A few political items I was able to pull.
Happy Easter.
"He is risen" for my Christian friends. Enjoy the chocolate bunny
ears for my secular friends.
Not much on the health front. On the plus side, my breathing
has been better and my oxygen use down. On the negative side, Friday morning I
blew too hard on the spirometer and turned a backache into a serious muscle
spasm, so that the last two days if I use it, or cough, it feels like a hard
strike with a ball peen hammer in my right lower back. Stops me from some
things I should be doing that make me cough. But it is slowly getting better,
it only peripheral to the lung issue and is not life threatening, so I continue
to march. ~Bob
Dr. Sowell looks at the history and integration in to
American life of several ethnic groups, such as Jews, Germans, Irish, Mexicans,
blacks, etc., as well as the intersection of the cultures they brought with
them and the cultures they developed in America . Published in 1981, much of
the data has been outdated by demographic and immigration changes, but his
insights into these issues are timeless. For example, his research indicate
that the eastern European Jews were the most destitute and illiterate of the
immigrant groups, and scored low on IQ tests, leading commentators to say that
the idea of the Jew as intelligent was a myth. Of course, now they are among
the most economically and academically successful of ethnic groups in America , with
IQs, college degrees and percentage holding professional jobs far above the
national average. Based on contemporary thinking of progressives, this must be
because these poor, literate Jews discriminated against native white Christians
to get ahead of the rest of us!
The Real History of
Slavery. By Thomas Sowell
I found this excellent essay read
here on YouTube. ~Bob
Excerpt: The crisis in America today isn’t about women’s
wages; it’s about men’s wages. Men are still the chief breadwinners in
most families, and their wages are not moving much at all. If we look at Census
Bureau data, we find that while men’s wages have risen by about 6 percent in
real terms since 1980, women’s wages have risen by about 60 percent. ... In
fact, a 2009 Labor Department study found that, when we control for work
experience and education, the gap is only about 5 percent. And when we account
for the fact that men are more likely to be injured or suffer an accident on
the job, and do riskier work and often more unpleasant jobs than women, the gap
virtually disappears.
Must Read: New Studies Indicate Problems with
ObamaCare Enrollment Figures
Excerpt: While President Obama has declared victory,
cheering the enrollment of 7.1 million in the health insurance exchanges and
announcing that the debate on the repeal of ObamaCare is over, studies from the
RAND Corporation and Express Scripts indicate otherwise, says the Fiscal Times.
... A significant portion of the increase in the number of insured actually
comes from increased Medicaid enrollment, not an increase in private insurance.
Nearly 6 million people enrolled in Medicaid, and most were eligible for
Medicaid prior to the health reform law. More than 8 million people enrolled in
employer-provided health care. In total, only 3.9 million people actually
enrolled in insurance plans through the state or federal exchanges -- not 7.1
million. Express Scripts, a pharmacy benefit manager, found that those
enrolling in the exchanges tended to be sicker than previous risk pools. This
means that premiums will have to rise even more than was expected. (If you like
Obama's statistics, you can keep Obama's statistics. Period. ~Bob)
Good review of the history: Everything you need to
know about the long fight between Cliven Bundy and the federal government
Excerpt: The case of
cattle rancher Cliven Bundy burst into the national news cycle over the past
week, captivating conservative media outlets with its protagonist, a
firm believer of states' right with an armed group of supporters backing
him. The stand-off between Nevada
rancher and federal government officials trying to push cattle off of protected
federal land has paused for now, but officials plan to renew their efforts
soon. This most-recent skirmish is only the latest in a decades-long fight
between the federal government and Cliven Bundy, however. Here's a timeline
that proves just how complicated this case is — as well as the power that the
media still retains to elevate a local political issue into a national one.
On
point: Holy Cow! - Real Lessons Learned in Nevada
Excerpt:
Yeah, yeah, yeah - several courts have ruled against Mr. Cliven Bundy (and his
grazing cattle). Blah, blah, blah.
Excerpt: As a matter of law, Cliven Bundy is in the wrong.
He is nevertheless a sympathetic figure, and the concerns raised by the
standoff in Nevada
transcend the illegality of his conduct.
Trouble: White House-Touted Health Costs Slowdown 'Could be
Over. ' By Guy Benson
Excerpt: The notion that Obamacare is bending downward the
so-called "cost curve" on national health spending has been debunked
by the government's
own numbers. At late 2013 estimate from CMS projected that aggregate
healthcare-related expenses would climb by 6.1 percent this year, as opposed to
4.5 percent in the absence of the new law. (Just another Obama promise
that came with an expiration date. What difference does it make? He can lie,
the media covers, we get enraged, and most people don't care. Yet. ~Bob)
49 percent think White House had IRS target conservatives.
By Dana Blanton
Excerpt: Nearly half of American voters think the IRS
targeted conservative groups at the request of the White House, and most want
Congress to keep investigating the matter. The latest Fox News poll also finds
69 percent don’t feel President Obama has followed through on his vow to “find
out exactly what happened on this.” (The other 51% were too busy talking on
their free Obama-Phones to respond. ~Bob)
Renaming street for
slain Officer Phillip Cardillo could 'open old wounds'
http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyc-crime/renaming-street-slain-officer-phillip-cardillo-open-old-wounds-article-1.1755185#ixzz2zAzvIbl1
http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyc-crime/renaming-street-slain-officer-phillip-cardillo-open-old-wounds-article-1.1755185#ixzz2zAzvIbl1
Excerpt: A plan to honor a Harlem cop killed by Nation of
Islam radicals is drowning under a flood of racial tensions created more than
four decades ago, but no one wants to throw it a lifeline — not even the NYPD’s
new top cop. Police Commissioner Bill Bratton is distancing himself from the
controversial push to get the street in front of the 28th Precinct renamed in
honor of Officer Phillip Cardillo, who was shot and killed inside a mosque run
by Louis Farrakhan in 1972 — noting that the community should make the final
decision. (Well of course you can't honor a cop murdered by Muslim extremists
if it would offend Muslims. I love the charge of racism--Islam is the only race
you can join by making the statement of faith. ~Bob)
An Inconvenient
Rancher: BLM Docs Show Feds’ Solar Plan Targets Bundy for Elimination
Excerpt: Once upon a time there were more than
fifty cattle ranches operating in the area of Southern
Nevada where Cliven Bundy, with the help of numerous armed patriots
from all over, is making his stand against the abusive, bankrupting tactics of
the bullying federal government. Now, there is only one rancher and his family
left. (And Harry Reid salutes him and the rest of us. --JB).
Jews ordered to
register in east Ukraine
Excerpt: Jews in the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk where pro-Russian militants have taken over
government buildings were told they have to "register" with the
Ukrainians who are trying to make the city become part of Russia ,
according to Ukrainian and Israeli media.
Jews emerging from a synagogue say they were handed leaflets
that ordered the city's Jews to provide a list of property they own and pay a
registration fee "or else have their citizenship revoked, face deportation
and see their assets confiscated," reported Ynet News , Israel
Obama Takes Bold Step
to Geoengineer Climate Change
Excerpt: A heavily redacted copy of a
classified report titled "America Cools Down on Climate" (ACDC) and
obtained by TheGreenGrok outlines the audacious plan to use commercial air
traffic to mitigate the growing impacts of climate change across the United States .
The plan falls under the category of what is known as geoengineering: the attempt by humans to slow, stop, or
even reverse global warming by manipulating the environment instead of aiming
to slow greenhouse gas emissions themselves. Geoengineering examples
include injecting particles into the stratosphere to reflect
sunlight back into space and dumping iron into the ocean to enhance the uptake of
atmospheric carbon dioxide by oceanic phytoplankton. The ACDC plan, code-named
"Rainmaker," is considered by experts to be groundbreaking not only
because it did not require the construction of a vast industrial infrastructure; it also
helped keep flights on time. (Continuing to follow pattern; makes
"announcement" of "executive order" after a fait accompli. Been
doing this for some time covertly. "Father knows best"....population
and citizens' input not desired or needed. --Barb)
Excerpt: According to the Government Accountability Office,
the federal government spends $18 billion a year on 47 duplicative job training
programs across nine federal agencies. But the White House isn’t just adding to
this host of repetitive rackets – it’s effectively creating a new program
that will duplicate other programs already put in place at the state
level. (Actually, these programs create lots of jobs--for bureaucrats to
run them who are loyal Democrat party votes. ~Bob)
Excerpt: The two sources, who spoke on condition of
anonymity because they weren�t authorized to disclose the information,
confirmed that there have been talks about the federal government supporting a
move by the state to give Detroit
$100 million in federal money for blight remediation. That, in turn, would free
up $100 million of the more than $500 million that emergency manager Kevyn Orr
planned to spend for blight removal over the next 10 years. Orr could then use
that money to reduce pension cuts. (You did know the Detroit Democrat Disaster
was going to come out of your pocket, right? It always does. ~Bob)
The True Opponents
of Immigration Reform: Too many special interests profit from
the present mess. By Victor Davis
Hanson
Excerpt: The problem instead is that the establishments of
both parties talk in high-minded fashion but in fact act selfishly.
Unfortunately, identity-politics elites and Democratic-party activists, along
with employers of undocumented workers, do not support such a grand bargain. Why
not? Because Democrats and the members of the identity-politics industry
believe that they have gained millions of new constituents. The more slowly
huge surges of undocumented immigrants assimilate, the more they are likely to
remain bloc constituents for particular causes and politics.
Does Tax Refund Fraud Benefit Democrats? By Ian Smith
Excerpt: That the Democrats in government gain from keeping the tax credit system as dysfunctional as
possible is probably a good guess why. ... The Earned Income Tax Credit alone
costs taxpayers a whopping $12-14 billion in fraudulent payments every year.
This is especially troubling considering the program pays out in total $56 billion per
year, meaning its average “improper payments rate” is around 25 per cent.
Medicaid fraud, which is very well publicized and has its own federal task force,
hovers at around 8-10 per cent a year.
Husband Convicted in
Case Touted as Hate Crime
Excerpt: A murder case once touted as a hate crime, and a Muslim Trayvon Martin, ended
with dramatic courtroom outbursts in El
Cajon , Cal.
Muslim drivers at Cleveland
Excerpt: Roughly 25 Muslim drivers dispatched to Cleveland Hopkins International
Airport
Shock Poll! Majority
of Americans Say President Obama is a Liar
Excerpt: According to a recent poll done by Fox News, the majority of Americans
believe that President Obama is usually lying. Sixty-one percent of the people who
took the poll believe that President Obama is lying at least some of the time
on important issues. An additional twenty percent say that the President
lies “here and there.” That means that eighty-one percent of Americans believe
that Barack Obama lies to us. (Yeah, yeah some of you will poo-poo the poll
simply because it was done by Fox News, but don't be afraid. --JB)
The Middle
East War on Christians: Muslim-majority nations are doing to
followers of Jesus what they did to the Jews. By Ron Prosor
Excerpt: The Middle East
may be the birthplace of three monotheistic religions, but some Arab nations
appear bent on making it the burial ground for one of them. For 2,000 years,
Christian communities dotted the region, enriching the Arab world with
literature, culture and commerce. At the turn of the 20th century, Christians
made up 26% of the Middle East 's population.
Today, that figure has dwindled to less than 10%. Intolerant and extremist
governments are driving away the Christian communities that have lived in the Middle East since their faith was born. (The time of
persecution of Christians is not over, not by a long shot, and the really
tragic thing about it is that these Christian communities have been in place
for over 1000 years, much longer in some places. And now, in the 21st century,
the rise of Islamic orthodoxy and extremism has yanked the rug of stability out
from under their feet, and they are targets every day for various forms of
harassment and persecution. The slaughter of Christians in Darfur
has gone on now for over a decade, and the UN troops there can't seem to do a
whole lot to stop it. There are times when I think that we should have money
being raised in Christian churches all over this country to go to organizations
that smuggle weapons and supplies to Christian communities in these countries,
to help them defend themselves. The Irish in this country many years ago raised
money to send weapons to the IRA, is it time to follow that example and send
weapons to these suffering Christians? Or is it time for our government to
bring down whatever sanctions it can on their governments for their gross
violations of human rights? In theory the wonderful UN is supposed to be the
worldwide organization that moves to protest human rights violations, but the
only real action we see there are the eternally repeated condemnations of Israel .
(The one place in the Middle East right now
where the Christian population is growing.) All the propaganda about the
"religion of peace" is nice, and there certainly are Muslims who are
perfectly fine living with people of other faiths, but the truth is that the
last 20 years of growing Islamic extremism has gone more than far enough to
make it a very serious problem in several Islamic states. It is not
"Islamophobic" to recognize what is going on, any more than it was
"Deutschophobic" to see that the rise of Naziism in Germany was a very bad thing. We
need to get off the PC parade of people wearing blinders and recognize the
reality of religious extremism in certain parts of the Middle
East . --Del. We should allow the Saudis to build a mosque here for
every church they allow here. ~Bob)
Bankrupt Illinois
Excerpt: Illinois
is broke. Its public pension plans are the most troubled in the nation. Illinois passed massive
"temporary" tax hikes to fix the pension problem, but that did not
make a dent in the problem. Nonetheless, ideas to waste more taxpayer money are
always on the table. Here's a recent example. $100 Million for Barack Obama
Library. (So glad to not live there any longer. ~Bob)
Excerpt: Islamic extremists Saturday claimed responsibility
for the massive rush-hour explosion earlier this week that ripped through a
busy bus station in Nigeria 's
capital, Abuja ,
killing at least 75 people and wounding 141. "We are in your city, but you
don't know where we are," Abubakar Shekau, leader of the Boko Haram
terrorist network, says in a new video that threatens more attacks. (“We are in your city, but you don’t know
where we are.” That is true of many more cities besides just Abuja
Excerpt: Schools in Birmingham
are illegally segregating pupils, discriminating against non-Muslim students
and restricting the GCSE syllabus to “comply with conservative Islamic
teaching”, an official report leaked to The Telegraph discloses. Department for
Education inspectors said that girls in a school at the centre of the so-called
“Trojan Horse” plot were forced to sit at the back of the class, some Christian
pupils were left to “teach themselves” and an extremist preacher was invited to
speak to children.
Catholic priest is
killed in Central African
Republic
Excerpt: A Catholic priest, Father Labbe Christ Formane
Willbona, was murdered in the north of the Central African Republic , allegedly
by a group of armed shepherds of the Fulani ethnic group, considered to be
close to the former rebel group of the Seleka.
Progressive
Insurance: The right ideological credentials mean never having
to say you’re sorry. By Victor Davis
Hanson
Excerpt: How do you ensure that you won’t be ostracized,
denounced, or fired if you are a media celebrity, captain of industry, or high
public official? For some, sexist banter is certainly no problem. Stand-up
comedian Bill Maher called Sarah Palin a c–t and a tw-t, but suffered no ill
consequences. David Letterman joked on air that Sarah Palin’s 14-year-old
daughter had had sex with Alex Rodriguez during a New York Yankees game. There
was no downside to that either. President Obama tosses around “sweetie” as he
wishes. No problem with that. No one believes Barack could be condescending to
women.
Corn biofuels worse than gasoline on
global warming in short term – study
Excerpt: Biofuels made from the leftovers of harvested
corn plants are worse than gasoline for global warming in the short term, a new
study shows, challenging the Obama administration's
conclusions that they are a much cleaner oil
alternative and will help combat climate change. A $500,000 study – paid for by
the federal government and released Sunday in the
peer-reviewed journal Nature Climate Change – concludes that biofuels made with
corn residue release 7% more greenhouse gases in the early years compared with
conventional gasoline. (When the free market is trashed and the regime is
pushing a command economy—they dictate what goes where and for how much—expect
gas over $5.00 a gallon (4.17 for premium today) and no feed allotted to
cattle; more corn being ordered to be used for ethanol by regime. Even though
it is going to starve the population and has been shown to damage engines and
the air. --Barb)
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