This came off the 'net, via a "forward" and I unfortunately do not have an attribution. I would love to know who wrote this because this person is a genius.
If one does not already understand the dangers to our freedoms, our economy, and the future of our Country by now -- 7 months post 11/04/08 -- one either truly was hoping for this or truly had an immeasurable amount of naïveté and ignorance blocking the brain.
Read and weep ... or, better yet, read and bombard your elected officials in Washington to stop this madness.
=================================================
Simplified Obamanomics
We have experienced [at least three years of bad policies,] specifically the years of the Democratic majority during President Bush’s administration. These bad policies were rushed through based on fear tactics. We have continued [since January 2009] to get the same thing.
Now, most especially, the rush is on, again, because our dedicated elected officials are rushing to get a bad bill through before they take their August vacation. This is, of course, without regard to logic, which demands that ANY THING done CORRECTLY has to be carefully planned, not rushed.
The tax system being pushed through under the guise of a much-needed “health care reform” is anything but carefully planned or thought through. The following is an explanation for the layman, the average “Joe,” who is, as always with anything planned out of Washington, overlooked completely.
The Tax System Explained in Beer
Suppose that every day, ten men go out for beer, and the bill for all ten comes to $100.00. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would resemble something like the following breakdown:
The first four men, the poorest, would pay nothing for his portion of the beers.
• The fifth would pay $1.00 for his portion of the beers.
• The sixth would pay $3.00 for his portion of the beers.
• The seventh would pay $7.00 for his portion of the beers.
• The eighth would pay $12.00 for his portion of the beers.
• The ninth man would pay $18.00 for his portion of the beers.
• The tenth man, the richest, would pay $59.00 for his portion of the beers.
So that is what they decided to do. This went on for many years.
The 10 men drank in the bar every day and seemed quite happy with the arrangement, until one day, the owner threw them a curve and offered them a “change.”
“Since you are all such good customers,” he said, “I’m going to reduce the cost of your daily beer by $20.00, from $100.00 that all 10 of you pay now, to $80.00 for all 10.”
The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes so the first four men were unaffected; they would still drink for free.
But what about the other six men, the paying customers? How could they divide the $20.00 “savings” so that everyone in the group would get their fair share?
They realized that $20.00 divided by 6, the actual number of paying customers, is $3.33. But, if they subtracted that amount from everybody’s share, then the fifth and sixth men would each end up getting paid to drink their beer.
So, the bar owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man’s bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each would pay. According to the “change,” explained by the owner, the new breakdown came to:
• The fifth man, like the first four, would now pay nothing: a 100% “savings.”
• The sixth man now paid $2.00 instead of $3.00: a 33% “savings.”
• The seventh man now paid $5.00 instead of $7.00: a 28% “savings.”
• The eighth man now paid $9.00 instead of $12.00: a 25% “savings.”
• The ninth man now paid $14.00 instead of $18.00: a 22% “savings.”
• The tenth man now paid $49.00 instead of $59.00: a 16% “savings.”
Each of the six was better off than before; the first four continued to drink free of charge.
After the first few days of this “change,” the men compared their “savings.” They were a bit surprised at the conclusions.
“I only got a dollar out of the $20.00,” declared the sixth man. He pointed to the tenth man and said, “But he got $10.00!”
“Yeah, that’s right,” exclaimed the fifth man. “I only “saved” a dollar, too. It’s unfair that he got 10 times more than I did!”
“That’s true,” shouted the seventh man. “Why should he get $10.00 back when I only got $2.00? The wealthy get all the breaks!”
“Wait a minute,” yelled the first four men in unison. “We didn’t get anything at all! The system exploits the poor!”
The nine men surrounded the tenth man and beat him up.
The next night, the tenth man didn’t show up for drinks, so the nine sat down and had beers without him. When it came to pay the bill, though, they discovered something important: they did not have enough money between the 9 of them to pay even half the bill!
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
And that, boys and girls, journalists and college professors, is how our tax system works.
• The people who pay the highest taxes benefit most from a tax reduction.
Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they may just not show up anymore. In fact, they may start drinking overseas where the atmosphere is somewhat friendlier.
Or . . . they may just shrug.
For those who understand, no explanation is needed. For those who do not understand, no explanation is possible.
Sunday, July 26, 2009
Saturday, July 25, 2009
"No, He Can't"
MCzwz Thinks:
This article is one that should have been very widely disseminated long before 11/04/08, but it is no surprise that it was not. In the atmosphere that developed in the year prior to and especially since that date, thoughts and opinions such as these are enough for the speaker to be not only ostracized, at best, but possibly persecuted, at worst, as in the retaliatory model applied to Sarah Palin. Regardless, any who still respect courageous thinkers, true “free-thinkers” cannot help but do one’s utmost to ensure these thoughts are spread far and wide.
I but do my little part by posting Dr. Wortham’s extraordinary open letter here in the hope of bringing it to the attention of yet a few more people. My goal is to make even more people aware of the imperative need to avoid a repetition of the electoral results of 11/04/08.
The future of our country depends on it.
From: Project World Awareness
The Other Side of Racism
-- By Dr. Anne Wortham
Anne Wortham is Associate Professor of Sociology at Illinois State University and continuing Visiting Scholar at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution. She is a member of the American Sociological Association and the American Philosophical Association.
She has been a John M. Olin Foundation Faculty Fellow, and honored as a Distinguished Alumni of the Year by the National Association for Equal Opportunity in Higher Education.
In fall 1988 she was one of a select group of intellectuals who were featured in Bill Moyers’ television series, “A World of Ideas.” The transcript of her conversation with Moyers has been published in his book, A World of Ideas.
Dr. Wortham is author of “The Other Side of Racism: A Philosophical Study of Black Race Consciousness” which analyzes how race consciousness is transformed into political strategies and policy issues.
She has published numerous articles on the implications of individual rights for civil rights policy, and is currently writing a book on theories of social and cultural marginality.
Recently, she has published articles on the significance of multiculturalism and Afrocentricism in education, the politics of victimization and the social and political impact of political correctness. Shortly after an interview in 2004, she was awarded tenure.
No He Can't
~~ By Anne Wortham
Fellow Americans,
Please know: I am Black; I grew up in the segregated South. I did not vote for Barack Obama; I wrote in Ron Paul’s name as my choice for president. Most importantly, I am not race conscious. I do not require a Black president to know that I am a person of worth, and that life is worth living. I do not require a Black president to love the ideal of America.
I cannot join you in your celebration. I feel no elation. There is no smile on my face. I am not jumping with joy. There are no tears of triumph in my eyes. For such emotions and behavior to come from me, I would have to deny all that I know about the requirements of human flourishing and survival – all that I know about the history of the United States of America , all that I know about American race relations, and all that I know about Barack Obama as a politician. I would have to deny the nature of the “change” that Obama asserts has come to America.
Most importantly, I would have to abnegate my certain understanding that you have chosen to sprint down the road to serfdom that we have been on for over a century. I would have to pretend that individual liberty has no value for the success of a human life. I would have to evade your rejection of the slender reed of capitalism on which your success and mine depend. I would have to think it somehow rational that 94 percent of the 12 million Blacks in this country voted for a man because he looks like them (that Blacks are permitted to play the race card), and that they were joined by self-declared “progressive” whites who voted for him because he doesn’t look like them.
I would have to wipe my mind clean of all that I know about the kind of people who have advised and taught Barack Obama and will fill posts in his administration – political intellectuals like my former colleagues at the Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government.
I would have to believe that “fairness” is equivalent of justice. I would have to believe that a man who asks me to “go forward in a new spirit of service, in a new service of sacrifice” is speaking in my interest. I would have to accept the premise of a man that economic prosperity comes from the “bottom up,” and who arrogantly believes that he can will it into existence by the use of government force. I would have to admire a man who thinks the standard of living of the masses can be improved by destroying the most productive and the generators of wealth.
Finally, Americans, I would have to erase from my consciousness the scene of 125,000 screaming, crying, cheering people in Grant Park, Chicago irrationally chanting “Yes We Can!” Finally, I would have to wipe all memory of all the times I have heard politicians, pundits, journalists, editorialists, bloggers and intellectuals declare that capitalism is dead- and no one including, especially Alan Greenspan, objected to their assumption that the particular version of the anti-capitalistic mentality that they want to replace with their own version of anti-capitalism is anything remotely equivalent to capitalism.
So you have made history, Americans. You and your children have elected a Black man to the office of the president of the United States, the wounded giant of the world. The battle between John Wayne and Jane Fonda is over – and Fonda won. Eugene McCarthy and George McGovern must be very happy men. Jimmie Carter, too. And the Kennedys have at last gotten their Kennedy look-a-like. The self-righteous welfare statists in the suburbs can feel warm moments of satisfaction for having elected a Black person.
So, toast yourselves: 60s countercultural radicals, 80s yuppies and 90s bourgeois bohemians. Toast yourselves, Black America. Shout your glee Harvard, Princeton, Yale, Duke, Stanford, and Berkeley. You have elected not an individual who is qualified to be president, but a Black man who, like the pragmatist Franklin Roosevelt, promises to – Do Something! You now have someone who has picked up the baton of Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society. But you have also foolishly traded your freedom and mine – what little there is left – for the chance to feel good.
There is nothing in me that can share your happy obliviousness.
This article is one that should have been very widely disseminated long before 11/04/08, but it is no surprise that it was not. In the atmosphere that developed in the year prior to and especially since that date, thoughts and opinions such as these are enough for the speaker to be not only ostracized, at best, but possibly persecuted, at worst, as in the retaliatory model applied to Sarah Palin. Regardless, any who still respect courageous thinkers, true “free-thinkers” cannot help but do one’s utmost to ensure these thoughts are spread far and wide.
I but do my little part by posting Dr. Wortham’s extraordinary open letter here in the hope of bringing it to the attention of yet a few more people. My goal is to make even more people aware of the imperative need to avoid a repetition of the electoral results of 11/04/08.
The future of our country depends on it.
======================================
From: Project World Awareness
The Other Side of Racism
-- By Dr. Anne Wortham
Anne Wortham is Associate Professor of Sociology at Illinois State University and continuing Visiting Scholar at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution. She is a member of the American Sociological Association and the American Philosophical Association.
She has been a John M. Olin Foundation Faculty Fellow, and honored as a Distinguished Alumni of the Year by the National Association for Equal Opportunity in Higher Education.
In fall 1988 she was one of a select group of intellectuals who were featured in Bill Moyers’ television series, “A World of Ideas.” The transcript of her conversation with Moyers has been published in his book, A World of Ideas.
Dr. Wortham is author of “The Other Side of Racism: A Philosophical Study of Black Race Consciousness” which analyzes how race consciousness is transformed into political strategies and policy issues.
She has published numerous articles on the implications of individual rights for civil rights policy, and is currently writing a book on theories of social and cultural marginality.
Recently, she has published articles on the significance of multiculturalism and Afrocentricism in education, the politics of victimization and the social and political impact of political correctness. Shortly after an interview in 2004, she was awarded tenure.
No He Can't
~~ By Anne Wortham
Fellow Americans,
Please know: I am Black; I grew up in the segregated South. I did not vote for Barack Obama; I wrote in Ron Paul’s name as my choice for president. Most importantly, I am not race conscious. I do not require a Black president to know that I am a person of worth, and that life is worth living. I do not require a Black president to love the ideal of America.
I cannot join you in your celebration. I feel no elation. There is no smile on my face. I am not jumping with joy. There are no tears of triumph in my eyes. For such emotions and behavior to come from me, I would have to deny all that I know about the requirements of human flourishing and survival – all that I know about the history of the United States of America , all that I know about American race relations, and all that I know about Barack Obama as a politician. I would have to deny the nature of the “change” that Obama asserts has come to America.
Most importantly, I would have to abnegate my certain understanding that you have chosen to sprint down the road to serfdom that we have been on for over a century. I would have to pretend that individual liberty has no value for the success of a human life. I would have to evade your rejection of the slender reed of capitalism on which your success and mine depend. I would have to think it somehow rational that 94 percent of the 12 million Blacks in this country voted for a man because he looks like them (that Blacks are permitted to play the race card), and that they were joined by self-declared “progressive” whites who voted for him because he doesn’t look like them.
I would have to wipe my mind clean of all that I know about the kind of people who have advised and taught Barack Obama and will fill posts in his administration – political intellectuals like my former colleagues at the Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government.
I would have to believe that “fairness” is equivalent of justice. I would have to believe that a man who asks me to “go forward in a new spirit of service, in a new service of sacrifice” is speaking in my interest. I would have to accept the premise of a man that economic prosperity comes from the “bottom up,” and who arrogantly believes that he can will it into existence by the use of government force. I would have to admire a man who thinks the standard of living of the masses can be improved by destroying the most productive and the generators of wealth.
Finally, Americans, I would have to erase from my consciousness the scene of 125,000 screaming, crying, cheering people in Grant Park, Chicago irrationally chanting “Yes We Can!” Finally, I would have to wipe all memory of all the times I have heard politicians, pundits, journalists, editorialists, bloggers and intellectuals declare that capitalism is dead- and no one including, especially Alan Greenspan, objected to their assumption that the particular version of the anti-capitalistic mentality that they want to replace with their own version of anti-capitalism is anything remotely equivalent to capitalism.
So you have made history, Americans. You and your children have elected a Black man to the office of the president of the United States, the wounded giant of the world. The battle between John Wayne and Jane Fonda is over – and Fonda won. Eugene McCarthy and George McGovern must be very happy men. Jimmie Carter, too. And the Kennedys have at last gotten their Kennedy look-a-like. The self-righteous welfare statists in the suburbs can feel warm moments of satisfaction for having elected a Black person.
So, toast yourselves: 60s countercultural radicals, 80s yuppies and 90s bourgeois bohemians. Toast yourselves, Black America. Shout your glee Harvard, Princeton, Yale, Duke, Stanford, and Berkeley. You have elected not an individual who is qualified to be president, but a Black man who, like the pragmatist Franklin Roosevelt, promises to – Do Something! You now have someone who has picked up the baton of Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society. But you have also foolishly traded your freedom and mine – what little there is left – for the chance to feel good.
There is nothing in me that can share your happy obliviousness.
Saturday, July 18, 2009
A New Age Fairy Tale of "Change" . . . or An Accurate Warning . . .
A Truly Cautionary Tale
And it came to pass in the Age of Insanity that the people of the land called America, having lost their morals, their initiative, and their will to defend their liberties, chose as their Supreme Leader that person known as "The One."
He emerged from the vapors with a message that had no meaning; but He hypnotized the people telling them, "I am sent to save you. My lack of experience, my questionable ethics, my monstrous ego, and my association with evil doers are of no consequence. For I shall save you with Hope and Change.
"Go, therefore, and proclaim throughout the land that he who preceded me is evil, that he has defiled the nation, and that all he has built must be destroyed."
And the people rejoiced, for even though they knew not what "The One" would do, he had promised that it was good; and they believed.
And "The One" said "We live in the greatest country in the world. Help me change everything about it!"
And the people said, "Hallelujah! Change is good!"
Then He said, "We are going to tax the rich fat-cats." And the people said "Sock it to them! And redistribute their wealth."
And the people said, "Show us the money!"
And then He said, "Redistribution of wealth is good for everybody"
And Joe the plumber asked, "Are you kidding me? You're going to steal my money and give it to the
deadbeats??" And "The One" ridiculed and taunted him, and Joe's personal records were hacked and publicized. ...
One lone reporter asked, "Isn't that Marxist policy?" And she was banished from the kingdom!
Then a citizen asked, "With no foreign relations experience and having zero military experience or knowledge, how will you deal with radical terrorists?"
And "The One" said, "Simple. I shall sit with them and talk with them and show them how nice we really are; and they will forget that they ever wanted to kill us all!"
And the people said, "Hallelujah!! We are safe at last, and we can beat our weapons into free cars for the people!"
Then "The One" said, "I shall give 95% of you lower taxes."
And one, lone voice said, "But 40% of us don't pay ANY taxes."
So "The One" said, "Then I shall give you some of the taxes the fat-cats pay!"
And the people said, "Hallelujah!! Show us the money!"
Then "The One" said, "I shall tax your Capital Gains when you sell your homes!"
And the people yawned and the slumping housing market collapsed.
And He said, "I shall mandate employer-funded health care for EVERY worker and raise the minimum wage. And I shall give every person unlimited health care and medicine and transportation to the clinics."
And the people said, "Give me some of that!"
Then he said, "I shall penalize employers who ship jobs overseas."
And the people said, "Where's my rebate check?"
Then "The One" said, "I shall bankrupt the coal industry and electricity rates will skyrocket!"
And the people said, "Coal is dirty, coal is evil, no more coal! But we don't care for that part about higher electric rates."
So "The One" said, "Not to worry. If your rebate isn't enough to cover your expenses, we shall bail you out. Just sign up with ACORN and your troubles are over!"
Then He said, "Illegal immigrants feel scorned and slighted. Let's grant them amnesty, Social Security, free education, free lunches, free medical care, bi-lingual signs and guaranteed housing..."
And the people said, "Hallelujah!!" And they made him King!
And so it came to pass that employers, facing spiraling costs and ever-higher taxes, raised their prices and laid off workers. Others simply gave up and went out of business and the economy sank like unto a rock dropped from a cliff. The banking industry was destroyed. Manufacturing slowed to a crawl. And more of the people were without a means of support.
Then "The One" said, "I am the "The One" - The Messiah - and I'm here to save you! We shall just print more money so everyone will have enough!"
But our foreign trading partners said unto Him, "Wait a minute. Your dollar is not worth a pile of camel dung! You will have to pay more..."
And the people said, "Wait a minute. That is unfair!!"
And the world said, "Neither are these other idiotic programs you have embraced. Lo, you have become a Socialist state and a second-rate power. Now you shall play by our rules!"
And the people cried out, "Alas, alas!! What have we done?"
But yea verily, it was too late. The people set upon "The One" and spat upon him and stoned him, and his name was dung. And the once mighty nation was no more; and the once proud people were without sustenance or shelter or hope. And the Change "The One" had given them was as like unto a poison that had destroyed them and like a whirlwind that consumed all that they had built.
And the people beat their chests in despair and cried out in anguish, "Give us back our nation and our pride and our hope!!" But it was too late, and their homeland was no more.
Posted Jul 6, 2009 on Sodahead.com by BLAH blah (http://www.sodahead.com/user/profile/1209586/blah-blah/)
And it came to pass in the Age of Insanity that the people of the land called America, having lost their morals, their initiative, and their will to defend their liberties, chose as their Supreme Leader that person known as "The One."
He emerged from the vapors with a message that had no meaning; but He hypnotized the people telling them, "I am sent to save you. My lack of experience, my questionable ethics, my monstrous ego, and my association with evil doers are of no consequence. For I shall save you with Hope and Change.
"Go, therefore, and proclaim throughout the land that he who preceded me is evil, that he has defiled the nation, and that all he has built must be destroyed."
And the people rejoiced, for even though they knew not what "The One" would do, he had promised that it was good; and they believed.
And "The One" said "We live in the greatest country in the world. Help me change everything about it!"
And the people said, "Hallelujah! Change is good!"
Then He said, "We are going to tax the rich fat-cats." And the people said "Sock it to them! And redistribute their wealth."
And the people said, "Show us the money!"
And then He said, "Redistribution of wealth is good for everybody"
And Joe the plumber asked, "Are you kidding me? You're going to steal my money and give it to the
deadbeats??" And "The One" ridiculed and taunted him, and Joe's personal records were hacked and publicized. ...
One lone reporter asked, "Isn't that Marxist policy?" And she was banished from the kingdom!
Then a citizen asked, "With no foreign relations experience and having zero military experience or knowledge, how will you deal with radical terrorists?"
And "The One" said, "Simple. I shall sit with them and talk with them and show them how nice we really are; and they will forget that they ever wanted to kill us all!"
And the people said, "Hallelujah!! We are safe at last, and we can beat our weapons into free cars for the people!"
Then "The One" said, "I shall give 95% of you lower taxes."
And one, lone voice said, "But 40% of us don't pay ANY taxes."
So "The One" said, "Then I shall give you some of the taxes the fat-cats pay!"
And the people said, "Hallelujah!! Show us the money!"
Then "The One" said, "I shall tax your Capital Gains when you sell your homes!"
And the people yawned and the slumping housing market collapsed.
And He said, "I shall mandate employer-funded health care for EVERY worker and raise the minimum wage. And I shall give every person unlimited health care and medicine and transportation to the clinics."
And the people said, "Give me some of that!"
Then he said, "I shall penalize employers who ship jobs overseas."
And the people said, "Where's my rebate check?"
Then "The One" said, "I shall bankrupt the coal industry and electricity rates will skyrocket!"
And the people said, "Coal is dirty, coal is evil, no more coal! But we don't care for that part about higher electric rates."
So "The One" said, "Not to worry. If your rebate isn't enough to cover your expenses, we shall bail you out. Just sign up with ACORN and your troubles are over!"
Then He said, "Illegal immigrants feel scorned and slighted. Let's grant them amnesty, Social Security, free education, free lunches, free medical care, bi-lingual signs and guaranteed housing..."
And the people said, "Hallelujah!!" And they made him King!
And so it came to pass that employers, facing spiraling costs and ever-higher taxes, raised their prices and laid off workers. Others simply gave up and went out of business and the economy sank like unto a rock dropped from a cliff. The banking industry was destroyed. Manufacturing slowed to a crawl. And more of the people were without a means of support.
Then "The One" said, "I am the "The One" - The Messiah - and I'm here to save you! We shall just print more money so everyone will have enough!"
But our foreign trading partners said unto Him, "Wait a minute. Your dollar is not worth a pile of camel dung! You will have to pay more..."
And the people said, "Wait a minute. That is unfair!!"
And the world said, "Neither are these other idiotic programs you have embraced. Lo, you have become a Socialist state and a second-rate power. Now you shall play by our rules!"
And the people cried out, "Alas, alas!! What have we done?"
But yea verily, it was too late. The people set upon "The One" and spat upon him and stoned him, and his name was dung. And the once mighty nation was no more; and the once proud people were without sustenance or shelter or hope. And the Change "The One" had given them was as like unto a poison that had destroyed them and like a whirlwind that consumed all that they had built.
And the people beat their chests in despair and cried out in anguish, "Give us back our nation and our pride and our hope!!" But it was too late, and their homeland was no more.
Posted Jul 6, 2009 on Sodahead.com by BLAH blah (http://www.sodahead.com/user/profile/1209586/blah-blah/)
Saturday, July 4, 2009
Independence Day
Patriotism has become more of a "dirty word" in recent years than the actual words with horrid, unsavory connotations ever were.
To be "patriotic" and to "love one's country" and to be "proud of one's country" are considered, by those who supposedly know, to be old-fashioned, at best, or sins, at worst, in many circles.
On any 4th of July, however, it is good to find the words on which this country was created and grew to be the country many, many, Americans still cherish today. It is good to see and read these words and hope that some out there will be reminded of the hope our country represented -- and most certainly still represents -- to the entire world, in spite of the many native-born who revile her.
When We the People who are proud of our country on a daily basis hear others revile and denigrate her, let us remember these words from those who created her and improved her throughout her history and let us all say, with great feeling, respect, and love: "God Bless America!"
****************************************************
July 3, 1776 letter from John Adams
The Second Day of July 1776, will be the most memorable Epocha, in the History of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated, by succeeding Generations, as the great anniversary Festival. It ought to be commemorated, as the Day of Deliverance by solemn Acts of Devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade, with Shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other from this Time forward forever more. You will think me transported with Enthusiasm.
Frederick Douglass, "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?" July 5, 1852
I have said that the Declaration of Independence is the ring-bolt to the chain of your nation's destiny; so, indeed, I regard it. The principles contained in that instrument are saving principles. Stand by those principles, be true to them on all occasions, in all places, against all foes, and at whatever cost.
Martin Luther King, "I Have A Dream," August 28, 1963
When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men would be guaranteed the inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. . . . I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal."
To be "patriotic" and to "love one's country" and to be "proud of one's country" are considered, by those who supposedly know, to be old-fashioned, at best, or sins, at worst, in many circles.
On any 4th of July, however, it is good to find the words on which this country was created and grew to be the country many, many, Americans still cherish today. It is good to see and read these words and hope that some out there will be reminded of the hope our country represented -- and most certainly still represents -- to the entire world, in spite of the many native-born who revile her.
When We the People who are proud of our country on a daily basis hear others revile and denigrate her, let us remember these words from those who created her and improved her throughout her history and let us all say, with great feeling, respect, and love: "God Bless America!"
****************************************************
July 3, 1776 letter from John Adams
The Second Day of July 1776, will be the most memorable Epocha, in the History of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated, by succeeding Generations, as the great anniversary Festival. It ought to be commemorated, as the Day of Deliverance by solemn Acts of Devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade, with Shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other from this Time forward forever more. You will think me transported with Enthusiasm.
Frederick Douglass, "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?" July 5, 1852
I have said that the Declaration of Independence is the ring-bolt to the chain of your nation's destiny; so, indeed, I regard it. The principles contained in that instrument are saving principles. Stand by those principles, be true to them on all occasions, in all places, against all foes, and at whatever cost.
Martin Luther King, "I Have A Dream," August 28, 1963
When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men would be guaranteed the inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. . . . I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal."
Saturday, May 23, 2009
Obama's Lies -- and YOUR Money
Ann Coulter always says it so much better than I! Read on and be edified, if not at least informed. . .
You know what really irritates me about liberals? (Besides the fact that they're spineless little girls in pretty dresses who can't play rough because it musses up their hair...)
They always think liberalism fixes the problem -- even when it was liberalism that caused the problem in the first place!
Case in point, the Financial Meltdown of 2008 (and counting). To hear liberals tell it, it all goes back to Ronald Reagan -- who with his seductive "B-actor" charm fooled America into thinking that by slashing taxes, regulation, and government spending we could unleash free enterprise and create a new wave of prosperity.
Sure, liberals concede, that seemed to work for, oh, the better part of three decades, but now we're paying the price for all that "greed." The solution? A return to the pre-Reagan policies of Jimmy Carter, LBJ, FDR... Speaking of which, what will victory look like in the "War on Poverty"? When are they going to produce an "exit strategy" from that quagmire?
Unfortunately, the facts -- as always when you're talking about liberal theories -- tell a different story. A story in which all the major villains, it turns out, have one thing in common: government.
That's right. From the "Community Reinvestment Act" that pressured banks into affirmative-action lending, to those "government-sponsored enterprises" Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- who bought up all the resulting subprime loans and repackaged them as "investment grade" securities -- the greasy thumb-prints of government were all over this fiasco from beginning to end.
But those, as I say, are facts. And facts have no place in the fantasy world of Democratic policy-makers. Nor does history -- true history, that is, as opposed to the public-school propaganda that teaches, for instance, that FDR's New Deal got us out of the Great Depression, when in reality it only deepened and prolonged it.
But the question remains: What can those of us in the fast-dwindling, Reality-Based Community do to survive financially as the Obamacrats prepare a "New New Deal" that threatens to outspend the original by about ten thousand to one?
Personally, I don't have a clue. But thank goodness I know of someone who does.
His name is Mark Skousen, Ph.D., editor of the investment newsletter Forecasts & Strategies -- and he just might be the smartest financial advisor working today.
Don't let that "Ph.D." fool you -- this is no pointy-headed leftist like Obama's economic team who seem to think that all the economy needs in order to flourish are more liberals running the economy.
Skousen, after all, launched his career by predicting during the 1980-82 recession -- and to the scornful laughter of nearly all the other so-called experts -- that "Reaganomics will work."
Boy, did he get that right. And boy, has he gotten it right ever since:
And here's the best thing about Mark Skousen. He knows how to make you money no matter how bad things get in the financial markets and the economy overall.
After all, he points out, the late billionaire John Templeton -- whom Money magazine called "the greatest stock-picker of the 20th century" -- began to build his vast fortune in the depths of the Great Depression.
Maybe you're not looking to be a billionaire. Maybe you're just looking to keep your head above water while the Obamacrats do their best to sink the economy. Either way, Mark Skousen can help -- and I urge you to give his Forecasts & Strategies a try.
The cost? Less than the tip on a John Edwards haircut -- in today's dollars, that is. After Obama gets done driving down the value of the dollar it wouldn't be enough to buy Governor Rod Blogojevich a haircut.
Click here to learn more.
Sincerely,
Ann Coulter
You know what really irritates me about liberals? (Besides the fact that they're spineless little girls in pretty dresses who can't play rough because it musses up their hair...)
They always think liberalism fixes the problem -- even when it was liberalism that caused the problem in the first place!
Case in point, the Financial Meltdown of 2008 (and counting). To hear liberals tell it, it all goes back to Ronald Reagan -- who with his seductive "B-actor" charm fooled America into thinking that by slashing taxes, regulation, and government spending we could unleash free enterprise and create a new wave of prosperity.
Sure, liberals concede, that seemed to work for, oh, the better part of three decades, but now we're paying the price for all that "greed." The solution? A return to the pre-Reagan policies of Jimmy Carter, LBJ, FDR... Speaking of which, what will victory look like in the "War on Poverty"? When are they going to produce an "exit strategy" from that quagmire?
Unfortunately, the facts -- as always when you're talking about liberal theories -- tell a different story. A story in which all the major villains, it turns out, have one thing in common: government.
That's right. From the "Community Reinvestment Act" that pressured banks into affirmative-action lending, to those "government-sponsored enterprises" Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- who bought up all the resulting subprime loans and repackaged them as "investment grade" securities -- the greasy thumb-prints of government were all over this fiasco from beginning to end.
But those, as I say, are facts. And facts have no place in the fantasy world of Democratic policy-makers. Nor does history -- true history, that is, as opposed to the public-school propaganda that teaches, for instance, that FDR's New Deal got us out of the Great Depression, when in reality it only deepened and prolonged it.
But the question remains: What can those of us in the fast-dwindling, Reality-Based Community do to survive financially as the Obamacrats prepare a "New New Deal" that threatens to outspend the original by about ten thousand to one?
Personally, I don't have a clue. But thank goodness I know of someone who does.
His name is Mark Skousen, Ph.D., editor of the investment newsletter Forecasts & Strategies -- and he just might be the smartest financial advisor working today.
Don't let that "Ph.D." fool you -- this is no pointy-headed leftist like Obama's economic team who seem to think that all the economy needs in order to flourish are more liberals running the economy.
Skousen, after all, launched his career by predicting during the 1980-82 recession -- and to the scornful laughter of nearly all the other so-called experts -- that "Reaganomics will work."
Boy, did he get that right. And boy, has he gotten it right ever since:
- Like when he issued a "sell everything" recommendation to his Forecasts & Strategies subscribers just 41 days before the stock market crash of 1987 -- then told them to get fully invested again several weeks later, just in time for the recovery.
- And when he called the Gulf War of 1990 "a turning point for U.S. stocks" -- and the Dow subsequently began a bull market that didn't end for nearly 10 years.
- And when he told his subscribers in 1995 that the NASDAQ would double, and then double again -- which is exactly what it did.
- And when, just weeks before the NASDAQ collapsed in 2000, he warned his subscribers that tech stocks were dangerously overvalued.
- And when, in 2006 -- more than two years before the financial meltdown -- he warned subscribers that "we clearly are headed for fiscal disaster," and showed them how to protect themselves.
And here's the best thing about Mark Skousen. He knows how to make you money no matter how bad things get in the financial markets and the economy overall.
After all, he points out, the late billionaire John Templeton -- whom Money magazine called "the greatest stock-picker of the 20th century" -- began to build his vast fortune in the depths of the Great Depression.
Maybe you're not looking to be a billionaire. Maybe you're just looking to keep your head above water while the Obamacrats do their best to sink the economy. Either way, Mark Skousen can help -- and I urge you to give his Forecasts & Strategies a try.
The cost? Less than the tip on a John Edwards haircut -- in today's dollars, that is. After Obama gets done driving down the value of the dollar it wouldn't be enough to buy Governor Rod Blogojevich a haircut.
Click here to learn more.
Sincerely,
Ann Coulter
Plain Ole Socialism is Starting to Look Good . . .
Many Conservatives (and Republicans and maybe even some Democrats) were extremely concerned throughout Mr. Obama's 2 year campaign to reach the high office of President of the United States of America for the "simple" reason that it was very clear to many that the road Mr. Obama would travel and have our Country follow would lead nowhere but to self-destruction through Socialism.
As has become painfully clear in the very first months of Mr. Obama's reign, the fear of Socialism was the least of our concerns. Little could anyone have known -- despite his writings and expressed philosophies and opinions -- that Mr. Obama's government would jump right over Socialism to land directly into Neo-nazism.
The government put in place, rather, in the process of being put in place showed its true colors fairly quickly; the colors have merely gotten truer and truer . . . and they are not the true colors of the Republic of the United States of America.
What is even more frightening to me is that not too many of We the People are reacting; too many of We the People are maintaining the complacency which has brought us to this frightening moment. Above all other frightening aspects, too many of We the People simply do not seem to care! Not only are We the People fighting the ever-tightening noose and the ever-closer encroachment of government, but we have the ever-present danger of the small-minded ignorant with which to contend -- also in government, also in positions of power! And too many of We the People do not seem to care.
It has become more and more apparent as the first weeks of Mr. Obama's reign roll by that the majority of We the People have truly been bought by the change promised by Mr. Obama. Unfortunately, not enough of We the People have yet noticed that the "paid for" part of the equation is a bill from which we will not receive any change other than that which will end our Country as we know The Republic of the United States of America to be.
An excellent example of the type of "change" that has begun is reported in Townhall.com. As an aside . . . a significant question would be to ask how many of the so-called "mainstream media" had the honesty to report this? Should any of We the People still have any doubts about Mr. Obama's governments intent -- or should any be working very hard (with the ubiquitous assistance of the so-called Mainstream Media) to keep their heads in the sand, perhaps these recent developments will bring clarity as well as fear to their thoughts.
Copyright MCzwz, May 2009. All Rights Reserved.
============================================================
From a Townhall.com Urgent Report:
A customer service representative at The Patriot Depot . . . received a call from Rosemary in Ball, Louisiana alerting him that her brother-in-law was stopped by small town Louisiana police and detained by the roadside for half an hour. A background check was conducted to determine whether he was a member of an “extremist” group. Why? Her brother-in-law (name not disclosed for privacy) had purchased a conservative “Don’t Tread on Me” bumper sticker from The Patriot Depot and displayed it on his car.
The bumper sticker is based on the famous flag designed by American Revolution era general and statesman Christopher Gadsden. The yellow flag featured a coiled diamondback rattlesnake ready to strike, with the slogan “Don’t Tread on Me!” underneath it. Benjamin Franklin helped make the rattlesnake a symbol of Americans’ reluctance to quarrel but vigilance and resolve in defense of their rights. By 1775 when Gadsden presented his flag to the commander-in-chief of the Navy, the rattlesnake was a symbol of the colonies and of their need to unite in defense of threats to their God-given and inherited rights. The flag and the bumper sticker symbolize American patriotism, the need to defend Americans’ rights, and resistance to tyranny’s threats to American liberty. Those threats included—and include—illegal taxation, profanation of Americans’ rights, and violation of the fundamental principles of American law.
The notorious Department of Homeland Security memo, which was apparently based on the infamous Missouri State Police Report that described supporters of presidential candidates Bob Barr, Ron Paul, and Chuck Baldwin as “militia”-type potential extremists and potential terrorists, is not the first effort of leftist radicals to slander their political opponents as “extremists.” Some observers have noted that similar “reports” emerged during the Clinton administration. But “liberals” and other leftists have been calling defenders of traditional American limited, constitutional government, free enterprise, and individual liberty “extremists” since at least the 1964 election.
The political left’s attempts to establish a false equivalence between genuine left wing extremists and those who oppose the left’s assault on our culture, law, and liberty is more than propaganda to fool the ignorant and manipulate public opinion. Combined with the power of government, it is an attempt to harass, intimidate, and silence all political opposition—and probably an attempt to demonize them as a prelude to governmental oppression and persecution. Keep in mind that the First Amendment states:
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."
Small town police misled by phony left wing “reports” are bad enough. Federal government agencies and their armed agents under the direction of leftist radicals are exponentially worse. They will tread on us. The time has come to let our voices be heard!
As has become painfully clear in the very first months of Mr. Obama's reign, the fear of Socialism was the least of our concerns. Little could anyone have known -- despite his writings and expressed philosophies and opinions -- that Mr. Obama's government would jump right over Socialism to land directly into Neo-nazism.
The government put in place, rather, in the process of being put in place showed its true colors fairly quickly; the colors have merely gotten truer and truer . . . and they are not the true colors of the Republic of the United States of America.
What is even more frightening to me is that not too many of We the People are reacting; too many of We the People are maintaining the complacency which has brought us to this frightening moment. Above all other frightening aspects, too many of We the People simply do not seem to care! Not only are We the People fighting the ever-tightening noose and the ever-closer encroachment of government, but we have the ever-present danger of the small-minded ignorant with which to contend -- also in government, also in positions of power! And too many of We the People do not seem to care.
It has become more and more apparent as the first weeks of Mr. Obama's reign roll by that the majority of We the People have truly been bought by the change promised by Mr. Obama. Unfortunately, not enough of We the People have yet noticed that the "paid for" part of the equation is a bill from which we will not receive any change other than that which will end our Country as we know The Republic of the United States of America to be.
An excellent example of the type of "change" that has begun is reported in Townhall.com. As an aside . . . a significant question would be to ask how many of the so-called "mainstream media" had the honesty to report this? Should any of We the People still have any doubts about Mr. Obama's governments intent -- or should any be working very hard (with the ubiquitous assistance of the so-called Mainstream Media) to keep their heads in the sand, perhaps these recent developments will bring clarity as well as fear to their thoughts.
Copyright MCzwz, May 2009. All Rights Reserved.
============================================================
From a Townhall.com Urgent Report:
A customer service representative at The Patriot Depot . . . received a call from Rosemary in Ball, Louisiana alerting him that her brother-in-law was stopped by small town Louisiana police and detained by the roadside for half an hour. A background check was conducted to determine whether he was a member of an “extremist” group. Why? Her brother-in-law (name not disclosed for privacy) had purchased a conservative “Don’t Tread on Me” bumper sticker from The Patriot Depot and displayed it on his car.
The bumper sticker is based on the famous flag designed by American Revolution era general and statesman Christopher Gadsden. The yellow flag featured a coiled diamondback rattlesnake ready to strike, with the slogan “Don’t Tread on Me!” underneath it. Benjamin Franklin helped make the rattlesnake a symbol of Americans’ reluctance to quarrel but vigilance and resolve in defense of their rights. By 1775 when Gadsden presented his flag to the commander-in-chief of the Navy, the rattlesnake was a symbol of the colonies and of their need to unite in defense of threats to their God-given and inherited rights. The flag and the bumper sticker symbolize American patriotism, the need to defend Americans’ rights, and resistance to tyranny’s threats to American liberty. Those threats included—and include—illegal taxation, profanation of Americans’ rights, and violation of the fundamental principles of American law.
The notorious Department of Homeland Security memo, which was apparently based on the infamous Missouri State Police Report that described supporters of presidential candidates Bob Barr, Ron Paul, and Chuck Baldwin as “militia”-type potential extremists and potential terrorists, is not the first effort of leftist radicals to slander their political opponents as “extremists.” Some observers have noted that similar “reports” emerged during the Clinton administration. But “liberals” and other leftists have been calling defenders of traditional American limited, constitutional government, free enterprise, and individual liberty “extremists” since at least the 1964 election.
The political left’s attempts to establish a false equivalence between genuine left wing extremists and those who oppose the left’s assault on our culture, law, and liberty is more than propaganda to fool the ignorant and manipulate public opinion. Combined with the power of government, it is an attempt to harass, intimidate, and silence all political opposition—and probably an attempt to demonize them as a prelude to governmental oppression and persecution. Keep in mind that the First Amendment states:
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."
Small town police misled by phony left wing “reports” are bad enough. Federal government agencies and their armed agents under the direction of leftist radicals are exponentially worse. They will tread on us. The time has come to let our voices be heard!
Sunday, April 26, 2009
"Non-judgemental"? "Open-minded"? "Accepting"? Humbug!
For many years, those of us of the more Republican, Conservative, or even the simply "non-mainstream" thought processes have been deemed to be "judgmental," "cold-hearted," and "uncaring" because of our opinions. (No contraction there, right? It appears to always have been completely acceptable to be judged by those self-proclaimed non-judgemental. After all, the left simply expresses an "opinion!")
Since the taking of control by the left, the "opinions" have reached depths of ugliness and hatred not seen so overtly in this country since the height of the Viet Nam war, in my opinion. The source of all this, strangely enough, comes from those who always scream the loudest in their demands for "acceptance," "open-mindedness" and that much touted "tolerance" of the liberal ideal.
Is this truly "strange," however? I think not. The intolerance of the so-called "most tolerant" has always been clear, has always been one of the most easily perceived aspects of their "truths." Any who may have wanted to try to maintain a sense of fairnness toward those so-called "non-judgemental" groups need only look at the reactions spewing from that quarter to understand their meaning of "acceptance."
Can it be made more clear that those much aclaimed virtues are only to be applied to those who not only accept the liberal perspective, fully and unquestioningly, but also only to those who do not dare to attempt to express any opinion of their own?
Thanks to those whose blindness voted in November 2008, We the People are watching the death of the Constitution, of the Bill of Rights, of the United States of America herself, and, ultimately, of the Individual.
~~ MCzwz
April 2009, All rights reserved.
============================================================
Michelle Malkin - Syndicated Columnist, expresses this issue much more cogently than I . . .
They told us if Barack Obama were elected, the nation would come together. Souls would be fixed. Spirits would be healed. Public discourse would be elevated. Welcome to civility and tolerance in the Age of Obama:
Celebrity leech/trash blogger Perez Hilton took to the Internet and TV airwaves to humiliate a beauty pageant contestant who gave what he considered an "offensive" answer about gay marriage. Hilton, inexplicably serving as a judge for the Miss USA contest, asked Miss California, Carrie Prejean, whether she supported the legalization of gay marriage. Prejean respectfully answered: "I think that I believe that a marriage should be between a man and a woman. No offense to anybody out there, but that's how I was raised." President Obama, by the way, defines marriage the same way Prejean does. (See related article)
No matter. Hilton immediately lambasted Prejean as a "dumb b****" in a viral YouTube video he taped after the pageant Sunday night. He apologized the next morning for the attack, then retracted his apology, then escalated his divisive rhetoric. On Tuesday afternoon, Hilton told an MSNBC female anchor that he was thinking of an even more vulgar epithet -- the "c-word" -- as he listened to Prejean's answer. The female anchor said nothing. Basking in his new role as thought and speech enforcer, Hilton told CNN's Larry King that beauty pageant contestants must bow to the tolerance mob: "Yes. I do expect Miss USA to be politically correct."
And apparently, the Miss USA organizers agree. Instead of apologizing for Hilton's vile behavior, the pageant director of the Miss California contest, Keith Lewis, sent a note to Hilton throwing Prejean under the bus: "I am personally saddened and hurt that Miss CA USA 2009 believes marriage rights belong only to a man and a woman....Religious beliefs have no place in politics in the Miss CA family."
But gutter profanity and misogyny do?
At the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill last week, former GOP Congressman Tom Tancredo came to speak against legislative proposals to provide illegal alien students in-state tuition discounts not available to law-abiding Americans and legal immigrant students. Protesters at the institution of higher learning responded by blocking Tancredo with massive banners and screaming, "No dialogue with hate!" Adults in the room stood by while students smashed a window a few feet from where Tancredo stood. Physically threatened, Tancredo was forced to leave without delivering his remarks. (See related article)
According to campus reports, for a week leftists had prepared to mount a speech-squelching demonstration. The same thuggish tactics have been used at Columbia University, Georgetown University, and Michigan State University to shut down speakers who support strict immigration enforcement. The UNC administration apologized for the students' tantrum, but took no steps to examine its own culpability for fostering a climate of intellectual vandalism and intolerance.
The nightly airwaves turned into a soft-porn cesspool last week as liberal journalists derided and slimed hundreds of thousands of TEA Party protesters across the country who oppose reckless taxing and spending by both major political parties. Award-winning CNN anchor Anderson Cooper, mimicking his bottom-of-the-barrel competitors at MSNBC, smugly indulged in sexual puns about "teabagging." MSNBC devoted the entire week to sophomoric sexual slang and innuendo with references to "nuts," Dick Armey, and "full-throated" protesters. (See related article)
And White House adviser David Axelrod calls the TEA Party folks "unhealthy"?
Speaking of unhealthy, angry white liberal actress Janeane Garofalo venomously played the race card: "It's about hating a black man in the White House. This is racism straight up and is nothing but a bunch of teabagging rednecks." The theme was echoed by Jeffrey Kimball, a professor emeritus of history at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, who castigated the "extreme right" for organizing against Obama because "he's black and he's liberal."
Tell that to the thousands of activists in South Carolina who practically booed and heckled white Republican Rep. Gresham Barrett off the stage at a TEA Party in Greenville last Friday night for supporting the trillion-dollar TARP and embracing the pork-laden stimulus law after voting against it. "Go home!" they shouted. The only color that mattered to protesters: the red ink of government debts.
But in the Age of Obama, there's no room for such nuance and inconvenient truths. A decent young woman is a "dumb b****" for holding the same view of marriage as the Obamessiah. A conservative campus speaker is bullied as a hatemonger by wild-eyed hatemongers. A grassroots movement is debased as a bunch of racist vulgarians by a media mob of racists and vulgarians. Civility and tolerance have taken a left-hand turn down a one-way street. So much for changing course.
- 4/22/2009 10:00:00 AM
COPYRIGHT 2009 CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.
Since the taking of control by the left, the "opinions" have reached depths of ugliness and hatred not seen so overtly in this country since the height of the Viet Nam war, in my opinion. The source of all this, strangely enough, comes from those who always scream the loudest in their demands for "acceptance," "open-mindedness" and that much touted "tolerance" of the liberal ideal.
Is this truly "strange," however? I think not. The intolerance of the so-called "most tolerant" has always been clear, has always been one of the most easily perceived aspects of their "truths." Any who may have wanted to try to maintain a sense of fairnness toward those so-called "non-judgemental" groups need only look at the reactions spewing from that quarter to understand their meaning of "acceptance."
Can it be made more clear that those much aclaimed virtues are only to be applied to those who not only accept the liberal perspective, fully and unquestioningly, but also only to those who do not dare to attempt to express any opinion of their own?
Thanks to those whose blindness voted in November 2008, We the People are watching the death of the Constitution, of the Bill of Rights, of the United States of America herself, and, ultimately, of the Individual.
~~ MCzwz
April 2009, All rights reserved.
============================================================
Michelle Malkin - Syndicated Columnist, expresses this issue much more cogently than I . . .
They told us if Barack Obama were elected, the nation would come together. Souls would be fixed. Spirits would be healed. Public discourse would be elevated. Welcome to civility and tolerance in the Age of Obama:
Celebrity leech/trash blogger Perez Hilton took to the Internet and TV airwaves to humiliate a beauty pageant contestant who gave what he considered an "offensive" answer about gay marriage. Hilton, inexplicably serving as a judge for the Miss USA contest, asked Miss California, Carrie Prejean, whether she supported the legalization of gay marriage. Prejean respectfully answered: "I think that I believe that a marriage should be between a man and a woman. No offense to anybody out there, but that's how I was raised." President Obama, by the way, defines marriage the same way Prejean does. (See related article)
No matter. Hilton immediately lambasted Prejean as a "dumb b****" in a viral YouTube video he taped after the pageant Sunday night. He apologized the next morning for the attack, then retracted his apology, then escalated his divisive rhetoric. On Tuesday afternoon, Hilton told an MSNBC female anchor that he was thinking of an even more vulgar epithet -- the "c-word" -- as he listened to Prejean's answer. The female anchor said nothing. Basking in his new role as thought and speech enforcer, Hilton told CNN's Larry King that beauty pageant contestants must bow to the tolerance mob: "Yes. I do expect Miss USA to be politically correct."
And apparently, the Miss USA organizers agree. Instead of apologizing for Hilton's vile behavior, the pageant director of the Miss California contest, Keith Lewis, sent a note to Hilton throwing Prejean under the bus: "I am personally saddened and hurt that Miss CA USA 2009 believes marriage rights belong only to a man and a woman....Religious beliefs have no place in politics in the Miss CA family."
But gutter profanity and misogyny do?
At the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill last week, former GOP Congressman Tom Tancredo came to speak against legislative proposals to provide illegal alien students in-state tuition discounts not available to law-abiding Americans and legal immigrant students. Protesters at the institution of higher learning responded by blocking Tancredo with massive banners and screaming, "No dialogue with hate!" Adults in the room stood by while students smashed a window a few feet from where Tancredo stood. Physically threatened, Tancredo was forced to leave without delivering his remarks. (See related article)
According to campus reports, for a week leftists had prepared to mount a speech-squelching demonstration. The same thuggish tactics have been used at Columbia University, Georgetown University, and Michigan State University to shut down speakers who support strict immigration enforcement. The UNC administration apologized for the students' tantrum, but took no steps to examine its own culpability for fostering a climate of intellectual vandalism and intolerance.
The nightly airwaves turned into a soft-porn cesspool last week as liberal journalists derided and slimed hundreds of thousands of TEA Party protesters across the country who oppose reckless taxing and spending by both major political parties. Award-winning CNN anchor Anderson Cooper, mimicking his bottom-of-the-barrel competitors at MSNBC, smugly indulged in sexual puns about "teabagging." MSNBC devoted the entire week to sophomoric sexual slang and innuendo with references to "nuts," Dick Armey, and "full-throated" protesters. (See related article)
And White House adviser David Axelrod calls the TEA Party folks "unhealthy"?
Speaking of unhealthy, angry white liberal actress Janeane Garofalo venomously played the race card: "It's about hating a black man in the White House. This is racism straight up and is nothing but a bunch of teabagging rednecks." The theme was echoed by Jeffrey Kimball, a professor emeritus of history at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, who castigated the "extreme right" for organizing against Obama because "he's black and he's liberal."
Tell that to the thousands of activists in South Carolina who practically booed and heckled white Republican Rep. Gresham Barrett off the stage at a TEA Party in Greenville last Friday night for supporting the trillion-dollar TARP and embracing the pork-laden stimulus law after voting against it. "Go home!" they shouted. The only color that mattered to protesters: the red ink of government debts.
But in the Age of Obama, there's no room for such nuance and inconvenient truths. A decent young woman is a "dumb b****" for holding the same view of marriage as the Obamessiah. A conservative campus speaker is bullied as a hatemonger by wild-eyed hatemongers. A grassroots movement is debased as a bunch of racist vulgarians by a media mob of racists and vulgarians. Civility and tolerance have taken a left-hand turn down a one-way street. So much for changing course.
- 4/22/2009 10:00:00 AM
COPYRIGHT 2009 CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.
School choice for me...but not for you
More Liberal "Fairness?"
Is this how the liberals show their vaunted concern and caring about children and education . . or . . is this an expert political group (the Teachers' Unions, NEA, et al. in action, being "repaid" for being one of the most vocal supporters, one of the strongest union groups who, in essence, gave the liberals the White House?
Since Mr. Obama is beholden to them, (as he is to ACORN, the Hollywood elite, the gay activist crowd, and so many other "special groups,") we should not be -- and some of us are not -- surprised that Mr. Obama is so quickly sending off the "Thank you" cards.
Not only is the irony so excruciatingly painful when one considers the utter hypocrisy of this issue, it merely becomes more grossly overwhelming when one remembers the double-talk by Mr. Obama about the school his children were to attend once in DC. During the campaign, the "man of the people" would enroll his children in public school, of course ... as one of "the people."
The truth? His children attend Sidwell Friends, one of the most exclusive schools in DC. He can afford it; never mind those who can't. (Also, let's all nevermind what Mr. Obama was supposedly to represent via his "change" mantra . . .)
~~ MCzwz
===============================================================
When it comes to school choice, one organization says Capitol Hill lawmakers are "do as I say, not as I do."
Lindsey Burke, a research assistant with The Heritage Foundation, explains that every other [year] her organization releases a report on Congress and school choice.
"This year's survey revealed that many members of Congress are, in fact, exercising private school choice for their children," says Burke -- and it is not just a few who are doing so. "Forty-four percent of senators and 36 percent of representatives have at some point sent a child to private school," she continues. "So overall it's about 38 percent total members of Congress had exercised private school choice."
Burke, who is a former public school teacher, says she has no problem with school choice, but finds it ironic that so many members of Congress exercise that option while at the same time squashing a school-choice program in their own backyard -- the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program.
"This has been a great program that has allowed 1,700 low-income children in [the District of Columbia] to escape the failing and often unsafe public schools in the district and go to a private school," Burke states.
Congress voted to allow the funding for the program to expire at the end of this school year. But Burke says the program has strong bipartisan support in the DC area, and she remains hopeful it can be revived.
-- Pete Chagnon - OneNewsNow - 4/23/2009 5:00:00 AM
Is this how the liberals show their vaunted concern and caring about children and education . . or . . is this an expert political group (the Teachers' Unions, NEA, et al. in action, being "repaid" for being one of the most vocal supporters, one of the strongest union groups who, in essence, gave the liberals the White House?
Since Mr. Obama is beholden to them, (as he is to ACORN, the Hollywood elite, the gay activist crowd, and so many other "special groups,") we should not be -- and some of us are not -- surprised that Mr. Obama is so quickly sending off the "Thank you" cards.
Not only is the irony so excruciatingly painful when one considers the utter hypocrisy of this issue, it merely becomes more grossly overwhelming when one remembers the double-talk by Mr. Obama about the school his children were to attend once in DC. During the campaign, the "man of the people" would enroll his children in public school, of course ... as one of "the people."
The truth? His children attend Sidwell Friends, one of the most exclusive schools in DC. He can afford it; never mind those who can't. (Also, let's all nevermind what Mr. Obama was supposedly to represent via his "change" mantra . . .)
~~ MCzwz
===============================================================
When it comes to school choice, one organization says Capitol Hill lawmakers are "do as I say, not as I do."
Lindsey Burke, a research assistant with The Heritage Foundation, explains that every other [year] her organization releases a report on Congress and school choice.
"This year's survey revealed that many members of Congress are, in fact, exercising private school choice for their children," says Burke -- and it is not just a few who are doing so. "Forty-four percent of senators and 36 percent of representatives have at some point sent a child to private school," she continues. "So overall it's about 38 percent total members of Congress had exercised private school choice."
Burke, who is a former public school teacher, says she has no problem with school choice, but finds it ironic that so many members of Congress exercise that option while at the same time squashing a school-choice program in their own backyard -- the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program.
"This has been a great program that has allowed 1,700 low-income children in [the District of Columbia] to escape the failing and often unsafe public schools in the district and go to a private school," Burke states.
Congress voted to allow the funding for the program to expire at the end of this school year. But Burke says the program has strong bipartisan support in the DC area, and she remains hopeful it can be revived.
-- Pete Chagnon - OneNewsNow - 4/23/2009 5:00:00 AM
Access to Education is Only for Some?
One has to wonder . . . why is it "fair," in the lexicon of some, that children who have not had the opportunities to attend "good" schools before, but were able to do so through the school voucher program are suddenly precluded from doing so?
Under the auspices of the very ones who claim to care so much about "children," "education," and "our future" a large group of children are now prohibited from attending "better" schools through the destruction of the very program that was to have helped.
Is this really the "change" people who voted for Mr. Obama last year thought they were getting? I do not believe anyone who voted for Mr. Obama really thought he would go this far . . . though it was clear in his words, his expressed philosophies, and his own history that this was his (and his cohorts') ultimate goal.
I am sure many of you will agree that education and helping young people get ready, through acquiring knowledge and education, to face the future and to better themselves is not a political issue -- at least, it should not be.
It has, however, become exactly that, more than ever before: a thoroughly political issue.
The destruction of the voucher program is just that: destroying the opportunity for a group of folks who were to be the very ones helped, supported, and ultimately built up through access to greater educational options.
Those who are sincere in wanting to keep our country true to its founding principles and intent must work to stop such insidious "change."
This type of "change" is not good for our country now or in the future.
Copyuright MCzwz, 2009. All Rights Reserved.
Under the auspices of the very ones who claim to care so much about "children," "education," and "our future" a large group of children are now prohibited from attending "better" schools through the destruction of the very program that was to have helped.
Is this really the "change" people who voted for Mr. Obama last year thought they were getting? I do not believe anyone who voted for Mr. Obama really thought he would go this far . . . though it was clear in his words, his expressed philosophies, and his own history that this was his (and his cohorts') ultimate goal.
I am sure many of you will agree that education and helping young people get ready, through acquiring knowledge and education, to face the future and to better themselves is not a political issue -- at least, it should not be.
It has, however, become exactly that, more than ever before: a thoroughly political issue.
The destruction of the voucher program is just that: destroying the opportunity for a group of folks who were to be the very ones helped, supported, and ultimately built up through access to greater educational options.
Those who are sincere in wanting to keep our country true to its founding principles and intent must work to stop such insidious "change."
This type of "change" is not good for our country now or in the future.
Copyuright MCzwz, 2009. All Rights Reserved.
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Resurgence of Self-Sufficiency?
I recently asked my friend's little girl what she wanted to be when she grows up. She said she wanted to be President some day. Both of her parents, liberal Democrats, were standing there, so I asked her, 'If you were President what would be the first thing you would do?'
She replied, 'I'd give food and houses to all the homeless people.'
Her parents beamed.
'Wow...what a worthy goal.' I told her, 'But you don't have to wait until you're President to do that. You can come over to my house and mow the lawn, pull weeds, and sweep my yard, and I'll pay you $50. Then I'll take you over to the grocery store where the homeless guy hangs out, and you can give him the $50 to use toward food and a new house.'
She thought that over for a few seconds, then she looked me straight in the eye and asked, 'Why doesn't the homeless guy go over and do the work, and you can just pay him the $50?'
I said, 'Welcome to the Republican Party.'
~~ Source Unknown
She replied, 'I'd give food and houses to all the homeless people.'
Her parents beamed.
'Wow...what a worthy goal.' I told her, 'But you don't have to wait until you're President to do that. You can come over to my house and mow the lawn, pull weeds, and sweep my yard, and I'll pay you $50. Then I'll take you over to the grocery store where the homeless guy hangs out, and you can give him the $50 to use toward food and a new house.'
She thought that over for a few seconds, then she looked me straight in the eye and asked, 'Why doesn't the homeless guy go over and do the work, and you can just pay him the $50?'
I said, 'Welcome to the Republican Party.'
~~ Source Unknown
Sunday, April 5, 2009
The Republicans have shown themselves to be disappointly malleable and insubstantial, much to the disgust and fear of those of us who are Conservative.
There are, in spite of (hopeful) claims to the contrary, plenty of Conservatives and Republicans left -- thank God.
All we have to do is get ourselves back on our feet and start to fend of the wild liberalism that has been voted into our government.
The GOP response budget was cobbled together pretty much at the last minute to show there was a GOP "alternative" in response to liberals' accusations of presenting no ideas.
That is not the way to go about presenting alternative ideas.
We the People who fear what this is bringing on must pull ourselves together, fight down our fears and fight for the good and the future of our country.
We must work hard to field strong candidates locally, statewide, and nationally to put the reins on this unbridled liberalism threatening out country.
Do we really want our entire country to replicate Calififornia, Washington State, and Oregon at best and San Francisco at worst?
If the answer to that is the resounding "NO!" I hope it is throughout the Conservative and Republican core of our Country, then we must stop feeling sorry for ourselves, stop blaming President Bush (because there was a Congress passing laws then, too) and start taking responsibility for ourselves as We the People and make the necessary changes in our leadership the next opportunity we have: 2010.
There are, in spite of (hopeful) claims to the contrary, plenty of Conservatives and Republicans left -- thank God.
All we have to do is get ourselves back on our feet and start to fend of the wild liberalism that has been voted into our government.
The GOP response budget was cobbled together pretty much at the last minute to show there was a GOP "alternative" in response to liberals' accusations of presenting no ideas.
That is not the way to go about presenting alternative ideas.
We the People who fear what this is bringing on must pull ourselves together, fight down our fears and fight for the good and the future of our country.
We must work hard to field strong candidates locally, statewide, and nationally to put the reins on this unbridled liberalism threatening out country.
Do we really want our entire country to replicate Calififornia, Washington State, and Oregon at best and San Francisco at worst?
If the answer to that is the resounding "NO!" I hope it is throughout the Conservative and Republican core of our Country, then we must stop feeling sorry for ourselves, stop blaming President Bush (because there was a Congress passing laws then, too) and start taking responsibility for ourselves as We the People and make the necessary changes in our leadership the next opportunity we have: 2010.
Sunday, March 29, 2009
Before the PC-Police Come for Me, Too . . .
And, by the by . . . I agree with Mr. Rooney on every single point.
I don't think being a minority makes you a victim of anything except numbers. The only things I can think of that are truly discriminatory are things like the United Negro College Fund, Jet Magazine, Black Entertainment Television, and Miss Black America. Try to have things like the United Caucasian College Fund, Cloud Magazine, White Entertainment Television, or Miss White America; and see what happens...Jesse Jackson will be knocking down your door.
Guns do not make you a killer. I think killing makes you a killer. You can kill someone with a baseball bat or a car, but no one is trying to ban you from driving to the ball game.
I believe they are called the Boy Scouts for a reason, which is why there are no girls allowed. Girls belong in the Girl Scouts! ARE YOU LISTENING, MARTHA BURKE ?
I think that if you feel homosexuality is wrong, it is not a phobia, it is an opinion.
I have the right 'NOT' to be tolerant of others because they are different, weird, or tick me off.
When 70% of the people who get arrested are black, in cities where 70% of the population is black, that is not racial profiling; it is the Law of Probability.
I believe that if you are selling me a milkshake, a pack of cigarettes, a newspaper or a hotel room, you must do it in English! As a matter of fact, if you want to be an American citizen, you should have to speak English!
My father and grandfather didn't die in vain so you can leave the countries you were born in to come over and disrespect ours.
I can't understand the word 'freeze' or 'stop' in English, see the above lines.
I don't think just because you were not born in this country, you are qualified for any special loan programs, government sponsored bank loans or tax breaks, etc., so you can open a hotel, coffee shop, trinket store, or any other business.
We did not go to the aid of certain foreign countries and risk our lives in wars to defend their freedoms, so that decades later they could come over here and tell us our constitution is a living document; and open to their interpretations...
I don't hate the rich; I don't pity the poor. I know pro wrestling is fake, but so are movies and television. That doesn't stop you from watching them.
I think Bill Gates has every right to keep every penny he made and continue to make more. If it ticks you off, go and invent the next operating system that's better, and put your name on the building.
It doesn't take a whole village to raise a child right, but it does take a parent to stand up to the kid and smack their little behinds when necessary, and say 'NO!'
I think tattoos and piercing are fine if you want them, but please don't pretend they are a political statement. And, please, stay home until that new lip ring heals.. I don't want to look at your ugly infected mouth as you serve me French fries!
I am sick of 'Political Correctness.' I know a lot of black people, and not a single one of them was born in Africa ; so how can they be 'African-Americans'? Besides, Africa is a continent. I don't go around saying I am a European-American because my great, great, great, great, great, great grandfather was from Europe. I am proud to be from America an d nowhere else.
And if you don't like my point of view, tough ...
Words With More Meaning Than Ever
President Reagan's policies and philosophies have essentially been usurped by the current majority though they attempt to vilify and denigrate the very ideas they are attempting to steal. This additional "grab" merely reinforces how exact and pertinent President Reagan's ideas are, even 45 years later.
We the People who still consider ourselves Conservatives have a lot to keep fighting for. It is imperative that we maintain our protests and ensure that the elected representatives who work for We the People listen and respond to our communications. I refuse to say that we are pleading with those currently in charge, though events certainly make what We the People are trying to say appear as a plea. President Reagan expressed the same thoughts, more forcefully and much more eloquently than any I have yet to hear.
President Reagan's words are just as -- or even more -- pertinent today. In the great span of time since, we are still facing the same enemy from within against which Mr. Reagan warned. It is very clear, within the very short period of time that Mr. Obama was elected to the highest office our great country has to offer that his stated intent, clear and obvious for all to hear during his year and a half long campaign, is well on the way to fruition: to socialize this great Republic at least, or to establish the foundations of totalitarianism at worst.
We the People must do everything within our power to ensure that our Republic stays true to the tenets and beliefs on which it was founded. The words of one of the greatest Presidents we have ever had should shine as beacons as we try our hardest to fight through the gloom in which we are currently enveloped, not much of a difference, sadly, between then and now.
>>> The words of President Reagan given as a stump speech, at speaking engagements, and on a memorable night in 1964 in support of Barry Goldwater's presidential campaign. This version is from that broadcast.
We the People who still consider ourselves Conservatives have a lot to keep fighting for. It is imperative that we maintain our protests and ensure that the elected representatives who work for We the People listen and respond to our communications. I refuse to say that we are pleading with those currently in charge, though events certainly make what We the People are trying to say appear as a plea. President Reagan expressed the same thoughts, more forcefully and much more eloquently than any I have yet to hear.
President Reagan's words are just as -- or even more -- pertinent today. In the great span of time since, we are still facing the same enemy from within against which Mr. Reagan warned. It is very clear, within the very short period of time that Mr. Obama was elected to the highest office our great country has to offer that his stated intent, clear and obvious for all to hear during his year and a half long campaign, is well on the way to fruition: to socialize this great Republic at least, or to establish the foundations of totalitarianism at worst.
We the People must do everything within our power to ensure that our Republic stays true to the tenets and beliefs on which it was founded. The words of one of the greatest Presidents we have ever had should shine as beacons as we try our hardest to fight through the gloom in which we are currently enveloped, not much of a difference, sadly, between then and now.
>>> The words of President Reagan given as a stump speech, at speaking engagements, and on a memorable night in 1964 in support of Barry Goldwater's presidential campaign. This version is from that broadcast.
A Time for Choosing
I am going to talk of controversial things. I make no apology for this.
It's time we asked ourselves if we still know the freedoms intended for us by the Founding Fathers. James Madison said, "We base all our experiments on the capacity of mankind for self government."
This idea -- that government was beholden to the people, that it had no other source of power -- is still the newest, most unique idea in all the long history of man's relation to man. This is the issue of this election: Whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American Revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capital can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves.
You and I are told we must choose between a left or right, but I suggest there is no such thing as a left or right. There is only an up or down. Up to man's age-old dream--the maximum of individual freedom consistent with order -- or down to the ant heap of totalitarianism. Regardless of their sincerity, their humanitarian motives, those who would sacrifice freedom for security have embarked on this downward path. Plutarch warned, "The real destroyer of the liberties of the people is he who spreads among them bounties, donations and benefits."
The Founding Fathers knew a government can't control the economy without controlling people. And they knew when a government sets out to do that, it must use force and coercion to achieve its purpose. So we have come to a time for choosing.
Public servants say, always with the best of intentions, "What greater service we could render if only we had a little more money and a little more power." But the truth is that outside of its legitimate function, government does nothing as well or as economically as the private sector.
Yet any time you and I question the schemes of the do-gooders, we're denounced as being opposed to their humanitarian goals. It seems impossible to legitimately debate their solutions with the assumption that all of us share the desire to help the less fortunate. They tell us we're always "against," never "for" anything.
We are for a provision that destitution should not follow unemployment by reason of old age, and to that end we have accepted Social Security as a step toward meeting the problem. However, we are against those entrusted with this program when they practice deception regarding its fiscal shortcomings, when they charge that any criticism of the program means that we want to end payments....
We are for aiding our allies by sharing our material blessings with nations which share our fundamental beliefs, but we are against doling out money government to government, creating bureaucracy, if not socialism, all over the world.
We need true tax reform that will at least make a start toward restoring for our children the American Dream that wealth is denied to no one, that each individual has the right to fly as high as his strength and ability will take him.... But we cannot have such reform while our tax policy is engineered by people who view the tax as a means of achieving changes in our social structure....
Have we the courage and the will to face up to the immorality and discrimination of the progressive tax, and demand a return to traditional proportionate taxation? . . . Today in our country the tax collector's share is 37 cents of every dollar earned. Freedom has never been so fragile, so close to slipping from our grasp.
Are you willing to spend time studying the issues, making yourself aware, and then conveying that information to family and friends? Will you resist the temptation to get a government handout for your community? Realize that the doctor's fight against socialized medicine is your fight. We can't socialize the doctors without socializing the patients. Recognize that government invasion of public power is eventually an assault upon your own business. If some among you fear taking a stand because you are afraid of reprisals from customers, clients, or even government, recognize that you are just feeding the crocodile hoping he'll eat you last.
If all of this seems like a great deal of trouble, think what's at stake. We are faced with the most evil enemy mankind has known in his long climb from the swamp to the stars. There can be no security anywhere in the free world if there is no fiscal and economic stability within the United States. Those who ask us to trade our freedom for the soup kitchen of the welfare state are architects of a policy of accommodation.
They say the world has become too complex for simple answers. They are wrong. There are no easy answers, but there are simple answers. We must have the courage to do what we know is morally right. Winston Churchill said that "the destiny of man is not measured by material computation. When great forces are on the move in the world, we learn we are spirits--not animals." And he said, "There is something going on in time and space, and beyond time and space, which, whether we like it or not, spells duty."
You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We will preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on earth, or we will sentence them to take the first step into a thousand years of darkness. If we fail, at least let our children and our children's children say of us we justified our brief moment here. We did all that could be done.
http://reagan2020.us/speeches/A_Time_for_Choosing.asp
Sunday, March 22, 2009
More to Keep in Mind
Guess our national leaders didn't expect this, hmm? On Thursday (03/19/09), Darrell Scott, the father of Rachel Scott, a victim of the Columbine High School shootings in Littleton , Colorado , was invited to address the House Judiciary Committee's subcommittee. What he said to our national leaders during this special session of Congress was painfully truthful.
They were not prepared for what he was to say, nor was it received well. It needs to be heard by every parent, every teacher, every politician, every sociologist, every psychologist, and every so-called expert! These courageous words spoken by Darrell Scott are powerful, penetrating, and deeply personal. There is no doubt that God sent this man as a voice crying in the wilderness. The following is a portion of the transcript:
Your laws ignore our deepest needs,
Your words are empty air.
You've stripped away our heritage,
You've outlawed simple prayer.
Now gunshots fill our classrooms,
And precious children die.
You seek for answers everywhere,
And ask the question "Why?"
You regulate restrictive laws,
Through legislative creed.
And yet you fail to understand,
That God is what we need!
Do what the media did not - - let the nation hear this man's speech...
They were not prepared for what he was to say, nor was it received well. It needs to be heard by every parent, every teacher, every politician, every sociologist, every psychologist, and every so-called expert! These courageous words spoken by Darrell Scott are powerful, penetrating, and deeply personal. There is no doubt that God sent this man as a voice crying in the wilderness. The following is a portion of the transcript:
Since the dawn of creation there has been both good &evil in the hearts of men and women.. We all contain the seeds of kindness or the seeds of violence. The death of my wonderful daughter, Rachel Joy Scott, and the deaths of that heroic teacher, and the other eleven children who died must not be in vain. Their blood cries out f or answers.
The first recorded act of violence was when Cain slew his brother Abel out in the field. The villain was not the club he used.. Neither was it the NCA, the National Club Association. The true killer was Cain, and the reason for the murder could only be found in Cain's heart.
In the days that followed the Columbine tragedy, I was amazed at how quickly fingers began to be pointed at groups such as the NRA. I am not a member of the NRA. I am not a hunter. I do not even own a gun. I am not here to represent or defend the NRA - because I don't believe that they are responsible for my daughter's death. Therefore I do not believe that they need to be defended. If I believed they had anything to do with Rachel's murder I would be their strongest opponent.
I am here today to declare that Columbine was not just a tragedy -- it was a spiritual event that should be forcing us to look at where the real blame lies! Much of the blame lies here in this room. Much of the blame lies behind the pointing fingers of the accusers themselves. I wrote a poem just four nights ago that expresses my feelings best.
Your laws ignore our deepest needs,
Your words are empty air.
You've stripped away our heritage,
You've outlawed simple prayer.
Now gunshots fill our classrooms,
And precious children die.
You seek for answers everywhere,
And ask the question "Why?"
You regulate restrictive laws,
Through legislative creed.
And yet you fail to understand,
That God is what we need!
Men and women are three-part beings. We all consist of body, mind, and spirit. When we refuse to acknowledge a third part of our make-up, we create a void that allows evil, prejudice, and hatred to rush in and wreak havoc. Spiritual presences were present within our educational
systems for most of our nation's history. Many of our major colleges began as theological seminaries. This is a historical fact. What has happened to us as a nation? We have refused to honor God, and in so doing, we open the doors to hatred and violence. And when something as terrible as Columbine's tragedy occurs -- politicians immediately look for a scapegoat such as the NRA. They immediately seek to pass more restrictive laws that contribute to erode away our personal and private liberties. We do not need more restrictive laws. Eric and Dylan would not have been stopped by metal detectors. No amount of gun laws can stop someone who spends months planning this type of massacre. The real villain lies within our own hearts.
As my son Craig lay under that table in the school library and saw his two friends murdered before his very eyes, he did not hesitate to pray in school. I defy any law or politician to deny him that right! I challenge every young person in America , and around the world, to realize that on April 20, 1999, at Columbine High School prayer was brought back to our schools. Do not let the many prayers offered by those students be in vain. Dare to move into the new millennium with a sacred disregard for legislation that violates your God-given right to communicate with Him. To those of you who would point your finger at the NRA -- I give to you a sincere challenge. Dare to examine your own heart before casting the first stone!
My daughter's death will not be in vain! The young people of this country will not allow that to happen!
Do what the media did not - - let the nation hear this man's speech...
Think Positive!
HOW TO START EACH DAY WITH A POSITIVE OUTLOOK
- Open a new file in your computer.
- Name it 'Barack Obama.'
- Send it to the Recycle Bin.
- Empty the Recycle Bin.
- Your PC will ask you: 'Do you really want to get rid of 'Barack Obama?'
- Firmly Click 'Yes.'
- Feel better?
- GOOD! - Tomorrow we'll do Nancy Pelosi
One must maintain a sense of humor, no matter how dire the situation may appear.
Saturday, March 21, 2009
Do Unto Others . . .
"Do unto others as you would have others do unto you." That, to me, is truly the Golden Rule. If we were to follow that Rule to even the slightest extent, many of the "ills" suffered by the world would greatly diminish or even disappear. I am no "Pollyanna,' but I do hope for the best for people and from people. At least, I have until 11/04/08. That is the day my faith in We the People was seriously shaken.
In the days and months since, that faith has started to grow again, slowly, hesitatingly, and with great doubt -- but still with hope and faith.
We the People made a grievous error on that fateful day last year. Though I am Conservative and voted in that way, I take responsibility for the results with which we are now dealing. Maybe I didn't work hard enough during the campaign, maybe I was not articulate enough in my efforts to convince people not to succumb to the "charm" and baseless promises of "change." Regardless, We the People did not get our message across clearly enough to counter the "celebrity" of the other candidate.
We are now all responsible, however, to do our utmost to safeguard our country to ensure she does not fall off the cliff at the end of the road. We must all work as hard as possible by contacting our elected representatives constantly to let them know we are aware of their actions. We must be diligent in our oversight of our elected representatives' behavior and be quick to express our approval or disapproval at all times.
We are in this position because We the People became complacent; we did not take our responsibilities seriously and we chose to take the easy way out by not providing the intense oversight on our elected representatives for which We the People are responsible. We took the naive road by placing our faith in the "character" of such people as Dodd, Rangel, Pelosi, Kennedy, and many others, both Democrat and Republican. That faith has been ill-served, much to our regret.
I hope, however, that We the People have learned our lesson. The government and its workers are OUR employees, WE pay their salaries, WE put them in place. WE are responsible for the actions because WE are the ones who ultimately have to deal with the results of their actions.
As long as We the People allow those we elect to run roughshod over us, without controls or safeguards, We the People deserve what we get.
Copyright MCzwz. March 2009. All Rights Reserved.
In the days and months since, that faith has started to grow again, slowly, hesitatingly, and with great doubt -- but still with hope and faith.
We the People made a grievous error on that fateful day last year. Though I am Conservative and voted in that way, I take responsibility for the results with which we are now dealing. Maybe I didn't work hard enough during the campaign, maybe I was not articulate enough in my efforts to convince people not to succumb to the "charm" and baseless promises of "change." Regardless, We the People did not get our message across clearly enough to counter the "celebrity" of the other candidate.
We are now all responsible, however, to do our utmost to safeguard our country to ensure she does not fall off the cliff at the end of the road. We must all work as hard as possible by contacting our elected representatives constantly to let them know we are aware of their actions. We must be diligent in our oversight of our elected representatives' behavior and be quick to express our approval or disapproval at all times.
We are in this position because We the People became complacent; we did not take our responsibilities seriously and we chose to take the easy way out by not providing the intense oversight on our elected representatives for which We the People are responsible. We took the naive road by placing our faith in the "character" of such people as Dodd, Rangel, Pelosi, Kennedy, and many others, both Democrat and Republican. That faith has been ill-served, much to our regret.
I hope, however, that We the People have learned our lesson. The government and its workers are OUR employees, WE pay their salaries, WE put them in place. WE are responsible for the actions because WE are the ones who ultimately have to deal with the results of their actions.
As long as We the People allow those we elect to run roughshod over us, without controls or safeguards, We the People deserve what we get.
Copyright MCzwz. March 2009. All Rights Reserved.
"Outrage?" More like More Hypocrisy!
The media's top reports these past few days have reflected the "outrage" supposedly felt by the "honorable" members of Congress elected to represent We the People as well as the "anger and outrage" expressed by some members of the citizenry.
This "anger and outrage" is supposedly directed toward the new head of AIG as well as the employees of AIG and the families of those employees.
Our "honorable" members of Congress appear to be either in cahoots with or at least supporting those who chose to recently express their "anger-and-outrage" via death threats sent in e-mail and voice mails, as well as through their physical representation in threatening drive-bys of private homes and stalking of private citizens. Our "honorable" members of Congress appear to be fully in agreement with the behavior of those who place full responsibility for the AIG issue at the feet of the employees of AIG.
It is bad enough that the so-called "anger-and-outrage" is patently misdirected; it is just as bad (if not worse) that the "honorable" members of Congress are condoning reprehensible behavior based on threats and intimidation by utilizing that same methodology themselves towards fellow citizens forced to "testify" before congressional committees.
The video of Mr. Liddy being excoriated by the "honorable" members of the congressional committee seemed to mesh very easily with an overlay of film of Senator McCarthy "questioning" those forced to testify before him.
That type of behavior from anyone, much less "honorable" members of Congress, is unacceptable . . . at least, it was unacceptable in a civilized society.
We the People used to be citizens of a civilized society.
================================
The employees of AIG who were contractually given the bonuses because they worked at AIG and, according to those in charge at AIG, deserved the bonuses.
The employees did not make the decision to give themselves bonuses anymore than most employees in most corporations have the authority to award themselves bonuses or salary increases just because they want to -- other than the employees of We the People, that is (a.k.a. the US House and Senate)!
In the case of the AIG employees who received bonuses, there had to have been at one point or another at least one or two levels of approval prior to the bonuses being authorized. The recipients of the bonuses did not authorize the bonuses themselves; their bosses, managers, and ultimately the US House and Senate lawfully and duly authorized the bonuses.
By what right, then, do the "outraged" residents of Connecticut threaten and try to intimidate employees who did nothing but accept bonuses which were not only contractually due to them, but which had been approved by all levels of authority -- including the U.S. Senate and House through duly passed legislation?
Based on recent developments in the "hallowed" halls of Congress, the "right," to intimidate and threaten private citizens has been given by the very leaders of the U.S.of A.
The "questioning" of Mr. Liddy this week by the "honorable" members of the congressional committee gives the "right" to those who feel themselves also "angered-and-outraged" to behave in a similar manner. The "right" to threaten and attempt to intimidate those whom they hold responsible for this debacle is condoned by elected US representatives . . . the "Honorable" members of Congress.
This is mob mentality: the mentality of threats and intimidation which has been evident since the early days of the presidential campaign and which merely intensified when focused on Gov. Sarah Palin, Joe Wurzelbacher, any others who did not fully support "The Candidate." This "right" to intimidate and threaten was brought to an official level by Mr. Obama's exhortation to not "mess with Joe," and now has been given the final seal of approval by the House and Senate of the United States who, by their own behavior, ease the way for private citizens of the U.S. to be threatened and harassed for something completely beyond their control.
What is currently happening to the employees of AIG -- from the threatened usurious and unconstitutional "tax," to the humiliating berating of the current head of AIG by the oh-so-honorable members of Congress, to the threats hurled at private US citizens by other private US citizens, harks back to the days of McCarthyism, at best, and the days of Politburos at worst.
It should be the goal of news organizations such Fox to consistently maintain truth ad honor. The Fox-n-Friends segment this morning misrepresented the issue completely.
It is not the employees (a.k.a. the "workers") of AIG who deserve threats and opprobrium, it is the U.S. Senate and House. It is Christopher Dodd for his part in the creating the scandal, it is Barney Frank for his part in instigating the origins of the economic "meltdown," it is Pelosi and her cohorts who deserve the ire of We the People. It is Mr. Obama who should be the target of anger and frustration because of his unconscionable acceptance of these events.
Why aren't the threats being aimed at the true culprits? Why are the ones who are really and fully responsible for these problems not being threatened and browbeaten?
Because on November 4, 2008, We the People elected a representative to serve We the People in the White House whose mentality, philosophy, background, and personal history clearly reflect that the processes being applied this week are part and parcel of his much expressed desire to "spread the wealth," "give back wealth to those who deserve it," to ensure all wants are met, whether deserved or earned or not, and to create "change" in the most fundamental aspects of our Country: Our Constitution and Laws.
We the People should be deathly afraid of what the next 4 years will bring if this mentality spreads any further.
Copyright MCzwz. March 2009. All Rights Reserved.
This "anger and outrage" is supposedly directed toward the new head of AIG as well as the employees of AIG and the families of those employees.
Our "honorable" members of Congress appear to be either in cahoots with or at least supporting those who chose to recently express their "anger-and-outrage" via death threats sent in e-mail and voice mails, as well as through their physical representation in threatening drive-bys of private homes and stalking of private citizens. Our "honorable" members of Congress appear to be fully in agreement with the behavior of those who place full responsibility for the AIG issue at the feet of the employees of AIG.
It is bad enough that the so-called "anger-and-outrage" is patently misdirected; it is just as bad (if not worse) that the "honorable" members of Congress are condoning reprehensible behavior based on threats and intimidation by utilizing that same methodology themselves towards fellow citizens forced to "testify" before congressional committees.
The video of Mr. Liddy being excoriated by the "honorable" members of the congressional committee seemed to mesh very easily with an overlay of film of Senator McCarthy "questioning" those forced to testify before him.
That type of behavior from anyone, much less "honorable" members of Congress, is unacceptable . . . at least, it was unacceptable in a civilized society.
We the People used to be citizens of a civilized society.
================================
The employees of AIG who were contractually given the bonuses because they worked at AIG and, according to those in charge at AIG, deserved the bonuses.
The employees did not make the decision to give themselves bonuses anymore than most employees in most corporations have the authority to award themselves bonuses or salary increases just because they want to -- other than the employees of We the People, that is (a.k.a. the US House and Senate)!
In the case of the AIG employees who received bonuses, there had to have been at one point or another at least one or two levels of approval prior to the bonuses being authorized. The recipients of the bonuses did not authorize the bonuses themselves; their bosses, managers, and ultimately the US House and Senate lawfully and duly authorized the bonuses.
By what right, then, do the "outraged" residents of Connecticut threaten and try to intimidate employees who did nothing but accept bonuses which were not only contractually due to them, but which had been approved by all levels of authority -- including the U.S. Senate and House through duly passed legislation?
Based on recent developments in the "hallowed" halls of Congress, the "right," to intimidate and threaten private citizens has been given by the very leaders of the U.S.of A.
The "questioning" of Mr. Liddy this week by the "honorable" members of the congressional committee gives the "right" to those who feel themselves also "angered-and-outraged" to behave in a similar manner. The "right" to threaten and attempt to intimidate those whom they hold responsible for this debacle is condoned by elected US representatives . . . the "Honorable" members of Congress.
This is mob mentality: the mentality of threats and intimidation which has been evident since the early days of the presidential campaign and which merely intensified when focused on Gov. Sarah Palin, Joe Wurzelbacher, any others who did not fully support "The Candidate." This "right" to intimidate and threaten was brought to an official level by Mr. Obama's exhortation to not "mess with Joe," and now has been given the final seal of approval by the House and Senate of the United States who, by their own behavior, ease the way for private citizens of the U.S. to be threatened and harassed for something completely beyond their control.
What is currently happening to the employees of AIG -- from the threatened usurious and unconstitutional "tax," to the humiliating berating of the current head of AIG by the oh-so-honorable members of Congress, to the threats hurled at private US citizens by other private US citizens, harks back to the days of McCarthyism, at best, and the days of Politburos at worst.
It should be the goal of news organizations such Fox to consistently maintain truth ad honor. The Fox-n-Friends segment this morning misrepresented the issue completely.
It is not the employees (a.k.a. the "workers") of AIG who deserve threats and opprobrium, it is the U.S. Senate and House. It is Christopher Dodd for his part in the creating the scandal, it is Barney Frank for his part in instigating the origins of the economic "meltdown," it is Pelosi and her cohorts who deserve the ire of We the People. It is Mr. Obama who should be the target of anger and frustration because of his unconscionable acceptance of these events.
Why aren't the threats being aimed at the true culprits? Why are the ones who are really and fully responsible for these problems not being threatened and browbeaten?
Because on November 4, 2008, We the People elected a representative to serve We the People in the White House whose mentality, philosophy, background, and personal history clearly reflect that the processes being applied this week are part and parcel of his much expressed desire to "spread the wealth," "give back wealth to those who deserve it," to ensure all wants are met, whether deserved or earned or not, and to create "change" in the most fundamental aspects of our Country: Our Constitution and Laws.
We the People should be deathly afraid of what the next 4 years will bring if this mentality spreads any further.
Copyright MCzwz. March 2009. All Rights Reserved.
Sunday, March 8, 2009
R.I.P.?
Professor Joseph Olson of Hemline University School of Law, St. Paul , Minnesota , points out some interesting facts concerning the Presidential election:
-- Number of States won by: Democrats: 19 Republicans: 29
-- Square miles of land won by: Democrats: 580,000 Republicans: 2,427,000
-- Population of counties won by: Democrats: 127 million Republicans: 143 million
-- Murder rate per 100,000 residents in counties won by: Democrats: 13.2
Republicans: 2.1
Professor Olson adds:
Olson believes the United States is now somewhere between the "complacency and apathy" phase of Professor Tyler's definition of democracy, with some forty percent of the nation's population already having reached the "governmental dependency" phase.
If Congress grants amnesty and citizenship to twenty million criminal invaders called illegals and they vote, then we can say goodbye to the USA in fewer than five years. If you are in favor of this, then by all means, [don't try to make changes in the mid-term elections].
If you are not, then pass this along to help everyone realize just how much is at stake, knowing that apathy is the greatest danger to our freedom.
Source Unknown
-- Number of States won by: Democrats: 19 Republicans: 29
-- Square miles of land won by: Democrats: 580,000 Republicans: 2,427,000
-- Population of counties won by: Democrats: 127 million Republicans: 143 million
-- Murder rate per 100,000 residents in counties won by: Democrats: 13.2
Republicans: 2.1
Professor Olson adds:
"In aggregate, the map of the territory Republican won was mostly the land owned by the taxpaying citizens of the country. Democrat territory mostly encompassed those citizens living in government-owned tenements and living off various forms of government welfare..."
Olson believes the United States is now somewhere between the "complacency and apathy" phase of Professor Tyler's definition of democracy, with some forty percent of the nation's population already having reached the "governmental dependency" phase.
If Congress grants amnesty and citizenship to twenty million criminal invaders called illegals and they vote, then we can say goodbye to the USA in fewer than five years. If you are in favor of this, then by all means, [don't try to make changes in the mid-term elections].
If you are not, then pass this along to help everyone realize just how much is at stake, knowing that apathy is the greatest danger to our freedom.
Source Unknown
Rushing Obama
I've included Mr. O'Reilly's thoughts on the so-called "feud" that supposedly developed between Rush Limbaugh and Michael Steele only to show that the immense influence of the liberal/mainstream/"drive-by" (as Rush calls 'em) media extends even into the Republican & Conservative party.
If anyone should know better than to react to the bait, these guys should ... but they've all spent an inordinately ridiculous amount of time discussing and dissecting this non-issue including Sean (my personal favorite) and Glen Beck (who took it and ran with it, without even considering the source, to his embarrassment, I would think).
I have the feeling that Mr. Steele is a tad too "moderate" to be the official RNC Leader at this particular period in time, but he's a smart man and I am willing to give him a chance to prove himself.
Though many may see Rush Limbaugh as the proverbial bull in the china shop, I strongly believe that Mr. Limbaugh's voice is an imperative to getting the core of the Republican and Conservatives back on track, to keeping them up-to-date and fully informed ... and, yes, to help lead us all back to where we need to be: Conservative Republicans.
I hope (perhaps against all hope) that the core of the Conservative and Republican party will not only listen to Mr. Limbaugh, but also to Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, Glen Beck, and Mike Huckabee, but also take their thoughts and advice to heart. There is a broad range of 'categories' in that group, from moderate to pretty tough hard-liners. This group, consequently, represents the equally broad range of We the People out here who are grateful for the outlet they provide to allow us to express ourselves when it appears to none in 'officialdom' really care to hear from We the People.
We the People need to hear all opinions, from all whose thoughts and ideas are geared solely to trying to ensure the continued success of our Country -- as we have always known her -- NOT remade to some horrific, liberal, socialistic image of Mr. Obama's mentors.
Copyright, 2009. MCzwz, All rights reserved.
*******************************
Man, I got out just in time. Last week I gave up doing the Radio Factor after seven years because I needed to get some sleep. Working 65 hours a week is fine when you're 30, but as Clint Eastwood once opined: A man must know his limitations.
My radio program competed against Rush Limbaugh's show in some markets, and now, in an amazing bit of political gamesmanship, the Obama administration has elevated Limbaugh to Alp-like heights. By publicly attacking the broadcaster, the Obama crew has not only galvanized his loyal audience, but also sent curiosity seekers into his domain. What a ratings bonanza for Limbaugh! Who would want to compete against that?
According to the website Politico, Democratic strategists Stanley Greenberg and James Carville polled Limbaugh's popularity and found it lacking among voters younger than age 40. The website contends they convinced White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel to go after Limbaugh and define him as the behind-the-scenes leader of the Republican Party. The strategy was to paint the GOP as a leaderless outfit fearful of a high-profile radio guy. Emanuel dropped the propaganda bomb on a morning TV show last Sunday.
In conjunction, Obama's former campaign manager David Plouffe wrote a sarcastic op-ed in The Washington Post claiming the Republican Party is "paralyzed with fear of crossing (Limbaugh)."
Presto, the liberal mainstream media pounced on the new leader of the Republican National Committee, Michael Steele, mocking him for playing second fiddle to Limbaugh. Steele did not like that and told CNN the broadcaster is an entertainer who often pops off. Limbaugh did not like that and lambasted Steele. Under pressure, the RNC chief apologized.
Meanwhile, the Democrats are "lol" as they say on the Net.
But there may be an unintended consequence in this for the White House. By empowering Limbaugh, who already commands an enormous audience, the Obama administration is supplying weaponry to the enemy. Sure, the Democratic home team is yukking this stuff up, but most Americans are steaming mad about the economy and in no mood for shallow political games. If the president cannot get Wall Street to believe in him, demonizing Limbaugh will begin to look like a diversionary tactic, which it might well be.
It is certainly true that the Republican Party is currently taking some lumps, especially among the pro-Obama media. But in politics things can turn fast. If the GOP can develop some strong leadership and a populist vision, it will compete in the 2010 election.
We are living in dangerous times and the folks know it. Fighting with a radio talk-show host may be entertaining, but it is certainly not presidential.
Bill O'Reilly
Saturday, March 07, 2009
Copyright © 2009 Salem Web Network. All Rights Reserved.
If anyone should know better than to react to the bait, these guys should ... but they've all spent an inordinately ridiculous amount of time discussing and dissecting this non-issue including Sean (my personal favorite) and Glen Beck (who took it and ran with it, without even considering the source, to his embarrassment, I would think).
I have the feeling that Mr. Steele is a tad too "moderate" to be the official RNC Leader at this particular period in time, but he's a smart man and I am willing to give him a chance to prove himself.
Though many may see Rush Limbaugh as the proverbial bull in the china shop, I strongly believe that Mr. Limbaugh's voice is an imperative to getting the core of the Republican and Conservatives back on track, to keeping them up-to-date and fully informed ... and, yes, to help lead us all back to where we need to be: Conservative Republicans.
I hope (perhaps against all hope) that the core of the Conservative and Republican party will not only listen to Mr. Limbaugh, but also to Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, Glen Beck, and Mike Huckabee, but also take their thoughts and advice to heart. There is a broad range of 'categories' in that group, from moderate to pretty tough hard-liners. This group, consequently, represents the equally broad range of We the People out here who are grateful for the outlet they provide to allow us to express ourselves when it appears to none in 'officialdom' really care to hear from We the People.
We the People need to hear all opinions, from all whose thoughts and ideas are geared solely to trying to ensure the continued success of our Country -- as we have always known her -- NOT remade to some horrific, liberal, socialistic image of Mr. Obama's mentors.
Copyright, 2009. MCzwz, All rights reserved.
*******************************
Man, I got out just in time. Last week I gave up doing the Radio Factor after seven years because I needed to get some sleep. Working 65 hours a week is fine when you're 30, but as Clint Eastwood once opined: A man must know his limitations.
My radio program competed against Rush Limbaugh's show in some markets, and now, in an amazing bit of political gamesmanship, the Obama administration has elevated Limbaugh to Alp-like heights. By publicly attacking the broadcaster, the Obama crew has not only galvanized his loyal audience, but also sent curiosity seekers into his domain. What a ratings bonanza for Limbaugh! Who would want to compete against that?
According to the website Politico, Democratic strategists Stanley Greenberg and James Carville polled Limbaugh's popularity and found it lacking among voters younger than age 40. The website contends they convinced White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel to go after Limbaugh and define him as the behind-the-scenes leader of the Republican Party. The strategy was to paint the GOP as a leaderless outfit fearful of a high-profile radio guy. Emanuel dropped the propaganda bomb on a morning TV show last Sunday.
In conjunction, Obama's former campaign manager David Plouffe wrote a sarcastic op-ed in The Washington Post claiming the Republican Party is "paralyzed with fear of crossing (Limbaugh)."
Presto, the liberal mainstream media pounced on the new leader of the Republican National Committee, Michael Steele, mocking him for playing second fiddle to Limbaugh. Steele did not like that and told CNN the broadcaster is an entertainer who often pops off. Limbaugh did not like that and lambasted Steele. Under pressure, the RNC chief apologized.
Meanwhile, the Democrats are "lol" as they say on the Net.
But there may be an unintended consequence in this for the White House. By empowering Limbaugh, who already commands an enormous audience, the Obama administration is supplying weaponry to the enemy. Sure, the Democratic home team is yukking this stuff up, but most Americans are steaming mad about the economy and in no mood for shallow political games. If the president cannot get Wall Street to believe in him, demonizing Limbaugh will begin to look like a diversionary tactic, which it might well be.
It is certainly true that the Republican Party is currently taking some lumps, especially among the pro-Obama media. But in politics things can turn fast. If the GOP can develop some strong leadership and a populist vision, it will compete in the 2010 election.
We are living in dangerous times and the folks know it. Fighting with a radio talk-show host may be entertaining, but it is certainly not presidential.
Bill O'Reilly
Saturday, March 07, 2009
Copyright © 2009 Salem Web Network. All Rights Reserved.
Waging War on Prosperity
President Lyndon Johnson's administration was known for his War on Poverty. President Obama's will become notable for his War on Prosperity.
We're speaking, of course, of Obama's plans to hike income taxes on the most wealthy 2 or 3 percent of the nation. He's not just raising the top rate to 39.6 percent; he's also disallowing about one-third of top earner's deductions, whether for state and local taxes, charitable contributions or mortgage interest. This is an effective hike in their taxes by an average of about 20 percent.
And soon the next shoe will drop - he'll announce that he's keeping yet another of his campaign promises: to apply the full payroll tax to all income over $250,000 a year. (Right now, the 15.3 percent Social Security tax only applies to the first $106,800 of income - you neither pay the tax on income above that, nor accumulate added benefit.) For many taxpayers in this bracket, this hike will raise their total taxes by about half.
Finally, he's declaring war on investors by raising the capital-gains-tax rate to 20 percent.
These increases are politically insignificant: The top 2 percent of the nation casts only about 4 percent of the votes, barely enough to attract the notice of even the most meticulous pollsters.
But they have enormous economic significance. Those who earn more than $200,000 pay almost 60 percent of America's income taxes and account for a third of its total disposable income. If these spenders and investors are hunkering down, waiting for the revenuers to beat down their doors, their confidence will be anything but robust. Their spending will drop; they'll be unlikely to invest (except in new tax shelters).
Franklin Roosevelt's presidency was marked by an emphasis on recovery in his first term and class warfare (which he called "reform") in his second. Campaigning for re-election in 1936, FDR famously declared, "I should like to have it said of my first administration that in it the forces of selfishness and of lust for power met their match. I would like to have it said of my second administration that in it these forces met their master."
Obama seems to have skipped the first-term FDR program and jumped right into the class divisions and warfare of the second.
But the president would do well to remember that Roosevelt's assault on the rich led directly to the recession of 1937-39 - when unemployment soared back up to 19 percent. (It was brought down only by World War II.)
Obama must realize that his tax hikes will dampen investment and consumer spending and prolong and deepen the economy's woes - this is presumably why he's postponing most tax hikes until 2011. But taxpayers, particularly wealthy taxpayers, are not dumb: They'll know what's coming, and look to secure the hatches in advance by sitting on their money.
But then, Obama must also realize that his stimulus package, with its massive growth of government, is going to kindle huge inflation in coming years. And he surely realizes that he can't expand government health insurance as massively as he intends introducing rationing of medical services.
He must know, but not care.
Here is a president who would rather redistribute income than create wealth. He thinks it more important to grow government than to fight inflation. He believes that it is crucial to expand health care to the young and middle aged, even if it means cutting it back for the elderly. He's more committed to effecting "broad change" in his first term than he is to winning a second one.
We have a president, in short, who will stand on his principles. Unfortunately, they're bad ones.
Dick Morris and Eileen McGann
Tuesday, March 03, 2009
Copyright © 2009 Salem Web Network. All Rights Reserved.
We're speaking, of course, of Obama's plans to hike income taxes on the most wealthy 2 or 3 percent of the nation. He's not just raising the top rate to 39.6 percent; he's also disallowing about one-third of top earner's deductions, whether for state and local taxes, charitable contributions or mortgage interest. This is an effective hike in their taxes by an average of about 20 percent.
And soon the next shoe will drop - he'll announce that he's keeping yet another of his campaign promises: to apply the full payroll tax to all income over $250,000 a year. (Right now, the 15.3 percent Social Security tax only applies to the first $106,800 of income - you neither pay the tax on income above that, nor accumulate added benefit.) For many taxpayers in this bracket, this hike will raise their total taxes by about half.
Finally, he's declaring war on investors by raising the capital-gains-tax rate to 20 percent.
These increases are politically insignificant: The top 2 percent of the nation casts only about 4 percent of the votes, barely enough to attract the notice of even the most meticulous pollsters.
But they have enormous economic significance. Those who earn more than $200,000 pay almost 60 percent of America's income taxes and account for a third of its total disposable income. If these spenders and investors are hunkering down, waiting for the revenuers to beat down their doors, their confidence will be anything but robust. Their spending will drop; they'll be unlikely to invest (except in new tax shelters).
Franklin Roosevelt's presidency was marked by an emphasis on recovery in his first term and class warfare (which he called "reform") in his second. Campaigning for re-election in 1936, FDR famously declared, "I should like to have it said of my first administration that in it the forces of selfishness and of lust for power met their match. I would like to have it said of my second administration that in it these forces met their master."
Obama seems to have skipped the first-term FDR program and jumped right into the class divisions and warfare of the second.
But the president would do well to remember that Roosevelt's assault on the rich led directly to the recession of 1937-39 - when unemployment soared back up to 19 percent. (It was brought down only by World War II.)
Obama must realize that his tax hikes will dampen investment and consumer spending and prolong and deepen the economy's woes - this is presumably why he's postponing most tax hikes until 2011. But taxpayers, particularly wealthy taxpayers, are not dumb: They'll know what's coming, and look to secure the hatches in advance by sitting on their money.
But then, Obama must also realize that his stimulus package, with its massive growth of government, is going to kindle huge inflation in coming years. And he surely realizes that he can't expand government health insurance as massively as he intends introducing rationing of medical services.
He must know, but not care.
Here is a president who would rather redistribute income than create wealth. He thinks it more important to grow government than to fight inflation. He believes that it is crucial to expand health care to the young and middle aged, even if it means cutting it back for the elderly. He's more committed to effecting "broad change" in his first term than he is to winning a second one.
We have a president, in short, who will stand on his principles. Unfortunately, they're bad ones.
Dick Morris and Eileen McGann
Tuesday, March 03, 2009
Copyright © 2009 Salem Web Network. All Rights Reserved.
How Many Billions of New Jobs, According to Mr. Obama?
For the last few months of 2008, Mr. Obama's main mantra was the incredible (at least to some thinking people) number of jobs "he" would create . . . clearly, since the results of November 4, 2008 were as they are, many people appeared to have believed the claim that "he" and/or "the government" would create this incredible (as in unbelievable) number of jobs.
I, for one, didn't believe him for an instant. . . except when I listened further and realized he meant, literally, that the government would create an incredible number of "new" government jobs. Yup, that's what he meant, alright!
Can't everyone just feel the growth of government as we speak? The earth just moved!
I spent most of the last few months of 2008 questioning how in tarnation that man expected to create (it's become "create or save" in the past few weeks) even half, or a third, or even a fourth the number of jobs he'd spent weeks claiming he would and as the campaign wound down and the First Hundred Days started to roll by, The Plan became clearer and clearer . . .
Within weeks of the inauguration, new departments, offices, secretaries, and directors of this-that-n-the-other started to sprout. The light finally burst through . . . his intent is to quadruple the size of the government by inventing (or "creating") an incredible number of jobs, making sure that "affirmative" action is in full play . . . and thereby get his constituents to applaud his achieving his stated goal of "saving or creating" billions and billions of jobs.
He will have met that goal by the creation of at least half of the billions in government jobs . . . and another reason to raise more taxes on all of us.
================================
Many Hires Needed for Budget Goals
Tens of Thousands Could Be Added to Federal Payroll
By Philip Rucker, Washington Post Staff Writer, Tuesday, March 3, 2009; A01
President Obama's budget is so ambitious, with vast new spending on health care, energy independence, education and services for veterans, that experts say he probably will need to hire tens of thousands of new federal government workers to realize his goals.
The $3.6 trillion plan released last week proposes spending billions to begin initiatives and implement existing programs, and given Obama's insistence that he would scale back the use of private-sector contractors, his priorities could reverse a generational decline in the size of the government workforce.
Exactly how many new workers would be needed remains unclear -- one independent estimate was 100,000, while the conservative Heritage Foundation said it is likely to be closer to a quarter-million.
Administration officials said they cannot determine overall hiring projections until the president's full budget is released this spring, but acknowledged that significant new hiring will occur.
"It is premature to be making any assumptions about overall federal employment levels," White House budget director Peter Orszag said. "We have no desire to bloat bureaucracy -- indeed, just the opposite -- and the budget will not do that."
But, he added, "in several key areas -- from properly auditing contracts to providing quality medical care to veterans and reducing errors in Medicare and other programs -- investing in skilled professionals will not only pay off over time but also immediately deliver better service to taxpayers."
Several major agencies said they are already making plans to grow their workforces, some significantly.
Officials at the Department of Veterans Affairs, for instance, said they expect to hire more than 17,000 new employees by the end of the year, many at hospitals and other facilities to fulfill Obama's pledge to expand veterans' access to health care. The agency -- whose budget will grow by 11 percent, to $56 billion, under Obama's plan -- will add about 7,900 nurses, 3,300 doctors, 3,800 clerks and 2,400 practical nurses, spokeswoman Josephine Schuda said.
At the Social Security Administration, the budget will increase by 10 percent, to $11.6 billion, enabling the agency to hire new staff to handle backlogs on frontline operations, such as local field offices, hearing offices and teleservice centers, spokesman Mark Lassiter said.
Said Max Stier, president of the Partnership for Public Service: "This is obviously a new world. We've had a government that has been starved. . . . When you look at virtually every agency in government -- whether it's food inspectors at the Food and Drug Administration or claims examiners at the Social Security Administration -- across the board, we've had all too few people doing the business of government."
Between 1940 and 1970, the federal civilian workforce swelled from 707,000 to 2.1 million, according to government statistics provided by Stier. But ever since Ronald Reagan swept into the White House in 1981 with a call to decrease the government's footprint, presidents have limited the size of the workforce. Although President George W. Bush added tens of thousands of airport baggage screeners and other homeland security jobs, he offset much of that increase by limiting hiring at other agencies.
In reversing this trend, Obama would make himself politically vulnerable to charges that he is growing not just the power of government, but also its size. If the outside estimates are realized, Obama could spur a government hiring spree on a scale unseen since President Lyndon B. Johnson's Great Society agenda in the 1960s.
"What group of socialists got in the room and wrote this budget? Do they have any idea what the implications are?" asked Republican Newt Gingrich, who as House speaker in the 1990s advocated a shrinking of the government. "This is the most aggressive 180-degree turn that we have seen in the American system."
Obama, in his radio address Saturday, acknowledged that the budget signals "real and dramatic change" to the status quo in the federal city. "I know these steps won't sit well with the special interests and lobbyists who are invested in the old way of doing business, and I know they're gearing up for a fight as we speak," he said. "My message to them is this: So am I."
But the new president is "caught between a rock and a hard place," said Paul C. Light, a professor of public service at New York University. Obama inherited a federal workforce of about 2 million that Light described as woefully understaffed, especially to fulfill his bold domestic policy agenda. He predicted that Obama's budget and the $787 billion economic recovery package could require an additional 100,000 federal workers, but warned that the number may be even higher.
"I think that's just a start," Light said. "You kind of look across the federal landscape and you say there has to be more bodies with more expertise, as well as more bodies that can just deliver the basic services we've already promised."
At the conservative Heritage Foundation, the Center for Data Analysis estimated that Obama's budget and the stimulus bill could result in 230,000 to 260,000 new federal employees, primarily in areas such as education and health care.
"We found in the Obama plan that the increases in employment were overwhelmingly in the public sector," said William W. Beach, the center's director. "We haven't seen this much growth for a while."
Beach cautioned, however, that "any number of things can happen once these budgets become the subject of debate in Congress."
The Office of Management and Budget has not determined how Obama's budget would impact the federal workforce. Managers may reassign employees in some areas to more critical functions, such as overseeing or enforcing stimulus grants and contracts, OMB spokesman Kenneth Baer said.
"The federal workforce is going to undergo a fundamental transformation over the next decade as baby boomers who entered government service in the 1960s retire," Baer said. "Much of the human capital needs for new initiatives will be met by reorganizing, so as to reallocate positions left unfilled by retirements."
In some agency headquarters across Washington, the potential for expanding the federal workforce is the subject du jour. "It's being discussed in this building around every water cooler and cafeteria line there is," said one official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss budget plans.
Colleen M. Kelley, president of the National Treasury Employees Union, which represents workers in 31 federal agencies, said the administration appears to be "rebuilding workforces that have not been properly maintained and supported."
At the Internal Revenue Service, she said, "there are hundreds of thousands more taxpayers today than there were 10 years ago, and there are 27,000 fewer employees."
At the Environmental Protection Agency, the employee base is expected to grow, but more modestly. The agency, which has about 17,000 employees, expects to add 100 to 200 positions, said a senior EPA official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the agency's plans have not been made public.
"We have the authority to have additional folks, because we want to ensure proper oversight and management of these [stimulus] resources," the official said.
The EPA is being "cautious" about expanding the workforce because of the long-term costs associated with permanent employees, he said. "Not only are you paying for the people today," he said, "but you have to think about what are the implications for the future as well."
I, for one, didn't believe him for an instant. . . except when I listened further and realized he meant, literally, that the government would create an incredible number of "new" government jobs. Yup, that's what he meant, alright!
Can't everyone just feel the growth of government as we speak? The earth just moved!
I spent most of the last few months of 2008 questioning how in tarnation that man expected to create (it's become "create or save" in the past few weeks) even half, or a third, or even a fourth the number of jobs he'd spent weeks claiming he would and as the campaign wound down and the First Hundred Days started to roll by, The Plan became clearer and clearer . . .
Within weeks of the inauguration, new departments, offices, secretaries, and directors of this-that-n-the-other started to sprout. The light finally burst through . . . his intent is to quadruple the size of the government by inventing (or "creating") an incredible number of jobs, making sure that "affirmative" action is in full play . . . and thereby get his constituents to applaud his achieving his stated goal of "saving or creating" billions and billions of jobs.
He will have met that goal by the creation of at least half of the billions in government jobs . . . and another reason to raise more taxes on all of us.
================================
Many Hires Needed for Budget Goals
Tens of Thousands Could Be Added to Federal Payroll
By Philip Rucker, Washington Post Staff Writer, Tuesday, March 3, 2009; A01
President Obama's budget is so ambitious, with vast new spending on health care, energy independence, education and services for veterans, that experts say he probably will need to hire tens of thousands of new federal government workers to realize his goals.
The $3.6 trillion plan released last week proposes spending billions to begin initiatives and implement existing programs, and given Obama's insistence that he would scale back the use of private-sector contractors, his priorities could reverse a generational decline in the size of the government workforce.
Exactly how many new workers would be needed remains unclear -- one independent estimate was 100,000, while the conservative Heritage Foundation said it is likely to be closer to a quarter-million.
Administration officials said they cannot determine overall hiring projections until the president's full budget is released this spring, but acknowledged that significant new hiring will occur.
"It is premature to be making any assumptions about overall federal employment levels," White House budget director Peter Orszag said. "We have no desire to bloat bureaucracy -- indeed, just the opposite -- and the budget will not do that."
But, he added, "in several key areas -- from properly auditing contracts to providing quality medical care to veterans and reducing errors in Medicare and other programs -- investing in skilled professionals will not only pay off over time but also immediately deliver better service to taxpayers."
Several major agencies said they are already making plans to grow their workforces, some significantly.
Officials at the Department of Veterans Affairs, for instance, said they expect to hire more than 17,000 new employees by the end of the year, many at hospitals and other facilities to fulfill Obama's pledge to expand veterans' access to health care. The agency -- whose budget will grow by 11 percent, to $56 billion, under Obama's plan -- will add about 7,900 nurses, 3,300 doctors, 3,800 clerks and 2,400 practical nurses, spokeswoman Josephine Schuda said.
At the Social Security Administration, the budget will increase by 10 percent, to $11.6 billion, enabling the agency to hire new staff to handle backlogs on frontline operations, such as local field offices, hearing offices and teleservice centers, spokesman Mark Lassiter said.
Said Max Stier, president of the Partnership for Public Service: "This is obviously a new world. We've had a government that has been starved. . . . When you look at virtually every agency in government -- whether it's food inspectors at the Food and Drug Administration or claims examiners at the Social Security Administration -- across the board, we've had all too few people doing the business of government."
Between 1940 and 1970, the federal civilian workforce swelled from 707,000 to 2.1 million, according to government statistics provided by Stier. But ever since Ronald Reagan swept into the White House in 1981 with a call to decrease the government's footprint, presidents have limited the size of the workforce. Although President George W. Bush added tens of thousands of airport baggage screeners and other homeland security jobs, he offset much of that increase by limiting hiring at other agencies.
In reversing this trend, Obama would make himself politically vulnerable to charges that he is growing not just the power of government, but also its size. If the outside estimates are realized, Obama could spur a government hiring spree on a scale unseen since President Lyndon B. Johnson's Great Society agenda in the 1960s.
"What group of socialists got in the room and wrote this budget? Do they have any idea what the implications are?" asked Republican Newt Gingrich, who as House speaker in the 1990s advocated a shrinking of the government. "This is the most aggressive 180-degree turn that we have seen in the American system."
Obama, in his radio address Saturday, acknowledged that the budget signals "real and dramatic change" to the status quo in the federal city. "I know these steps won't sit well with the special interests and lobbyists who are invested in the old way of doing business, and I know they're gearing up for a fight as we speak," he said. "My message to them is this: So am I."
But the new president is "caught between a rock and a hard place," said Paul C. Light, a professor of public service at New York University. Obama inherited a federal workforce of about 2 million that Light described as woefully understaffed, especially to fulfill his bold domestic policy agenda. He predicted that Obama's budget and the $787 billion economic recovery package could require an additional 100,000 federal workers, but warned that the number may be even higher.
"I think that's just a start," Light said. "You kind of look across the federal landscape and you say there has to be more bodies with more expertise, as well as more bodies that can just deliver the basic services we've already promised."
At the conservative Heritage Foundation, the Center for Data Analysis estimated that Obama's budget and the stimulus bill could result in 230,000 to 260,000 new federal employees, primarily in areas such as education and health care.
"We found in the Obama plan that the increases in employment were overwhelmingly in the public sector," said William W. Beach, the center's director. "We haven't seen this much growth for a while."
Beach cautioned, however, that "any number of things can happen once these budgets become the subject of debate in Congress."
The Office of Management and Budget has not determined how Obama's budget would impact the federal workforce. Managers may reassign employees in some areas to more critical functions, such as overseeing or enforcing stimulus grants and contracts, OMB spokesman Kenneth Baer said.
"The federal workforce is going to undergo a fundamental transformation over the next decade as baby boomers who entered government service in the 1960s retire," Baer said. "Much of the human capital needs for new initiatives will be met by reorganizing, so as to reallocate positions left unfilled by retirements."
In some agency headquarters across Washington, the potential for expanding the federal workforce is the subject du jour. "It's being discussed in this building around every water cooler and cafeteria line there is," said one official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss budget plans.
Colleen M. Kelley, president of the National Treasury Employees Union, which represents workers in 31 federal agencies, said the administration appears to be "rebuilding workforces that have not been properly maintained and supported."
At the Internal Revenue Service, she said, "there are hundreds of thousands more taxpayers today than there were 10 years ago, and there are 27,000 fewer employees."
At the Environmental Protection Agency, the employee base is expected to grow, but more modestly. The agency, which has about 17,000 employees, expects to add 100 to 200 positions, said a senior EPA official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the agency's plans have not been made public.
"We have the authority to have additional folks, because we want to ensure proper oversight and management of these [stimulus] resources," the official said.
The EPA is being "cautious" about expanding the workforce because of the long-term costs associated with permanent employees, he said. "Not only are you paying for the people today," he said, "but you have to think about what are the implications for the future as well."
Attacked: First Ammendment, Second Ammendment . . . Anyone Counting Out There?
"Ammunition Accountability" Legislation
Remember how Obama said that he wasn't going to take your guns? Well, it seems that his allies in the anti-gun world have no problem with taking your ammo!
The bill that is being pushed in 18 states (including Illinois and Indiana) requires all ammunition to be encoded by the manufacture in a data base of all ammunition sales. So they will know how much you buy and what calibers.
Nobody can sell any ammunition after June 30, 2009 unless the ammunition is coded.
Any privately held uncoded ammunition must be destroyed by July 1, 2011. (Including hand loaded ammo.) They will also charge a .05 cent tax on every round so every box of ammo you buy will go up at least $2.50 or more!
If they can deprive you of ammo they do not need to take your gun!
All eyes are diverted on talk radio topics, bailouts, television entertainments, news, propaganda, while state level legislatures are placing the second amendment into a grave.
This legislation is currently IN COMMITTEE in 18 states: Alabama, Arizona, California, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland, Mississippi, Missouri, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Washington.
To find more about the anti-gun group that is sponsoring this legislation and the specific legislation for each state, go to:
http://ammunitionaccountability.org/Legislation.htm
"The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in Government." - Thomas Jefferson
My opinion is they had this current take over government in mind when they created the 2nd ammendment.
From: PATRIOT NETWORK EMERGENCY ALERT 012709
Remember how Obama said that he wasn't going to take your guns? Well, it seems that his allies in the anti-gun world have no problem with taking your ammo!
The bill that is being pushed in 18 states (including Illinois and Indiana) requires all ammunition to be encoded by the manufacture in a data base of all ammunition sales. So they will know how much you buy and what calibers.
Nobody can sell any ammunition after June 30, 2009 unless the ammunition is coded.
Any privately held uncoded ammunition must be destroyed by July 1, 2011. (Including hand loaded ammo.) They will also charge a .05 cent tax on every round so every box of ammo you buy will go up at least $2.50 or more!
If they can deprive you of ammo they do not need to take your gun!
All eyes are diverted on talk radio topics, bailouts, television entertainments, news, propaganda, while state level legislatures are placing the second amendment into a grave.
This legislation is currently IN COMMITTEE in 18 states: Alabama, Arizona, California, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland, Mississippi, Missouri, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Washington.
To find more about the anti-gun group that is sponsoring this legislation and the specific legislation for each state, go to:
http://ammunitionaccountability.org/Legislation.htm
"The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in Government." - Thomas Jefferson
My opinion is they had this current take over government in mind when they created the 2nd ammendment.
From: PATRIOT NETWORK EMERGENCY ALERT 012709
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