The Pilgrims’ Short Lived Experiment in Communism

Many have credited Karl Marx with inventing what we now know as communism in the middle of the 19th century. The concept of communal living and dependence, however, came long before The Communist Manifesto. Over the centuries, the concept has been applied by different people in different places. While the reasons for applying the communal approach varied as widely as the people who attempted it, one thing did remain constant: failure. From Roman latifundiae to the Soviet Union, communism time and again proved the failure inherent in its concept. Americans do not need to look to distant lands and little known peoples for evidence of the failure of communism. They simply need to look back at one of the most celebrated groups of people in their history: the Pilgrims.

As most educated Americans know, Puritan Separatists, or Pilgrims, landed in Massachusetts in 1620. What many don’t realize is that the original economic system of their colony, Plymouth Plantation, was a form of communism. There was neither private property nor division of labor. Food was grown for the town and distributed equally amongst all. The women who washed clothes and dressed meat did so for everyone and not just for their own families. This sounds like the perfect agrarian utopia envisioned by Marx and Lenin. What happened to it? To find the answer to that question, one must turn to Of Plymouth Plantation by William Bradford. Bradford served as Governor of Plymouth Colony from 1620 to 1647 and chronicled in great detail everything that happened in the colony.

By 1623, it was obvious the colony was barely producing enough corn to keep everyone alive. Fresh supplies from England were few and far between. Without some major change, the colony would face famine again. In his chronicle, Bradford described what was going wrong and how it was solved (pardon the King James English):

All this while no supply was heard of, neither knew they when they might expect any. So they began to think how they might raise as much corn as they could, and obtain a better crop than they had done, that they might not still thus languish in misery. At length, after much debate of things, the Governor (with the advise of the chiefest among them) gave way that they should set corn every man for his own particular, and in that regard trust to themselves; in all other things to go in the general way as before. And so assigned to every family a parcel of land, according to the proportion of the number, for that end, only for present use (but made no division for inheritance) and ranged all boys and youth under some family. This had very good success, for it made all hands industrious, so as much more corn was planted than otherwise would have been by any means the Governor or any other could use, and saved him a great deal of trouble, and gave far better content. The women now went willingly into the field, and took their little ones with them to set corn; which before would allege weakness and inability; whom to have compelled would have been thought great tyranny and oppression.

With weak crops and little hope of supply, the Pilgrims divided the parcels among the families and told them to grow their own food. They found that those who would pretend they couldn’t work due to infirmity, weakness or inability (sound familiar?) gladly went to work in the fields. Corn production increased dramatically and famine was averted because communism was eliminated. Bradford’s account doesn’t end here; he goes on to describe why he believed the communal system failed. Understanding the reasons for the failure is just as important, if not more important, than learning about the failure itself. Governor Bradford wrote:

The experience that was had in this common course and condition, tried sundry years and that amongst godly and sober men, may well evince the vanity of that conceit of Plato’s and other ancients applauded by some of later times; that the taking away of property and bringing in community into a commonwealth would make them happy and flourishing; as if they were wiser than God. For this community (so far as it was) was found to breed much confusion and discontent and retard much employment that would have been to their benefit and comfort. For the young men, that were most able and fit for labour and service, did repine that they should spend their time and strength to work for other men’s wives and children without any recompense. The strong, or man of parts, had no more division of victuals and clothes than he that was weak and not able to do a quarter than the other could; this was thought injustice. The aged and graver men to be ranked and equalized in labours, victuals, clothes, etc., with the meaner and younger sort, thought it some indignity and disrespect unto them. And for men’s wives to be commanded to do service for other men, as dressing their meat, washing their clothes, etc., they deemed it a kind of slavery, neither could many husbands well brook it.

The communal system failed because it treated the older and wiser the same way as the young and brash. It failed because it rewarded the less productive as much as the more productive. It failed because members of the community found that they could do less and still get the same benefit. All of these problems arose in a very religious community in which gluttony and laziness were considered sins and drunkenness was rare. How much more would communism fail in a larger society where such problems are rampant! By returning to a system in which the older and wiser are respected, and by reorganizing so that one’s benefit was directly tied to his production, the Pilgrims ensured the survival of their colony. Governor Bradford, however, ultimately attributes the failure of the “common cause” to something much deeper:

Upon the point all being to have alike and to do alike, they thought themselves in the like condition, and one as good as another; and so, if it did not cut off those relations that God hath set amongst men, yet it did at least much diminish and take off the mutual respects that should be preserved amongst them. And would have been worse if they had been men of another condition. Let none object this is men’s corruption, and nothing to the course itself. I answer, seeing all men have this corruption in them, God in His wisdom saw another course fitter for them.

Governor Bradford is saying that communism failed because of the corrupt nature of humans. People are imperfect and sinful. The utopia Marx and Lenin dreamed of could only work if it were filled with perfect people- and no such infallible people can be found in this world. Furthermore, the communal system undermines the relations God instituted among men- marriage and family. With husbands growing food for other people’s children, wives washing other men’s clothes, and children doing chores for other families, the basic foundational social unit of society is undermined. Without that, no society can hope to survive.

Fox News anchor Brit Hume reported today:

The president-elect isn’t shy about his penchant for exercise. He begins most mornings with a visit to a gym and frequently discusses his love for sports. Associated Press reporter Deanna Bellandi describes the incoming first couple as “fabulously fit.” Back in June, Men’s Fitness magazine ranked Obama the candidate as one of the 25 fittest guys in America.

So if this virtue of exercise is praised, how, you ask, have reporters referred to President Bush’s workout routine? They have used words such as “obsession,” “indulgence” and even “creepy” to describe the President’s exercise habit.

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It is enough that the people know there was an election. The people who cast the votes decide nothing.  The people who count the votes decide everything.….Joseph Stalin

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Interesting article here (clip below)
Did Democrats Have Something to Do with the Economic Troubles?
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
By Mike Baker

…..

Citigroup deftly showed other big companies how to play bailout bingo earlier this week. They got theirs in record time even though most of the nation didn’t know they were in trouble until a few minutes before the check was written. By the way, lost in the back pages of the Citi story is an interesting sidebar about former Citi director and senior advisor Robert Rubin.

In case you’re not familiar with Robert Rubin, he was treasury secretary during the Clinton Administration and joined Citi in 1999 as a trusted smart guy. How smart? Reporting shows he made somewhere in the region of $100 million while working with the organization. Rubin claims that he studiously avoided any daily management issues, in part because Citi over the past few years has had some bad management issues. So that $100 million wasn’t for management, it was for things like schmoozing, making big picture pronouncements, pondering and muttering smart things in the CEO’s ear while glancing furtively side to side.

He left in August of this year after helping to fill the bucket of poo but before it was thrown at the fan. Rubin’s also been working as an economic advisor to Obama’s transition team. It appears that several Rubin protégés, proponents of Rubinomics, are being positioned within the new Obama administration.

So here’s what I find amusing, in a curl-up-in-a-fetal-position-and-scream-loudly kind of way.

Remember during the campaign how this whole economic mess, according to the Obama camp, was the fault of the Bush administration and the past 8 years? They had all those excellent slogans… we can’t afford four more years of the same… remember? I don’t want to say that a lot of people bought that crap, but anytime you tried to talk about actual economic history and how this mess evolved, most people glazed over and muttered “past 8 years… more of same… must change.”

Well, just this Sunday while enjoying a piping hot cup of joe and a danish, I was reading through the Sunday papers. Being desirous of news from all sides, I always start with the New York Times. Eventually I finish up with Guns & Ammo. The Times had a story on the front page entitled Citigroup Pays for a Rush to Risk.

The story continued on the inside pages and on page 34, paragraph 15 of the story I came dangerously close to throwing myself off my deck. Here’s paragraph 15:

“When he (Robert Rubin) was Treasury secretary during the Clinton administration, Mr. Rubin helped loosen Depression-era banking regulations that made the creation of Citigroup possible by allowing banks to expand far beyond their traditional role as lenders and permitting them to profit from a variety of financial activities. During the same period he helped beat back tighter oversight of exotic financial products, a development he had previously said he was helpless to prevent.”

Is the New York Times now suggesting that the Democrats might have had something to do with our current economic troubles?

Bobby Jeter, 1958 Hawkeyes
Des Moines Register Article here

Bobby Jeter, Iowa Hawkeye running back and Hall of Fame cornerback for the Green Bay Packers, died this weekend.  He was the MVP of a Rose Bowl for the Hawkeyes when there were only 3,4 bowl games on every year and they were mostly on January 1.

Jeter was a particular favorite of my Dad’s – a great runner on a fantastic team of Coach Forest Evashevski’s that won the national title in the late 50’s.  “Evy” was also a favorite Coach of my Dad’s – held in high esteem because of the good years of IOWA football in the 50’s.  But Evy “retired” to become AD in the 60’s and the IOWA Football team was horrible in those years.  My folks would take some of us annually to knot hole games. (Knot hole games were $2.00 bleacher seats available once or twice a season – before they closed in the stadium)

IOWA never really regained national prominence until Hayden Fry showed up at IOWA in 1979.

I never saw Jeter play but we watched him play as a Packer (for some reason he never caught on as a running back in the pros but was an All -Pro Cornerback).

If you want to read more about Iowa Football – my family is covered a bit in this book – Link to Amazon.com.

It’s natural to follow IOWA players through the NFL or College coaching ranks – we still have some good ones – Nate Kaeding, Bobby Sanders, Dallas Clark and a few more…  I see Chuck Long was fired today from his Coaching job at SDSU.

All three Stoops bothers were Hawkeye players for Hayden Fry, Barry Alvarez and Brent Beliema at WISKY, Bill Snyder of Kansas, as well as Coach Ferentz all coached under Coach Fry.

I was thinking about Chuck during the Minnesota game on Saturday.  As QB of the Hawkeyes, his Freedom Bowl play in the Mid-80’s was a game “when nothing went wrong”, much like the the IOWA – MINN game last night.

But, when you’re a Hawkeye, you’re a Hawkeye for life.

RIP Bobby Jeter 1918-2008

[11/23 10:23pm note - it appears that there could be more celebration in Iowa City tonight - from what I can see Brown ran for just less than 100 yards (UCONN vs USF tonight) which gives Shonn Greene the National Individual Rushing championship.  I do not believe any of the three leaders has another game, but I could be wrong.

And I was hoping that the Hawkeyes may crack the top 25 with the win on SATURDAY but they did not.  Consensus about 28 in the national rankings according to all the polls. -pf]

Hawks Bring Floyd of Rosedale Back to Iowa City

Kinnick North has always been a friendly place for IOWA Hawkeyes and last night was no different.  Playing outside in MINN as the last BIG TEN game of the season, (brrrrr) will be a much tougher “house” even though we’ll still probably outnumber the Gophers in the stands.  (this was the last game the Gophers will play in the HHH dome).

After a very tense and hard fought first quarter, where IOWA escaped with a 3-0 lead, the (once 7W-1L) Gophers of the University of Minnesota started to crack.  Penalties, Interceptions and yes, Shonn Greene doing his thing – lead to a 27-0 half time lead.  Shonn was also within 16 yards of a 100 yard game by halftime; a 100 yard game would complete his season.

TOUCHDOWN IOWA! TOUCHDOWN IOWA!

The Hawkeyes continued to pour it on and the Gophers continued their collapse as IOWA cruised to a 55-0 shellacking of the Gophers in IOWA’s quest to keep FLOYD of ROSEDALE in IOWA for another season.

The Gophers stacked the line and blitzed a lot, which opened up deep passing lanes for Stanzi, who had his best collegiate game to date.  DJK, after dropping one of the first passes thrown right to him early in the game, caught everything else in sight for 3 long touchdowns and 188 total receiving yards.

Greene, again was the story of the night as the 2nd place back (UCONN’s Brown) plays to night and has to have a 140 yard night to win the rushing crown.  Brown outpacing Greene is possible but would be sad, as Greene sat out the entire 4th Q due to the blowout.

Greene has carried this team and allowed Stanzi the time to mature as a QB – forcing teams to play 7,8 in the box to stop him.  Hope he has an incredible Bowl performance, but thanks Shonn, for a great season and best to you in your NFL career.

Good news, bad news as always for the Hawkeyes.  We are generally placed about one station above where we should play because IOWA fans travel so well to bowl games.  The Hawks may even get chosen for the January 1 Outback Bowl – which would be amazing – sitting in OCTOBER with a 3-3 record.  All in all though, not a bad season to finish 8-4 when the four loses were decided by a total of 12 points.

Kudos to Coach, the staff and the IOWA HAWKEYE team.

Links to a DMR article

IPC link

video links

University links

Cedar Rapids Gazette article

Worst Year Ever for Stocks: ‘Irrational Exuberance’ of 1990s Being Unwound

Any way you slice it, the 2008 is shaping up to annus horribilis for the U.S. stock market. Heading into Friday’s session, in which an early rally effort quickly faded, the S&P was down 49% year-to-date and on track for its worst year ever. Down 43% year to date, the Dow is heading for its second worst year in history, the WSJ reports, trailing only the 53% decline in 1931.

While the major averages tell a grim tale, the action in components of the S&P 500 speak to the extent of the devastation. Heading into Friday’s session:

• 115 S&P stocks were trading under $10
• 41 were trading under $5
• 204 were trading with a market cap of less than $4 billion

These are not the only criteria used for inclusion in the index, but S&P 500 companies typically have market caps above $4 billion and stock prices above $5. Furthermore, many institutional fund managers are prohibited from owning stocks that trade below $10 or $5, depending on the firm.

In other words, a lot of companies currently in the S&P 500 may not be eligible for membership or, more importantly, ownership by major institutions. That, in turns, may mean more selling ahead, even though stocks are “cheap” based on a variety of metrics. For example, 163 stocks in the S&P 500 are trading below book value, or assets minus liabilities, including non-financials like Alcoa and Duke Energy.

One way to look at what’s happened this year is the stock market is going back to what used to constitute “normal” valuations before the go-go 1990s.

Of course, “cheap” stocks can get cheaper and if we’re really going to wiped out that age of excess, I’ll point out the Dow was around 6400 in December 1996, when Alan Greenspan made his infamous “irrational exuberance” comment.

The real tragedy is that’s about the only thing Greenspan ever got right. Unfortunately, “the Maestro” not only didn’t do anything to prevent future “exuberance” after that speech, but quite a lot to encourage it.

there was a recount in the 2nd district primary for my candidate this year, and after the counts were certified by the auditors there was very little movement.  These events bother me a lot – is this one of the changes we expect to see in future elections?  -pf

Link to Wall Street Journal article 

Minnesota this week began its official statewide recount, and Mr. Franken isn’t hanging on the outcome. Instead, he’s trying to conjure up enough other, previously disqualified, ballots to overturn Mr. Coleman’s 215-vote lead. The Democrat needs to invent votes because he knows it will be tough to win a normal recount. Minnesota uses optical scanning machines, which are far more accurate than the punchcard paper ballots of the 2000 Florida recount. Prior recounts in Minnesota have resulted in few vote changes.

So off to court he goes, with Mr. Franken demanding that the state canvassing board delay certifying the initial election results. His campaign claims that absentee votes may have been wrongly rejected by election judges. Team Franken filed a lawsuit in Ramsey County (the state’s second largest, and an area Mr. Franken won decisively) demanding a list of these absentee voters, so that the Democrat can contact them, get them to declare their ex post facto preference, and, presto, he wins.

The state attorney general’s office ruled against a canvassing board delay, finding that certification was purely an administrative function and that any question of absentee ballots ought to be left to the courts. The problem is that at least one court has entertained this Franken ploy. Ramsey County Judge Dale Lindman this week ordered county officials to give Mr. Franken a list of voters who had cast rejected absentee ballots.

Put aside that these ballots have already been ruled on by trained election judges. Put aside, too, the invasion of voter privacy. The real problem of allowing Mr. Franken to conduct his own voter discovery operation is that this is changing the rules after the election has been held. The gambit introduces subjective judgment and political pressure into a voting process that is supposed to be immune to both.

Opening up the rejected-ballot question is also a recipe for potential fraud. When the Franken campaign filed its initial lawsuit demanding access to the voter lists, it used as an example an 84-year-old woman in Beltrami County whose vote was supposedly rejected because she’d had a stroke, and therefore her signature on her absentee ballot did not match the one on file. After some outside investigation, the Franken campaign admitted that the story was not true, and that her ballot had been rejected for entirely different (and legitimate) reasons.

Mr. Franken is also trying to raise public doubt about an “undervote” — suggesting that only machine error can explain why he received 12.2 percentage points fewer votes than did Barack Obama. But the Senate race had three serious candidates, not two. Maybe fewer Minnesotans liked a left-wing candidate who ran a nasty campaign. In any case, the same Democrats who claimed Florida was “stolen” by faulty ballot machines are now trying to discredit the optical-scanners that they have demanded — all in order to sway the human judges who’ll rule on Mr. Franken’s legal challenges.

The joker’s goal is to sow enough doubt about the vote so that if he loses the recount he can attract public support to challenge the final result in court. This is a slap at Minnesota, which, so far at least, appears to be doing all it can to make the recount open and transparent. Minnesota should respond by telling Mr. Franken that even a celebrity has to play by the rules.

Now.  Since November 2007 this new process (described in the article below) has made harvesting of any type of stem cells, unnecessary.   Why is Stem Cell Research still a political football?

Here is a article by DR. Charles Krauthammer, written in 2007.

THINK PEOPLE!!!   -pf

Stem Cell Vindication

By Charles Krauthammer
Friday, November 30, 2007; A23

“If human embryonic stem cell research does not make you at least a little bit uncomfortable, you have not thought about it enough.”
– James A. Thomson

A decade ago, Thomson was the first to isolate human embryonic stem cells. Last week, he (and Japan’s Shinya Yamanaka) announced one of the great scientific breakthroughs since the discovery of DNA: an embryo-free way to produce genetically matched stem cells.

Even a scientist who cares not a whit about the morality of embryo destruction will adopt this technique because it is so simple and powerful. The embryonic stem cell debate is over.

Which allows a bit of reflection on the storm that has raged ever since the August 2001 announcement of President Bush’s stem cell policy. The verdict is clear: Rarely has a president — so vilified for a moral stance — been so thoroughly vindicated.

Why? Precisely because he took a moral stance. Precisely because, to borrow Thomson’s phrase, Bush was made “a little bit uncomfortable” by the implications of embryonic experimentation. Precisely because he therefore decided that some moral line had to be drawn.

In doing so, he invited unrelenting demagoguery by an unholy trinity of Democratic politicians, research scientists and patient advocates who insisted that anyone who would put any restriction on the destruction of human embryos could be acting only for reasons of cynical politics rooted in dogmatic religiosity — a “moral ayatollah,” as Sen. Tom Harkin so scornfully put it.

Bush got it right. Not because he necessarily drew the line in the right place. I have long argued that a better line might have been drawn — between using doomed and discarded fertility-clinic embryos created originally for reproduction (permitted) and using embryos created solely to be disassembled for their parts, as in research cloning (prohibited). But what Bush got right was to insist, in the face of enormous popular and scientific opposition, on drawing a line at all, on requiring that scientific imperative be balanced by moral considerations.

History will look at Bush’s 2001 speech and be surprised how balanced and measured it was, how much respect it gave to the other side. Read it. Here was a presidential policy pronouncement that so finely and fairly drew out the case for both sides that until the final few minutes of his speech, you had no idea where the policy would end up.

Bush finally ended up doing nothing to hamper private research into embryonic stem cells and pledging federal monies to support the study of existing stem cell lines — but refusing federal monies for research on stem cell lines produced by newly destroyed embryos.

The president’s policy recognized that this might cause problems. The existing lines might dry up, prove inadequate or become corrupted. Bush therefore appointed a President’s Council on Bioethics to oversee ongoing stem cell research and evaluate how his restrictions were affecting research and what means might be found to circumvent ethical obstacles.

More vilification. The mainstream media and the scientific establishment saw this as a smoke screen to cover his fundamentalist, obscurantist, anti-scientific — the list of adjectives was endless — tracks. “Some observers,” wrote The Post’s Rick Weiss, “say the president’s council is politically stacked.”

I sat on the council for five years. It was one of the most ideologically balanced bioethics commissions in the history of this country. It consisted of scientists, ethicists, theologians, philosophers, physicians — and others (James Q. Wilson, Francis Fukuyama and me among them) of a secular bent not committed to one school or the other.

That balance of composition was reflected in the balance in the reports issued by the council — documents of sophistication and nuance that reflected the divisions both within the council and within the nation in a way that respectfully presented the views of all sides. One recommendation was to support research that might produce stem cells through “de-differentiation” of adult cells, thus bypassing the creation of human embryos.

That Holy Grail has now been achieved. Largely because of the genius of Thomson and Yamanaka. And also because of the astonishing good fortune that nature requires only four injected genes to turn an ordinary adult skin cell into a magical stem cell that can become bone or brain or heart or liver.

But for one more reason as well. Because the moral disquiet that James Thomson always felt — and that George Bush forced the country to confront — helped lead him and others to find some ethically neutral way to produce stem cells. Providence then saw to it that the technique be so elegant and beautiful that scientific reasons alone will now incline even the most willful researchers to leave the human embryo alone.

Return to the Article

November 15, 2008

Waltzing on the Titanic

By Larrey Anderson

America’s young people helped elect Barack Obama. Way to go kids! This article is for you. Let’s take a look at your future.

We won’t need a time machine. We will just need to visit Europe and talk to the youth of France, Italy, and Greece. Don’t worry. They won’t mind. They have plenty of time to talk. They don’t have jobs.

Young people in Western Europe tend to sit around, smoke Marlboro cigarettes, drink espresso (and Coca Cola), and (at least until this election) bitch about America.

They have been taught, since their first day in school, that capitalism is evil — that the government can, and should, provide health care, employment, and eventually, guaranteed retirement benefits for everyone.

In their leisurely conversations when they have finished condemning capitalism, they go on to praise the idea of socialism. They do not praise their own countries. They are not stupid. The health care stinks. (Young people don’t care much about that.) There are no jobs. (But there are unemployment benefits.) And the retirement systems are bankrupt. (But old age is way, way, way in the future.)

So, they argue, in the next election they are going to replace the loser socialists who currently run their countries with some real socialists — politicians who will finally keep their promises. I heard this discussion in France thirty years ago. I heard it the last time I was in Italy. It is taking place in Greece right now.

The last time I was in Rome I listened as a very bright young man explained to his friends, over lunch at a sidewalk café, what was really going on: Most European countries have become, essentially, plutocracies. The socialist governments give lip service to wealth redistribution but they are tightly interwoven with the “old money” in the banking system and in big business.

This came as no surprise to his educated friends. Their response was (same as it always is): Of course the system is corrupt. We will throw out the old socialists and put in some new ones. It played in their minds like a broken record. I have heard it for years and years and years.

The only thing that stopped the conversation from becoming a perpetual loop was that one of the conversationalists eventually proclaimed, “Ah. But at least we are not America!” The Marlboros got lit up. The espresso and Coca Cola were sipped. And they got back to the serious business of bashing capitalism.

Well, not all of them. It turned out that the bright young man who had so eloquently described the current corruption was the bus boy at the café. He had a university education … and a job!

I had the opportunity to speak with one of these young people alone. Actually, this fellow was not so young anymore. He was thirty-four. He still lived with his parents.

He could not afford his own place. His family was having problems even paying their electrical bills.

The reason the price of electricity was so high was that the “greens” had for years stopped the Italian government from building nuclear power plants.

He drove a taxi a few days a week (the only job he could find). He had a girlfriend but could not afford to marry her. He was not planning on having children. But in the next election, he assured me, a brand new socialism was coming. He started to rattle off the names of the experts he had read in the newspapers (and he had studied in the university) who had told him so.

I felt sorry for him. I had had this exact conversation many times before. He was brim full of hope and change.

Listen up young Americans: What is coming to the United States is what has been happening in Europe for decades. The ships of state have smashed into an iceberg called socialism and they are sinking.

This is not a Republican versus Democrat thing. Republicans had ten years to clean up the mess. They made it worse. I don’t blame you for wanting to throw the bums out. I did too.

But putting in a new and improved and ever more aggressive socialist like Obama is not the answer. (Don’t argue about his socialism. Go to his website and show me some free market proposals.) They have been trying this in Europe for three generations. It has not worked.

That trillion-dollar “bi-partisan” bailout passed by our Congress did not go to the people who cannot make their house payments. It is being handed out to the big bankers and to big business.

That is how socialism works. Politicians, bankers, and big businessmen do an age-old dance in triple time. There is no trickle down economics in socialism. Almost all of the money stays at the top.

America will soon be, like Europe has been, waltzing on the Titanic. Thanks for the dance.

Shonn Greene does it again.

what an awesome kid – what a huge heart!

You’ve heard the story, a Freshman sensation in 2005 but injury ridden, then grades slipped, wasn’t even at Iowa or playing football in 2007; working at a furniture store going to classes at Kirkwood Community College.  He could have gone home to New Jersey.

Today – Two touchdowns – one 75 yards of beauty; the second, more impressive, running OVER people for a 15 yard run…  30 rushes 209 yards for the game – should keep him at least in 3rd place in the country.  He’s the only player who’s rushed for 100 yards in each game.

He has one more season of eligibility, but I can’t believe he’ll stay.  He’s ready; he’s healthy and he’s 23.  He should have a great future in the NFL; we wish him every success (and a Chicago Bear uniform).

Some hokey-pokey in the locker room today….

Notes on the young man

and here

Iowa 22 – Purdue 17

 

Targeting Your 401(k)

Congress has an eye on the tax break for your retirement.

You may have heard about Argentina’s plan to nationalize private retirement accounts. Some Democrats on Capitol Hill are inspired, and with their big election victory they may get the chance to test Peronist ideas in America.

Meet Congressmen George Miller and Jim McDermott, who are eager to change the way Americans save for their golden years. They’ll also be powerbrokers in the next Congress. Mr. Miller, who came in with the Class of 1974 from California, chairs the House Education and Labor Committee. Mr. McDermott, who has represented Seattle the past two decades, runs a House Ways and Means subcommittee on income security and family support.

Before Election Day, the Congressmen began to target the $3 trillion in 401(k) accounts held by about 60% of Americans. Mr. Miller called the system “an inadequate vehicle” that “has not been terribly successful” in encouraging retirement savings. He wants a “wholesale re-examination” of pensions.

Just what alternative these Democrats support is unclear, and nothing has been formally proposed beyond Mr. Miller’s plan to make the system “more transparent,” reduce fees charged by the money managers, and suspend the tax penalty for seniors over 70 who don’t take the “required minimum” withdrawal from their account, regardless of the market situation.

But the Chairman has also signaled greater ambitions. At a hearing last month, Mr. Miller put the 401(k) system into play. Under the current system, employers match employee contributions that aren’t taxed until redeemed, an indirect subsidy worth some $80 billion today. “We have to start to think about in Congress . . . whether or not we want to continue to invest that $80 billion for a policy that’s not generating what we now say it should,” [we?  WE??!#!??] Mr. Miller said. “For a taxpayer investment of this size, we must ensure that the structure of 401(k)s adequately protects the nest eggs of participating workers.”

His committee listened to possible reform proposals. Most eye-catching was an idea from Teresa Ghilarducci at New York’s New School for Social Research. Her plan would end the tax breaks for 401(k)s; she proposes instead to give all workers an annual $600 inflation-adjusted tax credit for retirement and force them to invest 5% of their pay into a government-run retirement account managed by the Social Security Administration. She called the 401(k) “a failed experiment.” A McDermott spokesman called her proposals “intriguing” and “part of the discussion.” Mr. Miller hasn’t so far endorsed the plan.

The main liberal objection to 401(k)s seems to be that they let average Americans control their own investment decisions for retirement. As Shlomo Benartzi, a professor at UCLA’s Anderson business school, told Mr. Miller’s committee, “Individuals have a tendency to buy at the peak, and then panic when the markets drop and sell at the bottom.” Better to have the government do this instead.

It is certainly true that retirement plans have lost, on paper, some $4 trillion in the past 15 months — half in 401(k) and IRAs and half in company defined-benefit plans. Average 401(k)s are down a quarter this year. But assuming sensible policies and a normal economic recovery, those asset values should rise again over time. In any case, investment returns on stocks and bonds over extended periods far exceed the paltry returns on Social Security that for some workers are a mere 1% to 2%.

Tax breaks alone hardly explain the popularity of 401(k)s. Over the past 30 years, the number of individuals covered by them nearly trebled, up to 65 million accounts, while the number under defined-benefit pension fell 30%. People are attached to their 401(k)s because it is their property, which they can carry with them to new jobs (unlike traditional pensions), manage as they see fit and bequeath to heirs.

Before entertaining dreams of state-managed retirement accounts, Congressional Democrats might ask why Europe and Latin America have tried so hard in recent years to move in the opposite direction. Their pension systems are debt-ridden, can’t easily adjust for demographic shifts and show a historically lower return.

If Democrats want to improve the prospects for American retirees, their first priority should be removing barriers to economic growth. Anger over the drop in 401(k) balances is one reason that voters who belong to the “investor class” swung to Democrats in greater than usual numbers this year. Their mandate is for policies that improve those returns, not strip them of tax benefits.

Read  Teresa Ghilarducci’s full testimony here  2008-10-07-teresa-ghilarducci.pdf

Link
Obama’s Dictionary – Definition of Transparent = Conceal

Posted on 12 November 2008

The hot topic in the blogsphere today is the news that the FEC is going to audit McCains Campaign Finances and that Obama’s will most likely not be audited due to the ridiculous rules currently on the books.

The story within the story is about Obama’s campaign pledges about being “open, transparent, and accountable to the American people” and yet Obama refuses to disclose the names of donors under $200.  Not only will he not disclose those names his campaign went to extreme lengths to ensure the addresses of all internet donations were not validated ensuring the donors could be anonymous and thus immune to campaign finance laws. There has been no answer to why they went to the extraordinary effort to disable the computerized address verification systems for their internet donations.

At the very minimum his campaign could provide the ip addresses of all donations which his credit card processors could easily provide.  Dumping that data into a spreadsheet could show us in just a few short minutes:

- How many contributions were placed from foreign countries

- How many contributions were placed from the same ip address.

Why are these two questions important?  If there are a significant number of contributions placed from foreign countries it should raise a red flag for the FEC to investigate possible illegal foreign donations.  In the same vein if there are many contributions from the same ip address then the FEC should also investigate.  For example hypothetically – What if there were a high number of contributions made from an ip address lets say 5,000 contributions and that just so happens to be the address of an Obama campaign office?  Or what if there were 10,000 contributions all made from the same ip address in the Cayman Islands?

The Obama campaign could provide their “claimed” transparency with a miniscule amount of effort that could almost instantly remove any significant doubt of possible campaign fraud.  On the other hand it could almost instantly show significant potential campaign finance violations.  Is his total lack of transparency on this issue part of his plan to restore “faith in our government”?

CIA Agents Confirm: Al Queda WAS In Iraq in Before Invasion

Posted by: Scott @ 5:27 am

Eclipsed by the election campaigning, this story slipped under the radar. Much has been said about the invasion of Iraq. Often there are claims that there were no weapons of mass destruction and no ties to Al Queda. In fact, most of the WMD claims that were made before the invasion turned out to be true. Iraq was not clean and innocent in regards to WMD, and the ties to Al Queda were wrongly dismissed.

One of those ties regard Saddam’s involvement with Al Queda groups like Ansar al Islam which no one disputes was present and active in the northern section of Saddam’s Iraq. Opponents of the war dismiss that tie by saying that if they weren’t in the part of Iraq that Saddam controlled, then they weren’t under his control. That’s a nice piece of rhetoric, and it’s good spin, but it’s ignorant of the fact that Ansar was the ONLY means of influence Saddam had in the North (that, and the threat of invading the north). He used Ansar as his proxy guerrilla force to attack his Kurdish enemies and impose his will in the North.

The point remains, Ansar and other Al Queda groups were inside Iraq in 2002, and the CIA knew it. They knew it because they sent extremely brave people there-into Iraq, and those people monitored the Al Queda until the Pentagon blew the opportunity to destroy the camps.

Charles “Sam” Faddis, who led a CIA team into northern Iraq following the 9/11 attacks, says the Pentagon’s “endless planning and delays” foiled a chance to wipe out a band of al Qaeda leaders who were fleeing American bombs in Afghanistan.

Faddis says the delays, beginning in 2002, also facilitated the escape of some “key” al Qaeda figures, including terrorist scientists who were working on chemical and biological weapons.

“Some died, some are still on the run,” Faddis said in a telephone interview Tuesday, following his appearance on NPR’s Diane Rehm Show to promote a new book, Operation Hotel California: The Clandestine War Inside Iraq.

“The site was physically destroyed … but certainly the research wasn’t destroyed.”

link

To argue that the Pentagon “botched” this is to argue that there was something substantial to be botched. Admitting the US missed an opportunity to attack Al Queda in Iraq before 2002 is admitting that there was enough of an Al Queda presence in Iraq before the invasion to warrant military action.

Today, Ansar al Islam’s remnants and other Al Queda groups are lumped into the term AQI for Al Queda in Iraq groups as if they are all the same. Like all Al Queda groups, they are affiliated-not the same. They have great differences, but bear common themes, objectives, tactics, and alliance.

Why is this important today? America is looking at two more years of war in Iraq under President Obama. To accomplish anything, Americans must support efforts to succeed. It’s time to put away the anti-war, political opposition rhetoric, finally recognize facts such as this one, and support not only the troops, but the hard work, the good work that they are doing.

This is a post from a blog you should bookmark — our Canadian friends “get this”.   I have a slight variation on this story though, I don’t think the rich kids would complain that their parents paid for everything.  They just don’t “get it” either, and neither does most of the American Electorate.  -pf

The Coming War Between Producer and Taker

by Ron Ewart
Thursday, November 13, 2008

There is a story floating around the Internet about a teacher who decided to hold a mock election for president in her 5th grade classroom.  The gist of the story is that she instructed the class to pick several possible candidates for president on each side, as a kind of primary election.  Then the class voted for one candidate out of each of the two groups of candidates.  The names of the two finalists were Johnny and Mary. 

The teacher then told Johnny and Mary to give a speech about what they would do as president.  Johnny got to go first.  He gave a long speech about how he would follow his principles and always do a good job.  Mary gave a very short speech in which she said as president, she would give everyone in the classroom an ice cream cone.  Mary won hands down. 

When Mary was pressed for how she was going to pay for the cones, she said she would require that each kid with rich parents would have to pay because the poor kids didn’t have any money; to which the kids with the rich parents yelled, “….. why do our parents have to pay?” One little kid in the back of the room, rose from his desk and told the teacher in a plain, emotionless voice, ” such a plan is in violation of the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment.” The teacher was stunned.  She and Mary were speechless.  The class didn’t care who paid.  They wanted their ice cream cones.

The fact is, when a politician promises “goodies” like ice cream cones to get votes, their promises are made with Other People’s Money, or OPM.  The crux of the matter is, that seems to escape everyone’s attention, the candidate or politician doesn’t own what they are promising to give.  Some might call that theft or fraud and those who make a practice of “stealing” OPM, usually go to jail when caught.  But it is perfectly OK for a politician or a candidate for public office, to promise or steal OPM in order to “buy” votes to stay in office, or get elected.

But let’s go back to the little kid that stated that Mary’s plan for supplying the ice cream cones was in violation of the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment.  Section 1 of the 14th Amendment reads as follows:  (We have underlined the appropriate passage)

Section 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

First of all, there is no mention in the U. S. Constitution regarding the government’s authority to “TAKE” from those with the greatest capability, and give it to those with the greatest need.  The government has just assumed that authority by perverting the “……… and promote the general welfare” clause in the preamble.  Then, when the government forces those with the greatest capability to pay those with the greatest need, they deny the person with the greatest capability, equal protection of the laws. When someone with more, pays or gives something to someone with less, it is called charity and it is an act of selflessness.  In a free country, under liberty, charity is supposed to be the “FREE” choice of the giver, as to whom gets the gift and how much they are to receive.  Americans are the most generous people on Earth and give more to national and international charities than any other culture or country on Earth. 

When government forces people to be “generous” with a gun to their head under tax law, they make a mockery out of the charity of free choice.  But worse, what they have done, is created a system of government as described by Karl Marx in his Communist Manifesto.  A recent candidate for President of the United States has endorsed just such a system of government and the candidate’s wife totally agrees with him.  They are now the president elect and first lady in waiting. Two important questions arise in government’s enforced wealth re-distribution scheme.  Who decides who gets the charity and who decides what those with the greatest capability (the producer) have to pay?  In other words, what is the producer’s fair share?  The producer’s fair share is what government decides and is anything but free-choice charity.  It is instead, enforced charity, which isn’t charity at all.  This system operates on the false premise that someone in need is owed a debt by someone who is productive.  That’s not liberty, that’s government-induced slavery.

What happens over time is the producer starts realizing his “fair” share is anything but fair and the producer starts thinking very hard about either not producing any more, or hiding what he produces.  Or, he takes his wealth, his ideas, his skills, or his company that employs a lot of people, offshore.  It’s called brain and money drain and occurs often in socialist countries.  What happens is the wealth, creativity and production is removed from the country and it descends into mindless mediocrity.  This was the basis, or plot if you will, of Ayn Rand’s novel, “Atlas Shrugged”.

Far too many of “those supposedly with the greatest need” and who are receiving enforced charity from the producers, are more than capable of taking care of themselves.  Should the producer ever wise up, we predict that there will be a silent war of resistance.  Charity by choice will decrease, enforced charity may go down as more producers secretly opt out of the mandatory program and those on welfare might have to look for a job and become self-reliant and responsible, as they are supposed to be.  Those in true need may have to look to private, family or church charity for their subsistence.  Meanwhile, the producers will get even more creative about avoiding their “fair” share.

Americans are a funny lot.  When you tell an American he HAS to do something, he usually gets very creative on finding ways not to do it, unless of course a pay check or his freedom is at risk.  We wonder, how long he will take it before he finally rebels?  The answer is, he is rebelling already and the rebellion will just increase.  The silent war between the producers and the takers has already started and is in full swing.  And it is an unnecessary war, created by government socialist policies; policies that are totally designed to keep certain politicians in a particular party, in office, by playing on the weakness of man.

Long live the Socialist Republic of America under Pelosi, Reid, Frank, Dodd, Schumer, Kennedy and Clinton; Democrats all, the party that has bankrupted America and drove a knife into the heart of America’s solvency, sovereignty and freedom!  And whom did we select to be the new captain of the Titanic, Barack Hussein Obama, a candidate for which the Communist Party of America and our enemies, are jumping for joy!

Link to Iowa Independent Article

Miller-Meeks issues challenge to veterans, sounds like a candidate again

“Your actions have consequences, and your words have meaning,” Miller-Meeks said during her keynote address. “For those of you in this room who are worried that Veterans Day and the honor and commitment and sacrifice that you’ve made is losing its popularity and you will be forgotten, I’m imploring you to become relevant again.

….

Following the event, many in the audience came up to speak with Miller-Meeks and show their support for her congressional run and her continued service in Iowa’s 2nd District. She has not publicly indicated if she will again venture into politics, but, if she takes her own advice, it’s quite certain that she will remain relevant.

——————–

“Even my husband wants me to run again,” the 53-year-old Army veteran said after participating in a Cedar Rapids Veteran’s Day observance.

Cedar Rapids Gazette article

——————–

We can’t lose 3M as a voice for Iowans.  The fact that the VFW endorsed her opponent in this election shows the pox on the body politic, where money drives everything.  “PacMan” Loebsack hasn’t even been sworn in to his second term and I already feel short changed from what could have been.  -pf

Obama surfs through

http://www.salon.com/opinion/paglia/2008/11/12/palin/print.html  take link for full article

The Obamas are a warm vision for the White House — but he should strive toward full transparency. Plus: Yes, I still like Sarah Palin!
By Camille Paglia
Nov. 12, 2008 |

..Eat dirt, you sour Clintons, who said Obama was “unelectable.” ..

Yes, it’s true we know relatively little about Barack Obama, and his triumph is a roll of the dice. …In debate, McCain was always pugnacious but too often bland or rambling, and he often missed glaring opportunities to score off Obama’s vagueness or contradictions.

…No one knows whether Obama will move to the center .. . …The big question will be how patient the Democratic left wing is in demanding drastic changes in social policy, particularly dicey with a teetering economy.

As I’ve watched Obama gracefully step up to podiums or move through crowds, I’ve been reminded not of basketball, with its feints and pivots, but of surfing, that art form of his native Hawaii. .. Obama’s ability to stay on his feet and outrun the most menacing waves that threaten to engulf him seems to embody the breezy, sunny spirit of the American surfer.

In the closing weeks of the election, however, I became increasingly disturbed by the mainstream media’s avoidance of forthright dealing with several controversies that had been dogging Obama — even as every flimsy rumor about Sarah Palin was being trumpeted as if it were engraved in stone on Mount Sinai. For example, I had thought for many months that the flap over Obama’s birth certificate was a tempest in a teapot. But simple questions about the certificate were never resolved to my satisfaction. Thanks to their own blathering, fanatical overkill, of course, the right-wing challenges to the birth certificate never gained traction.

But Obama could have ended the entire matter months ago by publicly requesting Hawaii to issue a fresh, long-form, stamped certificate and inviting a few high-profile reporters in to examine the document and photograph it. (The campaign did make the “short-form” certificate available to Factcheck.org, a project of the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania.) And why has Obama not made his university records or thesis work widely available? The passivity of the press toward Bush administration propaganda about weapons of mass destruction led the nation into the costly blunder of the Iraq war. We don’t need another presidency that finds it all too easy to rely on evasion or stonewalling. I deeply admire Obama, but as a voter I don’t like feeling gamed or played.

Another issue that I initially dismissed was the flap over William Ayers, the Chicago-based former member of the violent Weather Underground. Conservative radio host Sean Hannity began the drumbeat about Ayers’ association with Obama a year ago — a theme that most of the mainstream media refused to investigate or even report until this summer. I had never heard of Ayers and couldn’t have cared less. I was irritated by Hillary Clinton’s aggressive flagging of Ayers in a debate, and I accepted Obama’s curt dismissal of the issue.

Hence my concern about Ayers has been very slow in developing. The mainstream media should have fully explored the subject early this year and not allowed it to simmer and boil until it flared up ferociously in the last month of the campaign. Obama may not in recent years have been “pallin’ around” with Ayers, in Sarah Palin’s memorable line, but his past connections with Ayers do seem to have been more frequent and substantive than he has claimed. …

Pursuing the truth about Ayers, I recently rented the 2002 documentary “The Weather Underground,” from Netflix. It was riveting.

Although the film seems to waver between ominous exposé and blatant whitewash, the full extent of the group’s bombing campaign is dramatically demonstrated. It’s not for everyone: The film uses gratuitous cutaways of horrifying carnage, from the Vietnam War to the Manson murders (such as Sharon Tate’s smiling corpse, bathed in blood). But the news footage of the Greenwich Village townhouse destroyed in 1970 by bomb-making gone wrong in the basement still has enormous impact. Standing in the chaotic street, actor Dustin Hoffman, who lived next door, seems like Everyman at the apocalypse.

Ayers comes off in the film as a vapid, slightly dopey, chronic juvenile with stunted powers of ethical reasoning. The real revelation is his wife, Bernardine Dohrn (who evidently worked at the same large Chicago law firm as Michelle Obama in the mid-1990s). Of course I had heard of Dohrn — hers was one of the most notorious names of our baby-boom generation — and I knew her black-and-white police mug shot. But I had never seen footage of her speaking or interacting with others. Well, it’s pretty obvious who wears the pants in that family!

The mystery of Bernardine Dohrn: How could such a personable, attractive, well-educated young woman end up saying such things at a 1969 political rally as this (omitted in the film) about the Manson murders: “Dig it. First they killed those pigs, then they ate dinner in the same room with them. They even shoved a fork into a victim’s stomach. Wild!” And how could Dohrn have so ruthlessly pursued a decade-long crusade of hatred and terrorism against innocent American citizens and both private and public property?

“The Weather Underground” never searches for answers, but it does show Dohrn, then and now, as a poised, articulate woman of extremely high intelligence and surprising inwardness.

The audio extra of her reading the collective’s first public communiqué (”Revolutionary violence is the only way”) is chilling.

But the tumultuous footage of her 1980 surrender to federal authorities is a knockout. Mesmerized, I ran the clip six or seven times of her seated at a lawyer’s table while reading her still defiant statement. The sober scene — with Dohrn hyper-alert in a handsome turtleneck and tweedy jacket — was tailor-made for Jane Fonda in her “Klute” period, androgynous shag. Only illegalities by federal investigators prevented Dohrn from being put away on ice for a long, long time.

Given that Obama had served on a Chicago board with Ayers and approved funding of a leftist educational project sponsored by Ayers, one might think that the unrepentant Ayers-Dohrn couple might be of some interest to the national media. But no, reporters have been too busy playing mini-badminton with every random spitball about Sarah Palin, who has been subjected to an atrocious and at times delusional level of defamation merely because she has the temerity to hold pro-life views.

How dare Palin not embrace abortion as the ultimate civilized ideal of modern culture? How tacky that she speaks in a vivacious regional accent indistinguishable from that of Western Canada! How risible that she graduated from the State University of Idaho and not one of those plush, pampered commodes of received opinion whose graduates, in their rush to believe the worst about her, have demonstrated that, when it comes to sifting evidence, they don’t know their asses from their elbows.

Liberal Democrats are going to wake up from their sadomasochistic, anti-Palin orgy with a very big hangover.

The evil genie released during this sorry episode will not so easily go back into its bottle. A shocking level of irrational emotionalism and at times infantile rage was exposed at the heart of current Democratic ideology — contradicting Democratic core principles of compassion, tolerance and independent thought. One would have to look back to the Eisenhower 1950s for parallels to this grotesque lock-step parade of bourgeois provincialism, shallow groupthink and blind prejudice.

I like Sarah Palin, and I’ve heartily enjoyed her arrival on the national stage. As a career classroom teacher, I can see how smart she is — and quite frankly, I think the people who don’t see it are the stupid ones, wrapped in the fuzzy mummy-gauze of their own worn-out partisan dogma.

So she doesn’t speak the King’s English — big whoop! There is a powerful clarity of consciousness in her eyes.

She uses language with the jumps, breaks and rippling momentum of a be-bop saxophonist. I stand on what I said (as a staunch pro-choice advocate) in my last two columns — that Palin as a pro-life wife, mother and ambitious professional represents the next big shift in feminism. Pro-life women will save feminism by expanding it, particularly into the more traditional Third World.

As for the Democrats who sneered and howled that Palin was unprepared to be a vice-presidential nominee — what navel-gazing hypocrisy!

What protests were raised in the party or mainstream media when John Edwards, with vastly less political experience than Palin, got John Kerry’s nod for veep four years ago?

And Gov. Kathleen Sebelius of Kansas, for whom I lobbied to be Obama’s pick and who was on everyone’s short list for months, has a record indistinguishable from Palin’s.

Whatever knowledge deficit Palin has about the federal bureaucracy or international affairs (outside the normal purview of governors) will hopefully be remedied during the next eight years of the Obama presidencies.

The U.S. Senate as a career option? What a claustrophobic, nitpicking comedown for an energetic Alaskan — nothing but droning committees and incestuous back-scratching.

No, Sarah Palin should stick to her governorship and just hit the rubber-chicken circuit,.. Step by step, the mainstream media will come around, wipe its own mud out of its eyes, and see Palin for the populist phenomenon that she is. …

— By Camille Paglia
Camille Paglia’s column appears on the second Wednesday of each month. Every third column is devoted to reader letters. Please send questions for her next letters column to this mailbox. Your name and town will be published unless you request anonymity.

WASHINGTON, D.C. —  You better watch out. There is a new combatant in the Christmas wars.

Ads proclaiming, “Why believe in a god? Just be good for goodness’ sake,” will appear on Washington, D.C., buses starting next week and running through December. The American Humanist Association unveiled the provocative $40,000 holiday ad campaign Tuesday.

In lifting lyrics from “Santa Claus is Coming to Town,” the Washington-based group is wading into what has become a perennial debate over commercialism, religion in the public square and the meaning of Christmas.

“We are trying to reach our audience, and sometimes in order to reach an audience, everybody has to hear you,” said Fred Edwords, spokesman for the humanist group. “Our reason for doing it during the holidays is there are an awful lot of agnostics, atheists and other types of non-theists who feel a little alone during the holidays because of its association with traditional religion.”

To that end, the ads and posters will include a link to a Web site that will seek to connect and organize like-minded thinkers in the D.C. area, Edwords said.

Edwords said the purpose isn’t to argue that God doesn’t exist or change minds about a deity, although “we are trying to plant a seed of rational thought and critical thinking and questioning in people’s minds.”

The group defines humanism as “a progressive philosophy of life that, without theism, affirms our responsibility to lead ethical lives of value to self and humanity.”

Last month, the British Humanist Association caused a ruckus announcing a similar campaign on London buses with the message: “There’s probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.”

In Washington, the humanists’ campaign comes as conservative Christian groups gear up their efforts to keep Christ in Christmas. In the past five years, groups such as the American Family Association and the Catholic League have criticized or threatened boycotts of retailers who use generic “holiday” greetings.

In mid-October, the American Family Association started selling buttons that say “It’s OK to say Merry Christmas.” The humanists’ entry into the marketplace of ideas did not impress AFA president Tim Wildmon.

“It’s a stupid ad,” he said. “How do we define ‘good’ if we don’t believe in God? God in his word, the Bible, tells us what’s good and bad and right and wrong. If we are each ourselves defining what’s good, it’s going to be a crazy world.”

Also on Tuesday, the Orlando, Fla.-based Liberty Counsel, a conservative Christian legal group, launched its sixth annual “Friend or Foe Christmas Campaign.” Liberty Counsel has intervened in disputes over nativity scenes and government bans on Christmas decorations, among other things.

“It’s the ultimate grinch to say there is no God at a time when millions of people around the world celebrate the birth of Christ,” said Mathew Staver, the group’s chairman and dean of the Liberty University School of Law. “Certainly, they have the right to believe what they want but this is insulting.”

Best-selling books by authors such as Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens have fueled interest in “the new atheism” — a more in-your-face argument against God’s existence.

Yet few Americans describe themselves as atheist or agnostic; a Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life poll from earlier this year found 92 percent of Americans believe in God.

There was no debate at the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority over whether to take the ad. Spokeswoman Lisa Farbstein said the agency accepts ads that aren’t obscene or pornographic.

link to article 

Wednesday, November 12, 2008

WASHINGTON NEWS

Did Obama Spin Bush Meeting Details?

Yesterday’s news outlets emphasized the apparent good will between President Bush and President-elect Obama during their meeting. The White House described the discussions as “constructive, relaxed, and friendly.” Twenty-four hours later, however, things have changed.

AFP notes that yesterday’s New York Times “cited unnamed sources as saying the president may agree to new funding for troubled US automakers and a new economic stimulus package if Democrats pass a Colombia free trade pact which is stalled in Congress.” The CBS Evening News detected “signs of possible bad blood between the Bush and Obama camps.” Fox News’ Special Report reported, “What started out as a courtesy call has developed into a controversy. … White House aides were fuming over the Obama camp’s description of the private Oval Office meeting Monday.

Leaks to several reporters made for front page headlines characterizing…Obama as urging…Bush to help struggling automakers and…Bush replying that he might consider it if Democrats dropped their opposition to a Colombia free trade agreement the administration supports. Senior White House aides told Fox the leaks were ‘flat wrong’ and ‘disappointing,’ saying the private meeting should have remained private.”

Roll Call, in a story headlined “Obama Camp Looks To Avoid Bush Rift,” says “the White House today heatedly denied that the statement was made, and Bush administration officials are said to be unhappy that details of the conversation were leaked — seemingly by the Obama camp.” Yesterday’s Washington Post, in its print edition, “cited a senior Obama aide as the source, but by this afternoon the Web site version was quoting knowledgeable sources.”

CNN’s The Situation Room reported, “We are told by both sides, there was no explicit tit for tat. The Financial Times notes White House press secretary Dana Perino “acknowledged trade was discussed during the meeting…but denied that any ‘quid pro quo’ was offered.” ABC World News also said “Obama’s team spent some of the day in a dispute with the White House over details of yesterdays meeting.”

The Washington Times quotes John Podesta, “who is overseeing the Obama transition,” as saying that “while the topic of Colombia came up, there was no quid pro quo in the conversation. … The president did not try to link the issue of Colombia to an economic recovery package.” Podesta “called White House chief of staff Joshua Bolten on Tuesday to discuss a leak from within the Obama camp that gave details of a conversation between Mr. Obama and Mr. Bush.” The Detroit News also notes Podesta said the Columbia Free Trade Agreement “should be dealt with on its own merits.” The Financial Times and The Hill run similar reports.

Bush “Very Pleased” CNN’s The Situation Room yesterday aired CNN’s Heidi Collins’ “exclusive interview” with President Bush. Bush, describing his meeting with Obama, was shown saying, “To the extent he asked my advice, and he may want to ask it again, and the best way to make sure he feels comfortable asking it again is for me not to tell you in the first place what I advised him. We had a very private conversation. It was relaxed. It was interesting to watch a person who is getting ready to assume the office of the President. … He didn’t need my advice about supporting the military. He knows he must do that. We had a good conversation. I was very pleased.”

Obama Wants Detroit Reform Point Person According to The Politico, Obama “wants a high-profile point person to oversee reforms in the ailing auto industry, according to members of Obama’s transition team.” His transition team says Obama “suggested to…Bush…that aid to the auto industry could be coupled with the appointment of ’someone in charge of the auto issue who would have the authority’ to push for reforms. The details came from a more extended readout of the White House meeting provided Tuesday.” The Wall Street Journal, meanwhile, reports Obama has “ordered his transition team to look at ways to aid the car industry even before his inauguration.”

The Congressional bail-out and stimulus package is a band-aid on a gaping wound. There are natural laws that govern the economy, but too many self-anointed government illuminati believe they have the answers. They don’t even know the question! God help us.

LINK 

Obama Not Garnering Financial Confidence Internationally
Donald Lambro
Wednesday, November 12, 2008

WASHINGTON — The U.S. economy is shrinking, unemployment is at its highest level since 1994, manufacturing is at its lowest point in 26 years — and Barack Obama is pushing a stimulus bill to rebuild bridges and roads.

Whatever the long-term infrastructure needs of the nation may be, we are not going to pull this economy out of its hole with a bunch of government public-works projects. The question is, did Obama’s economic advisers tell him that?

If they did, that wasn’t what he told the American people last Saturday after meeting with his 20-member advisory team. Instead, he went before the TV cameras and called on Congress to move ahead on a so-called “stimulus” package hatched by House Democrats that has very little, if any, economic stimulus in it. A better name for it would be a “status quo” plan.

Here’s some of what this plan contains: a 13-week extension of unemployment benefits, more money for food stamps and billions in federal infrastructure projects and funding for state Medicaid costs to help poor-to-low-income people. There was also maybe $50 billion for cash-strapped automakers to encourage them to build more fuel-efficient vehicles.

Let’s say all of these things need to be done. They will not, in and of themselves, create a single job, expand production or boost U.S. exports in the global economy.

Infrastructure spending has failed just about everywhere it’s been tried. Ask the Japanese who poured billions into public works to pull itself out of its last long recession, without much success.

Ask Obama’s chief economic adviser, Jason Furman, who told Congress in January that infrastructure spending was a very inefficient and ineffective economic-stimulus tool. Why? Because by the time the money that is appropriated makes its way through the government’s bureaucracy, through state channels to contractors and toward implementation, the recession is usually over or ending.

And who will decide which infrastructure spending will get funded? You can bet the farm lawmakers will have a long laundry list of local pork-barrel projects of dubious value will get added under the guise of “stimulus.”

If any of Obama’s advisers told him the stimulus plan, along the lines of the one the House approved Sept. 26, wouldn’t produce any short-term stimulus, no one would say. But then, his advisers are the last people on Earth you would seek out for financial advice.

There is Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm standing to Obama’s right. She is not a doctor but practices the economic equivalent of bleeding the patient — like when she raised taxes on her state’s anemic economy (where unemployment is 8 percent) as it was sinking into recession.

Nearby was former House Democratic Whip David Bonior, a fierce foe of any trade agreement, especially NAFTA, who could become Obama’s secretary of Labor, handing the AFL-CIO just about everything it wants.

Still, in the pantheon of anti-trade desperadoes, Obama is second to none. He opposed trade agreements with South Korea and Colombia, voted “no” on the Dominican Republic-Central America Trade Agreement and sought to impose tariffs on goods from China if it didn’t readjust its currency exchange rate.

But others on Obama’s “team of economists can explain why these positions were wrong-headed. Economic nationalism is not in the national interest,” writes Harvard economist N. Gregory Mankiw, an adviser to Mitt Romney in the GOP primary campaign.

Indeed it isn’t. Economic recovery will require having all our oars in the water, pulling in the same direction at once. It won’t be fixed with a stimulus package that does not create any new jobs in the months to come, or that raising taxes on the engines of job growth: businesses, investors, venture capital and entrepreneurial risk-takers — and certainly not by slamming the brakes on opening new trading markets for America’s manufacturers.

But this is what Obama ran on doing and what he intends to do once he takes office. Back-peddling on NAFTA with our two best trading partners and killing additional trade agreements is not a recipe for growth.

The pivotal question in the president-elect’s economic strategy is simply this: how can you stimulate a $14 trillion economy that is plunging into a recession when you’ve taken so many proven fast-growth initiatives off the table? You can’t.

The White House has signaled that President Bush will not sign an infrastructure spending package with projects that are at best “very limited and very … long range,” taking years to complete, his spokesman says.

So this is where matters stand as financial markets here and abroad turn increasingly bearish about the future — a sign of declining confidence that Obama understands what is needed to put the nation on a long-term growth path.

Link to article 

Deja Vu All Over Again: Blogger Again Finds Error in NASA Climate Data

.

GISS’s October Data. The large reddish-brown area in Russia is actually September readings. Amateur team finds NASA error similar to one they discovered a year ago.

NASA’S Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) is one of the world’s primary sources for climate data. GISS issues regular updates on world temperatures based on their analysis of temperature readings from thousands of monitoring stations over the globe. GISS’ most recent data release originally reported last October as being extraordinarily warm– a full 0.78C above normal. This would have made it the warmest October on record; a huge increase over the previous month’s data.

Those results set off alarm bells with Steve McIntyre and his gang of Baker Street irregulars at Climateaudit.org. They noted that NASA’s data didn’t agree at all with the satellite temperature record, which showed October to be very mild, continuing the same trend of slight cooling that has persisted since 1998. So they dug a little deeper.

McKintyre, the same man who found errors last year in GISS’s US temperature record, quickly noted that most of the temperature increase was coming from Russia. A chart of world temperatures showed that in October, most of Russia, the largest nation on Earth, was not only registering hot, but literally off the scale. Yet anecdotal reports were suggesting that October was actually slightly colder than normal. Could there be another error in GISS’s data?

An alert reader on McKintyre’s blog revealed that there was a very large problem. Looking at the actual readings from individual stations in Russia showed a curious anomaly. The locations had all been assigned the exact temperatures from a month earlier– the much warmer month of September. Russia cools very rapidly in the fall months, so recycling the data from the earlier month had led to a massive temperature increase.

A few locations in Ireland were also found to be using September data.

Steve McKintyre informed GISS of the error by email. According to McKintyre, there was no response, but within “about an hour”, GISS pulled down the erroneous data, citing a “mishap” and pointing the finger of blame upstream to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Adminstration (NOAA).

NOAA’s Deputy Director of Communications, Scott Smullens, tells DailyTech that NOAA is responsible only for temperature readings in the US, not those in other nations.

The error not only affected October data, but due to the complex algorithm GISS uses to convert actual temperature readings into their output results, altered the previously published values for several other months as well. The values for August 2008, for instance, changed by 0.11C and the global anomaly as far back as 2005 increased by a hundredth of a degree.

GISS is run by Dr. James Hansen, a strident global warming advocate who has accused oil companies of “crimes against humanity”.  Hansen recently made headlines when he travelled to London to testify on behalf of a group of environmentalists who had damaged a coal plant in protest against global warming. Hansen also serves as science advisor to Al Gore.

Dr. Hansen could not be reached for comment.

from a Canadian Newspaper 

Obama fools us: Whole world will pay for America’s electoral mistake (A Canadian View)

A young student friend e-mailed me on Tuesday night.

“Have locked myself in my room because the place is full of little idiots — who cannot spell Barack Obama’s name and could not name one of his foreign or domestic policies — running around screaming obscenities about George Bush, conservatives and how Sarah Palin is a bitch. I love democracy!”

Even so, the people spoke. A victory for the hysterical Oprah Winfrey, the mad racist preacher Jeremiah Wright, the mainstream media who abandoned any sense of objectivity long ago, Europeans who despise America largely because they depend on her, comics who claim to be dangerous and fearless but would not dare attack genuinely powerful special interest groups. A victory for Obama-worshippers everywhere.

A victory for the cult of the cult. A man who has done little with his life but has written about his achievements as if he had found the cure for cancer in between winning a marathon and building a nuclear reactor with his teeth. Victory for style over substance, hyperbole over history, rabble-raising over reality.

A victory for Hollywood, the most dysfunctional community in the world. Victory for Streisand, Spielberg, Soros and Sarandon.

Victory for those who prefer welfare to will and interference to independence. For those who settle for group think and herd mentality rather than those who fight for individual initiative and the right to be out of step with meagre political fashion.

Victory for a man who is no friend of freedom. He and his people have already stated that media has to be controlled so as to be balanced, without realizing the extraordinary irony within that statement. Like most liberal zealots, the Obama worshippers constantly speak of Fox and Limbaugh, when the vast bulk of television stations and newspapers are drastically liberal and anti-conservative.

Senior Democrat Chuck Schumer said that just as pornography should be censored, so should talk radio. In other words, one of the few free and open means of popular expression may well be cornered and beaten by bullies who even in triumph cannot tolerate any criticism and opposition.

WEAK TOWARD ENEMIES

A victory for those who believe the state is better qualified to raise children than the family, for those who prefer teachers’ unions to teaching and for those who are naively convinced that if the West is sufficiently weak towards its enemies, war and terror will dissolve as quickly as the tears on the face of a leftist celebrity.

A victory for social democracy even after most of Europe has come to the painful conclusion that social democracy leads to mediocrity, failure, unemployment, inflation, higher taxes and economic stagnation. A victory for intrusive lawyers, banal sentimentalists, social extremists and urban snobs.

Also a defeat for one of the weakest presidential candidates in living memory.

Why would anyone vote for a man who seemed incapable of outlining his policies and instead repeatedly emphasized a noble but, if we are candid, largely irrelevant war record?

He was joined by a woman who was defended so vehemently by her supporters when it was cuttingly evident that she is years away from being and perhaps never will be a serious candidate for senior national office.

Most of all it was a terrible defeat for democracy and the United States. A politician of nothing defeated a nothing politician and a credulous electorate screamed in adoration. I fear we will all suffer very much indeed.

Return to the Article

September 19, 2008

Mistress of Disaster: Jamie Gorelick

By C. Edmund Wright

Ken Lay and Jack Abramoff must be green with envy over the all the mischief that has been accomplished by Jamie Gorelick, with scarcely any demonization in the press.

Imagine playing a central role in the biggest national defense disaster in 50 years. Imagine playing a central role in one of the biggest economic disasters in your country’s history. Imagine doing both as an un-elected official.

Imagine getting filthy rich in the process, and even being allowed to sit self-righteously on a commission appointed to get to the bottom of the first disaster, which of course did not get to the bottom of that disaster or anything else for that matter. 

Imagine ending, ruining or at least causing signficant quality deterioration in the lives of millions of people, most of whom will never know your name. Imagine counting your millions of dollars while people who tried to stop you from causing all this mayhem were getting blamed for most of the ills you actually contributed to. 

Well, as un-imagineable as this is, there is one American who doesn’t have to imagine it. One Jamie Gorelick is this American. And without pretending that she caused the loss of countless thousands of lives and countless billions of dollars of wealth by herself, she certainly did push some of the early domino’s in catastrophic chain events that are a major factors in life in America today.

This is not a bad millineums’s work, when you think about it. Gorelick, an appointee of Bill Clinton, is the one who constructed the wall of separation that kept the CIA and the FBI from comparing notes and therefore invading the privacy of nice young men like, say, Muhammed Atta and Zacarius Moussaoui. While countless problems were uncovered in our intelligence operations in the wake of 9-11, no single factor comes close to in importance to Jamie Gorelick’s wall. 

In fact, it was Gorelick’s wall, perhaps more than any other single factor, that induces some people to blame Clinton himself for 9-11 since he appointed her and she acted  consistent with his philosophy of “crime fighting.” She put the wall into place as Deputy Attorney General in 1995.

And for good measure, she was appointed by Tom Daschle to serve on the “non partisan” 9-11 Commission. And we thought the fox in the henhouse was simply a metaphor. Of course, in a splendid example of “reaching across the aisle,” feckless Republican Slade Gorton of Washington did all he could to exonerate Gorelick in the commission. Thanks, Slade. God forbid the nation actually knows the truth. 

But for Ms. Gorelick, one earth shaking catastrophe is just not enough. You might think that she caused enough carnage to us infidels on 9-11 as to qualify her for the 72 virgins upon her death. (this would also keep her consistent with several of Clinton’s philosophies). 

Alas, that’s only part of her resume. Her fingerprints are all over the Fannie Mae-Freddie Mac mess, which is to say the mess that is central in the entire mortgage-housing crisis. Without so much as one scintilla of real estate or finance experience, she was appointed as Vice Chairman of Fannie Mae in 1997 and served in that role through 2003, which is when most of the systemic cancers that came home to roost today happened. She was instrumental in covering up problems with Fannie Mae while employed there and took multiple millions in bonuses as she helped construct this house of cards.
From Wikipedia:

One example of falsified financial transactions that helped the company meet earnings targets for 1998, a “manipulation” that triggered multimillion-dollar bonuses for top executives.  On March 25, 2002, Business Week  Gorelick is quoted as saying, “We believe we are managed safely. Fannie Mae is among the handful of top-quality institutions.” One year later, Government Regulators “accused Fannie Mae of improper accounting to the tune of $9 billion in unrecorded losses”

As we know, the financial damage done by the housing related problems in this country are still incalculable. Ms. Gorelick’s evil tab is still growing. 

But it doesn’t stop there. She managed to be on the wrong side of the Duke LaCrosse case, working for Duke University to protect that school from it’s damaging knee jerk reactions to the spectacularly unbelievable charges filed by a stripper. (excuse me, exotic dancer). So, even on a smaller scale, she continues to make money while working to ruin the lives of innocent Americans in defense of liberal dogma. At the Department of Defense, when she served as legal counsel there in 1993, she drafted the “Don’t ask /don’t tell” policy. 

From what can be gleaned, it all comes from being well connected. She was educated (is that what they call it?) at Harvard undergrad and Harvard Law. From there, she kept getting appointed to positions above her experience level where she could flex her liberal muscles, add a resume item, and move upward.

Sound familiar? 

SAY NO TO BAILOUTS!!! 

this is nuts – can I have a billion? 

Let’s see if I have this right. I, and millions of my fellow citizens, in addition to our other burdens, will now be asked to bail out the American automobile industry, which has fallen on hard times. No less a pair of automotive authorities than Nancy Hot Rod Pelosi and Harry “High Octane” Reid have said so.

Now wait. Did I miss something? I don’t see where Honda, Toyota or Nissan are begging for salvation. Mercedes seems to be in business. BMW is still moving cars. Even Rolls continues to transport the Saudi royals. This seems to involve the American companies only – GM, Ford, and what’s left of Chrysler.

read more at this Link 

It is the story of our lifetimes: a financial crisis is underway and getting worse. As the recession deepens, our jobs and savings are threatened, and our children and grandchildren will probably live in a country with lower living standards and fewer opportunities than what we have enjoyed. America may be reduced to the status of a second- or third-rate economic power, dependent on international agencies like the International Monetary Fund and Arab governments for investment dollars and foreign aid handouts.

However, the looting of the taxpayers, which was initially $700 billion for Wall Street and has now ballooned to an estimated $1.8 trillion and is not over yet, was not labeled as corruption by our media. Instead, it was called a “rescue” and was demanded by many anchors and reporters. We were told it would stabilize the markets and help ordinary people. It didn’t.

Kevin Howley, Associate Professor of Communication at DePauw University, says this was deliberate propaganda on their part. He comments that “…the phrase ‘bailout’―with its connotation that the government is letting Wall Street off the hook for questionable business practices―has given way to a far more agreeable term― ‘rescue plan.’ This phrasing appeals to the basic decency of the American people and suggests that we’re all in this thing together.”

read more at this link

In a “sea of greene” (yeah, the Students and some other Iowa fans all had green T-shirts on today) IOWA stuns Penn State with a last second field goal to win 24-23 today at Kinnick.

Iowa now @ 6-4, have lost 4 games by a total of 12 points.  Cold, wet and windy day in Iowa City, this win was so needed by a good team with great character – this win feels so good.

If I’m not mistaken, Murray’s last field goal attempt lost the PITT game 3,4 games ago.

What a struggle.  The Hawks gave up 10 points on turnovers (a fumble by Stanzi that looked more like a bad delivery by the center) and an interception.  Penn State had too many field goals that should have been touchdowns – a great bend but don’t break – defense by the Hawks.

The game was televised to 70% of the country – a great game to watch; Shonn Greene still got a 100 yard game (117 in 28 carries)  against one of the nation’s best defenses. I think that’s 100 yards or more for Shonn in each game this season.  Was 3rd in the nation last week.

Looking at some of the final stats, Iowa’s 7-10 3rd down efficiency is remarkable, and there was less than 600 yards of offense total, mostly because of the weather.

This makes Iowa Bowl Eligible with 2 games left.  Hmmm…  This could be interesting.  We play Purdue at home next week (Kinnick should be rockin!) then the last home game at Kinnick North against the Gophers…  [called Kinnick North because typically there are more Iowa fans than Minnesota fans at that game]

Shonn Greene is having a great come back season.  He arrived at Iowa – a MAN – Huge – as a freshman in 2005, but we had a large stable of running backs including Albert Young and Damian Simms.  Not getting much playing time in 2005-2006, he got into academic trouble and ended up at a community college in 2007.  Go Shonn.

He’s a Junior, but watch for him to move to the NFL next year.

Coached thanked the crowd in his post game.  It was a game of halves.  The first half Penn State dominated but could not get into the end zone more than once.  Half time was 13-7. Bottom line – Iowa scored the last 10 points and shut Penn State out in the fourth quarter – job well done.

Just the kind of game I needed after a very tough political week.

THANK YOU HAWKEYES!

oh my god, they’ll confiscate my 401k over my dead body.

particularly offensive statement below:

“humans often lack the foresight, discipline, and investing skills required to sustain a savings plan.”

this is sick. – I’m writing Grassley right now. -pf

Democratic leaders in the U.S. House discuss confiscating 401(k)s, IRAs

Karen McMahan
November 04, 2008

RALEIGH — Democrats in the U.S. House have been conducting hearings on proposals to confiscate workers’ personal retirement accounts — including 401(k)s and IRAs — and convert them to accounts managed by the Social Security Administration.

Triggered by the financial crisis the past two months, the hearings reportedly were meant to stem losses incurred by many workers and retirees whose 401(k) and IRA balances have been shrinking rapidly.

The testimony of Teresa Ghilarducci, professor of economic policy analysis at the New School for Social Research in New York, in hearings Oct. 7 drew the most attention and criticism. Testifying for the House Committee on Education and Labor, Ghilarducci proposed that the government eliminate tax breaks for 401(k) and similar retirement accounts, such as IRAs, and confiscate workers’ retirement plan accounts and convert them to universal Guaranteed Retirement Accounts (GRAs) managed by the Social Security Administration.

Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., chairman of the House Committee on Education and Labor, in prepared remarks for the hearing on “The Impact of the Financial Crisis on Workers’ Retirement Security,” blamed Wall Street for the financial crisis and said his committee will “strengthen and protect Americans’ 401(k)s, pensions, and other retirement plans” and the “Democratic Congress will continue to conduct this much-needed oversight on behalf of the American people.”

Currently, 401(k) plans allow Americans to invest pretax money and their employers match up to a defined percentage, which not only increases workers’ retirement savings but also reduces their annual income tax. The balances are fully inheritable, subject to income tax, meaning workers pass on their wealth to their heirs, unlike Social Security. Even when they leave an employer and go to one that doesn’t offer a 401(k) or pension, workers can transfer their balances to a qualified IRA.

Mandating Equality

Ghilarducci’s plan first appeared in a paper for the Economic Policy Institute: Agenda for Shared Prosperity on Nov. 20, 2007, in which she said GRAs will rescue the flawed American retirement income system (www.sharedprosperity.org/bp204/bp204.pdf).

The current retirement system, Ghilarducci said, “exacerbates income and wealth inequalities” because tax breaks for voluntary retirement accounts are “skewed to the wealthy because it is easier for them to save, and because they receive bigger tax breaks when they do.”

Lauding GRAs as a way to effectively increase retirement savings, Ghilarducci wrote that savings incentives are unequal for rich and poor families because tax deferrals “provide a much larger ‘carrot’ to wealthy families than to middle-class families — and none whatsoever for families too poor to owe taxes.”

GRAs would guarantee a fixed 3 percent annual rate of return, although later in her article Ghilarducci explained that participants would not “earn a 3% real return in perpetuity.” In place of tax breaks workers now receive for contributions and thus a lower tax rate, workers would receive $600 annually from the government, inflation-adjusted. For low-income workers whose annual contributions are less than $600, the government would deposit whatever amount it would take to equal the minimum $600 for all participants.

In a radio interview with Kirby Wilbur in Seattle on Oct. 27, 2008, Ghilarducci explained that her proposal doesn’t eliminate the tax breaks, rather, “I’m just rearranging the tax breaks that are available now for 401(k)s and spreading — spreading the wealth.”

All workers would have 5 percent of their annual pay deducted from their paychecks and deposited to the GRA. They would still be paying Social Security and Medicare taxes, as would the employers. The GRA contribution would be shared equally by the worker and the employee. Employers no longer would be able to write off their contributions. Any capital gains would be taxable year-on-year.

Analysts point to another disturbing part of the plan. With a GRA, workers could bequeath only half of their account balances to their heirs, unlike full balances from existing 401(k) and IRA accounts. For workers who die after retiring, they could bequeath just their own contributions plus the interest but minus any benefits received and minus the employer contributions.

Another justification for Ghilarducci’s plan is to eliminate investment risk. In her testimony, Ghilarducci said, “humans often lack the foresight, discipline, and investing skills required to sustain a savings plan.” She cited the 2004 HSBC global survey on the Future of Retirement, in which she claimed that “a third of Americans wanted the government to force them to save more for retirement.”

What the survey actually reported was that 33 percent of Americans wanted the government to “enforce additional private savings,” a vastly different meaning than mandatory government-run savings. Of the four potential sources of retirement support, which were government, employer, family, and self, the majority of Americans said “self” was the most important contributor, followed by “government.” When broken out by family income, low-income U.S. households said the “government” was the most important retirement support, whereas high-income families ranked “government” last and “self” first (www.hsbc.com/retirement).

On Oct. 22, The Wall Street Journal reported that the Argentinean government had seized all private pension and retirement accounts to fund government programs and to address a ballooning deficit. Fearing an economic collapse, foreign investors quickly pulled out, forcing the Argentinean stock market to shut down several times. More than 10 years ago, nationalization of private savings sent Argentina’s economy into a long-term downward spiral.

Income and Wealth Redistribution

The majority of witness testimony during recent hearings before the House Committee on Education and Labor showed that congressional Democrats intend to address income and wealth inequality through redistribution.

On July 31, 2008, Robert Greenstein, executive director of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, testified before the subcommittee on workforce protections that “from the standpoint of equal treatment of people with different incomes, there is a fundamental flaw” in tax code incentives because they are “provided in the form of deductions, exemptions, and exclusions rather than in the form of refundable tax credits.”

Even people who don’t pay taxes should get money from the government, paid for by higher-income Americans, he said. “There is no obvious reason why lower-income taxpayers or people who do not file income taxes should get smaller incentives (or no tax incentives at all),” Greenstein said.

“Moving to refundable tax credits for promoting socially worthwhile activities would be an important step toward enhancing progressivity in the tax code in a way that would improve economic efficiency and performance at the same time,” Greenstein said, and “reducing barriers to labor organizing, preserving the real value of the minimum wage, and the other workforce security concerns . . . would contribute to an economy with less glaring and sharply widening inequality.”

When asked whether committee members seriously were considering Ghilarducci’s proposal for GSAs, Aaron Albright, press secretary for the Committee on Education and Labor, said Miller and other members were listening to all ideas.

Miller’s biggest priority has been on legislation aimed at greater transparency in 401(k)s and other retirement plan administration, specifically regarding fees, Albright said, and he sent a link to a Fox News interview of Miller on Oct. 24, 2008, to show that the congressman had not made a decision.

After repeated questions asked by Neil Cavuto of Fox News, Miller said he would not be in favor of “killing the 401(k)” or of “killing the tax advantages for 401(k)s.”

Arguing against liberal prescriptions, William Beach, director of the Center for Data Analysis at the Heritage Foundation, testified on Oct. 24 that the “roots of the current crisis are firmly planted in public policy mistakes” by the Federal Reserve and Congress. He cautioned Congress against raising taxes, increasing burdensome regulations, or withdrawing from international product or capital markets. “Congress can ill afford to repeat the awesome errors of its predecessor in the early days of the Great Depression,” Beach said.

Instead, Beach said, Congress could best address the financial crisis by making the tax reductions of 2001 and 2003 permanent, stopping dependence on demand-side stimulus, lowering the corporate profits tax, and reducing or eliminating taxes on capital gains and dividends.

Testifying before the same committee in early October, Jerry Bramlett, president and CEO of BenefitStreet, Inc., an independent 401(k) plan administrator, said one of the best ways to ensure retirement security would be to have the U.S. Department of Labor develop educational materials for workers so they could make better investment decisions, not exchange equity investments in retirement accounts for Treasury bills, as proposed in the GSAs.

Should Sen. Barack Obama win the presidency, congressional Democrats might have stronger support for their “spreading the wealth” agenda. On Oct. 27, the American Thinker posted a video of an interview with Obama on public radio station WBEZ-FM from 2001.

In the interview, Obama said, “The Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth, and of more basic issues such as political and economic justice in society.” The Constitution says only what “the states can’t do to you. Says what the Federal government can’t do to you,” and Obama added that the Warren Court wasn’t that radical.

Although in 2001 Obama said he was not “optimistic about bringing major redistributive change through the courts,” as president, he would likely have the opportunity to appoint one or more Supreme Court justices.

“The real tragedy of the civil rights movement was, um, because the civil rights movement became so court focused that I think there was a tendency to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalition of powers through which you bring about redistributive change,” Obama said.

Link

According to recent Gallup polls, the president’s average approval rating is below 30% — down from his 90% approval in the wake of 9/11. Mr. Bush has endured relentless attacks from the left while facing abandonment from the right.

This is the price Mr. Bush is paying for trying to work with both Democrats and Republicans. During his 2004 victory speech, the president reached out to voters who supported his opponent, John Kerry, and said, “Today, I want to speak to every person who voted for my opponent. To make this nation stronger and better, I will need your support, and I will work to earn it. I will do all I can do to deserve your trust.”

Those bipartisan efforts have been met with crushing resistance from both political parties.

The president’s original Supreme Court choice of Harriet Miers alarmed Republicans, while his final nomination of Samuel Alito angered Democrats. His solutions to reform the immigration system alienated traditional conservatives, while his refusal to retreat in Iraq has enraged liberals who have unrealistic expectations about the challenges we face there.

It seems that no matter what Mr. Bush does, he is blamed for everything. He remains despised by the left while continuously disappointing the right.

Yet it should seem obvious that many of our country’s current problems either existed long before Mr. Bush ever came to office, or are beyond his control. Perhaps if Americans stopped being so divisive, and congressional leaders came together to work with the president on some of these problems, he would actually have had a fighting chance of solving them.

Like the president said in his 2004 victory speech, “We have one country, one Constitution and one future that binds us. And when we come together and work together, there is no limit to the greatness of America.”

To be sure, Mr. Bush is not completely alone. His low approval ratings put him in the good company of former Democratic President Harry S. Truman, whose own approval rating sank to 22% shortly before he left office. Despite Mr. Truman’s low numbers, a 2005 Wall Street Journal poll found that he was ranked the seventh most popular president in history.

Just as Americans have gained perspective on how challenging Truman’s presidency was in the wake of World War II, our country will recognize the hardship President Bush faced these past eight years — and how extraordinary it was that he accomplished what he did in the wake of the September 11 attacks.

The treatment President Bush has received from this country is nothing less than a disgrace. The attacks launched against him have been cruel and slanderous, proving to the world what little character and resolve we have. The president is not to blame for all these problems. He never lost faith in America or her people, and has tried his hardest to continue leading our nation during a very difficult time.

Our failure to stand by the one person who continued to stand by us has not gone unnoticed by our enemies. It has shown to the world how disloyal we can be when our president needed loyalty — a shameful display of arrogance and weakness that will haunt this nation long after Mr. Bush has left the White House.

Mr. Shapiro is an investigative reporter and lawyer who previously interned with John F. Kerry’s legal team during the presidential election in 2004

Here we go – waiting to decide how things end up today.

first news on a private deal against Israel, then the Black Pathers disrupting polling in Philadelphia, and NY Senator Schumer already talking about ending the reign of conservative talk radio.

Obama camp denies Jerusalem promised to Abbas

full article here

Dennis Ross vehemently denies report by Lebanese newspaper saying Democratic presidential hopeful told Abbas, Fayyad he would support their right to stable sovereign state  

Sources in Ramallah told the al-Akhbar daily that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Salam Fayyad are expecting Obama to win, “despite his leaning towards which they said was aimed at gaining the support of the Israel and the Jewish lobby in the United States.”

According to the report, the Democratic senator told Abbas and Fayyad that he “supports the rights of the Palestinians to east Jerusalem, as well as their right to a stable, sovereign state”, but asked them to keep the remarks a secret.

————–

Fraud in Philly

Link to entire story

GOP Election Board members have been tossed out of polling stations in at least half a dozen polling stations in Philadelphia because of their party status.

A Pennsylvania judge previously ruled that court-appointed poll watchers could be NOT removed from their boards by an on-site election judge, but that is exactly what is happening, according to sources on the ground.

It is the duty of election board workers to monitor and guard the integrity of the voting process.

Denying access to the minority (in this case Republican) poll watchers and inspectors is a violation of Pennsylvania state law. Those who violate the law can be punished with a misdemeanor and subjected to a fine of $1,000 and sent to prison between one month and two years.
————-

Fraud in Philly #2 

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aCeD1RcJjAg

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Fairness doctrine reinstated?

oh, the plans, the plans.

“Schumer’s comments echo other Democrats’ views on reviving the Fairness Doctrine, which would require radio stations to balance conservative hosts with liberal ones. ”

[Conservative talk radio is a revenue winner for radio stations, and liberal talk radio is not.  Stations required to carry a liberal message will cut down on Conservative talk radio - which gives the MSM the only clear voice to the public.  I don't like a lot of conservative talk radio - but guy's - let's let the market place sort this out.  -pf]

link to article

————–

Link

ATLANTA — Georgia’s Secretary of State has launched a full investigation and may seek criminal charges against three Georgia men who appear to have early-voted twice.

…..  For the larger list of 112,000 voters, WSB-TV Channel 2 was only able to verify their first, middle and last name and dates of birth; some of them could turn out to be different people with the exact same information.

The Secretaries of State can match them by social security number and if they wait until after the election, they will have a complete list of how many of them voted and how many times.

Is Obama Swiping the Tax Cut Issue?
Voters seem to think he’s the Ronald Reagan tax-cutter of the 2008 election.

By Larry Kudlow

Wouldn’t it be the height of irony if Barack Obama wins this election as the Ronald Reagan tax-cutter? His tax plans are severely flawed and his campaign narrative to support them is all wrong. And yet a recent Rasmussen poll shows that 31 percent of voters believe Obama is the real tax cutter, while only 11 percent choose McCain.

Believe it or not, Obama seems to have swiped the tax-cut issue from the Republican party. How can this be?

Well, for almost two years Obama has talked about cutting taxes for 95 percent of the people. McCain has no such record. And even though McCain has launched a strong Joe the Plumber investor-class tax-cutting surge in the last days of the campaign, it may not be enough to significantly impact Tuesday’s voting results.

This is bad news since Obama has some pretty strange views on taxes. Just look at his recent explanation for the decline in third-quarter GDP. He calls it “a direct result of the Bush administration’s trickle-down, Wall Street first, Main Street last policies that John McCain has embraced for the last eight years and plans to continue for the next four.”

Is Obama really blaming the Bush tax cuts for this recession?

After the bursting of the tech bubble and the 9/11 attacks, George Bush lowered tax rates across-the-board for individuals and investors. For five years the stock market rallied without interruption — the longest bull market without a correction in post-WWII history — while the economy expanded for six years, a bit longer than the average post-war recovery cycle.

And Obama wants folks to believe that tax cuts caused this downturn? Not the credit shock? Not the Obama-supported government mandate to sell unaffordable homes to low-income people and the pressure on Fannie and Freddie to securitize these loans? Not the oil shock?

No self-respecting Keynesian would buy into this. Yet Obama was at it again in Monday’s Wall Street Journal, saying, “It’s not change to come up with a tax plan that doesn’t give a penny of relief to more than 100 million middle-class Americans.”

Regrettably, not even John McCain has contradicted this. But the facts speak otherwise.

For example, the nonpartisan Tax Foundation says the Bush tax cuts — which McCain would maintain — provided substantially more relief than middle-class Clinton-era tax rates: A single earner making $30,000 will pay $2,756 under 2008 Bush tax law compared with $3,157.50 under Clinton tax law (in 1999). That’s a larger Bush tax cut by 8.7 percent. A married couple earning $50,000 will pay $4,012 under Bush compared with $5,085 under Clinton. That’s a bigger Bush tax cut by 21 percent.

So the facts of a middle-class tax cut are far different from what Obama claims. Obama also says his tax rates will be below those of Ronald Reagan. Wrong. Obama will raise the top rate to 39.6 percent, whereas Reagan left taxpayers with only two brackets of 15 and 28 percent.

Incidentally, the income cap for Social Security and Medicare taxes was about $42,000 when Reagan left office, compared with $104,000 today and the threat that Obama will raise that cap significantly.

It’s also worth noting that the Reagan tax-reform bill of 1986 mistakenly allowed the capital-gains tax rate to move up to 28 percent from 20 percent. Many believe this was a significant factor in the stock market crash of 1987.

Similarly, Obama intends to raise the cap-gains tax rate from 15 to at least 20 percent. It’s a risky move. Of course, Obama says only rich people will pay the higher cap-gains rate. But the reality is that a cap-gains tax hike will raise the after-tax cost of all capital, which will depress the future value of all equity assets.

McCain has recently proposed a reduction in the capital-gains tax rate from 15 to 7.5 percent. With 100 million-plus investors out there, and nearly two of every three votes in national elections being made by shareholders, this is right on target. Last Friday, McCain told me in an interview that a “low capital-gains tax is probably the greatest incentive for investment that we have in America today.”

In the frenetic final hours of the campaign McCain is also talking up his corporate tax cut, which would be a tremendous boost to plunging stock prices since corporate profits are the mother’s milk of stocks. Indeed, McCain’s overall tax-cut plan is far more powerful than Obama’s when it comes to creating jobs and stimulating economic growth. But his marketing effort appears to be too little, too late.

These things do, however, have a way of balancing out: If Obama and the Democrats go on a tax-hiking spree to penalize successful earners and investors, they will pay for it dearly in 2010 and beyond.    [ I pray it's that simple.  -pf ]
— Larry Kudlow, NRO’s Economics Editor, is host of CNBC’s Kudlow & Company and author of the daily web blog, Kudlow’s Money Politic$.

The PUMA and the Elephant – we can DO this.

http://www.puma08.com

http://democrats-against-obama.org/

VOTE McCain/Palin -
and if  you’re in CD2 Iowa
vote Miller-Meeks for Congress!

Link to original article

Obama vs. Clinton Running against prosperity.

By John Berlau

Ever since the economy emerged as the top campaign issue, Barack Obama has developed two basic messages. One is that the deregulation John McCain voted for is to blame. The second is that former rivals Bill and Hillary Clinton deserve credit for the prosperity and economic growth in the 1990s.

In the presidential debates, Obama charged that McCain “believes in deregulation in every circumstance,” and claimed “that’s what we’ve been going through for the last eight years.” As a contrast to the Bush II years, Obama said in a speech, his administration would go back to the “shared prosperity . . . when Bill Clinton was president.”

But these two messages are inherently contradictory: Bill Clinton signed nearly all the deregulatory measures John McCain backed. Clinton administration officials have even credited these policies for contributing to the ’90s economic boom — the very “shared prosperity” to which Obama says he wants to return.

Late in Clinton’s tenure, the Clinton White House put forth a document celebrating “Historic Economic Growth” during the administration and pointing to the policy accomplishments it deemed responsible for this growth. Among the achievements on Clinton’s list was none other than “Modernizing for the New Economy through Technology and Consensus Deregulation.”

“In 1993,” the document explained, “the laws that governed America’s financial service sector were antiquated and anti-competitive. The Clinton-Gore Administration fought to modernize those laws to increase competition in traditional banking, insurance, and securities industries to give consumers and small businesses more choices and lower costs.”

The document neglected to credit the GOP-controlled Congress for passing these policies, but the Clinton administration indeed deserves praise for signing and advocating this deregulation. These bipartisan financial policies are the very ones Obama, Joe Biden, and other Democrats attack. “Let’s, first of all, understand that the biggest problem in this whole process was the deregulation of the financial system,” Obama proclaimed in the second presidential debate.

In the financial area, Clinton was actually more deregulatory then Bush II has been. As James Gattuso of the Heritage Foundation points out, while there may have been flawed oversight, there really was no financial deregulation under Bush. Indeed, Bush’s signature achievement in the financial area was the costly and counterproductive Sarbanes-Oxley Act. My CEI colleague Wayne Crews notes in his study “10,000 Commandments” that the Bush administration has set records for the ten of thousands of pages it put in the Federal Register.

To be sure, Obama usually isn’t too specific on what exactly he would re-regulate. But to the extent he is specific, he’s running against not only McCain, and not only Clinton, but also people like Robert Rubin, Larry Summers, and virtually all the Clinton administration economic officials now surrounding, um, Barack Obama.

Take Gramm-Leach-Bliley, the 1999 law Clinton signed repealing the Depression-era Glass-Steagall Act that strictly separated traditional commercial banking from investment banking. Obama supporters claim that getting rid of Glass-Steagall led to the credit blowup. They seize on the first name on the law, that of former senator Phil Gramm, to bash it as a piece of Republican deregulation. Never mind that the Senate passed the legislation 90-8, with many Democrats voting for the final bill, including Joe Biden.

Obama specifically bashed this bipartisan achievement in a March speech on the economy in New York. There he said, “By the time the Glass-Steagall Act was repealed in 1999, the $300 million lobbying effort that drove deregulation was more about facilitating mergers than creating an efficient regulatory framework.” But then-Clinton Treasury secretary and now-Obama adviser Summers had a different view. Summers told the Wall Street Journal in 1999 that the law would spur economic growth “by promoting financial innovation, lower capital costs, and greater international competitiveness.”

What’s more, Clinton himself defends the law to this day. In a recent Business Week interview with CNBC personality Maria Bartiromo, Clinton said plainly, “I don’t see that signing that bill had anything to do with the current crisis.” He even added that its lifting of barriers to financial-service mergers may have lessened the crisis’s impact, pointing out, “Indeed, one of the things that has helped stabilize the current situation as much as it has is the purchase of Merrill Lynch by Bank of America, which was much smoother than it would have been if I hadn’t signed that bill.”

Summers and Clinton were, and are, correct. The law benefited the economy through more choice and competition, and there is little evidence of Glass-Steagall’s repeal playing a role in the mortgage crisis. As the American Enterprise Institute’s Peter Wallison noted in a Wall Street Journal op-ed, “None of the investment banks that have gotten into trouble — Bear, Lehman, Merrill, Goldman or Morgan Stanley — were affiliated with commercial banks.” He also pointed out that “the banks that have succumbed to financial problems — Wachovia, Washington Mutual and IndyMac, among others — got into trouble by investing in bad mortgages or mortgage-backed securities, not because of the securities activities of an affiliated securities firm.”

Even stranger than the Obama camp’s attack on Gramm-Leach-Bliley is their slap at a bill that cleared barriers to interstate banking. This law, the Riegle-Neal Interstate Banking and Branching Efficiency Act, was passed in 1994, before Republicans even took Congress. And the Clinton White House’s “historic economic growth” document boasts that “in 1994, the Clinton-Gore Administration broke another decades-old logjam by allowing banks to branch across state lines.”

Riegle-Neal finally allowed the U.S. to have nationwide banking chains, as virtually every other developed country does. And anyone who remembers the inconvenience of not being able to access your own bank’s ATM can attest to the benefits this law brought. Federal Reserve governor Randall Kroszner has credited the law for a myriad of economic benefits including “higher economic and employment growth, spurred by more-efficient and more-diverse banks” and “more entrepreneurial activity, as the more bank-dependent sectors of the economy, such as small businesses and entrepreneurs, achieve greater access to credit.”

Yet when McCain advocated letting individuals purchase insurance across state lines and wrote in a journal article that “opening up the health insurance market to more vigorous nationwide competition, as we have done over the last decade in banking, would provide more choices of innovative products,” the Obama campaign hit the roof. “McCain just published an article praising Wall Street deregulation,” Obama’s attack ad exclaimed. “Said he’d reduce oversight of the health insurance industry, too.”

FactCheck.org lambastes this ad for quoting McCain “out of context on health care.” But the greater worry is that the attacks on bipartisan deregulation that led to prosperity appear to be quite in context for Obama. Deregulation has never meant non-regulation, and indeed, updating laws for some of the new challenges we face will be an urgent task of any new administration. A good updating would also take into account existing regulations that encourage perverse incentives, such as Clinton’s expansion of the Community Reinvestment Act.

But when attacked today for supporting general financial deregulation, candidates can respond that they are simply being faithful to GOP-Clinton legacy of prosperity.

— John Berlau is director of the Center for Entrepreneurship at the Competitive Enterprise Institute.

an exchange from the movie The American President

Lewis Rothschild: …. People want leadership, Mr. President, and in the absence of genuine leadership, they’ll listen to anyone who steps up to the microphone. They’re so thirsty for it they’ll crawl through the desert toward a mirage, and when they discover there’s no water, they’ll drink the sand.

President Andrew Shepherd: Lewis, … People don’t drink the sand because they’re thirsty. They drink the sand because they don’t know the difference.

-LG found this article below – I’m just pasting it -
you decide its impact on you. -pf

When the stock market collapsed on Wall Street on Tuesday,  October 29, 1929, it sent financial markets worldwide into a tailspin with disastrous effects.

The German economy was especially vulnerable since it was built out of foreign capital, mostly loans from America and was very dependent on foreign trade. When those loans suddenly came due and when the world market for German exports dried up, the well oiled German industrial machine quickly ground to a halt.

As production levels fell, German workers were laid off. Along with this, banks failed throughout Germany.  Savings accounts, the result of years of hard work, were instantly wiped  out. Inflation soon followed making it hard for families to purchase expensive necessities with devalued money.

Overnight, the middle class standard of living so many German families enjoyed was ruined by events outside of Germany, beyond their control. The Great Depression began and they were cast into poverty, deep misery and began looking for a solution, any solution.

Adolf Hitler knew his opportunity had arrived. 

In the good times before the Great Depression the Nazi party experienced slow growth, barely reaching 100,000 members in a country of over sixty million. But the Nazi party, despite its tiny size, was a tightly  controlled, highly disciplined organization of fanatics poised to spring  into action.

Since the failed Beer Hall Putsch in 1923, Hitler had changed tactics and was for the most part playing by the rules of democracy.  Hitler had gambled in 1923, attempting to overthrow the young German  democracy by force, and lost. Now he was determined to overthrow it legally by getting elected while at the same time building a Nazi shadow government  that would one day replace the democracy.

Hitler began his career in politics as a street brawling revolutionary appealing to disgruntled World War One veterans redisposed to violence. By 1930 he was quite different, or so it seemed. Hitler counted among his supporters a number of German  industrialists, and upper middle class socialites, a far cry from the semi-literate toughs he started out with.

He intentionally broadened his appeal because it was necessary. Now he needed to broaden his appeal to the great mass of voting Germans. His chief assets were his speech making ability and a keen sense of what the people wanted to hear.

By mid-1930, amid the economic pressures of the Great Depression, the German democratic  government was beginning to unravel.

Gustav Stresemann, the outstanding  German Foreign Minister, had died in October 1929, just before the Wall  Street crash. He had spent years working to restore the German economy and stabilize the republic and died, having exhausted himself in the process. 

The crisis of the Great Depression brought disunity to the political  parties in the Reichstag. Instead of forging an alliance to enact desperately need legislation, they broke up into squabbling, uncompromising groups. In March of 1930, Heinrich Bruening, a member of the Catholic Center  Party, became Chancellor.

Despite the overwhelming need for a financial  program to help the German people, Chancellor Bruening encountered stubborn opposition to his plans. To break the bitter stalemate, he went to President Hindenburg and asked the old gentleman to invoke Article 48 of the German constitution which gave emergency powers to the president to rule by decree.  This provoked a huge outcry from the opposition, demanding withdrawal of the decree.

As a measure of last resort, Bruening asked Hindenburg in July 1930 to dissolve the Reichstag according to parliamentary rules and call for new elections.

The elections were set for September 14. Hitler and the Nazis sprang into action. Their time for campaigning had arrived.

The  German people were tired of the political haggling in Berlin. They were tired of misery, tired of suffering, tired of weakness.

These were desperate times and they were willing to listen to anyone, even Adolf Hitler. 

NEXT SECTION – Germans Elect Nazis _ (http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/riseofhitler/elect.htm) _The Rise of Hitler Index 

I haven’t written that much about the Miller-Meeks campaign because we’re working so hard – just had what I think was our last event there… the big mo is swingin’ our way… and Senator Grassley and his staff are helping too.

I don’t know what to make of all the national polling and spin everyone is doing.  I do know that a poll a few weeks ago indicated PacMan’s support was far from strong in CD2, and I’ve heard in detail about the construction of the poll listed below.  Believe it; AND it’s almost a week old.

Will let Krusty Konservative describe the news for you here:

from Krustie’s website:

Congressman Dave Loebsack is in real trouble. Yesterday the Miller-Meeks campaign released internal polling numbers to Jim Lynch of the Cedar Rapids Gazette. The poll showed incumbent Rep. Dave Loebsack leading 45.4 percent to 42.7 percent with a 2.06 percent margin of error. An incumbent polling at 45% just days before Election Day is lethal.

The Loebsack campaign questioned the numbers, suggesting they were the result of “soft methodology,” not a significant shift in voters’ sentiment and Loebsack’s spokesperson said, “These numbers are manufactured.” Now let’s compare this development to what happened in the 4th CD list last week. The Greenwald campaign released a poll showing Latham with a 5 point lead, the Latham campaign countered with numbers of their own which showed a much larger lead for the Congressman. The simple fact that Loebsack’s campaign didn’t counter with their own internal numbers tells you all you need to know, Miller-Meeks campaign has caught fire and Loebsack is in real trouble.

Also in this morning’s Gazette is their endorsement for the 2nd Congressional District. Sorry Dave, its more bad news as they enthusiastically endorsed Miller-Meeks.

“We were pretty comfortable with endorsing Loebsack for a second term … until we met Mariannette Miller-Meeks. The dynamo Ottumwa Republican physician and military veteran, who entered college at age 16, runs a small business and has been president of the Iowa Medical Society and a university professor. She impressed us with her command of key issues and a track record that proves she gets things done.”

Ummm Dave, it looks like you should have run a more aggressive campaign, because your headed back to school, not Congress.

So while the Des Moines Register has been obsessed with Becky Greenwald, it’s now obvious that if Iowa is going to elect a female to congress for the first time it’s going to be Dr. Miller-Meeks. Many people are now aware of her amazing life story of her continuously pulling herself up by her boot straps, but don’t over look what she has over come in this campaign.

1. She wasn’t given a chance in the primary because she wasn’t from Cedar Rapids or Iowa City.

2. She was quickly written off after the primary because of the voter registration numbers in the District.

3. The entire district was affected by the massive June floods making it difficult to campaign and raise money.

4. Former Congressman Jim Leach endorsed Obama, putting her in a difficult position in her race to take back his seat.

Despite all of that she soldiered on and is now in a great position to win a seat in Congress.

Miller Meeks in Wilton, Iowa this summer

very scary stuff. -pf

Link to original article

Larry King:  Concerning spreading the wealth, isn’t the graduated income tax spreading the wealth? ….

Senator McCain:  Well, that’s spreading the wealth in the respect that we do have a graduated income tax.  That’s a far cry from taking from one group of Americans and giving to another.  I mean, that’s dramatically different.
- “Larry King Live,” October 29, 2008

John McCain put his finger on an important point:  we currently have an extraordinarily progressive income tax, which requires the wealthy (and the relatively wealthy) to bear virtually the entire burden of the income tax.  Obama wants to spread the wealth not because the wealthy do not currently bear their fair share of supporting the government.  He wants to spread the wealth because he views the wealth itself as unfair.
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According to the latest IRS statistics, released this summer, we have an extremely progressive income tax system.  For 2006 (the latest year for which statistics are available), the share of the federal income tax paid by the top 1 percent of tax returns reached an all-time high — 40% of all federal income taxes.  The top 50% paid 97% of the tax.  The bottom 50% paid only 3% of it.
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In addition, there were 43 million tax returns filed by people who had gross income but who — after deductions, exemptions and credits — had no tax liability at all.  Many of these people got free money from the federal government, via “refundable credits” such as the Earned Income Tax Credit.  They got “refunds” even though they did not pay any income tax in the first place.
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Even more importantly, the statistics demonstrated that the Bush tax cuts actually increased the share of taxes paid by the “rich” (however they are defined).  In 2000 (the last year of the Clinton administration), the top 1% paid 37% of the federal income tax; by 2006, the figure was 40%.  In 2000, the top 25% paid 84% of the tax — by 2006 it had increased to 86%.  In 2000, the bottom 50% paid 4% — in 2006 the percentage had dropped to 3% (a 25% drop in the relative tax burden on the lower half of the country).
So after the Bush tax cuts the burden the “rich” bear is significantly up and the burden on the rest of society is dramatically down.  That’s great news, right?
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Well, no — not if your goal is “redistributive change” (and if you don’t think the courts, shackled as they are by their “interpretation” of the rights in the Constitution, can do it for you).  If the change you believe in is “redistributive change,” increasing the burden of government borne by the rich is nice, but it does not get you where you really want to go.

Robin Hood was not upset at the relative costs among the citizenry of supporting the Sheriff of Nottingham.  He did not think the rich should bear a greater burden in helping the Sheriff create an ordered society.  He wanted the money for his chosen beneficiaries, not for the government.  He didn’t want tax increases on the rich; he wanted their income.
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For progressives, the above IRS statistics simply prove that, under the Bush tax cuts (which were across the board to all taxpayers), the “rich” made more money (since they were allowed to keep more of it and invest it, which produced even more income for them).  The “rich” thus paid more taxes, and bore a greater burden of financing government, but for progressives, the Bush tax cuts have to be rescinded even if they demonstrably shifted more of the tax burden to the rich.
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For progressives, the goal is not ultimately to create more tax revenue for the government, but to equalize the income of the citizenry.  So increased taxes from the rich are not a solution if they mean the rich made more money compared to others.  In fact, even if the tax cuts end up making the tax system more progressive, that simply exacerbates the problem:  the “gap” between rich and poor.
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That is why Obama had this exchange earlier this year with Charlie Gibson about increasing the capital gains tax rate:

GIBSON:  . . . [You] said you would favor an increase in the capital gains tax. As a matter of fact, you said on CNBC, and I quote, “I certainly would not go above what existed under Bill Clinton,” which was 28 percent.  It’s now 15 percent.  That’s almost a doubling, if you went to 28 percent.
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But actually, Bill Clinton, in 1997, signed legislation that dropped the capital gains tax to 20 percent.
OBAMA:  Right.
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GIBSON:  And George Bush has taken it down to 15 percent.
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OBAMA:  Right.
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GIBSON:  And in each instance, when the rate dropped, revenues from the tax increased; the government took in more money.  And in the 1980s, when the tax was increased to 28 percent, the revenues went down.
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So why raise it at all, especially given the fact that 100 million people in this country own stock and would be affected?
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OBAMA:  Well, Charlie, what I’ve said is that I would look at raising the capital gains tax for purposes of fairness. . . .
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We saw an article today which showed that the top 50 hedge fund managers made $29 billion last year – $29 billion for 50 individuals.  And part of what has happened is that those who are able to work the stock market and amass huge fortunes on capital gains are paying a lower tax rate than their secretaries. That’s not fair.
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And what I want is not oppressive taxation.  I want businesses to thrive, and I want people to be rewarded for their success.  But what I also want to make sure is that our tax system is fair and that [blah, blah, blah for another 155 words].
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GIBSON:  But history shows that when you drop the capital gains tax, the revenues go up.
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OBAMA:  Well, that might happen, or it might not. It depends on what’s happening on Wall Street and how business is going. . . .  [Emphasis added].

Obama does not appreciate the fact that tax incentives for investment and business expansion have a direct effect on “what’s happening on Wall Street and how business is going.”  One does not simply increase the tax on capital gains, and on investors, and assume that the same amount of investment and capital gains will still occur.
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Obama believes the main thing is to make the capital gains tax “fair,” regardless of what history shows about the relationship between rates and revenue.  He does not appreciate that tax incentives for investing increases the amount of investing, which in turn expands business, creates more jobs and produces more income – and thus more tax.

The JFK tax cuts proved it; the Reagan tax cuts proved it; the capital gains tax cut that a Republican Congress forced on Bill Clinton proved it; and the Bush tax cuts proved it again.  It is not a theoretical argument.  The latest cold, dry IRS statistics demonstrate it once again.
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If Obama is elected next week, we will all be treated to another history lesson about why societies that sought “fairness” by taking massive amounts of money from one part of society to give to another (not simply to fulfill a governmental duty of providing a safety net, but for the affirmative purpose of “redistributive change”), not only did not create “fairness,” but in fact made matters significantly worse for everyone.