Author: MontereyBayForum

Twitter Updates for 2009-07-17

  • What is justice? Obama thanks it is equality. I think justice is appropriate treatment, making distinctions between people and situations. #
  • A single New Yorker making $80 K will pay $28,391 in taxes (35.5%) under Obama health care plan. http://www.freedomOK.net/wordpress #

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A wise Latina (Sotomayor) will make a better decision??? www.freedomOK.net/wordpress

Judge Soyomayor
Judge Soyomayor

written by Cameron Jackson cameronjacks@gmail.com

Wise people do not go around saying that they are wise. Judge Sotomayor has known for 10+ years that she might be considered for nomination to the Supreme Court. In her remarks she refers to herself as the “wise Latina” who she believes will make a better decision than a white male.

For Sotomayor to hold herself out as wise is not a wise decision. And to do so by connecting her wisdom to her racial background is dumb. That she made the “wise Latina” remarks in a number of speeches over a 4-5 year period is idiotic. It might even be viewed as a moronic decision considering that she knew she was on the list for possible nomination.

People we now call mentally retarded used to be called dumb, idiot or a moron. Those were commonly employed educational terms to describe students with low levels of functional intelligence.

For Judge Sotomayor to repeatedly say she is a “wise Latina” who will make better decisions because of her race/gender/rich experience shows a questionable level of functional intelligence. She may test smart on an IQ test – we have no information on that issue — but per her “wise Latina” remarks she can act in a dumb manner.

Getting a possibly dumb Latina on the bench may be exactly what President Obama wants. For Obama, it is all about leveling the playing field so everyone gets equality — except for Obama and close supporters.

After all, functionally dumb people should have an equal chance as a smart person to be on the Supreme Court. That is Obama’s thinking it appears. President Obama can just have Sotomayor over for social gatherings so that she learns how he wants her to vote on certain issues.

So how “dumb” is Obama? Not that dumb.


Asked questions during the nomination process about her “wise Latina” remarks, Sotomayor has tried to spin it differently. Do you think she succeeded? Or is her nose growing longer and longer?

“Pat Leahy opened the questioning of Judge Sonia Sotomayor by asking her some softball questions about her controversial speeches and decisions. In response, Sotomayor’s characterization of her “wise Latina” speech was strikingly disingenuous:

I want to state up front, unequivocally and without doubt, I do not believe that any ethnic, racial or gender group has an advantage in sound judging. I do believe that every person has an equal opportunity to be a good and wise judge regardless of their background or life experiences.

What — the words that I use, I used agreeing with the sentiment that Justice Sandra Day O’Connor was attempting to convey. I understood that sentiment to be what I just spoke about, which is that both men and women were equally capable of being wise and fair judges.

That has to be what she meant, because judges disagree about legal outcomes all of the time — or I shouldn’t say all of the time, at least in close cases they do. Justices on the Supreme Court come to different conclusions. It can’t mean that one of them is unwise, despite the fact that some people think that.

So her literal words couldn’t have meant what they said. She had to have meant that she was talking about the equal value of the capacity to be fair and impartial.

Sotomayor employs a rhetorical dodge by focusing on how she interpreted Justice O’Connor’s famous statement that “a wise old man and wise old woman will reach the same conclusion in deciding cases.” She says that O’Connor couldn’t have meant that the the wise man and the wise woman will reach the same decision in every case, since judges often disagree. Rather, she interpreted O’Connor’s statement to mean that men and women have an equal capacity to reach wise judgments.

Of course that’s correct: O’Connor was saying that men and women shouldn’t reach different decisions because of their genders. But here is where Sotomayor hides the ball. Having created a diversion by talking about what O’Connor meant, she slipped in this key statement: “the words that I use, I used agreeing with the sentiment that Justice Sandra Day O’Connor was attempting to convey.”

That statement is a falsehood. Sotomayor’s whole point in quoting Justice O’Connor was to disagree with, or at least express reservations about, O’Connor’s view that the judge’s gender shouldn’t affect the outcome of a case. Here is the passage from Sotomayor’s speech:

Whether born from experience or inherent physiological or cultural differences, a possibility I abhor less or discount less than my colleague Judge Cedarbaum, our gender and national origins may and will make a difference in our judging. Justice O’Connor has often been cited as saying that a wise old man and wise old woman will reach the same conclusion in deciding cases. I am not so sure Justice O’Connor is the author of that line since Professor Resnik attributes that line to Supreme Court Justice Coyle. I am also not so sure that I agree with the statement. First, as Professor Martha Minnow has noted, there can never be a universal definition of wise. Second, I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life.
Thus, Sotomayor’s characterization of the context of her “wise Latina” remark is the opposite of the truth. She wasn’t “agreeing with the sentiment that Justice O’Connor was attempting to convey,” as she told Senator Leahy. Rather, she staked out a position in opposition to O’Connor’s. In her speech she expressly disagreed with O’Connor’s view, as Sotomayor put it, “that both men and women were equally capable of being wise and fair judges.”

I’ve been on the fence as to whether Senators should vote to confirm Sonia Sotomayor, but this rather breathtaking dishonesty provides strong grounds to vote against her confirmation.

UPDATE: Later in the proceedings, Sotomayor couldn’t resist fudging the facts once again:

SOTOMAYOR: …I was talking about the value that life experiences have, in the words I used, to the process of judging. And that is the context in which I understood the speech to be doing.
The words I chose, taking the rhetorical flourish [i.e., “wise Latina”], it was a bad idea. I do understand that there are some who have read this differently, and I understand why they might have concern.

But I have repeated — more than once — and I will repeat throughout, if you look at my history on the bench, you will know that I do not believe that any ethnic, gender or race group has an advantage in sound judging. You noted that my speech actually said that.
And I also believe that every person, regardless of their background and life experiences, can be good and wise judges.

LEAHY: In fact, if I might…

KYL: Excuse me. Just for the record, I don’t think it was your speech that said that, but that’s what you said in response to Senator Sessions’ question this morning.

Indeed, Sotomayor said no such thing in her speech; she said the exact opposite

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What has happened in Episcopalian churches over the last 20-30 years? Why?

Roots at Ground Zero outside episcopal church
Roots at Ground Zero outside episcopal church

The Episcopalian Church used to be a welcoming church for persons hurt by their former faith. Scratch beneath the surface of many Episcopalians and you will find that about half are former Catholics. And, there are lot of Protestants from all sorts of fundamental churches who attend episcopal churches. The Episcopalian Church gave fresh air and new Life for hurting souls. That is who inhabited the pews. That was 20 to 30 years ago.

Twenty years ago, in the Episcopalian churches there was not a big focus on belief beyond reciting the Nicene Creed (“I believe in God the Father…) There were lots of liberals and lots of conservatives. And the priests who spoke expressed a variety of viewpoints.

More and more that variety of thinking no longer present. Neither in the pews nor from the pulpit.

Today the Episcopalian church is a welcoming place for liberals with a certain mind cast. Now, scratch an Episcopalian and you find first a liberal. A liberal who believes that same sex marriages are fine and dandy. A liberal who supports the Obama program whole hardly. A liberal who wants to level the playing field. One who wants to make Israel be nice to the Muslim world.

Lately, increasingly, the conservatives have fled the pews. Or been pushed out. Or feel unwelcome. Certainly the conservative views are not respected or given speaking space. What comes out of the typical priest is a palaver of support COPPA (an Alinsky type socialist group), Israel has been a bad boy, Bush had it all wrong and and let’s level the playing field. Oh, and you can work your way to heaven by giving money and time to the causes that this church supports.

Lately, in many Episcopalian and Catholic churches a popular hymn is All Are Welcome! When you look around at the “all” they all seem fairly similar in mind set.

Thus, when I read what the Episcopalian churches are doing at convention — I was not surprised. Disheartened, but not surprised. I wish Convention would address other concerns like the Biblical admonition to take care of the Widow and Orphan in our midst.

Taking care of orphans: Do you know that California law prevents grandparents older than 65 or so from taking care of their orphaned grandchildren? That’s right. If you are over a certain age and even if you were taking care of that child a grandparent is prevented from adopting or serving as a foster parent in California. That is a stupid law.

Why don’t the churches work to change California laws that hurt orphans? That seems like a better local Christian goal —

    take care of the world you immediately inhabit

— than he goals they want us to support, i.e., world wide eradication of poverty and world wide emancipation of women.

In California we put those orphan children in the Foster Care system which does not take care of them very well. And does it very expensively. Why doesn’t the Episcopalian Church focus on Biblical concerns such as the Orphan and the Widow?

I wonder whether the churches have become pawns of socialist organizations such as COPPA? It is hard to find out much about who actually RUNS COPPA.

Anyhow, see the article below about what is going on at the convention for Episcopalian churches:

The Socialist Workers Party at Prayer By: Mark D. Tooley
FrontPageMagazine.com | Thursday, July 16, 2009

“The 2 million member and fracturing Episcopal Church is currently convened in its governing General Convention in Anaheim, California, and seemingly poised, in between affirmations of same-sex unions and transgenderism, to condemn Israel as the focus of Middle Eastern strife.

“In stereotypes from another era, snooty Episcopalians once practiced anti-Semitism lite, keeping Jews out of their country clubs and not mixing socially. Later, many Episcopalians fought hard to overturn the reality behind those stereotypes. In the 1950’s and 1960’s, Episcopal leaders were in the forefront of defending Israel’s existence. Then in the 1970’s and 1980’s, much of the church endorsed Liberation Theology, which portrays Palestinians as innocent victims and Israel as the Western oppressor. Today, some Episcopal elites seem determined to return to earlier days, when the modern descendants of the ancient Hebrews were regarded with distaste.

There are no resolutions currently before this year’s Episcopal General Convention directly criticizing any government in the world, except two: Israel and the United States.

Resolutions mention human rights abuses in the Philippines and strife in southern Sudan but decline to criticize governments there, though surely Sudan’s Islamist regime, dripping with blood of millions of victims, might merit some disapproval. There is no criticism of any Muslim or communist dictatorship around the world, though Cuba’s Marxist regime is portrayed by one resolution as the victim of U.S. sanctions. In contrast, about a half dozen statements for consideration before the General Convention are aimed at Israel.

Many of these resolutions will not back it out of legislative committee onto the floor of the Episcopal General Convention. But they still reflect a disturbing anti-Israel ethos within much of the denomination.

One resolution disingenuously exploits biblical language to demand that the “Wall around Bethlehem and all other barriers to come down,” referring of course to Israel’s security barrier against Palestinian suicide bombers. “Reach down your divine hand so that the wall shall come down in Bethlehem, the birthplace of your Son, the Prince of Peace; And may the crumbling walls herald the fall of all barriers that divide us,” it intones, while saying nothing about what the security barrier guards against. “Bind us together so that love gives rise to an abundance of tenderness among all people; and may our hearts like Mary’s magnify the Lord, and may your love shower down throughout the world so all divisions are scattered and washed away.” Leaving Israeli defenseless is evidently an example of “tenderness.”

Another equally even-handed resolution urges deploying all the “authority and power” of the Episcopal Church “to end the oppression and the ghetto-ization [of Palestinians by Israel] and to bring the Wall down.” A third resolution demands a Palestinian “sovereign state, independent of the State of Israel, and created from territory in the West Bank and Gaza, with Jerusalem serving as the capitol of both Israel and Palestine, and urges the Administration’s immediate and continuous engagement with representatives of Israel, Palestine, the Arab League and other countries in the region to achieve a comprehensive and enduring peace in the region and in the world.”

Still another resolution, professing to be more equitable, insists that “peace between Israel and Palestine can be achieved only by a division of historic Palestine into two sovereign states,” along the “1949 Armistice line, with mutually agreed border adjustments”; with “unrestricted opening of borders” with Gaza; with a “shared Jerusalem” serving as capital for both Israel and “Palestine”; and denouncing any “force, violence or arbitrary power by Israelis or Palestinians.”

Yet another resolution bemoans the Israeli “blockade” of Gaza, without describing that the barrier responds to Hamas rocket attacks and terrorism against Israeli civilian targets. It cites the anti-Israel Friends of Sabeel group as a resource, demanding that Israel end its “crippling blockade” and “fulfill its obligation as an occupying power under international humanitarian and human rights law to ensure the welfare of the Palestinian population in the Gaza Strip, notably its obligation to ensure the supply of essential necessities such as electrical power and to allow the movement of people and goods.” It also quotes from the Free Gaza Movement in calling Israeli policies a “man-made disaster” that “continues to devastate the people of Gaza; due to Israel’s ongoing hermetic closure of the Gaza Strip over 80% of the population there require food assistance just in order to survive.” Evidently, according to the Episcopalian writers of this resolution, neither Palestinians nor Gaza had any role in this “man-made disaster” in Gaza.

There are no resolutions before the Episcopal General Convention expressing support for Israel or concerns about terrorism or radical Islam. Of course, there is a resolution condemning the U.S. for its policy of “preventive or preemptive strike that is aimed at disrupting a non-imminent, uncertain military threat.” Another resolution confesses that “our nation’s invasion and occupation of Iraq has resulted in individual and global injustices including death and maiming of countless Iraqi innocents, displacement of millions of Iraqi citizens, silent response to atrocities, illegal confinement without representation or formal charges, torture, lack of support and care for military personnel returning home and the opportunity costs of nearly $600 billion spent.” It warns against any continued U.S. military presence in Iraq and implores “our entire nation to seek wisdom from sin committed in Iraq and let that wisdom inform future relationships throughout the world.” Of course, there are no words about Saddam’s genocides, or the murder and mayhem of insurgent groups in Iraq.

One resolution faults the U.S. for not endorsing the “U.N. Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.” Another blames the U.S. for not banning cluster bombs. Still another condemns the U.S. for its “use of torture and the practice of extraordinary rendition.” No words about torture anywhere else in the world that might distract from portraying Israel and the U.S. as the focus of evil in today’s world. In one bright spot of restraint, the proposed resolution on the Honduras “coup,” thanks to the Bishop of Honduras, is reasonable, warning against OAS sanctions that would punish Honduras in favor of the ousted leftist president.

But that bright spot is rare among otherwise slanted Episcopal proposed resolutions. As my colleague Jeff Walton reported from on site at the Episcopal General Convention, the Episcopal Priest Richard Toll, Chairman of Friends of Sabeel North America, has told supporters that previous Episcopal calls for two-state solutions are now out of date, “when the viability of two states has been destroyed, actively and consciously, by Israeli settlements in the West Bank, settler highways and, in particular, the Wall which divides the land and separates the Palestinian people into five barely contiguous isolated areas.” The Rev. Toll insisted: “The United States needs to face as a nation its complicity and support, financially and emotionally, for this [Israeli] occupation.” Not surprisingly, Toll’s Friends of Sabeel hosted Palestinian Episcopal Priest Naim Ateek of the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center in Jerusalem to the Episcopal General Convention to tout his new book, A Palestinian Christian Cry for Reconciliation. No doubt, many Episcopalians flocked to Ateek’s anti-Israel book rally with eager and itching ears.

A draft of a moderated anti-Israel resolution heading out of committee for the General Convention floor urges “cessation of violence by all Palestinians and Israelis,” “the end of the air, water and land blockade of the Gaza Strip, “the wall in whatever its form around and through Palestinian land to be brought down,” and “an end to the on-going confiscation of Palestinian land, demolition of housing, and the displacement of people,” and a “just resolution for Palestinian refugees,” plus an independent Palestine, with a shared Jerusalem, as part of an “enduring peace.”

But can there be an “enduring peace” without a change of zealous anti-Israel attitudes among Palestinians and Arabs, who still dream of Israel’s ultimate extinction, if not militarily, then demographically? The Episcopalians seem unprepared for that question.

More widely, this year’s Episcopal General Convention, with its obsessive concern about Israel’s sins and various left-wing preoccupations, seems determined to spiral further into schism and futility.
Mark D. Tooley is president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy. Tooley authored the book Taking Back the United Methodist Church.

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Single person resident of New York City will pay a huge increase in taxes under Obama’s tax plans. www.freedomOK.net.wordpress

New York from ferry
New York from ferry

On Rush Linbaugh show 7-16-09 he listed figures that New Yorkers will pay. For a single person making about $80 K it was a whopping amount. Checking the web for the article not all the figures given on the show are on the Internet version of the story. For more exact figures check the Linbaugh page.

July 16, 2009

Congressional plans to fund a massive health-care overhaul could have a job-killing effect on New York, creating a tax rate of nearly 60 percent for the state’s top earners and possibly pressuring small-business owners to shed workers.

New York’s top income bracket could reach as high as 57 percent — rates not seen in three decades — to pay for the massive health coverage proposed by House Democrats this week.

OPINION: SLEDGEHAMMER HIT TO CRUMBLING EMPIRE STATE

EDITORIAL: HERE COMES OBAMACARE

OPINION: THESE PLANS WILL REDUCE YOUR CHOICE

The top rate in New York City, home to many of the state’s wealthiest people, would be 58.68 percent, the Washington-based Tax Foundation said in a report yesterday.

That means New York’s top earners, small-business owners and most dynamic entrepreneurs will be facing new fees and penalties.

The non-partisan think-tank calculated the average local tax rate in New York State at 1.7 percent, and combined it with the 8.97 percent that high-bracket state taxpayers will shell out in 2011, when the health care plan is set to take effect. Tack on the 39.6 percent federal tax rate, 2.9 percent for Medicare and 5.4 percent for the health care “surtax,” and the figure is 56.92 percent for the Empire State.

In New York City, the top tax rate is 3.65 percent, making the Big Apple’s top combined rate even higher.

The $544 billion tax hike would violate one of President Obama’s ironclad campaign promises: No family will pay higher tax rates than they would have paid in the 1990s.

Under the bill, three new tax brackets would be created for high earners, with a top rate of 45 percent for families making more than $1 million. That would be the highest income-tax rate since 1986, when the top rate was 50 percent.

The legislation is especially onerous for business owners, in part because it penalizes employers with a payroll bigger than $400,000 some 8 percent of wages if they don’t offer health care.

But the cost of the buy-in to the program may be so prohibitive that it will dissuade owners from growing their businesses — a scary prospect in the midst of a recession.

Obama took to the airwaves yesterday with ads and TV interviews promoting the need to reform health care.

As a Senate health committee passed a different version of a health-care reform bill – a milestone for the issue – Obama said on NBC, “The American people have to realize that there’s no such thing as a free lunch.”

And in a Rose Garden speech, he said the “status quo” on health care is “threatening the financial stability of families, of businesses, and of government. It’s unsustainable, and it has to change.”

Asked if Obama supports the surtax on wealthiest Americans even though it would break a campaign pledge, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said only, “It’s a process that we’re watching.”

Republicans in Washington and small-business defenders in New York said the House legislation would effectively place a stranglehold on businesses while running off top earners.

“Placing a big tax burden on the small-business community would rob them of the resources they need to create the jobs that will lead us out of the recession,” said Tom Donohue, president of the US Chamber of Commerce.

“If there’s one sure way to kill the goose that lays the golden egg, this is it.”

Richard Lipsky, a lobbyist for small stores and businesses in New York City, warned that “in the middle of a recession, it’s a very strange way to legislate.”

“According to what we’ve read, the House health-insurance plan would have a job-crippling impact on neighborhood stores and other small businesses because they put mandates on these businesses that would prevent them from hiring people because of the cost of the plan,” Lipsky said.

Under the House plan, businesses with payrolls of $400,000 or more would pay an 8 percent penalty for uninsured workers, while companies with payrolls between $250,000 and $400,000 would pay slightly smaller penalties.

Adding to this burden, said Michael Moran of the State Business Council of New York, is that New York is already a high-tax state.

“Any additional taxes make New York even less competitive,” he said.

New York would become the third-most-hostile place for top earners to live under the proposed new surtaxes supported by House Democrats and championed by Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY).

Also hit would be individuals earning $280,000 annually and families making $350,000 a year.

The profits from small businesses would also be taxed on the back end.

Kathryn Wylde, president of the Partnership for New York City, an umbrella organization representing the city’s major businesses, said that the estimated top marginal tax rate of 57 percent for New York actually underestimates the potential impact on businesses.

That’s because it doesn’t include the city’s burdensome unincorporated-business tax, which snares many entrepreneurs.

“It could be between 62 and 63 percent,” she said.

If the House plan passes, Wylde said, “There literally, at this point, is very strong reason to relocate your family and your business outside New York.”

A lot of small businesses would be hit with the penalties for not insuring workers and get hit with the surtaxes, Moran warned.

“Many small businesses file their business taxes under personal income,” he said. “That’s the way the tax law is written. Small business, which is really where most of the job creation takes place, could be hit hard.

According to the city’s Department for Small Business Services, there are some 220,000 small businesses in the five boroughs. The agency does not keep track of how many offer health insurance.

“It’s something that’s going to kill jobs. That’s the result,” said Stephanie Cathcart, spokeswoman for the National Federation of Independent Businesses.

Among the most egregious provisions of the House proposal, she said, is a requirement that businesses pay the cost of 72.4 percent of individual health plans and 65 percent of family plans.

Those that don’t hit the mark would face the payroll tax penalty.

churt@nypost.com
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snowcloud wrote:
What would Thomas Jefferson do?

What would Thomas Jefferson say?

Food for thought.
7/16/2009 5:01 PM EDT
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metsof62 wrote:
yoyo1234

You are by yourself properly named.
7/16/2009 5:00 PM EDT
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metsof62 wrote:
NYC deserves to lose ANY and ALL that want to move away from it and NYS to boot ! Some cry about pensions. At least those people put years of working for the city into the system on the books paying taxes– even city taxes if they lived in Nassau or Suffolk. Look at all the corrupt businesses , politicians , Tammany Hall wannabes , adult s-ex theathers that feed organized crime. No , many would rather go after retiress or workers . Well NYC is the next Mogadishu and NYS the next Somalia. I was born in Brooklyn in 1948 and taught to work and pay your taxes and don’t dare go on social programs that take from the taxpayers unless you are dying. Een when I came home from the navy after Nam my police recruiter said et a job don’t collect the un-employment you are entitled to The city does not like laggards or goldbrickers. Not today. The city politicians crave them because for a little of your money they get guaranteed votes. The laggards in numbers outnumber tax PAYING voters . That is the fact. Think what you will but don’t let your thoughts deceive your eyes.
7/16/2009 4:57 PM EDT
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yoyo1234 wrote:
“Hev wrote: We were all for your…teachers–working people.”

Oh come on now, if there’s one thing I know Southerners aren’t “all for” it’s teachers and working.

That’s why the South is statistically the stupidest, fattest, poorest section of the entire country. And proud of it!
7/16/2009 4:54 PM EDT
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TheHangman wrote:
So the point isn’t just 100% about the health care issue. Why doesn’t the post just come out and say that Taxes in New York are inflated dues to Political, Special Interest and Union CORRUPTION!?
7/16/2009 4:53 PM EDT
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metsof62 wrote:
Hev wrote:
Leave New York? Don’t even think about moving to the sunny south. We don’t want you here ruining our states with your liberal nonsense. We were all for your police, firefighters, and teachers–working people–moving here, and retirees who want to escape the cold. But you liberal morons who elected this sicko with his twisted evil agenda are most definitely NOT welcome. We have southern hospitality for regular ‘folk.’ But you will see the deliverance side of us if you think you can move down here and then proceed to vote for outrageous liberal policies and socialist candidates.

I’LL SECOND YOUR POST IMMEDIATELY !!!!!!!!!
7/16/2009 4:46 PM EDT
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metsof62 wrote:
When the government goes after the rich the middle class loses. Rich people have attorneys , tax accountants who use to work for the IRS and loop hole galore with exemptions from the tax code. Smaller wage earners $32, 000 for a family of 2 or more get tax money back and more money to bring them up to poverty level. Those who eventually get stuck with the tab are the middle of the road tax PAYERS .I am 61 and have learned one thing in those few years. Whenever Washington goes for tax money the middle of the roaders suffer. Cap and trade , health care , loss of local municipal revenue through prioperty tax loss and foreclosure. Who do you think will suffer the most from the cost of these calamities. Give me a break. I admit that I was NOT born yesterdy and received a decent education through college.
7/16/2009 4:45 PM EDT
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Hev wrote:
Leave New York? Don’t even think about moving to the sunny south. We don’t want you here ruining our states with your liberal nonsense. We were all for your police, firefighters, and teachers–working people–moving here, and retirees who want to escape the cold. But you liberal morons who elected this sicko with his twisted evil agenda are most definitely NOT welcome. We have southern hospitality for regular ‘folk.’ But you will see the deliverance side of us if you think you can move down here and then proceed to vote for outrageous liberal policies and socialist candidates.
7/16/2009 4:45 PM EDT
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TParty4USA wrote:
If you voted for Obama:

Be happy! You get to eat what you cooked.

And don’t complain! You broke it, you pay for it.

So quit whining and get ready to pay those taxes, just like Obama orders. It’s your patriotic duty.

And have a little empathy for all those voters who did not vote for Obama and his promise of “change” you can “believe in” — they are the true victims of the folly of those who enabled fundamental “change” to “belief” in one nation under Obamaism.

Heck, in this era of “fair” taxation at the expense of everything else, it would only be “fair” to allow a “hope” tax refund to all who voted against Obamaism.

They didn’t buy it then, and they shouldn’t have to pay for it now. After all, that’s only fair.
7/16/2009 4:45 PM EDT
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vanj wrote:
Hangman wrote:
“So only people who live in New York will only be those who will be effected? What about everyone else in the country? What state will everyone be moving to where there’s no federal tax?”

Every state has federal tax. The article addresses the combined burden of federal and local taxes on residents of NY. It addresses the potential of this causing a “straw that broke the camel’s back” scenario developing regarding high income and business flight from NY at a time NY can least afford it.
7/16/2009 4:42 PM EDT 240425024_4a6dd99e16

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Bishop Wright says below that justice is treating people appropriately, i.e., making distinctions between different people and situatons …

The Anglians Know This Will End in Schism by Tom Wright, Bishop of Duram

“In the slow-moving train crash of international Anglicanism, a decision taken in California has finally brought a large coach off the rails altogether. The House of Bishops of the Episcopal Church (TEC) in the United States has voted decisively to allow in principle the appointment, to all orders of ministry, of persons in active same-sex relationships. This marks a clear break with the rest of the Anglican Communion.

Both the bishops and deputies (lay and clergy) of TEC knew exactly what they were doing. They were telling the Archbishop of Canterbury and the other “instruments of communion” that they were ignoring their plea for a moratorium on consecrating practising homosexuals as bishops. They were rejecting the two things the Archbishop of Canterbury has named as the pathway to the future — the Windsor Report (2004) and the proposed Covenant (whose aim is to provide a modus operandi for the Anglican Communion). They were formalising the schism they initiated six years ago when they consecrated as bishop a divorced man in an active same-sex relationship, against the Primates’ unanimous statement that this would “tear the fabric of the Communion at its deepest level”. In Windsor’s language, they have chosen to “walk apart”.

Granted, the TEC resolution indicates a strong willingness to remain within the Anglican Communion. But saying “we want to stay in, but we insist on rewriting the rules” is cynical double-think. We should not be fooled.

Of course, matters didn’t begin with the consecration of Gene Robinson. The floodgates opened several years before, particularly in 1996 when a church court acquitted a bishop who had ordained active homosexuals. Many in TEC have long embraced a theology in which chastity, as universally understood by the wider Christian tradition, has been optional.

That wider tradition always was counter-cultural as well as counter-intuitive. Our supposedly selfish genes crave a variety of sexual possibilities. But Jewish, Christian and Muslim teachers have always insisted that lifelong man-plus-woman marriage is the proper context for sexual intercourse. This is not (as is frequently suggested) an arbitrary rule, dualistic in overtone and killjoy in intention. It is a deep structural reflection of the belief in a creator God who has entered into covenant both with his creation and with his people (who carry forward his purposes for that creation).

Paganism ancient and modern has always found this ethic, and this belief, ridiculous and incredible. But the biblical witness is scarcely confined, as the shrill leader in yesterday’s Times suggests, to a few verses in St Paul. Jesus’s own stern denunciation of sexual immorality would certainly have carried, to his hearers, a clear implied rejection of all sexual behaviour outside heterosexual monogamy. This isn’t a matter of “private response to Scripture” but of the uniform teaching of the whole Bible, of Jesus himself, and of the entire Christian tradition.

The appeal to justice as a way of cutting the ethical knot in favour of including active homosexuals in Christian ministry simply begs the question. Nobody has a right to be ordained: it is always a gift of sheer and unmerited grace. The appeal also seriously misrepresents the notion of justice itself, not just in the Christian tradition of Augustine, Aquinas and others, but in the wider philosophical discussion from Aristotle to John Rawls. Justice never means “treating everybody the same way”, but “treating people appropriately”, which involves making distinctions between different people and situations. Justice has never meant “the right to give active expression to any and every sexual desire”.

Such a novel usage would also raise the further question of identity. It is a very recent innovation to consider sexual preferences as a marker of “identity” parallel to, say, being male or female, English or African, rich or poor. Within the “gay community” much postmodern reflection has turned away from “identity” as a modernist fiction. We simply “construct” ourselves from day to day.

We must insist, too, on the distinction between inclination and desire on the one hand and activity on the other — a distinction regularly obscured by references to “homosexual clergy” and so on. We all have all kinds of deep-rooted inclinations and desires. The question is, what shall we do with them? One of the great Prayer Book collects asks God that we may “love the thing which thou commandest, and desire that which thou dost promise”. That is always tough, for all of us. Much easier to ask God to command what we already love, and promise what we already desire. But much less like the challenge of the Gospel.

The question then presses: who, in the US, is now in communion with the great majority of the Anglican world? It would be too hasty to answer, the newly formed “province” of the “Anglican Church in North America”. One can sympathise with some of the motivations of these breakaway Episcopalians. But we should not forget the Episcopalian bishops, who, doggedly loyal to their own Church, and to the expressed mind of the wider Communion, voted against the current resolution. Nor should we forget the many parishes and worshippers who take the same stance. There are many American Episcopalians, inside and outside the present TEC, who are eager to sign the proposed Covenant. That aspiration must be honoured.

Contrary to some who have recently adopted the phrase, there is already a “fellowship of confessing Anglicans”. It is called the Anglican Communion. The Episcopal Church is now distancing itself from that fellowship. Ways must be found for all in America who want to be loyal to it, and to scripture, tradition and Jesus, to have that loyalty recognised and affirmed at the highest level.

___________________________________________________________________

Tom Wright is Bishop of Durham

for more go to: Fulcrum

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Aptos Psychologist: How to teach consequences for bevavior to autistic children. www.freedomOK.net/wordpress

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Yes, it IS possible to teach CONSEQUENCES for behavior to children with autism. Here is an account by a single mother with two children, one child has autism. What she says makes good, common sense to me. Dr. Jackson at cameronjacks@gmail.com

To email the author contact her at Sylraen@sbcglobal.net Here is what she writes:

“Saac was faced with two alternatives. He could either stay inside all day every day or go outside and face the terrifying noises that arrived with the onset of summer; cicadas rattling, mosquitoes humming, and bees that buzzed at every flower. He weighed his options on the playground carefully. There were steam shovels that pushed dirt around, swings that carried you to the sky, and best of all, his scooter equipped with his space helmet. Yes, of all the toys, the scooter was the best alternative. At least it was fast and he could hope to fly past the alien invaders and their cruel sounds and threats to overcome him.

Tentatively he peeked out the door, scanning the horizon. “So far so good,” he thought. No bugs. He boarded his scooter timidly and took off. Immediately he was bombarded with a loud whirring and humming in his ear. Shrieking, he flung himself to the ground and awaited a fate worse than death.

Corinne, his mom watched him sadly. This had been an ongoing struggle that she had no idea how to deal with. Then an idea struck her. She had just been telling Isaac a story about a boy named David who fought a giant. She had tried to explain that he had overcome the giant by his bravery and his faith in an attempt to help him understand. He didn’t seem to understand. To him, even facing a giant was preferable to facing the sounds that overloaded his senses as an autistic child.

Then she had an idea. She had bought him a set of toy armor. Why not put it on him and encourage him to go face the terrors with his sword swinging. Better yet, why not make him the character in his own giant story. That afternoon and for the next few days she worked writing out the story that was forming in her mind and sketching out the characters. When she was done she called him over and told him the story. It was called Isaac and the Scare Giant, about a boy who was tormented by a giant who jumped out every time the boy was afraid and turned him into stone. The boy won however because he made the giant disappear by saying some magic words and by swinging his sword of truth. When the story was finished Corinne reviewed the magic words with Isaac and sent him out to play, crossing her fingers and hoping Isaac understood.

Isaac mounted his scooter a little more bravely. At least he had amour on and a sword. He rode out, his heart pounding in his chest. Sure enough a cicada started to whir and rattle menacingly in the tree above him and felt his skin turn clammy. Ok, according to his mom there was a scare giant. Though he couldn’t see it like in the story, it was there and it was shouting. He looked at his mom and she was telling him to say the words. He brandished his sword with one hand, his finger in his other ear and muttered. “You’re just a bug. I’m not afraid of you. Go away bug or I’ll cut you in two”. He felt a little better and the rattling seemed to stop.

A mosquito was the next to pounce. He brandished his sword a little more vigorously and actually made it go away. It returned diving at his ears, its sinister whine rattling his eardrums. He hit it with sword again. The mosquito retreated, stunned. He fought that mosquito and every bug that came within reach till the sweat ran down his face. With a menacing scowl he mounted his scooter with a swagger that befit a warrior, daring any bugs or scare giants to frighten him again.

Prologue

That was five years ago and since that initial success, there have been many more battles with fear battles of all sorts for Corinne and Isaac. What was important was that they both learned what their enemy was and how to fight it. Of course there were days of battles with insect noises when Isaac cowered and ran to Corinne but she had learned to become his cheerleader. Instead of panicking or overreacting she spoke bracingly to him. “Fight him Isaac.” She would say, “Fight that giant. Get your sword and win this fight”. Though Corinne had written a picture book meant for a child, the truth of the story had helped her too and would stay with her for a long long time.

Moral of the story

It is important to find the right tools to enable the autistic child to fight his fears, for a fight is what it is and needs to be addressed as such.

Here are a few tools that Corinne employed:

– She realized that beneath every paralyzing fear is a lie.

– She addressed the fear and spoke the truth.

– She cast a vision for a fear free way of thinking by reading stories of others who had conquered their fears.

– She believed in her son’s ability to fight his fears and became his cheerleader in the battle.

Life is full of many battles to face. Depending on the severity of the autism, the battle can be harder and more difficult than any yet faced. It is helpful and encouraging to know however, that others are fighting similar battles and that the battle can be won on many fronts though the struggle may be long.

Fact- Isaac is a child who has been diagnosed with mild autism. Autism is defined by the Autism Society Of America (ASA) as: “Autism is a complex developmental disability that typically appears during the first three years of life and is the result of a neurological disorder that affects the normal functioning of the brain, impacting development in the areas of social interaction and communication skills. Both children and adults with autism typically show difficulties in verbal and non-verbal communication, social interactions, and leisure or play activities.” Along with these symptoms is a hypersensitivity to noises and light which causes the child to act out or withdraw. www.definitionofautism.com/

Author: C.J. Yang
C.J. Yang is an Examiner from Chicago. You can see C.J.’s articles on C.J.’s Home Page.
Besides pursuing a teaching career and working on a novel she is a single mom to two children, one who is autistic. She can be contacted at sylraen@sbcglobal.net.

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