The Chevy Volt as tested by CNET

[dick thompson]

e 
http://reviews.cnet.com/coupe-hatchback/2011-chevrolet-volt/4505-10867_7-34168732.html?tag=nl.e404 


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I don't remember him at all

[dick thompson]

http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/04/05/2151332/flas-george-lemieux-launches-2012.html 


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JURY NULLIFICATION: Medical-Marijuana Dispensaries Trial Ends In Acquittal

[Jonathan Ashley]

Jury Nullification In Action


*Medical-Marijuana Dispensaries Trial Ends In Acquittal*
by Mark Morey
Yakima Herald-Republic

YAKIMA, Wash. -- Yakima County's first trial over a so-called 
medical-marijuana dispensary or collective quickly ended in acquittal 
Thursday afternoon.


The Superior Court jury that heard the charges against Valtino Hicks of 
Yakima returned its verdict in less than 25 minutes, unusually quick for 
almost any criminal trial.


At least two other local cases are pending in which a medical-marijuana 
argument could be raised.


The issue remains controversial across the state at political and legal 
levels. King County has been the most visible in declining to prosecute 
marijuana dispensaries, and legislation advanced this week that would 
take steps toward creating a framework for legal dispensaries.


The Yakima County prosecutor's office offered no immediate comment on 
the verdict or whether the outcome of the Hicks case would affect 
prosecution policy.


Defense attorney George Hansen declined to comment in detail on the 
verdict, but he said he spoke with a few of the jurors, "who indicated 
that they needed to see more from the state."


The jury returned its verdict in spite of the fact that Judge Rob 
Lawrence-Berrey prohibited testimony regarding a medical-marijuana card 
that Hicks said he possessed.


The prosecution maintained that he was responsible for a 201-plant 
growing operation at his home that far exceeded the 15-plant supply 
allowed for medical-marijuana patients or anyone who provides them with 
the drug. The plants were confiscated.


Hicks' defense called a half-dozen witnesses who said that they were 
either patients or authorized providers for patients.


Hicks was described as a passionate advocate for medical marijuana who 
is continuing to take horticulture classes and is committed to the cause 
despite his legal problems.


But in closing arguments, deputy prosecutor Leanne Foster suggested to 
the jury that Hicks' viewpoint on the issue had nothing to do with the 
current law.


"Marijuana is still a controlled substance, whether Mr. Hicks likes it 
or not," she told the jury.


Hicks was arrested in March 2010 after police received a tip that a 
marijuana-growing operation was being run out of a home he occupied with 
his mother in the 900 block of Central Avenue.


Hicks, whose criminal history includes drug-related convictions, was 
ultimately arrested on charges alleging that he was manufacturing 
marijuana and possessed it with intent to deliver.


Although Foster highlighted the fact that Hicks had a digital scale, 
common for drug dealers, no evidence was presented of street-level 
marijuana deals.


The home was promoted via a website as a place where qualifying patients 
could receive marijuana. His mother, who was not called to testify at 
trial, pointed out in an earlier interview with the Herald-Republic that 
illegal drug dealers would rarely advertise their efforts on the Internet.


The website is still up, although a phone number listed on it was out of 
service Thursday.


The defense maintained that he was doing nothing more than providing a 
place where others could grow marijuana. "There was no intent to deliver 
proven by the state," Hansen told the jury.


The state's voters approved a medical-marijuana initiative in 1998, but 
advocates say that the law does little to provide patients with a clear 
legal source for the drug, which remains illegal at the federal level.


Under one possible interpretation of the law, large grows would be 
illegal even for medical purposes. But advocates counter that the 
state's statute is silent on the issue.


Yakima defense attorney Greg Scott, who is handling two other cases 
charged by county prosecutors in which he expects to make a 
medical-marijuana argument, said marijuana is the only legal drug for 
which a prescription is not a clear-cut defense.


"I think the Legislature needs to clarify exactly what it is they will 
allow and what it is they will not allow," Scott said.


The Legislature is considering allowing limited dispensaries, although 
it's unclear what form the law would ultimately take.


The law faces opposition from several sides, including the Washington 
Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs, according to news reports.


* Mark Morey can be reached at 509-577-7671 or mmo...@yakimaherald.com.

http://www.yakima-herald.com/stories/2011/03/24/medical-marijuana-dispensaries-first-county-trial-ends-in-acquittal



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Eight ILLEGAL Aliens arrested at protest for blocking street...demanding acess to (free) higher education

[Travis]

Every illegal picked up for any reason should be immediately deported
period. No Exceptions.


 Eight ILLEGAL
Aliens arrested at protest for blocking street...demanding acess to (free)
higher 
education
*Scotty Starnes
*| April 5,
2011 at 6:14 PM | Tags:
Amnesty ,
Atlanta,
civil rights , college
education ,
criminals ,
Georgia,
illegal immigrants,
Illegal 
immigration,
President Obama  |
Categories: Political Issues
| URL:
http://wp.me/pvnFC-4Yp

Only in America can a group of criminals commit more crimes and have the
gale to demand free education. All paid for by the U.S. taxpayers.

>From the San Francisco
Examiner
:

*A group of eight illegal immigrants have been arrested by Atlanta police
after they blocked a downtown street to protest their lack of access to
higher education.*

The group, made up mostly of students, sat in the middle of a street near
the Georgia Capitol for more than an hour Tuesday before they were
handcuffed and placed in a police van. Hundreds of supporters lined the
sidewalks and cheered when they were led away.

The group says immigration is a civil rights issue and protesters met with
former activists before the demonstration to get help with their strategy.

Breaking the law isn't a right and isn't part of the civil right's movement.

Police re-routed traffic before arresting the students and charging them
with obstructing traffic. *Some of them were chanting through tears while
others were smiling as they were put into the van.*

That's because they know
Obama,
his DOJ, nor ICE, will not deport them. Obama said so himself.

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Re: Checkout this video about our military - do not miss this

[plainolamerican]

some don't forget

Oliver North was and still is Israel supporting scum.

The Iran–Contra affair was a political scandal in the United States
that came to light in November 1986. During the Reagan administration,
senior Reagan Administration officials secretly facilitated the sale
of arms to Iran, .

The scandal began as an operation to free American hostages being held
by terrorist groups with Iranian ties. It was planned that Israel
would ship weapons to Iran, and then the U.S. would resupply Israel
and receive the Israeli payment. Large modifications to the plan were
devised by Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North of the National Security
Council in late 1985, in which a portion of the proceeds from the
weapon sales was diverted to fund anti-Sandinista and anti-communist
rebels, or Contras, in Nicaragua.

Oliver North, one of the central figures in the affair, wrote in a
book that "Ronald Reagan knew of and approved a great deal of what
went on with both the Iranian initiative and private efforts on behalf
of the contras and he received regular, detailed briefings on both."
Mr. North also writes: "I have no doubt that he was told about the use
of residuals for the Contras, and that he approved it.
Enthusiastically."

After the weapon sales were revealed in November 1986, Reagan appeared
on national television and stated that the weapons transfers had
indeed occurred, but that the United States did not trade arms for
hostages.
On March 4, 1987, Reagan returned to the airwaves in a nationally
televised address, taking full responsibility for any actions that he
was unaware of, and admitting that "what began as a strategic opening
to Iran deteriorated, in its implementation, into trading arms for
hostages."
Several investigations ensued, including those by the United States
Congress and the three-man, Reagan-appointed Tower Commission. Neither
found any evidence that President Reagan himself knew of the extent of
the multiple programs.[3][4][8] In the end, fourteen administration
officials were indicted, including then-Secretary of Defense Caspar
Weinberger. Eleven convictions resulted, some of which were vacated on
appeal. The rest of those indicted or convicted were all pardoned in
the final days of the George H. W. Bush presidency; Bush had been vice-
president at the time of the affair.[15] Some of those involved in the
Iran–Contra scandal who were convicted of felonies and subsequently
pardoned later became members of the administration of George W. Bush.

The scandal was composed of arms sales to Iran in violation of the
official US policy of an arms embargo against Iran, and of using funds
thus generated to arm and train the Contra militants based in Honduras
as they waged a guerilla war to topple the government of Nicaragua.

The scandal emerged when a Lebanese newspaper reported that the U.S.
sold arms to Iran through Israel in exchange for the release of
hostages by Hezbollah. Letters sent by Oliver North to John Poindexter
support this. The Israeli ambassador to the U.S. has said that the
reason weapons were eventually sold directly to Iran was to establish
links with elements of the military in the country.

Michael Ledeen, a consultant of National Security Adviser Robert
McFarlane, requested assistance from Israeli Prime Minister Shimon
Peres for help in the sale of arms to Iran. At the time, Iran was in
the midst of the Iran–Iraq War and could find few Western nations
willing to supply it with weapons. The idea behind the plan was for
Israel to ship weapons through an intermediary (identified as Manucher
Ghorbanifar) to a supposedly moderate, politically influential Iranian
group opposed to the Ayatollah Khomeni;[28] after the transaction, the
U.S. would reimburse Israel with the same weapons, while receiving
monetary benefits. The Israeli government required that the sale of
arms meet high level approval from the United States government, and
when Robert McFarlane convinced them that the U.S. government approved
the sale, Israel obliged by agreeing to sell the arms.

Israel requested permission from the U.S. to sell a small number of
TOW antitank missiles (Tube-launched, Optically-tracked, Wire-guided)
to the "moderate" Iranians,[29] saying that it would demonstrate that
the group actually had high-level connections to the U.S. government.
[29] Reagan initially rejected the plan, until Israel sent information
to the U.S. showing that the "moderate" Iranians were opposed to
terrorism and had fought against it.[32] Now having a reason to trust
the "moderates", Reagan approved the transaction, which was meant to
be between Israel and the "moderates" in Iran, with the U.S.
reimbursing Israel.
In July 1985, Israel sent American-made BGM-71 TOW antitank missiles
to Iran through an arms dealer named Manucher Ghorbanifar, a friend of
Iran's Prime Minister, Mir-Hossein Mousavi. Hours after receiving the
weapons, the Islamic fundamentalist group Islamic Jihad (that later
evolved into Hezbollah) released on

Re: Sobering Comments From the London Daily Telegraph

[Tony K]

 it is amazing, we are NOT AT WAR, according to the O'Bomas, we can spend
our selves into prosperity, and most of all the government knows the needs
of every person, it is amazing, how did we ever miss this ? he is a man of
no common sense, and I am so glad I did not vote for such a unqualified
teacher of constitutional law.

On Tue, Apr 5, 2011 at 2:18 PM, Travis  wrote:

>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> - Original Message -
>
>
>
> LONDON DAILY TELEGRAPH
>
>
>
>
>
> The American people can now more readily 'understand' why the Obama's were
> omitted from the guest list to the Royal wedding in April!
>
>
>
> THIS FROM THE “LONDON DAILY TELEGRAPH" EDITOR
>
>
>
> This is a very sobering article.  Our handling of relationships with the
> Britons over the oil spill won't help either.
>
>
>
> From The London Daily Telegraph Editor On Foreign Relations
>
>
>
> Quote:
>
>
>
> "Let me be clear: I'm not normally in favor of boycotts, and I love the
> American people.  I holiday in their country regularly, and hate the tedious
> snobby sneers against the United States.  But the American people chose to
> elect an idiot who seems hell bent on insulting their allies, and something
> must be done to stop Obama's reckless foreign policy, before he does the
> dirty on his allies on every issue."
>   One of the most poorly kept secrets in Washington is President Obama's
> animosity toward Great Britain, presumably because of what he regards as its
> sins while ruling Kenya (1895-1963).
>
>
>
> One of Barack Hussein Obama's first acts as president was to return to
> Britain a bust of Winston Churchill that had graced the Oval Office since
> 9/11.  He followed this up by denying Prime Minister Gordon Brown, on his
> first state visit, the usual joint press conference with flags.
>
>
>
> The president was "too tired" to grant the leader of America’s closest ally
> a proper welcome, his aides told British journalists.
>
>
>
> Mr. Obama followed this up with cheesy gifts for Mr. Brown and the Queen.
>  Columnist Ian Martin described his behavior as "rudeness personified.”
> There was more rudeness in store for Mr. Brown at the opening session of the
> United Nations in September.  "The prime minister was forced to dash through
> the kitchens of the UN in New York to secure five minutes of face time with
> President Obama after five requests for a sit down meeting were rejected by
> the White House," said London Telegraph columnist David Hughes.  Mr. Obama's
> "churlishness is unforgivable," Mr. Hughes said.
>
>
>
> The administration went beyond snubs and slights last week when Secretary
> of State Hillary Clinton endorsed the demand of Argentine President Cristina
> Kirchner, a Hugo Chavez ally, for mediation of Argentina’s specious claim to
> the Falkland Islands, a British dependency since 1833.  The people who live
> in the Falklands, who speak English, want nothing to do with Argentina.
>  When, in 1982, an earlier Argentine dictatorship tried to seize the
> Falklands by force, the British -- with strong support from President Ronald
> Reagan -- expelled them.
>
>
>
> "It is truly shocking that Barack Obama has decided to disregard our shared
> history," wrote Telegraph columnist Toby Young.  "Does Britain’s friendship
> really mean so little to him?"  One could ask, does the friendship of anyone
> in the entire world mean anything to him?
>
>
>
> "I recently asked several senior administration officials, separately, to
> name a foreign leader with whom Barack Obama has forged a strong personal
> relationship during his first year in office," wrote Jackson Diehl, deputy
> editorial page editor of the Washington Post, on Monday.  “A lot of hemming
> and hawing ensued."  One official named French President Nicolas Sarkozy,
> but his contempt for Mr. Obama is an open secret.  Another named German
> Chancellor Angela Merkel. But, said Mr. Diehl, "Merkel too has been
> conspicuously cool toward Obama."
>
>
>
> Mr. Obama certainly doesn't care about the Poles and Czechs, whom he has
> betrayed on missile defense.  Honduras and Israel also can attest that he's
> been an unreliable ally and an unfaithful friend.  Ironically, our relations
> with both Israel and the Palestinian Authority have never been worse.
>  Russia has offered nothing in exchange for Mr. Obama's abandonment of
> missile defense.  Russia and China won't support serious sanctions on Iran .
>  Syria’s support for terrorism has not diminished despite efforts to
> normalize diplomatic relations.  The reclusive military dictatorship that
> runs Burma has responded to our efforts at "engagement" by deepening its
> ties to North Korea.
>
>
>
> And the Chinese make little effort to disguise their contempt for him.
>
>
>
> For the first time in a long time, the President of the United States is
> actually distrusted by its allies and not in the least feared by its
> adversaries.  Nor is Mr. Obama now respected by the majority of Americans.
>  Understandably focused on th

Sobering Comments From the London Daily Telegraph

[Travis]

- Original Message -



LONDON DAILY TELEGRAPH





The American people can now more readily 'understand' why the Obama's were
omitted from the guest list to the Royal wedding in April!



THIS FROM THE “LONDON DAILY TELEGRAPH" EDITOR



This is a very sobering article.  Our handling of relationships with the
Britons over the oil spill won't help either.



>From The London Daily Telegraph Editor On Foreign Relations



Quote:



"Let me be clear: I'm not normally in favor of boycotts, and I love the
American people.  I holiday in their country regularly, and hate the tedious
snobby sneers against the United States.  But the American people chose to
elect an idiot who seems hell bent on insulting their allies, and something
must be done to stop Obama's reckless foreign policy, before he does the
dirty on his allies on every issue."
  One of the most poorly kept secrets in Washington is President Obama's
animosity toward Great Britain, presumably because of what he regards as its
sins while ruling Kenya (1895-1963).



One of Barack Hussein Obama's first acts as president was to return to
Britain a bust of Winston Churchill that had graced the Oval Office since
9/11.  He followed this up by denying Prime Minister Gordon Brown, on his
first state visit, the usual joint press conference with flags.



The president was "too tired" to grant the leader of America’s closest ally
a proper welcome, his aides told British journalists.



Mr. Obama followed this up with cheesy gifts for Mr. Brown and the
Queen.  Columnist
Ian Martin described his behavior as "rudeness personified.”  There was more
rudeness in store for Mr. Brown at the opening session of the United Nations
in September.  "The prime minister was forced to dash through the kitchens
of the UN in New York to secure five minutes of face time with President
Obama after five requests for a sit down meeting were rejected by the White
House," said London Telegraph columnist David Hughes.  Mr. Obama's
"churlishness is unforgivable," Mr. Hughes said.



The administration went beyond snubs and slights last week when Secretary of
State Hillary Clinton endorsed the demand of Argentine President Cristina
Kirchner, a Hugo Chavez ally, for mediation of Argentina’s specious claim to
the Falkland Islands, a British dependency since 1833.  The people who live
in the Falklands, who speak English, want nothing to do with Argentina.
 When, in 1982, an earlier Argentine dictatorship tried to seize the
Falklands by force, the British -- with strong support from President Ronald
Reagan -- expelled them.



"It is truly shocking that Barack Obama has decided to disregard our shared
history," wrote Telegraph columnist Toby Young.  "Does Britain’s friendship
really mean so little to him?"  One could ask, does the friendship of anyone
in the entire world mean anything to him?



"I recently asked several senior administration officials, separately, to
name a foreign leader with whom Barack Obama has forged a strong personal
relationship during his first year in office," wrote Jackson Diehl, deputy
editorial page editor of the Washington Post, on Monday.  “A lot of hemming
and hawing ensued."  One official named French President Nicolas Sarkozy,
but his contempt for Mr. Obama is an open secret.  Another named German
Chancellor Angela Merkel. But, said Mr. Diehl, "Merkel too has been
conspicuously cool toward Obama."



Mr. Obama certainly doesn't care about the Poles and Czechs, whom he has
betrayed on missile defense.  Honduras and Israel also can attest that he's
been an unreliable ally and an unfaithful friend.  Ironically, our relations
with both Israel and the Palestinian Authority have never been worse.
 Russia has offered nothing in exchange for Mr. Obama's abandonment of
missile defense.  Russia and China won't support serious sanctions on Iran .
 Syria’s support for terrorism has not diminished despite efforts to
normalize diplomatic relations.  The reclusive military dictatorship that
runs Burma has responded to our efforts at "engagement" by deepening its
ties to North Korea.



And the Chinese make little effort to disguise their contempt for him.



For the first time in a long time, the President of the United States is
actually distrusted by its allies and not in the least feared by its
adversaries.  Nor is Mr. Obama now respected by the majority of Americans.
 Understandably focused on the dismal economy and Mr. Obama's relentless
efforts to nationalize and socialize health care, Americans apparently have
yet to notice his dismal performance and lack of respect in the world
community.



They soon will.



London Daily Telegraph editor -- Alex Singleton

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Republican Parody receives more views than Obama's lame Re-election ad

[Travis]

 Republican
Parody receives more views than Obama's lame Re-election
ad
*Scotty Starnes
*| April 5,
2011 at 3:08 PM | Tags: National
Repubican Senatorial
Committee,
Obama re-election
ad,
President Obama ,
YouTube  |
Categories: Political
Issues  | URL:
http://wp.me/pvnFC-4Ym

Could it be due to the Obama presidency being a parody?

Politicoreports:

The National Republican Senatorial
Committee's
parody of
Obama's  2012
campaign,
released Friday, now has 665,000 views on
YouTube.

Obama's real launch
video,
released yesterday: Just 168,000.

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Can’t Get Enough Bacon In Your Life?

[Travis]

http://supportyourlocalgunfighter.com/2011/04/cant-get-enough-bacon-in-your-life/

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Re: Checkout this video about our military - do not miss this

[Jonathan Ashley]

*The Army Experience - Conditioning young Minds to be Killers *
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LNHW-FsS6Y&feature=player_embedded#at=324

On 04/05/2011 10:40 AM, dick thompson wrote:
Then you obviously have never been in the military nor have you 
ever seen what the troops do.  Open your eyes and learn a little.  
Remember that if these "paid assassins for the empire builders" had 
not been there between 1941 and 1945 you would be speaking either 
German or Russian and saying Seig Heil or singing the Internationale.


On 04/05/2011 01:26 PM, Jonathan Ashley wrote:
I never understand why people find a need to honor those who chose to 
be paid assassins for the empire builders.


On 04/04/2011 10:10 PM, dick thompson wrote:

http://www.nragive.com/ringoffreedom/index.html



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The Radioactive Milk Coverup & Willful Ignorance

[Bruce Majors]

Govt holding radiation data back / IAEA gets info, but public doesn't

The Yomiuri Shimbun

*The Meteorological Agency has been withholding forecasts on dispersal of
radioactive substances from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant despite
making the forecasts every day, it was learned Monday.*

Meteorological institutions in some European countries such as Germany and
Norway have been publishing their own radiation dispersal forecasts on their
Web sites based on their own meteorological observations.

Nuclear experts at home and abroad are criticizing the Japanese government
for not releasing its own forecasts, raising new questions about the
government's handling of information on the nuclear crisis.

The agency is making daily forecasts at the request of the International
Atomic Energy Agency. When contamination by radioactive substances across
national borders is feared, weather organizations of the member nations
cooperate to make forecasts on possible migration of the substances.

The Meteorological Agency has been calculating its forecasts on the
migration once or twice every day since March 11, when the great earthquake
hit the Tohoku and Kanto regions.

The agency inputs observation data sent from the IAEA--such as the time when
radioactive substances are first released, the duration of the release and
how high the substances reach--into the agency's supercomputer, adding the
agency's observation data, including wind directions and other data. The
supercomputer then calculates the direction in which the radioactive
substances will go and how much they will spread.

However, *the agency has only been reporting the forecasts to the IAEA and
not releasing them to the public at home.*

The IAEA analyzes the data from Japan by adding observation data from other
countries it similarly asked for cooperation, such as China and Russia, and
notifies nuclear authorities of countries, including Japan, of the results.

Whether to announce the IAEA analysis is left to each government's judgment.
The Japanese government's Nuclear Emergency Response Headquarters has so far
not released the IAEA analysis.

"Japan has its own Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology
Ministry- operated System for Prediction of Environmental Emergency Dose
Information (SPEEDI) for dispersal forecasts. The government in its Basic
Disaster Management Plan defines forecasts by SPEEDI as official forecasts,"
a Meteorological Agency official explained.

"We don't know whether the IAEA basic data the agency uses for the forecasts
really fit the actual situation. If the government releases two different
sets of data, it may cause disorder in the society."

However, the SPEEDI forecast was announced only once, on March 23. The
Nuclear Safety Commission has been refusing to announce subsequent
forecasts. "We can't do it because the accuracy is still low," Seiji
Shiroya, a commission member said.

http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/T110404004911.htm

Willful Ignorance on parade.

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Shutting Down the Government

[MJ]

Shutting Down the Government 
Posted by
Butler Shaffer on April 5,
2011 01:56 PM 
The make-believe “news” media – along with C-SPAN – is awash with cries
that, unless a budget agreement is reached, the federal government will
“close down” on Friday.  That is good news, indeed.  This means
that all of the troops will have to be brought home from Afghanistan,
Iraq, Libya, and other outlands; the military will have to stop using its
bombs, rockets, bullets, etc. (perhaps it can get a refund from the
manufacturers!); the prisons will have to close down and release
prisoners – particularly those convicted of victimless crimes; shut down
the DEA, TSA, CPA, FDA, et. al.; the IRS will no longer be able to accept
tax returns; etc., etc. 
This is what will happen, right?  Or will the picture look more like
what state and local governments in California did on the day following
voter approval of Prop. 13: they cut back on library and park hours of
operation, and the few governmental services many people actually
wanted.  No cut-back in police, prisons, courts, zoning enforcers,
and other intrusive functions.





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Re: Somehow It's Worse to Burn the Koran Than the Bible?

[plainolamerican]

giving religions the ability to teach myths to our citizens disgraces
our nation

where is the separation of church and state?

On Apr 5, 2:03 pm, Travis  wrote:
>      Somehow It's
> Worse to Burn the Koran Than the
> Bible?
> *Scotty Starnes
> *| April 5,
> 2011 at 12:00 PM | Tags:
> Allah ,
> America,
> Bible , Bill
> O'Reilly,
> Christians ,
> Constitution , culture
> war ,
> God,
> Islam ,
> Jesus,
> jihad ,
> Koran,
> Muslims , Sharia
> law,
> theocracy  |
> Categories: Political
> Issues  | 
> URL:http://wp.me/pvnFC-4Y4
>
> by Snidely 
> Whiplash
>
> I'm afraid Bill O' Reilly is right...there is a culture war in this nation.
> Western and specifically American culture are under continuous assault from
> many quarters, foreign and domestic. I get a Muslim not caring for
> Christian's or the Bible, but what of those from the West who sympathize
> with such an asinine point of view?
>
> How is it "worse" to burn a Koran than a Bible? I know the arm-chair
> theological argument - the Bible are stories, allegories, etc., from God on
> how we are to comport ourselves as well as the story of Jesus, but the Koran
> is the word of Allah passed on to the Prophet and written down directly, or
> some rough approximation of that scenario. Horse hockey! Both are books
> written by MEN, HUMANS, EARTHLY CREATURES...get it?
>
> At the risk of personal jihad against me, as if I give a rat's ass, neither
> book is superior to the other. Devout Christian's hold their Bible as dear
> as Muslim's hold the Koran...end of story. Any other position by an American
> is simply a talking point to use to denigrate America and the West, or more
> specifically the Constitution, capitalism and basically any other central
> tenet of this nation.
>
> Do others find the leftist as odd and glaringly transparent as I do in their
> forwarding of Islam
> as so
> wonderful and righteous, deserving of respect, and maybe even
> accepting of Sharia Law, yet they then savage American Christian's as being
> evil, bent on theocracy? I mean Sharia is theocracy in practice, yet these
> lefties are fine with it, but a Christian just being a Christian is
> inherently dangerous and theocratic. This is pure hypocrisy for the purposes
> of further eroding American ideals, morals and yes, our Founding too! It's
> all connected.
>
> Continue 
> reading>>>
>
> Add a comment to this
> post
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>
>   [image: WordPress]
>
> WordPress.com  | Thanks for flying with WordPress!
> Manage 
> Subscriptions|
> Unsubscribe|
> Publish text, photos, music, and videos by email using our Post
> by Email  feature.
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Life with the Fed: Sunshine and Lollipops?

[MJ]

"The premise is familiar enough:
Why, without a central bank or its lesser cousin, a national bank, we had
nothing but boom, bust, and sorrow -- but since the creation of the
Federal Reserve System, it's been nothing but sunshine and lollipops. It
really is that simple. People who believe in a free market in banking, as
opposed to these cartel arrangements, are evidently so uninformed or so
blinded by ideology that they have never heard or internalized this
one-sentence encapsulation of 19th- and 20th-century monetary
history."
Life with the Fed: Sunshine
and Lollipops?
Tuesday, April 05, 2011 
by Thomas
E. Woods, Jr. 
We have heard the objection a thousand times: Why, before we had a
Federal Reserve System the American economy endured a regular series of
financial panics. Abolishing the Fed is an unthinkable, absurd
suggestion, for without the wise custodianship of our central bankers we
would be thrown back into a horrific financial maelstrom, deliverance
from which should have made us grateful, not uppity.
The argument is superficially plausible, to be sure, but it is wrong in
every particular. We heard it quite a bit in the financial press several
months ago when it was learned that Congressman Ron Paul, a well-known
opponent of the Fed, would chair the House Financial Services
Subcommittee on Domestic Monetary Policy. Fed apologists were beside
themselves ­ a man who rejects the cartoon version of the history of the
Fed will hold such an influential position? He must be made into an
object of derision and ridicule.
My favorite example comes from columnist Joseph N. DiStefano, whose

article on the subject is so defiantly at odds with the historical
record, so ludicrously at variance with easily verified facts, that I
thought for pedagogical purposes we ought to make an example of
him.
DiStefano spends most of his article on the current crisis, but,
having written quite
a bit about that already, I prefer to spend most of mine on the
cartoonish version of American monetary and banking history that seems to
inform every outraged pro-Fed reply to Fed critics, this one being no
exception. They read like fourth-grade book reports. Except DiStefano
didn't even read the book.
The premise is familiar enough: Why, without a central bank or its lesser
cousin, a national bank, we had nothing but boom, bust, and sorrow -- but
since the creation of the Federal Reserve System, it's been nothing but
sunshine and lollipops. It really is that simple. People who believe in a
free market in banking, as opposed to these cartel arrangements, are
evidently so uninformed or so blinded by ideology that they have never
heard or internalized this one-sentence encapsulation of 19th- and
20th-century monetary history.
The 19th-century boom-bust cycles DiStefano mentions in drive-by fashion
are consistently attributable to artificial credit expansion, a practice
government either connived at or actually participated in, through the
various privileges it granted to the banking industry.
First, let's consider DiStefano's 19th century. We are to believe that
national banks were indispensable sources of stability, while their
absence yielded terrible business cycles. How does DiStefano account for
the Panic of 1819,
which contemporaries attributed to the inflationary and then rapidly
contractionary policies of the Second Bank of the United States, the
great stabilizer? That's easy -- he leaves it out. (He likewise leaves
out the Great Depression from his discussion of the 20th century,
an episode one might think would count against the Fed, and which was
likewise set in motion by central-bank inflation; Benjamin Strong, who
headed the New York Fed, told other central bankers in 1927 that he
planned to "give a coup de whiskey to the stock
market.") The standard account is Murray Rothbard's

The Panic of 1819: Reactions and Policies (Columbia University
Press, 1962).
DiStefano does mention the
Panic of 1837, and
for that episode we are urged to blame President
Andrew Jackson
for having dissolved the Second Bank of the United States. DiStefano does
not deign to reveal what the causal mechanism might have been. The strong
implication, based on the rest of his article, is that we need
institutions with monopoly privileges to oversee our money, and if they
should ever be forced to close because the stupid rubes don't understand
how indispensable they are, the economy will crash. That's not much of an
explanation, but it's all DiStefano chooses to share with us.
Funny, the economy hadn't crashed when the First Bank of the
United States was shut down more than two decades earlier. When the
charter of the original Bank of the United States expired in 1811, and
the institution set about calling in its loans and closing its doors, the
DiStefanos of the world made wild predictions of bankruptcy and economic
collapse. Nothing of the sort occurred. A contemporary noted in
1816,

Many persons viewed a dissolution of the late Bank of the United
Sta

Re: Narcissist-in-Chief claims he's the most successful President in the last 50 years

[plainolamerican]

the most successful President in the last 50 years
---
yeah ... successful at promoting a socialist agenda in the USA

how can anyone trust a man who prays with jews, muzzies and xians?


On Apr 5, 2:23 pm, Travis  wrote:
> [[  See Attachment. ]]
>
>     
> Narcissist-in-Chief
> claims he's the most successful President in the last 50
> years
> *Scotty Starnes
> *| April 5,
> 2011 at 2:12 PM | Tags: 2012
> presidential 
> campaign,
> liar-in-chief ,
> narcissist , President
> Obama , re-election
> campaign  |
> Categories: Political Issues
> | URL:http://wp.me/pvnFC-4Yf
>
>  
>
> I am the greatest...at spending YOUR money!
>
> If his definition of success means bankrupting America, then yes, he is the
> most successful in our 235 year history.
>
> From Politico :
>
> President Barack Obama offered a sober assessment of his 2012
> campaignto
> supporters Monday night, admitting that the “newness” was gone but
> urging
> his grassroots troops to organize with the same fervor that propelled him to
> victory in 2008.
>
> On a conference call with hundreds of organizers, volunteers and campaign
> operatives, Obama played up the threats posed by Republicans to his agenda
> while *boasting of “hav[ing] had the most successful legislative initiative
> of any president over the last 50 years.”*
>
>  The call was the culmination of a day-long roll-out of his re-election
> campaign, which began with the 5 a.m. release of a
> video
> entitled
> “It Begins With Us.” That was followed by an email to supporters, the filing
> of re-election paperwork with the Federal Election Commission and a more
> exclusive rally-the-troops conference call with top donors conducted by
> campaign manager Jim Messina.
>
> “I’m fired up, I don’t know about everybody else,” Obama said after being
> patched through by the White House switchboard to a core group of campaign
> workers that pulled off an upset victory over Hillary Rodham Clinton in the
> Democratic primaries nearly three years ago and went on to defeat Republican
> John McCain.
>
> Continue reading>>> 
>
>  Add a comment to this
> post
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>
>   [image: WordPress]
>
> WordPress.com  | Thanks for flying with WordPress!
> Manage 
> Subscriptions|
> Unsubscribe|
> Publish text, photos, music, and videos by email using our Post
> by Email  feature.
>
> *Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your 
> browser:*http://subscribe.wordpress.com
>
>  ObamaBarfBag.jpg
> 31KViewDownload

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Re: Trump: If We Don’t Take Iraq’s Oil, U.S. Soldiers ‘Would Have Died In Vain’

[plainolamerican]

while private U.S. companies like Halliburton are exploiting Iraqi oil
for profit, the U.S. government is a signatory to the Hague
Conventions and thus cannot confiscate private property as an
occupying power

the USA should have never allowed DC politicians to invade the ME

let them fund their own charities

On Apr 5, 2:34 pm, MJ  wrote:
> "Welfare millionaire (and hair plug support system) Donald Trump offers his 
> riff on the "Kick their ass/take their gas" theme. I'd like to hear him 
> explain exactly what it means to be "de-neutered."" -- William N. GriggTrump: 
> If We Don’t Take Iraq’s Oil, U.S. Soldiers ‘Would Have Died In Vain’In his 
> quixotic search for attention, likely GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump 
> has added a foreign policy leg to hisfarcical platform. Revealinghis 
> thoughtson the Iraq war to Fox News host Bill O’Reilly last week, the real 
> estate mogul boiled his policy down to an argument of “to the victor belonged 
> the spoils.” Fearing that “15 minutes after we leave,” Iran would tromp into 
> Iraq and “take the oil,” Trump argued the U.S. should “stay and keep the 
> oil,” “take what’s necessary for us and we pay our self back $1.5 trillion or 
> more.”
> O’Reilly latermockedTrump’s policy on Fox and Friends: “You’d basically be 
> re-invading the country you already invaded to try and get their oil. Come 
> on, can you imagine the world reaction to that?” Unswayed, 
> Trumpdoubled-downin a Fox and Friends segment this morning. Still convinced 
> Iran will pounce on the oil fields once the U.S. withdraws, Trump insisted 
> that if we don’t “take the oil,” the5,885U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq “would 
> havedied in vain“:TRUMP: I very simply said that Iran is going to takeover 
> Iraq, and if that’s going to happen, we should just stay there and take the 
> oil. They want the oil, and why should we? We de-neutered Iraq, Iran is going 
> to walk in, take it over, take over the second largest oil fields in the 
> world. That’s going to happen. That would mean that all of those soldiers 
> that have died and been wounded and everything else would have died in vain– 
> and I don’t want that to happen. I want their parents and their families to 
> be proud.Watch it:http://mediamatters.org/mmtv/201104040005Trump’s 
> apprentice-level understanding isnotuniqueand is gathering support within the 
> right-wing. Echoing Trump, Fox News host Glenn Beck suggested that President 
> George W. Bush was a “bad leader” for failing to get enough “oil to repay us 
> for what we did” in Iraq and that our Libyan operations should protect our 
> oil interests. His network colleague Sean Hannity proposedre-invading Iraqto 
> “take all their oil.” Insisting the U.S. gave up oil in Iraq for “the guilt 
> of being a superpower,” right-wing radio host Rush Limbaugh stated, “I wish 
> we were going for oil” in Libya.
> Despite his desire to exploit the Iraq war for oil, Trump should learn that 
> while private U.S. companies likeHalliburtonare exploiting Iraqi oil for 
> profit, the U.S. government is a signatory to the Hague Conventions and 
> thuscannot confiscate private propertyas an occupying power. If Trump finally 
> decides to run, perhaps he should take his own advice on foreign policy: 
> “don’t be so 
> stupid.”http://thinkprogress.org/2011/04/04/trump-iraq-oil-soldiers-died-vain/

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Re: How the Senate was bait and switched into war

[plainolamerican]

those who want to protect the people in Libya are free to do so 
with their own money and soldiers

Warmongers Beware!
The USA is not a a world police force.
DC politicians should fund their own charities.

On Apr 5, 2:34 pm, MJ  wrote:
> How the Senate was bait and switched into warBy:Conn Carroll04/04/11 3:26 PM
> Associate Editor Of Commentary
> Last week, minutes after President Barack Obama explained to the nation why 
> he took the country to war, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) posted astatement on 
> YouTubefirst notingObama’s 2007 claimthat “The President does not have power 
> under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a 
> situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the 
> nation” and then adding: “Unfortunately, President Obama has failed to heed 
> his own advice. He has ignored our constitution and engaged us in a military 
> conflict without congressional debate and approval.”
> But the day before on This Week, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton toldABC 
> News’ Jake Tapper: “The United States Senate called for a no-fly zone in the 
> resolution that it passed on March 1st.”
> So who is right? Did the president go to war without any approval from the 
> Senate, as Sen. Paul says? Or did the Senate approve the president’s use of 
> military force, as Secretary Clinton claims?
> The answer involves a secretive Senate procedure known as “hotlining.”  
> Hotlining is a system that allows legislation to pass by “unanimous consent,” 
> usually in the evening, when almost no Senators are present.  Prior to a 
> bill’s consideration, the Democrat and Republican Cloakrooms send out hotline 
> notices – automated phone calls and emails – to key staff.  The hotline 
> notices typically include the bill number, so members can look it up and 
> review its contents.  However, in the case of the Libya, the resolution was 
> not made public until the day after the Senate approved it.
> According to numerous congressional aides, almost no members knew about the 
> no-fly zone language.  Most offices thought they were approving a different 
> resolution – with the same sponsor and a nearly identical title – that had 
> been circulating among congressional offices for two weeks.
> In a February 22, email obtained by the Examiner, an aide to Sen. Robert 
> Menendez (D-N.J.) sent a resolution to the staff of members of the Senate 
> Foreign Relations Committee condemning human rights abuses in Libya.  There 
> was no mention of a no-fly zone.
> On March 1st, at 4:03pm, a different resolution was “hotlined.”  The only 
> information provided in the hotline email was the title: “S. Res. __ A 
> resolution strongly condemning the gross and systematic violations of human 
> rights in Libya, including violent attacks on protesters demanding democratic 
> reforms, and for other purposes.”
> But what Senate offices did not know was that the sponsors had secretly 
> slipped into the resolutionthe following sentence:“[the Senate] urges the 
> United Nations Security Council to take such further action as may be 
> necessary to protect civilians in Libya from attack, including the possible 
> imposition of a no-fly zone over Libyan territory”Most staff assumed the 
> “hotline” referred to the previous draft, and had no reason to place a "hold" 
> on a resolution condemning Libya Human Rights abuses.  At 6:30 pm, Sen. Chuck 
> Schumer (D-NY) took to a near empty chamber, and introduced the brand new 
> resolution and asked that it be approved without debate or vote.  By 6:31, 
> the resolution was passed.
> The resolution is non-binding and has no force of law, but that did not stop 
> pro-war Senators from rushing out to claim that the Senate had just approved 
> military action: “There is a bipartisan consensus building to provide 
> assistance to liberated areas of Libya and to work with our allies to enforce 
> a no-fly zone," a Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.)statement releasedthat night read.
> Senators more skeptical of military action where the United States has no 
> national interest felt deceived. Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) tells The Examiner: 
> "Clearly, the process was abused. You don't use a hotline to bait and switch 
> the country into a military conflict. There is no more difficult decision 
> than whether to put our men and women in uniform in harm's way. With no 
> imminent threat to the national security of the United States, the President 
> should have asked for authorization and Congress should have had a thorough 
> debate.”
> Sen. Paul is not giving up without a fight. Last Wednesday he introduced an 
> amendment to a small business bill that would adopt then-candidate Obama’s 
> 2007 statement above as “the sense of the Senate.” Majority Leader Harry Reid 
> (D-Nev.)shut down the entire Senateto avoid debating the issue. But Sen. 
> Paul’s motion is till the pending business of the Senate. With Senate action 
> needed to avid a government shutdown next week, 

Re: Is America Addicted to War?

[plainolamerican]

a military establishment that costs more than all other militaries put
together and that is used not to defend American soil but to fight
wars mostly on behalf of other people.

politicians in DC should fund their own charities


On Apr 5, 2:44 pm, MJ  wrote:
> Is America Addicted to War?The top 5 reasons why we keep getting into foolish 
> fights.BY STEPHEN M. WALT | APRIL 4, 2011The United States started out as 13 
> small and vulnerable colonies clinging to the east coast of North America. 
> Over the next century, those original 13 states expanded all the way across 
> the continent, subjugating or exterminating the native population and 
> wresting Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California from Mexico. It fought a 
> bitter civil war, acquired a modest set of overseas colonies, and came late 
> to both world wars. But since becoming a great power around 1900, it has 
> fought nearly a dozen genuine wars and engaged in countless military 
> interventions.
> Yet Americans think of themselves as a peace-loving people, and we certainly 
> don't regard our country as a "warrior nation" or "garrison state." Teddy 
> Roosevelt was probably the last U.S. president who seemed to view war as an 
> activity to be welcomed (he once remarked that "A just war is in the long run 
> far better for a man's soul than the most prosperous peace"), and subsequent 
> presidents always portray themselves as going to war with great reluctance, 
> and only as a last resort.
> In 2008, Americans elected Barack Obama in part because they thought he would 
> be different from his predecessor on a host of issues, but especially in his 
> approach to the use of armed force. It was clear to nearly everyone that 
> George W. Bush had launched a foolish and unnecessary war in Iraq, and then 
> compounded the error by mismanaging it (and the war in Afghanistan too). So 
> Americans chose a candidate who had opposed Bush's war in Iraq and could 
> bring U.S. commitments back in line with our resources. Above all, Americans 
> thought Obama would be a lot more thoughtful about where and how to use 
> force, and that he understood the limits of this crudest of policy tools. The 
> Norwegian Nobel Committee seems to have thought so too, when they awarded him 
> the Nobel Peace Prize not for anything he had done, but for what it hoped he 
> might do henceforth.
> Yet a mere two years later, we find ourselves back in the fray once again. 
> Since taking office, Obama has escalated U.S. involvement in Afghanistan and 
> launched a new war against Libya. As in Iraq, the real purpose of our 
> intervention is regime change at the point of a gun. At first we hoped that 
> most of the guns would be in the hands of the Europeans, or the hands of the 
> rebel forces arrayed against Muammar al-Qaddafi, but it's increasingly clear 
> that U.S. military forces, CIA operatives and foreign weapons supplies are 
> going to be necessary to finish the job.
> Moreover, asAlan Kupermanof the University of Texas andSteve Chapmanof 
> theChicago Tribunehave now shown, the claim that the United States had to act 
> to prevent Libyan tyrant Muammar al-Qaddafi from slaughtering tens of 
> thousands of innocent civilians in Benghazi does not stand up to even casual 
> scrutiny. Although everyone recognizes that Qaddafi is a brutal ruler, his 
> forces did not conduct deliberate, large-scale massacres in any of the cities 
> he has recaptured, and his violent threats to wreak vengeance on Benghazi 
> were directed at those who continued to resist his rule, not at innocent 
> bystanders. There is no question that Qaddafi is a tyrant with few (if any) 
> redemptive qualities, but the threat of a bloodbath that would "[stain] the 
> conscience of the world" (as Obamaput it) was slight.
> It remains to be seen whether this latest lurch into war will pay off or not, 
> and whether the United States and its allies will have saved lives or 
> squandered them. But the real question we should be asking is:Why does this 
> keep happening?Why do such different presidents keep doing such similar 
> things? How can an electorate that seemed sick of war in 2008 watch passively 
> while one war escalates in 2009 and another one gets launched in 2011? How 
> can two political parties that are locked in a nasty partisan fight over 
> every nickel in the government budget sit blithely by and watch a president 
> start running up a $100 million per day tab in this latest adventure? What is 
> going on here?
> Here are myTop 5 Reasons Why America Keeps Fighting Foolish Wars:1. Because 
> We Can.The most obvious reason that the United States keeps doing these 
> things is the fact that it has a remarkably powerful military, especially 
> when facing a minor power like Libya. As I wrote acouple of weeksago, when 
> you've got hundreds of planes, smart bombs, and cruise missiles, the whole 
> world looks like a target set. So when some thorny problem arises somewhere 
> in the world

Is America Addicted to War?

[MJ]

Is America Addicted to War?
The top 5 reasons why we keep getting into
foolish fights. 
BY STEPHEN M. WALT | APRIL 4, 2011 
The United States started out as 13 small and vulnerable
colonies clinging to the east coast of North America. Over the next
century, those original 13 states expanded all the way across the
continent, subjugating or exterminating the native population and
wresting Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California from Mexico. It fought
a bitter civil war, acquired a modest set of overseas colonies, and came
late to both world wars. But since becoming a great power around 1900, it
has fought nearly a dozen genuine wars and engaged in countless military
interventions. 
Yet Americans think of themselves as a peace-loving people, and we
certainly don't regard our country as a "warrior nation" or
"garrison state." Teddy Roosevelt was probably the last U.S.
president who seemed to view war as an activity to be welcomed (he once
remarked that "A just war is in the long run far better for a man's
soul than the most prosperous peace"), and subsequent presidents
always portray themselves as going to war with great reluctance, and only
as a last resort. 
In 2008, Americans elected Barack Obama in part because they thought he
would be different from his predecessor on a host of issues, but
especially in his approach to the use of armed force. It was clear to
nearly everyone that George W. Bush had launched a foolish and
unnecessary war in Iraq, and then compounded the error by mismanaging it
(and the war in Afghanistan too). So Americans chose a candidate who had
opposed Bush's war in Iraq and could bring U.S. commitments back in line
with our resources. Above all, Americans thought Obama would be a lot
more thoughtful about where and how to use force, and that he understood
the limits of this crudest of policy tools. The Norwegian Nobel Committee
seems to have thought so too, when they awarded him the Nobel Peace Prize
not for anything he had done, but for what it hoped he might do
henceforth. 
Yet a mere two years later, we find ourselves back in the fray once
again. Since taking office, Obama has escalated U.S. involvement in
Afghanistan and launched a new war against Libya. As in Iraq, the real
purpose of our intervention is regime change at the point of a gun. At
first we hoped that most of the guns would be in the hands of the
Europeans, or the hands of the rebel forces arrayed against Muammar
al-Qaddafi, but it's increasingly clear that U.S. military forces, CIA
operatives and foreign weapons supplies are going to be necessary to
finish the job. 
Moreover, as

Alan Kuperman of the University of Texas and

Steve Chapman of the Chicago Tribune have now shown, the claim
that the United States had to act to prevent Libyan tyrant Muammar
al-Qaddafi from slaughtering tens of thousands of innocent civilians in
Benghazi does not stand up to even casual scrutiny. Although everyone
recognizes that Qaddafi is a brutal ruler, his forces did not conduct
deliberate, large-scale massacres in any of the cities he has recaptured,
and his violent threats to wreak vengeance on Benghazi were directed at
those who continued to resist his rule, not at innocent bystanders. There
is no question that Qaddafi is a tyrant with few (if any) redemptive
qualities, but the threat of a bloodbath that would "[stain] the
conscience of the world" (as Obama

put it) was slight. 
It remains to be seen whether this latest lurch into war will pay off or
not, and whether the United States and its allies will have saved lives
or squandered them. But the real question we should be asking is: Why
does this keep happening? Why do such different presidents keep doing
such similar things? How can an electorate that seemed sick of war in
2008 watch passively while one war escalates in 2009 and another one gets
launched in 2011? How can two political parties that are locked in a
nasty partisan fight over every nickel in the government budget sit
blithely by and watch a president start running up a $100 million per day
tab in this latest adventure? What is going on here? 
Here are my Top 5 Reasons Why
America Keeps Fighting Foolish Wars: 
1. Because We Can. 
The most obvious reason that the United States
keeps doing these things is the fact that it has a remarkably powerful
military, especially when facing a minor power like Libya. As I wrote a

couple of weeks ago, when you've got hundreds of planes, smart bombs,
and cruise missiles, the whole world looks like a target set. So when
some thorny problem arises somewhere in the world, it's hard to resist
the temptation to "do something!" 
It is as if the president has big red button on his desk, and then his
aides come in and say, "There's something really nasty happening to
some unfortunate people, Mr. President, but if you push that button, you
can stop it. It might cost a few hundred million dollars, maybe even a
few billion by the time we are done, but we can always float a bit more
debt. 

How the Senate was bait and switched into war

[MJ]

How the Senate was bait and switched
into war
By:
Conn
Carroll 04/04/11 3:26 PM 
Associate Editor Of Commentary 
Last week, minutes after President Barack Obama explained to the nation
why he took the country to war, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) posted
a statement on
YouTube first noting

Obama’s 2007 claim that “The President does not have power under the
Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation
that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the
nation” and then adding: “Unfortunately, President Obama has failed to
heed his own advice. He has ignored our constitution and engaged us in a
military conflict without congressional debate and approval.”
But the day before on This Week, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
told
 ABC News’ Jake Tapper: “The United States Senate called for a no-fly
zone in the resolution that it passed on March 1st.”
So who is right? Did the president go to war without any approval from
the Senate, as Sen. Paul says? Or did the Senate approve the president’s
use of military force, as Secretary Clinton claims?
The answer involves a secretive Senate procedure known as
“hotlining.”  Hotlining is a system that allows legislation to pass
by “unanimous consent,” usually in the evening, when almost no Senators
are present.  Prior to a bill’s consideration, the Democrat and
Republican Cloakrooms send out hotline notices – automated phone calls
and emails – to key staff.  The hotline notices typically include
the bill number, so members can look it up and review its contents. 
However, in the case of the Libya, the resolution was not made public
until the day after the Senate approved it.
According to numerous congressional aides, almost no members knew about
the no-fly zone language.  Most offices thought they were approving
a different resolution – with the same sponsor and a nearly identical
title – that had been circulating among congressional offices for two
weeks.
In a February 22, email obtained by the Examiner, an aide to Sen. Robert
Menendez (D-N.J.) sent a resolution to the staff of members of the Senate
Foreign Relations Committee condemning human rights abuses in
Libya.  There was no mention of a no-fly zone.
On March 1st, at 4:03pm, a different resolution was “hotlined.”  The
only information provided in the hotline email was the title: “S. Res. __
A resolution strongly condemning the gross and systematic violations of
human rights in Libya, including violent attacks on protesters demanding
democratic reforms, and for other purposes.”
But what Senate offices did not know was that the sponsors had secretly
slipped into the resolution
the
following sentence:

“[the Senate] urges the United Nations Security Council to take such
further action as may be necessary to protect civilians in Libya from
attack, including the possible imposition of a no-fly zone over Libyan
territory”
Most staff assumed the “hotline” referred to the previous draft, and
had no reason to place a "hold" on a resolution condemning
Libya Human Rights abuses.  At 6:30 pm, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY)
took to a near empty chamber, and introduced the brand new resolution and
asked that it be approved without debate or vote.  By 6:31, the
resolution was passed.
The resolution is non-binding and has no force of law, but that did not
stop pro-war Senators from rushing out to claim that the Senate had just
approved military action: “There is a bipartisan consensus building to
provide assistance to liberated areas of Libya and to work with our
allies to enforce a no-fly zone," a Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.)

statement released that night read.
Senators more skeptical of military action where the United States has no
national interest felt deceived. Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) tells The
Examiner: "Clearly, the process was abused. You don't use a hotline
to bait and switch the country into a military conflict. There is no more
difficult decision than whether to put our men and women in uniform in
harm's way. With no imminent threat to the national security of the
United States, the President should have asked for authorization and
Congress should have had a thorough debate.”
Sen. Paul is not giving up without a fight. Last Wednesday he introduced
an amendment to a small business bill that would adopt then-candidate
Obama’s 2007 statement above as “the sense of the Senate.” Majority
Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.)

shut down the entire Senate to avoid debating the issue. But Sen.
Paul’s motion is till the pending business of the Senate. With Senate
action needed to avid a government shutdown next week, Paul, and the
American people, may just yet get a debate on military action in
Libya.

http://washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/2011/04/how-senate-was-bait-and-switched-war#ixzz1Ig9pHszH






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Trump: If We Don’t Take Iraq’s Oil, U.S. Soldiers ‘Would Have Died In Vain’

[MJ]

"Welfare millionaire (and hair plug support
system) Donald Trump offers his riff on the "Kick their ass/take
their gas" theme. I'd like to hear him explain exactly what it means
to be "de-neutered."" -- William N. Grigg

Trump: If We Don’t Take Iraq’s
Oil, U.S. Soldiers ‘Would Have Died In Vain’ 
In his quixotic search for attention, likely GOP
presidential candidate Donald Trump has added a foreign policy leg to his

farcical platform. Revealing

his thoughts on the Iraq war to Fox News host Bill O’Reilly last
week, the real estate mogul boiled his policy down to an argument of “to
the victor belonged the spoils.” Fearing that “15 minutes after we
leave,” Iran would tromp into Iraq and “take the oil,” Trump argued the
U.S. should “stay and keep the oil,” “take what’s necessary for us and we
pay our self back $1.5 trillion or more.” 
O’Reilly later
mocked Trump’s
policy on Fox and Friends: “You’d basically be re-invading the country
you already invaded to try and get their oil. Come on, can you imagine
the world reaction to that?” Unswayed, Trump
doubled-down in a
Fox and Friends segment this morning. Still convinced Iran will pounce on
the oil fields once the U.S. withdraws, Trump insisted that if we don’t
“take the oil,” the
5,885 U.S.
soldiers killed in Iraq “would have
died in vain“:


TRUMP: I very simply said that Iran is going to takeover Iraq, and if
that’s going to happen, we should just stay there and take the oil. They
want the oil, and why should we? We de-neutered Iraq, Iran is going to
walk in, take it over, take over the second largest oil fields in the
world. That’s going to happen. That would mean that all of those soldiers
that have died and been wounded and everything else would have died in
vain– and I don’t want that to happen. I want their parents and their
families to be proud.
Watch it:


http://mediamatters.org/mmtv/201104040005

Trump’s apprentice-level understanding is
not
 unique
and is gathering support within the right-wing. Echoing Trump, Fox News
host Glenn Beck suggested that President George W. Bush was a
“
bad leader” for failing to get enough “oil to repay us for what we
did” in Iraq and that our Libyan operations should protect our oil
interests. His network colleague Sean Hannity proposed

re-invading Iraq to “take all their oil.” Insisting the U.S. gave up
oil in Iraq for “the guilt of being a superpower,” right-wing radio host
Rush Limbaugh stated,
“I wish we were going
for oil” in Libya. 
Despite his desire to exploit the Iraq war for oil, Trump should learn
that while private U.S. companies like

Halliburton are exploiting Iraqi oil for profit, the U.S. government
is a signatory to the Hague Conventions and thus
cannot
confiscate private property as an occupying power. If Trump finally
decides to run, perhaps he should take his own advice on foreign policy:
“
don’t be so stupid.”


http://thinkprogress.org/2011/04/04/trump-iraq-oil-soldiers-died-vain/
 




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Narcissist-in-Chief claims he's the most successful President in the last 50 years

[Travis]

[[  See Attachment. ]]




Narcissist-in-Chief
claims he's the most successful President in the last 50
years
*Scotty Starnes
*| April 5,
2011 at 2:12 PM | Tags: 2012
presidential 
campaign,
liar-in-chief ,
narcissist , President
Obama , re-election
campaign  |
Categories: Political Issues
| URL:
http://wp.me/pvnFC-4Yf

 

I am the greatest...at spending YOUR money!

If his definition of success means bankrupting America, then yes, he is the
most successful in our 235 year history.

>From Politico :

President Barack Obama offered a sober assessment of his 2012
campaignto
supporters Monday night, admitting that the “newness” was gone but
urging
his grassroots troops to organize with the same fervor that propelled him to
victory in 2008.

On a conference call with hundreds of organizers, volunteers and campaign
operatives, Obama played up the threats posed by Republicans to his agenda
while *boasting of “hav[ing] had the most successful legislative initiative
of any president over the last 50 years.”*

 The call was the culmination of a day-long roll-out of his re-election
campaign, which began with the 5 a.m. release of a
video
entitled
“It Begins With Us.” That was followed by an email to supporters, the filing
of re-election paperwork with the Federal Election Commission and a more
exclusive rally-the-troops conference call with top donors conducted by
campaign manager Jim Messina.

“I’m fired up, I don’t know about everybody else,” Obama said after being
patched through by the White House switchboard to a core group of campaign
workers that pulled off an upset victory over Hillary Rodham Clinton in the
Democratic primaries nearly three years ago and went on to defeat Republican
John McCain.

Continue reading>>> 

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Re: Wringing-the-Neck of Empty Ritual.

[Jonathan Ashley]

John,

I am well aware of your previous claims as to why you ordered YOUR New 
Constitution as you did. I simply wanted to point out to those 300-plus 
million people who you deem to be less intellectual than yourself how 
ludicrous such a construction is.


On 04/05/2011 11:56 AM, NoEinstein wrote:

Jonathan:  I've answered that same question numbers of times.
Obviously, you've not read very far back in my thread.  The logical
reason for the order of my New Constitution is because I used the
original constitution as the model.  My first step was to transcribe
the Constitution into my computer.  I did this in the days before
there was big cut and paste.  Only by transcribing the Constitution,
one key stroke at a time, does one come to realize how crudely written
the Constitution actually is.  Except for the (after-thought) Bill of
Rights, there is very little other than an organizational structure in
the majority of the Constitution.  Wherever possible, I 'fluffed out'
the document in those locations where the "subject heading" was
there.  That's why Article III is so much longer.  Anyone wishing to
find out about the Judiciary can still locate that in Article III.
And anyone wishing to see if their rights are still there can look for
the clarified and expanded Bill of Rights and Amendments.  I invite
the readers to look at what I've written one sentence at a time.  The
citizens—as individuals, not as 'puppet' members of biased groups—will
have incredibly more power, and more civil liberties!  When the size
of government goes DOWN, civil liberties go UP!  — J. A. Armistead —
Patriot
On Apr 4, 1:30 pm, Jonathan Ashley
wrote:

John,

I have a simple question that even someone with your incredibly superior
intelligence  should be able to answer.

How is it YOUR New Constitution has a "1st Amendment" when it has yet to
be viewed in its entirety, let alone ratified?

On 04/04/2011 10:19 AM, NoEinstein wrote:


Folks:  A blushing, almost-kid-like Glenn Beck was on Bill O'Reilly's
TV program this week.  It was discussed whether The Donald's ideas for
dealing with our economic woes make him a viable candidate for
President.  O'Reilly said, "Yes."   But Beck said he would prefer a
candidate who "just speaks the truth" (rather than one who has an
actual PLAN that works).  As a regular laugher (mostly) at Glenn
Beck's e4 shows, his blackboards and shuffling of photos to
incriminate people have gotten old fast.  His memorable shows are now
about one per month, where they used to be about one out of three.  In
essence, he has run out of material.  His having �oh-isn't-that-sweat�
shows like Mike Huckabee isn't improving the chances the USA will
survive.  Nor is Beck�s delusion that our present broke, broke
government can be fixed if only the voters can be told... "the
truth".  Beck is going on faith that towns (like in Ohio) can be saved
and countries, too, if only the good people in his viewing audience
can get the word...
At Fox News only two people stand out as selling the conservative
route to salvation for the USA: Stu Varney and Andrew Napolitano.
Sean Hannity continues to shoot-himself-in-the-foot by having Bob
Beckel, the socialist, Obama-loving traitor as his regular guest.
"Bob is a good friend," Hannity says.  Anyone having Beckel as a
friend isn't fit to have air time in this country.  My New
Constitution says:
"1st Amendment:  No law shall be made regarding the establishment of
peaceable religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, but
government, its campaigns, processes, slogans, and disbursements shall
be secular.  No law nor private or civil action shall abridge: the
freedom of speech; ***the freedom of a fair and pro-democracy press or
other medium; the right of People to peaceably assemble; and the right
of any Citizen or group to petition government or any of its branches
or departments for redress of grievances.  Citizens so petitioning
government shall receive appropriate, relevant, timely, comprehensive,
helpful and just responses from proper authorities who have thoroughly
read, understood, and addressed each salient aspect of the grievances
or requests for directions or clarifications.  Failure to so respond
to a rightful petition for redress of a grievance shall, on a single
provable instance, terminate the apt one�s employment, especially
those in management or public office�including judges and justices�who
ignore, frustrate or give the run-around to any competent Citizen who
has been diligent in having a grievance properly addressed, or in
having his or her civil rights fully upheld.  No judge or justice
shall presume that by performing the above required duties, that they
in any way might be compromising their objectivity or fairness in
court; justice be not �blind�, but well informed.  Freedom of the
press or other medium mandates that there be reasonable truthfulness
in reporting.  Wanton distortion of the truth, or deliberate omission
of the truth�except in case

Re: Wringing-the-Neck of Empty Ritual.

[Jonathan Ashley]

If I were to devote 14 years of my life to a single project, I would 
hope the results of that endeavor were something worthwhile. YOUR New 
Constitution is bloated and shows a complete lack of focus. Most of the 
provisions you present are unenforceable. Like the framers of our 
current constitution,  you offer no penalties for violating the 
provisions of YOUR New Constitution. You only declare such and such 
won't be allowed.


On 04/05/2011 11:38 AM, NoEinstein wrote:

Jonathan:  Devote 14 plus years of your life to writing 'a' new
constitution and see how you would describe it.  Saying anything other
than 'my' would imply that the document was the result of... a
committee.  I can say with certainty that nothing creative or worthy
was ever figured out while talking.  Since talking is what committees
do, that explains why committee solutions are never as good as those
of inspired intellectuals like me.  Take any issue of concern to you
and write even one paragraph explaining how 'your' constitution would
address the problem.  Not one person in a million could do that.  I'm
one person in 300 million!  —  J. A. Armistead —  Patriot
On Apr 4, 12:26 pm, Jonathan Ashley
wrote:

But John, it is you who has a holier-than-thou tone. It's YOUR New
Constitution. By your responses to posts it is obvious you think you are
the only one in the world worthy enough to have written IT.

How can you honestly claim YOUR New Constitution is pro-people when the
"people" cannot even ask you questions about it? It obviously doesn't
belong to "we the people."

It is YOU who claims to have written something SPECIAL - unworthy of
input from us mere mortals.

Admit it, John. That anyone has the nerve to challenge YOUR worthless
piece of crap pisses YOU off.

On 04/04/2011 08:38 AM, NoEinstein wrote:


who has a holier-than-thou tone

--

   The biggest obstacle to freedom and liberty is not knowing what
   freedom and liberty are.

Learn How To Protect Your Identity And Prevent Identity Theft



--


 The biggest obstacle to freedom and liberty is not knowing what
 freedom and liberty are.

Learn How To Protect Your Identity And Prevent Identity Theft 



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Somehow It's Worse to Burn the Koran Than the Bible?

[Travis]

 Somehow It's
Worse to Burn the Koran Than the
Bible?
*Scotty Starnes
*| April 5,
2011 at 12:00 PM | Tags:
Allah ,
America,
Bible , Bill
O'Reilly,
Christians ,
Constitution , culture
war ,
God,
Islam ,
Jesus,
jihad ,
Koran,
Muslims , Sharia
law,
theocracy  |
Categories: Political
Issues  | URL:
http://wp.me/pvnFC-4Y4

by Snidely 
Whiplash

I'm afraid Bill O' Reilly is right...there is a culture war in this nation.
Western and specifically American culture are under continuous assault from
many quarters, foreign and domestic. I get a Muslim not caring for
Christian's or the Bible, but what of those from the West who sympathize
with such an asinine point of view?

How is it "worse" to burn a Koran than a Bible? I know the arm-chair
theological argument - the Bible are stories, allegories, etc., from God on
how we are to comport ourselves as well as the story of Jesus, but the Koran
is the word of Allah passed on to the Prophet and written down directly, or
some rough approximation of that scenario. Horse hockey! Both are books
written by MEN, HUMANS, EARTHLY CREATURES...get it?

At the risk of personal jihad against me, as if I give a rat's ass, neither
book is superior to the other. Devout Christian's hold their Bible as dear
as Muslim's hold the Koran...end of story. Any other position by an American
is simply a talking point to use to denigrate America and the West, or more
specifically the Constitution, capitalism and basically any other central
tenet of this nation.

Do others find the leftist as odd and glaringly transparent as I do in their
forwarding of Islam
as so
wonderful and righteous, deserving of respect, and maybe even
accepting of Sharia Law, yet they then savage American Christian's as being
evil, bent on theocracy? I mean Sharia is theocracy in practice, yet these
lefties are fine with it, but a Christian just being a Christian is
inherently dangerous and theocratic. This is pure hypocrisy for the purposes
of further eroding American ideals, morals and yes, our Founding too! It's
all connected.

Continue 
reading>>>

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Re: Wringing-the-Neck of Empty Ritual.

[NoEinstein]

Jonathan:  I've answered that same question numbers of times.
Obviously, you've not read very far back in my thread.  The logical
reason for the order of my New Constitution is because I used the
original constitution as the model.  My first step was to transcribe
the Constitution into my computer.  I did this in the days before
there was big cut and paste.  Only by transcribing the Constitution,
one key stroke at a time, does one come to realize how crudely written
the Constitution actually is.  Except for the (after-thought) Bill of
Rights, there is very little other than an organizational structure in
the majority of the Constitution.  Wherever possible, I 'fluffed out'
the document in those locations where the "subject heading" was
there.  That's why Article III is so much longer.  Anyone wishing to
find out about the Judiciary can still locate that in Article III.
And anyone wishing to see if their rights are still there can look for
the clarified and expanded Bill of Rights and Amendments.  I invite
the readers to look at what I've written one sentence at a time.  The
citizens—as individuals, not as 'puppet' members of biased groups—will
have incredibly more power, and more civil liberties!  When the size
of government goes DOWN, civil liberties go UP!  — J. A. Armistead —
Patriot
>
On Apr 4, 1:30 pm, Jonathan Ashley 
wrote:
> John,
>
> I have a simple question that even someone with your incredibly superior
> intelligence  should be able to answer.
>
> How is it YOUR New Constitution has a "1st Amendment" when it has yet to
> be viewed in its entirety, let alone ratified?
>
> On 04/04/2011 10:19 AM, NoEinstein wrote:
>
> > Folks:  A blushing, almost-kid-like Glenn Beck was on Bill O'Reilly's
> > TV program this week.  It was discussed whether The Donald's ideas for
> > dealing with our economic woes make him a viable candidate for
> > President.  O'Reilly said, "Yes."   But Beck said he would prefer a
> > candidate who "just speaks the truth" (rather than one who has an
> > actual PLAN that works).  As a regular laugher (mostly) at Glenn
> > Beck's e4 shows, his blackboards and shuffling of photos to
> > incriminate people have gotten old fast.  His memorable shows are now
> > about one per month, where they used to be about one out of three.  In
> > essence, he has run out of material.  His having �oh-isn't-that-sweat�
> > shows like Mike Huckabee isn't improving the chances the USA will
> > survive.  Nor is Beck�s delusion that our present broke, broke
> > government can be fixed if only the voters can be told... "the
> > truth".  Beck is going on faith that towns (like in Ohio) can be saved
> > and countries, too, if only the good people in his viewing audience
> > can get the word...
>
> > At Fox News only two people stand out as selling the conservative
> > route to salvation for the USA: Stu Varney and Andrew Napolitano.
> > Sean Hannity continues to shoot-himself-in-the-foot by having Bob
> > Beckel, the socialist, Obama-loving traitor as his regular guest.
> > "Bob is a good friend," Hannity says.  Anyone having Beckel as a
> > friend isn't fit to have air time in this country.  My New
> > Constitution says:
>
> > "1st Amendment:  No law shall be made regarding the establishment of
> > peaceable religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, but
> > government, its campaigns, processes, slogans, and disbursements shall
> > be secular.  No law nor private or civil action shall abridge: the
> > freedom of speech; ***the freedom of a fair and pro-democracy press or
> > other medium; the right of People to peaceably assemble; and the right
> > of any Citizen or group to petition government or any of its branches
> > or departments for redress of grievances.  Citizens so petitioning
> > government shall receive appropriate, relevant, timely, comprehensive,
> > helpful and just responses from proper authorities who have thoroughly
> > read, understood, and addressed each salient aspect of the grievances
> > or requests for directions or clarifications.  Failure to so respond
> > to a rightful petition for redress of a grievance shall, on a single
> > provable instance, terminate the apt one�s employment, especially
> > those in management or public office�including judges and justices�who
> > ignore, frustrate or give the run-around to any competent Citizen who
> > has been diligent in having a grievance properly addressed, or in
> > having his or her civil rights fully upheld.  No judge or justice
> > shall presume that by performing the above required duties, that they
> > in any way might be compromising their objectivity or fairness in
> > court; justice be not �blind�, but well informed.  Freedom of the
> > press or other medium mandates that there be reasonable truthfulness
> > in reporting.  Wanton distortion of the truth, or deliberate omission
> > of the truth�except in cases of obvious fiction or satire�is
> > prohibited.  Stating or implying that a particular new

Re: CAIR's plan to 'run' U.S. revealed

[plainolamerican]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDwA_NWVTJM

On Apr 5, 1:25 pm, plainolamerican  wrote:
> The jewish lobby in the US should have thought about this before they
> lobbied to limit white immigration.
>
> The solution: Sell more weapons to the jews, muzzies and xians.
>
> On Apr 5, 12:44 pm, Travis  wrote:
>
>
>
> > Run CAIR out of town.
>
> >      CAIR's plan to
> > 'run' U.S. 
> > revealed
> > *creeping * | April 5,
> > 2011 at 12:40 PM | Tags: 
> > cair,
> > Creeping Sharia ,
> > hamas ,
> > islam,
> > Legal ,
> > Life,
> > Media ,
> > Muslim,
> > News ,
> > Politics,
> > Random ,
> > Sharia| Categories:
> > Alerts , Creeping
> > Sharia,
> > FBI ,
> > Media,
> > News ,
> > Politics,
> > Religion ,
> > Sharia,
> > Stealth Jihad  | 
> > URL:http://wp.me/pbU4v-8g9
>
> > via WND: CAIR chief's designs to 'run' U.S. revealed. The same national
> > Muslim leader who's launched an "education campaign" to quell American fears
> > over Shariah law once gave a full-throated speech to Muslims advocating an
> > Islamic rise to power in America. In a newly surfaced video of a 2000 speech
> > to the Islamic Society of [...]
>
> > Read more of this
> > post
>
> > Add a comment to this
> > post
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > 
>
> >   [image: WordPress]
>
> > WordPress.com  | Thanks for flying with WordPress!
> > Manage 
> > Subscriptions|
> > Unsubscribe|
> > Reach
> > out to your own subscribers with
> > WordPress.com.
>
> > *Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your 
> > browser:*http://subscribe.wordpress.com

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Re: Wringing-the-Neck of Empty Ritual.

[NoEinstein]

Jonathan:  Devote 14 plus years of your life to writing 'a' new
constitution and see how you would describe it.  Saying anything other
than 'my' would imply that the document was the result of... a
committee.  I can say with certainty that nothing creative or worthy
was ever figured out while talking.  Since talking is what committees
do, that explains why committee solutions are never as good as those
of inspired intellectuals like me.  Take any issue of concern to you
and write even one paragraph explaining how 'your' constitution would
address the problem.  Not one person in a million could do that.  I'm
one person in 300 million!  —  J. A. Armistead —  Patriot
>
On Apr 4, 12:26 pm, Jonathan Ashley 
wrote:
> But John, it is you who has a holier-than-thou tone. It's YOUR New
> Constitution. By your responses to posts it is obvious you think you are
> the only one in the world worthy enough to have written IT.
>
> How can you honestly claim YOUR New Constitution is pro-people when the
> "people" cannot even ask you questions about it? It obviously doesn't
> belong to "we the people."
>
> It is YOU who claims to have written something SPECIAL - unworthy of
> input from us mere mortals.
>
> Admit it, John. That anyone has the nerve to challenge YOUR worthless
> piece of crap pisses YOU off.
>
> On 04/04/2011 08:38 AM, NoEinstein wrote:
>
> > who has a holier-than-thou tone
>
> --
>
>       The biggest obstacle to freedom and liberty is not knowing what
>       freedom and liberty are.
>
> Learn How To Protect Your Identity And Prevent Identity Theft
> 

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Re: Wringing-the-Neck of Empty Ritual.

[NoEinstein]

Folks:  Pushing for socialism or communism in a Republic or Democracy
is the same as trying to overthrow the government.  There is no higher
crime than that!  I've never said that "anyone" who speaks freely is
an outlaw.  Only those like Mark, alias "The Annointed (sic) One" who
attack me—the most patriotic and pro civil liberties person in the USA—
is clearly an outlaw.  Free speech IS allowed for all of those not
employed by government and not being paid by any medium.  Working as a
'moderator' for Google gives the likes of Mark an advantage of
exposure.  My New Constitution doesn't allow any person working for
any medium to express their personal political biases.  There can be
no exceptions if the USA is to return the control of government to the
People, and away from the elitist media and elitist politicians which
the media made to be elitist in the first place.  — John A. Armistead
—  Patriot
>
On Apr 4, 12:11 pm, Mark  wrote:
> Stalinesque.. Your "pegging" ANYONE that speaks freely as an "outlaw" is
> absolutely Stalinesque.
>
> On Mon, Apr 4, 2011 at 9:38 AM, NoEinstein  wrote:
> > Jonathan:  My rationality for pegging you an outlaw and a traitor
> > should be evident to anyone who has read my pro-people New
> > Constitution that I've regularly detailed in Sections.  Anyone, like
> > you, who has a holier-than-thou tone doesn't have the value system to
> > judge anything.  Be content with looking things up in your elementary
> > school dictionary, Jonathan.  That's all the discourse you'll ever
> > get.  — J. A. A. —
>
> > On Apr 1, 4:09 pm, Jonathan Ashley 
> > wrote:
> > > John,
>
> > > If you truly believe I have "no virtues worthy of... being allowed to
> > > continue to live on this Earth," why don't you stop by sometime and we
> > > can discuss this in person.
>
> > > As for my being "an outlaw to humanity," how do you believe that is
> > > possible?
>
> > >     *OUTLAW,* n. A person excluded from the benefit of the law, or
> > >     deprived of its protection.
>
> > >     *HUMANITY*, n. The peculiar nature of man, by which he is
> > >     distinguished from other beings.
>
> > > How did you determine that humanity is law?
>
> > > On 04/01/2011 11:38 AM, NoEinstein wrote:
>
> > > > I can't be put on the defensive regarding the most highly-motivated,
> > > > for-the-people document ever written.  Jonathan, the socialist-
> > > > communist, is bent on destroying the USA.  He has no virtues worthy of
> > > > his being allowed to continue to live on this Earth.  He is an outlaw
> > > > to humanity, along with Mark and MJ.  I'm amazed that Keith can't see
> > > > what rascals he purports to understand and tolerate!  ï¿½ J. A.
> > > > Armistead �   Patriot
> > > > On Mar 29, 1:05 pm, Jonathan Ashley
> > > > wrote:
> > > >> John,
>
> > > >> The problem is you don't defend your document. If you were to defend
> > it,
> > > >> you would have to engage in dialogue. Instead, you resort to personal
> > > >> attacks against those who pose questions - failing in every instance
> > > >> thus far to answer any posed questions. You are nothing more than a
> > > >> hypocrite.
>
> > > >> On 03/29/2011 09:23 AM, NoEinstein wrote:
>
> > > >>> Jonathan:  You, like so many in the groups, seek to elevate your non-
> > > >>> existent status by attacking the work of your intellectual and
> > > >>> creative superiors.  As required by the original Constitution, I
> > > >>> only... "preserve, protect, and defend" my document from the attacks
> > > >>> of lame brains like you, MJ and Mark.  My time would be better spent
> > > >>> writing more essays.  ï¿½  J. A. A. �
> > > >>> On Mar 28, 11:59 am, Jonathan Ashley
> > > >>> wrote:
> > >  John,
> > >  Why won't you face the fact that you just don't like YOUR New
> > >  Constitution being criticized.
> > >  On 03/28/2011 08:00 AM, NoEinstein wrote:
> > > > Jonathan:  For your information, no socialist-communist will ever
> > get
> > > > a chance to serve in, or be employed by government.  The "input"
> > that
> > > > you seek to destroy the USA isn't available to tyrants like you.
> >  ï¿½ J.
> > > > A. A. �
> > > > On Mar 26, 7:36 pm, Jonathan Ashley
> > > > wrote:
> > > >> Once again John has resorted to cut and paste name calling rather
> > than
> > > >> engage in meaningful dialog.
> > > >> On 03/26/2011 03:53 PM, NoEinstein wrote:
> > > >>> Jonathan Ashley, the socialist-communist, is undeserving of a
> > reply.
> > > >>> � J. A. A. �
> > > >>> On Mar 25, 2:41 pm, Jonathan Ashley
> > > >>> wrote:
> > >  John,
> > >  I am shocked. I am in agreement with your statement, "In the
> > case of
> > >  contract law, a FAIR contract is one in which both parties to
> > the
> > >  contract are happy with the deal." That is voluntary
> > interaction. That
> > >  is how things should be.
> > >  However, you lose me with, "If a person thinks they have been

Re: CAIR's plan to 'run' U.S. revealed

[plainolamerican]

The jewish lobby in the US should have thought about this before they
lobbied to limit white immigration.

The solution: Sell more weapons to the jews, muzzies and xians.


On Apr 5, 12:44 pm, Travis  wrote:
> Run CAIR out of town.
>
>      CAIR's plan to
> 'run' U.S. 
> revealed
> *creeping * | April 5,
> 2011 at 12:40 PM | Tags: cair,
> Creeping Sharia ,
> hamas ,
> islam,
> Legal ,
> Life,
> Media ,
> Muslim,
> News ,
> Politics,
> Random ,
> Sharia| Categories:
> Alerts , Creeping
> Sharia,
> FBI ,
> Media,
> News ,
> Politics,
> Religion ,
> Sharia,
> Stealth Jihad  | 
> URL:http://wp.me/pbU4v-8g9
>
> via WND: CAIR chief's designs to 'run' U.S. revealed. The same national
> Muslim leader who's launched an "education campaign" to quell American fears
> over Shariah law once gave a full-throated speech to Muslims advocating an
> Islamic rise to power in America. In a newly surfaced video of a 2000 speech
> to the Islamic Society of [...]
>
> Read more of this
> post
>
> Add a comment to this
> post
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>
>   [image: WordPress]
>
> WordPress.com  | Thanks for flying with WordPress!
> Manage 
> Subscriptions|
> Unsubscribe|
> Reach
> out to your own subscribers with
> WordPress.com.
>
> *Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your 
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Re: Medical Marijuana Users Fight For Gun Rights

[plainolamerican]

The sheriffs "are opposed to the medical marijuana act," Berger said
from Portland. "It's not based on reason. That's how they are."
---
They really need to educated themselves on the effects and dangers of
pot.

On Apr 5, 12:12 pm, Jonathan Ashley 
wrote:
> *Medical Marijuana Users Fight For Gun Rights*
>
> WHITE CITY, Ore. April 4, 2011
>
> Cynthia Willis calls up and down the firing range to be sure everyone
> knows she is shooting, squares up in a two-handed stance with her
> Walther P-22 automatic pistol and fires off a clip in rapid succession.
>
> Willis is not only packing a concealed handgun permit in her wallet, she
> also has a medical marijuana card. That combination has led the local
> sheriff to try to take her gun permit away.
>
> She is part of what is considered the first major court case in the
> country to consider whether guns and marijuana can legally mix. The
> sheriffs of Washington and Jackson counties say no. But Willis and three
> co-plaintiffs have won in state court twice, with the state's rights to
> regulate concealed weapons trumping federal gun control law in each
> decision.
>
> With briefs filed and arguments made, they are now waiting for the
> Oregon Supreme Court to rule.
>
> When it's over, the diminutive 54-year-old plans to still be eating
> marijuana cookies to deal with her arthritis pain and muscle spasms, and
> carrying her pistol.
>
> "Under the medical marijuana law, I am supposed to be treated as any
> other citizen in this state," she said. "If people don't stand up for
> their little rights, all their big rights will be gone."
>
> A retired school bus driver, Willis volunteers at a Medford smoke shop
> that helps medical marijuana patients find growers, and teaches how to
> get the most medical benefit out of the pound-and-a-half of pot that
> card carriers are allowed to possess. She believes that her marijuana
> oils, cookies and joints should be treated no differently than any other
> prescribed medicines. She said she doesn't use them when she plans to
> drive, or carry her gun.
>
> "That's as stupid as mixing alcohol and weapons,"' she said.
>
> Oregon sheriffs are not happy about the state's medical marijuana law.
>
> "The whole medical marijuana issue is a concern to sheriffs across the
> country who are involved in it mainly because there is so much potential
> for abuse or for misuse and as a cover for organized criminal activity,"
> said Washington County Sheriff Rob Gordon, who became part of the Willis
> case because his office turned down three medical marijuana patients in
> the Portland suburbs for concealed handgun permits. "You can't argue
> that people aren't misusing that statute in Oregon.
>
> "Not everybody, of course. Some have real medical reasons. But ...the
> larger group happens be people who are very clearly abusing it."
>
> The sheriffs argue that the 1968 U.S. Gun Control Act prohibits selling
> firearms to drug addicts, and they say that includes medical marijuana
> card holders. Their briefs state that they cannot give a permit to carry
> a gun to someone prohibited from buying or owning a gun.
>
> But the cardholders have won so far arguing this is one situation where
> federal law does not trump state law, because the concealed handgun
> license just gives a person a legal defense if they are arrested, not a
> right.
>
> Oregon's attorney general has sided with the marijuana cardholders,
> arguing that the concealed handgun license cannot be used to buy a gun,
> so sheriffs who issue one to a marijuana card holder are not in
> violation of the federal law.
>
> Willis' lawyer, Leland Berger, says it is much simpler.
>
> The sheriffs "are opposed to the medical marijuana act," Berger said
> from Portland. "It's not based on reason. That's how they are."
>
> Rural southern Oregon is awash with marijuana --- legal and illegal.
> Arrests for illegal plantations are commonplace. The region's six
> counties also have the highest rate of medical marijuana use in the
> state. There are also a lot of guns in the Rogue Valley, where Willis lives.
>
> Sixteen states now have medical marijuana laws, according to NORML, an
> advocacy group. There is no way to determine how many medical marijuana
> cardholders also have gun permits. Patient lists are confidential, and
> an Oregon court ruled the sheriffs can't look at them.
>
> NORML executive director Allen St. Pierre said Oregon courts have not
> been entirely medical marijuana friendly. While they have upheld the
> right to pack a pistol, they have also ruled that employers can fire
> people who use medical marijuana.
>
> "A person who uses medical cannabis should not have to give up their
> fundamental rights as enumerated by the Constitution,"' St. Pierre said.
>
> Gordon said he expects the gun issue to come up in other states with
> medical marijuana laws.
>
> Oregon was the first state in the country to decriminalize small amounts
> of marijuana, with legislation enacted in 1973. An

Re: How Islamic Infiltration of our government institutions by the Muslim Brotherhood has severely compromised our national security (WARNING: Shocking content)

[plainolamerican]

Infiltration of our government institutions by the Muslim Brotherhood
has
severely compromised our national security

just as our government has been infiltrated by the Jewish Brotherhood

choose sides carefully!

On Apr 5, 12:43 pm, Travis  wrote:
>      How Islamic
> Infiltration of our government institutions by the Muslim Brotherhood has
> severely compromised our national security (WARNING: Shocking
> content)
> *barenakedislam 
> * | April 5, 2011 at 4:30 AM | Categories:
> EnemyWithin-American|
> URL:http://wp.me/peHnV-s2T
>
> While the domestic terror trend has continued unabated, elements of
> pre-violent, or rather stealth jihad, are taking firm root in our
> government, military, judicial, and educational institutions, not only
> without any opposition from the Obama administration, but with the
> willingness of government officials to lend their support to aid and abet
> this stealth jihad. The failure [...]
>
> Read more of this
> post
>
> Add a comment to this
> post
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>
>   [image: WordPress]
>
> WordPress.com  | Thanks for flying with WordPress!
> Manage 
> Subscriptions|
> Unsubscribe|
> Publish text, photos, music, and videos by email using our Post
> by Email  feature.
>
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Re: Checkout this video about our military - do not miss this

[plainolamerican]

if these "paid assassins for the empire builders" had not
been there between 1941 and 1945 you would be speaking either German
or
Russian and saying Seig Heil

speculation noted

Warmongers Beware!
The USA is not an int'l police force.
Fund your own charities.

On Apr 5, 12:40 pm, dick thompson  wrote:
>      Then you obviously have never been in the military nor have you
> ever seen what the troops do.  Open your eyes and learn a little.  
> Remember that if these "paid assassins for the empire builders" had not
> been there between 1941 and 1945 you would be speaking either German or
> Russian and saying Seig Heil or singing the Internationale.
>
> On 04/05/2011 01:26 PM, Jonathan Ashley wrote:
>
>
>
> > I never understand why people find a need to honor those who chose to
> > be paid assassins for the empire builders.
>
> > On 04/04/2011 10:10 PM, dick thompson wrote:
> >>http://www.nragive.com/ringoffreedom/index.html
>
> > --
>
> >       The biggest obstacle to freedom and liberty is not knowing what
> >       freedom and liberty are.
>
> > Learn How To Protect Your Identity And Prevent Identity Theft
> > 
>
> > --
> > Thanks for being part of "PoliticalForum" at Google Groups.
> > For options & help seehttp://groups.google.com/group/PoliticalForum
>
> > * Visit our other community athttp://www.PoliticalForum.com/
> > * It's active and moderated. Register and vote in our polls.
> > * Read the latest breaking news, and more.

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Re: Checkout this video about our military - do not miss this

[Jonathan Ashley]

I have seen what these paid assassins do!

http://npowebsite.net/pp/pp.asp?Mode=Flyer&ID=10205 



http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1368314/German-newspaper-publishes-suppressed-photos-U-S-soldiers-posing-partially-naked-Afghan-corpse.html

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1370758/Shocking-video-shows-U-S-troops-cheering-airstrike-blows-Afghan-civilians.html

On 04/05/2011 10:40 AM, dick thompson wrote:
Then you obviously have never been in the military nor have you 
ever seen what the troops do.  Open your eyes and learn a little.  
Remember that if these "paid assassins for the empire builders" had 
not been there between 1941 and 1945 you would be speaking either 
German or Russian and saying Seig Heil or singing the Internationale.


On 04/05/2011 01:26 PM, Jonathan Ashley wrote:
I never understand why people find a need to honor those who chose to 
be paid assassins for the empire builders.


On 04/04/2011 10:10 PM, dick thompson wrote:

http://www.nragive.com/ringoffreedom/index.html



--


  The biggest obstacle to freedom and liberty is not knowing what
  freedom and liberty are.

Learn How To Protect Your Identity And Prevent Identity Theft 



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Free Local Colleges Search.
http://click.lavabit.com/exfj1yswp38kt9qr7q4gzhz9k9wa61a4zjd959mfs6biufcubuyy/ 



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CAIR's plan to 'run' U.S. revealed

[Travis]

Run CAIR out of town.


 CAIR's plan to
'run' U.S. 
revealed
*creeping * | April 5,
2011 at 12:40 PM | Tags: cair,
Creeping Sharia ,
hamas ,
islam,
Legal ,
Life,
Media ,
Muslim,
News ,
Politics,
Random ,
Sharia| Categories:
Alerts , Creeping
Sharia,
FBI ,
Media,
News ,
Politics,
Religion ,
Sharia,
Stealth Jihad  | URL:
http://wp.me/pbU4v-8g9

via WND: CAIR chief's designs to 'run' U.S. revealed. The same national
Muslim leader who's launched an "education campaign" to quell American fears
over Shariah law once gave a full-throated speech to Muslims advocating an
Islamic rise to power in America. In a newly surfaced video of a 2000 speech
to the Islamic Society of [...]

Read more of this
post

Add a comment to this
post








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How Islamic Infiltration of our government institutions by the Muslim Brotherhood has severely compromised our national security (WARNING: Shocking content)

[Travis]

 How Islamic
Infiltration of our government institutions by the Muslim Brotherhood has
severely compromised our national security (WARNING: Shocking
content)
*barenakedislam 
* | April 5, 2011 at 4:30 AM | Categories:
EnemyWithin-American|
URL:
http://wp.me/peHnV-s2T

While the domestic terror trend has continued unabated, elements of
pre-violent, or rather stealth jihad, are taking firm root in our
government, military, judicial, and educational institutions, not only
without any opposition from the Obama administration, but with the
willingness of government officials to lend their support to aid and abet
this stealth jihad. The failure [...]

Read more of this
post

Add a comment to this
post








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Re: Checkout this video about our military - do not miss this

[dick thompson]

Then you obviously have never been in the military nor have you 
ever seen what the troops do.  Open your eyes and learn a little.  
Remember that if these "paid assassins for the empire builders" had not 
been there between 1941 and 1945 you would be speaking either German or 
Russian and saying Seig Heil or singing the Internationale.


On 04/05/2011 01:26 PM, Jonathan Ashley wrote:
I never understand why people find a need to honor those who chose to 
be paid assassins for the empire builders.


On 04/04/2011 10:10 PM, dick thompson wrote:

http://www.nragive.com/ringoffreedom/index.html



--


  The biggest obstacle to freedom and liberty is not knowing what
  freedom and liberty are.

Learn How To Protect Your Identity And Prevent Identity Theft 



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Joe. My. God.: Zombies Against Teabaggers

[Travis]

http://joemygod.blogspot.com/2011/04/zombies-against-teabaggers.html

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Re: Checkout this video about our military - do not miss this

[Jonathan Ashley]

I never understand why people find a need to honor those who chose to be 
paid assassins for the empire builders.


On 04/04/2011 10:10 PM, dick thompson wrote:

http://www.nragive.com/ringoffreedom/index.html



--


 The biggest obstacle to freedom and liberty is not knowing what
 freedom and liberty are.

Learn How To Protect Your Identity And Prevent Identity Theft 



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Medical Marijuana Users Fight For Gun Rights

[Jonathan Ashley]

*Medical Marijuana Users Fight For Gun Rights*

WHITE CITY, Ore. April 4, 2011

Cynthia Willis calls up and down the firing range to be sure everyone 
knows she is shooting, squares up in a two-handed stance with her 
Walther P-22 automatic pistol and fires off a clip in rapid succession.


Willis is not only packing a concealed handgun permit in her wallet, she 
also has a medical marijuana card. That combination has led the local 
sheriff to try to take her gun permit away.


She is part of what is considered the first major court case in the 
country to consider whether guns and marijuana can legally mix. The 
sheriffs of Washington and Jackson counties say no. But Willis and three 
co-plaintiffs have won in state court twice, with the state's rights to 
regulate concealed weapons trumping federal gun control law in each 
decision.


With briefs filed and arguments made, they are now waiting for the 
Oregon Supreme Court to rule.


When it's over, the diminutive 54-year-old plans to still be eating 
marijuana cookies to deal with her arthritis pain and muscle spasms, and 
carrying her pistol.


"Under the medical marijuana law, I am supposed to be treated as any 
other citizen in this state," she said. "If people don't stand up for 
their little rights, all their big rights will be gone."


A retired school bus driver, Willis volunteers at a Medford smoke shop 
that helps medical marijuana patients find growers, and teaches how to 
get the most medical benefit out of the pound-and-a-half of pot that 
card carriers are allowed to possess. She believes that her marijuana 
oils, cookies and joints should be treated no differently than any other 
prescribed medicines. She said she doesn't use them when she plans to 
drive, or carry her gun.


"That's as stupid as mixing alcohol and weapons,"' she said.

Oregon sheriffs are not happy about the state's medical marijuana law.

"The whole medical marijuana issue is a concern to sheriffs across the 
country who are involved in it mainly because there is so much potential 
for abuse or for misuse and as a cover for organized criminal activity," 
said Washington County Sheriff Rob Gordon, who became part of the Willis 
case because his office turned down three medical marijuana patients in 
the Portland suburbs for concealed handgun permits. "You can't argue 
that people aren't misusing that statute in Oregon.


"Not everybody, of course. Some have real medical reasons. But ...the 
larger group happens be people who are very clearly abusing it."


The sheriffs argue that the 1968 U.S. Gun Control Act prohibits selling 
firearms to drug addicts, and they say that includes medical marijuana 
card holders. Their briefs state that they cannot give a permit to carry 
a gun to someone prohibited from buying or owning a gun.


But the cardholders have won so far arguing this is one situation where 
federal law does not trump state law, because the concealed handgun 
license just gives a person a legal defense if they are arrested, not a 
right.


Oregon's attorney general has sided with the marijuana cardholders, 
arguing that the concealed handgun license cannot be used to buy a gun, 
so sheriffs who issue one to a marijuana card holder are not in 
violation of the federal law.


Willis' lawyer, Leland Berger, says it is much simpler.

The sheriffs "are opposed to the medical marijuana act," Berger said 
from Portland. "It's not based on reason. That's how they are."


Rural southern Oregon is awash with marijuana --- legal and illegal. 
Arrests for illegal plantations are commonplace. The region's six 
counties also have the highest rate of medical marijuana use in the 
state. There are also a lot of guns in the Rogue Valley, where Willis lives.


Sixteen states now have medical marijuana laws, according to NORML, an 
advocacy group. There is no way to determine how many medical marijuana 
cardholders also have gun permits. Patient lists are confidential, and 
an Oregon court ruled the sheriffs can't look at them.


NORML executive director Allen St. Pierre said Oregon courts have not 
been entirely medical marijuana friendly. While they have upheld the 
right to pack a pistol, they have also ruled that employers can fire 
people who use medical marijuana.


"A person who uses medical cannabis should not have to give up their 
fundamental rights as enumerated by the Constitution,"' St. Pierre said.


Gordon said he expects the gun issue to come up in other states with 
medical marijuana laws.


Oregon was the first state in the country to decriminalize small amounts 
of marijuana, with legislation enacted in 1973. And it was right behind 
California in making medical marijuana legal when voters approved a 
ballot measure in 1998. But voters here stopped short of following 
California all the way to selling medical marijuana to cardholders at 
dispensaries. A ballot measure failed last year, so patients still have 
to grow their own or get someone else to grow it for t

Get ready to hurl - Daily News claims Obama looking strong now

[dick thompson]

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2011/04/05/2011-04-05_president_obama_looking_strong_just_months_after_gop_midterm_victories.html 


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Jerry Brown's Pension Plan Just Fluff - what a surprise

[dick thompson]

183 Comments 
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 Dan Walters: Jerry Brown's pension plan is nothing but fluff

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ByDan Walters
dwalt...@sacbee.com 
Published: Tuesday, Apr. 5, 2011 - 12:00 am | Page 3A
Last Modified: Tuesday, Apr. 5, 2011 - 7:53 am

The timing of Gov. Jerry Brown's "12-point pension reform plan" last 
week was no accident.


The plan was released on Thursday, a couple of days after his 
negotiations with Republicans on a state budget deal collapsed. The 
latter contended that Brown had balked at their demands for public 
pension reforms because of opposition from unions that helped him win 
the governorship last year.


Thus, the plan's release was aimed at giving Brown political cover, 
implicitly demonstrating that he's tough-minded on pensions and not 
beholden to the unions. But while a 12-point plan sounds impressive -- 
especially coming from a politician who historically has sneered at 
multipoint policy plans -- there's less there than meets the eye.


The political debate over public pensions has been conducted on two 
levels, the largely superficial and the meaningful.


The superficial aspects -- anecdotal accounts of outrageous pension 
manipulation -- have received the most media attention. Meanwhile, the 
more meaningful issue of whether taxpayers and employees face a ticking 
time bomb of unfunded liabilities is complex and unsexy, receiving 
relatively little attention.


For the most part, Brown's plan deals with the former rather than the 
latter. It gives the illusion of being tough on pension issues without 
making truly tough choices.


Much of it deals, for instance, with "pension spiking" through various 
manipulative techniques -- outrageous, certainly, but of little effect 
on the larger and more serious issue. Other points are of equally light 
weight, such as prohibiting retroactive pension benefits or pensions for 
convicted felons.


Meanwhile, the plan either omits anything that would touch the larger 
issue of unfunded liability or places it in the category of "under 
development."


A couple of years ago, the chief actuary of the California Public 
Employees' Retirement System told a pension seminar that the system's 
benefits were "unsustainable." Outside analysts have pegged the 
potential unfunded liabilities of Cal-PERS, the California State 
Teachers' Retirement System and the University of California pension 
system as high as a half-trillion dollars.


Pension authorities dispute that figure, but they have maintained 
estimates of future earnings that are questionably high, even when their 
actuaries have urged modest reductions.


A real pension reform plan would first seek independent and expert 
analysis of unfunded liability and then lay out what's needed, in either 
reduced benefits or increased contributions by taxpayers and employees, 
to cover it.


The Legislature's budget analyst and the Little Hoover Commission have 
both called for such reforms and have taken political heat from unions 
and their political allies for doing so.


So far, however, all we're getting from Brown is fluff.

© Copyright The Sacramento Bee. All rights reserved. 



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more:http://www.sacbee.com/2011/04/05/3528019/dan-walters-jerry-browns-pension.html#ixzz1IfVQwovu 


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Diversity Perversity - op-ed by Walter E Williams - he makes a ton of sense

[dick thompson]

*Diversity Perversity
*by Walter E. Williams

The terms affirmative action, equal representation, preferential 
treatment and quotas just don't sell well. The intellectual elite and 
their media, government and corporate enthusiasts have come up with 
diversity, a seemingly benign term that's a cover for racially 
discriminatory policy. They call for college campuses, corporate offices 
and government agencies to "look like America."


Part of looking like America means if blacks are 13 percent of the 
population, they should be 13 percent of college students and 
professors, corporate managers and government employees. Behind this 
vision of justice is the silly notion that but for the fact of 
discrimination, we'd be distributed equally by race across incomes, 
education, occupations and other outcomes. There is absolutely no 
evidence that statistical proportionality is the norm anywhere on Earth; 
however, much of our thinking, laws and public policy is based upon 
proportionality being the norm. Let's look at some racial differences 
whilst thinking about their causes and possible remedies.


While 13 percent of our population, blacks are 80 percent of 
professional basketball players and 65 percent of professional football 
players and are the highest paid players in both sports. By contrast, 
blacks are only 2 percent of NHL's professional ice hockey players. 
There is no racial diversity in basketball, football and ice hockey. 
They come nowhere close to "looking like America."


Even in terms of sports achievement, racial diversity is absent. Four 
out of the five highest career home-run hitters were black. Since blacks 
entered the major leagues, of the eight times more than 100 bases were 
stolen in a season, all were by blacks.


The U.S. Department of Justice recently ordered Dayton, Ohio's police 
department to lower its written exam passing scores so as to have more 
blacks on its police force. What should Attorney General Eric Holder do 
about the lack of diversity in sports? Why don't the intellectual elite 
protest? Could it be that the owners of these multi-billion-dollar 
professional basketball, football and baseball teams are pro-black while 
those of the NHL and major industries are racists unwilling to put 
blacks in highly paid positions?


There's one ethnic diversity issue completely swept under the rug. 
Jewish Americans are less than 3 percent of our population and only 
two-tenths of 1 percent of the world's population. Yet between 1901 and 
2010, Jews were 35 percent of American Nobel Laureate winners and 22 
percent of the world's.


If the diversity gang sees underrepresentation as "probative" of racial 
discrimination, what do they propose we do about overrepresentation? 
Because if one race is overrepresented, it might mean they're taking 
away what rightfully belongs to another race.


There are other representation issues to which we might give some 
attention with an eye to corrective public policy. Asians routinely get 
the highest scores on the math portion of the SAT while blacks get the 
lowest. Men are 50 percent of the population and so are women; yet men 
are struck by lightning six times as often as women. The population 
statistics for South Dakota, Iowa, Maine, Montana and Vermont show that 
not even 1 percent of their populations is black. On the other hand, in 
states such as Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi, blacks are 
overrepresented in terms of their percentages in the general population.


There are many international examples of disproportionality. For 
example, during the 1960s, the Chinese minority in Malaysia received 
more university degrees than the Malay majority – including 400 
engineering degrees compared with four for the Malays, even though 
Malays dominate the country politically. In Brazil's state of Sao Paulo, 
more than two-thirds of the potatoes and 90 percent of the tomatoes 
produced were produced by people of Japanese ancestry.


The bottom line is there no evidence anywhere that but for 
discrimination, people would be divided according to their percentages 
in the population in any activity. Diversity is an elitist term used to 
give respectability to acts and policy that would otherwise be deemed as 
racism.



http://www.lewrockwell.com/williams-w/w-williams77.1.html --
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Why Are People So Forgiving of Government Failure?

[MJ]

"Public-sector growth begins on a
small scale and develops a dependent class. When the unintended
consequences inevitably come about, public officials expand their
programs to solve these problems while blaming "forces of
greed" or "market failure." While the role of such crises
(real or imagined) in instigating this cycle was spelled out by economist
Robert Higgs in his modern classic Crisis and Leviathan, the general
cycle of intervention leading to unintended consequences leading to
broader intervention was explained by the classical liberal Ludwig von
Mises in the 1920s."
Why Are People So Forgiving of
Government Failure?
Tuesday, April 05, 2011 
by

Christopher Westley 
Once upon a time, I
developed a theory that we have
much lower expectations for public-sector performance than we do for
private-sector performance.[1] We saw this in accounting standards that
-- when applied to Enron -- resulted in market forces shutting that firm
down, while the Department of Defense loses billions of dollars annually.
The difference in terms of waste between the two sectors is exponential,
but while Enron is held accountable for its ethics,
the government gets a pass.

Or consider what we tolerate from the US Postal Service (USPS) as opposed
what we tolerate from firms like FedEx Express or UPS. Again, if those
private-sector firms incurred the costs and waste that the USPS
institutionalizes, they would be long gone, and their assets would be
transferred to other entities that market institutions believe would use
those assets more efficiently and profitably.
The list could go on. Compare Amtrak to private
transportation; the billions of dollars of taxpayer money wasted on
producing the Chevy Volt (the only thing electric
about this car is that it is shockingly bad) compared to its
competitors;[2] the standards applied to public-school students as
opposed to those demanded in private and home schools; or the massive
waste we accept in those federal transportation and "farm"
bills Congress passes every five years, regardless of the party in
control.

Such examples are so universally accepted that they are not even worth
citing. The result is a huge dichotomy in modern life, and those of us
who point it out are often left to feel like the little boy who wondered
why there was so much fuss about the emperor's obviously nonexistent
clothes.
The result of this dichotomy is government growth, which is inversely
related to those characteristics we associate with a free and virtuous
society. The result is growing animosity in society between net taxpayers
and net tax consumers -- and chaos when the artificial institutions, on
which so many have become dependent, fail. Consider the sad case of
Social Security. If ever there were a showcase for the difference in
popular expectations maintained between public and private performance,
Social Security is it.
It began in the 1930s, a time of state-orchestrated uncertainty in the
economy. Much like today, this uncertainty emanated from multiple,
unprecedented, and unpredictable interventions in the market system. (The
Great Depression itself would last 17 years, ending when the New Dealers,
who were the source of many of these interventions, were repudiated soon
after the death of Franklin Roosevelt.) Looking back, what's striking is
how limited the program was when it began. It claimed a mere 2 percent of
payrolls and provided supplementary old-age payments to retired workers
at a time when most people died in their 60s and when the
worker-to-retiree ratio was 16 to 1. (It is now 3 to 1, and
falling.)
Therefore, Social Security is a good case study of
government interventionism in general. Public-sector growth begins on a
small scale and develops a dependent class. When the unintended
consequences inevitably come about, public officials expand their
programs to solve these problems while blaming "forces of
greed" or "market failure." While the role of such crises
(real or imagined) in instigating this cycle was spelled out by economist
Robert Higgs in his modern classic
Crisis
and Leviathan, the general cycle of intervention leading to
unintended consequences leading to broader intervention was explained by
the classical liberal Ludwig von Mises in the
1920s.[3]

Roosevelt knew that Social Security was primarily a
political triumph.[4] In a story related by historian Arthur
Schlesinger, Roosevelt told a visitor warning about
the program's economic inconsistencies, 


I guess you're right on the economics, but those
taxes were never a problem of economics. They were politics all the way
through. We put those payroll contributions there so as to give the
contributors a legal, moral, and political right to collect their
pensions and their unemployment benefits. With those taxes, no damn
politician can ever scrap my Social Security program.[5]
He was damn right, too. Whenever the laws of economics rose against
the politics of Social Security, Congress consistently expanded its
bene

Massive protests in Bangladesh over women getting equal rights - led by Islamic group supporting Sharia

[dick thompson]

http://www.thenewstribe.co.uk/2011/04/women-rights-police-disperse-bangladesh-protests/

For those who favor Sharia law, think what you are supporting and 
how it would affect women.


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Former Libyan Foreign Minister discussing Lockerbie Bombing with the Brits - not being offered immunity by Brits yet

[dick thompson]

http://www.thenewstribe.co.uk/2011/04/lockerbie-bombing-koussa-meeting-could-be-within-days/ 


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Raise Debt Limit, Treasury Secretary Pleads

[MJ]

Raise Debt Limit, Treasury
Secretary Pleads 
“Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner said that
even if he uses ‘extraordinary measures’ to prevent the United States
from defaulting on its obligations, lawmakers will need to raise the
legal limit on government borrowing by July 8.”
(
Washington Post)
Is a limit that doesn’t really
limit actually a limit?
Budget Deficits
Hans F. Sennholz
April 1995 • Volume: 45 • Issue: 4 •
An old English proverb may help us understand the nature of debt; "A
small debt makes a man your debtor, a large debt makes him your
enemy." When the national debt amounted to just a few million
dollars, the federal government was a gracious debtor, a protector of all
its subjects, enjoying public trust and admiration. Today, with the
federal debt approaching $5 trillion, it is a public enemy feared and
disdained by millions of suffering taxpayers. 
The pyramid of debt is growing at an annual rate of some $300 billion and
is expected to accelerate in the future. Both the White House and the
U.S. Congress are unwilling and incapable of balancing the federal
budget. In a sense of desperation about the growing alienation between
the people and their government, many Americans favor a constitutional
amendment which would require that "total outlays for any fiscal
year do not exceed total receipts for that year." 
No matter what we may think of such an amendment, the deficits, whether
they are on or off budget, are too big to be ignored or taken lightly.
They are felt not only in every home and business but also in the money
and capital markets of the world. After all, the U.S. economy is a
substantial part of the world economy, and the U.S. dollar the paramount
world currency. 
Budget deficits of the present magnitude are a prominent cause of all
that ails the American economy: declining private investments, stagnant
or even falling standards of living, unemployment of millions of workers,
and inability to compete in many world markets. It is a fundamental
economic principle that economic productivity, income, and wealth
primarily depend on the instruments of production in use, that is, on the
amount of capital invested per worker. When government deficits consume
the capital coming to market, they impede progress and bring stagnation.
The trillion-dollar deficits of the federal government have curbed
American productivity, obstructed production, and brought on much
economic and social evil. 
The federal debt is a pyramid of IOUs for income and wealth consumed in
the past. It differs fundamentally from business debt which generally is
productive and indicative of rising productivity. Government neither
forms nor accumulates capital; it merely consumes the savings of its
subjects. Even when it spends the funds on public works, it usually
wastes them serving lesser needs than they would have served if left in
the hands of taxpayers. 
Budget deficits are objectionable also on moral grounds. No generation
has any right to impose a debt burden on future generations. And yet, our
generation did not hesitate to hang a $20,000 first-mortgage around the
neck of every baby born in this country and does not scruple to increase
it by more than $1,000 every year. As individual debt is the worst
measure of poverty, so is political debt placed on our children the
greatest outrage. 
Yet, it is imperceptive to fault only politicians and bureaucrats for
their spending predilection. In an open society, like ours, they are
merely the representatives and agents of the public which is condoning or
even demanding the deficit spending. In final analysis, we must fault the
ideas and morals that guide the people in their political aspirations.

Most Americans live under the spell of progressive economic thought which
confers respectability on political profligacy. On all levels of
education the’ "new economics" teaches that government spending
sustains, stimulates, and invigorates economic life. Government spending
is presented as a benefit without cost, a grand addition to general
welfare, a social achievement of the highest order. In reality, it does
not sustain, stimulate, nor invigorate an economy; it diverts economic
resources to many nonproductive uses and thereby aggravates the
situation. 
The popular view of government spending as a grand addition to general
welfare springs from man’s inclination to prefer the seen over the
unseen. Government largess is visible to all in many forms, as benefit
checks and subsidies, public housing and office buildings, many of which
look like Greek temples built to the gods. Few observers see the costs
borne by millions of people who are forced to tighten their belts and do
without. They must forgo better housing, warmer clothing, comfortable
transportation, better education, medical insurance, etc., etc. To a
thoughtful person, the marble temples of politics, which may last a
thousand years, are durable monuments to the supremacy of political power
over individual freedom a

The Man Who Knows Gadaffi’s Secrets

[MJ]

The Man Who Knows Gadaffi’s Secrets
by Eric Margolis
Muammar Gadaffi’s Libya may not be sinking yet, but it’s low in the water
and springing new leaks by the day. 
Italy, a key player in North Africa, sniffed the winds of change, then
decided to abandon old ally Gadaffi and recognize the revolutionary junta
in Benghazi.
Last Wednesday, Libya’s Foreign Minister, Moussa Koussa, dressed in his
trademark gray shirt, gray jacket and gray trousers, defected to Britain,
inflicting a major blow on the faltering Gadaffi regime. 
Agents of British intelligence, MI6, spirited former intelligence chief
Koussa out of Libya via Tunisia and to a military airfield in southern
England.
The tall, dour Koussa was always the man in the shadows, the éminence
grise behind Muammar Gadaffi’s tent, the spy master who knew all the
secrets and, one supposes, where the skeletons are buried.
Moussa Koussa has been closeted in London with British intelligence. MI6
will have a huge number of questions to ask the man who headed up Libyan
intelligence for some fifteen years, either officially or unofficially,
and acted as a top advisor to the Libyan strongman. 
Her Majesty’s spooks are debriefing Koussa about the loyalty of Gadaffi’s
military and tribal supporters, and his "Plan B" in case of
defeat. In spite of denials, the US, Britain and France are already
sending increasing numbers of special forces into Libya, as I’ve reported
for two months. Egypt’s army, which is still under heavy American
influence, is also aiding Libya’s ragtag rebels.
My old friend, Libya’s former foreign minister, Dr. Ali Treiki, also
reportedly defected. In 1987, I flew with Treiki to Tripoli to interview
Muammar Gadaffi. 
Treiki, a soft-spoken intellectual who was Libya’s most accomplished
diplomat, was not in Gadaffi’s inner circle. But he always exercised a
calming influence on the volatile Libyan leader, and restrained him from
some more extreme actions. Treiki will likely figure in any new Libyan
government.
The military officer this writer named three weeks ago as the most likely
leader of the Benghazi insurgents, Gen. Abdul Fattah Younes, has been
named military chief. Other Libyan "assets" of CIA are being
flown in from North America.
British intelligence’s most interesting questions to Koussa will be about
the still enigmatic bombing of US Pan Am flight 103 in 1988 and a French
UTA DC-10 in 1989. 
Libya was blamed for bombing the Pan Am airliner over Lockerbie, Scotland
that killed 270 people. Western investigators accused two Libyan agents
of planting a bomb aboard the doomed aircraft. Under threats of crushing
sanctions, Libya reluctantly handed them over. One of them, a small-fry
named Abdulbasit el-Megrahi, was convicted by a Scottish court and jailed
for life.
The common view was that the Pan Am atrocity was revenge for the US
bombing of Libya in 1986. A year later, Gadaffi showed me the ruins of
his private quarters where a US 1,000 kg bomb had killed his two-year old
daughter. "Why are the Americans trying to kill me," he asked
me?
A year later, a bomb destroyed a French UTA airliner over the Sahara,
killing 171. France had just defeated Libya in a sharp border conflict
over Chad. The late head of French intelligence, SDECE, told me French
President Francois Mitterand ordered him to kill Gadaffi, but then
canceled the operation – a bomb hidden in Gadaffi’s aircraft – when
Franco-Libyan relations improved.
In 1999, French investigators and magistrates who were curiously allowed
to search the files of Libyan intelligence found Libya guilty of the UTA
attack. Six Libyan officials, including the deputy chief of intelligence,
Abdullah Senoussi, were convicted in absentia. Senoussi insisted to me
over dinner in Tripoli that he and his nation was innocent. But it
certainly looked like Libya was getting revenge for its defeat in Chad,
and the attempt on Gadaffi’s life. I wondered if the amiable Senoussi –
from traditionally anti-Gadaffi Benghazi – had not been set up as a fall
guy.
Lockerbie is another story. Some veteran observers believed al-Megrahi
was framed to implicate Libya when the real culprit was Iran, seeking
revenge for the downing of an Iranian airliner over the Gulf in July,
1988, by US cruiser "Vincennes" that killed 290, mostly
pilgrims, headed for Mecca. President George Bush Senior actually
decorated the captain of the "Vincennes" for this heinous crime
and called him a "hero."
But questions over Megrahi’s guilt grew. Scotland’s respected legal
system was considering an appeal that was likely to have revealed efforts
by western agents to frame the Libyan. To head off this embarrassment,
Britain sent him back to Libya, claiming he was about to die from cancer.
In return, British oil and commercial interests in Libya were quickly
expanded. It was a remarkably cynical business, greased by Tony Blair,
oozing synthetic charm and hypocrisy from every pore.
Libya never admitted guilt for these aerial crimes, but paid out $1.5
billion bloo

Diversity Perversity

[MJ]

Diversity Perversity
by Walter E. Williams
The terms affirmative action, equal representation, preferential
treatment and quotas just don't sell well. The intellectual elite and
their media, government and corporate enthusiasts have come up with
diversity, a seemingly benign term that's a cover for racially
discriminatory policy. They call for college campuses, corporate offices
and government agencies to "look like America." 
Part of looking like America means if blacks are 13 percent of the
population, they should be 13 percent of college students and professors,
corporate managers and government employees. Behind this vision of
justice is the silly notion that but for the fact of discrimination, we'd
be distributed equally by race across incomes, education, occupations and
other outcomes. There is absolutely no evidence that statistical
proportionality is the norm anywhere on Earth; however, much of our
thinking, laws and public policy is based upon proportionality being the
norm. Let's look at some racial differences whilst thinking about their
causes and possible remedies.
While 13 percent of our population, blacks are 80 percent of professional
basketball players and 65 percent of professional football players and
are the highest paid players in both sports. By contrast, blacks are only
2 percent of NHL's professional ice hockey players. There is no racial
diversity in basketball, football and ice hockey. They come nowhere close
to "looking like America." 
Even in terms of sports achievement, racial diversity is absent. Four out
of the five highest career home-run hitters were black. Since blacks
entered the major leagues, of the eight times more than 100 bases were
stolen in a season, all were by blacks.
The U.S. Department of Justice recently ordered Dayton, Ohio's police
department to lower its written exam passing scores so as to have more
blacks on its police force. What should Attorney General Eric Holder do
about the lack of diversity in sports? Why don't the intellectual elite
protest? Could it be that the owners of these multi-billion-dollar
professional basketball, football and baseball teams are pro-black while
those of the NHL and major industries are racists unwilling to put blacks
in highly paid positions?
There's one ethnic diversity issue completely swept under the rug. Jewish
Americans are less than 3 percent of our population and only two-tenths
of 1 percent of the world's population. Yet between 1901 and 2010, Jews
were 35 percent of American Nobel Laureate winners and 22 percent of the
world's.
If the diversity gang sees underrepresentation as "probative"
of racial discrimination, what do they propose we do about
overrepresentation? Because if one race is overrepresented, it might mean
they're taking away what rightfully belongs to another race.
There are other representation issues to which we might give some
attention with an eye to corrective public policy. Asians routinely get
the highest scores on the math portion of the SAT while blacks get the
lowest. Men are 50 percent of the population and so are women; yet men
are struck by lightning six times as often as women. The population
statistics for South Dakota, Iowa, Maine, Montana and Vermont show that
not even 1 percent of their populations is black. On the other hand, in
states such as Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi, blacks are
overrepresented in terms of their percentages in the general population.

There are many international examples of disproportionality. For example,
during the 1960s, the Chinese minority in Malaysia received more
university degrees than the Malay majority – including 400 engineering
degrees compared with four for the Malays, even though Malays dominate
the country politically. In Brazil's state of Sao Paulo, more than
two-thirds of the potatoes and 90 percent of the tomatoes produced were
produced by people of Japanese ancestry.
The bottom line is there no evidence anywhere that but for
discrimination, people would be divided according to their percentages in
the population in any activity. Diversity is an elitist term used to give
respectability to acts and policy that would otherwise be deemed as
racism.


http://www.lewrockwell.com/williams-w/w-williams77.1.html





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Cooking Meth: How Government Manufactured a Drug Epidemic

[MJ]

Cooking Meth: How Government Manufactured
a Drug Epidemic
by Roger Roots
Every decade or so, a new drug abuse epidemic is said to be
destroying the very fabric of American society, necessitating a
government crackdown or even a "war" to protect us all from it.
There have been opium and heroin scares, numerous cocaine scares, endless
marijuana scares, and of course that "crack" scare of the
1980s, which drastically increased America’s incarceration rate. Untold
thousands of years of prison time have been served by unfortunate
possessors, buyers and sellers of these substances over the past century.

The crack scare of today is methamphetamine, a (relatively) cheap
stimulant that can be used as an anti-sleep medication, a dietary aid or
an energy booster. Various forms of methamphetamines, or home-cooked
"speed" have displaced cocaine as the danger drug of the day.
Government officials in a majority of U.S. counties now report that meth
is their counties’ most serious drug problem. Meth use is said to be
particularly rampant in the American western states, where the substance
is in high demand. States like Montana, South Dakota, Idaho, Colorado and
Arizona have all launched extensive efforts -- both
private and public -- to fight
the meth menace. 
Anti-meth billboards depicting toothless, acne-scarred zombified
methheads now blanket the landscapes of western states. So-called public
service announcements blare accounts of girls and boys next door who
descended into lives of hooking, homelessness and hopelessness after
getting hooked on meth. The effects of meth on health and

appearance are notorious.
Before and
after photos of hardcore meth addicts are particularly difficult to
look at. 
Unlike cocaine, opium and heroin, which are derived from plants that do
not grow well in North America, meth can be manufactured easily by
Americans. Even poor Americans in trailer parks. But some of the primary
ingredients are difficult to obtain in large quantities. Most meth
recipes (there are many), require substantial amounts of precursor
chemicals such as ephedrine, pseudoephedrine or phenylpropanolamine.
These are chemical antihistamines commonly found in over-the-counter
allergy and cold medicines such as Sudafed, Actifed and Claritin.

Since the early 1990s – in response to efforts by Congress to require
prescriptions to purchase such products -- pharmaceutical companies and
retailers such as Target, Walgreens, CVS and Winn-Dixie have restricted
sales of pseudoephedrine-containing products. Purchasers have been
limited to buying small quantities and required to show I.D. to purchase
them. In 2005, Congress passed the

Combat Methamphetamine Epidemic Act (CMEA) as an amendment to the
renewal of the USA PATRIOT Act. The CMEA requires record-keeping and
identification of all sales and reports to law enforcement of any
"suspicious" transactions. Purchasers are limited to "3.6
grams of pseudoephedrine base" per day and 9 grams per month.
(Buying more than that is a federal misdemeanor.) (Ironically, the very
first arrest under the CMEA occurred when an Iowa allergy sufferer named
Tim Naveau was prosecuted in 2006 for purchasing

too much Claritin D. Naveau had stocked up on the allergy medication
because his teenage son, who was also an allergy sufferer, needed several
packages because he was headed off to a church camp.) 

An Epidemic of Entrapment
Restrictions on the purchase of meth precursor
chemicals have been a boon to law enforcement entrapment schemes. For
years, undercover government agents have been have been launching,
building, supplying, and then busting meth manufacturing operations.
Claims of entrapment are so closely linked to methamphetamine
manufacturing cases that most meth-lab conviction appeals focus on
officer conduct rather than defendant conduct. See

here,

here, and
here.
In

this case, an undercover government informant delivered a van with 52
gallons of ingredient chemicals to a threesome of dupes. In

this case, undercover informants provided not only the precursor
chemicals but also the very location for the lab and the necessary
equipment for manufacturing meth. Law enforcement agencies have even set
up fake

chemical supply stores in order to get the precursor chemicals out
onto the street so they can bust meth lab operators.
But since the U.S. Supreme Court’s 5-4 decision in

United States v. Russell in 1973, the question of entrapment has
turned on whether a defendant was "predisposed" to engage in
drug manufacturing. Since the Russell ruling, it has been
considered permissible for law enforcement agencies to provide the
hard-to-acquire chemicals for manufacturing meth to meth makers and even
to instruct them regarding how to manufacture the drug so long as the
agents do not force the idea of manufacturing meth upon the minds of
suspects. And since most defendants have drug histories, most judges and
juries conclude that the promise of vast riches provided by undercover
cops with buc

The Benefit of Obama’s War on Libya

[MJ]

The Benefit of Obama’s War on
Libya
by Jacob G. Hornberger 
Lost within the “humanitarian” rationale that President Obama and his
liberal cohorts have provided for the U.S. Empire’s war on Libya is one
of the principal benefits of the Libyan War, at least from the standpoint
of U.S. officials: the indefinite continuation of the U.S. government’s
anti-terrorist powers that have accompanied its decade-long “war on
terrorism.” 
Such powers include the search and seizure provisions of the Patriot Act,
the enemy- combatant doctrine, indefinite detention, kangaroo military
tribunals, Gitmo, secret overseas prison camps, kidnapping, rendition,
torture, denial of due process, and body groping and porn-scanning at the
airports. 
Just like the Middle East dictatorships, the U.S. government is not about
to relinquish such powers willingly, even though they have been in
existence for some 10 years. President Obama, with the full support of
the U.S. military, the CIA, Homeland Security, and both liberals and
conservatives in Congress, will come up with every possible rationale as
to why it is necessary for federal officials to continue retaining such
powers indefinitely into the future, perhaps even as long as the many
decades that the Middle East dictatorships have wielded such powers.

Recall Hosni Mubarak, one of the many U.S.-supported dictators in the
Middle East. His anti-terrorist powers included the power to arbitrarily
search people’s homes and belongings, to arrest suspected terrorists
without judicial process, to detain suspected terrorists indefinitely
without a trial, to torture suspected terrorists for information or
confession, and to even execute suspected terrorists without a trial.

It was Mubarak’s exercise of these anti-terrorist powers that was one of
the critical reasons the Egyptian people finally decided to revolt
against their own government. Over time, the Egyptian people came to
realize what the Framers of the U.S. Constitution understood: such
anti-terrorist powers are antithetical to a free society. 
Egyptians began risking their lives by demanding an end to their own
government’s decades-long anti-terrorist powers. After all, the people
understood that the government could and would exercise such powers
against those who were calling for the end of such powers. 
The Mubarak regime took the position that the Obama administration now
takes: No, it would not relinquish its anti-terrorist powers, and it
cited two primary reasons for its need to continue exercising such powers
indefinitely into the future: the war on terrorism and the war on drugs.

Sound familiar? 
Never mind that the Egyptian government had assumed its anti-terrorism
powers some 30 years before, when the president of Egypt had been
assassinated. Mubarak, like Obama ­ and Bush before him ­ emphasized that
the terrorist threat and the drug-dealer threat were still real, viable,
ongoing threats that required the continuation of the government’s
anti-terrorist powers. 
Of course, it helps when government officials make such threats viable.
In that way, the chances are improved that frightened citizens will
exclaim, “Do whatever you have to do but just protect me from the
terrorists and the drug dealers.” 
That’s what the Libyan intervention accomplishes. It adds more people
being killed by U.S. personnel to those in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan,
and elsewhere. More people being killed means a bigger threat of
terrorist retaliation from friends, family, and countrymen of the dead.

Obama tells us that the purpose of bombing Libyan military forces is to
protect Libyan civilians from Libyan soldiers. The idea is that killing
Libyan troops is no big deal. 
Oh? 
When a U.S. soldier is killed, is it no big deal for the American people,
and specifically the family and friends of the soldier? On the contrary,
it’s an enormous deal. Spouses, children, brothers, sisters, parents, and
other family members grieve, along with friends, clergy, and countrymen.
Americans get angry. Oftentimes, they want the government to wreak
vengeance against “the Muslims” for the deaths of U.S. soldiers who are
invading, attacking, or occupying Middle East countries. 
Why should anyone expect the family, friends, and countrymen of Libyan
soldiers who are killed by American bombs and missiles to react any
differently? Do they not grieve? Do they not get angry? Do they not seek
vengeance against those who did the killing? 
And therein lies the threat of terrorist retaliation from the friends,
family, and countrymen of the Libyan soldiers who are killed by U.S.
bombs, missiles, or bullets ­ a threat that is then used, needless to
say, to justify the continuation of the U.S. government’s anti-terrorist
powers, and indefinitely into the future ­ to protect us from “the
terrorists.” 
The U.S. government has concocted the perfect scheme for the indefinite
continuation of its anti-terrorism powers. It uses its IRS-collected tax
money and its diplomatic forces, mili

Wasn't government action necessary to halt slavery and racial oppression?

[MJ]

Wasn't government action necessary to
halt slavery and racial oppression?
Published April 04, 2011 in Short Answers by
Mary Ruwart
Question
I recently saw the movie "Amazing
Grace," about the end of the slave trade in England. How does
libertarianism respond to the American Civil War and the Civil rights
movement? In both of them, government action was used to enhance
freedom.
Answer
Government action made slavery possible, and kept
it possible -- and the government only backtracked when the citizenry
objected.
For example, prior to the Civil War, slavery was legal and enforced by
governments of both North and South. Slaves who escaped to the North were
returned -- by law -- to their Southern "owners." It was
against the law in the North to help slaves escape. To fight slavery it
was necessary for freedom lovers to fight the law.
Members of the Underground Railroad, who tried to get the escaped slaves
to Canada where they couldn't be extradited, were routinely hauled into
court. Courageous individuals serving on the juries refused to convict.
(Juries have the constitutionally-granted power to "nullify"
laws that they believe to be unjust; to learn more, see the
Fully Informed Jury Association)
Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation was not issued until the Civil War
had been underway for years, and it only "emancipated" slaves
in states that had joined the Confederacy. Towards the end of the Civil
War, indignant abolitionists, supported by President Lincoln, lobbied for
an amendment to the Constitution to free the blacks still enslaved in
Northern states.
Although Southern states didn't vote on this amendment, it still did not
pass easily.
Similarly, government power enforced, and often mandated, compulsory
racial segregation in the South in the first half of the twentieth
century. For example, economist
Thomas
Sowell points out that racially segregated seating on public
transportation, far from being a traditional Southern policy, only began
in the late 19th and early 20th centuries -- and it was government that
created the problem.
Writes Dr. Sowell:
"Many, if not most, municipal transit systems were privately owned
in the 19th century and the private owners of these systems had no
incentive to segregate the races.
"These owners may have been racists themselves but they were in
business to make a profit -- and you don't make a profit by alienating a
lot of your customers. There was not enough market demand for Jim Crow
seating on municipal transit to bring it about.
"... Private owners of streetcar, bus, and railroad companies in the
South lobbied against the Jim Crow laws while these laws were being
written, challenged them in the courts after the laws were passed, and
then dragged their feet in enforcing those laws after they were upheld by
the courts.
"These tactics delayed the enforcement of Jim Crow seating laws for
years in some places. Then company employees began to be arrested for not
enforcing such laws and at least one president of a streetcar company was
threatened with jail if he didn't comply.
 (Dr. Sowell discusses this in greater detail in his book

Preferential Policies, An International Perspective, 1990,
pp.20-21.]
This is not to say that these transportation company owners were not
racists, or were champions of black freedom. They simply wanted to make
money. And free markets make racial discrimination extraordinarily, even
prohibitively, expensive.
Because of such government-mandated discrimination, the modern Civil
Rights movement was pioneered by individuals such as Rosa Parks and
Martin Luther King, who practiced peaceful
civil disobedience.
Without the courageous sacrifices of such people, it's unlikely that
Congress would have been inspired (shamed?) into action.

Dr. Ruwart's outstanding books Healing Our World and Short
Answers to the Tough Questions are available at the Advocates

Liberty Store.

http://theadvocates.org/blog/227 





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Is Humanitarian War the Exception?

[MJ]

Is Humanitarian War the
Exception?
Monday, April 04, 2011 
by Marko
Marjanovic 
Many people who otherwise oppose war in general terms make an exception
for a so-called humanitarian war, such as the war in Libya. The idea is
that this kind of war is waged for disinterested, altruistic reasons.
These people are in urgent need of a
Hazlittesque
analysis of humanitarian intervention.
"Humanitarian intervention" refers to a state using military
force against another state when the chief publicly declared aim of that
military action is ending human-rights violations being perpetrated by
the state against which it is directed.
The reasons why humanitarian intervention is an extremely bad idea are
many. Some are obvious, but many more are less immediately apparent,
albeit no less harmful. They include

Humanitarian intervention is funded by taxation, which is theft.
The cover of humanitarian intervention can allow a state to launch a
war under pretenses that have nothing to do with the true aim of the
war.
Military action will result in innocents being killed or injured and
their property damaged or
polluted.
War psychosis in the intervening country can be used to prop up the
power of that country's rulers and scale down the civil liberties of its
subjects.
At any given point in time, numerous states are involved in
violations of human rights, so the principle of humanitarian intervention
taken to its logical conclusion is a recipe for endless war.
Humanitarian intervention sends out a signal to the downtrodden
around the world that instead of fighting for their rights themselves,
they should campaign for an intervention by a foreign power.
Humanitarian intervention can serve to convince the public of the
positive aspects of adventuristic foreign policy, of militarism, and of
disregard for the principle of national sovereignty. It can serve to
rehabilitate the idea of imperialism and to build up moral capital for
empire, which can then be expended launching wars of other kinds. 

These less obvious negative aspects of humanitarian intervention are
connected to the way in which the intervention changes the dynamics of
the conflict with which it interferes:

The group on whose behalf intervention may be launched receives
incentives to shift resources away from waging a regular or irregular war
and toward waging a propaganda war to bring about or broaden the extent
of intervention on its behalf. It receives incentives to exaggerate the
extent of crimes committed against it, to fabricate atrocities that did
not take place, and to carry out false-flag attacks targeting its own
people. 
The group on whose behalf intervention has been launched receives
incentives to refuse to settle for terms they might have settled for
before the intervention; they are now incentivized to hold out for a
better deal secured by the might of the intervening power. This prolongs
the crisis.
If the side against which the humanitarian intervention has been
launched believes itself to be innocent or largely innocent of what it is
being accused, or if it believes the other side to be no less guilty, it
will conclude that it is being targeted for reasons unconnected to its
human-rights record and that therefore there is no point to worrying
about appearances. This is conducive to an increase in the level of
human-rights violations.
Humanitarian intervention advances the war aims of the underdog in
the conflict. However, the mere fact that one side is apparently weaker
is no guarantee that their war aims are more just than the war aims of
the side that is stronger. Likewise, the fact that people who identify
with one side in the war have in general suffered more than the people on
the other side is not sufficient reason to expect that their war aims are
more just than the war aims of the side whose people have suffered less. 

Rarely considered are the effects that stem from the fact that, for the
intervening power, military intervention quickly becomes a matter of
prestige. The intervening power must be able to credibly claim a military
triumph.

Because calling off military action is therefore an impossibility,
once intervention has commenced there is no incentive for the side
finding itself under attack to improve its behavior: this would not
actually make a reduction in the intervention any more likely. 
Once a power begins military action or irreversibly dedicates to it,
it becomes important for it to shore up public support for it and to
demonstrate its necessity. It therefore has no real incentive to act in
ways that would lessen the level of human-rights violations; it has, on
the contrary, the incentive to provoke them. It also has an incentive to
accept all accusations leveled against its selected target at face value
and to
make
up its own.
The intervening power will not necessarily hesitate to commit
criminal acts

of its own if it judges they will make its aim of military victory
more likely.
In order to minimize the fallout stemm

The Physiocrats

[MJ]

The Physiocrats
by Wendy McElroy, Posted April 4, 2011
This article originally appeared in the December 2010 edition of
Freedom Daily.

The Physiocrats, a group of 18th-century French economists,
are often credited with founding Western political economy -- the study
of “laws” governing the production and distribution of wealth. 
The word “law” is not used in a legal sense. Rather it refers to a
principle or governing rule, much as one might speak of the laws of
physics. The Greek word “physiocracy,” from which the Physiocrats derive
their name, means “government of nature.” They believed that natural laws
governed human interaction in the same manner they governed every other
aspect of reality; they wanted legislation to reflect those natural laws.
In short, the Physiocrats advocated the natural rights of man and focused
on applying them to the realm of economics. In doing so, they constructed
an integrated system of economic theory. 
Politically, the Physiocrats held that every person possessed identical
natural rights. Although individual capacities varied widely, every
person best knew his own self-interest and how to best use his own
capacities. Society or a nation consisted of the individual persons
within it, and the social union was the agreement or contract between
those persons, which had the goal of restraining violations of natural
right. Government was a necessary evil for the purpose of securing the
rights of contract and private property. The essence of the Physiocrats’
theory of government was expressed in the phrase “laissez-faire,
laissez-passer” (“let us alone, get out of the way”), which has been
attributed to the Physiocrat Jean C.M.V. de Gournay. 
The French statesman and political economist Frédéric Bastiat wrote of
the Physiocrats, “The basis of their whole economic system may be truly
said to lie in the principle of self-interest The only function of
government according to this doctrine is to protect life, liberty, and
property.” 
The emphasis on individual persons, free trade, limited government, and a
social contract made the Physiocrats a significant voice for change.
Owing partly to their dry and dogmatic style, however, they never enjoyed
grassroots popularity. Instead, their influence was exerted on fellow
intellectuals of the day, including the philosopher and mathematician the
Marquis de Condorcet and the Marquis de Mirabeau (Mirabeau the elder).
Even that influence was fleeting, lasting only a few decades, roughly
from the mid to late 1700s, after which it was swept away by the French
Revolution (1789). 
The school’s most important legacy was to be a forerunner to classical
liberalism, especially through its personal impact on Adam Smith. The
school’s rise closely preceded the publication of Smith’s magnum opus,
An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations
(1776), from which the more modern school of classical economics springs.

Indeed, Smith was so influenced by the Physiocrats that he had intended
to dedicate The Wealth of Nations to François Quesnay, the leading
figure of the school; perhaps his several significant disagreements with
Quesnay dissuaded him. The Physiocrats also exerted a deep impact on
early American agrarian thought through admirers such as Thomas Jefferson
and Benjamin Franklin. Through the 19th-century libertarian Henry George
and the ongoing single-tax or Georgist movement, the Physiocrats’ vision
remains a subtheme within modern libertarianism. 
Some of the Physiocrats’ theories sound antiquated and flatly false to
modern ears. One belief, for example, was that all wealth has its origins
in agriculture; the production of goods and services is merely the
consumption or remixing of agricultural surplus. (Not all Physiocrats
agreed on that point; for example, Anne Robert Jacques Turgot differed.)
In exploring their theories, however, it is important to remember their
historical context and the competing theories against which they argued.


The context of the Physiocrats 
Under Louis XV (1710–1774) and Louis XVI
(1754–1793), France was plagued by ruinously expensive warfare along with
economic instability. A huge schism existed between the elite with wealth
and status and the vast majority of people without either. The elite
consisted of the nobility and the clergy, both of whom were exempt from
taxes; they lived off the sweat of average people in the private sector,
most of whom were peasants. 
The foundation of the private sector was agriculture, even though very
few citizens owned land. The nobility and clergy (some 600,000 in a
population of roughly 25 million) held most of the property. For example,
the Church owned about one-fifth of the total land in France; in some
provinces, it owned up to two-thirds. Moreover, the Church had feudal
privileges that had continued from the Middle Ages and bound
approximately one million people to the land as serfs. 
France was a comparatively wealthy nation, but the peasants existed at

Re: Criminal Justice Is No Job for the State

[MJ]

Teacher Gets 30 years for Consensual
Relationship with Student
April 4, 2011 by
Douglas French

As a follow-up to

today’s piece about crime and punishment in America, the Salt Lake
Tribune

reports that 41-year-old Valynne Bowers was sentenced to 30 years for
having an affair with a 14 year old student.
Bowers had no prior criminal record, she completed sex-offender therapy,
and many former students and parents wrote letters of support on her
behalf. Evaluations show she is not a sexual predator and is not a risk
to re-offend.
Her defense attorney was “a little shocked” by the sentence.  He had
requested probation and a year in jail.
Judge John Morris said, “This is about a community’s response to conduct
… deemed unacceptable.”
“During a preliminary hearing in 2009, the boy testified he initiated
contact with Bowers in December 2008 by showing up to her after-school
math study sessions, where he got her cell phone number and began texting
and talking to her.”
Neither he nor his parents attended Bowers’ sentencing.





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The News Tribe

[positive news]

[image: English.jpg]

Pakistan, UK agree to increase trade volume






 Islamabad: Pakistan and UK have agreed to increases trade volume to 5
billion pounds between both the countries till 2015. Addressing a joint
press conference with his Pakistani counterpart Yousaf Raza Gilani followed
by national security dialogue British Prime Minister David Cameron said that
Britain’s...  No
Comment
  [image: Pakistan, UK agree to increase trade volume]







 Pakistan  BB murder case:
Saud Aziz, Khurram Shehzad granted bail

 [image: BB murder case: Saud Aziz, Khurram Shehzad granted bail]

Lahore: The Lahore High Court (LHC) on Tuesday granted bail to former City
Police Officer (CPO) Rawalpindi and Superintended Police (SP) Khurram
Shehzad in the Benazir assassination case. A division...
More »

   - 10 Indian fishermen held in Karachi
   
   - AKTI to observe strike today
   


S-Asia  5.8 magnitude quake
struck north India

 [image: 5.8 magnitude quake struck north India]

New Delhi: A magnitude 5.7 earthquake jolted North India and its effect was
felt in Delhi, Ghaziabad, and Noida here on Monday. The India Meteorological
Department said the epicentre of the quake...
More »

   - Islamists call strike against Govt’s women’s policy
   

   - India believes in good ties with Pakistan
   



World  Women rights: police
disperse Bangladesh protests

 [image: Women rights: police disperse Bangladesh protests]

Dhaka: Police used baton-charge and tear-gas to disperse angry protesters
blocking a main highway in the capital over a new law giving women equal
property rights. Dozens were arrested and injured...
More »

   - 15 killed as troops fire on Yemen protesters
   

   - Lockerbie bombing: Koussa meeting ‘could be within days’
   



Uncensored  CID arrests
three target killers

 [image: CID arrests three target killers]

Karachi: Capital City Police Officer (CCPO) Karachi, the southern city of
Pakistan, Saud Mirza has claimed to arrest three target killers and
recovered illegal weapons and drugs from their...
More »

   - World Cup 2011: Bookies transfer Rs23 bn
   

   - 51% Pakistanis believe progress possible for the poor
   



Business  Business, trade
centers close against Bhatta mafia

 [image: Business, trade centers close against Bhatta mafia]

Karachi: The city over 300 major and minor markets and trade and business

Re: [World-wide_Politics] Fwd: This Is What Resistance Looks Like

[Bruce Majors]

The War in Libya: What Is the Role of Congress?

*CAPITOL HILL BRIEFING
Tuesday, April 5, 2011
Noon (Lunch Included)*

Featuring *Representative Tom McClintock (R-CA)*; *Gene Healy*, Vice
President, Cato Institute; and *John Samples*, Director, Center for
Representative Government, Cato Institute; moderated by *Brandon Arnold*,
Director of Government Affairs, Cato Institute.

B-338 Rayburn House Office Building

[image: Add event to Google
Calendar][image:
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Add event to 
iCal][image:
Add event to Yahoo
Calendar]

President Obama's intervention in the Libyan civil war raises profound
constitutional questions. Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution grants
the power to "declare War" to Congress. What does "declare War" mean in the
context of the Libyan intervention? James Madison noted that the president
had the power "to repel sudden attacks" on the United States, although not
the power to declare war. The War Powers Act of 1973 purports to define and
constrain the executive's power to declare war, yet some have suggested that
it gives the president a 60-day "free pass" for military action. What does
the War Powers Act mean in this situation? What options are available to
Congress for responding to America's new war in the Mideast?

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Preview: Sunday's Rationally Selfish Webcast

[Bruce Majors]

Some of the questions to be discussed on this week's webcast might be of
interest to you.  Go take a look, then join me on Sunday morning!

*Preview: Sunday's Rationally Selfish Webcast*

Come join my next Rationally Selfish
Webcast!
As always, it's on Sunday morning at 8 am PT / 9 am MT / 10 am CT / 11 am
ET. You can watch the webcast and join in the text chat via this
page.
Greg Perkins of Objectivist Answers  will be
my audio co-host, as usual.

Each week, I answer six questions on practical ethics and the principles of
living well. I select the most popular and interesting questions from the
ongoing queue of
questions.
Please submit your
questions,
as well as vote and comment on questions that you find interesting!

Here are the questions that I'll answer this week:

   - Question 1: Do animals have rights? If not, why not? Given that we
   don't need to eat animals to survive, shouldn't we be vegetarians? Also, if
   animals don't have rights, are people then entitled to do whatever they
   please with animals that they own?
   - Question 2: What does it mean to treat an animal humanely? The term
   "humanely" when applied to animals is confusing to me. More generally, what
   is the proper moral treatment of animals?
   - Question 3: How should I deal with the idea of man-made global warming?
   What is the proper approach to the whole idea? I can't decide on my own
   whether it's true or false without educating myself in climatology. And how
   should I treat others who believe in it just because many university
   professors do?
   - Question 4: Should spousal consent be required for sterilization
   procedures? A fairly well-known mommy blogger recently revealed that she was
   required to sign a consent form for her husband's vasectomy. Reading through
   some of the remarks on her blog, many of her commenters seem to support such
   a practice, believing that a person has a right to be involved in the
   reproductive decisions of his/her spouse. I think it's a violation of
   individual rights, and having had a sterilization procedure myself, I'd have
   been BEYOND upset if my spouse had been required to give his consent. He was
   in agreement with my decision, but I can't help but wonder what happens in
   situations where a person does not want his/her spouse to have a vasectomy,
   tubal ligation, etc. Any thoughts?
   - Question 5: What do you think about *Objectivism and the Corruption of
   Rationality: A Critique of Ayn Rand's Epistemology* by Scott Ryan? I came
   across the book on Amazon, and I was wondering if it's worth reading. Would
   it change my view about Objectivism?
   - Question 6: From Objectivist
Answers:
   How do you change from being an emotionalist to being rational? I have the
   tendency to reminisce on fantasies and memories of martyrdom. I do it
   because it gives me a emotional surge of ecstasy and heartache. For example,
   I fantasize about telling the people who mistreated me so badly in Army
   Basic Training about what that was like for me. This indulgence is costing
   me my mind. I want to be emotionally competent. Any advice on how to be
   level-headed lucid/rational thinker, and stop the habit of indulging my
   emotions?

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Fwd: OA: Daily digest

[Bruce Majors]

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What do you think of this guy's logic

[dick thompson]

Sounds to me like he is a PITA to work with.  You can't depend on 
his doing what he signed up to do.  He is a total JAP of a person.  
There are a couple of reasons to walk away but most of these don't reach 
that level.  The only one that really rings true is  if you yell at me 
in front of others and curse me out.  Then you will be talking to empty 
air because I will be gone.  If I were a better fighter you would also 
have at a minimum a busted lip.



http://althouse.blogspot.com/2011/04/you-are-afraid-to-run-into-people-in.html

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