The Republican House should immediately pass a short term debt ceiling hike (say $500 BILLION) coupled with double the amount ($1,000 BILLION) in spending cuts. Two dollars cut in spending for every dollar added to the debt ceiling sends a clear message that the United States will clamp down hard on its out of control spending spree.
Under Obama, Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats, the U.S. debt to GNP ratio DOUBLED in the last three years. This must be reversed. Here what the Speaker of the House has to say:
A 2008 Pew Research Center survey reveals the citizens of California are 42% various Christian denominations, 31% Roman Catholic Christians, 2% Jewish, 2% Latter Day Saints, and 1% Muslim. Those numbers total 78%. The rest of the citizens are either non religious or of other minority faiths.
According to the latest hate crime report from the Los Angeles County Commission on Human Relations, 88 percent of all religiously based hate crimes in 2009 were against Jews. Hate crimes that targeted Muslims (3 percent) ranked slightly above those directed at Scientologists (1 percent). In fact, the commission found that attacks against Christians (8 percent) outnumbered attacks against Muslims.”
It could be argued statistically, that if any religion needs a LA Sheriff’s special religious Community Affairs Unit, it’s the Jews and Christians not the Muslims.
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Wait til the Thuggees get a lobby.
Pelican Bay State Prison inmates on a sort of hunger strike...
Thousands of California inmates have joined a hunger strike that began last week at Pelican Bay State Prison, officials said.
Prisoners at the specialized maximum security unit at Pelican Bay began refusing meals on July 1 in protest of their conditions.
The Security Housing Unit segregates prisoners from the general population who have been determined to be prison gang members or have committed a serious crime while in prison.
Some who refused state meals paid for food at the prison canteen or ate meals in visiting rooms.
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And I always thought a hunger strike meant not eating. This is just selective dining.
Federal govt now eats over 1/4 of the gross domestic product (GDP) apple pie
Think of Gross National Product (GNP) akin to an apple pie. Currently, federal spending gobbles up 1/4 of the apple pie (25.3% of GDP). What the government spends means the producers of GDP cannot spend. We the People are left with less than 3/4ths of the pie.
Government spending works differently than the spending that individuals, families and corporations do. Private spending for goods and services grows the pie larger. In contrast, government spending eats from the existing pie and takes a huge cut from that pie.
When you and I go out to a restaurant that generates income to the cook and the farmer and the maker of stoves. When the government spends on existing entitlement programs (Medcare, Social Security, Medicaid) — which makes up about 40% of the budget — and to-come entitlement programs (ObamaCare) there is nothing created by government spending.
The Republican study Group wants to cap government spending at 18% of GDP. Republican Sen. Bob Corker of Tennessee has proposed a cap of 20.6% of GDP, the average level of federal spending over the past 40 years.
How much do We the People want the federal government to “eat” from the sweat, labor and hard work Americans do which comprises the Gross Domestic Product? Under Obama, the percentage grew from roughly 20 to 25%. That is a huge increase. How much should we shrink it? Why 20%? Why not 15%?
Individuals and families decide how much they want to spend and they have to live within a budget. All this talk about raising the debt ceiling does not make sense. If you and I max out our credit should we automatically get a line of credit so we can spend even more? No. And the same applies to the federal government.
Let’s hope that the Republicans that control the spending purse of the House hold steady. No more spending by the government until there are REAL spending cuts. Real spending cuts mean giving back the apple pie to the American people. Instead of eating a quarter of the pie, let the government shrink its percentage to 15% or less of the pie.
The Swiss have successfully reduced societal and personal costs of drug addiction by supplying heroin and other drugs to addicts.
Manage U.S. drug addiction based on Switzerland's successful program Perhaps we can learn from the successes of other nations’ management of drug addiction.
In the U.S. today 1 out of 100 persons in behind bars. If crimes related to drugs can be managed successfully without incarceration that will reduce the number of people in jail and the societal costs of keeping them there.
And, very importantly, if drug addiction can be managed without incarceration for the use of drugs, the angst, and shame that individuals and families experience will be considerable less.
The Swiss have a successful drug addiction program. They have solved many of their drug troubles by creating a successful policy of enforcement, treatment, harm reduction and prevention.
The Swiss have a heroin maintenance program that supplies addicts with cheap pharmaceutical-grade heroin, methadone and other things they need. They have seen a great reduction in addict-caused crime in Switzerland.
Demand for outlaw drug dealers in Switzerland has declined because there is no reason to buy boot leg drugs when a source of cheap, guaranteed, pure, legal drugs is available.
The Swiss have virtually eliminated overdose deaths for those in the program. Injection-transmitted diseases (HIV/AIDS, hepatitis C) have been greatly reduced.
The Swiss drug policy has resulted in a great decrease in heroin’s addiction’s damage to society. In 2008, the Swiss endorsed the national drug policy with a 68%+ vote of support in a national referendum.
Consider what might happen if alcohol was illegal today. Might gangs fight for turf control? Imagine Anheuser-Busch and Miller Brewing gangs killing each other for control of the beer market!
When we had Prohibition there was a surge of violence and organized crime. If pot and heroin are legalized, there’s no need for drug cartels in Mexico to fight each other resulting in thousands of dead Mexican citizens. Why not put the drug cartels out of business with the legalization of heroin and pot.
But before we legalize drugs let’s put a treatment program in place which can replicate the success Switzerland has achieved.
Switzerland is not America. Switzerland is much more homogeneous. One program which fits all in Switzerland might not work in America. For sure, the U.S. does need a drug policy that works better.
For more discussion, see The U.S. Needs a Drug Policy that Works Much Better, Letters to the Editor, The Wall Street Journal, Friday, July 8, 2011
Obama's Justice Dept. buys guns for Mexican criminals which kill Americans $50 MILLION U.S. taxpayer Stimulus money — the “stimulus” which created no shovel ready jobs for Americans — went to Eric Holder’s Justice Department’s Fast and Furious program.
The Fast and Furious program bought guns which were allowed to cross over the border destined for drug cartel criminals in Mexico. These guns, paid for by U.S. taxpayer money, killed Americans and Mexican citizens.
Why might Obama’s administration want guns to end up in Mexican hands and which resulted in the death of a border patrol person plus other Americans?
If American made guns do great harm, will Americans then desire more gun control?
Was this program, traceable directly to Eric Holder’s Justice Department and Obama’s Stimulus money, designed to undermine the willingness and constitutional right of Americans to hold guns? One wonders …..
If the above proves true, then it is time to ask for Eric Holder’s resignation …. And time for Americans to say NO MORE to Obama in 2012.
The World Bank’s Biocarbon Fund had arranged to pay European “entrepreneurs” $1 million to establish a system under which 60,000 Kenyans would restrict themselves to farming under rigidly controlled, inefficient, “sustainable” techniques.
For that the Kenyans will receive $1.4 million over 20 years.
That’s right, the beneficent World Bank will enrich more Europeans so 60,000 Kenyans can receive $23.83 a piece for 20 years of drudgery, poverty and misery – a princely $1.19 a year.
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Return to the stone age (for at least some of us). “Tote that barge…”
Beginning Friday, a new state law will require large out-of-state retailers to collect sales taxes on purchases that their California customers make on the Internet.
The new tax collection requirement — part of budget-related legislation — is expected to raise an estimated $317 million a year in new state and local government revenue.
But those taxes may come with a price.
That’s because the new requirement applies only to online sellers based out of state that have some connection to California, such as workers, warehouses or offices here.
Both Amazon in Seattle and Overstock in Salt Lake City have said that their affiliates will have to move to another state if they wanted to continue earning commissions for referring customers.
Many of about 25,000 affiliate businesses in California, especially larger ones with dozens of employees, are likely to leave the state. The affiliates combined paid $152 million in state income taxes last year.
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Who bets that the estimated 317M is going to be half of that? And, 10,000 jobs lost?
Going too far: TSA requires older woman to remove diaper during search Jean Weber filed a complaint with the Department of Homeland Security after her 95-year-old mother was detained and extensively searched last Saturday while trying to board a plane to fly to Michigan to be with family members during the final stages of her battle with leukemia.
Her mother, who was in a wheelchair, was asked to remove an adult diaper in order to complete a pat-down search.
“TSA cannot exempt any group from screening because we know from intelligence that there are terrorists out there that would then exploit that vulnerability,â€said Sari Koshetz a spokeswoman for the Transportation Security Administration in Miami,who also said she could not comment on specific cases to protect the privacy of those involved.
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As said before, no public employee was ever disciplined for following orders.
Just whose privacy is this monsterette protecting?
At what point do we say that we’d rather take our chances with hijackers and such rather than put up with muggings on the ground?
Much lower standard adopted for proving sexaul harassment — instead of beyond a reasonable doubt it is preponderance of evidence. Big change.
Sexual harassment gone wild...!
The Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights has sent a letter which includes a requirement that universities adopt a “preponderance of the evidence” standard of proof for deciding sexual harassment and sexual assault.
That’s far short of the requirement in criminal law that charges must be proved beyond a reasonable doubt. And these disciplinary proceedings sometimes face charges that could also be criminal, as in cases of alleged rape.
Campus definitions of sexual harassment include “humor and jokes about sex in general that make someone feel uncomfortable” (University of California, Berkeley), “unwelcome sexual flirtations and inappropriate putdowns of individual persons or classes of people” (Iowa State University) or “elevator eyes” (Murray State University in Kentucky).
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Elevator eyes: Guilty or not Guilty? Your’e going down for this hombre!!
