ABC published an article with McCain titled "The ‘Straight Talk Express’ is back: McCain on his fears about the future of the GOP" - go to this link to listen to McCain, who sounds reasonable until you consider the fact that when a person rolls over (on your principles) you pick up all sorts of debris. First McCain lauds platitudes on Hillary Clinton who is partly responsible in the deaths of Americans in Benghazi, and now he' says good things about Chuck Schumer!! Unbelievable.
Sen. John McCain has a strong warning for Republicans: Falter on immigration reform and the party will lose in 2016.
“If we fail on immigration reform, it won't matter who our nominee is because of the polarization of the Hispanic vote,” McCain, R-Ariz., tells “The Fine Print.” “Now that's not why I'm for immigration reform but it certainly is one of the consequences of a failure.”
McCain, who has simultaneously emerged as a friend to the White House and a critic of some of the new GOP firebrands on Capitol Hill, says he’s hopeful that the August congressional recess will bring lawmakers back to Washington “with at least a willingness to move forward” on a course to overhaul the nation's immigration system.
“Members are back interacting with their constituents,” McCain says of the upcoming recess. “And we see a coalition of Evangelicals, of the Catholic Church, of business, of labor, of small business, high tech, across the board, support the likes of which we, I've never seen for one specific part of legislation.”
As for Republican newcomers, such as Sens. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and Rand Paul, R-Ky., who have been bucking establishment Republican positions on immigration and other issues, McCain advises that they read up on their history.
“The people who are pushing this Obamacare vs. government shutdown, none of them that I know were here the last time we saw that movie,” he says.
While freshman senators do bring a positive “infusion” of new ideas, he says, it’s also important to maintain the Senate’s “corporate memory.”
Asked about their 2016 presidential aspirations, McCain isn't very charitable, calling them only "viable."
On the topic of his partnership with Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York, a key Democratic leader, McCain laughed off the criticism voiced by some Republicans, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.
“Sen. Schumer is a person who is as good as his word,” McCain says. “His word is good, and he reminds me, in a way, of the work that I used to do with Ted Kennedy.”
McCain says his bipartisan partnership with Schumer remains strong and has been solidified through months of negotiations on tough issues like immigration reform, potential filibusters and the fiscal cliff.
Cowboys and the Tea Party political movement have a lot on common. Both believe in individual responsibility; judging a man by his actions not words; and, both are disgusted with government intrusions into our lives and particularly our God given rights.
Showing posts with label politics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label politics. Show all posts
Thursday, August 8, 2013
Saturday, August 3, 2013
McCain Has Lost His Mind
McCain, as in John McCain the Senator, allegedy a Republican, from Arizona, has lost his mind. And we almost elected this asshat as president. He still would have been a better choice than Obama, but at least Obama serves a purpose, and that is to demonstrate liberal policies, large government and higher taxes just don't work.
McCain: Voting for Hillary a “Tough Choice”, She’s a “Rock Star" - from Capitalism Institute.
This man isn’t conservative, libertarian, or anything in between. He doesn’t believe in the basic idea of liberty, small government, or a defense-oriented foreign policy. He’s in the wrong party. It’s time to just flat-out say it. In a lengthy and comprehensive interview with the far-left publication, John McCain says that Hillary is a “rock star”, that she did a great job during Benghazi and the other conflicts, that Obama has “grown in office”, and that if Rand Paul runs against Hillary Clinton, it’ll be a “tough choice” who to vote for. That some continue to defend John McCain no longer makes sense. The man is seriously admitting that whether he would ever vote for Hillary Clinton is a tough choice. It’s probably impossible to make a bigger “RINO” statement than that. Quotes From the Interview Let’s look at the relevant quotes from the interview. “IC” stands for Isaac Chotiner, the interviewer. JC stands for John McCain. Here are the excerpts. IC: When Hillary Clinton versus Rand Paul occurs in 2016, I guess you are going to have to decide who to vote for, huh? JM: It’s gonna be a tough choice [laughs]. Note that a big part of what Obama has “learned” recently is “reaching out” to McCain and Graham. This included wining and dining them while Rand Paul was filibustering Obama. The sheer honesty of being a turncoat is pretty fascinating. He should go the next step and switch parties. Do you think Obama has grown in office since 2009? JM: Oh yeah. No doubt. IC: How so? JM: He had just won a huge victory in 2009, had overwhelming majorities, he could pass whatever he wanted. That breeds a certain degree of confidence, if not—the word isn’t cocky, it isn’t arrogant—a certain self-assuredness that you don’t have to deal with the minority. I think the big mistake was doing Obamacare when he should have addressed the debt. He had the votes to do it then. That is for historians to decide. He was confident and had reason to be. Here is a young man who, six or seven years before, was a state legislator and had lost a primary for a House seat. I think he has grown to appreciate bipartisanship. He is looking at his legacy. I know that for a fact and it is entirely appropriate. One is, close Guantánamo. It is an unfulfilled commitment. Outreach to me and Lindsey. So yeah, I think he has learned a lot.
Next up, McCain says something so disturbing, it made me wince. Here it is: IC: Given that you think things are out of control, what do you make of Hillary Clinton’s term as secretary of state? JM: I think she did a fine job. She’s a rock star. She has, maybe not glamour, but certainly the aura of someone widely regarded throughout the world. Note that this is AFTER Benghazi. This is AFTER the cover ups and the lies. He thinks she’s a “rock star” who did a “fine job”. I would say it’s “unbelievable”, but we’ve seen this kind of behavior from him before. He attacked Ted Cruz and Rand Paul as “wacko birds”. He dined with Obama while Rand and others were filibustering him. He says the Democrats are a “fine party”. He says he often has “more in common” with Obama on foreign policy. He says he’s bringing gun control “back”. We shouldn’t tolerate such pro-Hillary or pro-Obama behavior in the GOP. If the GOP begins to stand for Hillary and Obama, what’s even the point? John McCain must go.
McCain: Voting for Hillary a “Tough Choice”, She’s a “Rock Star" - from Capitalism Institute.
This man isn’t conservative, libertarian, or anything in between. He doesn’t believe in the basic idea of liberty, small government, or a defense-oriented foreign policy. He’s in the wrong party. It’s time to just flat-out say it. In a lengthy and comprehensive interview with the far-left publication, John McCain says that Hillary is a “rock star”, that she did a great job during Benghazi and the other conflicts, that Obama has “grown in office”, and that if Rand Paul runs against Hillary Clinton, it’ll be a “tough choice” who to vote for. That some continue to defend John McCain no longer makes sense. The man is seriously admitting that whether he would ever vote for Hillary Clinton is a tough choice. It’s probably impossible to make a bigger “RINO” statement than that. Quotes From the Interview Let’s look at the relevant quotes from the interview. “IC” stands for Isaac Chotiner, the interviewer. JC stands for John McCain. Here are the excerpts. IC: When Hillary Clinton versus Rand Paul occurs in 2016, I guess you are going to have to decide who to vote for, huh? JM: It’s gonna be a tough choice [laughs]. Note that a big part of what Obama has “learned” recently is “reaching out” to McCain and Graham. This included wining and dining them while Rand Paul was filibustering Obama. The sheer honesty of being a turncoat is pretty fascinating. He should go the next step and switch parties. Do you think Obama has grown in office since 2009? JM: Oh yeah. No doubt. IC: How so? JM: He had just won a huge victory in 2009, had overwhelming majorities, he could pass whatever he wanted. That breeds a certain degree of confidence, if not—the word isn’t cocky, it isn’t arrogant—a certain self-assuredness that you don’t have to deal with the minority. I think the big mistake was doing Obamacare when he should have addressed the debt. He had the votes to do it then. That is for historians to decide. He was confident and had reason to be. Here is a young man who, six or seven years before, was a state legislator and had lost a primary for a House seat. I think he has grown to appreciate bipartisanship. He is looking at his legacy. I know that for a fact and it is entirely appropriate. One is, close Guantánamo. It is an unfulfilled commitment. Outreach to me and Lindsey. So yeah, I think he has learned a lot.
Next up, McCain says something so disturbing, it made me wince. Here it is: IC: Given that you think things are out of control, what do you make of Hillary Clinton’s term as secretary of state? JM: I think she did a fine job. She’s a rock star. She has, maybe not glamour, but certainly the aura of someone widely regarded throughout the world. Note that this is AFTER Benghazi. This is AFTER the cover ups and the lies. He thinks she’s a “rock star” who did a “fine job”. I would say it’s “unbelievable”, but we’ve seen this kind of behavior from him before. He attacked Ted Cruz and Rand Paul as “wacko birds”. He dined with Obama while Rand and others were filibustering him. He says the Democrats are a “fine party”. He says he often has “more in common” with Obama on foreign policy. He says he’s bringing gun control “back”. We shouldn’t tolerate such pro-Hillary or pro-Obama behavior in the GOP. If the GOP begins to stand for Hillary and Obama, what’s even the point? John McCain must go.
Tuesday, June 25, 2013
The Jewish Quarterback
The new Head Football Coach had put together the perfect team for the Chicago Bears. The only thing that was missing was a good quarterback. He had scouted all the colleges and even the Canadian and European Leagues, but he couldn't find a ringer who could ensure a Super Bowl win.
Then one night while watching CNN he saw a war-zone scene in the West Bank. In one corner of the background, he spotted a young Israeli soldier with a truly incredible arm. He threw a hand-grenade straight into a 15th story window 100 yards away. KABOOM!
He threw another hand-grenade 75 yards away, right into a chimney. KA-BLOOEY!
Then he threw another at a passing car going 90 mph. BULLS-EYE!
"I've got to get this guy!" Coach said to himself. "He has the perfect arm!"
So, he brings him to the States and teaches him the great game of football. And the Bears go on to win the Super Bowl. The young man is hailed as the great hero of football, and when the coach asks him what he wants, all the young man wants is to call his mother.
"Mom," he says into the phone, "I just won the Super Bowl!"
"I don't want to talk to you, the old woman says. "You are not my son!"
"I don't think you understand, Mother," the young man pleads. "I've won the greatest sporting event in the world. I'm here among thousands of my adoring fans."
"No! Let me tell you!" his mother retorts. "At this very moment, there are gunshots all around us. The neighborhood is a pile of rubble. Your two brothers were beaten within an inch of their lives last week, and I have to keep your sister in the house so she doesn't get raped!"
The old lady pauses, and then tearfully says,.......... "I will never forgive you for making us move to Chicago !!!!
Friday, June 21, 2013
Obama's Approval Rating Tumble
Lying to the American people and scandal after scandal has taken it's toll,.... President Barack Obama’s job approval rating fell sharply over the past month—from 53 to 45 percent, according to a new CNN poll. Fifty-four percent of Americans disapprove of the job he’s doing, also up from 45 percent, the survey found.
Sixty-one percent disapprove of the way he’s handling government surveillance of Americans in the aftermath of a series of dramatic reports about National Security Agency spying, while 35 percent approve.
Obama's early second term has been buffeted by a series of controversies—not just about the NSA surveillance, but also allegations of misconduct at the IRS and government spying on reporters. The president was expected to address those issues in a new interview with Charlie Rose, which airs Monday night.
What about Edward Snowden, who says he revealed the government’s secret to expose abuses? Forty-four percent approve of what he did, while 52 percent disapprove. Should the U.S. government attempt to bring him back to U.S. soil and prosecute him? Fifty-four percent say yes, 42 percent say no.
Even as the economy picks up steam, the poll found that Obama’s disapproval rating on that issue has ticked up steadily over the first six months of the year, from 51 percent in January, to 54 percent in April, to 57 percent in June.
Is Obama honest and trustworthy? Fifty percent say no, up from 41 percent in mid-May, while 49 percent say yes, down from 58 percent.
Americans are sending mixed messages on the NSA surveillance controversy—43 percent say Obama has gone too far in restricting civil liberties in the name of national security, 38 percent agree with him that he’s found the right balance, and 17 percent say he hasn’t gone far enough.
At the same time, 51 percent say the administration was right to collect the telephone records of Americans. Forty-eight percent say it was wrong.
Approval soars to 66 percent regarding the government’s snooping on personal information over the Internet. Thirty-three percent say it was wrong. (CNN’s question phrasing might have something to do with that. “The government reportedly does not target Internet usage by U.S. citizens and if such data is collected, it is kept under strict controls.”)
Still, it’s not because people don’t think it hasn’t happened to them: 62 percent told CNN they thought the government had collected and stored data about their personal telephone and Internet. Thirty-four percent say they did not think so.
Does the federal government pose an immediate threat to the rights and freedoms of American citizens? A whopping 62 percent say it does, up from 56 percent the last time the question was asked, in February 2010.
The survey had an error margin of plus or minus 3 percentage points.
What suprises me is that anybody approves of Obama, but then again we are a nation of low information voters. More telling poll numbers would be the 75% of Americans who want Benghazi, the IRS scandal, and the AP phone tapping investigated to determine who is at fault for these crimes.
"Americans who will trade liberty for security will deserve and receive neither. "
Sixty-one percent disapprove of the way he’s handling government surveillance of Americans in the aftermath of a series of dramatic reports about National Security Agency spying, while 35 percent approve.
Obama's early second term has been buffeted by a series of controversies—not just about the NSA surveillance, but also allegations of misconduct at the IRS and government spying on reporters. The president was expected to address those issues in a new interview with Charlie Rose, which airs Monday night.
What about Edward Snowden, who says he revealed the government’s secret to expose abuses? Forty-four percent approve of what he did, while 52 percent disapprove. Should the U.S. government attempt to bring him back to U.S. soil and prosecute him? Fifty-four percent say yes, 42 percent say no.
Even as the economy picks up steam, the poll found that Obama’s disapproval rating on that issue has ticked up steadily over the first six months of the year, from 51 percent in January, to 54 percent in April, to 57 percent in June.
Is Obama honest and trustworthy? Fifty percent say no, up from 41 percent in mid-May, while 49 percent say yes, down from 58 percent.
Americans are sending mixed messages on the NSA surveillance controversy—43 percent say Obama has gone too far in restricting civil liberties in the name of national security, 38 percent agree with him that he’s found the right balance, and 17 percent say he hasn’t gone far enough.
At the same time, 51 percent say the administration was right to collect the telephone records of Americans. Forty-eight percent say it was wrong.
Approval soars to 66 percent regarding the government’s snooping on personal information over the Internet. Thirty-three percent say it was wrong. (CNN’s question phrasing might have something to do with that. “The government reportedly does not target Internet usage by U.S. citizens and if such data is collected, it is kept under strict controls.”)
Still, it’s not because people don’t think it hasn’t happened to them: 62 percent told CNN they thought the government had collected and stored data about their personal telephone and Internet. Thirty-four percent say they did not think so.
Does the federal government pose an immediate threat to the rights and freedoms of American citizens? A whopping 62 percent say it does, up from 56 percent the last time the question was asked, in February 2010.
The survey had an error margin of plus or minus 3 percentage points.
What suprises me is that anybody approves of Obama, but then again we are a nation of low information voters. More telling poll numbers would be the 75% of Americans who want Benghazi, the IRS scandal, and the AP phone tapping investigated to determine who is at fault for these crimes.
"Americans who will trade liberty for security will deserve and receive neither. "
Saturday, June 15, 2013
Liberal Joke
The conservative pulls out a GPS device and tells him exactly where he is. “You must be a conservative,” the balloon man says.
The man on the ground asks how he knows that.
The reply: “Everything you’ve told me is technically correct, I have no idea what to make of your information, and the fact is, I’m still lost. Frankly, you haven’t been very much help so far.”
The conservative replies that the balloon guy must be a liberal.
The liberal balloon guy asks, "How does he know?"
“You don’t know where you’re going or where you’ve been, you’ve risen to where you are on hot air, and you made a promise that you have no idea how to keep. Now you expect me to solve your problems. The fact is, you’re in the same place you were before we met and now it’s my fault!”
– from Roger Ailes, Fox News President and Chairman, who just won the Bradley Prize.
Tuesday, June 11, 2013
What Planet Is This Democrat Woman From?
You gotta give Mychal Massie credit for his extremely well written, and descriptive rants on idiots and liberals,...there I go again being redundant,....anyway, here's Mychal Massie on Daily Rant, Politics
I once said of Maureen Dowd, “Flatulence generally refers to gases generated in the intestines or stomach and expulsed through that end of the posterior that graces a saddle. Unless you are Maureen Dowd … then said gases are expulsed through the pen (or mouth – you choose) and are no less a poisonous, asphyxiating irritant to the atmosphere.” I said it because of the crude remarks she made in reference to Justice Clarence Thomas.
I find now that this observation is also applicable to another liberal, lunatic, hate-monger — State Senator Karen Carter Peterson (D-New Orleans). Additionally, in the case of this woman I might suggest the name of a good proctologist to assist her with her lordotic posture. Because her head being buried where it is, must be the reason she walks hunched over. It’s either that or she is bent over under the weight of the contempt she has for whites.
Just when I thought that Frau Debbie Wasserman-Shultz and Nancy Pelosi were as contemptible as it got for liberal Democrat women, Peterson slithers out of the Democrat
Jeff Crouere writing for the BayouBuzz.com said: “Last Tuesday, State Senator Karen Carter Peterson (D-New Orleans) hurled a verbal stink bomb at her Senate colleagues. On the State Senate floor, she made the reckless claim that several of her Senate colleagues were voting against the expansion of Medicaid in Louisiana because of ‘the race of this African American president.’”
Specifically she said: “It isn’t about the administration, and it should not be about the administration of the state nor federal level when it comes to Obamacare. But in fact it is. And why is that? I have talked to so many members in the House and Senate and you know what it comes down to? Are you ready for this? It is not about how many federal dollars we can receive. You ready? You want to know what it’s about? It’s about race. Now nobody wants to talk about that. It’s about the race of this African-American president. … It comes down to the race of the president of the U.S. which causes people to disconnect and step away from the substance of the bill.”
It is difficult to imagine a person from this planet saying something any more ridiculous even if they are a Democrat. Perhaps she should have an Estradiol test done or consider asking her doctor for fluoxetine. Her comments were offensive, absolutely racist, and morally opprobrious, but obviously not out of character for her.
But there is a bright side to her attempt to use race to bully her colleagues into supporting Obamacare. Crouere further reported, “After Peterson’s incendiary remarks, a prominent Louisiana State Senator Elbert Guillory switched his party affiliation to the GOP. Guillory becomes the first African American Republican State Senator in Louisiana since Reconstruction. Guillory called Louisiana Democrats the ‘party of disappointment.’ According to Guillory, Carter Peterson’s comments ‘certainly helped push me over the edge….it just showed me just how far out of tune I was, I am, with the Democrat Party.’”
Guillory may become just another Republican In Name Only (RINO), but at least he had the decency and willingness to express his consternation with more than silence and/or support for Peterson’s hateful screed.
Regardless at this point of what his voting record becomes, I tip my hat for his doing the right thing. I have repeatedly said we must be willing to do the right thing regardless of the names we are called. Peterson is a cancer on the fabric of civility, and it is time that the adults in the room start to act like responsible
It is one thing to disagree with a person’s viewpoint, but it is beyond contempt to voice it by using racial demagoguery as a bludgeon. Guillory sends a message to black children who are tempted to buckle under the weight of peer pressure to use racial epithets.
I do not believe Guillory is the only black political figure who feels as he does. But he is one of a very small handful to take the steps he did in expressing it.
One final thought. Those inclined to support and/or agree with Peterson might ask themselves what it was when we defeated Hillary’s healthcare proposal. Was that racism? Then again, to Peterson it probably was. In the twisted world of her mind, she would probably agree that it was racist white people who caused Hillarycare to fail in order to prevent blacks from getting healthcare.
It’s disgusting but true — in the absence of any ability to engage in reasonable debate people like Peterson use race as a fall-back argument. Even more egregious is that I doubt Peterson feels any shame for her hateful and punitive screed, and once the fingers of other liberal Democrats dry from checking which way the political wind is blowing they will join her in denouncing Guillory as a sellout and Uncle Tom.
I once said of Maureen Dowd, “Flatulence generally refers to gases generated in the intestines or stomach and expulsed through that end of the posterior that graces a saddle. Unless you are Maureen Dowd … then said gases are expulsed through the pen (or mouth – you choose) and are no less a poisonous, asphyxiating irritant to the atmosphere.” I said it because of the crude remarks she made in reference to Justice Clarence Thomas.
I find now that this observation is also applicable to another liberal, lunatic, hate-monger — State Senator Karen Carter Peterson (D-New Orleans). Additionally, in the case of this woman I might suggest the name of a good proctologist to assist her with her lordotic posture. Because her head being buried where it is, must be the reason she walks hunched over. It’s either that or she is bent over under the weight of the contempt she has for whites.
Just when I thought that Frau Debbie Wasserman-Shultz and Nancy Pelosi were as contemptible as it got for liberal Democrat women, Peterson slithers out of the Democrat
Jeff Crouere writing for the BayouBuzz.com said: “Last Tuesday, State Senator Karen Carter Peterson (D-New Orleans) hurled a verbal stink bomb at her Senate colleagues. On the State Senate floor, she made the reckless claim that several of her Senate colleagues were voting against the expansion of Medicaid in Louisiana because of ‘the race of this African American president.’”
Specifically she said: “It isn’t about the administration, and it should not be about the administration of the state nor federal level when it comes to Obamacare. But in fact it is. And why is that? I have talked to so many members in the House and Senate and you know what it comes down to? Are you ready for this? It is not about how many federal dollars we can receive. You ready? You want to know what it’s about? It’s about race. Now nobody wants to talk about that. It’s about the race of this African-American president. … It comes down to the race of the president of the U.S. which causes people to disconnect and step away from the substance of the bill.”
It is difficult to imagine a person from this planet saying something any more ridiculous even if they are a Democrat. Perhaps she should have an Estradiol test done or consider asking her doctor for fluoxetine. Her comments were offensive, absolutely racist, and morally opprobrious, but obviously not out of character for her.
But there is a bright side to her attempt to use race to bully her colleagues into supporting Obamacare. Crouere further reported, “After Peterson’s incendiary remarks, a prominent Louisiana State Senator Elbert Guillory switched his party affiliation to the GOP. Guillory becomes the first African American Republican State Senator in Louisiana since Reconstruction. Guillory called Louisiana Democrats the ‘party of disappointment.’ According to Guillory, Carter Peterson’s comments ‘certainly helped push me over the edge….it just showed me just how far out of tune I was, I am, with the Democrat Party.’”
Guillory may become just another Republican In Name Only (RINO), but at least he had the decency and willingness to express his consternation with more than silence and/or support for Peterson’s hateful screed.
Regardless at this point of what his voting record becomes, I tip my hat for his doing the right thing. I have repeatedly said we must be willing to do the right thing regardless of the names we are called. Peterson is a cancer on the fabric of civility, and it is time that the adults in the room start to act like responsible
It is one thing to disagree with a person’s viewpoint, but it is beyond contempt to voice it by using racial demagoguery as a bludgeon. Guillory sends a message to black children who are tempted to buckle under the weight of peer pressure to use racial epithets.
I do not believe Guillory is the only black political figure who feels as he does. But he is one of a very small handful to take the steps he did in expressing it.
One final thought. Those inclined to support and/or agree with Peterson might ask themselves what it was when we defeated Hillary’s healthcare proposal. Was that racism? Then again, to Peterson it probably was. In the twisted world of her mind, she would probably agree that it was racist white people who caused Hillarycare to fail in order to prevent blacks from getting healthcare.
It’s disgusting but true — in the absence of any ability to engage in reasonable debate people like Peterson use race as a fall-back argument. Even more egregious is that I doubt Peterson feels any shame for her hateful and punitive screed, and once the fingers of other liberal Democrats dry from checking which way the political wind is blowing they will join her in denouncing Guillory as a sellout and Uncle Tom.
Wednesday, May 8, 2013
Only in America - Canadian Version
Only in America - Canadian Version of David Letterman's Top 10 and good chance to see what Canadians think of what is going on in this country. Do we look like idiots or what? And this is all true, so let the Liberals explain that!
10) Only in America...could politicians talk about the greed of the rich at a $35,000.00 a plate campaign fund-raising event.
9) Only in America...could people claim that the government still discriminates against black Americans when they have a black President, a black Attorney General, and roughly 18% of the federal workforce is black while only 12% of the population is black.
8) Only in America...could they have had the two people most responsible for our tax code, Timothy Geithner (the head of the Treasury Department) and Charles Rangel (who once ran the Ways and Means Committee), BOTH turn out to be tax cheats who are in favor of higher taxes.
7) Only in America...can they have terrorists kill people in the name of Allah and have the media primarily react by fretting that Muslims might be harmed by the backlash.
6) Only in America...would they make people who want to legally become American citizens wait for years in their home countries and pay tens of thousands of dollars for the privilege, while they discuss letting anyone who sneaks into the country illegally just 'magically' become American citizens.
5) Only in America...could the people who believe in balancing the budget and sticking by the country's Constitution be thought of as "extremists."
4) Only in America...could you need to present a driver's license to cash a check or buy alcohol, but not to vote.
3) Only in America...could people demand the government investigate whether oil companies are gouging the public because the price of gas went up when the return on equity invested in a major U.S. oil company ( MarathonOil) is less than half of a company making tennis shoes (Nike).
2) Only in America...could the government collect more tax dollars from the people than any nation in recorded history, still spend a Trillion dollars more than it has per year - for total spending of $7-Million PER MINUTE, and complain that it doesn't have nearly enough money.
1) Only in America...could the rich people - who pay 86% of all income taxes - be accused of not paying their "fair share" by people who don't pay any income taxes at all.
10) Only in America...could politicians talk about the greed of the rich at a $35,000.00 a plate campaign fund-raising event.
9) Only in America...could people claim that the government still discriminates against black Americans when they have a black President, a black Attorney General, and roughly 18% of the federal workforce is black while only 12% of the population is black.
8) Only in America...could they have had the two people most responsible for our tax code, Timothy Geithner (the head of the Treasury Department) and Charles Rangel (who once ran the Ways and Means Committee), BOTH turn out to be tax cheats who are in favor of higher taxes.
7) Only in America...can they have terrorists kill people in the name of Allah and have the media primarily react by fretting that Muslims might be harmed by the backlash.
6) Only in America...would they make people who want to legally become American citizens wait for years in their home countries and pay tens of thousands of dollars for the privilege, while they discuss letting anyone who sneaks into the country illegally just 'magically' become American citizens.
5) Only in America...could the people who believe in balancing the budget and sticking by the country's Constitution be thought of as "extremists."
4) Only in America...could you need to present a driver's license to cash a check or buy alcohol, but not to vote.
3) Only in America...could people demand the government investigate whether oil companies are gouging the public because the price of gas went up when the return on equity invested in a major U.S. oil company ( MarathonOil) is less than half of a company making tennis shoes (Nike).
2) Only in America...could the government collect more tax dollars from the people than any nation in recorded history, still spend a Trillion dollars more than it has per year - for total spending of $7-Million PER MINUTE, and complain that it doesn't have nearly enough money.
1) Only in America...could the rich people - who pay 86% of all income taxes - be accused of not paying their "fair share" by people who don't pay any income taxes at all.
Thursday, March 28, 2013
Constitution Skirting Obama Executive Orders
Constitution Skirting Obama Executive Orders is the title of an article by Calvin Woodward and Richard Lardner of the Associated Press. This is what "Forward" looks like. Fast forward, even. President Barack Obama's campaign slogan is springing to life in a surge of executive directives and agency rule-making that touch many of the affairs of government. They are shaping the cost and quality of health plans, the contents of the school cafeteria, the front lines of future combat, the price of coal. They are the leading edge of Obama's ambition to take on climate change in ways that may be unachievable in legislation.
Altogether, it's a kinetic switch from what could have been the watchword of the Obama administration in the closing, politically hypersensitive months of his first term: pause.
Whatever the merits of any particular commandment from the president or his agencies, the perception of a government expanding its reach and hitting business with job-killing mandates was sure to set off fireworks before November.
Since Obama's re-election, regulations giving force and detail to his health care law have gushed out by the hundreds of pages. To some extent this was inevitable: The law is far-reaching and its most consequential deadlines are fast approaching.
The rules are much more than fine print, however, and they would have thickened the storm over the health care overhaul if placed on the radar in last year's presidential campaign. That, after all, was the season when some Republicans put the over-the-top label "death panel" on a board that could force cuts to service providers if Medicare spending ballooned.
The new health law rules provide leeway for insurers to charge smokers thousands of dollars more for coverage. They impose a $63 per-head fee on insurance plans — a charge that probably will be passed on to policyholders — to cushion the cost of covering people with medical problems. There's a new fee for insurance companies for participating in markets that start signing customers in the fall.
In short, sticker shock.
It's clear from the varied inventory of previously bottled-up directives that Obama cares about more than "Obamacare."
"I'm hearing we're going to see a lot of things moving now," Hilda Solis told employees in her last day as labor secretary. At the Labor Department, this could include regulations requiring that the nation's 1.8 million in-home care workers receive minimum-wage and overtime pay.
Tougher limits on soot from smokestacks, diesel trucks and other sources were announced just over a month after the Nov. 6 election. These were foreseen: The administration had tried to stall until the campaign ended but released the proposed rules in June when a judge ordered more haste.
Regulations give teeth and specificity to laws are essential to their functioning even as they create bureaucratic bloat. Congress-skirting executive orders and similar presidential directives are less numerous and generally have less reach than laws. But every president uses them and often tests how far they can go, especially in times of war and other crises.
President Harry Truman signed an executive order in 1952 directing the Commerce Department to take over the steel industry to ensure U.S. troops fighting in Korea were kept supplied with weapons and ammunition. The Supreme Court struck it down.
Other significant actions have stood.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued an order in February 1942 to relocate more than 110,000 Japanese-Americans living on the West Coast to internment camps after Japan's attack on the Pearl Harbor naval base. Decades later, Congress passed legislation apologizing and providing $20,000 to each person who was interned.
After the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, President George W. Bush approved a series of executive orders that created an office of homeland security, froze the assets in U.S. banks linked to al-Qaida and other terrorist groups, and authorized the military services to call reserve forces to active duty for as long as two years.
Bush's most contentious move came in the form of a military order approving the use of the military tribunals to put accused terrorists on trial faster and in greater secrecy than a regular criminal court.
Obama also has wielded considerable power in secret, upsetting the more liberal wing of his own party. He has carried forward Bush's key anti-terrorism policies and expanded the use of unmanned drone strikes against terrorist targets in Pakistan and Yemen.
When a promised immigration overhaul failed in legislation, Obama went part way there simply by ordering that immigrants brought illegally to the United States as children be exempted from deportation and granted work permits if they apply. So, too, the ban on gays serving openly in the military was repealed before the election, followed now by the order lifting the ban on women serving in combat.
Those measures did not prove especially contentious. Indeed, the step on immigration is thought to have helped Obama in the election. It may be a different story as the administration moves more forcefully across a range of policy fronts that sat quiet in much of his first term.
William Howell, a political science professor at the University of Chicago and the author of "Power Without Persuasion: The Politics of Direct Presidential Action," isn't surprised to see commandments coming at a rapid clip.
"In an era of polarized parties and a fragmented Congress, the opportunities to legislate are few and far between," Howell said. "So presidents have powerful incentive to go it alone. And they do."
And the political opposition howls.
Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., a possible contender for the Republican presidential nomination in 2016, said that on the gun-control front in particular, Obama is "abusing his power by imposing his policies via executive fiat instead of allowing them to be debated in Congress."
The Republican reaction is to be expected, said John Woolley, co-director of the American Presidency Project at the University of California in Santa Barbara.
"For years there has been a growing concern about unchecked executive power," Woolley said. "It tends to have a partisan content, with contemporary complaints coming from the incumbent president's opponents."
The power isn't limitless, as was demonstrated when Obama issued one of his first executive orders, calling for closing the military prison at the Guantanamo Bay naval base in Cuba and trying suspected terrorists housed there in federal courts instead of by special military tribunals. Congress stepped in to prohibit moving any Guantanamo prisoners to the U.S., effectively blocking Obama's plan to shutter the jail.
Among recent actions:
—Obama issued presidential memoranda on guns in tandem with his legislative effort to expand background checks and ban assault-type weapons and large capacity magazines. The steps include renewing federal gun research despite a law that has been interpreted as barring such research since 1996. Gun control was off the table in the campaign, as it had been for a decade, but the shooting at a Connecticut elementary school in December changed that overnight.
—The Labor Department approved new rules in January that could help save lives at dangerous mines with a pattern of safety violations. The rules were proposed shortly after an explosion killed 29 men at West Virginia's Upper Big Branch mine in 2010, deadliest mining accident in 40 years. The rules had been in limbo ever since because of objections from mine operators.
—The government proposed fat, calorie, sugar and sodium limits in almost all food sold in schools, extending federal nutritional controls beyond subsidized lunches to include food sold in school vending machines and a la carte cafeteria lines. The new proposals flow from a 2010 law and are among several sidelined during the campaign.
The law provoked an outcry from conservatives who said the government was empowering itself to squash school bake sales and should not be telling kids what to eat. Updated regulations last year on subsidized school lunches produced a backlash, too, altogether making the government shy of further food regulation until the election passed. The new rules leave school fundraisers clear of federal regulation, alleviating fears of cupcake-crushing edicts at bake sales and the like.
—The Justice Department released an opinion that people with food allergies can be considered to have the rights of disabled people. The finding exposes schools, restaurants and other food-service places to more legal risk if they don't accommodate patrons with food allergies.
—The White House said Obama intends to move forward on rules controlling carbon emissions from power plants as a central part of the effort to restrain climate change, which the president rarely talked about after global-warming legislation failed in his first term. With a major climate bill unlikely to get though a divided Congress, Obama is expected to rely on his executive authority to achieve whatever progress he makes on climate change.
The Environmental Protection Agency is expected to complete the first-ever limits on carbon pollution from new coal-fired power plants. The agency also probably will press ahead on rules for existing power plants, despite protests from industry and Republicans that such rules would raise electricity prices and kill off coal, the dominant U.S. energy source. Older coal-fired power plants have been shutting across the country because of low natural gas prices and weaker demand for electricity.
—In December, the government proposed long-delayed rules requiring automakers to install event data recorders, or "black boxes," in all new cars and light trucks beginning Sept. 1, 2014. Most new cars are already getting them.
—The EPA proposed rules to update water quality guidelines for beaches and control runoff from logging roads.
As well, a new ozone rule probably will be completed this year, which would mean finally moving forward on a smog-control standard sidelined in 2011.
A regulation directing federal contractors to hire more disabled workers is somewhere in the offing at the Labor Department, as are ones to protect workers from lung-damaging silica and reduce the risk of deadly factory explosions from dust produced in the making of chemicals, plastics and metals.
Rules also are overdue on genetically modified salmon, catfish inspection, the definition of gluten-free in labeling and food import inspection. In one of the most closely watched cases, Obama could decide early this year whether to approve the Keystone XL oil pipeline from Canada to Texas.
Altogether, it's a kinetic switch from what could have been the watchword of the Obama administration in the closing, politically hypersensitive months of his first term: pause.
Whatever the merits of any particular commandment from the president or his agencies, the perception of a government expanding its reach and hitting business with job-killing mandates was sure to set off fireworks before November.
Since Obama's re-election, regulations giving force and detail to his health care law have gushed out by the hundreds of pages. To some extent this was inevitable: The law is far-reaching and its most consequential deadlines are fast approaching.
The rules are much more than fine print, however, and they would have thickened the storm over the health care overhaul if placed on the radar in last year's presidential campaign. That, after all, was the season when some Republicans put the over-the-top label "death panel" on a board that could force cuts to service providers if Medicare spending ballooned.
The new health law rules provide leeway for insurers to charge smokers thousands of dollars more for coverage. They impose a $63 per-head fee on insurance plans — a charge that probably will be passed on to policyholders — to cushion the cost of covering people with medical problems. There's a new fee for insurance companies for participating in markets that start signing customers in the fall.
In short, sticker shock.
It's clear from the varied inventory of previously bottled-up directives that Obama cares about more than "Obamacare."
"I'm hearing we're going to see a lot of things moving now," Hilda Solis told employees in her last day as labor secretary. At the Labor Department, this could include regulations requiring that the nation's 1.8 million in-home care workers receive minimum-wage and overtime pay.
Tougher limits on soot from smokestacks, diesel trucks and other sources were announced just over a month after the Nov. 6 election. These were foreseen: The administration had tried to stall until the campaign ended but released the proposed rules in June when a judge ordered more haste.
Regulations give teeth and specificity to laws are essential to their functioning even as they create bureaucratic bloat. Congress-skirting executive orders and similar presidential directives are less numerous and generally have less reach than laws. But every president uses them and often tests how far they can go, especially in times of war and other crises.
President Harry Truman signed an executive order in 1952 directing the Commerce Department to take over the steel industry to ensure U.S. troops fighting in Korea were kept supplied with weapons and ammunition. The Supreme Court struck it down.
Other significant actions have stood.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued an order in February 1942 to relocate more than 110,000 Japanese-Americans living on the West Coast to internment camps after Japan's attack on the Pearl Harbor naval base. Decades later, Congress passed legislation apologizing and providing $20,000 to each person who was interned.
After the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, President George W. Bush approved a series of executive orders that created an office of homeland security, froze the assets in U.S. banks linked to al-Qaida and other terrorist groups, and authorized the military services to call reserve forces to active duty for as long as two years.
Bush's most contentious move came in the form of a military order approving the use of the military tribunals to put accused terrorists on trial faster and in greater secrecy than a regular criminal court.
Obama also has wielded considerable power in secret, upsetting the more liberal wing of his own party. He has carried forward Bush's key anti-terrorism policies and expanded the use of unmanned drone strikes against terrorist targets in Pakistan and Yemen.
When a promised immigration overhaul failed in legislation, Obama went part way there simply by ordering that immigrants brought illegally to the United States as children be exempted from deportation and granted work permits if they apply. So, too, the ban on gays serving openly in the military was repealed before the election, followed now by the order lifting the ban on women serving in combat.
Those measures did not prove especially contentious. Indeed, the step on immigration is thought to have helped Obama in the election. It may be a different story as the administration moves more forcefully across a range of policy fronts that sat quiet in much of his first term.
William Howell, a political science professor at the University of Chicago and the author of "Power Without Persuasion: The Politics of Direct Presidential Action," isn't surprised to see commandments coming at a rapid clip.
"In an era of polarized parties and a fragmented Congress, the opportunities to legislate are few and far between," Howell said. "So presidents have powerful incentive to go it alone. And they do."
And the political opposition howls.
Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., a possible contender for the Republican presidential nomination in 2016, said that on the gun-control front in particular, Obama is "abusing his power by imposing his policies via executive fiat instead of allowing them to be debated in Congress."
The Republican reaction is to be expected, said John Woolley, co-director of the American Presidency Project at the University of California in Santa Barbara.
"For years there has been a growing concern about unchecked executive power," Woolley said. "It tends to have a partisan content, with contemporary complaints coming from the incumbent president's opponents."
The power isn't limitless, as was demonstrated when Obama issued one of his first executive orders, calling for closing the military prison at the Guantanamo Bay naval base in Cuba and trying suspected terrorists housed there in federal courts instead of by special military tribunals. Congress stepped in to prohibit moving any Guantanamo prisoners to the U.S., effectively blocking Obama's plan to shutter the jail.
Among recent actions:
—Obama issued presidential memoranda on guns in tandem with his legislative effort to expand background checks and ban assault-type weapons and large capacity magazines. The steps include renewing federal gun research despite a law that has been interpreted as barring such research since 1996. Gun control was off the table in the campaign, as it had been for a decade, but the shooting at a Connecticut elementary school in December changed that overnight.
—The Labor Department approved new rules in January that could help save lives at dangerous mines with a pattern of safety violations. The rules were proposed shortly after an explosion killed 29 men at West Virginia's Upper Big Branch mine in 2010, deadliest mining accident in 40 years. The rules had been in limbo ever since because of objections from mine operators.
—The government proposed fat, calorie, sugar and sodium limits in almost all food sold in schools, extending federal nutritional controls beyond subsidized lunches to include food sold in school vending machines and a la carte cafeteria lines. The new proposals flow from a 2010 law and are among several sidelined during the campaign.
The law provoked an outcry from conservatives who said the government was empowering itself to squash school bake sales and should not be telling kids what to eat. Updated regulations last year on subsidized school lunches produced a backlash, too, altogether making the government shy of further food regulation until the election passed. The new rules leave school fundraisers clear of federal regulation, alleviating fears of cupcake-crushing edicts at bake sales and the like.
—The Justice Department released an opinion that people with food allergies can be considered to have the rights of disabled people. The finding exposes schools, restaurants and other food-service places to more legal risk if they don't accommodate patrons with food allergies.
—The White House said Obama intends to move forward on rules controlling carbon emissions from power plants as a central part of the effort to restrain climate change, which the president rarely talked about after global-warming legislation failed in his first term. With a major climate bill unlikely to get though a divided Congress, Obama is expected to rely on his executive authority to achieve whatever progress he makes on climate change.
The Environmental Protection Agency is expected to complete the first-ever limits on carbon pollution from new coal-fired power plants. The agency also probably will press ahead on rules for existing power plants, despite protests from industry and Republicans that such rules would raise electricity prices and kill off coal, the dominant U.S. energy source. Older coal-fired power plants have been shutting across the country because of low natural gas prices and weaker demand for electricity.
—In December, the government proposed long-delayed rules requiring automakers to install event data recorders, or "black boxes," in all new cars and light trucks beginning Sept. 1, 2014. Most new cars are already getting them.
—The EPA proposed rules to update water quality guidelines for beaches and control runoff from logging roads.
As well, a new ozone rule probably will be completed this year, which would mean finally moving forward on a smog-control standard sidelined in 2011.
A regulation directing federal contractors to hire more disabled workers is somewhere in the offing at the Labor Department, as are ones to protect workers from lung-damaging silica and reduce the risk of deadly factory explosions from dust produced in the making of chemicals, plastics and metals.
Rules also are overdue on genetically modified salmon, catfish inspection, the definition of gluten-free in labeling and food import inspection. In one of the most closely watched cases, Obama could decide early this year whether to approve the Keystone XL oil pipeline from Canada to Texas.
Saturday, March 23, 2013
The Heaviest Element Known to Science
Breaking News!! Lawrence Livermore Laboratories has discovered the heaviest element yet known to science.
The new element, Governmentium (Gv), has one neutron, 25 assistant neutrons, 88 deputy neutrons, and 198 assistant deputy neutrons, giving it an atomic mass of 312.
These 312 particles are held together by forces called morons, which are surrounded by vast quantities of lepton-like particles called peons.
Since Governmentium has no electrons, it is inert; however, it can be detected, because it impedes every reaction with which it comes into contact. A tiny amount of Governmentium can cause a reaction that would normally take less than a second, to take from 4 days to 4 years to complete.
Governmentium has a normal half-life of 2- 6 years. It does not decay, but instead undergoes a reorganization in which a portion of the assistant neutrons and deputy neutrons exchange places.
In fact, Governmentium's mass will actually increase over time, since each reorganization will cause more morons to become neutrons, forming isodopes.
This characteristic of morons promotion leads some scientists to believe that Governmentium is formed whenever morons reach a critical concentration. This hypothetical quantity is referred to as critical morass.
When catalyzed with money, Governmentium becomes Administratium, an element that radiates just as much energy as Governmentium since it has half as many peons but twice as many morons.
The new element, Governmentium (Gv), has one neutron, 25 assistant neutrons, 88 deputy neutrons, and 198 assistant deputy neutrons, giving it an atomic mass of 312.
These 312 particles are held together by forces called morons, which are surrounded by vast quantities of lepton-like particles called peons.
Since Governmentium has no electrons, it is inert; however, it can be detected, because it impedes every reaction with which it comes into contact. A tiny amount of Governmentium can cause a reaction that would normally take less than a second, to take from 4 days to 4 years to complete.
Governmentium has a normal half-life of 2- 6 years. It does not decay, but instead undergoes a reorganization in which a portion of the assistant neutrons and deputy neutrons exchange places.
In fact, Governmentium's mass will actually increase over time, since each reorganization will cause more morons to become neutrons, forming isodopes.
This characteristic of morons promotion leads some scientists to believe that Governmentium is formed whenever morons reach a critical concentration. This hypothetical quantity is referred to as critical morass.
When catalyzed with money, Governmentium becomes Administratium, an element that radiates just as much energy as Governmentium since it has half as many peons but twice as many morons.
Monday, March 4, 2013
Best Citizen Speech in a Long Time
Dan Bongino, a former Secret Service agent, ran for the U.S. Senate in his home state of Maryland last fall. He lost, go figure,...Maryland after all,.....and as he was closing up his campaign office when the news media reached him for comment. Mr. Bongino had became a local voice in the gun control debate after a previous speech at a Guns Across America event in Annapolis, Maryland.
Mr. Bongino speculated that the potential and threatening new gun laws coming to Maryland had the final intent of confiscation. “The legislation they are close to passing is a path to confiscation.” Dan Bongino said.
Watch Dan speaking below. What is remarkable is that he speaks from the heart and not from notes, talking points or as tele-prompter. Hopefully America will be hearing more from Dan Bongino.
Mr. Bongino speculated that the potential and threatening new gun laws coming to Maryland had the final intent of confiscation. “The legislation they are close to passing is a path to confiscation.” Dan Bongino said.
Watch Dan speaking below. What is remarkable is that he speaks from the heart and not from notes, talking points or as tele-prompter. Hopefully America will be hearing more from Dan Bongino.
Wednesday, February 27, 2013
Disillusioned with Obama
This editorial from the Washington Post, hopefully, is the beginning of a trend in previously blind Obama supporters in the national media coming to their senses and using the evidence of plain, cold facts to judge Obama.
By Matt Patterson (columnist - Washington Post, New York Post, San Francisco Examiner):
Years from now, historians may regard the 2008 election of Barack Obama as an inscrutable and disturbing phenomenon, the result of a baffling breed of mass hysteria akin perhaps to the witch craze of the Middle Ages. How, they will wonder, did a man so devoid of professional accomplishment beguile so many into thinking he could manage the world's largest economy, direct the world's most powerful military, execute the world's most consequential job? Imagine a future historian examining Obama's pre-presidential life: ushered into and through the Ivy League despite unremarkable grades and test scores along the way; a cushy non-job as a "community organizer"; a brief career as a state legislator devoid of legislative achievement (and in fact nearly devoid of his attention, so often did he vote "present"); and finally an unaccomplished single term in the United States Senate, the entirety of which was devoted to his presidential ambitions.
He left no academic legacy in academia, authored no signature legislation as a legislator. And then there is the matter of his troubling associations: the white-hating, America-loathing preacher who for decades served as Obama's "spiritual mentor"; a real-life, actual terrorist who served as Obama's colleague and political sponsor. It is easy to imagine a future historian looking at it all and asking: how on Earth was such a man elected president?
Not content to wait for history, the incomparable Norman Podhoretz addressed the question recently in the Wall Street Journal: To be sure, no white candidate who had close associations with an outspoken hater of America like Jeremiah Wright and an unrepentant terrorist like Bill Ayers, would have lasted a single day. But because Mr. Obama was black, and therefore entitled in the eyes of liberal Dom to have hung out with protesters against various American injustices, even if they were a bit extreme, he was given a pass. Let that sink in: Obama was given a pass - held to a lower standard - because of the color of his skin.
Podhoretz continues: And in any case, what did such ancient history matter when he was also so articulate and elegant and (as he himself had said) "non-threatening," all of which gave him a fighting chance to become the first black president and thereby to lay the curse of racism to rest?
Podhoretz puts his finger, I think, on the animating pulse of the Obama phenomenon - affirmative action. Not in the legal sense, of course. But certainly in the motivating sentiment behind all affirmative action laws and regulations, which are designed primarily to make white people, and especially white liberals, feel good about themselves.
Unfortunately, minorities often suffer so that whites can pat themselves on the back. Liberals routinely admit minorities to schools for which they are not qualified, yet take no responsibility for the inevitable poor performance and high drop-out rates which follow. Liberals don't care if these minority students fail; liberals aren't around to witness the emotional devastation and deflated self-esteem resulting from the racist policy that is affirmative action. Yes, racist. Holding someone to a separate standard merely because of the color of his skin - that's affirmative action in a nutshell, and if that isn't racism, then nothing is.
And that is what America did to Obama. True, Obama himself was never troubled by his lack of achievements, but why would he be? As many have noted, Obama was told he was good enough for Columbia despite undistinguished grades at Occidental; he was told he was good enough for the US Senate despite a mediocre record in Illinois ; he was told he was good enough to be president despite no record at all in the Senate. All his life, every step of the way, Obama was told he was good enough for the next step, in spite of ample evidence to the contrary.
What could this breed if not the sort of empty narcissism on display every time Obama speaks? In 2008, many who agreed that he lacked executive qualifications nonetheless raved about Obama's oratory skills, intellect, and cool character. Those people - conservatives included - ought now to be deeply embarrassed.
The man thinks and speaks in the hoariest of clichés, and that's when he has his Teleprompters in front of him; when the prompter is absent he can barely think or speak at all. Not one original idea has ever issued from his mouth - it's all warmed-over Marxism of the kind that has failed over and over again for 100 years.
And what about his character?
Obama is constantly blaming anything and everything else for his troubles. Bush did it; it was bad luck; I inherited this mess. It is embarrassing to see a president so willing to advertise his own powerlessness, so comfortable with his own incompetence. But really, what were we to expect? The man has never been responsible for anything, so how do we expect him to act responsibly?
In short: our president is a small and small-minded man, with neither the temperament nor the intellect to handle his job. When you understand that, and only when you understand that, will the current erosion of liberty and prosperity make sense. It could not have gone otherwise with such a man in the Oval Office.
By Matt Patterson (columnist - Washington Post, New York Post, San Francisco Examiner):
Years from now, historians may regard the 2008 election of Barack Obama as an inscrutable and disturbing phenomenon, the result of a baffling breed of mass hysteria akin perhaps to the witch craze of the Middle Ages. How, they will wonder, did a man so devoid of professional accomplishment beguile so many into thinking he could manage the world's largest economy, direct the world's most powerful military, execute the world's most consequential job? Imagine a future historian examining Obama's pre-presidential life: ushered into and through the Ivy League despite unremarkable grades and test scores along the way; a cushy non-job as a "community organizer"; a brief career as a state legislator devoid of legislative achievement (and in fact nearly devoid of his attention, so often did he vote "present"); and finally an unaccomplished single term in the United States Senate, the entirety of which was devoted to his presidential ambitions.
He left no academic legacy in academia, authored no signature legislation as a legislator. And then there is the matter of his troubling associations: the white-hating, America-loathing preacher who for decades served as Obama's "spiritual mentor"; a real-life, actual terrorist who served as Obama's colleague and political sponsor. It is easy to imagine a future historian looking at it all and asking: how on Earth was such a man elected president?
Not content to wait for history, the incomparable Norman Podhoretz addressed the question recently in the Wall Street Journal: To be sure, no white candidate who had close associations with an outspoken hater of America like Jeremiah Wright and an unrepentant terrorist like Bill Ayers, would have lasted a single day. But because Mr. Obama was black, and therefore entitled in the eyes of liberal Dom to have hung out with protesters against various American injustices, even if they were a bit extreme, he was given a pass. Let that sink in: Obama was given a pass - held to a lower standard - because of the color of his skin.
Podhoretz continues: And in any case, what did such ancient history matter when he was also so articulate and elegant and (as he himself had said) "non-threatening," all of which gave him a fighting chance to become the first black president and thereby to lay the curse of racism to rest?
Podhoretz puts his finger, I think, on the animating pulse of the Obama phenomenon - affirmative action. Not in the legal sense, of course. But certainly in the motivating sentiment behind all affirmative action laws and regulations, which are designed primarily to make white people, and especially white liberals, feel good about themselves.
Unfortunately, minorities often suffer so that whites can pat themselves on the back. Liberals routinely admit minorities to schools for which they are not qualified, yet take no responsibility for the inevitable poor performance and high drop-out rates which follow. Liberals don't care if these minority students fail; liberals aren't around to witness the emotional devastation and deflated self-esteem resulting from the racist policy that is affirmative action. Yes, racist. Holding someone to a separate standard merely because of the color of his skin - that's affirmative action in a nutshell, and if that isn't racism, then nothing is.
And that is what America did to Obama. True, Obama himself was never troubled by his lack of achievements, but why would he be? As many have noted, Obama was told he was good enough for Columbia despite undistinguished grades at Occidental; he was told he was good enough for the US Senate despite a mediocre record in Illinois ; he was told he was good enough to be president despite no record at all in the Senate. All his life, every step of the way, Obama was told he was good enough for the next step, in spite of ample evidence to the contrary.
What could this breed if not the sort of empty narcissism on display every time Obama speaks? In 2008, many who agreed that he lacked executive qualifications nonetheless raved about Obama's oratory skills, intellect, and cool character. Those people - conservatives included - ought now to be deeply embarrassed.
The man thinks and speaks in the hoariest of clichés, and that's when he has his Teleprompters in front of him; when the prompter is absent he can barely think or speak at all. Not one original idea has ever issued from his mouth - it's all warmed-over Marxism of the kind that has failed over and over again for 100 years.
And what about his character?
Obama is constantly blaming anything and everything else for his troubles. Bush did it; it was bad luck; I inherited this mess. It is embarrassing to see a president so willing to advertise his own powerlessness, so comfortable with his own incompetence. But really, what were we to expect? The man has never been responsible for anything, so how do we expect him to act responsibly?
In short: our president is a small and small-minded man, with neither the temperament nor the intellect to handle his job. When you understand that, and only when you understand that, will the current erosion of liberty and prosperity make sense. It could not have gone otherwise with such a man in the Oval Office.
Monday, February 25, 2013
Did God Intentionally Make Liberals?
Great you tube video on the Creator making Liberals. But I take offense to this. As God is perfect how could he make such a mistake?,...oh I get it,..it's a joke on the rest of us. God does have a sense of humor.
Tuesday, January 29, 2013
Bob Schieffer likens Obama Gun Control as defeating the Nazis
Really!! Not! Schieffer is a extreme butt clown. That's him peeking between Romney and Obama like the little worm he is. As you'll remember during this Presidential Campaign debate, Bob the worm backed up Obama on Obama contention that he called the Libyan attacks a Terrorist attack all along. Of course, the record indicates otherwise, but when do Liberals worry about the truth? When confronted with the truth, they change the questions.
Back to dead beat Bob's statement: First of all, President Johnson was only successful in passing Civil Rights legislation because Republicans supported it. The Democrats fought hard to defeat it. This fact is conveniently hid from the history books.
Second of all, Roosevelt did not defeat Hitler and Nazi Germany. American men did, and they saw first hand the results of a disarmed population who could not fight back against aggressive tryanny.
Monday, January 21, 2013
Colin Powell, A Disappointment
I am a Mychel Massie fan and wanted to share his recent post this about Colin Powell, who was once thought of as an American hero but now is sadly seeking attention and blatantly defending Obama's indefensible and reprehensible race baiting, class warfare and path to disaster for this country on all fronts,...economic, social and militarily.
Mychal Massie say's it best:
Colin Powell is beyond a disappointment to those who hailed him as a remarkable success story who exemplified not only the best of America, but who epitomized the standard of opportunity that existed for everyone in America. But today he comes across as a petulant race-monger who is eager to blame disapproval of Obama on racism and/or prejudice.
Appearing on "Meet the Press" January 13, Powell accused the Party that made him one of the most important and powerful men in the world of being racially intolerant. Which is just another way of calling the Republican Party racist.
Powell was feigning exception to what he viewed as racist code-speak about Obama. Accusations that Obama was "lazy" in preparing for the first presidential debate, to Powell was a synonym for "shiftless" which screamed racism. Powell strongly insinuated the Republican who called Obama "lazy" of lefthandedly calling Obama a "lazy N-word." He accused another Republican who referenced Obama as "shuckin' and jivin'," of being racist.
Let me note that Obama is lazy. And anyone watching his mac-daddy ghetto swagger and/or listening to his pernicious pontificating would be hard-pressed not to say he was a classic example of "shuckin' and jivin'."
Many will call Powell a shameful traitor to the party he had represented, but I think there is more at work with his statements.
I believe Powell is, in military terms, "softening the ground." He is laying the groundwork to further reduce any criticism of Obama policies to being racist. The media blather will be "even General Powell, the former Secretary of State, says," blah-blah-blah. You can bet on it. Of course it will be forgotten that liberals and blacks called Powell a token coon, sell-out, and Uncle Tom when he was in the Bush Administration.
Obama is up to something that is going to bring on much criticism, and Powell is out front softening the ground so as to disallow cogent objections.
I should also say that I find it interesting that Powell had no problems with the Republican Party when he was flying around the world on Air Force One, and/or when he was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, or when he was being asked to bear the Republican standard by becoming the Party's candidate for President. Powell's latent disingenuousness is an insult and offense to those of reasonable minds.
Mychal Massie say's it best:
Colin Powell is beyond a disappointment to those who hailed him as a remarkable success story who exemplified not only the best of America, but who epitomized the standard of opportunity that existed for everyone in America. But today he comes across as a petulant race-monger who is eager to blame disapproval of Obama on racism and/or prejudice.
Appearing on "Meet the Press" January 13, Powell accused the Party that made him one of the most important and powerful men in the world of being racially intolerant. Which is just another way of calling the Republican Party racist.
Powell was feigning exception to what he viewed as racist code-speak about Obama. Accusations that Obama was "lazy" in preparing for the first presidential debate, to Powell was a synonym for "shiftless" which screamed racism. Powell strongly insinuated the Republican who called Obama "lazy" of lefthandedly calling Obama a "lazy N-word." He accused another Republican who referenced Obama as "shuckin' and jivin'," of being racist.
Let me note that Obama is lazy. And anyone watching his mac-daddy ghetto swagger and/or listening to his pernicious pontificating would be hard-pressed not to say he was a classic example of "shuckin' and jivin'."
Many will call Powell a shameful traitor to the party he had represented, but I think there is more at work with his statements.
I believe Powell is, in military terms, "softening the ground." He is laying the groundwork to further reduce any criticism of Obama policies to being racist. The media blather will be "even General Powell, the former Secretary of State, says," blah-blah-blah. You can bet on it. Of course it will be forgotten that liberals and blacks called Powell a token coon, sell-out, and Uncle Tom when he was in the Bush Administration.
Obama is up to something that is going to bring on much criticism, and Powell is out front softening the ground so as to disallow cogent objections.
I should also say that I find it interesting that Powell had no problems with the Republican Party when he was flying around the world on Air Force One, and/or when he was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, or when he was being asked to bear the Republican standard by becoming the Party's candidate for President. Powell's latent disingenuousness is an insult and offense to those of reasonable minds.
Monday, January 7, 2013
Al Gore Sells Out to Radical Islamist Supporters
Gaining very little traction in the liberal, mainstream press is the story of former Vice President Al Gore selling his Current TV channel to Al Jazeera for somewhere in the $500 million price range.
Al Gore, of course, is the leading propagandist on global warning and had made every effort to get Americans either through choice or regulation to quit using fossil fuel based sources, reducing their carbon footprints. Ever the hypocrite, Gore maintains a giant mansion in Tennessee using butt loads of energy in a common liberal trait of "do as I say and not as I do" otherwise known as "we elites are exempt from mandates for the common man".
The hypocritcal thing, since Gore supports higher taxes on the rich, is that Gore hurried to get this sale done in 2012 before the Obama forced higher tax rates would have greatly diminshed his profits from this sale if enacted in 2013.
Another telling fact is that Gore rejected Glenn Beck and The Blaze's offer to buy Current TV. Beck was reportedly told that "the legacy of who the (Current TV) network goes to is important to the owners and we (Current TV) are sensitive to networks not aligned with our point of view."
Well then I guess that Al Jazeera must be aligned with Al Gore and Current TV's point of view for the sale of Al Jazeera to go through.
Let's see what Al Jazeera, owned by the Qatari Government believes in:
Islamic beliefs traditions provide are the foundation of the country’s customs, laws. Shariah law is the standard in Qatar.
Homosexual activity is outlawed; Gays are prohibited from living in Qatar. And Women have minimal rights.
So the views of Al Jazeera are closer to Al Gore and the liberal Current TV than Glenn Beck, a conservative, Christian. Really?..........This is another slap in the face America and our traditions by the two faced liberals, in this case led by that stinking pole cat Al Gore. In any case, good riddance.
Al Gore, of course, is the leading propagandist on global warning and had made every effort to get Americans either through choice or regulation to quit using fossil fuel based sources, reducing their carbon footprints. Ever the hypocrite, Gore maintains a giant mansion in Tennessee using butt loads of energy in a common liberal trait of "do as I say and not as I do" otherwise known as "we elites are exempt from mandates for the common man".
The hypocritcal thing, since Gore supports higher taxes on the rich, is that Gore hurried to get this sale done in 2012 before the Obama forced higher tax rates would have greatly diminshed his profits from this sale if enacted in 2013.
Another telling fact is that Gore rejected Glenn Beck and The Blaze's offer to buy Current TV. Beck was reportedly told that "the legacy of who the (Current TV) network goes to is important to the owners and we (Current TV) are sensitive to networks not aligned with our point of view."
Well then I guess that Al Jazeera must be aligned with Al Gore and Current TV's point of view for the sale of Al Jazeera to go through.
Let's see what Al Jazeera, owned by the Qatari Government believes in:
Islamic beliefs traditions provide are the foundation of the country’s customs, laws. Shariah law is the standard in Qatar.
Homosexual activity is outlawed; Gays are prohibited from living in Qatar. And Women have minimal rights.
So the views of Al Jazeera are closer to Al Gore and the liberal Current TV than Glenn Beck, a conservative, Christian. Really?..........This is another slap in the face America and our traditions by the two faced liberals, in this case led by that stinking pole cat Al Gore. In any case, good riddance.
Sunday, January 6, 2013
Chuck Hagel as Secretary of Defense?
From an Associated Press article — Former Nebraska Sen. Chuck Hagel is a contrarian Republican moderate and decorated Vietnam combat veteran who is likely to support a more rapid withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan.
As President Barack Obama's top candidate for defense secretary, Hagel has another credential important to the president: a personal relationship with Obama, forged when they were in the Senate and strengthened during overseas trips they took together.
Cowboys and Tea Parties comment: On the surface, Hagel appears to be a moderate choice for Obama given Obama's very radical and extremely unqualified cabinent. However, Carl Levin's support of Hagel is disconcerting as is Hagel's own comment's about Sarah Palin being unqualified for Vice-President when Obama became President within much, much less experience (or even common sense). Hagel's non-supportive comments over Israel are very troubling as well. A major point over Hagel's decision making may also come into question as Hagel's opinions on troop surges and strategy in Afghanistan were dead wrong.
Hagel, 66, emerged several weeks ago as the front-runner for the Pentagon's top job, four years after leaving behind a Senate career in which he carved out a reputation as an independent thinker and blunt speaker.
Wounded during the Vietnam War, Hagel backed the Iraq war, but later became a fierce and credible critic of the Bush administration's war policies, making routine trips to Iraq and Afghanistan. He opposed President George W. Bush's plan to send an additional 30,000 troops into Iraq — a move that has been credited with stabilizing the chaotic country — as "the most dangerous foreign policy blunder in this country since Vietnam, if it's carried out."
While Hagel supported the Afghanistan war resolution, over time he has become more critical of the decade-plus conflict, with its complex nation-building effort.
Often seeing the Afghan war through the lens of his service in Vietnam, Hagel has declared that militaries are "built to fight and win wars, not bind together failing nations." In a radio interview this year, he spoke broadly of the need for greater diplomacy as the appropriate path in Afghanistan, noting that "the American people want out" of the war.
If nominated — an announcement could come this week — and confirmed by the Senate, Hagel would succeed Defense Secretary Leon Panetta. Panetta has made it clear he intends to leave early next year, but has not publicly discussed the timing of his departure. He took the Pentagon job in July 2011.
At the same time, Obama is considering one of Hagel's former Senate colleagues, Democrat John Kerry of Massachusetts, for the job of secretary of state.
To political and defense insiders, Obama's preference for Hagel makes sense.
The former senator shares many of the same ideals of Obama's first Pentagon leader, Republican Robert Gates. When Obama became president in 2009, he asked Gates to remain as defense secretary. Both Hagel and Gates talk of the need for global answers to regional conflicts and an emphasis on so-called soft power, including economic and political aid, to bolster weak nations.
"A Hagel nomination signals an interest in, and a commitment to continuing a bipartisan approach to national security," said David Berteau, senior vice president at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
He said that Hagel's two terms in the Senate, before he retired in 2009, spanned the latter years of the post-Cold War military drawdown and the post-Sept. 11 buildup. "From a budget point of view he has seen both ends of the spectrum and that gives him a good perspective to start from."
Hagel's possible selection has been met with initial praise from key members of the Senate, including the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., who said Hagel would be "terrific."
The choice could trigger opposition from some Jewish groups and may worry Democrats concerned about Israel-related issues. Hagel has criticized discussion of a military strike by either the U.S. or Israel against Iran. He also has backed efforts to bring Iran to the table for talks on future peace in Afghanistan.
"The appointment of Chuck Hagel would be a slap in the face for every American who is concerned about the safety of Israel," said Matt Brooks, executive director of the Republican Jewish Coalition.
Hagel often straddled party lines and had some high-profile dustups with his Republican colleagues.
In 2008, he criticized GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, saying she lacked foreign policy credentials and that it would be "a stretch" to consider her qualified to become president. His wife, Lilibet Hagel, endorsed Obama in his first run for president. Hagel also was mentioned as a possible candidate for Pentagon chief when Obama was first elected.
As defense secretary, Hagel would preside over the withdrawal of combat troops from Afghanistan and the waning days of the war, and would direct some of the steepest cuts in Pentagon spending in years. His task would be to restructure a pared down military that can step away from the grinding wars of the past 11 years and refocus on a swath of regional challenges from Syria, Iran and North Korea to terrorism in Africa and the defense buildup in the Pacific.
A big benefit will be his experience and his allies on Capitol Hill.
"Certainly his name coming forward is one I'm very open to," said Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., who served with Hagel on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. "I had good relations with him while he was in the Senate. Certainly (he's) a veteran and someone who also spent a lot of time around the world understanding the relations other countries have with the U.S. and vice versa."
Defense analyst Loren Thompson, of the Virginia-based Lexington Institute think tank, said Hagel knows the political system and is known for thinking outside the box, which would help as budget cuts move forward.
"He's a veteran who understands how Congress works and has stayed plugged in to developments in defense policy," Thompson said. "He is not tied to the status quo and will think creatively about how to manage America's military forces."
As President Barack Obama's top candidate for defense secretary, Hagel has another credential important to the president: a personal relationship with Obama, forged when they were in the Senate and strengthened during overseas trips they took together.
Cowboys and Tea Parties comment: On the surface, Hagel appears to be a moderate choice for Obama given Obama's very radical and extremely unqualified cabinent. However, Carl Levin's support of Hagel is disconcerting as is Hagel's own comment's about Sarah Palin being unqualified for Vice-President when Obama became President within much, much less experience (or even common sense). Hagel's non-supportive comments over Israel are very troubling as well. A major point over Hagel's decision making may also come into question as Hagel's opinions on troop surges and strategy in Afghanistan were dead wrong.
Hagel, 66, emerged several weeks ago as the front-runner for the Pentagon's top job, four years after leaving behind a Senate career in which he carved out a reputation as an independent thinker and blunt speaker.
Wounded during the Vietnam War, Hagel backed the Iraq war, but later became a fierce and credible critic of the Bush administration's war policies, making routine trips to Iraq and Afghanistan. He opposed President George W. Bush's plan to send an additional 30,000 troops into Iraq — a move that has been credited with stabilizing the chaotic country — as "the most dangerous foreign policy blunder in this country since Vietnam, if it's carried out."
While Hagel supported the Afghanistan war resolution, over time he has become more critical of the decade-plus conflict, with its complex nation-building effort.
Often seeing the Afghan war through the lens of his service in Vietnam, Hagel has declared that militaries are "built to fight and win wars, not bind together failing nations." In a radio interview this year, he spoke broadly of the need for greater diplomacy as the appropriate path in Afghanistan, noting that "the American people want out" of the war.
If nominated — an announcement could come this week — and confirmed by the Senate, Hagel would succeed Defense Secretary Leon Panetta. Panetta has made it clear he intends to leave early next year, but has not publicly discussed the timing of his departure. He took the Pentagon job in July 2011.
At the same time, Obama is considering one of Hagel's former Senate colleagues, Democrat John Kerry of Massachusetts, for the job of secretary of state.
To political and defense insiders, Obama's preference for Hagel makes sense.
The former senator shares many of the same ideals of Obama's first Pentagon leader, Republican Robert Gates. When Obama became president in 2009, he asked Gates to remain as defense secretary. Both Hagel and Gates talk of the need for global answers to regional conflicts and an emphasis on so-called soft power, including economic and political aid, to bolster weak nations.
"A Hagel nomination signals an interest in, and a commitment to continuing a bipartisan approach to national security," said David Berteau, senior vice president at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
He said that Hagel's two terms in the Senate, before he retired in 2009, spanned the latter years of the post-Cold War military drawdown and the post-Sept. 11 buildup. "From a budget point of view he has seen both ends of the spectrum and that gives him a good perspective to start from."
Hagel's possible selection has been met with initial praise from key members of the Senate, including the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., who said Hagel would be "terrific."
The choice could trigger opposition from some Jewish groups and may worry Democrats concerned about Israel-related issues. Hagel has criticized discussion of a military strike by either the U.S. or Israel against Iran. He also has backed efforts to bring Iran to the table for talks on future peace in Afghanistan.
"The appointment of Chuck Hagel would be a slap in the face for every American who is concerned about the safety of Israel," said Matt Brooks, executive director of the Republican Jewish Coalition.
Hagel often straddled party lines and had some high-profile dustups with his Republican colleagues.
In 2008, he criticized GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, saying she lacked foreign policy credentials and that it would be "a stretch" to consider her qualified to become president. His wife, Lilibet Hagel, endorsed Obama in his first run for president. Hagel also was mentioned as a possible candidate for Pentagon chief when Obama was first elected.
As defense secretary, Hagel would preside over the withdrawal of combat troops from Afghanistan and the waning days of the war, and would direct some of the steepest cuts in Pentagon spending in years. His task would be to restructure a pared down military that can step away from the grinding wars of the past 11 years and refocus on a swath of regional challenges from Syria, Iran and North Korea to terrorism in Africa and the defense buildup in the Pacific.
A big benefit will be his experience and his allies on Capitol Hill.
"Certainly his name coming forward is one I'm very open to," said Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., who served with Hagel on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. "I had good relations with him while he was in the Senate. Certainly (he's) a veteran and someone who also spent a lot of time around the world understanding the relations other countries have with the U.S. and vice versa."
Defense analyst Loren Thompson, of the Virginia-based Lexington Institute think tank, said Hagel knows the political system and is known for thinking outside the box, which would help as budget cuts move forward.
"He's a veteran who understands how Congress works and has stayed plugged in to developments in defense policy," Thompson said. "He is not tied to the status quo and will think creatively about how to manage America's military forces."
Saturday, January 5, 2013
Senator Diane Feinstein's Semi-Auto Ban bill
Senator Diane Feinstein (D-CA) has published what her firearms ban bill will contain. The link to her publication is down below. Her bill would require:
All currently owned semi-auto firearms, handguns and rifles, that can use a magazine that can hold more than ten rounds must be registered as National Firearms Act items. That registration will be with the federal government.
1. There will be 120 named firearms that will become NFA firearms.
2. Such NFA automatic firearms require a $200.00 per firearm federal tax.
3. Newly made semi-automatic firearm will not be able to accept a magazine that contains more than ten rounds.
4. The point system is much more than in the prior (1994-2204) ban.
So, if you currently own a Glock, Springfield Armory XD, S&W or any other semi-auto pistol that will accept a magazine that can hold more than ten rounds, you will have register as described.
Same with a Ruger Mini-14, M1 Carbine, AR-type, Springfield Armory M1A or any other semi-auto rifle that will accept a magazine that can hold more than 10 rounds.
When the 120 firearms are named, it will most likely have shotguns in the list, for there was with the 1994-2004 gun ban. There were semi-auto and pump actions shotguns in that ban.
If Senator Feinstein has her unconstitutional way:
You will be registered with federal law enforcement. Like a convicted sex offender.
You will have to be fingerprinted and photographed by law enforcement.
You will have to surrender any magazines that can hold more than 10 rounds.
Of course, will have to get the required approval document from local law enforcement, for federal registration, you will also be registered with Vermont law enforcement.
You will have to hope that a local police department will sign off on you being able to register your newly designated NFA firearm. The PD may not want to accept such liability.
Of course, if you opt not to register, you will be able to surrender your firearm as possession of an unregistered NFA firearm or magazines that hold more than 10 rounds will be a federal felony offense.
If you want to read the bill Senator Feinstein's has announced she will introduce next month, click on the link below and then on the link to pdf document.
Senator Frankenstein Feinstein's proposed firearms bill.
Friday, January 4, 2013
Faith in Obama at an All Time Low
Poll: Obama begins second term facing pessimistic public. As President Barack Obama heads into his second term, he faces a pessimistic and weary public, according to a USA Today/Gallup poll released late Tuesday.
The percentage of Americans satisfied with the direction of the country stands at a paltry 23 percent in a poll taken Dec. 14-17. By a margin of 50 to 47 percent, respondents said the country's best years are over.
Fifty percent of respondents said it is somewhat or very unlikely that today's youth will have a better life than their parents.
That pessimism and negativity extends to the president, according to the poll.
When respondents were asked to choose adjectives to describe their feelings about the president's re-election, the poll showed the excitement and pride many Americans felt about the president's first term has diminished.
Sixty-seven percent of respondents in November 2008 said they felt optimistic about the president's election and the same percentage said it made them feel proud. Last month those numbers fell to 52 percent for optimistic and 48 percent for proud. Forty-three percent of Americans surveyed also said they feel pessimistic about the president's re-election and 36 percent said it made them feel afraid—both increases from 2008.
The president's approval rating, however, hovered at the 50 percent threshold in the USA Today/Gallup survey. This is 1 percentage point above George W. Bush as he headed into his second term, but below the 58 percent rating held by Bill Clinton and 59 percent held by Ronald Reagan.
The poll's margin of error was plus or minus 4 percentage points.
Cowboys and Tea Parties Comments: If only 23% approves of the direction Obama is leading us in, then why was he elected President again?
Obama received 70% of the vote in the demographic group of people who made around $40,000 or less. Did this group vote for continued deficit spending? No. Did this group vote for adding more debt to the incredible $16.4 trillion in debt we already have? No. Did this group vote for a continued failed foreign policy? No. Did this group vote for higher fuel prices? No.
No, they did not vote for the above or the status quo, but that's what they got with Obama. What they did vote for was simply......stuff. Welfare and checks. We are at the time in the history of this country where those who live off of others now outnumbered those of us who foot the bill.
The percentage of Americans satisfied with the direction of the country stands at a paltry 23 percent in a poll taken Dec. 14-17. By a margin of 50 to 47 percent, respondents said the country's best years are over.
Fifty percent of respondents said it is somewhat or very unlikely that today's youth will have a better life than their parents.
That pessimism and negativity extends to the president, according to the poll.
When respondents were asked to choose adjectives to describe their feelings about the president's re-election, the poll showed the excitement and pride many Americans felt about the president's first term has diminished.
Sixty-seven percent of respondents in November 2008 said they felt optimistic about the president's election and the same percentage said it made them feel proud. Last month those numbers fell to 52 percent for optimistic and 48 percent for proud. Forty-three percent of Americans surveyed also said they feel pessimistic about the president's re-election and 36 percent said it made them feel afraid—both increases from 2008.
The president's approval rating, however, hovered at the 50 percent threshold in the USA Today/Gallup survey. This is 1 percentage point above George W. Bush as he headed into his second term, but below the 58 percent rating held by Bill Clinton and 59 percent held by Ronald Reagan.
The poll's margin of error was plus or minus 4 percentage points.
Cowboys and Tea Parties Comments: If only 23% approves of the direction Obama is leading us in, then why was he elected President again?
Obama received 70% of the vote in the demographic group of people who made around $40,000 or less. Did this group vote for continued deficit spending? No. Did this group vote for adding more debt to the incredible $16.4 trillion in debt we already have? No. Did this group vote for a continued failed foreign policy? No. Did this group vote for higher fuel prices? No.
No, they did not vote for the above or the status quo, but that's what they got with Obama. What they did vote for was simply......stuff. Welfare and checks. We are at the time in the history of this country where those who live off of others now outnumbered those of us who foot the bill.
Monday, December 31, 2012
Obama Orders Pay Raise for Biden and Members of Congress,
President Barack Obama issued an executive order to end the pay freeze on federal employees, in effect giving some federal workers a raise. One federal worker now to receive a pay increase is Vice President Joe Biden. According to a senior Republican congressional aide who has reviewed the executive order and consulted with the Congressional Budget Office, Obama's pay raise will cost $11 billion. "The CBO told us that the President’s pay raise for federal workers will cost $11 billion over ten years," says the aide.
The aide explains, "On the cost-estimate, CBO says the (discretionary) cost of the .5% pay-hike the President is calling for in the Exec Order – relative to a freeze – is about $500m in FY 2013 and $11 billion over the ten years from FY 13 - FY 22. The reason why the FY ’13 savings is only $500 million is because the pay hike as proposed by the President’s Exec Order would not go into effect until April 1st, 2013 - when the current CR expires. So it only covers half the fiscal year. The annualized cost of the pay hike is about $1 billion/year."
Cowboys and Tea Parties comment: With federal law enforcement agencies facing payroll deficits in the tens of millons of dollars, per agency, Obama issues an executive order, therefore bypassing Congress, to effectively grant pay raises. And not only grant pay raises, but giving them to the least productive of government workers. Amazing. But this holds through true with the historical precedent of the last act of failed nation's being to loot the treasury.
The aide explains, "On the cost-estimate, CBO says the (discretionary) cost of the .5% pay-hike the President is calling for in the Exec Order – relative to a freeze – is about $500m in FY 2013 and $11 billion over the ten years from FY 13 - FY 22. The reason why the FY ’13 savings is only $500 million is because the pay hike as proposed by the President’s Exec Order would not go into effect until April 1st, 2013 - when the current CR expires. So it only covers half the fiscal year. The annualized cost of the pay hike is about $1 billion/year."
Cowboys and Tea Parties comment: With federal law enforcement agencies facing payroll deficits in the tens of millons of dollars, per agency, Obama issues an executive order, therefore bypassing Congress, to effectively grant pay raises. And not only grant pay raises, but giving them to the least productive of government workers. Amazing. But this holds through true with the historical precedent of the last act of failed nation's being to loot the treasury.
Wednesday, December 26, 2012
Lindisfarne To Sandy Hook: The Tragedy of Wishful
This article, Lindisfarne To Sandy Hook: The Tragedy of Wishful was sent to us and linked to the article published on the American Thinker.
By Richard F. Miniter
I pull up in front of our town's little savings bank branch, drop out of the door and when my boots hit the pavement reach under my shirt and the remove the Smith & Wesson Model 28 .357 which I then put under the seat before locking the truck. "What are you doing Grandpa?" my granddaughter asks walking around from the other door.
"Here's a word of advice cupcake. It's never a good idea to walk into a bank with a gun." I don't always carry it. It's a big piece of iron but it's the same gun I carried long ago as a police officer, I'm very comfortable with it and sometimes I get a feeling when about to leave the house and after a moment's hesitation, take it along. And that day was one of those.
The next stop after the bank was her school and when we walked in together I left it locked up under the seat again. Not because I was worried about violating the Federal Gun Free School Zones Act because, and while most school teachers and administrators don't understand this, there are exceptions and I'm one. Instead I left the gun under the seat because I would give those school teachers and administrators the vapors if they even suspected I was armed. Guns are evil most of them seem to feel. Not only mine. The guns of the police they'd summon to their aid are bad too. The make believe guns boys play cowboy with are bad too, even the gun a second grader might pencil in when drawing a picture of an "army man" is evil. It's a key tenet of their wishful thinking.
And a very strange brand of wishful thinking it is. Because instead of hoping for something to come their way, they're wishing for nothing to happen. Its symbol might be a monkey with it hands over its eyes because it's principal doctrine is that if you can't see any evil, refuse to see any evil, then it doesn't exist. Of course it's only a variation of the old notion that if you don't look a lion in the eye he won't charge. But it's what these people believe. Which is why that school, like many other schools run by similar believers once prohibited any discussion of 9/11, any videotapes, photographs or indeed any reference to it at all. Again if you don't see evil or don't learn about it, talk it out, try to learn the lessons it teaches you, then it doesn't exist, won't have any power over you. Can't.
Without any evidence at all that they're right, indeed in the face of any number of horrible examples proving them wrong, they cling to this belief. Because on some level they believe they want to convince themselves that they're "better than that", better than Beslan, better than Columbine, better than those awful images of people jumping from the twin towers. That they're different somehow. Special.
Which means that they will not suffer armed fathers or grandfathers around children as it "sends the wrong message."
And so I leave the gun under the seat.
But educators should know something about history. Because this is an old story and has its roots in a tragedy every bit as compelling as Sandy Hook School. The story of Lindisfarne.
An island connected to northern England's coast by a tidal causeway. A holy place, in fact its name today is Holy Island and 1300 years ago it was Christendom's most prominent experiment with what we today would call a Gun Free School Zone. But what happened there should have proved for all time that covering one's eyes, pretending that demons don't exist, that you're somehow "better than that", is worse than futile. Criminally worse.
Lindisfarne was a monastery, renowned for its non-violence, dedicated to learning, to the idea that in the tumult of the early Middle Ages, man could, should be, was "better than that." Gloriously "better than that." And for a while people believed along with them in this "right message" and endowed Lindisfarne with riches, sang its praises in ten thousand churches.
Its ruins today are still a beacon atop a spire of high rock, surmounted by sheer stone walls, far above the everyday concerns of this world.
But they are ruins because one dark night in the eighth century Lindisfarne's rock and walls were scaled by Vikings holding their swords in their mouths. Demons out of the northern seas who chased the unarmed monks from room to room in the monastery, butchering them for sport, sacking their golden altar and trampling their precious books underfoot. An event which shook Christendom to its core.
Why did it happen? Quite simply because the killers were drawn by the defenselessness of the place, by Lindisfarne's "right message", by the fact that Lindisfarne abjured violence and trusted as school administrators trust today, in never looking the lion in the eye.
Above all by the fact that Lindisfarne would not suffer the presence of armed men who might defend it.
Today most of us don't even remember that there once was such a place. Even though we keep repeating the same mistake it made. We don't remember what we should have learned then; that weakness will, sooner or later, summon horror.
As Adam Lanza was summoned to Sandy Hook School.
Chose the one target where he had the best chance of not encountering armed citizens, a gun-free school zone. Just as the Vikings didn't choose to assault one of the many fortified castles chock a block with armed men elsewhere on the coast but instead chose Lindisfarne. Just as Eric Harris and Dyland Klebold didn't choose a gun show to assault, a rodeo, a police station but instead chose Columbine.
I'm not certain what the solution is. No one wants schools to become armed camps with sandbagged revetments, passwords and barbed wire. Besides the evil one is a liar painted with many tongues and so the monsters who wish to kill children often adopt other techniques. Walter Seifert in Cologne Germany constructed a flame thrower he put to use through an elementary school's windows burning to death eight students, two teachers and horribly maiming many others. You have the three men who buried an entire school bus load of children in California. You have poisoners, knife wielding maniacs, stranglers, bombers, kidnappers and pedophile killers.
Instead it strikes me that any solution has to be rooted in natural affinity. The relationship of parent to child, neighbor to neighbor, grandparent to grandchild. Not in the fatuous belief that stone hearted killers will obey the resolutions of school boards, the acts of Congress or indeed do anything but laugh at any amount of wishful thinking.
In this vein there is an interesting sidebar to the Revolutionary War. That fact that while the British and the Tories and Indians found it relatively easy to break our militia in the open and massacre them, the same militia could not be defeated in the woods. The reason was that when the militia couldn't see their officers, let alone listen to them tell them where to stand, neighbors, fathers, sons, cousins and uncles broke ranks and gathered together. And after the battle had been joined wouldn't leave each other. Wouldn't desert their wounded son or their neighbor's body and so the British found them impossible to budge.
Considering this point one might recall that at Columbine there were no such bonds which could gather and stop Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold. Nor was one considered necessary. Instead there were only rules grounded in a lot of wishful thinking. Rules which Eric Harris and Dyland Klebold ignored and so despite a surplus of bravery among individual teachers and students, there was an armed sheriff's deputy on duty who heard the first shots and didn't run towards them as he would have if they were his children. There was the school principal clueless about the murderers, who couldn't recall Eric Harris and Dyland Klebold student walking the halls in black trench coats in the days prior to the killings and threatening other students. We can believe his testimony or not but one thing we know for sure is that he wasn't looking for any lions to stare down.
Finally there were the despicable parents of Eric Harris and Dyland Klebold who ignored or were oblivious to the collection of weapons. Mothers and fathers in authority over their children who simply wished nothing bad would happen.
And so the concept of a gun free school zone established by authority turned out to be as much of a joke at Columbine as it was the other day in Newtown, Connecticut. Just as the same idea was shown a farce at Lindisfarne 1300 years ago.
But yet, these children have fathers and numbered among them men who will protect their children and know how to do it.
Now I understand that public education today is a determinedly feminine institution. But they have tremendous leeway under the law and so one thing they school administrators and teachers might consider doing is admit the fact that they have no more idea on how to physically defend children than they do about how to build a space shuttle with their second grade paper doll scissors. But among the parents of their pupils are many men who do have that experience and training. Former or current police officers, soldiers and Marines. People who've been shot at and who've shot. Had to winkle armed men out of a closed room and take them down. Men who will deter evil by their presence.
So for once why can't some hapless school administrator call them in? Ask them what they would do to keep these children safe? Their children safe. And then heed what they say. Do what they say.
It is all so sad. But the bullet ridden bodies of those little angels and angelic teachers in Newtown should show us that wishful thinking won't work, has never worked and will never work. If it did, we'd only have to wish those children back.
Wouldn't we?
Richard F. Miniter is a former local Chief-Of-Police and the author of THE THINGS I WANT MOST, The Extraordinary Journey Of A Boy To A Family Of His Own, BDD, Random House. He can be reached at miniterhome@aol.com
By Richard F. Miniter
I pull up in front of our town's little savings bank branch, drop out of the door and when my boots hit the pavement reach under my shirt and the remove the Smith & Wesson Model 28 .357 which I then put under the seat before locking the truck. "What are you doing Grandpa?" my granddaughter asks walking around from the other door.
"Here's a word of advice cupcake. It's never a good idea to walk into a bank with a gun." I don't always carry it. It's a big piece of iron but it's the same gun I carried long ago as a police officer, I'm very comfortable with it and sometimes I get a feeling when about to leave the house and after a moment's hesitation, take it along. And that day was one of those.
The next stop after the bank was her school and when we walked in together I left it locked up under the seat again. Not because I was worried about violating the Federal Gun Free School Zones Act because, and while most school teachers and administrators don't understand this, there are exceptions and I'm one. Instead I left the gun under the seat because I would give those school teachers and administrators the vapors if they even suspected I was armed. Guns are evil most of them seem to feel. Not only mine. The guns of the police they'd summon to their aid are bad too. The make believe guns boys play cowboy with are bad too, even the gun a second grader might pencil in when drawing a picture of an "army man" is evil. It's a key tenet of their wishful thinking.
And a very strange brand of wishful thinking it is. Because instead of hoping for something to come their way, they're wishing for nothing to happen. Its symbol might be a monkey with it hands over its eyes because it's principal doctrine is that if you can't see any evil, refuse to see any evil, then it doesn't exist. Of course it's only a variation of the old notion that if you don't look a lion in the eye he won't charge. But it's what these people believe. Which is why that school, like many other schools run by similar believers once prohibited any discussion of 9/11, any videotapes, photographs or indeed any reference to it at all. Again if you don't see evil or don't learn about it, talk it out, try to learn the lessons it teaches you, then it doesn't exist, won't have any power over you. Can't.
Without any evidence at all that they're right, indeed in the face of any number of horrible examples proving them wrong, they cling to this belief. Because on some level they believe they want to convince themselves that they're "better than that", better than Beslan, better than Columbine, better than those awful images of people jumping from the twin towers. That they're different somehow. Special.
Which means that they will not suffer armed fathers or grandfathers around children as it "sends the wrong message."
And so I leave the gun under the seat.
But educators should know something about history. Because this is an old story and has its roots in a tragedy every bit as compelling as Sandy Hook School. The story of Lindisfarne.
An island connected to northern England's coast by a tidal causeway. A holy place, in fact its name today is Holy Island and 1300 years ago it was Christendom's most prominent experiment with what we today would call a Gun Free School Zone. But what happened there should have proved for all time that covering one's eyes, pretending that demons don't exist, that you're somehow "better than that", is worse than futile. Criminally worse.
Lindisfarne was a monastery, renowned for its non-violence, dedicated to learning, to the idea that in the tumult of the early Middle Ages, man could, should be, was "better than that." Gloriously "better than that." And for a while people believed along with them in this "right message" and endowed Lindisfarne with riches, sang its praises in ten thousand churches.
Its ruins today are still a beacon atop a spire of high rock, surmounted by sheer stone walls, far above the everyday concerns of this world.
But they are ruins because one dark night in the eighth century Lindisfarne's rock and walls were scaled by Vikings holding their swords in their mouths. Demons out of the northern seas who chased the unarmed monks from room to room in the monastery, butchering them for sport, sacking their golden altar and trampling their precious books underfoot. An event which shook Christendom to its core.
Why did it happen? Quite simply because the killers were drawn by the defenselessness of the place, by Lindisfarne's "right message", by the fact that Lindisfarne abjured violence and trusted as school administrators trust today, in never looking the lion in the eye.
Above all by the fact that Lindisfarne would not suffer the presence of armed men who might defend it.
Today most of us don't even remember that there once was such a place. Even though we keep repeating the same mistake it made. We don't remember what we should have learned then; that weakness will, sooner or later, summon horror.
As Adam Lanza was summoned to Sandy Hook School.
Chose the one target where he had the best chance of not encountering armed citizens, a gun-free school zone. Just as the Vikings didn't choose to assault one of the many fortified castles chock a block with armed men elsewhere on the coast but instead chose Lindisfarne. Just as Eric Harris and Dyland Klebold didn't choose a gun show to assault, a rodeo, a police station but instead chose Columbine.
I'm not certain what the solution is. No one wants schools to become armed camps with sandbagged revetments, passwords and barbed wire. Besides the evil one is a liar painted with many tongues and so the monsters who wish to kill children often adopt other techniques. Walter Seifert in Cologne Germany constructed a flame thrower he put to use through an elementary school's windows burning to death eight students, two teachers and horribly maiming many others. You have the three men who buried an entire school bus load of children in California. You have poisoners, knife wielding maniacs, stranglers, bombers, kidnappers and pedophile killers.
Instead it strikes me that any solution has to be rooted in natural affinity. The relationship of parent to child, neighbor to neighbor, grandparent to grandchild. Not in the fatuous belief that stone hearted killers will obey the resolutions of school boards, the acts of Congress or indeed do anything but laugh at any amount of wishful thinking.
In this vein there is an interesting sidebar to the Revolutionary War. That fact that while the British and the Tories and Indians found it relatively easy to break our militia in the open and massacre them, the same militia could not be defeated in the woods. The reason was that when the militia couldn't see their officers, let alone listen to them tell them where to stand, neighbors, fathers, sons, cousins and uncles broke ranks and gathered together. And after the battle had been joined wouldn't leave each other. Wouldn't desert their wounded son or their neighbor's body and so the British found them impossible to budge.
Considering this point one might recall that at Columbine there were no such bonds which could gather and stop Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold. Nor was one considered necessary. Instead there were only rules grounded in a lot of wishful thinking. Rules which Eric Harris and Dyland Klebold ignored and so despite a surplus of bravery among individual teachers and students, there was an armed sheriff's deputy on duty who heard the first shots and didn't run towards them as he would have if they were his children. There was the school principal clueless about the murderers, who couldn't recall Eric Harris and Dyland Klebold student walking the halls in black trench coats in the days prior to the killings and threatening other students. We can believe his testimony or not but one thing we know for sure is that he wasn't looking for any lions to stare down.
Finally there were the despicable parents of Eric Harris and Dyland Klebold who ignored or were oblivious to the collection of weapons. Mothers and fathers in authority over their children who simply wished nothing bad would happen.
And so the concept of a gun free school zone established by authority turned out to be as much of a joke at Columbine as it was the other day in Newtown, Connecticut. Just as the same idea was shown a farce at Lindisfarne 1300 years ago.
But yet, these children have fathers and numbered among them men who will protect their children and know how to do it.
Now I understand that public education today is a determinedly feminine institution. But they have tremendous leeway under the law and so one thing they school administrators and teachers might consider doing is admit the fact that they have no more idea on how to physically defend children than they do about how to build a space shuttle with their second grade paper doll scissors. But among the parents of their pupils are many men who do have that experience and training. Former or current police officers, soldiers and Marines. People who've been shot at and who've shot. Had to winkle armed men out of a closed room and take them down. Men who will deter evil by their presence.
So for once why can't some hapless school administrator call them in? Ask them what they would do to keep these children safe? Their children safe. And then heed what they say. Do what they say.
It is all so sad. But the bullet ridden bodies of those little angels and angelic teachers in Newtown should show us that wishful thinking won't work, has never worked and will never work. If it did, we'd only have to wish those children back.
Wouldn't we?
Richard F. Miniter is a former local Chief-Of-Police and the author of THE THINGS I WANT MOST, The Extraordinary Journey Of A Boy To A Family Of His Own, BDD, Random House. He can be reached at miniterhome@aol.com
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