Uncategorized

Want to help slash Pork in Congress?

I support the Fiscal Watch Team Offset Package
And you should too if you are a Conservative!

truthlaidbare.com

A video showing terrorists crashing a passenger plane into a nuclear power station – a vivid attack on the Government’s alleged intention to build a new generation of nuclear power plants – has been condemned by the nuclear industry as “distasteful”.

The 45-second Greenpeace film shows a family on a beach when a plane screams over them and smashes into the Sizewell nuclear plant behind them. “Do we really want more nuclear power stations? Tell Tony Blair nuclear power is not the answer to climate change,” it warns.

British Nuclear Fuels, which runs Sellafield, said it would not dignify the video with a full response. “We are not prepared to comment on what appears to be a distasteful publicity campaign,” said a spokesman.

The Department for Trade and Industry accused Greenpeace of trying to “sensationalise” the issue.

Dr Frank Barnaby, a former Aldermaston nuclear physicist who now works for the Oxford Research Group, said Greenpeace, who released the computer-generated film on the internet, was “facing up to reality”. He said: “The public have the right to know the danger. The Government says the terrorism threat is real. Building more nuclear power stations, especially after 11 September, is a risk we don’t have to take.For the Government to encourage it is crazy.”

He added that a terrorist attack on a British nuclear plant was “going to happen” and predicted that an attack at Sellafield in Cumbria, Britain’s largest nuclear power plant, could kill more than two million. The worst-case scenario could see 2,500kg of caesium-137, the most dangerous isotope, escape – 100 times more than that released in the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.

Although there are no-fly zones two miles around civil nuclear power stations to prevent aviation accidents overhead, Dr Barnaby said that there would probably not be enough time to prevent a terrorist attack.

Source link

___________________
These enviro-wackos have no shame. No we don’t want to win an issue by truth and logic, do we? We have to go for the overly-emotional throat!

I wonder what they’d say if we had pictures of trenches being filled with the dead bodies of our fellow citizens and have an voice over saying something like. “Want to see millions murdered by the state? Then, vote for the Democratic Party!”

Do ya think they’ll get their undies in a bundle in high dudgeon? Do ya think they might claim we were being outrageous if we made such a commercial?

If the left was so “right” they wouldn’t have to stoop to the kind of tripe that the Greepeacers stooped to in England. Remind you of Moveon.orgers?
____________________

January Rally—Supporters Across America called to Action

on Saturday January 21 and Sunday Jan 22

THE FIRST BATTLE is fast approaching in our campaign to end eminent domain abuse by having those who advocate it experience it themselves. We are holding a rally in Weare, New Hampshire over the weekend of January 21st and 22nd. We will meet in central Weare on Saturday morning at a location to be announced later. After a short briefing we will set out in all directions to ask Weare voters to express America’s outrage over the Kelo vs. City of New London decision by signing the ballot initiative that was drafted by our supporters in Weare.

This initiative asks the Town of Weare to use eminent domain to seize the land of Supreme Court Justice David H. Souter for the purpose of economic development through the construction of an Inn. It must be filed by the end of January and will be voted on in March 2006.

Although it only takes 25 signatures to put this initiative on the ballot we would like to collect as many as possible. Souter has reportedly laughed at us and thinks we aren’t serious. Let’s show him otherwise.

We need to send a strong message to all politicians—stop stealing our property or YOU will be on the receiving end of the eminent domain steamroller.

Make a vacation of it. New Hampshire offers great options for the whole family: skiing, snowmobiling, ice fishing, throwing snowballs at rotten politicians. You can fly into Boston’s Logan International Airport (BOS) or Manchester New Hampshire’s airport (MHT). There are no hotels in Weare (they need one) so supporters are recommended to find one in Manchester, New Hampshire. Be prepared for cold, snowy conditions both in how you pack and the vehicle you rent. Remember, no matter how bad the weather conditions we’ll have it a lot better than our forefathers at Valley Forge.

See Full Details
____________________
The Kelo decision made it easier for government to steal property rightfully owned by private citizens. Let’s use this to steal Souter’s home and show him how dangerous his decision was!
____________________

The mainstream U.S. media outlets have failed to report a major terrorist plot against the U.S. – because it would tend to support President Bush’s use of NSA domestic surveillance, according to media watchdog groups.

News of a planned attack masterminded by three Algerians operating out of Italy was widely reported outside the U.S., but went virtually unreported in the American media.

Italian authorities recently announced that they had used wiretaps to uncover the conspiracy to conduct a series of major attacks inside the U.S.
Continue reading “Wiretapping Worked!”

Morning in Cicero
– By David Tatosian

Its Saturday January 7 th , 7:20 AM. I park my vehicle in the Home Depot lot and head for the dozen or so Minutemen already gathered on the sidewalk (outside the lot) along Cicero Avenue.

A woman from IFIRE (Indiana Federation for Immigration Reform & Enforcement) hands me a ‘Honk To Stop Illegal Immigration’ sign and I take my place on the sidewalk. Behind us (in the Home Depot parking lot) are the racist illegal alien demonstrators already shouting “Nazis” and “Racists” into their bullhorns.

7:30 on a Saturday morning, with a mobile transmitter at their disposal, media cameras and reporters hanging on their every word, and still these frenzied bigots need to yell into bullhorns to get their message out.

This is the second Minuteman function I have attended. The first, in the basement of the Elgin American Legion Hall on Nov. 10, in Elgin Il, was a town hall, open forum meeting attended by over 100 Elgin residents. . …………
Click HERE To Read On

Mass. House votes no on rate cut for the undocumented

Massachusetts House members last night decisively defeated a controversial bill to extend in-state tuition rates at public colleges to undocumented immigrants, effectively killing the measure for this year.

The 96-to-57 tally surprised advocates of the bill, who believed they had enough votes to win approval in the House and at one point were predicting they may have enough support to override a certain veto from Governor Mitt Romney.

Opponents of the bill appeared well organized, and in recent days they had flooded some legislators with phone calls urging them to vote against the measure. Some lawmakers were told they would face opponents in this fall’s elections if they supported the bill.

”I’ve gotten dozens upon dozens of calls and e-mails, and they were all of one view,” said House minority leader Bradley H. Jones, a North Reading Republican, who opposed the legislation. ”Members heard people’s apprehension about giving benefits to undocumented people.”

The defeat followed an unusually emotional day at the State House. As legislators offered impassioned speeches on the House floor, young students, some of whom said they were undocumented immigrants, gathered on the marble floor outside the chamber, watching the debate on a small television, growing more deflated as the evening wore on and it became clear they would lose.

See full Story- Boston.com
______________________
This is quite good news! Illegals getting financial assistance for education is one of the most absurd cases of PCism in extent today. It rewards illegal activity with the highest of rewards a society can give; an education.

Let’s hope that Taxachusettskeeps this back-bone and does not ever return this bill for consideration.
______________________

Size Matters : How Big Government Puts the Squeeze on America’s Families, Finances, and Freedom (Hardcover)

Your right to pursue happiness has been revoked by Big Government.

Thousands of pages of regulations, millions of employees, and trillions of tax dollars … Big Government is bigger than ever, and as this bloated behemoth continues to fatten up and stretch out, it squeezes America’s entrepreneurs, workers, and families – cutting our choices, limiting our opportunities, and squelching our right to pursue happiness.

Every year, taxes increase, regulations pile higher, the cost of living goes up – and our quality of life suffers. So with everyone obsessing about the obesity problem in America, isn’t it time we looked at the fat, flabby, overstretched, and overbloated behemoth that is American government?

Size Matters shows through facts, figures, and head-spinning stories that as government increases in quantity, we all suffer a loss in life quality. Miller reveals the damning details of Big Government’s impact on the lives of ordinary Americans. How it …

reduces family income
drives up the cost of housing, healthcare, and most every other consumer product or service
hurts employment
misdirects entrepreneurial efforts
stifles vital marketplace creativity and innovation

Bristling with drama and data, Size Matters reveals the real daily drawbacks of Big Government. It comes down to this …

Amazon.com
_________________________________
Not to be a shill for a book sale, but this one looks like it holds the kind of info that can help back up every small government Conservative who wants to show real reasons to reduce the size of government.

_________________________________

Brian C. Anderson

Talk radio, cable news, and the blogosphere freed U.S. political discourse. The Left wants to rein it in again.

The rise of alternative media-political talk radio in the eighties, cable news in the nineties, and the blogosphere in the new millennium-has broken the liberal monopoly over news and opinion outlets. The Left understands acutely the implications of this revolution, blaming much of the Democratic Party’s current electoral trouble on the influence of the new media’s vigorous conservative voices. Instead of fighting back with ideas, however, today’s liberals quietly, relentlessly, and illiberally are working to smother this flourishing universe of political discourse under a tangle of campaign-finance and media regulations. Their campaign represents the most sustained attack on free political speech in the United States since the 1798 Alien and Sedition Acts. Though Republicans have the most to lose in the short run, all Americans who care about our most fundamental rights and the civic health of our democracy need to understand what’s going on-and resist it.

The most imminent danger comes from campaign-finance rules, especially those spawned by the 2002 McCain-Feingold Campaign Reform Act. Republican maverick John McCain’s co-sponsorship aside, the bill passed only because of overwhelming Dem support. It’s easy to see why liberals have spearheaded the nation’s three-decade experiment with campaign-finance regulation. Seeking to rid politics of “big-money corruption,” election-law reforms obstruct the kinds of political speech-political ads and perhaps now the feisty editorializing of the new media-that escape the filter of the mainstream press and the academy, left-wing fiefdoms still regulation-free. Campaign-finance reform, notes columnist George Will, by steadily expanding “government’s control of the political campaigns that decide who controls government,” advances “liberalism’s program of extending government supervision of life.”

The irony of campaign-finance reform is that the “corruption” it targets seems not to exist in any widespread sense. Studies galore have found little or no significant influence of campaign contributions on legislators’ votes. Ideological commitments, party positions, and constituents’ wishes are what motivate the typical politician’s actions in office. Aha! reformers will often riposte, the corruption is hidden, determining what Congress doesn’t do-like enacting big gas taxes. But as Will notes, “that charge is impossible to refute by disproving a negative.” Even so, such conspiracy-theory thinking is transforming election law into what journalist Jonathan Rauch calls “an engine of unlimited political regulation.”

McCain-Feingold, the latest and scariest step down that slope, makes it a felony for corporations, nonprofit advocacy groups, and labor unions to run ads that criticize-or even name or show-members of Congress within 60 days of a federal election, when such quintessentially political speech might actually persuade voters. It forbids political parties from soliciting or spending “soft money” contributions to publicize the principles and ideas they stand for. Amending the already baffling campaign-finance rules from the seventies, McCain-Feingold’s dizzying dos and don’ts, its detailed and onerous reporting requirements of funding sources-which require a dense 300-page book to lay out-have made running for office, contributing to a candidate or cause, or advocating without an attorney at hand unwise and potentially ruinous.

Not for nothing has Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas denounced McCain-Feingold’s “unprecedented restrictions” as an “assault on the free exchange of ideas.”

See rest of story here
_________________________
This is a long article but well worth the read. We ALL need to keep our eyes on this out of control Party deceivingly called the “Democratic” Party!

_________________________

Setting the Stage for World War III. History Repeats Itself.
– By Justin Darr

For years the term “World War III” has been tossed about to describe everything from the international fight against poverty and disease to most recently the War on Terror. However, as anyone who actually lived through the World War II era can tell you, the battles of the past 50 years share little in common with that dark time.

We like to romanticize the World Wars today, looking at the past through the distorting lens of victory and decades of comfort. But the reality of a World War is far different. These are conflicts we could actually lose, requiring the marshalling of our total national resources and costing the lives of millions. Trusting in our wealth and power to make such large-scale conflicts things of the past has made us lackadaisical to the point that we do not see the seeds of the next World War taking root around us. This arrogance has made us blind as we repeat the mistakes of the late 1930’s and set the stage for the next World War. ………….
Click HERE To Read On

Here is a great blog I have recently been made aware of that is a link to informing us about what is going on in Iraq today with the U.S. military.

Check it out at iraqwarnews.net

Burning the midnight oil here, folks!

We have added several new features for your convenience to make your visit to Publius’ Forum even better than sliced bread. Better than sex. Even better than an approving nod from your favorite computer peripheral salesman! (Was that over kill?)

If you’ll look to your left you will see that we have added a subscription service from Bloglet.com. You can use this free service to receive email updates when Publius’ Forum is updated with new content.

This Bloglet.com service is free and is also something YOU have to sign up for. It is not invasive and will not implant spywear into your system if you sign up.

But, if you’d like updates about the goings on here at Publius’ Forum, then this is the thing for you!

AND….

We have also added a search bar from technorati.com/ for those who would like to search this site using keywords.

If you remember something that was said or would like to search for a subject, just use this search bar to find things on our site.

We will continue to search for ways to make you visit fun, easy and informative as time rolls on.

Be SURE to keep your eye on Publius’ Forum as we will have many announcements of exciting things to come. We have a few things in the works that we cannot disclose as of yet, but they will be quite interesting, to say the least.

And as always, thanks for making Publius’ Forum a part of you daily search for the best commentary on today’s most important issues.

Yours, Warner Todd Huston,
Proprietor, Publius’ Forum

Today, written communication is increasingly being replaced by computer messages. And, while adding computer proficiency requirements, school districts across Texas and the nation are de-emphasizing cursive writing in elementary school training. In higher grades, teachers are seeing less work done in cursive and more in block lettering or on computer printouts.

Furthermore, some teachers say that with the pressure to help students pass high-stakes achievement tests, they don’t have time or classroom resources to ensure that students master all aspects of handwriting.

Traditional penmanship, like calligraphy before it, is fast becoming a lost art.

Some teachers think the marginalization of cursive writing is just as it should be — class time, they argue, is better used on other things.

“I don’t feel like it’s a great loss,” Detrich said. “I feel like the most important things to teach these days are problem-solving, logical reasoning, critical thinking — and that doesn’t have anything to do with cursive writing.

“My son, who is 15 and a freshman at Austin High, spent his entire third-grade year, and had a year of specific instruction, in cursive and has never used it since.”

Click here to see full story
______________________

This one is a hard one to decide on. For instance, I read a lot of original letters and communications from the Civil War era. They are awfully hard to decypher because each individual’s handwriting is so darn distinctive. It gets to where I just HATE cursive handwriting! It is common in transcripting civil war diaries and letters that you end up with dozens of words that you just cannot identify. This is very frustrating and it is sure that some history is lost because of this.

But, with typewritten letters this is not a problem. Nothing is lost for the most part. Everything is perfectly legible.

But, here is the problem that i might perceive relying solely on electronic communications. Letters can be saved. They can be put in a box and saved for 300 years, even longer if properly cared for. They can be opened up and read long after they have been written and sent.

Can we do the same with electronic files? Will there BE a device that can read a floppy dics, Zip disc, a CD or DVD 300 years from now? Will there be a program that can understand the code by which those letters were written 300 years from now on those “ancient” storage devices?

I contend that, unless someone takes the time to continually update, re-save and store on the newest media, their missives and written work, those items will be forever lost to future researchers. Until computers get to the point (if they ever do) where files can ALWAYS be read regardless of how they were created, we will see an entire generation of information lost to future researchers, biographers and historians.

So, cursive may be a pain in the butt to read, but it might just end up a more permanent record, those squiggles on paper, than electronically saved writing.

Interesting dilemma, eh?

INDIANAPOLIS — In Indiana, 862,670 people are without health insurance, or 14 percent of our population. Among adults ages 19 to 64 living in poverty, 224,740 are without insurance, or 45 percent, according to the Henry J. Kaiser Foundation. In America, 44 million are uncovered, or 16 percent.

Let’s talk about the Indiana General Assembly. About the time of that PBS report, Indiana legislators pulled a fast one on the Hoosier people. Secretly, with virtually no public discussion or input, they snuck 11th hour provisions in several bills that gave Indiana lawmakers … free health insurance for life. If you can serve six years in the Indiana House or Senate, you’ll never have to write another check for health insurance. What a deal!

And it doesn’t just cover legislators. It covers their wives and husbands, children through college age, widows and widowers, and even ex-spouses.

Except … it isn’t free.

That’s where you come in.

Taxpayers, are getting stuck with the tab.

Last November, when Indiana legislators gathered for Organization Day, State Sen. Luke Kenley, R-Noblesville, had shocking news for the majority Republican caucus in the Senate. The unfunded liability for this luxurious perk could cost Hoosier taxpayers tens of millions of dollars. “I don’t know what the actual figure is,” Kenley explained.

With no clear method to pay for it all.

See full article here

____________________________

Jeeze, what scum-bags sit in the Indiana government!!

This is why I am against ALL pensions for EVERY politicians, state OR Federal (except the president- yes, even Clinton).

I think that the second these people leave office the largesse they get from the pubic should IMMEDIATELY end.

Nathan Tabor: Columnist, Candidate, and True Conservative
– By John T. Plecnik

Who is Nathan Tabor? Nationally, Nathan is known for his conservative political commentary and radio broadcasts. The Washington Times, Townhall.com, Human Events, and NewsMax have all published his work. And courtesy of American Family Radio-part of the American Family Association-the radio spots from Nathan’s AConservativeMoment.com are heard on over 250 stations nationwide.

In his home state of North Carolina, Nathan is known as a self-made, small businessman who ran for congress. In an eight-way primary-one of the most expensive in American history—Nathan raised over $850,000 and received over 7,500 votes.

Great reputation? Yes. But who is Nathan Tabor? Not satisfied with taking advantage of existing venues for conservative speech and activism, Nathan founded TheConservativeVoice.com. The site has been noted by Rush Limbaugh and features up-to-the-minute news and opinion from more than 100 popular columnists. It boasts a listing of 150,000 e-mails. And after less than a year, TheConservativeVoice.com gets over 250,000 unique visitors per month.
… ………
Click HERE To Read On

History, Henry Ford and the minimum wage
– By Michael M. Bates

On this date in 1914, Henry Ford made history once again. The auto manufacturer established an unheard of $5.00 a day minimum wage in his factories.

Former Chrysler chairman Lee Iacocca, also known as I-ka-zizzle in a TV commercial in which he plays straight man to the redoubtable artiste Mr. Snoop Dogg, wrote in Time Magazine that Ford “shocked the world with what probably stands as his greatest contribution ever: the $5-a-day minimum-wage scheme. The average wage in the auto industry then was $2.34 for a 9-hr. shift. Ford not only doubled that, he also shaved an hour off the workday.”

Whether that was Henry’s greatest contribution is questionable. Less uncertain is what his primary motivation was in raising employee wages and reducing work hours. ………………..
Click HERE To Read On

JACKSONVILLE, FL: Priests and 8 more churches plan Episcopal split

They would join six other churches that already have left the Florida diocese

By JEFF BRUMLEY
The Times-Union
1/7/2006
A “good-sized second wave” of at least eight conservative Northeast Florida churches will be following six that have already quit the Episcopal Diocese of Florida to realign themselves with Worldwide Anglican Communion, two local priests said Friday.

One of the original “Florida Six” cut ties with the Jacksonville-based diocese and its denomination, the Episcopal Church USA, in November and now worships at the University of North Florida.

The remaining five — All Souls and Church of the Redeemer in Jacksonville, Grace Church in Orange Park, St. Michael’s in Gainesville and St. Luke’s Community of Life in Gainesville — formally ended their relationship with Bishop John Howard’s diocese on Dec. 31 or will do so by Sunday, said the Rev. Sam Pascoe, rector at Grace Church.

Pascoe said more parishes are on their way to “disassociating” with the diocese and the denomination.”

The second wave is what we call the churches that have made up their mind to do what we’re doing, but have to get their ducks in a row to do it and have put the bishop on notice they are going to do it,” Pascoe said.

A diocesan official declined to speak about the second wave on Friday.

“I can’t comment on a hypothetical,” said the Rev. Canon Kurt Dunkle, Howard’s chief of staff.

But he added: “I’m constantly aware that people threaten things, but very rarely does it come true.”

The Rev. Mark Eldredge, rector at the Church of the Epiphany in Jacksonville, said it will all come true as 2006 unfolds.

Eldredge said his parish and up to seven others are actively making plans to follow the first six churches out of the Episcopal Church.

One of those congregations, St. James in Macclenny, announced its realignment in a Dec. 31 letter to Howard.

Two more congregations, which wish to remain anonymous, may cut ties as early as next week, Eldredge said.

Another five — his own, Good Samaritan in Orange Park, St. Teresa in Wakulla County and two that wish not to be identified — will wait until after June to see if the Episcopal Church repents for its actions at its next General Convention.”

We have no expectation of repentance,” Eldredge said.

And there could be even more leaving in the fall and beyond, he said.

Some are reluctant to go public until they see how the diocese handles the property issues with Church of the Redeemer, All Souls and Grace Church, Eldredge said.

On Friday, Howard sent a letter to Grace Church citing church and federal laws that prohibit the transfer of diocesan property to other dioceses who agree to oversee departing parishes.

Others are nervous about how Howard will handle the job status of the priests of those congregations, he said.

“Part of the reason the second-wave churches are second-wave churches is they are more skittish,” Eldredge said.

He said there could even be a third wave comprised of individuals who leave parishes that do not realign themselves with the Anglican Communion, which has some 70 million members worldwide.

Howard has maintained he is an orthodox bishop who intends to keep the diocese both in the 2 million-member Episcopal Church and in the Anglican Communion, of which the denomination has historically been a part.

But Eldredge and other priests and lay people in the diocese have wanted Howard to sever ties with the denomination and stop taking communion with its leaders.

The diocese has approximately 31,000 members worshiping in 77 congregations in 21 North Florida counties, Dunkle said.

The original “Florida Six” long ago stopped giving money to the diocese and have joined parallel Anglican groups, including the Anglican Alliance of North Florida.

Fifteen parishes and an additional 14 clergy from the diocese are members of the alliance, said Eldredge, who is one of its leaders.

Some of the second-wave churches are now stopping their giving, Eldredge said.

Dunkle said it’s sad anytime a congregation leaves the diocese, but he said its job is to care of those who do not leave.

“Those who remain should be assured there will be ongoing Episcopal ministry in those locations,” Dunkle said.

See source
_________________________

Well, at least SOME Episcopalians still view their religion in traditional ways, still view it as a RELIGION and not just a social club.

The funniest part was the ominous warning that the “Reverend” Dunkle said…

“Those who remain should be assured there will be ongoing Episcopal ministry in those locations”

Here is is warning the churches that left that he and his storm-troopers will come through their area and try to woo away the membership of the churches that split from the Diocese.

Ooooo. Scary, kids!

Jack Abramoff: the BIG Story For 2006?
– By Warner Todd Huston

Everyone is saying so.

From The Daily Kos, to Juan Williams of Fox News, to Rush Limbaugh, the buzz is all about how badly the revelations of Jack Abramoff’s lobbying corruption will hurt the GOP in 2006. With his double dealing, his supplying large sums of money, trips and other gifts to members of Congress, and his apparent bilking of millions from various American Indian tribes who wished Congress to favorably review their gambling interests the Abramoff scandal seems like a political powder keg just waiting to go off.

Rabid Republican haters, like the Daily Kos, are gleefully rubbing their hands together in anticipation of a wooden stake through the GOP’s heart just before the 2006 midterm elections and GOP supporters are filled with dread and foreboding. One thing is sure, a political soap opera is about to loom into public consciousness.

But, how far reaching will this scandal be? Will the public take to it and follow it like they did Nixon’s Watergate, Reagan’s Contra affairs, or Clinton’s zipper problems? Will it so define the public’s feelings about the GOP that it will adversely affect the 2006 Midterm elections throwing victory to the Democrats?…………….

Click HERE To Read On

Just a reminder that Democracies are NOT killers, R.J.Rummel compiles the hideous death toll reaped by Leftist governments and their handmaidens.

-128,168,000 VICTIMS: THE DEKA-MEGAMURDERERS
61,911,000 Murdered: The Soviet Gulag State
35,236,000 Murdered: The Communist Chinese Ant Hill
20,946,000 Murdered: The Nazi Genocide State
10,214,000 Murdered: The Depraved Nationalist Regime

-19,178,000 VICTIMS: THE LESSER MEGA-MURDERERS
5,964,000 Murdered: Japan’s Savage Military
2,035,000 Murdered: The Khmer Rouge Hell State
1,883,000 Murdered: Turkey’s Genocidal Purges
1,670,000 Murdered: The Vietnamese War State
1,585,000 Murdered: Poland’s Ethnic Cleansing
1,503,000 Murdered: The Pakistani Cutthroat State
1,072,000 Murdered: Tito’s Slaughterhouse

-4,145,000 VICTIMS: SUSPECTED MEGAMURDERERS
1,663,000 Murdered? Orwellian North Korea
1,417,000 Murdered? Barbarous Mexico
1,066,000 Murdered? Feudal Russia

see the full report at: www.hawaii.edu

IPSOS Factless

It is increasingly clear that IPSOS, a French polling company with close ties to the French leadership is producing polls for AP designed solely to allow them to run editorials in the guise of news stories. The samplings are widely out of line; the questions off the mark, and the results not surprisingly advance a Democrat point of view obviously shared by AP.

…The Associated Press is touting its own AP-Ipsos poll purporting to show a significant majority of Americans opposes the Bush administration on warrantless tapping of al-Qaeda phone calls originated abroad to their terrorist agents in the United States. But as typical these days, there is much less here than meets the eye.

The poll in today’s story is very similar to the “generic congressional poll” results announced yesterday purporting to show a massive shift in Americans’ support for Democratic control of Congress, a seismic shift that would signal that the Democrats are poised to seize back the House; that poll found that if the mid-term election were held today, 49% of Americans would want to see the Democrats win, while only 36% would want to see the Republicans win. Besides both polls showing a big surge towards Democrats, they have other similarities:

…One might almost conclude that this was really the very same poll—just mendaciously reported twice, in two different contexts, to make it appear as though there were a trend moving in the Democratic direction, a rising crescendo of criticism of George W. Bush. But of course, it would be dishonest for AP to do that without noting the fact, so it can’t be true. It must simply be an eerie coincidence.

Another point the “two” polls share: they both wildly overpolled Democrats—52% of the respondents were Democrats, 40% were Republicans, and 8% were independents; that is, they polled almost a third more Democrats than Republicans.

See the full article at Americanthinker.cm

_________________

So much for the “science” of polling.

But, could we expect ANYTHING less from a french company

Fewer American Men in College? Good!
– By Warner Todd Huston

We are just beginning to see pundits and edu-watchers noticing that more women are attending Universities and colleges than are men in this country today. According to several articles I have recently read the ratio that will enroll in college this year is somewhere around 58 women to 42 men.

There are many questions being raised about the climbing number of women over men attending our colleges and what it means for our society and economy. Some wonder where the women of the near future will find men who are either their peers or their betters to marry. Some worry that we will have fewer and fewer men “educated” enough to fill the high-end jobs of the future. And some might worry that we are seeing a dumbing down of our male populace.

Another thing to wonder about is the continued focus of women’s groups and the government on fostering yet even more women to attend colleges even as there is already an imbalance of women over men. That such energy and money is being wasted fixing something that isn’t broken is a situation that reeks of foolishness.

All these questions are pertinent and good to ask. But are they something we must really worry about? That is the real question…………….

Click HERE To Read On

The Dirty Dozen
America’s Most Bizarre and Politically Correct College Courses

Princeton University’s Prostitute, Cross Dressing, and Same-Sex Eroticism Course ranked the most bizarre Class

HERNDON, VA – As tuition rates climb to an average of over $21,000 per year, today’s college students study prostitution, teeth whitening, and Beavis and Butthead. The following Dirty Dozen highlights the most bizarre and troubling instances of leftist activism supplanting traditional scholarship in our nation’s colleges and universities.

1. Princeton University’s The Cultural Production of Early Modern Women examines “prostitutes,” “cross-dressing,” and “same-sex eroticism” in 16th – and 17th – century England, France, Italy and Spain (emphasis added).

2. The Unbearable Whiteness of Barbie: Race and Popular Culture in the United States at Occidental College in California explores ways “which scientific racism has been put to use in the making of Barbie [and] to an interpretation of the film The Matrix as a Marxist critique of capitalism.”

3. At The Johns Hopkins University, students in the Sex, Drugs, and Rock ‘n’ Roll in Ancient Egypt class view slideshows of women in ancient Egypt “vomiting on each other,” “having intercourse,” and “fixing their hair.”

4. Like something out of a Hugh Hefner film, Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania offers the class Lesbian Novels Since World War II.

5. Alfred University’s Nip, Tuck, Perm, Pierce, and Tattoo: Adventures with Embodied Culture, mostly made up of women, encourages students to think about the meaning behind “teeth whitening, tanning, shaving, and hair dyeing.” Special projects include visiting a tattoo-and-piercing studio and watching Arnold Schwarzenegger’s bodybuilding film, Pumping Iron.

6. Harvard University’s Marxist Concepts of Racism examines “the role of capitalist development and expansion in creating racial inequality” (emphasis added). Although Karl Marx didn’t say much on race, leftist professors in this course extrapolate information on “racial oppression” and “racial antagonism.”

7. Occidental College—making the Dirty Dozen list twice—offers a course in Stupidity, which compares the American presidency to Beavis and Butthead.

8. Students at the University of California—Los Angeles need not wonder what it means to be a lesbian. The Psychology of the Lesbian Experience reviews “various aspects of lesbian experience” including the “impact of heterosexism/stigma, gender role socialization, minority status of women and lesbians, identity development within a multicultural society, changes in psychological theories about lesbians in sociohistorical context.”

9.Duke University’s American Dreams/American Realities course supposedly unearths “such myths as ‘rags to riches,’ ‘beacon to the world,’ and the ‘frontier,’ in defining the American character” (emphasis added).

10.Amherst College in Massachusetts offers the class Taking Marx Seriously: “Should Marx be given another chance?” Students in this course are asked to question if Marxism still has any “credibility” remaining, while also inquiring if societies can gain new insights by “returning to [Marx’s] texts.” Coming to Marx’s rescue, this course also states that Lenin, Stalin, and Pol Pot misapplied the concepts of Marxism.
11.Brown University’s Black Lavender: A Study of Black Gay & Lesbian Plays “address[es] the identities and issues of Black gay men and lesbians, and offer[s] various points of view from within and without the Black gay and lesbian artistic communities.”

12. Students enrolled in the University of Michigan’s Topics in Literary Studies: Ancient Greek/Modern Gay Sexuality have the pleasure of reading a “wide selection of ancient Greek (and a few Roman) texts that deal with same-sex love, desire, gender dissidence, and sexual behavior.”

yaf.org

We need to stop sending our children to Universities that offer such garbage as classes. We have some of the worst schools in the western world and students who aren’t learning ANYTHING worth while.

Race, Religion and Regression
– By David Tatosian

Tabari VIII:122/Ishaq:515 “The Prophet gave orders concerning Kinanah to Zubayr, saying, ‘Torture him until you root out and extract what he has’. So Zubayr kindled a fire on Kinanah’s chest, twirling it with his firestick until Kinanah was near death. Then the Messenger gave him to Maslamah, who beheaded him.”

Qur’an 8:12 “I shall terrorize the infidels. So wound their bodies and incapacitate them because they oppose Allah and His Apostle.”

Qur’an 33:21 “You have in (Muhammad) the Messenger of Allah a beautiful pattern of conduct for any one to follow.”

The religion of peace argument gets harder and harder to defend doesn’t it?

As we have seen this past year, the worldwide jihad has ratcheted up the violence and intimidation against citizens throughout Europe and Australia. Clearly some sort of Islamic tipping point has been reached. …………
Click HERE To Read On

This submission is a reply to my last Op Ed on the 14th Amendment (The 14th Amendment, Change it or Understand it?) by a blogger named B.E Brockett. Mr. Brockett’s blog can be seen here: http://www.americankernel.com/

Mr. Brockett ,

A note on form: You will see that my reply is posted in red type. All your original is posted in black with your form kept as original.…………….

Click HERE To Read On

Georgia Guard Troops Help Ailing Iraqi Teen

Soldiers from the 48th Brigade Combat Team arranged for an ailing Iraqi teen to be evaluated at a combat support hospital and then transfered to Baghdad for additional treatment.

-By U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Britt Smith 48th Brigade Combat Team

CAMP ADDER, AN NASIRIYAH, Iraq, Jan. 6, 2006 — In the middle of a country where medical care is tough to come by, a new bond was recently forged between Georgia’s Army National Guard soldiers and local Iraqi citizens. Ibitisam Hameed Kassar, a 17-year-old Iraqi girl from the An Nasiriyah area, was born with a rare blood vessel disorder called pulmonary hypertension.

“It gives the Iraqi people a new perspective about Americans. We are the final stop for many of them with regard to medical care.”- U.S. Army 1st Lt. Fernando Mendez

This rare condition causes severe shortness of breath as well as fatigue, chest pain and dizziness. Ibitisam lives in an area of Iraq where physical ability to work is necessary for all aspects of life, school included. Her condition made it difficult, if not impossible, to walk to school or to work the small plot of land her family calls home. As a result she has spent the majority of her young life inside her home, unable to do much more than smile and keep her mother company during the day.

Hope for any treatment was remote and unlikely, that is until the 48th Brigade Combat Team showed up a few months ago.

U.S. Army 1st Lt. Fernando Mendez conveys a good luck wish as the helicopter lifts off with his patient aboard, enroute to Baghdad for additional medical tests and treatment. U.S. Army photo by Staff Sgt. Britt Smith
Rahima Lafi (right), mother of patient Ibtisam Kasser, gets her first set of hearing protection as she prepares to board a helicopter to accompany her daughter to a hospital in Baghdad for medical treatment. U.S. Army photo by Staff Sgt. Britt Smith

The 48th Brigade’s civil affairs team heard about her plight and arranged for her to be seen at the Camp Adder base hospital staffed by the 10th Combat Support Hospital out of Fort Sill, Okalahoma.

“We arranged it through the [10th Combat Support Hospital] for Ibitisam to be treated by U.S. doctors” said U.S. Army Sgt. 1st Class William Lawson from Midland, Ga., a platoon sergeant for the 48th Brigade Combat Team civil affairs section.

The road to treatment was a long one. Ibtisam’s mother Rahima Abid Lafi knows. “It took three years to reach the Americans, and it’s a very good feeling to have the help from the U.S. soldiers.”

Help is what the medical professionals of the 10th Combat Support Hospital provide and after running tests the doctors determined that she needed additional treatment at a larger facility in the International Zone of Baghdad.

Ibtisam’s short stay at the combat support hospital produced a collection of new friends who were eager to do all they could to make her comfortable while she was prepared for her first helicopter ride.

U.S. Army 1st Lt. Fernando Mendez, head operating room nurse who hails from San Antonio, Texas, puts it in perspective. “It gives the Iraqi people a new perspective about Americans. We are the final stop for many of them with regard to medical care.”

He added, “that it makes the job great, its medical care and that’s what it is all about.”

Both mother and daughter made the trip to Baghdad aboard a Blackhawk helicopter for the additional tests and treatments. Ibtisam’s outcome is unknown but friendships were forged and trust gained, by both U.S soldiers and Iraqi citizens. “We are mind changers. What we do here today will help both countries gain a better understanding of each other,” Mendez said.

defendamerica.com

______________

I figured we should have some good news from Iraq for a change. The MainStreamMedia sure as heck won’t tell us any!

The NEA gave $65 million in its members’ dues to left-liberal groups last year.

If we told you that an organization gave away more than $65 million last year to Jesse Jackson’s Rainbow PUSH Coalition, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, Amnesty International, AIDS Walk Washington and dozens of other such advocacy groups, you’d probably assume we were describing a liberal philanthropy. In fact, those expenditures have all turned up on the financial disclosure report of the National Education Association, the country’s largest teachers union.

Under new federal rules pushed through by Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao, large unions must now disclose in much more detail how they spend members’ dues money. Big Labor fought hard (if unsuccessfully) against the new accountability standards, and even a cursory glance at the NEA’s recent filings–the first under the new rules–helps explain why. They expose the union as a honey pot for left-wing political causes that have nothing to do with teachers, much less students.

We already knew that the NEA’s top brass lives large. Reg Weaver, the union’s president, makes $439,000 a year. The NEA has a $58 million payroll for just over 600 employees, more than half of whom draw six-figure salaries. Last year the average teacher made only $48,000, so it seems you’re better off working as a union rep than in the classroom.

Many of the organization’s disbursements–$30,000 to the Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association, $122,000 to the Center for Teaching Quality–at least target groups that ostensibly have a direct educational mission. But many others are a stretch, to say the least. The NEA gave $15,000 to the Human Rights Campaign, which lobbies for “lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender equal rights.” The National Women’s Law Center, whose Web site currently features a “pocket guide” to opposing Supreme Court nominee Sam Alito, received $5,000. And something called the Fund to Protect Social Security got $400,000, presumably to defeat personal investment accounts.

The new disclosure rules mark the first revisions since 1959 and took effect this year. “What wasn’t clear before is how much of a part the teachers unions play in the wider liberal movement and the Democratic Party,” says Mike Antonucci of the Education Intelligence Agency, a California-based watchdog group. “They’re like some philanthropic organization that passes out grant money to interest groups.”

There’s been a lot in the news recently about published opinion that parallels donor politics. Well, last year the NEA gave $45,000 to the Economic Policy Institute, which regularly issues reports that claim education is underfunded and teachers are underpaid. The partisans at People for the American Way got a $51,000 NEA contribution; PFAW happens to be vehemently anti-voucher.

The extent to which the NEA sends money to states for political agitation is also revealing. For example, Protect Our Public Schools, an anti-charter-school group backed by the NEA’s Washington state affiliate, received $500,000 toward its efforts to block school choice for underprivileged children. (Never mind that charter schools are public schools.) And the Floridians for All Committee, which focuses on “the construction of a permanent progressive infrastructure that will help redirect Florida politics in a more progressive, Democratic direction,” received a $249,000 donation from NEA headquarters.

When George Soros does this sort of thing, at least he’s spending his own money. The NEA is spending the mandatory dues paid by members who are told their money will be used to gain better wages, benefits and working conditions. According to the latest filing, member dues accounted for $295 million of the NEA’s $341 million in total receipts last year. But the union spent $25 million of that on “political activities and lobbying” and another $65.5 million on “contributions, gifts and grants” that seemed designed to further those hyper-liberal political goals.

The good news is that for the first time members can find out how their union chieftains did their political thinking for them, by going to www.union-reports.dol.gov, where the Labor Department has posted the details.

Union officials claim that they favored such transparency all along, but the truth is they fought the new rules hard in both Congress and the courts. Originally, the AFL-CIO said detailed disclosures were too expensive, citing compliance costs in excess of $1 billion. The final bill turned out to be $54,000, or half of what the unions spent on litigation fighting the new requirements. When Secretary Chao refused to back down, the unions took her to court, and lost.

It’s well understood that the NEA is an arm of the Democratic National Committee. (Or is it the other way around?) But we wonder if the union’s rank-and-file stand in unity behind this laundry list of left-to-liberal recipients of money that comes out of their pockets.

Opinionjournal.com

___________

Exactly why Unions have outlived their usefulness! That and the fact that they don’t even try to hide the fact that they are no longer on the USA’s side in any fight. At least the old Unions in the 40s, 50s, and 60s were virulently anti-communist and anti-socialist and supported the supremacy of the country!

From time to time we will be presenting to you the books that you should have in your library to help you understand and explain to others what American Conservatism is, where it came from, and why it is the right American ideology.

Our First Recommendation:

The Federalist Papers
-James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay

First published in New York as a series of newspaper articles meant as an argument in favor of the adoption of the US Constitution, this book is indispensable for understanding the prevailing thoughts of just what our Constitution means.

Certainly there were Founders who disagreed with adopting the Constitution (and the anti-Federalist Papers should be read as well to find out why), but those in favor won the day and this book will help you see what those Founders meant when they created that important document.

This is a “conservative” book only in that it explains the Constitution so that you, as a conservative constructionalist idealist, may interpret the Constitution properly and can refute those who wish to continually “discover” new meanings and false rights (like the “right” of abortion, for instance).

James Madison, Republican from Virginia and fourth president, is often called the Father of the Constitution. Madison kept extensive notes on the Constitutional Convention and was closely involved in the creation of the U.S. Constitution. Aside from John Adams, few other Founders were as often in the thick of the creation.

Alexander Hamilton, Federalist from New York, was the chief architect of our economic system and was one of the most energetic Founders. He is often not given the credit for his efforts he deserves.

John Jay, Federalist from New York and first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, offered only but a few of the entries of the book, but ws a well known and respected member of our Founding brotherhood.

Te best printing of the book is the one from the Liberty Fund and can be found at:
http://www.libertyfund.org/details.asp?displayID=1638
See our List building here

Liberal “Tolerance”
– Eric Reikowski

If you looked up the definition of “liberal’ in the dictionary you might well find the following: “a person who favors a political philosophy of progress and reform and the protection of civil liberties” or “one who is open-minded and accepting of different viewpoints.” You would likewise expect Democrats to be staunch advocates of democratic principles.

However, in this day and age, both liberals and Democrats (if there is any meaningful distinction left between the two) seem willing to blatantly contradict their professed set of beliefs whenever possible.

The University of Kansas recently planned to establish a new course called “Special Topics in Religion: Intelligent Design, Creationisms, and Other Religious Mythologies.” Paul Mirecki, chairman of the KU Department of Religious Studies, stated in a private email that the course should be “a nice slap” in the “big fat face” of “fundies” (fundamentalists) since it will be taught under the heading of mythology.

No surprise that he would have the courage to say such things in private, rather than in public…………..
Click HERE To Read On

The real reason the West is in danger of extinction.
BY MARK STEYN

Most people reading this have strong stomachs, so let me lay it out as baldly as I can: Much of what we loosely call the Western world will not survive this century, and much of it will effectively disappear within our lifetimes, including many if not most Western European countries. There’ll probably still be a geographical area on the map marked as Italy or the Netherlands–probably–just as in Istanbul there’s still a building called St. Sophia’s Cathedral. But it’s not a cathedral; it’s merely a designation for a piece of real estate. Likewise, Italy and the Netherlands will merely be designations for real estate. The challenge for those who reckon Western civilization is on balance better than the alternatives is to figure out a way to save at least some parts of the West.

One obstacle to doing that is that, in the typical election campaign in your advanced industrial democracy, the political platforms of at least one party in the United States and pretty much all parties in the rest of the West are largely about what one would call the secondary impulses of society–government health care, government day care (which Canada’s thinking of introducing), government paternity leave (which Britain’s just introduced). We’ve prioritized the secondary impulse over the primary ones: national defense, family, faith and, most basic of all, reproductive activity–“Go forth and multiply,” because if you don’t you won’t be able to afford all those secondary-impulse issues, like cradle-to-grave welfare.

Americans sometimes don’t understand how far gone most of the rest of the developed world is down this path: In the Canadian and most Continental cabinets, the defense ministry is somewhere an ambitious politician passes through on his way up to important jobs like the health department. I don’t think Don Rumsfeld would regard it as a promotion if he were moved to Health and Human Services.

The design flaw of the secular social-democratic state is that it requires a religious-society birthrate to sustain it. Post-Christian hyperrationalism is, in the objective sense, a lot less rational than Catholicism or Mormonism. Indeed, in its reliance on immigration to ensure its future, the European Union has adopted a 21st-century variation on the strategy of the Shakers, who were forbidden from reproducing and thus could increase their numbers only by conversion. The problem is that secondary-impulse societies mistake their weaknesses for strengths–or, at any rate, virtues–and that’s why they’re proving so feeble at dealing with a primal force like Islam

opinionjournal.com
________________
Steyn is so on with this.

His point is we are multicultural-ing ourselves to death. We are so “caring” about “balance” and appearing multicultural (without REALLY know anything about any other culture, mind you… including our own) that we are dooming our own culture to obselescense. That we have become so self-absorbed that we don’t even care about having children. That we are so involved in our minutia that the enemy of modernity will walk right in and give us a killing blow without us even realizing it is happening.

Religious cultures place a high value on children, even the Islamofascists as they care more about males, than societies that center their thoughts and desires solely on the individual as leftist Europe and blue America is proving statistically.

That is why all you anti-Americans on the left probably won’t really be a bother in the long run. You are either gay or so self-involved that you will eschew children to pursue your selfish interests like perpetual adolescents and will not pass on your idiotic pseudo values on to the next generation. The Christians you all hate so much will win out in the long run.

But because of you selfish, adolescent liberals, the Muslims will over take us all because they, like the Christians, will have a lot of children. but, unlike the Christians, they will pass on a hatred for the west to those children.

So, the destruction of western values can be laid at the feet of leftists even more so than at the feet of Islamofascists.

And in that, Steyn is 100% right.

Eco-Claus: Greens Emphasize Red In Christmas
– By Frederick Meekins

In The Lion, The Witch & The Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis, the White Witch forbids the celebration of Christmas in part because she thinks the celebration is a waste of resources. Likewise, in Politically Correct Holiday Stories by James Finn Garner, Scrooge is as much a New Age acetic as he is a miser.

A classic song entreats the listener to have themselves a merry little Christmas. However, if certain environmentalists have their way, Americans won’t be enjoying much of a Christmas. For according to these elites, the Christmas festivities most of us enjoy are to be listed on the indictment of environmental crimes of Western Civilization against the ecosphere.

These leftists who have made an entire cottage industry insisting that right and wrong do not really exist certainly don’t mind telling the rest of us what to do. Published in the December 2005 edition of National Wildlife is a proclamation the reader is expected to adhere to if they wish to observe an environmentally-aware solstice season or whatever else the tree huggers wallow in this time of year.

Some of the suggestions are just commonsense tips on how to save money on electric bills. Others are more blatantly agenda driven……….
Click HERE To Read On

Democrat Dangerous Duplicity on Display
– By Chuck Busch

In their eagerness to inflict as much damage as possible to the Bush administration record, the Democrats once again are being reckless with the truth and with national security. Critics of President Bush’s efforts to keep America safe and to defeat our enemies have seized upon a New York Times report about the NSA conducting warrantless wiretaps on terrorist suspects to lambaste the Commander-in-Chief for abusing civil rights and exceeding his authority.

Several have accused him of not consulting Congress when in fact; the president met with members of the Senate Intelligence Committee initially and has discussed the program with congress at least 12 times.

Some claim that this is an unprecedented use of warrantless searches, but since the passing of FISA in 1978, Presidents Carter, Reagan, and Clinton have all justified using these security measures. Where were the civil liberty watchdogs back then? ………..
Click HERE To Read On