Monthly Archives: April 2013

There Are Probably Some Maryland Residents Hoping For A Drought This Year

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The Blaze posted an article today that shows what happens when the federal government passes unfunded mandates that the states have to pay for–the states then pass unfunded mandates that the taxpayers have to pay for.

On April 5, the Gazette (Maryland Community News Online) reported:

In 2010 the Obama administration’s Environmental Protection Agency ordered Maryland to reduce stormwater runoff into the Chesapeake Bay so that nitrogen levels fall 22 percent and phosphorus falls 15 percent from current amounts. The price tag: $14.8 billion.

And where do we get the $14.8 billion? By taxing so-called “impervious surfaces,” anything that prevents rain water from seeping into the earth (roofs, driveways, patios, sidewalks, etc.) thereby causing stormwater run off. In other words, a rain tax.

And who levies this new rain tax? Witness how taxation, like rain, trickles down through the various pervious levels of government until it reaches the impervious level — me and you.

The EPA ordered Maryland to raise the money (an unfunded mandate), Maryland ordered its 10 largest counties to raise the money (another unfunded mandate) and, now, each of those counties is putting a local rain tax in place by July 1.

There is nothing in the law that says the tax is less if the rainfall is less, but that would be an interesting wrinkle in the whole thing. The tax is slated to be in place by July 1.

It is interesting to note that although government-owned buildings are exempt from the rain tax, religious organizations and non-profit organizations are not exempt. I suspect there will a lawsuit about that somewhere along the line.

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What Are We Teaching Our Children?

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Recently there was an incident in one of our local schools that has caused me to wonder about what we are teaching our children in school–both in textbooks and in experience.

On April 5th, WCVB Boston reported the following:

Outraged parents said some students at Coelho Middle School cried when they were told by a worker for the district’s food service provider they could not eat on Tuesday because they couldn’t pay or their pre-paid accounts were short on funds.
    
The on-site director for the company, Whitsons Culinary Group of Islandia, N.Y., was placed on administrative leave by Superintendent Pia Durkin, who has ordered cafeteria workers not to deny any child food.

Today, the Attleboro Sun Chronicle reported:

News that dozens of students at Coelho Middle School were denied lunch for a lack of cash touched off anger among parents and the public, but an anonymous unseen feeding frenzy of outrage launched against school administrators via the Internet was far worse coming with personal threats.

Superintendent Pia Durkin said Wednesday that she and her family were threatened, as was Coelho Principal Andrew Boles.

What in the world is going on?

It is unfortunate that students were denied lunches because their lunchroom accounts were empty, but I don’t understand why the people working in the lunchroom were held responsible for taking a common sense approach to the matter.  Would you expect to eat at a restaurant and not pay for your meal? There are a few obvious solutions to this situation that I believe should have been in place to prevent this incident. First of all, what is the procedure for notifying parents or students that their accounts are low? Haven’t Middle School children had enough basic experience with money to know that when you buy something you pay for it? Why isn’t there a Plan B in effect that says if your account is empty and you can’t buy lunch, the cafeteria gives you a complementary soy butter (I believe peanut butter is not allowed in schools these days) and jelly sandwich and a carton of regular milk and sends you on your way. You don’t go hungry, but you don’t necessarily get the lunch you really want.

What are we teaching these children? How is it fair to the children whose accounts are paid and up to date that other children get the same lunch without paying for it? How in the world are the cafeteria workers responsible for providing lunch for students that have not paid?

It is truly unfortunate that the cafeteria workers were fired over this incident. Do they have a union? If so, why is that union silent? I can’t imagine someone in a retail store of any kind doing anything different. The way this incident has been handled will only contribute to a ‘gimme’ attitude on the part of the students and an entitlement attitude among their parents. This does not bode well for the future of our country.

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Whatever Happened To Free Speech?

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Yesterday’s Baltimore Sun reported that Dr. Ben Carson has stepped down as the commencement speaker at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.

The article reports:

The withdrawal came less than a week after medical school Dean Paul B. Rothman chastised Carson for his comments and met with graduating students concerned that the famed physician was an inappropriate commencement speaker.

This is the statement that caused the controversy:

“Marriage is between a man and a woman,” Carson said during the television appearance. “No group, be they gays, be they NAMBLA, be they people who believe in bestiality, it doesn’t matter what they are — they don’t get to change the definition.”

Dr. Carson is accused of comparing homosexuals to members of the North American Man/Boy Love Association, a pedophile advocacy group, and those who engage in bestiality. He has since apologized for the above comment, stating, “Although I do believe marriage is between a man and a woman, there are much less offensive ways to make that point,” he continued. “I hope all will look at a lifetime of service over some poorly chosen words.”

The article also reports:

Carson also stepped down as speaker for the Johns Hopkins University School of Education diploma ceremony. New speakers have not been chosen for either commencement address.

On January 30, 2012, the New York Times reported that General William Boykin, an honored graduate of West Point, was told that his invitation to speak at West Point was rescinded due to his views on Islam and Christianity.

These are not isolated incidents. We are silencing people who have made major contributions to our society because they do not practice political correctness. This is viewpoint discrimination–it you do not agree with the prevailing ideology, those in charge will not let you speak. Dr Carson is a brilliant surgeon with an inspiring story of success due to hard work and old-fashioned values. He has a lot to add to the public debate on a number of issues, but the young people graduating from his alma mater will be protected from his ‘radical’ ideas.

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The Remaining Questions About Benghazi

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Benghazi does not seem to be going away. Yesterday John Hinderaker at Power Line reported that 700 retired special operations military personnel have signed a letter to members of the House of Representatives, asking them to investigate the Benghazi debacle. This is the link to the letter.

The concern of the former special ops personnel is that the American policy of leaving no one behind was not followed during the attack. The Ambassador and three other people were essentially abandoned by the American government that was supposed to protect them.

The letter states:

A longstanding American ethos was breached during the terrorist attack in Benghazi. America failed to provide adequate security to personnel deployed into harm’s way and then failed to respond when they were viciously attacked. Clearly, this is unacceptable and requires accountability. America has always held to the notion that no American will be left behind and that every effort will be made to respond when US personnel are threatened. Given our backgrounds, we are concerned that this sends a very negative message to future military and diplomatic personnel who may be deployed into dangerous environments.  That message is that they will be left to their own devices when attacked.  That is an unacceptable message.

The letter asks that the House Select Committee ask the Obama Administration sixteen questions that have not yet been answered and demand answers to those questions. The families of those Americans killed in the attack deserve at least that much.

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Where The Sequester Really Hurts

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From President Obama’s perspective, the problem with the sequester is that the cuts haven’t hurt people enough for the public to understand the total folly of actually cutting the federal budget. Never mind that the sequester does not actually cut the federal budget–it only slows the rate of growth. But let’s look at some of the things that the sequester has cut, and let’s look at some of the places that could easily be cut in the federal budget.

Yesterday the Washington Examiner posted an editorial about the amount of overlapping and duplicated programs in the federal government. The editorial pointed out that according to the Government Accountability Office, which on Tuesday released its 2013 report on fragmentation and duplication of federal programs there are an estimated $95 billion in duplicative programs that waste precious tax dollars.

The editorial cites several examples:

Having three agencies doing catfish safety inspections may strike some as funny, but there is nothing to laugh about in the Department of Homeland Security having $568 million worth of overlapping research and development programs. Or that Department of Defense foreign language training services are provided by 159 separate contracting groups at a cost of $200 million. And why should taxpayers have to foot $15 billion worth of duplicative renewable energy programs?

This is the place where politics enters the picture. Wouldn’t it make much more sense to go through federal spending and eliminate waste and duplication than to cut spending in places where it has a visible negative impact? Of course–that’s why it is not being done that way.

There are two other stories on the internet this morning loosely related to this editorial. The first, found in the U.K. Mail yesterday, describes a star-studded concert held at the White House on Tuesday night. Meanwhile, children cannot tour the White House because of the financial restraints of sequestration. How much did the American taxpayers pay for last night’s party? The other story is from yesterday’s Providence Journal. The Navy has announced that the rest of the year’s performances by the aerial performance team the Blue Angels have been canceled for budget reasons. That means that they will not be performing at the Quonset Point Air Show this summer. This is just ridiculous. The air show is not solely for entertainment purposes–it is a major recruiting tool for the American military. There is a possibility that the entire air show may be cancelled, which will make things more difficult for military recruiters in the Rhode Island area.

By playing politics with the sequestration rather than dealing with major financial issues facing America, the Obama Administration and those in Congress who support this administration have done a great disservice to the American people. It is now the responsibility of the American people to vote out of office those politicians who are playing games with the federal budget rather than solving the spending problem.

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An Interesting Story About Margaret Thatcher

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Yesterday Tablet Magazine posted an article posted an article about an event in Margaret Thatcher’s childhood that made a lasting impression on her.

The article reports:

Johnson (Charles Johnson) starts with what Thatcher often said was her greatest accomplishment, which was not her work in helping to topple the Soviet Union or being the first British woman to hold the post of prime minister, but rather, was her work as a child to save a Jewish teenager in Austria from the grasp of Hitler’s terror.

The story begins in 1938 when Edith Muhlbauer, a 17-year-old Jewish girl, wrote a letter to Muriel Roberts, Edith’s pen pal and the future prime minister’s [Margaret Thatcher] older sister. The letter expressed fear that as Hitler began rounding up Jews in Austria that her family would be included in those round-ups. The Roberts family did not have the means to take Edith in, and Margaret, then 12, and Muriel, 17, set about raising funds and persuading the local Rotary club to help. Edith stayed with a number of Rotary families for about two years until she was able to go to South America to join relatives.

The article reports:

Had the Roberts family not intervened, Edith recalled years later, “I would have stayed in Vienna and they would have killed me.” Thatcher never forgot the lesson: “Never hesitate to do whatever you can, for you may save a life,” she told audiences in 1995 after Edith had been located, alive and well, in Brazil.

Prime Minister Thatcher showed courage and determination even as a young adult. It is no wonder that she grew up to be the “Iron Lady.”

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I Hesitate To Post This–It Is Horrific–But It Needs To Be Told

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The American Thinker posted an article today about the ongoing trial of abortionist Kermit Gosnell. There hasn’t been a lot written about this trial in the major media, but the story of the events that led to the trial  and the testimony that has been given during the trial need to be told.

Dr. Gosnell was running an abortion clinic that did late-term abortions. The charges against him are essentially that he killed babies that survived those late-term abortions.

The article reports some of the testimony at the trial (WARNING: this is not for the faint of heart):

When Assistant District Attorney Joanne Pescatore pressed the 53-year-old West (abortion clinic employee Sherry West) for specifics about the incident, West struggled to answer, clearly uncomfortable with the memory.

“I can’t describe it. It sounded like a little alien,” West testified, telling a judge and Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas jury that the body of the child was about 18 to 24 inches long and was one of the largest babies she had seen delivered during abortion procedures at Gosnell’s clinic.

West said she saw the child, whose face and features were not yet completely formed, lying on a glass tray on a shelf and she told a co-worker to call Gosnell about it and fled the room.

During her two years working for Gosnell, West said she also saw patients deliver “specimens” in the toilet, which she made a co-worker remove, adding she called aborted fetuses “specimens” because “it was easier to deal with mentally.”

Our society has become so desensitized to the killing involved in abortion that just by calling a baby a “specimen” we can kill a viable child. Where is the public outcry against the killing of the innocent. The problem of violence in our society is not related to guns–it is that we have forgotten the value of life.

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A Sad Day For The Early Baby Boomers

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Fox News is reporting today that Annette Funicello died yesterday in California. Anyone over the age of 55 remembers her smiling face on the original Mickey Mouse Club.

Annette represented a different time in our popular culture. Her wholesome image was very different from that of the stars to come out of the Disney studios in recent years.

The article at Fox reminds us of that fact:

The beach films featured ample youthful skin. But not Funicello’s.

She remembered in 1987: “Mr. Disney said to me one day, ‘Annette, I have a favor to ask of you. I know all the girls are wearing bikinis, but you have an image to uphold. I would appreciate it if you would wear a one-piece suit.’ I did, and I never regretted it.”

Modesty was a good thing. I miss it.

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We Have Lost A Great Lady

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The U.K. Mail is reporting today that Britain’s Iron Lady, Margaret Thatcher, died this morning. I am citing the U.K. Mail article because it includes a lot of pictures of Prime Minister Thatcher during her time as Prime Minister and after she left office. Lady Thatcher, along with President Reagan, stood up to the Soviet Union, and eventually the Soviet Union collapsed.

Lady Thatcher was Britain’s first and only woman prime minister. She won three consecutive general elections to that post. Please follow the link above to read the article in the U.K. Mail. It is an inspiring story of a lady who broke the mold when it came to British politics.

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You Can Depend On Politicians To Want More Taxes

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In Massachusetts you can always depend on the leaders of the Commonwealth to want to raise taxes. This is loosely related to the fact that the majority of the leaders in the executive and legislative branches of government In Massachusetts are Democrats. Well, this year is no exception to the rule.

Holly Robichaud posted an article in the Boston Herald today about Governor Patrick’s latest tax plan and the political theater surrounding it.

The article in the Herald reminds us of a few basic facts:

To sell Speaker Robert DeLeo’s $500 million tax package, there is a whole lot of political theater being staged to fool low information voters into being grateful it’s not Gov. Deval Patrick’s $1.9 billion plan.

When initially announced last week, Patrick pounced by stating that no Democrats lost their seats because they voted for his sales tax increase in 2009. There are Deval’s statements and then there are the facts. In 2010, the GOP doubled their numbers in the House.

It might be a good idea for Democrats to remember the consequences of raising the sales tax as they prepare to vote on the present tax bill.

Ms. Robichaud also notes that Democratic Party Chairman John Walsh has publicly warned Democrats that they will face challenges in primary elections if they do not support higher taxes.

I have lived in Massachusetts since 1978. I have spent a certain amount of that time wondering what in the world was in the water that caused the residents to vote the way they do. We are responsible for the government we have–we elected it. Until the voters of this state wake up and decide to protect their income from the kind of fraud we see in the EBT program and the constant demand for more of our money from the statehouse and legislature, the political theater surrounding tax hikes will continue.

I will be leaving Massachusetts by the end of this year and resettling to a place that has more respect for the fact that I wish to keep the money I earn. I will continue to blog about the perils of big government and its endless appetite for taxpayers’ money, but I will be glad to be in a place where that appetite is slightly smaller. More to follow…

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Sometimes It’s Better Not To Enter The Fight

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I say this reluctantly because I know that every day innocent people are dying in Syria, and I would love the see America step in and stop the killing. However, the fact remains that we are not able to step in and stop the killing and that it would not be wise for us to attempt to do so.

Andrew McCarthy posted an article at National Review on Saturday about the war in Syria. He points out that the people who are asking us to intervene in Syria are saying that if we don’t there will be a vacuum of leadership there. No, there won’t. Al Qaeda has already filled that vacuum. We need to remember that Bashar al-Assad. is an Alawite, a minority Shiite group in Syria. The rebels in Syria are Sunnis, led by the Muslim Brotherhood and Al Qaeda.. Why in the world would we want to get in the middle of that fight? Neither side represents either democracy or stability in the Middle East.

Andrew McCarthy sums up the problem of intervention in Syria:

…the narrative continues, untold legions of Muslim moderates, secular democrats, and religious minorities who would otherwise be charting Syria’s democratic destiny are being elbowed aside. Even worse, by failing to intervene forcefully — meaning, to fuel the jihad with high-tech combat weapons and an aerial campaign to soften up Assad’s remaining defenses — the administration is frittering away the opportunity to strike up pragmatic alliances with the Vaccum-filling Islamists. Sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought — eager to help the Brotherhood, but too concerned about arms falling into terrorist hands — Obama is forfeiting our chance to influence the outcome.

Right. I mean, look at how ably our decade of heavy investment has steered Iraq and Afghanistan in a pro-American direction. And behold how they love us in Benghazi!

The article concludes:

It is no longer 1996 — the year Iran bombed the Khobar Towers and killed 19 American airmen. The Syria hawks are quite right to argue that Iran remains a major threat to American interests. They are wrong, however, to treat Iran as the only such threat. The Sunni supremacist crescent that the Muslim Brotherhood, al-Qaeda, and their allies would run from Anatolia through the Persian Gulf and across North Africa would be no less hostile to the West than the Shiite competitor Iran is trying to forge. If Assad falls and the Brothers take over, that defeat for Tehran will not be a boon for the United States.

It is not isolationism to insist that American interventions be limited to situations in which a vital American interest must be vindicated. There is no such interest in Syria.

The only American intervention in Syria that would be acceptable to me would be to get the civilians out and let the extremists slug it out among themselves. The best thing we can do is provide aid to the refugee camps that have been set up in neighboring countries.

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Things That Make You Go Hmmmmm

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Yesterday Hot Air posted an article about the level of carbon dioxide emissions in the United States. It seems that carbon dioxide emissions fell once again in 2012, bringing the United States’ emissions levels down to a two-decade low.

This is the chart:

Graph of annual light bulb sales, as explained in the article text

So what is responsible for the drop in carbon dioxide emissions– the increased use of natural gas obtained by hydraulic fracturing. This has got to drive the environmentalists nuts.

The article at Hot Air reports:

The largest drop in emissions in 2012 came from coal, which is used almost exclusively for electricity generation (see figure below). During 2012, particularly in the spring and early summer, low natural gas prices led to competition between natural gas- and coal-fired electric power generators. Lower natural gas prices resulted in reduced levels of coal generation, and increased natural gas generation—a less carbon-intensive fuel for power generation, which shifted power generation from the most carbon-intensive fossil fuel (coal) to the least carbon-intensive fossil fuel (natural gas).

The article concludes:

It’s yet another piece of evidence that environmental quality and economic prosperity are not mutually exclusive, even on a large scale; the innovations, efficiencies, and technological developments that come with an advanced economy can be good for both humanity and the planet.

The comment above represents the kind of balance we need more of in the environmental movement.

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Something To Think About

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A friend sent me a link to the video below. I admit I wasn’t sure what to think when I watched it. Then I saw an article at Fox News that really caused me to wonder. Please watch, and draw your own conclusions:

The lead paragraph in the article at Fox News:

A U.S. Army training instructor listed Evangelical Christianity and Catholicism as examples of religious extremism along with Al Qaeda and Hamas during a briefing with an Army Reserve unit based in Pennsylvania, Fox News has learned.

…The incident occurred during an Army Reserve Equal Opportunity training brief on extremism. Topping the list is Evangelical Christianity. Other organizations listed included Catholicism, Al Qaeda, Hamas, the Ku Klux Klan, Sunni Muslims, and Nation of Islam.

The military also listed “Islamophobia” as a form of religious extremism.

Army spokesman George Wright told Fox News that this was an “isolated incident not condoned by the Dept. of the Army.”

There needs to be a serious investigation of who put this training brief together. This sort of ridiculousness is happening at a time when the American military is refusing to use the world Islamic terrorist and has declared the Fort Hood shootings as ‘workplace violence.’ Something is very wrong here.

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When Good Organization Do Bad Things

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The National Audubon Society was incorporated in 1905 by John James Audubon. Audubon was a naturalist who painted, cataloged, and studied the birds of North America. The organization is dedicated to teaching and encouraging conservation of our natural resources in America. So far, so good. However, in California, they recently overstepped their bounds.

On April 1, CBN News posted a story about a family in California who lost their family vacation retreat to a fire in 2004. The family had owned the retreat since 1924. When the family proceeded to rebuild the five homes destroyed in the fire, they found themselves in a legal battle with the Audubon Society.

The article reports:

To rebuild, the families would need to upgrade the roads leading across Audubon land to accommodate their heavy construction equipment.

But after decades of everyone sharing these roads, Audubon said no and then hit the families with yet another bombshell: It said it had proof their very best acres, the flat ones where their houses had been, were actually Audubon land.

The family engaged in a lengthy legal battle to reclaim their land, researching old property markers, etc.  The new boundaries the Audubon society claimed would have moved the families houses into a part of the land where building homes was not feasible, so the family fought to hold on to their retreat.

The story continued:

Then another stunning surprise in 2010 after years of legal wrangling: Audubon caved and said it would accept the original property lines and let the families use the roads unimpeded.

“They completely capitulated,” Prows stated.

No one outside of Audubon knows why this capitulation, but one more shock was ahead. In 2012, the families’ lawyers discovered with a subpoena that at the start of all this, Audubon had held back from family members some of the surveying maps it had commissioned.

They had also altered the maps they presented to prove Audubon’s claim.

“Audubon had actually doctored the drawings that it showed to our clients,” Prows said. “It took white out, and we have emails from Audubon’s very top people talking about putting white-out on the maps – removing the lines that its surveyors had put on the maps that Audubon didn’t like, showing that the boundary really was in the right place all along.”

The family is now suing the Audubon Society for fraud.  Unfortunately, the donations of well-meaning people will go toward defending and eventually settling this case. The thing to keep in mind here is that the case should never have existed in the first place. Even good organizations are occasionally capable of doing very bad things.

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The Consequences Of An America That Does Not Project Strength

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At some point we all have to grow up enough to realize that everyone in the world does not love us or wish us well. Some of this ill will is related to things we have done, but some of it is related to who we are–we are a free country whose citizens enjoy rights envied by much of the world. The people who are less free want to be us, and the leaders who are responsible for keeping their citizens less free would like us to go away. We are as hated for who we are as much as for what we do. It is possible to make amends for what you do; it is nearly impossible to make peace with someone who hates you for what you are. That has been the challenge to America since World War II.

The Washington Free Beacon reported yesterday that a Russian bomber recently made a practice run simulating cruise missile attacks on U. S. missile defenses in Asia.

The article reports:

According to U.S. officials, a Russian Tu-22M Backfire bomber on Feb. 26 simulated firing air-launched cruise missiles at an Aegis ship deployed near Japan as part of U.S. missile defenses.

A second mock attack was conducted Feb. 27 against a ground-based missile defense site in Japan that officials did not identify further.

The Pentagon operates an X-band missile defense radar on the northern tip of Japan that is designed to monitor North Korean missile launches and transmit the data to missile-firing ships.

The bomber targeting comes as Russia is building up forces in the Pacific by modernizing submarines and building a spy ship specifically for intelligence-gathering against U.S. missile defenses.

We all remember this supposedly off-the-record conversation:

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: This is my last election. And after my election, I have more flexibility.

DMITRY MEDVEDEV, RUSSIAN PRESIDENT: I understand you. I transmit this information to Vladimir —

President Obama has essentially taken down our missile defense systems in Europe (in accordance with Russian wishes), and now the Russians are making practice runs on our missile defenses in Asia. I really don’t think the Russians want peace, and I really don’t think they are worried about offending us right now. That is unfortunate. I liked it better when we had someone in the White House that the world thought was dangerous and unpredictable–America and the world were safer then.

The article at the Washington Free Beacon points out an obvious contrast in the direction Russia is traveling and the direction America is traveling:

Retired Air Force Lt. Gen. Tom McInerney said the Backfire targeting is troubling.

“Russia continues to conduct aggressive offensive missile training in the Pacific against U.S. and Allied Forces,” McInerney said.

“We should understand that they look at ‘reset’ differently than we do,” said the retired three-star general, who once commanded forces in Alaska. “They look at it as regaining their previous USSR position as a superpower while this administration is moving towards unilateral disarmament.”

When counties that stand for freedom put down their arms, countries that are not free take up arms. That is not a situation that should be encouraged.

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Is The Goal To Solve Problems Or To Punish The Rich?

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The Hill posted an article today about the budget proposal expected to come from President Obama in the near future. One aspect of the budget will be to limit how much ‘the rich’ will be able to keep in their individual retirement accounts.

The Obama Administration says that this proposal will add ‘fairness’ to the tax code. The provision is expected to raise $9 billion in ten years. At this point, I would like to point out that the current budget deficit is approximately $16 trillion dollars, and the projected annual deficit for 2013 will probably be in the neighborhood of $1 trillion dollars.

Let’s look at this concept of ‘fairness’ for a moment. How is it fair to continue to take money away from people who earn it and give it to people who don’t? How is it fair to punish someone who has worked hard and been successful for their efforts and success? Who has decided that we need ‘fairness?’ In 2009, the top 1% of earners paid 36.73 percent of the taxes (according to the National Taxpayers Union). How is that fair?

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Alarming Stories The Press Seems To Have Ignored

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The Accuracy in Media website posted a very disturbing article yesterday. It’s a rather long article consisting of stories of small businesses and private citizens who have been harassed by the federal government in the past few years.

The article expresses concern for the militarization of police forces and the seeming lack of regard for Constitutional rights of American citizens. The stories show a pattern of excessive force and SWAT- style tactics when a simple visit from a local police officer would have resolved a problem.

The article concludes:

The increased militarization of police forces and the associated use of SWAT teams for routine law enforcement are a dangerous trend. Given Obama’s seeming willingness to abuse the power of his office on so many fronts, it is reasonable to expect more, not less, of the kind of abusive police overreach described in this report, while police forces and capabilities will continue to grow.

Obama’s obvious hostility to gun owners is fueling legitimate fears of gun confiscation, furthering an atmosphere of mutual distrust and paranoia between police and civilians. This raises the specter of armed confrontations should there be attempts to confiscate firearms. As one law enforcement official said at a recent gun hearing, “Good people are going to die trying to take these guns and good people are going to die trying to keep them.”

Ironically, despite its professed commitment to stopping “gun violence,” the Obama Administration authorized gun-running to Mexican drug cartels and Jihadists in Libya and elsewhere in the Middle East. Some hearings and investigations have been held into these schemes but there has been little accountability for this “gun violence.”

If the disregard for the rights of American citizens is a pattern, it needs to be stopped quickly. A free country cannot survive four more years of total disregard for the rights of its citizens. At the very least, the press needs to be reporting the stories in this article and holding the officials responsible for the abuses or power responsible.

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Memories Of A Horrible Time

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This is a rambling article detailing some of my memories of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. There are no links–it is strictly my memories of the events–as I happened to be in Memphis at the time. Hopefully you will enjoy reading it.

Martin Luther King, Jr.

Martin Luther King, Jr. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

On April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King, Jr., was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee. My husband and I were temporarily stationed in Memphis at that time and were scheduled to return to his home port in Rhode Island the next day. During the time we were stationed there, I worked as a temporary office employee and made use of the city’s public transportation while my husband drove to the Navy base at Millington every day.

The city had been on edge since February due to a garbage strike and the death of some city employees who were taking a break in a garbage truck when the mechanism engaged.  Martin Luther King, Jr., had visited the city in March, speaking to thousands at Mason Temple.

I was working in downtown Memphis on the day that Martin Luther King, Jr., was shot. Things were tense that day–downtown had been declared ‘off limits’ to military personnel. City buses had been surrounded by crowds and ‘rocked.’  I don’t remember whether or not any buses were tipped over. My husband disobeyed the ‘off limits’ order and came into the city to get me because we were afraid that the bus would not be a safe way to get home.

The night of April 4 was even more tense. I don’t remember whether or not there was a curfew in the city, but I suspect there was. The next day we attended graduation ceremonies for the school my husband had been attending and then headed back to Rhode Island to his next duty station. That weekend we were supposed to visit a classmate of my husband who was part of the Presidential helicopter squadron. Needless to say, when Washington, D. C. had riots, we cancelled those plans.

We had a National Guard escort through Nashville, Tennessee, on the way home. The Guard would allow six or seven cars to go through the city with military vehicles ahead and behind the cars. We had bought a car in Memphis and had Tennessee license plates on the car, so I felt as if we blended in a little better than we might have with Rhode Island plates.

After two days of hard driving, we pulled into my husband’s parents’ house right outside of New York City. The next day we went into New York City and heard a story I have never forgotten.

New York Mayor Lindsay carries in his budget

New York Mayor Lindsay carries in his budget (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

During this time, John Lindsay was the Mayor of New York City. I am making no comment regarding the success or failure of his term as Mayor. We went into the city to the recording studio where my husband had worked before joining the Navy and were talking with another employee who was also a pastor in a black church in Harlem. The Pastor told us what had happened in New York City after the shooting of Dr. King. The Pastor explained why New York City had not had the riots that several other American cities had gone through after the news of the assassination broke. When the news of Dr. King’s death came over the wire, Mayor Lindsay immediately called the pastors of the churches in Harlem and asked them to meet him in the street on the edge of Harlem. He went there with his driver, got out his megaphone and said something like ‘If you want to march, I will march with you.’ That march changed the fate of New York City from one of riots to one of relative peace. Leadership matters.

The next day we headed back to our peaceful home in Rhode Island. It was really good to be home.

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America Used To Be A Place Of Sanctuary For The Persecuted

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Yesterday the Washington Free Beacon posted a story about Uwe and Hannelore Romeike, German parents who sought to home school their children in Germany. They felt that the curriculum in the public schools was in conflict with their Christian beliefs.

The article reports the challenges they faced in Germany:

German law mandates that children attend a public or state-approved school. The local mayor informed the family that they would face fines and could lose the custody of their children if they did not attend school. The parents also faced potential jail time.

The government fined the family heavily and at one point seized the children to force them to attend school.

In 2008 the Romeike family left Germany and moved to Tennessee. There they sought asylum in the United States. An immigration judge granted it to them, citing a well-founded fear of persecution if they returned to Germany.

Unfortunately, the happy ending did not last–the article reports:

However, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), appealed the ruling to the Board of Immigration Appeals.

The board overturned the original judge’s ruling and ordered the Romeikes deported to Germany. The Romeikes appealed their case to the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, where their case will be heard April 23.

At issue is whether the German law constitutes persecution against Christians for their faith, qualifying them for asylum under the Immigration and Nationality Act.

I am having a hard time understanding this. At the same time the Obama Administration seems to be willing to let anyone enter the country illegally and become a citizen, they are closing the door to a family genuinely seeking asylum. America used to be a beacon of freedom in the world.  I fear that we have forgotten our roots.

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Faux Science

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John Hinderaker at Power Line posted an article yesterday about some recent facts that have come out regarding global warming. It seems that we have been misled.

The chart below is from the article. It shows the difference between the made-up numbers and the scientific numbers:

The article explains how geologist Shaun Marcott had created his graph by changing the dates of reported temperatures to get the results he wanted.

The article quotes the Financial Post:

Stephen McIntyre of climateaudit.org began examining the details of the Marcott et al. work, and by March 16 he had made a remarkable discovery. The 73 proxies were all collected by previous researchers, of which 31 are derived from alkenones, an organic compound produced by phytoplankton that settles in layers on ocean floors, and has chemical properties that correlate to temperature. …

According to the scientists who originally published the alkenone series, the core tops varied in age from nearly the present to over a thousand years ago. Fewer than 10 of the original proxies had values for the 20th century. Had Marcott et al. used the end dates as calculated by the specialists who compiled the original data, there would have been no 20th-century uptick in their graph, as indeed was the case in Marcott’s PhD thesis. But Marcott et al. redated a number of core tops, changing the mix of proxies that contribute to the closing value, and this created the uptick at the end of their graph. Far from being a feature of the proxy data, it was an artifact of arbitrarily redating the underlying cores.

The earth routinely goes through climate cycles. As of yet, scientists do not totally understand these cycles. However, I believe that the scientific method calls for a study of the facts in order to reach a conclusion–not altering the facts to reach a desired conclusion.

Just for the record, I am not for pollution. I think we have a responsibility as residents of earth to keep things as clean as possible. I do think, however, that we have to balance the well being of the residents of earth with the price of progress. The current environmental movement may desire a clean planet, but they have lost their sense of balance.

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Never Forget

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If you read this site regularly, you know that I try to summarize articles that may not have been widely reported and that I think are important. I tend to cite a few quotes from an article and then add some comments on my reasons I think the article is important or relevant. In this case, I will make an exception. I have no comments, I just strongly suggest that you follow the link below and read the entire story. Never forget.

Posted by Jeff Jacoby on April 7, 1994, in the Boston Globe on the 50th anniversary of the events related:  The day the Nazis came for my father’s family.

Deja Vu All Over Again

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Yesterday’s Washington Post posted an article stating that the Obama Administration is working toward making home loans available to people with weak credit in order to boost the economy. Wow. Just as the housing market is recovering from the sub-prime mortgages of the 1990’s, we are going to add a bunch of risky mortgages to the mix.

The article reports:

In response, administration officials say they are working to get banks to lend to a wider range of borrowers by taking advantage of taxpayer-backed programs — including those offered by the Federal Housing Administration — that insure home loans against default.

Housing officials are urging the Justice Department to provide assurances to banks, which have become increasingly cautious, that they will not face legal or financial recriminations if they make loans to riskier borrowers who meet government standards but later default.

Part of the problem here is the government’s intervention into the housing market. Banks should be left alone to make their own decisions on issuing loans.

The article further reports:

Deciding which borrowers get loans might seem like something that should be left up to the private market. But since the financial crisis in 2008, the government has shaped most of the housing market, insuring between 80 percent and 90 percent of all new loans, according to the industry publication Inside Mortgage Finance. It has done so primarily through the Federal Housing Administration, which is part of the executive branch, and taxpayer-backed mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, run by an independent regulator.

It really is time to let the private sector be the private sector and shrink to government to a reasonable size.

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The Unintended Consequences Of Accountability

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This article has two sources, an article in the U.K. Telegraph posted on March 30 and an article posted at Real Clear Politics yesterday.

As the British government struggles to keep pace with the expenses involved in providing a safety net for its citizens, some government programs are being phased out and combined with other programs. One of the programs under scrutiny is the sickness benefit program.

Iain Duncan Smith, the Work and Pensions Secretary. is attempting to combine dozens of different out-of-work benefits into a single payment with the aim of ensuring an individual is always better off working than collecting benefits. As part of that process, there is an assessment of the people on the sickness benefit program to determine whether or not they are fit to work. Some 878,300 people on that program decided to come off the program rather than submit to the assessment. We need to learn from this experience.

The article at Real Clear Politics looks at disability payments in America:

In 1960, when vastly more Americans were involved in physical labor of some kind, 0.65% of workforce participants between the ages of 18 and 64 were receiving Social Security disability insurance payments. Fifty years later, in a much healthier America that number has grown to 5.6%.

In 1960, 134 Americans were working for every officially recognized disabled worker. Five decades later that ratio fell to roughly 16 to 1.

I am sure that in most cases disability payments are warranted. In fact, I am sure that everyone who is disabled does not necessarily look disabled. I can think of one example in particular where a person received severe neck damage in a work-related car accident and on some days appears to be perfectly normal. On other days, that person can barely move. Unfortunately, there is no way of predicting which days are which. However, I do think there are people among us who would rather ride in the wagon than help pull it. The problem is that at this point we have too few people pulling the wagon and too many people sitting in the wagon.

Government workers have no incentive to cut disability payments–their jobs depend on administering these programs–if you cut the programs, you might have to cut the number of administrators. Government spending has become like the hamster on the exercise wheel–it keeps moving (and growing) but nothing is actually being accomplished.

If we are serious about ever balancing the federal (and states) budget, we need to take a serious look at who is receiving payments from that government and what the basis for those payments is. Until we are willing to help people enter the workforce instead of helping them enter generations of dependency on government, we will not solve our financial problems.

Using News Stories To Shape Public Opinion

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Today’s Wall Street Journal posted an editorial that clearly shows how the major news media uses the way they report (or not report) stories to shape public opinion.

On Friday it was discovered that an old Exxon Mobil pipeline near Mayflower, Arkansas, was leaking. No one said exactly how much oil had leaked, but Exxon responded with enough people and equipment to handle as much as 10,000 barrels and had the flow stopped and cleanup begun by early Saturday. This event made the headlines–the major media used the leak as an example of the tragedy that would occur if the Keystone Pipeline were built. Well, wait a minute.

Last week a Canadian Pacific Railway train derailed in western Minnesota. The train was carrying crude oil and spilled up to 30,000 gallons. The spill was larger than the leak in Arkansas and took place near a town. The media somehow didn’t bother to cover the story.

The Wall Street Journal goes on to say that in 2008 U. S. railways transported 9,500 carloads of oil. In 2012 that number jumped to 233,811. There were 112 railroad oil spills from 2010 to 2012. From 2006 to 2009, there were 10 oil spills. Pipelines have fewer incidents per mile than rail cars.

Two of the things to keep in mind as the Keystone Pipeline remains in limbo are the fact that the Canadian oil is going to be shipped somewhere–either to America or China and that the person who is profiting by not building the pipeline is Warren Buffett (see rightwinggranny.com). One of the railroads that is in boom times because there is no Keystone Pipeline is Burlington Northern Santa Fe, owned by Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway. As usual, the discussion of the Keystone Pipeline is not really about the environment–it is about the money.

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