The Smoke Break

You want some brie with that whine?

Another Look At Global “Warming”

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Once upon a time, when I was just a child, I used to think that those who were bigger than me were therefore somehow also wiser. You know, people like mom and dad, scientists, and even the President. But as my adult years have passed, I’ve come to know that age is no guarantee of wisdom and that everyone has their own agenda.

It used to be that the agenda of scientists was a collective agenda to pursue an understanding of reality, a search for the truth of how things are and how they work. It was both a sacred and a noble task, this search; done for the sake of truth and truth alone.

But somewhere, somehow, the field began to be dominated by those who wouldn’t know a truth if it sat down beside them and introduced itself. Like a hamster on a wheel, many parts of the scientific community have become only never-ending churn in order to keep grants and funding coming in; as if busyness alone was enough to command respect.

It also used to be that the President of the United States was a leader. The one person who stood for the best this country had and could be, and who would die in defense of the freedoms upon which She was founded. We elected this leader to watch over the collective and keep us safe, and we sent representatives to work with the President for the same purpose.

But somewhere, somehow, being elected to the White House and to Congress began to be dominated by those who thought that being sent to serve meant they were smarter or somehow “above” those whom they represent. They, too, became like hamsters on a wheel, churning out more and more legislation that only restricts our freedoms and our rights instead of seeking to defend them; giving away what they, themselves, have not earned to those who have not worked for it either, solely to gain votes to stay in Washington.

When you put the two of these together, the scientists who value their titles more than their work and a President and Congress who see the people they represent as nothing more than an ignorant trough from which they are entitled to feed, you end up where we are today. Bad science dominates our government’s decisions, and whether it is due to the scientists need to pander for money from the politicians or the politicians seeking a convenient excuse from the scientists to pry more money and freedoms from America’s citizens, the result is the same: the monstrous myth of global warming.

It’s like watching a bunch of sheep go into a tailspin over the unexpected waving of a single blade of grass in the field and the hypocritical administration is now pulling out all the stops to pull the wool over the eyes of the American people. If the TV commercial of late isn’t about some drug or another to correct erectile dysfunction, it’s about “green energy”. It makes me think about the impotence of tilting at windmills (that no one wants in their own backyard, mind you.)

I was sent this video today and decided to post it here. Trust the late George Carlin to put things into perspective.

Anyone up for sheering some sheep?

How Congress Intends To Sidestep An Outright Repeal Of The 2nd Amendment

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It is rumored that HR 45 is about to undergo hearings on Capitol Hill.  And the more I read about this piece of legislation, the more angry I become.

HR 45 is titled, “Blair Holt’s Firearm Licensing and Record of Sale Act of 2009”.  This is an embarrassing nod to the courage of high school junior Blair Holt, who died shielding another student from gang-related gunfire on a Chicago city bus; titled solely to distract from the fact that both criminals and wack jobs walk amongst us.  Nowhere is it mentioned, of course, that the gun used to kill Blair Holt was itself illegal and there are already laws on the books to address this.

The purpose of this bill is ostensibly to legislate some kind of bassackwards morality as cover for the progressive liberals’ wish to destroy our 2nd Amendment rights.  Because people use guns to kill other people, whether for all the wrong or right reasons, it is now being presumed that it is the government’s job to insure that only those it deems qualified may own “any handgun” or “any semiautomatic firearm that can accept any detachable ammunition feeding device” (not “antique”).    The thinking goes that it is only by restricting private gun ownership to only those approved by only the government that the number of guns getting into the hands of criminals or secretly taken by screw-loose, unsupervised youngsters will be reduced.

It’s bullshit.  The truth is that both laws and locks keep only honest people honest.  The criminal element is by big, fat “DUH!” definition “criminal” because it never has and never will have any regard whatsoever for laws or locks or anything else that would stand in their way of going about their bad business.  The real protections of we, the people, provided by the 2nd Amendment comes from criminals’ uncertainty about what they might face should they attempt to steal or otherwise harm us.  Not to mention that when citizens have the right to bear arms, it is no longer such an easy task for the government to overstep its bounds and (illegally) seize anything from them by force.  In both cases, the 2nd Amendment creates a truce-type of situation; exactly as was intended by the Founding Fathers the bulk of control, the power, remains with the people.

The gist of this wicked bill is that no one may possess a “qualifying firearm” without a license.  And in order to get a license, you must give the Attorney General $25 and all of the following:

  1. A current, passport-sized photograph
  2. Your name, address, and date and place of birth
  3. Any other name you ever used or by which you have ever been known
  4. A clear thumb print (yours, of course)
  5. A statement that you are not a person prohibited from obtaining a firearm
  6. Certification you will keep any firearm safely stored and out of the possession anyone under 18 years of age
  7. Proof of having taken a written firearms examination intended to test your knowledge about
    1. The safe storage of firearms, particularly in the vicinity of persons who have not attained 18 years of age
    2. The safe handling of firearms
    3. The use of firearms in the home and the risks associated with using them in the home
    4. The legal responsibilities of firearms owners, including Federal, State, and local laws relating to requirements for the possession and storage of firearms, and relating to reporting requirements with respect to firearms
    5. Any other subjects, as the Attorney General determines to be appropriate
  8. An authorization to release any of your mental health records to the Attorney General or their authorized representative (if there are any)
  9. Date the application was submitted
  10. Your signature

If you are then deemed worthy, you will get your very own firearms license (it will say so, in bold letters centered right at the very top, “FIREARM LICENSE–NOT VALID FOR ANY OTHER PURPOSE”).  Each one will have a unique number and include your photograph, address, date of birth, the license’s expiration date, and your signature.  Though if you move, you’d better tell the Attorney General or you’ll be in trouble!

You won’t be able to buy a “qualifying firearm” from anyone except a “licensed importer, licensed manufacturer, licensed dealer, or licensed collector” and they will be given a special number to note on the bill of sale that they’ve verified with the Attorney General’s office you have a valid license.  Oh, you can’t sell a gun to anyone except a  “licensed importer, licensed manufacturer, licensed dealer, or licensed collector” either, though they kindly made provision to allow inheriting guns.

Of course, there are always exceptions and the ones in this bill should be even more cause for concern.  It won’t apply  to “any department or agency of the United States, of a State, or of a political subdivision of a State, or to any official conduct of any officer or employee of such a department or agency”, or to “a peace officer, a member of the Armed Forces, or a member of the National Guard”.

What this bill does is to effectively negate the 2nd Amendment by automatically making all private citizens a criminal until they prove themselves otherwise.

Not only is that the real crime, it is also unconstitutional.

Selling Out the 14th Amendment For Criminal Votes

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“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

Penned by Emma Lazarus in 1883, this is perhaps the most famous part of her small sonnet, originally simply a donation read at the opening of a fundraiser for construction of the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty and then quickly forgotten.  Through the efforts of a friend, in 1903 it was inscribed on a plaque and mounted inside the Statue of Liberty.  It was these words that then turned the original symbol of the Republic into a beacon of hope for countless immigrants when they passed by Lady Liberty as they sailed through New York Harbor.

Legal immigrants.  Those like my grandfathers, and maybe even yours, who came here hoping to create a better life; knowing no one and unable to speak the language yet determined to become one with their adopted country.  Who worked hard and with pride, fought for the United States during the Great Wars; they took no handouts from anyone and were grateful right ’til the day they died for the opportunity provided to them by the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, for they had seen with their own eyes the evil that walks upright, the evil that lures with progressive dreams designed only to hide its real intent – the enslaving of the people in a fascist regime.

As I write this piece there are some 22+ million illegal immigrants in the United States.  Ninety-eight percent of them from Mexico.  Yes, 98% of them.  And some 11+ million of them are working in skilled trades, thereby displacing American citizens.  Some 1 million of them are either incarcerated or considered fugitives – ironic when you consider that their illegal status already made them criminals.

The Democrats, now even more encouraged by President Obama and his administration, are looking once again at amnesty for illegal immigrants.  They are looking at how to grant citizenship to criminals who are growing more and more bold in their organizing and seeking out the bleeding hearts with sympathetic ears – not to ask, mind you, but to demand health care, welfare and other services, all the while waving the Mexican flag.

What is wrong with this picture?

They broke the law the moment they crossed the border.  Simply being here doesn’t make them American citizens, even if they choose to pay taxes (using someone else’s Social Security number).  Nor are their children American citizens, even if they are born on U.S. soil.  It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand the intent of the 14th Amendment:

“All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and 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.”

An illegal immigrant is NOT subject to the jurisdiction of the United States to any extent beyond humane treatment as provided by the Geneva Conventions while being ushered out of the country. They remain citizens of their native country and therefore under the legal jurisdiction of their native country.  Their children, too, remain under the legal jurisdiction of their native country.

In United States v. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649 (1898), the Supreme Court addressed the 14th Amended as it applied to someone born in the United States – but what most are not aware of or do not want to know is that his parents were considered to be here legally.  It is only those who see an opportunity to expand their base of possible votes by giving away the hard-earned tax dollars of America’s legal citizens who could think any child born on American soil is automatically a United States citizen and encourage this misconception within our society.  Yet for the same reason – potential votes – they would be the first to argue that the children of Americans born abroad inherit their parents’ citizenship, but the truth is that you can’t have it both ways.

It can also be argued that granting amnesty to illegals both abridges and deprives legal Americans the fruits (property) of their labors since the  tax dollars of legal Americans go to support those who pay nothing towards those things that were intended to benefit the collective.

If we can send men to the Moon, we can send illegal immigrants back home.  Especially those entering from Mexico, so round ’em all up now.  If they have come here legally and overstayed their welcome, consider amnesty ONLY if they have proof of having paid taxes during their time here, are currently employed, and have no criminal record.  Otherwise, all of them – including the children – go back over the border.  If they don’t like what is going on in their own country, then let them take their outrage over their “victim” status and unite against the mistreatments and inequalities there.  Their flag can fly equally well in protest in their own country, and they won’t have to press any extra buttons on their telephones to speak to someone in Spanish.

First The Banks, Then The Automakers, Now The Internet

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Count yourself fortunate to be reading these words.  If certain members of Congress and President Obama have their way, there is a good chance that you will find yourself hitting that frustrating “404 Page not found” error more often than not.  That is, if your internet connection even works.

Two bills have just been introduced in the Senate: 

S. 778:  A bill to establish, within the Executive Office of the President, the Office of National Cybersecurity Advisor.

Sponsor:  Senator John Rockefeller [D, WV]
Co-Sponsors:
Sen. Bill Nelson [D, FL]
Sen. Olympia Snowe [R, ME]

Apr 01, 2009: Read twice and referred to the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.

S.773:  A bill to ensure the continued free flow of commerce within the United States and with its global trading partners through secure cyber communications, to provide for the continued development and exploitation of the Internet and intranet communications for such purposes, to provide for the development of a cadre of information technology specialists to improve and maintain effective cybersecurity defenses against disruption, and for other purposes.

Sponsor:  Senator John Rockefeller [D, WV]
Co-Sponsors:
Sen. Bill Nelson [D, FL]
Sen. Olympia Snowe [R, ME]

Introduced on Apr 01, 2009.  Read twice and referred to the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation.

 Here we go again.  Pater Obama and the Family think that we need more protection.  Their fears aren’t entirely unfounded, though I find it ironic that, even though it’s not new news, it’s all over the media that the footprints of Chinese and Russian spies have been found inside the networks that control the country’s power systems, indications that someone is wondering if they can wreak havoc by cutting off electricity, or water, or other critical communications between the regional groups that control them.  It’s already happened in other countries and was discussed here in the United States – and certain measures implemented – after the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

But as in most businesses (and probably even the case with the computer by which you read these words), computer security is at the bottom of the to-do list.  The power industry’s own standards-setting organization, the North American Electric Reliability Corp (overseen by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission) is only now getting serious about the far-reaching impact of malicious intrusions to the power grids’ networks.  And since we’ve all read about the compromises of personal information brought about by thoughtless financial employees, this late-coming assessment from those who oversee we have power and water oughtta scare the bejesus out of you.

 So you’re thinking it’s a good thing that we, the people, start to take this “security stuff” more seriously, right?  I have two words for you:  fear factor.  Unfortunately, if you take the time to read S.773 in its entirety, what you will find is the government reproducing what, for all intents and purposes, already exists in the private sector.  Security standards.  Educational programs.  Accrediting organizations.

But when you live in the Obamanation, it’s “better” if it’s run by the government.  The same government that giveth the bonuses and then taketh them away, all the while claiming they never gaveth them out in the first place.  The same government that will, through this nefarious legislation, allow the President to determine what is considered “critical infrastructure information systems and networks” and shut them down, should he deem it necessary.  This includes state, local, and nongovernmental information systems and networks.  Yes, nongovernmental – private – information systems and networks.

And here’s a fun one – the President “shall notify the Congress within 48 hours after providing a cyber-related certification of legality to a United States person.”  Okey-dokey….

How about funding a study of “the feasibility of an identity management and authentication program, with the appropriate civil liberties and privacy protections, for government and critical infrastructure information systems and networks”?

And let’s not forget the indoctrination part, “a national cybersecurity awareness campaign”, using “public and private sector means of providing information to the public, including public service announcements”.  Like we need more government-sponsored advertising?  How about government-sponsored competitions, complete with prize money given to students or academic or research institutions?  In lip-service to “public-private partnership”, some of the money will come from the private sector since the governing organizations will be non-profits that receive government funding.  And more non-profit, government-supported centers will focus on the cybersecurity of small and medium-sized businesses.  (See the snake eating its own tail?)

Of course, we must attend to the children.  This bill will use a “a Federal Cyber Scholarship-for-Service program ” to:

  • provide a procedure for identifying promising K-12 students for participation in summer work and internship programs that would lead to certification of Federal information technology workforce standards and possible future employment; and
  • examine and develop, if appropriate, programs to promote computer security awareness in secondary and high school classrooms.

All of which is intended to get them into the government-sponsored “Federal Cyber Scholarship-for-Service program” (the bill actually states there will be preference given to undergraduate or graduate program applicants who participated in the government-sponsored competitions).  Can you smell the socialistic bent of this?  Just like the professional vs. blue collar educational tracks in countries like Germany, where the government determines your career for you.  How will you tell your child they can’t go to school to study art because they are too good at math or playing video games?

Like so many good intentions, this is bad and it’s scary.

Does the United States need to step up its computer security?  You bet.  Do we need the government to define computer security and K-PhD train individuals to design and implement it?  No.  This is yet another area where the private sector and the rewards system of the free market will always to a better job than a bureaucracy.  The dot-com boom and bust was driven by ingenuity and smarts; computers and the internet is a 20th century phenomenon that government sponsorship couldn’t have created in ten times the number of years.  Success in any area requires innovation and risk-taking, they are the key components of the many small, private business ventures birthed from ideas of bright people who had the freedom to pursue their dreams that allow you to read my thoughts right here, right now.

This country has more important things to do than spend millions and millions of dollars recreating what we already know needs to be done just to disguise one more government takeover of the private sector.  It is yet another audacious idea whose time must not come.

A Word To The Rich

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The tender nurturing of the entitlement mentality that occupies this Congress and so causes it to take deeper root throughout this great country is incredibly disheartening to those of us who still believe in the American dream. 

I could go on a tear about it, however, at this moment I defer to this excellent piece posted at Pajamas Media that addresses the government’s attacks on those who try to honestly run their businesses and so create jobs for others; even – Obama forbid! – getting “wealthy” in the process.

When Does It End? Part 2 of 2

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After posting Part 1 of this piece, I went about my day’s business.  Finally sitting down to watch the evening news I saw that 2 more people had gone on murderous rampages at opposite ends of the country.  One, a father who murdered his 5 children in Graham, Washington, the other a man in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania who set up an ambush for the local police department, leaving 3 of them dead.

And a nation still reeling from the senseless slaughter of dreams of a better life in America in Binghamton, New York casts about clumsily trying to understand.

Unfortunately, there is no easy answer.  As noted in Part 1, what we are reaping are the consequences of a collective swing of the moral compass.  Once pointing figuratively to a rigid north and its iron-clad roles based on both gender and race, over the last 40 years it turned south and is now lodged there firmly.  But as we shed not only our clothes during that “summer of love” along with ideas about roles we knew weren’t in synch with the equality upon which this country was founded, we also tossed what I call the basics.  We grabbed our individuality like some brass ring on a merry-go-round but at the same time we let go of our personal responsibilities with regards to the expression of them.

Every action has an equal and opposite reaction.  This is a basic law of physics and in terms of a human life it means that every action we take has a consequence.  Sometimes the consequence is intended, sometimes it is unexpected and then for better or for worse.  But just as we own our actions, we also own their consequences.  For example, if we work hard, we expect the result, the consequences, to be a comfortable retirement.  But if we choose to take some easy way out, to try to cheat the system, so to speak, then there is a chance the results, the consequences, will not be in our favor.  That’s called a risk, and as we’ve watched events unfold with the housing and banking industry and “toxic assets”, sometimes we lose.  And lose a lot.

But we still own it.  And we own the ripple effects of our choices as they impact others, creating situations like Binghamton and Graham and Pittsburgh and so many others.

I said that this Part 2 would address “how” we can save ourselves from the despair now gripping our nation.  So let us begin.

Step 1:  We must all, as individuals, accept that we, the people, own this whole, stinkin’ mess.  Understand that it is both our actions and our inactions, most of them the sum total of incalculable small ones, that put this country where it is today.  Today’s problems aren’t the banks’ fault, they aren’t “big bad” business’ fault, they aren’t the government’s fault.  They are our fault.  You.  Me.  Every single one of us.  We are the banks, we are “big bad” business, we are the government.  WE OWN THIS.

Step 2:  Take a good hard look at our assumptions.  It’s obvious that they, just like some 15% of Americans, aren’t working.  The biggest and most deadly assumption that I hear when talking to people is the faith put in our elected representatives.  The majority of the time it’s a blind faith since most couldn’t tell you who represents them in Congress if you dangled a hundred-dollar bill in front of them.  Most people have no idea what Congress does all day, unless they happen to catch a mainstream-media news story about it.  And even then they don’t understand the implications, nor how often other insidious amendments are buried in a particular bill.  They get it when it’s explained to them, however, and, interestingly, often don’t agree.

Step 3:  The Constitution of the United States and the Bill of Rights are required reading.  It’s a fact of life that you can’t play any game if you don’t know the rules.  Like Glinda, the Good Witch of the North, said to Dorothy in “The Wizard of Oz”, “You don’t need to be helped any longer. You’ve always had the power to go back….”  I can’t emphasize this enough.  These 2 documents are our power and they are the means by which we can right today’s wrongs.  They are, however, under unbelieveable assault every single day.  Proposed amendments to the Constitution are introduced in Congress on a regular basis but do nothing except chip away at our rights.  The truth is it ain’t broke, folks, and it don’t need any fixing.  Especially the kind of “fixes” currently on the table in Congress. 

What does need to change is our understanding of what these documents mean and that we, the people, actively exercise the rights given to us by them.  A look at these documents as they originated can be seen here; another good site is here.  To understand the intentions of the Founding Fathers when drafting the Constitution, it is also important to read what are called the “Federalist Papers“.  Despite all our technology, the basics of life today aren’t very different than they were 223 years ago; we must listen to these wise men as much today as did the early colonists.  Listen to them as if our very lives depended upon it because…they do.

Step 4:  We must all take the time to review the work our elected representatives – our employees – are doing.  Go to websites like thomas.gov and opencongress.org and look around.  Sure, bills are sometimes awkward to read, but I promise that you can get the gist of them.  See what your elected representatives – your employees – are introducing as legislation, what they are signing on to cosponsor (support), and how they are voting. 

Step 5:  Let your elected representatives – your employees – know what you think of their work.  Congress operates on the theory that no news from their constituents is good news.  They don’t want to hear they are going against the wishes of those who sent them to what they see as a cushy, power-tripped job but if we, the people, expect things to change, communicating with our elected representatives – our employees – is critical.  They must come to understand that they are being watched and that when they fail to protect this country and its citizens there are consequences.  This will only happen if we, the people, take the time to contact them.  You don’t have to write a novel, just a few short sentences about the issue will suffice.  When an issue is critical and time is of the essence, call their office and leave them a message. 

Step 6:  President Obama has promised the “most open and accessible administration in American history”, promised transparency, and says he wants to know what we, the people, are thinking.  TELL HIM.  If you are disgusted with his inability to select cabinet position nominees that are honest taxpayers or if you agree with his warnings to North Korea, let him know.  If you think his ideas about the national budget are wacked, if you think goverment shouldn’t be in the car business, tell him.  While it may come as a surprise to some, Barack Obama is no one special and he is certainly not some Messiah.  He is just another American (giving him the benefit of the doubt for purposes of this example) who was selected to do a job in much the same way that you and I are interviewed and hired for a position.  Like our Congress critters, the President of the United States works for us and he is responsible for upholding and defending the Constitution of the United States.  (Remember Step 3?)  He is rather like the CEO of our corporation and as such is subject to review and given direction by the board of directors – we, the people.

Step 7:  Vote.  Vote in every election and learn to vote with your dollars.  Support ethical companies, whether they are media outlets or manufacturers.  Demand honesty from every business, from the worker bees to the boards of directors, and when it is not forthcoming, take your business elsewhere.  You are a stakeholder in every business and have a responsibility to hold them accountable so let them know why you choose to do your business with them or why you choose to do your business elsewhere. 

Step 8:  Understand how your money is being used or abused.  This is closely related to Step 7, but bears addressing on its own.  Most of us have investments, be it mutual funds, 401ks, or a retirement plan, and I venture to guess that most of us have no idea how those funds are invested.  We hand over our money and let someone else decide what’s going to make our nest egg grow.  Yet there are often companies in the mix who do not operate ethically or honestly and, personally, I do not want to support them and neither should you.  Let me give you an example. Your neighbor, someone who has become a very good friend over the years, someone you consider “family”, is let go from their job after 20-odd years.  They are a good person, a responsible person, living within their means and often working on salary more than 40 hours a week because they believe in their employer and believe it’s the right thing to do.  You’d be upset right along with them, wouldn’t you?  You’d be even more upset when you discover that the company made almost $2 billion in net profit that quarter, and your friend’s firing is solely to make the numbers “look good” for the next quarter, wouldn’t you?  How about if you learned that the company’s CEO and other top executives are due five-figure bonuses at the end of the year if they make those nefarious “numbers” but the workers, the people who do the “grunt work” that creates the company’s ability to sell goods and services and thereby be profitable, won’t see a penny?  And what if you learn those “grunt workers” take a pay cut along the way, too, and there is no intention by the CEO or executives to give any of it back?

It’s a disgusting scenario but it happens more than you think.  And the reason it happens is so that those dividend checks can have one more penny per share.  This is where the problems with our moral compass are most clear, at least to me, so I have to ask:  is it worth it?  Would you willingly destroy the lives of others, some of those people your neighbors and your friends, just to get one more penny in dividends?

I’ve posed this question to numerous people and the answer is always “no”.  So what is the answer?

Step 8:  Exercise your rights as a shareholder.  Read the annual reports of the companies where your money is invested and read them with an eye towards honesty and fairness.  (You can get the list of your mix from your brokerage firm.)  Certainly, those who take the most risk are entitled to reap the most reward, however, every business has both shareholders and stakeholders.  Employees, whether or not they own stock, are stakeholders, and as such must be taken care of the same as shareholders who get dividends because the reality is that it is the good employees, the “best and brightest”, who make a company successful.  The role of the CEO and executives is to be the “public face” of a company and in big companies they have very little knowledge – if any, since the job of CEO isn’t necessarily industry-specific any more – about what it takes to do the work required on a daily basis to successfully meet the company’s contracts.  Executive compensation, whether excessive or not, is set down in black and white and if you disagree with the way a company is run, especially those taking money out of the pockets of some employees simply in order to line the pockets of other employees, tell the board of directors.  It is their job to set things like executive compensation and they will do whatever they think is best – which is most often decided inside some kind of bubble because they never hear from individual shareholders.

When you get a proxy statement from a company in which you’ve invested, read it carefully and don’t let someone else cast it for you.  Take some time to learn about who is on the board of directors, who is being proposed to serve on it, understand any issues being presented, and send the proxy back by the deadline.  This is your ability to have a say in how the company is being run, a right given to you when you bought stock, so in the same way you must vote for representation and vote with your dollars, so, too, must you exercise your right as a shareholder and take care of your employees.  It is perhaps the simplest way to put honesty back in big business and negates the need to lose money through unionization.

Step 9:  Talk to people.  Discuss issues like responsibility and honesty and ethics, and encourage others to see they do hold the power to effect change.  Your awareness of our rights and the issues we face, your willingness to do what is right every day, to accept your responsibilities both personal and civic, are a lesson, an example. 

In the end, problems like the despair that is setting off murderous rampages aren’t about anyone versus anyone else, they aren’t about lunatics or guns, they are about us being in this mess together.  Together we must find our way out of them by each of us, as individuals, going back to basics.  That is where we will find real change and it is the only source of real hope.

When Does It End? Part 1 of 2

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The news yesterday was filled with up-to-the-minute reports about the tragic shooting in Binghamton, New York that ended with 14 people shot to death, including the apparent suicide of the gunman.  Certainly, this isn’t the first time such a thing has happened; the list includes 3 senseless “killing sprees” last month alone.

Such actions by those who, for all intents and purposes, look like a regular person, just like our friends, neighbors – just like us – becomes fodder for tabloid speculation.  What causes someone to open the door to that secret, inner place that would allow fellow humans to be hated so much that they become expendable things?  Just what kind of pain do such actions attempt to assuage?

The truth is that we will never know.  There have always been those whom we would define as mentally ill, there have always been those who become addicted to things that alter the brain’s chemistry and allow for the loosening of behavioral regulators.  And the truth is that each of us is closer to this kind of “snapping” than we would ever admit.

Despair always plays a large part in the course of human events.  For to reach the point of feeling utterly hopeless and unable to alter one’s circumstances can be met with only resignation or anger.  I will argue that neither one is, in and of itself, a bad thing.  There are times in our lives when we must meet our circumstances with resignation for there are things we cannot change, such as the death of a loved one.  There are also times when we must become angry.  A deep and righteous anger against tyranny is what founded this country.

In a news conference about the Binghamton shootings, New York Governor David Patterson voiced despair when he said, “When are we going to be able to curb the kind of violence that is so fraught and so rapid that we can’t even keep track of the incidents?”

The answer, Governor Patterson, is never.  As long as there are humans living in groups, in the same way that there will always be prayer in schools as long as there are tests, there will always be sporadic outbreaks of violence.  It is the nature of the beast, and as such, something over which we – the collective – really have no control.  We must resign ourselves to the fact that we are one with Nature, a part of the circle of life, and subject to the same overriding rule of the survival of the fittest.  The only difference between humans and other species is that we have tools that make inflicting deadly harm on one another much easier.

But that doesn’t put the anger of despair out of the picture.  It is possible to address the circumstances that breed this kind of tragic action in response to despair, however, anger used simply in retaliation has never worked to solve anything.  Knee-jerk reactions like banning guns, banning immigrants, or banning bonuses for that matter, is not the answer for the roots of the problem go much, much deeper, reaching right down into the collective mindset of American society.

It is this mindset that must be addressed but it can only be addressed at the level of the individual.  It requires a collective awakening to the loss of basic values then those values must be recouped by individual action.  You simply cannot legislate morality, despite the administration’s misguided attempts to do so as evidenced by the recent passing of legislation enhancing the “opportunity for “national service”.  Personal goodness and actions consistent with the definitions of morals and ethics in behaviors all begin at home.  They are learned from our parents, from our extended families, from our neighbors.  They are reinforced by ethical and moral teachers, business owners, and others with whom we interact.  Religion plays a part, but the ability to recite chapter and verse from some ancient book is not necessary to know that treating others fairly creates a world that contains more harmony than discord.

Life is all about choices, and I believe that too many people forget that regardless what happens, they always have a choice.  We may choose to hand over our power to another person, but we can always make the choice to take it back.  There are rules of engagement for everything we do, and though sometimes they may not seem very clear, they are there and we have the ability to learn them and to use them.  If we so choose.

I’ve noticed, for whatever it may be worth, that many of the people “snapping” are those who were raised during or after that pendulum swing to “anything goes” that took hold in the late 1960s.  Manifestation of the 60s ideologies of equality and sharing were long overdue, to be sure, but in the giddy aftermath of reaching them what can be termed blind liberalism resulted in a generations that have been raised with few, if any, real ethical or moral boundaries.  Too much indulgence awarding a shameless materialistic mentality is now manifesting in an entitlement mentality as the reality, the natural law, if you will, that equal opportunity does not guarantee equal results continues to hold sway.

Without a strong moral compass, as it has been lately labeled, without an understanding of what it really means to live freely, we find ourselves staring at these blood-spattered messes, looking for someone to save us from ourselves.  There are those, like the President and so many in Congress, who are more than happy to take our individual power and the rights inherent in them and use them for their own purposes.  And they are doing just that – enslaving multiple future generations to a life beholden to paying off debts we cannot afford.  They are willing to sell off America and her sovereignty to the rest of the world as an apology for the success of the truths upon which this country was founded, willing to extinguish the beacon of the light of Liberty to pacify some false, unnatural belief in entitlement.

This is wrong.  No one can save us from ourselves but us.  I grant you that the results of our placing our power and our faith in the hands of those who fail to see the beautiful truths contained in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights and who refuse to uphold them is cause for despair.  But I say that we can no longer afford to indulge in the resignation of despair.  We must move to tightly grasp and then to act with the same righteous anger that moved the Founding Fathers to throw off the shackles of European monarchal slavery.

How?  We have many choices.  We will explore them in Part 2.

Enough Is Enough: Energy, ACORN & HR 1388, Tax Cheats & Illegals, And The Supreme Law of The Land

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It’s time to stop.  Just stop.

Every day we learn more and more about selfish idiocy that created the big problems directly affecting all of us.  The new administration has taken great advantage of the situation- taking control over things that are fundamentally and Constitutionally not their responsibility.  AND WE HAVE LET THEM.

Oh, sure, some people are speaking out, but this administration continues to call them names and make fun of them.  It seems that most of the population sits and stares stupidly at their dwindling 401k funds, wonders if they’ll be able to continue to pay their upside-down mortgage, then wonders if they’ll even have a job tomorrow.  Some sit there with their hands out, looking for Pater Obama to give them something for nothing.

In today’s news, it is being reported that Congress is unveiling their latest proposal for an “energy bill“.  Pay attention – it’s all about leading us into cap and trade and in the end raising the cost of EVERYTHING that we, the people, use – and eat – every single day.

Yesterday, the Department of Transportation released a report outlining new fuel economy standards.  These are on top of the increased fuel economy standards put in place in 2007.  So while on the one hand we bail out the auto companies and the President replaces CEOs, on the other hand they are adding inordinate costs to the auto makers.  Costs that the consumers will not recoup for some 8 years (if at all).  In effect, “President Barack Obama directed the Department of Transportation” to set the automakers up to fail.

Last Friday, the Senate killed an amendment to the National Service Act (H.R. 1388) that would exclude funding for ACORN.  Yes, ACORN will continue to reap massive financial benefits from the federal government, despite their never-ending illegal activities – ranging from outright voter registration fraud to breaking and entering.  Funny that you don’t hear very much about all this, isn’t it?  The more I read about them, the more I feel I need to go take a shower; it’s hard to understand why the media keeps ignoring tabloid-worthy after tabloid-worthy problem, though after all the campaign donations ACORN made, it’s easier to understand why Democrats simply deny it.

And in what is becoming old news, or perhaps simply business as usual in this new administration, yet another cabinet nominee, House and Human Services candidate Nancy Sebelius  is revealed to have somehow not paid all her taxes.  (Senator Grassley doesn’t think this is a big deal.  Please tell me that’s an April Fool’s Day joke.)  Just like all the other failed nominees, she is a poster child for the “rich” – the very same folks the administration asks to be “patriotic” by paying more taxes.  Congessional liberal leaders like Feinstein, Kennedy, Kerry, Kohl, Pelosi, Rockefellar are all mulitmillionaires, yet get their panties in a bunch about Wall Street bonuses and pass ex post facto laws to stop them.  While they and their Congress brethren hand out “traditional” bonuses – made up of our hard-earned tax dollars, of course – to their own employees.

We also have a little “human interest” story.  Another lawbreaker getting a break, and using the excuse of our administration-derided health care system as justification:

Barack Obama’s Kenyan aunt lost her bid for asylum more than four years ago, and a judge ordered her deported. Instead, Zeituni Onyango stayed, living for years in public housing.

Now, in a case that puts the president in a tough position both personally and politically, Onyango’s request is being reconsidered under a little-used provision in U.S. immigration rules that allows denied asylum claims to be reheard if applicants can show that something has changed to make them eligible.

Such as the ascension of her nephew to the presidency of the world’s most powerful country.

Onyango’s reasons for seeking asylum have not been made public, and her immigration hearing will be closed at her lawyer’s request.

Onyango’s lawyer, Margaret Wong, may also argue that she needs to stay in the United States for medical reasons. Onyango, who has been photographed walking with a cane, has some kind of a neurological problem, said Mike Rogers, Wong’s spokesman.

All these things upset me to no end.  But awareness is only the first step.  Action must be the second.  Honestly, folks, we don’t have to take this lying down.  There is power in numbers and it is imperative that everyone who cares about stopping the dangerous direction in which the administration is taking this country raise their voices in loud and insistent protest.

When was the last time you told your elected representatives to stop the bullshit…errrr…stop the madness?  If you need to find them, go here.  Tell them you’re tired of their hypocrisy.  Tell them you don’t want the government to be running the private sector.  (Put an “i” for “I won” in the word “run” and you get “ruin”.)  Tell them you don’t want bailouts and handouts.  Tell them you want less government, not more.  Tell them to get themselves out of the way of our Constitutionally-guaranteed freedoms and allow capitalism and the free market to do what they have always done – help we, the people, create the opportunities to pursue our individual, unique happiness.

Frankly, all current government programs and most of its operations should be eliminated.  Collectively, our federal taxes should fund only the military and the national infrastructure.  Government’s only business is to oversee that we all play nicely in the sandbox together.  Private enterprise  is not the government’s business.  Government doesn’t belong in our factories, in our boardrooms or bedrooms, or on our car lots.  Government doesn’t exist to pay anyone’s medical bills or to insure they have a cell phone in their pocket.  If states or local municipalities want to fund such things, then let the people who make up that state or municipality pay for it.  Let them reap their own benefits but not subject the rest of us to the expense of their failures.  Simply put, this “minimalist’ government is what the Founding Fathers gave us in the Constitution.

Go back and read it.  The Constitution is the “supreme law of the land” and, as such, gives the federal government only the powers “necessary and proper” to:

  1. Collect taxes
  2. Regulate interstate commerce
  3. Coin money, regulate currency, set standards of weights and measures
  4. Declare war
  5. Raise and maintain an army and navy

It explicitly denies the federal government:

  1. The writ of habeas corpus cannot be suspended unless in cases of rebellion or invasion, when deemed necessary to national safety.
  2. No bill of attainder or ex post facto law can be passed.

Everything else falls to the states, per the 10th Amendment (“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”)  Such sovreignty was by design in order to avoid the problems inherent in a central, all-powerful seat of government.  (Think North Korea.  Think Venezuela.  Think Iran.)  The individual states, like the people of the United States, are to be seen and treated as equal but allowed to operate individually.

Note for the record that the taxes on AIG and other bailout bonuses can be interpreted as ex post facto law.  Meaning, they are passed and encompass something that has already occurred.  This would be similar to a state deciding to institute the death penalty and then executing people serving a life sentence for a crime that would fall under the new law without due process.

I don’t know if it’s ignorance or laziness or a combination of both that has put so much garbage into the American definition of government, but in the same way some shout that AIG and the auto companies should be allowed to go into bankruptcy, so, too, should our government be stripped down and reorganized.  The power, the control, must be returned to the people, to the states, but I fear wresting it from the smarmy, greedy hands that now sit in Congress and the White House will prove very, very difficult.  For to do this would require great courage in terms of personal responsibility.  We would each have to face our individual failures and unfortunately it is always so much easier to blame someone else than look in the mirror.

But if the buck doesn’t stop here, just where does it stop?

American Slavery In The 21st Century

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We all know that President Obama is real big on giving.  That is, of other people giving.  He merely sits back and basks in the warmth of the applause.  Or is that the warmth from the raised thermostat of the Orchid Office?

While watching television this evening, I saw an odd commerical.  It was for an organization called “City Year”.  I decided to do some investigating because it smelled an awful lot like a candidate for funds set aside in the stimulus bill for the “civil service” touted in such flowery language by our Campaigner-in-Chief.

And sure enough, City Year is right in lockstep with Obama’s socialistic agenda.  Alan Khazei co-founded City Year in 1988 and served as its CEO until 2006.  Listed as a non-profit with the IRS (status obtained only within the last 2 years), its 2007 annual report shows net assets of $26,775,138.  It holds over $8 million in investments; and it answered “yes” on IRS form 990 to the question of whether the organization attempted “to influence national, state, or local legislation, including any attempt to influence public opinion on a legislative matter or referendum” but, interestingly, no dollar amounts were included for “expenses paid or incurred in connection with the lobbying activities”.  It received government grants to the tune of some $5.6 million.

One thing always leads to another and so came a check into “bethechange.org”.  This little outfit bought the domain name on 1/11/08 but isn’t listed with the IRS as a non-profit.  It, too, touts Alan Khazei as its founder and CEO and its basic goals are the same as City Year.

All of this ties back to AmeriCorps, which was the subject of much debate as the “GIVE act” wound its way through Congress with a price tag of some $6 billion over 5 years.  While one nefarious inclusion – that of “mandatory service” was removed from the “GIVE act”, it is instead now part of HR 1444, which includes studying (in part), “The effect on the Nation, on those who serve, and on the families of those who serve, if all individuals in the United States were expected to perform national service or were required to perform a certain amount of national service.”

Now, I’ve nothing against people volunteering to help other people.  It’s part of what makes this country great.  And I put a good thousand volunteer hours myself every year.  But paying people to volunteer?  That negates the definition of the word.  And the government paying people to volunteer?  The government then defining the recipients of the altruistic impulses of its citizens?  Good deeds or no good deeds, the whole thing smells a little fishy to me.

In the end, it’s always a matter of following the money.  In this case, the nice salaries that people like, for example, Alan Khazei collect by sitting on the boards of a non-profit – $315,500 from City Year in 2007.  (He also serves on the boards of Citizen Schools, Harvard Alumni Association, New Profit, Inc., Share Our Strength, and on the Advisory Board of America’s Promise, the Partnership for Public Service, and the Center for Public Leadership at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, though from what I can tell, without pay.)

So let’s go snooping around a little more.  AmeriCorps has burgeoned since former President Bill Clinton penned it into existence in 1993, and while it includes generally-lauded programs like Habitat for Humanity and the Scouting programs, it also funds City Year and Citizens Schools.  It is run by the Corporation for National and Community Service, and in a 2004 longitudinal study (updated in 2007) they commissioned to measure the impact of AmeriCorps, it was determined that “there are no statistically significant effects of participation on education or teamwork and other life skills behavior outcomes.”  Nor does participation have “significant impacts on measures of educational attitudes or degree attainment”.

In other words, while people helping people is a good thing, having the government control the volunteering of young people and having the oxymoron of the government paying for it is a waste of the taxpayer’s money.  Of course, paying below-poverty wages to people so they can perform “volunteer work” for federal, state, or local government agencies (yes, some assignments are to do government work) is good business for the government but the government does not exist to be in business in the private sector (Tim Geithner’s misplaced wishes to control “threats” to the economy aside). 

This is just plain and simple badness and money that this country can ill afford to spend.  People will help people – that is the American way.  Legitimate non-profit organizations that serve legitimate purposes do not need government handouts to be successful. 

Besides, whose job is it, really, to instill values, such as helping others, in our young people?  I do not believe it is, in any way, a function of government.  The job of instilling values belongs to parents.  And I don’t mean Pater Obama.

There still remains the more serious matter of the 13th Amendment:

Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime where of the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

Section 2. Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

While this administration’s mad dash to replicate itself like some rogue cancer virus is frustrating, to find we are staring at yet another and decidedly direct assault on the Constitution as stated in HR 1444  is utterly infuriating.  Wonder what Representative John Conyers, Jr, chair of the House Committee on the Judiciary and sponsor of HR 40 (reparation proposals for African-Americans) thinks about involuntary servitude? 

In the case United States v. Kozminski, 487 U.S. 931 (1988), the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that the Thirteenth Amendment did not prohibit compulsion of servitude through psychological coercion but “victim’s vulnerabilities are relevant in determining whether the physical or legal coercion or threats thereof could plausibly have compelled the victim to serve.”  Yet one item in HR 1444 states, “(8) The means to develop awareness of national service and volunteer opportunities at a young age by creating, expanding, and promoting service options for primary and secondary school students and by raising awareness of existing incentives.”  Think that might be something you’d call “psychological coercion”?

Referencing the same case, the U.S. Department of Justice clearly spells out, besides peonage (“debt servitude”) and involuntary servitude, what is considered the coercion of forced labor:

Whoever knowingly provides or obtains the labor or services of a person–

(1) by threats of serious harm to, or physical restraint against, that person or another person;
(2) by means of any scheme, plan, or pattern intended to cause the person to believe that, if the person did not perform such labor or services, that person or another person would suffer serious harm or physical restraint; or
(3) by means of the abuse or threatened abuse of law or the legal process

I believe it to be quite clear that HR 1444’s sponsor James McDermott, and co-sponsors Patrick Kennedy, Dutch Ruppersberger, Christopher Van Hollen, James Moran should all be called out as traitors.  By introducing this legislation they fail to act in the best interests of their constituents by upholding the 13th Amendment as it clearly states is their responsibility, and in turn they betray this nation.  Any other Congress critter who goes along with it should be considered a traitor as well.  This country was founded by those who knew full well the evils of servitude both literal and figurative, and we, the people, have continued to work towards removing it as we have grown as a nation.  To even consider undoing this critical freedom, regardless the flowery phrases used to clothe it in some maniacal distortion of definitions of goodwill, is inexcusable.

She’s Still Talking…

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… and she really, really needs to shut up.

Just because her title is Speaker of the House doesn’t mean that Nancy Pelosi must continue to talk about shutting up everyone else who doesn’t agree with her wacked out, socialistic views.  I’m not going to reinvent the wheel here, but instead simply link to a story about her latest attempts to reinstate the Fairness Doctrine.  This time by trying to use anti-trust laws.

In case you hadn’t yet noticed, Speaker Pelosi, where you and the rest of this administration are concerned, there’s already more than enough anti-trust to go around.