[Where 'World Governments' lead...
{didn't meet curvature specifications to be called bananas - not a joke}]
{didn't meet curvature specifications to be called bananas - not a joke}]
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
Climate Realists unite
In early September, I began noticing a string of news stories about scientists rejecting the orthodoxy on global warming. Because a funny thing is happening to global temperatures -- they're going down, not up... [snip]
Also in September, American Craig Loehle, a scientist who conducts computer modelling on global climate change, confirmed his earlier findings that the so-called Medieval Warm Period (MWP) of about 1,000 years ago did in fact exist and was even warmer than 20th-century temperatures. [snip]
Don Easterbrook, a geologist at Western Washington University, says, "It's practically a slam dunk that we are in for about 30 years of global cooling," as the sun enters a particularly inactive phase. His examination of warming and cooling trends over the past four centuries shows an "almost exact correlation" between climate fluctuations and solar energy received on Earth, while showing almost "no correlation at all with CO2." [snip]
An analytical chemist who works in spectroscopy and atmospheric sensing, Michael J. Myers of Hilton Head, S. C., declared, "Man-made global warming is junk science," explaining that worldwide manmade CO2 emission each year "equals about 0.0168% of the atmosphere's CO2 concentration ? This results in a 0.00064% increase in the absorption of the sun's radiation. This is an insignificantly small number." [snip]
Other international scientists have called the manmade warming theory a "hoax," a "fraud" and simply "not credible". It may be that more global warming doubters are surfacing because there just isn't any global warming.
[ignore 'em, they're {highly qualified} doubters - let's spend trillions anyway and give away most of our liberties in the process...]
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Paler shade of green
[Canada]
Since Stephen Harper won another election, it has become clear just what the irrelevant in the room is. That would be the environment. And that should gladden the heart of every Albertan, given that every party, save the Tories, had a serious Rape-The-Alberta-Economy platform plank. The Greens got 6% of the popular vote. Who knew there were that few pairs of Birkenstocks in this country?
[I.e., folks are slowly waking up to this scam the world over - but it will be a fight to the death against our own governments and the big money (and now business) interests determined to force it upon us regardless of the harm caused...]
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We Cannot Worship Nature and Remain Free
When I heard Barack Obama promise to bankrupt the coal industry I did not hear a man at war with coal -- I heard a man at war with man.
His harsh words for the coal industry sprang from his near deification of nature and his subsequent willingness to sacrifice not only our livelihoods in the name of “environmental responsibility” but our freedom as well...
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Media Attacked Bush Over Baseless Conscription Fears, Ignores Conscription Calls From Obama And Other Dems
Since U.S. troops have been in Iraq, the media instilled baseless fears around college campuses that President Bush would bring back the draft. The Washington Post reported in 2004 the following:
The news, however, remains silent as President-elect Barack Obama rolls out his own plans for conscripting America’s youth.
Obama will have help pushing this agenda from his new chief of staff appointment, Rahm Emanuel. Emanuel proposed conscripting young Americans in his 2006 co-authored book, The Plan:
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Who Defines 'Fair and Balanced,' Sen. Schumer?
Question for Chuck Schumer: Who appointed you - or anybody else in government for that matter to decide what qualifies as "fair and balanced" political news and commentary on radio and television? The question arose earlier this week when the Democratic senator from New York was asked during an interview on Fox News whether he supports restoration of the Federal Communications Commission's Fairness Doctrine:
"I think we should all be fair and balanced, don't you?"
That's an especially rich retort coming from one of the most zealously hyper-partisan members of the Democratic caucus in the U.S. Senate.
The truth is that Democrats like Schumer and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-CA, have been talking up bringing back the Fairness Doctrine because they hope to use it to stifle conservative dissent, particularly that which is heard daily from the likes of Rush Limbaugh and Examiner columnist Michael Reagan on Talk Radio...
[and they will, if we don't have another comprehensive-immigration like uproar to stop them]
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Economic Ignorance: Financial Crisis Bush's Fault
No finer example of a media member who should understand her limitations and keep her mouth shut during economic discussions was the Atlanta Journal-Constitution's Cynthia Tucker Sunday morning who on ABC's "This Week" actually said that all the problems in the financial services industry would have magically disappeared if only the Bush administration would have bailed out individual homeowners.
Maybe more interesting was that she began her nonsensical accusation by saying, "I've never understood." As this was the most accurate statement she made concerning this matter, she should have stopped there.
Sadly, she didn't (video available here, relevant section at 11:33, file photo)
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THE STOCKHOLM CURVE
Recently, the Swedish government announced business tax cuts, income tax cuts and payroll tax cuts to boost jobs. And to market their country to outside businesses, cutting the corporate tax rate is a great move, since the corporate tax is one of the taxes which large companies study when they plan to set up business somewhere:
- The corporate tax reduction will bring the Swedish rate down to 26.3 percent from 28 percent, continuing its fall from a high of 57 percent in 1987.
- This means that Swedes will soon have a corporate tax rate one-third lower than the U.S. average of 39.5 percent (the 35 percent federal rate plus the state average).
- Sweden remains a high-tax country overall, with individual rates well above 50 percent plus pension and payroll obligations; however, Sweden is discovering that it must cut taxes to compete with Ireland, Eastern Europe and fast-growing Asia.
- Nearly three years ago, Sweden eliminated its inheritance tax. The U.S. death tax rate is still 45 percent.
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Sheriff's office can now access huge immigration database
[HT:BK]
The Harris County Sheriff's Office today became the first local law enforcement agency in the nation to test an automated fingerprint check system that gives jailers full access to suspects' immigration history, officials said.
The new program provides a seamless and simultaneous check of immigration and criminal history by linking the FBI's database with the Department of Homeland Security's database, known as IDENT (the Automated Biometric Identification System), officials said Monday.
Gregory Palmore, a spokesman with Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Houston, said the Sheriff's Office was selected to lead the pilot program in part because Houston has "one of the largest criminal alien populations in the United States."
[2008 - 7 years after 9/11 - 'pilot' program. excuse me if I don't give kudos all around]
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Edu...
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Overhauling D.C. School Overcome by Violence
D.C. Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee has dispatched a team of administrators and extra security to an Anacostia middle school where three teachers have been assaulted, a 14-year-old was charged with carrying a shotgun and students have run the hallways discharging fire extinguishers.
Interviews with teachers, parents, students and police paint a picture of a troubled school...
[ya think!?]
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OBAMA AND VOUCHERS
According to public opinion polls, 65 percent of adult African-Americans and 63 percent of adult Hispanics favor the use of school vouchers, as well they should: the number of minority students that are quitting the education system is staggering:
- In 2006 nearly 11 percent of African-American students between the ages of 16 and 24 dropped out of school.
- The dropout rate among Hispanics was 22 percent.
- Higher dropout rates also mean higher unemployment: in 2006, more than half of all African-American dropouts and more than one-third of Hispanic dropouts were not in the labor force.
[this is a {another} union problem - and their strangle hold on certain politicians - plain and simple]
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'Office of President Elect of the United States'
First post-election press conference BO has given, I thought. Cut the guy some slack. But then my mom called me: "Did you see the sign on the podium?
Well, I hadn't seen the sign. I asked American Thinker contributor Otis Glazebrook to send me a picture of the podium. He sent me this:
Once again, BO can't wait to invest himself with the trappings of office.
[it's a little thing - but you've got to admit it's a little bit creepy thing]
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Monday, November 10, 2008
A Statistical Analysis of Media Bias
During the 2008 presidential election, even center-left observers have noted the unmistakable bias of the prestige news media toward Democratic candidates and the Democratic Party in general. As we shall reveal, the bias of the media is pervasive, ideologically motivated, and quantifiable: that is, it has been admitted, measured, and analyzed in statistical terms. Those results reveal a media doggedly out-of-touch with the political center and tilted decidedly leftward. [snip]
These numbers are nothing short of astonishing. It is exceedingly rare to find, even in the most heavily partisan voting districts in the United States, such pronounced imbalances in terms of votes cast or dollars earmarked for one party or the other... [snip]
The most comprehensive investigation of this subject, completed in 2004, found that such outlets cited the views of liberal/leftist organizations at fully 3 times the rate of conservative groups.[47] [snip]
Bias in the news media manifests itself most powerfully not in the form of outright, intentional lies. Rather, media bias is most often a function of what reporters choose not to tell their audience; i.e., the facts they purposely omit so as to avoid contradicting the political narrative they wish to advance. As Tim Groseclose and Jeffrey Milyo put it:
“[F]or every sin of commission…we believe that there are hundreds, and maybe thousands, of sins of omission –" [snip]
Unfortunately, there is nothing funny about the distortion our media have unleashed on the American public and the disabling impact it has on national discourse.
[this is a great piece, credible quantification of different components contributing to media bias, all fully referenced - longish, but fascinating stats that carry you through it - for anyone skeptical of how pervasive it is - HIGHLY RECOMMENDED > ]
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Vets, Troops Not in Uniform Now Can Salute Flag
[HT:PW]
A change to federal law allows U.S. veterans and military personnel not in uniform to render the military-style hand salute during the playing of the national anthem. The law took effect earlier this month, according to a Department of Veterans Affairs news release.
“The military salute is a unique gesture of respect that marks those who have served in our nation’s armed forces,” Veterans Affairs Secretary Dr. James B. Peake said. “This provision allows the application of that honor in all events involving our nation’s flag.”
Traditionally, veterans’ service organizations rendered the hand-salute during the national anthem and at events involving the national flag while wearing their organization’s headgear. Otherwise, as with all other Americans, the etiquette is to place the right hand over the heart.
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US forces find footing in Afghanistan's "human terrain"
Khost, Afghanistan - The young Texan woman talking to the Afghan tribesman wears a US military uniform and carries an assault rifle, but she's not a soldier.
Her training is in anthropology, which is proving an effective tool for negotiating the complexities of Afghanistan's honeycomb tribal structure and, according to a senior US commander, significantly reducing the need for 'kinetic,' or combat, operations.
'We describe the environment that the bad guys operate in, build a foundation for units so they can understand their area,' said Audrey Roberts of the seven-member Human Terrain Team (HTT) in the eastern Khost province. 'It's important so our soldiers can ask informed questions and so we don't walk round in circles.'Translated into actions, that means for example that units are able to quickly tap the real powerbrokers as they push into guarded and often fearful rural communities...
[fascinating article, and proof positive of the adaptability of our military when left to do so - Recommended > ]
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Allies Losing Battle to Plug Terrorists' Cash Pipeline
International interest in continuing to comply with U.N. enforcement rules is waning, according to the former officials, and terrorists have shifted from official financial institutions, frustrating government efforts to cut off their money streams.
"Few assets are now being frozen and, in fact, many countries still have not put in place the legal framework necessary to take action," the report states. The arms embargo and travel ban against those on the list have not been enforced.Donors from Saudi Arabia are the chief sources of support for al-Qaida extremist groups, while the Iranian government keeps financing Hezbollah, Hamas and other terrorist groups, according to the report. The research is intended as a road map for the incoming Obama administration to tighten the system and crack down on evolving terrorist financing schemes.
An advance copy of the report, "The Money Trail," was provided to The Associated Press.
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British Al-Qaeda enclaves back jihad, according to leaked Government document
The threat posed by 'home-grown' terrorists has been laid bare in a leaked Government report which says thousands of Islamist militants in the UK are actively supporting jihadist activities at home and abroad.
The secret dossier states that Britain will remain 'a high-priority target' for international terrorists linked with Al Qaeda for the foreseeable future.And it warns that a network of extremist cells exists in the UK, with the main concentrations in London, Birmingham and Luton.
[photo HT:DT]MSM Spins Surge in Public's Positive View of War Effort
The Pew Research Center finds there has been a dramatic, double-digit jump in the percentage of Americans who believe that the military effort in Iraq is going well. You are the Washington Post. How do you play the story?:
- a. You run a front-page story headlined "Study Finds Surge in Positive Public View of War Effort"; or
- b. You run a story on page A10 headlined "Military Progress Doesn't Make War More Popular."
Both organizations are marching in the proud MSM footsteps of the New York Times. When earlier this month news came that the US-led MNF had successfully routed al Qaeda completely out of Baghdad, the Times buried the story fathoms deep . . . on A19.
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GCWOT?
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Something wrong when a government lets terrorists become celebrities
The long-delayed execution of the three Bali bombers ends one of the strangest sagas in Indonesia's legal history. It is not unusual that Mukhlas, Amrozi and Imam Samudra were put to death five years after their sentencing; many Indonesians on death row have waited far longer.
What is bizarre is that these Jemaah Islamiah members became celebrities before they died...
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Pilgrim site planned for Bali bombers
A WEALTHY supporter of the Bali bombers wants to create a jihadi cemetery for the three men and other "holy warriors". Cecep Hermawan, a businessman and activist in Indonesia's radical Islamist movement, says he wants it to become a site where "pilgrims" can pay their respects to "those who fought for the existence of Islamic sharia, those that paid with their life". He has offered a hectare of land in the city of Cianjur, West Java.
[GCW: Global Cultural War - are we fighting it?]
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Empowering Lies
What if a major news story is made up? What if it's just Hamas propaganda without being true? And what if this story is repeated around the world? Of course, nowadays it's not hard to imagine such things happening. When one gets to specific statistics, however, it should not be too easy to lie and get away with it.
But it is.
The story in question here is by Ibrahim Barzak, “Israel cuts fuel, electricity to Gaza.” Like all individual articles it might be of limited importance by itself but it is an example of a phenomenon which has grown to be almost daily.
In the version run by the Philadelphia Inquirer it carries the following subheadline: “People have only a third of winter needs, said an official. The intent is to halt rocket attacks.”
It is important to emphasize—do a computer search if you like—that this article has been published and broadcast around the world by huge media outlets, not to mention websites.
And the main point—and impact—of the story is a fabrication...
[read how it's done > READ MORE ]
South Ossetian forces occupy Georgian village
Tbilisi - Georgia accused South Ossetian security forces of occupying a Georgian village outside the borders of the breakaway territory on Sunday, drawing warnings from EU officials monitoring a cease-fire. The Georgian government said two South Ossetian tanks and 50 men had entered the village of Perevi on South Ossetia's western flank after Russian forces pulled back.
[this is Russia - pushing until stopped. by who?]
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Zimbabwe attacks 'kill dialogue'
Renewed violence has ended hopes of negotiating an end to Zimbabwe's political crisis, the country's main opposition party has said. The Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) blamed President Robert Mugabe's Zanu-PF party for an ''orgy of brutality'' across Zimbabwe.
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China pumps money into Zim
China has further strengthened its ties with Zimbabwe after Chinese mining giant China Jiangxi Corporation for International and Technical Cooperation (CJIC) announced plans to form a joint venture company with the Zimbabwe Mining Development Corporation (ZMDC) to mine chrome in Zimbabwe. According to a report carried by The Zimbabwe Guardian on Wednesday, CJIC has agreed to bankroll the development of two chrome mines.
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Good news & bad...
.
Iran criticised in new UN report
The International Atomic Energy Agency says Iran is continuing to enrich uranium in defiance of a UN Security Council resolution. In its latest report, the UN watchdog says it has been unable to clear up questions about a possible military dimension to Iran's nuclear work.
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North Korea bans UN weapons monitors
Vienna - North Korea barred UN monitoring throughout its Yongbyon nuclear complex on in a significant step towards scrapping a deal with five powers to scrap its atomic bomb programme, diplomats said. ''The monitors were told that as of today, they are out, no more access permitted to any facilities in Yongbyon.'' The Yongbyon complex includes the reprocessing plant where bomb-grade plutonium can be extracted from spent fuel rods,...
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[BUT...]
Traditional lightbulbs banned by EU
The high energy filament bulbs are being phased out in order to improve energy efficiency and meet climate change targets. The switchover, which will affect all of the European Union's 500 million citizens, was first ordered at a Brussels summit last year as part of an ambitious energy policy to fight climate change.
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WINDS ARE DOMINANT CAUSE OF ICE SHEET LOSSES
Wind-induced circulation changes in the ocean are the dominant cause of the recent ice losses through the glaciers draining both the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets, not "global warming," according to two new studies.
The first study, published in Nature Geoscience, found that there has been a rapid acceleration of several outlet glaciers in Greenland and Antarctica; most notably, Jakobshavn Isbræ, a large outlet glacier feeding a deep-ocean fjord on Greenland's west coast, triggered by the arrival of relatively warm water originating from the Irminger Sea near Iceland.
The second study, published in Geophysical Research Letters, focused on the delivery of Circumpolar Deep Water (CDW) to the inner continental shelf around Pine Island Bay (Antarctica). The most significant result was that temperature changes in CDW related to regional wind, driving seasonal on-shelf flow, while inter-annual changes in the wind forcing lead to inflow variability on a decadal timescale...
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CLIMATE DISTORTING U.S. ENERGY POLICIES
[HT:TO]
Proponents of anthropogenic global warming (AGW) have largely ignored natural climate influences; yet, the evidence is overwhelming that natural factors control the climate and that the greenhouse effect from rising carbon dioxide, while certainly present, is insignificant and as yet undetectable.
Instead of pushing forward the current energy and climate policies floating around Congress, the nation's goal should focus on rational energy policy -- one that accepts that fossil fuels and CO2 present no threat, says S. Fred Singer, an atmospheric physicist and professor emeritus of environmental sciences at the University of Virginia. [snip]
- Today's technologies allow us to burn coal and capture almost all the resulting pollution, making coal a "clean" fuel.
- The high capital costs thrust upon nuclear generation should be lowered considerably by streamlining the licensing process and eliminating the delays that arise from litigation against constructing nuclear reactors.
- Considerable cost savings also can be achieved by standardization and, most importantly, by factory production of major components rather than onsite construction.
[sounds like everyone but us has been making fine progress on energy technology...]
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PANIC OF 2008
Will the recent economic turmoil be remembered by the history books as "the panic of 2008?" If Democrats actually adopt the policies they have advocated on the campaign trail, they will be repeating with eerie precision the mistakes made by both parties that gave us the Great Depression
Economists generally have concluded that, in addition to woefully misguided Federal Reserve actions, two policy errors worsened and prolonged the Great Depression: the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930 and the rapid expansion of unionization and cartelization that followed the National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA) and the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA).
But perhaps the key negative component was the massive increase in unionization, from 13 percent of the workforce in 1935 to 29 percent in 1939, explains Hassett:
- Then, greater unionization led to a doubling of the number of strikes and an increase in their effectiveness because new rules let workers use "sit-down" tactics that shut plants;
- The key labor policy parallel to the 1930s is "card- check" -- union organizers can forgo standard secret ballot procedures when they receive signed union-authorization cards from a majority of employees.
- Although card-check procedures are legal, current law lets employers reject card-check petitions and require secret- ballot elections instead.
Supporters of card-check are presumably willing to accept the possibility of coercion because they believe the end -- a large increase in unionization -- justifies the means. But if that end is achieved, then it likely will lead to a surge in labor costs and reduction in competitiveness for U.S. companies at just the wrong time.
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Bailout funds being spent in ways Congress never foresaw
WASHINGTON — After a bruising battle to get it through a doubting Congress, the Bush administration's $700 billion Wall Street rescue plan to purchase distressed mortgages and other bad assets has morphed into something else entirely. Today the Emergency Economic Stabilization Plan, signed by President Bush on Oct. 3, involves the government taking direct equity stakes in banks, and at least one bank used the money to buy a rival...
[show of hands: who's surprised?]
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[HT:GC]
'I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our
liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow
private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by
inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow
up around the banks will deprive the people of all property until their
children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.'
Thomas Jefferson 1802
[I.e., beware the central bank]
Reason 142 to Homeschool: Obama Teachers Won’t Bully Kids Who Support McCain
.
This video captured in a Finnish documentary (filming and American school) is absolutely horrible and the teacher in it should be fired immediately [it starts on street with adults - hang in there]. Not only does she show her bias, she does it in a way that humiliates the students who support McCain. Just moments later the same teacher is interviewed and rants against doing the exact thing she just did. Simply amazing.
Watch the video here.
[Email recipients not receiving embedded video go to > http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDEAYgm0Dv8 ]
That huge voter turnout? Didn't happen
Despite widespread predictions of record turnout in this year’s presidential election, roughly the same portion* of eligible voters cast ballots in 2008 as in 2004.
Between 60.7 percent and 61.7 percent of the 208.3 million eligible voters cast ballots this year, compared with 60.6 percent of those eligible in 2004, according to a voting analysis by American University political scientist Curtis Gans, an authority on voter turnout.
In 2004, turnout was 6 percentage points higher than in 2000. But Gans said he believed it did not spike more this year because fewer Republicans went to the polls. While it may be premature to draw conclusions, Gans said, it appeared that Republican voting declined 1.3 points, to 28.7 percent of the electorate, while Democratic turnout rose from 28.7 percent to 31.3 percent of the electorate.
[*again: always suspect cardinal-number statistics; they're usually meaningless in an ever growing country/world]
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New Poll: Palin a GOP Rock Star
Despite some news reports suggesting otherwise, a new poll shows that Sarah Palin was a definite asset to John McCain in his run for the White House.
According to a Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey, 69 percent of Republican voters say the Alaska governor helped McCain’s bid for the presidency. Twenty percent of GOP voters said she hurt the ticket, six percent said she had no effect, and 5 percent were undecided.
Other results of the poll:
- 91 percent of Republicans have a favorable view of Palin.
- 65 percent of Republicans have a very favorable view of Palin.
- 64 percent of Republicans say Palin is their top choice for the GOP 2012 presidential nominee.
- 12 percent of Republicans say Mike Huckabee is their top choice for the GOP 2012 presidential nominee.
- 11 percent of Republicans say Mitt Romney is their top choice for the GOP 2012 presidential nominee.
[HT:DT]
The Pope is visiting DC, and Palin takes him out for an afternoon on the Potomac. They're admiring the sights when, all of a sudden, the Pope's hat blows off his head and out into the water. Secret service guys start to launch a boat, but Palin waves them off, saying "Wait, wait. I'll take care of this. Don't worry." Palin steps onto the surface of the water and walks out to the Holy Father's little hat, bends over and picks it up, then walks back. She hands the hat to the Pope amid stunned silence.
The next morning, the Washington Post, NY TImes, ABC News, CBS News, NBC News, and CNN carry a story, complete with photos of the event. The banner headline reads:
"Palin Can't Swim!"
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Friday, November 7, 2008
‘Screaming Eagles’ to Come Home Early
Improved security and decreased violence across the unit’s area of operations in northwestern Baghdad is enabling the early redeployment of the soldiers back to Fort Campbell, Ky., Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman told reporters today.
The unit is commencing pack-up operations, Whitman said, and its return window is around the Thanksgiving-Christmas holiday season.
READ MORE
Thanksgiving is approaching...
[HT:LH!]
The holiday countdown is on, and we have thousands of soldiers registered with our Foster-A-Soldier and Group and Unit Support Programs who are still waiting to receive their first package. What better time to put a smile on a soldier’s face than right now?
We know your heart is with the troops. And we hate asking you to open up your wallets. But without your support, many soldiers will go without this holiday season. If you can’t send a package, you can still help by forwarding this newsletter. Do you belong to a group, church or organization that could pitch in and send a package? Would your company consider supporting a soldier for the holidays? Our Group Gift Department is standing by, ready to create a program just for you.
Want to know what a package means to our soldiers? Check out this thank you sent by Steve Henderson, pictured above, to his friends at Dunkin Donuts last Christmas.
Dear Angela Rae:
I wanted to thank you and all of the people at Dunkin Donuts very much for the Treats for Troops box. All of us in the office shared the goodies and they were great. All of the items were awesome and the Christmas tree was fantastic. We felt like it was Christmas and you know what, it was!!! Thanks for all of your support.
A Thank You from America in Every Package
Shopping is Easy
Treats for Troops makes it easy to put a smile on a soldier's face. Visit Gifts to Go for ready-to-send packages, or shop for individual items on Market Street. Visit Foster-A-Soldier to choose a soldier to sponsor by home state, branch of service, gender or area of deployment. Click on Shop Now if you know your soldier's address or TFT ID. No time to shop? Contact Group Gift and we'll shop for you.
How to Help Without Spending a Dime
The number of soldiers registering with Treats for Troops goes up every month. But with more people having to pinch pennies and cut corners to make ends meet, the number of soldiers being sponsored is way down. We could really use your help reaching out to individuals, groups and organizations who support the troops. So please pass this newsletter along, or copy this link and e-mail it: http://www.treatsfortroops.com. You can also click on the Forward to a Friend Link up in the Quick Links at the Top right.
[PLEASE PASS THIS ON...]
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Pentagon spends $442m on 'multiple kill' space interceptors
The US Missile Defence Agency has assigned a further $442m for work on ''multiple kill vehicles'', designed to let a single American interceptor rocket destroy several orbital targets.
The multi-kill capability is seen as vital if the nascent US missile shield is ever to become a credible defence. Friday's contract award was to Raytheon, to work on their MKV-R concept.
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Russia successfully test-fires new Bulava missile
Moscow - The Russian Navy successfully test-fired a new intercontinental ballistic missile on Thursday, officials said. The Bulava missile was launched from the submerged Dmitry Donskoy nuclear submarine in the White Sea
The Bulava is designed to have a range of 6,200 miles and carry six individually targeted nuclear warheads. It is expected to equip new Borei-class nuclear submarines, the first of which, Yuri Dolgoruky, was to be commissioned later this year.
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Iran to get missile system from Russia
TEHRAN (Reuters) - Russia has agreed to sell an S-300 anti-aircraft missile system to Iran, Iran's defense minister was quoted as saying on Wednesday, a report likely to irritate the United States. S-300 missiles are longer-ranging than the TOR-M1 surface-to-air missiles which Russia, in a deal criticized by the West, earlier this year said it had delivered to the Islamic Republic under a $1 billion contract.
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Russia to Obama: Move to the Back of the Bus
Whether or not we should reach across party lines, we are still one country. We are like a dysfunctional family. While we may or may not always like each other our American family comprises the core of how we first see and know the world. As a family we should always bond tightly together when threatened from the outside.
Yesterday Russian President Medvedev addressed POTUS Elect Obama. Medvedev did not congratulate, extend any offer of cooperation, or show any respect for President Elect Obama. Rather, Medvedev threatened direct attacks on European allies and further military action if President-elect Obama doesn't know Obama's place and act accordingly.
No one ... and I mean no one ... has the right to tell our President Elect to go to the back of the bus. Conservatives, moderates, and liberals alike, we should all be outraged.
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Putin may return to Kremlin in '09: report
[HT:BJ]
MOSCOW– Russian President Dmitry Medvedev could resign from his post in 2009 to pave the way for Vladimir Putin to return to the Kremlin, Vedomosti newspaper reported on Thursday, citing an unidentified source close to the Kremlin.Medvedev Wednesday proposed increasing the presidential term to six years from four years, a step the newspaper said was part of a plan drawn up by Vladislav Surkov, who serves as Medvedev's first deputy chief of staff.
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Chavez takes over biggest gold mine in Venezuela
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's government will take over and nationalize La Cristinas, the biggest gold mine in the country owned by Canada's Crystallex, Mining Minister Rodolfo Sanz said Wednesday. The move is part of leftist Chavez's socialist agenda that calls for nationalizing Venezuela's natural resources.
(Snip) ''This mine will be seized and managed by a state administration''
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[the 'prequel':]
The Glories of Socialism
October 13, 2008
Hugo Chavez has ruined the Venezuelan oil industry.
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U.N. Anti-Blasphemy Resolution Curtails Free Speech
Religious groups and free-speech advocates are banding together to fight a United Nations resolution they say is being used to spread Sharia law to the Western world and to intimidate anyone who criticizes Islam...
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China Sends Global Warming Ransom Note
China has now destroyed Western hopes for a new global warming agreement, just weeks before global talks in Poland aimed at writing a successor for the Kyoto Protocol— which expires in 2012. China has attached a ransom note to its Polish meeting RSVP: They might go along with a new warming pact if the rich countries agree to hand over 1 percent of their GDP—about $300 billion per year—to finance the required non-fossil, higher-cost energy systems the West wants the developing countries to use.
China, India, Brazil, and Mexico had already demanded—in July— that the developed countries cut their emissions by 80–95 percent by 2050. Very unlikely... [snip]
The EU has loudly boasted of trying to set an 80-percent cut in its emissions, but that now looks impossible. Italy, Poland, Hungary, and Greece are part of a “blocking force” saying says they can’t afford to give up coal and oil. Especially when the only alternative is imported Russian gas; Russia recently “invaded” Georgia, many think to stop Georgian efforts to build a gas pipeline that would have competed with Russia’s.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who helped create the Kyoto Protocol, now says that drastic cuts in CO2 emissions are “ill-advised climate policy.” She’s building 26 brown-coal power plants instead, and re-thinking the German promise to scuttle its nuclear power plants.
Don’t spend much of your “worry time” on a new climate treaty however. Global temperatures are doing their best to tell us that CO2 isn’t very important after all...
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A Really Bad Idea
... First, the plan will first destroy America's domestic energy producers, and once that bridge is burned, force the United States to rely on alternative energies that have not been developed.
History shows that centrally planned industries fail, and when there's an energy shortage, the private sector works best when it's left alone. The Obama plan would also destroy America's best competitive advantage -- its treasure trove of coal and the companies that produce it. Consider:
- America is the Saudi Arabia of coal, with the world's largest demonstrated reserve base of 489 billion short tons.
- About 93 percent of it is used to produce electricity, and it provides about half of U.S. electricity needs.
- As the nation's economy expands, that need for coal is projected to grow about 20 percent by 2030.
- If that need can't be met, consumers will be hit with high prices brought on by shortages.
- Meanwhile, America's 80,000 miners and 1.6 million workers in coal-related and coal-dependent industries would suffer from taxes on new coal power plants.
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Capitalism and the Financial Crisis
Professor George Reisman has written a very insightful article on his blog titled "The Myth that Laissez Faire Is Responsible for Our Financial Crisis." You can decide whether we have in an unregulated laissez-faire economy. [snip]
... the Departments of: Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, Health and Human Services, Education, Energy, Labor, Agriculture, Commerce, and Interior. In addition, there is the alphabet soup cluster of federal agencies such as: the IRS, the FRB and FDIC, the EPA, FDA, SEC, CFTC, NLRB, FTC, FCC, FERC, FEMA, FAA, CAA, INS, OHSA, CPSC, NHTSA, EEOC, BATF, DEA, NIH, and NASA.
Here's my question to you: Can one be sane and at the same time hold that ours is an unregulated laissez-faire economy? Better yet, tell me what a businessman, or for that matter you, can do that does not involve some kind of government regulation. [snip]
The blame for our current financial mess rests with government, with the major player being the Federal Reserve Board keeping interest rates artificially low and the congressional and White House market interference in the name of more home ownership.
In the clamor for more regulation over our financial institutions, has anybody bothered to ask whether people in government know what they're doing?
[actually they tend to - the problem is that they've no incentive to do the right thing and often plenty of incentive to do the opposite. It's the nature of government that makes abysmal performance inevitable]
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Amendment to make English official language passes
JEFFERSON CITY - The Missouri Constitution will include an amendment making English the official language for all government proceedings. Voters on Tuesday approved Amendment 1, which would prohibit using any other language in all government meetings from local committees to the state Legislature.
[a good idea, differences in language is the single most divisive difference there is, and makes those who don't speak it inordinately susceptible to manipulation by special interest groups {yeah, like the rest of us have proven particularly resistant - but still}]
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Prop 8 losers don't understand Constitutional law...
California
The losers in the hotly contested issue of changing the historic definition of marriage to suddenly include all kinds of various definitions in California evidently do not understand the authority of Constitutional rule.
The Supreme Court of a State can not override specificity in the document that they themselves are organized by. (Snip) The Constitution is accountable to the will of the people, the Supreme Court is accountable to the Constitution...
[time will tell]
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New York Times Election Map Shows America As Nearly All Blue
Thursday's New York Times has a large map of the U.S. showing county-by-county election results as a sea of Democratic blue, with red areas limited to a few southern states, Arizona and Alaska. It looks like a Democratic landslide. The big blue map consumes the entire top half of the front page of the Times special election section of today’s paper.
But Barack Obama did not actually win states like Utah, Montana, Idaho, North and South Dakota, Nebraska, South Carolina, etc., that this map shows as mostly or totally blue. What the New York Times published this year is a map showing the shift in a county’s vote from 2004, not the results. So if a Republican county voted for Bush by 12 points in 2004, but only gave McCain a seven-point advantage this year, the Times paints it as blue, not red.
The Washington Post has a county-by-county results map that looks a lot like the map from 2004, although there is clearly a little more blue this year and the red is a little lighter.
There’s no disputing that Obama won on Tuesday, but the big blue map published by New York Times seems like a way to overstate the magnitude of the Democratic victory — maybe just to give liberals a nice blue souvenir to hang on their office cubicles, or maybe a subliminal way of pushing the idea of a huge mandate for liberal government.
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Media Bias Saved America?
Philadelphia Daily News senior writer Will Bunch first tried to argue that the media are not really biased, just accurate in pointing out the sleazy negativity of John McCain and the know-nothingness of Sarah Palin. But he ended by merely proclaiming that this so-called media bias "may just have saved America." Objectivity is for cowards:
But for eight years now, there’s been an out-of-control fire raging outside of the sacred sanctuary of the Temple of Objective Journalism – a fire that was built upon the USA Patriot Act and Guantanamo and rendition and torture and signing statements and 16 words in a State of the Union Address. Ultimately, saving the last fabric of democracy is more important than worrying about what commandments of journalism were stepped on while the blaze was finally extinguished.
[translation: it's ok in our case because we're right]
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The Oath of a Citizen
By Nancy Salvato Thursday, November 6, 2008
The United States of America has in one fell swoop rejected the status quo and elected the first black president. Now that the minorities in this country have seen one of their own elected to the highest office in the land, hopefully we can finally put the race issue to bed and discontinue the Balkanizing of America. Although we have our differences, these differences should not be what identify us. There should not be a hyphen in front of or behind the word American. Profiling should be left to those who investigate crime.
Although I chose to support McCain-Palin, I feel none of the angst that my Democratic brethren expressed at President Bush’s election. I am willing to accept America’s choice in the next leader of this free country.
There are two things I ask of this new administration. I ask that they respect the government that was put into place 220 years ago because it allows us the most freedom to pursue the most happiness without trampling on others’ freedom and pursuit of happiness. I ask that the change that can and should help more people realize their dreams while not occurring at someone else’s expense. Let’s begin the new era of change by teaching those who cannot fish, how, and not use the hard earned catch of some to feed others' drive and ambition. That has to come from within.
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Thursday, November 6, 2008
Soldiers Learn Electronic Warfare Skills in Eastern Baghdad
FORWARD OPERATING BASE RUSTAMIYAH, Iraq, Nov. 5, 2008 – Selected soldiers assigned to the 10th Mountain Division’s 4th Brigade Combat Team and Multinational Division Baghdad received electronic warfare training here.
Electronic warfare applies the radio frequency spectrum to defeat an enemy and save lives on the battlefield. Improvised explosive devices are the biggest threat to coalition and Iraqi forces, and defeating that threat is the biggest concern for leaders, explained Navy Lt. Christopher Winters, the 4th Infantry Division’s electronic warfare training officer from Waterville, Maine.
The Army will add electronic warfare specialist to its collection of military occupational specialties in 2010, he said, adding that the soldiers attending the here will be among the first to attain the new MOS.
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Ballots from U.S. troops risk being discarded
WASHINGTON -- As absentee ballots pour in from U.S. troops overseas, officials are voicing concerns that many of those votes won't be counted. "It's dismal," said Rosemary Rodriguez, who works for the U.S. Elections Assistance Commission, a non-partisan group.
"These are the voters that are in some cases preserving our liberties and out there with their lives on the line."Rodriguez estimates that in the last general election, only about 30 percent of overseas military ballots were actually returned and counted...
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Both campaigns experience foreign cyber attacks
Newsweek is reporting that both the Obama and McCain campaign computer systems came under assault from a foreign entity:
The FBI has feared the Russian mob's hacking ability for years and has warned American companies what kinds of attacks they prefer. The Chinese government has also apparently been active in carrying out full fledged assaults against our military networks including those related to nuclear missiles.
This is 21st century warfare carried out by governments. This is a war where the arms race is between those who seek new ways to break into systems past safety and security features put in place by experts on the other side whose job is to safeguard our vital systems.
What is known is that we are behind in this arms race but catching up as both the FBI and Secret Service departments responsible in this area have received massive new funding in recent years to counteract the threat. Hopefully, we'll be able to match the hacker's efforts in the near future.
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Hope and Change in the Real World
You can't deliver on hope and change when you have a vast government apparatus eating up 35 percent of gross domestic product and your program is to increase it. Here are the projected numbers for fiscal year 2009, according to usgovernmentspending.com.
Pension Industrial Complex: 5.9% GDPYep, that military industrial complex doesn't look quite as big and frightening today as it did in 1961 when President Eisenhower first mentioned it.
Medical Industrial Complex: 6.4% GDP
Education Industrial Complex: 5.8% GDP
Military Industrial Complex: 5.4% GDP
With so much money sloshing around you'd think that there would be plenty in there for change -- to look after seniors, to cure the sick, and educate the children. After all, the Pentagon is fighting a couple of foreign wars on its share of the national product. But Sen. Obama doesn't think so. He's not proposing to change very much. He is more into increases.
He proposes to increase the size of the medical industrial complex to extend health insurance to the 50 million uninsured. He's proposing to increase the size of the education industrial complex by introducing universal pre-kindergarten to pre-schoolers. And he's proposing to increase the size of the welfare industrial complex by giving "tax cuts" to people who don't pay federal income tax.
And the military? Well, something's got to be cut...
[to th tune of 25% if Barney Frank gets his way]
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Iraqi raid nets 220 Al Qaeda suspects
Baghdad - Iraqi forces hunting Al Qaeda members arrested 220 people in a raid in western Anbar province, a former insurgent stronghold, the province's police chief and the U.S. military said on Friday.
Police backed by the Iraqi army stormed houses in the village of Owesat, in southern Anbar where they believe the Sunni Islamist insurgents were hiding, on Thursday morning, said Anbar police chief Major General Tareq Yusuf ...
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Accused car-bomb doctors 'motivated by religion'
London - Two doctors accused of plotting to murder hundreds of people using car bombs packed with nails and gas were motivated by an extreme form of Islam, prosecutors will argue at their trial this week. Bilal Abdulla, 29, and Mohammed Asha, 28, are alleged to have staged failed attacks on a central London nightclub and the main terminal building at Glasgow Airport in June 2007.
[GWOT]
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Extremists face tougher UK entry
A ''presumption in favour of exclusion'' is being introduced to make it easier to prevent extremists entering the UK, Home Secretary Jacqui Smith has said. Ms Smith said it would now be up to the individual concerned to prove they would not ''stir up tension'' in the UK. For the first time a list of the names of those excluded - including so-called ''preachers of hate'' - will be published and shared with other countries.
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[Hmm. a bit behind the curve I'd say...]
[photos from London, HT:DT]
Stoning victim 'begged for mercy'
[our enemy]
A young woman recently stoned to death in Somalia first pleaded for her life, a witness has told the BBC. "Don't kill me, don't kill me," she said, according to the man who wanted to remain anonymous. A few minutes later, more than 50 men threw stones.
Human rights group Amnesty International says the victim was a 13-year-old girl who had been raped.
[GWOT]
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Europe's Mosques Move from Back Alleys to Boulevards
There are plans to build several hundred new and often magnificent mosques throughout Europe -- particularly in Germany. Architecture has become the field of a fierce ideological battle about the visibility of Europe's 16 million Muslims. (Snip) stone by stone and minaret by minaret, Muslims in Germany want to become more visible -- they are no longer content to have their places of worship largely hidden from public view. In architectural terms, they want to be part of the cityscape...
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Satellite shows Georgia villages ''torched''
Washington - Hundreds of houses in ethnic Georgian villages in South Ossetia were torched in August, after Russian troops took control of the area, according to an analysis of satellite images released on Thursday.
The analysis, conducted by the American Association for the Advancement of Science on behalf of Amnesty International, did not show who was responsible for the damage but Amnesty said it may be evidence of war crimes.
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World Bank Under Cyber Siege in 'Unprecedented Crisis'
The World Bank Group's computer network — one of the largest repositories of sensitive data about the economies of every nation — has been raided repeatedly by outsiders for more than a year, FOX News has learned.
It is still not known how much information was stolen. But sources inside the bank confirm that servers in the institution's highly-restricted [or not] treasury unit were deeply penetrated with spy software last April.
[and we're now suppossed to sign up to a 'global' banking {and regulated} system?]
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Alaska’s Glaciers Are Growing
Alaska’s glaciers grew this year, after shrinking for most of the last 200 years. The reason? Global temperatures dropped over the past 18 months. The global mean annual temperature has been declining recently because the solar wind thrown out by the sun has retreated to its smallest extent in at least 50 years. This temperature downturn was not predicted by the global computer models, but had been predicted by the sunspot index since 2000. [snip]
Most of our Modern Warming occurred before 1940 and virtually all of our human-emitted CO2 came after that date. The temperatures in 1998—the recent peak—were only 0.2 degree C higher than in 1940. After the temperature drop of the past 18 months, the temperatures are now cooler than in 1940. [snip]
The sunspots are now predicting a 30-year cooling of the earth. That would thicken the Alaskan glaciers somewhat, but probably wouldn’t refill Glacier Bay with ice. That’ll have to wait for the next icy age.
The sunspot index has a 59 percent correlation with our temperatures (with a roughly ten-year lag). CO2 has only an “accidental” 22 percent correlation with our temperatures, which should be grounds for dismissing CO2 as a major climate player. All this is radically different from the 5-degree C warming predicted by the computer models.
However, the scientific rule says: if actual observations tell you something that’s the opposite of your theory, change your theory...
[poor fellow, he still thinks it's about science]
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U.S. FACES SERIOUS RISKS OF BROWNOUTS IN 2009
The United States faces significant risk of power brownouts and blackouts as early as next summer that may cost tens of billions of dollars and threaten lives. It will require about 120 GW of new electricity generation just to maintain a 15 percent reserve margin.
Examining the current state of energy generation in the United States today, researchers found that:
- The United States will require more than 14,500 miles of new electricity transmission lines by 2016. [but not allowed to run through anyone's neighborhood]
- While renewable energy proponents are saying that the United States needs to only add renewable power facilities such as wind farms, generators, at their [laughably optimistic] peak, only produce between five and 20 percent of required energy.
- Opposition to natural gas production, which is needed to fuel the growing reliance on natural gas fired power plants.
- Regulatory uncertainty associated with climate change policy development and the reluctance by state regulators to approve rate increases related to the imposition of new environmental regulation.
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National road toll devices to be tested by drivers next year
[UK]
Hundreds of drivers are being recruited to take part in government-funded road-pricing trials that could result in charges of up to £1.30 a mile on the most congested roads.
The test runs will start early next year in four locations and will involve fitting a satellite-tracking device to the vehicles of volunteers. An on-board unit will automatically deduct payments from a shadow account set up in the driver’s name.
[~$3.00 - a mile - and that's just the start...]
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School Clams Up on 'Gay' Pledge Cards Given to Kindergartners
A California school system refuses to say what action, if any, it will take after it received complaints about a kindergarten teacher who encouraged her students to sign "pledge cards" in support of gays.
During a celebration of National Ally Week, Tara Miller, a teacher at the Faith Ringgold School of Arts and Science in Hayward, Calif., passed out cards produced by the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network to her class of kindergartners.
The cards asked signers to be "an ally" and to pledge to "not use anti-LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) language or slurs; intervene, when I feel I can, in situations where others are using anti-LGBT language or harassing other students and actively support safer schools efforts." [snip]
Val Joyner, a school district spokeswoman, told FOXNews.com in an e-mail that when deciding what to teach on this subject matter, educators "gather materials from community agencies and other education groups" and that "the materials have grade level indicators which help determine what is age-appropriate." [special interest groups all, with no mention of parents being consulted anywhere in the article]
[we need universal vouchers. nothing else will work with these people.]
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THE WAR ON 401(K)S
House Democrats are considering an alternative plan that would replace 401(k)s with a flat tax credit at all income levels. The plan, supported by Reps. George Miller (D-Calif.) and Jim McDermott (D-Wash.) states that:
- All workers would get a credit of $600 if they invest 5 percent of their pay into a retirement account run by the Social Security Administration and invested solely in special government bonds paying 3 percent plus inflation.
- Existing 401(k)s would be allowed to remain, but would no longer be tax-deductible.
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Mexican border city desperate to recruit police
The border city of Ciudad Juarez is sending police recruiters across the country and will keep 175 officers who have used drugs in the past as it tries to replace nearly half a police force gutted by firings and retirements. The tough industrial city of 1.2 million, just across the border from El Paso, Texas, has seen several policemen killed and dozen of people murdered in bloody drug gang turf battles in recent months.
[thanks to our impenetrable border security this is little more than an 'interest' piece which won't effect us]
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MEDICAL TOURISM: HEALTH CARE FREE TRADE
Global competition in health care is allowing more patients from developed countries to travel for medical reasons to regions once characterized as "third world." Many of these "medical tourists" are not wealthy, but are seeking high quality medical care at affordable prices.
To meet the growing demand, entrepreneurs are building technologically advanced facilities in India, Thailand, Latin America and elsewhere, and are hiring physicians, technicians and nurses trained to American and European standards. Fees for treatments abroad range from one-half to as little as one-fifth the price in the United States... [snip]
- Apollo Hospital in New Delhi, India, charges $4,000 for cardiac surgery, compared to about $30,000 in the United States.
[Q: think a US-government run program would tolerate such competition?]
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