tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8167595553138009902024-03-13T03:46:26.612-07:00live dangerously be a conservativelive dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.comBlogger348125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-86013458363122898102014-12-02T10:28:00.002-08:002014-12-02T10:29:43.456-08:00The Efficiency of the Inefficient American Constitution.<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt; line-height: 107%;">The Efficiency of the Inefficient
American Constitution.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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It has been said the Democracy isn't efficient.</div>
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It may all depend on your vantage point. <o:p></o:p></div>
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I'd like to make the case that our form of Representative
Democracy with its checks and balances is the most efficient model out there
that furthers a nations chances of becoming successful. It does this by limiting the power any one
person or branch of government can have.
In the long term it has served America well. In the short term I agree that by limiting the
power of a President for example it can become extremely hard to pass and enact
a law which that President “knows” is right and in which he believes “everyone
else” “knows” is “right” too.<o:p></o:p></div>
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The main theory which makes the Constitution unique was that
the Founding Fathers believed when power is too concentrated in too few hands,
that power will corrupt those who hold it.
They believed in that as a basic human nature. Therefore they wrote the Constitution and
created a government model that separated the power among three branches of
government. To do this they in effect
put the three branches at odds with one another. <o:p></o:p></div>
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That is why our government sometimes seems so inefficient
with “grid-lock” all over the place. <o:p></o:p></div>
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This “inefficiency” however has kept us from falling prey to
the popular spur of the moment uprisings from both the liberal and conservative
antagonists or just the mass greediness of our human natures. Our country does not for example in a fit of
self-righteousness be-head those who don’t agree with whoever is the current
President. Nor does it blindly follow a
popular uprising in the US House or Senate.
In the past it was only after much debate and a battle of give and take
we would create legislation and the President would sign it.<o:p></o:p></div>
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History is full of governments who for the best of reasons
ran off unchecked into the nightmare of mass killings and tyrannical oppression
of the people they were trying to “better” and the countries they were trying
to make great. The Chinese under Mao,
the Communists under Stalin were very efficient at mass killings for what they
alone deemed was the common good. To
them what they did was so obviously good that it was beyond debate. When I hear the phrases, “everyone knows”, “we
all believe”, “no one would disagree”, or “we are beyond debate”, I start to
get worried.<o:p></o:p></div>
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If it were not so inefficient we would have the trains
running on time as Mussolini claimed he was doing in Italy before murdering
thousands who stood in his way, or how about those wonderful sounding 5 year
plans the Communists in Russia and China had.
Or the totally efficiency of a one Party State we found in Nazi Germany
which managed through trial and error to kill millions of people not of their
own kind in the most efficient way.<o:p></o:p></div>
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The reason I’m writing this is because of an interview I
listened to through Rudaw, an internet newspaper coming out of the Kurdistan
Regional Government. <o:p></o:p></div>
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-----link-----<br />
<a href="http://rudaw.net/english/world/02122014">http://rudaw.net/english/world/02122014</a><br />
---------------<o:p></o:p></div>
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If you read my blog you will note that I’m one of their
biggest fans in their fight for independence from Iraq and in forming a
homeland around their Kurdish communities.
Their problem is that they have to take land from not only Iraq, but
Iran, Turkey and Syria to form this country. </div>
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Watching the interview, it soon became apparent that while the Kurds for
the most part are great friends with America and they say they want a secular
government modeled after the US Constitution the interviewer really had a very
limited knowledge of what makes our Constitution unique. They are fighting for their very lives, so it
is understandable why they seem to put a high price on efficiency. Why they want a strong leader to lead them
with the powers to make the hard decisions quickly is again understandable. </div>
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Looking back on our Revolution, we too almost
fell into that trap. We knew George
Washington was an honorable man and a good leader, why not keep electing him
President? That would have probably
happened if Washington had not after his second term set the precedent and
stepped down. A peaceful transition went
forward and has ever since. A point to
this is discussion is to show how it took an honorable man with a vision firmly
in mind for his country and all its people to ensure the US Constitution and its
underpinning logic was cemented in place through his actions. </div>
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What America and its leaders did was to
sacrifice their personal goals and ambitions to create a Constitution and then
abide by it long enough for that government to follow them and take on a life
of its own.<o:p></o:p></div>
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I truly hope the leaders of Kurdistan forget not that
lesson.</div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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I just read a George Will article which mirrors the Rudaw
interview and of course he does it far better than I or them. <o:p></o:p></div>
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-----link-----<br />
<a href="http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/will112914.php3">http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/will112914.php3</a><br />
---------------<o:p></o:p></div>
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Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative<o:p></o:p></div>
live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-7566512871156951262014-11-28T12:26:00.000-08:002014-11-28T12:31:07.558-08:00Speak Softly, Carry a Big Stick<h2 style="text-align: center;">
Speak Softly and
Carry a Big Stick</h2>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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That phrase we associate with Teddy Roosevelt, incidentally
he said he picked it up on Safari in West Africa. That saying along with, Peace through strength,
trust but verify and others simply mean that when people have a “big stick” to
wield they can afford to talk softly. </div>
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American
Presidents have used these phrases for their benefit to achieve foreign policy
objectives. These all carry the message that they were willing to use physical
force to back up what they wanted to do.
But the key to that working was that their opponents believed they would
use that “big stick” if needed. The
physical force when it’s threatened to be used by a super power is clear and
understood. </div>
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The phrases above are clever
and catchy linguistic tools to get the point across in negotiations. Our opponents believe we will use that force
because we have in the past and proven we are willing to do it again and they know
it. We are saying to them, “Do what we
want or we’ll smack you down”. It
usually works in our case because our opponent decides they don’t want to risk
it and withdraws.<o:p></o:p></div>
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What happens however when a struggling region of a country
that dreams of becoming a country in its own right says the same thing? Usually they aren't believed and are attacked. In their as in ours they have to continually
prove that they are willing to go into harm’s way to achieve their end. It is only after repeated victories in
battles and strategic retreats from losses to re-group and fight again, that
their opponents will start to pay the upstart of a people its due.<o:p></o:p></div>
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America started out in this way. We had to fight battles with less troops
poorly trained and equipped and we lost many battles. But we won a few and we retreated to fight
again, the point became clear that we were not afraid to fight and die if need
be to achieve our dream of nationhood.
Not all countries survive that “trial by fire”.<o:p></o:p></div>
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But even though a country or people may fight the good fight
and risk it all for what they believe; they may not win in the end: However their willingness to die for what
they believe strikes a chord in most people as a noble thing. Something worth emulating. A way we can rise above ourselves and find a
higher plain. Win lose or draw we gain
from the effort. This type of action in a losing but heroic fight reminds us of
our own loss at the Alamo, and as far back to antiquity of famous defeat of 300
Spartans who died saving Athens from the army of Barbarians who were threatening
to wipe Athens/Greece from the face of the earth and in so doing wipe away the
underpinning of the birth of Freedom which was built upon and from which
Western Civilization flourished. <o:p></o:p></div>
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When a people show this dedication to putting all else
including their own lives on the line for Freedom we tend to say that they are
fighting like Spartans. In an Aljazeera
article written by Michael Knights entitled <u>Iraqi Kurdistan: the Middle East’s
Next Little Sparta</u>, Mr. Knights gives a nice account of why the military is
starting to refer to the Kurdish Regional Government’s (KRG’s) army the
Peshmerga as “little Sparta”. (Link to “Little
Sparta”. <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2014/11/iraqi-kurdistan-middle-east-ne-2014112285055907550.html">http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2014/11/iraqi-kurdistan-middle-east-ne-2014112285055907550.html</a>
<o:p></o:p></div>
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This is a good article for background and to catch up in
general with the news from Kurdistan.
This article talks to the respect the US military and the Washington
power brokers have learned to afford this regional government of Iraq, and its
army, and in the reverse the lack of respect the Iraqi Army has earned. With the threat of the Islamic State in all
its incarnations, it has been the Peshmerga which consistently laid down their
lives to stem the tide when the Iraqi Army has thrown down their weapons and
run off. <o:p></o:p></div>
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The slant of most news articles is that this was made possible
by US air strikes. The real fact of the
matter was that it was the Peshmerga and other Kurdish forces which stood up
when others ran. They stood up with
inferior weapons and numbers, but like the Spartans they stopped the tide of
the Islamic State giving time for the Iraqi government to save face and the US
to start funneling supplies to the Kurds.
The land mass of the Kurdistani people as I pointed out in the previous
articles includes parts of Turkey, Syria, Iran as well as Iraq. <br />
see map below.<br />
<br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-RWixyHjqnOc/VHjbdDNljFI/AAAAAAAAC6M/Rg3wQcRvBd0/s1600/Kurdistan%2Boverlay%2Bmap.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-RWixyHjqnOc/VHjbdDNljFI/AAAAAAAAC6M/Rg3wQcRvBd0/s1600/Kurdistan%2Boverlay%2Bmap.jpg" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
They have their strongest most developed organization
in Northern Iraq and their Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) of Iraq is
almost daily getting recognition now from not only foreign powers but even
grudgingly from Iraq. For example there
are a couple of bills in the US House which will allow our President to give
training and some pretty heavy weapons to the KRG.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="http://www.hawlergov.org/en/article.php?id=1416723058">http://www.hawlergov.org/en/article.php?id=1416723058</a>
<o:p></o:p></div>
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With the likes of Senator John McCain saying to the KRG delegation:<span style="font-size: large;">
</span>“<span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; line-height: 107%;">Not a day goes by that I don’t work with my
colleagues to get you what you need to defeat these terrorists</span>”. You know
help is on the way.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="background: white; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; line-height: 107%;">I am too old in the tooth to
believe this dream of Kurdistan wrested from parts of Iran, Syria, Turkey and
Iraqi will magically appear. It may, and
it will keep trying to form itself regardless of what I believe. As long as their courage stays the course
they have a chance. The chance comes for
them as with all of us from how they handle diversity not how they avoid
it. The human race from its beginning
has prospered by overcoming adversity not from shrinking away from it. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="background: white; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; line-height: 107%;">Perhaps the deciding factor of
their future success will be ideological.
They like the Spartans are fighting for the ideology of Freedom for
their homeland and themselves, not in conquering people, not in tyrannizing them. Another phrase comes to mind. I think President Regan would agree that the
Kurds could be a “Shining City on a Hill” for all of those other Mid-East
countries so downtrodden for centuries under the boot of tyranny.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="background: white; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; line-height: 107%;">Even when the Kurds say they
are willing to die fighting, they are doing so because they are fighting for
their homes and family and their very lives.
For them to give into the Islamic State (IS) means that they will be
raped, sold into slavery, or beheaded.
Not much of a choice perhaps but it constantly amazes me how many people
in that same situation were unwilling to face reality and at least put up a fight
and were lead to the slaughter.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="background: white; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; line-height: 107%;">So when Masoud Barzani the
leader of the KRG talks softly I know and I think the world is learning that
when he is talking about the Kurdish homeland he does indeed carry a big stick.</span><o:p></o:p></div>
live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-34028754549082241972014-11-19T08:20:00.000-08:002014-11-19T08:20:01.111-08:00<h2 style="text-align: center;">
Update on Kurdistan </h2>
<h2 style="text-align: center;">
(Kurdish Regional Government of Iraq)</h2>
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This all has happened since I wrote the previous article.</div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">News, 11/17/2014<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><a href="http://www.france24.com/en/20141114-focus-peshmerga-fighters-islamic-state-front-line-border-kurdistan-checkpoints-patrols/">http://www.france24.com/en/20141114-focus-peshmerga-fighters-islamic-state-front-line-border-kurdistan-checkpoints-patrols/</a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Shows pretty much how the Peshmerga (Kurdish army) has been
alone in the fight against the Islamic State.
Also the video tells of the problem of refugees and the strain on their
economy and how some of the Sunni refugees are not necessarily friends to the
Kurds.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">11/18/2014<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><a href="http://rudaw.net/english/middleeast/iraq/181120141">http://rudaw.net/english/middleeast/iraq/181120141</a>
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Kurds repulse attack on border town.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">More news, 11/19/2014<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><a href="http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/iraqi-kurdish-oil-deal-falls-short-solutions-26951284">http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/iraqi-kurdish-oil-deal-falls-short-solutions-26951284</a>
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Talks of the economic problems the Semi-autonomous Kurdish
Regional Government (KRG) of Iraq is having since the Iraq government stopped
paying government workers because of the KRG going around the Iraq government
to sell its oil.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">11/19/2014<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><a href="http://www.france24.com/en/f24-interview/20141118-barzani-kurdish-iraq-heavy-weapons-islamic-state/">http://www.france24.com/en/f24-interview/20141118-barzani-kurdish-iraq-heavy-weapons-islamic-state/</a>
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Barzani, KRG leader claims they are doing most of the fighting
and deserve to get heavier equipment from the coalition of forces now fighting
the Islamic State. They have been at the
forefront of this fight. They want some
armed personal carriers and helicopters.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Breaking 11/19/2014<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><a href="http://rudaw.net/english/middleeast/iraq/191120141">http://rudaw.net/english/middleeast/iraq/191120141</a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">From the Newspaper of Erbil the capital of the Kurdish
Regional Government. Tells of the ISIS
Governor of Mosul was killed in US air strikes.
The Kurds have been fighting and taking back territory the Islamic state
has taken along their border with Iraq.
They are in the process of solidifying Kirkuk an oil rich city, and the
biggest oil prize is Mosul. Kirkuk is on
their way to Mosul. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">********************<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="line-height: 107%;">For up to date news from the Kurdish Regional Government
their </span></span><span style="line-height: 17.1200008392334px;">newspaper</span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="line-height: 107%;"> out of their capital of Erbil.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><a href="http://rudaw.net/english">http://rudaw.net/english</a>
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
</div>
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<br /></div>
live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-83165654840234203882014-11-14T13:14:00.001-08:002014-11-14T13:35:11.541-08:00<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Steven Stockman, Congressman from
Texas’ 36th<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span></div>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-p_sfT1TZ7G0/VGZwiYc-QuI/AAAAAAAAC58/I35Z0EBACfY/s1600/Stockman-with-peshmerga-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-p_sfT1TZ7G0/VGZwiYc-QuI/AAAAAAAAC58/I35Z0EBACfY/s1600/Stockman-with-peshmerga-1.jpg" height="480" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span></div>
<h3 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 21px; text-align: start;">“I mean, these guys love America,”</span></h3>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; text-align: left;">“They’re tough people, but they can’t do it with sticks.”</span><span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; font-family: Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: left; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; font-family: Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: left; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; font-family: Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: left; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 18.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Kurdistan a dream becoming a reality.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: 18.0pt; line-height: 107%;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Article, 11/11/14. WND
exclusive by Garth Kant<br />
</span><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><a href="http://www.wnd.com/2014/11/congressman-very-dangerous-to-be-an-american-ally/">http://www.wnd.com/2014/11/congressman-very-dangerous-to-be-an-american-ally/</a></span><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<br />
I got this from the article above.</div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Map of what the Kurds are fighting for. What they perceive as their homeland.
Kurdistan.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">As the map shows, what better place to have an ally? Borders Iran Iraq, Syria and Turkey.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="line-height: 107%;">Turkey is our sometime ally and why </span></span><span style="line-height: 17.1200008392334px;">wouldn't</span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="line-height: 107%;"> they want a
Kurdistan as a buffer from Syria, Iraq and Iran?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">From the article we see that Turkey is hostile to the
Kurds. Why? Kurdish population in Turkey? Find out.
Would the proposed map of Kurdistan include parts of Turkey and which
parts, what would Turkey lose? Find out.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Yes! Map below shows
Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran would all have to give up land to form Kurdistan.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Turkey being the largest loser.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">What population of Kurds are in these countries and more to
the point what is the population in these specific areas that would form
Kurdistan? Find out. </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurdish_population"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurdish_population</span></a><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">
This shows that Turkey also has the most Kurds at about 14 million, Iran
and Iraq at 6 million each and Syria at 2 million.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Below a map from the CIA in 1992 of Kurdish populated areas
which seems to roughly correspond to the map above of Kurdistan.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurdistan">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurdistan</a></span><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-eMLN0HVnUwM/VGZoDGNbkgI/AAAAAAAAC5g/p0x3K4lDW8A/s1600/Kurdish-inhabited_area_by_CIA_(1992).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-eMLN0HVnUwM/VGZoDGNbkgI/AAAAAAAAC5g/p0x3K4lDW8A/s1600/Kurdish-inhabited_area_by_CIA_(1992).jpg" height="521" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">The Kurds are and have been fighting for a re-creation of
their original home state. The Kurds are
situated in a hotbed of hostilities that is called the Middle East. The ethnic Kurds have a majority in
communities in SE Turkey, NW Iran, Northern Iraq, and NE Syria. They have carved out a semi-autonomous region
in Northern Iraq which is called the Kurdish Regional Government (NRG). They have been fighting ISIS since ISIS’
beginning, along with Al Quaida. Before that they were the only ones Americans
could count on in the fight to overthrow Sadam Hueisen, they were the fighters
we could count on when all else failed.
As Iraq started falling apart with attacks from ISIS, they held
strong. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">They have encountered resistance from the beginning from
everyone including those who should be helping them. This resistance is understandable since one
or more of the above countries would have to give up some of their territory to
enable the creation of a Kurdistan. Turkey which has the largest Kurdish
population of the Mid East Countries was actively fighting the Kurds. It is only recently since the rise of ISIS
that they have come to see an armed Kurdish separate state in Iraq as something
they could live with. The other reason
is that the Kurds control a lot of Turkey’s area and the Turks are tiring of
the fight. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">The big news is that the Turks have allowed Northern Iraqi
Kurdish fighters and weapons to cross Turkish land to reinforce Syrian Kurdish
fighters in Syria with weapons and soldiers.<br />
</span><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><a href="http://online.wsj.com/articles/iraqi-kurdish-fighters-head-to-kobani-in-syria-to-battle-islamic-state-1414518448">http://online.wsj.com/articles/iraqi-kurdish-fighters-head-to-kobani-in-syria-to-battle-islamic-state-1414518448</a></span><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Another bit of news just in hours ago is that the Iraqi
government in Bagdad has agreed to pay the civil servant salaries of its northern
Kurdish Regional Government civil servants for the equivalent of $500 million
dollars of the North’s oil. This is a
major step showing that the Iraqi government in Bagdad is recognizing their
Northern Kurdish region as a separate entity at least in regards to its
ownership of its own oil. It hasn’t in
the past. This also will help pay for
the war on ISIS that the Kurds have been fighting long before Americans ever
heard of the name ISIS.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">All of this and the trip by Congressman Steven Stockman in
the WMD Garth Kant article at the beginning of this article reminds me of the
movie titled “Charlie Wilson’s War” starring Tom Hanks. In that movie Wilson mobilized behind the
scenes private and governmental efforts to fund the Afghanistan freedom
fighters that eventually beat the Russians and forced them out of their country. Both of these solutions seem so obvious it is
no wonder that the powers that be would not use them; but when bureaucrats who are experts at confounding
others by splitting hairs, have their minds
faced with something so simple to understand they themselves seem confounded
and refuse to act.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">I am just happy to see that America and the President have
been brought kicking and screaming to the same conclusion. Our government is seemingly putting pressure
on Turkey and Bagdad to help and allow the Kurds to do what they do so well,
fight their enemy ISIS. We have often
times heard from this administration, “a crisis is too big to pass up”. For once it is nice to see that phrase used
as a reason to fight our actual enemies.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Breaking new now is that the Islamic State (IS) and Al-Quaida
have joined forces. See Article linked
below.<br />
<a href="http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/E/EU_ISLAMIC_STATE_AL_QAIDA?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2014-11-13-14-35-12">http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/E/EU_ISLAMIC_STATE_AL_QAIDA?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2014-11-13-14-35-12</a>
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">The Kurds as previously reported were given permission to
cross Turkey land to travel from Arbil Iraq to Kobani Syria to reinforce that beleaguered
city and help stop the Islamic State tide.
American arms are going with them.
The latest map is below showing the Islamic State encroachment upon
Syria, Iraq, Turkey and most pertinently to this article upon the newly formed
Kurdish Regional Government of Iraq.
Reminder from the other maps before that there is a large Kurdish
population in nearly all this contested area and in Kobani.</span><span style="font-size: 18.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-zYxrNS2UDGI/VGZpGRtfZfI/AAAAAAAAC5s/ZpvI7LJAS50/s1600/kurd%2Bisis%2Bcurrent%2Bcontrol.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-zYxrNS2UDGI/VGZpGRtfZfI/AAAAAAAAC5s/ZpvI7LJAS50/s1600/kurd%2Bisis%2Bcurrent%2Bcontrol.png" height="534" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">In looking at the map above I see the city of Sinjar and I
remember the stranding of thousands of Kurds on the mountain top there. Mosul just to the east had fallen to ISIS and
the refugees fled to Sinjar’s mountain top.
A helicopter made it in with guns blazing and back out with guns blazing
and saved 20. The following link tells
what happened to the rest. If you have
any sympathy for ISIS read that article.
Genocide pure and simple. If you
wonder if the Kurds are fighting for their life read that article.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2792552/full-horror-yazidis-didn-t-escape-mount-sinjar-confirms-5-000-men-executed-7-000-women-kept-sex-slaves.html">http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2792552/full-horror-yazidis-didn-t-escape-mount-sinjar-confirms-5-000-men-executed-7-000-women-kept-sex-slaves.html</a>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">This new map raises the question of how involved the Syrian
regime is with the Kurdish fighters and who exactly are the Syrian rebels. Find out.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Below is a link to a Reuter’s article<br />
<a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/10/31/us-mideast-crisis-idUSKBN0IK15M20141031">http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/10/31/us-mideast-crisis-idUSKBN0IK15M20141031</a>
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">The latest fighting in and for the
border town of Kobani shows the confusing and convoluted coalitions being set
up. The Kurds in this battle have
aligned themselves with the FSA (Free Syrian Army) which is battling both the
Assad Syrian government forces and the Islamic State (IS). Assad in this article condemns the Turkish
action of letting Kurdish forces from Iraq backed by American war planes cross
their border calling such forces “terrorists”.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">The Kurds of Syria are after a piece
of Syria and indeed Assad should worry about losing some of his former country,
however IS or ISIS is after the total of Syria and Iraq and all bordering
countries in an effort to set up an Islamic caliphate. I know what I’d fear more.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Although America’s current President
has been vocal about the “Arab Spring” and is slow to see the reality of the
Islamic Caliphate and its intolerance and brutality, the US Congress may not be,
as evidenced by the efforts of Steven Stockman (TEXAS) as I related earlier in
this article.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">The Kurds have taken control of the
Northern section of Iraq and formed a semi-autonomous region. The area is predominantly Kurdish in
population. They are doing the same in
the North of Syria. While their aim is
for a Kurdish state, they have proven the old adage that any enemy of my enemy
becomes my friend. Assad should realize
the greatest enemy to him is not the Kurds, but the Islamic State. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">The Kurds are all in against the
Islamic State. When I say all in I mean
it. They prove it by their deeds. Much like the Israelis the Kurdish women have
taken up arms and in large numbers.
Remember these people are defending their own families and
villages. <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2014/10/29/world/us-newest-allies-syrian-kurds/">http://www.cnn.com/2014/10/29/world/us-newest-allies-syrian-kurds/</a>
The names they give their different
groups reflect that desperate fight to the death attitude of a proud
people. The Kurdish Regional Government
fighters are called the Peshmerga (translated – Those who Face Death). They are not afraid of death. They have seen what the Islamic State does to
the women and children it captures.
These Kurdish women would rather face death than be sold into sex
slavery tortured etc. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">This next link gives insight into the
Kurdish Regional Government and the fight they are up against from all sides as
they try to find and fight for their existence.
I think it is safe to say that they have earned the respect of American
military leaders and their own people.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><a href="http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/09/29/fight-lives">http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/09/29/fight-lives</a>
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">The biography of Masoud Barzani the
President of the KRG taken from the above link, is an example of the depths and
desperation of the Kurdish people to survive and form a home state for their self-protection.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="background: white; font-family: Times, serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 107%;">“Barzani has fought for the Kurdish cause for fifty years.
During that time, the Kurds endured successive waves of calamity, mostly at the
hands of Saddam Hussein: the genocidal onslaught of Anfal, which killed as many
as a hundred and eighty thousand people; chemical-weapons attacks; and an
unrelenting campaign of torture and imprisonment that touched nearly every
Kurdish family. Barzani himself lost thirty-seven family members.</span>”<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">If you want to keep up with the
latest stuff on Kobani check out this twitter feed <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/kobani">https://twitter.com/hashtag/kobani</a>
Check out the Canadian girl fighting in Kobani for the Kurds. Remarkable.
I saw a call from ISIS for a cease fire.
Don’t know if that is confirmed but the Kurds seem to reject it. Bravo Kurds.
If I’m in a fight for my life, I’m not going to let my attacker off so
they can go out and get reinforcements.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Regards, Live Dangerously be a
Conservative <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-50749811388619580002013-11-10T07:49:00.001-08:002013-11-10T08:03:55.047-08:00Tesla's Dream Coming True ???<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
Tesla’s Dream Coming
True !!!<o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-HhPuc1xB_Y0/Un-pq41UTfI/AAAAAAAAC3g/jqLKBU9vTu8/s1600/Tesla.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-HhPuc1xB_Y0/Un-pq41UTfI/AAAAAAAAC3g/jqLKBU9vTu8/s1600/Tesla.jpg" /></a></div>
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No not that Tesla automobile for the dalliance of the
extravagant uber rich, consumed by guilt for not earning their riches, but the Tesla from the turn of the century. The Tesla looking to give energy for the masses. This Tesla was an eccentric genius who seemed
to have tapped into the future and desperately tried to “invent” what he saw.<o:p></o:p><br />
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Such is the fate of most seers, that they may not have the
practical ability to create what they envision, nor the genius to put a reason
behind it and be able to connect the dots.
Not so with Nicola Tesla who actually invented the radio and not Marconi. The Supreme Court finally said so. Tesla also invented Alternating Current that
the world uses every day. Before then
Direct Current was the model that Edison used and wanted the world to use. The problem was that DC current lost power
over short distances. For Edison’s power
to work, there would have to be a power plant and all that entails every mile
along a power lines route.<o:p></o:p><br />
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Tesla’s genius lay in his seeing a way to create alternating
current which could be used, stored and amplified at will without additional
power plant along the way. Tesla’s
humanity lay in his tearing up the agreement he had with Mr. Westinghouse in
which Westinghouse would pay Tesla a sum per amount of electricity used in his
system. This would have made Tesla the
richest man alive. Westinghouse however
was having financial problems getting the infrastructure up and running. Tesla tore up the agreement because
Westinghouse had believed in him when no one else did and Westinghouse had
risked all for Tesla’s ideas; and they both went to work. The result was that they built generators at
Niagra Falls which operate still today, and electrified New York City for the
first time. The rest is history. What is sometimes over looked is the in
humanity in the way Tesla was treated by society. He died a poor and broke person.<o:p></o:p><br />
<br /></div>
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Now to the reason of this blog. Tesla had a vision that seemed to permeate
all his inventions which included the concepts of Laser beams, x-rays, friction
less motors and a myriad of other inventions.
That vision was simply that the world, the universe is made up and
filled up with (for a lack of a better term) energy. That is what everything is made up of. His idea was that there should be an easy way
to simply hook into the largest piece of matter available, the earth and tap
into the excess power of the forces that make up the matter of the earth as it
radiates outward. Simply put he hoped to
invent a way to harvest that power and he also thought this power could be
wirelessly transmitted anywhere it was needed<br />
.
<o:p></o:p></div>
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Think of your local radio station which puts out x amount of
signal, and our radios are tuned to that frequency. We pick up some of that signal and our radios
work. Think of the amount of signal that
is continually surrounding us and which you could say goes to waste. In this case falls on deaf ears.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Well Tesla saw this and invented the concept of the radio –
before there was a radio. He also
thought that electricity should be able to be transmitted in the same
manner. He understood the idea of waves
and that all things are made up of them and all he should have to do is tune
into the “force”.<o:p></o:p><br />
<br /></div>
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This guy was ridiculed as crazy at the time, when all that
was needed for his dream to come true was in my opinion a way to deal not in
millions of watts ect. But to find a way to make it happen with small amounts
that could be boosted later as he did with alternating current vs Direct
current. <o:p></o:p><br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://www.electronicsweekly.com/news/research/us-researchers-harvest-microwaves-with-a-meta-material-2013-11/">http://www.electronicsweekly.com/news/research/us-researchers-harvest-microwaves-with-a-meta-material-2013-11/</a><o:p></o:p><br />
<br /></div>
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Allen Hawkes and Alexander Katko a couple of students have
come up with a way to harvest out of thin air the myriad of excess electromagnetic
that surrounds us. Although the energy
these students are capturing is from manmade sources such as the microwave
energy already harvested by satellite receivers for TV, Radio and cell phones,
which pervades us all, all the time.<o:p></o:p><br />
<br /></div>
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Much like what the solar cell does when it collects the suns
radiant energy this new invention collects excess microwave energy in the air
around us. It could be used to collect
the excess energy from a WiFi set in your house, convert it to DC power and
continually charge your phone. This is
done in their break through model by simply tuning a receiver cell to the
frequency of the source and then through the use of Meta material and an active
in this case copper conductor turning that energy into electricity of the DC
variety.<o:p></o:p><br />
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This breakthrough is possible with the use of Meta material. To my unscientific mind this is how the electromagnetic
waves that are emitted are captured.
This Meta material is simply microscopically engineered material which
is smaller than the waves it is trying to harvest. I look at it in a mind game as trying to control
waves in water. Before our abilities to
create things in the Meta or microscopically small world we could only block a
wave entirely or let it pass. With the
new Meta technology we can take out as much water from each wave as it passes
to fit our needs and let the waves continue.
This of course is pretty much pure conjecture on my part. Here is the Wiki on it.<o:p></o:p><br />
<br /></div>
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<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metamaterial">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metamaterial</a><o:p></o:p><br />
<br /></div>
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This is the breakthrough I think that allows us to modulate
energy and make it usable to us. Much as
Tesla did with Alternating current. </div>
<h4>
When you think of it all matter; the earth, the dirt,
cement, you and me, everything of substance is made up of “energy” in one form
or another and emits energy. We consume
food and turn it into energy at varying levels of efficiency why should it be
thought strange to capture excess energy that permeates everything in our world
and use it? The inventors of this
process say of it. </h4>
<h4>
“<span style="background: #F9F9F9; color: #666666; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 9.0pt; line-height: 107%;">“Our
work demonstrates a simple and inexpensive approach to electromagnetic power
harvesting,” said Professor Steven Cummer. “The beauty of the design is that
the basic building blocks are self-contained and additive. One can simply
assemble more blocks to increase the scavenged power.” <o:p></o:p></span></h4>
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<span style="background: #F9F9F9; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Professor
Steven Cummer is the teacher in charge of and guiding these two inventors.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-2SGXyVSb3UE/Un-qEBuhJhI/AAAAAAAAC34/XoOGJq6oS18/s1600/harvestWaveguide-300x210.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-2SGXyVSb3UE/Un-qEBuhJhI/AAAAAAAAC34/XoOGJq6oS18/s1600/harvestWaveguide-300x210.jpg" /></a></div>
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This is a picture of their Contraption in series gathering
enough energy just sitting there to keep your phone charged, at an efficiency
rating of a solar cell. From their article the fiberglass pieces are in effect antennas
built at a frequency needed to collect energy from a source and build it
through five such antennas to the voltage needed to power your cell phone.<o:p></o:p><br />
<br /></div>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-WvnI_lD3Mgk/Un-p_8i981I/AAAAAAAAC3w/Amptzmr6_vw/s1600/harvest-300x200.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-WvnI_lD3Mgk/Un-p_8i981I/AAAAAAAAC3w/Amptzmr6_vw/s1600/harvest-300x200.jpg" /></a></div>
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Before you start thinking these are just kids,
anyone remember two kids working out of their garage thinking that there would
be a market for personal computers. Well
there was and it along with all the variations that it generated were beyond
the Steve’s conception.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Or62BKoH0Zw/Un-p_3P3XfI/AAAAAAAAC30/g7X0S5zT2vg/s1600/steve_Jobs_wozniak_thumb.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="185" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Or62BKoH0Zw/Un-p_3P3XfI/AAAAAAAAC30/g7X0S5zT2vg/s320/steve_Jobs_wozniak_thumb.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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This Picture below and the quote in it shows to me that great things can be had when the individual is left alone to "create" their own future. As Tesla, as Jobs/Wozniak and Hawkes/Katko have or are doing.<br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rHXrh9Hf9f0/Un-tXFgNCxI/AAAAAAAAC4E/MuAlR2VV7XI/s1600/Tesla+Future+is+Mine.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rHXrh9Hf9f0/Un-tXFgNCxI/AAAAAAAAC4E/MuAlR2VV7XI/s320/Tesla+Future+is+Mine.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<h1 class="quoteText" style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; padding: 0px; text-align: center;">
<i>“Let the future tell the truth, and evaluate each one according to his work and accomplishments. The present is theirs; the future, for which I have really worked, is mine”</i></h1>
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Live Dangerously be a liberal Conservative<o:p></o:p></div>
live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-68369986889732047742013-11-03T09:16:00.001-08:002013-11-03T09:21:32.887-08:00The Battle<div class="MsoNormal">
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/--gChAoozIGE/UnaBur96ELI/AAAAAAAAC3Q/Nn6tQ83IkeE/s1600/Battle,+the+Brooks.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/--gChAoozIGE/UnaBur96ELI/AAAAAAAAC3Q/Nn6tQ83IkeE/s320/Battle,+the+Brooks.jpg" width="213" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Arthur
Brooks is an author I really admire. Mr.
Brooks is an economist that has studied the junction where social systems, and
politics meet with economics.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Brooks is a
born again conservative, a true believer in the Capitalist system. While he is a numbers guy, through his study
of the nexus of politics, people and money he has solidified a conservative
approach that before he came was only vaguely hinted at. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">George W.
mentioned Compassionate Conservatism and because of his vagueness and lack of
factual knowledge not to mention lack of ability to articulate his message was
roundly criticized by the left and the right.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Arthur
Brooks has worked his way around from a Democrat to an Independent and if you
read his works you would say a libertarian or a Republican. He is very passionate about Capitalism. He also has a lot of advice for Republicans
on how to sell the Free Market position.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Mr. Brooks
has given us a path that unites the arguments of the fiscal and moral
conservatives and shows how both together and the synergy they create can be a
potent force.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">Simply put he thinks the Democrats win because they make
their argument in moral terms whereas the Republicans end up talking about
money.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">Early on Brooks saw the moral superiority in Free
Enterprise. Through his books you can
see how he has evolved his ideas from merely studying the facts and data from countless
reports and making academic style reports to making something grander.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">His book "Who Really Cares"<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<a href="http://www.aei.org/book/society-and-culture/poverty/who-really-cares/">http://www.aei.org/book/society-and-culture/poverty/who-really-cares/ </a><o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">And his next book “Gross National Happiness” </span><a href="http://www.aei.org/book/society-and-culture/gross-national-happiness-book/">http://www.aei.org/book/society-and-culture/gross-national-happiness-book/ </a> <span style="font-size: 14pt;">progresses us through his thought process during his
political shift.</span><span style="font-size: 14pt;"> </span><span style="font-size: 14pt;">The prodigious amount
of facts and figures he has analyzed staggers the mind;</span><span style="font-size: 14pt;"> </span><span style="font-size: 14pt;">however the way he writes about them will
eases the mind and his conclusions he reaches will soothe it.</span><span style="font-size: 14pt;"> </span><span style="font-size: 14pt;">He writes in other words for the laymen, his
conclusions while dealing with complicated and other times ill articulated
maters become easily understood.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">His next book “<a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Battle-Enterprise-Government-Americas/dp/B007BWAO0G">The Battle</a>” is a short book. </span></div>
<br />
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">It is easy to read and brings together Arthur C.
Brooks’ ideas into a cohesive vision of what’s happening and what the battle
for this country is about.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">His last book, “<a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Road-Freedom-Fight-Enterprise/dp/046502940X/ref=pd_sim_b_1">The Road to Freedom</a>” is a blueprint
for how to get out of the mess we are in and off the path to European
Socialism.</span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">Or as Frederick Hayek would say off of “The Road to
Serfdom”.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt;">This is where he comes up with the idea that this
battle has to be fought on moral grounds, as he says in a speech (</span><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_ryet5IUow">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_ryet5IUow</a>)<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b> our immigrant parents didn't come over here
for a better welfare state. They came
over here for the freedom to live off of their work. To start a farm and live off of that
labor. He then jokes, they didn't come
here because we have a cash for clunkers program.</b></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">In this
lecture and his books he talks about how we need to talk about fairness and how
our conservative programs help the individual because they are fair and the
right thing to do. He also quotes Jesus Christ
<span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">“</span></span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one
of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.”</span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;"> Jesus Christ
Mathew 25:31-40.</span></span></div>
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<span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;"> The lynch pin to truly
helping people is through showing at a personal level how a government that
creates opportunity for entrepreneurs is a benefit to individuals. Again the biblical idea of teaching a person
to fish rather than giving them fish. I
might add not regulating and taxing a fisherman out of business too. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">He
better than I writes of how Republicans and those battling for Free Enterprise if
they do it in terms of moral high ground will win. In other words, in a political setting people
will be persuaded not through facts alone but facts that point to a moral
conclusion, that also points to a choice that is best made not by the
government but by the individual. He
talks of Earned success as the definition of Happiness and backs it up with
reams of facts.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">Few
Republicans have been able to do that with any success in the modern age. Ronald Reagan comes to mind.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">George
Will also has this <a href="http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/will060813.php3#.Ubx7dfnryHs">quote</a> about how big government has rigged society for big
business. </span></span><span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.5pt; line-height: 107%;">“</span></span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.5pt; line-height: 107%;">But,
then, big government always is most caring about the strong, the articulate and
the organized.” <a href="http://www.blogger.com/goog_816819097"> </a></span><a href="http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/will060813.php3#.Ubx7dfnryHs">http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/will060813.php3#.Ubx7dfnryHs</a><span class="MsoHyperlink"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="MsoHyperlink"><span style="color: windowtext; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">But
even Mr. Will only hints at the moral justification of smaller government.</span></span></div>
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<span class="MsoHyperlink"><span style="color: windowtext; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">Republicans have to learn to be more
articulate about how our programs affect people on a fiscal level and how that
is morally superior to what the Left has been giving them.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span class="MsoHyperlink"><span style="color: windowtext; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">Clever
subtleties may win the argument but will lose the war.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span class="MsoHyperlink"><span style="color: windowtext; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">I think Mr. Will would read Mr.
Brooks with relish.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span class="MsoHyperlink"><span style="color: windowtext; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Liberal Conservative</span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-78980627154149364392013-10-20T11:42:00.001-07:002013-10-21T09:24:45.248-07:00The Outsourcing of the American Dream<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 28.0pt; line-height: 107%;">The Outsourcing of the American
Dream.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-pecFjR-RY4I/UmQcMoYAnzI/AAAAAAAAC1c/53CHYOwlKyw/s1600/Road+to+Freedom.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-pecFjR-RY4I/UmQcMoYAnzI/AAAAAAAAC1c/53CHYOwlKyw/s1600/Road+to+Freedom.jpg" /></a></div>
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<h4 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">What's the
next big thing in outsourcing? </span></h4>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Well
there seem to be two things in the works.
The first is the fact that businesses are merging with other businesses
in another country and reincorporating the new entity in that or a third
country. Why? It’s simple; lower corporate tax rates for
one or both. Less regulation. An example
from Michigan is the company Perrigo which bought an Irish company Elan and
reincorporated in Ireland which has a tax rate of 12.5% compared to the US rate
of 35%. The link below lists various
other businesses that are doing the same thing.
This is article #4 in the link below from Newsmax, where I got most of the
ideas for this blog post. The Thrid thing is Banking. While we can't outsource our poor the money is definately leaving.<br />
</span><a href="http://tinyurl.com/pfyxrma"><b><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 107%;">http://tinyurl.com/pfyxrma</span></b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><o:p></o:p></span></a></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">To continue from that same Newsmax email,
you’ll see in article #3 that Canada is in effect outsourcing health care for its
citizens to other countries. This, while
a voluntary migration of Canadians to America mainly to receive quicker and
better health care is being forced upon the wealthier or more desperate
Canadians by their government run health care.
The article blames this on the “Free Health Care” of Canada which is
anything but free and is making their service anything but workable, if the
definition of workable is to provide quality medical service in a timely manner
to its people. By timely I mean that
they don’t want to die while waiting in line. With our new Health Care are we not doing the same? Where will we migrate too?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">We all have seen the outsourcing of
parts of businesses to take advantage of cheaper labor found in other
countries, now it is the actual companies due to our higher tax rates driving more companies and their profits off shore. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">We too know of the influx of wealthy patients
from around the world who hope to save themselves from their countries health
care which for the most part is dysfunctional due to over regulation or being outright
taken over by their respective governments.
The thread is common, the quality goes down, services get rationed to “people
who need it most for the good of all”, which doesn’t work, and is not for the
good of all only those who the bureaucrats deem so.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">Along the same lines and looking at
Article #2 in the Newsmax email, we look at the harmful effect the Dodd Frank
Banking Bill has upon poor Americans.
This bill which has regulated nearly every aspect of the banking system
in America was supposed to be for the benefit of poor people. Instead the cost of the regulations and the
limits it places on the types of fees allowable only forced the banks to
sharply raise the fees it was allowed and is forcing poor folk out of normal
banking. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">So is the main idea of the American
Dream; that in America anyone of any means is free to do whatever is within
his/her means to get ahead and to do whatever they wish to pursue their wants
and desires, ie. Happiness, coming close to the end?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">We are seeing that with the
enactment of the Left’s policies of ever increasing government control and
regulation in all aspects of our life; be it our jobs, small businesses we run
or hope to start up, our ability and our doctors ability to receive and to give
premium health care, to our ability to do with our money what we want is being
taken away. Even our “Free Market” is
being corrupted by limiting our choices in the Market place by over regulation.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">The obvious based upon common sense
is being replaced by those obtuse regulations and regulators based on the Left’s
mantra of "Its For the Common Good”. Which
is anything but good or the “common sense” with which we ran our lives before there was even
“common law” from which the law derived. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">The regulations needed to implement
the laws for the “common good” are negative and while professing free choice,
really in effect limit the choices we have to choose from. Those choices we have left are because
someone other than the individual censored or limited the other choices to the ones they liked.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">Walter Gellhorn in his book “Individual
Freedom and Governmental Restraints” quoted Yale’s President Whitney Griswold
when talking about censorship leaving less choices. “The only sure weapon against bad ideas is
better ideas”. That was written in the
1950’s. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">Isn’t censorship by definition
arbitrary and tyrannical?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">After all, isn’t the American Dream
having the freedom to simply put your idea out there for the public to decide on and not have it “censored” first by the government? Isn't doing something we want to the definition of freedom. Isn’t that one of the main reasons Europeans
came to America in the first place? To
flee tyranny? </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">A farmer of the Free Choice ilk Joel Salatin, after butting heads with the bureaucracy on many occasions because he tried to do things outside the box wrote a book titled "<a href="http://www.amazon.com/Everything-Want-To-Do-Illegal/dp/0963810952">Everything I Want to Do is Illegal</a>", voicing the frustration most of us face when trying to do anything in this (Our) over-regulated country. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">While Joel would probably not call himself a Conservative, he might bite on being tagged a Liberal Conservative. I on the other hand might balk on being called a Liberal I too might bight on being called a Liberal Conservative. There is common ground to build upon here.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">Aren’t we now after all facing a
tyranny of regulation? Where left is
there to flee too accept within ourselves? Does not the saying in the picture below seem to sum it up?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/--H4EuLxZNI0/UmQg_lzXjeI/AAAAAAAAC1s/Yu0GUZDbjsY/s1600/Freedom+Camu.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/--H4EuLxZNI0/UmQg_lzXjeI/AAAAAAAAC1s/Yu0GUZDbjsY/s1600/Freedom+Camu.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: 19px; line-height: 20px;">I think Breitbart would agree.</span></div>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/--oJ7LkZ-hOE/UmQkBNDqFjI/AAAAAAAAC14/2KbvnVNO69g/s1600/Andrew+Breitbart.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="232" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/--oJ7LkZ-hOE/UmQkBNDqFjI/AAAAAAAAC14/2KbvnVNO69g/s1600/Andrew+Breitbart.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">Regards, Live Dangerously Be A
Conservative<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 107%;">PS.
Here is a link to Gellhorn mentioned above. </span><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1995/12/11/nyregion/walter-gellhorn-law-scholar-and-professor-dies-at-89.html">http://www.nytimes.com/1995/12/11/nyregion/walter-gellhorn-law-scholar-and-professor-dies-at-89.html</a><o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;"> As you will see Walter Gellhorn brought
together the liberal thoughts of individual freedom and how they were being
trampled by over regulation through the government. I would suggest reading further his book “<a href="http://www.amazon.com/Individual-Freedom-Governmental-Restraints-Gellhorn/dp/0837104424">IndividualFreedom and Governmental Restraints</a>”. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;"> I abhor any tyranny no matter what ideology it
professes. I would call myself an
outright Liberal because I believe that by definition along Gellhorn and Hayek’s
lines a Liberal is against the notion that the government should decide what we
are allowed to do. I believe in Freedom of choice in
all aspects; work, health care, and money. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">However I will add to my new title (Liberal),
the word Conservative because most liberals today have strayed from the
original Liberal path and believe Individual Freedom of Choice should only be
made between the choices defined by the government and which choices they allow us to
choose from.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Even the
religiously rigorous Amish allow their young adults the individual freedom of
choice when they send them out to venture among the “English” to judge for
themselves what they want to do with their lives.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">So perhaps
now I should sign my posts with;<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Live
Dangerously Be a Liberal Conservative <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">(To my Conservative friends that indeed may mean I’ll be
Living Dangerously)<span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Yup sounds good.</span></div>
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live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-85751879458604363772013-10-07T20:08:00.002-07:002013-10-21T09:25:22.181-07:00George Will to Be on Fox<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<b><i><u>George Will on Fox</u></i></b></div>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-DGBb6tZEqhI/UlN1H3Fmw2I/AAAAAAAAC08/oqrnEHuzu1U/s1600/George+Will.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-DGBb6tZEqhI/UlN1H3Fmw2I/AAAAAAAAC08/oqrnEHuzu1U/s1600/George+Will.jpg" width="196" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Fox news recently broke the news that
they will be hiring respected writer et all,</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;"> George Will.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Mr. Will in his latest article shows
what he will bring to the table.<br />
<a href="http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/will100313.php3#.Uk1qe4brxU8">http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/will100313.php3#.Uk1qe4brxU8</a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="line-height: 107%;">George Will has always been a
refreshing voice of reason. He actually </span></span><span style="font-size: 19px; line-height: 20px;">delves</span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="line-height: 107%;"> into the facts of the matter and lets the facts lead him where they will
and not pander to the rhetoric of the day.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">This article above shows us the facts
and explains what the motivation is behind the actions being taken without
unduly taking sides. Mr. Will then has
the ability to state his opinion not as some God like decree relegating other
opinions as unworthy but simply as his opinion.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">That will be refreshing.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">While I will love to see his brand of
fact and reasoned opinion off set the rhetoric sometimes portrayed on Fox, It
will be a shame for him not to be the conservative face on the Main Stream
Media, he was so good at it. That I believe is the where the most violent rhetoric is that needs to be off set. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">That after
all is where the battle that counts will be fought. In the Main Stream Media for the hearts and
minds of the public.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">When fighting for the hearts and
minds of their congregation a preacher may win his congregation, but as Martin
Luther showed, when you fight for the hearts and minds of the public, you can
win a whole religion.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">A fight within a church and the Devil
wins. A Fight by the church against the
Devil and the Devil loses.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-11903512855323759962013-10-03T16:56:00.001-07:002013-10-21T09:25:54.300-07:00Clancy and Flynn Dead<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Clancy and Flynn dead.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">If you're a reader and
love books the passing of both Tom Clancy and Vince Flynn is a sorrowful double blow to your spirits.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">If you happen to be a
conservative and are action minded, then the pain of their passing becomes hard
to bear, for me nearly intolerable.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I have enjoyed and
read all the books of them both. I remember first reading Clancy's
"The Hunt for Red October" and as President Reagan, I too lost some
sleep because I couldn't put it down. I remember hoping this was the first of many and indeed it was.</span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> </span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Tom Clancy's uniqueness was found not
just in the fast paced and militarily cogent aspects of his action novels, but
how he merged the genre of the cold war with the world wide spread of
terrorism and political intrigue.</span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> </span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">His books were blockbusters
and the movies made from them were big hits also. Most have seen
"The Hunt for Red October", "Patriot Games", and or
"Clear and Present Danger". All were Big Time movies with the likes
of Harrison Ford and Sean Connery as their Stars.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">While we do not yet
know the cause of death, his dying will be mourned by many. Perhaps a
blessing to ease us through our grief is that there will be another novel of
his writing coming out this winter titled "Command Authority". Also
there will be a movie titled "Jack Ryan: Shadow One" coming out
around the same time.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Some time into the progression of my reading of Clancy's "Jack Ryan" novels I found another
author. His name was Vince Flynn who broke onto the scene with
his collection of titles featuring Mitch Rapp as the fictional lead
character. </span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The first book in the series was the Assassins, I read it and
was hooked. Mitch Rapp seemed a fitting candidate to take over for Jack Ryan in the never ending fight over good and evil.</span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Vince Flynn's books like Clancy’s were fast
paced, factual and prescient. These books also dealt with political
intrigue at the highest levels, with terrorism running
throughout. Flynn cemented the genre Clancy created. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The real sadness for
readers is the relative youth of their passing.
Clancy died at age 66 which may seem old for the creative juices to be
flowing but if you look back in time, Robert Ludlum (of the Jason Bourne trilogy) was writing until he died at the age of 73. The two authors both favorites of mine were
much alike and I would say Clancy took Ludlum to the next step, evolving the
genre for the next generation, just as Flynn was evolving Clancy's. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The sadness becomes
more stark with the passing of Vince Flynn at only age 47. I remembered a quote from Flynn about Clancy
in a recent interview. I looked it up
here it is. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="apple-converted-space"><i><span style="background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #6d6d6d; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></i></span><i><span style="background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #6d6d6d; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">“Hey, if Clancy can do it, why can’t I? They
need books;<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span>somebody<span class="apple-converted-space"> has got to be the next Tom Clancy.”</span>
</i><span style="background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Talk about some irony, who will the next Vince Flynn be?<br />
</span><a href="http://www.atlassociety.org/tni/tnis-interview-vince-flynn">http://www.atlassociety.org/tni/tnis-interview-vince-flynn</a><o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">That
interview truly spells out the struggles of Vince Flynn from a poor background
with a learning disorder and how one can overcome all with sheer grit.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">Clancy sent out and received 60 rejection slips before a non fiction Naval publisher
accepted it for $5,000. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Both writers had their
struggles and Tom Clancy would tell you that the keeping your dream is the key
to it all. This link to an article
explains at the time the rise of Clancy as a literary force against the odds.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/tom-clancys-first-book-2013-10">http://www.businessinsider.com/tom-clancys-first-book-2013-10</a><o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-hAg_pgUHUZ8/Uk4BmHhCZrI/AAAAAAAAC0s/fxFGqI9AF4w/s1600/Hunt+for+Red+October.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-hAg_pgUHUZ8/Uk4BmHhCZrI/AAAAAAAAC0s/fxFGqI9AF4w/s1600/Hunt+for+Red+October.jpg" width="226" /></a></div>
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<o:p><br /></o:p></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Tom Clancy, Article
about his death.<br />
<a href="http://www.newsmax.com/US/obit-tom-clancy/2013/10/02/id/528873" target="_blank"><span style="color: #1155cc;">http://www.newsmax.com/US/obit-tom-clancy/2013/10/02/id/528873</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Tom Clancy's website<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><a href="http://www.tomclancy.com/tom_clancy_books_fiction.php" target="_blank"><span style="color: #1155cc;">http://www.tomclancy.com/tom_clancy_books_fiction.php</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Vince Flynn. Article about his death.e<br />
<a href="http://www.newsmax.com/TheWire/vince-flynn-dies-best-selling-author/2013/06/19/id/510783" target="_blank"><span style="color: #1155cc;">http://www.newsmax.com/TheWire/vince-flynn-dies-best-selling-author/2013/06/19/id/510783</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Vince Flynn's web
site.<br />
<a href="http://www.vinceflynn.com/" target="_blank"><span style="color: #1155cc;">http://www.vinceflynn.com/</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Regards, Live Dangerously Be a Conservative<br />Never let others dream for you.</span></div>
live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-30031192980014279232013-09-02T10:38:00.003-07:002013-10-21T09:26:51.351-07:00Democrat's War on the Middle Class.<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 36.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Democrats =<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 36.0pt; line-height: 107%;">War on the Middle Class<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 36.0pt; line-height: 107%;">???<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 36.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Jimmy Hoffa’s Letter to the Democrats
about Obamacare.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-size: 36.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<a href="http://blogs.wsj.com/corporate-intelligence/2013/07/12/union-letter-obamacare-will-destroy-the-very-health-and-wellbeing-of-workers/">http://blogs.wsj.com/corporate-intelligence/2013/07/12/union-letter-obamacare-will-destroy-the-very-health-and-wellbeing-of-workers/</a><span style="font-size: 8.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<br /></div>
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<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“When you and the President sought our support
for the Affordable Care Act (ACA), you pledged that if we liked the health
plans we have now, we could keep them. Sadly, that promise is under threat.
Right now, unless you and the Obama Administration enact an equitable
fix, the ACA will shatter not only our hard-earned health benefits, but
destroy the foundation of the 40 hour work week that is the backbone of the American
middle class.”</span></i></b><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: justify;">
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Like millions of other Americans, our members
are front-line workers in the American economy. We have been strong
supporters of the notion that all Americans should have access to quality,
affordable health care. We have also been strong supporters of you. In
campaign after campaign we have put boots on the ground, gone door-to-door
to get out the vote, run phone banks and raised money to secure this vision.”</span></i></b><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: justify;">
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Now this vision has come back to haunt us.”</span></i></b><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: justify;">
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Since the ACA was enacted, we have been
bringing our deep concerns to the Administration, seeking
reasonable regulatory interpretations to the statute that would help
prevent the destruction of non-profit health plans. As you both know
first-hand, our persuasive arguments have been disregarded and met with a stone
wall by the White House and the pertinent agencies. This is especially
stinging because other stakeholders have repeatedly received successful
interpretations for their respective grievances. Most disconcerting of course
is last week’s huge accommodation for the employer community—extending the
statutorily mandated “December 31, 2013” deadline for the employer mandate
and penalties.”</span></i></b><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: justify;">
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Time is running out: Congress wrote this law;
we voted for you. We have a problem; you need to fix it. The unintended
consequences of the ACA are severe. Perverse incentives are already creating
nightmare scenarios.”</span></i></b><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: justify;">
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“First, the law creates an incentive for
employers to keep employees’ work hours below 30 hours a week.
Numerous employers have begun to cut workers’ hours to avoid this
obligation, and many of them are doing so openly. The impact is two-fold:
fewer hours means less pay while also losing our current health benefits.”</span></i></b><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: justify;">
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Second, millions of Americans are covered by
non-profit health insurance plans like the ones in which most of our
members participate. These non-profit plans are governed jointly by unions and
companies under the Taft-Hartley Act. Our health plans have been built
over decades by working men and women. Under the ACA as interpreted by the
Administration, our employees will treated differently and not be eligible for
subsidies afforded other citizens. As such, many employees will be
relegated to second-class status and shut out of the help the law offers
to for-profit insurance plans.”</span></i></b><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: justify;">
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“And finally, even though non-profit plans
like ours won’t receive the same subsidies as for-profit plans, they’ll be
taxed to pay for those subsidies. Taken together, these restrictions will make
non-profit plans like ours unsustainable, and will undermine the
health-care market of viable alternatives to the big health insurance
companies.”</span></i></b><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: justify;">
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“On behalf of the millions of working men and
women we represent and the families they support, we can no longer stand
silent in the face of elements of the Affordable Care Act that will destroy the
very health and wellbeing of our members along with millions of other
hardworking Americans.”</span></i></b><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: justify;">
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“We believe that there are common-sense
corrections that can be made within the existing statute that will
allow our members to continue to keep their current health plans and
benefits just as you and the President pledged. Unless changes are made,
however, that promise is hollow.”</span></i></b><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: justify;">
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“We continue to stand behind real health care
reform, but the law as it stands will hurt millions of Americans including
the members of our respective unions.”</span></i></b><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: justify;">
<b><i><span style="color: #444444; font-family: "Tahoma","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“We are looking to you to make sure these
changes are made.”<o:p></o:p></span></i></b></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It’s
about trust.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
President is losing his credibility and sense of trustworthiness among his base.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">No
matter how you spin it, the battle over the Affordable Care Act, (Obamacare),
is a battle between those who work and those who don’t.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">President
Obama will throw anyone under the buss to keep that war of disparity in high
gear.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It’s
about time the Union workers of the world realize they are the ones, funding
those who don’t</span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
is they who are being thrown under the bus as we speak or more appropriately as
they work.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Some
of the Union leaders are getting the picture.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">They
are feeling threatened by their working members because the President lied to
them about not taxing their benefits to fund Obamacare.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It’s
time now for the workers of the world unite, stand up and take their turn to
throw Obamacare and all forms of socialism under the bus</span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Most
people especially the Union workers are figuring this out, and it’s about time. <o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">From
the letter above, Teamsters President Jimmy Hoffa I think has realized that President
Obama isn’t loyal to those who got him there only loyal to those who will get him
to where he is going.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I’m
hoping that the working middle class of this great country will finally figure
out that important fact about Obama. In
fact I hope all those who are being used by him and treated as a doormat will
start to stand up.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
and his policies are a strictly class war between those who get their money
from government and those who make it otherwise.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Obama’s
class war is between those who work and those who don’t.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">President
Obama will throw anyone under the buss to keep that war of disparity in high
gear.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It’s
about time the Union workers of the world realize they are the ones that will
be thrown under the bus next.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">As
Mr. Hoffa intimates, this is a war on the American Dream where a person can
support his family through their work, vs. taking money from them so others
don’t have to.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Hoffa
is sounding like a Reagan Democrat.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
hope it’s catchy.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
is catchy<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">News
Flash 9/1/2013<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #444444; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">40,000
longshoremen dissociate themselves from The AFL-CIO over Obamacare. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/09/01/Citing-Obamacare-40-000-Longshoremen-Quit-the-AFL-CIO">http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/09/01/Citing-Obamacare-40-000-Longshoremen-Quit-the-AFL-CIO</a><o:p></o:p><br />
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #111111; font-size: 16pt;">Robert McEllrath, head
of the ILWU wrote a letter to Richard Trumka AFL-CIO leader. Below is a snippet. </span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #111111; font-size: 16pt;">"We feel the
Federation (AFL-CIO) has done a great disservice to the labor movement and all
working people by going along to get along," <br />
<br />
McEllrath the Longshoremen leader was voicing his objections of Trumka’s
support of the President’s Obamacare and immigration policies.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #111111; font-size: 16pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;">Trumpka head of the AFL-CIO a big supporter of
Obamacare and the President in the beginning is now sounding reminiscent of
Nancy Pelosi as he starts to feel the heat from his members. Recently he said in answer to the question of
how the changes he wanted to be made in Obamacare would work: “I can’t tell you how it
would work until its done”. I.e. Pelosi
“We won’t know what’s in it till we pass it.”<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;">What a chance for Republicans to win a landslide in
2014. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;">How? Who? <o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;">Who do the Republicans have that can unite these
Reagan Democrats with their base?<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;">Who do the Republicans have that can unite the
Republicans?<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;">I fear for the Republicans, if they cannot take the
lead in this. If they cannot why would people expect they could take leadership
across the board</span><span style="font-size: 16pt;">.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: 16pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;">Americans now have a leader who cannot lead, who is
afraid of making a decision that may tarnish his image. He changes his mind on a whim, he seems all
image, all rhetoric; from his swaggering to the podium, to his “jaunty” salute
at the bottom of the steps of air force one, to his feet up on the White House
furniture. As people get tired of his
bling and look for leadership they are finding none.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;">An empty suit.
A Cocky Smile.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;">What is the alternative?<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;">Give me a Tea Party candidate? One without rhetoric? Haven’t
found many.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;">Why? Because
they are drowned out by and quickly pick up their own rhetoric.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;">Catch 22? No
just tell the truth and be willing to support those who do. Not those who will give you the most. Beware, it is the oldest of survival instincts. It has been the foundation of support for
tyranny since records have been kept.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;">It is Greed, or “self-interest” for the squeamish.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; mso-line-height-alt: 12.6pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;">Civilizations are measured by how they control that.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
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<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;">Not their Governments but they the people that chose leaders and allow them to keep power.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;">Our civilization - we will be judged by who we allow to lead.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: 16.0pt;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: 16pt;">Elections matter.</span></div>
live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-29860276534651739502013-07-26T07:16:00.001-07:002013-07-26T07:16:41.601-07:00On the EdgeOn the Edge<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xtPzv3_ypcI/UfKEFoI4POI/AAAAAAAAC0Q/ZoOO6fDtUmE/s1600/cart+in+front+man.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img bba="true" border="0" height="200" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xtPzv3_ypcI/UfKEFoI4POI/AAAAAAAAC0Q/ZoOO6fDtUmE/s200/cart+in+front+man.jpg" width="178" /></a></div><br />
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<div class="separator" style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><br />
What if, as Thomas Sowell in his recent article, “Mindset of the Left” said; “…. institutions and government policy -- are not the most important factors in the world's problems,… What if things like the family, the culture and the traditions that make a more positive difference than the bright new government "solutions…"?<br />
<br />
-----link-----<br />
<a href="http://townhall.com/columnists/thomassowell/2013/07/02/the-mindset-of-the-left-n1631804">http://townhall.com/columnists/thomassowell/2013/07/02/the-mindset-of-the-left-n1631804</a><br />
---------------<br />
<br />
Mr. Sowell’s article asks questions such as what if locking up criminals works better than understanding motives and the rest? What improvement in teenage pregnancy have we had since we started teaching sex in elementary school? <br />
<br />
We are at a tipping point in history. Many people have made that statement, and while we all on both sides seem to understand that; we don’t quite know what to do about it. <br />
<br />
So why don’t we change our country’s path?<br />
<br />
What we need to understand at this point are two things. The first thing is the tremendous effort which is needed to reverse the momentum. Secondly we must also understand that at the point where we are spending our greatest effort is the point of least direct reward. In other words, slowing something down which is moving one way gives us nothing to point to as progress along the path in which we want it to go. Even though the most effort is needed at this juncture, because of the lack of progress there is little to point to as progress for our side.<br />
<br />
It is at this point that faith is our only measure that can keep us striving.<br />
<br />
It is at this point that those without faith will point to our lack of progress and the terrible cost our “stubbornness” is charging. Without faith there can be no dreams except nightmares.<br />
<br />
Throughout history we see that it is when we lose the faith in our dreams that we lose the battle. Look at America and the Vietnam war, when we lost the faith in what and why we were fighting, we lost the war. So too in our culture, when we lose faith in the American Dream we will lose it and the exceptionalism that dream has inspired.<br />
<br />
As we think back upon our Independence it behooves us to remember that when all was against American Independence, when the papers and world opinion called us down for the count; it is then that the Individual who called him/herself an American fell back on faith to see them through. When all they had was Faith in a Dream they put their all on the line and won the day for little reward but for the chance at the American Dream for their children. Can we expect of ourselves any less? <br />
<br />
It is Faith that founded and made this Country and only Faith that can keep it.<br />
<br />
Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-20471762830593445702013-04-28T11:45:00.001-07:002013-05-11T07:09:54.368-07:00Watching the Dollars, the Millions take care of Themselves<br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-WOJlRD1QOYM/UX1t5Sh7D9I/AAAAAAAACws/4KoF_J9WMqk/s1600/Candice+Miller+I.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-WOJlRD1QOYM/UX1t5Sh7D9I/AAAAAAAACws/4KoF_J9WMqk/s1600/Candice+Miller+I.jpg" /></a></div>
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I recently <a href="http://conservativeinmuskegon.blogspot.com/2013/04/ever-optimist.html">blogged</a> about a Peggy Noonan article, “the
Presidential Wheel is Turning”. I
blogged about all the evidence that is becoming clearer to people that the promises of Hope and Change made by President Barack Obama was a sham. Although the President has made drastic Change, that change was not in line with the hopes of the public who voted for him. Up and down the line people are beginning
to understand that the person whom they voted for because he offered Hope and
Change, provided none of the later and they are running out of Hope he ever will. They voted for him in the first place because their hope was that he could change government and make it work. He hasn't, Americans are still angry with government and want something done and they are still looking for someone who will.
<o:p></o:p></div>
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I have seen how hope and change can really happen. I've seen it come from the bottom up. I have seen how a small group of people can
make a change not befitting their size. In
our state of Michigan I have seen what used to be a minority overtake the majority
by doing the simple things; those things they learned from their friends and
family. I have helped local candidates
win elections and go to the state capital where they followed through and
practiced what they preached. They made
a difference and I’m not too humble to say from the bottom up I had a part,
albeit a small part.<o:p></o:p></div>
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The acts were small but consistent to start with and they
all shared the common goal of doing more with less, of actually rolling up
their sleeves and doing the work themselves when possible instead of looking to
spend more money to do less. It is
called living within your means.
Americans outside of politics practice that every day when we decide to
eat meatloaf instead of borrowing money to buy standing rib. The smartest of us learn from this kind of experience. We learn that we grow as individuals by the doing, (there are ways to make a great
tasting meatloaf), not to mention how wonderful that standing rib tastes when you
have a month or more to look forward to it.</div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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Well excuse my getting carried away about food, it’s way
past lunch time.<o:p></o:p></div>
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We in Michigan are starting to turn this state around. The people we have helped get elected are
taking those lessens to the state capital and putting them into practice. This was done not in the best of times but the Budget has been balanced and on time for
3 years now during the worst of times. Not three plentiful years,
but three years that have seen shrinking population and income with high
unemployment. Because of this and other
belt tightening measures our state’s credit rating has been upgraded, Detroit’s
mayor is in jail, we have an actual rainy day fund and people have started to
move back to Michigan along with business.
Our population which had been dwindling for the past decade has finally started
to show a net increase. Unemployment has started to go down.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Regulations are being reigned in. Individuals on all fronts are starting to
gain back their rights to do and decide things on their own, freer of the encumbrances of government. We again are getting the chance to make our own mistakes and learn from them. The government better beware, that freedom is addictive. We may have a long way to go but as we learn
to enjoy the journey in our personal lives, but we are learning to enjoy that sense of contentment I think we could all use more of.</div>
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This type of talk used to be laughed at by the bureaucrats
but read the following link.<o:p></o:p></div>
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-----link-----<br />
<a href="http://clicks.electionemail.com/trkr/?c=2412&g=1197&p=c8a7cc814fc95e99961c310dbb0bd26c&u=58dc0a84526eb2d10fef1326d6145067&q=&t=1" target="_blank"><span style="background: white; color: #1155cc; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 13.5pt; line-height: 107%;">http://www.usatoday.com/story/<wbr></wbr>news/politics/2013/04/24/<wbr></wbr>boehner-millions-house-<wbr></wbr>savings-budget/2106435/</span></a><br />
---------------<o:p></o:p></div>
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Although this is led by Speaker John Boehner in the House, I
take pride that it is a Republican from Michigan, Candice Miller that is taking
the lead. I give credit to them both. Republicans seem to be willing to practice
what they preach and do the work themselves when they can. Below is a quote from the article.<o:p></o:p></div>
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-----Quote-----<br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.5pt;">"Believe
me, I am totally aware that there is no sympathy for members of Congress.
However, I think we should lead by example," said Rep. Candice Miller,
R-Mich., a Detroit-area congresswoman who chairs the committee that oversees
internal budget cuts.”<br />
------------------<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 16.5pt; margin-bottom: 11.25pt; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in;">
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.5pt;">The next quote seems to point
out the disdain Democrats have for such things.
They seem to think that it is for their staff to do the thinking and working
and not themselves. Think about it, if they don't trust themselves to make decisions what chance do you think they will give the ordinary people that chance?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.5pt;">-----quote-----<br />
{Leading Democrats have chafed at the belt tightening, arguing it undermines
adequate personnel resources for research and oversight. "We are past the
point of cutting what we want, and we are now into cutting what we need — our
ability to attract and retain expert staff," said Rep. Robert Brady,
D-Pa., in opposition to further committee cuts approved in March.}<br />
----------------<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.5pt;">I just read an article that
says Michigan is having a hard time recruiting a strong Republican Candidate
for the US Senate seat that will be vacated by the retiring Carl Levin. What about Candice Miller? From the article linked above the Senate could
use a dose of Michigan Wisdom. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.5pt;">Regards, Live Dangerously Be a
Conservative<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-43132758821112827952013-04-26T16:18:00.000-07:002013-04-27T05:46:17.091-07:00Ever the Optimist<br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Ever the Optimist.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">I just read Peggy Noonan’s article from the Wall Street
Journal, I pulled it from the Drudge Report.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">-----link------------------</span><a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323789704578445232153839720.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_sections_opinion"><span style="color: #0563c1; font-family: Calibri;">http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323789704578445232153839720.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_sections_opinion</span></a><br />
--------------</div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">I’ve always loved the way she writes, and the common sense
she weaves through her pieces.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Her
ability to show how the “The Presidential wheel turns” and is turning on
President Barack Obama was clear and to the point.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So is most of her writing.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Amid the recent backdrop of 5 living Presidents together on
one stage for President George W’s Presidential Library, there was one who
stood out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While the rest evoked
positive passions for, as Peggy said “the way we were”, like I said one didn’t.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Instead that one stood out as he likes to do
but from the wrong emotions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Those
emotions were the ones we feel when we are being used cheaply and taken for
granted by someone who is manipulative and self-serving.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Again better said by Noonan<span style="font-size: 10pt; line-height: 107%;">.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br />-----quote-----</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 10pt; line-height: 107%;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">“</span></span><span lang="EN" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN;">President Obama was more formal than the
other speakers and less confident than usual, as if he knew he was surrounded
by people who have something he doesn't. "No matter how much you think
you're ready to assume the office of the president, it's impossible to
understand the nature of the job until it's yours." This is a way of
seeming to laud others when you're lauding yourself. He veered into current
policy disputes, using Mr. Bush's failed comprehensive immigration reform to
buttress his own effort. That was manipulative, graceless and typical.”<br />----------------</span></div>
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<span lang="EN" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN;">The wheel
does seem to be turning when noted and respected journalist Tom Brokow turns
down an invite to the White House Correspondents dinner because of the way the
expense and foppery of the event must appear to outsiders, those not in the
Beltway.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As he said the televised affair
must look to the average person as if </span><span lang="EN" style="color: black; mso-ansi-language: EN;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">‘We’re Versailles. The rest of you eat cake.’” Not to
mention how as I try to write with Peggy’s style, the old look of two competing
sides trying to be civil to one another from the past has changed to one of obvious
suck-uppyness.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This article about Brokow
came from Politico which normally has a slight left slant.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Again some “Wheel” turnage?<br /><br />-----link------------------
<br />
</span><a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2013/04/tom-brokaw-white-house-correspondents-dinner-90427_Page2.html#ixzz2Rbm5shlq"><span style="color: #003399;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">http://www.politico.com/story/2013/04/tom-brokaw-white-house-correspondents-dinner-90427_Page2.html#ixzz2Rbm5shlq</span></span></a><br />--------------</span></div>
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<span lang="EN" style="color: black; mso-ansi-language: EN;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Then
I ran across this “wheel turning” article again in Politico, by Keith Koffler, titled
“Obama’s hubris problem”.<br /><br />-----link-------------------</span></span><br />
<a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2013/04/obamas-hubris-problem-90650.html?hp=l13"><span style="color: #0563c1; font-family: Calibri;">http://www.politico.com/story/2013/04/obamas-hubris-problem-90650.html?hp=l13</span></a><span style="font-family: Calibri;">
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Koffler’s critique of Obama’s seemingly reckless race to
turn Noonan’s “wheel” faster is well stated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Koffler chronicles a few examples of the President’s “high handedness
and self-absorption”.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>By the time the
reader has read the few it seems more like many and by the time the second page
is read the many have become a picture of a manipulative, self-aggrandizing
leader much more worried about the word I than We.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Further into the article Koffler brings up the idea of <span lang="EN" style="mso-ansi-language: EN;"> and that Obama is
giving off that vibe more and more by legislating from the Executive through
executive order and picking which laws he and his justice department will
enforce and which ones they won’t.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
saying “L’etat, c’est moi” is attributed to Napoleon and means “I am the State”.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> Is it just me or doesn't it seem ironic that the sayings above "Let them eat cake" and “<span lang="EN" style="mso-ansi-language: EN;">L’etat, c’est moi” are French words describing an American President?</span></span></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN" style="mso-ansi-language: EN;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The “Presidential
wheel turns” indeed and it is becoming so blatant that even what talk show host
Rush Limbaugh calls the “Low information voter” is picking up on it.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<br />
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<span lang="EN" style="mso-ansi-language: EN;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The list of
evidence for the turning wheel is all around us and it is coming in ever
increasing cascades as an avalanche gathers coming down a mountain -- well ever
an optimist I hope and work for change instead of morning about loss.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One thing seems certain, from all of the
above to the arrogance and Nixonian style cover up of Ben Gazzi, to the
petulance of recent press conferences when he hasn’t gotten his way, to
homeland security trying to get the corner on the ammunition market to stifle
gun sales without legislation, Obama is coming off the rails.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> Speaking of which is the coming "train wreck" that is coming with the costs of Obama Care. </span>The list of his growing abuses of executive
power is long and much too obvious and denials are too often and wordy to be
believed anymore by most, except the most entranced.</span></span><br />
<span lang="EN" style="mso-ansi-language: EN;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"></span></span><br />
<span lang="EN" style="mso-ansi-language: EN;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The proof is becoming clear to more and more people, the proof indeed will be in the pudding or the "cake" as it were.</span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN" style="mso-ansi-language: EN;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">This “Obama
Fatigue” that Peggy Noonan talks about let us hope not be replaced by the ”Hillary Clinton fatigue”, we all
remember.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If it is, then we will have
forgotten. Forgotten about the fatigue we had with her that nearly cost her husband the
election.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> Forgotten about her Hillary Care, and about her peevishness and pettiness. </span>I'm hopeful however that once she
starts talking, even with Bill by her side we will remember the emotions she
evoked in us, while different than those of the current President they are just
as “emotionless” with that same lack of conscience or empathy that in others of lesser personage we describe as psychopathic.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<br />
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<span lang="EN" style="mso-ansi-language: EN;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Ever the optimist
I think the people are saying they want more from their leaders than $500,000
hotel bills from the Vice President.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>They want more than to be allowed to eat the left over cake crumbs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They want to be exempted from Obama Care just
like everyone within the Beltway seems to be doing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They are starting to demand that laws be
applied equally to Congress and Presidents and then themselves.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> That our leaders should lead by example not by "do as I say not as I do". </span>That even a President who won two elections
and is a “Lame Duck Wearing a Crown” isn’t above the law.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN" style="mso-ansi-language: EN;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">The final proof
of the wheel turning is that Donna Brazile just wrote an article for CNN saying
that Bush came through on Katrina.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
upshot of which was that beyond the talk that all politicians use to assuage
the masses, the Bushes (W. and his wife) actually followed through and made
more trips to the Katrina site than the Obamas and Biden’s took vacation trips
and that is saying a lot.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Donna if you
remember was Gore-Lieberman’s campaign manager.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span></span></span><br />
<span lang="EN" style="mso-ansi-language: EN;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">-----link-----<br /><a href="http://www.cnn.com/2013/04/25/opinion/brazile-katrina-bush">http://www.cnn.com/2013/04/25/opinion/brazile-katrina-bush</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">---------------</span><br />
<span lang="EN" style="mso-ansi-language: EN;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;"></span></span><br />
<span lang="EN" style="mso-ansi-language: EN;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">To her credit she gave credit where credit was due and some of us on the
other side should also practice that a little more, and a little less preaching
or the “Wheel” will quit turning.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN" style="mso-ansi-language: EN;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Regards Live
Dangerously be a Conservative<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></div>
live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-15274072206563831712013-04-18T09:52:00.000-07:002013-04-18T09:57:49.465-07:00Who is This Guy ???<br />
<br />
<br />
What is bottom up politics? (Please take note of the quotes – although I would love to claim the quoted material as mine - it is not) Here's a hint the smoke is clearing.<br />
<br />
Who is the guy who said the following ??? What right wing Waco is he ??? <br />
<br />
Was it J.S. Mill, or F.A. Hayek, or Edmund Burke, or Milton Friedman or George Will or Ronald Reagan or Maggie Thatcher? <br />
<br />
None of the above.<br />
<br />
“You asked and now you will listen, my son. The social assistance state leads to a loss of human energies and an inordinate increase of public agencies, which are dominated more by bureaucratic thinking than by real concern for helping people. Needs are best understood and satisfied by people who are closest to them who act as neighbors and parish members to those in need. It should be added that certain kinds of demands often call for a response which is not simply material but which is capable of perceiving the deeper human need. This is not to mention the welfare states excesses and abuses.”<br />
<br />
Who is this guy ???<br />
<br />
(ME) - Yup bureaucracy is a self fulfilling evil by definition. It is put in place initially to take care of an evil such as poverty, or mental health, and then it quickly starts to expand the definition of poverty or mental health to include those things we used to think as normal that are not evil. In effect their efforts broaden the number of people included (or stigmatized) in its base. The whole concept of helping people becomes a concept of helping the bureaucracy first and then the people. The energy and wealth of the people is therefore wasted on the bureaucracy and not on actually helping people. As the quote above alluded to, helping people is best done one on one from the bottom up. From the top down the idea of helping people gets lost, and it becomes the government’s job and not their neighbors. Now back to the burning question,<br />
<br />
Who is this guy ??? <br />
<br />
“In Europe first and now in America, elected men have taken it upon themselves to indebt their people to create an atmosphere of dependency.And why? For their own selfish need to increase their own personal power. I’ve been a keen observer of the effect this has on the people, especially the poor. They are very good at creating poverty where there is no reason to explain it. My job is try to alleviate poverty….”<br />
<br />
Who is this guy ??? (The quoted material is all from an interview conducted by Chris Matthews, who is he interviewing?)<br />
<br />
Reporter’s question: “But you refuse to blame corporations for their role?”<br />
<br />
Answer. “Okay, they also told me you have a degree in economics. No buyer, or seller either, enters into any exchange against his will. It is the nature of the economy. Man is frail, and he makes mistakes and sometimes is greedy and they enter into exchanges that don’t help them. Sometimes they become poor, but they made choices. There is nothing the Church can do except try to educate people to become good consumers. Chiefly, for me, it is an education solution on that side. And the Church has more schools around the globe than any other faith. I say teach the people to save their souls, and also teach them how not to become poor. And how not to allow the government to trick them into poverty.”<br />
<br />
REPORTER: “ And you blame government?<br />
<br />
Answer: “No, I blame the self-serving politicians! <br />
<br />
REPORTER: “So your solution to poverty is to change the nature of politics? <br />
<br />
Answer: “Please feel free to broadcast this; I don’t want to be pope. Friend, you are a socialist and your friends are socialists. And you are the reason for 70 years of misery in Russia and Europe now is seizing in pain from your policies. You believe in the redistribution of wealth and it makes entire populations poor. You want to nationalize everything and bring every human endeavor under your control. You destroy a man's incentive to take care of his very own family, a crime against nature and nature’s God. You want social control over populations and incrementally you are making everything against the law. Together this ideology creates more poverty today than all the corporations you vilify have in the history of man.” <br />
<br />
REPORTER: “I’ve never heard such from a Cardinal. I’m not sure if you are here to help yourself or disqualify yourself?”<br />
<br />
Answer: “Please air this interview. People being dominated by socialists need to know we don’t all have to be poor. Some poverty is part of our being cast out of the Garden of Eden. But look at the empire of dependency created by Hugo Chavez. Promising them, tricking them into worship of government and his very own person. Giving them fish but not allowing them to fish. If a fisherman does develop a talent today in Latin America; he is castigated and his catch stolen by the socialists. He stops?”<br />
<br />
REPORTER: “Feedom isn’t punished anywhere, is it?” <br />
<br />
Answer: “Certainly it is!” <br />
<br />
REPORTER: “In Latin America?” <br />
<br />
Answer: “I’m afraid Latin America is lost. The people of the entire area are controlled by a bloc of militant socialist regimes in the region, most prominently Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia and Nicaragua. They have a gun pointed at their head. So their heart is now captured. Who will save them at this point?” <br />
<br />
REPORTER: So the game is over. Checkmate?” <br />
<br />
Answer: “Friend, I’ve been studying America this month before the Pope chose to resign. You must not have fear at speaking the truth. It is for the salvation of souls and the recovery of Thomas Jefferson’s people. America must not fall to the new painted communism. Even the low information voters don’t want America to be sold into slavery. I pray they cast out the money changers in their government! What manner of government is there that condones sin? Abomination upon abomination--giving monies for the murder of children, giving monies for the murder of the elderly! You are an American. Your government, My child, has been infiltrated by men of sin.” <br />
<br />
Who is this Guy? <br />
<br />
Was the interview ever published?<br />
<br />
Do you think Chris Matthews “…felt a thrill going up his leg” on this interview? <br />
<br />
REPORTER: “I think we are done?” <br />
<br />
Answer: “Wait. If I speak on the ordination of women, on celibacy, on divorce, will you air this interview and my message?”<br />
<br />
REPORTER: “No, we are done.” <br />
<br />
Answer: “Partially what irritates me to the core is the media’s inability to look at anything without looking into the cause of the various problems. People are made poor so they will vote for the very candidates that made them poor.” <br />
<br />
REPORTER: “Have a nice day and thanks for your time.” <br />
<br />
CAMERA OFF / END TRANSCRIPT<br />
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Wow. Who is this guy ??? He is the new Pope.<br />
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No, this interview wasn’t published.<br />
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No, Chris didn’t get that tingle up his leg.<br />
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This new Pope’s name is Pope Francis I. <br />
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The white smoke has cleared, this guy is indeed a "God Send".<br />
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The whole interview is really great. <a href="http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/3000243/posts">http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/3000243/posts</a>live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-39917540696752631702013-04-13T09:40:00.001-07:002013-04-13T09:40:51.737-07:00Simple TruthsSimple Truths<br />
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The common saying we hear is that “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”.<br />
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Well -- Government is broke and needs fixing.<br />
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The Republican Party for the most part is simply happy to proclaim that far and wide. They simply forget to say how they’ll fix it or make any substantial effort to fix what broke it.<br />
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In 2007 at a Republican Congressional District Roundup to Rally the troops for our Congressman at the time in which he asked the assembled faithful why people were not behind the Republicans as evidenced by the sweeping Democrat victories in the 2006 off year elections. He seemed genuinely perplexed. I rose and said something to this effect.<br />
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“If you had a car whose transmission was broke and took it to a garage and they gave it back to you after claiming to fix it and -- it didn’t work, it cost twice what it should have as if it was fixed and they continued to claim it did work and that their charge was reasonable, and then because you were unwilling to pay you were somehow unfaithful to the cause; would you seriously take your car back to that same garage to get it running?”<br />
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I told him that I wouldn’t nor would any sane person. I then said the Republicans were given all the reigns of power and didn’t do what they claimed they would. What did they expect the voters to do. <br />
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Well history tells us the Republicans didn’t change much and a Democrat promising change won the Presidency to match the House with a filibuster proof Senate in the 2008 elections. The only redeeming occurrence for Republicans that history tells us is that the Democrats also charged twice as much to fix it, claimed it was fixed and like Republicans left it worse off than they found it. <br />
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So again the voters picked the only option there was in the two party system in the 2010 off year election and gave the House back to the Republicans and took away the filibuster Senate from the Democrats. <br />
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This article is supposed to be about “simple truths” so the simple truth I’ve seen in all of this is that the voters when faced with incompetence voted for anyone promising change. The other “simple truth” is that once elected the party promising change didn’t come through. The car remained broke. <br />
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The other truth was that the Tea Party provided the face of change for the Republican Party in the 2010 election. The truth was that the Republican Party didn’t change their message until pushed by the Tea Party. Whether the change offered by the New Republicans will be substantive remains to be seen. Whether the Tea Party offers “concrete” change as Peggy Noonan in the article by her refers to below remains also to be seen. <br />
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I think Demagoguery, is just an excuse for lazy minds, provides something to say for those incapable of thinking for themselves on the right and left.<br />
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The other “simple truth” that is above all the others; voters want their government to work. For all the money and power we as voters convey upon our legislators and the $trillions we pay in taxes, we expect solutions to our problems. What we get is unbridled bureaucracy which instead of fixing the problems convinces us that what they need is an ever-increasing budget to help them fix an ever-expanding group of newly defined problems. <br />
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It has been often quoted that the “War on Poverty” has been lost. We still however, continue to spend an ever-increasing amount fighting it.<br />
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Peggy Noonan in her Blog article, “Two Thoughts and a Question Answered” states another “simple truth” -- “nobody trusts Congress”. Rather than trying to paraphrase her thoughts, here is the full quote.<br />
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-----link-----<br />
<a href="http://blogs.wsj.com/peggynoonan/2013/03/27/two-thoughts-and-a-question-answered/">http://blogs.wsj.com/peggynoonan/2013/03/27/two-thoughts-and-a-question-answered/ </a><br />
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“Nobody trusts Congress. We all know this. Approval of Congress is at 13% in the polls. Part of this is the general decline in respect that Americans feel for their institutions. But part of it also is that Congress the past few years has taken to passing 1,000- or 2,000-page bills that nobody has read, and nobody knows what’s in them, and, as Nancy Pelosi famously said, we have to pass it to find out what’s in it. Administrators and bureaucrats get to define the meaning of page 873, paragraph 8, subsection 5, line 12. Their definitions often agitate the public. Everyone winds up feeling jerked around.”<br />
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The classic Noonan expression that “Everyone winds up feeling jerked around” is really the driving force today between the voters and all politicians and the government they are supposed to be running. That feeling is what formed the Tea Party, and has defined the word “Change” in a political setting. It has become apparent that it is now the bureaucrats and administrators running Congress not the other way around. The purpose of elected officials should be to guard the public’s interests from the bureaucracy’s and not to give free license to the bureaucracy fulfilling their interests over the public’s. <br />
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The other simple truth is that if our elected officials cannot do that, then they are redundant and we could have a less costly more simple bureaucratic despotism. For make no mistake it is a Bureaucratic Despotism that we are saddled with. Too pay all we do for the Congress just to give us the appearance of freedom without the substance is a waste of our money.<br />
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AND<br />
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The Car Remains Broken<br />
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Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative<br />
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live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-7120873621781427142012-11-12T16:51:00.000-08:002012-11-12T16:51:16.820-08:00Who's Right?Sure sometimes I pretend to understand the last election.<br />
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But I really don’t.<br />
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Some of the best and brightest minds have in the last few days admitted as much, putting me at least in some pretty great company. Take for example Newt Gingrich saying this on Nov 12th six days after the election.<br />
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“But if you had said to me three weeks ago that Mitt Romney would get fewer votes than John McCain [in 2008] — and it looks like he will be 2 million fewer — I would have been dumbfounded.”<br />
-----link-----<br />
<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/election-2012/wp/2012/11/12/newt-gingrich-dumbfounded-by-election-results/">http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/election-2012/wp/2012/11/12/newt-gingrich-dumbfounded-by-election-results/</a> <br />
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Then there is George Will saying the following about some things conservatives need to do, about immigration, same sex marriage and legalized marijuana.<br />
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“And one who tilts toward the libertarian side of the Republican Party’s fusion of social and laissez-faire conservatism. Most voters already favor less punitive immigration policies than the ones angrily advocated by clenched-fist Republicans unwilling to acknowledge that immigrating — risking uncertainty for personal and family betterment — is an entrepreneurial act. The speed with which civil unions and same-sex marriage have become debatable topics and even mainstream policies is astonishing. As is conservatives’ failure to recognize this: They need not endorse such policies but neither need they despise those, such as young people, who favor them. And it is strange for conservatives to turn a stony face toward any reconsideration of drug policies, particularly concerning marijuana, which confirm conservatism’s warnings about government persistence in the teeth of evidence.”<br />
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-----link to George Will’s article-----<br />
<a href="http://www.beloitdailynews.com/opinion/george-will-for-the-gop-start-all-over-again/article_4bbf876c-2ceb-11e2-a9ee-001a4bcf887a.html">http://www.beloitdailynews.com/opinion/george-will-for-the-gop-start-all-over-again/article_4bbf876c-2ceb-11e2-a9ee-001a4bcf887a.html</a> <br />
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Even Dick Morris admitted his mistakes this way.<br />
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The key reason for my bum prediction is that I mistakenly believed that the 2008 surge in black, Latino, and young voter turnout would recede in 2012 to “normal” levels. Didn’t happen. These high levels of minority and young voter participation are here to stay; and, with them, a permanent reshaping of our nation’s politics.<br />
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-----link to Morris’s’ article-----<br />
<a href="http://www.dickmorris.com/why-i-was-wrong/">http://www.dickmorris.com/why-i-was-wrong/</a> <br />
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The list goes on of the respected prognosticators on the Right who predicted a Republican/Conservative landslide. They were mistaken, so was I.<br />
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What then are we to do? Simply put we need to convince people to vote for our candidate. If you read the above closely and read the links, one thing should be clear. We need to be more accepting of those who believe differently than we do. If you really want to study up on the real difference between Liberals and Conservatives read Thomas Sowell’s book A Conflict of Visions. <br />
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-----link to Conflict of Visions-----<br />
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/dp/0465002056/?tag=googhydr-20&hvadid=15193224570&hvpos=1t1&hvexid=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=3812343221989195374&hvpone=12.87&hvptwo=&hvqmt=b&ref=pd_sl_3kzu3cnmr8_b">http://www.amazon.com/dp/0465002056/?tag=googhydr-20&hvadid=15193224570&hvpos=1t1&hvexid=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=3812343221989195374&hvpone=<br />12.87&hvptwo=&hvqmt=b&ref=pd_sl_3kzu3cnmr8_b</a><br />------------------------------------<br />
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If we think our beliefs are true and because of that we will not bend on the ways in which we implement them then we are no different in the liberal idea that man is born perfect and we only have to pass the right laws to attain perfection. Mr. Sowell says a Conservative believes in the imperfection of man/woman and passes laws to protect the majority and minority from abuses of unlimited power enshrined in a government run by imperfect humans. <br />
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We need good candidates of course who understand this along with ourselves, the lowly and unwashed masses of Republican/Conservatives at the grass roots level. With that in mind, with that as our controlling adjuster for our attitude we will have better luck trying to convince other voters that we have the best answers to their problems. The best way to do this is as always through our actions. Let our deeds be fair and honest and they will do the talking for us -- one person at a time. Then when the time draws nearer we can find a candidate that echoes what we say, not one that we have to “bring along”. If we are lucky we will find a candidate that is a real standard bearer, a real leader that will bring us along. Someone that through their actions teaches the right of our values, and not just by demagoguery but by their actions, persuades others of the justness and common sense of our cause.<br />
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If our beliefs are just then we need not belittle anyone, but uplift them.<br />
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People will understand this on their own.<br />
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So to answer the question in the title of who's right -- yup you guessed it -- We The People.<br />
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Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative.<br />
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live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-39589077505814472742012-03-18T07:35:00.005-07:002012-03-18T08:14:50.310-07:00Another Shot Over the Bow for Obama ???<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-yRIYG2zQoms/T2X7zh5SX2I/AAAAAAAACs0/4LPGmjSmplM/s1600/Bob%2BTurner.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 225px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-yRIYG2zQoms/T2X7zh5SX2I/AAAAAAAACs0/4LPGmjSmplM/s320/Bob%2BTurner.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5721255764334632802" /></a><br />Remember Anthony Weiner, the disgraced US Rep. from New York’s 9th Congressional District? Weiner was forced out of office at the time and a special election was called for Sept. 11th, 2011. <br /><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-I4ZmeNvXLZ8/T2X2j1TlDnI/AAAAAAAACso/eamQOBvEbfc/s1600/weiner%2Bmobile.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 200px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-I4ZmeNvXLZ8/T2X2j1TlDnI/AAAAAAAACso/eamQOBvEbfc/s320/weiner%2Bmobile.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5721249997109137010" /></a><br />A Democrat David Weprin was set up to take his Weiner’s place in that seat which had been held for 80 years by a Democrat.<br /> <br />At the time I got wind of a Conservative Republican who was thinking of entering the race to challenge him. His name was Bob Turner. I called up a # I found and reached his brother who was in the process of setting up a campaign HQ. They were operating on a shoestring and yet he was happy to talk with me. <br /><br />He talked about the obstacles his brother had to overcome in this race. Of course the main one was the polling data which had Turner in the 30’s and Weprin in the 60's. Then there was the religious issue. Bob Turner is a Roman Catholic and Weprin is a Jew. The Jewish vote in the district made up 24% of the vote. The other thing was that the Republicans of NY were out of money and not willing to spend much to help Turner.<br /><br />After talking with his brother, I came away knowing that Turner was a Conservative and willing to take the battle to Obama. Mayor Ed Koch started the ripple on the pond that turned into a tsunami for the support of Bob Turner. The Mayor was Jewish and his endorsement helped sway that crucial vote. (Imagine a famous Jewish Mayor telling his people to vote against a Jew in favor of a Roman Catholic) That took some guts on Koch’s part.<br /><br />Mayor Koch did this because he could no longer live with the “anti-Israel” appearing agenda of Obama. This race turned into a referendum of the Obama administration. From the Israely thing to the huge debt, unemployement and Obamacare. <br /><br />Bob Turner ran against the policies of Obama. He labled Weprin as a rubber stamp for the leftist policies of Obama. Obama’s policies on Obama care and the national debt were the grist for Turner’s miraculous upset of David Weprin come election day.<br />There were a lot of other factors and famous New Yorkers coming down on Turner’s side but the point was a district that defeated Turner by a wide margin in the past, turned a district that had voted solid Democrat for 80 years into a Republican Seat, due to the terribly unpopular policies of newly elected President Obama .<br />After the call I made to his brother, and some research, I sent him a $25.00 donation and started blogging about this newcomer. I was overwhelmed by this upset come election day.<br /><br />Well guess what, NY is run by Democrats and they after that upset set about redistricting out the 9th District. Bob Turner now had no district!!!<br /><br />I got the email below from the campaign a few days ago. Bob Turner is running for US. Senate. There will be a primary fight on the Republican side to see who will run against the Democrat incumbent Kirsten Gillibrand.<br /><br />-----email-----<br />Statement from U.S. Representative Bob Turner <br />March 13, 2012<br /><br />"I will travel to the Republican State Convention in Rochester later this week and humbly ask for the Republican nomination for the United States Senate. I will respectfully ask for the Conservative nomination a few days later at that Party's convention. I have made my intentions known to the other Republican candidates in this race.<br /> <br />"I ran for the House six months ago as a private citizen fed up with what is happening in Washington. I could not sit and watch career politicians sink my nation deeper into economic crisis. Brooklyn and Queens voters, of all political parties, graciously responded by sending me to Congress. It now appears that their district has been eliminated.<br /><br />"There is serious work to be done to get this economy back on track, and I will not walk away from that work now. I will run for the Senate, and I will run to win."<br /><br />Paid for by Bob Turner for Congress<br />PO Box 140016, Howard Beach, NY 11414 <br />www.BobTurnerForCongress.com<br />-----------------<br /><br />Here is what Bob Turner said about the US Senator from NY.<br /><br />“Senator Kirsten Gillibrand does not deserve re-election. She defrauded the voters of this state with promises that she would act as a moderate,” he said. “Instead she has governed from the far left, and is now ranked the most liberal senator in America. That is a firing offense.”<br /><br />-----link to the above quote-----<br /><a href="http://foresthills.patch.com/articles/turner-secures-gop-senate-nomination">http://foresthills.patch.com/articles/turner-secures-gop-senate-nomination</a><br />---------------------------------<br /><br />Well in Mi. we know about Liberal Senators. Debbie Stabenow used to be the most liberal, so now it’s Debbie and Kirsten sharing that dubious distinction. I would love to not see either in the Senate next year.<br /><br />One thing is certain however, the Democrat Machine in NY will not be taken by surprise this time. Kirsten already has started bashing Turner. Just a couple days ago she put our an email fundraising letter trying to link Turner and Rush Limbaugh together. If this Senate seat is taken by Turner from Gillibrand then the Republicans will most assuredly win back the Senate. But what a battle it might be.<br /><br />Turner is biting off a huge fight in this effort. First he has to win the nomination, and spend scant resources to do that. He has two so far to beat and at least one of them calls herself a Conservative. I have yet to research them. <br />Next he’ll have to fight an incumbent Senator that has not been disgraced and is willing to fight back using the same tactics Turner used in his previous upset. She also, if the election appears close will get the full support of the NY and DNC political machines. Democrat Mayor Koch who was so instrumental before for Turner is on the side of Gillibrand. In the article below you'll see also that the NY Conservative group is backing Wendy Long for the primary. But the Manhatten GOP have just endorsed Turner. I’m hoping the big guns like Cuomo and Guliani will still help out Turner.<br /><br />-----link-----<br /><a href="http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/dailypolitics/2012/03/manhattan-gop-endorses-bob-turner-for-senate">http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/dailypolitics/2012/03/manhattan-gop-endorses-bob-turner-for-senate</a><br />--------------<br /><br />But the fact that is so surprising is that we are even talking about the possibility. The more votes Turner can win here will be less votes for Obama in this Dark Blue State.<br /><br />Regards, Live Dangerously Be a Conservative<br /><br />Here is the Wikipedia link for Bob Turner.<br />-----link-----<br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Turner_(politician)">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Turner_(politician)</a><br />--------------<br /><br />PS. I usually pick one out of state race to put $25.00 of my money on and I think this Turner guy will get it again.live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-59071413046357580632012-03-17T10:22:00.001-07:002012-03-17T10:24:28.445-07:00Another Day another StateSame story different state.<br /><br />This time it’s Illinois. According to the link below Romney is putting $4 million into the state’s primary and Santorum less than ½ a million.<br />---link---<br /><a href="http://www.newsmax.com/Headline/Pressure-Mounts-Romney-Illinois/2012/03/16/id/432858?s=al&promo_code=E735-1">http://www.newsmax.com/Headline/Pressure-Mounts-Romney-Illinois/2012/03/16/id/432858?s=al&promo_code=E735-1</a><br />-----------<br />Money can’t buy love, but maybe it can buy elections, at least that’s what political machines and all the people that get paid by them think. Also the media where all the money is spent would probably agree. Therefore it is easy for me to understand the slant the media puts on things. Hey doesn’t everybody say, follow the money.<br /><br />Can you imagine the hue and cry if Santorum would win the admittedly more liberal state of Illinois? Do I think he can? Probably not, I think it is a question of timing. If Michigan and Ohio for example were holding their primary now after the Mississippi and Alabama primaries which Santorum won I believe Santorum would have won both of those. It’s a momentum thing at least partially.<br /> <br />The other thing in Santorum’s favor besides momentum is that people, I think are getting tired of Romney’s seeming aloofness and how he throws around money. How he thinks that money can buy an election. However, in a state like Illinois that is used to “Play to Play” and their leaders being jailed maybe that isn’t so important. Maybe I’m thinking wrong. Then again maybe there is even in Illinois a tipping point where voter backlash kicks in against this slick kind of political condescension. <br /><br />Well I’m here blatantly hoping it does.<br /><br />After Romney keeps putting his foot in his elitist mouth such as the repeated remarks about not knowing the participants only the owners of NASCAR, and the other thing about boasting about knowing football team owners and not much about Peyton Manning, I’m thinking wow what a smuck.<br /><br />Once ok, but repeatedly? I know Obama thinks we are stupid, but then why vote for someone else who thinks we are? I can understand the political machine of Illinois flocking to the $4 million Romney is throwing around vs. the ½ million of Santorum’s but the people? But I ask, are we not finally fed up with the BS of political money machines? Didn’t Lincoln come from there. Are we all not aware that in the voting booth no amount of money or pressure can change our vote? If we don’t know that then all of Romney’s money compared to The Democrat machine and the vaunted $Billion dollars of Obama the Unions and the like of Soros will surely give us another 4 years of Obama and an eternity of Socialism.<br /><br />Well I don’t have millions – just 2 cents – and you’ve just heard it.<br /> <br />My vote ain’t for sale.<br /><br />Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservativelive dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-28552824200762727202011-11-21T15:02:00.000-08:002011-11-21T15:07:15.310-08:00The Courage of Making a Decision<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-qaeo_SSIQr0/TsrZj6ki_II/AAAAAAAACsE/IyCg6M-KA5w/s1600/Mamet%2BDavid%2BSecret%2BKnowledge.bmp"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 175px; height: 256px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-qaeo_SSIQr0/TsrZj6ki_II/AAAAAAAACsE/IyCg6M-KA5w/s320/Mamet%2BDavid%2BSecret%2BKnowledge.bmp" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5677589491295124610" /></a><br />What is the responsibility of freedom? What is it we have to do to choose what path we take, what decision we make?<br /><br />Isn’t this an easy thing? Don’t we just look at the options get the facts then decide what is in our best interest? What happens if we make the wrong decision? Do we have to accept the results of our choices?<br /><br />To people that have learned through trial and error from birth in the constantly changing vagaries un-written in the book of life; this process is in fact relatively easy simply because of the small increments through which it is learned. In Toto however it would be an immense undertaking for an adult unaccustomed to decision making.<br /><br />That had been the job of the culture in which Americans of old had grown up in. The in-variable rules of the playground and society in general have given most of us what we refer to as “common sense”. Such macro trials as World Wars and The Great Depression have instilled in us as a culture, a societal “common sense”. In a society these rules get worked out seemingly effortlessly. That is how it happens – effortlessly - but not painlessly.<br /><br />The choice that is inherent in our Freedom is not easy. Choice is usually a decision with consequences we know going in may not be what we would wish for; but the alternative we feel is worse. There are always tradeoffs we learn through interacting with society. Which ones we make, is what maturity is all about.<br /><br />We as a society are in the process of losing the maturity we had held in high esteem and other countries admired. We are losing the ability to make the hard choices.<br /><br />We have begun raising generations that more and more rely upon not making hard choices to try to better themselves. They at the age of 30 and 40 are still in adolescence. We are creating a generation that values eating fish far more than fishing. By definition work is hard and takes up a person’s time; that is why they get paid to work. Why would someone want to do that if they get more given to them by not working? <br /><br />We were a country that had learned, through the trials and tribulations of that God given gift called Free Will, the ability to fish and that by fishing we would never be hungry. We were proud of that. However just as we sometimes dismiss the word “pursuit” in our inalienable right to the pursuit of happiness and demand happiness; we also demand wisdom without the trials and tribulations so necessary in the process. <br /><br />Is it not through the trials and tribulations we go through which gives us a sense of pride in our accomplishments, is this not the way we get “skin in the game”? Is it not the journey we should enjoy more than the destination? Do not learn and grow and become a wiser person for the effort, rather than being magically somehow transported to the finish line?<br /><br />By doing the same thing everyone else is doing, are we not forming a herd mentality and losing our individual freedom. Are we not becoming as slaves?<br /><br />David Mamet in his book “The Secret Knowledge” writes “the essence of freedom was and is choice” His book goes through the process of the Jews being freed from the slavery of Egypt and how hard it was for them to accept the hardships of making an unlimited list of choices that came with freedom. Many as he uses the Bible to point out wished for the security of slavery.<br /><br />Here is what Mamet says regarding slavery and the Socialism of the Left.<br /><br />“The Jews were led through the Sea of Reeds and, in the desert, complained, and wished to return to Egypt and slavery. Life in Egypt was by no means perfect; its only attraction was the absence of the necessity of choice. But it made all people equal. No slave need choose between good and evil, morality and immorality, all such anxiety had been usurped by or surrendered to the masters.”<br /><br />Mr. Mamet also in the book talks of the Bible and wisdom. “The Bible is the wisdom tradition of the West.” He also talks of the fear being instilled in the young then and today by liberals for things which they don’t understand such as work and free enterprise. He shows how what they do not know they fear and what they fear they demonize. He I think believes in the Rule of Law based upon the wisdom of the Bible as the guiding light America has followed to become the freest country in the world, where individuals have the Freedom to succeed knowing full well and being completely cognizant of the fact that they may also fail in the effort.<br /><br />That the real courage lies in making the decision yes making the choice to try.<br /><br />Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservativelive dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-35266139027753587802011-11-17T08:42:00.000-08:002011-11-17T08:45:35.569-08:00Now the Same as EverBack in early 2011 world famous writer David Mamet wrote a book titled <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Secret-Knowledge-Dismantling-American-Culture/dp/1595230769">“The Secret Knowledge”</a>. Mr. Mamet is a Pulitzer Prize winner and up until the writing of a political play and then writing of Secret Knowledge to defend it, a darling of the Left.<br /><br />I just today finished reading “the Road to Serfdom” by F.A. Hayek and picked the next book off the pile. It was “The Secret Knowledge”. Within the first 4 pages I realized the two books were not separated by philosophy but only time hence style. Hayek wrote during WWII nearly 75 years ago.<br /><br />The styles of course vary widely as well. Hayek was an economist and Mamet is a playwright. Right off the bat Mamet claims he had a change of political heart after reading “The Road to Serfdom”. The book Secret Knowledge is about his transformation. By political I don’t mean party affiliation but which side of the age old divide between Left and Right he wanted to be on.<br /><br />By page four I came across this great line.<br />“But the fiction of top-down Government Control, of a Command Economy, is, at essence, like a Reality Show, which is to say, a fraud. The Good Causes of the Left may generally be compared to NASCAR; they offer the diversion of watching things go excitingly around in a circle, getting nowhere.”<br /><br />I’m tempted to add that ultimately, inevitably the race will end in a crash.<br />Kind of reminds me of the “Budget Battle”; the eventual wreck being the economy. <br /><br />Mamet has come to terms with the reality of the world as being made up of cause and effect, and that there is a cost to everything and that cost is to be born with limited coinage. I’m reminded of the saying Anthony Hopkins made in the movie “Hearts in Atlantis” about reality and wishing otherwise. He said “and wishing cannot make it so.” <br /><br />I remember too the anger and vitriol which characterized the attacks upon David Mamet. <br /><br />The same anger the Left uses on any who disagree with them, the full weight of which is especially reserved for those the Left feels they are fighting for. Women and minorities (think Palin and Judge Thomas); also in that mix are those who they decide are traitors such a Mamet. <br /><br />I’m continually amazed as I read about past conservatives at the similarities of the past with the future. Milton Friedman in his forward to Hayek’s “Road to Serfdom” reminds us that “Freedom has to be fought for over and over again”. These thoughts of Freedom and Capitalism vs Big Government have been with us since there was politics. Only the names of the jargon have changed. Milton Friedman wrote that 50 years ago.<br /><br />He and Hayek are both now dead.<br /><br />Ronald Reagan in more recent times reminded us that Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. <br /><br />The battles continue to be fought only the names have been changed to protect the guilty. Now the Same as Ever.<br /><br />Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative.live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-42452270619793143272011-11-13T04:31:00.000-08:002011-11-13T05:10:47.392-08:00Victory and Denile<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-VT3jWQWftiI/Tr_BxDCLswI/AAAAAAAACrg/PngHaY7kqgU/s1600/barack-obama-sad-3.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 315px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-VT3jWQWftiI/Tr_BxDCLswI/AAAAAAAACrg/PngHaY7kqgU/s320/barack-obama-sad-3.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5674467103882326786" /></a><br />Wow what a mess the Obama team is in now compared to where they were almost two years ago. Check out this article from the Wall Street Journal – Potomac Watch. <br />-----link-----<br /><a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204358004577030481545613916.html">http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204358004577030481545613916.html</a><br />---------------<br />Double Wow. Looks like Virginia in which Obama did so well two years ago has pulled a Michigan. By that I mean the Republicans increased their majority in the State House and took over the Senate. Similar to Mi. accept the House and Senate were vice versa. <br /> <br />It wasn’t for lack of money or effort by Obama and his Campaign either. A quote from the article. <br /><br /> “The Obama campaign has held some 1,600 events in the state in the last half-year alone. Only last month Mr. Obama hopped a three-day bus trip through Virginia and North Carolina. Obama officials keep flocking to the state, and Tuesday's election was to offer the first indication of how these efforts are succeeding.”<br /><br />The quotes from the article are just too juicy to ignore. Try this one on about the Dems gerrymandering like crazy and still to no avail.<br /><br />“…given that Virginia Democrats this spring crafted an aggressive redistricting plan that had only one aim: providing a firewall against a Republican takeover of that chamber. Even that extreme gerrymander didn't work.”<br /><br />I apologize for quoting so much from the article but this is all good stuff. Remember last year in the off year upset elections of the Governorships of NJ (Christie) and Virginia (McDonnell)? Well it wasn’t a fluke, this time all the incumbent Republicans won in the House and Senate in Virginia. See quote from the article below.<br /><br />“Every Republican incumbent—52 in the House, 15 in the Senate—won. The state GOP is looking at unified control over government for only the second time since the Civil War. This is after winning all three top statewide offices—including the election of Gov. Bob McDonnell—in 2009, and picking off three U.S. House Democrats in last year's midterms.”<br /><br />It doesn’t take a fortune teller to know that heads on the Obama Campaign are going to roll. From the past we see how fond the President is of throwing people under the bus. <br /><br />I wonder how they will spin this so it is really Bush’s fault.<br /> <br />Oh what a joke he is.<br /><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-FoyJZ5RO-Ug/Tr--76N0CiI/AAAAAAAACrI/LB-WlCzzt6E/s1600/LOL%2BObama%2Bimage.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 94px; height: 94px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-FoyJZ5RO-Ug/Tr--76N0CiI/AAAAAAAACrI/LB-WlCzzt6E/s320/LOL%2BObama%2Bimage.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5674463991958866466" /></a><br />I Almost feel sorry for the guy. But then I remember the hundreds of millions his campaign has and the millions more of tax payer’s money funneled into ACORN like Acronyms plus all the Union boots on the ground and I start to lose my sense of pity especially in Union centric states like Mi. Where are the Republican counterweights to those union boots/thugs?<br /><br />The Republicans need to take what Christie and Mc Donnell are giving them and follow it in spades.<br /> <br />Still I love to gloat. Can’t help myself.<br /><br />Victory !!!!!<br /><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-OsJWEwmw-HY/Tr--7rhAyEI/AAAAAAAACqw/jqmew7BWUUE/s1600/boxing%2Bvictory.bmp"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 227px; height: 320px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-OsJWEwmw-HY/Tr--7rhAyEI/AAAAAAAACqw/jqmew7BWUUE/s320/boxing%2Bvictory.bmp" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5674463988012861506" /></a><br />What a nice thing to see after the apparent softening in Ohio and the re-call of Paul Scott in Michigan’s state house.<br /><br />So what does our President do??? How does he pick up the reins of government to show the American people his firm grasp on leadership and the economy.??? Well he leaves Dodge/Washington on a foreign tour. This article in Politico titled “Obama spurns Congress for overseas” by Carrie Budoff Brown says it all.<br />-----link-----<br />http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1111/68168.html<br />---------------<br />I might ask, what do you do to combat a do nothing Congress ??? President Obama seems to think the answer is Nothing, or perhaps do nothing better. Boy now that is leadership. What was that about the cart before the horse?<br /><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-7S6UMrdQk-A/Tr--7-aiK5I/AAAAAAAACq4/VV9D0_g1sTU/s1600/cart%2Bin%2Bfront%2Bof%2Bhorse.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 116px; height: 81px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-7S6UMrdQk-A/Tr--7-aiK5I/AAAAAAAACq4/VV9D0_g1sTU/s320/cart%2Bin%2Bfront%2Bof%2Bhorse.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5674463993085963154" /></a><br />Or What about that river in Egypt called Denial<br /><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-pchBGu37Zz8/Tr--8DTSaOI/AAAAAAAACrQ/zxk-t-c6q-4/s1600/Waterfall%2Bcanoe.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 286px; height: 320px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-pchBGu37Zz8/Tr--8DTSaOI/AAAAAAAACrQ/zxk-t-c6q-4/s320/Waterfall%2Bcanoe.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5674463994397747426" /></a><br /><br />Regards, Live Dangerously Be a Conservativelive dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-84863682668181076182011-11-10T10:46:00.000-08:002011-11-10T10:49:35.047-08:00If you can keep itThe never ending opportunity/struggle for Freedom.<br /><br />Which would you rather have it be an opportunity or a struggle?<br /><br />Lately I’ve been asked as a Tea Party person; “What hope is there for the Tea Party to finish the change we started in the 2010 election.” “How can we increase our membership?” “How can we rebuild our momentum?” The reasons that this question is being asked now are many. Fellow Tea Partiers seem to think for the main part that those reasons lie with things and people outside of themselves. It is always easier to think that way. I’m always fighting myself to not think that way.<br /><br />The familiar old whipping dogs for the seeming lesser influence of the Tea Party and a decline in attendance at our meetings are; the Liberal media, the monopoly of union thought within the education community, and the ever-increasing role of big government/big business/big labor within the legislative process. Ie the perceived idea that once in Washington elected officials seem to become corrupted. The common thought from all the above is the question of “What can one person do?” <br /><br />While all of these things indeed are threats to the individual citizen and their ability to affect government, they have been around in various guises since the founding of our country. For Example after writing the Constitution, Ben Franklin was reportedly asked by a citizen, “What have you created for us?” His reply was “a Republic madam if you can keep it.” By saying “…if you can keep it” Franklin rightly put the responsibility on the shoulders of not the government but on those of the individual citizen. In America, that was the uniqueness of our “Great Experiment” in <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Search-Self-Governance-Scott-W-Rasmussen/dp/1449593542#_">self-governance</a>. <br /><br />So whether we now change our whipping dog to the Occupy Wall Street gang or something else such as the citizens themselves whom I’ve heard labeled as; “ignorant, selfish, lazy, uncaring etc. The fact remains that all of these reasons are really just excuses for our own lack of energy in promoting what we believe or the validity of those beliefs. Never questioning our beliefs leads to dogma and the ideologues who preach it. <br /><br />Keeping the energy level within any movement steady is impossible. While the energy level of a movement ebbs and flows, it is necessary for all the Tea Party groups to understand that the real catalyst for change lies with the energy level (motivation) of the individual within the group. While naïve sounding the simple truth is that the energy of the group is made up of the energy of the members of that group. To regain our momentum, it is necessary for us to tap back into the individuals and what is making them upset and angry, not necessarily what our own ideological reasoning tells us what it “should” be.<br /><br />There is no easy way to do that and never has been, except in the case of an immediate emergency such as a War etc. The energy level needed to keep people “keeping the Republic” can only be kept up by facilitating the individuals capacity for energy with examples and education how citizens can get involved and how their lives and families will be better off; then through activities letting them through self awareness start to enjoy the journey and their own energy.<br /><br />To be honest, ask yourself the following question. If I and my family were hungry, would I want to learn how to fish or be given a fish? In my case I would want both, BUT first I would want at least a mouthful. While learning to fish I and my family would need to eat something. The Tea Party’s job is to teach citizens to fish through “class like” meetings mixed with “Boots on the Ground” activities. Do we not need to foster and facilitate both the teaching to fish and going out to actually fishing? Do we need not learn not only through the book but by doing?<br /><br />That is the factor upon which individual Tea Parties need to focus. We need to not become as ideologues but rather to become far seeing enough to welcome progress towards our goals for what it is. We need to celebrate that progress whether it is with the new member because he/she decided to come to their first meeting or celebrate a Senator, Representative or Township Trustee for that matter who votes for something we believe in. We need to congratulate both along with ourselves for making progress. <br /><br />Just as with our lives, once we lose the enjoyment of the journey no matter how difficult, the sooner we will lose our way on the path towards our goal. I feel it is important to let people know when they are doing good, as well as when they are not.<br /><br />Whether we are raising children, herding cats, or trying to get congressmen to vote our way; the carrot is as persuasive as the stick and much more agreeable. Think about it; when the stick becomes more pleasurable to use than the carrot are we not headed toward the tyranny we loathe, whether it be with our children, our cats or our government?<br /><br />If we accept the responsibility of Freedom given to us by the Constitution, need we not learn how to wield it wisely? Do we not learn this by actually wielding it? Is that not what Benjamin Franklin alluded to? Need we not learn how to wield it in such a manner as to strengthen and promote that individual freedom and a government which does the same?<br /><br />In other more familiar words there is a Responsibility for Freedom that is needed to be accepted by and acted upon by the Individual to insure a government that will act only as necessary to insure the freedom of the individual to exercise their own God given rights as expressed in the Constitution and Bill of Rights.<br /><br />Should we as individual Tea Party leaders and organizers not Only do the same?<br /><br />Regards, Live Dangerously Be a Conservativelive dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-73477165075069385902011-11-02T09:28:00.000-07:002011-11-02T09:49:19.414-07:00Connecting the DotsConnecting the Dots<br /><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-DGIVqCMh-IA/TrFzHBLAK0I/AAAAAAAACpo/Q21A4sR4JMA/s1600/Hayek.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 183px; height: 275px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-DGIVqCMh-IA/TrFzHBLAK0I/AAAAAAAACpo/Q21A4sR4JMA/s320/Hayek.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5670439970247027522" /></a><br />As I got my wood furnace started this morning and settled down to reading more of “The Road to Serfdom” by F.A. Hayek; I was amazed as always about how old the battle between current conservative and liberal thought in all its various and conflicting (nameologies) has been going on.<br /><br />In other words whatever you label individual freedom vs society’s freedom, the argument has been going on for a long, long time. Hayek for example writing as late as the 1940’s looks at the liberalism of England as the method best suited for the expression of individual freedom vs the “Conservative” state run life of Nazi Germany. The terms today seem reversed.<br /><br />The constant flux in the meaning of the words conservative and liberal seem to belie the underlying truth of the eternal conflict between the Individual and collective. As long as people must live in the society of others the success of that society will be measured by the mixture of both and not the supremacy of either.<br /><br />The part of Hayek’s “Road to Serfdom” that I read was all about how the corporate monopolists and the Unionist were on the same page as far as limiting Individual Freedom in favor of a top down government run, centrally planned society. I was struck of Hayek’s prescience about how the scientific and intellectual communities were so easily made a tool of the State. He also alluded to how those individualists who differed in view were arrogantly dismissed and not let into the clique of the prevailing thought. How later they would be hounded down, imprisoned and later executed. The dot of today between the words such as accepted scientific theory or scientific consensus and the shunning of those not believing in such for example in regards to global warming was connected.<br /><br />As I returned upstairs to my computer and started going through my emails; I opened one by Amazon about their sale of nonfiction books which got my attention. Scrolling and reading through the list there were several titles which intrigued me. They were about the brain and how it worked and about unique individuals. I then went to the Amazon site for each and read the parts of the book they will let you read to whet the appetite. Most of the titles were pretty simple and or backwards to what I wanted to study. But it was in this effort that I read some of a book about “outliers” which was simply about individuals who stood out from their surroundings. The author went on to explain why. People such as Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Gordie Howe. Simply stated the book was trying to make the case that these standouts were simply using their abilities as best they could but that they were more a product of their environment and time than what they possessed as individuals. <br /><br />At this I was disappointed; this was not what I was looking for. However one of the “Outliers” the book mentioned was Chris Langan. I had never heard of him. I believe he is still alive. The book said he was the smartest person alive. I googled and looked at Wikipedia which confirmed the accolades heaped upon this person within the book. <br /><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-eBKWtQL29wQ/TrFzHCHx8PI/AAAAAAAACpc/AsvrssD3qnQ/s1600/chris-langan.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 284px; height: 320px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-eBKWtQL29wQ/TrFzHCHx8PI/AAAAAAAACpc/AsvrssD3qnQ/s320/chris-langan.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5670439970501947634" /></a><br />Mr. Langan came from a broken marriage, the mother had four boys and each from a different father. They were dirt poor and ostracized by the different communities they were forced to continually move to. The eclectic nature of Chris appealed to me. He self taught himself the sciences, was a bouncer of repute in several bars, and all around studied anything that interested him. <br /><br />Langan’s genius is where he and I part. He for example got a 100% on the SATs, and his IQ was over 200. He as I said taught himself in High school and would only show up for the tests which he invariably got 100%. He then went to college on a scholarship from which he dropped out because he thought he was teaching the teachers more than vice versa. He was probably right.<br /><br />He also has come up with his unifying theory he calls the Cognitive-Theoretic Model of the Universe which I can only grasp the basis of, which says the Universe was created by God and all the rules physics etc along with it and it is our God given intellect that we have which creates the realities we see and deal with. <br />The “outlier” book from which I found Langan was of the opinion his genius was wasted because he lacked the social skills necessary to make it in a University setting. This seemed to be against the whole idea of the term Outliers. The book in my opinion would have been more aptly named “The Top People of the Pyramid and how to get there”<br /><br />The refreshing thing I found out through this email and some study was that there were indeed brilliant people that believed in God and Creationism. The fact that they were shunned by society in no way lessens their achievements. In fact it was ironic that Galileo was also mentioned in the book because while he was following the progression of the science of the time he too was shunned by the prevailing scientific community. Curious Albert Einstein was not even in the book. Must be because he failed to graduate highschool. Lol<br /><br />The last email I read was by Newt Gingrich titled “What the Battle of the Crater Means Today”<br /><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ShLvu1oWBio/TrFx9nfqGzI/AAAAAAAACpQ/H9cHvadDajk/s1600/newt.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 110px; height: 110px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ShLvu1oWBio/TrFx9nfqGzI/AAAAAAAACpQ/H9cHvadDajk/s320/newt.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5670438709223889714" /></a><br />The first line was as follows;<br />{When our Founding Fathers wrote in the Declaration of Independence that it was a "self-evident" truth that "all men are created equal," endowed by our Creator with unalienable rights of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," they enshrined those words as an eternal principle for which the war for liberty would be fought.}<br /><br /> The dots were being connected alright, along a Godly line.<br /><br />From the morning to 11am I went from Hayek to Langan to Gingrich. My journey went from an anti collectivist anti Nazi economic genius to a certified scientific genius supporting creationism to a former Speaker of the House and supporter of God as one of our most important beliefs in the founding of our country.<br /><br />It is along this path of dots connected by people I admire that I travel.<br />It is this free use of my God given gifts that spur me on to continue fighting the battle against Individual freedom through overreaching bigness of government, labor, business and politics.<br /><br />Some would say I wasted this beautiful autumn morning, I think not. Now up and out into this glorious day.<br /><br />BTW I did finish cutting my wood for the winter last weekend<br /><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-pRx9C_wjnyA/TrF0brgfDeI/AAAAAAAACp0/8aBBhesexEA/s1600/Wood%252BPaul%2BScott%2B009_small.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 214px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-pRx9C_wjnyA/TrF0brgfDeI/AAAAAAAACp0/8aBBhesexEA/s320/Wood%252BPaul%2BScott%2B009_small.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5670441424720432610" /></a><br /><br />Regards, Live Dangerously Be A (Current) Conservative.live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-37922900355940206502011-10-20T11:05:00.000-07:002011-10-20T11:19:23.858-07:00Reflections on Splitting WoodWhat is the difference between Liberals and Conservatives?<br /><br />Between Big Government Statists and Limited Government Constitutionalists?<br /><br />Between Socialism and Capitalism?<br /><br />Between wanting to solve our own problems, or demanding the government solve them for us?<br /><br />Simply stated, that difference is Individual Freedom.<br /><br />Who should decide what to do with the fruits of my labor?<br />With your labor?<br /><br />Arthur C. Brooks takes these questions in his book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Battle-between-Enterprise-Government-Americas/dp/B004H8GL4A/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1319132918&sr=1-1">“The Battle “</a>and explains what is so unique in the American Experience. He even makes a case for what I would call the “American Freedom Gene”.<br /> <br />Although in my case he is preaching to the choir, I admire his work for its focus, brevity and highest of all for the extensive research. (Kind of like reading Thomas Payne with footnotes.)<br /><br />Newt Gingrich said of the work, and I paraphrase here, that reading and committing to memory the main points will allow the reader to argue and win the debate with any liberal. Coming from Newt, that is high praise indeed. <br /><br />From the footnotes I have started studying and finding out more and more about the conservative roots of my thinking and perhaps my forefather’s predisposition towards Individual Freedom.<br /><br />From this study I have been better able to understand what it is within myself that cries out and hungers for Personal Freedom. Also from this and other books I am learning why I am so against all forms of big government and for that matter big Labor and big Business. <br /><br />I am learning that this is not a negative but The Positive upon which this country was founded upon. This is simply standing up for my right to do with what is mine, what I will. This is not so much an anti government sentiment but rather that government has become anti Individual Freedom.<br /><br />I have enjoyed all of Mr. Brooks’s titles but this one titled “The Battle” in its scope and incisiveness seems to be ahead of the others. As with his other works as in most of the conservative issues the argument is won, however with “The Battle” not only the argument but the war is won.<br /><br />I read “The Battle” last winter and blogged about it etc, but at this time when my mind is racing to keep up with the current hectic events such as the different presidential candidates and/or the differences between the Tea Party and the Occupy WS thing are popping up I find I need some reflective time.<br /><br />In this time of enhanced knowledge distribution with 150 TV channels and all the great resources that come with the internet, and all the social/political volunteer stuff I’m into; I find it helpful to help clarify my thoughts by sitting down in my basement by my wood furnace and reading a good book; especially at this time of year in my situation. That is what rural living and the seasons have forced upon me – reflection and hard work. What free time I have had the last three months has been spent cutting splitting and stacking five cords of wood. Two days ago I started my first fire to get my house temperature from 55 to 70. <br /><br />This is the second winter in my new home and location. Last year I moved into my wood heated home during the start of winter without wood. I had to cut two days worth of wood a day and shovel/snow blow about a thousand feet of driveway. Each morning before those chores I would get a fire going in my basement furnace and sit and make sure a bed of coals was started and that the house was getting warmed; which took about an hour during which time I would shower and sit and read a book getting warm by the furnace; on a morning without a snowfall the previous night that hour might stretch into three.<br /> <br />These morning books were not fiction (those I saved for bedtime), but were pretty in-depth conservative books. Authors like <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Road-Serfdom-Documents---Definitive-Collected/dp/0226320553/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1319134554&sr=1-1">Hayek</a>, Freedman and others from previous generations. That morning time helped me keep my conservative roots sharp and helped me make sense of the senselessness which I see so often in the world.<br /> <br />This morning I started that regimen again. It felt good. Although I have a stack of unread books I had ordered during the summer it was “The Battle” that I picked up. I felt immediately at home, on top of which I proudly reflected upon the full winter supply of wood I had on hand. This winter should prove a lot easier than last.<br /><br />This pride in self reliance is part of me and what makes me get out of bed in the morning. <br /><br />I bring up this snippet of my life to show that there is something in me (the “Freedom Gene”?) through which I find great contentment and happiness fighting through these obstacles. Do not however think that I’m a hermit out in the middle of nowhere. After I moved here I had gotten heavily into politics up here, started a Tea Party and set up a weekly conservative breakfast club to keep my social conservatism intact. I find my personal and social life interchangeable.<br /><br />To bring this back to “The Battle”, here is a link to a page on Arthur C. Brooks<br /><br />-----link-----<br /><a href="http://www.arthurbrooks.net/">http://www.arthurbrooks.net/</a><br />--------------<br />Check this guy out and his videos. If you like those; read “The Battle” and devour the footnotes. Have a Happy Winter, I will.<br /><br />Regards, Live Dangerously Be A Conservative<br /><br />PS. <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Losing-Ground-American-1950-1980-Anniversary/dp/0465042333/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1319132615&sr=1-1#_ ">“Losing Ground”</a> by Murray is another good book predating “The Battle”.live dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-816759555313800990.post-73115098125548546172011-09-14T09:30:00.000-07:002011-09-14T09:33:29.719-07:00Money Ain't EverythingMoney ain’t everything.<br /><br />Neither is political experience and support of your national party.<br /><br />Those two things now and in the future are being moved out of the number one priority of a campaign, what that money and the political power of the “political class” tries to buy is jumping into the number one spot.<br /><br />What the “political class” tries to buy in their minds is the votes of the unwashed electorate.<br /><br />When the unwashed electorate rises up and demands the respect they deserve – the respect the founders of this country gave it – then the power brokers see the upsets like we have seen since the special elections presaging the 2010 elections where simple common sense outweighed the money and power of the political elite.<br /><br />When we the people came out to vote, not for slogans but for the better candidate. Not for the slickest ad but for the candidate with common sense, integrity and honor.<br />That is what Democrat David Weprin found out to his dismay.<br /><br />He received money from Democrat national Organizations to the amount of $600,000 .<br />Neither did the money and “fame” he received from backers of the liberal left help him win. Nancy Pelosi gave him the $5,000 maximum allowable by law and threw in another $2,000 from her campaign war chest. <br />-----Link-----<br /><a href="http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2011/09/democrat-david-weprin-holds-financi.html">http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2011/09/democrat-david-weprin-holds-financi.html</a><br />---------------<br />Also notice from the article that Democrat Weprin’s donations of under $200 amounted to only 2% of his total. Compare that to Turner receiving 18% from small time donors. In respect for full disclosure, I was one of those “really” small time investors. <br /> <br />Nor did Turner get more from PACs, which let’s face it is the epitome of “political class” power. The Democrat Weprin received over 25 times more money from PACs than Bob Turner.<br /><br />Neither did Bill Clinton and his robo calls help stem the tide. Nor did President Obama’s mailings help stem the bloodletting.<br /><br />Nor did the vaunted but rusty Democrat machine in NYC. Their voters didn’t bother to vote or if they did were likely to vote for the Republican out of self defense against an Obama backing Liberal like Weprin, and a party backing the shameful actions of the disgraced Weiner.<br /><br />What mattered was the 50-100 volunteer which at any one time were hitting the bricks going door to door or making phone calls – constantly for the few short weeks of this special election. Added to this, what helped more was that like their candidate they were working for; these citizen soldiers were not being paid. They and their candidate were not of the political class. <br /><br />They were of by and for the People. Only in this way can the great American experiment in self governance remain a shining example of government being run – of by and for the People.<br /><br />Regards, Live Dangerously Be a Conservativelive dangerouslyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05667239977434492134noreply@blogger.com1