Journalism 101

Who?  What?  Where?  When?  Why?  How?  That's journalism simplified.  I took journalism in Mrs. Kirtley's 8th grade class and learned that, even in the Jr. High Newspaper, a journalist will answer those questions.  It's that simple.  When was the last time you read or watched or heard a news report that answered those questions about an important event?  Let's take a look at a couple of current events and see what we have learned from our "journalists."

Last night our federal government avoided the fiscal cliff.  The United States would have "gone over the cliff" if an agreement on taxes and spending cuts was not reached between the Democrats in the White House and in the Senate who want to deal with our $16,000,000,000,000 (the 12 zeroes make more of an impact than just "trillion," doesn't it?) debt and the Republican controlled House of Representatives who want to cut spending to deal with the $16,000,000,000,000 debt.  The president campaigned on a balanced approach that would ask the wealthiest to pay more in taxes and cuts in spending to start to rein in the out of control debt.  Both sides agree that deficit spending is "unsustainable."  Who?  The House of Representatives, the Senate, and President Obama.  What?  Agreed on a deal that would raise tax rates for individuals making over $400,000 a year and families making over $450,000 a year.  Agreed on "future" spending cuts to be negotiated by the end of February, conservative estimates of $10 of tax increases for every $1 of spending cuts or realistic estimates of $410 in tax increases for every $1 cut.  That's Washington D.C.'s definition of a "balanced approach."  Where?  That is an easy  one, in Washington D.C.  When?  Another easy one, last night.  How?  Through negotiations between Vice President Biden and Senator McConnell in the Senate and a yes vote in the House that included all Democrats and 84 Republicans.  Here's the important one that is almost never answered by "journalists."  Why?  Why do Democrats, including the president, insist on raising taxes on high earners even though the increase in taxes collected will not fund even one month's spending?  Why did 84 Republicans, including the Speaker of the House, go against their principles and agree to raising taxes on 77% of the population when you include increases through the loss of the payroll tax cut and the new Obamacare taxes in addition to the negotiated tax rate increase on the "rich" or "more fortunate" with no guarantee of ANY spending cuts at all?  "Journalists" have not answered the why, so we can come to our own conclusion.  But first lets look at a couple of more current events and answer these same basic questions.

Who?  Adam Lanza.  What?  Killed 28 people, himself, his mother, six adult teachers and school staff, and 20 kindergarten students.  When?  The morning of December 14, 2012.  Where?  Sandy Hook Elementary School, Newtown, Connecticut.  How?  With a gun.  Why?  Starts getting a little unclear here again, but if you look to the solutions offered by the president, lawmakers like Harry Reid, Senator Diane Feinstein, New York City Mayor Bloomberg, "reporters" like Piers Morgan of CNN, and the majority of Hollywood, since their solution to the mass murder problem is more restrictive gun control laws; the gun is the answer to both how and why.  We all know it's the answer to how, although it's not clear exactly what type of gun was used, maybe we can look into that question in another post.  Is it really also the answer to why?  Can an object, a tool, be a reason why?  Is a rock why Cain killed Abel?  Is an ax why Lizzie Borden killed her family?  Is a knife why someone killed O.J. Simpson's ex-wife?  Is a derringer why John Wilkes Boothe killed Abraham Lincoln?  Is an airplane why terrorists killed 3,000 Americans on September 11, 2001?  Seems a little illogical to have a weapon as a reason.  So let's take a look at another set of questions.

Who?  Progressives, President Obama, Vice President Biden, Senators Biden and Feinstein, Mayor Bloomberg, reporter Piers Morgan, Hollywood in general.  What?  Promoting tighter gun control laws, up to the complete overturning of the 2nd Amendment.  When?  As soon as possible.  Where?  In the United States.  How?  Through federal law or regulations, or as the president put it, "under the radar."  Why?  Supposedly to prevent another tragedy like the Sandy Hook Elementary murders.  But if the gun is not the reason for the murders, can eliminating or restricting access to guns be the solution?  If it's not, then what is the why, for the what - gun control laws?

The answer to why takes a little more work, a little more thought.  I was taking the journalism class shortly after the Watergate scandal, and actually read Woodward and Bernstein's All the President's Men in 7th grade.  One thing I learned from reading that book is that lust for power is a common motive, or a common reason why.  Another is greed, or lust for money.  Hatred is a motive.  Rage is a motive.  Jealousy or envy is a motive.  Sometimes there might not be a motive, just flat out evil is the reason why.  Of course there are good motives too.  The most basic is love, whether it's the motive for working to take care of your family or the reason for donating to the local food bank.  At its most basic, love is the motive for any positive action.

So back to the why for the first "what" in this post, the fiscal cliff deal reached by our legislative branch and the president.  Why would both parties agree to raise taxes and not cut spending when both sides agree that our deficit is a major problem and raising taxes will not reduce it?  Let's be generous and say the reason is love.  Both sides don't want to cut social programs like Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps, public housing, unemployment benefits, and on and on and on because they have such a heartfelt love for their fellow man.  Basically our government is the parent that just cannot say no.  They give their children (us) everything we want and some things we don't want, even though they have maxxed out all the credit cards and it will be up to our grandchildren and great grandchildren to pay them off.  But they do it because they have such love for all of us.

Yeah.  Right.  What's the more likely motive?  Lust for power, lust for money, or most likely a combination of the two. What better way to consolidate a politician's position than by taking from a small group to pay for benefits to a larger group.  If there was anything learned this past November, it was, as one pundit said "personal responsibility will lose out to Santa Claus every time."  

The second "what" listed above, Adam Lanza's killing spree.  Why did he do it?  There are reports of mental health issues.  Speculation about medications he may have been taking.  The bottom line is that the only possible motivation for killing 20 kindergartners is evil.  Pure evil.  Killing his mother and even the officials at the school could be motivated by rage, jealousy, or hatred, especially when combined with mental health problems and medication.  But killing children?  Evil.  There is no other explanation.

That brings us to the motive for the response to the murders.  Just as there is no way to legislate "good," there is no way to legislate to prevent "evil."  Good and evil just are.  They exist.  But as humans, we all feel the need to do something to prevent a mass murder, especially of children, from ever happening again.  Many, maybe even the majority, of the people pushing for new tighter gun control laws are doing so out of the need to just do something, anything, in response to the tragedy.  They know, deep inside, maybe even subconsciously, that there is absolutely nothing we can do to completely eliminate evil.  Because there is nothing to be done to stop the "why," they target the "how"-the tool, the gun.  Again, the basic motive here is love, the need to make sure that no other young lives are lost and no other families or communities have to feel the pain of such loss.  But for some; the president, Senators Reid and Feinstein, Mayor Bloomberg, Michael Moore, and others, the motivation once again is a lust for power. They have the need to control us, their subjects.  As the president's former chief of staff and current mayor of the United States' murder capitol (Chicago), Rahm Emmanuel said, "never let a crisis go to waste.  They give you the opportunity to accomplish things you would never be able to accomplish otherwise."  Those motivated by a lust for power are pushing hard to accomplish legislation with this fresh crisis that they have been trying unsuccessfully for years to accomplish.  They are using those with other motivations to help them.  Once again, Stalin's definition of useful idiots applies.

I think in the next few posts, we should take a look at other current events and issues and see if we can answer not just the who, what, when, where, and how, but the why as well.

See What You See, Say What You See

One of the "gadgets" on my blog is right above the posts, random quotes from Ronald Reagan.  The quote that convinced me to add the gadget is "Don't be afraid to see what you see."  Fortunately for us, Reagan lived before political correctness completely overran our common sense.  When Reagan called the Soviet Union "the Evil Empire," Americans weren't afraid to see the truth in the description.  That is no longer the case.  Because of fear of insulting someone, or a particularly easily offended group, we progressed from being afraid to say what we see, to now, being afraid of even seeing what we see.  The most ridiculous example is "Muslim extremist."  It's was more than a year ago when Whoopi Goldberg walked off the set of The View because Bill O'Reilly described the 9-11 terrorists as Muslim extremists.  Our "Justice" Department, I'm assuming in the spirit of political correctness - they couldn't be that incompetent, could they?, described the shooting of U.S. soldiers on a U.S. Army base by an American Muslim soldier screaming "Allah Akhbar" as an incidence of workplace violence, rather than what it obviously was -  an act of terror by a Muslim extremist. We have a president who campaigns on a theme of redistribution of wealth, the very definition of Marxism, but we can't call him a Marxist.  He's only interested in fairness.  I won't give further examples of political correctness run amok, just the latest and its consequences.

This week, in Portland, Oregon, a 22 year old man walked into Clackamass Town Center, a mall packed with Christmas shoppers and started shooting.  He killed two people and seriously injured another, before reportedly killing himself.  The focus immediately was placed upon the gun he used, an "assault rifle."  Gun control advocates would have us believe that the blame for the crime should be placed on the gun.  If only Oregon had stricter gun control laws, this crime would never have happened.  The problem with this argument is that Oregon already has fairly restrictive gun laws.  To buy the gun, Jacob Roberts would have had to pass an federal background check.  He bypassed this requirement by breaking the law.  He stole the gun and ammunition.  The mall, like the theater in Aurora, Colorado, was declared a "Gun-Free" zone.  Persons who take a firearm onto property declared to be "Gun-Free" are breaking the law and subject to prosecution and penalties that vary by location.  Mr. Roberts broke that law too.  So how exactly will making more laws prevent actions by a person like Jacob Roberts from committing these crimes?  Obviously the law had no meaning to him.  We are afraid to blame Mr. Roberts for being evil?  A person who commits an act of random violence against people that he doesn't even know, has no reason for killing, is evil, PERIOD.  Why are we afraid to see that?  Why are we afraid to say that?  The second amendment did not kill two people.  Oregon's gun laws did not kill two people.  Mr. Roberts' friend who owned the gun did not kill two people.  The mall's Gun-Free policy did not kill two people.  Jacob Roberts killed two people. Are we afraid to say Roberts was evil because his friends and family described him as a "friendly," "adrenaline junkie," "video game player," who "just wanted to make you laugh."?  Were his friends and family afraid to see what they saw in him?  Were they afraid to see that he was troubled?  Afraid to really talk to him, to really get to know him?  Were there signs that he might be troubled, and friends and family were just afraid to see them?

The shooting of strangers by an EVIL deranged man in a mall was bad enough.  But yesterday evil struck again.  This time at an elementary school in Connecticut.  A man walked into an elementary school and shot six adults and twenty kindergarten students before reportedly killing himself.  Once again, the focus went immediately not to the killer, but to his weapons.  He was found inside the school with a 9mm Sig Sauer, and a Glock, both handguns.  A .223 Bushmaster rifle was found in the backseat of his mother's car in the school parking lot.   So once again, an evil and senseless murder is being blamed on an assault rifle, this time one in the backseat of a car parked outside the scene of the murders.  Connecticut has some of the most restrictive gun control laws in the country, the school, once again is a "Gun-Free Zone."  And the evil deranged murderer was too young to legally purchase either of the guns he used.  But many people, including the president are demanding that we "take action," i.e. pass laws, to insure that heinous actions like this do not happen again.  So once again, they are demanding that more laws be written to prevent people like the one who broke countless laws to commit this crime from doing it in the future.  Apparently just one more law would have stopped him in the view of the president and others.  As Einstein said, the "definition of insanity is repeating the same action, expecting different results."  So Rush Limbaugh makes perfect sense when he says that "liberalism is a disease," it's a disease that causes insanity.      Like the health care laws, EPA regulations, and tax hikes for the "wealthy," gun control is about control.  It's not a policy to solve any problem, it's a policy to control people or a group of people.  It's about eliminating choice.  As horrible as yesterday's crime is, as much as any of us want future crimes like this to be prevented by an easy fix, a new law will not prevent an evil person from committing evil acts.  The only way to prevent atrocities like this is for each of us to not be afraid to see what we see.  Adam Lanza is described as "troubled," exhibiting "autistic-like behaviors."  So were friends and family afraid to see his troubles until after he killed 20 kindergartners and 6 adults?  Were they afraid to say what they saw and try to get Adam Lanza some help?  The only way to stop this violence is to stop being politically correct.  We must see evil where there is evil.  We must say we see evil when we see evil.  We can't be afraid to say what we see, for fear of hurting someone's feelings, or damaging their self-esteem.   Inaction can lead to much worse.

So, what I see today is a country shocked by a horrible crime.  A crime that is so unimaginable that we absolutely must do something to make sure that nothing similar happens again.  But once again, a very large number of us want to take the easy way out.  Rather than taking personal responsibility, we want our "mommy," the government, to do it for us.  Blaming the weapons is an emotional reaction that is being reinforced by the president and the media and it is the lazy, easy way out.  Once again, the president and the media is counting on Americans being "low information voters" and useful idiots.  Yes, the idiots are being used once again.  Yesterday I saw almost everyone shocked and hurt by the actions of an evil lunatic.  I saw Americans imagining themselves in the place of those parents in Connecticut.  I saw media and the president's press secretary saying it's too early to bring politics into the discussion about the murders.  I then saw the same media, on CNN, MSNBC, and others immediately bring up the need for more regulations.  I saw celebrities like Alec Baldwin (his photo, along with Sean Penn's is in the dictionary beside the useful idiot definition) use Twitter to call for Americans to "stop defending your right to bear arms.  You're stupid."  Then finally I saw the president speak about the murders.  Most of us saw our own emotions and outrage reflected in the president's face as he spoke about the children and the fact that they would never experience life's events that all children experience.  We could see our own sorrow reflected as he paused, clenched his jaw to hold back the emotion he was feeling, the emotion we were all feeling.  For once, I could actually see the president had the same feeling and reaction that I did.  Then he wiped away a non-existent tear, and another, and another.  Then he made the statement I was hoping not to hear, but fully expecting, "And we're going to have to come together and take meaningful action to prevent more tragedies like this, regardless of the politics."  I expect that his "meaningful action" does not involve personal responsibility, but instead more restrictions of the rights guaranteed in our Constitution.  Never let a crisis go to waste, as you fundamentally transform the United States, right Mr. President?

Just saying what I see again, I see a president expressing great emotion at the loss of 26 lives, 20 babies.  A president, who as Illinois state senator voted multiple times AGAINST, not his usual "present," but AGAINST  legislation that would require doctors to act to save the lives of babies born during failed abortions, babies born, living through abortion procedures.  The same president who campaigned this past fall that taking taxpayer money away from Planned Parenthood was part of the Republican Party's war against women.  Taxpayer money that funded 289,750 murders or abortions in 2008 alone, according to their own website.  So either he feels great sorrow at the loss of children taken by gun related violence, but not those taken by physical violence at the hands and instruments of a government funded murderer, or what I see.  I see a president that feels nothing about either.  He sees both as a crisis to be taken advantage of.  We have all seen many examples of evil in the past few days.

Just an update that has been published since I started writing this, Adam Lanza, the Connecticut murderer, tried to buy a rifle at a local sporting goods store two days before his killing spree.  He was blocked by the state's gun sale waiting period.  He stole the guns he used from his mother.  The door of the school was locked as required by the school's security policy.  Lanza broke a window beside the door to enter the school.  Laws and physical obstructions will not solve our problem, not a gun problem, a people problem.  Only we, individually, can fix a people problem.  Don't be afraid to see what you see.

We Lost

Well, the most important election of our lifetime is over.  How many times did you hear both sides use that phrase?  "The most important election of our lifetime."  Now the reality hits.  We lost.  Lots of experts, so-called experts, wannabe experts, everyday people, and conspiracy theorists are weighing in with their opinion of why we lost.  We lost because religious voters stayed home.  We lost because Latino voters didn't like the phrase "self-deportation."  We lost because women want free birth control.  We lost because unemployed welfare moms don't want to give up their Obama-phone.  We lost because of election fraud.  These are just a few of the reasons I have heard from experts of varying degrees of credibility.  I think there is a bigger reason that we lost.  I am afraid that, at least to a very large portion of our population, the truth doesn't matter.

Wednesday morning, the day after the election, a friend posted comments on Facebook about how hateful and mean so many of the comments were.  She then mentioned a Tweet from Tim Tebow on Monday.  Something to the effect of, "don't worry about the early election results tomorrow.  The Democrats will have an early lead.  Then the Republicans will get off work and vote."  She gloated about Tebow being so wrong, and in fact the opposite actually happened.  I'm not a huge Tebow fan, but I do respect him a lot, and that just didn't sound like something he would say.  So I typed "Tim Tebow election tweet" into a Google search. The very first response was about the fake Tim Tebow tweet being re-tweeted more than 17,000 times already.  It took me all of 5 seconds to find the truth and another minute to read the article to make sure it was a credible source.  I didn't want to post on my friend's Facebook timeline, thinking it might be embarrassing to her, so I sent a private message just listing the link that I found.  She responded in minutes, saying she thought it was probably a hoax, but she just likes to argue.  She didn't care about the truth, only about "winning."  She said she votes based on a couple of issues that are important to her and actually did not do ANY research into Romney's stand on these issues!  I changed the subject at that point because she admitted to having absolutely zero interest in the truth, only in arguing.

There were so many WTH!? moments on election evening.  Pennsylvania going to President Obama was one of the big ones.  When he says he plans to bankrupt the state's largest industry, coal, did they not believe him?  Or did they just not care to learn his position?  It's not like it's a secret, if you have enough interest in the truth to look.





But at least he respects the people of Pennsylvania and their beliefs, right?  Well, not exactly.  He says they "bitterly cling to their guns and their religion," specifically speaking about residents of Pennsylvania.


Virginia not only depends on the coal industry, but the military as well.  In the last presidential debate, the president says that the mandatory cuts to the military that would happen on the first of the year came from Congress' suggestion, not from him.  And that if he has his way they will never happen anyway.  Bob Woodward says that Obama was "mistaken."  In interviews for his book, The Price of Politics, the White House Office of Management Director and the Legislative Affairs Director both told Woodward that the idea for sequestration came from the White House and was presented to Senate Majority Leader Reid before being suggested to Congress.  So Woodward gives the president the benefit of the doubt, he was just  mistaken about where the idea originated.  The very next day, the president touts his idea of sequestration to produce a cut in the deficit in an off the record interview with the Des Moines Register.  No talk of a deal to prevent the mandatory cuts to military or Medicare payments to doctors, as he claimed the prior evening.  He lied period.  In spite of his promise to cut their number one industry, coal; and boasting about cuts coming to their number two economic engine, the military, Virginia voted for Obama.  Not only that, the Des Moines Register called the president on his lies and demanded that the off the record interview be made public.  Based on his interview and on the fact that he lied either during the debate or in their interview, the Register endorsed the Republican candidate for the first time in 40 years.  Iowa voted for Obama.

Ohio was crucial for a Romney win.  Obama hit Romney hard about his stand on the bailout of GM and Chrysler.  He said that Romney wanted the two automakers to go out of business.  He said that Romney was in favor of letting the automakers go bankrupt and lose all their jobs in Michigan and Ohio.  These claims led to a pretty heated exchange in the debates.  Finally ending with the president saying "let the people read it for themselves."  And Romney saying "yes, please do."  The editorial is out there and easy to find.  In it Romney does advocate a managed bankruptcy to allow the companies to restructure and provide government guarantees for loans by private lenders.  Did it matter to voters or even to the president that the truth was on Romney's side?  Apparently not.  The day after the debate, fact checkers - even those normally firmly backing the president, said the president was wrong in his debate claims.  But the president was in Dayton, OH repeating his false claims.  And in spite of the Detroit Free Press' endorsement of Romney, both Michigan and Ohio voted for Obama.

The biggest and probably most important lie of all involves the death of Ambassador Stevens, former Navy Seals and CIA contractors, Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty, and State Dept. Information Officer Sean Smith in Benghazi.  This incident, our president's response to it and its aftermath defines who we are as a country.  Do we still have the policy of "no man left behind?"  Initial evidence says not any more.  Hopefully Congress, the press, and the American public are still interested enough to push for the truth about this attack and our White House's response to it.

As Fox Mulder used to say on The X-Files, "the truth is out there."  It's truly not hard to find either.  It matters.  The question is, do we care anymore?  If not, we really have lost.  And we are lost as well.

By the way, did you know Iran fired on a U.S. drone over international waters on the Friday before the election?  Thought not.  It's true.  It's out there, if you are interested in looking.

An Electric, or at least Hybrid Mess

The Obama administration has never been confused for the Bush administration when it comes to energy policy.    Even as a presidential candidate, Senator Obama told reporters that under his policy, "electricity prices would necessarily skyrocket."  Now this is not like the Sarah Palin "quote" that she could see Russia from her front porch.  That was actually Tina Fey on Saturday Night Live spoofing Palin, although you couldn't convince thousands of Palin-haters of that fact.  Senator/candidate Obama actually said his plan would cause the cost of energy for every American, no matter what their income, to "necessarily skyrocket."  And no news organization or "journalist" asked him about this plan, before or after the the election.  In fact, outside of a few conservative radio talk show hosts, you will never hear anything at all about this plan.


All right, the president plans to make our electricity rates skyrocket.  Surely he won't mess with our other energy costs too, right?  What is the president's plan to reduce the emissions from our cars?  Well, first of all he had to takeover a car maker - GM.  Then he had to force GM to manufacture a car that the American buyer didn't want or need and that GM was not ready to manufacture, the all-electric Volt.  Now the Volt may be the "car of the future," as the president of GM - Barack Obama claimed.  But as one reviewer said, "only if your future is 40 miles away.  Actually 20 if you want to get back home again."  That's right, the Volt has a range of 40 miles in its all-electric version.  After these horrible reviews, Chevrolet announced that the Volt now has a greatly improved range.  They basically turned it into a hybrid.  You know the kind of car that Honda, Toyota, and Nissan have been producing for years.  Only it's smaller and not as reliable as the Honda, Toyota, or Nissan.  Oh yeah, it's more expensive too.  Only $40,000 for a subcompact car.  Who doesn't want to pay $40,000 for a Cavalier or Focus?  American car buyers, apparently.  In January and February combined Chevrolet sold 602 Volts, up from its double digit sales from each of the previous four months.  This incredible increase proved that Americans were starting to warm up to the idea of an overpriced, unreliable clown car, right?  Well not exactly.  They also announced sales of over 5,000 Tahoes.  If you are not familiar with the Tahoe; and judging from the lack of sales by the company, most Americans are not, the Tahoe has enough space to haul everyone in my hometown of Graham, TX and their luggage on a two week vacation.  With enough room leftover to pick up a few souvenirs on the trip.  While that be a slight exaggeration, it would take the vacation budget of Graham to buy the fuel needed for a long trip.  The new fuel-efficient hybrid version of the Tahoe gets 20 miles per gallon!  So obviously gas mileage is not a major concern for the American car buyer. 

So what is the president of GM, Barack Obama, to do to encourage Americans to pay too much for a car they don't really want?  Go back to the engineering drawing board and design an electric car big enough, reliable enough, and efficient enough that the buyer will be happy to pay for it?  Don't know what country you're from, but that's not Barack Obama's America!  His plan is to take taxpayer money and give it to anyone who buys an all-electric car, in the form of a $7,500 tax credit to the buyer.  That would make the Volt a $32,500 embarrassment, rather than a $40,000 embarrassment.  Well, apparently, not enough people that pay enough taxes (49% pay nothing at all, but that's for another post) to make a $7500 credit worthwhile fell for the scam.  Those folks generally travel more than 40 miles per trip and carry cargo larger than a bag of M&M's, so the Volt isn't too practical.  Another slight glitch in the plan - to get anyone to buy the Volt at any price, with any incentive, Chevrolet had to go back to the 1990's hybrid technology.  So now the credit has been re-written to include hybrids.  And rather than a tax credit, the Obama administration is planning take the $7,500 straight out of the dealer's overflowing bank account and give it to anyone who buys a Volt.  The dealer is then responsible for filing for reimbursement from the similiarly overflowing vaults of the United States Treasury.  Most auto dealers who dealt with the government in the "cash for clunkers" scam will tell you how excited they are to participate in this plan.

What's the next step in getting the public to buy government-produced electric cars?  How about $4+ per gallon for gasoline.  I'll get to that in my next post.

Our President is THE BLACK KNIGHT

This post has absolutely nothing to do with race.  But watching the president today reacting to the shellacking he and his fellow progressives took yesterday, I was reminded of one of my all time favorite movie scenes.
 President Obama is now willing to call it a draw.  Now we can compromise.  "It's only a flesh wound!"

America, we've got a problem. Really, we do this time.

In arson investigations, at least on TV, one of the first suspects is the person who reported the fire.  And then the people who help put out the fire, or who rescue the victims.  A few years ago, a huge wildfire burned thousands of acres in Arizona.  The fire, or actually a series of fires, was started by a firefighter.  He wanted the opportunity to be the hero who put out the fire.  About the same time, there was a similiar case in Colorado.  It's even more common in housing arson.  A firefighter, or more likely a firefighter wannabe,  creates a crisis in the hopes of coming to the rescue and becoming the hero.  And in the process gaining a job, a promotion, money, or at least publicity.

Next time we have a crisis in Washington D.C., we need to take a close look to see if it is a real crisis, and if it is, how was it created?  The perfect example is the housing crisis that brought about the current economic mess.  First of all, Chris Dodd and Barney Frank were part of a Democratic congressional majority that forced banks to make high risk loans to people who could not qualify for housing loans, as part of the Fair Housing Act.  (As an aside, take a REALLLLLLLLY close look any bill that includes the word Fair and doesn't involve ferris wheels and corn dogs).  The promise to the banks was that the loans would be backed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.  While CSpan will generally result in a full-on slobbering nap, maybe we should all be making that network the top rated cable channel.  Here's an enlightening video from 2004.



So, they created the crisis, ignored the warnings about crisis, and then took billions, soon to be trillions, to fix the crisis.  And oh, yeah, blame the people who were sounding the warnings for the crisis!

Another example, how about the $854 billion dollars to create jobs to keep unemployment from going over 8% at the beginning of Obama's presidency.  Using their own numbers, which are very questionable if not outright lies, they created or saved 3.5 million jobs.  That means the federal government spent $244,400 for every job saved or created.  And unemployment still went to almost 10%, or 14.4% if you include those who became discouraged and just stopped looking or were unemployed for so long that they were no longer eligible to be counted.

And don't even get started on Global Warming, Climate Change, Man Caused Global Climate Disruption.  I've written about that DC Caused crisis several times, so I won't get into it again.  Here are three links.
Obama and Gore to profit from Cap and Trade  Why no media outrage about cap and trade?  Rednecks and global warming

How about financial reform?  Was that even on your radar?  Now, with the solution that passed in a 2000+ page law this summer, every one of your financial transactions is subject to scrutiny by the the government.  Student loan crisis?  Fixed, as part of the 2000+ healthcare law.  Yes, part of the HEALTHCARE law!  The healthcare law that 60% of Americans want repealed.  The healthcare law that 68% of Americans did not want passed.  Now, for a Golden Oldie, victims of rape and incest do not have access to abortion.  Was that really such a pervasive problem that the government needed to get involved?  I'd like to see some stats, but now, less than 30 years later, abortion is an accepted form of birth control.  Or in the words of this British pundit, "getting rid of a couple of cells."



With the election this November, we had better take steps to handle our own problems before the "firefighters" in DC burn down our whole country.

Hobgoblins and Community Organizers

For some reason, I don't remember a lot of quotable lines from my college literature classes.  One I do remember is from Ralph Waldo Emerson's essay, Self Reliance.  "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines."  Today, I think Emerson would add community organizers who become president to his list of those with hobgoblins. 

President Obama has shown a tendency to react from his gut.  From his first month in office when he made his off-teleprompter "it is apparent the police acted stupidly" remark, the president has to use his own words, acted stupidly and then stubbornly stood by those actions.  In the case of this remark, Obama was barely a month into office, and most of us were still giving him the benefit of the doubt.  He had no experience in a position where his every word and action was being watched and scrutinized.  So most of us gave him the chance to retract, or at least soften his remarks, especially since he admitted that he did not have "all the facts."  But, Emerson's hobgoblins got to the president.  He never backed off his comments.

Then we had Arizona passing state legislation making illegal immigration illegal in their state.  When asked for a reaction, President Obama called the legislation "misguided."  Without reading the legislation.  After learning that the law mirrored already existing federal law, the president stuck to his comments and went even further by ordering an investigation of the civil rights ramifications of the law.  A little reflection should lead "the smartest man in the room" to the conclusion that civil rights are applicable to citizens, and illegal immigrants by definition are not citizens, but the hobgoblins have struck again.  The federal government has decided to pursue legal action against the state.  Again, the president has had ample time to adjust his stance as he has learned the facts and learned the opinion of the voters.  But once again, he is remaining "foolishly consistent."

Last week Senator Jon Kyl told a town hall meeting that the president, in a private meeting, told Kyl that he had no reason to close the American borders, as citizens of border states and citizens in general, are begging him to do.  President Obama told Senator Kyl that if he closed the borders and enforced federal immigration laws, Congress would have no motivation to compromise on immigration reform, or amnesty.  Think this is a case of Kyl making up the president's quotes to advance Arizona's view?  Well once again, President Obama's got that hobgoblin issue.
 

More recently, in reaction to the British Petroleum leak in the Gulf of Mexico, the president announced a moratorium on drilling in the gulf.  Upon further review, the moratorium would do nothing but cost the region jobs, not only for the six months announced, but probably forever.  Some estimates of the loss of payroll, and tax revenue, reach the billions.  Those estimates do not include the loss caused by the leak itself.  So when a federal judge suspended the moratorium, the president had the perfect opportunity to adjust his stance and in essence, save both face and jobs.  He could have said something along the lines of "we tried, but a judge overturned our action.  That's the way checks and balances works."  He could then let the drilling continue, especially since this is the first spill in more than 4,000 wells drilled in the Gulf.  Instead of letting the judge's decision stand and moving on, within minutes of the announcement of the judge's decision, the Obama administration announced their decision to appeal the decision.  Not only is the government appealing the decision, but today Secretary of Interior Salazar announced a new moratorium!

Three days after the accident and resulting leak, the Dutch, Norwegians, and British offered to help with the clean up effort with tankers, skimmers, and booms.  The federal government declined the offers, citing the Jones Act.  The Jones Act requires all ships working between U.S. ports be American built, American flagged, and consist of American crews, all to protect unions.  While the Act has been suspended many times, the Obama administration refused to do so.  After more than two months of massive amounts of oil moving to beaches along the Gulf coast, commentators started questioning the application of the Jones Act.  The British and Dutch again offered their help with the clean up.  The president had the opportunity to exorcise his hobgoblins and suspend the Jones Act, but, once again, has acted foolishly consistently and refused the help.

We have been told that President Obama is one of most intelligent people ever to hold the office of president.  So, while is he repeatedly the victim of the hobgoblins of a little mind?  It could be that he knows all the facts, but is working to advance his agenda.  It's either part of his plan, or we were lied to all along and the president's not as intelligent as we were led to believe.  And if that's the case, what is the agenda of those who led us to believe we were electing "the smartest man in the room?"  I think we have more than hobgoblins to worry about.

Feel Better Now?

With BP's accident in the Gulf of Mexico, a lot of reports have referred back to 1989 and the spill of the Exxon Valdez.  So, here's a little history of the spill and its consequences.  First of all, Exxon paid for the cleanup, estimated at about $2 Billion.  In addition to the cleanup cost, Exxon paid about $6 billion in damages.  No one feels bad for Exxon, they deserved to pay for their negligence.  And it was negligence.  The captain was sleeping off a bender below deck and the third mate was navigating without a sonar.  The Valdez's sonar had been inoperable for over a year.

Now for the unforeseen consequences.  After paying out somewhere around $8 billion for the accident, Exxon's lobbyists went to the federal government to request limits to the damages an oil company would be liable for in the case of future accidents.  A Republican Congress passed a bill limiting future oil company's liability to $75 million in the case of future accidents.  The bill was signed into law by a Democratic president, Bill Clinton.  The law also gave the federal government final say on drilling locations.  Starting to get a little queasy?

Now come forward to 2008.  British Petroleum requested permission to drill in 500 (that's 5 hundred) feet of water in the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of Louisiana.  Louisiana's state government approves the plan.  The federal government then denies the request.  So, BP moves to its second option, a deep water project, 5,000 (that's 5 thousand) feet underwater to be specific.  You know what happened next.  An explosion and massive leak.

Three days after the accident, Norwegian, Dutch, and British companies offered use of their skimmers and booms to aid BP in the cleanup efforts.  The federal government declined the offer, citing the Jones Act which requires all ships working in U.S. waters to be American made, American flagged, and manned by American crews.  The Jones Act was a concession to unions in 1920,  as a protection to American shipbuilding jobs.  The Jones Act has been waived many times, most recently in the days after Hurricane Katrina devastated Louisiana, to accept aid from other countries.

Within a week of the accident, Louisiana governor Bobby Jindal, requested permission from the federal government to allow the state to build sand barrier walls between barrier islands off the coast of his state.  His request was denied, citing the need for further study of the affects of the proposed sand barriers.  After repeatedly denied requests to the federal government to allow the barriers, on June 14, Jindal ordered the National Guard to start building the barriers.  

For the first time in his 16+ month reign, the president started to receive criticism from the mainstream media, and some pressure from Democrats.  His get tough response?  Let's suspend all offshore drilling projects for at least six months.  The consequence?  It will only cost the region about 14,000 high paying jobs and untold payroll, and coincidentally tax revenue.  Again coincidentally, the deepwater drilling equipment will move on to other projects, notably in Brazil, where Petrobas stands to make huge money with its deepwater wells.  Oh yeah, the Petrobas projects will receive billions of dollars in aid from U.S. Export-Import Bank either through loans or loan guarantees.  Turns a U.S. disaster into a giant windfall for the Brazilian state-owned company, huh?  Also a nice turn of profit for one of Petrobas' large investors, George Soros.  Soros, again coincidentally, contributed thousands personally, and who knows how much through his various foundations to the presidential campaign of Barack Hussein Obama.  Another coincidence, Soros' socialist foundations promote the view of America as an "institutionally oppressive nation."  Just as a coincidental link to other hot issues of our time, his foundations also campaign for open borders and social benefits and amnesty for illegal immigrants.

Since destroying the economy of the region was not tough enough to satisfy the president's critics, he took on British Petroleum.  From the first day of the crisis, BP did everything possible to stop the leak.  They also said from the first day they would pay all legitimate claims.  The president said he didn't need to talk to the CEO of BP.  He said that in his experience, CEO's will tell you what you want to hear.  But the president's not interested in talk,  he wants action.  So, 58 days after the accident, the president meets with BP officials.  For 45 minutes.  The president is a busy man after all.  Lunch with Joe Biden after all.  That and an arm-twisting scheduled with senators who oppose his cap and trade scam legislation.  Give the man credit though.  In 45 minutes, the president got a promise of a $20 billion escrow account to be set up by BP to pay for claims.  Oh yeah, the account will be managed by the federal government.  The same government that handled the TARP theft and Stimulus ripoff so well.  That loud KA-CHING you just heard?  That came from the adding machines of unions all over the country.  You gulf shrimpers and resort owners better not hold your breath waiting for your money.   

Feel better now?

President Obama finally found out whose a$$ to kick. Yours.  Again. 

Life as Sport

Fans are constantly reminded that the NBA, or NFL, or whatever league is a copycat league.  In the mid 1970's, Tom Landry brings back the shotgun formation to the NFL.  Soon every team in the league is using the formation.  Jerry Glanville used a maximum pressure defense with his "Grits Blitz" philosophy in Atlanta.  Soon Mike Ditka's Bears are dominating the league with their pressure 46 defense.  In baseball, teams have tried with varying degrees of success to copy Billy Beane's "Moneyball" style of management to build teams on a budget.

Pat Riley won three championships with the Lakers before moving on to the New York Knicks.  His New York team did not have the talent Riley was accustomed to coaching, so he moved to a defensive philosophy.  His Knick teams were built around an aggressive, very physical defense.  Their philosophy boiled down to "foul them on every possession.  The referees, not only won't call every foul, but they will soon call fewer fouls as they become accustomed to the physical play.  It was a variation of the Overton Window theory I wrote about a couple of months ago.  Riley's Knicks were successful, at least until they ran into either Jordan's Bulls or Olajuwon's Rockets in the playoffs.

A few years later, Bill Belichick used the same tactic to beat the St. Louis Rams in the Super Bowl.  The Rams used their high powered passing offense, known as the "Greatest Show on Turf," to win a Super Bowl and were favored to beat Belichick's Patriots.  Belichick knew his defensive backs were no match for the Ram's speed receivers, so his defensive backs held the Ram's receivers on virtually every play.  After a couple of calls, the referees stopped calling the violation.  The Ram receivers were frustrated and the Patriots won a close game.

Our president is an admitted sports fan.  He learned the lessons of Belichick and Riley.  Just keep hitting the public with outrageous tax after outrageous policy after outrageous decision and soon we will stop calling him on it.  Remember the outrage when the stimulus package was passed with no Republican support?  Followed by an outright takeover of the largest automaker in the nation?  Followed by "the police acted stupidly" comment?  Followed by an "apology tour" of the middle east?  Followed by the health care takeover?  Followed by public condemnation of Arizona's "misguided" immigration law (that neither he nor his attorney general had yet read)?  Followed by a lack of interest in helping the Louisiana governor prepare for the arrival of oil from the worst environmental accident in U.S. history?  Followed by a drilling moratorium that will cost the same regions affected by the spill thousands of jobs and millions of dollars?  Now, about to be followed by a cap and trade, energy independence, clean energy, whatever they are calling it today, legislation that will effectively take over the energy industry in the country.   Rumored to soon be followed by turning against Israel and its right to defend itself against terrorist neighbors. 

We are the referees.  We can't let this administration keep getting away with the violations of our rights and principles.  We've got to keep blowing the whistle until they stop.

Got a Funny Feeling?

Survival books, whether they be outdoor survival, or about surviving in the city, tell you to trust your instincts.  We can all sense danger, it's just that we usually ignore our instincts.  As Americans, we trust until we are given a reason not to trust.  That makes us easy targets for everything from e-mails from Nicaraguan check-cashing scams, to 9/11 terrorists taking flying lessons in our country.  Or for that matter, immigrants entering our country illegally, counting on us to let them stay.  Our trust makes us an easy target.

So, let's put a couple of things in writing and see if it gives us a "funny" feeling.  I'm not even going to list all our president's socialist/communist/maoist advisers.  That's so old that we don't even get any feeling about it.  So let's start with the president's reaction to the incident involving the D.C. police and Harvard professor Gates.  When asked for a reaction, President Obama said, "I don't have any details, but it is apparent that the police acted stupidly."  I don't have any facts, but I have a strong opinion anyway.  Kind of funny coming from the most powerful leader in the free world, huh?  

President Obama on his cap and trade legislation, changed to green job creation legislation, now changed to American energy independence legislation:  "under my plan, the cost of electricity would necessarily skyrocket."  What politician in their right mind would say his plans would make any utility cost, not just increase, but "skyrocket?"  Seems like he is not worried about our support.  It's like the issue has already been decided.  And why would he want it to take effect during the worst recession of the lifetime of the average American and before an already hotly contested midterm election?  A little funny, huh?  Then we learn that the president was the conduit for the Joyce Foundation's grant to start the only energy exchange in the United States, and that he worked on the grant while still an unknown state senator.  A little funny.  A little, very little actually, research is required to learn that other investors in the Chicago Climate Exchange are a company with Al Gore on the board (An Inconvenient Truth, huh Al?); a bank, Goldman Sachs, who not only was a major contributor to the economic recession, but also received huge taxpayer funded bailouts; and several of the board members of the Chicago Climate Exchange came from Goldman Sachs.  Funny.  

Exxon-Mobil decided a couple of years ago not to form a separate department to do research for alternate forms of energy.  They decided it was best to do what they have always done, look for oil.  Seeing how fast the world is changing, it seemed a little funny that they would not at least hedge their bets by starting to adapt to future alternative energy demands.  Fuji Films and Kodak are examples of how quickly an established company can go from the top to broke by not being on the leading edge of innovation.  But Exxon-Mobil seemed oblivious to the danger of falling behind.  Funny.

One of the president's first acts when he took office was to freeze leasing on shallow water offshore oil drilling, and a federal takeover, or much tighter restrictions of western land where drilling was planned, or already taking place.  No freeze on deepwater drilling though.  Oil companies complained a little, but were strangely quieter than you would expect about the restrictions.  Some just adapted and went to more deepwater drilling projects.  Now we all know what happened with British Petroleum's well in the Gulf of Mexico.  Strangely enough, the president was very reasonable in his early reaction.  He said BP would be responsible for the clean-up and loss of business revenue caused by the explosion and leak.  Again, strangely enough, BP has seemed relatively unconcerned about the cost of the lost rig, its eleven employees killed, the loss of sales of a minimum 5000 barrels of oil a day, at $70+ per barrel for more than 40 days and counting, that turns into real money pretty quickly.  Kind of funny how calm and reasonable BP has been about this loss, and the potential cost of the clean up.  Funny too how unconcerned about the huge decline in their stock market value they have been.

Now, all offshore drilling leases have been frozen for a minimum of 6 months.  Effectively a minimum of a year for projects off the coast of Alaska where many projects had been planned.  Land-based drilling restrictions still have not been eased to compensate.  The cap and trade bill in the senate has now been re-named an American Energy Independence bill, and it still will cause costs to skyrocket.  But little to no complaints or comments from the media or oil companies like Exxon-Mobil or British Petroleum who would potentially be hurt the most by the legislation.  Funny.

The Chicago Climate Exchange estimates business transactions of $10 trillion a year if the legislation passes.  They stand to make a boatload, make that an oil tankerload, of money if the legislation passes.  Yet, only a couple of days after the Canadian Free Press ran stories showing the suspicious links of the Exchange to the president, his backers and advisers, to Goldman Sachs, to Al Gore, and more, the founders of the Exchange sold their controlling interest.  Funny.  Sold their interest to an Atlanta based company called Intercontinental Exchange (ICE on the New York Stock Exchange).  Thirty minutes on their site and a couple of business news sites and you will learn that major shareholders in ICE include Exxon-Mobil.  Funny.  British Petroleum holds a large share.  That's funny.  Why isn't MSNBC investigating?  General Electric holds a big piece of ICE.  General Electric owns all the NBC networks.  Now that's funny.

For as long as I can remember, oil prices have gone up around Memorial Day, as Americans hit the road for summer vacations.  Oil prices traditionally go up when hurricane season arrives in June and potentially threatens to interfere with our coastal refineries and oil shipments.  Oil prices always go up with increased regulation, like the recent offshore freezes by the president.  Oil prices always go up when tension in the middle east increases, like it has with the recent incident with Israel blockade of Gaza.  So, in the past 60 days, we have had the worst offshore drilling accident in U.S. history, followed by tightened government restrictions, followed by the arrival of summer vacation season, followed by the start of hurricane season in the Gulf, topped off by extreme tension in the middle east.  Oil prices have gone down in that time.  That's funny.

That's just the oil-related funny feelings.  Throw in the funny worldwide and media reaction to Israel's defending itself against terrorist organizations whose goal is the absolute annihilation  of Israel.  Add the president's funny labeling of Arizona's immigration law as "misguided" before he, his attorney general, his Homeland Security secretary, or anyone else in the administration had even read it.  Add the continued criticism of the law even though an estimated 65% of Americans and over 70% of registered voters nationwide support the law.  Add the passage of a health care law that over 60% of registered voters oppose; a bill whose cost upon analysis by the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office keeps going up.  And finally add the seeming indifference to an unemployment rate staying near 10%, even with funny hiring practices by the Census department reducing the number of unemployed temporarily.

We should have a very funny feeling about all this.  Either they have another crisis planned that they will take advantage of to keep and increase their control, or this Democratic/Progressive Congress and President are the political equivalent of a suicide bomber that is just trying to do as much damage and leave as big a hole as possible when all this blows up.  I have a funny feeling that a large hole is not their goal.      

Barack Hussein Obama is a Jewish Mother??

 A commentary on the average American's response to Arizona's new immigration law quoted poll results from Newsweek illustrating that Americans overwhelmingly support Arizona's position.  The question was phrased in several different ways.  In the different versions of the question, Americans' support of the law ranged from 65% to 78%.  The lowest positive rate was of the question, "would you support your state passing a similar law.  "Only" 58% answered yes.  So, why is everyone in the Obama administration criticizing the law, without ever reading it?  What is their goal?  In an already contentious mid-term election year, when most experts predict Democrats losing control of at least one branch of congress, why fly into the face of such overwhelming public opinion?


At the risk of sounding racist, I'm going to bring up the stereotypical Jewish mother.  You know how they are portrayed as using guilt to get their way with their children?  "No, son, you don't have to visit this Mother's day.  I know you are busy and all.  I wouldn't want to interfere with your hectic schedule.  I'm only 98, I'm sure I'll be around for many more Mother's days that I will be able to celebrate with you."


The president's big stick is our collective guilt over slavery, abolished about 145 years ago, by the way.  That's why he was never criticized or even challenged during his campaign.  Republicans were afraid of being labeled racist.  They couldn't question his choice of religion.  So what if he is a Muslim?  They couldn't question his choice of a pastor.  So what if he was a twenty year member of Jeremiah Wright's church that taught, among other outrages, that the 9/11 attacks were justified and even a message from God?  They couldn't question his relationship with domestic terrorists like Bill Ayers.  His political career started with a meeting in Ayers' basement, but that doesn't mean Obama knew him.  They couldn't question his wife's opinion of America when she said "for the first time in my life, I'm proud of America."  They couldn't even question his habit of voting "present" as a senator.  Any question or challenge was immediately met with charges of racism.  Even now, when Tea Party supporters carry signs with slogans such as "I want my country back," they are charged with using racist "code words."  And like the Jewish son, we get defensive and give in.

Now immigration policy is the hot topic.  Anyone who has read Arizona's law knows that it is only a repeat of current federal law.  The law only empowers local and state law enforcement to aid the federal government in enforcing current law.  It goes to great lengths to make illegal any type of racial profiling, with strictly worded definitions of restrictions of who can be questioned and why, and punishments for violating those restrictions.  So immediately after the law, actually a state bill at the time, was reported on national news, the president publicly called it misguided and requested a department of justice review of its legality.  Without ever reading it!  He was quickly followed with public condemnations of the law by his attorney general, homeland security secretary, and numerous governors and mayors, most of whom still claim not to have read the law!

Now, last week, the president of Mexico was invited to speak on the floor of the House of Representatives.  His topic?  The racist components of the United States immigration policy and specifically the Arizona law.  His speech was followed by a standing ovation by Democratic members of the House!  And remember this is a policy overwhelmingly favored by Americans.  What is the progressives' purpose in making these comments.  The whole guilt over slavery thing is getting a little tired to most Americans, so if that's the plan, it's obviously not working.  Or are they trying to divide the country even further.  It is apparent that many Americans will blindly follow the Democratic party no matter what.  So they are inclined to believe the charges of racism.  Some legal immigrants and minorities are genuinely worried about harassment.  And admittedly some have read the law, know that it mirrors federal law, but believe that the federal law should be changed.  So at the very least, the progressives seem to be trying to widen a gap between the approximately 60% who oppose them and the 40% who support them.  What could be their endgame?  The possibilities are a little scary to think about.

Here's a video of Representative McClintock's, a Republican congressman from California, response to Mexican president Calderon's speech last week.  


Just to be fair, California gets slammed a lot, but it's obviously not all California that is so completely screwed up.  Just the cities, as the case in most of the country.  It's just that the rest of us that have to pay for their stupidity!  Hope that wasn't too racist.  I'm feeling a little guilty.

Pop, Pop, Pop, Pop

 Did you hear a pop, pop, pop?  Kind of like a series of champagne bottles being opened?  That is the sound of the media pulling their collective heads out of their collective....  Maybe I'd better use a light bulb metaphor.  So, did you see a few small lights coming on the past ten days or so?

A couple of weeks ago, in the Sunday Denver Post, I read an editorial.  The writer, whose name I can't remember, wrote about his surprise about local politics.  He quoted several stories from local meetings and elections.  He was surprised that even with all the distrust of Washington, especially here in the west, most people actually feel pretty good about their local government.  Several of his stories even involved raising local taxes for local issues.  His point was that people are willing to pay for what is important to them.  If it is handled locally.  Sound familiar?  Constitutional even?  It is easy to trust people you see everyday, whether you voted for them or not.  And on the flip side of the equation, it is hard to take advantage of constituents that you see frequently.  You don't steal from, or over-tax people you know, or people you have to answer to.  The writer quotes former speaker of the House, Tip O'Neill, "All politics are local."  A slightly less complex version of Jefferson's creed, 

Our country is too large to have all its affairs directed by a single government. Public servants at such a distance and from under the eye of their constituents . . . will invite the public agents to corruption, plunder, and waste. . . . What an augmentation of  the field for jobbing, speculating, plundering, office-building, and office-hunting would be produced by an assumption of all the state powers into the hands of the federal government.

Pop.  Pop.  


Last week three of the four editorials in the Sunday Denver Post were about the importance of local control of issues, not federal.

Pop.  Pop.  Pop.

Monday night, Brian Williams from NBC news, appeared on David Letterman.  He said that he felt the huge swing in the stock market last week had nothing to do with "fat fingers" or automated trading or any of the other official explanations given by analysts.  He said that all that was showing on monitors all over Wall Street was news video of the riots in Greece.  He said that he had the same sick feeling he had on 9/11.  

Pop.  Pop.  Pop.

Today's New York Times, yes, THE New York Times, you know None "of the news that's fit to print."  That New York Times.  They ran a story about the parallels between the path the current administration and its leaders (yes, leaders, not followers) are taking our country down and the situation in Greece that led to the current union-led violence.  Of course, the article never mentioned unions.  Some heads are buried so deep, it'll take some pulling to get them out.  

Keep listening for the pops.  I mean looking for the dim bulbs to brighten. 

Hear the Crickets??

While looking up sources for yesterday's post about the president's link to CCX, and Al Gore's, and Goldman Sachs', I found one source for a few blogs about the subject.  It was a link to Canadian Free Press' site.  Today, I found page after page after page of links on a Google search.  Want to take a guess how many of them were from American newspaper sites?  How about two?  You would think that a story that links the president of the United States financially to a company that stands to earn $10 trillion annually if his legislation is passed would be front page news all over the country!  Then throw in a 10% share of the company being blamed for the financial crash that cost the country 11 million jobs (according to one congressman in today's congressional proceedings), Goldman Sachs.  Just for added interest, add a 5% stake in the mountain of money to a company headed up by Al "I invented the internet and won an Oscar and Nobel Prize" Gore.  Oh yeah, also link CCX to the United Nations and Fannie Mae, whose mismanagement was the real cause of the country's financial crash.  And not a word from any U.S. newspaper.  Except for the Washington Examiner, who basically summarized Glenn Beck's television program from Monday, with a Youtube video of Beck's blackboard.  And a line from the writer that she had verified as true Beck's claims.  Then the Dallas Morning News shows up on page 2 of the Google search.  The link goes to a comment page about the media's relationship with President Obama.  After scrolling down approximately three pages, there was a comment from a reader asking why no DMN investigation.  That's it.

Front and center all over the nation's media watchdogs, Sandra Bullock has adopted a baby!  How was she able to keep such a big secret????  Shocking!  Next we will learn that Kate Gosselin was voted off Dancing with the Stars.

Today I found several stories from British newspapers about the scandal.  I knew from the site I linked to yesterday that Fannie Mae owned the patent to a device that measures carbon output.  Guess what?  It was modified for use on manufacturers, but was originally designed to measure household carbon output.   Household output.  The plan calls for individual American homes to have a carbon cap.  Just like businesses, individuals can buy additional carbon certificates when they have reached their annual cap.  Buy the certificates from individuals in third world countries that don't create the emissions that Americans do.  According to the site, the cap would be set at 2500 pounds of carbon produced per year.  Over two times the amount produced by the average citizen of a third world country, but coincidentally only half the amount produced by the average American.  So basically Americans would be forced to purchase carbon certificates from people in India or China or South America, through the Chicago Climate Exchange of course.  After taking their cut, CCX would pass that American money on to the citizens of the unindustrialized countries.  In theory anyway.  Want to give odds on how much of that money makes it to the average citizen of Sri Lanka?

By the way, does your electric company give you the option to buy "green" energy, at a higher rate than traditional energy?  Green ain't cheap!  The idea is that it lowers your carbon output, so you won't exceed your cap so quickly.  Pro-choice again, give your money to the electric company or a Bangladesh villager (minus CCX;s cut of course).  Or you can pay to plant a tree, like the Vatican chose to do, in order to be carbon neutral.  Guess what, no trees were planted for the Vatican.  The payments were taken though!  Like Glenn Beck said, scamming the Pope pretty much guarantees some very warm temperatures in your future!

How's that for redistribution of wealth?  Mainly redistributed straight from your pocket to that of Barack Hussein Obama, Al Gore, Goldman Sachs, and Fannie Mae.  I guess the New York Times has laid off too many "reporters."  They missed this one.  Hear the crickets?  Oh, yeah, Sandra's baby is a healthy 3 month old boy.  And she has filed for divorce from Jesse.  Shocker!

Evil, yes. Stupid, no

It is the end of April.  Two feet of snow today in New York.  High of 35 here in Gunnison tomorrow.  So let's talk about global warming.  Like I wrote in a previous post about redneck snow skis, I know that cold weather halfway through spring does not mean that global warming isn't true.  But surely ten years of cooling temperatures does.  And false data by leading climate change (global warming is sooo 2009) researchers should make even the most rabid Al Gore sycophants wipe off their Kool-Aid mustaches.  

Then there's the cost.  The president himself says that under his plan, electric rates would "necessarily skyrocket."


So what exactly is cap and trade? Manufacturing produces carbon.  Carbon, according to the global warming "experts," leads to warming temperatures.  So, something must be done to discourage manufacturers from producing carbon.  Under this plan, a manufacturer would have a set amount of carbon emissions allowed as a by product of their business.  They would receive a certificate for that amount carbon emission.  If they go over the amount covered by their certificate, they can buy another manufacturer's certificate.  


Let's say that Cathy and I decide to go into the potato chip business.  We register as a potato chip manufacturer and receive our certificate to produce 2 tons of carbon dioxide.  Well, we are not really that into potato chips, so we only make a couple of batches of chips a year.  We didn't produce even an ounce of our allowable emissions.  Frito Lay, on the other hand, is realllly into potato chips.  They have produced all the carbon they are allowed, and they want to make even more chips.  They are selling a lot more chips than Cathy and me.  But they aren't allowed to make any more.  They have no more carbon certificates left.  Well, I'm smarter than the average rock, I'll sell them my unused carbon certificates.  Frito Lay is more than happy to buy them from me.


Small problem.  Who decides how much the certificates are worth?  How does Frito Lay find Larry and Cathy?  Where do they find even more?  It's not like there's an exchange similar to the New York Stock Exchange for carbon certificates.  Now, there would be a money making idea!  Guess what?  There is one!  It's the Chicago Climate Exchange or CCX!  Now there's some forward thinking folks.  If global warming weren't such a scam, I bet they could make some major bucks matching certificate buyers to certificate sellers, and of course taking their commission.  We are a capitalist society after all.  They could sell the certificates of manufacturers in third world countries to U.S. companies and basically give them boatloads of money (minus CCX's cut of course) for producing nothing!  CCX estimates they would process $10,000,000,000,000 in transactions.  A year.  That's $10 trillion a year.  That will buy a pretty nice house, won't it, Al Gore?  What's Al Gore's connection to this $10,000,000,000,000 a year business?  Oh, just a little thing.  He's on the board of a British company that owns a 5% share of Chicago Climate Exchange.  So, that's how he can afford such a non-environmentally friendly estate.  Compare Gore's estate to that of a nature-hating, let's melt the icecaps I love heat anyway George Bush.  When you stand to get even a piece of a 5% share of $10,000,000,000,000 a year, you can stand a little skyrocketing electric cost.

Nice story, but no one is forcing companies like Ford and DuPont, or local governments like the city of Chicago and Miami-Dade county to participate in this wonderful Enron-style scheme (they are already buying and selling certificates voluntarily so they can advertise as "carbon neutral"), right?  Not yet.  But that's the very basis of cap and trade legislation in front of Congress right now!  Requiring companies and local governments to participate.  Forcing the cost of their goods and services to skyrocket.  Amazing.  

So how does a start-up like Chicago Climate Exchange get started in 2003 with no cap and trade legislation on the horizon?  Through charitable, almost untraceable grants from a wonderful foundation called the Joyce Foundation.  They were supported by a Joyce Foundation board member who secured the funding for them.  The board member who was such a forward thinking visionary?  An up and coming Illinois state senator.  His name?  All together now, Barack Hussein Obama, mmm, mmm, mmm.


Now that should give you something to think about.  Here's a link detailing all the viper's nest of ties to the United Nations (where most of the global warming "research" came from).  Just for grins, let's throw in 5 CCX board members from Goldman Sachs, a 10% share in the company to Goldman Sachs, and a compleeeeetely coincidental link to Fannie Mae.  No conspiracy theory.  Facts.  It's mind-boggling.  Almost as mind-boggling as the fact that no U.S. newspaper or news organization has mentioned any of this.  The link refers to a Canadian Free Press site.  Free press, remember when America had one of those?  Another fact, NBC is owned by GE.  General Electric.  Think they might have a stake in this game? 

Catch!!!!

Remember when you were a kid and your friend would throw a ball at you and then yell, "catch!!?"  His goal was usually to hit you in the face.  Hilarious, huh?  One of our football drills was similar.  The receiver would stand inside a circle of 6 other players.  The coach would yell out a clock point, 12, 2, 4, 6, 8, or 10.  The player at that point would throw the ball at the receiver as he spun to catch the ball.  The coach would yell out the points out faster and faster, until you had footballs flying from all directions.

Right now, average Americans are the receiver in the middle.  And the Obama administration is surrounding us at all points of the clock, down to the seconds.  First they fire a fast, hard one at us.  A 2000+ page health care takeover.  We turned,  but not quick enough and took that fastball to the face.  Good news is that Americans threw it back hard enough to get their attention for a couple of minutes anyway.

Now they are firing away from every direction.  Here comes cap and trade.  Look out, here comes immigration reform.  Pow, there is another western state land grab Zoom, there went FCC regulation of the internet Voting on a change in language for statehood ballots for Puerto Rico Didn't see that one coming There went representation in the House for D.C. Lobbed in legalizing carrying firearms in national parks, while zipping in voting rights for convicted felons Ouch At least it is called the Democracy Restoration Act, how bad could that be Student loans as part of health care How'd that one get by It will be a revenue stream to reduce the cost of health care, oh, ok How's it going to produce revenue when it doubles the amount of grants given (those don't have to paid back)And if you work for the government you don't have to pay back your loan at all Boy, we fumbled that one Federal regulation of all U.S. waters, right over our head Goldman Sachs executives being excoriated by the Senate.  Caught that one.  Good.  Let those evil thieving bankers have it.  Almost destroyed our economy with their shady home loans.  Wait a minute, Congress required them to make those risky loans.  They protected their investors by hedging their bets, didn't they?  If I had money invested in Goldman, I'd be adding them to my Christmas card list!  Dropped that one too.  Stop, we need a break!  Put down that banking regulation reform!  Look out, here comes Supreme Court nominee!!

Trust Each Other, Unless You Live in D.C.

I have worked for many, sometimes it feels like too many, years in management.  My first management job was in a small bookstore.  It was basically me and one part time associate.  Obviously there was not much delegating.  If something needed to get done, I did it.  My next management position was with Stride Rite shoes.  With Stride Rite, I had several part time associates and an assistant.  While with Stride Rite, I learned a lesson that our government needs to learn.

Part of my job as manager was to train my assistant to be a future manager.  Tisha was one of my first assistants who was serious about getting her own store.  After some basic training, we split the daily tasks and paperwork.  Once on Tisha's day off, I had finished all my usual activities and had probably listened to the Dino Dave recordings a couple of times too many for the day.  I went back to the office and noticed that Tisha had a couple of days' paperwork still unfinished.  So I decided to do her a favor and finish it for her.

I was off the next day, but got a phone call from the store.  It was Tisha, and she was irate.  She asked if she should start looking for a new job, or maybe a transfer to another store.  I had no idea what could possibly be the problem.  I thought everything was going well.  Finally she calmed down enough to ask me if I thought she was incapable of doing her job.  I told her, no. I thought she was doing well and would be able to take her own store soon.  She then asked why I would do her job if that was the way I really felt.  She was insulted at my doing her job for her.  From my point of view, I was doing her a favor.  It seemed a case of "no good deed will go unpunished."  From her point of view, her manager did not trust her or did not think she was capable of doing her job.

Tisha went on to get her own store with Stride Rite and did very well.  She eventually moved on to another management position with another company with even more responsibility.  She taught me a lesson that I think about each time I "help" a trainee.  I always tell them this story and let them know the reason I'm "helping" them.  The story is used as a motivator for those who may not be as self-motivated or as capable as Tisha, in addition to teaching them a management lesson that I learned the hard way.

Unfortunately, I have had trainees that did not have the drive or capability of Tisha.  In their case, I "helped" them a great deal. Until they either caught on or moved on.  As a rule, the more "help" they required, the more likely they were to move on.  

I don't know if the good folks in D.C. think we are capable of taking care of ourselves.  The majority of Americans will gladly take care of themselves and do the right thing.  All we ask is that the government get out of our way.  We are more than willing to help each other and contribute to causes in which we believe.  As long as the government leaves us the resources to do so. I believe most of our representatives think they are doing the right thing.  They feel a little like I did during the phone call from Tisha, "no good deed will go unpunished!"

More and more, I have come to believe that our government doesn't want to trust us.  They take our tax dollars and spend them for us on causes the majority of us do not believe in or support, in order to further their own agenda or strengthen their positions.  No non-profit should receive federal funds.  That's no, none, not any, for any reason.  Nowhere in the constitution does it give the federal government the authority to collect money from the general population to give to any non-profit organization.  Leave that money in the hands of the individual who earned it.  Let that person decide where his/her contribution will go.  Let the non-profit organizations compete for our dollars.  Then let's see if ACORN gives tax advice to pimps for Salvadoran teens, or registers the lineup of the Dallas Cowboys to vote in Las Vegas(you knew I had to work the Cowboys in here somewhere).  Or if Planned Parenthood takes 15 year old girls from their school in Washington and gets them a free abortion without notifying their parents.  If they do, and you choose to support them with your hard-earned dollars, that's your choice.  In that case, I am pro-choice, as are most Americans.  But do not force us to contribute.  We will gladly contribute to causes we believe in.

We need to learn which representatives want to control us, and which just need a phone call from Tisha.  Soon, while we still have any choices left.