Psych Ward).
http://thinkprogress.org/health/2011/10/19/347993/jim-demint-prohibit-internet-abortion-discussion/
Anyone care to support this little gem?
Things are not as simple as they sometimes seem. The Pro-choice group is trying to use this format to make abortion pills allowable after an internet talk -instead of a doctor visit. At least that is the claim-I have no reason to doubt it-but I haven’t researched it very much. this still seems like an overreaction-the ability to do such, should just be prohibited-not the freedom of speech to talk.
As far as attaching it to an unrelated bill-we all dislike that practice.
This does not surprise me much. He also said we had years of SS savings to tap into, to go past the Aug 2nd 2011 debt ceiling without defaulting.
Senate Amdt Would Prohibit Tax-Funding Telemed Abortions
by Steven Ertelt | Washington, DC | LifeNews.com | 10/18/11 4:16 PM
Sen. Jim DeMint, a South Carolina Republican, is offering an amendment to legislation in the U.S. Senate that could receive a vote as early as today or tomorrow to ensure taxpayer funds are not used to pay for the dangerous RU 486 abortion drug under a telemedicine grant section.
The amendment is similar to the one Congressman Steve King, an Iowa Republican, introduced in the House this summer that the lower chamber approved on a bipartisan 240-176 vote. The amendment prevents any funds within the legislation from being spent on the abortion drug RU-486 “for any purpose,” including use in “telemed abortions.”
Telemed, or webcam, abortions are those in which a woman gets the abortion drug only after a webcam conversation with the abortion practitioner, who may be out of state. The woman is denied the in-person consultation with a physician that the Food and Drug Administration recommends, especially due to the dangerous nature of the drug as it has killed dozens of women worldwide and injured 2,200 alone as of April 2011 FDA figures. The consultation helps determine whether or not the woman may suffer from an ectopic pregnancy — as usage of the abortion drug RU 486 in such instances is life-threatening.
Abortion providers like Planned Parenthood are the frequent recipient of federal telemedicine grants, and King’s amendment makes it clear that telemedicine grants contained within the agriculture bill cannot be used to facilitate the use of RU-486 in “telemed abortions.” King and DeMint tell LifeNews the issue is of particular importance as the practice spreads to other states from Iowa, where 1,900 such telemed abortions have been done.
“Doctors at Planned Parenthood have been using telemedicine conferencing to prescribe RU 486, commonly known as the abortion drug,” King’s office said in comments on the bill. “These doctors are not present when the woman takes the drug and have never had any personal contact with the woman. The presence of this drug has led to more taking of human life. It was even more disheartening to learn that doctors at Planned Parenthood had found a way to make it even easier for a woman to get this drug.”
“Not only do telemedicine consultations make it easier for a woman to have an abortion, it makes it much more dangerous. Pregnant women should not be making the decision to terminate a life without a doctor present and should not be enduring this gruesome, invasive and harmful procedure without the presence of a doctor,” King’s office added. “It’s a multi-day treatment that is dangerous at every step. The FDA guidelines say that the woman must be in the presence of a doctor and must return after 14 days. Planned Parenthood has been using telemedicine to circumvent the intent of this guideline which was the safety of the woman.”
“This amendment must be passed in order to ensure that no taxpayer dollars are going to build facilities or set up computer networks designed to facilitate these gruesome, and dangerous procedures over the Internet,” the lawmaker concluded.
The pro-abortion group NARAL is already working to jam Senate phone lines against the amendment, with a communication to its members opposing the DeMint amendment.
“Sen. DeMint is so obsessed with attacking a woman’s right to choose that he’s using an agriculture and transportation bill to advance his agenda,” NARAL president Nancy Keenan claimed. “Last week, anti-choice politicians in the House used an entire day to pass yet another anti-choice measure. Apparently, Sen. DeMint is trying to play catch up with the House. This kind of political gamesmanship jeopardizes women’s health and privacy and is out of touch with our country’s values and priorities.”
During the debate in the House on the amendment, King said Republican lawmakers had learned from HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius that Planned Parenthood had been receiving taxpayer-funded grants to pay for webcam abortions.
“Smoe of us signed a letter – 70 of us – to Kathleen Sebelius and asked if they had distributed grants for telemedicine to any of the abortion providers including Planned Parenthood,” Rep. King said. “There response came back in the affirmative that they had issued several grants to Planned Parenthood. And these funds, as near as we can determine, are being used to provide telemedicine for the robo-abortions, the robo-Skype abrotions as I’ve described.”
The House vote (see http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2011/roll445.xml) saw 226 Republicans and 14 Democrats join together to ensure Planned Parenthood won’t receive funds for telemed abortions while 176 members, including 167 Democrats and 9 Republicans, voted to fund the abortion business to do abortions in this dangerous manner.
Okay, now the “Let Women die” issue -which is really named “The Protect Life Act”
House Passes ‘Protect Life Act,’ Controversial Anti-Abortion Funding Bill [VIDEO]
By Julia Greenberg | October 13, 2011 10:14 PM EDT
Congress passed the “Protect Life Act” Thursday evening. The bill, introduced by Rep. Joe Pitts (R-Pa), is an attempt to bar federal funds from going towards health care plans that cover abortions.
* (Photo: Reuters)The House passed HR 385, the "Protect Life Act," Thursday night.
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The bill, HR 385, prohibits women who are under the Affordable Care Act to purchase health insurance plans that cover abortion, even though most health insurance plans do in fact cover abortions.
It also makes it legal for hospitals, such as those who may find abortions morally objectionable, to deny abortions to pregnant women with life-threatening conditions. Current law requires hospitals to give a patient whatever care they need in life-threatening situations, but the Protect Life Act relieves hospitals of their medical obligations.
“Congress has passed refusal laws before, but it’s never blatantly tried to override emergency care protections,” said Sarah Lipton-Lubet, policy counsel at the American Civil Liberties Union. “We’ve heard proponents of this bill say that women don’t need emergency abortion care, but that is really just willful blindness to the facts.”
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The bill does stipulate that it excludes cases where the pregnancy is “the result of an act of rape or incest” and cases where a woman suffers “from a physical disorder, physical injury, or physical illness that would… place the female in danger of death unless an abortion is performed.”
However, the bill also says that the federal government cannot discriminate against medical professionals that do not wish to provide abortions.
Although the Protect Life Act passed the House 251 to 172 Thursday night, but it is unlikely to pass the Democrat controlled Senate. The White House released a statement saying President Obama would veto the bill if it were to reach his desk.
“The Administration strongly opposes H.R. 358 because … the legislation intrudes on women’s reproductive freedom and access to health care and unnecessarily restricts the private insurance choices that women and their families have today,” the White House said in a statement.
A supporter of the bill, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.), told voters last week that Protect Life Act’s purpose is “to ensure that no taxpayer dollars flow to health care plans that cover abortion and no health care worker has to participate in abortions against their will.”
However, some have argued that the bill is facetious and unnecessary because the Affordable Care Act already separates federal funds from private insurance payments of abortions. In a lawsuit between former Rep. Steve Driehaus (R-Ohio) and the Susan B. Anthony List, a federal court found in August that “the express language of the [Affordable Care Act] does not provide for taxpayer-funded abortion.”
The controversial anti-abortion bill while supported heavily by Republicans, received impassioned testimony by many congressman. Rep. Jackie Speier (D-Calif.) said she personally faced a situation in which an abortion was a medical necessity.
“I was pregnant, I was miscarrying, I was bleeding,” she said on the House floor Thursday. “If I had to go from one hospital to the next trying to find one emergency room that would take me in, who knows if I would even be here today. What my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are trying to do is misogynist.”
Minority leader, Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) also expressed fury at the House’s proceedings.
“I can’t even describe to you the logic of what it is that they are doing,” she said. “I just know that you’ll see a large number of women on the floor today fighting for women’s health issues as well as to point out how savage this is about withholding care for a woman because of this legislation.”
http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/231009/20111013/protect-life-act-abortion-anti-funding-federal-government-nancy-pelosi-joe-pitts-republican-democrat.htm
Please Note —-“The bill does stipulate that it excludes cases where the pregnancy is “the result of an act of rape or incest” and cases where a woman suffers “from a physical disorder, physical injury, or physical illness that would… place the female in danger of death unless an abortion is performed.”
Sorry about that-I usually look closer and delete all the garbage that separates the articles. 🙂
V.H.
Looks to me like the attempts to manage the minutiae of our lives is resulting in Legislation that is impossible to understand or implement.
This is what we get when people aren’t willing to attack the bull head on and instead try to construct all types of paper fences to keep the bull from running where he wants.
Interesting article from today’s Globe and Mail out of Toronto on the demise of the one income household. Uses historical economic data to show the “flattening” of wage increases. It also blames Richard Nixon as the cause.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/commentary/neil-reynolds/the-sad-demise-of-the-one-income-family/article2205193/
The comment section is also hilarious.
CarbonUnit
How the heck are ya doin? Winter set in yet?
Tried to find the source article from WSJ, but could not. Apparently I can’t find the right combination of search words.
But the first question that comes to mind is “What is included as INCOME” in the analysis.
Past reports of this nature left out the value of “benefits” added to workers “pay package”. In the 1970’s Union and Non-Union companies started increasing non wage benefits in lieu of increasing wages. Pensions, 401K, health insurance, life insurance, etc, etc..
There is also an assumption that “income” should continue to grow in real terms. This is not necessarily true. If income is flat, in real dollars, then you are the same as before, not worse off.
Unless of course the real price of “expenses” is increasing and income is not. But comparison of NET INCOME in real dollars shows a continuing increase in NET INCOME since 1960.
WHY???? Those cheaper imports and reduced prices in the USA due to productivity gains.
Winter set in yet?
Winter set in up there in mid July. It’s currently 42 below, and he considers this a “fair weather” day. Winter will end sometime in late June.
Hopefully Caribou Unit can avoid being eaten by a polar bear in the meantime.
Actually it’s a balmy 6 degrees Celsius today and the fall colours (with a ‘u’ dammit!) are amazing.
I’m new to the whole economics thing but I thought SUFA would like the link to a “foreign” news source that blames the same people that you do.
@JAC thanks for helping to explain the data
@Mathius remember, Mukluk is my pet, he would never eat me. Ice fishing is a whole lot better when your pet can pull you up a 400 lb seal with one swipe.
Now back to teaching polymer chemistry by having my students make various Jello shots. We teach important science here in Canukistan.
Carbon
That is why I enjoy my visits there so much.
Nothing like a good fishin buddy to help pull in the big ones.
No kidding! It’s an eye opener on this blog. With so many opinions, and so many people capable of data analysis, the individuals who read through the material gain quite an education.
I’ve even had to buy some basic economics texts just to keep up with some of the discussions. Makes me wonder why I spent so much time and money on university.
I’m thankful to all the personalities on this website who make learning so enjoyable.
Tonight I think I will raise a glass to USW for providing a cyber hole-in-the-wall for all of us information junkies. (Someone has to fill Canine Weapon’s bowl though…that mutt hates me!)
http://www.cnbc.com/id/44962589
Another source.
LOI
Still doesn’t address key questions about the data.
This one is even sillier. Good golly molly, guess what? Our median income has dropped during a major recession. Do ya think there MSNBC?
Apples, oranges and bananas.
http://blog.american.com/2011/10/5-reasons-why-income-inequality-is-a-myth-and-occupy-wall-street-is-wrong/
But Gordon explained that this “compares apples with oranges, and then oranges with bananas.” When various statistical quirks are harmonized between the two economic measures, Gordon found middle-class income growth to be much faster and the “conceptually consistent gap between income and productivity growth is only 0.16 percent per year.” That’s barely one‐tenth of the original gap of 1.46 percent. In other words, income gains were shared fairly equally.
2. A pair of studies from 2007 and 2008 conducted by the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis supports Gordon. Researchers examined why the Census Bureau reported median household income stagnated from 1976 to 2006, growing by only 18 percent. In contrast, data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis showed income per person was up 80 percent. Like Gordon, they found apples-to-oranges issues such as different ways of measuring prices and household size. But in the end, they concluded that “after adjusting the Census data for these three issues, inflation-adjusted median household income for most household types is seen to have increased by 44 percent to 62 percent from 1976 to 2006.” In addition, research shows that median hourly wages (including fringe benefits) rose by 28 percent from 1975 to 2005.
My eldest and I have gone back and forth on this one for years. He actually has looked at the analysis from the point of view of child care costs and other related costs and it is an illusion that you are doing better by having both parents work.
I disagree with him on the basis that while costs to take care of the little ragamuffins while you are away are substantial you still usually make more but you miss out on teaching the kid and watching them grow. That is priceless. In addition from a sociological perspective I remember back in college reading about how the “slave mentality” affected the upper classes in Roman society. Since slaves raised the children once the going got good in the empire, the values a Roman was exposed to became those of a slave while Mom and Pops were out having a good time. You see something like that on the Upper West side of Manhattan where the kids are all raised by nannys,
Personally, there is no comparison today to “Leave it to Beaver Days”. They had one TV. I expect the only cruise that Ward ever took was without his wife and courtesy of the Seabees in WW 2. They had one car. Taxes were a fraction of what they are today especially property taxes in the suburbs. I doubt that their vacations went much beyond camping and don’t think they made Disneyland. They rarely if ever, ate out. Kids seemed to make their own fun and didn’t notice Beaver and Wally’s mom hustling them to Soccer, Football, Lacrosse, ice hockey and other assorted sports. Beaver and I are the same age today. My first year at a commuter college in ’64-65 was $ 900.00 for the year, Never expected the folks to pay for it, Perhaps if there was less a desire for “stuff” we could go back to the single wage earner again.
Mortgage rates today are close to what they were in the early ’50’s. At that time a cape or ranch could be had with GI mortgage insurance for $ 6,000-$ 9,000 salaries were in the $ 5,000 per year range. The run up in real estate over the past ten to fifteen years made no real sense and houses are getting affordable if you will settle for a 1,000-1,200 sq Ft starter with a bath and a half. No, the average shlub cannot afford a McMansion with the $ 50,000 kitchen that is never used because we are always going out to dinner.
I’ve always thought that the real conspiracies in this country are much more subtle than the Kennedy assassination or the WTC. They revolve around the destruction of the family and the removal of the child from parental influence where they can be indoctrinated at a young age in the values promoted by our Watson/Dewey education system which if I remember correctly were Utopian Socialist. Hey, after all, isn’t Daycare good for you? Never ever going to hear that early childhood education such as Headstart doesn’t work. Th big lie told over and over is that it does but if you build it, they will come because it is easier to do so..
Ok…Qudaffi is dead, Now what?
Now Zombie Quadaffi
Now Zombie Quadaffi.
You have entirely too much time on your hands.
Red Bull.
It’s amazing what you can accomplish when you sleep only 29 seconds a week.
Also, I can type 1,427 words per minute. I completed the Boston Marathon in 2 1/2 minutes, but was disqualified (note the wings from the Red Bull – apparently you’re required to run, not fly). I can dance the minute waltz in 42 seconds, and I learned fluent Sanskrit in an afternoon. It is possible that it is my running in circles which generated Hurricane Irene.
Scientists can only know my velocity or my location at any given time, but not both.
If you locked me in a box with a 50% chance of killing me, you’d have to consider me 100% alive and 100% dead, but you’d be wrong because I escaped already.
I roundhouse kicked Chuck Norris, and lived to tell about it.
I found a Higgs Boson, but forgot where I put it.
Red Bull Therapy…..
May be more effective than grog!
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/dont-listen-to-this-song-while-driving-youll-fall-asleep/
BUT…have you seen Elvis?
Hey, the guy had balls.
d13
Great game last night. Hope Texas finally gets their ring but it is going to be a close one, either way.
HI JAC…..yes…it was a good game….I bet they are all like that. I hope they get their ring as well…..at least they are at the dance.
And now from Tennessee……………
http://www.newschannel5.com/story/15725035/officials-claim-tennessee-becomes-first-state-to-deploy-vipr-statewide
Big Brother expands………..
Just as soon as I start bitching about the writers at American Thinker being clueless, one of them gets a clue:
http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/10/subsidies_have_consequences.html
Time for some harder thinking.
JOBS is the WRONG issue.
The way to increase wealth is to increase productivity. It is also the only way we have to increase our leisure time.
BUT
What happens when we have MAXIMIZED PRODUCTIVITY (theoretical maximized, OK BF)?
Answer: NOBODY NEEDS TO WORK ANYMORE.
Now go back and review the “new resource economy” that I posted for Charlie last night. Yes, it was tongue in cheek, but give it some deeper thought.
Is not the ultimate conclusion of Capitalism total “unemployment” or Star Trek Universe, and NOT Communism or Socialist Democracy???
First-I don’t see how you would ever get to “no one” needs to work anymore-and even if you could-I don’t see how you could transition from one to the other -without having a huge powerful government to handle the transition.
V.H.
Robots!!
The notion is that people would only work on those things they want to work on and that work is not REQUIRED for them to acquire goods and services.
So, if robots are providing my basic living needs that will allow me to spend more time inventing the next generation of XYZ, which is my passion. This in turn helps spur further growth to the entire economy or a new good for society. My reward is PERSONAL GRATIFICATION instead of money.
As for the transition I am thinking it could be organic and would in fact lead to NO GOVT rather than a Big Govt.
There is one critical flaw I see in the theory. Resource Scarcity.
Keep on thinking-I’m sure you can come up with some more critical flaws to this plan. 🙂
Ya gotta read the entire Heinlein cannon. He takes this stuff all on. If people don’t work, they will screw up big time. Man has to keep busy, it is what separates him from let’s say, cats.
SK
Man will still work and remain busy. But he will NOT have to work just to feed himself. Thus allowing him to pursue his passion. Which might lead to a cure for Cancer or some other great thing.
Okay Mr. Devil’s Advocate 🙂 how will he acquire the things he needs to follow his passion? If he owns nothing and no one else own’s anything either.
V.H.
The ROBOTS will make what ever it is he needs, including more robots.
New robots will be built by BF because he loves A I devices and functions well in a 1 or 0 world.
I meant “designed by BF”
My great passion is being served adult beverages by scantily clad women while I read a good book in a hammock on my private tropical island.
Somehow, I doubt this will lead to a cure for cancer.
I’m quite certain under this type of “utopia” you wouldn’t be allowed to have a private island 🙂
More importantly, the part his wife won’t allow!
It’s very fortunate for me that her great passion involves dressing scantily and serving me adult beverages at my hammock on my private island.
Another great pitching duel last night…..good job Rangers. Very entertaining game.
d13
Agreed, great game.
Two very small mistakes account for all the runs. Mistakes missed by the casual observer, but noted by the keen eye of Buck and McCarver.
Couldn’t believe however that the same Ranger relief pitcher made the exact same pitch to the exact same guy as the night before, and got the exact same outcome. At first I was befuddled until the replay showed the catcher calling for high and tight. Mistake One, result St. Louis scores 1 run.
The runner fails to stop early at 3rd, possibly distracting the first baseman who misses the cuttoff, allowing the runner to advance to 2nd, by an inch. Mistake Two, result Texas scores two runs on two fly balls, instead of the single run to tie.
And don’t forget the fabulous defense on both sides. But up the middle for Texas was the game changer.
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2011/10/oh-this-is-good.php
That is strange, but timely and true. Might be time for a new thread soon, USW must be super busy lately.
http://www.businessinsider.com/15-stunning-statistics-about-the-jobs-market-2011-9
15 Stunning Statistics About the Jobs Market
Ben Baden, U.S. News & World Report | Sep. 29, 2011, 12:36 PM | 669 | 1
An Unprecedented 26 Million Americans Are Now Underemployed
There Are Actually Millions Of Job Openings
Next week, the Labor Department will release its much-anticipated monthly jobs report. Last month, the economy added exactly zero jobs overall, and 14 million Americans still remain unemployed.
Economists expect September’s numbers to be a slight improvement, but not enough to make a noticeable dent in the unemployment rate. In the meantime, here are 15 statistics about the jobs market that put the jobs crisis in perspective:
1. 9.1 percent. Today’s unemployment rate is the highest it has been since 1982.
2. 131.1 million. The total number of jobs held by Americans in August. In January 2000, total nonfarm employment stood at 130.8 million. That means that over the past decade or so, less than 400,000 jobs have been added overall. At the same time, the eligible work-age population (those older than age 16, who are not in the military or prison) has grown by 28 million.
3. 58 percent. That’s the number of workers currently employed as a percentage of the work-age population. In December 2007, it was 63 percent. “Particularly in an economy where multiple-earner households are an important element, that drop of about 5 percentage points equates to several million people who want jobs, who would like to have jobs, but for whom there are no jobs available,” says Patrick O’Keefe, director of economic research at accounting firm J.H. Cohn and former deputy assistant secretary in the U.S. Department of Labor.
4. 11.5 million. Currently, there are 11.5 million fewer job holders than there were in 2007 before the recession began. “That’s the true depth of our jobs deficit,” O’Keefe says.
5. 6 million. That’s how many workers have been out of work for at least six months and have looked for a job within the last 30 days. They are called the “long-term unemployed.” This group accounts for 43 percent of the total number of unemployed. “That’s the most striking statistic,” says Stacey Schreft, director of investment strategy for the Mutual Fund Store, an investment firm in Overland Park, Kan. “Even though we have unemployment rates that were comparable to the ’81-’83 recession, we didn’t have long-term unemployment anywhere close to this.”
6. 40 weeks. The average duration of unemployment is almost a full year.
7. 16.7 percent. The unemployment crisis has affected races differently. This is the unemployment rate for blacks. Compare that with 11.3 percent for Hispanics and 8 percent for whites.
A driver is stuck in a traffic jam on the highway. Nothing is moving.
Suddenly, a man knocks on the window. The driver rolls down the window and asks, “What’s going on?”
“Terrorists have kidnapped Congress, and are asking for a $10 million dollar ransom.
Otherwise, they are going to douse them all in gasoline and set them on fire.
We are going from car to car, taking up a collection.”
“How much is everyone giving, on average?” the driver asks.
The man replies, “About a gallon”
http://www.thesmokinggun.com/buster/michigan/autoerotic-senior-cops-plea-435218
“”Life’s journey is not to arrive at the grave safely in a well preserved body,
but rather to skid in sideways, totally worn out, shouting ‘Holy shit! what a ride!'”
An open letter from Goldman Sachs regarding the OWS movement…. 😉
http://www.borowitzreport.com/2011/10/17/a-letter-from-goldman-sachs/
A great investment opportunity if I ever saw one.
Damn but that’s funny. Really did laugh out-loud.
If I didn’t find it on another website I would have sworn that Mathius wrote it just to get a rise out of people.
Interesting interview on CNN. The reporter was talking to a group of unemployed in California.There were about 20 of them. The average unemployed worker interviewed had been that way for 18 months. Several made the comment that they were looking for work but were not in a hurry because they had plenty of unemployment and saw no need to be in a hurry. When asked why they were not working other jobs, they just laughed and said why would I want to work at something less than what I can make on unemployment and food rations. One woman said that she is making more from the government through housing subsidies, unemployment, and food rations that working at a full time job and said that she looks at this as the same as a job. She said that the government can afford it so why not take it.
sigh.
Food for thought today.
As I look around the world and see all the “tribal” conflicts that form the foundation for so much trouble, I wonder what makes a NATION a NATION in reality. You know, a group of people within a defined area that share enough in values and heritage that they can put family squabbles aside to deal with threats to the family itself. The USA, is vast and filled with people of equally vast differences in ancestry. Yet to a person, those within this country identify themselves as AMERICANS first.
So here is the thought to ponder. Has our Federal Government, as an institution, helped contribute to this sense of National Identity. Is it not our Govt Laws and Institutions that allow us to overcome our tribal (State) allegiance in favor of Nation? We came together initially under the banner of Liberty. But is it not the Fed Govt that has helped “set the concrete” so to speak, that has formed one people from many?
This does not imply that this is a legitimate “purpose” of such govt, but that it is an unforeseen benefit. Some can argue that it is not a benefit, but I think that our shared National Identity is in fact beneficial to our freedom and liberty.
And yes, there is an irony in that the institution that may help form and support that identity also acts to undermine the foundational values that allowed it to grow. Namely our freedom, liberty and justice.
Don’t know that I agree with this statement considering the amount of “hyphen Americans” we hear people describe themselves as.
JAC,
“Has our Federal Government, as an institution, helped contribute to this sense of National Identity.”
Has, as in in the past. Now it seems hellbent on destroying that same national identity. It used to be that to be a citizen, you had to learn English. They are printing a record number of bi-lingual ballots for the 2012 election, part of US law requirements. How many neighborhoods have attempted to ban displaying the flag?
One of my first bookmarks:
http://www.theblessingsofliberty.com/
Charlton Heston’s speech on the cultural war is brilliant.
Just a thought but wasn’t that the idea behind our needing a Constitution in the first place-to help solve the problems between the states and to provide defense for the whole country. I think if the Federal had stayed within these confines-it would have continued to keep us United.
V.H.
I think at that time the formation of the Federal Govt did little to bind us together, beyond our already common ancestry. But as we move forward from that point, with an ever growing immigrant population and an increasing regional segregation it seems possible that its functional effect changes. Right up until it becomes the mechanism for undermining the very cultural values that bound us together.
My thoughts are that the “binding effect” comes in subtle ways, not so much via laws. But more by the mere fact that it forces us together to debate and argue over those laws and coming to some “common understanding” in order to Pass said laws.
Just thinking out loud here, but:
Is “allow” the right descriptor or would “compel” be more accurate? I would consider “allow” to give the option of not identifying with the national identity and letting groups maintain their cultural identity.
Isn’t, if we’re honest with ourselves about it, the “we” white Europeans? We know that the banner of liberty was not extended to all at the founding of our free nation.
Then, under that view, would it be accurate to say that government laws and institutions – in some cases – blocked the ability of races/cultures to become a integral part of the national identity?
plainly
“compel” would be to hard to describe the effect I am considering. But maybe “allow” is to passive. Maybe “FACILITATE” would better describe it.
I think we all know that the founders of the country were primarily “white Englishmen”. That still doesn’t change the fact that there were immigrants from other countries and that there was this common “bond” or “value” that led to the formation of the country and then the Federal Govt.
I agree that the Govt can and often does “block” some groups from becoming part of the National Identity. But in the case of the USA, it was that identity which led to efforts to “correct” those disparities. We can argue success but that is in fact part of what makes us American.
As I noted up front. There is an irony in that the same institution that can help bind can also help destroy those bonds.
I think you found the better word, facilitate would – in ways – incorporate both “allow” and “compel” (and maybe “compel” should be replaced with “urge”).
You did note that the institution can bind as well as destroy. In fact I think the destroy aspect is a natural part of the life cycle of a nation. It comes not as a matter of “if” it happens, but more truthfully “when” it happens.
plainly
I am not so sure there is a natural destructive cycle of “nation”. At least not at the core level. That depends on the coherence of the people making up the nation. This is what got me thinking harder about this. We see nations stop to exist and turn into other nations. But that is always because the “cement” that held them together was more “coercive” I think. It did not overcome the tribal values within the nation.
It seems this usually relates to size, with the bigger having the greatest chance of failing. And yes, Govt plays a key role as it grows in power and allows the destructive forces to outweigh the constructive.
Ours, up until now, is different. While the South lost the Great War of Northern Aggression, and southerners are still Southerners, they are also Americans First. Some just think the Wrong America won. But we ARE a LARGE Nation and thus I think vulnerable.
But my real point in raising the question is to consider the possibility that a Federal Govt does in fact have a positive influence in bringing a diverse group of people together to form a Society and Nation.
If true, then we should guard this quality against destruction to an equal degree that we guard our own Liberty.
Some founders expressed this concept, I believe, when stating that only a JUST Govt would be tolerated by a FREE PEOPLE.
I call it a natural destruction cycle simply because nations “grow” and change throughout their existence. This comes about (whether the nation is ethnically diverse or not) from the dissatisfaction with those being governed. I agree that larger, more diverse, nations are more vulnerable than small nations. While we speak of America as a melting pot, the blending isn’t as complete as is implied. If it were we wouldn’t have the – for lack of a better word – dissatisfaction among the cultures, religions, races and ethnics groups that occurs in the country as it seems to now more so than ever. I will consider your thoughts on it happening because the cement was more coercive – not sure I can come to agreement on that.
Also, are we to consider that only a federal government can have this positive influence? Can not a state government do the same? Could it be that the federal government needs first for the state governments to effect this positive influence to bring forth the federal ability to do the same?
plainly
Yes, I think all govts have this affect. It was in fact my thoughts on “local” govt that caused me to consider the effect being scaled up. Just happened to be thinking about these levels, VDLG, etc when I mixed it with thoughts about the conflicts around the world. News folks were talking about how Libya is also a nation made up of three distinct tribes and there is some doubt that it will survive as a nation.
While we have all the divisions you mention, they are not anchored in territory. Well that is until we start talking about Mexico taking back the Southwest.
So, I think local builds a sense of identity and State Govt helps facilitate a sense of State identity. In the USA these are somewhat arbitrary but have been reinforced by the Fed not allowing the States to constantly readjust boundaries. I am not so sure you need the local and/or State before you can have the Federal/National.
I agree with your natural destruction concept as it applies to National Govt. I was just noting that some people who have a more “National Identity” such as Germans, have managed to maintain a Nation despite many collapses and reconstructions. Obviously their “German” identity is stronger than the tribes that comprise the larger group.
I will give this some more hard thinking and hope others do as well. I wanted to share with others a possible “benefit” of OUR federal govt that we have not considered in our discussions about the role of govt. Let me offer this as a more detailed explanation of the mechanism that may be in action.
Govt provides us with an institutionalized place to discuss and deliberate our differences and our similarities. It is a place where the group decides how to move forward in unity while recognizing our differences.
President Obama just announced that all US troops would leave Iraq by Dec 31, 2011.
Thoughts?
Including “advisers”? How about contractors?
I’ll believe it when I see it.
My younger sisters have never lived in an America at peace. Think about that for a minute.
From the the commentators were saying all civilian contractors (I think they said about 16,000 of them) would come under State Department supervision and that about 160 military personnel would remain as advisers/trainers.
If the civvies want to stay that’s up to them. There are currently around 40,000 troops still in Iraq at the moment. Cutting to 160ish is a major move ending the ability of America to nation build in Iraq.
And won’t yet for years to come with the continued Afghanistan follies (and potentially spread with the government’s latest “stern” warning delivered to Pakistan).
Mathius
Neither have you. Or me, or anyone who was born in this country and is still alive today. Well I take that back. There may still be a few folks around who lived during the 1920’s.
PEACE requires that we do not place our citizens in harms way………ANYWHERE.
WWII, Korea, COLD WAR, Vietnam, War on Drugs, CUBA, Nicaragua, etc, etc, Africa, etc, etc,; Gulf I, Gulf II, Philippines, Indonesia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and now BACK TO AFRICA.
Neither have you.
d13
Heh, heh, heh. Love it when great minds are running on the same track.
True.
Rephrasing: I have two sisters who have never lived in an America that was “officially” at peace.
They’ve never even known pretend peace.
True.
Rephrasing: I have two sisters who have never lived in an America that was “officially” at peace.
They’ve never even known pretend peace.
But at least they are free to pretend that there is peace, if they wish.
That is after all, the American way.
He is carrying out GW Bush’s deadline.
Another Left Wing CONTRADICTION.
As the argument goes, we have a right to tell you what you can eat, smoke, drink etc etc because we are paying for the cost of your behavior through welfare, medicare, and other such govt programs.
Putting aside the obvious lunacy that creating the programs in the first place creates the rationalization for the controls, lets consider this.
They can tell me what to do because they pay for the cost of my decisions. But I can not tell them what to do when I must pay for the costs of their decisions.
Can you give me some more color on this?
I think we can tell you what to do / what not to do because your actions affect us. Insofar as you’re on the dole, etc, then we should also be able to put conditions on that. That is, if you’re on unemployment, you must be looking for work. If you’re on food stamps, you can’t be on drugs.
However, just because you may some day be on the dole does not justify controlling your actions now.
However, however, when you actions affect other, non participatory, third parties, then we should be able to control your behavior. That is, if you’re smoking affect others who do not want to breathe in carcinogens, then we should be able to stop that.
However, however, however, part of me thinks that if your restaurant allows smoking, I’ll go elsewhere, so it’s in your interest to set up a “real” segregated smoking section (with actual separate air, not just another part of the room). Go Free Market!
However, however, however, however, part of me knows that this doesn’t work and I’d be stuck having to breath in smoke.
However, however, however, however, however, no one is forcing me to go to smoke-filled restaurants in the first place.
However, however, however, however, however, however, but what about dangerous drivers, maybe that’s a better example….
DPM: How so?
Mathius: Well, I shouldn’t have to risk getting run over because you’re an idiot?
DPM: So your solution is to control everyone, even the good drivers?
Mathius: Well, I don’t have a way of regulating only the bad ones, and we need some objective standards.
DPM: But I drive safely, but quickly. I am not a threat to you. Why do you have the “right” to control my actions?
Mathius: It’s not your actions I’m trying to control. You just get caught in the net, like a dolphin in a tuna net.
DPM: So you’re trampling my rights… by accident?
Mathius: Well it’s the only way to make sure my rights don’t get trampled (ie, my right not to get hit by a car).
DPM: So your right to safety from other drivers trumps my rights to do something unrelated?
Mathius: Shut up.
DPM: Make me.
Mathius: The problem is magnitude. If I am hit by a car, it kills me. If you are forced to drive slower, it’s inconvenient. So I err on the side of the lesser harm.
DPM: You’re an idiot, bleeding-heart liberal.
Just a Citizen: I think we’re off topic. The topic is, do you have the right to control my actions because you’re paying the cost of my actions.
DPM: And why exactly am I paying anything for you? You’re making me, that’s why.
Mathius: He said to skip over that bit.
DPM: Y’AARRG! Ok, fine. I think we have to separate the issues. My “gift” of paying for you is a sunk cost. It is an evil perpetrated on me, beyond my control, but irrelevant to the other actions. That is, you’re smoking is your choice. Just because someone is going to steal from me later on to pay your cancer bill doesn’t mean that I have the right to stop you from freely being stupid when it doesn’t harm me.
Mathius: But it does harm you. It means that you’re going to have more “stolen” from you later on. By letting him smoke, you are increasing the amount that will be stolen from you.
DPM: Two wrongs do not make a right. I see your argument (of course I do, I’m your alter ego) that the net affect is less (less smoking = less cancer = less theft), but I am not responsible for the theft, neither is the smoker. I AM responsible for my support of evil.
(this conversation carried on much longer, but I have work to do.. you know, “real” work. Amazingly, they don’t pay me to play around on the internet all day. Too bad..)
I don’t know whether to chuckle or be scared by “overhearing” your internal identity dialogues?
Hitting the RB a little strong today aren/t WE?
Bought a Mountain Dew in the cafeteria.. turned out to be diet. Ugh.
I think it’s messing with my/our head.
Just wanted to add that, you don’t know that my smoking will lead to cancer. Ergo, if you perpetrate violence on me to stop me from smoking, in the HOPES that it will mean that the government will steal less from you later on.
This is the same as the speeding example. You’re controlling me when I may not pose any threat to you. I am the dolphin in your can of tuna, and I say it’s evil.
Mathius: I’d love to argue with you about this, but I have work to do, and you’re getting in the way.
DPM: In other words, you don’t have a good retort.
Mathius: I do! It’s that I’m playing the odds. I’m sorry you got caught up in things that you could have been exempted from, but your rights must be aggregated with everyone else’s. You have individual rights – to risk harm to yourself, and there are societal rights – to minimize the harm from people risking harm to themselves (weighed by probability and severity and the resultant costs).
DPM: Well that sounds pretty, doesn’t it. And just how do you calculate all that, exactly?
Mathius: (squirming a little) Well I’m very smart and good at math….
DPM: I’m exactly as smart as you, and I have no idea how to even begin.
Mathius: Well, er, you see.. it’s a question of balance.. You just have to try to figure out where the line should be.
DPM: Even if I buy that, and I don’t, why should your idea of where the line should be drawn trump my idea of where the line should be drawn? I say it should be drawn all the way to the libertarian side.
Mathius: And I say it’s to the left of that. More to the middle.
DPM: So why does your idea trump mine, when your idea is inflicting violence on me?
Mathius: Because we live in America, and majority rules, and this is where the line has been drawn by a general consensus.
DPM: So, whatever the teaming masses says, goes?
Mathius: I know where you’re going with this…
DPM: Of course you do. So, if it’s the year 1800, and the consensus of teaming masses think that black people should have no rights, then they’re right.
Mathius: You’re annoying. No. Of course not. Slavery is wrong.
DPM: So there are empirical rights and wrong.
Mathius: Some.
(ok, seriously.. have to do some work…)
Okay, now you’ve done it – I’m paging through the DSM IV to help you out Mathius. DPM doesn’t need any aid beyond helping him overcome the “hostile” liberal in his head…… 😉
Let me know what you find. I’ve got to get rid of that guy.
I am……..rolling on the floor laughing so hard it hurts.
It still amazes me though, how one who understands the coral difference between right and wrong, moral and immoral, good and evil, continues to reject the moral and good because the other choice somehow “seems” or “feels” better.
Keep after DPM. Maybe some day you will become ONE with the Universe.
At least no one can say I think a certain way because I’m ignorant.. That’s worth something, I guess…
Hmmm-I was of the impression that most everyone had this type of internal struggle about not all, but many things. Not sure my sharing this condition with you Mathius is a point in your favor or not. 😆 But I feel, I’m in good company. 🙂
Funny isn’t it how the International Criminal Court wants (“demands”?) to know how Qaddafi ended up dead but say nothing about other countries executing people in non-hostile nations?
What is to understand…..found the coward hiding in a concrete pipe…dragged his ass out….watched him beg for awhile…single tap behind the ear…..brains splattered all over the place…..one despot dead to be replaced by a committee of despots…..
Meanwhile Obama ENDS the war in Iraq (according to the already established time table), says all troop will be out of Iraq (UL= uncontrollable laughter)..used troops in Libya,…sending more to Africa (6 nations so far…you know, the “defensive” only Special Forces),,,,Yemen and Syria are next (remember you saw it here)…increasing US role in Afghanistan and Pakistan with Special and Black Ops…..(all the while hating US intervention….yeah right)..Raised more money from Wall Street than all the Repubs combined thus far (Wall Street Journal and Washington Post)…..standing on the platform decrying how bad wall street is with one hand and pocketing with the other…..Goldman Sachs (look at the “O”) has adopted a rather unique logo while asking for 500 million more in stimulus (theft)…..
Driving D13 crazy (short drive)…so much so that he has taken Don Julio sippin’ tequila and laced it with Red Bull while downing a DP and eating Oreo cookies (double cream) at the same time.,,,eye balling the doritos and Jalapeno Bean Dip as a follow up, wondering what in the hell JAC is doing……..
rofl….you’ve written an excellent commentary describing Obama and placing him (with the exception of a portion or two) squarely into the hawkish, conservative Republican political group. Congrats!
Ahhhh………please…..do not use Conservative and Republican in the same sentence…….
Sorry, no can do……………it seems fitting for the most part.
But…but…but……I am a conservative and have voted for many democrats……sigh…..and to be lumped with Republicans.
d13
I am getting ready for a steelhead fishin trip to Idaho. Leaving tomorrow morning and will be gone all week.
Care to join me?
You would fit right in with the guys I fish with, I GUARANTEE IT.
Three blondes are sitting by the side of a river holding fishing poles with the lines in the water. A Game Warden comes up behind them, taps them on the shoulder and says, “Excuse me, ladies, I’d like to see your fishing licenses.”
“We don’t have any,” replied the first blonde.
“Well, if you’re going to fish, you need fishing licenses,” said the Game Warden.
“But officer,” replied the second blonde, “we aren’t fishing. We all have magnets at the end of our lines and we’re collecting debris off the bottom of the river.”
The Game Warden lifted up all the lines and, sure enough, there were horseshoe magnets tied on the end of each line. “Well, I know of no law against it,” said the Game Warden. “Take all the debris you want.” And with that, he left.
As soon as the Game Warden was out of sight, the three blondes started laughing hysterically. “What a dumb Fish Cop,” the second blonde said to the other two. “Doesn’t he know that there are steelhead in this river?”
COOL…..the bonding thing Have not been steel head fishing in over 20 years……..all guys…..that means we can scratch and burp and do all the vulgar stuff without recompense? COOL. Drink beer and tell fish stories and tell about our pursuits and conquests when we were in college?
d13
You can, but I am going to have to be on less than normal behavior. Taking my oldest son along. We haven’t done this trip since before he was in High School so I am more than looking forward to it.
Perhaps you could make it out one of these days. I’ll take care of the arrangements if you can get that fancy plane of yours on the ground.
Deal, my friend…deal…..Can ALWAYS get the plane on the ground. So, gonna take the boy out…..well….hmmmm…I would suggest to let D13 have him for a couple of hours for intensive training…..but MRS JAC might not approve.
D13…you said “Driving D13 crazy (short drive)…”, I would submit, much as it is with myself, that it is much more of a putt than a drive. As a golfer, I thought you might enjoy that analogy…
Good point….good analogy…
JAC, looks like it’s worse than you have stated. 254 foreign workers hired to log Oregon timber……
Obama stimulus cash goes to foreign workers
byConn Carroll Senior Editorial Writer
A Labor Department Inspector General report released this week found that $7,140,782 in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds went to four Oregon forestry services firms who hired no U.S. workers. From the report:
Only two Oregonians were listed on the employer recruitment reports, indicating that workers in Oregon were likely unaware these job opportunities were available. In fact, although 146 U.S. workers were contacted by the three employers regarding possible employment, none were hired. Instead, 254 foreign workers were brought into the country for these jobs.
The Labor OIG even interviewed local workers to find out why no Americans were hired. The OIG reports:
We spoke with two workers who reported that the employer used discouraging language, such as references to age and the ability to speak another language, which are not valid conditions of employment.
Reached for comment by The Oregonian, there was bipartisan anger at the what OIG found. “This is a timber area and we hadn’t been cutting trees for years,” Republican state Sen. Chris Telfer told the paper. “It really ticked off a lot of people here.”
Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., who asked the OIG to investigate the program in September 2010, was also displeased: “The goal of the stimulus bill was to put Americans back to work, not foreign nationals. … Oregonians have been logging for over a century, our workforce is one of the best in the world, and these contracts should have been awarded to companies that hire Oregon loggers.”
This is not the first time President Obama’s policies have killed Oregonian jobs. In July, the Obama administration rescinded a Bush administration plan to double logging in Western Oregon. “Communities throughout western Oregon are facing extreme economic dislocation that has been compounded by a lack of timber coming from the BLM forests–southwest Oregon has become a sacrifice zone for this Administration,” American Forest Resource Council Tom Partin said in a release.
http://campaign2012.washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/obama-stimulus-cash-goes-foreign-workers
LOI
What do you mean worse than I have stated?
I said from day one this programs was a “political payback” and would result in massive waste.
I thought they had just stopped all logging, not hired foreigners to come in and log US timber. Somehow, Obama will spin it claiming how he’s increased domestic timber harvesting to greater than Bush allowed….. So he’s destroying Oregon’s economy and looting it’s resources at the same time. And I think it’s a win/win situation for him, but I’m damned if I can see how it profits him.
LOI,
It’s just a conspiracy theory. There is no TRUTH that anyone with a brain will believe, so don’t waste your time trying to step on Big Brother. The Govt can do no wrong and all they care about is those that they serve 🙄
Of course, instead of pumping SPENDULUS money into stupid projects Congress and the Administration could have pushed forward on Salvaging Bug Killed timber, thus preventing this:
http://missoulian.com/news/local/article_33e5c862-f930-11e0-9771-001cc4c03286.html
Please note two things from the article.
1. The use of models to make decisions, when the models have no “ground truthed examples”.
2. Claiming they have no examples, except in Canada, of radical fire behavior. Can anybody say YELLOWSTONE?????????
Not even a mention of the possibility that logging might help.
***squelch breaking in the background*** “DPM this is Delta 13, over”
***squelch breaks again*** “Delta 13, I told you not to bother me when I am sailing”
*** DPM, Mathius has been sighted, over”.
*** Wha???? where is he, over***
*** He appears to be walking with Charlie ‘the Sella’ and Buck ‘ the Walla’….it could be a conspiracy in the making. If G Man finds out, it will be a conspiracy, over”***
*** Thas’ ok. Let LOI handle this. I am going to sail up and join JAC steel head fishing with laser guided magnets, over”***
*** But Mathius appears to be arguing with himself***.
***Thas’ ok. He does it quite often as he is a captive audience. Charlie and Buck will just let him talk and nod their heads in agreement”.***
*** Roger that…see you at the mout O th river”***
Meanwhile, Buck and Charlie have stopped walking and Mathius, content with his own argument, continues to saunter into the sunset.
I’m on it…….
True in general. There are regional territorial differences to a degree (New Englanders, Midwesterners, Southerners as examples) and those mayhap could come into play in a fragmenting of the US into regional “nations” leading to differences in national identity – yet I would bet even these regional areas would claim some aspect of being American.
I don’t know. I see it as a pyramid in construction with the lower local/state being the foundation supporting the federal/national.
I too will be pondering this topic more.
ALERT !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1
For those who are watching and waiting. When the financial markets melted down in 2007/2008 it was all started with a run on the Fed window. The value of the run, in other words the amount of exposure banks had due to the run, was between 200 and 300 billion dollars. When the banks had to start covering the run they had to start liquidating assets to cover their margin needs. So a downfall of 200 plus was the trigger that locked up the system and brought on a 800 billion TARP, followed by 20 trillion in Fed “EASING” and 700 billion in Stimulus.
Well ladies and gentlemen. I was told this evening that the US Bank exposure to GREECE, directly and indirectly, is in the area of 800 to 900 billion dollars. This means that when Greece falls and take the other European dominoes with it, the USA banks will have to cover almost 900 billion in devalued assets.
What nobody seems to know, or won’t tell, is how much do the banks have on hand to cover the crisis? What is known is that the FED does not have that much on its books to cover the banks. At least that is what I was told.
So what do you think will happen based on what we know happened over a 300 billion asset loss?
With that little piece of wonderful news, I am off for a week of fishing with my son and best friends. I hope sincerely that you are all here when I return.
In the meantime, I think I have given everyone a lot to consider. I will continue to think on these things as well, while I am standing in the Salmon River. 🙂
Best of the best to one and all.
See ya in a week.
JAC
JAC
It is monetize any debt.
Now, what will happen if it adds another $1trillion to the money supply?