Archive for July, 2009
Two Urgent Calls For Action
Land Rights Network
American Land Rights Association
PO Box 400 – Battle Ground, WA 98604
Phone: 360-687-3087 – Fax: 360-687-2973
E-mail: alra@pacifier.com
Web Address: http://www.landrights.org
Legislative Office: 507 Seward Square SE – Washington, DC 20003
Your Senators Will Vote On S 787 (Water Land Grab) In Sept.
Do not take your Senators for granted. Call, Fax and E-mail them now.
You need to contact your Senators NOW to find out when they will be back in your state over the August-September recess. Plan to go to one or more of his or her meetings to fire questions about the Clean Water Restoration Act (S 787) and urge a NO vote. Call any Senator at (202) 224-3121.
S 787 is the biggest Water and Land Grab in history. The full Senate could vote on S 787 in September. You must take action.
—–The Senate Committee removed the requirement that the Corps and EPA can only regulate “Navigable” waters. That means the Corps and EPA will be able to regulate “all waters of the United States.” That includes rain water and underground water even if you don’t have surface water.
Congress Moves To Seize Control Of All U.S. Waters
—–Do you want the Corps and EPA in your backyard?
—–Do you want the EPA and Corps to control your water?
—–Do you want the Corps and EPA to control all your watersheds that means all your land too?
—- That’s what will happen if the new Clean Water Restoration Act (CWRA) (S 787) passes Congress.
See the “letter to the editor” at the bottom of this message. You should try to write a letter to the editor of any papers in your local area.
Action Items:
—–1. Forward this message to your entire list if possible. Forward it to no less than five other people.
—–2. Call both your Senators immediately to ask for their August and September recess schedule. Call (202) 224-3121 to reach any Senators office. Be sure to ask for the staff person who handles the proposed Clean Water Restoration Act (S 787). When you speak to that person, ask for his or her e-mail address and fax number.
—–3. After you call, send a message by fax or e-mail to both your Senators using that staff person’s e-mail or fax address opposing the Clean Water Restoration Act. Send a new message even if you have written before. You can write your Senator at: Honorable ______,
US Senate, Washington DC., 20210. Try to fax or e-mail it as mail to Washington, DC is slowed by the Anthrax inspections.
—–4. Send a copy of your letter with a cover letter to the Honorable James Inhofe, Ranking Member, Environment and Public Works Committee, US Senate, Washington, DC 20210. You can fax it to (202) 224-5167.
—–5. Organize teams in your area to go to your Senators meetings to discuss the Clean Water Restoration Act (S 787).
—–6. Also call your Congressman at (202) 225-3121 to tell him or her you are opposed to the Clean Water Restoration Act and urge a NO vote if it comes up in Committee or on the House Floor. So far it has no number and has not made it out of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee thanks to all the calls to Congressmen by you and many others. Keep it up. Tell them this is a big issue people will remember in November, 2010.
—–7. Send a letter to the editor of any newspapers in your local area. The most read section of many newspapers is the Letters to the Editor. See the real Letter to the Editor we are sending as a sample “letter to the editor” by Randy Dutton at the bottom of this e-mail. Please do not copy this letter. Write in your own words. The Clean Water Restoration Act is S 787 in the Senate. It does not have a House number yet but it will so contact your Congressman.
The Clean Water Restoration Act (S 787) passed the Senate EPW Committee that failed to hold hearings in this Congress. You can still ask your Senators and the Senators on the Committee to hold hearings. Ask them how they could vote on a bill without holding public hearings. You must deluge both your Senators with calls, letters, e-mails and faxes. Call your friends in other states and have them call their Senators to oppose S 787. This is a monster land grab.
News for 07/29/09
Traffic to Obama’s White House Web Site Has Plummeted
http://www.cnsnews.co…
The traffic at President Obama’s official White House Web site–whitehouse.gov–has fallen from a post-Inauguration peak to nearly the same level it was during the waning days of the Bush administration. The dramatic drop in traffic has happened despite the Obama Administration’s complete redesign of the site. According to the web-traffic tracking site Alexa.com, whitehouse.gov was almost the 500th most popular Web site in the world in February. Since then, it has fallen to the 3,732 ranked Web site in the world. Traffic to the site has fallen 51.6 percent in the last three months. People are also spending less time on the site than they did before. Time spent on a Web site is often used as a barometer for how interested visitors are in a site’s content. Time spent on whitehouse.gov declined 15 percent since May to an average of 2.6 minutes per visitor…The decline in White House’s web traffic has coincided with a decline in the president’s approval ratings and the approval ratings for his policies. A Zogby poll released July 24 showed that only 48 percent of Americans approve of the job President Obama is doing, down from 51 percent in mid-June — 49 percent of Americans said they disapprove of Obama’s performance and 4 percent were unsure. When asked to rate Obama’s performance, 53 percent rated it negatively, with 43 percent giving the president a “poor” rating. Other polls show a similar, negative trend for Obama. A Rasmussen tracking poll, published July 27, showed that only 49 percent of Americans approve of Obama’s performance, with a majority of 50 percent disapproving. (Ed note: People, in general, like relationships to be two way. As with any one sided relationship, people stop listening and stop caring. Perhaps the President should, if he cares what the citizenry thinks, take this to heart. People feel as if they are going to do what they are going to do with or without the consent of the voters. Mmmm.. maybe passing legislation like the bailouts, cap and trade, etc.. despite overwhelming opposition by voters should sound some sort of warning??? If not to the President, The Senate, The House, The Cabinet.. then to the people!)
Dallas Tea Partiers Outnumber MoveOn.org Members at Health Care Rally Ten To One
http://www.jbs.org/he…
When Dallas area members of MoveOn.org showed up at a district office of Senator John Cornyn (R-Texas) on July 23 for a rally in support of President Obama’s health care legislation, they were surprised by even greater numbers of Dallas Tea Party members on hand to demonstrate against Obama’s health care plan.
Find Out How Your Congressional Members Rate! Michigan Residents Need New Senators- Ours Rated a Big Fat 0
http://www.thenewamer…
The current (July 20) issue of The New American includes our first congressional scorecard on the 111th Congress, which convened in January. The scorecard, entitled “The Freedom Index,” rates congressmen based on their adherence to constitutional principles of limited government, fiscal responsibility, national sovereignty, and a traditional foreign policy of avoiding foreign entanglements. Our newly published “Freedom Index” shows how every member of the House and Senate voted on key issues, such as the TARP funding to bail out financial institutions, SCHIP (children’s health insurance), the federal budget, and the economic stimulus package.
Michigan Representatives
1 Stupak (D) 20 + – – – – – – – + –
2 Hoekstra (R) 60 + + + + – + + – – –
3 Ehlers (R) 60 + – + – + + + + – –
4 Camp (R) 70 + + + – + + + – + –
5 Kildee (D) 10 – – – – – – – – + –
6 Upton (R) 50 + – + – – + + – + –
7 Schauer (D) 10 + – – – – – – – – –
8 Rogers, Mike (R) 50 + + + – – + + – – –
9 Peters (D) 10 – – – – – – – – + –
10 Miller, C. (R) 40 + – + – – + + – – –
11 McCotter (R) 50 + – + – – + + – + –
12 Levin, S. (D) 10 – – – – – – – – + –
13 Kilpatrick (D) 10 – – – – – – – – + –
14 Conyers (D) 33 + – – – – – – + + ?
15 Dingell (D) 10 – – – – – – – – + –
Michigan Senators
Levin, C. (D) 0 – – – – – – – – – –
Stabenow (D) 0 – – – – – – – – – –
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( None so far )News for 07/28/2009
Obama Administration Says Regulatory Failure to Blame for Financial Crisis — Proposes More Regulation
http://www.cnsnews.co…
Timothy Geithner told Congress that the administration planned to fix the “basic regulatory flaws” that it thinks caused the financial crisis by instituting more regulations and creating a new regulatory agency to oversee all financial products. Geithner, testifying before the House Financial Services Committee on Friday, told lawmakers that Obama’s proposal would address the “core causes” of the nation’s financial collapse as well as any problems in the future…. Hensarling criticized the Obama proposal, arguing that there was no way the administration could address the core causes of the crisis and ignore reforming Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the two government-backed mortgage giants at the heart of the financial crisis. I’m simply taken aback by the lack of reform of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the epicenter of the financial crisis,” he said. “Rather than changing the current status quo for these GSEs [Government-Sponsored Enterprises], the administration’s plan institutionalizes the problem. When President Obama references sweeping reform, I didn’t know he meant sweeping Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac under the rug.”
Get a Daily Briefing on The Lies Told By Your President
http://obamalies.net/…
Lies posted daily. Keep aware of how honest your fearless leader actually is (not).
Printable Flier for Stop The Healthcare Bill
http://www.deservelib…
Free flier to hand out or distribute. Available here in trifold brocure in pdf format.
Five Freedoms We Loose with Obamacare
http://thedailyinstig…
CNN Money article on freedoms we will loose if this thing passes.. brought to you by The Daily Instigator
Conyers Questions The Point of Reading The Health Care Bill
http://www.cnsnews.co…
During his speech at a National Press Club luncheon, House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.), questioned the point of lawmakers reading the health care bill. “I love these members, they get up and say, ‘Read the bill,’” said Conyers. “What good is reading the bill if it’s a thousand pages and you don’t have two days and two lawyers to find out what it means after you read the bill?” (video at link above)
News for 07/27/2009
Good Blog from Peter Fleckenstein .. He’s the One that Read the Health Care Bill and Told Us What Was In It
http://blog.flecksofl…
I put the first five hundred pages in the newsletter the other day.. but here you can see the rest.
Check Out This Very Entertaining Video from a Michigan Resident
http://www.youtube.co…
Son Of Card Check By INVESTOR’S BUSINESS DAILY
http://www.investors….
Cardcheck may be a dead issue, but companies aren’t yet free of the union threat. An anti-business provision of the perversely named Employee Free Choice Act is still under consideration. If the card check process were to become law, the traditional method for forming a union would be replaced with a pro-union system. In the current practice, workers vote to either join the union or reject it through a secret ballot. A simple majority carries the vote. Under card check, a work force would become unionized if a simple majority signed the cards that are used to measure workers’ interest in voting on unionization. New legislation would contain a provision from the earlier bill requiring federal arbitrators to set the terms of the initial contract if labor and management can’t agree on a deal three months after a union is certified. Based on Washington’s history of pro-union bias, chances are good rulings will favor organized labor. In addition, lawmakers are likely to attach language instituting quicker elections, giving businesses less time to show workers what they’d be getting into, and drop the standard needed to call an election from a simple majority of workers signing cards to 30%. It’s possible the bill could include, as well, a rule that forces employers to grant labor organizers access to company property.
American Thinker on The Health Care Bill
While Americans worry over government insurance plans, longer waits for treatment, and “healthcare rationing,” a more sinister agenda lurks in the shadows of the healthcare bill now before the House of Representatives. Today’s Medicare recipients could be the first to experience our government’s new solution to America’s “useless eaters.”
Section 1233 of HR 3200, the healthcare reform measure under consideration, mandates “Advance Care Planning Consultation.” Under the proposal, all senior citizens receiving government medical care would be required to undergo these counseling sessions every five years. Further reading of the law reveals that these sessions are nothing more than a not-so-veiled attempt to convince the elderly to forego treatment. HR 3200 calls outright for these compulsory consultations to recommend “palliative care and hospice.” These are typically administered in the place of treatment intended to prolong life, and instead focus on pain relief until death. These are, of course, reasonable and beneficial options for terminally ill patients and their families.
But this legislation doesn’t stop there. Section 1233 requires “an explanation by the practitioner of the continuum of end-of-life services and supports available, including palliative care and hospice, and benefits for such services and supports that are available under this title.” But, under the terms of the section, the federal government can compel more frequent end-of-life sessions if it declares a “significant change” in the health of the Medicare recipient, a change that the bill does not confine to fatal illness, but which encompasses broad and abstract conditions described as “chronic,” “progressive,” or “life-limiting.” The bill even empowers physicians to make an “actionable medical order” to “limit some or all specified interventions…” In effect, the government can determine that a “life-limiting” condition demands the withholding of treatment.
The bill puts the Secretary of Health in charge of life and death decisions coming out of these sessions. Under the heading, “QUALITY REPORTING INITIATIVE,” the bill says, “For purposes of reporting data on quality measures for covered professional services furnished during 2011 and any subsequent year, to the extent that measures are available, the Secretary shall include quality measures on end of life care and advanced care planning that have been adopted or endorsed by a consensus-based organization, if appropriate. Such measures shall measure both the creation of and adherence to orders for life-sustaining treatment.
President Obama has even been so disingenuous as to accuse Republicans of denying medical treatment to people that need it, saying, “The opponents of health insurance reform would have us do nothing. But think about what doing nothing, in the face of ever increasing costs, will do to you and your family.” This is a classic false choice scenario. Either we pass Obama’s legislation, or people will die. In fact, doing nothing is infinitely preferable to doing the wrong thing, especially when we’re being pushed to move too quickly.
It was the same with the stimulus package. And we all know how that turned out: 9.4 percent unemployment and a budget deficit four times larger than when President Bush was in office. Obama has become a master at using false urgency to achieve hidden goals completely unrelated to the issue at hand.The real concern is not the imaginary people who might die without this legislation, but rather those real people who might die because of it. Never before have we been this close to making federal law that formalizes procedures for limiting the care we will provide to certain categories of citizens.
…The language of Obama’s healthcare reform bill should be a warning to us. This is only the first step in a process that spells death to our way of life. This bill is a test to see what the American people will allow. If you treasure the elderly and the wisdom of previous generations, if you value human worth and care about equality for all Americans, oppose this bill.
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( None so far )News for 07/26/2009
Ed note- I appologize for the tardiness of the newsletter the past few days. My small grandchildren are visiting from out of town and I am somewhat preoccupied. 🙂 This will continue until next weekend, then things should return to normal. Thanks for your understanding.
Midwives pay equal to doctors under health care bill
(CNSNews.com) – If the House of Representatives passes the health-care bill approved by the Ways and Means and Education committees, midwives–who sometimes deliver babies in place of doctors–will receive the same level of government reimbursement as obstetricians. Section 1304 of the Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009 (H.R. 3200) would raise government Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement for certified nurse midwives to the same level as the reimbursement for doctors who perform the same services. Under current law, midwives only receive 65 percent of what a doctor receives for equal services.
64% of California Voters Say Illegal Immigrants Are Major Strain on State Budget
(Rasmussen.com) – Nearly two-out-of-three California voters (64%) say illegal immigrants put a significant strain on the state budget as lawmakers struggle to close a $26 billion deficit. A new Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of California voters shows that just 25% say illegal immigrants are not a major strain on the state budget. Eleven percent (11%) are not sure.
Conservatives Now Outnumber Liberals Almost Two to One in America, According to Washington Post Poll
(CNSNews.com) –Americans who consider themselves conservatives now outnumber Americans who consider themselves liberal by almost two to one, according to a new poll by the Washington Post and ABC News. In the poll of 1,001 adults conducted between July 15-18, respondents were asked: “Would you say your views on most political matters are liberal, moderate, or conservative?” Thirty-eight percent said they were conservative, while only 20% said they were liberal. Thirty-nine percent, meanwhile, said they were moderate. The percentage of self-described conservatives has increased since President Barack Obama was inaugurated in January and the percentage of self-described liberals has diminished. A Washington Post poll conducted in mid-January, shortly before the inauguration, showed 32% saying they were conservative, 24% saying they were liberal and 42% saying they were moderates.
A case for abolition of the Fed
http://www.youtube.co…
Video of Congressman Grayson interviewing Bernanke..who pulled a Clinton (memory loss)
Citizens Begin To Fight Back
http://nygoe.wordpres…
ACORN and their new front group Act Now were pwned by Tea Party Patriots again on Long Island! When they couldn’t win their arguments with facts, the ACORN employees tried to intimidate the Tea Party folks. No way that could work with dedicated Patriots! So ACORN cut and run when the going got tough, and repeated that sorry performance twice in one day. (this is good! Good Job Long Island Patriots)
News for 07/25/2009- Health Crock
Peter Fleckstein (aka Fleckman) is reading it and has been posting on Twitter his findings.
This is from his postings (Note: All comments are Fleckman’s)
Pg 22 of the HC Bill MANDATES the Govt will audit books of ALL EMPLOYERS that self insure!!
Pg 30 Sec 123 of HC bill – THERE WILL BE A GOVT COMMITTEE that decides what treatments and benefits you get
Pg 29 lines 4-16 in the HC bill – YOUR HEALTHCARE IS RATIONED!!!
Pg 42 of HC Bill – The Health Choices Commissioner will choose your HC benefits for you. You have no choice!
PG 50 Section 152 in HC bill – HC will be provided to ALL non US citizens, illegal or otherwise
Pg 58HC Bill – Govt will have real-time access to individuals’ finances and a National ID Healthcard will be issued!
Pg 59 HC Bill lines 21-24 Govt will have direct access to your banks’ accounts for election funds transfer
PG 65 Sec 164 is a payoff subsidized plan for retirees and their families in unions & community orgs (ACORN).
Pg 72 Lines 8-14 Govt is creating a HC Exchange to bring private HC plans under Govt control.
PG 84 Sec 203 HC bill – Govt mandates ALL benefit pkgs for private HC plans in the Exchange
PG 85 Line 7 HC Bill – Specs for Benefit Levels for Plans = The Govt will ration your Healthcare!
PG 91 Lines 4-7 HC Bill – Govt mandates linguistic-appropriate services. Example: Translation for illegal aliens
Pg 95 HC Bill Lines 8-18 The Govt will use groups (i.e., ACORN & Americorps) to sign up individuals for Govt HC plan
PG 85 Line 7 HC Bill – Specs of Ben Levels for Plans. #AARP members – your health care will be rationed.
PG 102 Lines 12-18 HC Bill – Medicaid-eligible individuals will be automatically enrolled in Medicaid. No choice.
pg 124 lines 24-25 HC No company can sue GOVT on price fixing. No “judicial review” against Govt Monopoly.
pg 127 Lines 1-16 HC Bill – Doctors/ #AMA – The Govt will tell YOU what you can make.
Pg 145 Line 15-17 An Employer MUST automatically enroll employees into pub opt plan. NO CHOICE
Pg 126 Lines 22-25 Employers MUST pay for health care for part-time employees AND their families.
Pg 149 Lines 16-24 ANY employer with a payroll of $400k and above who does not provide pub opt. pays 8% tax on all payroll
pg 150 Lines 9-13 Businesses with payroll between $251k & 400k who don’t provide pub. opt pays 2-6% tax on all payroll
Pg 167 Lines 18-23 ANY individual who doesn’t have acceptable HC according to Govt will be taxed 2.5% of income
Pg 170 Lines 1-3 HC Bill Any NONRESIDENT Alien is exempt from individual taxes. (Americans will pay)
Pg 195 HC Bill – Officers and employees of HC Admin (GOVT) will have access to ALL Americans’ financial and personal records.
PG 203 Line 14-15 HC – “The tax imposed under this section shall not be treated as tax” Yes, it says that.
Pg 239 Line 14-24 HC Bill Govt will reduce physician services for Medicaid. Seniors, low income, poor affected
Pg 241 Line 6-8 HC Bill – Doctors will all be paid the same, regardless of what specialty you have.
PG 253 Line 10-18 Govt sets value of doctor’s time, professional judgment, etc. Literally value of humans.
PG 265 Sec 1131 Govt mandates and controls productivity for private HC industries
PG 268 Sec 1141 Fed Govt regulates rental and purchase of power driven wheelchairs
PG 272 SEC. 1145. Treatment of certain cancer hospitals. Cancer patients: welcome to rationing!
Page 280 Sec 1151 The Govt will penalize hospitals for what it deems preventable readmissions.
Pg 298 Lines 9-11 Doctors who treat a patient during initial admission that results in a readmission will be penalized by the Govt.
Pg 317 L 13-20 PROHIBITION on ownership/investment. Govt tells doctors what/how much they can own.
Pg 317-318 lines 21-25,1-3 PROHIBITION on expansion- Govt is mandating hospitals cannot expand
pg 321 2-13 Hospitals have opportunity to apply for exception BUT community input required. Can you say ACORN?!!
Pg335 16-25 Pg 336-339 – Govt mandates establishment of outcome-based measures. HC the way they want. Rationing
Pg 341 Lines 3-9 Govt has authority to disqualify Medicare Adv Plans, HMOs, etc. Forcing peeps into Govt plan
Pg 354 Sec 1177 – Govt will RESTRICT enrollment of special needs people.! WTF. My sis has down syndrome!!
Pg 379 Sec 1191 Govt creates more bureaucracy – Telehealth Advisory Committee. Can you say HC by phone?
PG 425 Lines 4-12 Govt mandates Advance Care Planning Consult. Think Senior Citizens end of life
Pg 425 Lines 17-19 Govt will instruct and consult regarding living wills, durable powers of atty. Mandatory!
PG 425 Lines 22-25, 426 Lines 1-3 Govt provides approved list of end of life resources, guiding you in death. Excuse me???!?!?!?
PG 427 Lines 15-24 Govt mandates program for orders for end of life. The Govt has a say in how your life ends
Pg 429 Lines 1-9 An “advance care planning consult” will be used frequently as patient’s health deteriorates
PG 429 Lines 10-12 “Advance care consultation” may include an ORDER for end of life plans. AN ORDER from GOV
Pg 429 Lines 13-25 – The govt will specify which Doctors can write an end of life order.
PG 430 Lines 11-15 The Govt will decide what level of treatment you will have at end of life
Pg 469 – Community Based Home Medical Services=Non profit orgs. Hello, ACORN Medical Svcs here!!?
Page 472 Lines 14-17 PAYMENT TO COMMUNITY-BASED ORG. One monthly payment to a community-based org. Like ACORN?
PG 489 Sec 1308 The Govt will cover Marriage & Family therapy. Which means they will insert Govt into your marriage
Pg 494-498 Govt will cover Mental Health Services including defining, creating, rationing those same services
From Fox News:
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has set the legislative throttle at full-speed-ahead as she plans to bring health care reform to a floor vote by the August recess, a move that could inflame tensions in the party and imperil the bill’s passage since fiscally conservative Democrats say they’re still not satisfied. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid on Thursday announced that the Senate would wait until after recess to bring the bill to a vote, and President Obama said it was “OK” to miss his deadline so long as lawmakers are working in earnest to reach a compromise. Reid’s announcement led some members of the House to wonder why Pelosi feels it’s necessary to hold to a deadline that’s already been broken. Multiple sources with the Blue Dog Coalition, the group of fiscally conservative Democrats who have been holding up the bill in the only House committee yet to vote on it, said Friday they still don’t have a deal — despite Pelosi’s insistence that she’s got the votes.
News for 07/23/2009 – Entitlements for illegals, banks, big med, but not gun owners
LaRaza says if American People Find Out This Health Care Bill Covers Illegals They Will Rise Against It
http://constitutional…
You won’t believe this one. Take 3.5 minutes to listen, for your own sake. This is RIDICULOUS! Please, listen.
Victory for Gun Control Proponents In Senate Yesterday from DC Examiner
http://www.washington…
Gun control proponents scored a rare victory as the Senate rejected the carrying of concealed weapons across state lines. The 58-39 vote Wednesday defeated a measure giving people with concealed weapons permits the right to carry their firearms into other states that have similar gun laws. Sixty votes were needed to approve the provision, an amendment to a defense spending bill. It is an unusual setback for the gun rights side, which has been able to muster majorities of Republicans and pro-gun Democrats to move its agenda through both the Bush and Obama administrations. Opponents say the concealed weapon proposal would force states with tough gun laws to accept gun-carrying visitors from states with weaker laws.
We Are Approaching Critical Mass by Ron Ewart at Canada Free Press
http://canadafreepres…
Never, in all of our 70 plus years, have we seen the country so riled up! Never have we heard so much anger in people’s voices and in their written messages, as we see today. Never have we seen so many normal, hard-working, responsible Americans take to the streets in tea parties and other forms of protest, to express their anger at what government has done and is doing. Never have we seen so many different solutions to re-claiming our freedom, with many of those solutions based on the simple application of the foundation of our liberty …..the constitution. The word “Revolution”, is uttered quietly amongst some of the more hot-headed types, whose rising emotional frustration has transcended reason and logic. Some might say it is a terrible, if not a frightening sight. On the other hand we say it is liberating, encouraging and uplifting. This rising anger we are witnessing, is a free country waking up from a deep, deep sleep and it is a sign that critical mass is approaching and approaching rapidly. Feds will be rapidly back-peddling, as more and more of the 545 people who think they run this country, come face to face with an angry Consent of the Governed who DO run this country, and those 545 people won’t like what they see. We will reclaim our freedom, as more and more proud Americans unite as one and we reach necessary critical mass. The right of the people to life, liberty, property and the pursuit of happiness, the irrevocable gift from their creator, shall not be infringed. At critical mass, we will make sure these rights are not infringed. Government should be afraid, very afraid, as the people approach the event horizon to critical mass, where the power of the people will overwhelm the intransigence and arrogance of government tyranny. “Government only responds to the rising collective voices of millions of Americans who demand that government stay within its constitutional limits. No other power, short of armed revolution, will have any affect on them. If you don’t care, neither do they and their power rises accordingly. That is exactly the “State of the Union” today.”
Outrage at ‘Potential’ $23.7-Trillion Liability Bank Bailout Law Could Impose on Taxpayers at CNS News.com
http://www.cnsnews.co…
Capitol Hill (CNSNews.com) – Rep. Brian Bilbray (R-Calif.) called it a “brave new world.” Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) called it “one fraud after another.” Rep. Edolphus Towns (D-N.Y.) said the corporate bailout was being run as a “don’t ask, don’t tell program,” and Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) made biblical references. A bipartisan group of lawmakers were mystified Tuesday at how what began as the $700-billion Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) could potentially reach a liability of $23.7 trillion for U.S. taxpayers–compared to the U.S. gross domestic product of $14 trillion. Neil Barofsky, special inspector general of the TARP program, testified Tuesday before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, the same day his office’s TARP quarterly report was released, which showed the potential escalating cost of the program. “Your report really demonstrates that we have entered into a very, very scary territory, a brave new world where Washington decides what happens on Wall Street and Main Street, and hopefully sometime in the future, we can find a way to have an exit strategy,” Bilbray said. Generally, the Treasury Department has been lacking in transparency in operating TARP, the report said. “TARP has become a program in which taxpayers (i) are not being told what most of the TARP recipients are doing with their money, (ii) have still not been told how much their substantial investments are worth, and (iii) will not be told the full details of how their money is being invested,” reads the report. “In SIGTARP’s view, the very credibility of TARP (and thus in large measure its chance of success) depends on whether Treasury will commit, indeed as in word, to operate TARP with the highest degree of transparency possible.” The special inspector general’s office has 35 ongoing criminal and civil investigations examining how TARP money is being spent. These include suspected cases of accounting fraud, securities fraud, insider trading, mortgage servicer misconduct, mortgage fraud, public corruption, false statements, and tax investigations. More than half of those were initiated from the inspector general’s tip line (877-SIG-2009, or http://www.sigtarp.gov), Barofsky said.
Visitor list shows White House meetings with health execs started soon after inauguration by Sharon Theimer at DC Examiner http://www.washington…
President Barack Obama’s administration began holding private meetings with health industry executives at the White House a few weeks after he took office, a visitor list released Wednesday night by the White House shows. Lobbyists were among those there to talk health care. Richard Umbdenstock, president of the American Hospital Association, was at the White House on Feb. 4 and has been back at least a half-dozen times since then, most recently May 22. Other industry executives making February visits included health insurance company chief executives Angela Braly of WellPoint Inc. and Jay Gellert of Health Net Inc. Obama released a list of White House visits by health care executives after a government watchdog group, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, announced it planned to sue to try to get White House visitor logs. Only names and dates were released, not the visitors’ titles or employers. So far, the Obama administration is following a Bush administration policy of refusing to release the logs, which are maintained by the Secret Service.
News for 07/22/2009-Broken Promises and Oligarchy
PROMISES- Is Obama Breaking His Pledges? at Breitbart.com
http://www.breitbart….
WASHINGTON(AP) – In cutting deals with hospitals and drug makers, President Barack Obama is giving a private inside track to special interests that’s at odds with his promise to make policy in the open. Obama promised Americans he would hold special interests at arm’s length—that it would no longer be business as usual in Washington. He pledged to open government and let the public and news media hold his administration accountable. And just over two months before the 2008 election, Obama promised before an audience in Chester, Va., to hash out a health care overhaul in public. “We’ll have the negotiations televised on C-SPAN, so that people can see who is making arguments on behalf of their constituents, and who are making arguments on behalf of the drug companies or the insurance companies,” he said then. That didn’t happen. Instead, the administration’s multibillion-dollar deals with hospitals and pharmaceutical companies have been made in private, and the results were announced after the fact. Both industries promised Obama cost savings in return for an expanded base of insured patients; beyond that, the public is in the dark about details. When cutting special interests out of his campaign and then his administration, Obama targeted people currently registered as Washington lobbyists. He never said he would cut off the companies, unions, trade associations and others that employ lobbyists—just lobbyists themselves. And even then, he has made exceptions here and there. Presidents, regardless of party, prefer to keep their dealmaking private, obscuring what’s being said, what’s being taken and given, and by whom. It’s messier and less practical to open the door to a lot of public input, particularly on a national scale. It’s much easier to use polls to gauge what the public thinks. That means the interests whose ideas make it into national policy are usually those with the money and clout to press their case in Washington and the power to block any idea they haven’t helped shape.
Impending Media Bailout
http://ow.ly/15IqIe… Letter To Timothy Geitner from Minority Owned Media Outlets Seeking Funds
MRC President’s Letter To Timothy Geitner seeking funds for Conservative Media Outlets http://ow.ly/15IqIb…
Health Care Bill Outlaws the Private Individual Medical Insurance Market by Investors Business Daily
http://www.ibdeditori…
When we received a copy of the House’s 1,018-page health care reform legislation, it didn’t take us long to find a passage that made us wince. On Page 16, the language indicated to us that once the bill became law, insurers would no longer be permitted to sell new private individual coverage. While we were expecting the worst out of this legislation, we really didn’t anticipate anything quite so radical. Had we simply misread the bill? Not fully trusting our own interpretation, we asked for confirmation from the House Ways and Means Committee. Sources there agreed: The bill would indeed shut down the individual private health care insurance market. Our impression was further confirmed Monday when Rep. Dave Camp, the ranking member on Ways and Means, told us that “any existing plan will not be able to enroll members.” There will be “a prohibition,” the Michigan Republican said, “on enrolling individuals in private health plans” after the bill becomes law in 2013.
The Economist and Ron Paul on Auditing / Abolishing The Fed at Reason Magazine
http://reason.com/blo… Video
OLIGARCHY – The Definition
A form of government in which power effectively rests with a small elite segment of society. Oligarchies have been tyrannical throughout history, being completely reliant on public servitude to exist. According to this school of thought, modern democracies should be considered as elected oligarchies. In these systems, actual differences between viable political rivals are small, the oligarchic elite impose strict limits on what constitutes an ‘acceptable’ and ‘respectable’ political position, and politicians’ careers depend heavily on unelected economic and media elites.
Stimulus Spending Includes Rental Cars, Outhouses, and ‘Sediment Removal’ by Matt Cover at CNS News
http://ow.ly/hMJL…
Among the 3,266 entries in a government database detailing to-date spending under the Democrats’ stimulus law are expenditures for concrete outhouses, “deli-sliced” turkey, and hotel bills. Passed in February, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (AARA) – also called the “stimulus package” — was sought and signed into law by President Obama, who declared at the time, “We have begun the essential work of keeping the American dream alive in our time.”
Among the many things that have been built with stimulus money so far are:
– $971,711.42 to “replace pond liners” at the Garrison Dam National Fish Hatchery in Cole Harbor, N.D.
– $193,077 for a “double-vault toilet building” at the Hoyer Campground in Spokane, Wash.
– $487,944 for “toilet buildings and vaults” in the Pike and San Isabel National Forests
– $254,000 for “pre-fabricated restroom facilities” in Atlanta, Ga.
– $17,110 in hotel bills at a Marriott Hotel in Arlington, Va., for the Employment Standards Administration’s annual “Prevailing Wage Conference.”
– $1.8 million for the “renovation of Slate Hill Barn and Hay Shed” in Front Royal, Va. According to the database the money was requested by the Smithsonian
– $326,304 for “roadside vegetation removal” in the Six Rivers National Forest in Eureka, Calif.
– $928,194.50 to nine different firms to provide an “increased level of effort for dtv [digital television] installation”
– $25.3 million for the National Institutes of Mental Health to study schizophrenia
– $65 million for NASA’s James Webb telescope project
– $20 million for “sediment removal” at the EPA’s Iron Mountain Mine Superfund site
– $6,066.18 to buy “three laptop computers” for the National Fish and Wildlife Service
– $4,250 for “short-term vehicle rental” from Enterprise Rent-A-Car in order to “run errands” in Kings Canyon National Park in King’s Canyon, Calif.
– $840 to “disassemble” one desk and “properly reassemble and relocate” 2 other desks in Reston, Va.
News for 07/21/2009 – Does anyone in government remember the Constitution?
http://www.capitolhil…
This goes far beyond Obama.. let’s remember history. In the interest of fairness and clarity, our problems did not start with Pres. Obama, nor did they start with George Bush, Bill Clinton, etc.. they started with Woodrow Wilson. As citizens do not perform their due dilligence, the problem just exacerbates. Please get involved to the best of your ability. The politicians in Washington do not value us, our views, our tax dollars, our lives, our privacy, etc…
Part Time Congressional Hair Stylist Needed – Glenn Beck radio show
Congress is looking for a part time hair stylist accomplished in both male and female services. Pay is $9000/yr, plus 45% commission, plus parking and FEDERAL BENEFITS. – once again, your tax dollars hard at work. By, the way, Glenn says they have their own gas pumps in the congressional garage, too, FYI. Their own restaraunts, their own pension plans, their own health care.. and the list goes on and on. No wonder they are not in touch with reality. We should revoke their amenities. They make over four times the average American’s salary, NOT including benefits.
HR 1018 – Welfare for Wild Horses with $700,000,000 of Your Tax Money
http://republicans.re…
Things included in the bill – Horse census every 2 yrs, 19M in land purchases (real agenda no doubt), $5M to correct damage to land from horses, and enhanced horse birth control and contreception, Govt inspections of people’s facilities who want to adopt horses. Seven hundred million dollars. Are you kidding??? This passed in the house and now goes onto the Senate. See who voted for this at http://www.govtrack.u… and do not re-elect them!
CALL TO ACTION- Silly but useful.. from Glenn Beck
Larry Summers, Obama’s top economic advisor, sees some strong evidence that the economy is out of free fall. We apologize if the following has too much financial lingo for the average person to understand, but this is really good news. Summers says the recent decrease in Google searches for ‘economic depression’ are down to normal levels. Yes, that is correct, and Summers is a ‘top’ economic advisor. Help Larry understand the economy is not fixed — Google search ‘economic depression’ right now. (personally, I hit the Search button at least a hundred times)
Candidates Ask Lobbyists for Campaign Help from TheHill.com
http://thehill.com/le…
July 15 was the first time that candidates’ political committees had to detail to the Federal Election Commission (FEC) the lobbyists and companies registered to lobby that have been bundling for them — collecting checks for campaign donations to give to the politicians. In the new reports, several prominent congressional leaders in the House and the Senate have listed lobbyists as bundlers for them, bringing in tens of thousands of dollars from their networks for the lawmakers. Examples and details given in article linked above.
Uproar Over $2M 2lb Ham Causes Govt to Issue Press Release
http://www.usda.gov/w…
See yesterday’s newsletter for clarification, if necessary. At least they now know we are paying attention! Chalk up one for the transparency police!
STATEMENT FROM AGRICULTURAL SECRETARY: The references to “2 pound frozen ham sliced” are to the sizes of the packaging. Press reports suggesting that the Recovery Act spent $1.191 million to buy “2 pounds of ham” are wrong. In fact, the contract in question purchased 760,000 pounds of ham for $1.191 million, at a cost of approximately $1.50 per pound. In terms of the dairy purchase referenced, USDA’s Farm Service Agency (FSA) purchased 837,936 pounds of mozzarella cheese and 4,039,200 pounds of processed cheese. The canned pork purchase was 8,424,000 pounds at a cost of $16,784,000, or approximately $1.99 per pound.
Health Care Bill Will Cover Illegal Alliens At Untold Expense To Legal Taxpaying Citizens by F.A.I.R.
http://www.fairus.org…
The draft House bill — consisting of 1,018 pages — was introduced by Rep. John Dingell (D-MI) and cosponsored by the chairmen of the three House committees of jurisdiction: Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-NY), Chairman of the Ways & Means Committee; Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), Chairmen of the Energy & Commerce Committee; and Rep. George Miller (D-CA), Chairman of the Education & Labor Committee. Section 202 of this bill creates a Health Insurance Exchange (exchange) and states that “all individuals are eligible to obtain coverage” through the exchange. The House Education & Labor Committee has produced a summary of the bill and explains that the exchange will allow individuals and employers to “comparison shop for coverage” and that the bill creates “new affordability credits… for people purchasing [health coverage] through the exchange.” Under Section 242, all legal aliens will qualify for the affordability credit. Subsection (d) states that the affordability credits “shall not be treated [as] a benefit provided under section 403” of the Welfare Reform Act of 1996. Under Welfare Reform, legal aliens are generally required to wait five years before becoming eligible for welfare or other taxpayer funded benefits. The House health reform bill eliminates that 5-year waiting period for legal aliens as applied to taxpayer financed health insurance subsidies, such as the affordability credit.
Congress is Taxation Without Representation by Todd Huston at Canada Free Press http://canadafreepres…
We are speeding headlong toward a time when our Congress will have become just like Mad King George’s Parliament, that body from which in 1776 the American colonists separated with the rallying cry of “no taxation without representation.” Our national government is fast becoming just as unrepresentative of the people as far off Briton was when we went to war to become the United States of America. Compared to the British Parliament that raised the ire of our forefathers so long ago, today’s Congress shows many signs of the same, oppressive, haughty, disinterested politicians that considered their national government more important than the local’s interests and needs. All is not lost, to be sure. But with the poor education we are now offering our youth, it cannot be much longer before no one has the slightest clue what it was that the founders created and just why it is special enough not to let slip through our fingers. (Ed Note: That’s why it is up to us, as parents and grandparents to TEACH our children about the Constitution, what it meant, what our responsibilities are as citizens and what our forefathers did for us.) Please see full article at link above.
** Free EBook For You..** In the spirit of education From Mises.org
The Case Against the Fed by Murray Rothbard
News for 07/20/2009- Obamanation of Tax Dollars, Gun Laws, Goldman Sachs and CFR
Ohio Company Recieves $1,562,568 Stimulus For Mozzerella Cheese at Recovery.gov
http://www.recovery.g…
See it yourself folks. Your tax money hard at work.
Or How About Replacing A Dumbwaiter for $351,807?
http://www.recovery.g…
Or How about $1,192,000 for a 2lb frozen sliced ham?
http://www.recovery.g…
Or How about $2,531,600 for a 2lb Ham, water added?
http://www.recovery.g…
White House putting off release of budget update by Tom Raum at MyWay
http://apnews.myway.c…
WASHINGTON (AP) – The White House is being forced to acknowledge the wide gap between its once-upbeat predictions about the economy and today’s bleak landscape. The administration’s annual midsummer budget update is sure to show higher deficits and unemployment and slower growth than projected in President Barack Obama’s budget in February and update in May, and that could complicate his efforts to get his signature health care and global-warming proposals through Congress. The release of the update – usually scheduled for mid-July – has been put off until the middle of next month, giving rise to speculation the White House is delaying the bad news at least until Congress leaves town on its August 7 summer recess.
ATF says New States Protective Gun Laws are Illegal by Liberty News Radio/Dprogram
http://libertynewsrad…
Last month, the state of Tennessee’s General Assembly passed House Bill 1796, the “Tennessee Firearms Freedom Act,” which states that any firearms or ammunition manufactured within the state and legally owned and kept within the state by citizens are “not subject to federal law or federal regulation, including registration” due to provisions in the Second, Ninth, and Tenth Amendments to the United States Constitution. But according to Assistant Director Carson W. Carroll of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, the U.S. Constitution is little more than a g.d. piece of paper, as George W. Bush so infamously deemed it during his reign as the decider-in-chief. On July 16, Carroll dispatched his agency’s official response to the law passed in Tennessee — the BATFE asserts that “Federal law supersedes the Act, and all provisions of the Gun Control Act and the National Firearms Act, and their corresponding regulations, continue to apply.”
A Worse Economy Is The New Normal by Bob Chapman at Liberty News Radio
http://libertynewsrad…
Goldman Sachs raking in massive profits, growth in high-frequency trading, bogus CPI figures, subprimes still being sold off, the need for financial policy reform cannot be overstated, PIMCO Paul McCulley has ideas for the economy, clamor for another stimulus package, zero hedge is a bad recommendation. Due to the fact that Goldman Sachs is currently the favorite of Washington they are raking in massive profits during a time when most banks and brokerage firms are struggling for survival. We find this of great interest inasmuch as the recently converted bank received a $10 billion taxpayer bailout via Goldman’s connections in Washington. They also received a myriad of benefits from several other government schemes over the past two years. It is nice to know that in part American taxpayers made this possible while unemployment is running on a U6 basis at 20.5%, and Americans are losing their homes by the millions. Pay surged 75% in the second quarter and compensation and benefits costs were $6.65 billion, up 37% from the equivalent quarter in 2008.
Hillary Clinton admits that the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) runs the Government from Global Research/Liberty News Radio
As with a recent blog I did about a Rothschild puppet blatantly promoting a One World Government solution to our “man-made” global warming “crisis,” now Secretary of State (and CFR member) Clinton admits in her latest address to the Council on Foreign Relations what Carroll Quigley wrote about in Tragedy and Hope (Chapter 65), Dan Smoot wrote about in The Invisible Government, and Gary Allen wrote about in None Dare Call It Conspiracy: See Video Here
http://libertynewsrad…
“..it’s good to have an outpost of the Council right here down the street from the State Department. We get a lot of advice from the Council, so this will mean I won’t have as far to go to be told what we should be doing and how we should think about the future.”
Web sites that help us fght back
News for 07/18/2009
It is fairly clear, to anyone paying attention, that the people of the US are currently suffering the political tyranny of the special interest minority. We arrive at this point not because the character of the nation has changed dramatically – we are still a center-right nation ideologically, although we have become more permissive in our social views – but because we have fallen prey to exactly the political malady James Madison feared we would: factionalism. This factionalism exists within both political parties, as well as throughout our society. Instead of celebrating the hybrid identity that is American and standing as one people in support and defense of a singular culture we have become a country of hyphenated Americans all too willing to put our individual and special interest needs ahead of honest politics, good government and Americanism…. Would term limits be employed, instituted at the state level in an effort to usurp the special interest factions currently in control of our federal government, they would act as a great equalizer – an eradicator – of factions. …I still believe that an educated, aware and engaged American citizenry can provide effective governmental oversight. Our Founders and Framers constructed our Republic’s Charters of Freedom with that understanding. But today, we have become so self-absorbed as a culture that we have placed our personal wants and desires – as a society – above the duty demanded of us by the Framers and by constitutional mandate.
New – American Independent Party – God, Country, Constitution http://aipnews.com/
Our purpose? The same as the stated purpose of the U.S. Constitution: “To secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our posterity.” This party is now an official party in the state of Michigan and most other states. Give them a look at the link above. That’s why we’re pro-life and pro-liberty, and will always unswervingly support a strong and secure America. Along with the signers of the Declaration of Independence, we believe in the self-evident truth that all men are created equal, that our unalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness come from our Creator, and that just government can only exist by the consent of the governed. We call these “America’s Principles.” We are recruiting, training and equipping a new generation of leaders – patriotic men and women who will courageously act to implement those principles. History proves, beyond a shadow of a doubt: AMERICA’S PRINCIPLES WORK when the people put them into practice.
FORECLOSURES RISE FOR FIRST HALF 2009 DESPITE AID from Global Reasearch / Realty Trac
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14408
US home foreclosure activity galloped to a record in the first half of the year, overwhelming broad efforts to remedy failing loans while job losses escalated. Foreclosure filings jumped to a record 1.9 million on more than 1.5 million properties in the first six months of the year, RealtyTrac said on Thursday.
The number of properties drawing filings, which include notices of default and auctions, jumped 9.0 percent from the second half of 2008 and almost 15 percent from the first half of last year.“Despite everybody’s best efforts to date we’re not really making any headway against the problem,” Rick Sharga, senior vice president at RealtyTrac in Irvine, California, said in an interview.
TREASURY DEPT SEEKING SPEAKER TO ADDRESS “HUMOR IN THE WORKPLACE” AT THEIR SEMINARS
Please drop Treasury an email, as I did (seen below) to let them know we can not afford to pay for their entertainment. Email address is in the posting seen above. Please note, there is an error in the email address of the primary contact.. should be tres.gov not gres.gov. Thank you.
me very much… and the only laughter I can hear is those in government laughing as
Instituting a Safeguard Against Political & Ideological Tyranny from Canada Free Press
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( None so far )News for 07/17/2009- New Health Care Bill Issues In Orwellian Predictions
http://tinyurl.com/nh…
It didn’t take long to run into an “uh-oh” moment when reading the House’s “health care for all Americans” bill. Right there on Page 16 is a provision making individual private medical insurance illegal. When we first saw the paragraph Tuesday, just after the 1,018-page document was released, we thought we surely must be misreading it. So we sought help from the House Ways and Means Committee. It turns out we were right: The provision would indeed outlaw individual private coverage. Under the Orwellian header of “Protecting The Choice To Keep Current Coverage,” the “Limitation On New Enrollment” section of the bill clearly states: “Except as provided in this paragraph, the individual health insurance issuer offering such coverage does not enroll any individual in such coverage if the first effective date of coverage is on or after the first day” of the year the legislation becomes law. So we can all keep our coverage, just as promised — with, of course, exceptions: Those who currently have private individual coverage won’t be able to change it. Nor will those who leave a company to work for themselves be free to buy individual plans from private carriers.
Title III of the Health Care Bill.. by CNS News
http://tinyurl.com/nb…
Title III of the bill is entitled, “Improving the Health of the American People.” It includes four subtitles. They are: “Subtitle A: Modernizing Disease Prevention of Public Health Systems,” “Subtitle B: Increasing Access to Clinical Preventive Services,” “Subtitle C: Creating Healthier Communities,” and “Subtitle D: Support for Prevention and Public Health Information.” The program authorizing home “interventions” to promote immunizations falls under “Subtitle C: Creating Healthier Communities.” This subtitle directs the secretary of health and human services to “establish a demonstration program to award grants to states to improve the provision of recommended immunizations for children, adolescents, and adults through the use of evidence-based, population-based interventions for high-risk populations.” The bill lists eight specific ways that states may use federal grant money to carry out immunization-promoting “interventions.” Method “E” calls for “home visits” which can include “provision of immunizations.”
“National Defense” Earmarks from National Taxpayers Union
http://tinyurl.com/la…
The House Appropriations Committee released a table of Congressionally Directed Spending Items, which are more colloquially known as “earmarks.” It is available as a 59-page pdf, and includes lots of items only tangentially related to national defense. For example, there are several earmarks for state and locally-based counter-drug programs that seem to be focused at the community level. There are also many transportation and fuel cell research earmarks that would seem to be more appropriately funded, if at all, through the Department of Energy. Please visit the link to see the OUTLANDISH items included in this bill.
THANK YOU SENATOR TOM COBURN
http://online.wsj.com…
He suggested to the Senate Committee yesterday they should have to give up their special health care plan and live under the one they choose to require everyone else live under by the passage of this bill. Apparently, it was not very well received. Go figure. Full article at Wall Street Journal at link.
House Dems Won’t Allow Republicans To Speak from HumanEvents
http://tinyurl.com/ly…
Monday night Democrats voted to shut down the U.S. House Representatives rather than allow a handful of Republican Congressmen to speak on the floor. What could have been so offensive or frightening about our discourse that Speaker Pelosi felt she had to protect her party by gagging free speech in the House? In fact, we had planned to speak on the lack of transparency of the House since Democrats took control. We had planned to criticize Speaker Pelosi for repeatedly denying Members, the media, and the public to right to read legislation before it was voted on. We were set to discuss House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer’s statement last week that if his Members were required to read the Democrats’ healthcare reform package before it was voted on, it would fail.
Dr. Nancy Snyderman Wants To Snatch Smokes From Soldiers by News Busters
http://ow.ly/15HUv1…
There was NBC’s Dr. Nancy Snyderman this morning, arguing that the Pentagon should prohibit soldiers in combat zones from smoking. Snyderman was a guest on Morning Joe for purposes of reporting on her interview of Pres. Obama yesterday on his health care plans. But along the way, she weighed in on the proposal that had been floated, then quickly snuffed, by the Defense Department to deny combat soldiers the right to light up. Mika Brzezinski was grateful for an ally in the fight against letting warriors make their own choices. Joe Scarborough mocked the two Big Mommy Government-types, touting a tongue-in-cheek “cigarette drive” to provide soldiers with free packs of their favorite smokes. – The White House says it has no plans to ban smoking in the military.
The Health Care Reform Bill in Its Own Words Posted by Jeff Dircksen
http://tinyurl.com/lr…
We’ve spent a little time looking at the language in the House Democrat’s 1,018-page health care reform bill, “America’s Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009,” and a couple of things stand out. First, the legislation empowers a very busy bureaucracy. The term “Secretary” — as in the Secretaries of Health & Human Services, Labor, Defense, and Veterans Affairs – appears 1,124 times in the bill. The Secretaries — along with Commissioners (199 references), Committees (76 references), and Boards (17 references) are busy conducting studies, developing methodologies, and receiving recommendations among other things — some of the other things are listed in the table below, including requiring, limiting, penalizing, regulating, taxing, and enforcing their way to affordable health care for all. Second, the bill doesn’t include language that might help driven down costs without the busy bureaucracy. The terms “consumer-driven” and “patient-driven” as in consumer-driven and patient-driven choices and health care do not appear in the bill. And while the terms “benefit” and “benefits” appear 375 times, “choice” and “options” appear just 85 times combined. Even “marketplace” — a term that the President has used to describe the so-called public option — appears just 3 times as does the term “competition. 1,400 uses of words like “taxes/regulation,” only 88 of “choice/options. Words don’t always have a lot of meaning inside the Beltway, but if the language of the “America’s Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009” is a guide to its true intent then the bill is really about empowering bureaucracy and limiting freedom, competition, and the marketplace. See Chart on Bill: http://tinyurl.com/lp…
Glenn Beck on Goldman Sachs (Brilliant)
http://tinyurl.com/nd…
If you missed this on the show Wednesday night.. you have to check this out. All of a sudden, things begin to make sense.
PARADE MAGAZINE SAYS PATRIOTIC AMERICANS ARE MERELY POSERS FOR HIRE by AFP
http://tinyurl.com/n9…
This past Sunday, Parade Magazine (that insert in tens of millions of Sunday newspapers) derisively wrote that the efforts of Americans for Prosperity Foundation, our affiliate organization, to discuss the public policy implications of a government takeover of health care is “astroturf,” only a “so-called grassroots” operation. Parade’s writer went on to say “so-called grassroots campaigns are often effective because they’re thought to represent the will of the people. But what politicians — and many ordinary Americans — may not know is that some ‘grassroots movements’ are actually sophisticated marketing campaigns financed by business and special interest groups.” (Ed note: I do exist. Myself and well over 5000 people belonging to AFP have emailed Parade to tell them so) http://tinyurl.com/l3… (original article)
News for 07/16/2009- Pocket Full of Czars & Treaties, Grassroots for Hire, Other Cluster*ucks
http://canadafreepres…
(items below are taken from this article.. chock full of quotes from a book writen by our Science Czar.. check it out)… A quote from US Climate Czar: “Should a Law of the Sea be successfully established, it could serve as a model for a future Law of the Atmosphere to regulate the use of airspace, to monitor climate change, and to control atmospheric pollution. Perhaps those agencies, combined with UNEP [United Nations Environmental Program] and the United Nations population agencies, might eventually be developed into a Planetary Regime-sort of an international superagency for population, resources, and environment. Such a comprehensive Planetary Regime could control the development, administration, conservation, and distribution of all natural resources, renewable or nonrenewable, at least insofar as international implications exist.” … as is: “If this could be accomplished, security might be provided by an armed international organization, a global analogue of a police force. Many people have recognized this as a goal, but the way to reach it remains obscure in a world where factionalism seems, if anything, to be increasing. The first step necessarily involves partial surrender of sovereignty to an international organization.” (Ed note: there are also quotes regarding chemically drugging our water supply to promote sterilization should our population get to large, as well as mandating abortion for unwed mothers, etc.. you need to read this for yourself in order to believe it- and he is top advisor to the president on science issues ??? Really????)
Accuracy In Media was told Monday by Holdren’s office that only two telephone calls had been received from the press about the sensational charges being reported against Holden in the blogosphere. Clearly, the major media haven’t taken the charges seriously, explaining why there has been a “deafening silence” from the mainstream media, as noted by Michelle Malkin.
Obama’s Ambitious U.N. Treaty Agenda (Treaty of the Seas) from Accuracy In Media
http://www.aim.org/ai…
With Al Franken replacing Norm Coleman, Senate Democrats have another vote for the U.N.’s Law of the Sea Treaty, and there are strong indications that they intend to bring this controversial document up for a vote within days or weeks. Those who favor the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) believe that U.S. security lies in passing a treaty and hiring more lawyers to defend America before an international tribunal, rather than building more ships for the Navy and Coast Guard. The anticipated vote on the treaty follows a strong recent push for ratification from the Council on Foreign Relations and newspaper ads in favor of the treaty from the Pew Charitable Trusts, a $5 billion non-profit entity. Plus, the Obama State Department sent a document to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on May 11 that declared UNCLOS to be a top priority for the administration. In fact, Obama’s submission to the Foreign Relations Committee names 17 treaties that he wants ratified. In addition to UNCLOS, they include the feminist Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), the unverifiable Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, and the gun rights-destroying Inter-American Convention Against Illicit Manufacturing of and Trafficking in Firearms, Ammunition, Explosives, and Other Related Materials.
Communist Past of the ‘Green Jobs’ Czar from News Busters
The administration’s “Green Jobs” czar, Van Jones, has a “very checkered past” deep-rooted in radical politics, including black nationalism, anarchism, and communism. The broadcast network newscasts have mostly failed to report on Mr. Jones’s past political affiliations which are lock-step with the network’s downplay of coverage regarding President Obama’s associations with the former radical and terrorist William Ayers during the election. The administration’s “Green Jobs” czar, Van Jones, has a “very checkered past” deep-rooted in radical politics, including black nationalism, anarchism, and communism. The broadcast network newscasts have mostly failed to report on Mr. Jones’s past political affiliations which are lock-step with the network’s downplay of coverage regarding President Obama’s associations with the former radical and terrorist William Ayers during the election. At 6:47 a.m. EDT on the July 10 edition of “Fox and Friends,” Americans for Prosperity Policy Director Phil Kerpen, told interviewer Brian Kilmeade that Jones is “somebody who was involved in radical politics in San Francisco, “who was self-admittedly “radicalized in jail” and found “Communism and anarchism.” Kerpen compares Van Jones’s Communist past with his new quest for environmentalism and the creation of green jobs:
I think it’s pretty instructive what his past is…it’s the same sort of philosophy, the idea that government ought to be reordering society in accordance with some utopian vision that failed with communism and socialism, and will fail with this green jobs idea.
In an April 12, 2009 World Net Daily article titled “Will a “red” help blacks go green?”Aaron Klein reports that Jones himself stated in a 2005 interview his environmental activism was a means to fight for racial and class “justice,” and that he was a “rowdy black nationalist,” and a “communist.” Because the administration’s “czars” do not go through congressional confirmation, and are therefore not scrutinized or vetted, many Americans have no idea who they are or where they come from. Kudos to Fox News for bringing Van Jones’s controversial past and political ideology to light.
OBAMA NOW HIRING “GRASS ROOTS” WORKERS TO BOOST SUPPORT FOR HEALTH CARE BILL from Drudge
Ed note: Just as ACORN does, so, apparently, does the white house. When Acorn needs concerned citizens to parade by AIG bosses, homes, they pay them by the hour. When ACORN needs people to (fruadually in many cases) voters signed up, they pay people by the hour. Now, our president, needs normal people to support his health care bill and guess what… he’s paying by the hour! $11-16 dollar an hour, expecting to pay these “grass roots” supports $4-6K for the summer. No lie. Apparently, grass roots does not mean what it used to mean.. now it means employees… go figure!
Sec 542 of HR 2647 http://ow.ly/15HOp8…
This legislation was passed in the house. Now it’s on to the Senate for vote THIS WEEK. CALL YOUR SENATORS, NOW.
This legislation is written purposely in a manner very “open to interpretation” by Attorney General Eric Holder, or his successors. It would make it illegal to belong to, blog on, associate with and group or groups of people who not only hate people or ethnic groups, etc.. but hate the GOVERNMENT. Please take a moment and read the article linked above from the 9/12 website.
Ed Note:Look… I am not a hater…. I am a lover .. of the Constitution of the United States of America. It is my opinion that the past several administrations of our government are the haters… Hey, maybe we could have THEM all arrested ?????
Have You Seen The Organizational Chart for The Democrats Version of Health Care Bill???
Check this out! (It reminds me of the Mouse Trap game I had as a kid)
CNN Legal Analyst Calls 2nd Amendment Rights Preposterous from News Busters
During CNN’s coverage of the Sotomayor hearings on Wednesday, legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin implied that the Supreme Court’s 2008 decision to uphold the Second Amendment was revolutionary: “When I was in law school…the idea that you had a Second Amendment right to a gun was considered preposterous….But the Supreme Court [in Heller]…said that…individuals have a personal right to bear arms.” Just after the bottom of the 12 noon hour of the network’s coverage, anchor Wolf Blitzer raised the Second Amendment issue with Toobin, a graduate of Harvard Law School, and the others on their panel analyzing the hearings, which included anchor/correspondent John King; senior political analyst Gloria Borger; and correspondent Candy Crowley, as well as Republican strategist Alex Castellanos and former Clinton administration official Maria Echaveste. After playing a clip of Republican Senator Tom Coburn asking Sotomayor about the right to keep and bear arms, Blitzer asked Toobin what were the nominee’s “positions, specifically on the federal obligation to support the Second Amendment, as opposed to local communities or states?” The CNN senior legal analyst harkened back to his law school days in his answer … the idea that you had a Second Amendment right to a gun was considered preposterous. The text of the Second Amendment, you know, speaks of a well-regulated militia and the right to bear arms. Well, courts used to say, well, this only affects the rights of state militias. But the Supreme Court, two years ago, in the famous Heller decision, said that when it comes to the federal government, we- individuals have a personal right to bear arms, and the D.C. gun control law was thus unconstitutional. And the question that came before Judge Sotomayor in the Second Circuit was, what about states? Do individuals have a right against states- state law to a personal right to bear arms? And she said, according to her reading of the precedents, is that that’s not decided yet, that it only applies to the federal government. Now, it’s up to the Supreme Court to make that decision.
Acorn Hails Confirmation of New Census Director by Michelle Malking (their approval can not be good, all things considered)
News for 07/15/2009- Be your own landlord, Bad to Worse, Up for Some Light Reading?, Give Me Liberty
Obama mulls rental option for some homeowners-sources from Reuters
http://www.reuters.co…
Government officials are weighing a plan that would let borrowers who have fallen behind on their mortgage payments avoid eviction by renting their homes instead, sources familiar with the administration’s thinking said on Tuesday. Under one idea being discussed, delinquent homeowners would surrender ownership of their homes but would continue to live in the property for several years, the sources told Reuters. Officials are also considering whether the government should make mortgage payments on behalf of borrowers who cannot keep up with their home loans, tapping an unused portion of a $50 billion housing aid kitty. As part of this plan, jobless borrowers might receive a housing stipend along with regular unemployment benefits, the sources said. (Reporting by Patrick Rucker; Editing by Diane Craft) .
(Ed note: good thing as interest rates climb and unemployment climbs this may become needed more than anyone now realizes)
The Economy Is Even Worse Than You Think by Mortimer Zuckerman at WSJ
http://online.wsj.com…
The Bureau of Labor Statistics preliminary estimate for job losses for June is 467,000, which means 7.2 million people have lost their jobs since the start of the recession. The cumulative job losses over the last six months have been greater than for any other half year period since World War II, including the military demobilization after the war. The job losses are also now equal to the net job gains over the previous nine years, making this the only recession since the Great Depression to wipe out all job growth from the previous expansion.
Ed note- he lists ten reasongs why we’re in more trouble than we think: estimates given are believed low, Employers requesting their workers take unpaid leaves are up, 1.4 million unemployed not counted in figures, many are underemployed and thus not counted, work week now aveages 33 hours for rank and file workers, Avg length of unemployment of 24.5 weeks is highest in history, compensation averages remain flat, goods production sector is way down, hiring after recession lets up will not happen quickly as workers there will have hours increased before hiring begins, unemployment nationwide projected to soon be stagnant at 11%
Read the House Dems’ Health Bill by Kevin Waterman at Americans for Tax Reform
http://www.atr.org/in…
As sad as it is to say, no one really expects that members of Congress are going to read a bill before they decide to pass it. Usually that means they see nothing wrong with pushing a bill out late and then quickly voting before anyone else has a chance to read it either. Lucky for us though, the House Democrats have let slip the full text of their healthcare bill. We know they won’t read it, so it’s up to us.
Americans for Tax Reform has already made note of several serious problems with the bill, including:
insurance mandates for both individuals and businesses
an excise tax on health insurance
steps towards full double-taxing of corporate income earned abroad
and of course, the new surtax on small businesses and high income earners
However, with 1,018 pages there’s bound to be some other surprises left in there. So if you can, do the work Congress won’t and read the bill. Leave a comment to let us know anything you find so we can make sure everyone else knows about it too.
Read the bill here: http://edlabor.house….
Bring Back the Declaration of Independence by Matt Hawes at Campaign for Liberty
http://www.campaignfo…
So, President Obama, we’ve asked if government works, and the answer is a resounding no. Why? Because of the overreaching vs. limited question you claim is outdated. Big government has had decades to make its case, and if its closing argument doesn’t drive our nation over the cliff, let us hope we have learned our lesson. Unfortunately, the president failed to realize he had answered his own question in the preceding paragraph of his statement, saying: “Now, there are some who question the scale of our ambitions — who suggest that our system cannot tolerate too many big plans. Their memories are short. For they have forgotten what this country has already done; what free men and women can achieve when imagination is joined to common purpose, and necessity to courage.” Our Republic can ill afford any more big plans from the federal government, but it has always needed — and has always had room for — the big plans of the individual, the big dreams of the new arrivals to its shores. From those who would create products for or entertain millions, to the ones who wish nothing more than to be left alone to live their lives in peace, our country does indeed have room. Though our nation can do more than just tolerate big plans, our system is built on the fundamental concept that you should not be able to forcibly take money from others to pay for them. President Obama was correct when he said that free men and women have achieved great things. It is their freedom, and not the government, that works. Why then, does our system insist on regulating and burdening them as much as it can get away with? Because we have allowed it to. So, what can we do to recapture the vision our Founders had when they declared their independence to the world? (the suggested solutions can be found in the full article, linked above)
News for 07/14/2009- God Given Rights, Another 1984 Alert, Bailout for the Favored, Liberals Who Hate
Senator Durbin…You are Simply *WRONG* by Aceintex
http://www.theminorit…
(Yesterday during the Sotomayor hearing,Senator Dick Durbin quoted) Senator Paul Simon of Illinois during the 1993 Hearings to confirm Roth Bader Ginsburg to the Supreme Court said:
“You face a much harsher judge than this committee. That’s the judgment of history. And that judgment is likely to revolve around the question “Did she restrict freedom, or did she expand it?” Then, he went on to say: “It is the Supreme Court that defines our personal rights to privacy…and decides the restrictions that can be placed on the most personal aspects of our lives. The court decides the rights of the victims of discrimination, immigrants, consumers. The nine justices decide whether Congress has the authority to pass laws to protect our civil rights and our environment. It decides what checks will exist on the Executive Branch in war…and in peace. MY RIGHTS COME FROM GOD NOT NINE JUDGES, OR 100 SENATORS WHO EMPOWER THEM TO JUDGE ME. ”
MY RIGHTS ARE DIVINE RIGHTS. THEY ARE ENDOWED UPON ME BY MY CREATOR! NO SENATOR, CONGRESSMAN, PRESIDENT, OR EVEN SUPREME COURT JUSTICE CAN ADD ONE JOT OR ONE TITLE TO THE RIGHTS THAT ARE GIVEN TO ME BY MY CREATOR! THESE JUSTICES ARE NOT GOD, (LET ALONE A GOD I WOULD WORSHIP) AND THEY CAN NOT GIVE ME ONE RIGHT THAT IS NOT MINE BY RIGHT OF BIRTH.AN DIVINE APPOINTMENT!
Obama-meters on the way… by Steve Milloy at Canada Free Press
http://canadafreepres…
Baltimore Gas & Electric is leading the way to electricity rationing, courtesy of President Obama. The utility announced to day that it filed with local regulators an application to install 2 million so-called “smart meters” in the homes of its residential customers. Smart meters allow local utilities to control electricity use in your home. Using a $200 million Department of Energy grant — part of the $787 billion Stimulus Package enacted earlier in the year — BG&E plans to charge customers for the balance of the costs. BG&E claims that benefits to consumers (about $5 per month) will amount to about three times the cost of the meters. Not only is this benefit trivial, it’s pretty phony. It comes from you using less electricity or using electricity at less convenient times — things you can already do without the meter. What’s the benefit from doing less or being inconvenienced? We don’t know about you, but we’re not interested in selling our freedom to use electricity as we choose — especially for a lousy $5/month. Also, consider that, since smart meters allow two-way communication, each meter represents a node from which a hacker can gain entry to the grid and wreak havoc. The ultimate purpose of the meters is to allow local utilities to ration electricity as demand is rising faster than supply, a phenomenon that can be traced to the greens blocking construction of new power plants and transmission lines. Rolling power outages are already being planned for the Baltimore-Washington area starting as early as 2011-2012. Smart is the new dumb.
Minority Broadcasters Seek Financial Bailout by Fawn Johnson for WSJ
WASHINGTON –A group of minority broadcasters asked Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner Monday for financial assistance akin to the aid that has been extended to the financial and auto industries. “Minority-owned broadcasters are close to becoming an extinct species,” the letter said. “Even in better economic times, minority broadcasters have historically had difficulties accessing the capital markets.” The broadcasters told Mr. Geithner they can bounce back if they are given some temporary assistance while the credit markets are slow. “Unlike the auto business, broadcasting has been healthy for many years,” their letter said. The broadcasters appeal follows a proposal sent in May to Mr. Geithner by a group of influential House members asking for a minority broadcaster support program, bridge funding, or government-backed loans.
(Ed note- this is a follow up to a story appearing in an earlier newsletter… it starts here and branches out. The network news divisions and the newspapers of the country have lost their objectivity and turned into nothing more than state-run entities. In greater and greater nubmers, people don’t trust them for news any longer. The less objective they become, the lower their ratings and numbers. Therefore, this bailout will be the payback for the positive press they’ve given and will be used to leverage against any urge they may have to become more objective).
The Two Types of Republicans Liberals Hate by Daniel Greenfield at Canada Free Press
http://canadafreepres…
There are two types of Republicans that liberal Democrats hate above all else with an unreasoning venom that borders on madness…
The American Populist represents an American ideal, often Western in nature, and promotes independence, small government and an old fashioned self-centered Americanism. The Populist relies less on bureaucratic advice and more on common sense, gut instincts and thinking about issues from a new angle. The Populist is often not a professional politician, and has a background or hobbies that define him more than his political career does. Models include Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush and Sarah Palin. Liberals routinely denounce the populists as stupid, mentally incompetent hicks who can barely tie their shoes… At a cultural level, liberals react with the innate distaste of class warfare to populists, the way the Bourbons did to peasants presuming to tell them what to do. At the ideological level, the American Populist is coded as representing the classic American values of hard work, individualism and the American Way, that they have been doing their best to stamp out for generations, by replacing them with their own values of collectivism, tolerance and global collaboration. The Populist automatically subverts this process by reminding the American public of what being an American really means.
The second Republican type to trip Liberals haywire is the Government Organizer. The Organizer is often gruff, matter of fact and projects competence. He is not charismatic, in fact he’s often anti-charismatic, being unattractive and unappealing. A longtime career politician, he relentlessly and aggressively pursues goals that he believes will benefit the country, regardless of the obstacles. His competence however cannot compensate for his perceived unpleasantness, or ruthless attitudes. Worse yet to many liberals he represents a “bad father” figure who is ominous and threatening. Models include Richard Nixon, Dick Cheney and John McCain.
These two types not only comprise the two types of Republicans that draw obsessive liberal hate, but they also comprise the most visible Republican Presidents and Presidential candidates.
Interesting Tidbit:
* Rhode Island Tea Party group banned from next year’s July 4th Parade for handing out copies of the Constitution.*
Read Full Post | Make a Comment ( None so far )News for 07/13/2009- Narcisism, Smoking Guns, Irresponsibility and Tolerance
Barack Obama is a narcissist, his contempt towards average Americans is boundless by David Podvin at Canada Free Press
Obama governs using the Chicago model on which he was politically weaned: “You scratch my back, or I break yours.”
General Electric perceived an opportunity to reap tremendous benefits if Obama were elected, and so GE media outlets assisted the conglomerate’s preferred candidate. That decision will prove tragically short-sighted when Obamanomics rupture the capitalist system. However, Corporate America’s time horizon is now dictated by quarterly earnings reports, and for the time being General Electric is making out like a bandit. So is Goldman Sachs, which has received billions from the Troubled Asset Relief Program designed to bail out failing financial institutions. That rescue money has gone to a company in no need of being rescued: Goldman recently reported record earnings. As other Wall Street firms struggle to survive, Goldman Sachs is thriving because it aligned with Obama. Among the other prominent organizational and corporate collaborators receiving administration largesse are:
- ACORN, the quintessential left-wing community organization that illegally registered voters on Obama’s behalf and is being rewarded with a massive increase in its taxpayer funding.
- Chevron Texaco, the quintessential multinational conglomerate that supported Obama and consequently still administers the Iraqi oilfields despite the candidate’s promise that he would promptly return those fields to the Iraqi people.
- The Service Employees International Union, which contributed over thirty million dollars to Obama and on whose behalf he attempted to extort California taxpayers. State officials were threatened that any budgetary cuts adversely affecting SEIU employees would result in California forfeiting a $7 billion federal stimulus grant.
- Berkshire Hathaway, whose Chairman Warren Buffett aggressively supported Obama. Since the inauguration, the financial institutions contained in Berkshire’s portfolio have received priority treatment. Ninety-one percent of California-bound TARP funds have gone to banks in which Berkshire is the largest shareholder.
- Hamas, the genocidal anti-Semitic terrorist group that illegally raised funds for the Obama campaign and is now receiving an infusion of American taxpayer money totaling $900 million.
- Time Warner, which contributed more than half a million dollars to Obama and deployed its Time Magazine subsidiary to promote him as a “centrist” despite his voting record being the Senate’s most liberal. In exchange for the communication conglomerate’s unswerving allegiance, Obama has appointed five Time Warner executives to his administration, where they will have input on legislation affecting…the communications industry.
While most Americans are suffering financially, Obama’s major contributors are enjoying taxpayer-provided prosperity.
Yet Another Smoking Gun For Sotomayor by Tom Bowden at Ayn Rand Center
http://blog.aynrandce…
On the eve of Supreme Court confirmation hearings for Judge Sonia Sotomayor, Politico.com was reporting that “Republicans have yet to uncover a smoking gun in Sotomayor’s past, and her confirmation is seen by many as a fait accompli.” This says a lot about the Senate’s inability (on both sides of the aisle) to recognize a smoking gun when they see it. In previous posts, I’ve discussed the oft-quoted public speech in which she rhapsodized about “how wonderful and magical it is to have a Latina soul.” In that speech, which she later authorized to be reprinted as a law review article, Sotomayor publicly declared that judicial impartiality is just a pipe dream, that judges can’t be objective because “
ersonal experiences affect the facts that judges choose to see,” and as a result “‘there is no objective stance but only a series of perspectives.’” This speech not just a smoking gun—it’s an atomic blast meant to obliterate the rule of law. Any senator of either party who cannot see the implications of Sotomayor’s views is intellectually unequipped to perform the kind of searching review the Founders intended when they required advice and consent of the Senate for Supreme Court nominations.
America sliding into a pit of foreign debt By Howard Richman, Raymond Richman, and Jesse Richman at American Thinker
http://www.americanth…
There are two types of news: the news that fits and the news that would cause fits if it were printed. A responsible press would cover both. Unfortunately, economic reporting in the US doesn’t always do this. If news of an economic bombshell gets suppressed… did it really explode? The United States net foreign debt hit an unprecedented $3.5 trillion, 24.3% of our GDP, at the end of 2008, according to a report issued on June 26 by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. When foreign debt rises as a percentage of GDP, a country becomes less and less able to pay off debt from its income stream. Normally the dramatic rise for 2008 would have been newsworthy but on July 8, almost two weeks after the report was issued, only the Washington Times covered the story. Elsewhere in the news were references to foreign debt in Argentina, Armenia, Bulgaria, China, Colombia, Croatia, Egypt, Indonesia, Mexico, Namibia, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Russia, Turkey, and Zimbabwe, but not to America’s rising foreign debt. Obama has been expanding U.S. government borrowing from abroad. On April 15, Treasury Secretary Geithner, intent on borrowing more money from China, issued a report to Congress which pretended that China does not manipulate its currency, despite the fact that China had already collected about $1.7 trillion dollars of our debt as a byproduct of its non-existent currency manipulations.
The Tolerance Surplus By Daniel Greenfield at Canada Free Press
http://canadafreepres…
If you ask American, Israeli and European liberals and leftists what the key problem with Islam is, they will answer that there is a lack of tolerance. Not of course a lack of tolerance on the part of the throat-slitters, car burners, gang rapists, car bombers and hate preachers of Islam. On the contrary they will assert that there is a great tolerance deficit on the part of Western nations toward Islam. In a rational political calculus, we take for granted that the people blowing up synagogues, stabbing their sisters to death for wearing jeans, and kidnapping and beheading people they don’t like, are the ones suffering from a tolerance shortage. But to a progressive, brutal violence by a minority is always a symptom that they are being oppressed, rather than that they are the ones doing the oppressing. Muslim violence is comeuppance or blowback, and the only solution is to be more and more tolerant of Muslims. Having classified Western nations as always being in the wrong, and Muslims as being always in the right, where reasonable people see a failure to fight terrorism, progressives see a failure to fight intolerance. Given a mandate, conservative governments will try to get to grips with violent Islamists. Liberal governments will try to get to grips with anyone who criticizes Islam. And naturally it becomes a good deal more difficult to point out that Muslim violence is a serious problem, when you’ve passed laws prohibiting anyone from making any mention of Muslims and violence in the same sentence. This has the convenience of making it illegal to point out the stupidity of progressive policymaking, which is something that their fellow People’s Democratic regimes routinely do. Tens of thousands dead in America, Europe, Israeli and Australia has not done much to chip away at the insistence of multiple governments that Islam is a religion of peace. And even conservatives have adopted the liberal mantra that Islamic violence is something carried out by splinter groups, in response to not being tolerated enough. The solution being more cowbell, or more tolerance. But so far the “Hug them until they love us” approach has not yielded any dividends, except more bombs and bullet holes, and bodies in morgues.
Special Report – Is Michelle Obama the new Jackie Kennedy?
News for 07/12/2009-Mind Control, Stinky Steny, 1984 by 2020, Passport Points, Interesting Video
How Politicians and the Media Change Our Minds By Paul Murdock at Campaign For Liberty
http://www.campaignfo…
Unbeknownst to us, our lives are filled with messages that have a profound effect on our emotions, beliefs, values, and behaviors. These messages can be as obvious as a tornado siren in Kansas or as secretive and stealthy as the viruses and bacteria that invade your biological organs. What is guaranteed is that, for good or evil, the message never ends, and its impact is powerful! …Although most intelligent individuals recognize bias, the inundating messages unconsciously lead to helplessness, apathy, and eventually acquiescence. In other words, the totality of the messages eventually destroys most individual defenses! Even when we are aware! For example, if individuals are consistently faced with “supposed facts and experts” from the media, professors, politicians, and corporations, values, ideals, and behavior is subtly manipulated like a river that never ceases to erode its banks. It will eventually get deeper and wider. What then can be done to minimize the persuasiveness of those in control? In the words of George Bernard Shaw, “Beware of false knowledge; it is more dangerous than ignorance.” Social control is dependent on providing one point of view and limiting knowledge and contrary viewpoints. The U.S. constitution became great because it was “the single greatest effort of national deliberation that the world has ever seen” (John Adams). It is vital to openly debate topics, engage in fruitful discussion, and play devil’s advocate. Practice responding to propaganda, thinking rationally about the issues, attempt to understand the full range of options, avoid being dependent on a single news source, monitor your emotions, and be prepared to challenge the “group.”
Many unanswered questions about Hoyer, $18 million Recovery.gov redesign award by Mark Tapscott at Washington Examiner http://tinyurl.com/nv…
One of the great things about journalism is that you never know where a story is going to lead. So it was earlier this week when I saw a notice that the federal government had awarded an $18 million, multi-year contract to redesign the Recovery.gov web site to Smartronix, an obscure Maryland firm. Recovery.gov is the federal government’s web site that is supposed to provide up-to-date data on how funds are being spent under the $787 billion economic stimulus bill that was approved by Congress in February. The site has been criticized by folks across the political spectrum for being full of praise for the Obama administration but lacking in timely data on recovery spending. The amount struck me as excessive, even for a government web site, the multi-year duration also seemed a bit odd, and a quick scan of the Smartronix web site disclosed that it was a defense firm that had received more than $260 million in federal contracts, but with no obvious claims to special experience or skills for web site design. So I queried my colleagues on the Examiner’s commentary staff. Within five minutes, David Freddoso emailed back the news that several Smartonix executives had made $19,000 in contributions to House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer since 1999, and that it appeared those were their only contributions. Those (questions brought by author in full article) are extremely relevant questions since Lundberg’s statement makes clear that there is indeed a relationship between Hoyer and Smartronix. The nature of that relationship is of interest because there is no FEC record of political donations by the Smartronix executives to any other federal office holder, the $18 million award and the RFP that produced it are raising multiple eyebrows among knowledgeable web designers, Smartronix refuses to discuss the controversy and Lundberg refuses to clarify the nature of the relationship between her boss and Smartronix. Stay tuned.
Coming: A New Definition of “Road Tax”– By Henry Lamb for Canada Free Press
http://canadafreepres…
It’s coming. With a $16 million grant from the federal government, the University of Iowa is developing a Global Positioning Satellite system that can measure the mileage, apply a variable tax rate that will increase during rush hours, and in high-traffic areas, calculate the total, charge a designated account card, and shut down your automobile if unpaid when due. Some 2700 automobiles in five states will be used in the test. The new by-the-mile tax system will give government much more than a new tax collection mechanism; it will give government much greater control over everyone. The new GM, now owned by the government, can install this new system in all of its vehicles. All that’s needed is an instruction from the car-czar. Auto makers that have not yet been taken over by the government can be required to install the system quite easily, by regulation or legislation. With such a system in every vehicle, the government can have virtual control over the population. Purchase of a vehicle will give the government a database containing the name and residence location of every automobile owner. Since the system has the ability to record and track the geographic location of the vehicle at every moment of the day or night – only for the purpose of applying the correct tax rate, of course – government can know where your vehicle is at any moment. Frightened yet? This is not hocus-pocus conspiracy-theory nonsense. The National Surface Transportation Infrastructure Financing Commission has unanimously endorsed the scheme. A past president of the Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials says that several states have considered not waiting for the federal government, and implementing this system within their states. It is on the horizon, and currently targeted for implementation by 2020.
An Interesting Point on Obama’s Citizenship– From WeThePeople.org
http://wethepeople.or…
Here are some points not yet made in the elusive birth certificate issue.
A Video That Will Cause You To Question That The President Transends Race
http://www.youtube.co…
Ed note- this would be interesting if it just weren’t so darn sad.
News for 07/11/2009-Gore Says Cap & Trade Brings Global Governance
Al Gore: U.S. Climate Bill Will Help Bring About ‘Global Governance’ by Marc Morano at Climate Depot
http://www.climatedep…
Former Vice President Al Gore declared that the Congressional climate bill will help bring about “global governance.”
“I bring you good news from the U.S., “Gore said on July 7, 2009 in Oxford at the Smith School World Forum on Enterprise and the Environment, sponsored by UK Times. “Just two weeks ago, the House of Representatives passed the Waxman-Markey climate bill,” Gore said, noting it was “very much a step in the right direction.” President Obama has pushed for the passage of the bill in the Senate and attended a G8 summit this week where he agreed to attempt to keep the Earth’s temperatures from rising more than 2 degrees C. Gore touted the Congressional climate bill, claiming it “will dramatically increase the prospects for success” in combating what he sees as the “crisis” of man-made global warming. “But it is the awareness itself that will drive the change and one of the ways it will drive the change is through global governance and global agreements.”
Warning: Cap and Trade Bubble Ahead By Stephen Lendman at Global Research
http://www.globalrese…
On May 15, Cap & Trade was introduced in the House purportedly “To create clean energy jobs, achieve energy independence, reduce global warming pollution and transition to a clean energy economy.” In fact, it’s to let corporate polluters reap huge windfall profits by charging consumers more for energy and fuel as well as create a new bubble through carbon trading derivatives speculation. It does nothing to address environmental issues, yet on June 26 the House narrowly passed (229 – 212) and sent it to the Senate to be debated and voted on.
On July 1, Catherine Austin Fitts’ Solari.com blog headlined “The Next Really Scary Bubble” in stating:
“If you think the housing and credit bubble diminished your financial security and your community, or the bailouts, or the rising gas prices did as well, hold on to your hat” for what’s coming. “Carbon trading is gearing up to make the housing and derivative bubbles look like target practice.”
She quoted Rep. Geoff Davis calling it “a scam,” Rep. Devin Nunes saying it’s a “massive transfer of wealth” from the public to polluters and Wall Street, Rep. James Sensenbrenner stating “Carbon markets can and will be manipulated using the same Wall Street sleights of hand that brought us the financial crisis,” and Dennis Kuchinich citing “The best description to date (to) be found in Matt Taibbi’s….’The Great American Bubble Machine: From tech stocks to high gas prices, Goldman Sachs (GS) has engineered every major market manipulation since the Great Depression – and they are about to do it again.’
Editors Note: This brings to mind an email I recently recieved from a friend of mine with some Real World Experience in Cap and Trade. The email follows:
Thought I’d take some time and share some real world experience I had with Cap and Trade when I worked at DTE Energy. Keep in mind, this is from real experience which did not involve me performing research on the rules and regulations set forth by the government. At one time, within the last 10 years or so, the government once again studied the affects coal burning plants have on our atmosphere. As a result, the EPA regulations were tightened. The utilities have a very strong PAC (political action committee) and lobbyist so before any laws could be passed, negotiations took place regarding the new EPA regulations. In a nutshell the main concern was the amount of money it would require to upgrade the plants so the new emission standards could be met. Both the government and the utilities acknowledged this was not a sound business decision, so a graduated timeline was constructed to meet the new standards. Part of the graduated timeline included giving each electric utility credits (tokens) which essentially pardoned them for not meeting the new standards. The thought was the utility can use the credits during the graduated timeline so no penalty fees would be issued by the government. This sounded practical from both parties and the law was set. The kicker was, as I was told by several DTE employess AND the CEO, the number of tokens issued to a utility was based on the total amount of electricity generated at each plant, not just coal burning plants. In DTE’s case, they were issued credits for the nuclear power plant in Monroe which already met the new standards. So what really occurred over the subsequent years? The credits were sold to other utilities that needed them to avoid any fines. As stated in one management meeting, DTE made huge sums of money as a result of selling the tokens. So, a natural thought on my behalf was the money that was made would be used to upgrade the coal burning plants to meet the new standards. Logical but not good business sense. This money was thrown into multiple budgets and used at will. To make matters worse, at least for me, I just read in the paper about a month ago that DTE was approaching the Michigan Public Service Commission (MPSC) requesting a rate hike to consumers. The reason for the rate hike? DTE just spent millions of dollars upgrading only 1 stack at a coal burning plant in Monroe. The upgrade brought that stack up to 80% of the new emmission standards. When DTE approached the MPSC for the rate hike that will be applied now, they also informed the MPSC that next year they will complete the upgrades to the stack that was started this year and begin upgrading the second stack as well. And oh, by the way, that effort will require another rate hike next year. When DTE approached the MPSC for the rate hike that will be applied now, they also informed the MPSC that next year they will complete the upgrades to the stack that was started this year and begin upgrading the second stack as well. And oh, by the way, that effort will require another rate hike next year. So, does cap and trade work? Oh yeah, you can make a lot of money in that market then turn around and get rate hikes to pay for things.
Obama Missile Defense Plan Puts America at Risk by Baker Spring at Heritage Foundation
http://www.heritage.o…
On February 2, 2009, Iran successfully launched a satellite into orbit using a rocket with technology similar to that used in long-range ballistic missiles. On May 20, 2009, Iran test-fired a 1,200-mile solid-fueled ballistic missile. North Korea attempted to launch a satellite on April 6, 2009, which, while failing to place the satellite in orbit, delivered its payload some 2,390 miles away in the Pacific Ocean. This was followed by a North Korean explosive nuclear weapons test on May 25, 2009. The ballistic-missile threat to the U.S. and its friends and allies is growing. Under these circumstances, common sense would dictate that the Obama Administration support full funding for the U.S. missile defense program.
What does the Administration do? On April 6, 2009, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates announced that the Obama Administration’s fiscal year (FY) 2010 broader defense budget would reduce the ballistic-missile budget by $1.4 billion. …
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