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If you'll check history a bit...
I think you'll find the concluding statement in your post...
Yet the bottom line is simply that you cannot legislate an end to ignorance, prejudice and bigotry, and that's the problem with the Hate Crimes Act. All legislation will do is punish actions and sweep in more innocent people. But it won't change hearts and minds--and that's where you have to start in combating hatred and bigotry.
...re-states the Klan's position re; anti-racism statutes in the 50's.
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Right wing idiots
Christian Attorneys Urge Senate to Vote Against 'Hate Crimes' Bill
By Aaron J. Leichman
Fri, May. 01 2009
Attorneys at a Christian legal group are urging the U.S. Senate not to pass the expanded “Hate Crimes” bill, which the House this week voted 249-175 in favor of. The attorneys at the Alliance Defense Fund insist that the bill, H.R. 1913, could severely impede Americans’ constitutional rights to freedom of religion and freedom of expression while creating additional legal protections for those engaged in homosexual behavior that are not available to everyone else.
If made into law, the bill would add violence against individuals based on sexual orientation, gender, gender identity or disability to the list of federal hate crimes. Current federal law only covers crimes committed on the basis of race, religion, ethnicity or national origin. “All violent crimes are hate crimes, and all crime victims deserve equal justice,” said ADF Senior Counsel Kevin Theriot in a released statement. “So-called ‘hate crime’ laws actually serve only one purpose: The criminalization of citizens based on whatever thoughts, beliefs, and emotions they have that are not considered to be ‘politically correct.’ No one should fall for the idea that this bill does anything to bring about greater justice for Americans.”
Last week, ADF attorneys had delivered a letter to the House Judiciary Committee, urging it to reject the bill. In it, the attorneys shared how similar efforts to “impose upon sincere people of faith a ‘political orthodoxy’” have already led to fines, arrests, and prosecution in states with similar legislation. One small photography company in New Mexico, for example, had been fined by that state’s human rights commission for refusing to photograph a civil union “commitment ceremony.” In another example, a group of Christians in Philadelphia that protested at an “Outfest” in 2005 was arrested and charged under Pennsylvania’s hate crimes laws with “ethnic intimidation,” “riot,” and “conspiracy.”
“Although the charges were ultimately dismissed (with Alliance Defense Fund assistance), they nevertheless had to go through the ordeal of arrest and prosecution,” the attorneys noted. “Simply being required to undergo a criminal defense in such circumstances can lead to a chill and censorship of legitimate free speech and free exercise of religion activities,” they added. ADF and other opponents of the bill see its passage as one step on “a slippery slope toward religious persecution.” “Similar laws in this country that elevate ‘sexual orientation’ and/or ‘gender identity’ to a protected status are being used to silence and punish those who oppose homosexual behavior on legitimate moral and religious grounds,” ADF attorneys argued.
Supporters of the bill, however, say the bill is necessary, noting that hate crimes against sexual orientation are the third most frequent, behind race and religion and ahead of ethnicity or national origin. “I would think that the followers of Jesus would be first in line to protect any group from hate crimes,” commented Dr. Joel C. Hunter, senior pastor of Northland - A Church Distributed in Florida and a member of President Obama’s advisory council for faith-based and community initiatives. “This bill protects both the rights of conservative religious people to voice passionately their interpretations of their scriptures and protects their fellow citizens from physical attack,” Hunter continued. “I strongly endorse this bill.”
At the present moment, all states except five – Arkansas, Georgia, Indiana, South Carolina and Wyoming – have hate crime laws, according to the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights. Before the House vote on Wednesday, President had urged both sides of the House to pass the legislation “that will enhance civil rights protections, while also protecting our freedom of speech and association.” He later urged the Senate to work with his administration to “finalize this bill and to take swift action.”
http://www.christianpost.com/Society/Homosexuality/2009/05/christian-attorneys-urge-senate-to-vote-against-hate-crimes-bill-01/
Arab forum tackles a Washington taboo
Tim Sebastian – Fri May 1, 5:00 am ET
This story began – as so many do – with a lunch. While attending a conference in 2004 in the tiny Gulf state of Qatar, I was invited to break bread with the ruler, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, and his wife, Sheikha Mozah. As a bewildering array of courses came and went, the royal couple talked of their vision for reform and openness and asked me if I had any suggestions. It was the start of a journey, now entering its sixth year, that led to the formation of the first global free speech forum in the Middle East – The Doha Debates – and last month to a highly controversial session in Washington.
My suggestion to Qatar's ruler was to stage a series of town hall debates in the country, get people arguing without fear of censorship or repercussions and tackle the hottest political topics in the Arab and Islamic worlds. The key condition was that my team would retain full editorial independence – with no interference of any kind from the state. Half a decade later, that condition has been respected in full. Moreover, hundreds of young Arabs from across the region have talked publicly and for the first time in their lives about such issues as war, extremism, Arab disunity, and human rights.
They have embraced the concept that words are the only acceptable weapons in a civilized society; they have formed their own debating teams and come to our events, ready to challenge the likes of Shimon Peres, Bill Clinton, and senior Hamas official Mahmoud Al Zahar. It may be a cliché in the West to talk of debates as the court of public opinion. But it's not a cliché in the Arab world, where free speech is the rarest of all commodities – and where there is simply no other possibility of holding key political figures and thought leaders to account. Never mind if those speakers tell the truth or lie their heads off – at least they are forced to listen to the public's criticism and obliged to justify their positions.
If you can stage debates like that in the Middle East, you'd have thought it would be easy to do the same in the US. You'd have thought wrong.
"Why would we write you a blank check to come to our campus and say whatever you want?" asked one prominent – and incredulous – East Coast academic.
"Why would I accept less freedom than I get in Qatar?" I replied.
It was a telling start to a struggle over free speech in America that I simply never had expected. Few observers felt we would survive Washington. Media colleagues and PR experts told us well before we arrived that they scented blood – ours – and that after our debate March 25 at Georgetown University, we would be hammered by lobbyists, pundits, and hostile hacks. Whichever way it went, they said, our reputation was finished. The direct cause of our predicted demise was nothing more than my insistence on debating Israel's relationship with the US in a city that quakes at the slightest prospect of upsetting Jerusalem or criticizing its actions in public.
We didn't set out to upset anyone. But we did debate the robust motion "that this house believes it's time for the US administration to get tough on Israel," in the belief that it would air opinions, not often heard in the US, and provoke a timely discussion of the Obama administration's approach to the region. As it happened, we came, we debated – and lo and behold – not a single dog even snarled at us! No sign, either, of the much-vaunted Jewish lobby, apparently poised to strike at anyone who dared question Israel's peace-loving credentials.
I won't pretend that all our participants enjoyed the event. The motion's opponents, Harvard law Prof. Alan Dershowitz and former Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations Dore Gold, lost graciously enough to the other side, Michael Scheuer, who had hunted Osama bin Laden for the Central Intelligence Agency, and Avraham Burg, former speaker of the Israeli Knesset. But at times the evening must have seemed to them a like a rough session at the dentist: a lot of painful scraping, probing, and drilling.
We do that eight times a year in that roughest of neighborhoods, the Middle East, without any threat of being savaged by anyone. And now we have done it in a highly charged Washington – and got away with it. I was surprised to learn that freedom of this kind is considered such a risky proposition – or "blank check" in the US. But unlike most other checks these days, this one really does pay dividends. Keep writing them, America.
Tim Sebastian, an author and award-winning television journalist, is the chairman of the Doha Debates.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/csm/ysebastianweb
10 Gadgets That Can Protect You From The Swine Flu Pandemic
http://gizmodo.com/5235782/10-gadgets-that-can-protect-you-from-the-swine-flu-pandemic?skyline=true&s=x
Enjoy!
'Truth' no longer valid in school...
High school teacher found guilty of insulting Christians
By SCOTT MARTINDALE
Friday, May 1, 2009
SANTA ANA – A Mission Viejo high school history teacher violated the First Amendment by disparaging Christians during a classroom lecture, a federal judge ruled today. James Corbett, a 20-year teacher at Capistrano Valley High School, was found guilty of referring to Creationism as “religious, superstitious nonsense” during a 2007 classroom lecture, denigrating his former Advanced Placement European history student, Chad Farnan.
The decision is the culmination of a 16-month legal battle between Corbett and Farnan – a conflict the judge said should remind teachers of their legal “boundaries” as public school employees. "Corbett states an unequivocal belief that Creationism is 'superstitious nonsense,'" U.S. District Court Judge James Selna said in a 37-page ruling released from his Santa Ana courtroom. "The court cannot discern a legitimate secular purpose in this statement, even when considered in context."
In a December 2007 lawsuit, Farnan, then a sophomore, accused Corbett of repeatedly promoting hostility toward Christians in class and advocating "irreligion over religion" in violation of the First Amendment's establishment clause. The establishment clause prohibits the government from making any law "respecting an establishment of religion" and has been interpreted by U.S. courts to also prohibit government employees from displaying religious hostility.
"We are thrilled with the judge's ruling and feel it sets great precedent," said Farnan's attorney, Jennifer Monk, who works for the Christian legal group Advocates for Faith & Freedom in Murrieta. "Hopefully, teachers in the future, including Dr. Corbett, will think about what they're saying and attempt to ensure they're not violating the establishment clause as Dr. Corbett has done." Chad Farnan and his parents did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment, but released a prepared statement through their attorney: "We are proud of Chad's courageous stand and thrilled with the judge's ruling. It is a vindication of his constitutional rights."
Fees, injunction to be determined
Farnan's original lawsuit asked for damages and attorney's fees. These issues – plus a possible court injunction prohibiting Corbett from making hostile remarks about religion – will be considered in court at a future, undetermined date, Monk said. Advocates for Faith & Freedom does not have an estimate yet of the legal fees the group incurred, she added. Selna said that although Corbett was only found guilty of violating the establishment clause in a single instance, he could not excuse or overlook the behavior. "To entertain an exception for conduct that might be characterized as isolated or de minimis undermines the basic right in issue: to be free of a government that directly expresses disapproval of religion," Selna said.
Farnan's lawsuit had cited more than 20 inflammatory statements attributed to Corbett, including "Conservatives don't want women to avoid pregnancies – that's interfering with God's work" and "When you pray for divine intervention, you're hoping that the spaghetti monster will help you get what you want." In an April 3 tentative ruling, however, Selna dismissed all but two of the statements as either not directly referring to religion or as being appropriate in the context of a class lecture, including the headline-grabbing "When you put on your Jesus glasses, you can't see the truth." "We're happy that the court saw 99.9 percent of the case our way, but we're disappointed obviously with regard to finding against Dr. Corbett on that one statement," said Corbett's attorney, Dan Spradlin. Corbett, who has declined all requests to be interviewed about the lawsuit, did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment.
Lemon test applied to statements
Selna applied a three-pronged legal analysis known as the Lemon test to determine whether the establishment clause had been violated. The Lemon test, developed during a 1971 federal court case, asks whether a statement has a secular purpose, whether it advances or inhibits religion as its principal or primary effect, and whether it fosters an "excessive government entanglement" with religion. Corbett made his "superstitious nonsense" remark during a class discussion about a 1993 court case in which former Capistrano Valley High science teacher John Peloza sued the Capistrano Unified School District, challenging its requirement that Peloza teach evolution.
Corbett's attorney said Corbett simply expressing his personal opinion that Peloza shouldn't have presented religious views to students. Selna, after reviewing an audio-taped recording of the discussion, decided that wasn't the case and that Corbett crossed a legal line. For the other disputed statement – in which Corbett was accused of saying religion was "invented when the first con man met the first fool" – the judge ruled in Corbett's favor, arguing Corbett may have been simply attempting to quote American author Mark Twain. Corbett's full statement was, "What was it Mark Twain said? 'Religion was invented when the first con man met the first fool.'"
The Capistrano Unified School District, which paid for Corbett's attorney, was found not liable for Corbett's classroom conduct. Corbett remains in his teaching position at Capistrano Valley High. Farnan, who dropped out of Corbett's class after filing the lawsuit, is now a junior at the school. "The court's ruling today reflects the constitutionally permissible need for expansive discussion even if a given topic may be offensive to a particular religion or if a particular religion takes one side of a historical debate," Selna said in his written decision. "The decision also reflects that there are boundaries. … The ruling today protects Farnan, but also protects teachers like Corbett in carrying out their teaching duties."
http://www.ocregister.com/articles/corbett-religion-court-2387684-farnan-selna
R.I. legislators losing secondary revenue source...
R.I. Senate panel OKs bill outlawing indoor prostitution
03:14 PM EDT on Friday, May 1, 2009
By Lynn Arditi
PROVIDENCE — The House Judiciary Committee on Thursday evening swiftly approved a bill to criminalize prostitution that occurs indoors, with a full vote on the House floor expected as early as next week. The bill, which the committee approved in an 8-to-4 vote, with 3 members absent, seeks to rewrite a nearly 30-year-old law that outlaws streetwalkers and soliciting for prostitution outdoors, but has no prohibition against prostitution that occurs indoors.
Rhode Island is the only state, except for certain counties in Nevada, that has no prohibition against indoor prostitution. “Why should Rhode Island have this dubious distinction?” Rep. Joanne M. Giannini, D-Providence, who introduced the bill, said after the vote. “Rape behind closed doors, is that permissible? Is murder permissible if it’s done behind closed doors?” Supporters of the bill include state and local police, who say that it’s needed to investigate and prosecute cases where prostitutes may be coerced or forced into prostitution, generally defined as human trafficking. (A separate bill also introduced by Giannini to strengthen the state’s law against human trafficking has yet to come up for a vote.)
Opponents of the bill generally fall into two categories: those such as the American Civil Liberties Union, which opposes what it views as an intrusion into peoples’ privacy, and those such as members of Brown University Students Against Human Trafficking, who say that criminalizing indoor prostitution will mean prosecuting prostitutes, who they view as victims. (The Rhode Island Coalition Against Human Trafficking has lobbied in favor of the bill to strengthen the laws against human trafficking, but has taken no position on the prostitution bill.)
The amended version of the prostitution bill (H-5044 Sub A) approved Thursday includes a provision designed to protect victims of sex trafficking from being prosecuted by including an exemption for women who were “forced” into prostitution. In addition to being threatened, restrained or physically harmed, the bill states that force can include someone whose passport, immigration papers or other identification documents are confiscated, concealed or destroyed. “The bill gives the prostitute all of the outs,” Rep. Peter F. Martin said after the vote. “The prostitute can plead coercion … but the person procuring the services gets none of the outs. It’s against the johns.”
Rep. Rodney D. Driver, a Democrat whose district includes Charlestown, Exeter and Richmond, voted against the bill. “I don’t see why we should try to regulate what consenting adults do,” he said. “For the most part, [prostitutes] are there for their own free will… It’s a way for people to earn money.” Rep. David A. Segal said that previous attempts to pass the prostitution bill have engendered opposition from groups such as the Coalition Against Domestic Violation and the National Organization of Women. “A vote for this is a vote against the will of those organizations,” he said.
Under the bill approved last night, anyone found guilty of prostitution or of procuring the services of a prostitute (both misdemeanors) would face imprisonment of up to six months, and a fine of $250 to $1,000. For a subsequent offense, they could face up to a year in prison and a fine of $500 to $1,000. Giannini has introduced versions of the bill in each of the last three years, but this was the first time it has gained enough support among the membership to move it out of committee, said the committee’s chairman, Rep. Donald J. Lally Jr.
“I’m very confident,” Lally said, “we’ll pass it on the floor of the House.”
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/post_new.asp?board_id=181
Pizza...
What DD are you basing your claims on?
Grrrrrr...
Harrisburg City Council passes gun law
by DAN MILLER, Of The Patriot-News
Harrisburg City Council Wednesday by 7-0 vote passed legislation where gun owners upon learning that their firearm has been lost or stolen would have to tell police of this within 48 hours. Failure to do so could mean a fine of from $50 to $1,000 or up to 90 days in jail. Supporters say the proposal is to help police prevent a lost or stolen gun from being resold to be used in a crime.
Joe Grace, executive director of CeaseFirePA, said that most of the 12 law enforcement officers in Pennsylvania shot and killed on duty since 2005 were slain by someone using a gun acquired by such illegal means. Grace Wednesday noted that three Pittsburgh police officers had been shot and killed since Grace had testified in support of the gun measure before a Harrisburg council committee on March 31.
National Rifle Association spokesman John Hohenwarter has said the Harrisburg law and similar ones passed in five other Pennsylvania cities are illegal because only state and federal governments have authority to impose gun control measures. Grace said the local laws have authority because they concern guns acquired illegally, not those in the possession of law-abiding owners. Harrisburg would become the sixth Pennsylvania city with such a law, after Allentown, Reading, Pittsburgh, Pottsville and Philadelphia. The NRA and pro-gun groups have challenged the Pittsburgh and Philadelphia laws in court.
http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2009/04/harrisburg_city_council_passes_1.html
Scientists dig for lessons from past pandemics
Caleb Hellerman
CNN Senior Medical Producer
(CNN) -- If there's a blessing in the current swine flu epidemic, it's how benign the illness seems to be outside the central disease cluster in Mexico. But history offers a dark warning to anyone ready to write off the 2009 H1N1 virus. In each of the four major pandemics since 1889, a spring wave of relatively mild illness was followed by a second wave, a few months later, of a much more virulent disease. This was true in 1889, 1957, 1968 and in the catastrophic flu outbreak of 1918, which sickened an estimated third of the world's population and killed, conservatively, 50 million people.
Lone Simonsen, an epidemiologist at George Washington University, who has studied the course of prior pandemics in both the United States and her native Denmark, says, "The good news from past pandemics, in several experiences, is that the majority of deaths have happened not in the first wave, but later." Based on this, Simonsen suggests there may be time to develop an effective vaccine before a second, more virulent strain, begins to circulate.
As swine flu -- also known as the 2009 version of the H1N1 flu strain -- spreads, Simonsen and other health experts are diving into the history books for clues about how the outbreak might unfold -- and, more importantly, how it might be contained. In fact, the official Pandemic Influenza Operation Plan, or O-Plan, of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is based in large part on a history lesson -- research organized by pediatrician and medical historian Dr. Howard Markel of the University of Michigan.
Markel was tapped by the CDC to study what worked and what didn't during the 1918 flu disaster. Markel and colleagues examined 43 cities and found that so-called nonpharmaceutical interventions -- steps such as isolating patients and school closings -- were remarkably successful in tamping down the outbreak. "They don't make the population immune, but they buy you time, either by preventing influenza from getting into the community or slowing down the spread," Markel said.
Markel describes a dramatic example in the mining town of Gunnison, Colorado. In 1918, town leaders built a veritable barricade, closing down the railroad station and blocking all roads into town. Four thousand townspeople lived on stockpiled supplies and food from hunting or fishing. For 3½ months, while influenza raged in nearly every city in America, Gunnison saw not a single case of flu -- not until the spring, when roads were reopened and a handful of residents fell sick. Visit LIFE.com for photographs of the lethal flu pandemic of 1918
Nonpharmaceutical interventions, or NPIs, also proved effective in big cities such as New York, according to Markel. In fact, the sooner cities moved to limit public gatherings or isolate patients, the less severe their experience tended to be -- as much as an eight- or ninefold difference in case and death rates, he says. Based on this guidance, the CDC preparedness plan devotes dozens of pages to potential NPIs, from voluntary isolation to reorganizing company work schedules to reduce the density of people sitting next to each other in the office or while riding trains and buses.
If it seems odd to base medical strategy on 90-year-old newspapers, the approach is increasingly popular. "There's a big case for looking at history," says Simonsen. "We call it archaeo-epidemiology. You go to libraries and places like that, dig around, collaborate with people like John Barry and try to quantify what really worked." Barry is the author of "The Great Influenza," perhaps the signature history of the devastating 1918 pandemic. He says the historical record shows that isolating patients worked to slow the spread of flu in 1918, but that attempted quarantines -- preventing movement in and out of cities -- was "worthless."
While Barry supports the CDC's general containment strategy, in the past he has publicly criticized Markel's work. After Markel's findings were published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, Barry wrote a letter in response, saying it wasn't swift action but rather an earlier wave of mild flu, acting like a vaccination, that was probably responsible for New York's relatively low caseload. In the letter, he noted, "New York City Health Commissioner Royal Copeland did tell reporters ... that he would isolate and quarantine cases," but based on his own articles in the New York Medical Journal, he "apparently never imposed those measures." In response, Markel and CDC officials pointed to a decision by the New York Board of Health making influenza a reportable disease, and a 1918 JAMA article describing strict quarantine efforts in New York. Barry says both those sources rely on Copeland's assertions, which he considers unreliable.
It looks superficially like an academic feud, but in this field, different conclusions can suggest radically different approaches to quashing a pandemic. Nowhere is this more true than in research that builds computer models to predict the spread of outbreaks, based on previous ones. Markel, along with most analysts, says that in prior pandemics, the so-called R-naught number -- the number of new infections caused by each infected person -- has been approximately 2.0. The current U.S. pandemic control strategy is based on computer simulations that assume a flu virus with an R-naught between 1.6 and 2.4.
Last year, however, Simonsen and Viggo Andreasen concluded that the true R-naught of the 1918 flu virus was probably somewhere between 3 and 4. Since an epidemic grows exponentially -- each person sickens three others, each of whom infects three more, and so on -- this is a tremendous difference. "It says it's going to be harder than we thought" to control a pandemic, Simonsen says. Barry agrees. "I do think that some of these things, like isolating [sick people], will take off some of the edge. We hope they'll do more than that. But to think they'll stop a pandemic, that is just not going to happen."
Simonsen says control measures such as the steps taken by Mexico in recent days -- closing schools and restaurants, for example -- are still worth the effort. "It doesn't mean we should give up, because we don't know the R-naught [for swine flu]. We don't know how easily this spreads." But she adds, NPIs are at best a way to buy time. "We just badly need a vaccine. That's the most important thing." To date, the CDC has emphasized personal protective steps such as washing hands and using hand gels, as opposed to tightening border controls or issuing formal directives to close schools or limit public gatherings. Such steps have been left to state and local officials, who have responded in a variety of ways.
One reason for the delay in stronger guidelines is that swine flu caught planners off guard; they had anticipated being able to recognize a pandemic overseas, weeks or at least days before it hit the United States. At the same time, CDC acting director Dr. Richard Besser said Thursday that it's important to let officials tailor their response to local conditions. "They can take the recommendations we're providing and apply them locally. [By doing that] we hope to learn and see what are the most effective control strategies."
Markel agrees that the best response depends on the particular situation. "History is not predictive science. And the powers of public health officials [in 1918] were much greater. Another difference is that people's trust of doctors and government in 1918 was probably remarkably different.... But what I have found, studying epidemics, is that good planning and good relationships between local state and federal authorities, goes a long way."
http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/04/30/swine.flu.1918.lessons/index.html
Taxpayers To Get Rude Surprise
7:27 am PDT May 1, 2009
WASHINGTON -- Millions of Americans enjoying their small windfall from President Barack Obama's "Making Work Pay" tax credit are in for an unpleasant surprise next spring. The government is going to want some of that money back. The tax credit is supposed to provide up to $400 to individuals and $800 to married couples as part of the massive economic recovery package enacted in February. Most workers started receiving the credit through small increases in their paychecks in the past month.
But new tax withholding tables issued by the IRS could cause millions of taxpayers to get hundreds of dollars more than they are entitled to under the credit, money that will have to be repaid at tax time. At-risk taxpayers include a broad swath of the public: married couples in which both spouses work; workers with more than one job; retirees who have federal income taxes withheld from their pension payments and Social Security recipients with jobs that provide taxable income.
The Internal Revenue Service acknowledges problems with the withholding tables but has done little to warn average taxpayers. "They need to get the Goodyear blimp out there on this," said Tom Ochsenschlager, vice president of taxation for the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants. For many, the new tax tables will simply mean smaller-than-expected tax refunds next year, IRS spokesman Terry Lemons said. The average refund was nearly $2,700 this year.
But taxpayers who calculate their withholding so they get only small refunds could face an unwelcome tax bill next April, said Jackie Perlman, an analyst with the Tax Institute at H&R Block. "They are going to get a surprise," she said. Perlman's advice: check your federal withholding to make sure sufficient taxes are being taken out of your pay. If you are married and both spouses work, you might consider having taxes withheld at the higher rate for single filers. If you have multiple jobs, you might consider having extra taxes withheld by one of your employers. You can make that request with a Form W-4. The IRS has a calculator on its Web site to help taxpayers figure withholding. So do many private tax preparers.
Obama has touted the tax credit as one of the big achievements of his first 100 days in office, boasting that 95 percent of working families will qualify in 2009 and 2010. The credit pays workers 6.2 percent of their earned income, up to a maximum of $400 for individuals and $800 for married couples who file jointly. Individuals making more $95,000 and couples making more than $190,000 are ineligible. The tax credit was designed to help boost the economy by getting more money to consumers in their regular paychecks. Employers were required to start using the new withholding tables by April 1. The tables, however, don't take into account several common categories of taxpayers, experts said.
For example:
--A single worker with two jobs making $20,000 a year at each job will get a $400 boost in take-home pay at each of them, for a total of $800. That worker, however, is eligible for a maximum credit of $400, so the remaining $400 will have to be paid back at tax time -- either through a smaller refund or a payment to the IRS.
The IRS recognized there could be a similar problem for married couples if both spouses work, so it adjusted the withholding tables. The fix, however, was imperfect.
-- A married couple with a combined income of $50,000 is eligible for an $800 credit. However, if both spouses work and make more than $13,000, the new withholding tables give them each a $600 boost -- for a total of $1,200.
There were 33 million married couples in 2008 in which both spouses worked. That's 55 percent of all married couples, according to the Census Bureau.
-- A single college student with a part-time job making $10,000 would get a $400 boost in pay. However, if that student is claimed as a dependent on a parent's tax return, she doesn't qualify for the credit and would have to repay it when she files next year.
Some retirees face even bigger headaches.
The Social Security Administration is sending out $250 payments to more than 50 million retirees in May as part of the economic stimulus package. The payments will go to people who receive Social Security, Supplemental Security Income, railroad retirement benefits or veteran's disability benefits. The payments are meant to provide a boost for people who don't qualify for the tax credit. However, they will go to retirees even if they have earned income and receive the credit. Those retirees will have the $250 payment deducted from their tax credit -- but not until they file their tax returns next year, long after the money may have been spent.
Retirees who have federal income taxes withheld from pension benefits also are getting an income boost as a result of the new withholding tables. However, pension benefits are not earned income, so they don't qualify for the tax credit. That money will have to paid back next year when tax returns are filed. More than 20 million retirees and survivors receive payments from defined benefit pension plans, according to the Employee Benefit Research Institute. However, it is unclear how many have federal taxes withheld from their payments.
The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees union raised concerns about the effect of the tax credit on pension payments in a letter to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner in March. Geithner responded that Treasury and IRS understood the concerns and were "exploring ways to mitigate that effect." Rep. Dave Camp of Michigan, the top Republican on the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, said Geithner has yet to respond to concerns raised by committee members. "So far we've got the, 'If we don't address this maybe it will go away' approach," Camp said.
IRS withholding calculator: http://tinyurl.com/3eorb
http://www.ktvu.com/news/19335530/detail.html
Here ya go...
http://tinyurl.com/d8xe8s
Is torture faith-based?
Survey: Support for terror suspect torture differs among the faithful
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The more often Americans go to church, the more likely they are to support the torture of suspected terrorists, according to a new survey.
The Washington Region Religious Campaign Against Torture rallied on Capitol Hill in March 2008. More than half of people who attend services at least once a week -- 54 percent -- said the use of torture against suspected terrorists is "often" or "sometimes" justified. Only 42 percent of people who "seldom or never" go to services agreed, according the analysis released Wednesday by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life.
White evangelical Protestants were the religious group most likely to say torture is often or sometimes justified -- more than six in 10 supported it. People unaffiliated with any religious organization were least likely to back it. Only four in 10 of them did. The analysis is based on a Pew Research Center survey of 742 American adults conducted April 14-21. It did not include analysis of groups other than white evangelicals, white non-Hispanic Catholics, white mainline Protestants and the religiously unaffiliated, because the sample size was too small.
The president of the National Association of Evangelicals, Leith Anderson, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The survey asked: "Do you think the use of torture against suspected terrorists in order to gain important information can often be justified, sometimes be justified, rarely be justified, or never be justified?" Roughly half of all respondents -- 49 percent -- said it is often or sometimes justified. A quarter said it never is. The religious group most likely to say torture is never justified was Protestant denominations -- such as Episcopalians, Lutherans and Presbyterians -- categorized as "mainline" Protestants, in contrast to evangelicals. Just over three in 10 of them said torture is never justified. A quarter of the religiously unaffiliated said the same, compared with two in 10 white non-Hispanic Catholics and one in eight evangelicals.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/04/30/religion.torture/index.html
1000 mcg = 1 mg
Striper, not always...
The majority of the time fat soluble vitamins are listed in international units (IU). On rare occasions, they may appear in metric units, which throws everyone for a loop. Once you know the equivalents, it's fairly simple to convert IU to mg, then all you need is pen and paper.
Vitamin E
Natural
1 IU = 0.735 mg d-alpha Tocopheryl Acetate
1 IU = 0.671 mg d-alpha Tocopherol
1 IU = 0.861 mg d-alpha Tocopheryl Succinate
Synthetic
1 IU = 1 mg dl-alpha Tocopheryl Acetate
1 IU = 0.91 mg dl-alpha Tocopherol
Vitamin A Acetate
1 IU = 0.344 mcg
Vitamin D
1 IU = 0.025 mcg
40 IU = 1 mcg
Global Warming Ruled a Religion by British Judge
Marc Sheppard April 30, 2009
A fired British executive is suing his former employer on the grounds that he was unfairly dismissed due to religious views – his belief in global warming.
According to the Independent:
“In the first case of its kind, employment judge David Sneath said Tim Nicholson, a former environmental policy officer, could invoke employment law for protection from discrimination against him for his conviction that climate change was the world's most important environmental problem.”
The judge ruled that Nicholson’s extreme green views fit the definition of “a philosophical belief under the Employment Equality (Religion and Belief) Regulations, 2003.” So strong were these “beliefs,” that they “put him at odds with other senior executives within the firm.” The 41-year-old told the employment tribunal that, as head of sustainability at Grainger plc, Britain's largest residential property investment company, he constantly tangled with fellow-executives over the company’s environmental policies and corporate social responsibility.
Nicholson complained that senior executives obstructed his attempts to lower the company’s “carbon footprint,” and that while Grainger advertised green policies, executives actually drove "some of the most highly polluting cars on the road". He also griped that chief executive Rupert Dickinson refused numerous requests to change the company’s policy toward employee air travel. Nicholson even included this personally upsetting example in his written complaint: "He [Mr Dickinson] showed contempt for the need to cut carbon emissions by flying out a member of the IT staff to Ireland to deliver his BlackBerry that he had left behind in London."
All of which offended Nicholson’s green beliefs, which he says dictate his very existence, "including my choice of home, how I travel, what I buy, what I eat and drink, what I do with my waste and my hopes and my fears". Harry Trory, counsel for Grainger, argued that Nicholson’s “views on climate change and the environment were based on fact and science, and did not constitute a philosophical belief.” But the judge agreed with Nicholson, finding that “his belief goes beyond a mere opinion.” The decision makes Nicholson the first person ever to be allowed to sue for religious discrimination with environmentalism listed as the affronted creed.
What next, Earth Day declared a religious holiday, tax-exempt status extended to recycling plants, or defacing effigies of Al Gore prosecuted as a hate crime? Not likely. On the other hand, greenies scoffed when Michael Crichton first called environmentalism “one of the most powerful religions in the Western World” over five years ago, insisting that “settled science” was on their side. Since then it’s become increasingly evident that alarmists’ warming beliefs are based not on reason or evidence, but a trusting acceptance in the absence of either. They outright refuse to discuss it, debate it, or abide those daring to question it.
Antitheist Sam Harris once wrote:
“The difference between science and religion is the difference between a willingness to dispassionately consider new evidence and new arguments, and a passionate unwillingness to do so.”
If British carbo-chondriacs now choose to capitulate which better exemplifies their position in an effort to exploit victims’ status, we can only hope their American counterparts soon follow their lead. It’d be well worth a few silly law-suits to establish precedent necessary to keep this nonsense out of our public schools on those very same grounds. And that’s just the tip of the expanding iceberg.
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/04/global_warming_ruled_a_religio.html
Unreported news...
Iranian arms ship sunk off Sudan coast
04.26.09, 17:43 / Israel News
An Egyptian weekly reported Sunday that an Iranian ship carrying weapons traveling en route to the Gaza Strip has been sunk in the Red Sea, off the coast of Sudan.Al-Usbua's report quotes sources from Sudan's capitol Khartoum, who say missiles were fired towards the ship from "an unidentified boat, which may be Israeli or American."
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3706989,00.html
Nice shooting.
re; military 'exercise'...
Something like that was attempted a few years ago on a small town in eastern Oklahoma. Telling an Okie what to do is tough enough...telling an Okie what to do with a gun in your hands is suicide. Some of 'em learned the hard way that if you point a gun at an Okie you have two choices...shoot it or eat it.
*R*O*F*L*M*A*O*!!! em
kro, enuff w/ the posturing...
Your sockpuppet posited the info as proof that GSRE's CEO is a criminal on another forum. Due to i-Hub's overwhelming popularity with GSRE shareholders, I posted my DD on the issue here to inform them in the most efficient manner.
IP info doesn't lie...& is so easy to obtain.
kro, hate to tell ya this....
I've known about the guy in the Raleigh, NC area for quite awhile now. Due to the obvious impossibility of him being in two places at once in '07 when Mr. Toth was clearly documented being in the North West, I knew there was no issue. Figuring you would hold the info for use as a coup de grace when you really needed it, I just sat back & waited.
There is a disease we all incur at one time or another. It's commonly known as "Steptinit". A major cause of this affliction is called "Agenda". The only known preventions are "Caution" & "Honesty".
If you still believe the GSRE CEO, Mr. Toth, is the guy indicted in '06/'07 in Wake County, NC for various frauds all you have to do is contact the local Sheriff's Office. They have a mug shot taken in early May of '07 that clearly shows a balding, heavy-set man with a buzz cut.
No more make-believe in the Middle East
Let's not be so hard on Bibi. The squealing on the Israeli and American left is making Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin "Bibi" Netanyahu out to be a minority radical, a warmonger among the majority progressives who want a just peace with the Palestinians. In reality, the bad news – and the good – is that Mr. Netanyahu doesn't pretend to be a peacemaker. Let's look at the record. Settlement construction, including the massive developments encircling Jerusalem, has continued for four decades. All of Bibi's predecessors – even the "doves" – never once slowed settlement construction, despite their repeated assurances. Throughout, despite intensive US monitoring and reporting on growth, the US has always pretended to believe them.
In the early 1990s, then-Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin told the US that settlement sites such as Har Homa were merely in the planning stages. When site work began, he claimed that it was only preparatory work with no approval for construction. When ministry approvals for construction were given, he and his successors claimed that they would prevent construction. Today Har Homa stands as one of the many monuments to the success of deny, deny, deny.
The latest and final major link in the chain of Jerusalem-encircling settlements, known as E1, has followed exactly the same progression. E1 is important, because if it is allowed to become a town, it will effectively split the West Bank in two, ending hopes for a two-state solution. US observers, myself included, reported during the past six years the clear evidence of site preparation, only to be told by the highest levels of the Israeli government that roadbeds, drainage systems, terracing, and other clearly observable major works were "erosion control." Again, the US pretended to believe the official spin.
Former Israeli Prime Ministers Ariel Sharon and Ehud Olmert told the US repeatedly that the separation barrier would not be used for political purposes, and that its route through the West Bank, rather than along the internationally accepted "Green Line," was to provide security "setback" for towns on the Israeli side of the Green Line. Again, the US pretended to believe them. Today, the tens of thousands of acres of West Bank land between the Green Line and the separation barrier are the fastest-growing areas for settlement construction, all built right up against the barrier, with no security setback, ensuring Israeli facts on the ground.
This pattern of pretending holds true for promises to ease travel for Palestinians within the West Bank. At the time of the Nov. 15, 2005, Agreement on Movement and Access, which was pressed on the Israelis and Palestinians by then-Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, there were some 320 roadblocks. At the time, some US embassy staff openly termed the agreement toothless. Secretary Rice and her team termed it a historic achievement. Today, there are 632 roadblocks. Ditto for the growth in Israeli-settler-only road systems in the West Bank, the thousands of Palestinians held prisoner for years without charge in Israeli "administrative detention," and the continuing blockage of Palestinian commercial traffic into and out of the Occupied Territories.
Ditto, too, for the talk in the late 1990s – by Bibi no less! – about weaning Israel from the billions in US aid it gets each year. The Israelis assured progress and the US pretended to believe them. For cash-strapped American taxpayers, the 10-year agreement signed in 2007 for $30 billion in military assistance to Israel, plus another billion or so a year in assorted other US-funded programs, amounts to a lot of pretending. Palestinians, unlike Americans, are under no illusion about change under a Netanyahu government; hence the lack of public outcry over the Netanyahu-Avigdor Lieberman alliance. Despite the regular meetings that the US insisted take place since 2002 between Israeli prime ministers and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, Mr. Abbas never won a single substantive, realized concession. Israel and the US pretended that meetings equaled progress, but, each time, Abbas returned to Ramallah weakened, the object of increasing scorn not only from Hamas, but from his own Fatah supporters.
From the field, the relationship was always reminiscent of the scene from the 1967 comedy "A Guide for the Married Man," where a man and his mistress, caught in flagrante by the wife, simply deny, deny, deny until they have calmly dressed and the mistress has departed, leaving the wife wondering whether to believe her eyes. Once he became prime minister in the 1990s, even firebrand Netanyahu played the "we pretend, you pretend" game, signing on to the 1998 Wye River Memorandum, which, among other things, provided billions in US funding for Israel's redeployment out of the West Bank and Gaza.
Now, though, Netanyahu appears to have ended the charade, although perhaps only until political expediency warrants another metamorphosis. His policies may be misguided, but his intellectual honesty may prove salutary. The Israeli right and its American supporters have a hard time claiming Israeli moderation and reasonableness when Netanyahu and his ministers openly oppose a two-state arrangement; affirm the blockade of Gaza, preventing reconstruction there; tout settlement expansion; brag of undermining US efforts to talk with Iran; and threaten an attack on Iran – across US-controlled Iraqi airspace – that could jeopardize US troops and interests throughout the region.
In lifting the veil on Israeli policy and the criticism-stifling fiction of US-Israeli mutual interest, Netanyahu leaves the US open, finally, to voice and pursue its own positions and interests. Finally, Washington can say, clearly and forcefully, that Israel's occupation harms US interests; that an attack on Iran is unacceptable and will get no US support, even in the UN Security Council; that settlement construction must stop and barriers be removed; that meetings are no substitute for progress; that Palestinians must be granted the opportunity – a real one – to form a viable state; and that the time has come for one of the world's wealthiest countries to be weaned off American largess.
Norman H. Olsen is a former senior United States Foreign Service officer. He served at the US Embassy in Tel Aviv from 1991 to 1995, and from 2002 to 2007, including four years as chief of the political section.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/csm/20090427/cm_csm/yolsen
kro, are you intending...
to post the pics you received from det. Warren?
it is not illegal to post public record!
...Your source? em
To validate my DD...
call 919-554-6171 & ask for det. Warren.
Lotsa bells...
I have no intention of incurring civil liability...even to show you up.
Go play.
"Post the picture"...
That's illegal & you know it. The man in question is approx 70 lbs. heavier & has a...to put it politely...'receding hair line'.
ROFLMAO!!!
Road Runner wins again.
P-o-o-o-r coyote.
Let's see, 2 posts/2 months apart...
Makes you an expert, huh?
Yeah...right.
12ring, I've associated with a few...
pro musicians most of my life. One guy whom I've known since he was a kid who's probably one of the most recognized c & w singers on earth, was here for dinner the other night. I've intro'd him on stage a time or three. I collect guitars & dobros. Does that make me a musician...famous or otherwise?
No.
Same for all those ephemeral 'links' you're trying to pass off as reasons to hold SLJB shares. (while somebody's selling)
Oh yeah...I have a new koa wood flat top Gibson...very rare...$3k...any takers?
Are any of these companies listed as specifically being owned by a Nevada incorporated pinky called SLJB?
Fox sticking with schedule instead of Obama
NEW YORK – The Fox network is sticking with its regular schedule over President Barack Obama this week. The network is turning down the president's request to show his prime-time news conference on Wednesday. The news conference marks Obama's 100th day in office. Instead of the president, Fox viewers will see an episode of the Tim Roth drama "Lie to Me."
It's the first time a broadcast network has refused Obama's request. This will be the third prime-time news conference in Obama's presidency. ABC, CBS and NBC are airing it.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090427/ap_on_en_tv/us_tv_obama_1
Real chickenshit...no surprise, though.
'perhaps'~I forgot that one. eom
A bit of info...
As most of you are aware, a poster we all know recently posted a news story on the Y! forum about a 'Brandon Toth' in Wake Forest, NC who was a con artist & check kiter arrested in 2006. Here are the news stories:
http://search.abclocal.go.com/search/results?station=wtvd&search=siteSearch&q=toth&submit.x=0&submit.y=0
I contacted the Local Police Dept. & spoke with Det. Warren, who kindly provided pics and info proving beyond doubt the two are NOT the same individual.
The pics show a very slight resemblance, but the clincher is that the middle names are VERY different...as proven to me by a fellow shareholder with sharper eyes than I have. (don't ask)
...Another allegation shot down! (I'm shocked...SHOCKED, I tell you!)
Bucky, the only problem is...
we've heard "what if, soon, maybe, next week, might, should, possibly" for 3 years w/no result.
So...whatcha got?
12ring, Rather than continued...
mysterious hints, Why not just show your hand? What exactly gives you reason to believe SS will 'do the right thing'?
I firmly believe that Steve Sulja and Co will do the right thing and try to save their collective behinds and company. And in doing so, will reward loyal long shareholders as well.
Not 'could'...'WILL'. eom
Raven...
i.e;...Our current situation is attributable to a bunch of idealistic opportunists who forgot the 'Responsibility' part of Rand's credo.
Time for this one to move. We've waited long enough.
I gotta agree with that!
Only one problem...five days from now it won't matter if Mr. Sulja doesn't re-up SLJB in Nevada.
OR...are you saying he has decided to take care of it in time to prevent the obvious?
Thanks.
The Portuguese Experiment: Did Legalizing Drugs Work?
By Maia Szalavitz Sunday, Apr. 26, 2009
Although its capital is notorious among stoners and college kids for marijuana haze–filled "coffee shops," Holland has never actually legalized cannabis — the Dutch simply don't enforce their laws against the shops. The correct answer is Portugal, which in 2001 became the first European country to officially abolish all criminal penalties for personal possession of drugs, including marijuana, cocaine, heroin and methamphetamine. At the recommendation of a national commission charged with addressing Portugal's drug problem, jail time was replaced with the offer of therapy. The argument was that the fear of prison drives addicts underground and that incarceration is more expensive than treatment — so why not give drug addicts health services instead? Under Portugal's new regime, people found guilty of possessing small amounts of drugs are sent to a panel consisting of a psychologist, social worker and legal adviser for appropriate treatment (which may be refused without criminal punishment), instead of jail.
The question is, does the new policy work? At the time, critics in the poor, socially conservative and largely Catholic nation said decriminalizing drug possession would open the country to "drug tourists" and exacerbate Portugal's drug problem; the country had some of the highest levels of hard-drug use in Europe. But the recently released results of a report commissioned by the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank, suggest otherwise. The paper, published by Cato in April, found that in the five years after personal possession was decriminalized, illegal drug use among teens in Portugal declined and rates of new HIV infections caused by sharing of dirty needles dropped, while the number of people seeking treatment for drug addiction more than doubled. "Judging by every metric, decriminalization in Portugal has been a resounding success," says Glenn Greenwald, an attorney, author and fluent Portuguese speaker, who conducted the research. "It has enabled the Portuguese government to manage and control the drug problem far better than virtually every other Western country does."
Compared to the European Union and the U.S., Portugal's drug use numbers are impressive. Following decriminalization, Portugal had the lowest rate of lifetime marijuana use in people over 15 in the E.U.: 10%. The most comparable figure in America is in people over 12: 39.8%. Proportionally, more Americans have used cocaine than Portuguese have used marijuana. The Cato paper reports that between 2001 and 2006 in Portugal, rates of lifetime use of any illegal drug among seventh through ninth graders fell from 14.1% to 10.6%; drug use in older teens also declined. Lifetime heroin use among 16-to-18-year-olds fell from 2.5% to 1.8% (although there was a slight increase in marijuana use in that age group). New HIV infections in drug users fell by 17% between 1999 and 2003, and deaths related to heroin and similar drugs were cut by more than half. In addition, the number of people on methadone and buprenorphine treatment for drug addiction rose to 14,877 from 6,040, after decriminalization, and money saved on enforcement allowed for increased funding of drug-free treatment as well.
Portugal's case study is of some interest to lawmakers in the U.S., confronted now with the violent overflow of escalating drug gang wars in Mexico. The U.S. has long championed a hard-line drug policy, supporting only international agreements that enforce drug prohibition and imposing on its citizens some of the world's harshest penalties for drug possession and sales. Yet America has the highest rates of cocaine and marijuana use in the world, and while most of the E.U. (including Holland) has more liberal drug laws than the U.S., it also has less drug use. "I think we can learn that we should stop being reflexively opposed when someone else does [decriminalize] and should take seriously the possibility that anti-user enforcement isn't having much influence on our drug consumption," says Mark Kleiman, author of the forthcoming When Brute Force Fails: How to Have Less Crime and Less Punishment and director of the drug policy analysis program at UCLA. Kleiman does not consider Portugal a realistic model for the U.S., however, because of differences in size and culture between the two countries.
But there is a movement afoot in the U.S., in the legislatures of New York State, California and Massachusetts, to reconsider our overly punitive drug laws. Recently, Senators Jim Webb and Arlen Specter proposed that Congress create a national commission, not unlike Portugal's, to deal with prison reform and overhaul drug-sentencing policy. As Webb noted, the U.S. is home to 5% of the global population but 25% of its prisoners. At the Cato Institute in early April, Greenwald contended that a major problem with most American drug policy debate is that it's based on "speculation and fear mongering," rather than empirical evidence on the effects of more lenient drug policies. In Portugal, the effect was to neutralize what had become the country's number one public health problem, he says. "The impact in the life of families and our society is much lower than it was before decriminalization," says Joao Castel-Branco Goulao, Portugual's "drug czar" and president of the Institute on Drugs and Drug Addiction, adding that police are now able to re-focus on tracking much higher level dealers and larger quantities of drugs.
Peter Reuter, a professor of criminology and public policy at the University of Maryland, like Kleiman, is skeptical. He conceded in a presentation at the Cato Institute that "it's fair to say that decriminalization in Portugal has met its central goal. Drug use did not rise." However, he notes that Portugal is a small country and that the cyclical nature of drug epidemics — which tends to occur no matter what policies are in place — may account for the declines in heroin use and deaths. The Cato report's author, Greenwald, hews to the first point: that the data shows that decriminalization does not result in increased drug use. Since that is what concerns the public and policymakers most about decriminalization, he says, "that is the central concession that will transform the debate."
http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1893946,00.html
Ya think...
that's stirrin' the pot a bit much? You know as well as I that's virtually impossible.
What an excellent way to impose martial law without imposing martial law...
sharpening on glass...
try to take thin slices off the edge of the glass. The sand-blasted (frosted) edge of a plate glass shelf is even better. I have a 4"x1"x1/4" piece of plate glass w/ blasted edges I've had for 40+ yrs I picked up in Sydney, Aus.