Blog
postings will be very limited due to the on-going challenges from my lung
transplant, which is not doing well. So I have to delete 90% of incoming non-personal
email unread, due to time and energy. But a few things caught my eye.
I remind
everyone I don't have time for Facebook or Linked-In, so poking, tagging and
posting there doesn't get anything to me.
Say, no
time like the present to support charity and get copies of my books:
They say these things go up in value after the author is gone.
They might get to be worth the paper they are printed on. ~Bob
Book Recommendation: Dark Invasion: 1915: Germany 's
Secret War and the Hunt for the First Terrorist Cell in America
this interesting history was a birthday gift from my
brother, Tom. Except for the Zimmerman Telegram, I knew almost nothing about Germany 's sabotage campaign against a
"neutral" United
States in WWI. It included many ship and
ammo plant bombings and a couple of attempts at germ warfare--which killed some
people. Well written and well researched, this one is for the history buff.
Excerpt: This is the power of social media. This is the
power of personal video cameras. This is the power of citizen journalists. And
the next time Senator Feinstein calls for “licencing” only “legitimate
journalists,” that the 1st Amendment only extends to people who work at the New
York Times, Washington Post, or MSNBC, remember this moment. This is how the
bullies with the power, the cronies and their allies, are turned back. (I
wouldn't say this is over. When you cross the Big Government, you and your kids
can end up dead. See Wako and Ruby Ridge. Big Government liberals automatically
see the government as right. There are arguments, especially that Bundy doesn't
own that land. If his claim predates the Federal Government, then the Indians'
claim predates his. Limited Government conservatives, like me are likely to
come down on the ranchers' side. There are arguments. The government's "protect
the turtles" argument stinks when Senator Reid-connected lobbyists want
the land for a solar project, which is no better for the turtles than, say cattle
grazing or Reid's home, which is reportedly in tortoise [yes, I know the
difference] land. ~Bob)
I recommend everyone go to NCPA.org and subscribe both to
Dr. Goodman's free blog and their free daily policy digest. Thy do good work
and deserve your support. ~Bob. Excerpt: Have you ever wondered why poor people
are poor? It’s not as though there aren’t plenty of role models around.
Millions of people live highly successful, productive lives in this country. So
why don’t people at the bottom of the income ladder copy the behavior of those
several rungs above them and better their lot in life? If this question doesn’t
really interest you, that’s understandable. What’s not understandable is why it
is not an interesting question for those who regard inequality of income the
burning issue of the day. For example, when is the last time you saw a Paul
Krugman column on why poor people are poor? When Krugman writes about poverty,
he can’t get more than a few sentences into the piece without launching into an
attack on Republicans for being racists and indifferent to the plight of the
poor. And that’s on a good day. When he’s in a bad mood, he depicts Republicans
as actually delighting in the suffering of the poor. What motivates Krugman
more: Concern for the poor? Or hatred of Republicans? You decide.
BREAKING: Emails Show Lois Lerner Fed True the Vote Tax
Information to Democrat Elijah Cummings. By Katie Pavlich
Excerpt: New IRS
emails released by the House Oversight Committee show staff working
for Democratic Ranking Member Elijah Cummings communicated with the IRS
multiple times between 2012 and 2013 about voter fraud prevention group True
the Vote. True the Vote was targeted by the IRS after applying for tax exempt
status more than two years ago. Further, information shows the IRS and
Cummings' staff asked for nearly identical information from True the Vote
President Catherine Engelbrecht about her organization, indicating coordination
and improper sharing of confidential taxpayer information.
Worth Reading
Excerpt: It is a statistical fraud when Barack Obama and
other politicians say that women earn only 77 percent of what men earn — and
that this is because of discrimination. It would certainly be discrimination if
women were doing the same work as men, for the same number of hours, with the
same amount of training and experience, as well as other things being the same.
But study after study, over the past several decades, has shown repeatedly that
those things are not the same.
The "77 Cents on
the Dollar" Myth
Excerpt: It is a myth that a woman makes 77 cents on every
dollar earned by a man, say Andrew Biggs and Mark Perry of the American
Enterprise Institute. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) report,
"Highlights of Women's Earnings in 2012," full-time wage and salaried
female workers had median weekly earnings of $691, compared to male median
earnings of $854 (an 81 percent gap). That might seem to support the
77-cents-on-the-dollar claim, until you look at what else BLS said. While this
was a comparison of "full-time" workers, what actually qualifies as
"full-time" varies within that designation. Men were nearly twice as
likely to work more than 40 hours a week than women were, and women were almost
twice as likely to work only 35 to 39 hours per week. Taking that into account
shrinks the pay gap -- women working 40-hour weeks earned 88 percent of male
earnings.
War on Women: DSCC Pays Women $.70 per $1.00 for Men. By Heather Ginsberg
Excerpt: The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC)
has been working to make the midterm election season a nightmare for
Republicans across the country by blaming them for inequalities in pay between
men and women. Many know the commonly touted statistic that women earn 77 cents
on every dollar men make. Well according to a new analysis
of salary information from the DSCC, the group only pays women 70 cents for
every dollar men make.
3 myths on our
natural gas boom: The reality is that the new energy explosion helps us all. By
Mark P. Mills
Excerpt: For all the coverage America 's
energy boom has gotten, there are still a lot of common assumptions about the
oil and natural gas business that are flat out wrong. We know the good news:
Oil and gas production is rising so fast that U.S. dependence on imports will soon
disappear. Growth in natural gas has made America the world's largest
producer and could soon make us a huge exporter. In the past
half-dozen years, America 's
hydrocarbon juggernaut has boosted our economy by hundreds of billions of
dollars. To keep the boom going, the federal government needs to
keep out of the way, even as pressure grows to tighten energy-industry
regulation. That's why it is important to unbundle three myths about the boom:
American
Birthright
http://www.jdpendry.com/2014/04/07/american-birthright/
Excerpt: I will not be forced into silence while freedom slips away. If you are a member ofAmerica
http://www.jdpendry.com/2014/04/07/american-birthright/
Excerpt: I will not be forced into silence while freedom slips away. If you are a member of
Excerpt: Eich broke the rules of the game. Suddenly
everything appears in another light. Just days after being named CEO of
Mozilla, Brendan Eich was forced out because he is an opponent of same-sex marriage.
After declining opportunities to recant his views, he “voluntarily” decided to
step down. Responses have been all over the map. (I don't have a problem with
gay marriage. The threat to America
in marriage is not gays getting married, it is straights having kids and not
getting married, contributing to poverty, ct\rime, welfare spending and drugs.
But i have a problem with people trying to bully others out of speaking their
views. At the time he contributed, a guy named Obama had the same views. Should
the left force Obama out of his job? ~Bob)
Advocate for
"Women in Tech" Accused of Raping His Wife. By Daniel Greenfield
Excerpt: Dana Contreras, a man, married his wife Melissa in
2007. Then he had surgery to mutilate himself so that he could pretend to be a
woman. Then despite not going to college, got a top job at Twitter where he
became an advocate for transgender issues, but then things didn’t go so well.
Rich Lady: Code
Pink's Medea Benjamin Supports BDS, Just Not When She's Investing. By Daniel
Greenfield
http://www.frontpagemag.com/2014/dgreenfield/code-pinks-medea-benjamin-supports-bds-just-not-when-shes-investing/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=code-pinks-medea-benjamin-supports-bds-just-not-when-shes-investing
http://www.frontpagemag.com/2014/dgreenfield/code-pinks-medea-benjamin-supports-bds-just-not-when-shes-investing/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=code-pinks-medea-benjamin-supports-bds-just-not-when-shes-investing
Excerpt: There’s a great tradition of Socialists doing and
saying different things. Especially the wealthy Medea Benjamin kind. While
Medea Benjamin pushes BDS on her Facebook page, her investment page looks rather different.
The Joy of Thinking:
Shmuel Trigano. By Nidra Poller
Excerpt: Thirty-seven years later, Shmuel Trigano finds
himself once more in a linguistic-cultural-geographic conundrum. The French
language, which has lost nothing of its vibrant beauty and capacity for
expression, is losing its territorial scope. And Jews in France are
tottering on the edge of a familiar precipice. The same Muslim population that
forced them to flee Arab lands has now created such a hostile environment in France that
many envisage another exodus. The French language once practiced by fine minds
all over the world is becoming a backwater, a trap for thinkers whose work is
not easily translated and marketable. We who are enduring this difficult period
in contemporary French history have the privilege of reading their works in the
original; it isn’t a golden age, but there’s some silver in it.6
Anti-Immigration
Euro-Skeptic Parties May Be On the Rise: Geert Wilders Once Again Endures a
Firestorm of Criticism. By Jerry Gordon
Excerpt: The leader of the United Kingdom Independence
Party, Nigel Farage, given current trending opinion polls, may be
poised to surpass the Labor party. It alleged in a UK Telegraph report that Lady Thatcher’s unofficial biographer
considers Farage’s immigration and EU stands “closely aligned” with her views.
A decade ago this writer was on a weekly international Radio America panel
with Farage where as the lone UKIP Member of the European Parliament he boosted
these views. These opinion polls prior to the May European Parliamentary
elections reflect the ascendency of the anti-immigration Euro skeptic parties
in many EU countries.
Excerpt: Today I’m going to get personal. The reason? To see
if readers have had similar experiences. There were about 450 students in my
high school graduating class. I don’t remember a single one I would call
“poor.” Only one would I call “rich.” All the rest were squarely within the 20
yard lines. Socioeconomically, we were all very much alike: solidly middle
class. We went to school together, played sports together and socialized with
each other. Since my school was segregated by law at the time, all of the
students were white. Now let’s run the tape forward and approach the time of
normal retirement. At this point I made five observations. First, I made a rough calculation that between
5% and 10% of our class was earning about half the class income. Obviously, my
calculation was far from precise, but I believe that the inequality of income
within my high school class was similar to the inequality we observe in society
as a whole. Second, I have no idea why this happened. The highest earners in my
class were not necessarily the ones with the highest grades or test scores.
Excerpt: Paul Krugman has
written another one of those columns where almost every single sentence is
wrong. But he did get one thing right: The crucial thing to understand about
the Affordable Care Act is that it’s a Rube Goldberg device, a complicated way
to do something inherently simple. The biggest risk to reform has always
been that the scheme would founder on its complexity. Have you ever wondered
why ObamaCare is burdened with so much complexity? Here’s the answer: Barack
Obama. Obama? Yes, the president himself. He campaigned on the promise that he
would put partisanship aside and unite the country behind sensible answers to
pressing problems. Then he didn’t.
The Democrats’ Fixation On ‘Disparate Impact’ Denigrates Minorities:
No such thing as "race neutral" outcomes. By John
Rosenberg
Excerpt: The Department of Education’s Office for Civil
Rights has had a busy week or two trying to stamp out equal treatment of
minorities. First, the Miami Herald reports, it “has quietly revived an investigation of Florida ’s Bright Futures
scholarships,” which are awarded in part on the basis of SAT or ACT
scores. Inside Higher Ed points out that critics of Bright Futures, and all
programs that rely on similar tests, regard those tests as discriminatory
because “on average, black and Latino students’ scores lag behind those of
whites and Asians students.” State Rep. Erik Fresen, the Miami Republican who
chairs the Florida House education subcommittee on appropriations, replies to
charges of bias by insisting that “Bright Futures, from its inception, has
always been race, gender and creed blind…. [T[he program is unbiased and based
only on the merit of individual students.” That, of course, is precisely why
the Obama administration, which regards color- and gender-blindness as
simply Jim Crow dressed up in modern garb, objects to Bright Futures. An Office
for Civil Rights spokesman stated in an email to the Miami
Herald that OCR was “investigating allegations that the state of Florida utilizes
criteria for determining eligibility for college scholarships that have the
effect of discriminating against Latino and African-American students on the
basis of national origin and race.” ... Apparently the Obama administration
regards “diversity” as compelling for colleges, but not academic merit. (We
keep seeing this again and again. If the statistics on some minority
don't match up- that is, their percentage in the population and their
percentage in either something good (graduating college) or something not so
good (expulsion from school) are not the same number, or very close- then that
is prima facie evidence that there has been discrimination against
them. In other words, it must be impossible that the actions of
individuals in the minority could be different from the actions of everyone
else. That such an idea runs totally against the common experience of diverse
groups of humans just doesn't get acknowledged. Jews make up maybe 3% of
the population, but are a much higher proportion of doctors and lawyers.
Blacks make up 13% of the population, but are a much higher proportion of
professional athletes in basketball and football. Women are half the
population, but make up 75% of veterinarians and only 15% of mechanical
engineers. There is no way to force-fit people into equal boxes in any
system, and trying to do so just makes one hell of a mess. The Dept of
Education is one of the federal agencies whose existence I have to wonder
about; that is, do we really need this bureaucracy at all, can we demonstrate
that its activities really serve society well? Right now it looks more
like they are going to bring more damage to the system, that will serve no one
well in the end. --Del )
Excerpt: The Democratic Party, the party of slavery, which
openly practices the only form of discrimination that is acceptable today in
American politics – class warfare – and discrimination against the successful,
yesterday, for the third time in recent weeks, wrongly accused the Republican
Party of racism. (Actually, the democrats also support race-based
discrimination, as long as they can appeal to interest groups on the basis of
diversity, in affirmative action, or against Asians at the universities. ~Bob)
America’s New
Anti-Strategy : Our allies and our enemies have seriously
recalculated where the U.S.
Excerpt: It was not difficult to define American
geopolitical strategy over the seven decades following World War II — at least
until 2009. It was largely bipartisan advocacy, most ambitiously, for nations
to have the freedom of adopting constitutional governments that respected human
rights, favored free markets, and abided by the rule of law. And at the least,
we sought a world in which states could have any odious ideology they wished as
long as they kept it within their own borders. There were several general
strategic goals as we calculated our specific aims, both utopian and realistic.
Roland Martin:
Attacks on Black Conservatives Too Personal. By Aaron Stern
Ecerpt: When Ben Carson, a neurosurgeon turned conservative
pundit, compared the United States to Nazi Germany last month, he was quickly
criticized in mainstream and liberal media outlets, including by the Daily Beast's Joshua DuBois, who wrote that Carson
was no longer a role model for black children because he "sold out to the
right." Carson
gets plenty of attacks like that whenever he speaks out against liberal causes,
but he rarely gets public support from groups like the NAACP. (Whites who
criticize Mr. Obama are racists, and Blacks who do so are of course "Uncle
Toms", or Oreos, or sell-outs. These are the standard attacks made
to suppress criticism, and the mere facts and logic just don't matter.
While not every criticism of Mr. Obama or Democrat policies is fair or
accurate, no one and no Party can be above all criticism, and personal attacks
on individuals who levy criticisms is inappropriate. --Del )
A Halo for Selfishness. By Thomas Sowell
Excerpt: The recent Supreme Court decision over-ruling some
Federal Election Commission restrictions on political campaign contributions
has provoked angry reactions on the left. That is what often happens whenever
the High Court rules that the First Amendment means what it says -- free speech
for everybody. When the Supreme Court declared in 2010 that both unions and
corporations had a right to buy political ads, that was considered outrageous
by the left. President Obama called the decision "devastating" and
said it "will open the floodgates for special interests."
Excerpt: Attorney General Eric Holder must be suffering from
a sort of amnesia. He is upset at supposed divisiveness and rudeness directed
at him when testifying before Congress, and suggests not too subtly that he and
President Obama have been accorded inordinately harsh treatment (fill in the
blanks why). Aside from the fact that he seemed to have relished the combat
with Representative Gohmert in quite unprofessional tones (“you don’t want to
go there, buddy, alright?”/ “good luck with your asparagus”), he seems to
forget what former attorney general Alberto Gonzales once endured both in the
liberal media and before Democrats in Congress, not to mention the films, comic
routines, novels, and op-eds that focused on the idea of assassinating
President George W. Bush, a shameful chapter in our history, which I think Eric
Holder was largely mum about at the time.
Dude! Casual marijuana use linked with brain
abnormalities, study finds
Excerpt: Casual marijuana use may come with some
not-so-casual side effects. For the first time ever, researchers at
Northwestern University have analyzed the relationship between casual use of
marijuana and brain changes – and found that young adults who used cannabis
just once or twice a week showed significant abnormalities in two important
brain structures. The study’s findings, to be published Wednesday in
the Journal of Neuroscience, are similar to those of past research linking
chronic, long-term marijuana use with mental illness and changes in brain
development.
Worth Reading : The Boston
Excerpt: When Islamic jihadists set off two bombs last year
at the Boston Marathon, murdering three people and wounded 260, maiming some
for life, they brought to fruition not only their own plot, but the whole
enterprise of making Americans think that there is a big problem of “Islamophobia”
in this country. As this grim anniversary of the April 15, 2013 bombings
approaches, it is useful to recall what the ongoing drumbeat over
“Islamophobia” is really all about: enabling Islamic jihad murder.
More than 100
schoolgirls kidnapped by Islamic terror group Boko Haram
Excerpt: Heavily armed men have kidnapped more than 100
girls from a secondary school in northeast Nigeria ’s Borno state and torched
the surrounding town, a day after a deadly bombing in the African state’s
capital. (Well, the Holy Qur'an permits sex with slave girls. It's their
culture--don't be Islamophobic. ~Bob)
Excerpt: George Leef, director of research for the North
Carolina-based John
William Pope
Center
Excerpt: I mean, I could tell a story about how the
exchanges make a trivial contribution to solving the problem of the uninsured,
but a lot of uninsured people who are afraid of the individual mandate bite the
bullet and sign up for that employer-sponsored insurance they’ve been declining
because their share of the premium is $150 a month. Where the existence of the
exchanges causes a lot of companies to dump their retirees onto the individual
market in order to pick up some subsidies. Where people who already had
individual policies take one look at the new premiums they have to pay and
decide it’s better to just sign up for their spouse’s insurance, even if they
have to pay the whole premium for the additional coverage. It’s not a
particularly flattering story for Obamacare, but it’s a story you can string
together from these data.
Excerpt: Media outlets in Australia
and New Zealand today
reported that two Australian nationals, including one
who was a New Zealand citizen
as well, were killed in a US predator drone strike in Yemen on Nov. 19. Last year's
airstrike took place in Yemen 's
eastern Hadramout province, a known jihadist haven, and targeted al Qaeda in
the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) fighters driving in the Ghayl Bawazir area near
Mukallah, the provincial capital.
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