Friday, July 17, 2009
Al Qaeda American Terrorist Condemns,Mocks Obama in New Audio Tape
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An American who left the United States to join an Al Qaeda-linked group in Somalia is strongly condemning President Obama’s efforts to seek “a new beginning” with the Muslim world, mocking Obama's “magic of charisma” and warning of more attacks against U.S. interests."...pretend to extend your hand in peace, we cannot and shall not extend our hands, rather, we shall extend to you our swords.
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[Meanwhile, in America...]
FLASHBACK >
Cheney's Top Ten Points Every American Should Consider
It's indisputably an achievement of the Bush administration that it prevented the US from being attacked after 9/11. By ramming this point home, Cheney tees things up for some very tough questioning of Obama in the event that the US is attacked again..
Journalist Tells of Harrowing Protest Experience...
Over the last few weeks dozens of Iranians yearning for a more democratic government, striving to beat back the oppressive Mullahs, desperate to live free, have been killed in the streets of Iran during democratic protests. In China Uighurs and members of the religious sect Falun Gong are constantly attacked, imprisoned, tortured and killed for their ethnicity or beliefs by Chinese officials. Not long ago Buddhist Monks were killed by police for their protests in the streets of Myanmar. And on a nearly daily basis, members of the Taliban are killing villagers for not observing their oppressive rule in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
We live in times of violent protests tearing at some of the most oppressive governments in the world. And so, Australia's ABC fielded a report about one "violent" protest experienced by one of its own reporters. Was it murderous Islamists attacking villagers? How about Chinese thugs killing ethnics? Perhaps it was an Iranian Mullah ordered massacre of citizens wanting democracy that frightened her so much?
Uh, no. It was Orthodox Jews - that spit on her.
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RAISING THE MINIMUM WAGE: GOOD INTENTIONS, BAD POLICY
[Unless you work for the government]
Minimum wage advocates argue that increases are needed to reduce poverty for the "working poor," and that these increases can be implemented without negatively impacting employment. The reality, however, is that increases in the minimum wage come with serious negative costs, particularly for those workers whom the increases are intended to help, says the Fraser Institute.
The most damaging consequence of minimum wage increase is that employers respond by reducing the numbers of workers they employ and/or the numbers of hours their employees work. In other words, minimum wage increases result in higher unemployment for low-skilled workers and young people.
In Canada, 14 studies have reviewed the effects of minimum wage increases in the Canadian provinces, specifically British Columbia. According to Fraser:
- A 10 percent increase in the minimum wage is likely to decrease employment by 3 percent to 6 percent among all young workers.
- Those individuals earning between $8 and $10 an hour will see the greatest effect and 4.5 percent to 20 percent will lose their employment.
- Even for those workers who retain their employment after the minimum wage increase, they are likely to see a drastic decrease in the amount of hours worked.
Additionally, the Journal of Labor Economics found that a 10 percent increase in the minimum wage would decrease on-the-job training for unskilled workers by two percentage points. This will entrench them in the unskilled workforce, decreasing chances for vertical mobility.
[Ah, but in America virtually all government unionized employees' compensation is 'indexed' to the federal minimal wage, meaning every time it goes up so does the pay of every 'represented' public employee. This is why they keep passing such increases despite their obvious lunacy.]
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MANDATING UNEMPLOYMENT: CONGRESS PREPARES TO KILL MORE JOBS
There's been a long and spirited debate among economists about who gets hurt and who benefits when the minimum wage rises. But in a 2006 National Bureau of Economic Research paper, economists David Neumark of the University of California, Irvine, and William Wascher of the Federal Reserve Bank reviewed the voluminous literature over the past 30 years and came to two almost universally acknowledged conclusions:
- First, "a sizable majority of the studies give a relatively consistent indication of negative employment effects." [I.e., for every 10% increase, there's 2% job loss]
- Second, "studies that focus on the least-skilled groups (i.e., teens, and welfare moms) provide relatively overwhelming evidence of stronger disemployment effects." [I.e., it's predominantly minimum wage earners that get sacked]
Proponents argue that millions of workers will benefit from the bigger paychecks. But about two of every three full-time minimum-wage workers get a pay raise anyway within a year on the job. Meanwhile, those who lose their jobs or who never get a job in the first place get a minimum wage of $0. [worse than '0', they typically start/continue drawing on some form(s) of government assistance - from contributor to consumer - a huge delta] And single mothers without jobs also lose out on other benefits provided by programs such as the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC).
Consider a single mom with two kids who earns the current $6.55 minimum at a full-time, year-round job:
- In 2009 she receives a $5,028 EITC cash payment from Uncle Sam -- or about an extra $2.50 per hour worked.
- Other federal income supplements, such as the refundable child tax credit, add another $1,900 or so.
- Thus at a wage of $6.55 an hour, her actual pay becomes $10.02 an hour -- more than a 50 percent increase from the current minimum.
But that single mom can't collect those checks if she doesn't have a job, and the tragedy of a higher minimum wage is that it will prevent tens of thousands of working moms striving to pull their families out of poverty from being hired in the first place.
[Who cares? As long as the government labor unions are kept happy...]
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image toon mny bbro bdd = Pelosi putting up min wage increase during layoff meeting
'Green guidelines' are unaffordable
As if the real-estate market wasn't depressed enough and taxes weren't high enough, the House last week passed the controversial cap-and-trade, global-warming bill that among many other things would require households and businesses to retrofit their buildings to meet new strict "green guidelines"
Retrofits would cover everything from air quality to energy and water usage, and would require the use of government-approved "green" supplies and materials...
[It's not just the biggest tax increase in the history of the planet {literally}, it's also the single largest assault on individual liberty that has ever been attempted in America {at least, by Americans}.
It must be defeated - speak loudly and often...]
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Then >
"OPPOSE WAXMAN-MARKEY CAP-&-TAX BILL"
Senate-Reid: http://reid.senate.gov/contact/index.cfm
YOUR Senator: http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm
or: Speed Message them with your personal distribution list...
and as always, pass it on...
.OBAMA BLOCKS NEW ENERGY EXPLORATION
Although the President regularly expresses verbal support for a comprehensive energy plan, his Administration has demonstrated that no matter how many Americans are out of work, it will continue to take steps to proactively discourage certain types of economic development -- including the creation of natural gas jobs, oil drilling jobs and nuclear jobs.
Exactly a year ago, President Bush issued an executive order lifting the ban on offshore oil and natural gas drilling on the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) and opened the door for new energy production and the creation of millions of new energy jobs in our country.
But today -- July 14, 2009 -- a defacto ban remains in place only because the Obama Administration has actively blocked the new five-year leasing program which would open areas for offshore exploration and development. The Obama Administration's decision has prevented:
Americans from enjoying 1.2 million new, well-paying jobs annually across the country and $70 billion in additional wages each year.
And the federal government from receiving over $2.2 trillion in total tax receipts -- revenue that would go a long way towards addressing the historic $1.8 trillion deficit .
In addition to obstructing the creation of future American energy jobs, the Obama Administration is also eliminating current energy jobs. On February 4th, the Interior Department withdrew areas offered for 77 oil and gas leases in Utah that thousands of Utah citizens were depending on for employment.
Environmentalists may cheer the Obama Administration's obstructionism as a victory against "Big Oil" but the truth is that fewer drilling leases equal lost jobs, higher unemployment, a higher national deficit, and increased dependence on foreign oil.
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NINE-MONTH WAIT FOR ARTHRITIS TREATMENT:
Thousands of rheumatoid arthritis sufferers in the United Kingdom face a lifetime of agony because they are not being treated quickly enough through the government-run Nathional Health Service, according to a new report by the National Audit Office:
- Guidelines state that patients should receive treatment within three months of the first symptoms appearing.
- But the average wait is nine months -- and general practitioners (GPs) are not trained well enough to know what help to offer.
- There is no cure, but experts say that if arthritis is diagnosed in the first three months, drugs can be given which limit its progression; this means the disease will not be as painful as it would have been if the condition was diagnosed later.
This is a nasty disease, a progressive auto-immune disease, which attacks otherwise healthy joints. Early symptoms are joint pain and stiffness and it leads to inflammation and loss of strength. It also affects other parts of the body, such as the heart and lungs, and is also associated with increased risk of cardiovascular disease.
The report found that the average length of time from the onset of symptoms to treatment has not improved in the past five years.
[The inevitable evolution of government run health care.]
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ABC's John Stossel: 'I Hate It That ABC Didn’t Run My Piece'
John Stossel on Monday blogged about the fact that ABC bumped a planned segment of his that is skeptical towards universal health care, saying, "Yes, I am sick of the coverage of Michael Jackson. I hate it that ABC didn’t run my piece." According to TV Newser, the report, which would have aired on the June 26 edition of 20/20, has now been rescheduled for the July 17 edition of the show.
The five minute segment will look at the problems that countries such as Canada and Britain have faced with government-run health care. In an online version of the story, Stossel (see file photo above), Andrew Sullivan and Andrew Kirell wrote,"In England, shortages of dentists have caused hundreds of people to wait in line just for an appointment. The queues can be so long that some people have resorted to pulling out their own rotting teeth, using vodka and pliers as tools."
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The long game plan
As much as the Republicans have been suffering from the electoral blues lately, a different kind of an affliction seems to be rising in Democratic ranks. It's called overconfidence. Exhibit A is the title of a new book by Democratic consultant James Carville: "40 More Years: How the Democrats Will Rule the Next Generation."
[To start: have less than half of Americans pay federal income taxes, make them dependent on the government for their health care, use environmoralism to control every aspect of their lives and implement some form of 'fairness doctrine' to silence decent, and it's literally possible: a permanent Democrat majority.]
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What is DOJ hiding in the New Black Panther case?
Republican Congressmen want to know the answer although Democrats seem perfectly content to have a bunch of thugs physically blocking access to polling places, using racial slurs and carrying nightsticks.
To try and find out why the Obama Justice Department dropped the case (or at least to get them on record saying it was for political purposes), a group of prominent GOP lawmakers have dispatched a letter to the DOJ Inspector General asking him to look into the matter.
This Washington Times editorial aptly titled "Flak Panthers" has the details
But there really isn't much of a mystery why the case was dropped after the defendants offered no defense and the Department had a slam dunk win in its grasp; one of the local New Black Panther party defendants was carrying credentials at the time of his arrest indicating he was a member of the local Democratic party committee.
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FLASHBACKs >
Return of the Black Panther
Justice is stonewalling on voter intimidationU.S. Commission on Civil Rights Demands Answers on Voter Intimidation Case Dismissal
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Bias you can BET on
During a commercial break, they gave a news update. An announcer said,"They tried to get the Bronx kid, Sonia Sotomayor, but she beat them".
There was not one mention of Sotomayor's controversial racist statements.
Thus, black viewers who don't follow the news closely are led to conclude that those "evil racist white republicans" are at it again trying to block a person of color.
I wonder how BET reported the Democrats' trashing of black, Clarence Thomas and Hispanic, Alberto Gonzalez? [snip]
With the majority of black Americans getting their news from black and white liberal-biased media, there is very little chance of them hearing the truth. Fortunately, I escaped the liberal plantation in the early 90s when I started listening to brilliant black conservatives like Thomas Sowell and Walter Williams.
I thought, "Why haven't these guys ever been featured on Oprah or honored at the NAACP awards?"
[Recommended > ]
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CNN's Toobin: 'Preposterous' to Believe in 2nd Amend. Right Back at Harvard
During CNN’s coverage of the Sotomayor hearings on Wednesday, legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin, a graduate of Harvard Law School, implied that the Supreme Court’s 2008 decision to uphold the Second Amendment was revolutionary: “When I was in law school...the idea that you had a Second Amendment right to a gun was considered preposterous....But the Supreme Court [in Heller]...said that...individuals have a personal right to bear arms.”
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[Meanwhile, in the real world...]
Suit Thrown Out That Would Have Stoped Guns In Restaurants Bill
NASHVILLE, Tenn. - A judge has thrown out a lawsuit intended to keep Tennessee's new restaurant gun law from going into effect.
A group of restaurant owners went to court Monday to try and stop a new law that would let people carry handguns into restaurants...
[Bet the service improves.]
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50% Say 'Rigged' Election Rules Explain High Reelection Rate for Congress
Why do virtually all members of Congress get reelected despite the public's disapproval of the legislative body they serve in? One answer frequently heard in Washington, D.C. is that “people hate Congress but love their own congressman.”
The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey shows that just 23% of voters really accept this answer. Those 23% believe members of Congress get reelected because they do a good job representing their constituents.
However, 50% believe the high reelection rates result from election rules that are “rigged to benefit members of Congress.” It is worth noting that the word “rigged” is a strong term included in this survey question. The fact that half the nation’s voters believe the election rules are "rigged" is a testament to the high levels of distrust in the country today.
Twenty-eight percent (28%) aren’t sure how to explain the extraordinarily high level of job security enjoyed by incumbent legislators.
[They know, they just weren't sure how to spell gerrymandering.]
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News Executives In The Tank
The network news divisions are enjoying the unprecedented coverage they're providing President Obama, not just because they support him, but because White House specials are cheap and do well in the ratings.
"Obama should change his middle name from Hussein to Nielsen,"
quipped longtime TV reporter Gail Shister (Snip)laudatory coverage leads to popularity, which leads to higher TV ratings, which leads to more laudatory coverage...
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DID YOU KNOW?...
Monday night Democrats voted to shut down the U.S. House Representatives rather than allow a handful of Republican Congressmen to speak on the floor. What could have been so offensive or frightening about our discourse that Speaker Pelosi felt she had to protect her party by gagging free speech in the House ?
In fact, they had planned to speak on the lack of transparency of the House since Democrats took control... [snip]
So the Speaker obviously feels that if the public is truly aware of her party’s agenda, they will reject it. She is now making sure the public is kept in the dark by trampling the centuries-old democratic traditions of the House.
What are those traditions? Every day that the House is in session, following the final vote of the day, representatives are allowed the privilege of free speech on the House floor in what is known as “Special Orders.” They may speak for one minute, five minutes, or one hour segments, and must request their time in advance. Time is allocated equally to both parties on a first-come basis... [snip]
Instead, Republicans were met with locked doors....
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'We Took Sides, Straight and Simple' Against Palin'
On AOL Politics Daily, long-time White House reporter Carl Cannon bluntly declared that the political press gave Sarah Palin a raw deal in the 2008 campaign, and seriously failed to scrutinize Joe Biden, especially his fact-mangling and odd statements in the vice presidential debate. Cannon summed up:
"In the 2008 election, we took sides, straight and simple, particularly with regard to the vice presidential race. I don't know that we played a decisive role in that campaign, and I'm not saying the better side lost. What I am saying is that we simply didn't hold Joe Biden to the same standard as Sarah Palin, and for me, the real loser in this sordid tale is my chosen profession.'
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Barack Obama Campaign Promise No. 517:
Negotiate health care reform in public sessions televised on C-SPAN
"I'm going to have all the negotiations around a big table. ... What we will do is, we'll have the negotiations televised on C-SPAN, so that people can see who is making arguments on behalf of their constituents, and who are making arguments on behalf of the drug companies or the insurance companies. And so, that approach, I think is what is going to allow people to stay involved in this process."Barack Obama, Town hall meeting on Aug. 21, 2008, in Chester, Va.
So far, substantial negotiations on health reform have been held behind closed doors. These include two agreements with the drug industry and hospitals to reduce costs over the next 10 years. In Congress, some of the committee bill writing sessions have been open, but negotiations are also taking place behind closed doors.
Obama promised — repeatedly — an end to closed-door negotiations and complete openness for the health care talks. But he hasn't delivered. Instead of open talks of C-SPAN, we've gotten more of the same — talks behind closed doors at the White House and Congress.
We might revisit this promise if there's a dramatic change, but we see nothing to indicate anything has changed. We rate this Promise Broken.READ MORE
House orders 'In God We Trust' engraved in new visitor center
Washington - The national motto, "In God We Trust," will be engraved in the Capitol Visitor Center, responding to critics who said Congress spent $621 million on the new facility without paying due respect to the nation's religious heritage.
The House voted 410-8 Thursday to direct the Architect of the Capitol to engrave ''In God We Trust'' and the Pledge of Allegiance in prominent places in the three-story underground center...
[HOW did a 3-story-621-million National visitor center get built without these cornerstones?
A: Intentionally. The only was you can understand how a conservative nation such as our must constantly battle with such liberal activism is that they've infiltrated and dominate so many of our institutions - most notably a) academia, b) the media, and c) government (not elected 'representatives', but bureaucrat 'lifers').
It's why government must be kept as small as possible...]
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India wants births remote-controlled
Mumbai - India intends to harness the passion-killing properties of late-night television to help control a potentially catastrophic population explosion. Health and Family Welfare Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad has called for the country to redouble its efforts to bring electricity to all its huge rural population.''people will watch TV until late night and then fall asleep. They won't get a chance to produce children''
[Worked for America.]
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