Update
Winter is here. The high Friday was 4 degrees. Lows below
zero, with dangerous wind chills much lower. ~Bob
General News and Comment
Worth Reading
Excerpt: On a blustery November morning in
2014, Karl Eikenberry, now 63, close-cropped hair going gray at the temples,
stands in khakis and a sports coat before a class at Princeton University U.S. combat
troops poised to leave Afghanistan
the following month, ending the longest war in American history, the students
naturally want to know what lessons he has taken away from the experience. One thing he has learned—one thing he knows for sure—is
that few if any of the students before him, the scions of American wealth and
power, will ever serve in the armed forces. The less than 1 percent of the U.S.
population that Eikenberry led in wartime were the sons and daughters not of
Wall Street hedge-fund managers or high-tech entrepreneurs, but of
working-class cops, teachers, firefighters, and especially other soldiers. One
2007 U.S. Army survey cited in The Modern American Military found that the 304 general
officers in the military had 180 children serving in uniform, making military
service something of a family business. By contrast, the editor's own research
indicated that, of the 535 members of Congress, the country's political elite,
fewer than a dozen had children in uniform. Since the establishment of the
all-volunteer force, military experience in Congress has also dropped
precipitously, with the number of members who served in uniform falling from
398 in 1971 to only 118 in 2013.
Nation’s Largest
Teachers Union Massively Funds Wisconsin
Cop-Hating Protests. By Eric Owens
Excerpt: The National Education Association is heavily
involved in supporting a militant group in Wisconsin that spends its time and energy
organizing angry anti-police protests. ... Wisconsin Jobs Now has variously
declared that the state’s police officers are racists, killers and animals,
according to EAGnews.
Why Free Community
College Is Anything But Free. By Lindsey Burke
Excerpt: The administration’s proposal begs certain
questions. Low-income students already have access to federal Pell Grants,
which can be used to finance their tuition obligations at a community college.
Indeed, the number of Pell recipients has doubled since 2008. So the proposal
will serve as little more than a federal handout to the community college
system.
Important: Labor Participation Rate Drops To Fresh 38
Year Low; Record 92.9 Million Americans Not In Labor Force
Excerpt: Case in point: after a modest rebound by 0.1% in
November, the labor participation rate just slid once more, dropping to
62.7%,or the lowest print since December 1977. This happened because the
number of Americans not in the labor forced soared by 451,000 in
December, far outpacing the 111,000 jobs added according to the Household
Survey, and is the primary reason why the number of unemployed Americans
dropped by 383,000. (If everyone would give up, the unemployment rate would
drop to zero. ~Bob)
Meet U.S. Representative Elise Stefanik, the Youngest Woman to Ever Break into the Old Boys' Club of Congress
Excerpt: "When I first told
Congressman Ryan I was thinking of running, his advice was this: 'You have one
mouth and two ears. Use them in that ratio.'" To do that she traveled more
than 100,000 miles through her upstate New York district, much of it in her
Ford F-150 truck—often alone, sometimes stranded by snowstorms—to meet voters
and hear their concerns. (...) Featured photo: Rep. Elise Stefanik,
photographed at the Viceroy New York hotel in New York City . Ann Taylor shirt. Loft skirt.
Vita Fede earrings. Timex watch. Lana Jewelry bracelet. Sarah Chloe ring. (For
any who wonder why some media aren’t taken seriously when they give us
"news," ask yourself when was the last time you saw the brand name of
one of Obama’s [or any other male politician’s] shirts and jewelry mentioned.
This lady clearly deserved better. We will hear more of
her. --Ron P.)
Stop obsessing about
inequality. It’s actually decreasing around the world. By Marian L. Tupy
Excerpt: In America ,
the income gap between the top 1 percent and the rest has
grown. But if we look not at America , but the world, inequality
is shrinking. We are witnessing,
in the words of the World Bank’s Branko Milanovic, “the first decline in global
inequality between world citizens since the Industrial Revolution.” For most of
human history, incomes were more equal, but terribly low. Two thousand years
ago, GDP per person in the most advanced parts of the world hovered around
$3.50 per day. That was the global
average 1,800 years later.
46 Million on Food
Stamps in 2014
Excerpt: A total of 46 million people received food stamps
last year, costing taxpayers a whopping $80 billion. Contrast those numbers
with 2007, when the food stamp program cost $38 billion. Only during the
recession, says Russell, has enrollment in the food stamp program been higher.
In fact, prior to 2007, the highest enrollment had ever been was 27.5 million
in 1994.
President Obie. By Daniel Greenfield
Excerpt: Culture was bureaucratically and violently absurd.
Counterculture was humanely lovingly absurd. That's still the image that the
left likes to wear like an old pair of jeans. It's still just a bunch of
easygoing fellows out to build community and take on Officer Obie’s senseless
repressive rules. But then the counterculture became the culture and the left
became Officer Obie. Or President Obie. If there's anyone who's going to drag
you into court with twenty seven eight-by-ten color glossy photographs as
proof; it's going to be the Officer Obies of the EPA. (The article does
a very nice job in explaining how what was a movement for freedom and
ridicule of the bureaucrats has somehow become the creator of more restrictions
by far more powerful and arrogant bureaucrats than ever before. Remember that
old Pogo statement... "We have met the enemy, and they is us". --Del )
Gun News
Excerpt: Colorado lawmakers
haven’t wasted any time in their efforts to repeal Colorado ’s magazine capacity limit and the
state’s universal background check laws. Republican lawmakers introduced two
new bills yesterday which would repeal both of the controversial laws passed by
lawmakers last year.
Las Vegas homeowner
shoots, kills intruder
Excerpt: Police say two men kicked in the front door of the
home and one of them was shot multiple times by someone inside the home. Police
say the two suspects were armed and shot at the homeowner first.
Another Bloomberg Gun Control Lackey Faces Jail Time. By Tony Oliva
Excerpt: Kathleen Kane has been on my crap list since day
one. I knew that she was getting her marching orders from Michael Bloomberg and
she has exercised her authority as AG to make it ever more difficult for gun
owners in Pennsylvania .
She started out by trashing reciprocity agreements with other states. She also
refuses to work on any new agreements so the ability of Pennsylvanians to
travel with their 2nd Amendment rights intact is being curtailed by her
directly.
Why Is America
Excerpt: In recent talks on tax policy, pundits have focused
on the rise in corporate "inversions" -- when American corporations
move abroad and reincorporate overseas. But is that really America 's biggest corporate
problem? There were just 14 inversions in 2014. However, America does lose 60,000
corporations every year. How? A new report from William McBride of the Tax
Foundation explains: restructuring. Traditional corporations are taxed on their
income via the corporate income tax. After they distribute profits to their
shareholders, those shareholders are taxed on the dividends they receive, and
they are also subject to the capital gains tax when they sell their stock. This
is known as "double taxation," because shareholders are forced to pay
taxes on money that was already taxed first at the corporate level. All
corporations face this tax system, but not all businesses are corporations --
many businesses are partnerships, sole proprietorships or what are known as
"Subchapter S corporations" (a form that carries the liability
benefits of a corporation, but in which business income is taxed at the
individual level, not the corporate level). In his report, McBride explains
that one of the major differences between these business forms and the
traditional corporation is how their profits are taxed: these non-corporate
forms are known as "pass-through" entities. Rather than being forced
to pay the corporate income tax and face double taxation, their income
"passes through" to owners and shareholders, where it is taxed once.
Obamacare/Government Healthcare News
What You Need to Know
About the Fight to Make Members of Congress Enroll in Obamacare. By Melissa Quinn
Excerpt: For years, Republicans have made the case that
members of Congress and their staffs are getting special treatment under
Obamacare. Their complaint stems from a 2013 decision by the federal Office of
Personnel Management that allowed more than 12,000 congressional employees,
their spouses and dependents to purchase health insurance from D.C.’s small
business exchange. Now, as the case makes its way through D.C. Superior Court,
the city’s attorneys say those congressional employees should not be permitted
to purchase health insurance through the District’s Small Business Health
Options Program.
Why Does the ACA
Definition of Full-Time Work Matter?
Excerpt: Congressional Republicans are looking at changing
the Affordable Care Act's definition of full-time work. What exactly would that
mean? Currently, the ACA's employer mandate requires employers who have at
least 50 full-time employees to provide their employees with health insurance
-- those who do not are forced to pay a fine. Under the ACA, full-time work
means working 30 hours per week or more. To avoid the additional labor costs,
employers have a few options. For example, they can keep their workforce under
50 employees, cut employees' pay, cut current employees' hours to less than 30
hours a week or hire more part-time employees (for less than 30 hours per
week). Employers have responded to the law with workforce changes -- according
to Ben Gitis, policy analyst at the American Action Forum, the ACA had reduced
employment by 350,544 jobs as of September 2014.
Public Approval of Health
Care Law
Religion of Peace News
Vive la France
http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2015/01/french_police_end_ho.php?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+LongWarJournalSiteWide+%28The+Long+War+Journal+%28Site-Wide%29%29
http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2015/01/french_police_end_ho.php?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+LongWarJournalSiteWide+%28The+Long+War+Journal+%28Site-Wide%29%29
Excerpt: French police launched simultaneous raids against
jihadists who were holding hostages in two separate locations near Paris , France Paris were killed by police officers as they
stormed a print shop and a Jewish grocery where the jihadists were holding
hostages, Le
Monde reported. Four hostages were killed at the grocery story.
French police end
twin standoffs, killing Charlie Hebdo terror suspects and an associate
Excerpt: The fast-moving events Friday also underscored the
complex, even haphazard web of allegiances that constitute locally bred
terrorism, with three men apparently working together yet claiming loyalties to
two rival organizations based in the Middle East: al-Qaeda’s affiliate in Yemen and the Islamic State militant group that
has seized parts of Iraq and
Syria .
French police kill Paris
Excerpt: A member of Al Qaeda's branch in Yemen said the group directed the massacre at a Paris magazine, hours
after near simultaneous raids by French police on Friday killed the two
Islamist brothers behind the attack and another terrorist.
Media Cowards and the Cartoon Jihad. By Michelle Malkin
Excerpt: I have never laughed so bitterly as I did while
reading Thursday’s lead editorial by the great pretender-defenders of free
speech at The New York Times. Paying obligatory lip service to the 10
cartoonists and staffers of the Paris satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo who were
slaughtered for offending Islam, the Times intoned: “It is absurd to suggest
that the way to avoid terrorist attacks is to let the terrorists dictate
standards in a democracy.” ... “Under Times standards,” a newspaper spokesman
said in a statement this week, “we do not normally publish images or other
material deliberately intended to offend religious sensibilities. ... So says
the paper that blithely published a Catholic-bashing photo of the Virgin Mary
covered in elephant dung and defended the taxpayer-funded “Piss Christ” exhibit
thusly:
Another Ex-Con,
Another Terrorist Attack - The Danger in Closing Gitmo. By Patrick Dunleavy
Excerpt: Said Kouachi, Cherif Kouachi, and Amedy Coulibaly,
the radicalized Islamic terrorists who brutally murdered police, journalists,
and civilians in the streets of Paris share a common theme with other Muslim
terrorists such as Mohammed Merah (Toulouse, France Massacre 2012) Alton Nolen
(the Oklahoma beheading), Michael Zehaf Bibeau (Attack on Canadian Parliament)
and Carlos Bledsoe (Arkansas Army Recruiting Station). All spent time behind
bars. This list would be larger if we included those arrested for plotting
terrorist attacks that were thwarted by counter-terrorism officials. (Simple
solution. Take no prisoners. ~Bob)
Bill Maher Blasts
‘Pussy Nation’ Too Afraid Of Offending Muslims Over Paris
Excerpt: Maher asked those with left-leaning political beliefs to
acknowledge that it’s not “racist” to call Islam a violent religion. And when
Kimmel suggested that Americans need to realize what a huge deal this was,
Maher uttered the line of the night: “Pussy nation.”
Bill Maher: Hundreds
of Millions of Muslims Support Attack on ‘Charlie Hebdo’
Excerpt: “I know most Muslim people would not have carried
out an attack like this,” the host of HBO’s Real Time With Bill
Maher said on ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel Live. “But here’s the important
point: Hundreds of millions of them support an attack like this. They applaud
an attack like this. What they say is, ‘We don’t approve of violence, but you
know what? When you make fun of the Prophet, all bets are off.”
Muslims Defend
Homicides in USA
http://politicaloutcast.com/2015/01/muslims-defend-homicides-usa-today-editorial/
http://politicaloutcast.com/2015/01/muslims-defend-homicides-usa-today-editorial/
Excerpt: USA
Today obviously thought it was a good idea Thursday to print an
argument that murder of those who “insult” Muhammad is not only “legitimate,”
but apparently “right”: “People know the
consequences: Opposing view.” ... "Contrary to popular misconception,
Islam does not mean peace but rather means submission to the commands of Allah
alone. Therefore, Muslims do not believe in the concept of freedom of
expression, as their speech and actions are determined by divine revelation and
not based on people’s desires."
Nicholas Kristof
& the Spirit of Charlie Hebdo. By Abigail R. Esman
Excerpt: On the day when journalists were massacred in Paris, while blood still ran wet where they
had fallen, and as eye witnesses described the killers' shouts of "Allahu
Akbar" – "Allah is great" – the New York Times' Nicholas
Kristof asked the world not to judge the killers too quickly: most
urgently, he said, don't jump to the conclusion they are Muslims. Really?
Even when they sounded the Muslim prayer? Even when they called their deeds,
loud and clear in the streets of Paris ,
"vengeance for the Prophet"?
Important Detail Revealed About the French Officer Executed
on Video by Suspected Islamic Extremists. By Dave Urbanski
Excerpt: The French police officer seen executed on video by
suspected Islamist extremists after a deadly attack on a satirical Paris newspaper was
himself a Muslim, NBC News has revealed.
Bicycle Patrolman Ahmed Merabet, 42, also was a married
father, NBC News learned from an official in Merabet’s station.
Will Egypt show America
Excerpt: The biggest story not yet covered appropriately in
mainstream media plays out now in Egypt, where President
Abdel Fattah el-Sisi attacks the root causes of continuing conflict between
certain adherents of Islam and freedom-loving secularists, in defiance of
President Obama and of fierce critics. Living in a nation of 87 million
persons, where an estimated 90 percent are Muslim, President el-Sisi is
certain that the Muslim
Brotherhood is not a secular organization, or a force for good and so
his government holds hundreds of members of that organization in prison, where
many face death sentences, including former President Mohammed Morsi.
5 Recent Terrorist
Attacks by Islamists You May Have Missed. By Daniel Kochis
Excerpt: March 2012: Toulouse
and Montauban, France – A French national of Algerian origin kills
three off-duty soldiers, three Jewish children and a rabbi in three separate
terrorist attacks in southern France .
Before being killed by police in a shootout, the terrorist, who carried out the
terrorist attack in the name of Islam, told authorities he did so in part
because he was mad over France ’s
military role in Afghanistan .
Our moderate "allies." Meanwhile, Saudis
Lash Blogger for "Insult" to Islam
Excerpt: For sheer brutality, it pales in comparison to the
massacre of journalists and cartoonists Wednesday at the Paris office
of Charlie Hebdo, but Saudi Arabia's flogging of a liberal blogger Friday further
shows how rooted the concept of violence is in response to any insult of Islam.
Raif Badawi was sentenced to 1,000 lashes – he received the first 50 in a
public square in Jeddah Friday – along with 10 years in prison and a
fine equal to $266,666, Reuters reports. His crime? Creating a website called "Free
Saudi Liberals," which advocated greater religious freedom. Saudi Arabia
found this "insulting to Islam."
US School Forces
Girls to Follow Islamic Dress Code on Field Trip
Excerpt: A school
district in Colorado
is coming under the wrath of the community for telling school girls that they
may have to submit to sharia-compliant rules regarding covering their heads and
ankles on a field trip to a Muslim mosque.
Excerpt: In the wake of the horrifying Charlie Hebdo
massacre in Paris ,
leftists and Islamic supremacists are, once again, moving swiftly to portray
Muslims as victims and any attempts to examine the real motives and goals of
the Jihadist killers in Paris as unjustified and “Islamophobic.” To combat this
pernicious tactic and the toxic delusion that impoliteness about the Prophet,
and not planned Islamic terrorism, is somehow the cause of the Charlie Hebdo
massacre in particular and the global jihad in general, Frontpage is running
the Freedom Center
Laughing at Mohammed. By Daniel Greenfield
Excerpt: The implication is clear, if you believe your
precious sky fairy had a son and he is your god, then you are clearly not to be
taken seriously. You belong to on oppressive cult that wants to hang gays and
enslave minority. Also, SCIENCE. BOOM!! But then, a group of people yelling
Allahu Akbar murder someone and the script changes tone and direction to
absolutely no one’s surprise.
The Real Islam: Bodies ‘littered on the streets’
after Boko Haram attack on Baga. Locals say insurgents began shooting
indiscriminately in Nigerian town
Excerpt: Two locals said the Islamist insurgents began
shooting indiscriminately and burning buildings on Tuesday evening in raids on
the civilian population that carried on into Wednesday.
More than 2,000 people are unaccounted for according to Musa
Bukar, chairman of local government for the Kukawa district, which includes
Baga.
White House
spokesman: US needs to “redouble” efforts to explain the true “tenets” of
Islam. By Robert Spencer, JihadWatch.org
Excerpt: I think this is a great idea. The White House
should indeed redouble its efforts to explain what the Qur’an and Sunnah
actually say. If it did this honestly, this would lead to a massive change in
its foreign and domestic policies. What’s the downside? Of course, the problem
with this is that the White House is enveloped in a fog of willful ignorance
about Islam’s texts and teachings, and Earnest here is only saying that they’re
going to redouble their efforts to thicken that fog.
Muslims segregated
from French society in growing Islamist mini-states. By Rowan
Scarborough
Excerpt: A backdrop to the massacre in Paris on Wednesday
by self-professed al
Qaeda terrorists is that city officials have increasingly ceded
control of heavily Muslim neighborhoods to Islamists, block by block. France has Europe ’s largest population of Muslims, some of whom talk
openly of ruling the country one day and casting aside Western legal systems
for harsh, Islam-based Shariah law.
Hashim Hanif Ibn
Abdul-Rasheed shot dead outside Ohio
Excerpt: A 41-year-old Ohio
man armed with several knives tried to buy a plane ticket with a fake ID before
being gunned down by police after lunging at an officer with a blade outside
the Columbus
airport, police said.
*****
Robert A. Hall is a Marine Vietnam Veteran who served five
terms in the Massachusetts State Senate. He is the author of The Coming Collapse of the American Republic.
http://www.amazon.com/Coming-Collapse-American-Republic-prevent/dp/1461122538/ref=sr_1_5?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1304815980&sr=1-5
For a free PDF of Collapse, e-mail him at tartanmarine(at)gmail.com. Hall’s
eleven books are listed here:
http://tartanmarine.blogspot.com/2010/07/new-book-published.html.
His blog of political news and conservative comment is www.tartanmarine.blogspot.com.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment