Last week on Frank Beckman's show on WJR 760AM, Frank asked Michigan Congressman Thaddeus McCotter (R-11) if he thought that Obama was engaging in Cloward-Piven Strategy. This question surprised and intrigued me. I wrote about the Cloward-Piven Strategy before (see post Cloward-Piven Strategy), but for those of you who are sadly not frequent readers of my blog, I'll explain it to you now.
The strategy is called the Cloward-Piven Strategy after a pair of radical socialist professors from the 60's who came up with it. The idea is to purposefully create a series of crisis, each one of which will then be blamed on capitalism, de-regulation, low taxes, free markets, etc. After the crisis is at its peak and conservative ideals have been successfully blamed, you then advance a solution for the crisis- a solution to put in place a more socialist, state-run, liberal society. This solution will not make society better, but will instead create more crisis, which you then in turn blame on conservative ideas, and advance more solutions that are liberal. Eventually, the state will take over every aspect of our lives and run our society as a radical socialist utopia.
When I first suggested that the national Democrats were engaging in this policy back in 2008, I was drawing on my long experience watching Democrats in Michigan, particularly Detroit. In our state, Democrats put in place their liberal ideas, they backfire, and we get more liberal ideas, which backfire, leading to more liberal ideas, and eventually, you get Detroit (dominated by liberal Democrats for over 40 years) and to a lesser degree Michigan (dominated by liberal Democrats for almost 8 years). I figured that the series of crisis which followed the Democrats regaining control of Congress in 2006 were not due to bad ideas, incompetence, or just plain stupidity, but due to an organized and concentrated plot to create crisis so that that you could then advance liberal solutions.
For example, this current healthcare bill is not just an idiotic attempt to destroy our nation out of a foolish and misguided attempt to make things better, but a grand conspiracy to actually create a crisis in the healthcare system by putting in place laws and regulations that will lead to higher costs and lower coverage and benefits, and the response then will be an even bigger and stronger healthcare bill (which will then create an even worse situation, like we see in Canada, which will then lead to calls for more government, etc, until government controls everything).
In other words, the Democrats are purposefully overloading the system in an attempt to collapse it- adding more regulations and laws and taxes to our capitalist free-market system so that people will then think that the capitalist free-market system is failing, where in reality it is the very liberal policies that are creating the crisis.
In his interview, Frank Beckman suggested that the Democrats were engaging in this policy. Congressman McCotter disagreed.
McCotter thinks that it isn't an intelligent conspiracy of not letting any crisis go to waste to put in place more government, but rather just plain out liberal elitism and incompetence. He thinks that it is instead simply a selfish desire to create permanent dependent constituencies that will then vote Democrat, who will then distribute benefits to them. It isn't 1984, but rather more like the People's Republic of Haven (from the Honorverse). He makes a good argument, as most liberals that I have come across are really not evil manipulative people, but rather idiots and fools who lack an understanding of people, history, economics, and policy.
It does bear watching though if the pattern laid out in the Cloward-Piven Strategy holds true- if we get another crisis followed by more government control which leads to another crisis and more government control, etc. Keep your eyes on it- we have one more year of Democrats running the show in Congress, and they are sure to create more crisis in our society, either through an orchestrated strategy or incompetence, and keep your eyes out for the resulting 'the market failed' rhetoric and the 'more government is the solution' rhetoric that will follow.
Return to Cloward-Piven Strategy: Beckman Interviews McCotter
Moving Windmills Rebuilds a School
The Moving Windmills Project partners with buildOn.org to rebuild Wimbe Primary School:
The new building project encompasses a master plan for approximately seven new structures over the course of two to three years. Each new school building will sturdy construction, fully equipped classroom, boys’ and girls’ latrines, and, thanks to William Kamkwamba’s design additions, carbon-free hybrid solar/wind power, battery storage systems, lights, ventilation fans and A/C electricity. The plan also provides for a much larger library than the one that inspired William to build his windmill.More here
The Symbolism of Yar Adua's illness
No one denies the fact that symbolism is a greater part of the human culture expressions. A symbol is a reality that points to another reality. The former being merely a pseudo depiction of the beingness of the later which is more a quintessential. In other words, a symbol is less the center of attraction than the object or reality which it represents. If you ask me what symbol should represent a nation, I would say the president...Consequently, it seems undeniable that the much talked about medical condition of the president is a clear pictogram or rather a symbol of the Nigeria‘s national illness. The country is simply sick. And it appears that our frantic efforts to revitalize her proves sterile as had been shown by Yar’Adua’s stubborn illness.More here
An Elite Education is Not Enough Nor is an MBA
William Deresiewicz wrote in American Scholar:
Being an intellectual begins with thinking your way outside of your assumptions and the system that enforces them. But students who get into elite schools are precisely the ones who have best learned to work within the system, so it’s almost impossible for them to see outside it, to see that it’s even there...[continue reading]An observation even more ominous for the future of Africa's productive capacity where the elite adopt a redistributive rather than productive approach to wealth. This is further accentuated by a preference for non-manufacturing MBA's
Yucca Mountain
The Nuclear Waste Policy Act, amended in 1987, designated Yucca Mountain as the national repository for high level nuclear waste in the United States. After passage of that act, the United States spent $9 billion building the Yucca Mountain facility and putting in place every possible safeguard. Congress voted on this issue many times, and for over 20 years has voted to continue funding this project and developing it. This year, after considerable time and debate, Congress voted not to change or amend the Nuclear Waste Policy Act and to continue to legislate that Yucca Mountain will be the national repository for nuclear waste, and appropriated money for this effort.
But this is not a nation built on laws from our legislative branch any more- our nation is turning into a dictatorship of tyranny under Obama. Obama declared that the policy will change, that the Yucca Mountain facility will no longer be considered as a site to store our waste, and that from now on, he is calling the shots in our nation, not Congress. He openly defied Congress and his energy secretary, Steven Chu, has mocked efforts by Congress to have him follow the laws of our nation with regards to this issue.
There is no real backup plan advanced either- Obama in all his brilliance is putting together a 'blue-ribbon' panel to produce a report on what to do with the nuclear waste that is piling up in our nuclear facilities, but nothing will come of this effort and 4 years from now, we'll just have more nuclear waste building up in temporary on-site storage's that were never designed or meant to house spent nuclear material for long periods safely. Obama's policies will hurt the security and environment of our nation, and he is putting these policies in place in clear violation to the laws and policies that Congress has legislated this very year.
The shutting down of the Yucca Mountain project will cost jobs (already thousands are being laid off in Nevada because of this policy decision), will cost energy companies money (they paid billions of their own money for this project and now will have to pay billions more for unsafe temporary storage of spent nuclear waste), and will lead to lower investment in clean and safe nuclear energy (because there is no place to store the waste).
Under George W Bush, thousands of studies were conducted on this issue and extensive research was produced, and after analyzing that data, Congress continued to vote to fund the Yucca Mountain facility and advance its mission of storing waste. But Obama radically altered this policy only two months into office (in March 2009), with no new data, no new studies, and no real reasons presented for the change. It is suspected that the move came as payback to soon-to-be ex-Senator Harry Reid, of Nevada, and as payback to extreme environmental groups that do not support any energy creation, even if it is clean and safe nuclear energy.
You Senators and Congressmen should be contacted about this issue and made aware that the Obama administration has ignored Congress and changed policies and abandoned $9 billion in spending for no good reasons. And if they don't act on this issue and others like it, they should be thrown out of office in 2010.
Stay Hungry Stay Foolish-Steve Jobs
In a most memorable commencement address Steve Jobs states "...Stay Hungry Stay Foolish...":
via TED's Best of Web
Knock, Knock Wash. Teachers' Union Prez George Parker, Anybody There ?
Equality, Relativism, and The Chicago Way
According to Victor Davis Hanson, there are three catalysts/ideas/background/origins that are driving Obama's agenda- Equality of Result, Multiculturalism, and The Chicago Way.
Equality of result is the belief that it isn't fair that some people are born smarter, faster, harder working, talented in different areas, etc, and thus earn more money, earn more respect, or earn more benefits in life. It isn't enough to simply put in place a system that encourages people to achieve to the best of their abilities, because some people's best will be better than other people's best, and they believe that isn't fair. Instead, a system must be put in place which assures equality of result, so that everyone gets everything equally. It's an old idea and an idea that has failed many times over, but that doesn't mean that people don't believe it today. "It isn't fair that not everyone gets healthcare," "it isn't fair that not everyone gets a living wage," etc- the idea is that it is morally wrong for there to exist different end results for different people. Thus the state must step in a correct these wrongs, through various communistic, socialistic, and progressivistic government actions. Obama believes in this philosophy, and since he knows almost nothing of economics, theology, history, or law, he doesn't even realize that he is naive and dangerous for believing in this idea.
Multiculturalism (moral equivalence, utopian pacifism, post-modernism, moral relativism, etc) is the idea that the origin of the unhappiness and unfufillment of today’s women/nonwhites/poor comes from the historical 'privileges' of the white Christian Western males, who have come to dominate society through oppression of said women/nonwhites/poor. Poverty and unhappiness are not due to accident, fate, bad luck, bad decisions, poor judgment, illegality or drug use, or simple tragedy, but rather exclusively to a system that is rigged to ensure oppression on the basis of race, class, and gender. Thus there is a need for government to level the playing field by redistributing the wealth and opportunities away from white male Christians. Obama learned these ideas sitting in the pew listening to Rev. Wright for 20 years, and you can hear echo's of these ideas when he talks about how his his wife is a victim (even though she makes 300K/year) and reflexively stands up to protect Professor Gates.
The last motivation that Victor Davis Hanson points to for Obama is his training in politics in Chicago, where he learned 'The Chicago Way.' This is the idea that a small insider clique can control the government, that the wheels of government can be greased with bribes and by pork projects, and that every word that comes out of Obama's mouth means nothing at all- they are 'words, just words' as Obama put it. This is how Obama rose to power, and this is how he views power.
I've long noticed these same things. Don't believe me? Then go back and read some of the following posts:
The Good and Bad of Obama
Obama: Promising Everything, Delivering Nothing
Barack Obama - Narcissistic Personality Disorder?
Corruption, Thy Name is Democrat
Liberalism is a Religion
The Religion of the Democrats
Elections Have Consequences
From Nolan Finley in the Detroit News today:
The wisest quote of 2009 came from President Barack Obama, who cut off belligerent Republicans with the reminder: "Elections have consequences." They surely do. And Americans are paying the consequences of the 2008 election.Anyone who failed to vote Republican for every single race last election, this is on you as much is it is on the moron's who vote Democrat. And I hate to say "I told you so", but I did- my post from 10/11/08 was entitled An Obama Win Means No Opposition to Socialism. I wrote then these words, which are now coming back to haunt our nation:
The old saw, "power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely," applies perfectly to the process we're witnessing in Washington. This is how legislating works when there's no check on power. Some of the stuff we've seen over the past couple of months would qualify as criminal coercion, vote buying and bribery if it were the private sector writing the checks.
But as Obama pointed out, elections have consequences. So at least for the next year, this Democratic Congress will be able to do whatever it pleases.
A vote for Republicans is a vote for some opposition, for some other view, for some other segment of our society to be represented in government.You should have listened to me.
African Media Leaders Forum 2009
Ideas to ponder from the African Media Leaders Forum,Tolu Ogunlesi in 3QuarksDaily:
Continue reading
- Monetising content
- The Obama Effect
- The Law OF ‘KATO’
- The State Versus The Market
Top Ten Foreign Policy Blunders of 2009
From Telegraph, via Powerline:
Barack Obama's Top Ten Foreign Policy Blunders of the Year:
- Surrendering to Russia over missile defence.
- Appeasing the mullahs of Iran.
- Ending the war on terror.
- Announcing a surge while declaring an exit.
- Apologizing to France for America's "arrogance."
- Giving DVDs to the British Prime Minister.
- Siding with Marxists in Honduras.
- Bowing to emperors and kings.
- Embracing genocidal killers in Sudan.
- Throwing Churchill out of the White House.
'Contemporary African Art Since 1980'
In Boing Boing:
Contemporary African Art Since 1980, a new book by Okwui Enwezor and Chika Okeke-Agulu,The book explores how political, social, and cultural changes over the past thirty years have shaped urban, indigenous, and globalized "diasporic" art forms. Contemporary African Art is a roadmap of change and of evolving identities.More here
Merry Christmas!
From my heart, I really do hope that all of you have a wonderful Christmas, filled with family, friends, and joy. Forget politics, forget economics, forget the environment, and just enjoy the real things that matter in this world.
Merry Christmas everyone!
Zain Africa Challenge
From JoyOnline, the objective of the Zain Africa Challenge:
"...is to develop the intellect of Africa’s youth and highlight the excellent educational opportunities that African Universities offer to its citizens."...“Zain will be awarding 50,000 USD to the winning University and 5,000 USD to the student contestants, which is part of the company’s 1,000,000 USD total investment in cash, educational grants and teaching materials,”The questions in the fast-paced quiz programme cover a wide range of topical areas including: history, science, African culture, geography, literature, music and current events.More here
How roads hold back African exports...
Caroline Freund and Nadia Rocha write in Vox:
It has been shown that poor trade infrastructure is a key reason for Africa's weak exports. This column goes a step further and provides evidence that the delays in inland transport are the most crucial factor restricting Sub-Saharan Africa's trade. Policy makers’ focus on foreign trade policy may therefore be misguided.Continue reading
Photo courtesy of Global Envision
Debt Ceiling Rises; Another Car in the Long Train of Abuses?
In a dramatic Christmas eve vote, the Senate voted massively increase the amount of debt that the United States government is going to pile up, raising the ceiling on the government debt to $12.4 trillion, an amount that should only be enough to last through February, analysts say.
With the move, Democrats in Congress announced that they had no intention of ever balancing the budget and intend to pile up as much debt as rapidly as they can before they are thrown out of office. The move will surely doom generations of future Americans to poverty and crippling interest payments, but the Congressman of the broken 'me-first' hippy generation of the '60's and '70's signalled that it doesn't care at all for the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of our nation, who will not see the benefits of this spending (Social Security, Medicaid, Medicare, etc are all projected to be bankrupt within 20 years) but will see this debt.
Democrats applauded the move to raise the debt ceiling to $12,400,000,000,000, saying that in order to pay off all of the politically connected groups that vote Democrat, it is necessary to give ever increasingly amounts of money.
President Obama also applauded the move, saying that after campaigning last year as a moderate and as someone who will balance the budget that it is only fitting that people who believed his lies will pay for them now by destruction of the futures of their kids and grandkids.
Thank you Senators and Congressman for screwing over my kids with this vote. At some point, the risk-reward ratio for voting and changing the system vs bloody revolution and overthrow will switch, and that point is coming quickly.
Governments long established should not be overthrown because of passing and light mistakes- but these permanent and brutal blows that the Democrats are laying on the people are moving beyond light and transient. What the Democrats are doing is passing many many laws in a row which demonstrate their ultimate goal of tyranny and oppression, and if that is the case, it is my right and duty to destroy the United States government and put in place a new government for the benefit of our future, a government that will protect the life, liberty, and property of my children and grandchildren. That point is rapidly approaching.
What does a Warlord do?
...most of what Ryszard Kapuscinski wrote about the warlord phenomenon still applies to the handful of ex-students and poorly educated former army sergeants who have been plundering the northern half of Ivory Coast for the past seven years. "Warlords," he writes in The Shadow of the Sun, "are the sowers of tribal and racial hatred in Africa. They will never admit to this. They will always proclaim they are leading a national movement or party...What does a warlord do? Theoretically, he fights with other warlords. Most frequently, however, he is busy robbing his own country’s unarmed population. The warlord is the opposite of Robin Hood. He takes from the poor to enrich himself and feed his gangs. We are in a world in which misery condemns some to death and transforms others into monsters. The former are the victims, the latter are the executioners. There is no one else.”More here
Photo courtesy of Screaming Pen
Watching a Liberal Teacher Indoctrinate Youth
Last week as part of my mandated professional development I observed another teacher teaching their students. I use the term 'teaching' loosely- indoctrinating is a more accurate description of what that teacher does every day in her classroom.
The class began with students being given an article by a very liberal slanted New York Times columnist named Garry Wills. The topic of the article was about how George Bush has destroyed our economy and country, and that the best hope for America is to support the Democrats agenda without question or thought.
At no other time were any other articles assigned on this issue, and at no time was any other viewpoint presented by the teacher to the students. In the self-contained world of that classroom, there was one agenda presented and information and views presented from that one liberal direction alone.
After reading the article, the teacher then asked the class to talk about the arguments put forth by the author and discuss why they were true and what implications they have for the future of America. Yup- once the class of innocent high school students was provided with information from one point of view only the next step for that teacher was to have the students validate that information and internalize it so that it wasn't just something that they read, but something they would really believe. She had the students practice lines from the article, and pretend to debate 'conservatives' by offering up straw men arguments and then having the students act out how to be a super liberal. Once students became comfortable with the ideas, the thoughts, and the arguments, the teacher made them comfortable playing the part and believing in those things. With a sick feeling in my stomach, I watched the indoctrination occur, knowing that every day this is what this teacher did.
Afterwards, I asked the teacher what her goals were with this lesson. "I want to teach students to think critically about issues that they face in the world and talk about how they can change the world," she said. I did not point out to her that taking data and validating it and talking about why that data was true is not critical thinking; in fact, it was the opposite of critical thinking. Teaching students critical thinking is what we do in my classroom- we taken arguments from liberals and conservatives and attack them and tear them apart, looking for weaknesses, holes, or flaws in their theories and arguments. This teacher did the opposite- she made students read and then buy into liberal views.
I tried to point this out to her in a very cautious and roundabout manner, and her defenses went up. She told me "In order for these kids to become good students, it is important that they know that George Bush and the Republicans are wrong and that their views are not acceptable in our society. They hear otherwise on trashy talk shows and Fox News and from their parents, so it is my job to teach them that those people are wrong and that I am right and that they should always follow President Obama."
To this teacher, and to thousands of teachers around the nation, their job is not to teach math, science, reading, writing, or history. Their job, as they believe it to be, is to indoctrinate the youth of our nation into accepting and fighting for tyranny. Their jobs are to teach students to disobey their parents and throw down man so that he can be raised up again as a new man, more progressive and communist. This teacher had dozens of lesson plans created for this purpose (I went through her folders and piles on her desks when she wasn't looking) and every day she was dedicated in her mission.
As I went back to my classroom, I was conflicted. In my room, I present both views and work hard to not indoctrinate students one way or the other. And I am one of the more conservative teachers in all of my district. If I'm being moderate, how warped are students going to be when the moderates lean left and the leftists dedicate their lives to moving students left. What sort of students are our education system going to produce? It is a scary thought indeed.
UPDATE: Thanks for checking out this post! If you liked it, take a couple minutes to look around my blog and my archives and read some other stories of interest! Enjoy!
Yes, They Can
The Viscount Monckton of Brenchley described in a recent post being knocked out by a Danish cop in Copenhagen as he attended the party that was the UN Climatefest of Global Warming Believers. When he came to, he was struck with the brilliance that only can come as you realize he horror that you are in an insane asylum and the inmates are running it:
...I came to some time later (not sure exactly how long), to find my head being cradled by my friends, some of whom were doing their best to keep the police thugs at bay while the volunteer ambulance-men attended to me.... ...However, the Danish police were far too free with their hands when pushing us around, and that is not acceptable in a free society. But then, Europe is no longer a free society. It is, in effect, a tyranny ruled by the unelected Kommissars of the European Union. That is perhaps one reason why police forces throughout Europe, including that in the UK, have become far more brutal than was once acceptable in their treatment of the citizens they are sworn to serve. It is exactly this species of tyranny that the UN would like to impose upon the entire planet, in the name of saving us from ourselves – or, as Ugo Chavez would put it, saving us from Western capitalist democracy. A few weeks ago, at a major conference in New York, I spoke about this tendency towards tyranny with Dr. Vaclav Klaus, the distinguished economist and doughty fighter for freedom and democracy who is President of the Czech Republic. While we still have one or two statesmen of his caliber, there is hope for Europe and the world. Unfortunately, he refused to come to Copenhagen, telling me that there was no point, now that the lunatics were firmly in control of the asylum. However, I asked him whether the draft Copenhagen Treaty’s proposal for what amounted to a communistic world government reminded him of he Communism under which he and his country had suffered for so long.He thought for a moment – as statesmen always do before answering an unusual question – and said, “Maybe it is not brutal. But in all other respects, what it proposes is far too close to Communism for comfort.” Today, as I lay in the snow with a cut knee, a bruised back, a banged head, a ruined suit, and a written-off coat, I wondered whether the brutality of the New World Order was moving closer than President Klaus – or any of us – had realized.Modifying a bit from what Richard Fernandez at the Belmont Club says in his post on this, people have always believed that ‘they can’t do that here; they can’t foist this fraud on me; they can’t take over 15% of the US economy just like that; they can’t give my tax money to Hugo Chavez; they can’t borrow money from China in my name and give to China, etc.’ But one day the answer to those questions will be “Yes, they can”.
RIF'ed DC Teachers Challenge Union Colleagues To Fight
Teachers and school counselors who were recently laid off by the Rhee administration have stepped up their fight on behalf of unfairly laid off teacher colleagues. These group of laid off teachers and school staff are known as Fight for Fired DC personnel. Included in this activist group are Washington Teachers’ Union Executive Board members Sheila Gill, Willie Brewer and Agnes Dyson. This group plans to work to combat unfair November 2 teacher cuts by Chancellor Rhee’s administration.
Abstained from voting: Maria Angala (teacher/Jefferson MS), Joyce Armoo ( teacher/Seaton ES), Deborah Hines (teacher/Beers ES) , Andre’ Taylor (itinerant librarian), Robert Willis (RIF’d teacher/Ballou SHS)
Voted No: Camille Locke (teacher/Hart MS) , Erich Martel (teacher/Wilson SHS ), Lorraine Smith (teacher/Bancroft ES)
Voted Yes: Willie Brewer (RIF'ed teacher/Marshall ES) , Agnes Dyson (RIF'ed teacher/Woodson SHS), Sheila Gill (RIF'ed counselor/McKinley TSHS) , Nathan Saunders (WTU Gen. V.P.), Diane Terrell (teacher/Stoddert ES).
Not Allowed To vote: Candi Peterson, WTU Board of Trustees
* According to Parliamentarian, John Tatum’s interpretation, WTU Board of Trustees are not allowed to vote even as ex-officio member’s of the WTU Executive Board. I have repeatedly challenged this interpretation to no avail.
Absent: Sallie Littlejohn Dorsey, Pablo Giron’, Jackie Hines (BOT), Milton Bruce Williams, Rashida Young
Retired or resigned: Derek Davis, Gloria Everette, Tenia Pritchard, Joshua Rascoe
Given that there were five YES votes mostly from the laid off WTU Executive Board members to three NO votes, the motion passed. The WTU President agreed to notify our lawyer On December 16 that the motion passed and request that he prepare his legal appeal.
Posted by The Washington Teacher featuring Candi Peterson, blogger in residence
Missing the Africa investment opportunity
Alonzo Fulgham wrote in CS Monitor:
Normally, by the time an investment tip makes its way into a newspaper, conventional wisdom says the money is already off the table. Not so in the case of sub-Saharan Africa. American investors and companies are overlooking an investment opportunity in plain sight. And the smart money will climb aboard before the economic tide rises. The rest will miss a fast-moving boat.More here
The Battle is Joined
Charles Krauthammer has picked up on the fact that we are once again living in interesting times:
Which brings us to the age of Obama, perhaps the most exhilarating time of all. There is nothing as bracing for democracy as the alternation of power, particularly when it yields as serious, determined and challenging an ideological agenda as Barack Obama's. This third wave of transformative liberalism -- FDR, then LBJ, now Obama -- is no time for triangulation. This is not incrementalism. We're not debating school uniforms. When Obama once declared Ronald Reagan historically consequential and Bill Clinton not, he meant it. Obama intends to be the Reagan of the new liberalism. The prospect of combative and clarifying 2010s, of sharply defined and radically opposed visions, is both politically and intellectually invigorating.He's right- after Reagan's Presidency that marked the 1980's and the Republicans took back Congress in the 1990's, everything got better, and success and prosperity was boring and predictable and happy, and a sizable number of people couldn't handle that and rejected that. They rejected the 'jobless' 4% GDP growth of the Bush years, they rejected the victory over evil enemies in Iraq, they rejected the accountability of our education system, and they demanded a change. And they got it.
The election of Obama and rise of the liberals in Congress changed America- it marks the end of our nation as a free, prosperous nation built on liberty, freedom, rule of law, and protection of property rights. The new USA that Obama is building, the hope for many and the change from the past, is a nation built on nationalization and government takeover of privately owned and operated industries like the auto companies and healthcare and banking, of unelected bureaucrats in the EPA or czars like the pay czar determining what sorts of policy we will follow as a nation, of the rise in the power of the person and the violation of the rules of law by people, of increasing tyranny and dehumanization of those opposed to their tyrannical agenda, and the fall of morals and values in society.
The change that Obama represents is a change that I oppose with the whole strength of my being, and which I now fight on every front that I can possibly fight it on- I resist the rise in drug use, I resist the increase in abortions, I resist the rise in unemployment, I resist the increase in disrespect in our society, I resist the rise in sexting and underage sex, and I reject other changes the Obama's policies represent.
And because I resist and fight this change of Obama, it is going to be an interesting decade that we are looking forward to. The children of Reagan, embracing the conservative principles on which our nation was built and recognizing the benefits and beauty of the free market and religion and liberty, are going to be engaging an all out war against a generation of lost and sad individuals who embrace meaningless phrases as they stumble through their religion-less life believing in ghosts and global warming, fighting to establish communism and fascism in our society. Through this battle, America will emerge either stronger and more certain of itself and its place in the world, or weaker and less certain of its future as a nation in this world.
Expect the '10's to be a wild ride. Indeed, Our Long Conservative Nightmare is Over
and May You Live in Interesting Times.
SME's-innovation comes in small packages
SA's Human Sciences Research Council urges further focus on SME's
Small, medium and micro-sized enterprises (SMMEs), a central policy focus area in South Africa, specifically with regard to economic growth and employment creation, have the potential to become engines of innovation. But lack of funding hampers the sector's innovation development. Irma Wilkinson believes that current SMME policies and programmes need to be broadened to stimulate innovation.More here
Michigan Senators Fail to Game Corrupt Healthcare Bill
The Democrats made a lot of corrupt insider deals in order to get the 60 votes needed to shut off debate on the issue of 1/6 of our economy and jam through without a single vote from the other major party in our nation a bill that will in the end increase the cost of healthcare with dozens of new taxes and government agencies and lower the number of people covered by private healthcare by bankrupting insurance companies and jobs-providers. And Michigan, as usual with our our inept representation in the Senate, got nothing.
Nebraska Sen. Ben Nelson traded his vote on this issue for an estimated $45 million in federal Medicaid funds funneled to his state, enough to completely cover his state's costs of complying with an expansion of the program mandated by the bill. This money was taken from residents all around the country and is now being sent to Nebraska simply because that Senator held out the longest and was able to game the system for increased kick-backs and bribes. But he wasn't the only one.
The Senators in Vermont (1 Democrat and 1 Socialist) and Massachusetts (2 Democrats) also won additional Medicaid funds in exchange for promising to vote for the bill. Senators in North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming and Montana also managed to find ways to make insider deals and game the corrupt system of passing legislation under Democratic leadership, scamming additional Medicare funds for their states, and also the good Senators from Hawaii (2 Democrats) exchanged their votes for additional taxpayer money funneled to their state.
Read the story here.
Michigan received no additional money and was not able to scavenge a piece of the dying carcass of the United States taxpayers because Michigan's two Senators, Carl Levin and Debbie Stabmenow, are so extremely liberal, so partisan, and so far to the left that their determined ambitions to expand the size of government blinded them to the opportunity that existed with the passage of this 'healthcare bill' to funnel kick backs and bribes to the residents of our good state.
This is not to say that I endorse this process or applaud the actions of Senators who, in what I feel is a violation of the Constitution, took bribes in exchange for their votes. I'm just saying that Michigan Senators continue their record on turning the residents of Michigan into a donor state that transfers wealth from our citizens to the citizens of other states purely because of their representation is better at the political game than ours. If our Senators did this out of principle or because they rejected bribes, that would be one thing, but the real reason that our state didn't get any corrupt kick backs is pure incompetence.
As this year ends, we are witnessing some pretty shocking behavior by the Democrats. If you know anyone who is a voter, they need to vote Republican for every single race next election. Republicans aren't perfect, but at least when they were in charge they never engaged in this irresponsible one-sided orgy of spending funded by corrupt bribes and kickbacks.
If you want, you can call Senators Levin and Stabmenow, but it won't have much of an effect- they don't care a bit what you think about this issue, otherwise they'd be listening to the opinion polls that show over 60% of the people reject what they are trying to do. Your Michigan Senators don't care about you, don't care what you think, and would sooner kick you in the face than talk to you about healthcare debate. Senator Stabmenow doesn't owe you anything anyways- she has long been bought off by special interest groups from California- and has spent her time in office figuring out ways to funnel money to her campaign coffers, not to Michigan residents.
UPDATE I: Michelle Malkin has two complete lists of all of the bribes that were used to pass this healthcare bill- as you can see from list one and list two of the bribe lists, there were a lot of deals that were made using your taxpayer money.
It turns out, Michigan Senator Carl Levin was able to get a little kickback in return for trading his vote. The 'Healthcare Bill" includes a new $7 billion tax on nonprofit insurance companies, but for some unexplained reason, Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Michigan will be exempt from this tax. Levin received a lot of funding from BCBS last election, as did Democrats in general, and so in exchange for money for their re-election campaigns they fought hard to make sure that while every other company is taxed, they are exempt.
So it looks like Levin was able to win a concession for a major company in Michigan, although I still feel he sold his vote for very little. Stabmenow remains in my mind an utter failure in every possible way as a Senator.
Incidentally, this just highlights yet another reason why I oppose this bill so vigorously. Raising taxes on nonprofit insurance companies will not 'cut into the profits of those evil healthcare robber barons.' They are nonprofit. They will pay for that tax by raising prices on the customers- ie, they will raise the cost of healthcare coverage on those who are currently paying it. That is what this Demcare bill does- it will raise the cost of healthcare coverage on those who do pay for it in order to provide enhanced healthcare to those who do not pay for it.
UPDATE II: Not surprisingly, the deal that Nebraska cut in exchange for its vote is almost certain to be unconstitutional, and attorney generals all over the nation are looking into suing the federal government if this unconstitutional bill becomes law.
Global Warming Worshippers Like Ancient Babylonians
The Daily Kos article Aliens, Elves, and the Politics of Utopia begins well:
Every year in Babylonia, the gods came out to play. On feast days, people lined the streets as the statues of the gods, festooned in gold and jewels, were paraded through Ur and Kish and Eridu. In Babylon, priests ascended the seven tiers of the massive ziggurat and stood next to the golden bull horns at each corner. There they recounted the story of the Enûma Elish, explaining how Marduk came to rule over the other gods. In the time before time, Lord Marduk had slain the vast dragon-goddess of chaos, Tiamat. Seas were forced back from land. The order of day and night was fixed. The borders of the great city were set and the stones of the ziggurat stacked by the god's divine hand.Everything that comes after in that article is pure garbage full of a lack of knowledge about history and people, but that first part caught my interest, because there is a group out there today that worships the Babylonian Gods and imagines a world that was once perfect and ordered, that once had the seas in their perfect places and the trees neatly aligned and marching forever, and where the people of the world were controlled and ruled by powerful elites. These worshippers of pagan religion just got done with a conference in Copenhagen.
Those people at the Copenhagen conference imagine a world ruled by gods- elite individuals who are no men but are transformative individuals outside of men- better than us, smarter than us, and stronger than us. They work in the United Nations, they are dictators controlling nations like Cuba or Venezuela or Cuba, and they are the unelected technocrats running the European Union.
The purpose of the gods, as imagined by those who believe in global warming and support the proposals that came out of the Copenhagen conference, is to restore order and keep the people under control. They fear chaos, they fear the unknown, and they have a burning need to control every aspect of society. The globe and the weather than rages around the globe is untamed and uncontrolled, and that scares them. Learning that the data that they use to control the globe may be wrong terrifies them. The free market and capitalism frighten these people because these are the chaos that man is supposed to control. Democracy and free will mean nothing to these people- the Babylonian Gods never gave man a choice in their affairs and never judged them for their choices, they just ruled them and class conflicts ensued.
When conservatives gather at their tea parties, they shout liberty and freedom and talk history, science, religion, and philosophy. They pick up after themselves, wave flags, and dress in the colors of red, white, and blue. There is no drinking or drugs, and people police themselves for language and human decency (I know, I've been to several- read My Report from the Birmingham Healthcare Rally or Report from Peters Townhall Sept 09). Their 'festivals' are subdued, intense, patriotic events that evoke images of our founding fathers arguing in the streets for life, liberty, and protection of property.
By contrast, when liberals gather at events such as the one in Copenhagen, they are pagans on festival day, lining the streets, festooned in outlandish outfits, having parade after parade, lavish party after lavish party, and engaging in pagan behavior that embraces drugs, alcohol, swearing, sex, and general human debauchery. They loose themselves in trances and are overcome by spirits that give them license to engage in behavior that would not be acceptable in any other format. They are the pagan worshippers of Babylonia, and if they had their way, the worshippers of other religions would be kept in slaves and mocked at for not engaging in their sad fantasy world.
God’s letter to Nigerians
Okey Ndibe writes in Sahara reporters:
At the slightest provocation – in fact, often at no provocation at all – Nigerians invoke God’s name. In today’s column, I imagine a letter God has written to Nigerians titled “You’re on your own.” Here goes. Beloved Nigerians (yes, I call you beloved even though many of you are among the world’s most unrepentant sinners), I’m going to be blunt.More here
From the UN Millenium Office-"Stop Aid"
Are the UN Millenium crew coming to their senses? The Guardian reports on comments made by Sylvia Mwichuli:
African countries need to find alternative sources to money to finance their national budgets, rather than rely on overseas aid, according to an official from the UN millennium campaign..."African governments must find ways of financing development; we are calling for a paradigm shift in financing of development, not depending on donors,"More here
Palin Joking
Via Sharp Right Turn comes this humor from Republican Governor Sarah Palin, who was speaking at the winter dinner of the Gridiron Club, an organization of Washington-based journalists. According to reports, Palin was able to poke fun at herself, the politicians in the room, Obama, Democrats, Joe Biden, and the McCain campaign:
- Palin joked that she was looking at a magazine cover of Obama and Chinese president Hu Jinato during an airplane flight and a nearby passenger stated, “Hu’s the Communist.” Palin said, “I thought he was asking a question."
- Sarah Palin poked fun at herself in a speech to journalists Saturday night, drawing laughter when she announced she “came down from my hotel room and I could see the Russian embassy.”
- The 2008 Republican vice presidential candidate also joked that she had originally thought of titling her book “How To Look Like a Million Bucks, for Only $150,000″ before settling on “Going Rogue.”
- If the election had turned out differently, she said, “I could be the one overseeing the signing of bailout checks and vice president Biden could be on the road selling his book, ‘Going Rogaine.’” (Biden has sparse hair).
- As for her hosts, she said she was glad to be appearing before an elite audience of leading intellectuals, “or as I like to call it, a death panel.”
- McCain’s campaign staff also came in for a barb from the former Alaska governor when she said she is touring the country by bus as she sells her book. “The view is so much better from inside the bus than under it,” she said, referring to the poisonous relations between her and some of the McCain campaign staff.
Wade's path to Centralisation and Decadence
Amy Niang writes about the decline of leadership under the Senegalese president:
The implications for state-building in Senegal and similar regimes are clear: democratic change may be a prerequisite but the absence of an institutionalised effort to stabilise the system beyond the regime remains an obstacle. The Wade administration may have few days of glory left. But the damage done by his ruling style to the state-building project is immense. The nominal state has become a carcass institution with a flag and an anthem. Its leading structure is a coalition of an amorphous body made of new political aristocrats whose main characteristics are wealth and relative economic prosperity.More here
Send in the Senate Clowns: Jokers and Fools Run Democratic Senate
Amazing. In the hundreds of years of our nation's history, rarely has the Senate degenerated to the point where it has after the Democrats took it over. The madness and funny games began early yesterday but only got worse as the day went on, as this party made a mockery of tradition, decorum, and the rules of the chamber.
The first bit of fun was when Senator Tom Coburn objected to a request to waive the reading of an amendment that was offered by Senator Bernie Sanders. The Senate rules state that an amendment must be read in full unless the entire Senate, by unanimous consent, agrees to waive that requirement, in which case the Senator offering up the amendment can just explain it and give an outline of what it does.
Earlier that day, Coburn had offered an amendment to the healthcare bill that would have required the bill to been available for at least 72 hours before it could be voted on, but the Democrats did not allow that amendment to receive a vote. In response, Coburn later objected to the request to waive the reading of Sanders bill, as per Senate rules.
Sanders was outraged by the action, as Democrats reacted furiously to the reading of their bill out loud in the Senate. After three hours of reading only about a quarter of the bill had been read, and then Sanders withdrew his amendment and the reading of it stopped, in violation of Senate rules which stipulate that any amendment proposed must be read in its entirety (although to be fair, it is not clear if the reading has to continue if the bill is withdrawn).
The Democrats were outraged that the rules were being asked to be followed and that they were being forced to read the bills that they are proposing (no one has yet to even see a copy of the latest health care bill that is being proposed), alleging that it was all a giant conspiracy and that the rules shouldn't have to be followed when they are ruling the nation. Coburn's move was most likely a delaying tactic, but it was an acceptable tactic that has been used frequently in the past in the Senate, and as such should the Democrats should not have reacted like they did.
Later that day, the madness continued, when in a bit of petty and bitter vindictiveness that joke-of-a-Senator Al Franken shut down Senator and 2000 Democratic VP-nominee Joseph Lieberman. Lieberman spoke for 10 minutes on the Senate floor about a health care amendment that he is co-sponsoring, and then after his 10 minutes expired, Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) — the president chair of the Senate at the time — informed Lieberman his time was up.
When Lieberman politely requested “just an additional moment,” to finish, and Franken rudely barked out, “In my capacity as Senator from Minnesota, I object.” “Really??” a clearly surprised Lieberman said before he returned to his seat.
Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) later spoke about this issue, saying "I’ve never seen a member denied an extra minute or so, as the chair just did." Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI also spoke about this, saying "If the chair would yield for that…I think the same thing did occur earlier this afternoon, for reasons which have to do with trying to get this bill going..."
Levin and McCain and Lieberman have been Senators for years, and Franken has only been a Senator for a short time after stealing the election, but that does not excuse he rude behavior. Other Democrats are leaping now to defend Franken, proving that they don't respect the rules of that chamber and are willing to tolerate all sorts of thuggish and rude behavior in their quest to change America into a country where this sort of behavior is encouraged.
At their worst Republicans were never as vindictive, rude, irresponsible, and downright ugly as the Democrats are today running the United States Senate. Anyone who voted Democrat at any level should be ashamed at themselves and what they did to our nation.
Democrats More Likely to Believe in Ghosts, Global Warming, Psychic Powers, Stimulus Bills, Single Payer, and Astrology
A new study from the bipartisan Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life found that liberals and Democrats are far more likely to believe in ghosts, psychic powers and astrology than their conservative/Republican counterparts. About 50 percent more Democrats than Republicans say they have spoken to the dead.
Michael Graham, writing in the Boston Herald, isn't surprised by this find at all- to him, it is obvious that the essence of contemporary liberalism is the ability to believe in nonsense:
I'm not surprised by this Pew Study either, having realized long ago that liberals will believe in almost anything (except that we have God-given rights to life, liberty, and property). Check out some of my ideas and thoughts about what Democrats believe in this post- The Religion of the Democrats.This week, President Obama and his fellow Democrats told “60 Minutes” that they are serious about dealing with America’s debt problem. That very same Sunday, Senate Democrats pushed through a $1.1 trillion spending bill, every penny of which has to be borrowed.
President “No More Earmarks” is going to sign a bill that includes subsidies for Amtrak, a government pay raise and more than 5,000 individual earmarks for pork-barrel pols to send home the bacon. The ObamaCrats need to raise the debt ceiling by $1.8 trillion just to get through the 2010 elections. That’s as much debt in one year as the entire eight years of George W. Bush.
Then there’s the latest version of health care reform put forward by Sen. Harry Reid. We all know what great financial shape Medicare is in, right? (“It’s not technically bankrupt, it just needs more money” - Barney Frank).
Now Democrats want you to believe that the way to fix health care is to push millions of Americans into becoming new Medicare patients, while simultaneously cutting the Medicare budget by $500 million. It’s going broke, you’re adding millions of patients while cutting billions of dollars - and you think it will fix the problem?
I don’t believe in man-made CO2, that tiny fraction of all greenhouse gases in the atmosphere that Al Gore believes has the power to destroy the Earth. I don’t believe in Cinderella courtrooms with charms to turn international terrorists into mere criminals with all the rights of U.S. citizens. And I don’t believe in invisible jobs “saved” by magic “stimulus” money in Neverland’s 99th Congressional District.
The Fomunyoh Foundation of Cameroon
The Fomunyoh Foundation (TFF) on Paul Biya,Cameroon's long term dictator:
...he has systematically undermined Cameroon's legal and political institutions to perpetuate his own rule. He has minimized the role of the legislative and judiciary branches of government and totally ignored input from opposition parties and civil society. He has also co-opted most of the traditional authority in the country, where 55 percent of the population lives in rural areas under the influence of powerful chiefs and lamida.
MI Congressman Peters One of the Most Partisan, Most Liberal, Most Bitter, Most Divisive, and Most Bought Off Congressman in the Whole Congress
In a vote analysis conducted by The Washington Post, liberal Gary Peters was found to have voted with his party and with liberal Nancy Pelosi over 96% of the time over the last 11 months.
That puts Peters in the same company with New York's ethically-challenged Charlie Rangel, California's "Big Three Killer" Henry Waxman, and Massachusetts' Barney Frank (who precipitated the mortgage-back securities meltdown).
How does he compare to all Democratic members in the House? Gary is MORE PARTISAN than the average Democratic members and MORE PARTISAN than average Republican member.
Who else is Peters more partisan than? Ironically enough, though he campaigned as an independent, moderate, pro-business fiscally conservative Democrat, Gary Peters has proven to be MORE PARTISAN than former Congressman Joe Knollenberg, whom Peters lambasted for supposedly voting in lock step with his party and with President George Bush.
According to The Washington Post, in his last term in Congress, Rep. Joe Knollenberg's voting record was SIGNIFICANTLY LESS PARTISAN than Gary Peters.' What's more, Knollenberg was less partisan than Peters over the course of his entire eight terms in Congress.
Peters' intensely liberal, partisan voting record isn't surprising given the fact that he was recruited, bought and paid for by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, liberal environmentalist groups, and Big Union dollars.
This year, Peters has accepted nearly HALF A MILLION DOLLARS in special interest campaign contributions from LOBBYISTS and POLITICAL ACTION COMMITTEES. That’s money from unions, from trial lawyers, from health care lobbyists and from Wall Street. Peters is NOT an independent voice; he’s bought and paid for by his liberal special interest cronies. His voting record shows it.
For the record, I didn't support Peters but wasn't that enthusiastic about Knollenberg, but am very excited about Rocky Raczkowski, who hopefully will be the Republican nominee that challenges Peters in the 9th District. He is a solid conservative and a recent war veteran, and would be a much better legislator for Michigan's 9th than Peters has proven to be.
Hat tip to Michgan's 9th.
Climate Change contd.
James Shikwati writes:
For resource rich Africa, the Copenhagen meeting if not well debated, might provide yet another excuse for wealthy nations to seek to micro manage mineral exploitation on the continent. It is therefore crucial that the continent's experts and leadership focus on judicious parameters for exploitation, and use of technology to ensure clean usage of the same. Climate change eschatology through the fear of "melting earth" or "end of the world" should not be used to render a resource rich continent poor at the stroke of the pen simply because world powers are at each others throats over resources.More here
Gods with No Free Will or Men with Free Will- The Real Choice in Copenhagen
Ben Stein begins his latest article from The American Spectator with a quote from Shakespeare:
Compare this writing to the usual drivel you get from the liberals in support of control over every aspect of our lives in the name of global warming. Here is George Moonbot, writing in the Guardian:"What a piece of work is man! How noble in reason! How infinite in faculty!…In apprehension how like a god…" so said the Bard, and of course, he was right. Man's capacities, for good and evil, are stupefying. In science, in language, in war, in healing, how miraculous are man's achievements.
And yet, so much eludes us and how tiny we are compared with our challenges. Disease strikes us down in our prime. We age and grow weak and then pass away, often cruelly. We make war upon our own kind and kill largely for sport. We cannot control the tides or the sun or man's theft from man.
But we try to rise above our puniness compared with our problems and pretend that we have solutions and explanations that will take away much of the mystery of life and history and make everything clear. We create models that we think make us appear to be gods.
On one hand, you have an educated man quoting Shakespeare and realizing that man is indeed a flawed person and not able to design a perfect system to figure out the world, but that man does a have a free will and that way to make the world a better place is to unleash that free will. On the other hand you have a man saying that the time is now, that we are the world, that everything is about us, that we are perfect people and can design systems to control every aspect of our lives, but that we should not have free will and liberty.This is the moment at which we turn and face ourselves. Here, in the plastic corridors and crowded stalls, among impenetrable texts and withering procedures, humankind decides what it is and what it will become. It chooses whether to continue living as it has done, until it must make a wasteland of its home, or to stop and redefine itself. This is about much more than climate change. This is about us.
The summit's premise is that the age of heroism is over. We have entered the age of accommodation. No longer may we live without restraint. No longer may we swing our fists regardless of whose nose might be in the way. In everything we do we must now be mindful of the lives of others, cautious, constrained, meticulous. We may no longer live in the moment, as if there were no tomorrow.
My question is which hand would you like to smack around moonbots with when they try to take away your liberty and freedom in the name of putting in place their perfect plans for running your life.
Permanent Poverty the South & Climate Change Talks
Franklin Cudjoe and Richard Tren write in the Bangkok Post:
The question is whether or not developing nations should be permitted to harness their natural resources to lift their people out of poverty. Many rich-nation delegates, particularly from Europe, say "no" as they fear such development will exacerbate climate change and ecological degradationMore here via African Liberty
Al Gore: All Ice Will Melt in 5 Years
A new computer game created by Al Gore's team seemed to offer the suggestion to Al Gore that the Arctic Ocean may be nearly ice-free in the summertime as early as 2014, Al Gore said Monday at the U.N. climate conference, and for some reason, it made the news.
"It is hard to capture the astonishment that the experts in the science of ice felt when they saw this," former U.S. Vice President Gore and one-time Democratic-nominee for President told reporters and other conference participants at a joint briefing with Scandinavian officials and scientists, his first appearance at the two-week session.
Personally, I am not really 'astonished' that a computer model that probably relies on faulty data and is designed to produce a previously-arrived at result shows something that likely will not come true. I mean, kick me and ignore everything I wrote about global warming if in 5 years if the Arctic Ocean is ice-free during the summer, but if it isn't, we probably should kick Al Gore and start ignoring him and all of his crazy predictions.
The biggest piece of evidence cited by Al Gore was the melting of Greenland's ice sheet. According to Al Gore and those 'experts' at the conference, the reason why Greenland is no longer going to be covered by ice and will start to have more and more land available for farming and raising of animals is because of human activity and not because the Earth warms and cools on its own every now and then.
Al Gore will be especially astonished when Greenland once again is green and when glaciers melt away to reveal signs of human habitation and farming as short as 500 years ago (the Vikings).
WTU Executive Board Meeting Rescheduled To This Tuesday
Climate Activists Chant "We Want the Whole World to Be Like Africa!"
As negotiations at Copenhagen stalled, young climate activists closed their eyes and clapped their hands over their ears and chanted over and over again "We stand with Africa - Kyoto targets now!" They want the whole world to be more like the Africa that is poor, impoverished, and controlled by brutal dictatorships- and they Believe in Global Warming and worship at its alter and demand that you do too.
Liberals from around the world have converged on Copenhagen and are now negotiating with the sane and responsible people of the world over appropriate goals to set to help the environment. These people back the brutal dictatorships of the world and are being used as willing stooges to press for the rich nations to become poorer and impoverished by abandoning all the progress these nations have made in production and prosperity over the last several years.
Perhaps the most encouraging thing though about this conference is that the louder that these rich spoiled kids being used as stooges by evil dictatorship thugs yell and scream and cry and rant and rave, the less effect they are having. It seems as if surprisingly the adults are actually holding their own against those who indulge in juvenile theories regarding global warming and are not buying into their mentality. Even a fly-in by Obama did not help those idiots who are pushing for society suicide by adopting something like the Kyoto Protocol.
Read the full story here.