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Russia is just trying to show it's "relevance" in the world.
-faz
Denver. I lived in the "burgh" from '93 to '97.
Entire Quick Start Guide:
http://www.warroom.com/quick_start.php
Quick Start Guide to the Quinn and Rose Show
QUINNs FIRST LAW: Liberalism always generates the exact opposite of its stated intent.
1. We believe the solution to the human condition is Liberty. Three hundred years of the most successful country the globe has ever seen is proof enough. No government program created this country, free people created this country.
2. The unspoken Bush doctrine is this, The decades of the dictators are over. We had a parade of them for a hundred years. They have killed one hundred million of us. We have learned our lesson. UPDATE SINCE NOVEMBER: MAYBE WE HAVENT.
3. America is not an Imperialist nation despite what your professors tell you. We are not shoving our way of life down anyones throats, we are shoving freedom down the throats of tyrants so other people can chose their own way of life. That is the answer to the question "What is the role of the worlds only superpower?".
4. Marxism is the greatest threat to human freedom and growth. It has never worked anywhere. It has been tried, but it is still taught in every college. Its time to drain the swamp of these 1960s reprobates and charge them with selling a defective product. UPDATE: RADICAL ISLAM NOW JOINS MARXISM, AND LIBERALS ARE DOING EVERYTHING THEY CAN TO ENABLE IT. NOW THE MSA IS ON EVERY COLLEGE CAMPUS AND LIBERALS ARE FALLING ALL OVER THEMSELVES TO KOWTOW TO IT.
5. America is not the world largest polluter because a) carbon dioxide is not a pollutant it is plant food. b) In terms of wealth versus tons of pollution we are the cleanest country on earth because we are free and have the disposable income to clean up after our selves; something the vaunted Soviet block never had.
6. The environmental movement uses the environment and animal species as an excuse for putting the means of production (the land) off limits to the American citizen. Putting the means of production off limits to the citizen is the definition of communism. UPDATE: PUTTING GAS AND OIL OFF LIMIITS TO THE CITIZEN IS THE DEFINITION OF INSANITY.
7. We have a highly progressive income tax. The tax code rewards bad choices and punishes good ones. Russia has moved to a 13% flat tax. So we have Karl Marxs tax system and Russia has Steve Forbes. If you dont see a problem here, you are probably a registered democrat.
8. Abortion is the Sacrament of the Feminist Church. It is the ultimate celebration of the separation of a woman from her nature. Feminists like this will go to any lengths to protect this so-called right. There is no abortion argument that is not rooted in feminist rage, personal inconvenience, or self loathing.
9. The fundamental difference between Liberals and Conservatives is - Liberals see every new life as a potential problem and a burden. Conservatives see every new life as a potential source of creativity and wealth. Allow me to elaborate a little bit on that. When your view of your responsibility to your fellow citizen is to take care of them through government planning and government force, every new person born becomes another mouth to feed another person to educate another burden on the states resources. If you are a liberal you believe that resources are limited and there is only so much to go around. You see yourself or government policy as the arbiters of who gets what. A conservative understands that new wealth is created every time human creativity acts on a resource and is unlimited. To a conservative, life is a blessing. To a liberal life is a curse. (Does this clarify their love of abortion and euthanasia?)
10. There is no conclusive evidence that humans have caused global warming. It is the hoax of the century, and it makes a lot of people a lot of grant money. It also makes a convenient excuse for putting a global governor on capitalism to make the world fair for dictators and socialist welfare states. So, why not teach it to our kids and lets pretend that its true? UPDATE: EVEN THE UN IS NOW HAVING DOUBTS AND SCIENTISTS ARE WARNING THAT WE MAY BE RETURNING TO THE MINI ICE AGE OF THE 16 AND 1700s.
11. No-one had ever died trying to paddle a rubber boat from Miami to Cuba.
12. Racial profiling is what groups pejoratively call common sense when they have a problem that they dont want to talk about. When you notice that several Middle Eastern men boarding an airplane are acting strangely, you yank them out of line and your airline gets sued for 1.2 million dollars. You were engaging in common sense, but they say you were engaging in racial profiling. And so racial profiling is what groups call common sense when they have a problem they dont want to talk about. And when they say they do want to discuss it with you they really dont they just want to shut you up.
13. To a Conservative adversity is indistinguishable from opportunity.
14. The United Nations is an expensive farce that allows tyrants to park illegally and pretend that they are legitimate World Statesmen - they are not They are thugs in $4000.00 suits.
15. Wahhabist Islam is a global mental illness. It is a sickness, it is a cancer and it is evil.
16. There is such a thing as Evil, and you cannot negotiate with it.
17. Common sense and government are mutually exclusive. Government is what you do when you've decided that you cant trust the citizen to use their common sense. So, when you as an elitist and one of our betters notices that not all of us out here are perfect, and not all of us make the right judgments about everything, you then impose your bureaucratic rules upon us and we cant use our common sense any more. Dont ever let a politician tell you that he is going to bring common sense to government. The only way to bring common sense to government is to get rid of government and allow people to use their common sense instead.
18. Reganomics is the only economics that works. Lowering tax rates increases wealth to everyone, including the government because there is no limit to wealth. New wealth is created where wealth did not exist before when a human acts on a resource and humans can only do that when they are free. (see: North Korea and Palestine) Taxes are restrictions on freedom.
19. The Second Amendment [to the US constitution] is the essential counterbalance to the fearsome power of lawmaking, and it means exactly what it says. ["A well-regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed."] If you are a lawmaker and this amendment makes you nervous; good! As long as you stay nervous you have nothing to fear.
20. In our Republic, God is a necessary legal concept. This is not a Democracy, it is a Representative Constitutional Republic and there is a big difference. In case you are wondering why so many of the Socialists out there want God out of everything in our public life there is a real utilitarian reason for this. It is not just that the idea of God makes them uncomfortable personally. God is a major speed bump on their super highway to their super state. Why? Because our founding documents set forth that our rights as humans pre-date the government of men, those rights cannot be abridged (at least easily). They come from God and are inalienable. Drive God out of the mix and rights will flow from government. Once that happens government will alter and abridge those rights because they can. Whether God exists or not he is necessary for the maintenance of freedom.
21. There is no such thing as the separation of church and state. That is a trick to intimidate people of faith. The founders feared a Church of the United States, not a manger scene outside the courthouse or red and green cookies in school. In using this canard as a tool to drive all God centered religion out of public life, the secular humanist actually establishes an official state religion. That religion is Atheism.
22. Rules of war: War is the only effective means for defeating evil.
23. In war there is no such thing as excessive force.
24. Using only the amount of force necessary to win, insures that you will lose.
25. The U.N. does not prevent war. It prevents war from working by stopping it before there is a definitive result. (see: Korea, Israel, Lebanon and Hezbollah) In doing so it invalidates the sacrifices of blood and treasure.
26. You cannot legalize gay marriage because there is no such thing. Its like legalizing the square wheel. There is no such thing as that either. Marriage as a concept was created so as to give a name to an arrangement between a man and woman that has the potential to create the lives of the next generation of citizens. If sex between a man and a woman didnt create the next generation of citizens there would be no need for a word to describe their relationship since civilization would have no interest in it. We would just hook up with each other and when we got bored move on. Gay activists understand this and it explains the headlong plunge into gay adoption as an attempt to legitimize the oxymoron, Gay Marriage.
27. THERE IS NOTHING YOU CAN DO ABOUT THIS SHOW.
Awesome...a fellow Quinn listener!! Where you from?
-faz
longhorn,
Don't get me wrong, there I wish that everyone would choose to serve in the military. There is so much that it could do for young people and would give all young people an appreciation for honor, country, hard work, and sacrifice.
However, I don't think that this is something that should be forced on anyone. The Israeli situation is very different from our own, but I understand your perspective on service. I just don't think people should be forced to do it.
-faz
Ethanol Demand in U.S. Adds to Food, Fertilizer Costs (Update3)
By Alan Bjerga
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=aBbT_F7fsibM&refer=home#
Feb. 21 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. plans to replace 15 percent of gasoline consumption with crop-based fuels including ethanol are already leading to some unintended consequences as food prices and fertilizer costs increase.
About 33 percent of U.S. corn will be used for fuel during the next decade, up from 11 percent in 2002, the Agriculture Department estimates. Corn rose 20 percent to a record on the Chicago Board of Trade since Dec. 19, the day President George W. Bush signed a law requiring a fivefold jump in renewable fuels by 2022.
Increased demand for the grain helped boost food prices by 4.9 percent last year, the most since 1990, and will reduce global inventories of corn to the lowest in 24 years, government data show. While advocates say ethanol is cleaner than gasoline, a Princeton University study this month said it causes more environmental harm than fossil fuels.
``We are mandating and subsidizing something that is distorting the marketplace,'' said Cal Dooley, a former U.S. congressman from California, who represents companies including Kraft Foods Inc. and General Mills Inc. as president of the Grocery Manufacturers Association in Washington. ``There are no excess commodities, and prices are rising.''
The energy bill requires the U.S. to use 36 billion gallons of renewable fuels by 2022, of which about 15 billion gallons may come from corn-based ethanol. The nation's current production capacity is about 8.06 billion gallons.
Alternative Energy
Oil prices tripled since the end of 2003, causing the government to consider alternative fuels. Now, the competition for corn is leading to higher costs for food companies, raising prices for everything from cattle to dairy products.
Corn doubled in the past two years, touching a record $5.29 a bushel today in Chicago. The price of young cattle sold to feedlots gained 8.7 percent in the past year, reaching a record $1.1965 a pound on Sept. 6 on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. Average whole milk rose 26 percent to $3.871 a gallon in January from a year earlier, the Department of Labor said yesterday.
``For thousands of years, humans grew food and ate it,'' said Andrew Redleaf, 50, chief executive officer of Whitebox Advisors LLC, a Minneapolis hedge fund that manages $3 billion. ``Now we are burning crops to make fuel.''
Whitebox bought three U.S. grain depots in the past year to profit from the growth in demand.
Updated Forecast
Farmers will have to increase planting of corn for ethanol by 43 percent to 30 million acres by 2015 to meet the government's requirements, said Bill Nelson, a vice president at A.G. Edwards Inc. in St. Louis. This year, growers outside the Midwest are focused on more profitable crops such as soybeans and wheat, the USDA said today in a crop forecast.
Corn planting will fall 3.8 percent this year to 90 million acres as farmers sow 12 percent more land with soybeans and 6 percent more with wheat, Joe Glauber, USDA acting chief economist, said today at the department's annual conference in Arlington, Virginia. The USDA said Feb. 8 that world corn reserves would drop for the seventh year in the past eight.
Increased planting has caused some fertilizer costs to double. Diammonium phosphate, a nutrient used on corn fields, reached $792.50 a ton on Feb. 15 from $297 a year earlier, USDA data show.
Greenhouse Gases
Researchers led by Timothy Searchinger at Princeton University said their study showed greenhouse-gas emissions will rise with ethanol demand. U.S. farmers will use more land for fuel, forcing poorer countries to cut down rainforests and use other undeveloped land for farms, the study said.
Searchinger's team determined that corn-based ethanol almost doubles greenhouse-gas output over 30 years when considering land-use changes. Bob Dinneen, president of the Renewable Fuels Association in Washington, said the study used a flawed model and overestimated how much land will be needed.
Ethanol is important in reducing emissions, ending energy dependence on the Middle East and creating jobs in rural areas, Dinneen said today at the USDA conference.
``There are still some who want us to choose between food and fuel,'' said Dinneen, whose organization represents ethanol producers including Archer Daniels Midland Co. ``I don't think we have to choose.'' Research shows cellulosic ethanol made from grasses and crop waste may contribute 21 billion gallons by 2022, and farmers will be able to boost yields, he said.
Food Costs Rise
U.S. food costs, which account for about a fifth of the consumer-price index, rose 0.7 percent in January, the Labor Department said Feb. 20. They will increase as much as 4 percent this year, Glauber said in remarks at the forum.
``Food prices through 2010 will rise greater than the overall inflation rate,'' because of rising energy and commodity costs, he said.
Ethanol's contribution to inflation is limited, USDA economist Ephraim Leibtag said in an interview. A 50 percent jump in corn prices in 2007 from the 20-year average only added 1.6 cents to the cost of an 18-ounce box of Kellogg Co. Corn Flakes cereal, Leibtag said. The cost is less than 2 percent per box, JPMorgan Chase & Co. estimates.
Ethanol's boom helps restrain government spending on farm subsidies, said House Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson, a Minnesota Democrat. The USDA expects taxpayers to spend $941 million on the two main subsidy programs tied to price this year, down from $9.1 billion in 2006.
Smithfield, Tyson
For food companies, demand for ethanol translates into lower profits and job cuts.
Smithfield Foods Inc., the largest U.S. hog producer, said Feb. 19 it will cut output by as much as 1 million animals a year, or 5 percent, because feed costs are too high. The company is based in Smithfield, Virginia.
Tyson Foods Inc., the largest U.S. meat company, forecast an increase in grain costs this year of more than $500 million. Springdale, Arkansas-based Tyson also reported a 40 percent drop in first-quarter profit and said it will close a beef plant in Kansas, firing 1,800 workers.
Ethanol ``has caused a domino effect,'' CEO Richard L. Bond said in a statement Jan. 28. ``For the foreseeable future, consumers will pay more and more for food.''
Very true.
This is a common statement from Obama and the left:
"Barack Obama says the U.S. "should do bio diesel," said Pickens, "but that won't solve any problems."
George Monbiot
Tuesday December 6, 2005
The Guardian
By promoting biodiesel as a substitute, we have missed the fact that it is worse than the fossil-fuel burning it replaces
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2005/dec/06/transportintheuk.comment
Over the past two years I have made an uncomfortable discovery. Like most environmentalists, I have been as blind to the constraints affecting our energy supply as my opponents have been to climate change. I now realise that I have entertained a belief in magic.
In 2003, the biologist Jeffrey Dukes calculated that the fossil fuels we burn in one year were made from organic matter "containing 44 x 1018 grams of carbon, which is more than 400 times the net primary productivity of the planet’s current biota". In plain English, this means that every year we use four centuries’ worth of plants and animals.
The idea that we can simply replace this fossil legacy - and the extraordinary power densities it gives us - with ambient energy is the stuff of science fiction. There is simply no substitute for cutting back. But substitutes are being sought everywhere. They are being promoted today at the climate talks in Montreal, by states - such as ours - that seek to avoid the hard decisions climate change demands. And at least one substitute is worse than the fossil-fuel burning it replaces.
The last time I drew attention to the hazards of making diesel fuel from vegetable oils, I received as much abuse as I have ever been sent for my stance on the Iraq war. The biodiesel missionaries, I discovered, are as vociferous in their denial as the executives of Exxon. I am now prepared to admit that my previous column was wrong. But they’re not going to like it. I was wrong because I underestimated the fuel’s destructive impact.
Yeah, but why force people? Why not let them do it voluntarily?
That is the whole point. It is not a free society that forces people to volunteer. A free society allows for those who want to volunteer to do so.
-faz
Imagine that...
I particularly like this part of the definition of "volunteer"
Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of Law - Cite This Source - Share This
Main Entry: vol·un·teer
Pronunciation: "vä-l&n-'tir
Function: noun
1 : one that voluntarily undertakes something; especially : one who without request, obligation, or an interest pays the debt of another and is denied reimbursement from subrogation
2 : one who receives property without giving valuable consideration
Can't see anything about forcing in that definition.
-faz
Pickens: U.S. Faces Disaster over Oil Wealth Exodus
http://moneynews.newsmax.com/money/archives/articles/2008/2/21/105505.cfm
One of America's most influential businessmen, legendary oilman T. Boone Pickens, says the nation's wealth is being plundered by oil exporters and the U.S. faces a potential financial disaster if our energy policy is not reformed.
Pickens, who correctly predicted that oil would top $100 a barrel, also says he expects oil prices to drop sharply in the near term.
Appearing on CNBC's "Squawk Box" Thursday morning, Pickens pointed out that the U.S. is currently sending half a trillion dollars out of the country each year to buy oil, in some cases from people who "are our enemies."
Said Pickens, "You take 10 years and you've got $5 trillion ... That's more than $1 billion a day.
"We can't stand that. Wealth is moving out of the country...
"Not one presidential candidate has addressed this … The candidates have to get up to speed on what energy cost is doing to our country." Pickens even turned on his own industry, oil, and called for an increase in alternative energy sources.
"If we do not get on the alternative energy bandwagon and if we don't have a global recession, we could be sitting on $150 oil in two years," he told CNBC.
Pickens touched on a number of other points:
# Although he was originally against ethanol, Pickens now favors an increase in ethanol production, saying, "I'd rather have ethanol, and recirculate the money in the country, than to have it go out the back door on us."
# "I think oil is going to back off," he said. "The weakest quarter is the second quarter. We'll drop $10 or $15 a barrel in the second quarter. I think we'll be back above $100 in the second half of the year."
# Natural gas prices are too high and they can be expected to drop, according to Pickens, who is shorting both oil and gas.
# Natural gas will become a "serious transportation fuel," Pickens predicted, adding: "We've got to get coal cleaned up and we've got to get natural gas into the transportation mix."
# The U.S. should increase its use of solar and wind to meet the expected rise in electricity demand, locating those alternative energy sources in the Great Plains and "middle of the country," Pickens urged.
# Barack Obama says the U.S. "should do bio diesel," said Pickens, "but that won't solve any problems."
# He also said about Obama: "He talks about change. I haven't seen yet what he's going to change."
# A windfall profit tax on U.S. oil companies would be "ridiculous," Pickens charged, saying: "You've got to keep the money in the industry."
# Pickens originally backed Rudy Giuliani for president. Asked what happened to his campaign, Pickens said: "My guy rode up in front of the grandstand and fell off his horse. I've never seen anything come and go as fast as Rudy's campaign.
Pickens told CNBC he now backs John McCain for president. Asked if the Republicans can win the White House this year, he said simply: "Sure."
-faz
Ivy League Populism
By Victor Davis Hanson
Thursday, February 21, 2008
http://www.townhall.com/columnists/VictorDavisHanson/2008/02/21/ivy_league_populism
The rhetoric of Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton about the sad state of America is reminiscent of the suspect populism of John Edwards, the millionaire lawyer who recently dropped out of the Democratic presidential race.
Barack Obama may have gone to exclusive private schools. He and his wife may both be lawyers who between them have earned four expensive Ivy League degrees. They may make about a million dollars a year, live in an expensive home and send their kids to prep school. But they are still apparently first-hand witnesses to how the American dream has gone sour. Two other Ivy League lawyers, Hillary and Bill, are multimillionaires who have found America to be a land of riches beyond most people’s imaginations. But Hillary also talks of the tragic lost dream of America.
In these gloom-and-doom narratives by the well off, we less fortunate Americans are doing almost everything right, but still are not living as well as we deserve to be. And the common culprit is a government that is not doing enough good for us, and corporations that do too much bad to us.
In the new pessimistic indictment, the home mortgage meltdown has not occurred because too many speculative buyers were hoping to flip houses for quick profits. It had nothing to do with misguided attempts of government and lending institutions to put first-time buyers in homes through zero-down payments, interest-only loans, and subprime but adjustable mortgage rates — as part of liberal efforts to increase home ownership rates.
And there apparently are few Americans who unwisely borrowed against their homes a second and third time to remodel or purchase big-ticket consumer items — on the belief that their equity would always be rising faster than their debts. Nor are we to look at this downturn as part of a historical boom-and-bust cycle in the housing industry — the present low prices and non-performing loans the natural counter-response to the overpriced real estate of the last five years.
Likewise, students are failing to graduate from college because there are too few government-guaranteed student loans. We don’t hear that thousands enter public universities without basic reading and mathematical skills — or that their college problems might in part be the fault of their own misplaced priorities in high school, and in part the fault of an educational system that is mostly therapeutic, offering fluffy courses and self-esteem training rather than rigorous math, science, literature and history classes. Nor is there ever mention of teachers’ unions, the system of tenure, or a vapid, politically correct curriculum, as explanations why our students are not competitive in the global marketplace.
We also hear that oil prices are sky high and our own automobile industry is failing due to windfall profits and corporate greed, but there’s no discussion of the fact that oil-rich autocracies like Russia, Venezuela and the Gulf monarchies have obtained a stranglehold on the global petroleum supply.
For Hillary and Barack, our automobile manufacturing crisis is not the result of uniquely lavish union health and retirement packages for American autoworkers. The government is somehow mostly to blame for Detroit’s meltdown and the energy crisis, not Americans’ own tastes in the 1990s for large gas-guzzlers and big homes, and their concurrent opposition to nuclear power plants, oil drilling off the coasts and in Alaska, and conservation of resources.
Wal-Mart, free trade and our debt to China also come in for blame. Neither Obama nor Clinton suggests that the middle classes of America have more purchasing power and have accumulated more consumer goods than any people in history. In reality, our acquisitiveness is a result not of corporate greed, but of our fondness for shopping at discounted warehouse mega-stores, whose goods are the result of hard work of hundreds of millions of low-paid Chinese. They not only toil long hours to make our cheap televisions and stereos, but their government lends us the money at low interest — through massive buying of U.S. government bonds — to buy their stuff in the first place.
To the extent that we have any social and legal problems from unchecked illegal immigration, it has nothing to do with the cynicism and corruption of the Mexican government that deliberately exports, exploits and profits off its own people. The problem is not the fondness for low-paid, off-the-books illegal labor among the upper-middle classes, nor the disdain for the law of illegal immigrants themselves, who crowd to the front of the immigration line. Instead, America’s xenophobia, blame-casting and insensitive government have made it needlessly rough on 11 million arrivals who otherwise did us a favor by coming.
As Sens. Obama and Clinton try to outdo each other in blaming government for our lack of individual responsibility and promising solutions by raising taxes to give us more government, they offer little change and less hope.
AHHHH GLOBAL WARMING!!!
http://www.accuweather.com/news-top-headline.asp?partner=accuweather&traveler=0
Global warming — right on schedule
By PETER FRIEDMAN
Conservative Corner
February 21, 2008 6:00 AM
http://junkscience.com/blog_js/2008/02/21/global-warming-right-on-schedule/
Although there are many uncertainties in climate science, we do know with reasonable assuredness that the earth is currently experiencing a modest warming trend. We also know that CO2, which is a small contributor to the "greenhouse effect," is increasing in concentration in the atmosphere.
The short-term confluence of these trends has led many to disregard the more convincing longer-term data and jump to a conclusion that there is a cause-and-effect relationship. But while the media have decided that the science is settled, many in the scientific community are skeptical — and with good reason.
Much of the current panic began when Dr. Michael Mann and his coauthors published their now-discredited "hockey stick" temperature plot — so named for its shape that showed a long trend of steady temperature over a thousand-year period and a sudden rise since the early 1900s. Dr. Mann’s hockey stick became the foundation for policy leaders advocating mandatory emissions caps.
Fortunately for mankind (but unfortunately for the professional reputation of Dr. Mann), the hockey stick was convincingly shown to be an artifact of his flawed statistical methodology, which exaggerated recent data and smoothed older data. Stephen McIntyre even demonstrated that Dr. Mann’s erroneous methodology generated hockey stick plots even when random data were inserted.
In contrast with Dr. Mann’s conclusion, the current modest temperature trend is consistent in both magnitude and timing with the natural temperature cycles that the earth has been experiencing for millions of years, and it is nothing to fear.
The earth’s climate cycles result from a number of long- and short-term driving forces. Long-term cycles, which include a 100,000-year orbital eccentricity cycle, a 41,000-year axis tilt angle cycle and a 23,000-year orbital "wobble" cycle, are responsible for major ice ages and interglacial periods.
Superposed on top of the long-term climate fluctuations are smaller and shorter climate cycles that have a period of roughly 1,500 years, theorized to result from solar variation.
Convincing evidence for these short-term cycles has been found all over the world. Originally, these 1,500-year cycles were discovered by studying radioactive isotopes in ice cores taken from Greenland, which provided a 250,000-year geologic record. Similar results have been uncovered on the opposite side of the world in Antarctic ice cores.
Hundreds of peer-reviewed articles in the world’s leading scientific journals have documented additional evidence using a variety of proxies from all over the world. These include coral samples, cave stalagmites, tree rings, ocean glacial deposition, pollen deposition, bore holes and fossils, as summarized by renowned scientist and skeptic of the current CO2 hysteria, Dr. S. Fred Singer, in his recent New York Times best seller, "Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1,500 Years."
Historical records from a broad geographic sampling corroborate the physical evidence. For example, records showed that the agricultural range of temperature-sensitive plants expanded and contracted in a manner consistent with the temperature cycle.
Just another viewpoint.
-faz
From HotAir.com:
Bride of Messiah: Every woman I know is struggling to keep her head above water
posted at 6:10 pm on February 21, 2008 by Allahpundit
http://hotair.com/archives/2008/02/21/bride-of-messiah-every-woman-i-know-is-struggling-to-keep-her-head-above-water/
Really? I know several who are doing pretty well. Who’d have guessed that the circles I move in are more comfortable than a would-be First Lady’s?
I have to say that my life now is not really that much different from many of yours. I wake up every morning wondering how on earth I am going to pull off that next minor miracle to get through the day. I know that everybody in this room is going through this. That is the dilemma women face today. Every woman that I know, regardless of race, education, income, background, political affiliation, is struggling to keep her head above water.
We need to stop scrutinizing her speeches so closely. It’s obvious by now that she doesn’t particularly care what she says so long as the basic message is conveyed. It’s the same watery leftist pap peddled by the Godhead himself; he simply pays closer attention to the actual verbiage than she does. Here’s every Michelle Obama speech from now until November in three sentences: Everything in America is wrong. Only Barack can fix it. Vote and be healed. The rest of it, all the absurd “dystopian populist” excesses beyond that, as Geraghty puts it: Just words.
Exit question: How does Oprah manage on a billion dollars a year?
-faz
Incredibly interesting how the same paper that endorsed McCain is now running a hit piece on him. Great opening from Rush today.
See below:
The Story Is the Drive-By Media Turning on Its Favorite Maverick
February 21, 2008
http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_022108/content/01125106.guest.html
BEGIN TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Would you give me a break? You're surprised that Page Six-type gossip is on the front page of the New York Times? Where have you been? How in the world can anybody be surprised at the New York Times? I cannot believe how everybody's missing this! I even have guys from The Politico, Jonathan Martin saying, "You got a reaction?" I sent him a couple paragraphs, and it's being misinterpreted a bit. I guess I wasn't clear enough. Anyway, greetings, folks. Here we are with another three hours of broadcast excellence at the Limbaugh Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies. It's great to have you with us. The telephone number is 800-282-2882. The e-mail address is ElRushbo@eibnet.com.
What have I always said that today is proven beyond a shadow of a doubt? It is this: If you let the media make you, you are subjecting yourself to the media being able to destroy you. Senator McCain -- the important thing about what has happened here in the New York Times, the only important thing to me -- I don't care what's in this story. The story is not the story. The story is that this paper endorsed McCain, sat on this story and now puts it out just prior to McCain wrapping up the nomination. And McCain says he's disappointed. Why? Why is anybody disappointed or surprised but this? They are who they are. A snake is a snake. A tiger is a tiger. The New York Times is the New York Times. Folks, if you expect me to be angry about the story and angry at the New York Times, you have tuned to the wrong radio show. I refuse to get mad when something I have predicted is going to happen, happens. I refuse to get mad when something I know is true, is true. It's a total waste of energy.
The important question for John McCain today is, is he going to learn the right lesson from this, and what is the lesson? The lesson is liberals are to be defeated. You cannot walk across the aisle with them. You cannot reach across the aisle. You cannot welcome their media members on your bus and get all cozy with them and expect eternal love from them. You are a Republican. Whether you're a conservative Republican or not, you are a Republican. At some point, the people you cozy up to, either to do legislation or to get cozy media stories, are going to turn on you. They are snakes. If the right lesson is not learned from this, then it will have proved to be of no value. There's a great opportunity here for Senator McCain to learn the right lesson and understand who his friends are and who his enemies are. He's had that backwards for way too long. He has thought the New York Times is his friend. He has thought Chris Matthews and these other people in the Drive-By Media are his friends. They aren't. That's the lesson today.
Senator McCain says that he's disappointed here in the New York Times. Of course, I'm sure he's disappointed. The question is, is he surprised? If he's not surprised, that's a positive. If he's surprised by this, then we've got a problem, Houston, because he doesn't understand who he's dealing with. You know, Senator McCain has disappointed me a lot of times, accusing our intelligence officers of engaging in torture, calling people who opposed his amnesty bill nativists, supporting others who called us racists and so forth, people who opposed campaign finance reform as people unwilling to clean up corruption and so forth. You look at this, and you see it for exactly what it is. Now, here's an interesting aspect here. You talk about the details of the story and how thinly sourced and all that. Yeah, right, yada yada. It's the Drive-By Media, for crying out loud. It's the New York Times reporting about a Republican. You know damn well a story like this wouldn't run about Hillary or Obama, even Bill Clinton, a story like this wouldn't run. If it did, it would be fawning. "Oh, there's old randy Bill out there, still showing us he got some lead in the pencil here after the heart surgery. Oh, yeah!"
I don't understand why it's so hard for the people on the Republican Party side to understand who the enemy is and who they're dealing with. This is another clear-cut illustration. But even now they're tiptoeing around, don't want to make 'em too mad because Senator McCain denied everything. He had a press conference today, denied everything. Better be right. You gotta ask yourself this about the New York Times. Did they put this story out as a singular story, or as their follow-up? You gotta figure they knew what was going to happen. You have to figure that they were aware of the firestorm that this would create. Do they have any more? Is there any more to the story? Are other people going to now start working it? Will they find anything? Will Senator McCain's denials be brought back into question? Let's listen to Senator McCain this morning. He's in Toledo, Ohio, with his wife, Cindy, at a press conference. We have a couple sound bites.
MCCAIN: I'm very disappointed in the article. It's not true. As has been pointed out, I've served this nation honorably for more than a half a century. When I was 17, I raised my hand and supported -- said I would support and defend this nation, and I've had the honor of serving it ever since. At no time have I ever done anything that would betray the public trust nor make a decision which in any way would not be in the public interest and would favor anyone or any organization.
RUSH: All right, so Senator McCain there says he's very, very disappointed in the New York Times. Let's not forget that during immigration battles, illegal immigration battles, this whole Abu Ghraib situation, and the ability to make our intelligence officers at Guantanamo Bay out to be torturers and so forth, and the call to close down Guantanamo Bay, where did all that stuff come from? The New York Times. Day in and day out. You know how many front-page stories there were on Abu Ghraib? And guess who was right there agreeing with everything they said? The New York Times' favorite Republican, John McCain. I'm sure he's disappointed. The question, is he going to learn the right lesson from this? That's a great opportunity. If he can learn the right lesson from this and understand who his friends really are, then there may be a positive out of this. Now, folks, I understand, I've read my e-mail today, and I had conversations with people last night when the story first came out.
In fact, the theory last night, most people's predictions last night was that this was going to finally rally conservatives to McCain. McCain couldn't do it himself, but that the New York Times could and the Drive-By Media. I got some e-mails, "That's it, Rush, I hadn't planned on voting for McCain, but I'm going to send him some money now. I'm not going to sit here and let the New York Times destroy my candidate." Well, you let the New York Times pick your candidate. The media picked the Republican Party candidate this year, folks, whether you want to believe it or not, they did. Republicans didn't, and so you see what happens. I want to go to back archives of this program, January 25th, 2008, this is what I said, this is my prediction.
RUSH ARCHIVE: But you have to know now that when you get down to November, the New York Times has a choice -- let's say it is McCain, say McCain gets the nomination. And, of course, Hillary gets the nomination for the Democrats. And the New York Times going to write an editorial endorsing who? Gotta get out of this mode here that our acceptance, or our arrival, or the fact that we're making progress can be tracked by whether or not Democrats like some of us. Screw that! Because when it comes to the meat-cracking time down there in November on Election Day, they're not going to vote for any of us, or our guys. So who cares what they say about them ever? The more they praise them, the more suspicious you gotta get, because they do not want our side to win. There is not one of them, from Matthews -- I don't care who it is in the Drive-By, not one of them that wants McCain to become president. If it happens, if an accident happens and by hook or by crook, Hillary would lose, McCain would be acceptable. But they wouldn't be afraid of him. But the last thing they want is for him to actually win, any of our people.
RUSH: Yeah. And, of course, we had the New York Times story last night and in the paper this morning that clearly illustrates this. Here's one more bite from Senator McCain.
MCCAIN: I'm proud of my record of service to this country. I'm proud of my service as chairman of the commerce committee, which has oversight of literally hundreds of issues, the largest committee in the United States Senate, in terms of jurisdiction, and I will continue to serve, and I will focus my attention in this campaign on the big issues, on the challenges that face this country, and I think that's what the American people are very interested in hearing about. Again, I'm very disappointed in the New York Times piece. It's not true.
RUSH: In the previous sound bite from Senator McCain that we just played, another section of his press conference this morning in Toledo, Ohio, he again reminded us that he has served the nation honorably for more than a half century. When he was 17 he raised his hand and supported to defend and protect the nation, had the honor of serving the country ever since. What? Military service is supposed to inoculate you from criticism? Ask General Petraeus about that. When are we going to learn our lessons? No, no. When are some in our party going to learn the lessons that you and I have known for years and years and years and years? David Brooks, Bill Kristol write for the New York Times. Their newspaper has attempted today to take out their boy. What are they going to do? Here's Cindy McCain. She spoke also.
MRS. MCCAIN: Well, obviously, I'm very disappointed in the New York Times, and more importantly my children and I not only trust my husband, but know that he would never do anything to not only disappoint our family, but disappoint the people of America. He's a man of great character, and I'm very, very disappointed in the New York Times.
RUSH: Well, it seems to be the slug line, "I'm very disappointed in the New York Times." Why? Where are the honest, understood expectations here? The story is not the story. The story is the Drive-By Media turning on it's favorite maverick trying to take him out. The media picked the Republican candidate. The New York Times endorsed that candidate while they sat on this story, and now with utter predictability, they are trying to destroy him. This is what you get when you walk across the aisle and try to make these people your friends. Why should any of us be surprised or even angry at what the New York Times is doing here trying to take out John McCain? Those of you who listen regularly should have been expecting this all along because it's utterly predictable. It's as predictable as the sun rising in the morning. It's as predictable as Ted Kennedy finding a bar at happy hour.
trkyhntr,
"For some time, I have thought it would be a good idea for every high school graduate to put in one year of service before getting on with his/her life"
Why do you think that?
"It is not demeaning for a high school graduate to work in a landfill sorting materials to be recycled, nor is it demeaning for a high school graduate to put in a year working in food preparation in a hospital."
Who cares if it is demeaning or not. That is not the fundamental issue here. Volunteering is exactly that...VOLUNTEERING. You should not be forced to volunteer if you don't want to.
"What would be wrong with every graduate putting in a year doing one of them?"
Because they are free to choose what they want to do with their life, not be forced to. What value would they get out of forced work?
"As an alternative, high school grads could choose to go into one of the branches of the military."
This might be the only statement that I agree with except that this is already they way it is. High School grads can CHOOSE to go into the service if they want to. That is why our military is a volunteer military.
Why not try to give incentives to encourage volunteering? That would be a more reasonable approach. Forcing people to do something that they may not want to do and in the name of "the common good" or "the national spirit" is Socialism. Plain ans simple.
-faz
Gotta love those classy, civil, third world countries eh?
-faz
Liberals are freaking scary!!!
'Mandatory' volunteerism?Is it time yet?
Posted Thursday, February 21, 2008
Rhonda B. Graham
http://www.delawareonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080221/OPINION12/802210310
Along with an end to the botched Iraq war, and a sustainable economic rescue, the idea that Americans at some point in their lives must do a volunteer stint to improve the country is worth pursuing.
Like Michelle Obama there have been many, many times when Americans of all political persuasions haven't been proud of their country's actions.
But enforced community service at this time in American history could bring immeasurable benefits to the nation's psyche as it grapples with housing foreclosures, doped-up national sports heroes and serious challenges to our international image as world leaders.
In the 80s, Ronald Reagan, our 40th president, coined the phrase volunteerism.
Service projects
Somehow you always got the impression that the Gipper's idea was about a duty to be inspired by patriotism, rather than the one that fuels it.
Before leaving the presidential race Sen. John Edwards promoted community service through his One Corps program. Supporters in each state worked on service projects.
Sen. Barack Obama proposes a "5-E Youth Service Corps" to get disadvantaged young people involved in service projects that focus on energy efficiency and the environment.
But Connecticut Sen. Chris Dodd, whose ideas on public service should get a better reception from voters than his recent bid for the Democratic presidential, gets its.
Dodd's plan for an enforced comprehensive national service focuses on drawing upon "the very best of our character."
This would be the new American patriotism at work -- a more insular approach that inspires that ubiquitous village as Sen. Hillary Clinton once encouraged, but not the bragging rights of missionaries to the third world as the Peace Corps became better know for.
But the Dodd plan includes a particular position that's worth pursuing by the next president because it drills down beyond the college-age graduate to the budding adulthood of all high school graduates.
Every student in America would be required to perform 100 hours of community-based service prior to high school graduation.
It would be a mistake to assume teenagers will appreciate clearing trash from highway shoulders or fishing out debris from public streams as their contribution to their community.
That is work that is suitable for well-guarded prison populations or perhaps more beneficial to society for the hordes of jobless ex-cons being released everyday.
The high school years are as much an impressionable age as a time when young people need to accomplish something that is impressionable.
Learning process
If the goal is inciting patriotism and pride of ownership at the local level, then targeting mandatory volunteerism to the learning process will be critical.
Dodd's proposal calls for integrating school-based voluntarism with academics.
He wants to "give every student in America an opportunity to gain new knowledge and skills while contributing to their communities and their own sense of pride."
States and schools districts will have flexibility to tailor their individual programs and requirements to meet their community's immediate needs.
For instance, pairing up the Delcastle Vo-tech carpentry and general construction students with local Habitat for Humanity projects.
Even though Dodd is out of the race, the leading presidential contenders of both parties would be stupid to not adapt his proposal to their domestic policy for the good of the country and its high school graduates.
bid building at .51
...and we would all be slave laborers...errr....fair and equal laborers.
Socialism is always a great solution when you are the one in power. Then, the rules don't apply to you because, someone needs to look out for the best interests of the people.
Scary stuff out there when you think about it. However, with McCain's thumping of Huckabee the other night, the gloves should come off and he should go after Obama like Rocky went after Apollo Creed!
All McCain needs to do is show the American people that if you vote for the LIBS, you are voting for socialism. Hopefully, if McCain has it in him, it shouldn't be too hard of a sell.
-faz
It all starts to make a little more sense...Obama is a socialist.
AIM Identifies Mysterious Obama Mentor As Communist Party Revolutionary
Press Release | February 19, 2008
http://www.aim.org/press-release/aim-identifies-mysterious-obama-mentor-as-communist-party-revolutionary/
WASHINGTON, February 19, 2008 -- A mysterious friend and adviser to Barack Obama when he was growing up in Hawaii is identified in a new column by Accuracy in Media editor Cliff Kincaid as a member of the old Moscow-controlled Communist Party USA. "Obama's communist connection adds to mounting public concern about a candidate who has come out of virtually nowhere, with a brief U.S. Senate legislative record, to become the Democratic Party frontrunner for the U.S. presidency," Kincaid writes in the column, posted on the AIM web site www.aim.org
Obama's mentor "Frank" is Frank Marshall Davis, who was publicly identified as a member of the Communist Party USA (CPUSA). Obama, in his book, Dreams From My Father, refers to him repeatedly as just "Frank," without a middle or last name.
Kincaid explains, "The reason is apparent: Davis was a known communist who belonged to a party subservient to the Soviet Union. In fact, the 1951 report of the Commission on Subversive Activities to the Legislature of the Territory of Hawaii identified him as a CPUSA member. What's more, anti-communist congressional committees, including the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), accused Davis of involvement in several communist front organizations."
AIM recently disclosed that Obama has connections to the Democratic Socialists of America and that he sponsored a "Global Poverty Act" designed to send hundreds of billions of U.S. foreign aid to the rest of the world, in order to meet U.N. demands. The bill has passed the House and a Senate committee and awaits full Senate action.
Obama's speeches take on a whole new meaning now that we know his mentor was a communist.
-faz
So true. The LIBS today are just a bunch of empty suits.
Gotta love it.
Link: http://hotair.com/archives/2008/02/20/video-obama-supporter-cant-name-anything-obama-has-actually-done/
-faz
Another Obama supporter can’t name anything Obama has actually done
http://hotair.com/archives/2008/02/20/video-obama-supporter-cant-name-anything-obama-has-actually-done/
Great video here. Gotta love it. If Hillary really wanted to live up to her "world's smartest woman" title, she would be asking questions like Matthews did all day and all night.
-faz
Very nice statement from the PR:
"The independent geological consultants will look to evaluate Gulf's historic data as well as look at the potential for additional mineral values, such as uranium, tantalum and Rare Earth Metals which are often associated with carbonatite deposits."
Would be interesting to see if they discover any other resources on the property.
-faz
News:
http://biz.yahoo.com/iw/080220/0364125.html
Sarissa Orders Preliminary Independent Geological Assessment Report on Lake Nemegosenda Property
Wednesday February 20, 9:15 am ET
BAY CITY, MI--(MARKET WIRE)--Feb 20, 2008 -- Sarissa Resources, Inc. (Other OTC:SRSR.PK - News) Sarissa is pleased to announce the Company has engaged the services of Hawk Exploration Consultants, an independent and highly regarded Toronto-based geological consulting firm to conduct a preliminary assessment report on Sarissa's Lake Nemegosenda carbonatite-hosted niobium property in Northern Ontario.
With existing, historical property data indicating approximately 20 million tons of 0.47% Nb2O5 (non-NI 43-101-compliant: Ontario Geological Survey study 34 by R.P Sage, published in 1987), the purpose of the preliminary assessment report is to evaluate the historical exploration work on the property conducted by Gulf Minerals Canada Limited and include an initial review of the original drill logs. The independent consultants will then make recommendations for future exploration assessment work that may be required in order to allow the company to have an NI 43-101 compliant resource estimate prepared.
Sarissa president Scott Keevil commented, "We are extremely excited to begin the process of re-evaluating this historic deposit. The fact is mines are made, not discovered, and Sarissa is in a position any junior exploration company would be envious of. Hypothetically, we could have gone out and spent 10 years and $10 million to find properties, explore them and possibly outline an economic ore body, and still not have what we already have now. The independent geological consultants will look to evaluate Gulf's historic data as well as look at the potential for additional mineral values, such as uranium, tantalum and Rare Earth Metals which are often associated with carbonatite deposits." He continued, "If it is determined Nemegosenda has additional mineralization, it could be incrementally accretive to the niobium values already there. We anticipate this initial assessment being completed in a 4 to 5 week time frame, at which time we will update shareholders on the outcome."
A qualified person, as defined under NI-43-101, has not yet done sufficient work to comment on the relevance or reliability of this historical estimate. The company is not treating the historical estimate as, nor can the historical estimates be relied upon as, current mineral resources or reserves. Dr. Cam Cheriton, a director of Sarissa, is a "qualified person" within the meaning of National Instrument 43-101 and has read and is responsible for the technical information contained in this news release.
3 x .67 right on th ask.
Might just break through that with some volume. This stock is like a powder keg right now. Just waiting to go big!
-faz
Spying T. Boone Pickens: Q4 Holdings Show Big Energy Sector Moves
Tuesday February 19, 10:20 am ET
By the BullMarket.com Staff
The price of oil has pulled back from the century mark recently on slowing economic prospects, but investors still have an eye on the sector, and in recent years, this means watching the moves of T. Boone Pickens, a Texas billionaire and oil and gas industry guru who was adding shares in a number of firms across the oil patch in Q4.
Pickens is regarded as a shrewd businessman whose oil and gas empire has helped make him one of the richest people in the world. Pickens made headlines in 2005 when he took home $1.5 billion managing his energy-focused hedge fund BP Capital Management. BP Capital disclosed its holdings as of the end of Q4 Thursday evening, giving investors a window into some of Pickens' recent moves.
Looking at BP's top equity holdings at the end of Q4, Pickens' focus on oil and gas is evident. His biggest moves during the quarter were to significantly increase positions in oil and gas explorers Denbury Resource (NYSE: DNR - News) and Talisman Energy (NYSE: TLM - News), as well as in engineering and construction company Fluor (NYSE: FLR - News).
He also upped stakes in energy giants Exxon Mobil (NYSE: XOM - News) and Chevron (NYSE: CVX - News). As of the end of Q3, BP controlled stakes of 1.9 million and 968K shares, respectively, in the two companies.
As the Fluor stake indicates, Pickens' holdings aren't narrowly confined to oil and gas producers. During Q4, BP also added incrementally to its stake in ABB (NYSE: ABB - News), a Swiss engineering giant focused on power infrastructure, and held a stake in Titanium Metals (NYSE: TIE - News), the titanium producer whose chairman, Harold Simmons, has been an investor in Pickens' funds (and who is a fellow billionaire.)
BP's other holdings at the end of Q4 also included large stakes in Suncor Energy (NYSE: SU - News), Schlumberger (NYSE: SLB - News), Occidental Petroleum (NYSE: OXY - News), and Jacobs Engineering (NYSE: JEC - News).
Looking at tickerspy.com's graph charting the performance of BP's end-of-Q4 holdings so far in Q1, one can see how the pullback in the energy sector has affected the fund. If you want to see how your performance stacks up to T. Boone Pickens' or just see some of the other stocks he's invested in, visit tickerspy.com to see BP's top equity holdings and a chart of their combined performance.
http://biz.yahoo.com/indie/080219/1098_id.html?.v=1
-faz
Thanks for that, now I am not going to be able to sleep at all tonight with visions of that nightmare in my mind. LOL!
-faz
Definitely a start. Listening to more and more of Hillary and Obama, I am thinking that we really can't afford to have them win the election.
-faz
The council at Berkley speaks out...what a disgrace.
http://hotair.com/archives/2008/02/16/the-siege-at-berkeley-not-over-yet/
This is very embarrassing. Sickening that there are people in power that actually think and believe this way.
-faz
ONEBGG,
I am starting to come around the idea of voting for McCain. I wish he would be confronted about his prior record and have him state publicly that he will promote conservative ideas. Hell, I want him to say McCain-Feingold was bad and that his first order of business is overturn it, that he will build the freaking wall, that he will really crack down on employers for immigration, that he will push a law to require ID at all voting centers, and that he will veto any bill with earmarks.
Have him say that live and swear to it and I will even campaign for him.
-faz
Dude,
You could give the Clintons a run for their money on dodging questions. I say:
"As for AIDS research? Where do you think that money is going? Most likely to pockets of the dictators and corrupt politicians who run most of those countries. Have you seen a report or any evidence on what benefit that money is having?"
...and all you get out of that is..."So you're also against The Decider supporting AIDS research, etc. Interesting."???
Unreal. Have a great one.
-faz
"I take it you are against a nat'l healthcare program? You got yours; why the hell should you help those less fortunate, right?"
Correct. I work damn hard to have mine and if I didn't have mine or my kids didn't...I would go and work even harder to get it. I am against a national health care program. As for having mine and helping the less fortunate. No worries on that mate, I do help the less fortunate. I donate money, I volunteer my time, help you when ever I can. What I don't need is a federal bureaucracy to administer a national health care program when they can't even get anything else right. You see, I look at solving problems by doing something myself rather than trying to look to a corrupt, sub standard bureaucracy to make myself feel better by having them solve problems for me.
Also, nice dodge on the question. Guess you couldn't think of any social program that actually works save maybe welfare reform.
As for AIDS research? Where do you think that money is going? Most likely to pockets of the dictators and corrupt politicians who run most of those countries. Have you seen a report or any evidence on what benefit that money is having?
Have a good one.
-faz
Your reply had absolutely zero evidence on how you can be a fiscal conservative as well as a social liberal.
All you did was ramble on and on about "The Decider" which I assume you mean Bush. As for the size of government growing in the past 7 years, there is no doubt. Has it grown out of control? You bet. Do we need more social programs? Nope. No way. No how.
Can you give me one social program that the Government has implemented that has actually worked and come in on budget? That may take you a while.
As for the Repubs "looking more from a national security perspective", that's a Sean/Rush line and I'm surprised you buy into it...do you REALLY believe the Repubs want us to be safe AND the Dems do not?
This is not an opinion, this is a fact. The only thing I got wrong was that it was the 2004 election. There is no way that you missed that the entire campaign by the republicans, which was about how they would make the country safer and the dems would not, while Kerry's campaign was all about how bad this war was and how to get us out.
Anyway, my point in that last post is the main difference between Liberals and conservatives is that conservatives put trust in the individual to solve their own problems while liberals put their trust in government to solve the problems. By placing more trust in the individual, there is less of a need for government.
I am a social conservative as well as a fiscal conservative. I am all for smaller government getting out of our lives so that we can decide what is best for ourselves. I wish the government would cut the tax rates again but this time cut the hell out of spending. That means put this country in the mind set of actually winning in Iraq so that we can get out of there as soon as possible, doing a complete overhaul on social security, stop earmarks all together, put term limits on congressmen, repeal the 17th amendment, deport all the illegal immigrants that are in jail, open up offshore and ANWAR to drilling, reduce the corporate taxes, and stop funding the U.N.
All of those things would be a step in the right direction to making this country fiscally conservative. We could be back to balancing the budget and paying off the astronomical debt we are incurring. Anyway, I am rambling and am going to go to bed. Have a great rest of the weekend.
-faz
PegnVA,
How can you be fiscally conservative and socially liberal? A social liberal wants to increase the size of government where a "true" fiscal conservative wants to reduce it.
I will give you this. In the 2005 election, the repubs were looking more from a national security perspective than a fiscal conservative perspective. In fact, with todays republicans, they have a plethora of excuses as to why they are not fiscally conservative.
-faz
Larry Kudlow...nope...don't watch CNBC.
Well I did not know the Laughter Curve was faith based. Glad you told me. I think I will stick with the Laffer Curve.
Thanks for pointing that out.
-faz
And the downward spiral of liberalism continues
'£10 licence to smoke' proposed
Last Updated: Friday, 15 February 2008, 17:16 GMT
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/7247470.stm
Smokers could be forced to pay £10 for a permit to buy tobacco if a government health advisory body gets its way.
No one would be able to buy cigarettes without the permit, under the idea proposed by Health England.
Its chairman, Professor Julian Le Grand, told BBC Radio 5 Live the scheme would make a big difference to the number of people giving up smoking.
But smokers' rights group Forest described the idea as "outrageous", given how much tax smokers already pay.
Professor Le Grand, a former adviser to ex-PM Tony Blair, said cash raised by the proposed scheme would go to the NHS.
He said it was the inconvenience of getting a permit - as much as the cost - that would deter people from persisting with the smoking habit.
"You've got to get a form, a complex form - the government's good at complex forms; you have got to get a photograph.
"It's a little bit of a problem to actually do it, so you have got to make a conscious decision every year to opt in to being a smoker."
'Extra bureaucracy'
He added: "70% of smokers actually want to stop smoking.
"So if you just make it that little bit more difficult for them to actually re-start or even to start in the first place, yes I think it will make a big difference."
But Forest said it would be "an extra form of taxation, while tobacco taxation is already at record levels".
Forest spokesman Simon Clark said that when the cost of administration, extra bureaucracy and enforcement are taken into account, "the mind boggles".
He added that the people most affected by the proposals would be "the elderly and people on low incomes".
Mr Clark added: "The senior government advisor putting this idea forward is not only adding to the red tape and bureaucracy we already have in this country.
"He is openly bragging that he wants to make the form as complex as possible to fill in."
A department of health spokeswoman did not rule out such a scheme as part of the next wave of tobacco regulation.
She said: "We will be consulting later this year on the next steps on tobacco control.
"Ministers are seeking input from a whole range of stakeholders."
Qaeda defeated in Baghdad: Iraqi PM
Feb 15 01:25 PM US/Eastern
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=080215182516.1kw853y4&show_article=1
Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki proclaimed on Friday that Al-Qaeda had been routed in Baghdad thanks to a security plan launched a year ago, and would soon be defeated throughout the country.
"Thank God, we destroyed the cells of Al-Qaeda. They have been chased out of Baghdad and this has opened the way for their defeat throughout Iraq," Maliki said at a ceremony marking the launch on February 14 last year of the Baghdad security plan, known as Operation Fardh al-Qanoon (Imposing Law).
"Today our forces are locked in battle against outlaws in Nineveh and we are chasing them," he added, referring to the northern province where Iraqi officials say Al-Qaeda has regrouped after fleeing Baghdad.
Maliki on January 25 announced a "decisive battle" against Al-Qaeda in Nineveh province, and sent troop and police reinforcements to the provincial capital Mosul, which the US military says is the last urban stronghold of Al-Qaeda in Iraq.
The prime minister thanked "all those who helped make the security plan a success and who saved the country from the miserable situation it was in due to Al-Qaeda's violence and terrorism."
To mark the anniversary of the launch of Fardh al-Qanoon, he laid a wreath at the monument to the Unknown Soldier in Baghdad at a ceremony attended by the defence and interior ministers and other Iraqi officials.
The launch of Fardh al-Qanoon coincided with the start of a "surge" of an extra 30,000 US troops in Iraq, which has helped reduce the number of bombings in the capital, while the streets are no longer theatres for violent clashes between insurgents and the security forces.
The decrease in violence is being experienced elsewhere as well, with US and Iraqi officials saying that attacks across the country are down 62 percent since June while the number of Iraqis -- civilians and security force members -- killed in January 2008 was 541 against 2,087 in the same month in 2007.
But recent attacks in Baghdad, including twin blasts in the city centre which targeted a meeting of tribal leaders and killed 19 people, have shown just how fragile the security situation is.
But...the surge is a failure right?
-faz
Laughter curve. Not sure that I have heard of that? Have a link?
-faz
Steph,
Nice article and I agree with it to an extent. However, it is important to differentiate between tax cuts and tax rate cuts. A good article on that.
Do Tax Cuts Pay for Themselves?
By Thomas E. Nugent
June 29, 2006 7:27 AM
Senator Kent Conrad of North Dakota badgered Henry Paulson, nominee for secretary of the Treasury, at Paulson’s confirmation hearing this week. Conrad — armed with poster-sized exhibits of economic misinformation and isolated quotes from the current and prior chairmen of the Federal Reserve — tried to lure the nominee into admitting that tax cuts don’t pay for themselves. Paulson, demonstrating that he is not only a financial heavyweight but an agile debater when among undereducated politicians, focused on the impact of tax cuts on the economy in 2001, and gave credit to President Bush’s first tax cuts for moving the economy out of recession and into expansion. Nice job, Henry!
The assumption that tax cuts don’t pay for themselves is a central tenet of the Democratic party, and also leads to the party’s objection to the president’s tax cuts of 2001 and 2003. Since this belief is so important to Democrats (they rail against any type of tax cuts), it is crucial to take a closer look at the role tax cuts play in “paying for themselves.”
First of all, let’s make the important distinction between tax cuts and tax-rate cuts. Obviously, tax cuts do not pay for themselves. If you reduce the taxes that I pay, I’ll say thank you and that’s it. No effect on my behavior. The president’s tax rebate of 2001 is an example of a one-time transfer to consumers that had little, if any, impact on incentives. On the other hand, cutting tax rates can have dynamic effects that will generate additional tax revenues. In other words, tax-rate cuts can indeed pay for themselves.
So why is the debate between Republicans who believe tax-rate cuts pay for themselves, and Democrats who say they don’t, so acrimonious?
The answer lies in a closer examination of the Laffer curve.
Arthur Laffer, the well-known supply-side economist, has demonstrated that cutting tax rates can produce higher, not lower, revenues. Using the graphical presentation shown below, Laffer analyzed the relationship between tax rates and tax revenues. As noted in the exhibit, there are two tax rates (at points A and A*) that can produce the same revenues. However, if tax rates are lowered from A*, revenues go up, not down. Therefore, lowering any tax rate in the prohibitive zone will produce higher tax revenues.
The missing piece to this puzzle is that incentives matter. When tax rates in the prohibitive zone are lowered, people (or corporations) may very well be willing to pay more taxes, since doing so could be a net positive versus the costs of not paying those taxes.
On the other hand, lowering tax rates from point A will, in fact, produce lower tax revenues. The reason is that lower tax revenues produced by lower tax rates cannot be offset by increased incentives to pay taxes. When tax-rate cuts reduce rates in the normal zone, government tax revenues will decline. (Note: The Laffer curve is a pedagogic device that has a variety of shapes for different circumstances. The shape is subject to how individuals and companies respond to incentives.)
So, can tax-rate cuts pay for themselves? The Laffer curve clearly demonstrates that cutting tax rates that are in the prohibitive zone will pay for themselves, while lowering tax rates in the normal zone will not. If Democrats understood this concept, it would be logical to assume that they would be for lower tax rates in the prohibitive zone and higher tax rates in the normal zone.
The next time we have a debate over whether or not tax cuts pay for themselves, some well-educated Republican should take a page from Sen. Conrad and use this exhibit to demonstrate the real relationship between tax rates and tax revenues.
— Thomas E. Nugent is executive vice president and chief investment officer of PlanMember Advisors, Inc., and principal of Victoria Capital Management, Inc.
"It is up to us, to vote out, at the local level the 'wasteful spenders'"
I could not agree with you more, the problem that we are going to get with either party this election will be more spending and increased size of government.
-faz
Alex,
A good article on tax rate cuts and their impact on the economy and revenues to the government.
Tax Cut Revenue Rewards
The Bush tax cuts continue to bring in more revenue.
This piece was originally published in The Washington Times on August 23, 2006.
Many in the Washington establishment were shocked Aug. 17, when the Congressional Budget Office reported a surge of "unanticipated tax receipts" that will sharply push down this year's deficit. Those who had been proclaiming the Bush tax rate cuts would result in a big reduction in tax revenues tried to hide their disappointment. It was tough being proved wrong again after having said the same thing when Ronald Reagan cut tax rates in the early 1980s.
We have now had three major experiments with tax rate reduction in the last half-century, and each time both economic growth and tax revenues have surged, despite the fears and cries of the anti-tax-cut crowd. How much more evidence will they need to understand the difference between tax rates and tax revenues? Most everyone, including most members of Congress, can understand that properly structured tax rate reduction, by decreasing the impediments to working, saving and investing, will lead to a higher rate of economic growth. Why then is it so difficult to understand that a bigger economic pie can lead to more tax revenue rather than less?
The table shows the average annual change in tax revenue from the year before the tax cut to the end of the experiment (or in Mr. Bush's case to the present).
President Kennedy proposed major tax reduction before he was assassinated in 1963. Congress passed and President Johnson signed the tax cuts in the summer of 1964. Rates for all income groups were cut and the top rate was reduced from 91 percent to 70 percent. Economic growth averaged more than 5 percent a year for the three years after the tax cut, with very low inflation. President Johnson and the Democratic Congress raised taxes in 1968, ending the Kennedy experiment.
When Ronald Reagan took office in 1981, the economy was experiencing no growth and high inflation. As part of the solution, Reagan proposed a 30 percent reduction in tax rates. His critics claimed this would increase inflation and lead to economic disaster. Twenty five years ago this month, Congress passed a slightly watered-down version of the Reagan proposals, which reduced tax rates by about 25 percent over three years, and brought the top rate down to 50 percent.
In retrospect, the entire tax rate reduction should have been made in 1981, rather than dragging it out to 1983, which had the short-run effect of reducing growth by giving people an incentive to delay income realization. However, once enacted, the results were spectacular. Real economic growth averaged more than 4 percent per year, and inflation fell from double digits and averaged roughly 4 percent.
During the Reagan years, several other tax changes were made, both increasing and lowering some rates; but at the end of his term, the maximum marginal rate was only 28 percent. The first President Bush and Congress increased tax rates in 1990, thus ending the Reagan experiment.
The latest major tax rate reductions were enacted in 2003, and the first three-year results are now in. The increase in tax revenues, as in the previous two experiments, has far outstripped inflation, and the economy is close to full employment. The economy was already falling into recession when George W. Bush took office, and he made the mistake then of giving small tax rebates (which had no positive economic effects) rather than cutting marginal tax rates on labor and capital as he did in the bigger tax cut of 2003.
The question is always asked, did the "tax cuts pay for themselves?" If, by "paying for themselves," one means more tax revenue was produced for the government after several years than otherwise would have occurred, we can provide a reasonably certain answer. As noted above, the Kennedy tax cuts led to a very high rate of economic growth and no reduction in tax revenue as a percent of gross domestic product (GDP) over the period (average of 17.6 percent). Therefore, with a very high degree of confidence, we can say the Kennedy rate cuts paid for themselves in three years.
The Reagan tax cut program also led to higher GDP growth than would have been expected; in fact, the U.S. economy grew in real terms by almost one-third during the Reagan years. Tax revenues as a percent of GDP fell slightly from 19.6 percent of GDP at the beginning of his administration to 18.3 percent at the end, but total tax revenues were almost certainly far higher -- actually, the tax cuts probably "paid for themselves" within four years. This is because the tax base was at least 15 percent larger than would have been expected without the rate reduction program.
The Bush tax cuts also appear to be well on their way to "paying for themselves," despite the dire warnings of his critics.
Richard W. Rahn is director general of the Center for Global Economic Growth, a project of the FreedomWorks Foundation.
http://www.freedomworks.org/informed/issues_template.php?issue_id=2685
The major problem with Bush and today's Republicans is that they have veered away from their conservative principals and continue to grow the size of the government. I wish we could have an opportunity to see how decreasing both tax rates and spending would do for the economy.
-faz