Eric Holder Was a Gun Control Nightmare

Friday, November 21, 2008 11:03 AM

By: Jim Meyers




Barack Obama’s nomination of Eric Holder for attorney general will not sit well with advocates of Second Amendment rights — Holder has consistently championed stronger gun-control measures.

As deputy attorney general in the Bill Clinton administration from 1997 to 2001, Holder “was a strong supporter of restrictive gun control,” according to The Volokh Conspiracy, a Web site that focuses on the legal system and the courts.

He advocated federal licensing of handgun owners, a three-day waiting period on handgun sales, rationing handgun sales to no more than one per month, banning possession of handguns and so-called "assault weapons" by anyone under age 21, a gun show restriction bill that would have given the federal government the power to shut down all gun shows, and national gun registration.

“He also promoted the factoid that ‘Every day that goes by, about 12, 13 more children in this country die from gun violence’ — a statistic that is true only if one counts 18-year-old gangsters who shoot each other as ‘children,’” noted the Web site, founded by law professor Alexander Volokh.

After the 9/11 attacks, Holder wrote an opinion piece for The Washington Post arguing that a new law should give "the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms a record of every firearm sale." He also said prospective gun buyers should be checked against the secret "watch lists" compiled by various government entities.

Earlier this year, Holder — who would become the first African-American attorney general — co-signed an amicus brief in support of the District of Columbia’s ban on all handguns and on the use of any firearm for self-defense in the home.

Holder also played a key role in the snatching of 6-year-old Cuban Elian Gonzalez from his Miami relatives’ home in April 2000, according to the Web site. Gonzalez was to be sent to Cuba where his father lived.

Although a photo clearly showed a federal agent pointing a gun at the man who was holding the terrified child, Holder claimed that the federal agents sent to capture Gonzalez had acted "very sensitively."

David Kopel, author of the Volokh Conspiracy report, observed: “If Mr. Holder believes that breaking down a door with a battering ram, pointing guns at children (not just Elian), and yelling ‘Get down, get down, we'll shoot’ is an example of acting ‘very sensitively,’ his judgment about the responsible use of firearms is not as acute as would be desirable for a cabinet officer who would be in charge of thousands and thousands of armed federal agents, many of them paramilitary agents with machine guns.”

Holder has already come under fire due to his involvement in the Mark Rich pardon in the final hours of the Clinton presidency.

Billionaire Rich renounced his U.S. citizenship and moved to Switzerland to avoid prosecution for racketeering, wire fraud, tax fraud, tax evasion, and illegal trades with Iran in violation of the U.S. embargo following the 1979-80 hostage crisis.

Seventeen years later, Rich wanted a pardon, and he retained Jack Quinn, former counsel to the president, to lobby his old boss.

Holder had originally recommended Quinn to one of Rich's advisers, political analyst Dick Morris reported. And he gave substantive advice to Quinn along the way.

Once the pardon was granted, Holder sent his congratulations to Quinn.

http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/holder_gun_control/2008/11/21/153808.html

52% strikes again and we lose! All of us lose...


Hillary Accepts Secretary of State Post, Says Aide

Friday, November 21, 2008 3:56 PM

By: Kenneth D. Williams

Hillary Clinton’s associates have confirmed to The New York Times that she has accepted President-elect Barack Obama’s offer to become secretary of state in his new administration.

Earlier in the week, Bill Clinton agreed to do whatever the Obama team wanted with regard to investigating his finances — he turned over information on the donors to his foundation — and Obama representatives said just this morning that Hillary’s nomination was on track.

Now, someone described as a “confidant” of the former first lady told the Times, “She’s ready,” and that Obama and Clinton met twice so that they could get “comfortable” with the idea of working together. "She knew this was the right thing to do but just needed to sit with it for a bit to make sure," the adviser said.

There had been speculation that Sen. Clinton would not want to give up her role in Congress, and that she was in line for even more powerful positions within the world's most exclusive debate club.

However, she may have seen a greater role for herself as secretary of state. Michael O'Hanlon, a senior fellow at the liberal Brookings Institution, told Britain's Telegraph newspaper, "She will be aware that the influence of secretary of state on foreign policy is comparable to the whole of the senate."

The Times writes that Hillary will be powerful, but “will have . . . to subordinate her own agenda and ambitions to Mr. Obama’s and sacrifice the independence that comes with a Senate seat and the 18 million votes she collected during their arduous primary battle.”

Policy analysts say her selection as secretary of state could mean the State Department's stance could be more hawkish. She has not committed to a firm timetable for withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq, reports Reuters.

http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/hillary_gets_cabinet_post/2008/11/21/153904.html

That is very disturbing. What are the parents thinking?

It's starting already!

Would-be appointees quizzed on guns

President-elect Barack Obama’s transition team is asking potential appointees detailed questions about gun ownership, and firearms advocates aren’t happy about it.

The National Rifle Association has denounced the move, which has already led one Republican senator to consider legislation aimed at ensuring a president can’t use an applicant’s gun ownership status to deny employment.

It’s just one question on a lengthy personnel form — No. 59 on a 63-question list — but the furor over the query is a vivid reminder of the intensity of support for Second Amendment rights and signals the scrutiny Obama is likely to receive from the ever-vigilant gun lobby.

Obama’s transition team declined to go into detail on why they included the question, suggesting only that it was done to ensure potential appointees were in line with gun laws.

“The intent of the gun question is to determine legal permitting,” said one transition aide.

But even some Democrats and transition experts are baffled by the inclusion of the question.

Tucked in at the end of the questionnaire and listed under “Miscellaneous,” it reads: “Do you or any members of your immediate family own a gun? If so, provide complete ownership and registration information. Has the registration ever lapsed? Please also describe how and by whom it is used and whether it has been the cause of any personal injuries or property damage.”

Paul Light, professor of public service at New York University, said there was no such question for potential appointees when President George W. Bush took office in 2000.

“It kind of sticks out there like a sore thumb,” Light said.

He expressed uncertainty over why it was included but surmised it was out of an abundance of caution, a desire to avoid the spectacle of a Cabinet-level or other high-ranking appointee who is discovered to have an unregistered handgun at home.

“It’s the kind of thing that, if dug out, could be an embarrassment to the president-elect,” Light said.

Clay Johnson, deputy director of management at the Office of Management and Budget and the head of Bush’s 2000 transition, also didn’t quite understand the purpose of the question.

“It could be their way to say to prospects that they will have to answer all these questions sooner or later, so be prepared,” Johnson observed.

Matt Bennett, a veteran campaign operative who did a stint at Americans for Gun Safety and who now works for the moderate Democratic think tank Third Way, was equally befuddled.

“It strikes me as overly lawyerly,” he said, noting that only a small percentage of guns owned by adults are ever used improperly.

Only half-joking, Rep. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio) alluded to the shooting accident involving Vice President Dick Cheney, suggesting the query could be a better-safe-than-sorry measure.

“Given the behavior of the vice president under the last administration, you may want to know these things,” Ryan said.

On a more serious note, Ryan suggested that the new president was being “very, very thorough” in his approach.

An Obama ally and pro-gun Democrat from a blue-collar region of Ohio, Ryan dismissed the notion that the inclusion of such a question would do any political harm to the incoming president.

But other gun rights supporters want Obama to know the question has raised their antennae.

“It’s very odd and very concerning to put out a question like that,” said Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.), adding that it may also be “unprecedented.”

The freshman senator, who is up for reelection in 2010, had his campaign organization send an e-mail to supporters this week, pledging to enact legislation to bar federal hiring discrimination on the basis of gun ownership.

“Barack Obama promised change, and this is proof positive that we are going to see some of the most liberal change in our nation’s history,” wrote DeMint’s campaign in the e-mail.

DeMint conceded it was unrealistic to try to get a bill on the matter through during the lame duck session this week.

Still, it’s the sort of symbolic issue that may provide a political opening for Republican members of Congress from conservative-leaning states to contrast themselves with the new Democratic administration.

“I want him to know that we’re looking for areas we can work with him but also looking for areas of concern that we want to let him know we’re going to fight on,” DeMint said.

The NRA, the gun-rights group that spent millions to defeat Obama, only to see him easily carry sportsmen-heavy states such as Michigan and Pennsylvania, is signaling that it intends to keep up the fight.

“Barack Obama and his administration are showing their true colors and true philosophy with regard to the Second Amendment,” said Chris Cox, the NRA’s top political official. “It shows what we’ve been saying all along — this guy doesn’t view the Second Amendment as a fundamental constitutional right.”

Cox said the group had put the word out to their members on the question.

Bennett, though, argued that approach would have little resonance.

“The real question is whether he’s doing harm to the broader image of Democrats on guns, and the answer is probably no,” he said. “It may gin up 350,000 hard-core NRA types, but it won’t really bother 65 million other gun owners.”

http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20081120/pl_politico/15835

I'm convinced DPDW and 99% of all stocks are ridiculously oversold because of the lemming mentality. When it comes back, it will come back harder than anything we've ever seen. Those who are ready will make astronomical returns. GL!

If you look at a 6 year chart and take out the recent spike to $147, you see that the range would most likely be in the $60-100 area. Since we always overshoot in both directions, I'm beginning to think we're going to bottom in the $30-40 range with an outside shot for the $20s briefly. I think we'll be back in the $60-80 range by the second half of 2009. Of course, any number of geo-political incidents, terrorist attacks, etc could turn this on a dime. There will be some serious money to be made when this market turns and if you're playing some of these bear etfs, you can make a killing right now. Just my 2 cents worth (or is it only a penny now...lol!)

That's why I'm a big proponent of withdrawing from the public schools and either going to a Christian school or having your kids home-schooled. We're not going to change the public schools! Think what would happen if all the Christian parents withdrew their kids and starting sending them to Christian schools.

Time for an Upgrade?
by Paul Garner
September 2, 2008

Creationist researchers strive to understand what the earth’s rock record has to teach us about God’s judgment and mercy. While we never waver on God’s Word, we must constantly reevaluate models and adopt new ones if they make better sense of the evidence. British researcher Paul Garner made such a radical shift when he learned what the catastrophic plate tectonics (CPT) model can explain.

It’s encouraging to see the growing number of modern scientists engaged in constructing the creation model of origins. For a long time, I’ve felt that simply attacking evolutionary theories is insufficient. Instead, our main efforts need to be channelled into showing how the biblical framework of history explains the world around us better than any alternative.

Creationists want to reclaim the natural sciences for Christ, and that means constructing new theories in biology, geology, and astronomy that are founded on the Bible and consistent with the scientific data, and then fitting those theories together in a coherent creation model. This is no easy task. It’s much simpler to criticize evolution than to build positive alternatives that can withstand rigorous examination.

Trained in the earth sciences, I have focused my interest in developing a creationist theory of earth history. Since the advent of modern geology, John Whitcomb and Henry Morris’s 1961 book, The Genesis Flood, was pretty much the first attempt to create a creationist theory of the earth. But it was only a start. Their ideas need to be updated, improved, built upon, and integrated with new theories to produce a coherent creationist model of earth history.

The Bible gives information that can help in interpreting the clues we unearthed in geological studies, but many questions remain. For example, which are the Flood layers?
Which are the Flood Layers?

Much of the earth’s geological record consists of sedimentary rock layers laid down by water, such as mudstones, limestones, and sandstones. In most cases, these layers built up sequentially, one being laid on top of another in the manner of a multi-layer sandwich. Provided that earth movements have not disturbed the sequence, the oldest layer will be at the bottom of the pile.

Early in the rise of modern geology, the portion of the geological record that includes animal fossils was divided into four main parts: the Primary (later called Paleozoic), Secondary (later called Mesozoic), Tertiary, and Quaternary (see below). Whitcomb and Morris suggested that all these layers were laid down in Noah’s Flood.
How to Read the Rock Record


However, in the 1980s, some creationists began to suggest that only the Primary sediments were laid down during Noah’s Flood. They made this suggestion to explain otherwise puzzling features of the rock layers, in particular the existence of structures such as reefs, soils, and colonized seafloors that apparently took longer than just the year of the Flood to build up (though not millions of years).

This seemed to be an interesting avenue to explore, and in the mid 1990s I contributed to a symposium in which I argued that the Flood/post-Flood boundary must be placed somewhere near the top of the Primary layers. It’s fair to say that this proposal proved controversial and generated a great deal of discussion and debate!
Problems with My Favored Theory

Over the next few years, however, I began to find a number of problems with the theory that I’d helped develop. It became evident that many of the features that had led me to conclude that the Secondary layers were post-Flood were also present in the Primary layers. I began to wonder whether the end of the Flood should be pushed even further back in the geological record.
Problem #1

If this were true, however, creation geologists would have to account for even more sedimentary layers laid down after the Flood. But my study of the biblical genealogies had persuaded me that the time between Noah and Abraham was fairly short—perhaps no more than 350 years. This didn’t seem long enough to accommodate so much erosion and earth movement, unless the post-Flood period was almost as catastrophic as the Flood itself.
Problem #2

Another problem I saw concerned the breakup of the earth’s continents. The geological evidence that the continents had once been united into a single supercontinent was very strong, but how and when did they break apart?

Piecing Together the Continents


I soon realized that, if the Flood ended much lower in the geological record as I had suggested, then much of the continents’ breakup must have taken place after—not during—the Flood. But this raised a serious problem. The known physics indicated that the earth’s plates could either move very fast (as during the Flood) or hardly at all (like today). There didn’t seem to be any way for them to move at moderate speeds, which is what the post-Flood theory required.
Problem #3

Another concern was that placing the end of the Flood so low in the geological record completely “decoupled” the Ice Age from the Flood. Creationist modelling in the 1990s had successfully shown how widespread ice sheets could have developed after the Flood, as moisture from the warm oceans fell as heavy snow on the cold continents. However, if the Flood were pushed further down in the geological record, the Ice Age would have begun long after the Flood. This bothered me because it left me without any explanation for the Ice Age.
Problem #4

One final factor was the realization that I had failed to take account of the bigger picture. When dealing with very specific geological problems, it’s easy to “miss the forest for the trees.” A broader context adds a fresh perspective. This broader context is the thick and uniform sediments extending across continents in the Primary and Secondary layers. In the Tertiary and Quaternary layers these continent-scale patterns are largely absent, with most sediments restricted to more local areas or basins. With this in mind, the most obvious place to locate the end of the Flood was near the top of the Secondary layers, at the point where continent-scale processes gave way to regional-scale processes. My favored model was inconsistent with this big picture.
Putting the Pieces Together

After years of grappling with the combined weight of these considerations, I felt I had to change my view. But whatever I did accept needed to put all the pieces together.

For example, I wanted to explain the evidence that the continents were breaking up at the same time that the Primary and Secondary sediments were being laid. What mechanism could break up the continents so quickly? In 1994, a team of creationist researchers had proposed just such a theory, called catastrophic plate tectonics (CPT).

It turns out that the CPT theory is able to explain much more than the breakup of continents. For instance, it explains everything that conventional plate tectonics explains and more (see “The Missing Piece,” p. 61).
Rapid Motion Explains More Things

THE MISSING PIECE—A Creationist Perspective


Continents plowing through the ocean floor? How geologists came to accept this radical idea is one of the most interesting stories in modern science. But the evidence became overwhelming with the development of new instruments to study the ocean floor.

Recent discoveries have left geologists with new puzzles. For example, deep in the earth’s mantle are pieces of cold plates that apparently came from the earth’s surface. How could these cold plates sink slowly through the hot mantle (up to 7232°F), over millions of years, without “melting”? In their search for answers, conventional geologists are hindered by a belief that the earth’s plates have been moving at current, slow rates (1–2 inches per year) for millions of years.

Creationists, on the other hand, know from the data of Scripture that the earth has only been around a few thousand years. Using the Bible’s history as their starting point, these scientists were ready to take the theory of continental movement to the next level. They worked out a theory, called catastrophic plate tectonics. CPT included the best parts of the earlier theories but added speed. Recent studies of granite have shown that silicate rock, under stress, can weaken by a factor of a billion or more. This means that, under the right conditions, the continental plates could move a billion times faster than today. The Flood provided the necessary conditions.

CPT explains many problems that are a puzzle in conventional plate tectonics. For example, how did plates ever have enough energy to drive their way down through the mantle layers, which currently prevent plates from moving any lower? Also, how could cold crust material sink to the earth’s core without melting? The answer is to speed things up in a catastrophic, global Flood!

CPT also seems to be consistent with the biblical details about the Flood, such as the breakup of the “fountains of the great deep,” the forty days and nights of rain, and the flooding of the continents. The emission of vast quantities of molten rock onto the bottom of the ocean raised the seafloor, raising the water level and flooding the continents. Also, this magma heated the ocean water, which later generated the heavy snowfall of the Ice Age after the Flood (see “A Dark and Stormy World,” p. 78).

Of course, that isn’t to say that CPT has all the answers or has solved every problem. Outstanding questions remain, such as how to explain the removal of the heat that would have been generated by the rapid breakup of the continents. However, I’ve come to think that the issues facing CPT are not insoluble and, in fact, they suggest some interesting avenues for further research. To me, the CPT model has the greatest potential to bring together information from a variety of scientific fields, including geology, geophysics, paleontology, and climatology, in a full-fledged model of the global Flood.
Holding Our Models Loosely

One of the important lessons I’ve learned from this process is the need for Christians to exercise humility in our search for the truth. We don’t have all the answers, and our scientific hypotheses may be wrong. So we ought to be ready to concede our models as the evidence demands.

We must continually seek a better understanding of the Bible and the scientific data, even if it means revising or rejecting our cherished ideas. Scientific theories—even creationist ones—are tentative, and we should learn to hold onto them loosely. Of course, the other side of this is that it’s always important to glean as many truths from a successful model as possible. Scientists don’t abandon theories just because they haven’t explained all the data. All theories are incomplete, but we should seek to embrace the best and see how far we can get with them.

Is catastrophic plate tectonics the “final word” in creationist geology? Will it withstand further scientific and scriptural scrutiny? Only time will tell. If experience has taught me anything, it’s that our scientific models will look very different in, say, ten years’ time. Some will have been confirmed, others will have fallen by the wayside, and new ones will have been developed. But that’s not something that should unduly concern us. In fact, it’s one of the things that makes science so exciting.
Paul Garner, researcher and lecturer with Biblical Creation Ministries in the UK, has a BSc in Environmental Sciences and is a Fellow of the Geological Society. He is currently studying the Coconino Sandstone of northern Arizona as part of ICR’s FAST project (see p. 62).

Continental Drift


http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/am/v3/n4/upgrade-time

Welcome VERITAS77! Feel free to add to our discussion if you like what you see. God Bless!

Thanks for posting that NYBob! My two big issues right now. And hardly anyone is talking about it.

As a long time DPDW shareholder, I am very pleased with the latest Q. It was on the high end of my expectations with a net profit of 1.6M. Q2 hurt us but Q3 will help us as much or more. The .01 eps for the quarter will be the turning point for DPDW imo. The trend will be up from here for Q4. The gross margins where much larger again as management said they would and we're just now seeing the benefits of our acquisitions. Looks like 1.3M of the costs of SG+A was due to the recent Mako and Flotation. Looking forward to 2009 and beyond! Nice job DPDW!

Here's one story from May:

Secret Ballots May End in Union Elections If Obama Becomes President

Monday, May 19, 2008

How would you like elections without secret ballots? To most people, the notion of getting rid of secret ballots is absurd. This is modern-day America. Such an idea could not be seriously considered, right?

People support secret balloting for very obvious reasons. Politics frequently generates hot tempers. People can put up yard signs or wear political buttons if they want. But not everyone feels comfortable making his or her political positions public. Many would rather vote without fearing that their choice will offend or anger someone else.

Secret balloting has solved another potential problem: vote buying, which they essentially ended in U.S. elections. After all, why pay people if you couldn't be sure how they voted?

But if Barack Obama becomes president, secret ballots seem destined to end for at least one type of election: union certifications.

Currently, when 50 percent of workers in a company sign statements to unionize, that merely sets up a second stage, where workers vote by secret ballot to determine if the company would be unionized. Under the new proposal, using a system called “Card Check,” unionization would occur as soon as half the workers had signed cards stating that they favor union representation.
Related

In other words, up until now, a worker could placate union supporters and sign a statement saying that he wanted a union and then vote against the union when he was protected by the secrecy of the voting booth.

While the Bush administration promised to veto the so-called “Employee Free Choice Act,” Obama has made his feelings about the legislation very clear. Last year, Obama promised, “We will pass the Employee Free Choice Act. It’s not a matter of 'if'; it’s a matter of 'when.' We may have to wait for the next president to sign it, but we will get this thing done.”

Many are predicting Democrats will increase their current majorities, but even if they keep them as they are now, there is already substantial support in Congress. In votes last year, almost exclusively along party lines, Democrats in the House easily passed the bill by 241 to 185. The Senate support was closer, with 51 senators supporting it and 48 opposing, but Democrats are predicting that they will gain enough seats to withstand a filibuster.

Why have unions placed this at the top of their legislative agenda? Changing the rules would only make a difference if workers were unwilling to vote in private for unionization, but apparently there are a lot of companies where unions think that this change will make a difference. After all, the AFL-CIO calls the “Employee Free Choice Act” its million-member mobilization.

Unions are making an all-out push to get this passed, planning to spend $360 million on the 2008 election, $200 million more than in 2004 general election. Just one union alone, the Service Employees International Union, plans on spending $75 million this year, much of it to help the Democratic presidential nominee. Compare that to the $83 million that John McCain will be able to spend during the fall general election.

That's not all. The Service Employees International Union is already committed to making 10 million telephone calls early next year to congressmen to ensure this bill gets enacted.

Unions are understandably desperate to increase membership, as membership has been declining for decades, the share of private-sector workers who are union members falling from around 35 percent in the 1950s to 8.2 percent in 2007. Public-sector union membership has declined, but much more slowly, still representing 36 percent of government workers in 2007. The decline has continued under both Democratic and Republican presidents.

Obama has promised in many ways to help unions and protect their workers from competition. He wants to renegotiate the NAFTA agreement signed under President Clinton. He opposes free trade agreements with such strong American allies as Colombia. He has long been opposed to educational vouchers, something teachers’ unions also strongly oppose. But despite all his troubles with working-class voters, it is hard to think of much else that Obama could promise unions.

Obama claims that strengthening unions is good because unions will “lift up the middle-class in this country once more.” But protecting teachers unions from competition comes at the expense of students. Protecting workers from trade competition comes at the expense of customers and even other workers (e.g., if you protect steel workers from competition, the prices of American-made cars rise relative to foreign-made ones).

Unionization virtually always raises some workers' salaries at the expense of other workers. If unions insist on increasing worker pay by threatening strikes that shut down companies, firms reduce the number of workers they hire. Some workers gain higher wages, but only at the expense of causing other workers to lose their jobs. Possibly this last point explains why unions want to scrape secret ballots.

It is hard to believe that Obama and Democrats really think that eliminating secret ballots is a good idea. Surely, they are not going to start proposing we start getting rid of secret ballots all together and let voters simply sign cards? But their desire to impose unionization, whether workers really want it, is overriding their common sense. Their proposal will make the country and most workers poorer.

John Lott is the author of Freedomnomics and a senior research scientist at the University of

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,356643,00.html

I was listening to Bob Brinker yesterday and now I hear Obama wants to ban all secret ballots when voting on whether to join a union or not. I need to find the story on this but how dangerous is this. We all know how radical some of these unions are. Think of the retaliation of the workers that decide not to join a particular union. Another in a downward spiral of things to look forward to.

I included all of those numbers in my latest calculation.

The sad truth. And this man is going to be president.

What follows is a release from the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC) in Washington, D.C., issued Thursday, October 16, 2008, at 10 AM EDT. For further information, contact NRLC at 202-626-8820 or 202-626-8825, or send e-mail to Legfederal@aol.com


Obama Distorts His Abortion Record In Third Debate

WASHINGTON -- "On partial-birth abortion and on the rights of infants who survive abortions, Barack Obama's answers in the third presidential debate were highly misleading," commented Douglas Johnson, longtime legislative director for the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC), the nation's largest pro-life organization.

-- The Illinois Born-Alive Infants Protection Act (BAIPA) was a simple three-sentence bill to establish that every baby who achieved "complete expulsion or extraction" from the mother, and who showed defined signs of life, was to enjoy the legal protections of a "person." As a state senator, Obama led the opposition to this bill in 2001, 2002, and 2003. On March 13, 2003, Obama killed the bill at a committee meeting over which he presided as chairman. In the October 15 debate, Obama said, "The fact is that there was already a law on the books in Illinois that required providing lifesaving treatment." This claim is highly misleading. The law "on the books," 720 ILCS 510.6, on its face, applies only where an abortionist declares before the abortion that there was "a reasonable likelihood of sustained survival of the fetus outside the womb." But humans are often born alive a month or more before they reach the point where such "sustained survival" – that is, long-term survival – is likely or possible (which is often called the point of "viability"). When Obama spoke against the BAIPA on the Illinois Senate floor in 2001 -- the only senator to do so -- he didn't even claim that the BAIPA was duplicative of existing law. Rather, he objected to defining what he called a "previable fetus" as a legal "person" -- even though the bill clearly applied only to fully born infants. These events are detailed in an August 28, 2008 NRLC White Paper titled "Barack Obama’s Actions and Shifting Claims on the Protection of Born-Alive Aborted Infants -– and What They Tell Us About His Thinking on Abortion," which contains numerous hyperlinks to primary sources.

-- Because 720 ILCS 510.6 gives complete discretion to the abortionist himself, and because a 1993 consent decree issued by a federal court nullified key provisions (such as the definition of "born alive"), the law was so riddled with loopholes as to be virtually unenforceable even with respect to babies who had clearly achieved the capacity for long-term survival. During Obama's time in the state Senate there were bills (other than the BAIPA) to close some of these loopholes in order to provide more effective protections for post-viable abortion survivors. Obama opposed those bills, too. On April 4, 2002, Obama opposed a bill (SB 1663) that would have more strictly defined the circumstances under which the presence of a second physician (to care for a live-born baby) would be required during a post-viability abortion; Obama argued that this would "burden the original decision of the woman and the physician to induce labor and perform an abortion . . . t’s important to understand that this issue ultimately is about abortion and not live births."

-- In the debate, Obama said that the state BAIPA "would have helped to undermine Roe v. Wade." To evaluate this claim, one must examine the actual language of the BAIPAs. The original 2001 bill was only three sentences long; the third sentence was as follows: "(c) A live child born as a result of an abortion shall be fully recognized as a human person and accorded immediate protection under the law." As recently as August 19, 2008, the Obama campaign issued a memo in which it singled out that sentence as "Language Clearly Threatening Roe." This claim is consistent with Obama's 2001 argument that a "previable fetus" should not be regarded as a person, even when born alive.

-- At the March 13, 2003 committee meeting over which Obama presided, the "immediate protection" clause was removed and replaced with the "neutrality clause" copied from the federal BAIPA, which said explicitly that the bill had no bearing on the legal status of any human "prior to being being born alive." Obama then led the committee Democrats in voting down the bill, anyway. For years afterwards, Obama claimed that the state BAIPA had lacked the "neutrality clause," and on August 16, 2008, Obama said that NRLC was "lying" when we said otherwise. This dispute was reviewed by both FactCheck.org and Politifact.org, both of which came down on NRLC's side. To read the original 2001 Illinois BAIPA side-by-side with the amended 2003 version -- both of which Obama voted against -- click here.

-- In the presidential debate, Senator John McCain accurately noted that Obama had opposed Illinois legislation to ban partial-birth abortions. This is true -- indeed, during his primary contest with Hillary Clinton, Obama's supporters presented detailed accounts lauding his leadership in opposing legislation to ban partial-birth abortion, afford legal protection to born-alive babies, and require parental notification for abortion. (Under Article IV, Section 8 of the Illinois Constitution, the effect of voting "present" on the Illinois Senate floor is exactly the same as voting "no.") In his response to McCain in the debate, Obama said, "I am completely supportive of a ban on late-term abortions, partial-birth or otherwise, as long as there's an exception for the mother's health and life, and this did not contain that exception." Here, Obama packed two distortions into a single sentence. First, Obama is using the phrase "late term" to refer to the third trimester of pregnancy. It has long been established that the great majority of partial-birth abortions are performed in the fifth and sixth months; these are babies developed enough to be born alive (hence the term "partial birth"), but are not "late term" in the sense that the phrase is used by pro-abortion advocates. Secondly, the Supreme Court has defined the term "health" to include, in the abortion context, "all factors -- physical, emotional, psychological, familial and the woman's age -- relevant to the well-being of the patient."

-- Obama is a cosponsor of the so-called "Freedom of Choice Act" (FOCA) (S. 1173), which would nullify all state and federal laws that "interfere with" access to abortion before "viability" (as defined by the abortionist). The bill would also nullify all state and federal laws that "interfere with" access to abortion after viability if deemed to enhance "health." Because the term "health" is not qualified in the bill, no state would be allowed to exclude any "health" justification whatever for post-viability abortions, because to do so would impermissibly narrow a federally guaranteed right. In short, the FOCA would establish a federal "abortion right" broader than Roe v. Wade and, in the words of the National Organization for Women, "sweep away hundreds of anti-abortion laws [and] policies." The chief sponsors and advocacy groups backing the legislation have acknowledged that it would make partial-birth abortion legal again, nullify state parental notification laws, and require the state and federal governments to fund abortions.

-- Speaking to the Planned Parenthood Action Fund on July 17, 2007, Obama said, "The first thing I'd do as president is sign the Freedom of Choice Act. That's the first thing that I'd do."

-- In the presidential debate, Obama said, "But there surely is some common ground when both those who believe in choice and those who are opposed to abortion can come together" -- for example, by "helping single mothers if they want to choose to keep the baby." Yet, Obama advocates cutting off all federal aid to crisis pregnancy centers (CPCs). Across the nation, CPCs provide all manner of assistance to women who are experiencing crisis pregnancies, and they save the lives of many children. There is a very modest amount of federal funding going to such centers in some states. Pro-life lawmakers have pushed legislation to greatly expand such funding, but it has been blocked by lawmakers allied with the abortion lobby. Late in 2007, RHrealitycheck.org, a prominent pro-abortion advocacy website (representing the side hostile to such funding), submitted in writing the following question to the Obama campaign: "Does Sen. Obama support continuing federal funding for crisis pregnancy centers?" The Obama campaign's written response was short, but it spoke volumes: "No."

***

For additional information on Obama's sweeping pro-abortion agenda, read "Efforts to Sell Obama to Pro-Life Americans_Collide With His Support for Sweeping Pro-abortion Policy Changes," by NRLC's Douglas Johnson (from National Review Online) and "Obama's Abortion Extremism" by Robert P. George, professor of jurisprudence at Princeton University (from Public Discourse).

http://www.nrlc.org/Election2008/Release101608.html

I believe that is correct and here's Note 11 from the last Q.
They settled nearly 50K in accounting and legal fees but they owed 140K. And we also see that the salaries to management through August 1st was only partially settled. They 1.5M shares could be the final payment on the 140K. Let's hope so.

NOTE 11 – SUBSEQUENT EVENTS

In July 2008, the Company settled outstanding payables for legal and consulting expenses. The Company issued 562,662 shares of Rule 144 restricted stock in settlement of $26,600. As consideration for converting the amount to restricted stock, the Company offered the common shares to the vendor at a 30% discount to the closing price on the conversion date, resulting in an expense of $7,721 to the Company.


Additionally, in July 2008, the Company settled a demand note for $23,000, issuing 597,403 shares of Rule 144 restricted stock. As consideration for converting the amount to restricted stock, the Company issued the common shares at a 30% discount to the closing price on the conversion date, resulting in an expense of $9,857 to the Company.


On July 30, 2008, the Company executed the option to purchase the terminal at 17617 Aldine Westfield Rd, Houston, Texas. The purchase price is $3,550,000 and the Company has sixty days to finalize the transaction.


On August 1, 2008, the Company settled a portion of the outstanding accrued salary for both Mr. Byrd and Mr. Wooley. Mr. Byrd and Mr. Wooley elected to convert $200,000 and $130,472, respectively, into Rule 144 common shares. As consideration for converting the amount to restricted stock, the Company offered the common shares at a 30% discount to the closing bid price on the conversion date. Mr. Byrd and Mr. Wooley were issued 5,102,041 and 3,328,367 shares respectively, resulting in an expense of $259,657 to the Company.

http://edgar.brand.edgar-online.com/DisplayFiling.aspx?TabIndex=2&FilingID=6100162&companyid=7184&ppu=%252fdefault.aspx%253fcompanyid%253d7184

Did you get a recent share structure number?

We had 75,891,699 in August and based on these recent Form 4's
it adds up to another 4,304,147

For a total of 80,195,846.

Did you see the other Form 4's from the end of October?

Looks like our CEO acquired 2.3M shares (in lieu of salary again I assume) and then apparently signed them over to our Chairman.

http://edgar.brand.edgar-online.com/displayfilinginfo.aspx?FilingID=6220770-1466-9500&type=sect&TabIndex=2&companyid=7184&ppu=%252fdefault.aspx%253fcompanyid%253d7184

http://edgar.brand.edgar-online.com/displayfilinginfo.aspx?FilingID=6220798-1443-9113&type=sect&TabIndex=2&companyid=7184&ppu=%252fdefault.aspx%253fcompanyid%253d7184

Can't have you do all the heavy lifting around here!

It must be something recent because I believe the last Q indicated all consulting/service fees were paid off with shares through at least July. Maybe it was the work on the new lease deal. Or maybe RBC is working on a huge financing deal for us...lol!

So if I read that right, our CEO gave up 1.5M of his own shares to pay off a consulting debt and then gave himself 2M shares for services rendered (I assume in lieu of salary).

Thank you to all our military and fellow veterans for your service. Just a little taste of what our guys are going through to defend our freedom. Three intense minutes in Sadr City.

http://www.greatamericans.com/videos/1d05368b56/us-and-iraqi-special-operations-forces-from-genupload

Just a glimpse into Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf's great service to our country. Worth your 13 minutes.

http://www.greatamericans.com/videos/5e1f3d5d72/exclusive-schwarzkopf-profile-from-gainspiresme

Schwarzkopf Top Draw as Patriotic Site Debuts

Tuesday, November 11, 2008 10:28 AM

By: Dave Eberhart

On this Veterans Day, when America reveres those who have served in the military, retired Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf provides a glimpse into the source of the courage that inspires such service: “Confidence with character — that’s what you must have,” says the Army commander who led the way to victory in the 1991 Gulf War concludes.

Veterans Day is parades, the Tomb of the Unknowns, a flag-draped Main Street, children and old men with hands over their hearts, but a lot of the celebration is words – great words describing great courage and paying homage to present and past warriors, and sometimes even future military heroes.

When Schwarzkopf was fresh back from the Gulf War triumph, he was asked to speak to the cadet corps at West Point, his alma mater.

The hero whose demeanor earned him the label “Stormin’ Norman” was brimming with pride in the caliber of America’s armed forces when he boomed forth to the ranks of the young men and women of the United States Military Academy: “It takes a war to demonstrate that we have these people in our ranks — and our ranks are loaded with them. They are loaded with them, and you are going to be one of them when you join our ranks. And if there is any doubt in anybody’s mind or was any doubt in anybody’s mind, there sure in hell isn’t any doubt now — because it has taken us 100 hours to kick the ass of the fourth-largest army in the world!”

Schwarzkopf had the young cadets in the palm of his hand by the time he his final points reverberated across the assembly: “If you leave here with the word DUTY implanted in your mind; if you leave here with the word HONOR carved in your soul; if you leave here with love of COUNTRY stamped on your heart, then you will be a 21st-century leader worthy of the great privilege and honor of leading the sons and daughters of America . . .”

Schwarzkopf’s inspirational message can be seen and heard on a new online patriotism portal that opened formally today in honor of Veterans Day.

The Web site, GreatAmericans.com, is intended to provide inspiring videos about great Americans, says the site’s creator, Matt Daniels. The first video offering, an exclusive chat with Schwarzkopf, features Daniels as the interviewer and moderator.

“GreatAmericans.com celebrates citizens in every area of society whose lives offer a positive example to others,” Daniels told Newsmax. “As the first step in the pursuit of this vision, the Web site focuses on the men and women who serve our nation in uniform.”

As the Web site develops, segments will feature not only military heroes but also great figures and role models from law enforcement, fire- rescue, NASA, Homeland Security, and “everyday American heroes,” Daniels said.

In addition, the site provides an interactive forum allowing visitors to comment on subjects ranging from their military experience to a specific video or current affairs item.

GreatAmericans.com also features an online memorial to American heroes in uniform.

So if you need to borrow a cup of pride or a fistful of patriotism, there will be a handy place to visit — and only as far away as your computer.

Catch Stormin’ Norman recount the courageous act that earned him one of his three Silver Stars: “My knees were shaking to beat the band. I actually had to reach down and hold my knee. Every step I take, I would have to hold my knee, expecting at any minute for the knee to blow up under me . . . ”

The incident occurred when he was a commander in Vietnam, flying in his company’s chopper to the scene where some of his troops had become ensnared in a mine field. One of the soldiers had tripped one of the buried explosives and was writhing on the ground — sure to trigger yet another blast.

Risking his own life, Schwarzkopf inched his way to the side of the wounded man to splint his ripped and broken leg and keep him from thrashing about.

Later, after visiting his wounded at the hospital, he received a memorable accolade from one of his black noncommissioned officers. “As I walked out,” he recalls in the video, “an African-American sergeant, a non-commissioned officer, came up to me and said, ‘Sir, I want you to know that you will never have any problem from the African-American community. We saw what you did today and the fact that you cared enough about one of us to go out there and risk your life — you won’t every have to worry about a problem.’”

Daniels, who has listened to the whole remarkable story, concludes: “In the final analysis, it’s character that counts.”

The video cuts to the Gulf hero explaining the role of the famous West Point motto in his life: “Every difficult decision I have had to make in my life, I find that I always fall back to Duty, Honor, Country, and that points me in the direction I want to go in.”

Daniels told Newsmax that, by the grace of God, America has a lot of people of Schwarzkopf’s quality, and it’s more important than ever for young Americans to know them and embrace them.

“There are no perfect people, but there are many ordinary people in America doing extraordinary things for the sake of others and our country,” Daniels said. “Too often, the media is a source of negative examples. GreatAmericans.com is an effort to use the power of the media, especially the Internet, to introduce our society and our young people to better examples.”

Enter Audie Leon Murphy, once a household word but now, not so well known to the new generations.

His entry on the Web site informs viewers that this son of poor Texas sharecroppers rose to national fame as the most decorated U.S. combat soldier of World War II. Among his 33 awards and decorations was the Medal of Honor, the highest military award for bravery the United States gives to any individual, for “conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty.”

Murphy also received every decoration for valor that his country has to offer, some of them more than once, and five decorations from France and Belgium. Credited with killing more than 240 of the enemy while wounding and capturing many others, he became a legend within the bloodied 3rd Infantry Division.

Beginning his service as an Army private, Murphy rose quickly to the enlisted rank of staff sergeant, was given a battle field commission as second lieutenant, was wounded three times, and fought in nine major campaigns across the European Theater.

Upon returning home, he went to Hollywood at the invitation of actor James Cagney. After enduring the frustrations of a slow start in the film industry, he starred in 26 films, including 23 Westerns. His autobiography, “To Hell And Back,” in 1949 became a best seller, as well as a movie in which he starred as himself.

Murphy, who later was plagued with post-traumatic stress disorder, is buried at Arlington National Cemetery, just one of many heroes interred in the hallowed venue that is the epicenter of our remembrances on Veterans Day.

http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/veterans_day_military/2008/11/11/149991.html

Honoring All Who Served
Veterans Day

By Rod Powers,

Many Americans mistakenly believe that Veterans Day is the day America sets aside to honor American military personnel who died in battle or as a result of wounds sustained from combat. That's not quite true. Memorial Day is the day set aside to honor America's war dead.

Veterans Day, on the other hand, honors ALL American veterans, both living and dead. In fact, Veterans Day is largely intended to thank LIVING veterans for dedicated and loyal service to their country. November 11 of each year is the day that we ensure veterans know that we deeply appreciate the sacrifices they have made in the lives to keep our country free.

Armistice Day

To commemorate the ending of the "Great War" (World War I), an "unknown soldier" was buried in highest place of honor in both England and France ( (in England, Westminster Abbey; in France, the Arc de Triomphe). These ceremonies took place on November 11th, celebrating the ending of World War I hostilities at 11 a.m., November 11, 1918 (the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month). This day became known internationally as "Armistice Day".

In 1921, the United States of America followed France and England by laying to rest the remains of a World War I American soldier -- his name "known but to God" -- on a Virginia hillside overlooking the city of Washington DC and the Potomac River. This site became known as the "Tomb of the Unknown Soldier," and today is called the "Tomb of the Unknowns." Located in Arlington National Cemetery, the tomb symbolizes dignity and reverence for the American veteran.

In America, November 11th officially became known as Armistice Day through an act of Congress in 1926. It wasn't until 12 years later, through a similar act that Armistice Day became a national holiday.

The entire World thought that World War I was the "War to end all wars." Had this been true, the holiday might still be called Armistice Day today. That dream was shattered in 1939 when World War II broke out in Europe. More than 400,000 American service members died during that horrific war.

Veterans Day

In 1947, Raymond Weeks, of Birmingham Ala., organized a "Veterans Day" parade on November 11th to honor all of America's veterans for their loyal and dedicated service. Shortly thereafter, Congressman Edward H. Rees (Kansas) introduced legislation to change the name of Armistice Day to Veterans Day in order to honor all veterans who have served the United States in all wars.

In 1954, President Eisenhower signed a bill proclaiming November 11 as Veterans Day, and called upon Americans everywhere to rededicate themselves to the cause of peace. He issued a Presidential Order directing the head of the Veterans Administration (now called the Department of Veterans Affairs), to form a Veterans Day National Committee to organize and oversee the national observance of Veterans Day.

Congress passed legislation in 1968 to move Veterans Day to the fourth Monday in October. However as it became apparent that November 11th was historically significant to many Americans, in 1978, Congress reversed itself and returned the holiday to its traditional date.

Veterans Day National Ceremony

At exactly 11 a.m., each November 11th, a color guard, made up of members from each of the military branches, renders honors to America's war dead during a heart-moving ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknowns in Arlington National Cemetery.

The President or his representative places a wreath at the Tomb and a bugler sounds Taps. The balance of the ceremony, including a "Parade of Flags" by numerous veterans service organizations, takes place inside the Memorial Amphitheater, adjacent to the Tomb.

In addition to planning and coordinating the National Veterans Day Ceremony, the Veterans Day National Committee supports a number of Veterans Day Regional Sites. These sites conduct Veterans Day celebrations that provide excellent examples for other communities to follow.

Veterans Day Observance

Veterans Day is always observed on November 11, regardless of the day of the week on which it falls. The Veterans Day National Ceremony is always held on Veterans Day itself, even if the holiday falls on a Saturday or Sunday. However, like all other federal holidays, when it falls on a non-workday -- Saturday or Sunday -- the federal government employees take the day off on Monday (if the holiday falls on Sunday) or Friday (if the holiday falls on Saturday).

Federal government holiday observance (for federal employees, including military) is established by federal law. 5 U.S.C. 6103 establishes the following public holidays for Federal employees: New Year's Day, Birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr., Washington's Birthday (President's Day), Memorial Day, Independence Day, Labor Day, Columbus Day, Veterans Day, Thanksgiving Day, and Christmas Day.

This federal law does not apply to state and local governments. They are free to determine local government closings (including school closings) locally. As such, there is no legal requirement that schools close of Veterans Day, and many do not. However, most schools hold Veterans Day activities on Veterans Day and throughout the week of the holiday to honor American veterans.

Veterans Day Around the World

Many other countries honor their veterans on November 11th of each year. However, the name of the holiday and the types of ceremonies differ from the Veterans Day activities in the United States.

Canada, Australia, and Great Britain refer to their holidays as "Remembrance Day." Canada and Australia observe the day on November 11, and Great Britain conducts their ceremonies on the Sunday nearest to November 11th.

In Canada, the observance of "Remembrance Day" is actually quite similar to the United States, in that the day is set aside to honor all of Canada's veterans, both living and dead. One notable difference is that many Canadians wear a red poppy flower on November 11 to honor their war dead, while the "red poppy" tradition is observed in the United States on Memorial Day.

In Australia, "Remembrance Day" is very much like America's Memorial Day, in that its considered a day to honor Australian veterans who died in war.

In Great Britain, the day is commemorated by church services and parades of ex-service members in Whitehall, a wide ceremonial avenue leading from London's Parliament Square to Trafalgar Square. Wreaths of poppies are left at the Cenotaph, a war memorial in Whitehall, which was built after the First World War. At the Cenotaph and elsewhere in the country, a two-minute silence is observed at 11 a.m., to honor those who lost their lives in wars.

Have You Hugged Your Veteran Today?

One of the most personal and meaningful Veterans Day activities for people is to send notes or cards to hospitalized veterans or those living in veterans homes. Or, better yet, visit a veteran in a local veterans hospital or veterans home. The best way to have a "happy Veterans Day" is to do something special to make a veteran happy.

http://usmilitary.about.com/cs/generalinfo/a/veteransday.htm

Excellent article NYBob! Thanks!

Washington Post Admits Bias for Obama, Against McCain, Palin

Sunday, November 9, 2008 11:38 AM

By: Phil Brennan Article Font Size

Now that the presidential election is over, the liberal press can freely admit it was in the tank for Barack Obama.

On Sunday, The Washington Post's ombudsman admitted that the paper's coverage was strongly skewed in favor of Obama and against John McCain.

This report is not so much "news" -- readers knew that papers like the Post were working for the Obama campaign and had thrown claims of journalistic "objectivity" out the window to help the Illinois senator become president.

What is news is that the paper is admitting to the brazen bias.

In an article headlined "An Obama Tilt in Campaign Coverage," Post ombudsman Deborah Howell writes that Post readers "have been consistently critical of the lack of probing issues coverage and what they saw as a tilt toward Democrat Barack Obama."

Howell quickly adds, "My surveys, which ended on Election Day, show that they are right on both counts."

Howell studied the paper's coverage of the campaigns beginning in November 2007 -- about a year before Election Day.

She found rampant evidence of a pro-Obama bias.

"The op-ed page ran far more laudatory opinion pieces on Obama, 32, than on Sen. John McCain, 13. There were far more negative pieces (58) about McCain than there were about Obama (32), and Obama got the editorial board's endorsement. The Post has several conservative columnists, but not all were gung-ho about McCain.

"Stories and photos about Obama in the news pages outnumbered those devoted to McCain. Post reporters, photographers and editors -- like most of the national news media -- found the candidacy of Obama, the first African-American major-party nominee, more newsworthy and historic. Journalists love the new; McCain, 25 years older than Obama, was already well known and had more scars from his longer career in politics."

Howell fails to raise the "L" word (read liberal) to explain the Post's and other media infatuation with Obama.

Put another way, if the young Louisiana governor, Bobby Jindal, a conservative Republican and person of color, was running against an elderly liberal Democrat for president, would the coverage have been so kind to Jindal?

To ask the question is to answer it.

Howell says some of the lopsided coverage was due to the longer, heated campaign Obama underwent, beginning with his primary fight with Hillary Clinton. But even when Obama and McCain became their parties’ presumptive nominees, Post coverage continued to tilt toward Obama.

And the Post's bias didn't stop with McCain. Howell also admits the Post was out to get Sarah Palin.

"One gaping hole in coverage involved Joe Biden, Obama's running mate. When Gov. Sarah Palin was nominated for vice president, reporters were booking the next flight to Alaska. Some readers thought the Post went over Palin with a fine-tooth comb and neglected Biden. They are right; it was a serious omission."

As for the man we just elected our next president, Howell thinks "Obama deserved tougher scrutiny than he got, especially of his undergraduate years, his start in Chicago and his relationship with Antoin 'Tony' Rezko, who was convicted this year of influence-peddling in Chicago. The Post did nothing on Obama's acknowledged drug use as a teenager."

Oh well, it is nice to hear the paper that brought us Woodward and Bernstein finally admits that even the most basic investigative reporting gets targeted at Republicans.

Thanks for the candor, Deborah.

http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/post_obama_bias_media/2008/11/09/149343.html

There ya go. It's making the main news rounds. More babies killed by the 100s of thousands! If the man doesn't respect human life, then there is no starting point for other issues! Period! President Bush was a staunch supporter of human life on every possible front and he defended this country with all his might.

WASHINGTON – President-elect Obama plans to use his executive powers to make an immediate impact when he takes office, perhaps reversing Bush administration policies on stem cell research and domestic drilling for oil and natural gas.

John Podesta, Obama's transition chief, said Sunday Obama is reviewing President Bush's executive orders on those issues and others as he works to undo policies enacted during eight years of Republican rule. He said the president can use such orders to move quickly on his own.

"There's a lot that the president can do using his executive authority without waiting for congressional action, and I think we'll see the president do that," Podesta said. "I think that he feels like he has a real mandate for change. We need to get off the course that the Bush administration has set."

Podesta also said Obama is working to build a diverse Cabinet. That includes reaching out to Republicans and independents — part of the broad coalition that supported Obama during the race against Republican John McCain. Defense Secretary Robert Gates has been mentioned as a possible holdover.

"He's not even a Republican," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada said. "Why wouldn't we want to keep him? He's never been a registered Republican."

Obama was elected on a promise of change, but the nature of the job makes it difficult for presidents to do much that has an immediate impact on the lives of average people. Congress plans to take up a second economic aid plan before year's end — an effort Obama supports. But it could be months or longer before taxpayers see the effect.

Obama could use his executive powers to at least signal that Washington is changing.

"Obama's advantage of course is he'll have the House and the Senate working with him, and that makes it easier," said Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond. "But even then, having an immediate impact is very difficult to do because the machinery of government doesn't move that quickly."

Presidents long have used executive orders to impose policy and set priorities. One of Bush's first acts was to reinstate full abortion restrictions on U.S. overseas aid. The restrictions were first ordered by President Reagan and the first President Bush followed suit. President Clinton lifted them soon after he occupied the Oval Office and it wouldn't be surprising if Obama did the same.

Executive orders "have the power of law and they can cover just about anything," Tobias said in a telephone interview.

Bush used his executive power to limit federal spending on embryonic stem cell research, a position championed by opponents of abortion rights who argue that destroying embryos is akin to killing a fetus. Obama has supported the research in an effort to find cures for diseases such as Alzheimer's. Many moderate Republicans also support the research, giving it the stamp of bipartisanship. (not only does it kill a human life but it's proving to be not very promising. God is knocking on the head and saying use adult stem cells, or cord blood or baby's teeth...Hello!)

On drilling, the federal Bureau of Land Management is opening about 360,000 acres of public land in Utah to oil and gas drilling. Bush administration officials argue that the drilling will not harm sensitive areas; environmentalists oppose it.

"They want to have oil and gas drilling in some of the most sensitive, fragile lands in Utah," Podesta said. "I think that's a mistake."

Two top House Republicans said there is a willingness to try to work with Obama to get things done. But they said to expect Republicans to serve as a check against the power held by Obama and Democratic leaders in Congress.

"It's going to be a cheerful opposition," said Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind. "We're going to carry those timeless principles of limited government, a strong defense, traditional values, to the American people."

Pence, of Indiana, is expected to take over the No. 3 leadership post among House Republicans.

In other transition matters, Obama's new chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, would not say whether Obama would return to the Senate for votes during the postelection session this month. Obama's presence would be extraordinary, given his position as president-elect, especially if Congress takes up a much-anticipated economic stimulus plan.

"I think that the basic approach has been he's going to be here in Chicago, setting up his economic, not only his economic team, but the policies he wants to outline for the country as soon as he gets sworn in, so we hit the ground running," Emanuel said.

Also, Emanuel would not commit to a Democratic proposal to help the auto industry with some of the $700 billion approved by Congress to for the financial bailout.

Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said in a letter Saturday to Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson that the administration should consider expanding the bailout to include car companies.

Podesta appeared on "Fox News Sunday," as did Pence, and CNN's "Late Edition," where Reid also was interviewed. Emanuel spoke on ABC's "This Week" and CBS' "Face the Nation."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081110/ap_on_go_pr_wh/obama

Stem Cells
Does Their Origin Matter?
by Georgia Purdom, Ph.D.
January 1, 2007


The topic of stem cell research forces individuals to consider the question ... when does life begin?

Preserving life—it is extremely important in the Christian faith. But what is the biblical definition of life, and how does this definition affect stem cell research?

God clearly commands in Exodus 20:13: “You shall not murder [the intentional, predatory killing of another]” (NIV; see also Matthew 19:18; Romans 13:9). A big controversy today is that of determining when life begins. In the field of embryonic stem cell research (ESCR), this determination is especially crucial. Because technology is advancing faster than society’s ethics, we are left to solve such dilemmas in the midst of active research. Determining the ethics in these issues is especially difficult when the research promises to cure diseases that leave millions disabled or dying every year. However, the Bible clearly prohibits evil means to accomplish good ends (Romans 3:8). To develop a biblical worldview of ESCR, we first must sort fact from fiction.

In a recent Pew Research poll, 56% of Americans said it is more important to conduct stem cell research that may lead to new medical cures than to avoid destroying human embryos during the research.1

Definitions and the Beginning of Life

A “stem cell” is an unspecialized cell with the capacity to change into many different cell types, such as blood, muscle, and nerve cells. Two main categories of stem cells are found in embryos and adults. Embryonic stem cells (ESC) are derived from human embryos shortly after fertilization (union of egg and sperm) in a lab dish and are considered to be “totipotent,” meaning that they can form any other type of cell in the human body. Adult stem cells are derived from varying locations in adults and are considered to be “pluripotent” or “multipotent” because they can give rise to some but not all the cells in a human body.

Harvesting ESCs kills the embryo, but harvesting adult stem cells does not kill or harm the adult. Many involved with the research of embryonic stem cells do not believe a new person begins at conception or don’t care. Embryonic stem cells are viewed as property, not people. However, the Bible clearly indicates that life does begin at conception (Psalm 51:5, 139:13–15; Jeremiah 1:5). We are made in God’s image and are image bearers from conception to death (Genesis 1:27).2 Therefore, harvesting ESCs violates God’s commandment not to murder.
Therapeutic Uses of Stem Cells

Researchers promise many cures as a result of ESCR, and the media tout a world free of Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, multiple sclerosis, spinal cord injuries, and cancer. But, so far, these claims have gone unrealized. President Bush’s 2001 ban3 on government-supported research using new ESCs may have slowed progress in this area. Less reported in the media is that ESCs have been found to have great genetic instability (mutations and chromosomal changes) that is associated with tumor formation.4 If these ESCs are used in therapy, they could actually do more harm than good. In addition, anyone receiving these cells will need to take anti-rejection medicine their entire lives since the cells are not a genetic match.

Also underreported is the fact that doctors have currently treated more than 70 different diseases and defects using adult stem cells.5 Although adult stem cells are more difficult to find and grow in the lab, they are more genetically stable. One type of cell, the Multi-Potent Adult Progenitor Cell (MAPC), has been found that may be able to form many different cell types, such as an ESC.6 It seems that adult stem cells have great, untapped potential.
Ethical Alternatives to Embryonic Stem Cell Research

Adult stem cells provide only one of several ethical alternatives to ESCR.7 They can be harvested from the individual who needs therapy without worry of cell rejection.

A recent article in Nature8 indicates it may be possible to reprogram an adult cell to become more like an ESC. Currently this technology depends on the use of an ESC to reprogram the adult cell, but it is hoped that this requirement can be overcome.

Several ethical alternatives to embryonic stem cell research that hold great promise are available.

Another popular alternative is to use umbilical cord blood. Since umbilical cord blood is rich in stem cells, it is collected shortly after birth. These blood cells have been used to successfully treat many diseases in adults and children.9 Several companies store such blood for a fee.10 The stem cells can then be used if needed later in life by that individual or possibly by their family.

Stem cells found in baby teeth11 are capable of becoming several different types of cells, including neural cells. Such cells are extracted from the pulp of a tooth that a child has lost as a result of the transition to permanent teeth. Dr. Songtao Shi, discoverer of these cells, says this about their future, “We can ask parents to put [baby] teeth that comes out in milk, put it in the refrigerator and give a call the next day, and we can get stem cells out. You can freeze them in nitrogen and save them for years and years.”12 These cells hold great promise for use in future therapies.
The Process Cannot Be Justified

Although ESCR is highly publicized as a possible means to put an end to many debilitating diseases, the murder of a human being is not justified. Many less popularized means, such as the ones previously mentioned, have already begun treating and bringing an end to these same diseases, and without the need to destroy human life.

Although everyone wants to see such devastating diseases come to an end, we all must realize our work will only lead to a temporary alleviation. Jesus Christ, the true conqueror of disease and death, will create a new heaven and a new earth where the effects of sin have been removed. That is the cure we eagerly await.

Dr. Georgia Purdom earned her doctorate in molecular genetics from Ohio State University. She spent six years as a professor of biology at Mt. Vernon Nazarene University. Dr. Purdom is also a member of the American Society for Microbiology and American Society for Cell Biology.

Human developement

From the moment of conception, a baby begins to develop. Embryonic stem cell research uses cells from unborn babies, ending the baby’s life. The use of adult stem cells does not end life. (Click to enlarge)
Stem Cells in Baby Teeth?

An encouraging new field of study involves stem cells found in the dental pulp of baby teeth. One U.S. company involved in this research is Babytooth Technologies of Massachusetts founded by three Christians: Jason Bourgeois, John Beaulieu, and Robin Crossman, DVM. Because they believe the Bible’s teaching that life begins at conception, they focus on adult stem cell research. The founders also say that they desire both to make embryonic stem cell research less palatable and to bring glory to God.

Go to www.BabytoothUSA.com for more information on Babytooth Technologies.

To read more about Babytooth Technologies and its founder, see Questions for Robin Crossman, DVM, founder of Babytooth Technologies.
Footnotes

1. pewforum.org/publications/surveys/social-issues-06.pdf Back
2. For a fuller discussion of euthanasia go to www.equip.org/free/DE197-1.htm Back
3. www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/08/20010809-2.html. Back
4. Maitra, Anirban, et al., Genomic alterations in cultured human embryonic stem cells, Nature Genetics 37:1099–1103, 2005. Back
5. www.stemcellresearch.org/facts/treatments.htm Back
6. www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn1826 Back
7. In August 2006, scientists claimed to have harvested ESCs without killing the embryo, but this was later shown not to be the case. Back
8. Silva, J., et al., Nanog promotes transfer of pluripotency after cell fusion, Nature 441:997–1001, 2006. Back
9. Laughlin, Mary, et al., Outcomes after transplantation of cord blood or bone marrow from unrelated donors in adults with leukemia, New England Journal of Medicine 351(22):2265–2275, 2004. Back
10. www.marrow.org/NMDP/cord_blood_bank_list.html Back
11. Miura, Masako, et al., SHED: Stem cells from human exfoliated deciduous teeth, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 100(10):5807–5812, 2003. Back
12. www.christianliferesources.com/?news/view.php&newsid=3788

http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/am/v2/n1/stem-cells

Barack Obama's "Freedom of Choice Act" Would Mean 125K More Abortions

by Matt Bowman
September 24, 2008

LifeNews.com Note: Matt is an attorney with the Alliance Defense Fund, a leading pro-life law firm. This article concerns the so-called Freedom of Choice Act that presidential candidate Barack Obama said he would make signing his first action as president.

With so much attention on the economy, one area of federal legislation that can be overlooked is abortion. An old and dangerous bill that will increase abortions by an enormous amount is being resurrected by abortion advocates: the Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA). H.R. 1964 and S.1173.

FOCA is usually reported as “codifying Roe v. Wade,” but it is much more. Since the Webster and Casey decisions in 1989 and 1992, the Supreme Court has allowed states to limit abortion somewhat by such things as requiring parental involvement and informed consent, prohibiting government funding of most abortion, and more recently outlawing most partial birth abortions.

But FOCA tolerates none of this. Advocates and opponents of FOCA all agree that the bill would nullify every legal limit on abortion, state, federal or otherwise. Americans United for Life, as well as the Family Research Council, explain this fact in great detail. Abortion advocates who want FOCA concur: NOW, NARAL, Planned Parenthood, and FOCA sponsor Senator Barbara Boxer all contend that FOCA will strike down all state pro-life laws.

The shockwaves that FOCA would cause are immense and wide-ranging, but recent research shows one effect in particular. Certain state laws that are doomed under FOCA actually prevent a statistically significant number of abortions. These laws include parental involvement requirements, informed consent laws, and restrictions on government funding of abortions.

Specifically, if FOCA is passed it will increase abortions by 125,000 more per year in the United States. Since 2004, Dr. Michael New has published studies with the Heritage Foundation showing that a large reduction in abortions can be attributed to these three kinds of laws.

Even considering other reduction factors such as change in public opinion, Dr. New’s regression analysis shows that parental involvement laws in a state lead to 0.54 fewer abortions per 1000 women of childbearing age, informed consent laws lead to 0.92 fewer, and state restrictions on Medicaid funding lead to 2.08 fewer.

Both pro-life and pro-abortion organizations tell us which states have these laws in place: 36 states have parental involvement laws, 26 states have informed consent laws, and 34 states have funding restrictions.

The U.S. Census Bureau gives us projections for 2009 of females age 15-44 in each of these states. Then it’s a simple matter of cross-referencing the number of women of childbearing age in each state with each abortion restriction, and applying Dr. New’s ratio. The grand total number of abortions reduced by these laws is 124,947.6, per year.

This is a minimum. FOCA will strike down other laws, state and federal, that reduce abortions, and will force states to facilitate abortions. 125,000 more abortions is only the tip of the FOCA iceberg.

Even with this minimum, that’s 125,000 children that were not killed this year because we have these laws, and 125,000 children (added to the existing 1.3 million abortions) who will be killed in 2009 and every year after if FOCA is passed. FOCA is indeed a staggering expansion of abortion, both in principle and in actual lives lost.

http://www.lifenews.com/nat4359.html

This is the radical 60M voted for! Sickening...
And what does he want to do for his first two things come January? Sign the Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA) which will end all federal and state restrictions on abortion. It will also allow partial birth abortion again and cancel any restrictions on federal funding. The other thing Obama wants to do right away is nix President Bush's bill banning federal funding of embryonic stem cell research. This research kills an embryo after conception! God clearly considers this murder! We can't compromise on these issues! And for those who've studied this issue knows that the promising research is actually coming not from embryonic stem cells but from adult stem cells, cord blood and other cells. Please read the article I will post shortly!

Obama Statement on 35th Anniversary of Roe v. Wade Decision
Chicago, IL | January 22, 2008

Chicago, IL -- Senator Barack Obama today released the following statement on the 35th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision.

"Thirty-five years after the Supreme Court decided Roe v. Wade, it's never been more important to protect a woman's right to choose. Last year, the Supreme Court decided by a vote of 5-4 to uphold the Federal Abortion Ban, and in doing so undermined an important principle of Roe v. Wade: that we must always protect women's health. With one more vacancy on the Supreme Court, we could be looking at a majority hostile to a women's fundamental right to choose for the first time since Roe v. Wade. The next president may be asked to nominate that Supreme Court justice. That is what is at stake in this election.

"Throughout my career, I've been a consistent and strong supporter of reproductive justice, and have consistently had a 100% pro-choice rating with Planned Parenthood and NARAL Pro-Choice America.

"When South Dakota passed a law banning all abortions in a direct effort to have Roe overruled, I was the only candidate for President to raise money to help the citizens of South Dakota repeal that law. When anti-choice protesters blocked the opening of an Illinois Planned Parenthood clinic in a community where affordable health care is in short supply, I was the only candidate for President who spoke out against it. And I will continue to defend this right by passing the Freedom of Choice Act as president.

"Moreover, I believe in and have supported common-sense solutions like increasing access to affordable birth control to help prevent unintended pregnancies. In the Illinois state Senate, when Congress failed to require insurance plans to cover FDA-approved contraceptives, I made sure those contraceptives were covered for women in Illinois. In the U.S. Senate, I've worked with Senator Claire McCaskill (D-MO) on a bill that would make birth control more affordable for low-income and college women, and introduced the Senate version of Representative Hilda Solis' bill to reduce unintended pregnancies in communities of color. As President, I will improve access to affordable health care and work to ensure that our teens are getting the information and services they need to stay safe and healthy.

"But we also know that Roe v. Wade is about more than a woman's right to choose; it's about equality. It's about whether our daughters are going to have the same opportunities as our sons. And so to truly honor that decision, we need to update the social contract so that women can free themselves, and their children, from violent relationships; so that a mom can stay home with a sick child without getting a pink slip; so that she can go to work knowing that there's affordable, quality childcare for her children; and so that the American dream is within reach for every family in this country. This anniversary reminds us that it's not enough to protect the gains of the past – we have to build a future that's filled with hope and possibility for all Americans."

http://www.barackobama.com/2008/01/22/obama_statement_on_35th_annive.php

Here's Teresa Ghilarducci's original briefing paper. We should all probably spend some time reading this so we know what we're up against. The elimination of our 401K as we know it!

http://www.sharedprosperity.org/bp204/bp204.pdf

Here's Teresa Ghilarducci's original briefing paper. Have only skimmed it but it's definitely left-wing writing.

http://www.sharedprosperity.org/bp204/bp204.pdf

Democrats target your 401(k)
Posted: October 27, 2008

Democrats plan to tap your private retirement plan to fund Barack Obama's many promises to expand the power and size of the federal government.

Your pre-tax annual contribution to a 401(k) will be taxed under a plan considered by House Education and Labor Committee Chairman George Miller, D-Calif., and Rep. Jim McDermott, D-Wash., chairman of the House Ways and Means Subcommittee on Income Security and Family Support.

Worse yet, instead of the familiar, tax-deferred plan which typically invests in diversified mutual funds, in turn investing in private companies, these Democrat leaders want to create a new system of mandatory worker-retirement accounts which would invest only in government debt (bonds) and yield 3 percent per year.

In other words, Miller and McDermott want to redirect trillions of dollars of workers' savings from private investments to fund the ballooning government deficit.

In 2008, a typical 401(k) plan (there are many variations) allows an employee to contribute up to $15,500, often matched in whole or part by a corresponding contribution from the employer. Most plans are participant directed, meaning the employee selects from an assortment of mutual funds for diversified investment in stocks, bonds and money market investments.

Of course, this year the best advice financial planners can give you is: Don't even look at that 401(k) earnings statement! The Panic of '08 has crashed stock markets all over the world. More than one-third of the value of all 401(k) accounts has evaporated. It's not much comfort to those thinking of retiring this year or next, but these stock markets will come back. They always have, despite wild fluctuations, the value of stocks overall rises over time.

Democrats Miller and McDermott offer a tantalizing alternative to stock market uncertainty. They would eliminate the annual tax deferral for 401(k) contributions, which reduces federal revenues by about $80 billion per year. Instead, they propose that the federal government pay every worker $600 per year (inflation adjusted each year) and require every worker to invest 5 percent of their after-tax pay into a new retirement account to be administered by the Social Security Administration. The money would be invested in a new class of government bond which would yield 3 percent per year, adjusted for inflation.

This plan was originally proposed by Theresa Ghilarducci, professor of economic policy analysis at the New School for Social Research in New York, and presented to Miller and McDermott last week at a House hearing.

These liberal Democrats thought the plan ingenious. They could take over the largest pool of private savings in the U.S., redirecting some $3 trillion to government spending.

In one move, the hated private market would be deprived of the capital that makes "capitalism" possible, and the government would have the money to fund the massive expansion of government programs, subsidies and tax "cuts" promised by Barack Obama.

And, as with Social Security itself, the government could borrow and spend all the annual proceeds over and above any payout to retirees.

The history of the federal government raiding the Social Security fund provides a warning to anyone seduced by the promise of government guaranteed retirement funds.

In 1967, President Lyndon Johnson promised "guns and butter" (i.e. money to fight the Vietnam War would not be raised by higher taxes on consumers, but by "borrowing" money from Social Security not used that year for retiree payout).

The federal government has borrowed this annual "surplus" every year since. With the number of retirees growing, and the benefits expanded by Congress over the years, this "surplus" turns deficit in a few years – with no accumulated, invested trust fund to pay the retirees. What's left in the fund is the government promise to pay but no money.

Obama has promised to solve this problem by making "rich people" pay more into Social Security while reducing their benefits, transforming a retirement plan into a wealth transfer plan.

The Miller/McDermott plan creates a new government-guaranteed retirement plan to begin the scam all over again.

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=79168

Bob Brinker has been talking about this as has Rush and I'm sure others. We must do all we can to stop this government takeover of our 401K! I'm sure the Obama administration will jump at this idea.

House Democrats contemplate abolishing 401(k) tax breaks
Mandatory contributions from workers considered
By Sara Hansard
October 12, 2008, 6:01 AM EST

Powerful House Democrats are eyeing proposals to overhaul the nation's $3 trillion 401(k) system, including the elimination of most of the $80 billion in annual tax breaks that 401(k) investors receive.

House Education and Labor Committee Chairman George Miller, D-Calif., and Rep. Jim McDermott, D-Wash., chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee's Subcommittee on Income Security and Family Support, are looking at redirecting those tax breaks to a new system of guaranteed retirement accounts to which all workers would be obliged to contribute.

A plan by Teresa Ghilarducci, professor of economic-policy analysis at The New School for Social Research in New York, contains elements that are being considered. She testified last week before Mr. Miller's Education and Labor Committee on her proposal.

George Miller: Looking at redirecting tax breaks to a new system of guaranteed retirement accounts.
At that hearing, the director of the Congressional Budget Office, Peter Orszag, testified that some $2 trillion in retirement savings has been lost over the past 15 months.

Under Ms. Ghilarducci's plan, all workers would receive a $600 annual inflation-adjusted subsidy from the U.S. government but would be required to invest 5% of their pay into a guaranteed retirement account administered by the Social Security Administration. The money in turn would be invested in special government bonds that would pay 3% a year, adjusted for inflation.

The current system of providing tax breaks on 401(k) contributions and earnings would be eliminated.

"I want to stop the federal subsidy of 401(k)s," Ms. Ghilarducci said in an interview. "401(k)s can continue to exist, but they won't have the benefit of the subsidy of the tax break."

Under the current 401(k) system, investors are charged relatively high retail fees, Ms. Ghilarducci said.

"I want to spend our nation's dollar for retirement security better. Everybody would now be covered" if the plan were adopted, Ms. Ghilarducci said.

She has been in contact with Mr. Miller and Mr. McDermott about her plan, and they are interested in pursuing it, she said.

"This [plan] certainly is intriguing," said Mike DeCesare, press secretary for Mr. McDermott.

"That is part of the discussion," he said.

While Mr. Miller stopped short of calling for Ms. Ghilarducci's plan at the hearing last week, he was clearly against continuing tax breaks as they currently exist.

John Belluardo: "If the tax deferral goes away, the employers have no reason to do the matches, which primarily help people in the lower income brackets."
"The savings rate isn't going up for the investment of $80 billion," he said. "We have to start to think about ... whether or not we want to continue to invest that $80 billion for a policy that's not generating what we now say it should."

"From where I sit that's just crazy," said John Belluardo, president of Stewardship Financial Services Inc. in Tarrytown, N.Y. "A lot of people contribute to their 401(k)s because of the match of the employer," he said Mr. Belluardo's firm does not manage assets directly.

Higher-income employers provide matching funds to employee plans so that they can qualify for tax benefits for their own defined contribution plans, he said.

"If the tax deferral goes away, the employers have no reason to do the matches, which primarily help people in the lower income brackets," Mr. Belluardo said.

"This is a battle between liberalism and conservatism," said Christopher Van Slyke, a partner in the La Jolla, Calif., advisory firm Trovena LLC, which manages $400 million. "People are afraid because their accounts are seeing some volatility, so Democrats will seize on the opportunity to attack a program where investors control their own destiny," he said.

The Profit Sharing/ 401(k) Council of America in Chicago, which represents employers that sponsor defined contribution plans, is "staunchly committed to keeping the employee benefit system in American voluntary," said Ed Ferrigno, vice president in the Washington office.

"Some of the tenor [of the hearing last week] that the entire system should be based on the activities of the markets in the last 90 days is not the way to judge the system," he said.

No legislative proposals have been introduced and Congress is out of session until next year.

However, most political observers believe that Democrats are poised to gain seats in both the House and the Senate, so comments made by the mostly Democratic members who attended the hearing could be a harbinger of things to come.

In addition to tax breaks for 401(k)s, the issue of allowing investment advisers to provide advice for 401(k) plans was also addressed at the hearing.

Rep. Robert Andrews, D-N.J., was critical of Department of Labor proposals made in August that would allow advisers to give individual advice if the advice was generated using a computer model.

Mr. Andrews characterized the proposals as "loopholes" and said that investment advice should not be given by advisers who have a direct interest in the sale of financial products.

The Pension Protection Act of 2006 contains provisions making it easier for investment advisers to give individualized counseling to 401(k) holders.

"In retrospect that doesn't seem like such a good idea to me," Mr. Andrews said. "This is an issue I think we have to revisit. I frankly think that the compromise we struck in 2006 is not terribly workable or wise," he said.

Last Thursday, the Department of Labor hastily scheduled a public hearing on the issue in Washington for Oct. 21.

The agency does not frequently hold public hearings on its proposals.

E-mail Sara Hansard at shansard@investmentnews.com.

http://www.investmentnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081012/REG/310139971

Sick and sad!

'Thy kingdom come' through Obama
President-elect's headquarters declare, 'To God be the glory' for victory
Posted: November 06, 2008
11:05 pm Eastern

By Chelsea Schilling

Obama's campaign headquarters in Lake City, Fla., has posted a victory sign in its window stating, "To God be the glory. Great things he has done. Obama. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done."



Prominently displayed poster at Obama's campaign headquarters in Lake City, Fla. (Photo: Bruce Hoster)

The sign, prominently posted in the front window, is visible from the street. As WND reported, some of Obama's supporters have regarded him as a Messiah figure, heralding a new age.

Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, a powerful Chicago-based political figure associated with the Rev. Jeremiah Wright and other long-time associates of Obama, told a crowd in February the Illinois Democrat's rise to power is a sign the Messiah is coming soon.

"You are the instruments that God is going to use to bring about universal change, and that is why Barack has captured the youth," Farrakhan said. "And he has involved young people in a political process that they didn't care anything about. That's a sign. When the Messiah speaks, the youth will hear, and the Messiah is absolutely speaking.

"Brothers and sisters," the Nation of Islam leader said, "Barack Obama to me, is a herald of the Messiah. Barack Obama is like the trumpet that alerts you something new, something better is on the way."

WND also previously reported a website called " Is Barack Obama the Messiah?" captured the wave of euphoria that followed the senator's remarkable rise.

The website is topped by an Obama quote strategically ripped from a Jan. 7 speech at Dartmouth College just before the New Hampshire Primary in which he told students, "… a light will shine through that window, a beam of light will come down upon you, you will experience an epiphany, and you will suddenly realize that you must go to the polls and vote for Obama."

WND also reported talk-radio host Rush Limbaugh criticized Democrats who compared Obama to Jesus and Gov. Sarah Palin to Pontius Pilate.

"I know Jesus Christ. I pray to Jesus Christ all the time," said Limbaugh." I study what Jesus Christ did and said all the time, and let me tell you something, Barack Obama, you are no Jesus Christ."

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=80294

This can not be allowed to happen again. Reagan ended this and talk radio took off. This will say everything we need to know (as if we don't already) about Obama and the left-wingers in Congress.

Obama to appoint talk radio's executioner?
Expected FCC transition chief served during 'Fairness Doctrine' days
Posted: November 08, 2008
1:00 am Eastern

Democrat Henry Rivera, a former commissioner of the Federal Communications Commission, is expected to head President-elect Barack Obama's FCC transition team, a move that has sparked fear in media circles that the Fairness Doctrine may return to silence conservative talk radio.

If reenacted, the "Fairness Doctrine" would require broadcasts over the public airwaves to give equal time to opposing political views. For talk radio, which boomed after the law's repeal in 1987 by building an audience devoted to conservative talk, the law's return would decimate the industry's marketability.

Many fear the "Fairness Doctrine" would drive talk radio hosts – like Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Michael Savage – out of business.

Brian Maloney of the blog The Radio Equalizer said in his post, "Meet Talk's Executioner," he believes Rivera will use his position to bring back the law for that very purpose.

Rivera, according to Maloney, "is expected to lead the push to dismantle commercial talk radio that is favored by a number of Democratic Party senators. Rivera will play a pivotal role in preventing critics from having a public voice during Obama's tenure in office."

(Story continues below)




Rivera served on the five-member FCC from 1981 to 1985 under Republican chairman Mark Fowler. He is now a partner at the Wiley Rein law firm, the same firm current FCC chairman Kevin Martin worked at prior to his appointment to the FCC.

Rivera resigned from the FCC in 1985. The remainder of his term was served by President Reagan appointee Patricia Diaz Dennis, who opposed the Fairness Doctrine. The law was then repealed in 1987 after the FCC admitted it "had the net effect of reducing rather than enhancing the discussion of controversial issues of public importance."

Rivera himself has not confirmed his selection as Obama's FCC transition team chief, first reported by Multichannel News.

"The only thing I can tell you is that there will be a release of the folks involved in that," Rivera told the News. "I just can't comment on anything. They told us not to talk to the press."

Rivera also declined to answer WND's request for his position on reinstating the Fairness Doctrine.

Obama's position on the law also remains unclear.

"Sen. Obama does not support reimposing the Fairness Doctrine on broadcasters," campaign press secretary Michael Ortiz told Broadcasting & Cable earlier this year. "He considers this debate to be a distraction from the conversation we should be having about opening up the airwaves and modern communications to as many diverse viewpoints as possible."

As WND reported, ATI-News President Brad O'Leary examined Obama's legal and organizational attempts to silence media detractors during the presidential race and came to a different conclusion.

"Barack Obama has shown a stunning lack of tolerance for free speech throughout the course of this campaign," said O'Leary. "His presidency, combined with supermajorities for Democrats in Congress, would almost certainly bring back the so-called 'Fairness Doctrine' and allow the Democrats to snuff out any broadcasters with whom they disagree."

Democrats in Congress have been more definitive in advocating the "Fairness Doctrine."

In June, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., affirmed her support to Human Events reporter John Gizzi.

Speaking on Albuquerque station KKOB, Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., told host Jim Villanucci, "I would want this station and all stations to have to present a balanced perspective and different points of view, instead of always hammering away at one side of the political [spectrum]."

Bingaman said, "For many, many years, we operated under a Fairness Doctrine in this country. I think the country was well-served. I think the public discussion was at a higher level and more intelligent in those days than it has become since."

Rush Limbaugh, the most-listened to radio host in American history, however, blasted Bingaman's comment that there were "a lot of talk stations" before 1987.

"A 125 radio stations talking about carrot cake recipes for the holidays," Limbaugh said. "Senator Bingaman, do you know how many talk-radio stations there are in America today? Try over 2,000 since the Fairness Doctrine was lifted, and on those 2,000 radio stations are countless points of view, from the extreme communist left to the wacko whatever it is way out on the fringe right. They're all over the place."

Republican Rep. Mike Pence of Indiana has opposed to the Fairness Doctrine by introducing the Broadcasters Freedom Act, arguing that lifting the restrictive law has "opened the public airwaves to free and vigorous discussion of controversial issues by individuals of all political stripes."

"Bringing back the Fairness Doctrine would amount to government control over political views expressed on the public airwaves," Pence said. "It is a dangerous proposal to suggest the government should be in the business of rationing free speech."

Pence, a former broadcaster, said his Broadcasters Freedom Act would ensure that "true freedom and fairness will remain on our radio airwaves."

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=80424

More on Obama and whether he is even a U.S. Citizen.

No retreat

Election 2008: Conservative reaction to the GOP’s defeat | The Editors

In the hours before and after results were in, WORLD writers around the country spoke with a variety of leading conservative political and religious minds, asking for reaction to Barack Obama's victory but also seeking answers to this question: What should conservative Christians focus on politically over the next four years?

(Editor's Note: What follows are the full comments of these conservative political and religious leaders, expanding upon what appeared in the print edition of the magazine.)

Robert George, Princeton professor of jurisprudence, specialist on constitutional law and political philosophy

"The idea that we would retreat into churches or into insular communities and abandon our responsibilities as citizens is a daft and dangerous idea. There's no way that Christian families can insulate themselves from the culture. … There's no retreating to a corner. … Culture shapes conduct. Law shapes culture.

"Of course the central human right of our domestic politics is the question of abortion and embryo destructive research and the right to life of the unborn child. There's no turning away from that. ... The second issue is the issue of marriage and family. This must remain central and we must redouble our efforts across the country at both a state and a national level to protect the institution of marriage.

"The best thing we can do to fight poverty in this country—not the only thing, but the best thing we can do—is rebuild the institution of marriage and the family.

"We need to encourage people to be citizen-statesmen, that is citizens—not professional politicians—who are prepared, often at great cost to themselves, to stand for public office. ... More people, who share our convictions, need to be willing to take up the burden of running for office. We need more activism. We need more love-inspired action in supporting the candidates who will stand for the sanctity of human life and the institution of marriage.

"We need to be more generous about contributing money to the pro-life and pro-marriage cause. ... The side that's prepared to give more is the side that wins."

Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission

"I think [Republicans] have to go back to their core principles. And I think they have to try to make a better argument. I had someone ask me the other day, 'What's going to happen if Obama wins?' And I said, 'The sun will come up in the morning, and it will go down at night.'

"Let's remember that if Jimmy Carter hadn't won over Gerald Ford, we would never have had Ronald Reagan. If Bill Clinton hadn't won, we would never have had the Contract with America and the Republican ascendancy in Congress, which led to the balanced budget that Bill Clinton takes credit for. You never know what the consequences are going to be."

Larry Schweikart, professor of History, University of Dayton, Ohio

"Conservative Christians must focus on … wealth redistribution. This is fundamentally unscriptural and unbiblical. We are commanded to give on a personal, voluntary basis, not to allow Caesar to take more than what is his. This is where the ‘values voters’ and the ‘fiscal conservatives’ can work to rebuild the Reagan coalition. Wealth confiscation is fundamentally sinful, whatever the reason for doing so. But it will require some of the conservative Christians to subordinate [the issue of] abortion … to issues that can bring us together, and which can provide a power base so that, once again, a government could take action on abortion. George Bush [signing] the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act was the final step of a program Ronald Reagan started in 1980—but it took 20 years to achieve, and it was not Reagan's first political priority.

"The first mistake [conservatives made] is a mundane, ‘inside baseball’ error. Namely, we were told for eight years of Karl Rove that ‘If Republicans turn out, they can't lose.’ … Well, that's not true. We need to realize that Republicans—hence, conservatives as a subgroup—are a minority, or close to it, in states they once dominated: Nevada, Virginia, Ohio, Missouri, and Florida. So the first thing you have to do is figure out who ‘your people’ are—who can you absolutely rely on to vote with you in an election.

"Second—and John McCain is a classic example of this—a conservative can never out-give a liberal. Whatever you promise, they'll promise double and not feel guilty about providing it. Conservatives need to return to the conservative message of small government, low taxes, local control, sanctity of life, and free markets. The minute John McCain came out in favor of the bailout bill, he was political toast. This is the kind of thing that plays into the ‘feels your pain’ answers to pollsters. Americans did not want big banks bailed out, and it becomes impossible to talk about the virtues of the free market if you don't ever allow the big shots to feel the pain of the free market when they mess up."

U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla.

"What we’ve had is eight years of Republicans not doing what they said they would do and consequently discouraging the heck out of everybody. It’s political expediency abandoning conservative values. The party has to have a change in the people who are representing it. If it doesn’t, it will die and another party will come along."

Robert Spencer, director of JihadWatch

"Conservative Christians should emphasize politically their commitment to and defense of constitutional principles, particularly as challenges to the freedom of speech and the principle of the equality of rights of all people before the law continue to increase. Muslim brotherhood-linked groups in America are certain to step up their campaign to have any examination of how Islamic jihadists use Islamic texts and teachings to justify violence and supremacism classified as ‘hate speech’ and criminalized. They are also certain to continue their stealth jihad campaign to win special accommodations and privileges for Muslims from American businesses, schools, and institutions, as part of their larger effort to—in the words of a brotherhood document revealed last year—eliminate and destroy Western civilization, ‘so that Allah's religion is made victorious over other religions.’ Christian conservatives, as among the few who generally recognize the nature and magnitude of this Islamic supremacist threat, need to be prepared to stand at the vanguard of resistance to these jihadist efforts.

"The election of Obama will bring renewed challenges to the freedom of speech, which the Organization of the Islamic Conference is already challenging at the U.N. Christian conservatives and all free citizens will need to raise awareness among Americans of what's at stake, and try to head off any attempt by the new president to build bridges with the Islamic world by enacting ‘hate speech’ codes that compromise this constitutional right."

Former U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa.

"I happen to believe that truth doesn't change because the American public decides to elect a different group of people with a different philosophy. The idea of principled conservatism and Christian conservatism is a standard that has stood the test of time and will stand the test of time. We should not walk away from policies that we know are beneficial to mankind and to America as a society because we have either poorly implemented our own philosophy or poorly communicated those philosophies.

"I don't think the things that have occurred happened in a vacuum. They occurred because we did not implement our governing philosophy and did not communicate our philosophy.

"If we did articulate those principles in a way that was persuasive, then we will be successful again, because America will try something that doesn't work and then come back to something that does.

"I think we do need to recognize that we lost our way on some things, in particular at home and in the economy, in the way we got wrapped up in the idea that government can solve problems instead of looking for ways to facilitate the private sector to do so.

"We have to look back at how we govern from the standpoint of domestic policy. We have failed on the domestic policy, particularly in not implementing our vision. From a broader perspective we have failed on the standpoint of communication.

"On social policy, to me, the policies aren't going to change. We have implemented very little. We are treading water in the culture right now, in a culture that is getting much more polluted and noxious to swim in."

Wendy Wright, president of Concerned 
Women for America

"Barack Obama was like a blank screen and people projected their own beliefs onto him, so I think his challenge now is how he is going to govern. Of those who voted for him, liberals saw themselves in him, moderates heard themselves in him, and some conservatives hoped that he'd believe like them. … We're going to have to fight for every pro-life protection that we have gained in the last 35 years. … We hope that he will honor the decisions of the majority of Americans when it comes to protecting marriage, especially when it comes to helping this next generation of children who deserve a mother and a father.

"We're going to need grassroots activists to be more involved than they ever have before when it comes to the issues Christians care about, especially judges. Even now, before the new president and new Congress are sworn in, people could be reaching out to their representatives, especially if they are new representatives … and congratulating them in their victories but also making very clear that we hope that they will honor the desires of the majority of Americans who overwhelmingly support regulations on abortion, protection for marriage, and judges who rule according to the Constitution and not their whims.

"The left has been unusually successful in demonizing our rising stars. We saw this most blatantly when it came to judges, when President Bush appointed really solid candidates for the federal bench and the left threw all kinds of spurious and untruthful accusations against them. We need to learn how to defend and stand up for good men and women who are in public office or would be in public office.

"The left has had a strategy of picking off rising conservative stars and not just fighting their current position or nomination but destroying the candidates’ reputations, to try to keep them from future positions. And we've got to learn how to protect good people better."

Mark DeMoss, public relations executive

"I'm still amazed and somewhat disappointed at the number of evangelical voters, including many in leadership positions, who are really quite uninformed about candidates and the process. I think that's a terrible mistake to approach something this important uninformed. People will say they're for this candidate or they like this candidate, and if you ask them why, many times the best answer they can give is that they're Christian or they love the Lord or they share my values. And you ask them which values, and they don't know. We ought to be informed. And particularly in a day and age when it is so easy to get informed.

"To a large degree, [evangelicals] have not realized the importance of money in elections. … If we're serious about electing Candidate X or Candidate Y, we've got to not only speak out for these candidates and talk them up, we have to give them money. A pastor stands up and promotes a missions campaign or a new building campaign, and he asks people to give money and support it because it takes money. We stand up and say that we need to elect a candidate who will represent our values, but we don't give them money. … If Christians wanted Mike Huckabee, for example, as the Republican nominee, they should have given him money. And I think we just ignore this too often. We think our job is to talk and promote and invite candidates to our churches, but somehow we're exempt from putting money down.

"No candidate is perfect and no candidate is all bad, in my opinion. To be more specific, I would say, for religious conservatives, John McCain is not our savior and Barack Obama is not the antichrist. Too often we look at things completely black and white, and suggest that the candidate we're supporting can do no wrong, and the other candidate can do nothing right or say anything right. And that's just not true anywhere in life. I think we lose credibility when we suggest we're perfect and you're evil. I think we lose a platform for influence. I think that's a terrible mistake.

"Governing the United States of America encompasses so much more than two or three so-called social issues.

"I would emphasize a positive vision for America rather than a divisive attack on Barack Obama. I think if Obama wins it will be in large part because he ran arguably the most positive, uplifting, energetic campaign in modern history. I think evangelicals of all people ought to be able to speak the truth in love, and to be respectful and kind and courteous, and it's possible to be all those things without compromising your beliefs.

"I would really like to see evangelicals begin to or continue encouraging people of faith to look for and support candidates who share their values, whether or not they share your theology or faith. And I think we made some progress on that front this year, but I don't think we made enough. I think we still have too many evangelicals choosing candidates on the basis of their faith rather than on the basis of their values and their competence and qualifications and experience to serve.

"Evangelical Christians ought to be the thought leaders, not the flame-throwers. We ought to make compelling arguments and do it respectfully. We ought to be attractive to other people who look at us, and I don't see enough of that."

Tony Evans, senior pastor, Oak Cliff Bible Fellowship, Dallas, Texas

"Relevancy. You have to show where your belief system is relevant to the perspectives, needs, hopes, dreams of the people. Without compromising standards, you have to be relevant. Conservatives have often been too disconnected from where people really are and that showed up in the economic crisis. The masses did not feel that the conservative approach was relevant to where the average person is. It didn't relate to their kitchen table talk.

"Conservatives can often be ethereal and irrelevant. We must show how our biblical worldview is also a relevant worldview, and that it speaks to what people are dealing with here and now. That means making sure that we're giving them answers for their particular situations, not solutions so broad that they are simply ‘making America a better place.’ Barack Obama made people on the lower levels feel like they mattered and that their pain was worth making a big deal about. Even if his [policy ideas] weren't the best strategy, they appealed to people on a personal level.

"When Ronald Reagan asked, ‘Are you better off today than you were four years ago?’ it was a global question, but it required an individual answer. For most people the answer was no, therefore Reagan swept into office.

"When he first ran for president, George W. Bush's faith-based initiative was a big deal. It made the issue [of compassion] practical. Bush said, ‘Let's respond to these faith-based organizations who are doing good works across the nation.’ It localized the issue in terms of people helping people in need.

"Moral issues need to be heralded so that they are viewed as important. We need to lift those issues up so that they are not seen as peripheral issues, but as central to the well-being of the nation. That's a big order, and it can't be done independently of other issues, such as economic need."

Karl Zinsmeister, White House domestic policy adviser

"True Story: On my way in to after the election, I was cycling down Pennsylvania Avenue at dawn. Just as I passed the National Gallery of Art I heard a thud to my left. I looked over, and was astonished to see a big, strong red-tailed hawk, which had pounced on a rat in the bushes. Quite apart from the beauty and thrill of seeing a wild predator hunting right in the heart of Washington, I found it a very comforting symbol of how the natural order goes on—unruffled, adaptable, persistent, and permanent. Men come and go, but always there are longer-term forces that drive forward, that cannot be suppressed, that accomplish unexpected things with a motive force beyond human orchestration."

U.S. Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan.

"We've got to get back to being more of who we are rather than less. By that, I think of being both pro-life and whole-life. We really have to emphasize that all life is sacred at all stages. We have to emphasize the whole-life side—issues of poverty, prison reform, human rights, immigration—to attract people in a compassionate way. We have to go back to dealing with tough problems to show the country that we believe life is sacred and then proving that by those actions.

"We have to take our faith fully into the public square and when we're debating, it's got to be in truth and love. If that's not evident, our words either come across as tinny or empty.

"I think it will be a good soul-searching time period. I think there should be some real experimentation at the state level on our core philosophical issues. We need to be a loyal opposition.

"It really is a historic election and I'm pleased from that standpoint that the racial barrier has been broken through. I hope our policy differences don't take away from the history-making aspect of this election."

Zuhdi Jasser, founder of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy

"The conservative movement needs to recalibrate itself as to what are the ideas that we stand for and look at what has happened to our branding, because somewhere we seem to have lost the ideas of freedom and liberty. Part of what made Reagan effective was that he called a spade a spade; he called the Soviets an evil empire and had a clear policy with how we dealt with the Cold War and the ideology of communism and socialism. Now, we too often let go of the righteousness of the ideas of freedom and liberty in exchange for short-term compromise. As a result, we fall into the same dilemmas of moral equivalency as the left. Voters turn off when they realize the inconsistency there."

http://www.worldmag.com/articles/14663

Nice work jdsgungho! I wonder if we are working with them on terminal financing? There must be something to these nearly 12M in buys in less than 3 months.