They're in Illinois, one of the states with the nastiest anti-gun attitudes of any state in the union. And the city council of East Saint Louis, on Illinois soil, just fired 19 police officers.
The city, when the firefighters' union and the police officers' union wouldn't accept a 20% pay cut to already abysmal pay, decided last week to simply fire some of those horrible, expensive safety officers.
Take a look at the ratio of fired city workers: out of 37 fired, there were 19 police officers, 11 firefighters, 4 public works employees (gas and water maybe?), and 3 administrators.
That's right: three administrators fired. Thirty-four useful, likely underpaid, city workers fired, but only three likely overpaid administrators.
And in one of the worst crime-ridden areas in the Midwest.
The people who live there have no chance to defend themselves from the violent criminals they live alongside, thanks to the viciously strict gun laws that said criminals refuse to abide by. Those people will have to deal with drug dealers, gangs, and arsonists with fewer cops and firefighters to help them pick up the pieces of their lives.
Maybe the city council needs to be fired, and their salaries folded back into the budget. I bet the city could hire twice the number of essential personnel they just fired.
Explains why they keep voting Liberal. They, collectively, have the mental health of a depressed lemming (Ken and Ricki and a few others excepted, of course).
Americans are self-rationing their health care! That isn't right! Don't they know that's the government's job?
Okay, all sarcasm aside, the current recession is causing people to forgo the Cadillac insurance plans with no deductible, go to urgent care clinics and doc-in-the-box offices for standard checkups (instead of going to the family doctor at twice the rate), and elect not to have the elective procedures they might have gone for in years past.
The health care industry are a little puzzled. And concerned. This is going to force them to lower their prices to attract business back, for a while, at least.
That's the best thing about a demand-driven economy: prices are self correcting. Goods and services only cost what people are willing to pay. And, until Obamacare/mandatory Medicaid comes into effect and turns it into a command-driven sector of the economy, the health care industry is still demand-driven. Doctors and insurers can only charge what people are willing to pay.
I know this is speculative fiction, but it could easily happen. Key quote:
"America’s collapse occurred when government ceased to represent the people and became the instrument of a private oligarchy. Decisions were made in behalf of short-term profits for the few at the expense of unmanageable liabilities for the many."
Massachusetts is trying to bypass the constitution with their little game with the electoral college.
While I can see it coming back to bite them in the ass, I still think that they're trying to disenfranchise flyover country, rather than themselves. Where is the greatest concentration of population? Blue states. Where is the greatest concentration of Democrat votes? Inner cities and cemeteries.
Massachusetts isn't the only state that's pushed this through, either. So have Illinois (Chicago), New Jersey, Hawaii, Maryland, and Washington. They claim that it wouldn't come into effect unless more states pass similar legislature.
Like what happened when the 17th amendment was passed, the states that have passed this claim they want the people to have a greater say in who is elected President. And like the reality of how senators quit listening to the people once the state legislatures no longer seated and recalled them, this new law is going to do nothing but shaft the people it's supposed to benefit.
A black teenager is likely to be charged with a hate crime on top of assault and battery for attacking a white man. And it is a hate crime in this case: the black kid went after the white guy because the white guy was listening to rap.
I just wish we could charge all rap artists with a hate crime for producing the crap they produce--inflicting it on the rest of us should count.
Talk about stupid. A judge in Arizona is directly telling the people of Arizona that they are too stupid to know what's right and what's wrong.
This is going to lead to bloodshed. No, I don't think someone's going to go after the judge. I think that people are going to set up shop along the border to hand out a little vigilante justice.
And justice it would be, just as it would be if I shot someone coming in through one of the windows of my home. Or found someone camping peacefully in my living room without my permission.
Stupid politicians. If it was voter-passed, voter approved, the voters are going to be really pissed off, and there will be a backlash that will unseat said city council.
Chicago gangs are taking over sports teams' accoutrement to designate membership. A good blog buddy of mine, Oldcatman, has it entirely correct:
Same with any other race. And, in my opinion, any individual that uses sports team branding to designate membership in a criminal organization is a nigger, regardless of race.
At least on some level. I don't think the state meant for legal residents and naturalized citizens to leave (and I don't think the ones who understand U.S. law are), but the news that illegals are leaving the state in droves has to be counted good news by everyone with a brain.
I have nothing against legal immigration. I'd actually like it if the immigration number restrictions were relaxed. I don't want to see any other requirements for immigration (like checking backgrounds, health status, and double-checking that it's Juan Valdez, and not Abdulla Hussein) relaxed, but I don't see any reason to prevent healthy and otherwise law abiding citizens from fleeing their corrupt and oppressive government for a place where they can build a life without it being confiscated because someone else wants it.
Yesterday, we were taking the imp to see my mother, and stopped at a convenience store to get some extra caffeine for my other half. I glanced up and noticed a small sticker on the door, just above the handle, that announced that they accept the modern equivalent of food stamps.
A convenience store that really doesn't have anything in its grocery section (candy, jerky, chips and cookies) takes food stamps.
I grew up on food stamps. They didn't used to be accepted by convenience stores that didn't sell bread and milk and such. They didn't count for alcohol.
Now they do.
What the fuck is wrong with this country? It was bad enough when I found out that a local pizza place that sells premade pizzas for people to take home accepts food stamps. It was worse when I found out that college students in larger cities go on food stamps so that they could afford gormet food. The Daily Caller reports that Portland State University states that food stamps aren't charity, but a right.
Oh. That explains it.
When my family was on food stamps, we got a thick envelope stuffed with 295 food dollars worth of food stamps. They worked like cash...but for the looks we got when my mother pulled them out. There used to be a stigma attached, especially to single, healthy adults--even those with children--that simply doesn't exist anymore, thanks to the EBT cards, which (unless someone is looking over the user's shoulder and sees them choose that option on the pin pad) looks identical to a debit card. See? No stigma. Nothing to see, here. Move along.
To tell the truth, I'm not sure the stigma that used to be attached to food stamps would do any good to get people off of the program, anymore. I'm pretty sure that modern Americans, those who apply for such, consider themselves completely entitled to live off of the hard work and paychecks of others.
Take, for example, the WIC program. Every time we go to buy baby food (less and less, as the imp insists on eating the same thing as we eat more and more), we have to edge past people looking through their WIC certificates as they get baby formula and baby food. And usually, there's an X-Box game in the cart.
My other half and I would qualify for WIC. I've been pressured to apply for it. I've even been told that my state offers mothers that nurse a higher dollar allowance with a wider variety of permitted/covered food than it does mothers who just chuck a can of cheap formula (or not so cheap formula) in the cart.
We both refuse. It's not because it wouldn't make things easier--the imp is, after all, still on Prevacid, which runs nearly a month's grocery budget by itself--but because we can cut luxuries from the budget, and still afford everything we need without government assistance.
For a nation that has been accustomed to cradle-to-(early) grave socialized medicine for more than sixty years, it's going to be incredibly hard for Britain to successfully decentralize.
However, if they don't, with the current economic problems the entire world is having, they're doomed.
We need to learn from their (and Canada's, and New Zealand's, and everywhere else that's tried it) mistakes, and dump Obamacare/mandatory Medicaid before it completely destroys the best, most advanced health care in the world through starving it for funding, and choking it with regulations.
On a purely gut-level "this ain't right" reaction, I really don't like this. It's not that I mind sharing what I make per year in income (it's pitiful, and should shame the university I work for), I don't think the government has any business having access to what everybody makes in every job outside of every year's prepared taxes.
Obamacare/mandatory Medicaid is not only not going to not cover preexisting conditions, but the passing of the bill has had several unintended consequences. Things like wiping out large chunks of private enterprise profits. Likely in the future, it'll wipe out employer-provided health insurance. But right now, the most recent "unintended" consequence is that health insurance companies are no longer willing to underwrite children.
That's right: the government is forcing parents that don't have family plans to put their kids on Medicaid now, which gives the government a whole lot more say over how parents are allowed to care for their kids.
That makes me wonder just how much of these consequences are actually unintended.
New York City's lefty mayor, Michael Bloomberg, is planning to start charging a fee for trash pickup. New York City residents are whining "But that's what we pay taxes for!"
Grow up, grow a pair of gonads, pay your fees like everyone else in the country, or leave NYC for someplace where it's not supposed to be covered in the abusive property taxes you pay.
I've been thinking for days, and I just don't see how the interstate commerce clause permits you to argue that Obamacare/mandatory Medicaid is constitutional. Especially not since you also believe in a woman's right to privacy (pro-abortion), and this bill is one of the biggest federal invasions of privacy out there, despite what your side says to the contrary.
First of all, the interstate commerce clause doesn't apply, because I don't think there's a state out there that permits people to buy health insurance from out of state--which is one of the leading causes of high-cost health insurance. Therefore, the decision to purchase (or not purchase, as the case may be) a good or service in one place does not automatically mean that there was a possibility that an individual may have purchased said good or service elsewhere. In this case, there wasn't. Which renders your argument void.
Too bad more Americans aren't aware of their history, laws, and limits that the Constitution was created to place on you.
"I remember thinking, Kanzler, back when I still had some faculties for it, that although the Communists may have gone under I could no longer tell the difference between a Red Russian and a Green German."--Watch on the Rhine, by John Ringo and Tom Kratman
I could easily say the same thing about a Green American. Unfortunately, that's what we've got in the highest office.
I am strongly beginning to suspect that the Deepwater Horizon oil spill debacle was a setup from start to finish, solely so that Dear Leader can further harm U.S. industry, with the EPA's willing and eager cooperation. Why do I think this? Several bits of disparate evidence that, when looked at with an open mind, offer a glimpse at a larger picture.
The stories aren't exactly easy to find, but they are out there: the Obama administration waived impact studies and safety regulations that are in place to prevent occurrences like the April 20 explosion of the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig, which led to nearly three full months of spillage. Not long after the debacle, Dear Leader tried to impose a moratorium on drilling in the gulf. The attempt was blocked by the judiciary.
It wasn't the first time Dear Leader had tried to block new drilling, either. The first time he attempted to block drilling happened before the waivers for the Deepwater Horizon rig passed his desk. Which is what has led me to believe that this was a setup on Dear Leader's part to attempt to further damage the economy.
You see, the moratorium--even for just six months--carries huge consequences. The six month moratorium has and will cost between 8,000 jobs at a lowball estimate, and several tens of thousands of jobs at the high end. And that assumes that the oil companies don't follow Diamond Offshore's example, and simply move the floating rigs they use for the deepwater drilling. Should that happen, it's estimated that the U.S. could lose another 400,000 jobs.
And if that isn't enough, the clown in the number two slot has admitted that we already "can't recover all the jobs lost." And they're playing on Americans' love of their country, its ecosystems, and nature to try to force us to accept throwing more away.
How are they playing on our fears? Simple: both the administration and the EPA are blocking efforts to clean up the mess, and refusing aid to do it. The EPA in particular are doing their best to be obstructionist, by posing unreal expectations on the cleanup effort: "Nearly oil-free isn't good enough for the U.S. regulators, who have a standard of 15 parts per million -- if water isn't at least 99.9985% pure, it may not be returned to the Gulf of Mexico."
They're also lying to us about how bad the spill still is, two weeks after it's been capped. Despite continuing hysterics from the environmentalists, cleanup ships have been having more and more trouble finding that which they were dispatched to clean up.
The good news in all of this is that neither the judiciary nor the people are about to take the threat Dear Leader poses to our economy lying down: more than 11,000 people in Louisiana are protesting the legal battle preventing them from working. Hopefully, the administration will shut up and get their fingers out of their ears, and listen to the ones that hired them in the first place.
I do not think it is too late to save our country. Not yet.
BP has Photoshopped enough photos of the cleanup efforts on their website that it gives the impression of the latter--at least at first.
However, as I read the rest of the story, I realized that they were trying to avoid the appearance that they weren't doing enough. Yeah, they doctored pictures of a pilot sitting in a helicopter sitting on a ship's deck to make it look like he was in the air. The undoctored picture shows that the pilot is doing pre-flight checks in preparation to taking off. In other words, in an attempt to look like things are being done, BP gave the opposite impression. Same with the photoshopped monitor images.
I assume he means health insurance providers that deny coverage to preexisting conditions unless one pays out the ass to get the condition covered, or that (because of regulations requiring this, that, and the other to be covered) is too expensive for the average family to afford without giving up luxuries like XBox systems and games.
Actually, the "health insurance providers" that are the most at fault for rationing care (like Britain and Canada do) are the VA, and Medicaid. Government providers.
Here's a bit of anecdotal evidence: in Missouri, at least, if you need dentures, can't afford to pay for them yourself, and are on Medicaid, tough shit. Medicaid ain't paying for them. Ask my mother.
Need glasses? Medicaid pays for a new pair every two years. Even for kids that may need new prescriptions every year.
Need hip replacement surgery? Welcome to the waiting list. They may get to you sometime before you die--unless they determine that it isn't worth it.
If you're on thyroid medication, as soon as you get put on Medicare/Medicaid, your doctor will lower your dosage or take you off. What do you need a health weight or energy level for? You don't contribute.
It's not the private sector denying care. They do deny coverage at what most people deem reasonable prices, but they don't deny care like the government programs do.
But that's okay. Before too long, Obamacare/mandatory Medicaid will apply to everyone, and we'll all be getting exactly the same denial of care that the government programs have always been so famous for.
I wonder what they'll announce next? The fact that summer time is hot? Oh, wait: that's what those heat advisories that the Midwest are getting are supposed to be doing.
I can see cutting back city employees to four day weeks, not buying gas for nonessential city vehicles, and not decorating for Christmas, but really, Newark? Is it really bad enough that your city can't even provide the sandpaper that elementary schools nationwide provide?
I will be posting something specific on The FFOT this week (where I'm now a contributor), about why I've felt so awful (beyond just the morning sickness--which is mostly gone, now). Suffice to say, I have a further medical issue that has finally been treated.
I've been so exhausted that I've barely been able to keep up with grading papers (for which I am actually paid), and haven't been able to think straight enough to write. Thank God I decided to take things into my own hands--my primary care doctor is quite willing and able to treat my problem. No overbooked, undermotivated specialist needed, despite what the midwife would have preferred.
Not because I don't think it's worthwhile, but because the AIDS research lobby won't rest until the reason the funding was cut gets repealed.
What do I mean?
Well, we recently learned that those with pre-existing conditions will not be covered under mandatory Medicaid, or Obamacare (and yes, I think the smug spoiled child deserves to have his name attached to the piece of shit he passed). We're also pretty sure that employer-provided health care is going to start showing up as income on W2 forms.
Another probable effect that hasn't been mentioned is that, with the government putting caps on what pharmaceutical companies can charge for new drugs and new treatments, funding for research is going to dry up.
And it's going to happen before anything can come of the most recent discovery: a type of antibody that kills 91% of the different strains of HIV/AIDS.
So yes, I hope the research funding for that dries up faster than anything else, so that the gay lobby can be the loud part of the coalition of all the sane people working to get this bad law repealed.
In the beginning of the Obama presidency, mandatory Medicaid, was touted as a way for those with pre-existing conditions to get coverage. It was prophecied that it would shorten our wait times in emergency rooms, and reduce the costs we would pay.
In fact, while the politicians were fighting to bend us over the barrel and ram it up our collective national ass, they promised us these things, as well as that funding for research into conditions like cancer, AIDS, Alzheimers, and diabetes would continue. Basically, we were promised that it would heal all the sick, and wouldn't make anyone dead.
Like I told my friend that was for it way before it was passed--that ain't gonna happen. Neither is making it cheaper, or making wait times for care in emergency rooms shorter. The government is in the power business, not the philanthropy business (i.e., making sure those with preexisting conditions got the coverage they "deserved").
Looks like I was right. Experts are now predicting that preexisting conditions won't be covered under mandatory Medicaid, and that emergency room waits will be much longer than they are now.
...if, when you drive by a fireworks stand selling "Golden Bear" brand fireworks, you wonder if they're selling fireworks or reloadable brass-cased Russian ammunition.
I mean, if they're as disconnected from reality as Nancy Pelosi, they really need to be institutionalized, not re-elected every time they come up.
There is no way extending unemployment payments will help the economy. The only thing that will accomplish is to basically put people on welfare, and get them to not look for work. It is, after all, human nature to put forth the least amount of effort to maintain their standard of living. If people can just collect a government check and not work...well, they won't work.
No, the fastest way to create jobs would be to cut taxes, both those on personal income and those on corporate income. Oh, and repeal a whole lot of the regulations and rules (like the community reinvestment act) that directly contributed to the crash.
Instead, we're slated for some massive tax and regulation increases, beginning within the next six months.
Over 1,800 of our veterans who went to a Saint Louis, MO VA hospital for dental treatment are at risk for contracting Hepatitis B, C, and/or HIV.
Why?
Because government-run hospitals don't follow proper procedure.
I don't like the little weasel, but I have to agree with Democrat Rep. Russ Carnahan:
"This is absolutely unacceptable... No veteran who has served and risked their life for this great nation should have to worry about their personal safety when receiving much needed healthcare services from a Veterans Administration hospital."
It's her fault, and that of her (late) husband that the psycho Lurch look-alike is such a special snowflake that he's escaped the rap for Holloway. If it weren't for this stupid, blind, retarded socialite spoiling her son, he might have actually grown up into a productive, law-abiding, sane citizen. Instead, he beats and strangles a young woman to death because she asked him something he didn't want to answer.
I'm still really morning (and afternoon, and evening) sick, but it is easing, bit by bit. I'll probably be back up and running on my usual schedule by the end of the month.
That is, assuming Dear Leader doesn't shut down all sources of "new media" with the new toy that Lieberman et. al. are trying to give him.
I know it's been a while since I posted anything. My university "upgraded" the online class platform we use, which completely FUBARed my classes. I'm still working to get the classes for fall fixed. It took me until Sunday night to get the one I started teaching Monday fixed.
I also put my lectures, handouts, assignment sheets, and other useful stuff together into a textbook for the Composition II class, and am working on a similar one for the Composition I class.
Beyond that...I've been so sick that if I haven't been laying down, I've been throwing up. It should ease within another two to four weeks, but for now, I'm not able to do much of anything.
When an individual citizen takes out credit card after credit card after mortgage after whatever other kind of debt they can think of, their credit rating tends to drop. That, in turn, causes their lender to raise the interest rates, raising their payments on said debt.
Somehow, our current administration's secretary of finance doesn't seem to think that Moody's actually will reduce our national credit rating, regardless of how much we owe. The man who couldn't figure out TurboTax obviously doesn't understand how the credit/debt system works, any more than he does the tax system.
According to the story, a group of Islamotards loaded a whole lot of dynamite onto a donkey cart, and blew it up at the border. I guess they were trying a low-tech version of a car bomb that didn't work--the only casualty was the donkey.
My husband snarked that the donkey ought to get 72 donkey virgins. I don't know whether that would be donkey heaven though--I think the donkey would prefer endless pasture with clover and alfalfa, and maybe a small family herd to keep it company.
Leave your descriptions in the comments if the idea made you laugh.
I have to admit once again to approing of something that the Obama administration is doing: according to this, he's ordered an upswing in covert ops in the Middle East.
The mixed feelings come from the fact that someone, likely in the White House, leaked the memo to the press, and it was announced to the world, including the people the ops are set up to take out,in the New York Times. And that puts our ops teams in danger.
Clinton just signed the UN small arms treaty. This treaty intends to take all guns out of the hands of everyone not in the military or law enforcement.
All hope is not yet lost, however: the treaty still has to be ratified by congress. And, given the trends in the nation pushing toward nation-wide "shall-issue" concealed carry laws, and the expansion of the Castle Doctrine laws amongst the states, it might not be ratified.
If the filthy bastards sitting in congress continue in their trend of not listening to the people that hired them, I'll be willing to bet that each and every one of them would be replaced, and every bit of legislation that the creeps have passed limiting our freedom would likely be repealed.
Honestly, I don't want to see this come down to the wire. I hope it's not ratified. I wouldn't want to bet that the resolution wouldn't be preceded by another bloodbath like in the 1860's.
Seriously, the only way we're going to dissuade the barbarian fucktards advocating the murder of American civilians is to kill ten of theirs for every one of ours attempted.
Analysts are saying that California's proposed laws targeting child predators for longer prison terms are going to cost "many millions."
I don't think they've really thought this out. How many children's lives would this new legislation save? How many lives in that one state are ruined annually, and what effect would this new legislation have?
In other words, what is the dollar amount that each child's life and emotional/mental health worth?
Why don't we ban stupid, nanny-state laws dreamed up by the federal government, instead? If enough people are thrown back onto their own feet, they'll either learn to take care of themselves, or they'll die out.
People simply are too careless with their progeny. My other half and I check the fittings on our son's crib every time we put him in or take him out of it. There's nothing stopping other parents from doing the same.
Where will the poor Canadians, Brits, and Mexicans go for surgeries that improve the quality or length of life?
Like this little boy, born with a lymphatic system deformity in the left side of his face. He's coming to the U.S. to get the treatment that will change his life and leave him...normal. Why here? Because Canadian doctors aren't capable of the same quality of care as American doctors, nor are the hospitals capable of an equal quality of care, after socialized medicine being in place for so long.
Key quote: "Doctors in Canada were unable to perform the surgery to remove the growth due to the complexity of the procedure..."
This is where we're headed. But where will we go to get the complex procedures done, once we've sunk to the same level of quality as every other country with socialized medicine?
This country was envisioned and created by our Founding Fathers to be ruled by law, not ruled by an individual or set of individuals. Our Founding Fathers envisioned a nation where the laws would be evenly enforced, and always enforced, creating a system of justice where the poorest was equal to the richest in the eyes of the law.
That vision has been viciously perverted by the dynasties in power in Washington, D.C. And not only has that vision been perverted, but betrayed.
Need proof? Take a look at Arizona: they passed a law recently that basically says the same as national immigration law (which has been ignored by the transnational progressivist nobility), and has the gall to state publicly that they will enforce it. And ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) now says they won't process any illegals turned over to them by Arizona.
Arizona's law specifically forbids Arizona law enforcement from racially profiling to catch criminal aliens (even though upwards of 95% of all criminal aliens in Arizona are Mexican). The new law specifically states that cops can only ask about immigration status if they're interviewing someone who's committed any other crime. Arizona's law targets the criminals themselves less than it does those who enable said criminals to work and live in a place where they're trespassing: those who hire criminal aliens, and those who rent to them.
Yet ICE is refusing to process any criminals Arizona turns over to them caught under this new law.
And one immediate effect is that the criminals that Arizona catches committing other crimes will be released. Like this guy, who raped a woman in Seattle. He was caught and deported back to Mexico nine times. Essentially, ICE is saying that thieves, rapists, murderers, and other criminals who happen to be in this country illegally, won't be processed and deported if they're turned in by Arizona. This is a direct contravention of the Rule of Law.
What this means is that the Rule of Law that protects us from tyrannical rulers has been subverted and betrayed--it no longer applies to a certain class of people who became criminals as soon as they crossed our border. And since it no longer applies to Mexicans, the rest of us are no longer protected by it.
Vote them all out. Fire every individual working for every government bureau. Dismantle all government bureaus not listed in the U.S. Constitution. We need to start from scratch.
I do. I hate the smarmy, spoiled little teleprompter-reading post turtle, and I hate everything he stands for. I hate the legislation he's passed, and I hate his Wookie wife that calls her own healthy, beautiful little girls fat.
That said, I cannot blame him and his administration for keeping Congress in the dark, where intelligence reports are concerned. I wouldn't trust them not to do to any president, whether they like him or not, what they did with the intelligence reports President Bush shared with them. Especially not since Dear Leader is about to lose his supermajority in both houses of congress.
Apparently, North Korea's sinking of a South Korean vessel was more than likely ordered by their mental midget president, to secure the line of succession for his youngest son.
It'll be a while, but I think this will be what I'm saving toward. I really like the built-in bipod.
And, when I said it'll be a while, I meant it. We're going to have to rebuild our savings account after self-paying for prenatal care, the delivery (hopefully in December) and the hospital stay.
I hope it's still legal by the time we can afford it.
A WWI memorial set up in the Mojave Desert--a seven-foot cross--has been in the center of a court battle between bed-wetter, crybaby atheists, and normal Americans who love God, their country, and their troops. The bed-wetters wanted the cross removed because they interpreted it as a violation of the first amendment (establishment), and the normal Americans opposed the bed-wetters because it's a war memorial, and removal constitutes a violation of the first amendment (forbidding the free exercise of religion).
The Supreme Court ruled in favor of the normal Americans--and the cross was promptly stolen.
Now, when this happened, my first reaction was that the bed-wetters did it, and that they did it to declare that only the memorial itself--the one that was stolen--counted under the Supreme Court decision, and that any replacement wouldn't be allowed to stand. And, as it turns out, I was right.
Especially not when the civilians killed in a firefight are more likely than not enemy collaborators.
And when we investigate soldiers responsible for carrying out military objectives of murder, we do nothing but cripple the rest of our troops, and set them up to become nothing more than live targets for the enemy.
We really need an administration that loves the country it governs, loves the troops, hates our enemies, and has the balls to do what needs to be done (both overseas and enforcing our borders) to protect our country.
Barring that, we need to bring all of our troops home. From everywhere. They need time to rest and resupply before the rest of the world attacks us to bring us down to Europe's level.
Recently, a little girl was killed by a SWAT team making a dynamic entry in Detroit, MI. The SWAT team served a no-knock warrant on the wrong half of a duplex, and the SWAT guys claimed that the little girl was killed by a negligent discharge when an officer had to wrestle with a woman over his gun.
Turns out there was both more to the story, and that the cop's story was completely false. Turns out that there was a reality show filming that particular SWAT team, and the film crew's work caught the cop's lie: there was a flash-bang thrown through the window, immediately followed by a shot fired through the door from the porch.
A&E needs to not turn all copies of the footage over to the PD in question, even if it's subpoenaed. In fact, Detroit's PD shouldn't be involved in the investigation at all, other than as the parties under investigation.
We don't need Rambo shooting little girls, even in drug-ridden slum cities.
Not even with innocuous questions like names, ages, and sexes of people living in my home. All the census needs to know is that three people live at this address. A mom in New Jersey probably wishes she'd had the same attitude.
Amy Schmalbach answered the door, saw the badge, and thought she'd be safe. Then she noticed that the worker looked a little familiar. After he left, she realized where she'd seen him: in her state's sex offender registry. She probably was safe, but if her children were girls, she just gave him the info he needed to go after them.
One commenter mentioned that they thought he was entitled to a job, because everybody's got to eat, right? In my opinion, those that target children for sex attacks not only don't deserve a job, but don't deserve freedom, and honestly don't even have a right to keep breathing.
The former CEO of Panera Bread Company (formerly St. Louis Bread Company) has opened up a pay-as-you-see-fit branch of the chain of restaurants in one of its more upscale locations. The idea is that, instead of paying for your food and service, you leave a donation that you think covers the value, whether that is $1 or $1000.
They're about to learn a really harsh lesson about human nature. The more upscale the location in the larger cities, the more likely they are to have people making excuses not to pay anything, and they're going to fold. Oh, it'll likely float along for a couple of months from the novelty, but if goods and services are offered with payment optional, people will begin taking the option to pay nothing.
I have great faith in individuals. People, on the other hand, suck.
I mean, seriously. We've got Chris Matthews getting hard from Dear Leader's speeches, all of the left confusing a major spending protest movement with a demeaning sex act, and now Rachel Maddow demonstrates a lack of understanding of what's acceptable activity to do on camera for a news show.
There are things that should be kept behind a closed bedroom door (or on camera in a porn studio), no matter what team one happens to swing for.
A TSA agent took more than $400 from a handicapped woman's baggage. The agent, one Leroy Ray (picture with this story, but not the earlier link), found $300 in a white envelope in the woman's purse, and another $195 in a zippered pocket in her bag as he was searching her luggage. He took the cash. When the lady discovered the theft and went to complain, he rushed the stolen money to the lost and found area.
Talk about someone who's earned the title of nigger! He stole money from a wheelchair-bound woman's luggage! Dude! Your job is not a limbo contest!
Although, I do have a theory about why there hasn't been a press conference with the TOTUS taking questions through the spoiled idiot child reading it: the people who put the turtle on the post want him to stay quiet to try to avoid revealing that he didn't get up there by himself. I mean, everybody knows it didn't, but there seems to be a bit of a conspiracy of silence.
Dick[weed] Blumenthal's opponent recently caught him in a huge lie: rather than serving in Vietnam (as he claimed), he actually got five--count 'em, FIVE--deferments, keeping him out of danger.
I respect those who served. I accept that there were "conscientious objectors" that got deferments or ran away to Canada. I may think they're cowardly wastes of space, but at least they didn't do a Jane Fonda.
Those who lied about serving? Those assmunches I do count as low as the traitorous whore that did a photo op with the Viet Cong.
In a perfect world, it would kill his political career. In ours? Dhimmicites still support him. It's not surprising, really. If you look at it, we've had Bill "I ran away to Canada" Clinton (don't get me wrong, I do like the guy), John "Fuck the soldiers" Kerry, and John "Marines are murder machines" Murtha (RIP) lionized by the Dhimmicrites. I guess Mr. Dick "I lied about my deferments" Blumenthal would fit right in.
Marijuana growers in California (the only state discussing legislation to make pot completely legal for any purpose, medical or recreational) are getting worried. Why? Because, with legalization on the horizon, market prices are falling. And the pot growers don't seem to understand why, or that they shouldn't really be worried after all.
Let me explain: the quoted price of a pound of pot ($5,000) is artificially inflated to cover the risk involved for the grower and the seller--if they're caught and convicted, they go to jail.
When marijuana is legalized, the risk goes away. Prices will fall to more reasonable levels. I understand how that can worry the growers, but it just goes to prove that they're either smoking their product (and profits), or haven't had enough education to understand supply and demand: as the price goes down, demand goes up. As the product is decriminalized, those who wanted to try it, but didn't want to break the law are going to start trying it, pushing demand up further.
In the end, the pot growers are likely going to see far higher income, despite lower profit margin, because of much higher volume sold.
I'm guessing from context clues in the story that it happened in Florida. Probably a good thing, too, otherwise, said pervert might have been shot, rather than beat up by a mixed martial artist.
From the news story:
Parkerson, 28, was arrested Wednesday night after he allegedly sneaked into the screened patio of a home, carrying a video camera, police said.
The homeowner's wife saw him and yelled for her husband, Pembroke Pines firefighter Ireneusz Fajkis, according to the police report.
Fajkis chased Parkerson onto his front lawn and tackled him to the ground, according to the police report.
Parkerson, of Coral Springs, was taken to Coral Springs Medical Center, where he talked to a nurse treating his wounds.
"I picked the wrong house," he reportedly said, "because a UFC [mixed martial arts] fighter lived there and beat me up."
Actually, dude, not only did you pick the wrong house, you picked the wrong hobby.
Harry Reid said that the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico was caused by...GREED!!
He may well be right, but I don't think it was the oil company's greed, necessarily, at fault. More likely his party's greed for campaign contributions from British Petroleum caused the Obama administration to rubber stamp the rig that caused the spill.
For the next three weeks, I've got some vacation time. Then, I've got eight weeks of summer semester, then four more weeks of break. Then fall semester. Baby number 2 is going to make sure I don't really get a Christmas break.
Not too long ago, I posted something about what I’ve learned about life from reading Robert Heinlein.There were thirty-two items on that list, which by no means covers everything I learned from reading Heinlein, instead of from my family, but does cover a good bit of conventional wisdom that isn’t.I decided to go ahead and write a bit more about each item on that list.First up:
Men are more sentimental than women. It blurs their thinking.—Robert Heinlein, The Notebooks of Lazarus Long.
Men tend to be fairly straightforward, with at least a basic sense of honor.Not every man has the same sense of honor, but whatever morality they play by does tend to guide their behavior, and make them somewhat predictable.They tend to have at least a few rules in an unspoken code of conduct.They tend to try to play within the rules of whatever field they try to accomplish things in.They tend to believe that others will play by the same set of rules that guide their own behavior.
Women, on the other hand, don’t tend to play by any set “rules,” whether spoken or unspoken.As a sex, women tend to be backstabbing, conniving, vicious harpies.They tend to be manipulative, and willing to do anything to get their way.
Nowhere do we see this as clearly as in the recent mandatory Medicaid debates: sure, Obama and his camp did things the Chicago way (as in, “I’m gonna make you an offer you can’t refuse,”), but he followed Chicago rules in the game.He did a lot of back-room deals with money.He did a fair few threats.
He played by a certain set of rules—Chicago mob-style rules, but rules, nonetheless—to accomplish what he wanted to do.And he made compromises to get what he wanted the most.
Nancy Pelosi, on the other hand engaged in a win-at-any-cost campaign that’s currently having repercussions on those she forced into voting her way.She doesn’t look likely to lose her seat, but many of those she coerced, blackmailed, browbeat, and/or guilt tripped do look likely to lose theirs.Even some in the Senate that looked like sure-things for re-election are finding that they’re vulnerable.
She doesn’t care.She didn’t play by any given set of rules, but she got the job done to get the president’s plans the votes they needed to pass.
I hate to say it, and it’s going to sound sexist, but this is just the way women work.Men really have no defense against it, mostly because they don’t understand the way women’s minds work, biologically.
A bunch of so-called "experts" are looking at an upswing in homeschooling numbers, and are getting suspicious. I won't argue that it ought to take more than the school's word to define kids withdrawn from said school as being homeschooled, but I don't think it ought to take more than a signed and notarized statement from the parents.
I think the tone of the article is slightly suspicious. It may just be my own biases, but the negative way the article discusses homeschooling, and the positive references to the strict regulations some states have put onto homeschoolers (i.e., parents being forced to register what curriculum they use for each homeschooled child) makes me suspicious of the whole article.
I doubt that homeschooling has had as much of an upswing as the article says (most parents are too busy working two to three jobs trying to keep up with the Joneses, or are too lazy to do what's best for their kids), and admit fully that they probably have a point. However, I do know that homeschooling has become far more popular, mostly because of how absolutely awful public schools have become, both academically and administratively. I would believe a 10% or even a 15% uptick in homeschooling elementary and middle school age kids. I am, however, with the authors of the aricle in doubting a full 24% upswing, especially when you consider that there are a lot of high schoolers figured in, and "More than 22,620 Texas secondary students who stopped showing up for class in 2008 were excluded from the state's dropout statistics because administrators said they were being home-schooled."
I know they want to cripple us and distract us from whatever it is they're trying to do. I understand that. I understand that they're currently waging war against us--again--by proxy, especially in the Middle East.
That's fine. I get that. But I think they're being incredibly short-sighted in the way they're going about it.
What they don't seem to understand is that, once they've armed the Islamofacists in Iran and Syria with nuclear weapons, we may be target number one, but they're target number two.
I've heard the administration claim that not extending unemployment benefits to nearly two years is inhumane. Michigan does well illustrating why extending said benefits is a fucking stupid idea:
But the fact that some seasonal landscaping workers choose to stay home and collect a check from the state, rather than work outside for a full week and spend money for gas, taxes and other expenses, raises questions about whether extended unemployment benefits give the jobless an incentive to avoid work.
Well, DUH! If money's coming in while they sit on their a$$es, then why should they break their backs doing landscaping work full time? Especially if the money's not too different.
The average landscape worker earns about $12 per hour, according to the Michigan Department of Labor and Economic Growth. A full-time landscaping employee would make $225 more a week working than from an unemployment check of $255.
But after federal and state taxes are deducted, a full-time landscaper would earn $350 a week, or $95 more than a jobless check. The gap could narrow further for those who worked at other higher-paying seasonal jobs, such as construction or roofing, which would result in a larger benefits check.
And get a load of this:
Members of the Michigan Nursery and Landscape Association "have told me that they have a lot of people applying but that when they actually talk to them, it turns out that they're on unemployment and not looking for work," said Amy Frankmann, the group's executive director. "It is starting to make things difficult."
Chris Pompeo, vice president of operations for Landscape America in Warren, said he has had about a dozen offers declined. One applicant, who had eight weeks to go until his state unemployment benefits ran out, asked for a deferred start date.
"It's like, you've got to be kidding me," Pompeo said. "It's frustrating. It's honestly something I've never seen before. They say, 'Oh, OK,' like I surprised them by offering them a job."
and this:
Some job applicants are asking to be paid in cash so they can collect unemployment illegally, said Gayle Younglove, vice president at Outdoor Experts Inc. in Romulus.
All in all, I think it may be time to simply cut the time someone can collect unemployment benefits to about twenty weeks. That's five months.
Otherwise, we're going to find out that everyone is taking the full two years that the government will permit them to.
Should that happen, we'll have the revolution that the Marxists want: nobody working, and everybody sucking on the government teat.
I'd determined, from the minute I realized we were entering a census year, that I wouldn't open the door to any census worker, identification or no. If one had claimed that they needed to speak to one of us, they could have yelled through the living room picture window.
The only census worker we've seen only wanted to ask if we knew if a couple of houses in our neighborhood were inhabited, and didn't ask us to even open the storm door.
Good enough. Because I find that my decision was the correct one.
A group of thugs impersonated census workers to break into a Texas home and kill one of the inhabitants. They spent two hours rifling the house, before driving away unmolested.
Another incident, this time with a real census worker, saw the man breaking into the home of a disabled woman to beat and rape her. He'd used his work with the census to choose his victim.
I don't know what's worse, the idea that Dear Leader was planning to turn the census over to ACORN, or knowing that these bastards weren't ACORN workers/volunteers.
I will say this: home alone or not, I never am out of reach of a pistol.
Dimitri Medvedev, after following in his puppet master's footsteps in praising Stalin and his USSR for the past two years, has said something new:
"The Soviet Union was a very complicated state and if we speak honestly the regime that was built in the Soviet Union... cannot be called anything other than totalitarian. ...Unfortunately, this was a regime where elementary rights and freedoms were suppressed."
I'd give him a lot more credit, were it not that under his and his puppet master's leadership, Russia was heading directly down the same path. As it is, I suspect it's far more likely that Russia's current totalitarian leaders are trying to direct the world's attention away from what they're doing now.
The "Reverend" Al Sharpton probably thinks that "Harrison Bergeron" is a utopia. I cannot imagine how he thinks "social justice" is achievable when the government is used to smash everyone down to the same terrible standard of living.
True social justice is when everyone has the same chance to make something of themselves. It's up to the individual how much work to put into it. Equality of opportunity is not illustrated by perfectly equal results.
Al Sharpton's definition of social justice is my definition of theft and tyranny.
Because I'm pretty sure that it wasn't the whites, in this case.
Ann Arbor, Michigan: home of the school whose principal created a race-based club. No, the club wasn't for exclusively white kids, nor did it include all minorities. The club was for black students, and only black students.
And so was the field trip to see a black rocket scientist.
Seems to me that the nigger* son of a bitch is trying to turn all of the black kids under his authority into niggers.
*As Old Cat Man says, "Black people aren't born niggers--they earn the title.
Don't believe me? The People's Democratic Republic of California have some very strict gun control laws. And a man took a California-illegal gun--a so-called "assault rifle," of which every type is illegal in California--to an ex-girlfriend's house, and started shooting up her family.
Two of her family are dead: the ex-girlfriend and her brother. Her mother and father were critically wounded. The gunman was shot by a police officer with an AR-15 when he aimed his "AR-47" at the officer.
(First of all, I didn't know there was such a thing as an "AR-47." Second, what I saw in the picture was an AK-47, with a California-legal thumb hole stock, and an illegal 30 round magazine. The editors really need to proofread more carefully. And maybe know what they're talking about so they don't make such embarrassing mistakes.)
The two that are dead might not be were the gun control laws--which are only affect those who obey the laws in the first place--so stringent.
Once they're able to regulate how fast internet users can access things online (meaning, your broadband can't advertise different speeds for different price levels), they'll start regulating content.
Given the way Gibbs jumped all over Fox for one of their columnists' speculation, I can't help but wonder if he's trying to hide something for the administration.
In fact, it makes far too much sense for Dear Leader to have delayed reaction to the oil spill so that he could frame crippling our economy by refusing any more drilling as trying to save the ecosystem.
Except for one tiny detail: I don't think he's mentally capable of it. Maybe the ones that put the turtle on the post are, but I don't know that they've thought that far.
How else do you explain this? And how do you explain it being called a "nonevent"?
Sorry, exploding luggage in an airport doesn't strike me as a nonevent. It strikes me as another failed terror attempt, or at the very least a test. And calling it a "nonevent" strikes me as someone trying to cover just how bad a job airport security is doing.
A woman who worked at a university health center (double jeopardy, there) was shot and killed Tuesday afternoon.
When are we, as a nation, going to wise up and refuse en mass to tolerate the government's refusal to allow us to defend ourselves? When are we going to stop respecting the laws banning guns from certain areas, which does nothing but make us vulnerable?
I've said it before: only those who are law-abiding already are made vulnerable. Those who have harmful intent are going to ignore the "gun-free zone" rules as applied to themselves.
Or, no. Those with criminal intent choose to make their attacks in "gun-free zones" because they know their intended victims don't have the capability of fighting back.
