You Decide

Always decide for yourself whether anything posted in my blog has any information you choose to keep.

Friday, April 28, 2006

 

"Mayor Won't Give Dead Marine's Money Back

When you think humanity has reached an all time low someone has to strip-mine even deeper.


"Mayor Won't Give Dead Marine's Money Back

 

Bostick Is Mayor Of Fort Lupton

Source The DenverChannel.com

"FORT LUPTON, Colo. -- The mother of a U.S. Marine was grieving for her dead son when she found that his savings account had been claimed by the director of the funeral home.

 

It was money that he had no right to and despite a court ruling, the funeral director refused to pay. What's even more puzzling is that he's not just any debtor, he's the mayor of the small town and a member of a City Council that has financial responsibility for the city's budget.

 

7NEWS also found that he has other debts as well, something his constituents may want to know.

 

Jason Sepulveda, a Marine, was training at Camp Lejune in North Carolina, preparing to go to Iraq, when in an evening off-base, he was killed in a car accident.

 

"My son died instantly and the other Marine died approximately two weeks after," said Elis Sepulveda, Jason's mother.

 

His parents, who spoke with him weekly, knew he had been saving his money for a long weekend when they would all be together.

 

"We were going on vacation for the Fourth of July to visit him," Sepulveda said. "I know he had been sacrificing because they don't get paid very much."

 

Jason's body was returned to Colorado for burial. Records show that the funeral was paid, in full, by the Marines. But after closing out her son's accounts, Jason's mother realized that the probate court had sent the proceeds of Jason's savings account to the funeral home, which is run by Jim Bostick.

 

"I called Mr. Bostick and I said, 'Well, the courts sent you my son's savings account.' He just kind of really blew me off a lot," Sepulveda said.

 

She said he didn't give her any receipts or bills and just kept the money." .....

 


Friday, April 28, 2006

 

Discover the Networks (dot org)

Discover the Networks (dot org) gives background and funding information about many organizations steering politics today.  Excellent reference.

http://www.discoverthenetwork.org/viewGroups.asp?catId=60


Friday, April 28, 2006

 

"China Eyeing Cuba Offshore Oil

Typical leftist diversionary tactic .... chaos created by illegal aliens demanding amnesty as China moves in to seal a deal with Cuba to drill for oil 50 miles from US shores as leftist environmentalists put pressure on limp wristed politicians for the US to not explore or drill because of "environmental concerns," legal constraints.  Anything to wreck our economy so we can live like third world countires. 

Only makes sense to an Puke environmentalist.


"China Eyeing Cuba Offshore Oil

NewsMax.com

 

China and a host of other oil-hungry nations will be tapping into huge offshore oil deposits a mere 50 miles from the United States while this nation is forced to endure rising gas prices as a result of record high demand for oil fueled by such countries as China and India.  

According to Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, the U.S. energy sector has been "hamstrung" from seeking additional oil resources while at the same time allowing "the likes of China, Canada, Brazil, Spain, France and others to freely seek energy opportunities 50 miles off our coast without competition from state-of-the-art technologies and expertise of our own U.S. gas and oil industries."  

In a speech on the Senate floor, Craig said that a February 2005 U.S. Geological Survey report described "a possible deposit in the North Cuba Basin estimated at 4.6 billion barrels of oil, and possibly as much as 9.3 billion barrels." He then reminded his colleagues "that estimates for Alaska National Wildlife Refuge range from 4 billion to 10 billion barrels."  

So, he said, "The question must be asked: 'What is the U.S. doing while foreign companies and countries are exploring right off the U.S. coast in the North Cuba Basin, which is adjacent to the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf and contiguous with this country's Exclusive Economic Zone?'  Well, I can firmly tell my colleagues that we are doing absolutely nothing. Not one single U.S. company is exploring in these potentially beneficial waters that extend to within 50 miles off the coast of Florida. So, we sit here watching China exploit a valuable resource within eyesight of the U.S. coast. I say -- not on my watch."  

Craig added that he is "certain the American public would be shocked, as this country is trying to reduce our dependency on Middle East oil, that countries like China are realizing this energy resource."

 

China, which he said is the world's second-largest user of petroleum products "is using this area off our coast, and in Cuban national waters, as a strategic commodities reserve. It is doing this by acquiring exclusive rights in the emerging Cuban offshore oil sector -- thereby forever closing the door on those resources to the U.S. industry and drastically impacting our foreign policy in the region."  

According to the Bush administration's "National Security Strategy," China is "expanding trade, but acting as if they can somehow lock up energy supplies around the world or seek to direct markets rather than opening them up."  

A shocking report aired on the Lou Dobbs show Thursday night revealed that Cuba has not only allowed China to drill but also to service an old Soviet refinery in Cuba while U.S. companies are locked out of the game. The Dobbs report also revealed that Venezuela's Castroite president, Hugo Chavez, has offered Chinese oil firms operating rights in his country.   

Craig wants to introduce legislation that will allow the United States to operate in these waters off our southern coast, adding that we cannot allow China to lock up a potentially lucrative oil supply for life in our own backyard. "

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2006/4/27/224539.shtml?s=ic   

 


Friday, April 28, 2006

 

'Green' Politicians Add to Gas Price Woes

And we have the same facts laid out for us again. 

Clintons' economic policies can be reviewed here top 4 paragraphs, the results of which we're living through now. 

http://alamo-girl.com/0341.htm 


 

'Green' Politicians Add to Gas Price Woes

By Steven Milloy

FoxNews.com

" Amid the race between politicians to capitalize on consumer anger at high gas prices, at least one member of Congress, Rep. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., expressed a much-needed perspective on the problem -- these same politicians own a share of the blame.

During an interview with Larry Kudlow earlier this week about rising gas prices, Rep. Blackburn observed, “If we're going to work toward [energy independence], we’re going to have to do some things differently. Now, I can tell you one of the things that I wish had been done differently is over the past 30 years, we have had environmental extremists driving energy policy in this country, saying no to everything.”

Certainly increased demand for oil from the growing Chinese and Indian economies and instability in the Middle East are major pressures on oil prices, but both Republicans and Democrats have added to these pressures by allowing the environmental movement to tie our energy policy in knots.

Bowing to environmentalist demands since the 1970s, Congress has blocked oil and gas drilling from areas like the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (10.4 billion barrels of oil, according to the U.S. Geological Service) and the Outer Continental Shelf (86 billion barrels of oil, according to the Minerals Management Service).

As Cuba works out deals with Canadian, Spanish and Chinese companies to explore for oil as close as 50 miles to Key West, Sen. Mel Martinez, R-Fla., – apparently trying to appease the League of Conservation Voters which has given him a 10 percent rating – dubbed a proposal by Rep. John Peterson, R-Pa., to allow drilling 20 miles off the Florida coast as “crazy.”

Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., and Rep. Connie Mack, R-Fla., also oppose OCS drilling thanks to oil spill hysteria whipped up by the Sierra Club.

Environmentalists helped pressure Congress in 1990 to require “reformulated” gasoline (RFG) supposedly to reduce the formation of ground-level ozone or smog. The RFG process requires use of additives such as ethanol or MTBE.

The RFG requirement raised the price of gasoline not only because of the cost of the additives but because different areas of the country require different blends of fuel to address different air quality circumstances. The 17 so-called “boutique” fuels used around the country make the national gasoline supply less fungible, which causes supply bottlenecks.

And for all this pain, there appears to be little gain from RFG. A 1999 report from the National Research Council reported that, “the net impact of RFG on ambient ozone concentrations...is a few percent. For this reason, it is difficult to quantify the specific contribution of the RFG program to the apparent downward trend in ozone.”

The final kick-in-the-teeth to consumers from the RFG program came last year when environmental groups like the Natural Resource Defense Council pressured Congress to not provide legal liability protection for MTBE makers, who will stop using the additive in gasoline on May 1. (MTBE from leaking underground storage tanks had been detected in groundwater around the country, raising the specter of lawsuits against MTBE manufacturers). Gas prices will soon jump again in many parts of the country as refiners try to avoid future MTBE-related legal liability by switching to the more expensive ethanol additive.

The policy missteps didn’t all occur in Congress.

In the 1990s, the environmentalist-friendly Clinton Administration made Environmental Protection Agency air quality standards much more stringent. Because states that fail to meet these standards stand to lose federal highway money, state governments now require gasoline refineries to install expensive air emissions equipment. The equipment is so expensive that it makes the expansion of existing refineries economically unattractive to investors – and you can forget about the construction and permitting of new refineries.

The problem here is that domestic refineries are operating at or near capacity -- limiting supply and putting more pressure on prices. A weather calamity like Hurricane Katrina can strike the weak link ­– Gulf Coast refineries – thereby limiting supply further and forcing the importation of more expensive gasoline to meet demand.

Not only are the alleged health and environmental benefits of these EPA regulations in doubt, but the EPA is getting ready to make the air quality standards even more stringent – virtually guaranteeing that expanding refinery capacity will proceed very slowly, if at all.

President Bush encouraged fuel conservation this week. That sounds reasonable and it may even be a temporary strategy for reducing gasoline demand and, therefore, prices. But conservation is not a viable long-term strategy for growing the economy. We’re going to need more energy in the future, not less.

Of all the proposals and ideas offered by politicians this week, only Rep. Blackburn’s questions Congress’ role in the problem. No other politician has even come close to hinting that Congress has allowed our national energy policy to be hijacked by environmentalists.

I’m all for environmental protection measures that do more good than harm. I’m also all for private research into alternative energy technologies that make economic sense and don’t require subsidies.

None of this, however, requires that politicians simply knuckle under to junk science-fueled environmental extremists. "

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,193487,00.html


Friday, April 28, 2006

 

Tornado photo link

Thud


 

http://www.stevequayle.com/News.alert/06_Photo_of_Day/060427.photo.of.day.html

http://www.stevequayle.com/index1.html


Thursday, April 27, 2006

 

High Gas Prices ...............

Ann Coulter is recommended reading for anyone who has guts enough to look at the heart of a matter with all the frills cast aside. 

I very much like her no BS bottom line approach.  Big Grin


 

"It's hard out here for a pump

By Ann Coulter

Source World Net Daily

"I would be more interested in what the Democrats had to say about high gas prices if these were not the same people who refused to let us drill for oil in Alaska, imposed massive restrictions on building new refineries, and who shut down the development of nuclear power in this country decades ago.

But it's too much having to watch Democrats wail about the awful calamity to poor working families of having to pay high gas prices.

Imposing punitive taxation on gasoline to force people to ride bicycles has been one of the left's main policy goals for years.

For decades Democrats have been trying to raise the price of gasoline so that the working class will stop their infernal car-driving and start riding on buses where they belong, while liberals ride in Gulfstream jets.

The last time the Democrats controlled the House, the Senate and the presidency was in 1993. Immediately after trying to put gays in the military and socialize all health care, Clinton's next order of business was to propose an energy tax on all fuels, including a 26-cent tax on gas. I think the bill was called "putting people first in line at the bus station." This is the Democratic Party. That's their program.

Al Gore defended the gas tax, vowing that it was "absolutely not coming out" of the energy bill regardless of "how much trouble it causes the entire package."

And mind you, this was before we knew Gore was clinically insane. Back then we thought he was just a double-talking stuffed shirt who seemed kind of gay. The important thing was to force Americans to stop their infernal car-driving, no matter how much it cost.

Democrats in Congress promptly introduced an "energy bill" that would put an additional 25-cent-a-gallon tax on gasoline to stop "global warming," an atmospheric phenomenon supposedly aggravated by frivolous human activities such as commerce, travel and food production.

Democratic House Speaker Tom Foley endorsed the proposal on "Charlie Rose," saying: "I'd have a five-cent increase every year for five years ... But that's not going to happen ... because we've got people who fret and worry that one- or two-tenths of a cent of a gasoline tax is going to cause some revolution at home." So in Tom Foley's universe, two-tenths of a cent is the same as a quarter – another testimonial to the American public educational system.

The Democrats' proposed gas tax did cause a revolution at home, and consequently the Democrats were able to sneak through only an additional 4.3-cent federal tax on gasoline. After tut-tutting the idea that voters would object if the Democrats attempted a huge gas tax increase, Speaker Tom Foley soon became former speaker, and indeed former Congressman Tom Foley.

Gary Hart, another whimsical demonstration of what Democrats think a president should be like, said at the time, "I certainly favor consumption taxes, particularly on energy." Then there's John Kerry, who favored a 50-cent increase in the gas tax in 1994. If he were a rap artist, Kerry's stage name would be "Fifty Cent a Gallon."

Last year, a couple of green "climatologists" at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign were back at it in the journal Science, wheeling out their proposal for a 25-cent-a-gallon tax on gasoline as an "insurance policy" against global warming.

Just two months ago, we were being confidently told – on the basis of a New York Times-CBS News poll, so it must be true – that "Americans might OK a gasoline tax hike if it reduced global warming or lessened U.S. dependence on foreign oil." (This poll was wedged in among the 29 polls claiming Americans think we're losing the war in Iraq.) Other results from the Times' "meaningless polls" section: Americans might "OK" a Dennis Kucinich presidency if it meant free ice cream every Tuesday.

How many times do Democrats have to tell us they want to raise the price of gas for the average American before the average American believes them? Is it more or less than the number of times Democrats tell us they want to surrender in the war on terrorism?

It's as if a switch goes off in people's brains telling them: The Democrats can't be saying they want to destroy the lives of people who drive cars because my father was a Democrat, and the Democrats can't be this stupid!

The Democrats' only objection to current gas prices is that the federal government's cut is a mere 18.4 cents a gallon. States like New York get another 44 cents per gallon in taxes. The Democratic brain processes the fact that "big oil companies" get nearly 9 cents a gallon and thinks: WE SHOULD HAVE ALL THAT MONEY!

When the free market does the exact thing liberals have been itching to do through taxation, they pretend to be appalled by high gas prices, hoping the public will forget that high gas prices are part of their agenda.  "

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=49929


Thursday, April 27, 2006

 

California -156 years ago!

California -156 years ago!

Do you know what happened this week back in 1850, in California?

California became a state.
The State had no electricity.
The State had no money.
Almost everyone spoke Spanish.
There were gun-fights in the streets.

So basically, it was just like California today  .....
except the women had real breasts and men didn't hold hands.       

Tuesday, April 25, 2006

 

"We Can Make Them Go Home On Their Own!

Neal Boortz, a Libertarian usually comes up with some good workable logical solutions based on law since he is an attorney.  From my perspective these sound pretty good especially to force registration compliance for visting worker programs which in NO WAY amounts to amnesty.

Live embedded links.


"WE CAN MAKE THEM GO HOME ON THEIR OWN!

Source Boortz.com

"President Bush is now on record as saying that a massive deportation of illegal aliens in this country just wouldn't work.  OK, so he didn't call them "illegal aliens."  He used the "immigrant" word.  That doesn't work for me.  Immigration is a legal procedure.  Rushing across the border without permission is not immigration.  It's trespassing at best, an invasion at worse.  But .. we digress.  Bush has now told Republicans that "massive deportation of the people here is unrealistic.  It's just not going to work."

He may be right.  I've said it before right here.  If we started loading these criminals onto busses and airplanes and tried sending them back to Mexico, the Mexican government would simply deny  permission for those busses to cross the border and for those airplanes to fly into Mexican airspace.  The United Nations would then immediately start screaming about massive human rights abuses on the part of the U.S.  Forced repatriation with Mexico for the invaders is simply not going to work.

Before we get to a plan that would work, let's review the problem.

Since 1990 an estimated 25 million Latinos have crossed the Mexican - American border .... northbound.  The reason you keep hearing the 11 million figure is because the other 13 to 14 million were given amnesty during the mid-1990s.

Mexicans have come to view crossing the border into the United States in order to work and send money back home as a way of life.  According to an AP article by Mark Stevenson (4/23/06) "Mexico's economy, society and political system are built around the assumption that migration and amnesties for undocumented migrants will continue -- and that the $20 billion they send home every year will keep coming, and almost certainly grow."

Stevenson also reports that Mexicans -- the ones actually living in Mexico -- are giving their babies American names like Johnny and Leslie so that they will fit in better once they've moved to the United States. 

Vicente Fox, Mexico's president, considers the illegal aliens to be "heroes."  Why?  Because they send those tens of millions of dollars back to their families, thus, at least to some extent, relieving Fox of the necessity of tackling corruption in the Mexican government and reforming the Mexican economy so that these people can earn that money there instead of invading the United States to get work.

And please don't forget our friend, Professor Charles Truxillo of the University of New Mexico.  Professor Truxillo says that there will be a new, sovereign Hispanic nation formed within the United States and northern Mexico in the not-too-distant future.  The good professor says that this new nation, called "Republica del Norte" will take in all of California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas and southern Colorado, as well as several northern Mexican states.  How will this all happen?  Truxillo says it will come as a result of electoral pressure of the "future majority Hispanic population in the region."

You think it can't happen?  Well, could you please tell me, then, why Mexican magazines are publishing articles praising the exploits of the "reconquistadors"  while politely informing American citizens "with all due respect, Los Angeles is ours?"

Now, back to the president's remarks.  As it happens, I agree.  We aren't prepared to handle the reaction from Latin America and the howls of protest from the United Nations if we actually try to gather up these invaders and send them back from whence they came.  There is, however, another way.  Let me lay it out for you step-by-step.

1.  Close the borders.  Not next month.  Now.  Send the National Guard.  Send American troops.  What are they for if not to defend the borders of this country?  Start stringing the barbed wire.  Patrol with dogs.  Do whatever needs to be done, but shut the border down.  Let the rest of the world scream, but we have every right to defend our borders against invaders.

2.  Immediately pass legislation providing for harsh penalties for any and all businesses and individuals who hire illegal aliens.  No half-measures.  Make it hurt.  Last week immigration officials arrested over 1000 illegal aliens working for one company that makes pallets and shipping crates.  The officers of that company should be headed to jail, and the company should be seized by the government and sold at auction with the proceeds being used to pay for securing our border.  Put employers in jail --- take their stuff.  Let them know that this is serious and that hiring illegal aliens is tantamount to giving aid and comfort to the enemy.  The hell with their campaign contributions.  Fine them and jail them.  Make 'em scream.  As for getting these jobs done?  Pay a wage that will attract Americans.  It won't hurt.  The majority of people working in agriculture and construction in this country are citizens.  They'll do the work.  Spreading pine straw may be a problem.

3.  Heavily tax all wire and other transfers of money from illegal aliens to their homelands. If Mexico is getting $20 billion a year from illegal aliens in the U.S., seize about 30% of it.  Call it a fine. That $7 billion could also be spent on border and immigration control.

4.  Change the law so that any child born to a person in this country illegally does not automatically become an American citizen.  That child will adopt the citizenship of its mother. 

5.  Put an end to providing all but emergency social services to illegal aliens.  No food stamps, no welfare benefits, no access to taxpayer-funded government schools ... no taxpayer-funded government services except for life saving medical care. 

Enact those proposals, and what would we have?  Those who have already illegally crossed the border will have one helluva time finding work in this country.  No trabajo, no dinero.  If they do find work they'll have another problem sending the money they earned back home.  So .. they're here with no job, no prospect of finding a job, and no way to send their money back to Mexico without a heavy fine if they do happen to find work.  Plus, they can't tap into the great American welfare state.  What is there left to do?  Go home!  That's about it!  And please notice that this is all accomplished without passing any laws making the illegals felons or threatening to deport them or put them in jail.

I heard of one other possible solution recently ... one that is apparently being given some consideration in Washington.  Simply pass a law about illegal immigration that matches, word-for-word, the law in Mexico.  Being in Mexico illegally is a crime, yet Mexico screams when we try to criminalize illegal aliens in this country.  If our law read exactly the same as does theirs, what are they going to say? "

http://boortz.com/nuze/200604/04252006.html#aliens


Tuesday, April 25, 2006

 

.... Spiritual Information from Hopi Indians

This is strictly metaphysical information so if you have an aversion to that type thing please skip over it. 

I found this article to provide a very clear synopsis of earth changes we've been going through the past few years based on ancient timetables and tribal predictioins.  At the very least it provides some interesting things to ponder, and as always good information is about claiming your own power to decide what is the truth for yourself.

Since the concept of time as we know it is measured by a series of events I've been aware for a number of years it has sped up, but this is the first article I've read stating just how much.


"Hopi Elders Say Earth Changes Are Upon Us
"A BIT OF SPIRITUAL INFORMATION FROM THE HOPI INDIANS

by Simon Hunt

Source Kryon In The Spirit Magazine  March 20, 2006

"During the past week there have been a few events that deserve our attention, thought, and examination.

In an unprecedented and totally unexpected way, Hopi
Elders for the first time in history have openly shared their sacred, and heretofore secret prophecies with the world. Robert Ghost Wolf, noted Native American Prophet and author arranged for two Hopi Elders to appear for three hours on the nationally aired Art Bell show (out of Pahrump, NV) and freely discuss their sacred, and heretofore secret prophecies.
It has been said by many who have had limited access to the prophecies in the past, that the Hopi prophecies of the coming earth changes are among the most ancient and accurate available.

The Elders have come forth at this time because they believe that we have passed the point of no return and major changes are imminent, beginning within the next few months.

It is their hope to "soften" the effects by appealing to all to return to a simpler, more spiritual way of life.

Last month at Spiritual Endeavors (and returning again this coming month) noted author, environmentalist, and channeler, Rev. Fred Sterling carried much the same message. Rev. Sterling emphasized that "The Great Shift" has already begun.

It is happening now. In other related recent events, Gordon Michael Scallion, Robert Ghost Wolf, and other modern day prophets began predicting major Earth Changes, especially noticeable in the state of California among other places, beginning this summer. And now the Hopi Elders have gone on national radio with the same message.

So, the Earth is changing? The Great Shift is upon us? What is one to do? I offer the following in reply.

First of all, if you are in denial - get over it. Open up your eyes. Take a look around.

How's the weather in your neck of the woods?

Perhaps it's a little different than it's ever been for your locality?

Try to find out what's really going on. You won't find out by watching Hard Copy, or even the Evening News. Try Nexus magazine at your newsagent. Read back copies.

You'll have to get away from the latest political scandal of who is sleeping with whom and dig just a little deeper to find the things of real importance.

Did you know that tornadoes have been spotted, for the first time in history, that are spinning the wrong way?

Did you know that there are places in Mexico where the ground temperature is heating up in excess of 200 degrees?

Did you know that during a seven day period in early June there were 772 earthquakes recorded on the California - Nevada border near Mammoth Lake? (Gordon Michele Scallion and others are predicting a volcanic eruption there this summer.)

Did you know that on May 31st, the jet stream (an extremely fast wind current that flows through the upper atmosphere) touched ground for the first time in recorded history?

Did you know that all over North America, migratory birds have stopped returning to their nesting grounds? And that salmon are no longer returning to their spawning grounds? And indigenous tribes throughout the world have stopped having children?

OK, so much for denial.

Once you accept that change is happening, LET GO OF FEAR.

Realize that it is a time of change and not necessarily a time of fear. Fear clouds good judgement and put heavy blocks between the inner intuition, which will be so important during this time, and your conscious mind. The earth changing will not kill you; it changes all the time! But fear, denial, and not being open to your Inner -Self and your intuition may.

Once accepted, and FEAR IS NOT AN ISSUE, investigate.

Learn all you can about what is happening. The Internet can be an invaluable tool here. Through the Internet, you'll be able to discover what you'll never hear on the six o'clock news. You will no longer be at the mercy of news programs governed and determined by entertainment ratings.

When one steps out from under the umbrella of mainstream media and begins to learn what is really happening in the world, there is often the tendency towards anger.

"Why hasn't anyone told me this before?"
"Why isn't this on the News?"
"There's a conspiracy going on to keep us in the dark!"

My advice here is to let it pass. Finding out who's responsible and the inner workings of the government or large conglomerations is a tangent that will not only waste your time, but probably lead you into deeper anger and fear and further away from love and truth.

Instead, take the path advised by the Hopi Elders and offered to the world on June 15 over national radio.

Rediscover your spirituality! "If you change now, and change your life around, it will help in the alleviation of much of the terrible outcome from the cataclysms. There is a lot in store for all of us. And the intensity of this will be a lot less if we can all settle down and behave, and not be in the actions that we are right now."

The Hopi Elder went on to explain that it makes no difference whether your spirituality falls in line with an organized philosophy or religion, or if it is something that you have come up with and practice on your own.
"Practice your spirituality, whatever it may be, like you have never practiced it before." And realize that your consciousness affects the outcome.

Your consciousness effects everything.

Realize that your thoughts, words and actions of today contribute to what the world will be like tomorrow. There you have it.

Four easy steps to surviving the earth changes and all the prophecies.
1. Keep your eyes open.
2. Let go of fear.
3. Learn all you can.
4. Live your spirituality.
It all sounds pretty simple. It almost sounds like it could even be fun. And that's a very important point to keep in mind. Fun. True spirituality is fun. Very big fun. Joy is probably a better word; bliss perhaps even better. If your spiritual path is not leading you on a path of joy, I would suggest that it's perhaps time to start shopping around. I have come to the understanding (and it has taken a lot of sorrow to get here) that experiencing joy is the most spiritual thing that one can do in the course of their day.

Joy is infectious. It changes and charges the very air that you walk through. It lightens the hearts of those around you. And in these troubled times I can think of no better healing energy to saturate the Earth with. Joy! Why not take a few moments during each day just to pause and think of something that makes you very happy? Try it. You'll like it.

It might even become a habit.

Well, I guess there's only one more point that need to be addressed here. It's usually the position adopted by most skeptics and those in denial as a justification for their position.

"What if the Hopi Elders are wrong?" "What if Gordon Michael Scallion, Robert Ghost Wolf, Edgar Cayce, and all those other modern day prophets are wrong?"

"What if the weather changes back to the way it has been in the past?"

"What if the birds, and the fish and babies come back?"

"What if there are no big earth changes?"

"What if absolutely nothing happens at all?"

To this I can only reply, "Wouldn't that be nice?"

We'd all be able to breathe a collective sigh of relief and joy, take a look around at the Heaven we've created here on Earth, and take great satisfaction in the fact that we didn't have to go through Hell to get there.

Yes indeed, "WOULDN'T THAT BE NICE?"

2012 Unlimited philosophy

1. Humanity and Planet Earth are currently going through a huge change shift in consciousness and reality perception.

2. The Mayan civilization of Central America was and is the most advanced in relation to time-science knowledge. Their main calendar is the most accurate on the planet. It has never erred. They actually have 22 calendars in total, covering the many timing cycles in the Universe and Solar System. Some of these calendars are yet to be revealed.

3. The Mayan fifth world finished in 1987. The sixth world starts in 2012.
So we are currently "between worlds". This time is called the "Apocalypse" or revealing. This means the real truth will be revealed. It is also the time for us to work through "our stuff" individually and collectively.

4. The Mayan sixth world is actually blank. This means it is up to us, as
co-creators, to start creating the new world and civilization we want now.

5. The Mayans also say that by 2012- we will have gone beyond technology, as we know it. We will have gone beyond time and money. We will have entered the fifth dimension after passing through the fourth dimension Planet Earth and the Solar System will come into galactic synchronization with the rest of the Universe. Our DNA will be "upgraded" (or reprogrammed) from the centre of our galaxy. (Hunab Ku) "Everbody on this planet is mutating. Some are more conscious of it than others. But everyone is doing it" -

6. In 2012 the plane of our Solar System will line up exactly with the plane of our Galaxy, the Milky Way. This cycle has taken 26,000 years to complete. Virgil Armstrong also says that two other galaxies will line up with ours at the same time. A cosmic event!

7. Time is actually speeding up (or collapsing). For thousands of years the Schumann Resonance or pulse (heartbeat) of Earth has been 7.83 cycles per second, The military have used this as a very reliable reference. However, since 1980 this resonance has been slowly rising. It is now over 12 cycles per second! This mean there is the equivalent of less than 16 hours per day instead of the old 24 hours. Another interpretation is, we, or rather Consciousness have been down this same road seven times before over the last 16 billion years. Each of these cycles of Creation runs 20 times faster than the last one. The same amount of Creation is paced 20 times tighter. This is why time seems to be going so fast. It is not "time" but Creation itself that is accelerating.

8. During the Apocalypse or the time "between worlds" many people will be going through many personal changes. The changes will be many and varied. It is all part of what we came here to learn or experience. Examples of change could be- relationships coming to an end, change of residence or location, change of job or work, shift in attitude or thinking etc.

9. Remember, in any given moment we are making small and large decisions. Each decision is based on LOVE or FEAR. Choose love, follow your intuition, not intellect and follow your passion or "burning inner desire." Go with the flow.

10. Thought forms are very important and affect our everyday life. We create our reality with thought forms. If we think negative thoughts of others this is what we attract. If we think positive thoughts, we will attract positive people and events.
So be aware of your thoughts and eliminate the unnecessary negative or judgmental ones.

11. Be aware that most of the media is controlled by just a few. Use discernment! Look for the hidden agendas. Why is this information being presented to you? What is "their" real agenda? Is it a case of problem reaction solution? Do "they" create a problem so that "we" react and ask for a fix, then "they" offer their solution? The "solution is what "they" really wanted in the first place.

12. Remember , almost nothing happens by accident. Almost all "events" are planned by some agency or other. Despite this, it is a very exciting time to be alive!"

http://www.kryon.com/inspiritmag/articles/index.html 


Tuesday, April 25, 2006

 

"Climate Change's Gravy Train

"Climate Change's Gravy Train

By Peter C. Glover

Source Tech Central Station Daily

"In an open letter to Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, 60 leading scientists called upon him to "re-visit the science on global warming and review the policies inherited from his leftwing predecessor." Referring to Kyoto as "pointless," the letter not only questioned the science of climate change, it also cites as a greater threat the billions of dollars that are to be wasted on associated research and development -- an outgrowth of that self-same science.

 

Questioning the justification for this R&D will not only attract the ire of researchers on the gravy train, it threatens the sources of fodder for scare-mongers in the mainstream media. Indeed, had 60 scientists written urging almost anything else, it would have, no doubt, received widespread coverage. But this open letter was marked by an almost deafening media silence in the US, UK and elsewhere.

 

Richard Lindzen, Sloan Professor of Atmospheric Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) asks a pertinent question: "How can a barely discernible, one-degree increase in the recorded global mean temperature since the late 19th century possibly gain public acceptance as the source of weather catastrophes? And how can it translate into claims about future catastrophes? The answer has much to do with misunderstanding the science of climate, plus a willingness to debase climate science into a triangle of alarmism."

 

Lindzen goes on to identify how the doom-mongers in both the science research community and media have a "vested interest" in "hyping" the "political stakes for policymakers who provide more funds for more science research to feed more alarm. "After all", Lindzen wonders, "who puts money into science -- whether for AIDS, or space, or climate -- where there is nothing really alarming"?

 

Lindzen himself knows a thing or two about science research funding. The faculty at MIT has recently suffered cuts. The physics department was only able to accept 25 students this year -- down from 50 last year. And two MIT contracts with NASA -- which PhD candidates rely on to pay for their work -- have been trimmed by 91 percent. During 2005 two research workers turned down funding at MIT to work in Europe where funding is currently less of struggle. But he plainly does not allow this to cloud his opinion on the science.

 

Even though the US still spends more than any other country on scientific research, federal research funds more generally are currently flat or declining in many areas. But the National Institutes of Health saw its budget double between 1998 and 2003. Still, this year saw the Congress approve the first NIH budget cut since 1970. The National Science Foundation received only a modest increase to its massive $5.6 billion budget. (The usual response from science advocates squaring up to warn of the US 'losing its competitive edge' duly followed.)

 

The Bush-led government duly felt the full force of the "anti-science" accusation as a result. The notion that there are issues of more immediate financial need, like Homeland Security, cuts no arctic ice with funding ideologues, however.

 

Lindzen points to how the successes of climate alarmism are directly reflected "in the increased federal spending on climate research from a few hundred million dollars pre-1990 to $1.7 billion today." But he notes a "more sinister side to this feeding frenzy." It's that "scientists who dissent from alarmism have seen their funds disappear, their work derided, and libelled as industry stooges, scientific hacks or worse." The result? "Consequently, lies about climate change gain credence even when they fly in the face of the science that supposedly is their basis."

 

Dr. Roy Spencer recently warned that the current global warming hysteria could be assuaged if "more scientists who don't believe in predictions of climate catastrophe...rise above their fears of losing funding and speak out."

 

In the UK, the trade union Prospect -- which represents 68,000 scientists -- issued a report in March called 'Who's looking after British science?' The report complained bitterly that recent government cuts have "damaged the UK's core science capability." Once again, we are talking about public funding in the public sector. Prospect's real concern was that funding would be switched to "fund research that would only benefit private companies, which could switch the focus of research according to commercial demand."

 

In response to the publication of 2006 Climate Change Programme, Tomorrow's climate, today's challenge, the chair of the British Local Government Association's Board David Sparks has recently demanded that local government "needs £28 million to meet climate change challenges."

 

Perhaps never, in the annals of scientific research, has Mark Twain's observation about science been so apt: "One gets such wholesale returns of conjecture out of such a trifling investment of fact." And the fact is, billions in special interests are now controlling the debate. "

 

Peter C Glover is the author of The Politics of Faith. He also edits the blog Wires From The Bunker. "

http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=042506A


Monday, April 24, 2006

 

"The Immigration Wars

This article lives up to Front Page Magazine's excellent, well researched, articulately stated journalistic ability to go right to the heart of the matter, exposing motivations behind demonstrations and honey dripping offers of amnesty from bleeding hearts. 

When my intuition says there's a hidden agenda, I hammer an issue home and in this case there are two just below the radar, and both aimed at sending our standard of living down the toilet. 

Businesses are NOT one of those hidden agendas but are taking advantage of cheap labor in the short haul.

Well worth the time to read!!


 "The Immigration Wars

By William R. Hawkins
Source  FrontPageMagazine.com
"Conservative talk radio made much of all the foreign flags being waved during the first round of pro-illegal alien demonstrations in March. So when protests were staged in Washington April 10, organizers distributed thousands of American flags and warned activists not to wave the standards of Mexico or El Salvador. CASA of Maryland distributed many of these new false flags. CASA was founded in 1985 by mostly El Salvadoran leftists fleeing from the anti-communist government supported by the Reagan administration during the civil wars in Central America.

The effort to change the image of the April protest was only partially successful. The first demonstrator I encountered outside my office was holding an American flag, but was wearing a Che Guevara T-shirt. Since he had presumably dressed himself, his decision to glorify the communist revolutionary was more indicative of his outlook than the flag given to him for PR purposes. 

Some demonstrators have raised the issue of  "La Reconquista" of the American Southwest by Mexican immigrants. This is most often expressed in signs that read "we didn't cross the border, the border crossed us." It is taught in Mexican schools that what are now the states of Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, California , and Utah, along with parts of Colorado and Wyoming, were "stolen" from Mexico between 1836 and 1848 by American imperialists and will one day be regained. Ironically, the revolt that won Texas independence was staged by colonists and "guest workers" originally invited into the territory by the Mexican government. But the threat to American independence is not limited to the Southwest, as illegals do not all stay in the border areas. They spread out across the United States. Thus, the political aim of those mobilizing the immigrants is to take national power in Washington and change the course of American destiny.

The march down 16th Street to Lafayette Park, across from the White House, passed in front of my office building. There were still plenty of Mexican and other Latin flags being waved, as well as signs written in Spanish. There were also many placards from the A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition (Act Now to Stop War & End Racism), the leading leftist antiwar group that was one of the main organizers of the march. On their website, the column demanding "amnesty and full rights for immigrants" sits next to the column boosting of the protests in March marking the third anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, and above the articles condemning anti-terrorist operations in Gaza and the Philippines.

Casting its propaganda in terms of halting U.S. imperialism, A.N.S.W.E.R. wants to change the direction of American politics by enfranchising a Third World electorate. Its efforts should be considered a companion tactic to that of the International Endowment for Democracy (IED) which was founded in March at about the same time the marches started. Its board of directors includes Ramsey Clark, Gore Vidal and Howard Zinn, all of whom have ties to A.N.S.W.E.R. as well as a gaggle of Marxist professors who specialize in anti-imperialist studies. The aim of the IED is to help finance "progressive" politics throughout the United States with foreign money. In its "Urgent Appeal to the People of the World," IED asked for "donations, no matter how small, from all those victimized by our government's actions." The IED hopes "to use foreign monies  to help build a real democracy in the country that needs it most, the U.S.A." A democracy expanded by the influx of alien– and alienated, voters. This leftist strategy of using foreign funders and immigrants to take over American government amounts to an invasion plot.

Some proponents of amnesty argue that to oppose open borders is to retreat into isolationism. Yet, it is the left-wing groups organizing the "open border" rallies who desire to see a withdrawal of U.S. power from the outside world and a collapse of America's global influence, which they consider to be the manifestations of an evil empire.

My favorite banner was a large one carried by six marchers which read, in both English and Spanish, "For A World Without Borders And Law." It is commonly heard that "9/11 changed everything." For the large and well-organized immigrant rights community, which is heavily funded by left-wing foundations like Ford, Soros and MacArthur, this has meant a more active drive to keep the borders open, if not disappear all together. Their aim is not just to legalize the "undocumented" horde that is already here, but to make sure the flow continues.

The march went past the headquarters of the AFL-CIO. Some unions have endorsed immigrant rights in an attempt to find new recruits, and the AFL-CIO supported the cross country "freedom ride" conducted on behalf of illegals in 2003. However, the AFL-CIO's arch rival, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) has been the more active force behind the current wave of nation-wide protests. The SEIU, which claims to be the country's largest immigrant union with 1.8 million members, led several other unions in a walk out from the AFL-CIO in July 2005 on the grounds that the traditional unions were not playing an active enough role in politics.

The SEIU endorsed Howard Dean for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2004, and at its national convention voted to end the U.S. "occupation of Iraq" and withdraw all U.S. troops, putting the union firmly in the "anti-imperialist" camp. The SEIU has called for "the redirecting of the nation's resources from inflated military spending to meeting the needs of working families for health care, education, a clean environment, housing and a decent standard of living."

In the U.S., leftists have long believed that importing a new proletariat is the quickest way to build a mass movement to challenge a middle America that has been trending towards the right. Democratic Sen. Ted Kennedy understands this, and wants illegals rushed into the voting booths via an amnesty program. This is much more radical than President Bush's original guest worker plan, which envisioned immigrants staying only a few years to work before going back home. Senators John McCain, Chuck Hagel and other Republicans supporting rapid "citizenship" seem ignorant of this larger left-wing agenda.

The April 11 front page color photo in the Express tabloid, distributed by the Washington Post to commuters, should awaken all Republicans and conservatives to the danger. The photo centered on a demonstrator holding a sign that read "Today We March, Tomorrow We Vote."

In an odd alliance with radical labor and antiwar groups, major business organizations like the Chamber of Commerce and the Business Roundtable have endorsed amnesty programs for illegal workers to insure a pool of "cheap labor." But what may be "cheap" for a company can be very expensive for society. After generations of trying to alleviate poverty and expand the middle class, we are now being told that poverty is so critical to the economy that more of it must be imported.

Yet, polls consistently show that the vast majority of Americans do not want to see their tax dollars used to subsidize "cheap labor" with the welfare checks, remedial education programs, health care benefits and larger prisons that come with any expansion of a destitute Marxist-style "working class" favored in some dim-witted business circles. I say dim-witted because the business community will be the first to suffer if there is a demographic shift to the left in American politics. For business leaders to advocate the enfranchisement of millions of illegal aliens would be the perfect example of the old adage "penny wise, but pound foolish."
http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=22156


Monday, April 24, 2006

 

"Is it Bin Laden or Another Angry Democrat?

"Is it Bin Laden or Another Angry Democrat?

by Sher Zieve

Source New Media Alliance

"No, I’m not trying to unjustly accuse Democrat leaders of terrorism—although, with some of their ongoing and recent comments one does have to wonder. I must say that I do find Osama bin-Laden’s comments eerily similar to those I’ve heard from the mouths of Democrats. And Al-Jazeera’s Sunday release of a new audio tape, recorded by its leader Osama, brought many Democrats’ comments and positions flooding back. So, I have to question if this most-recent Osama tape was actually made by the “man himself” or some enraged Democrat. Hmmm.

In his latest tirade, Osama blames the West (naturally—he predominantly condemns the US and the Muslims’ long-standing purported nemesis Israel) for “waging war on Islam”. Never mind that it is Islam that started and continues these latest debacles and if the terrorists would simply stop committing terrorist acts, we would not have the need to retaliate. Self-preservation and survival are, after all, strong driving forces.

But, Osama is counting on the fact that Americans have, at last, completely forgotten those Islamic-caused “minor incidents”; the ones that included commandeering 4 planes and crashing them—3 of which made it to their intended targets—that used to be known as the “9/11 disaster and catastrophic event”. This was, of course, caused by radical Islam and an Act of War waged against the US but, no matter. As Senate Minority leader Harry Reid (D-NV) obstructed any and all votes on the Border Security and Immigration bill, before the Senators scurried off to their 2-week Easter vacation, I guess he and the rest of the Dem Senators have followed bin-Laden’s lead and implied command. They have forgotten—or are working very hard to forget (or at least want the American public to forget)—what actually occurred on 9/11/2001. Senators, let me help: “We were attacked!”

Note: Working toward forgetting 9/11, or “assisting” the rest of us to forget, may be the only work they’ve actually done, recently.

Both Senator Kerry (D-MA) and Osama bin-Laden have verbally beaten up President Bus—on the same topic. On 22 April, failed presidential candidate Kerry said before an enthusiastic liberal and leftist crowd at Faneuil Hall, that President Bush sacrificing lives at the '”altar of stubborn pride”. Osama has said on numerous occasions that President Bush is “stubborn”. Note: Whether I agree with President Bush on his entire agenda or not, I personally want a president who is stubborn with respect towards defeating the enemies of our country.

Then we have the much-reported story of President Bush reading to children just before he was advised that the first 9/11 plane had hit one of the World Trade Center towers. Osama said: “He was more interested in listening to the child's story about the goat rather than worry about what was happening to the towers. So, we had three times the time necessary to accomplish the events.” Three times the time? Give us all a break, Osama. But—then we had Sen. Kerry (who confidently says he will probably run for POTUS—again—in 2008—can you believe it?) saying, in his own inimitable monotone: “Had I been reading to children and had my top aide whisper in my ear that America is under attack, I would have told those kids very nicely and politely that the president of the United States has something that he needs to attend to.” These comments from both Osama “the-Islamic-menace” and Sen. John “I-fought-the-US-when-I-returned-from-Viet-Nam” Kerry are a bit to similar for any semblance of comfort. Note: Considering Mr. Kerry’s natural inclinations, in most things, I imagine he would have run sweating and screaming from the classroom and out of the school doors yelling to the Secret Service “Get me outta’ here to someplace safe! Aaarrgh!!!”

Today’s tape, in which Osama makes no apologies for al-Qaeda’s indiscriminate bombings, dismembering and murder of fellow Muslims around the world says: “While the war continues, the people renew their allegiance to their rulers and politicians and continue to send their sons to our countries to fight us” and then continues saying that the war is “a Zionist [Jewish] and crusaders [Christian] war on Islam”. We had to know that was coming. Guess that pretty much cover the 2 major religious groups and the populations that have had the audacious arrogance to fight back against a war that radical Islam brought to us. Naturally, liberals and leftists within the US and elsewhere also want us to stop fighting. Just as the French, the Left is committed to surrender—even before any fight is imminent. That’s what Osama, al-Qaeda, the Taliban, Hezbollah and all the rest of the myriad terrorist groups want. It’s what they are counting on. It’s also what US Democrat Senators Kennedy, Kerry, Durbin, Schumer and on—and on—want too!

From my perspective, I hear Osama speak and then I hear and see the Democrat leaders use what he says to continue to trash the president. Do the Democrats and Osama have the same speech writers? One has to wonder. And what is the recently announced “Democrat national security plan”? Oh, yeah—to “get bin-Laden”. I have to doubt that. If they really have a plan, why haven’t they shared it with the White House? Or is it the same plan Kerry had when he was running for president? You remember, don’t you? Kerry said that he’d share his plan with “the people” AFTER he was elected. Yeah—right. Democrat plan to “get bin-Laden”? Nah—won’t happen. If they do, they’ll lose one of their biggest supporters.

However, the Democrats are mad at Osama for one thing. Every time one of his tapes is released, it reminds the people who really have forgotten 9/11 that the massive carnage and destruction really occurred and that radical Islam actually does plan to destroy and kill all of those who disagree with its barbaric agenda. That’s the only reason the Democrats would want him caught—to shut him up."

http://www.therealitycheck.org/StaffWriter/szieve_NMA042406.html

Monday, April 24, 2006

 

"we are never reminded more clearly how blessed we

"we are never reminded more clearly how blessed we
are till we see those with so little  "

 

http://www.stevequayle.com/News.alert/06_Photo_of_Day/060424.photo.of.day.html


Monday, April 24, 2006

 

"America Losing Its Faith in Itself

"America Losing Its Faith in Itself"

By Warner Todd Huston

Source Chronwatch.com
“Our contest is not only whether we ourselves shall be free, but whether there shall be left to mankind an asylum on earth for civil and religious liberty.” --Samuel Adams

“The cause of America is in a great measure the cause of all mankind...” --Thomas Paine

“...t is a common observation here that our cause is the cause of all mankind, and that we are fighting for their liberty in defending our own.”  --Benjamin Franklin

Americans are losing their faith.  Not their faith in God or religion, though that is slackening as well, but their faith in the essential rightness of America itself.  Until recently Americans were quite sure of the basic truths upon which we are formed and the basic righteousness of those truths.  Unfortunately, many of us are no longer sure of our “givenness,” as Daniel Boorstin so famously termed it.

It’s easy to peg the degradation of that surety to the counter culture of the 1960’s, of course.  The Sixties was a watershed decade for self-doubt, but the doubting began decades before, during the great age of socialist theorizing that swept the world in the early 1900’s. Though seemingly immune from socialist practice and politics, we Americans none-the-less fostered reflection on such ideas in our Universities and from the realm of philosophy, history and art our educated elite accepted the concept of relative thinking--perhaps we weren’t really so good after all. By mid century, when William F. Buckley wrote his famous lament about Yale, it seemed that those educators sanguine of American exceptionalism were far and few between.  It has gotten no better by the start of this new century as anyone who knows of David Horowitz’s work could easily realize.

There was a time not long ago when, to European eyes, both major American political Parties seemed nearly indistinguishable one from the other.  There was a reason for that, too.  It was because both parties agreed that America was a righteous place differing only on the various technical means to sustain that righteousness.  They agreed that our basic ideals were good and both believed that the U.S. Constitution was to be interpreted conservatively as opposed to loosely.  Not only were our principles, conventions, and procedures good but they were the best ever conceived by the mind of man.  Perhaps even the best that ever could be imagined.

Today, Europeans would find one party, the Democratic Party, to seem far more like a party they would be familiar with in their own country.  The Democratic Party has, since the McGovern nomination for his party’s candidacy in 1974, been drifting from a belief in American exceptionalism to one doubting such assuredness.  The party does not believe that America is good, but that it must be remade into a new nation, one governed by early 20th century European sensibilities instead of the ideas of our founding fathers.

Of course, this isn’t a sentiment shared by every--maybe not even most--rank and file Democrats yet today.  However, it is one sponsored by party leadership and party theorists.  But that it has gotten to nearly every last party bigwig and policy wonk is indicative of the distance to which this self-doubt has crept into the American mainstream.  A proof of this is the way conservative former-Sen. Zell Miller (D-Ga.) was treated as a pariah by the his party.  This is not to say that such self-doubt doesn’t exist at all outside of Democratic Party operatives, a notion that will easily be disabused by a glimpse at the many leftist websites.  But it is certainly spreading.

Of course, that spreading cancer in the American heart is what so many conservatives are responding to.  And that is why the conflict has escalated so loudly since Reagan arrived to infuse the conservative movement with purpose and legitimacy.  Naturally, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction and American conservatism is a vital and strong reaction to American doubt coming from the left.  We can only hope that conservatism is a surgeon with a deft enough scalpel to remove that cancer.

Unfortunately, though, that cancer has metastasized in many areas of American life.  It has infected our schools, our entertainment--from movies to literature and poetry--our news providers and even our religious community in many ways.  It will take more than one surgeon for the task, to say the least.

So, what, then, do we do?  How can we return to a belief in ourselves?

Because of the diversity that has always been America, it is harder to identify how to fix it than it is to identify what is going wrong. After all, that diversity is one of the things that made this country the juggernaut that it is.  But, even with the diversity we have always so valued, there have been things that remained constant contributing to our greatness across this land.

English

Certainly there are and have been many regions of this country where one would find a foreign language in great abundance. Cincinnati, Ohio, saw a large German community in the mid-to-late 1800’s.  Texas and points southwest always embraced Spanish.  The Swedes were plentiful in Minnesota.  Creole was heard as much as English in Louisiana and Alabama.  Chicago, Illinois, has claimed the largest Polish community outside of the country of Poland itself.  But, none of these languages were expected to supplant or take higher importance to English.  English was the de facto American language. Today, however, we have allowed that supremacy to be eroded by including other languages on official documentation, and by foisting so-called “bi-lingual” education upon our children in our grade schools.

A reliance on English as the national language will re-focus immigrants and residents alike on being American.  Proficiency in English will again become a badge of citizenship and will foster a feeling of unity and homogeneity, as well it should.  There is nothing wrong with speaking more than one language, but since we are that famous “melting-pot” by design using English as a common tongue is all the more important.  It serves as a glue holding us together, a common bond.

Religion

Ben Franklin said:  “History will afford frequent opportunities of showing the necessity of a public religion, from its usefulness to the public; the advantages of a religious character among private persons; the mischiefs of superstition, etc., and the excellency of the Christian religion above all others ancient or modern.”


 
Religion underlies nearly every aspect of America and its history.  Every founder can be quoted to present religion, belief in God, and the moral precepts of Christianity as essential to the American way of life and the pursuit of virtue.  Even the founders that many today call Deists can be so quoted, though they may have eschewed organized religion.
If we are to continue down the road of excising religion from American life, we will undermine the basic ideas of our laws and society.  Excising religion from our schools is a dangerous game and will do nothing but end up teaching our children that only men should be relied on in life, that there is nothing greater than themselves.  And that is a nihilist notion that this country will not long survive.
Of course, we are also a land of tolerance toward multiple religions.  We do not have to focus solely on the Christian religion, but it is a grave mistake to attack it above all others.  It informs our culture, not just American but all of western society.
           Citizenship
Today, fewer and fewer Americans understand how our civil government works.  Too many citizens lack even a basic understanding of the Constitution and the history that led to our country’s founding. This must be reversed and we must return to teaching such things in our schools.

Americans are jealous of their rights, and that is as it should be. But, John Milton said: ”None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license.” Yet, just what is “liberty,” or “freedom,” or our “rights”?  It is what our rights really entail that is so often misunderstood by the clenched fisted, caterwauling, yahoo braying, by a person that others are violating his “rights.”  Usually, he is utterly ignorant that he is actually violating the rights of everyone around him, not to mention being a societal nuisance.


 
We must return to teaching our children what their “rights” entail, what they mean, and where those rights come from.  Children must be taught that their own rights end where other’s rights begin.  So should everyone else, for that matter.
           Great Men of History
Ralph Waldo Emerson is quoted as saying, “There is properly no history; only biography,” and nothing could be truer of the history of the United States.  We are absolute proof of the “Great man” theory of history; that every time hinges on the actions of great men.
This trend of moving away from teaching our young about our great national heroes and personages is a huge mistake especially when replaced by lesser individuals or foreigners.  Without a feeling for what we have done as a people, we cannot expect our citizens to have a feeling for where we are headed … or should be headed.
We don’t have to settle for the “dead white man’s club” of history, but to turn away from those same “white men” is a slight to our national struggle and the character it built.  We have a whole array of great people in our rich American history so there is no need to sanitize or employ “equal opportunity” for a program on U.S. history.
We should not deny our children the example that these great people of history offer us, to inspire as well as teach.
          Education
While we are discussing educating ourselves about our great national heroes--and I mean real heroes, not sports stars and movie actors--we need to revamp our educational system otherwise, as well.  Math, economics, science, classic literature, history, writing, and reading, these are the subjects we need to impart to our nation’s students.  “Women’s studies,” “minority studies,” or “gay studies” are fine for specialty research for extremely small and focused groups of people, but to have them as highly funded departments, or worse yet, required courses, is simply an absurd waste of money and the valuable learning time of our students..
While we are patting ourselves on the back with such wastes of time, other countries are graduating students with high degrees in the sciences, engineering, and mathematics.  All the while, our students fall farther and farther behind.  This is a crime of education and we will deserve our second-class status if we allow this to continue.
          Charity
Even as far as we have slid as a country, we are still the most generous people on earth.  But our government is beginning to put a major crimp in that generosity.  Until the last 30 years, America grew strong by local communities gathering to build their community through donation of time and money of the locals.  People raised schools, churches, and libraries by urging their citizens and neighbors to join the community in the effort to improve for the good of all.
Culture was spread by thousands of small clubs and gatherings in every last community across the country.  Famed reformer, Jane Addams, of Chicago’s Hull-House, spent her days in the early 1900’s helping poor young women engage in self-improvement through work, literature and fellowship.  She did so through all private donation and volunteerism.  But, today, fewer and fewer people engage in such community conscious activities.  It has become a venue only for the rich or the highly religious.
Too many citizens look to their own selfish desires because, after all, what are they paying the government all those taxes for? Americans today feel that all schools or community organizations should be sponsored and paid for by the government.  This is destroying the sense of community we once had and should have still.
Government is too involved in our everyday lives.  It is removing our sense of responsibility past paying taxes.  We need to rekindle a sense of camaraderie with our neighbors and take such responsibilities back from government.
In closing, I should like to urge every American to cast away that self-doubt.  Yes, we have been responsible for perpetrating some bad things; we will probably make a few more mistakes yet.  But when comparing all the good that we have done in this world to that of any other people, one can easily see that we have far outshone the rest. When discovering the “bad” that we have done in the last 200 and more years, a little perspective is warranted lest you think we come out the worse for comparison.

We are “that shinning city on a hill” of Reagan and Witherspoon’s vision.  Never forget it and never let anyone say different without challenge. "


Monday, April 24, 2006

 

"It's the border, stupid

Thanks to RightNation.US for the link to this. 

<excerpt> 
"It's the border, stupid
By Salena Zito
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Sunday, April 23, 2006


"LAREDO, Texas
There is no homeland security without border security.

Americans sitting in the heartland may not be sweating over border issues but Webb County, Texas, Sheriff Rick Flores thinks they should be.

"Any sheriff, whether they are in Dallas, Iowa or even Nebraska, would much prefer that we squash a threat at the border than force them to deal with it after it gets through us," the sheriff told me in his office here.

"Smugglers have a ready-made infrastructure in place ... and they are just waiting to substitute terrorists and their cargoes for drugs if the price is right."

Flores and 15 other Lone Star sheriffs along the Mexican border banded together in May 2005 to address drug cartels warring over the control of narcotics, human smuggling and a natural offshoot -- the likelihood of a terrorist migration into the United States.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who has taken the lead in funding border security, is impressed with the Texas Border Sheriffs Coalition, "first, by how they identified the scope and magnitude of the growing threat ... then by how they delivered a coordinated strategy to address those risks and threats."

It's intel-led policing at its best.

Talk of a terrorist pipeline is not paranoia. If criminals can smuggle drugs, gang members and illegals, what would stop them from importing members of al-Qaida or Hezbollah?

I recently got an on-the-ground look at what happens along the border. Armed with bulletproof vests, night-vision goggles and M-4s, Webb County deputies showed me the night life along the great divide.".......

........"Washington needs to take the racism card off the table so our leaders can have a reasonable debate about security. This is not about "economic refugees" crossing our borders. This is not an anti-Hispanic issue. It's not an anti-immigrant issue.

It's the border, stupid.  "
http://pittsburghlive.com/x/tribune-review/opinion/columnists/zito/s_446141.html

Sunday, April 23, 2006

 

"Evidence of work fraud untapped

"The incorrect worker files mushroomed during the 1990s as immigrants poured into the United States. Almost half the inaccurate reports come from industries such as agriculture, construction and restaurants. "

The current administration has been cleaning up the mess left by the previous one which precipitated 9-11, the organization of Homeland Security, the un-hobbling of national intelligence which was tied into a pretzel druing the Clinton years, a catastropic hurrricanes and unprecedented other events  .... all the while dealing with obstructionist Democrats and national intelligence leaks now being revealed. 

Hopfully with Homeland Security getting a grip on the problem we'll see more investigations, deportations, penalizing employers to put the invasion put into perspective and do something real about it.


"Evidence of work fraud untapped

By LIz Chandler

Source StarTelegram.com

"WASHINGTON -- Two federal agencies are refusing to turn over a mountain of evidence that investigators could use to indict the nation's burgeoning work force of illegal immigrants and the firms that employ them.

Last week, immigration authorities trumpeted the arrests of nearly 1,200 illegal workers in a massive sting on a single company, but they acknowledge that they relied on confidential informants and an unsolicited tip.

It didn't have to be that hard.

The Internal Revenue Service and the Social Security Administration routinely collect strong evidence of potential workplace crimes, including the names and addresses of millions of people who are using bogus Social Security numbers, their wage records and the identities of those who hire them.

But they keep those facts secret.

"If the government bothered to look, it could find abundant evidence of illegal aliens gaming our system and the unscrupulous employers who are aiding and abetting them," said Rep. J.D. Hayworth, R-Ariz.

The two agencies don't analyze their data to root out likely immigration fraud -- and law enforcement authorities can't do so because the agencies won't share their data.

Privacy laws prohibit that, they say.

The agencies also don't use the power that they have.

The IRS doesn't fine employers who repeatedly submit inaccurate data on workers. Social Security does virtually nothing to alert citizens whose Social Security numbers are being used by others.

Evidence abounds within their files, according to an analysis by Knight Ridder Newspapers and The Charlotte Observer.

One internal study found that a restaurant company had submitted 4,100 duplicate Social Security numbers for workers. Other firms submit inaccurate names or numbers for nearly all their employees. One child's Social Security number was used 742 times by workers in 42 states.

"That's the kind of evidence we want," says Paul Charlton, the U.S. attorney in Arizona. "If you see the same Social Security number a thousand times, it's kind of hard for them to argue they didn't know."

The potential crimes are so obvious that the failure to provide such information to investigators raises questions about Washington's determination to end the widespread hiring of illegal immigrants.

An estimated 7 million unauthorized workers are employed in the United States. They're picking crops, building homes and tending yards. In some cases, they work for the government on public projects that pay them with taxpayer money.

They've built roads in North Carolina and military housing in California and even helped rebuild the Pentagon after 9-11, until law enforcement found out.

They also work at airports, seaports and nuclear plants.

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff has asked Congress for access to earnings reports, sent by employers with money withheld for taxes and Social Security.

The reports contain workers' names and Social Security numbers, and when they don't match Social Security records, the information is set aside in what's called the Earnings Suspense File.

Created in 1937, the file contains about 255 million unmatched wage reports representing $520 billion paid to workers but not credited to their Social Security earnings records.

The incorrect worker files mushroomed during the 1990s as immigrants poured into the United States. Almost half the inaccurate reports come from industries such as agriculture, construction and restaurants.

"We believe the chief cause of [unmatched] wage items ... is unauthorized work by noncitizens," Social Security Inspector General Patrick O'Carroll told Congress in February.

The IRS also receives the mismatch information.

Particularly disturbing is that possibly millions of the Social Security numbers belong to other people.

In Utah, after Social Security provided data for one criminal inquiry, investigators discovered that the Social Security numbers of 2,000 children were being used by other people.

"What do you think we'd find if we had the ability to analyze all of their information?" said Kirk Torgensen, Utah's chief deputy attorney general. "It would be invaluable. How shortsighted is it that the government doesn't follow this trail?"  "

http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/news/nation/14411281.htm


Sunday, April 23, 2006

 

"Overqualified Immigrant

Looks like our bleeding heart legislatorsNo Pity!  are missing something very important here by restricting educated, upwardly mobile ..... and allowing uneducated, unskilled to invade at will. 

However it seems the Socialist left (which is most of the Democratic party whether in stealth or out in the open) is taking a cue from their joined at the hip Marxist communist philosophy of allowing the coarser societal groups to run roughshod over law abiding members of society to purposefully throw things into chaos.  For them it is a matter of asset redistribution ..... seizing your money and distributing it to whoever will vote to keep them in office.

I am not in favor of placing them on a fast track ahead of those who have gone through the arduous legal process of applying for legal citizenship status. 

To do so is to ignore more laws and send a message to immigrants and citizens alike that laws can be twisted at will and may not apply to all. 

We had ENOUGH of that during the Clinton years and WILL BE PAYING FOR IT IN THE FORESEEABLE FUTURE!! Cussing Face  He sold us out to China for illegal foreign campaign contributions so we're seeing that come back around biting deeply economically, did not extradite bin Laden when offered him by the Sudan so directly precipitated 9-11, did squat for illegal alien invasion which is taking another firm bite ...... leaving it for President Bush to pick up the pieces.


"Overqualified Immigrant

By Ilya Shapiro

Source Tech Central Station Daily

"If the federal government ever gets its act together and passes a much-needed immigration reform, I'm giving up my legal career and taking up a profession that will actually allow me to become a U.S. citizen. Like gardening. Or construction. Or anything else that counts as "unskilled."

 

And maybe I'll also fly to Cancun for some sun-and-fun. And come back illegally. (I'm tan and speak fluent Spanish; think I could pass?) Or I'll have a Miami friend take me out on a boat -- so I can come back on a raft.

 

Because I sure ain't gonna get a green card the way I'm going: English-speaking, highly educated, law-abiding, and patriotic. I'm precisely the type of person Uncle Sam would never dream of inviting to be a permanent resident. Unless I got married -- which'll happen sooner or later, right?

 

You see, as I follow the overheated rhetoric about guest-workers and homeland security, legal versus illegal immigrants, and the needs of American business and American labor, I can't help but smile and shake my head. And then go home and cry.

 

Because no matter how hard I work, how good I am at my job (my day job or this writing thing), how brilliant (and sincere) a personal statement I write espousing my love for this country, its people and values, I will never be able to achieve that which is being offered to certain classes of "undocumented" aliens under any of the proposals being batted around Congressional water coolers. That is, every plan under consideration -- save the "enforcement only" ones that don't even attempt to deal with the reality of 12 million illegal aliens -- contains a measure that allows unskilled foreign workers to be put "on the path to citizenship." This path is simply unavailable to skilled workers like me.

 

I'm not trying to be cute here: from President Bush to Kennedy-McCain to Kyl-Cornyn, every immigration policy proposal would allow a certain number of unskilled laborers to obtain legitimate work visas for a number of years. As one or two terms of such a visa run out, those who are still gainfully employed would be able to apply to convert their work visas into permanent resident (green card) status -- holders of which can apply for citizenship five years later.

 

This seems to me a perfectly reasonable reform -- even if you don't grant any amnesty whatsoever for existing illegals; and if these visas are only available to people applying from outside the United States -- there should be some mechanism for importing workers for jobs that can't be filled by Americans at prices Americans employers want to pay (because of limits to what American consumers want to pay). And if these "guest-workers" prove themselves to be good citizens, they should be able to become, well, citizens.

 

The problem for me -- and for the mere tens of thousands of professionals like me -- is that our visas don't work that way. Under an H1-B -- of which only 55,000 new ones are statutorily authorized for each year -- a highly skilled individual (like a software engineer from Bangalore) can work for a particular American employer for six years (two three-year periods). At the end of that time, unless the employer is willing to begin the arduous process of green card sponsorship and can convince the Labor Department that no American possesses even the minimal qualifications for that job -- it is irrelevant if that hypothetical American is far less qualified than the non-American -- the foreign professional has to leave the country. No exceptions.

 

For those of us who are that special brand of foreign professionals known as Canadians, there's also the option of a TN (NAFTA-created) visa. (A TN differs from an H1-B only in that it lasts one year instead of three, and can theoretically be renewed an infinite number of times instead of once.) Either way, there is no "path to citizenship" -- and thus, for me, no way to fulfill the higher purpose that has long been my dream: the service of my adopted country.

 

Despite living here my entire adult life and career, despite my fancy degrees, I cannot work in the State or Defense Departments, in the challenging and critical Justice Department jobs for which I am otherwise qualified, in Executive Office positions, or in any other legal or policy-making posts for which this country has trained me. I cannot even "put my money where my mouth is" (in terms of my support of our engagement in Iraq) by serving in the military JAG Corps -- or even enlisting as a simple infantryman.

 

Nothing in any proposed immigration reform changes any of this.

 

Which is why my resolution to come in on the ground floor of the landscaping industry is only partially in jest. After all, America is worth spending time on your knees in the dirt for. But, really, why have such perverse incentives in the first place?

 

Ilya Shapiro, whose parents took a wrong turn at the St. Lawrence Seaway when immigrating from the Soviet Union, is a Washington lawyer who writes "Dispatches from Purple America.""

http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=042106A


Saturday, April 22, 2006

 

CIA leaker identified, bio

From the Strata-Sphere blog news about who is the first CIA leaker to be nabbed.  They also add  ... "Also, the Department of Justice said they have DOZENS of leak investigations ongoing. This number is much larger than than any I have heard to date, and is, sadly, stunning." ..... 

It's about time!!!  Hit With Stick


"NSA Leak Investigation Nabs First Criminal

http://strata-sphere.com/blog/index.php/archives/1665


Friday, April 21, 2006

 

How Chinese goods remain cheap

A lightbulb moment understanding US China trade imbalances based on Chinese currency exchange rates being kept from floating on world money market exchange rates.  Idea

 

Currency exchange calculator    http://www.xe.com/ucc/

  1.00 CNY China Yuan Renminbi      =      0.124774 USD United States Dollars  


"How Great Powers Become Great

By Pat Buchanan

Source Townhall.com

"The economic growth of 10 percent recorded by China in 2005 would seem to contradict a tenet of faith of all good democratic capitalists.
 
China's performance tells us that, contrary to the teachings of free-trade liberals, dictatorship and protectionism do not necessarily ensure stagnation. For China is a one-party state and the most protectionist great nation on earth. Yet, her growth has been unequaled by any free-market rival nation for 15 years.

How does China achieve her success? By keeping her currency cheap -- refusing to let it float against the dollar -- China is able to offer Chinese goods at fire-sale prices to U.S. consumers, while the cheapness of her currency keeps U.S. goods priced out of China's market.

Despite blustery U.S. protests, the arrangement continues, because both nations see their interests served.

America's consumers want quality goods at the cheapest price. American businesses want to maximize profit by producing at the lowest cost. China accommodates both, by providing efficient and reliable workers at a tenth of the wages an American needs to support his family.

The plaque inside our Statue of Liberty reads, "Send us your tired, your poor, your huddled masses, yearning to breathe free." Beijing says: "Send us your jobs, factories and technology, and we will produce your goods at a far lower price than your own people."

What the U.S. transnational corporation seeks is to retain its privileged access to American consumers, while getting rid of its American workers. China is delighted to accommodate.

Thus, it was our capitalists who were the first and most enthusiastic hosts of Chinese President Hu Jintao on his visit to America. But what does Beijing want?

In China the consumer does not come first. Nor do the voters decide policy, for there are no voters. The regime, state and nation come first. China's leaders want to make her first in manufacturing and high-technology, to become the primary producers for the world, and to displace the United States as the dominant power in Asia and the world.

The story of China and America is the story of the ants and the grasshopper. We spend every dime we earn. The Chinese are forced by the regime to sacrifice the present for a future their leaders envision.

In 2005, China ran up a $203 million trade surplus with us, selling us seven times as much as she bought from us. That trade surplus with America is responsible for 100 percent of her economic growth. China literally produces for the American market. As a result, her dollar reserves are the largest on earth, approaching $1 trillion.

What does Beijing use the money for?

First, she uses the dollars to create ties of dependency in Free Asia by buying more from these nations than she sells to them. Australia, whose natural resources are pouring into China, is becoming dependent for her prosperity on China.

Second, she invests her dollars strategically in energy projects outside of China and in nations America has declared off-limits: Sudan, Iran, Burma.

Third, she buys weapons and weapons technology from Russia, Israel and Europe to modernize her armed forces. And while her GDP growth was 10 percent last year, her defense budget has been steadily rising by more than 10 percent a year.

"Since no nation threatens China, one wonders: Why this growing investment (in her military)?" asks Donald Rumsfeld.

Good question. The configuration of China's forces gives us the answer. China has implanted 600 missiles opposite Taiwan, which can have only two plausible purposes: to intimidate Taiwan, or to attack Taiwan.

China is also investing in warships, submarines, modern fighter-bombers and space technology. As there is only one great air and sea power out there, there is no doubt at whom this buildup is directed.

Diplomatically, Beijing is drawing to her side all the nations that are on the outs with George Bush's America -- from Russia to Burma to Iran to Sudan to Venezuela to the new nations of Central Asia.

China today calls to mind the Kaiser's Germany. As the Kaiser's Germany built a High Seas Fleet to rival the Royal Navy, so China builds up a military to rival ours in Asia. As the Kaiser saw British-backed plots to isolate and surround her, so China sees the United States organizing Japan, Taiwan, Australia, Vietnam, India, Pakistan, Afghanistan and the old Russian provinces of Central Asia against her. Encirclement -- in her eyes.

There is no greater work for today's statesmen than ensuring that what happened to Germany and Britain in the first half of the 20th century is not replicated by America and China in the first half of the 21st. "

http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/patbuchanan/2006/04/21/194568.html


Thursday, April 20, 2006

 

"Give Peaceniks a Chance?

My feelings are that if an competent adult knowingly places themselves in a battle zone protesting the war and is kidnapped, then they did so knowing that was a real possibility and a consequence of the actions they undertook.  Great if they can be rescued in the NORMAL course of military operations, but otherwise hope they manage to convince their captors to spare them until the end of the war.  Life's tough sometimes.


"Give Peaceniks a Chance?

By Val MacQueen

Source Tech Central Station Daily

"In what must be one of the most extraordinary military rescues in history, the British SAS and the Canadian special forces recovered 74-old-British peace activist Norman Kember and his two co-hostages by warning the kidnappers that they would be coming by to effect a rescue and it would be a good idea if they weren't there. Once the "several million pound" ultra sophisticated surveillance operation was ready to activate, the SAS detained a man they were certain was one of the kidnap leaders, persuaded him to cooperate with details of where the hostages were held and ordered him to warn his cohorts to vacate the premises.

 

By the time the British and Canadians blew the door off the house, 118 days after the kidnapping, it was empty except for the three hostages lying on the floor, bound but unguarded. As Glasgow Sunday Herald writer Torcuil Crighton wrote, "With the names of the executed Britons Margaret Hassan and Ken Bigley haunting the Foreign Office, there was never any question of the British government not going after the gang that kidnapped the 74-year-old peace activist Kember."

 

Norman Kember doesn't approve of the war in Iraq.

 

He had made his feelings known to the government, which had inexplicably failed to heed his insights, thus leaving Kember, a retired physics professor, no choice but to go to Iraq to try to organize things himself. He and three others, including 54-year-old American Tom Fox, under the aegis of Christian Peacemaker Teams, went to Iraq with the specific aim of helping Iraqis opposed to the war to file grievance suits against the Coalition of the Willing.

 

On November 26 last year, they were kidnapped by the Swords of Truth Brigade, an outfit that specializes in ransom demands, and on November 30, the now traditional video footage of pleas made its traditional appearance on al-Jazeera. The choreography creaked along, with a second al-Jazeera video of threats made by the hostage-takers a few days later, followed by a video-ed plea from Kember's wife a few days after that.

 

Meanwhile, Kember called, in yet another video, for British troops to be pulled out of Iraq, apparently unaware that his kidnappers had little interest in the war one way or the other. They kidnap people for money. A day or two after that, Abu Qatada, a terrorist suspect -- so someone with street cred in the hood -- made a guest appearance video pleading for their release. Two days later, another terrorist suspect, British-born ex-Guantanamo Bay detainee Moazzam Begg, made his own video pleading for their lives.

 

Then, the deadline passed and all went quiet on the video front. Suddenly, at the end of January, production picked up again, with a video showing the four hostages alive. Two days after that, another video was released, this one showing only three of the hostages. Missing was American Tom Fox. Three days later the Americans confirmed that a body found in Iraq was that of Fox. There has been no explanation of why he was murdered

 

Thirteen days later, the three remaining hostages were rescued in the massive, "several million pounds" operation.

 

On arrival at London's Heathrow, his face churlishly free of gratitude, Kember allowed as how he was fairly pleased to be home.

 

The Christian Peacemaker Team put out a press release advising that the three had "been released", which was a lie, of course. Kember and his two fellow hostages had been rescued in one of the most sophisticated operations ever mounted. Besides the "several million pounds", the massive three months of meticulous and sophisticated information-gathering and planning had involved cooperation between Coalition forces, the SAS, the Joint Communications Headquarters at Cheltenham, MI5 and MI6, with both the armed forces and ordinary Iraqis taking tremendous risks.

 

The British press and the public were quick to pick up on, and condemn, Kember's self-righteous omission of a single word of gratitude that he was back in Britain with his head was still firmly attached to his rigid, disapproving neck, thanks to the action of British military forces. According to Oliver Poole reporting from Baghdad for Britain's The Telegraph, the three rescued hostages also refused to cooperate in their debriefing. Britain's Chief of Defence Staff, General Sir Mike Jackson appeared in television studios with a face like thunder.

 

Although Kember was eventually persuaded to make a faintly more gracious statement, this begs the question: should someone who has demonstrated disloyalty to his own country and has deliberately placed himself in harm's way be the subject of massive public expenditure and risk of the lives of professional soldiers, and ordinary citizens on the ground, when his foolish and willful behavior leads him to be kidnapped? If the citizen shows no loyalty to his country, what does his country owe him?

Val MacQueen is a TCS contributing writer."

http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=041906C


Wednesday, April 19, 2006

 

"Is there a federal deficit?

"Is there a federal deficit?

By Walter E. Williams

Townhall.com

"Let's push back the frontiers of ignorance about the federal deficit. To simplify things, I'll use round numbers that are fairly close to the actual numbers.

The nation's 2005 gross domestic product (GDP), what the American people produced, totaled $13 trillion. The federal government consumed $2.4 trillion, but it only received $2 trillion in tax revenues, leaving us with what's said to be a $.4 trillion budget deficit.

By the way, it's sheer constitutional ignorance to say that President Bush spends or lowers taxes. Article I, Sections 7 and 8, of the U.S. Constitution gives Congress authority to spend and tax. The president only has veto power that Congress can override.

Getting back to deficits, my question to you is this: Is there truly a deficit? The short answer is yes, but only in an accounting sense -- not in any meaningful economic sense. Let's look at it. If Congress spends $2.4 trillion but only takes in $2 trillion in taxes, who makes up that $.4 trillion shortfall that we call the budget deficit? Neither the Tooth Fairy, Santa nor the Easter Bunny makes up the difference between what's spent in 2005 and what's taxed in 2005.

Some might be tempted to answer that it's future generations who will pay. That's untrue. If the federal government consumes $2.4 trillion of what Americans produced in 2005, it must find ways to force us to spend $2.4 trillion less privately in 2005. In other words, the federal government can't spend today what's going to be produced in the future.

One method to force us to spend less privately is through taxation, but that's not the only way. Another way is to enter the bond market. Government borrowing drives the interest rate to a level that it otherwise wouldn't be without government borrowing. That higher interest puts the squeeze on private investment in homes and businesses, thereby forcing us to spend less privately.

Another way to force us to spend less privately is to inflate the currency. Theoretically, Congress can consume what we produce without enacting a single tax law; they could simply print money. The rising prices, which would curtail our real spending, would act as a tax. Of course, an important side effect of doing so would be economic havoc.

Some Americans have called for a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution as a method to rein in a prolific Congress. A balanced budget is no panacea. For example, suppose Congress spent $6 trillion and taxed us $6 trillion. We'd have a balanced budget, but we'd be far freer with today's unbalanced budget. The fact of business is that the true measure of the impact of government on our lives is not the taxes we pay but the level of spending.

The founders of our nation would be horrified by today's level of American servitude to their government. From 1787 to the Roaring '20s, federal government spending, as a percentage of GDP, never exceeded 4 percent, except in wartime, compared to today's 20 percent.

The average taxpayer, depending on the state in which he lives, works from Jan. 1 to May 3 to pay federal, state and local taxes. That means someone else decides how four months' worth of the fruits of the average taxpayer's labor will be spent. The taxpayer is forcibly used to serve the purposes of others -- whether it's farm or business handouts, food stamps or other government programs where the earnings of one American are taken and given to another.

This situation differs only in degree, but not in kind, from slavery. After all, a working description of slavery is the process where one person is forcibly used to serve the purposes of another. The difference is a slave has no rights to what he produces each year, instead of just four months.

 

Since 1980, Dr. Williams has served on the faculty of George Mason University in Fairfax, VA as John M. Olin Distinguished Professor of Economics. "

http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/walterwilliams/2006/04/19/193985.html


Wednesday, April 19, 2006

 

....must think I'm a moron .....

If you get one of these, this is where to forward them if you don't hit the delete button first.  Same category as the ones that tell you you've won something in a foreign lottery you didn't enter.

[email protected]

[email protected]

[email protected]


 My name is Mr. Johnson Akuomas, I am a senior partner (Attorney) in the firm of Akuomas Consults Inc: Private Investigators, Security Consultants and Financial Managers. We are conducting a standard process investigation/Recommendation on behalf of African Development Bank (ADB), The African Continental Banking Conglomerate.

This investigation involves a client who shares the same surname with you and also the circumstances surrounding investments made by this client at ADB Gold Account, the Private Banking arm of ADB. The ADB Private Banking client died intestate and nominated no successor in title over the investments made with the bank amounting to over US9Million (Nine Million Dollars). The essence of this communication with you is to request that you provide us information/comments on any or all of the four issues as regards nominating you to inherit the fund left behind by this client.

You are therefore being contacted to be legally nominated as next of kin (inheritor) to this client after all enquiries and investigation has yielded results showing that there is no known next of kin. You are required therefore to answer this questions to enable us make our recommendation.

1-Are you aware of any relative/relation born on the 2nd of February 1951, who shares your same name whose last known contact address was West Africa?

2-Are you aware of any investment of considerable value made by such a person at the Private Banking Division of ADB Bank PLC?

3-Can you confirm your willingness to accept this inheritance if you are legally and legitimately nominated and approved to stand as inheritor to this huge investment in regards to the bank account with ADB?

4-Would you agree to donate part of this inheritance to charity if you are officially approved to stand as the inheritor?

It is pertinent that you inform us ASAP whether or not you are familiar with this personality or and your interest towards the issues mentioned.

You must appreciate that we are constrained from providing you with more detailed information at this point. Please respond to this mail as soon as possible to afford us the opportunity to provide you with more information on this investigation and recommendation.

Thank you for accommodating our enquiry.

Mr. Johnson Akuomas
For: Akuomas Consults Inc.
977 Winners Avenue
Abuja
West Africa
Tel: +234-804-3419724


Wednesday, April 19, 2006

 

American jobs and global economy

"Dobbs's Disciples

By Donald Boudreaux 

Source Tech Central Station Daily 

"Economist Paul Craig Roberts has joined recently with the likes of Lou Dobbs and Sen. Charles Schumer to denounce so-called "outsourcing" -- that is, the importation of services.

 

Roberts is aware that, throughout history, free trade has raised the living standards of ordinary people. But, he says, this historical record is irrelevant to today's world. He explained the reasons in a January 6, 2004, New York Times op-ed written with Sen. Schumer and entitled "Second Thoughts on Free Trade":

 

"First, new political stability is allowing capital and technology to flow far more freely around the world. Second, strong educational systems are producing tens of millions of intelligent, motivated workers in the developing world, particularly in India and China, who are as capable as the most highly educated workers in the developed world but available to work at a tiny fraction of the cost. Last, inexpensive, high-bandwidth communications make it feasible for large work forces to be located and effectively managed anywhere."

 

In short, Roberts alleges that the American standard of living is threatened by the world's growing prosperity, improved education, better governance, and greater fluidity of capital and resources to move in search of higher returns.

 

Roberts' argument is deeply flawed. Its most fundamental defect is his implicit assumption that the world's stock of non-human capital is fixed.

 

Suppose for the moment that the world does possess only a fixed amount of capital goods -- a fixed amount of factories, robots, machine tools, industrial chemicals, and R&D labs. In this case, Americans would indeed suffer from improvements in foreigners' work ethic, education, and emancipation from their governments' misguided regulations. Some capital goods that today are here, raising the productivity of workers in America, would relocate tomorrow to other countries whose citizens can now use much of this capital more effectively than they could in past. As capital flees America, the productivity of U.S. workers falls because these workers will be partnered with fewer efficiency-enhancing capital goods. Americans' only hope of keeping much of this capital from fleeing would be to accept lower wages. Workers suffer. Capitalists get filthy rich.

 

But one of the defining features of the modern world is capital's expansiveness, its non-fixity. Capitalists the world over know that in every place governed by a rule of law and marked by a reasonably free market, a strong work ethic, and a spirit of commerce, profits can be made by employing workers there. And this employing of workers is done by creating capital in those places.

 

As people in China and India become freer, and as advanced technology enables them better to serve customers in America, some jobs currently done in America will indeed be 'outsourced' to these distant lands. But America's loss of some capital to foreign countries creates opportunities for other investments in America.

 

The reason is that as some capital and jobs leave America, workers -- along with some supply routes and capital equipment remaining in America -- are freed up to work at other tasks that in the past were insufficiently profitable. By freeing up this labor and capital, outsourcing increases the profitability of new investment opportunities. These diligent and honest workers, along with some capital equipment, remain in place, willing to work, all in an economy and culture friendly to enterprise. Perceiving these profit opportunities, entrepreneurs sweep in and create new capital, capital that never before existed and that would not be created were it not for the fresh opportunities opened by outsourcing.

 

And this new capital creates not only new products for consumers to enjoy but also new jobs for domestic workers.

 

Don't think me Pollyannaish for predicting that new capital and jobs eventually will be created to replace the capital and jobs attracted abroad by outsourcing. My prediction is based not on fanciful wishes, but on the fact that the capital drawn away from America by outsourcing was profitably invested in America before new foreign opportunities attracted it away.

 

Why was this capital invested here in the first place? The reason is that property rights in the U.S. are secure, taxes are reasonably low and predictable, corruption is minimal, and American workers are well trained and hard-working. Also, producers and consumers in the U.S. have direct access to history's greatest legal, physical, and economic infrastructure. So when particular goods and services become more profitable to produce elsewhere -- because of the principle of comparative advantage -- these features of the American economy that prompted the initial investment don't disappear. They remain. And they prompt entrepreneurs to create new capital and jobs in place of the departed capital and jobs.

America grows richer, not poorer, as we trade openly with a freer and more prosperous world.  "

 

Don Boudreaux is Chairman of Economics Department at George Mason University.  "

http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=041706C


Tuesday, April 18, 2006

 

Mexico and Illegals ... not pretty

<excerpt> 

"Mexico Harsh to Undocumented Migrants 

 By MARK STEVENSON

Source Yahoo News

"TULTITLAN, Mexico - Considered felons by the government, these migrants fear detention, rape and robbery. Police and soldiers hunt them down at railroads, bus stations and fleabag hotels. Sometimes they are deported; more often officers simply take their money.

While migrants in the United States have held huge demonstrations in recent weeks, the hundreds of thousands of undocumented Central Americans in Mexico suffer mostly in silence.

And though Mexico demands humane treatment for its citizens who migrate to the U.S., regardless of their legal status, Mexico provides few protections for migrants on its own soil. The issue simply isn't on the country's political agenda, perhaps because migrants make up only 0.5 percent of the population, or about 500,000 people — compared with 12 percent in the United States.

The level of brutality Central American migrants face in Mexico was apparent Monday, when police conducting a raid for undocumented migrants near a rail yard outside Mexico City shot to death a local man, apparently because his dark skin and work clothes made officers think he was a migrant.

Virginia Sanchez, who lives near the railroad tracks that carry Central Americans north to the U.S. border, said such shootings in Tultitlan are common.

"At night, you hear the gunshots, and it's the judiciales (state police) chasing the migrants," she said. "It's not fair to kill these people. It's not fair in the United States and it's not fair here."

Undocumented Central American migrants complain much more about how they are treated by Mexican officials than about authorities on the U.S. side of the border, where migrants may resent being caught but often praise the professionalism of the agents scouring the desert for their trail.

"If you're carrying any money, they take it from you — federal, state, local police, all of them," said Carlos Lopez, a 28-year-old farmhand from Guatemala crouching in a field near the tracks in Tultitlan, waiting to climb onto a northbound freight train."................

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060418/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/mexico_mistreating_migrants


Tuesday, April 18, 2006

 

bubonic plague case reported in Los Angeles

Good reason to keep fleas absent from your pets, from your home.


<excerpt>

"Rare bubonic plague case reported in Los Angeles

A case of bubonic plague has been reported in the second largest US city of Los Angeles for the first time in 22 years, health officials said.

An unidentified woman came down last week with symptoms of the disease, known as the Black Death when it devastatingly swept across Europe in the 14th century.

 Health officials said they believed the infected woman, who remains hospitalised, was exposed to fleas in the area around her house and stressed that the likelihood of a spread of the rare disease was very unlikely. " ....

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/04/18/060418221440.ge1hwj2v.html


Monday, April 17, 2006

 

New Immigration Law today

Said to be one of the toughest state laws in the nation just signed today by Georgia's governor.


"Governor Signs Immigration Bill
Reported by Denis O'Hayer
Source WXIA TV
"Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue signed a sweeping immigration bill into law on Monday as supporters of the measure rallied outside the state capitol.

"We cannot tolerate activity that distracts us from embracing those who come here legally and thrive," the governor said upon signing the legislation into law.

Hours before the signing, about 200 demonstrators gathered on the capitol steps to support the measure, which they say will duplicate existing federal law. The law will deny many state services to adults who are in the country illegally and penalize employers who hire illegal immigrants.

"Your coming to America does not give you the right to tread on the American law. Abide by the immigration laws that are in tact today," said Rep. Melvin Emerson, R-Gwinnett County.

The counter rally did not come close to the gathering of nearly 50,000 people who marched through DeKalb County last week to demand recognition for illegal immigrants. However, organizers of the counter rally on Monday disagreed with the theme of the original march and said it does not matter what the economic impact of illegal labor is.

"Let's assume that each state could make a $1 billion profit from not enforcing existing law. Would we be willing to do that and, if so, which other laws maybe could we ignore to further increase our profit?" asked organizer D.A. King.

"For me and most of us here, it is about the rule of law upon which our nation was founded and there really is no other agenda."

Organizers of the counter rally said they would like Congress to go even further with harsher penalties for employers who hire illegal immigrants and the possibility of prison time.

The Georgia Security and Immigration Compliance Act will verify that adults seeking many state-administered benefits are in the country legally. It sanctions employers who knowingly hire illegal immigrants and mandates that companies with state contracts check the immigration status of their employees.

The law also will require police to check the immigration status of people they arrest to see if they face deportation orders.

The National Conference of State Legislatures says the measure is believed to be the first comprehensive immigration bill to make it through a statehouse this session. Many of the new law's provisions will not take effect until 2007.

The bill drew protests at Georgia's state Capitol and prompted a daylong work stoppage by some immigrants earlier this month. "
http://wxiatv.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=78693

Monday, April 17, 2006

 

Snotty Receptionist

SNOTTY RECEPTIONIST
An older gentleman had an appointment to see the urologist who shared an office with several other doctors. The waiting room was filled with patients. As he approached the receptionist desk he noticed that the receptionist was a large unfriendly woman who looked like a Sumo wrestler.
He gave her his name.
In a very loud voice, the receptionist said, "YES, I HAVE YOUR NAME HERE; YOU WANT TO SEE THE DOCTOR ABOUT IMPOTENCE, RIGHT?"
All the patients in the waiting room snapped their heads around to look at the very embarrassed man. He recovered quickly, and in an equally loud voice replied, "NO, I'VE COME TO INQUIRE ABOUT A SEX CHANGE OPERATION, BUT I DON'T WANT THE SAME DOCTOR THAT DID YOURS."
DON'T MESS WITH OLD FOLKS!

Monday, April 17, 2006

 

H.R.25 "Fair Tax"

Embedded H.R.25  link in Neal's article seems to work, not sure if my copied links under the bill name will work for you or not.


 

H.R.25            Fair Tax Act of 2005 (Introduced in House)

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c109:H.R.25:

<a href="http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c109:H.R.25:"> 

"IT MAY BE APRIL 17TH --- BUT IT'S REALLY TAX DAY.

"Well, here we are, folks.  Did you enjoy your Easter weekend?  Did you take the kids out for an Easter Egg hunt somewhere?  Or, is it possible that you were trapped in your home, ignoring your family, trying to get your tax return finished.  It needs to be filed today, you know.  Oh, you could file an extension, but if the Imperial Federal Government of the United States still has any claim to some of the money you worked for and earned in 2005, you have to send that in with your extension.

A few questions, if you have the time.

First:  How much time did you spend fixing up your tax return and getting it ready to file?  The average individual taxpayer spent an average of 57 hours for their 2004 return.  Was 2005 better or worse?  Fifty-seven hours.  That's over 7 working days.  What else could you have done with those days?  Could you have added an additional week of vacation for your family?  Could you have spent that time with your children, visiting a sick relative, or just sitting on a fishing boat somewhere?  Sorry 'bout that, but there's tax returns to be filled out ... and you either do it yourself or you pay someone else to do it.

Oh ... and that "paying someone else to do it" thing.  Just how much money do you think is spent every year by individuals and businesses just complying with our tax code?  Well, if history is our guide, the tax return for General Motors will be over 50 feet high.  Just what do you think GM is paying for tax compliance and return preparation?  There are many estimates here, but they seem to start at about $300 billion a year and go up to $500 billion.  That's money that isn't being spent to expand businesses, create jobs, or investigate new technologies.  Eliminate our tax code and you'll see an immediate infusion of $300 billion, or more, into our economy.

Another question:  Just how much did you pay in taxes for 2005?  Come on now, don't look at your tax return.  Just say it out loud.  "I paid $______________ in federal income taxes last year."  You don't know?  Well, don't feel pregnant.  Most people don't  They know how much they "got back," or how much extra they had to pay with their return, but few can tell you how much they actually paid without having to look it up.  Politicians love it this way.  With their withholding program your money just vanishes.  It disappears before you ever even get your hands on it.  You can't miss what you never had .. so we now have this lovely situation where people not only don't know how much they paid in taxes, but they don't even know how much they made!  Go ahead!  Ask someone what they make!  If you get an answer at all it will be something like "I take home ......"  You didn't ask what they took home, you asked what they made!  They don't know, and the free-spending politicians smile.

While we're talking about your taxes, rest assured that American businesses have it just as bad as you do.  You would never believe how many hours businessmen have to spend every year worrying about the tax consequences of virtually every decision they make.  This is time they don't spend growing their businesses.  But .... and this is a huge "but" ... these businesses, especially the larger ones, have one advantage you don't have.  They can run.  They can flee the United States for a more favorable tax climate overseas.  This doesn't mean that they have to shut down their operations here in the U.S.  They just move their headquarters.  Some businesses can save tens of millions of dollars by just moving their headquarters overseas.  Politicians hate this.  They start spewing forth phrases like "Corporate Benedict Arnolds," as if there were something treasonous about fleeing a high-tax location for one with lower taxes.  These corporations have a responsibility to their shareholders.  Perhaps you're one of them; one of the shareholders.  Do you want the company in which you hold shares to maintain it's corporate home in America when money could be saved by simply moving a corporate office and some employees overseas?

OH!  And let's not forget the dreaded AMT!  The Alternative Minimum Tax!  Many taxpayers --- and many more each year --- have to calculate their federal income taxes not once, but twice every single year.  They figure their taxes once with all of their legal credits and deductions, and then again with several limits on credits and deductions.  Whichever method creates the higher tax liability is the method you use to pay your taxes. The AMT was created 35 years ago to make sure high income-earners didn't take advantage of perfectly legal deductions and credits to avoid the payment of taxes.  The rich had to be nailed.  Trouble is, due to inflation the AMT is now sneaking into middle income tax returns.  Today the AMT will hit about 3.5 million Americans.  In a few years that figure will increase to about 30 million.  Although it's a bit late, here's an AMT calculator you can use to see just how close you are to being nailed --- or, just how nailed you already are! 

OK ... you already know where I'm heading with all of this.  The FairTax.  If H.R. 25, The FairTax Act, became law all of the scenarios mentioned above, and many more, would disappear.  There would be no "tax day" because there would be no federal income tax.  You would not spend one single penny on tax planning and preparation, and neither would any American business.  Tax compliance costs, be they $300 or $500 billion, would be a thing of the past.  If the FairTax were law right now this past weekend would have been nothing more than a beautiful Easter Weekend for all Americans.  No distractions.  Just enjoy your family on another beautiful Spring weekend.

With the FairTax American businesses wouldn't be spending tens of thousands of hours a year, and billions of dollars, contemplating and working out the tax consequences of business decisions.  Instead, they would be spending that time and money on decisions and projects to grow their businesses.  That, of course, means hiring more people; opening new locations; and generating more revenue.

No --- the FairTax isn't perfect.  For the life of me I can't figure out a perfect, unblemished way to collect the billions of dollars that our voracious federal government needs to operate both it's legitimate and illegitimate functions.  The vast bulk of that money has to come, one way or another, from the people in this country who earn and hold all of the wealth.  I've been studying tax reform for over 25 years.  Flat tax, sales tax, excise taxes, AMT .. you name it. 

The FairTax is clearly the best plan out there.  Let's check off some points:

  • The FairTax is the ONLY tax reform proposal that would completely lift the federal tax burden, including Social Security and Medicare, from the poor. 
  • It is the ONLY tax reform proposal that will protect every single American  household from the responsibility of paying federal taxes on their income up to the federal poverty level. 
  • The FairTax is the ONLY tax reform proposal that would bring much of the $11 trillion in dollar denominated deposits outside of the jurisdiction of this country and our tax code back to the United States to go to work in our economy.
  • The FairTax is the ONLY tax reform proposal that would make America the number-one tax haven in the world for businesses!  The United States would be the only country in the world in which businesses, domestic and foreign, could operate without any tax component on tax or labor.
  • It is the ONLY tax reform proposal that would sharply curtail, if not eliminate, the influence of the K Street lobbyists on our politicians.  The FairTax leaves no room for manipulation for the benefit of favored constituencies. 
  • The FairTax is the ONLY tax reform plan that would make the payment of federal taxes essentially a voluntary act.

Now ... let me tell you the biggest drawback to the FairTax.  This may not be a drawback for you --- but it certainly is for the people we must rely on to get rid of the current tax code and enact the FairTax.  It's just this simple:

Implementation of the FairTax would constitute the biggest transfer of power from Washington DC to the people of the United States since our country was founded.  "

http://boortz.com/nuze/200604/04172006.html#taxday


Sunday, April 16, 2006

 

Where your tax $$ go

This is by the co-author of the "Fair Tax" book, revised and in paperback,  Neal Boortz referencing to stats in an article.

Embedded links in the top of this article does not work correctly. 


"AND JUST HOW BIG IS YOUR TOTAL TAX BITE?

The Georgia Public Policy Foundation steered me to a rather interesting (though not shocking) facts on taxation in America.  The source is an article by Michael K. Evans posted on IndustryWeek.com  (ArticleID=11678).  Do you have any idea just how huge your total tax load is? Take a look at these facts. 

First -- and this fact is now beyond debate -- all taxes are paid by individuals.  All taxes are levied against wealth, and only individuals hold wealth.  For those of you who attended government schools, and are thus a little slow on concepts like this, corporations are not wealthy.  Corporate shareholders hold that wealth. Individuals.  So ... for the sake of Evan's article, he says that the taxes are paid by employees or proprietors, the owners of small businesses. Now .. the tab:

  • Total federal income taxes collected last year:  $932 billion.  That works out to $6,650 per employee.
  • In addition to income taxes, the federal government collected another $1.286 trillion in taxes, mostly Social Security taxes. 
  • The total state and local tax burden amounts to $1.14 trillion.
  • The grand sum here -- paid by employees and proprietors -- is $3.358 trillion.  That's $3,358,000,000,000.00
  • This works out to $24,000 per employee. 
  • The total compensation earned by employees and individual proprietors last year was $8.2 trillion.   
  • This means that 40% of income goes to taxes of some sort.
  • That rate, of course, is much higher for those earning higher incomes.  Much lower for those in low income brackets.
  • Nice, huh?

Now ... grab this fact.  Where did most of this money go?  National defense?  Homeland security?  Hardly.  In terms of Federal expenditures you have:

  • $495 billion for national defense.
  • $272 billion spent by the federal government for the purchase of goods and payment of employees
  • $1.69 trillion sent to someone else.  $1.69 trillion in income redistribution.

This is just fine with those on the left who believe that income is distributed, not earned.  For the rest of us?  Well, I don't know about you, but I have a wee bit of a problem with all of this."

http://boortz.com/nuze/200604/04142006.html#taxes


Sunday, April 16, 2006

 

"Fair Tax info update ...

As promised more information on the "Fair Tax" which eliminates all federal taxes and no more April 15th frenzy.  As information and explanations become available I will post them in my blog so you can read them.  This first article gives a good overview about information I've heard before which seems to cover many questions about the concept.

 

I personally like the "Fair Tax" which is implemented at the same time the federal income tax amendment to the Constitution is repealed, so no double taxation.

 

The Fair Tax national sales tax is based upon what people buy so captures tax from the underground economies of illegals and high rollers who engage in less than legal occupations.
 Big Grin 

 

Since the Fair Tax is based upon what we the people buy and that is how Washington is funded if we're happy with their policies we spend and fund them.  If we're not happy with their policies we quit spending and put them on a monetary diet, therefore we are in direct control over how the federal government is run.

 

From what I've heard so far it is a really outstanding idea that will work in its current form.

 

It is with Todd's permission that I've posted the Fair Tax book information below the article.

 


 

"Fair Tax" Promotes Better Compliance, Smaller IRS

Apr 14, 2006, 15:45

Ben Pierce

KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- John Collet of Americans for Fair Taxation presented their ideas to a small crowd Tuesday, March 28 at UMKC in Kansas City, Mo. If this Houston-based organization had their way, the Internal Revenue Service would be a thing of the past and more high income taxpayers would pony up their fair share of taxes.

The FairTax replaces the income tax and all other federal taxes with a national consumption tax. The FairTax is levied only once, at the point of purchase on new goods and services.

The group admits it will be difficult for legislators to face down entrenched special interest groups, but they initially proposed replacing the current system with U.S. Senate bill S. 25 and U.S. House of Representatives bill H.R. 25. The next step would be to repeal the 16th Amendment to the constitution allowing the Federal government to levy an income tax.

Signatories to the original petition include noted academic economists and practitioners who feel the current tax code cannot simply be fixed. The current regs include 54,000 pages, approximately 2.8 million words of mind-numbing rules, exceptions and special interest loopholes. This tangled web would be replaced by a simple national sales tax similar to that paid to the county, city or, in the case of our own Hawthorne TDD, the subdivision.

But what about poor people? The FairTax provides every family with a rebate of the sales tax on spending up to the federal poverty level (plus an extra amount to prevent any marriage penalty). The rebate is paid monthly in advance. It allows a family of four to spend $25,660 tax free each year. The rebate for a married couple with two children is $492 per month ($5,902 annually). Therefore, no family pays federal sales tax on essential goods and services and middle-class families are effectively exempted on a big part of their annual spending.

But what about the administrative burden of collecting the tax, now falling on the IRS? States can elect to collect the federal sales tax on behalf of the federal government in exchange for a fee of one-quarter of one percent of gross collections. Retail businesses collecting the tax also get the same administrative fee.

One of the biggest results of the Fair Tax would be to make it more difficult to evade taxes through shelters and other schemes. According to former IRS boss Charles Rossotti, people who actually pay taxes are cheated nearly $300 billion by those who do not pay all their taxes. This means we would enjoy a 20 percent decrease in what we have to pay if everyone paid their fair share.

Charities, which theoretically enjoy the benefits of our tax deduction for contributions, also would benefit under the FairTax. After the 1986 Tax Reform Act, charitable giving increased rather than decreased, despite lowering marginal income and transfer tax rates. Charitable giving rose by $6.4 billion, or 7.6 percent, in 1987 after the top tax rate fell from 50 to 28 percent (more than doubling the tax price of giving). The message is that increasing disposable incomes allows more giving, should citizens decide to do that.

Perhaps one of the worst drawbacks of the current tax system, with its preferences for certain industries and citizen expenditures, is that it distorts the price system of allocating resources to an activity. By removing the twisted incentives of the tax code, the FairTax people hope to accomplish a better use of resources.

Many citizens support the FairTax idea, too. Although many people who would favor such a system look at it from the perspective of making paying taxes simpler, that also represents a huge savings in national resources. If people are not forced to support a massive army of accountants to take care of their taxes, and instead use those resources for something else, the reallocation could potentially benefit all Americans and make our economy more competitive.

A tax every time you pay for your groceries also helps keep in front of taxpayers exactly how much they really pay in taxes. Seeing it come out of your pocket provides a rarely cited psychological advantage of causing people to bulk at every attempt to increase their taxes. Having taxes come out of a check when you never see the full amount makes it easier for Uncle Sam to pilfer your earnings.

(digitalBURG.com publisher Ben Pierce, CFA, signed the original FairTax petition letter along with approximately 75 other economists from locations throughout the country.)
____________________________

THE FAIRTAX BOOK --- REVISED AND EXPANDED

In just over two weeks - on May 2nd - the soft-cover edition of The FairTax Book will be released.  The book contains revisions to clarify points about the FairTax, and a 5000 word "afterword" to bring you up to speed on the latest status of H.R. 25 and to answer some of the critics who have surfaced in the last six months.

Though the furor over the hard-cover edition of The FairTax Book has died down, interest in the FairTax has not.  The president's tax reform commission turned out to be a complete flop -- recommending nothing more than more of the same.  In the meantime H.R. 25 is adding sponsors in the congress, and House leadership has promised a vote on H.R. 25 in the coming months. 

Many of you ask what you can do to move the FairTax forward.  I have a simple, and, on the surface, a self-serving suggestion on how you can do just that.  Buy the soft-cover edition of The FairTax Book.  Don't just by one, buy several. Spread them around.  Send them to your friends.  I would ask you to do that today ... buy them today.  Go to Amazon.com and order a few copies.  For less than $100 you can get 10 copies to spread among your friends.  Business owners could buy a copy for every employee!  We had just that happen with several business owners when the hardback came out.  I can remember several days when Belinda and I were hidden in a conference room signing hundreds of books for this or that corporation that bought a book for every employee. 

Members of Congress were already shocked last year to see The FairTax Book, a book on taxes, debut at No. 1 on the New York Times Bestsellers list.  If the soft-cover edition of the book has a similar success it will send an even-stronger message to Washington.  The people have studied this idea for tax reform, and they like it.  It's not just a flash-in-the-pan. 

Now .. I see that my asking you to get out there and buy the soft-cover edition might sound a bit self-serving.  After all, I'm earning royalties here, aren't I?  Well, the same pledge I made for the hardback edition stands for the soft-cover.  Every penny of royalties, after expenses, will go to charity.  With good sales of the soft-cover edition when all is said and done I will have contributed over a half-million to charity.  I'm not in this to make money.  I'm in this to change the tax code.  Help me.

Here's your link for ordering the soft-cover edition from Amazon.com.  Order now and you'll have your books within a day or two of the release date.  There's an even fancier link at the bottom of the page!


Sunday, April 16, 2006

 

"Medicaid Hurdle for Immigrants

This is something that should have happened 30 years ago.  In the age of technology they should also have a thumbprinted photo ID so cards can't be "borrowed" or multiple ID's assumed to double dip from several states.

MSM decries hardship on recipients when in fact it's been an ongoing hardship on working, tax paying Americans for years which is NEVER mentioned.

Kudos for Georgia (R) Representative Norwood!!


"Medicaid Hurdle for Immigrants May Hurt Others

by ROBERT PEAR

Source New York Times

WASHINGTON, April 15 — More than 50 million Medicaid recipients will soon have to produce birth certificates, passports or other documents to prove that they are United States citizens, and everyone who applies for coverage after June 30 will have to show similar documents under a new federal law.

The requirement is meant to stop the "theft of Medicaid benefits by illegal aliens," in the words of Representative Charlie Norwood, Republican of Georgia, a principal author of the provision, which was signed into law by President Bush on Feb. 8.

In enforcing the new requirement, federal and state officials must take account of passions stirred by weeks of national debate over immigration policy. State officials worry that many blacks, American Indians and other poor people will be unable to come up with the documents needed to prove citizenship. In addition, hospital executives said they were concerned that the law could increase their costs, by reducing the number of patients with insurance.

The new requirement takes effect on July 1. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that it will save the federal government $220 million over five years and $735 million over 10 years.

Estimates of the number of people who will be affected vary widely. The budget office expects that 35,000 people will lose coverage by 2015. Most of them will be illegal immigrants, it said, but some will be citizens unable to produce the necessary documents. Some Medicaid experts put the numbers much higher, saying that millions of citizens could find their health benefits in jeopardy.

State officials are trying to figure out how to comply. Many said the requirement would result in denying benefits to some poor people who were entitled to Medicaid but could not find the necessary documents.

"This provision is misguided and will serve as a barrier to health care for otherwise eligible United States citizens," said Gov. Chris Gregoire of Washington, a Democrat.

Ms. Gregoire said the provision would cause hardship for many older African-Americans who never received birth certificates and for homeless people who did not have ready access to family records.

Hospitals and nursing homes are expressing concern. "The new requirement will result in fewer people being eligible for Medicaid or enrolling in the program, and that means more uninsured people," said Lynne P. Fagnani, senior vice president of the National Association of Public Hospitals and Health Systems. "They still need care, but are more likely to wait until their condition becomes more severe and more costly to treat."

The new requirement will come as a surprise to most Medicaid recipients. The law said federal officials should inform them "as soon as practicable" after Feb. 8. But the education campaign, to be conducted in concert with states, has yet to begin." .....

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/16/us/16medicaid.html?ei=5065&en=2f79a02d4edc9cb7&ex=1145764800&partner=MYWAY&pagewanted=print


Saturday, April 15, 2006

 

Scam Alert ~ Jury Duty

"Jury Rigged

Scam:   Identity thieves trick the unwary into revealing their personal details by telling them they've failed to report for jury duty and warrants for their arrest are being issued.

Status:   Real fraud, potential for financial harm unknown. 
 http://www.snopes.com/crime/fraud/juryduty.asp

Thursday, April 13, 2006

 

"Start immigration reform with those who follow the law

This says it all!!  Cool  Thanks to Powerline for the link.


"Start immigration reform with those who follow the law
Katherine Kersten,
Source Star Tribune
"In recent days, our TV screens have been filled with pictures of vast crowds, demanding more "rights" for the estimated 11 million illegal immigrants in the United States. Religious groups have championed their cause. Adoring reporters have shoved microphones in front of them -- falling head over heels again for raucous '60s-style demonstrations.
Jaco van Rooyen, a 22-year-old South African immigrant worker, hasn't been out there waving a sign. He's a legal immigrant playing by the rules. In short, he's a forgotten man.
Bob Webber, an Edina immigration attorney who works with immigrants like Van Rooyen, says, "My clients ask, 'Why isn't anyone talking about us?' They can't understand it."
Van Rooyen's story mirrors that of thousands of other legal immigrants, whom the media have largely ignored in their romance with "undocumented workers." He is a general farmworker and mechanic for Kristie and Marlyn Seidler on a 9,000-acre farm 55 miles north of Bismarck, N.D. "There's nothing he can't fix," says Kristie Seidler. "He's vital to us."
Seidler says it's impossible to find skilled Americans willing to work in rural North Dakota. In the last three years, not one American has answered the many advertisements she and her husband have run.
The Seidlers could hire illegal immigrants but don't want to break the law.
But following the law is costly and time-consuming. The Seidlers have had to jump through multiple hoops with government agencies to hire Van Rooyen, who honed his skills on his family's South African farm. In addition to proving that no qualified American will do the job, they have had to pay thousands in fees and legal and travel costs. Van Rooyen has worked for them for four agricultural seasons, but was compelled to return to South Africa each autumn. Every year, they have had to repeat the whole expensive process to get him back legally.
Now, the Seidlers need Van Rooyen year-round. Nine months ago, they started paperwork to adjust his immigration status. But they've hit a wall: The American government caps visas for skilled workers such as him at 140,000 a year.
As a result, Van Rooyen will have to return to South Africa again when his visa expires on Nov. 30. This time, he will probably have to wait at least five years to return, because of the current visa backlog.
"I do what's asked of me; I obey the law," says Van Rooyen. "There are many obstacles, and it's frustrating that some people get to be here without doing those things."
"The issue with illegals has blurred the problem of people trying to come here legally," adds Seidler. "All the policymakers see is the illegal issue."
Obviously, many illegal immigrants are good folks, striving to better their families. But they have broken the law to get here. That's why many Americans find it unsettling to see them pumping their fists and shouting grievances in the streets -- cheered on by their American "social justice" allies.
You don't hear an entitlement mentality in Van Rooyen's voice.
Do our immigration laws need an overhaul? You bet they do. But let's start with what we should be able to agree on: much-needed reform for law-abiding immigrants such as Van Rooyen. Instead of marching for the cameras, they are quietly striving to show their respect for that centerpiece of American citizenship: the rule of law."
http://www.startribune.com/191/story/367832.html

Wednesday, April 12, 2006

 

INVASION USA "Protests backfire!

Second article is what Georgia's Senior (R) Sen. Chambliss is trying to accomplish and gives a timeline of 2 previous amnesties which are precipitating the current invasion and protests.  Unlike the MSM who's putting a PC spin on the protesting invaders, they are illegal aliens who are breaking US laws by crossing the border without proper visas.  Have heard it said that the majority do not want to adapt to and meld into US culture, but do want to bring Mexico to the US.


INVASION USA
"Protests backfire!
Zogby poll: National demonstrations by illegal aliens have negative impact

"Recent images of seas of illegal aliens marching in cities across the U.S. are having a far greater negative than positive impact on the foreigners' cause, according to a new poll.

A Zogby survey of nearly 8,000 people shows coast-to-coast protests against immigration proposals in Congress – particularly to make it a federal felony to be an illegal worker in the U.S. – have not persuaded a majority of likely American voters.

Asked whether the protests have made likely voters more or less sympathetic toward undocumented workers, 61 percent said they're less likely to be sympathetic to the plight of illegals as a result of the protests, while only 32 percent of respondents said they're now more sympathetic. Younger respondents to the poll were more likely to be sympathetic than were older participants. And while 56 percent of Democrats said the protests made them feel more sympathy for unlawful workers, just 6 percent of Republicans felt that way.

"The gap between what the American people believe ... and what these elites in Washington thinks is right, that continues to grow wider," said host Sean Hannity on his national radio program today. "Many Republican leaders are siding with the elites, they are not siding with the people that put them in office."

The survey also shows an overwhelming majority of Americans – nearly 4 out 5 – is doubtful President Bush and Congress will find a fair and effective solution to the immigration crisis. While 88 percent of Democrats and 85 percent of independents said it's unlikely a solution will be found, 66 percent of Republicans agreed.

Doubt about the prospect of Washington's success on the issue spreads across all geographic and racial demographics, the survey shows.

Asked specifically whether Bush or Congress is trusted more to properly handle the immigration issue, 50 percent said they don't think it's likely either branch of government will get the job done properly. Another 22 percent said they trust Congress more, while 17 percent said they think Bush is more likely to come up with the right answer. There was some difference depending on the age of the respondents – those over age 65 said they trusted Bush more, while those under age 30 said they put more trust in Congress.

Likely voters said their biggest concern about illegal immigration is the burden it places on government social services at all levels. While 27 percent said the increased burden was their top concern, another 22 percent said they hold a companion worry – that illegals will trigger an increase in the cost of government services.

One in four – 26 percent – said they were concerned America's southern border may be the entry point for terrorists intent on attacking the U.S.

A majority of Americans said they oppose amnesty for illegals who already reside in this nation. While 52 percent said there should be no amnesty, 32 percent said they'd favor it.

The survey shows significant partisan divide on this question. Among Democrats nationwide, 51 percent favor amnesty, while 29 percent oppose it and another 20 percent said they are unsure. Among Republicans, just 13 percent said they favor amnesty, while 76 percent said they oppose such an offer.

The Zogby Interactive survey included 7,967 respondents nationwide between March 31 and April 3, and has a margin of error of +/- 1.1 percentage points."

http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=49711


Chambliss: Amnesty would be mistake

By Dave Williams
Staff Writer
Source Gwinnett Daily Post

"ATLANTA — Any immigration reform bill that gives undocumented workers a path to American citizenship would repeat mistakes  Congress made 20 years ago in granting illegals amnesty, U.S. Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., said Tuesday.
“That was the trigger that got us into the situation we’re in today,’’ Chambliss told reporters during a telephone conference call. “People on the other side of the border saw a chance to come across illegally and get some kind of legal status.’’
Chambliss is pushing an amendment this week that would remove from the bill a provision allowing illegal immigrants working in agriculture to become U.S. citizens following an 11-year process that would include undergoing a background check, paying a $2,000 fine and learning English.
His proposal instead would require illegal farm workers to return to their home countries after two years and re-enter the U.S. in a legal manner.
Senate leadership has set a goal of passing a bill by the end of this week and getting the illegal immigration issue into a conference committee with the House, which passed its version of the legislation last December.
Congress granted a limited amnesty in 1986 to some 3 million illegal immigrants then living in the U.S., which is believed to have touched off a wave of immigration primarily from Latin American countries.
 

Today, the nation’s population of illegals is estimated at about 12 million.
“The ’86 law failed, and it failed miserably,’’ Chambliss said.
The same thing happened when Congress granted another amnesty to illegals in 1990, said Phil Kent, the Atlanta-based national spokesman for Americans for Immigration Control.
“This would be the third amnesty,’’ he said."

http://www.gwinnettdailypost.com/index.php?s=&url_channel_id=1&url_article_id=13569&url_subchannel_id=&change_well_id=2


Wednesday, April 12, 2006

 

'Hex' on a plane lands woman in jail

 Crazy  Naughty  Skeptical

 
'Hex' on a plane lands woman in jail
"A 50-year-old woman is accused of getting violent on a Delta Airlines flight from Las Vegas to New York City, slapping a flight attendant in the face, putting a "hex" on the plane, announcing that it would crash and declaring that all the passengers, their children and their grandchildren would die early Tuesday.

The pilot made an unscheduled stop just after midnight Tuesday morning at Denver International Airport, where passenger Svetlana Yankovsky, address unknown, was arrested.

She faces a federal charge of interfering with a flight crew.

One flight attendant told an FBI agent that Yankovsky was drinking from a bottle of wine while the plane was taxiing at the Las Vegas airport, according to court documents.

After the flight attendant took away the bottle, Yankovsky allegedly demanded her "red water" back and began singing, chanting and touching other passengers.

The plane still was climbing after takeoff when two passengers asked flight attendants to "do something" about Yankovsky, court documents said.

But when flight attendants tried to calm Yankovsky down, she allegedly told them, "Not good, plane crash, all die."

"Yankovsky continued her erratic behavior by 'hexing' the aircraft, the crew, and the other passengers," an FBI agent's affidavit said. "Yankovsky was singing and chanting in the aircraft and saying that everyone was going to die, their children would die, and their grandchildren would die."

It said the plane's four flight attendants gathered in the rear of the plane to discuss how to handle Yankovsky, and considered using the restraints that were on board and asking other passengers to help them subdue the woman. They got out the restraints, but were afraid to use them, the affidavit said.

When flight attendant Sandra McKibben approached Yankovsky and tried to quiet her, Yankovsky slapped her in the face, it said.

"Yankovsky continued her erratic behavior throughout the rest of the flight until removed by Denver police officers," the affidavit said."

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/local/article/0,1299,DRMN_15_4616431,00.html


Wednesday, April 12, 2006

 

"..... rush to border

"Guest-worker hopes spark rush to border

 

Associated Press
Apr. 12, 2006 11:31 AM

 

NOGALES, Mexico - At a shelter overflowing with migrants airing their blistered feet, Francisco Ramirez nursed muscles sore from trekking through the Arizona desert - a trip that failed when his wife did not have the strength to go on.

He said the couple would rest for a few days, then try again, a plan echoed by dozens reclining on rickety bunk beds and carpets tossed on the floor after risking violent bandits and the harsh desert in unsuccessful attempts to get into the United States.

The shelter's manager, Francisco Loureiro, said he has not seen such a rush of migrants since 1986, when the United States allowed 2.6 million illegal residents to get American citizenship.

This time, the draw is a bill before the U.S. Senate that could legalize some of the 11 million people now illegally in the United States while tightening border security. Migrants are hurrying to cross over in time to qualify for a possible guest-worker program - and before the journey becomes even harder. "..............
http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/0412mexico-border-rush12-ON.html

Tuesday, April 11, 2006

 

"Union Dues Spent on Golf, Cadillac, Resorts, and Even Wal-Mart

"PRESS RELEASE
"Union Dues Spent on Golf, Cadillac, Resorts, and Even Wal-Mart

New Union LM-2 Financial Information Available and Searchable on UnionFacts.com

4/3/06

Washington, DC – Revised financial reporting requirements by the Department of Labor (DOL) are exposing union leaders’ spending habits with unprecedented clarity. Last Friday (3/31), most major unions filed their LM-2 financial disclosure forms with the government, and jaw-dropping expenditures are already easy to find.

Using the search function on www.unionfacts.com, making sense of the mountains of union financial data is simple. A preliminary look revealed the following:

 

“The increased transparency of union spending will be especially meaningful to union members who are getting their first candid look at how their mandatory union dues are spent by labor officials,” said Richard Berman executive director of the Center for Union Facts. “The 40% of union members who voted for George W. Bush might be interested to know just how much of their dues money went to support John Kerry.”

To learn more visit: www.UnionFacts.com. For further information or to arrange an interview please call Sarah Longwell at (202) 463-7106.


The Center for Union Facts is a non-profit organization supported by foundations, businesses, union members, and the general public. We are dedicated to showing Americans the truth about today's union leadership.

http://www.unionfacts.com/news.cfm?id=16


Monday, April 10, 2006

 

Illegal Alien Voter Recruitment

A friend sent this in email.  All senators dissenting on the immigration bill are listed after this article and guess what they're all Democrat. 


**ILLEGAL ALIEN VOTER RECRUITMENT

 

http://www.flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=126025429&size=o

 


A number of photos were taken at yesterday's Dallas illegal immigrant protest, including this one of a Democrat recruitment flyer encouraging Mexican immigrants to vote for Democrats in 2006.

The fact that the Dems are recruiting at these protests isn't a surprise. It fits into their big picture of race and politics (which is why the flyer's visual puts Texas and Mexico together). The Democrats classify people based upon race and then work to corner the racial voting collectives. At this point, the white vote is already split down the middle, half voting Democrat, half Republican. The Dems have cornered the black voting collective with over 90% voting Democratic. If Democrats manage to corner the Hispanic vote like they have cornered the black vote, Republicans won't win the White House for a very long time. This is the Democrats' dream, so they are trying very hard to collectivize the Hispanic community by turning the immigration issue into another civil rights issue.
Immigrants who come from south of the border usually don't see themselves as a part of a collective. They tend to be more individual-minded, which works to the Republicans' benefit. However, these rallies and protests are helping reshape how these immigrants view themselves. As Power Line points out, one of the organizers of these rallies is A.N.S.W.E.R., a communist organization.

 


Some legal immigrants are against illegals getting citizenship. Of course, their views rarely get covered in the media and are drowned out by the mass protests:

 


Contrary to scenes of hundreds of thousands of united Latinos marching across the country in support of immigration reform, a sizable number of the ethnic group opposes the marches and strongly objects to illegal immigration.
"There are a lot of Hispanics that are upset about the illegal just the same way as the Anglo population," said Barrios, a third-generation Mexican-American who traces his family's roots in Arizona to the 1870s. "That group is larger than many people would believe."

 


South Phoenix resident Elsie Orta said she has no plans to participate in Monday's march in Phoenix.

 


"Other Hispanics have told me to go to the demonstrations," said Orta, 55, who said her mother is from New Mexico and her father's family traces its roots to Spain. "I think it's hurting them. They're making a fool of themselves."

 


The Phoenix native believes Arizona is under siege by illegal immigrants who speak Spanish, use public services and take jobs away from citizens. Illegal immigrants, she said, should be deported.

 


"They want us to cater to them all the time," she said. "They're coming over here, they're taking our jobs. And now, everything has to be in English and Spanish? I don't think so. They need to go back."

 

http://wizbangblog.com/2006/04/10/democrats-recruiting-at-illegal-immigrant-protests.php

 

 

ALSO see:  http://www.michellemalkin.com/

 

 


Nays on the US Senate Immigration Bill

 

 

Akaka (D-HI)
Baucus (D-MT)
Bayh (D-IN)
Biden (D-DE)
Bingaman (D-NM)
Boxer (D-CA)
Cantwell (D-WA)
Carper (D-DE)
Clinton (D-NY)
Dayton (D-MN)
Dodd (D-CT)
Durbin (D-IL)
Feingold (D-WI)
 Feinstein (D-CA)
Harkin (D-IA)
Inouye (D-HI)
Jeffords (I-VT)
Johnson (D-SD)
Kennedy (D-MA)
Kerry (D-MA)
Kohl (D-WI)
Landrieu (D-LA)
Lautenberg (D-NJ)
Leahy (D-VT)
Levin (D-MI)
Lieberman (D-CT)
 Lincoln (D-AR)
Menendez (D-NJ)
Mikulski (D-MD)
Murray (D-WA)
Obama (D-IL)
Pryor (D-AR)
Reed (D-RI)
Reid (D-NV)
Salazar (D-CO)
Sarbanes (D-MD)
Schumer (D-NY)
Stabenow (D-MI)
Wyden (D-OR)

Monday, April 10, 2006

 

New Immigration Poll ends Monday

http://www.powerlineblognews.com/  Multiple choices, ends at the end of the day Monday April 10.  They're going to send it in to the Senate and House because they know legislators read Powerlineblog.com.

Vote to have your opinion known. 


Sunday, April 9, 2006

 

..Integrate the U.S., Mexico and Canada

 
" CFR's Plan to Integrate the U.S., Mexico and Canada

 


by Phyllis Schlafly, July 13, 2005

The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) has just let the cat out of the bag about what's really behind our trade agreements and security partnerships with the other North American countries. A 59-page CFR document spells out a five-year plan for the "establishment by 2010 of a North American economic and security community" with a common "outer security perimeter."

"Community" means integrating the United States with the corruption, socialism, poverty and population of Mexico and Canada. "Common perimeter" means wide-open U.S. borders between the U.S., Mexico and Canada.

"Community" is sometimes called "space" but the CFR goal is clear: "a common economic space ... for all people in the region, a space in which trade, capital, and people flow freely." The CFR's "integrated" strategy calls for "a more open border for the movement of goods and people."

The CFR document lays "the groundwork for the freer flow of people within North America." The "common security perimeter" will require us to "harmonize visa and asylum regulations" with Mexico and Canada, "harmonize entry screening," and "fully share data about the exit and entry of foreign nationals."

This CFR document, called "Building a North American Community," asserts that George W. Bush, Mexican President Vicente Fox, and Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin "committed their governments" to this goal when they met at Bush's ranch and at Waco, Texas on March 23, 2005. The three adopted the "Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America" and assigned "working groups" to fill in the details.

It was at this same meeting, grandly called the North American summit, that President Bush pinned the epithet "vigilantes" on the volunteers guarding our border in Arizona.

A follow-up meeting was held in Ottawa on June 27, where the U.S. representative, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, told a news conference that "we want to facilitate the flow of traffic across our borders." The White House issued a statement that the Ottawa report "represents an important first step in achieving the goals of the Security and Prosperity Partnership."

The CFR document calls for creating a "North American preference" so that employers can recruit low-paid workers from anywhere in North America. No longer will illegal aliens have to be smuggled across the border; employers can openly recruit foreigners willing to work for a fraction of U.S. wages.

Just to make sure that bringing cheap labor from Mexico is an essential part of the plan, the CFR document calls for "a seamless North American market" and for "the extension of full labor mobility to Mexico."

The document's frequent references to "security" are just a cover for the real objectives. The document's "security cooperation" includes the registration of ballistics and explosives, while Canada specifically refused to cooperate with our Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI).

To no one's surprise, the CFR plan calls for massive U.S. foreign aid to the other countries. The burden on the U.S. taxpayers will include so-called "multilateral development" from the World Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank, "long-term loans in pesos," and a North American Investment Fund to send U.S. private capital to Mexico.

The experience of the European Union and the World Trade Organization makes it clear that a common market requires a court system, so the CFR document calls for "a permanent tribunal for North American dispute resolution." Get ready for decisions from non-American judges who make up their rules ad hoc and probably hate the United States anyway.

The CFR document calls for allowing Mexican trucks "unlimited access" to the United States, including the hauling of local loads between U.S. cities. The CFR document calls for adopting a "tested once" principle for pharmaceuticals, by which a product tested in Mexico will automatically be considered to have met U.S. standards.

The CFR document demands that we implement "the Social Security Totalization Agreement negotiated between the United States and Mexico." That's code language for putting illegal aliens into the U.S. Social Security system, which is bound to bankrupt the system.

Here's another handout included in the plan. U.S. taxpayers are supposed to create a major fund to finance 60,000 Mexican students to study in U.S. colleges.

To ensure that the U.S. government carries out this plan so that it is "achievable" within five years, the CFR calls for supervision by a North American Advisory Council of "eminent persons from outside government . . . along the lines of the Bilderberg" conferences.

The best known Americans who participated in the CFR Task Force that wrote this document are former Massachusetts Governor William Weld and Bill Clinton's immigration chief Doris Meissner. Another participant, American University Professor Robert Pastor, presented the CFR plan at a friendly hearing of Senator Richard Lugar's Foreign Relations Committee on June 9.

Ask your Senators and Representatives which side they are on: the CFR's integrated North American Community or U.S. sovereignty guarded by our own borders. "

http://www.eagleforum.org/cgi_bin/print/MasterPFP.cgi?doc=http://www.eagleforum.org/column/2005/july05/05-07-13.html&bottom=http://www.eagleforum.org/column/2005/july05/05-07-13.html


Saturday, April 8, 2006

 

Venezeula and US voting machines

People have always inferred that electronic voting using  could be hacked, outcome rigged.   

Considering this latest news about Venezeula supplying US machines after their seemingly rigged election to re-elect Chavez .... the prospect looms ominous that it could happen here with those machines.  Carter Naughty "overseeing" that election made it even more suspect. 


 

"Hugo Chavez wants your vote

 

"Looking for something to be alarmed about? Forget Dubai. Try Venezuela’s potential takeover of the U.S. voting apparatus. A secretive, intransparent company called ‘Smartmatic’ that’s known to have ties to the Venezuelan government, has just bought a U.S. voting machine company called Sequoia. And the deal has gotten no scrutiny from federal regulators, who cite outdated criteria for national military security as their only watchpoint.

That’s right, Venezuela, a country that holds the dirtiest, filthiest most intransparent and fraudulent elections in the hemisphere, elections that match those of Zimbabwe or Belarus, has just got its hands on a U.S. electronic voting company and now might be in charge with the outcome of your vote. There is not one good thing about this deal. Aleksander Boyd at VCrisis has done an extraordinary job of ferreting the first reports of this information out here.  And the Miami Herald has a spectacular editorial.

Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez has long used soft power against the U.S., through the manipulation of oil prices and the distribution of cheap heating fuel to select poor contingencies in a bid to buy loyalty. He’s also funded a very active propaganda office, whose chief purpose has been to intimidate U.S. news media like the Los Angeles Times into publishing Venezuela’s otherwise not-worth-bothering-about government tripe. It openly organizes letter-writing campaigns using swarms of U.S. leftists as its semi-covert agents. Now, Chavez has moved on to far more ambitious things like getting a grip on the U.S. voting apparatus itself.

Venezuela’s electoral system is based on a system of highly suspect electronic machines. These machines have been demonstrated to have the capacity to record voter identities and match them with cast ballots. This was proven  in Venezuela in November 2005. These machines also appear to have flipped final tally results, as seemingly happened in August 2004, a sham election endorsed by the odious Jimmy Carter who—- amazingly—endorsed the obviously fraudulent recall referendum as “free and fair” and tried to undermine any other sources with evidence to the contrary.

All of these horrible things brought Venezuela its current dictatorship. Smartmatic’s voting machines are the chief reason why Venezuelans no longer trust their voting systems and why at least 82% of them refused to vote at all during December 2005’s elections, something I witnessed myself in Caracas.

With Chavez already convincingly shown to have been meddling in Mexico’s  and in Peru’s elections right now, there is no doubt in the slightest that Chavez intends to do as much as he can to destroy our elections in our free system here, too. He’s got his eyes on us. He intends to destroy our elections and put a candidate to his liking as high up as he can go in our government in our next election.

This must be stopped.  "

A.M. Mora y Leon 03 27 06 "

 

http://www.americanthinker.com/comments.php?comments_id=4744





  

Friday, April 7, 2006

 

"It is not what happens to you ....

Came in email ....... seems to be a lot of truth in that. 

More concisely brings to mind the Mexican couple featured on 20/20 last Friday who came to the US about 20 years ago and supported their children by recycling from garbage/dumpsters.  They sent one son through college, have a daughter employed in management and another son in college.

They have not been on public assistance and have attained US citizenship.  They're still working .... going through garbage in dumpsters for recyclables.  I bow to their courage, tenacity and character to bring it about themselves through a means no one else wanted to use.


 

"It is not what happens to you that determines how far you go in life, but it is what you do with what happens to you that's going to determine how far you go in life." - Zig Ziglar


Thursday, April 6, 2006

 

Going to hit the fan soon ...

The MSM has been silent thusfar on this matter which has been out in the open about a month. 

CCP = Chinese Communist Party 

 "CCP Kills and Covers Up: Sudden Surge in Organ Transplants Reported

Source The Epoch Times
In an urgent announcement

(http://clearwisdom.net/emh/articles/2006/4/6/71668.html ) a special investigative group reports an alarming increase in the number of organ transplants being done in transplant centers throughout China. The announcement was published by the Integrated Committee to Investigate the Secret Sujiatun Concentration Camp published on the Clearwisdom website and concludes that the Chinese communist regime is killing detainees in Sujiatun and other concentration camps in an effort to hide the evidence of mass murder.

The Integrated Committee's investigation has confirmed that hospitals and transplant centers in Heilongjiang, Hunan, Shanghai, Zhejiang, Yunnan, Anhui, Shan'xi and Xinjiang are operating overtime to perform transplant operations. This surge in activity is said to be due to the release of information over the past three weeks about the slaughter that has gone on at Sujiatun and other concentration camps in China at least since 2001.

Mass Murder through Live Organ Harvesting

The Epoch Times first reported on March 9 the existence of a concentration camp in the Sujiatun District of Shenyang City in Liaoning Province, China, whose sole purpose is the harvesting of organs from Falun Gong practitioners. The source for this report is a journalist who had worked since 1999 for a Japanese television station in the area around Shenyang. Although he understood himself to be putting his life at risk in revealing what he had discovered, he felt compelled to reveal what he termed "worse than any nightmare:" the harvesting of organs from living Falun Gong practitioners for the purpose of sale to doctors for use in organ transplants.

Two other witnesses with direct knowledge of this slaughter of Falun Gong practitioners have since confirmed this first report. A former staff member of the Liaoning Thrombus Treatment Center of Integrated Chinese and Western Medicine whose ex-husband had worked as a surgeon performing the organ harvesting reported that the Sujiatun camp had held 6,000 Falun Gong practitioners at one time, but that two-thirds of these had been killed by organ harvesting, with their bodies quickly cremated.

A veteran military doctor in the region of Shenyang confirmed the reports of these two witnesses, and also reported that the Sujiatun camp was only one of thirty-six concentration camps where the widespread practice of organ harvesting takes place. One of these, a camp in Jilin Province, is said to hold 14,000 practitioners. Another camp in Jilin Province referred to as 672-S is said to hold over 120,000 inmates, including Falun Gong practitioners, other prisoners of conscience, and felons.

The reports of these witnesses as to what has taken place in Sujiatun have also been confirmed by investigations done by the World Organization to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong (W.O.I.P.F.G.).

As the news of the mass murder in Sujiatun has gotten out, responses have begun to build. The U.S. State Department raised the issue of Sujiatun with Chinese regime last week, and legislators in the U.S. Congress and even in some U.S. statehouses have begun asking for explanations.

'Come in Quickly' ...........

http://www.theepochtimes.com/news/6-4-6/40147.html
__________________________________________

"The Reaction to Sujiatun
Is Holocaust History Repeating Itself?

http://www.theepochtimes.com/news/6-3-30/39903.html



"Gao Zhisheng: Why Is the Communist Regime So Silent on the Sujiatun Concentration Camp
http://www.theepochtimes.com/news/6-3-26/39719.html



"Witness Says Teachers Extracted Organs From Executed Student
http://www.theepochtimes.com/news/6-3-26/39636.html


"Sujiatun Death Camp: Putting Conscience on Trial

http://www.theepochtimes.com/news/6-3-25/39741.html



"Horror Built by History
How Sujiatun fits into the violent legacy of the Communist regime
http://www.theepochtimes.com/news/6-3-23/39590.html


"The Media's Silence on the Sujiatun Death Camp

http://www.theepochtimes.com/news/6-3-23/39612.html

Thursday, April 6, 2006

 

"A Right to Migrate

"A Right to Migrate

By Nathan Smith

Sourch Tech Central Station Daily  

"At the heart of the current immigration debate is an ethical question: Is it wrong for a poor but able-bodied Mexican without the requisite documents to cross the Rio Grande to look for work in El Norte?

 

Certainly, it is illegal. On the other hand, no one is harmed by it in the strictest sense. No one's person is violated. No one's property is stolen or damaged.

 

It's true, of course, that illegal immigrants may bid down the wages of low-skilled native-born workers. But this is relevant neither to law nor morality. If I become a dentist, I may marginally reduce the wages of other dentists. That does not make my dentistry illegal or immoral.

 

Or is it wrong to break the law, per se? But hardly anyone believes that consistently. Most of us approve of one or more of history's famous lawbreakers. Take your pick: Sam Adams and the Boston Tea Party boys; Thomas Jefferson and the signers of the Declaration of Independence ; Pastor Bonhoeffer; Mahatma Gandhi; Martin Luther King; Robin Hood; the Prophet Daniel; the early Christian martyrs. Even the usual argument for obeying laws you disagree with -- that we're all part of a social contract, and owe obedience to the state in return for the benefits we get from it -- doesn't apply to foreigners, who aren't part of the US social contract, at least not before they get here.

 

I am sympathetic to the idea that a Mexican who comes to the United States to work and share our material prosperity thereby tacitly consents to be ruled by the laws laid down by Washington. With one exception: It is absurd to say that, by immigrating illegally, he signals his consent to the law which he is breaking.

 

In short, an undocumented Mexican who enters the US is doing something illegal, but it is not clear that he is doing anything immoral. Certainly, in terms of the minimalist morality of not harming others and fulfilling one's obligations, he is not.

 

Is the law that prohibits an undocumented Mexican from entering the country, then, an unjust law? Or can such laws be defended? Different defenses of these laws come from the right or the left.

 

"Defending our borders"

 

Critics of immigration from the right like to say they support "defending our borders." This is a clever phrase, because it erases the distinction between peaceful workers and invading armies. Every state must defend its borders against invading armies, to protect its citizens' lives and property. But states have generally permitted the entry of peaceful traders, who do not threaten the lives or property of citizens. In any case, they know the difference between the two. By pretending not to understand it, right-wing opponents of immigration may score rhetorical points, but they fail to make the case for the widely-disobeyed laws.

 

That said; the case for restricting immigration in order to "defend our borders" is more legitimate in the wake of 9/11. America is in no danger of armed invasion from Mexico or Canada, of course -- the idea that Mexican immigrants pose an irredentist threat to the Southwest is sheer fantasy -- but we are threatened by jihadi terrorists, who could potentially filter in across our southern border. If counter-terrorism were the good-faith motivation for our tight border controls, the case for US citizens to cooperate with them would be strong.

 

But a counter-terror borders policy would look totally different from what we now have. For a start, we would probably permit the unrestricted entry of passport-carrying nationals of Mexico, which is not a terrorist source, and then cooperate with the Mexican government to prevent fraud, and thus prevent a flood of job-seeking migrants from camouflaging terrorist infiltrators. At present, there is not even a pretense that counter-terror is the major motivation for our border controls. The main challenge for applicants for US visas is to prove, not that they have no ties to terror, but that they don't intend to stay and work.

 

The argument that we need to defend our borders is perfectly valid, especially after 9/11. It just isn't a defense of anything like the regime of border controls that currently exists.

 

A conundrum for paternalists

 

A critique of immigration from the political left was recently published in the Denver Post by Paul Krugman. Krugman calls himself "instinctively, emotionally pro-immigration," but he thinks that "we'll need to reduce the inflow of low-skill immigrants," because he is concerned about the effect of immigration on the social safety net:

 

"[M]odern America is a welfare state, even if our social safety net has more holes in it than it should - and low-skill immigrants threaten to unravel that safety net.

 

"Basic decency requires that we provide immigrants, once they're here, with essential health care, education for their children, and more."

 

Krugman's argument amounts to a paternalist case for border controls: he doesn't want to let in immigrants whom we'll be unable, or unwilling, to treat "humanely" by "providing [them] with essential health care, education for their children, and more," even if they still want to come without those guarantees. This restriction is in the interests neither of current citizens, nor of potential migrants, but only of Krugman, and others who feel a psychological need to live in a welfare state.

 

There are many hundreds of millions of people in the world who lack "essential health care, education for their children, and more." Does "basic decency," in Krugman's opinion, require that we provide for them, too? Presumably not, but then why do we suddenly acquire this obligation "once they're here?" We can't provide a social safety net for the whole world. We may be able to provide one for everyone physically located in the US, but only by restricting who gets in, and why should we do that?

 

The reaction of a leftist like Krugman to immigration represents a change in, or possibly an unmasking of, the motivation behind the welfare state. A generous view of the welfare state is that it is meant to serve the ends of mercy -- a desire to alleviate the suffering of others -- and/or social justice -- a belief that poverty is (in part) a result of misfortune or exploitation, and therefore that we make life fairer if we tax the well-off to help the poor. But there is nothing just about guaranteeing a decent life to all who live north of the Rio Grande by closing the door of opportunity to those born further south. Nor is there anything merciful about denying a destitute Mexican the chance, however uncertain, of improving his lot in the United States. Krugman entitles his article "We've got a moral duty," but in fact he has detached the welfare state from its notional moral content, and the "basic decency" he mentions is really a form of squeamishness: We know there is poverty in the world, we can't alleviate it; we just don't want to see it here.

 

This is a cowardly point of view, but Krugman is free to cast his vote for legislators who will pass laws designed to keep poor people abroad where Krugman doesn't have to see them. Krugman has not, however, made the case that any aspiring Mexican or liberal-minded American citizen should obey such laws.

 

Civil disobedience

 

Many actions prohibited by law -- murder, robbery, perjury in court -- are also morally wrong. Other actions -- most private lies, adultery, skipping church (according to some people) -- are immoral, but not prohibited by law. A third class of actions is prohibited by law but is not morally wrong, and these are problematic.

 

When policy and conscience clash, the stage is set for what Henry David Thoreau, in his classic 1849 essay, called "Civil Disobedience." Thoreau's premise is the primacy of the individual conscience against democratic majoritarianism.

 

"[A] government in which the majority rule in all cases can not be based on justice, even as far as men understand it. Can there not be a government in which the majorities do not virtually decide right and wrong, but conscience? Must the citizen ever for a moment, or in the least degree, resign his conscience to the legislator? Why has every man a conscience then?... It is not desirable to cultivate a respect for the law, so much as for the right."

 

Based on this premise, Thoreau argues that the right response to an unjust law is deliberately to break it, and then take the consequences:

 

"Unjust laws exist: shall we be content to obey them, or shall we endeavor to amend them, and obey them until we have succeeded, or shall we transgress them at once?... If [the law] is of such a nature that it requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then I saw, break the law. Let your life be a counter-friction to stop the machine..."

 

Thoreau seems to have a lot of disciples lately. An estimated 15 to 20 million people are breaking the law, residing in the United States without legal permission. Millions more are hiring them, leasing them accommodations, and otherwise doing business with them and aiding them. So far, though, this lawbreaking generally does not qualify as civil disobedience in Thoreau's sense, because most illegal immigrants and their employers would rather deceive the state to avoid punishment, than defy the law openly and go to prison as living testimonies against injustice. But that is why the recent pro-immigration demonstrations are so interesting: defiance of immigration laws is becoming more self-conscious, more public, more proud. Illegal immigration may be evolving from a black-economy phenomenon into true mass civil disobedience.

 

Victor Davis Hanson, among others, predicts that the demonstrations are likely to provoke a backlash. Okay, but what are the backlashers going to do about it? Civil disobedience challenges the powers that be to decide how much violence they are willing to do in defense of (allegedly) unjust laws.

 

Thoreau wrote that "a minority is powerless when it conforms to the majority... but it is irresistible when it clogs by its whole weight... if one thousand, if one hundred, if ten men... ay, if one HONEST man... were actually to be locked up in the county jail [for anti-slavery civil disobedience], it would be the end of slavery in America." Um, not quite: Thoreau proved himself wrong by going to jail for not paying his taxes, without ending slavery.

 

But Thoreau is right that civil disobedience can vastly empower a minority that is willing to take risks and make sacrifices for a just cause, in the context of a liberal state which is not willing to commit atrocities against non-violent people. Mahatma Gandhi led a successful movement for Indian independence by means of satyagraha, an Indian version of civil disobedience. He succeeded because the British were not willing to kill on a large scale to maintain their rule of India, and because Gandhi and others in his movement were too brave to be diverted from their purpose by lesser punishments, like imprisonment.

 

It's a safe bet that the American people would not countenance the massive coercion and violence -- the Berlin Wall at the border, the long trains full of deportees, the raids of peaceful suburbs, the tearing apart of families, the repression of peaceful protesters, the jeers of "ethnic cleansing" from around the world -- that would be necessary to block or reverse the natural process by which migrants are drawn from poor, low-opportunity countries to the thriving economy of the United States. The question, then, is whether illegal immigrants and their sympathizers have the courage and conviction to organize civil disobedience until they force lasting change.

 

The right to migrate

 

I, for one, hope they do. And I hope they bring about a world in which the right to migrate is accepted as an essential pillar of freedom. That's the long-run vision. How to get there is harder. But we can afford to let in anyone who is not a threat to national security, if we manage the economic impact of immigration so as to ease the way.

 

Low-skilled workers in the US today enjoy higher wages because border controls reduce the competition. Lift the border controls, and wages would fall. From one point of view, that's fine, because US-born low-skilled workers earn a lot more than (most) low-skilled foreign workers earn abroad. Why not narrow the gap? On the other hand, low-skilled workers are used to, and expect, a relatively high (by worldwide or historical standards) level of disposable income. A principle of good policy is to avoid causing unpleasant surprises, when possible.

 

So if immigration redistributes wage income from (some) US workers to newcomers, why not offset this by using the built-in redistributive effects of our tax-and-transfer system?

 

Every worker in the United States today pays a payroll tax to pay unsustainable hand-outs to the generation born in the 1930s or earlier. There's nothing fair about this, but we're used to it, and we lump it together with the general obligation to pay taxes. And 12.4% is a burden, but it won't ruin your life, the way being deported from or barred entry to a country might. So, as a start, we can create a guest worker program, available to all non-terrorists, and require participants to pay their 12.4% payroll tax, while barring them from collecting benefits in the future. This would be fairly easy to arrange, and it would help to shore up the finances of the Social Security system, making the retirements of working-class Americans more secure. (To avoid causing unpleasant surprises to anyone, these policy changes would not affect current legal immigrants.)

 

A more direct way to compensate the US-born working poor for the effect of immigration on wages is through the Earned Income Tax Credit, a negative tax on labor income established in 1975 and rapidly expanded in the 1990s. Currently, most Green Card-holding immigrants are eligible for the EITC. If we allowed in guest workers while not making them eligible for the EITC, this would allow US-born low-skilled workers to be competitive with guest workers in the labor market, while still enjoying a higher standard of living. And more prosperous guest workers' income taxes would help to finance the EITC.

 

Guest-worker programs are appealing, in part, as a market-friendly form of foreign aid. Instead of brain-draining poor countries, the theory goes, guest workers will enrich their home countries by bringing back savings and skills. But once they're in America, guest workers tend to want to stay. Solution: give them a monetary incentive to return, by creating a mandatory guest-worker savings account (say, 20% of all earned income), which they can withdraw only when they get home. Or if they want to stay, they have to accumulate a certain amount (say, $50,000) in their savings accounts, after which they can apply for citizenship, but in that case, they forfeit the money.

 

Every year, the federal government would split the proceeds from these forfeited savings accounts 300 million ways, and send everybody a check, as a tangible reminder of the benefits of immigration. (It's not a lot. If 1.5 million guest workers became citizens, we'd each get $250. A poor family of four would get $1,000 -- no fortune, but not pocket change either.)

 

Finally, if we're still reluctant to see desperate people on our streets, we can require guest workers to pre-imburse the US government for the cost of deporting them. After that, if they end up in desperate need, they have a right to be sent home by the US government, on demand. If they return home on their own, they can get this money back.

 

The details are immaterial: the point is that open borders can benefit all Americans . I'm all in favor of bribing the median voter during a transition period, though I would hope that these policies would be phased out over time. Regardless of how they're treated by our tax-and-transfer system once they arrive, potential migrants are always better off having the option of coming, than not having it. And it is less unjust to let in guest workers and tax them, than to deny millions of people the chance to come to the greatest country in history, just because of the accident of where they were born. In the meantime, if illegal immigrants are ready to resort to protests and civil disobedience to get the American people to do the right thing, more power to them.  "

 

Nathan Smith is a writer living in Washington, D.C. You can e-mail him here. Read more of his ideas about immigration here, here and here.  "

http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=040606D


Thursday, April 6, 2006

 

"Criminal alien exception blocked

  Mad   Security of the US and its citizens from any threat from anywhere is not a concern of Democrats, period ... proven it time and time again.  They're too busy constructing a socialist empire for them to rule from ivory towers to be bothered with our security. 

Democrat Barney Frank worked overtime to gut our standing immigration bill ..... https://blogs.lotterypost.com/konane/2006/04/laying-it-at-the-feet-of-who-caused-it.htm    now this.


"Criminal alien exception blocked

 By Charles Hurt
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
"Senate Democrats refused to allow consideration of an amendment yesterday that would bar illegal aliens convicted of felonies from obtaining U.S. citizenship.
    Democrats said the amendment would "gut" the immigration bill under consideration in the Senate and refused to allow a vote on it.
    "It hurts the bill," said Minority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada. "It hurts the very foundation and what I believe is the spirit" of the legislation.
    Republican Sens. Jon Kyl of Arizona and John Cornyn of Texas restated the purpose of their amendment and appeared incredulous that anyone would object to it.
    "I do not have to explain in any more detail than what I have as why I don't want to move forward," Mr. Reid said. "I don't agree with the amendment. I don't think it's going to benefit this legislation that is pending before the Senate and I'm going to do what I can to prevent a vote on it."
    Later, Mr. Reid added, "We're not going to allow amendments like Kyl-Cornyn to take out what we believe is the goodness of this bill."
    The entire bill is "in effect being blocked by the other side," said Majority Leader Bill Frist, Tennessee Republican.
    After debate over the bill ground to a halt last night, Democrats filed a "cloture motion" that could set up a final vote before the end of the week on an immigration bill that many conservatives view as "amnesty." The bill allows illegal aliens to pay a $2,000 fine and remain working in the U.S. while applying for citizenship.
    The Kyl-Cornyn amendment would have barred from U.S. citizenship any illegal alien who has been convicted of a felony, three misdemeanors or refused a court order to leave the country.
    Democrats said the amendment is not necessary because crimes of "moral turpitude" such as rape and murder already prevent an illegal from obtaining U.S. citizenship, as would violations of drug laws.
    Mr. Kyl came to the floor and listed the crimes he said would not be included without his amendment, such as burglary, assault and battery, possession of an unregistered, sawed-off shotgun, kidnapping and alien smuggling. "
http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20060404-105601-5010r.htm

Thursday, April 6, 2006

 

NBC's Dateline and NASCAR

Backfired attempt Scared  at making agenda look like news.  Green laugh  Green laugh  Green laugh 

Powerlineblog.com quoted as written to show that Michelle Malkin broke the story first and AP picked it up from her.  Conservative bloggers are ahead of the maninstream news organizations quite frequently now, are showing greater research and accuracy in their reports. 

Live embedded links. 


"NBC: Busted!

 

Michelle Malkin had a scoop yesterday: NBC's Dateline program put out a call for Muslims--but only those who "look Muslim"--to parade around at a NASCAR event, hoping to draw a hostile reaction from red-state "bigots" that NBC could film. So Dateline wanted to stage a fake news story intended to discredit NASCAR fans (i.e., conservatives) by catching them in the act of bigotry.

Michelle has follow-ups here, here, and here. The latest is that the Associated Press has picked up Michelle's story, and NASCAR has responded:"It is outrageous that a news organization of NBC's stature would stoop to the level of going out to create news instead of reporting news," Poston said.

"Any legitimate journalist in America should be embarrassed by this stunt. The obvious intent by NBC was to evoke reaction, and we are confident our fans won't take the bait," he said."................

http://powerlineblog.com/archives/013661.php

________________________

"NASCAR: Dateline NBC's Plan 'Outrageous'

CHARLOTTE, N.C. - NASCAR said it was "outrageous" that "Dateline NBC" targeted one of its race tracks last weekend for a possible segment on anti-Muslim sentiment in the United States.

NASCAR said NBC confirmed it was sending Muslim-looking men to a race, along with a camera crew to film fans' reactions. The NBC crew was "apparently on site in Martinsville, Va., walked around and no one bothered them," NASCAR spokesman Ramsey Poston said Wednesday.

"It is outrageous that a news organization of NBC's stature would stoop to the level of going out to create news instead of reporting news," Poston said.

"Any legitimate journalist in America should be embarrassed by this stunt. The obvious intent by NBC was to evoke reaction, and we are confident our fans won't take the bait," he said." ..........

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060405/ap_on_sp_au_ra_ne/car_nascar_dateline_1

 


Wednesday, April 5, 2006

 

Group behind demonstrations

Directly from Powerlineblog.com about the underpinnings of the immigration demonstrations which are causing our legislators, the Senate in particular to abandon any courage in dealing with the issue or simply enforcing existing laws.


"Strange Bedfellows

 

This morning's Washington Times reports the astonishing--to me, anyway--news that last week's massive pro-illegal immigrant demonstration in Los Angeles was organized by International A.N.S.W.E.R. We've written about International A.N.S.W.E.R. a number of times; for example, here. It is a Communist organization and a front for the Workers World Party. The Workers World Party has been around for quite a while. It is one of the last unapologetically Stalinist organizations in the world; it supported the Soviet invasion of Hungary in 1956. More recently, the WWP and ANSWER have supported dictators like Saddam Hussein and North Korea's Kim Il Jong.

These same groups organized or participated in most of the major demonstrations against the Iraq war; the fact that Communist organizations were heavily involved in the antiwar movement was, for the most part, an unreported story.

I once did some research to try to find out who is behind the Workers World Party. I obtained the government forms that it filed. Those forms are not required to identify donors, so, while I could infer that the WWP is kept afloat by donations from a few wealthy donors, I couldn't tell who they were. The individual named on the documents did not return calls asking for more information. "  ........

http://powerlineblog.com/archives/013649.php#013649


Tuesday, April 4, 2006

 

Laying it at the feet of who caused it

A suggested read as to which party openly paved the way for both the 9-11 illegals, also illegals marches which are proclaiming ownership of the US. 

Allow lawless dregs of society to run roughshod over law abiding citizens is the communist way of throwing society out of its normal historical order into chaos and gaining control while telling the gullible they're the common man's party.  In this instance open the borders so more can pour in with impunity. 


"Immigrating Terror
By Rocco DiPippo
FrontPageMagazine.com | April 4, 2006


"In the years since the Twin Towers were destroyed, Rep. Barney Frank, D-MA, has come under fire from several writers who claim that immigration laws he wrote made it easier for foreign subversives to enter America, set up terror cells, and raise funds for extremists. One writer, Chuck Morse, who ran against Frank as an Independent in 2000, asserts Frank bears responsibility for loosening restrictions on student and temporary visas, which eased the way for the 9/11 hijackers to enter the U.S. to plan and carry out their attacks.

 

 

Frank denies that any of his legislative activity contributed to these things. He implies that “the Republicans” approved of his immigration legislation. He says that his immigration laws were good ones. He says poor enforcement of them was the problem. He says that the 9/11 Commission cleared him of any culpability in the weakening of America’s ability to keep out extremists and foreign terrorists. He calls those who say his immigration policies contributed to 9/11 “right-wing extremists.”

 

There is evidence – presented later in this article – that approximately 19 months before 9/11, Barney Frank had been given specific information indicating that at least some of his immigration legislation was causing a massive infiltration of America by radical Muslims and radical Muslim clerics. He did nothing in response to that information but continued writing and pushing legislation that further relaxed immigration requirements and granted additional rights to non-U.S. citizens, even to those who had been deported from the U.S. for committing felonies.

 

All legislation must be discussed within the historical context in which it was written. Frank began writing immigration legislation while the domestic surveillance abilities of the FBI and the foreign surveillance abilities of the CIA were being devastated by attacks by the Democratic Party, the radical Left, and “civil liberties” groups including the National Lawyers Guild, the Center for Constitutional Rights and the American Civil Liberties Union. The Alien Border Control Committee (ABCC), formed by President Reagan in 1986 to coordinate the FBI and CIA in rooting out and deporting Islamists and alien immigrant supporters of Muslim terror, was effectively forced to dismantle by the coordinated efforts of the aforementioned parties. And Congressman Frank contributed to the ABCC’s demise by writing legislation that stripped its authority to deport alien extremists based on their political beliefs.

 

From 1981 onward, while terror attacks around the world by Muslim radicals were rising dramatically and America’s intelligence agencies were being neutered by the Left, Congressman Barney Frank legislated to loosen America’s immigration controls. At the same time, he consistently voted to slash funding for the CIA, the FBI, and the U.S. military.

 

Frank’s most far-reaching work on immigration law occurred in the context of a major overhaul of the McCarran-Walter act of 1952. That act contains the body of U.S. immigration law. Its overhaul during the 1980s culminated in the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) of 1990. To expedite the work, the project was divided into two parts: an overhaul of legal immigration laws and a separate overhaul of illegal immigration laws. Congressman Frank wanted to reform the exclusion provisions of legal immigration laws, laws that codified the things a prospective legal immigrant to the U.S. could be denied entry for.

 

“The exclusions were part of the legal immigration provisions, and as a member of the Democratic majority on the immigration subcommittee, I asked for and was accorded by my colleagues the right to take the lead in rewriting the exclusion provisions,” says Frank. [1]

 

Frank concentrated on removing the ideological exclusions. Those exclusions were used to prevent people with totalitarian views from immigrating to the U.S. and causing unrest. They were also used to deport legal aliens who had caused unrest or engaged in subversive activities in America. Frank categorized the exclusions as “relics of the McCarthy era.” His associating the ideological exclusions with “McCarthyism” is disingenuous for many reasons, not least because Senator Joseph McCarthy concentrated his anti-Communist efforts on U.S. citizens, not aliens or visitors.

 

In fact, ideological exclusions were not “relics of the McCarthy era.” They originated from the Alien Registration Act of 1940, signed into law by President Roosevelt as a national security measure on the eve of World War II. The bill made it a federal crime for anyone to “knowingly or willfully advocate, abet, advise or teach the duty, necessity, desirability or propriety of overthrowing the Government of the United States or of any State by force or violence, or for anyone to organize any association which teaches, advises or encourages such an overthrow, or for anyone to become a member of or to affiliate with any such association.”

 

Frank was passionate about removing ideological exclusions. “I was in an ideal situation because while I was in favor of the overall bill, I cared most of all about the exclusions, and I was prepared to try to defeat the bill if I was not successful in reforming what I considered to be the most outrageous aspect of American immigration law, the antigay, anti-free-speech McCarthyite hangover,” said Frank.

 

To Frank, the ideological exclusions were inconsistent with the notion of free speech. But the question was: Should the full First Amendment right to free speech be extended to non-U.S. citizens while they were in America? Frank said yes. He then flipped the issue on its head by arguing that denying entry to foreigners with subversive or “dangerous” views and radical ideologies was a de facto violation of American citizens' First Amendment rights to hear those views.

 

“Beginning around the turn of the century,” said Frank, “American law contained a large number of exclusions to protect what legislators apparently thought was a fragile citizenry from all manner of dangerous foreign influences. Anarchists, people who believed in polygamy, Communists, people who knew people who were related to Communists, people who thought and said unpleasant things about America – the list of those kept out of America was egregious and in total violation of the spirit of free expression.”

 

It is typical for left-wing politicians to waltz past the bones of Communism’s 150 million victims on their way to trivializing the dangers that radical ideologues present. Frank is no exception, since he considers foreigners who hold totalitarian views to be of no concern to national security, a view he has held since at least 1981, the year he officially began working to eliminate ideological exclusions. The Soviet Union, America’s long-time communist enemy, did not collapse until 1990. Though Frank’s final exclusion amendment included language making deportable “any alien who participated in Nazi persecution,” there was no clause barring any alien who participated in Communist persecution.

 

When Frank’s exclusion amendment became law, it said aliens could not be excluded or deported “because of any past, current, or expected beliefs, statements, or associations which, if engaged in by a United States citizen in the United States, would be protected under the Constitution of the United States.”

 

Frank used the elimination of ideological exclusions to facilitate the removal of another long-standing exclusion statute, one truly unjust. It is important to mention this since it raises questions concerning his motives for legislating against ideological exclusion in the first place.

 

Frank tailored his attack on ideological exclusions to expedite the removal of the sexual preference exclusion, an exclusion that denied homosexual immigrants entry to the U.S. Given the cultural climate of the 1980s, a stand-alone effort to have the sexual preference exclusion removed would not have been supported by many Congressmen, regardless of their private views on homosexuality. So in a brilliant legislative sleight-of-hand, Frank crafted the comprehensive immigration exclusion amendment to define the only reasons that entry to America could be denied – and he left the sexual preference exclusion out.

 

That strategy of omission put anyone wanting to continue the ban on admitting homosexual immigrants in the unsavory position of having to sponsor a separate amendment seeking to continue that ban. In his essay “A Case Study in the Effective Use of the Political Process,” Frank explains his strategy:

 

My intention was to take the legitimate bases for excluding people from this country – namely, that they would in some real way be dangerous to our well-being – and embody them in a new section that would replace the existing obnoxious [ideological exclusion] sections. I would deal with the anti-gay exclusion simply by leaving it out of the re-draft. Thus, no separate vote would be taken on whether or not to repeal this provision, because its abolition would be accomplished by omission. And since I was part of the majority that would be presenting the new bill, the burden in Congress would thus be shifted to those who sought to preserve this homophobic aspect.

 

In other words, Frank took an issue concerning national security and parlayed it into a significant victory for gay rights.

 

In spite of security concerns, the ideological exclusion is removed

 

In 1987, over the objections of the State Department because of security concerns, Frank’s exclusion amendment was made temporary law. Though President Reagan also objected to Frank’s ideological exclusions amendment, he accepted it in compromise to get broader aspects of the McCarran-Walters revamp passed into law. For the first time in American history, the full First Amendment right to free speech and free association, once exclusively enjoyed by full U.S. citizens, had been granted to non-citizens and visitors to the United States. The moment Barney Frank’s exclusions amendment was made law, it became unlawful, on the basis of their beliefs alone, to deny entry to immigrants or other foreign nationals with radical ideologies. It also made it nearly impossible to deport them once they were here.

 

Three years later, the overhaul of McCarran-Walter was finished, and it became law as the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1990. Frank’s ideological exclusions amendment remained intact, except for a single word. The final amendment said that an alien could not be excluded from entry into the U.S. nor deported once there ''because of any past, current or expected beliefs, statements or associations which, if engaged in by a United States citizen in the United States, would be protected under the Constitution.” Frank had also wanted to prevent the U.S. from denying entry to immigrants based on past “activities,” but under pressure from the Bush State Department, Frank was forced to drop “activities” from the amendment’s final wording.

 

The New York Times, which vigorously supported Frank and his fellow Democrats’ drive to remove ideological exclusions, reported its permanent removal on Oct. 26, 1990: “Representative Barney Frank, the Massachusetts Democrat who was the chief House negotiator in the conference committee, said the new provisions worked out Wednesday night and today 'made rational the reasons a person can be excluded,' and added, ‘We are saying you can't exclude someone because of their speech, their beliefs, or their associations.’” [Emphasis added]

 

Some changes were made to the 1990 exclusion amendment in 1996, but Frank’s ideological exclusions amendment remained untouched and in force until after the 9/11 attacks. The 1996 exclusion list allowed immigration officials to bar aliens from entry or deport them for the following terrorism-related reasons:

 

(1) has engaged in a terrorist activity,

 

(2) a consular officer or the Attorney General knows, or has reasonable ground to believe, is engaged in or is likely to engage after entry in any terrorist activity .

 

(3) has, under circumstances indicating an intention to cause death or serious bodily harm, incited terrorist activity,

 

(4) is a representative of a foreign terrorist organization, as designated by the Secretary under section 219, or

 

(5) is a member of a foreign terrorist organization, as designated by the Secretary under section 219, which the alien knows or should have known is a terrorist organization is inadmissible.

 

But U.S. immigration officials could not deny entry to or deport aliens solely on the basis of their political or ideological beliefs or the associations they engaged in while in America. And the remaining exclusions, as they related to terrorism, were filled with ambiguities that monkey-wrenched the process of deporting suspect aliens expeditiously. The Center for Constitutional Rights, National Lawyers Guild, and other left-wing groups lined up to exploit those ambiguities. They filed endless litigation in defense of aliens arrested for suspicion of involvement in crime, terrorism or terrorist-related activity.

 

James R. Edwards of the Hudson Institute sums up the overall effect of Barney Frank’s elimination of ideological exclusion:

 

History teaches that foreign ideologues have long sought to promote their beliefs and advance their causes on American soil. Alien subversives have spied, spread propaganda and stolen state and industrial secrets. Foreign anarchists, communists and other radicals have sought to make converts, raise funds, organize followers and otherwise exploit American freedoms...In short, the 1990 Immigration Act’s revision of exclusion grounds preserved the spirit of the McGovern and Moynihan [Frank] Amendments. Indeed, this law made it much easier for aliens who hold radical, dangerous, anti-American or subversive political beliefs to enter and remain in the United States. This perversion of the First Amendment means the guy who preaches hatred, pollutes hearts and minds, steeps persuadable people in reasons to harm Americans and wage war from within against America…gets a free pass.

 

 A Graphic Warning Ignored

 

On January 26, 2000, at 11 a.m., in Room 2237 of the Rayburn House Office Building, the Avalon Project at Yale Law School for the House Subcommittee on Immigration and Claims held a hearing. During that presentation, testimony was given by experts on terrorism and immigration regarding the vast influx of Islamist ideologues and other extremists into the U.S. and Canada. One of those experts, Steven Emerson, described, in great and shocking detail the large number of foreign Islamic radicals and radical clerics entering the U.S. each year. Emerson said, “U.S. officials say they are virtually powerless to stop the influx of known militants into the United States for reasons ranging from lack of adequate intelligence to easy circumvention of the watch list to legal restrictions in stopping self-described religious clerics from entering the United States.” (Emphasis added.)

 

Those “legal restrictions” were a clear reference to Barney Frank’s ideological exclusions amendment, which forbade denying entry to or deporting aliens based solely on their beliefs, ideologies, or associations. Rep. Frank was a member of that House Subcommittee on Immigration Claims that the Avalon Project had addressed. And Congresswoman Sheila Jackson-Lee, D-TX, who works closely with Frank on immigration matters, had physically attended the Avalon hearing.

 

Five hundred and ninety-four days after that hearing, 19 months later, Muslim radicals, acting out their radical beliefs, murdered 3,000 Americans under a clear, blue sky.

 

How many of the hundreds, if not thousands, of Muslim radicals and their Islamic clerics, who legally entered America under Barney Frank’s amendment, aided the 9/11 murderers? How many of them had attended to some operational detail of the 9/11 plot? How many cheered and supported it, or excused it in front of their mosques? How many alien Muslim radicals remain in the U.S., awaiting a signal to murder? How many of them have become full U.S. citizens?

 

Most importantly, how many American hearts and minds did these ideologues poison with their hatred? What will the result of that be?

 

After 9/11, the Patriot Act became law and Congressman Frank’s ideological exclusion amendment was effectively suspended. Visa laws were significantly tightened up and the enforcement of immigration laws increased. Frank does not like what he sees.

 

 “When 3,000 Americans were murdered by illegal immigrant terrorists on September 11,” says Frank, “that was the end of rational immigration policy in the United States.”

 

Or rather, it was the beginning.

 

Rocco DiPippo is a freelance political writer and publisher of The Autonomist blog

 

ENDNOTES:

 [1] Barney Frank, A Case Study in the Effective Use of the Political Process, an essay published in Creating Change: Sexuality, Public Policy and Civil Rights by John D'Emilio, William B. Turner and Urvashi Vaid (Stonewall Inn Editions 2002)

 

Note: While Rep. Frank’s categorizing of the 9/11 killers as “illegal immigrant terrorists” is, in the strictest sense, technically true, it is a misleading categorization. When applying for their visas, none of the hijackers-to-be admitted to being members in the terrorist al-Qaeda organization, an admission that would have made them ineligible for a visa. Hence, technically speaking, since they did not disclose this (assuming they were even asked about it), the visas that all of them held were obtained illegally making them technically, but not practically, null and void. In addition, some of the killers had removed pages containing visas from countries on a U.S. terror watch list, where they had obtained training. Again, this made their visas technically illegal. The most important fact is that all of the 9/11 hijackers entered the U.S. with non-counterfeit, functionally legal temporary visas. And the ones who traveled to and from America while planning the attacks, did so with ease. Collectively, the hijackers entered the U.S. 33 times in 21 months. Between them, they had a total of 68 contacts with immigration and consular officials. Who can forget this?

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Printable.asp?ID=21894


Tuesday, April 4, 2006

 

EU "Corporate Social Restriction

Interesting to see what doesn't work in Europe and remember this is the continent Kerry wanted the US to walk lockstep behind as a social and economic model. 

Socialism and its "business models" only work on the drawing board in a vacuum 100 years ago, never in today's real world with real people who like to improve their lives by making free informed, unencumbered choices.

We can use their hard won experience as a vital lesson of how NOT to do it. 


"Corporate Social Restriction

By Carlo Stagnaro, Co-Authored by Lawrence A. Kogan

Source TCSDaily.com

"In recent years Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has become a mantra. A complex movement has been campaigning throughout Europe for high labor, environmental, and human rights standards, even though it is not quite clear what 'is meant by "high". The movement comprises Western trade unions, environmental non-governmental organizations (ENGOs), and human rights activists who have little faith in the ability of private companies and free markets to generate wealth and improve living conditions for all workers. In fact, these groups believe that there exists a threshold beyond which a company's profits become too high, inequitable, and even immoral.

 

The CSR movement has grown to become a potent regional political force, and has thus far succeeded in causing many companies to "voluntarily" adopt or develop programs that have nothing at all to do with their core businesses. They range from special commitments to environmental and labor conditions, to aid initiatives in developing countries that are often accompanied by information and education-based campaigns. Notwithstanding the costs incurred and distractions suffered by such companies in pursuit of CSR, many critics within the CSR movement are still not satisfied.

 

Sensing that companies are employing CSR disingenuously as a mere advertising façade to cover up their otherwise socially bereft conduct, CSR activists have sought to raise the level of "public accountability". They now want the current voluntary benchmarks converted into something more concrete: mandatory requirements. Their goal, simply, is to impose upon companies third-party monitoring and enforcement systems, thus providing themselves with an ample source of future employment, to ensure that pure and unadulterated CSR is practiced company- and region-wide. And they have enlisted none other than national governments and international organizations, including the United Nations, which endorse public "naming and shaming" campaigns in order to "smoke out" (expose and extinguish) corporations' heretical practices. The movement is especially strong in the European Union, where the Commission is expected to and often does embrace every request.

 

If you combine the political agenda of the CSR movement and the political power of the European Commission, the result may well be explosive. In fact, Europe's business climate is already less-than-welcoming. There continues to be a persistently low rate of economic growth and technological innovation, and a dramatic rise in the number of costly regulations that require strict company compliance. It is no surprise, then, that European companies have chosen to invest significantly less on local research & development than their American and Asian counterparts.

 

If recent media reports are any indication, perhaps the Commission has finally awakened from its largely self-imposed stupor, and has discovered the distinctly negative influence that the movement has had on European corporate performance. Indeed, Enterprise and Industry Commissioner Günther Verheugen might have been so startled by what he found when he actually took the trouble to look, that he "moved [the Commission] towards a more pro-business view on CSR over the past year." This change of heart has resulted in last month's launch of the "European Alliance for CSR". The alliance focuses on enterprises as the "primary actors in CSR". This is an elegant way of signaling that, at least for the time being, CSR is and should be the business of companies, and not the business of NGOs or the Commission. "The Commission has opted for a voluntary approach which is more effective and less bureaucratic," Verheugen said. "Since CSR is about voluntary business behavior, we can only encourage it if we work with business."

 

CSR proponents, such as the European Trade Union Confederation and Friends of the Earth, attacked Verheugen as a hijacker of CSR. Despite his attempt to implement a soft move from the old to a new concept of CSR, however, one must seriously question the Commission's ability to stay the course in the face of rabid NGO opposition. No matter how one "packages" CSR the problem of unmasking its true identity will remain, as long as the core issue underlying CSR is left unresolved: what is the social responsibility of a business? According to renowned economist and Nobel laureate, Milton Friedman, "there is one and only one social responsibility of business -- to use its resources and engage in activities designed to increase its profits so long as it stays within the rules of the game, which is to say, engages in open and free competition without deception or fraud." Although this makes perfect sense in the increasingly competitive and low-margin global marketplace in which companies operate, regionally-focused and regulatory-minded NGOs and EU bureaucrats abhor it.

 

If a business has any "social" corporate responsibility at all, it is owed to the shareholders and debt-holders who keep it going. Plus, in order to survive and flourish another day so that it might later consider redeploying excess profits to "social philanthropic causes", a business must also competently serve its market constituents. If Jean Q. Consumer is different from Jean Q. Citizen, then the products and services a company offers for sale may also need to be different. For instance, Jean Q. Consumer may only want high quality and performance-driven goods and services at an affordable price, while Jean Q. Citizen might not be so concerned. He might instead demand only goods and services with a "high" level of environmental, labor and human rights protections, for which she would be willing to pay a higher price, even though she does not quite know what those protections really mean. Is it substantively different than "low" standards? How is this measured? Who makes such a determination? Is it verifiable and truthful?

 

In the end, the decision to purchase one rather than the other of these types of products or services is part personal and part market-driven. And, despite what the NGO community often claims, there exists no moral difference between the companies that respond to these different demands. Indeed, one may argue that each such company is socially responsible.

 

EU bureaucrats and European NGOs recognize the truth about market influences, and have developed ways to distort it. One such way is to identify artificial distinctions between products and services, such as "low" and "high" environment, worker, and human rights content, and to falsely claim that the former are not socially responsible because they pose unacceptable health and environmental hazards to the public. When this distortion rises to the political sphere as the result of well-organized and funded NGO public fear campaigns, it is usually doomed to turn into anti-business regulations that raise costs to all businesses, harming both shareholders and consumers. Firms that suffer from harmed reputations become fearful, risk averse, less competitive, and protectionist in nature. As Professor David Henderson, formerly head of the Economics and Statistics Department of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development Organization, has said, "insofar as this trend weakens enterprise performance, limits economic freedom and restricts competition, the effect is not only to reduce welfare: it is to deprive private business of its distinctive virtues and rationale".

 

Mr. Kogan is CEO of The Institute for Trade, Standards and Sustainable Development, Inc. Mr. Stagnaro is Free Market Environmentalism Director of Istituto Bruno Leoni. "

http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=040406F


Monday, April 3, 2006

 

"Zarqawi 'sacked for mistakes'

"Zarqawi 'sacked for mistakes'

Sunday 02 April 2006, 13:01 Makka Time, 10:01 GMT
Source Aljazeera.net   

Iraq's resistance has replaced Abu Musab al-Zarqawi as political head of the rebels, the son of Osama bin Laden's mentor has said in Jordan.

Hudayf Azzam, 35, who claims close contacts with the fighters, said on Sunday: "The Iraqi resistance's high command asked Zarqawi to give up his political role and replaced him with an Iraqi, because of several mistakes he made. 

"Zarqawi's role has been limited to military action. Zarqawi bowed to the orders two weeks ago and was replaced by  Iraqi national Abdullah bin Rashed al-Baghdadi."
 

Azzam's late father, Abdallah Azzam, was known as the "prince of mujahedeens" and advised bin Laden, the head of al-Qaeda.

Azzam said he regularly receives "credible information on the resistance in Iraq. He said al-Zarqawi had "made many political mistakes", including "the creation of an independent organisation, al-Qaeda in Iraq".

 
"Zarqawi also took the liberty of speaking in the name of the  Iraqi people and resistance, a role which belongs only to the  Iraqis," Azzam said.

 
As a result "the resistance command inside and outside Iraq, including imams, criticised him and after long discussions demanded that he be confined to military action".
 
"Zarqawi pledged not to carry out any more attacks against  Iraq's neighbours after having been criticised for these operations which are considered a violation of sharia [Islamic law]," Azzam said.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/2B8B878B-D862-4056-B677-E600549C2738.htm


Sunday, April 2, 2006

 

"Islamist Challenge to the U.S. Constitution

Blog entry quoted below links to a hugely worthwhile article about a creeping, well funded assault on our Constitution in an attempt to elevate Shari‘a law above both US Constitutional and individual state laws.  Hey it worked in Europe so why not here??


"The Islamist Challenge to the U.S. Constitution

"David Kennedy Houck reveals how serious the challenge to the U.S. Constitution by Muslim groups has already become. From the Middle East Quarterly, [ http://www.meforum.org/article/920 ]with thanks to DFS:

First in Europe and now in the United States, Muslim groups have petitioned to establish enclaves in which they can uphold and enforce greater compliance to Islamic law. While the U.S. Constitution enshrines the right to religious freedom and the prohibition against a state religion, when it comes to the rights of religious enclaves to impose communal rules, the dividing line is more nebulous. Can U.S. enclaves, homeowner associations, and other groups enforce Islamic law?

Such questions are no longer theoretical. While Muslim organizations first established enclaves in Europe,[1] the trend is now crossing the Atlantic. Some Islamist community leaders in the United States are challenging the principles of assimilation and equality once central to the civil rights movement, seeking instead to live according to a separate but equal philosophy. The Gwynnoaks Muslim Residential Development group, for example, has established an informal enclave in Baltimore because, according to John Yahya Cason, director of the Islamic Education and Community Development Initiative, a Baltimore-based Muslim advocacy group, "there was no community in the U.S. that showed the totality of the essential components of Muslim social, economic, and political structure."[2]

Baltimore is not alone. In August 2004, a local planning commission in Little Rock, Arkansas, granted The Islamic Center for Human Excellence authorization to build an internal Islamic enclave to include a mosque, a school, and twenty-two homes.[3] While the imam, Aquil Hamidullah, says his goal is to create "a clean community, free of alcohol, drugs, and free of gangs,"[4] the implications for U.S. jurisprudence of this and other internal enclaves are greater: while the Little Rock enclave might prevent the sale of alcohol, can it punish possession and in what manner? Can it force all women, be they residents or visitors, to don Islamic hijab (headscarf)? Such enclaves raise the fundamental questions of when, how, and to what extent religious practice may supersede the U.S. Constitution.

Don't fail to read it all.

Posted by Robert at April 1, 2006 05:43 AM"| Print this entry | Email this entry "
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/010847.php

Sunday, April 2, 2006

 

Todd, this one's for you!!

Found the link on Powerlineblog.com .... their take on the video in quotation marks below.  Big Grin



"Introducing The Right Brothers

 

Ladies and gentlemen, we proudly bring to you "Bush was Right" by The Right Brothers. A beat you can dance to, lyrics shot through with optimism, a killer hook...and a brilliant middle eight: "Ted Kennedy -- wrong, Cindy Sheehan -- wrong, France -- wrong, Zell Miller -- right!"

The song condenses the theme of Hugh Hewitt's Painting the Map Red into a wild three-minute ride. Joe Malchow comments: "Whether you agree with the causal argument, these guys are stunningly informed about recent world events." Don't miss it! (Courtesy of Dartblog.)

Posted by Scott at 12:52 PM "

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o762HKxYMeA&eurl=

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