More IRS protest coverage

Here

Here

Here

Here

Meanwhile, Lois Lerner, the head of the exempt organizations division of the IRS, will take the 5th in her non-testimony to Congress.

It's curious that a high-level IRS official would have to invoke non-self-incrimination in a situation where she apologized for low-level people who were solely responsible. Since when does "bad customer service" require that?

No telling, really, when these people will decide to respect Constitutional Law.

Rein in the IRS Protest, East Lansing MI

Warm and overcast, threat of thunderstorms here today.



There were 25 - 30 very polite people, some couldn't stay long so we averaged about 25 at any given time. Many drove an hour or more to attend. Most were older, but there was a 2 year old with his mother, and these young ladies. Nice to see. They're all home-schooled, by the way.


We were not allowed on the private property wherein the IRS rents its office space, so we marched up and down West Road in front of the building.

The building manager was nervous, perhaps frightened, and quickly escalated from a firm but polite eviction speech to threatening to call the police. He didn't, but his mannerisms when he got to that point (about 30 seconds) were quite agitated. I don't think he understands who it is that shows up for tea party protests.

It wouldn't have taken long for the police to arrive. There were 2 squad cars the entire time (some others cruised through) and a Homeland Security vehicle.



Update: Thanks to Instapundit for the link.

How can you tell?

Maybe the confluence of interest from the ATF, FBI, IRS and OSHA are coincidental. Maybe not.

The insidious part of government out-of-control is that you're a lot less sure it's coincidence than you were last week.

IRS Protest

Short notice, but -

On behalf of Tea Party, Patriot groups, 9/12, liberty activists, and the American people, we are calling for anyone and everyone to protest the IRS’ complete abuse of power on Tuesday, May 21, 2013 at noon local time.

Find an address close to you at the link above.

Obanana Republic

On November 5th, 2008, I said that the Obama Administration would be the most corrupt in living memory. I was wrong. It's not merely living memory. And it goes beyond simple corruption.

The American people have been subject to a direct, systematic attack by the federal government, accomplished via the tax laws. Extremely complex laws were combined with bureaucratic ignorance, institutional arrogance, a monopoly on the use of force and a leadership competent solely in permanent campaign mode; in a comprehensive effort to punish dissent, interfere in elections and restrict religious freedom. Information was demanded that could only result in limiting freedom of assembly. Confidential tax information was leaked. Lies were repeatedly told to the legislative branch and to all Americans. When it became apparent that the perfidy would be exposed, and before informing Congress, the IRS staged a passive "Mistakes were made" apology by planting a question at a press conference.

[The IRS] acknowledged it was wrong for the agency to target groups based on political affiliation.

"That was absolutely incorrect, it was insensitive and it was inappropriate. That's not how we go about selecting cases for further review," Lerner said at a conference sponsored by the American Bar Association.

"The IRS would like to apologize for that," she added.

OK, go ahead and apologize, you have our permission. When you do, please reference the First Amendment. And then, name names, fire people and bring charges.

Admit that it was not just groups with the words "Tea Party" in their names. Discuss why, after president "Know Nothing" and his cronies specifically named individual Americans who disagree with the president's policies, that those named individuals were audited. Expand on your understanding of why it's wrong for the federal government to demand the content of individual prayers, specifically threatening perjury charges for those so questioned. Tell us why "progressive" groups received preferential treatment in the same time period. I think we need more insight than "inappropriate," or "poor customer service."

Tell us if you believe that the root problem is allowing corporations to practice free speech, and whether more regulation is needed. Why is current legal complexity insufficient unto hiding the IRS agenda? Explain why the reasons you gave for the "enhanced scrutiny," don't even hold up.

Finally, do you think the IRS transgressions are irrelevant if no one can prove that Obama is directly involved? Do you agree that if the president was involved, it shows that he is the most corrupt, tyrannical leader in American history, and that every branch of the executive division in our government is suspect? If the president wasn’t involved, can any number of straw men, any amount of ad hominem political hackery, any quantity of ignorance pleading - change the fact that it is his Administration?

Before answering, think about what it means if Obama wasn’t involved: The IRS, an agency with the power to destroy every person in America, did all of this on its own initiative.

Explain, please, why your actions did not violate each and every term of the following:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

There is a nascent protest scheduled at IRS locations on Tuesday May, 21st. At noon, I will be at:

EAST LANSING, MI /DET IRS OFFICE
3100 WEST ROAD
EAST LANSING, MI 48823

Let us see what happens.

The Moral Foundations of Society

Rest in Peace, Mrs. Thatcher.

I can think of no better tribute than the email I received today from Hillsdale College.

A Message from Hillsdale College President Larry P. Arnn:

Lady Thatcher, born Margaret Roberts in 1925, was one of the most important and beneficial statesmen of the twentieth century. When she came to power in 1979, her nation was held in the grip of unions that had command of the largest political party in the state. They used that power to shut down industries and even sections of the country at will to make employment demands. Rather than resist, the government would collude in crippling strikes. Margaret Thatcher was elected with a promise to stop these practices, and in a series of dramatic confrontations in her first year she was successful. She did not seek, she said, to adjust the power from labor to capital, but rather to return the government to serving the whole people and the public interest.

In 1982, she sent British forces to war against the junta in Argentina, which had invaded the Falkland Islands, a British protectorate. Britain won that war with the help of the United States and its president, her friend, Ronald Reagan. The Falklands are in dispute between Britain and Argentina today, and the current administration in Washington is less friendly to Britain. The people of the Falklands, whenever they are asked, still indicate in overwhelming numbers that they wish to remain as they are.

The only statue of Lady Thatcher in North America stands on the Hillsdale College campus. She visited the campus in 1994 and spoke at college events on several occasions. We are proud to have known her. At our spring convocation on Thursday we will say prayers of thanksgiving for her life and service.

Here is the text of a speech Mrs. Thatcher gave at Hilsdale, and from which this post takes its title.

Fueling fascism

Why would any organization continue to pursue practices and policies which have exactly the opposite effects of their stated goals? Why would they double down on an obvious failure??

Ethanol as fuel provides a case study:
Ethanol Fraud and Why You Pay More at the Pump

It starts as mere cronyism, and ends up as Fascism - the ultimate public-private partnership. The partners will beggar consumers (and tax them for the privilege), pollute the air and water, install protectionist tariffs and stifle innovation and competition with arcane and draconian regulation.

When this is rolling along nicely, they create an unnecessary and inefficient market to place rigged bets on trade in the ruination. All the while they whine about the evils of free markets, castigating "greedy people" who are too venal and stupid to behave according to the central plan. The solutions always require more money and more regulation.

Conservatives (who used to be called liberals) believe all people are imperfect and subject to the temptations of power. Therefore, they seek to limit the application of power.

Progressives (who are now called liberals) believe all people, except those in power, are imperfect, and that the temptations of power are trumped by good intentions. They seek to maximize the application of their intentions - no matter the results.

Note: The article linked above repeats itself, so when you reach the part you've already read, you can stop.

Ammo shortages & DHS

People have been noticing the large ammunition contract let by DHS. Shortages of ammo for use by private citizens are rampant.

DHS Won't Answer Congress On Billion Bullet Purchase

Whatever the DHS plans are, this quote from the above is just silly:

...[Former] Marine Richard Mason told reporters with WHPTV News in Pennsylvania recently, hollow-point bullets (which make up the majority of the DHS purchases) are not used for training because they are more expensive than standard firing range rounds.

"We never trained with hollow points, we didn't even see hollow points my entire 4-1/2 years in the Marine Corps," Mason said."

Different ammo has different ballistic characteristics, including where it hits. At only 50 yards, this may be measured in inches in some cases. Therefore, training with the ammo you will use in action is a preferred practice if you can afford it. DHS can. And, unlike the military, can use it "in action."

The Marines can't use hollow point ammo in action without violating the Geneva Conventions, so it's not surprising this Marine didn't see it while in the Corps. Training Marines with hollow points would be stupid not primarily because it's more expensive, but because it can't be used when it really counts anyway.

Then, too, maybe it's not simply private citizens who are causing shortages for cops.

Cops Disarmed By Ammo-Hoarding Gun Nuts, Complains Salon Writer

Protection Racket

"Nice little federal program you have there. Be a shame if anything were to happen to it."

Obama's Next Move

ALL of Big Banks’ Profits Come from Taxpayer Bailouts & Subsidies

White House Report Claims Sequestration Will Affect Federal Agency That No Longer Exists

Why a one-room West Virginia library runs a $20,000 Cisco router

Squeezing Medicare Advantage

Slash Federal Spending: GAO Details Waste, Inefficiency and Duplication (Again)

The sequester's not much, but it's better than nothing.

The #SeekRenters

The sequester debate isn't about spending cuts, it's about a tiny slowing in the rate of increase of funds transferred to Federal rent seekers. Noted in the Wall Street Journal: The Unscary Sequester

In Mr. Obama's first two years, while private businesses and households were spending less and deleveraging, federal domestic discretionary spending soared by 84% with some agencies doubling and tripling their budgets.

... from 2008-2013 federal discretionary spending has climbed to $1.062 trillion from $933 billion—an increase of 13.9%. Domestic programs grew by 16.6%, much faster than the 11.6% for national security.

Transportation funding alone climbed to $69.5 billion in 2010 with the stimulus from $10.7 billion in 2008, and in 2013 the budget is still $17.9 billion, or about 67% higher. Education spending more than doubled in Mr. Obama's first two years and is up 18.6% to $68.1 billion from 2008-2013.

... total discretionary domestic spending is up closer to 30% from 2008-2013. The sequester would claw that back by all of about 5%.

... The sequester will surely require worker furloughs and cutbacks in certain nonpriority services. But most of those layoffs will happen in the Washington, D.C. area, the recession-free region that has boomed during the Obama era.

If Mr. Obama were really serious about improving the equality of income distribution, he might consider that a positive. According to Stephen S. Fuller, director of the Center for Regional Analysis at George Mason University, about

"...15 cents of every dollar from the entire federal procurement budget stays in or around the government's hometown. ..."We're seeing an enormous transfer of wealth from taxpayers to the Washington economy," said Fuller."

Upton Sinclair was a socialist, but when he said, "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it," he was on to something; though he did neglect to mention the mendacity of politicians in fostering said ignorance. The threats issuing forth from the Obama administration - to prioritize cutting baby food and meat inspection rather than not funding the next Solyndra or ending high speed rail boondoggles; and putting slashing veterans benefits ahead of cancelling the DOD's "green" projects - show a cynical disregard for taxpayers and reveal the deep hypocrisy of the president's purported compassion.

Director of Hatcheries and Conditioning

A paper to be published in March in BioScience, the journal of the American Institute of Biological Sciences, titled “Social Norms and Global Environmental Challenges” is discussed here. The article is relatively long, but that's because there are a lot of examples of a call to totalitarianism from people who claim to be "scientists." They are anything but. They believe their opinions are not subject to the basic requirement of scientific method: the possibility of falsification.

This entire publication is a clear and unmistakable sign that a scientific dictatorship is emerging under the pretext of environmentalism. More government control through regulations and fines combined with a proactive scientific community, brainwashing people into accepting this increasing governmental control where they would otherwise reject it.

That is not an exaggeration, based on the paper's content. It is a call to abandon Constitutional government in the United States in favor of the UN. The group of scientists involved include two Nobel Prize winners. They have Nobels in economy and political science. One wonders why there's no Peace Prize winner. Perhaps Mr. Obama was too busy hobnobbing with Tiger Woods. And Yasser Arafat, of course, is dead.

I thought the scientific dictatorship had actually emerged a long time ago, when the "consensus" of scientists was supposed to make us stop asking any questions about global warming/climate change - or whatever they're calling it today. The effrontery of publishing this indicates the current political environment is encouraging to these statists, and that their privilege blinds them to their hubris.

As to consensus, no such thing must be tolerated from the citizens in a democratic republic if it disagrees with these ivory tower savants. This totalitarian impulse is not new, it is a foundational principle of the eugenicists and the core idea of socialism.

Aldous Huxley wrote about it in 1931. In the introduction to the 1946 edition of Brave New World, he said this:

Unless we choose to decentralize and to use applied science...as the means to producing a race of free individuals, we have only two alternatives to choose from: either a number of national, militarized totalitarianisms, having as their root the terror of the atomic bomb...or else one supra-national totalitarianism, called into existence by the social chaos...and developing, under the need for efficiency and stability, into the welfare-tyranny of Utopia.

All things considered, it looks as though Utopia were far closer to us than anyone, only fifteen years ago could have imagined. Today [in 1946] it seems quite possible that the horror may be upon us in a single century.

By the time he wrote Brave New World Revisited in 1958, he had though more on the subject of a world governing scientific dictatorship:

The older dictators fell because they could never supply their subjects with enough bread, enough cir­cuses, enough miracles and mysteries. Nor did they possess a really effective system of mind-manipulation. In the past, free-thinkers and revolutionaries were often the products of the most piously orthodox educa­tion. This is not surprising. The methods employed by orthodox educators were and still are extremely inefficient. Under a scientific dictator education will really work - with the result that most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution. There seems to be no good reason why a thoroughly scientific dictatorship should ever be overthrown.

That appears to be the plan.

Creative Accounting

Reuters reports "U.S. posts $3 billion budget surplus for January". They fail to note that from December through January US debt rose by $137 billion.

This "surplus" is as if you counted a $500 per month raise as extra cash, while calling the $20,000 you borrowed and spend at the race track "long term debt."

Preferring a government of men, not of laws.

Jennifer Granholm speaks to the NYT on the president's drone strike policies:

“We trust the president,” former Gov. Jennifer Granholm of Michigan said on Current TV. “And if this was Bush, I think that we would all be more up in arms because we wouldn’t trust that he would strike in a very targeted way and try to minimize damage rather than contain collateral damage.”

Right. Jennifer sees due process as a presidential whim, not as a legal principle. The 5th Amendment is optional.

It's saying a lot, but I've never been more ashamed of her.

Duh

A Washington Post editorial today begins with the sentence, "ONE UNSETTLING result of the debate over gun violence has been a spike in firearm purchases."

Actually: One predictable result of government threats to force gun owners to buy special liability insurance, place confiscatory taxes on ammunition, ban firearms because of their appearance and limit the sale of normal capacity magazines has been more citizens exercising their 2nd Amendment rights.

There, fixed that for you, WaPo.

Detroit Charter Schools 47, Detroit Public Schools 0

A Stanford University study suggests attending Charter Schools in Detroit results in significantly better educational achievement than attending government schools. Stanford University study finds charter pupils gain an extra three months of learning

Detroit school children are learning at a rate of an extra three months in school a year when in charter public schools compared to similar counterparts in conventional Detroit Public Schools, according to the findings of a Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO) study done by Stanford University on students in the Detroit area.

It isn't perfect, of course,

"While on average the Detroit charter students have higher learning gains than their traditional school counterparts, when we look at the school results, only about half of the Detroit charter schools perform significantly better than their local alternative," said Dev Davis, research manager for CREDO at Stanford University.

It isn't certain what a comparison of the Bell curves for non-Charter vs Charter schools' performance in Detroit would be from that statement, but here is a crude example which I think satisfies all the criteria Ms Davis specifies. Blue is the Detroit Public School System, green is the Detriot Charter schools.

Which curve would you prefer for your child?

Ms Davis seems to be soft pedaling the Charter story, at least for the Detroit study. I find it interesting that she does not mention a number important to this study; How many Charters are doing worse? CREDO generally does look at that:

A Credo study in 2009 of charter schools in 16 American states found almost half of the schools were no better than public schools; 17 per cent performed significantly better, while 37 per cent performed worse.

In fact, the CREDO report states that 47% of Charter schools in Detroit perform "better than their market," and "Slightly more than half of Detroit charter schools were not significantly different from their market." So none are performing worse than government schools.

That's not the end of Charter advantages, though. I am fairly certain that no weight was given to the reduction in anti-capitalist, blame America first propaganda to which students are exposed. And, while I'll agree that some Charters probably surpass even government schools in such polemics, at least the parents are choosing the slant they want. I would also contend that the improved educational outcomes are positively correlated with less time spent on social justice indoctrination and more on math and reading.

Women now safe on Super Bowl Sunday

Early each year, I experience heightened sensitivity to feminist foibles. The month of January brings the anniversary of the Big Lie that Super Bowl Sunday is the annual high-water mark for the beating of American women by their husbands and boyfriends. On Super Bowl Sunday testosterone-besotted men celebrate the violence of professional football by assaulting females. Feminists find this oppression of women to be self-evident. This is necessary for their argument, because there is no actual evidence for it now, nor was there in 1993 when they kicked it off.

The Super Bowl Hoax was initially perpetrated on January 28, 1993. The perps were FAIR, an organization allegedly dedicated to "Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting,” along with several women's groups. They called a press conference in Pasadena, California, promoting an unexceptional 30-second Super Bowl public service announcement opposing domestic violence.

Did I mention the PSA wasn't hyperbolic? So, during the press conference it became necessary for FAIR associate Linda Mitchell to go over the top. "Many women's shelters report as much as a 40 percent increase in calls for help on Super Bowl Sunday," she said. The press ran with it - AP Wire 1/28/93. No reporter even said, "Name one."

To be sure, this whopper wasn't entirely Ms Mitchell's invention, FAIR had previously mailed to its activists a letter stating, "women's shelters report a 40 percent increase in calls for help during Super Bowl Sunday" (American Journalism Review, 5/93).

The principal study cited to support this claim was conducted by Virginia’s Old Dominion University in 1988-89. This study was claimed to have found a 40 percent increase in beatings and hospital admissions after games won by the Redskins.

But Ken Ringle of the Washington Post was skeptical. He took the time to check the sources. He spoke with one of the principal authors of the Old Dominion study, Janet Katz. She said: “That’s not what we found at all.” Instead, she told Ringle, they had found that an increase in emergency room admissions “was not associated with the occurrence of football games in general.”

Ringle followed up on other “studies” referenced and found that none supported (or that they did not exist) the claims of increased violence against women on Super Bowl Sunday. His story was published on the front page of the Washington Post on January 31st.

Steve Rendall, FAIR's "Senior Analyst," was asked by a reporter from the Boston Globe about the 40 percent claim. Rendall admitted, "It should not have gone out in FAIR materials." (Boston Globe 2/2/93) Where did FAIR get the figure? According to Rendall, it came from a book of photo essays called "Living with the Enemy." So much for "accuracy” and “fairness” in reporting.

In the ensuing 20 years no one has established a link between the Super Bowl and violence against women. And now US News & World Report tells us that the idea of a huge spike in wife beating on Super Bowl Sunday is known to be an “urban myth.”

"Urban myths rarely have a useful purpose other than to confound, outrage, and frighten people into passing them along. But there's a silver lining to this one—the idea that Super Bowl Sunday is linked to the highest incidences of domestic abuse in the country.

While experts in the field dismiss that theory, they value the increased attention paid to domestic violence on the occasion.

"The Super Bowl does not cause domestic violence, and it doesn't increase domestic violence, but it does increase the public's awareness of the issue, which will help victims learn about help and resources," says Cindy Southworth, vice president of development and innovation at the National Network to End Domestic Violence."

Nice. It takes 20 years for a propagandist lie to comfortably transform into something akin to a story about alligators in the New York City sewer system. It's all good because it keeps the curious from wandering around the sewers, or wondering if we really need a Violence Against Women Act. No alligators were harmed in the making of either myth, but a misandrist agenda was advanced by one of them.

They're defending 20 years of cultural poisoning, of course, but it is amazing they're even finally admitting the lie. US News & World Report just matter-of-factly announces that feminists have been lying about domestic violence for decades. Their conclusion, apparently, “What difference does it make?”

It's OK because the ends justify the means.  The gratuitous male bashing, the whining about VAWA; It's all good. Not to have lied would have been the evil.

I have news: Lying in support of your moral superiority damages your moral status.

The Super Bowl Hoax is not an urban legend with benign consequences. It's a lie that has damaged our culture, our polity, feminism's credibility and, most egregiously, the actual victims of domestic violence for 364 days out of 365.

Firearm Appreciation Day

A good day to join

...or extend your membership.

Defending your civil rights since 1871.

#PureHooligan: At the Capitol today

Michigan altercations provoke our indignation, elevate our blood pressure, dismay us and inspire us to avoid large gatherings of union thugs. Michigan's union halls, large manufactories, public schools, government departments and more are stuffed with people yearning to be free. But felonious assault, is... Pure Hooligan.

A Michigan Union man discusses right-to-work with Steven Crowder

The Teamsters, UAW and SEIU play the Irish Republican Army to MEA's Sinn Féin.

That guy's face is on camera, and the union logo on his jacket is easily identifiable. The authorities response will be of interest.

Four more years

The president's insistence on taxing "the rich" is populist tripe, because he presents an argument that a relatively tiny amount of taxation revenue will make a serious contribution toward solving our deficit and indebtedness problems, while he simultaneously promotes more government spending.

His ideological refusal to stop incurring debt makes a mockery of his argument for any tax increase whatsoever: He's just going to spend it. His plan appeals to the economically ignorant; from Nobel Prize winning "economists" such as Paul Krugman, through welfare scammers, to the truly destitute - for many of whom Barack Obama already bears personal responsibility.

His ideology is cynical, cruel, elitist and dangerous.

Let us look at just two results of the enervating Federal Government spending he promotes:

[T]he amount spent on federal welfare programs last year was enough to mail a $60,000 check to every one of the 17 million households living beneath the poverty line. And that doesn’t include spending by state and local governments.

If a single Federal agency just wrote checks to those who merely express need, we'd use the money more efficiently. Maybe we'd even see an eventual revival of shame, for those who lied about their need. They're currently brazen enough to brag about it. Even though we couldn't completely trust all the claimants, I'll bet half of them wouldn't need assistance by 2014.

We have entrenched bureaucracies who resist the idea that individuals under their care can ever become self sufficient. It isn't about their clients, it's about their own salaries. Not their fault. We created the system rules.

And here's a simple, clear example of what government spending does to the market: Editorial: Federal flood insurance subsidizes risks

...Get appraisals for their homes, write them a check, knock the homes down and just let it go back to its natural state," said Steven Sweeney, a Democrat and president of the New Jersey Senate.

Good luck with that. A huge federal apparatus and powerful special interests are intent on doing just the opposite. The best illustration of this misguided policy is the National Flood Insurance Program, created in 1968 to provide insurance to homeowners on coasts and near rivers who had trouble getting private coverage.

It's why people are still willing to build houses in high risk locations. They get a discount on disaster.

We will not be seen to have been doing these people any favors when we can no longer supply the welfare, or market distorting subsidies. Stein's law applies: "That which cannot continue will stop." A catastrophic stop, the kind our leaders are arranging, will damage the poor most. We will eventually run out of the money we are stealing from our great-grandchildren.

All this brings me to a point about morality. It isn't simply immoral for government to lie to people about the economy, it is evil.

Governments aren't just inefficient at spending, they lie about it. Fiat currency is just governments' way of lying about the value of money and imposing the hidden tax of inflation on every citizen. That hurts the poor most, too.

We've seen this movie several times before. It never ends well.

A sad and fearful day

Yesterday, Barack Obama received 9.1 million fewer votes than he did in 2008.

Yesterday, Mitt Romney received 2.4 million fewer votes than John McCain did in 2008, and lost by 2.8 million votes.

How could this happen? Because sometime in the last four years this nation reached an inflection point. We've forgotten what America stands for. We're fundamentally transformed.

We were offered a choice between "voting for revenge" and voting for "love of country."
We chose revenge.

We were offered a choice between "free" stuff and earned stuff.
We chose "free" stuff.

We were offered a choice between Julia and Horatio Alger.
We chose Julia.

We were offered a choice between a cult of personality and traditional values
We chose the cult.

We were offered a choice between equal outcome and equal opportunity.
We chose outcome.

We were offered a choice between dependency and economic freedom.
We chose dependency.

Worst of all, this was accomplished by the most vicious and petty campaign tactics in living memory. Therein lies an unfortunate lesson, which we will see applied again.

Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and hard.
H. L. Mencken

And get it we will.

#Votefraud. It exists and we need to stop it.

Doesn't anybody remember ACORN?

Three voters disenfranchised at one poll in NC. All three black.
One man, one vote. Democrat apparatchiks don't believe in that. "Those people" might not have voted correctly.

Voters in Philadelphia forced to vote next to giant Obama mural; Update: Not fully covered despite court order
You don't cover religious icons. It's like contraception... or something.

Obama Poster Hanging in Florida Polling Station
Not a chad, anyway.

Election Judge Wears Obama Cap While Checking in Voters in Obama's Chicago Ward
A Chicago high school graduate, he thought it said "Cubs."

Intimidation in Detroit: Report of GOP vote observer chased by man claiming to have gun, Obama supporter punches woman in face
I know! We'll pay for the bridge if Canada agrees to merge Windsor and Detroit.

New Black Panthers Back at the Same ’08 Polling Place in Philadelphia
Thanks to encouragement from Eric Holder.

Philly GOP: Poll inspectors being ousted for Dems
On orders from the DOJ, no doubt.

GOP senators: Thousands of ballots unlikely to reach military voters in time
Yep, stood down and left behind.

When cheating goes on in such blatant and petty ways, it means people have no fear of the law, much less shame. They have no honor. Why, then, do Democrats doubt it goes on in secret?

Probably they don't:
Pat Moran Relied on Civil Rights Lawyers for Voter Fraud
"Moran was the field director of his father’s reelection campaign and worked out of the joint campaign office for President Obama and Democrat Senate candidate Tim Kaine in Virginia."

Indiana Democratic Party Head Resigns as Fraud Probe Heats Up

Obama campaign staffer thinks vote fraud is “funny and cool”

The third world gets it, even if the ACLU doesn't: The head of Libya's national election commission, among them.
"The most often noted difference between American elections among the [foreign] visitors was that in most U.S. states, voters need no identification."

The lack of voter ID is eroding the trust which so amazes those visitors. It will result in chaos.

Finish it

VOTE!

Make sure you vote

In addition to Mr. Obama, there are other notable threats to freedom on the Michigan Ballot.

The most important of these are Proposals 1, 2, 3 and 4, and the composition of Michigan's Supreme Court.

Michigan Ballot Proposals:
Yes on Proposal 1.
NO on Proposal 2.
NO on Proposal 3.
NO on Proposal 4.
Yes on Proposal 5.
? Proposal 6.

If you only remember "Yes on 1. No on the rest," that'll work. In fact, if you can only remember "NO," that'll even work.

Proposals 2, 3 and 4 must be defeated.
More information on these proposals can be found by scrolling down.

Be sure to vote for Supreme Court Justices on the non-partisan ballot!

It is important to keep lawmakers off the Supreme Court, especially since the same self-promoting elites who brought you Proposals 2, 3, and 4 won't be finished when the Proposals are defeated.

Michigan Supreme Court:
Stephen Markman
Colleen O'Brian
Brian Zahra

That's 2 incumbents and O'Brian.

Proposal 1 - Yes! We need an adult in the room.

Proposal 1 can be described as the "adult in the room" proposal. Voting "Yes" keeps a strong Emergency Financial Manager law in place.

Public service unions oppose Proposal 1 on the same basis they push Proposals 2 and 4: Maintaining their advantaged economic position.

Proposal 1 is about changes to an existing Emergency Manager law passed after Rick Snyder was elected governor. The old law did not allow an Emergency Manager to recommend that the state amend a local government’s collective bargaining agreements. That mainly affects pensions and health insurance in insolvent local jurisdictions, like Detroit. The new law must be kept for that provision alone. Pontiac provides an example:

Pontiac is one city where the new law appears to have worked. The EM there is Lou Schimmel, who has served as emergency financial manager for another city under the old law and also served as a court-appointed receiver for one city. Among the necessary changes in Pontiac that were made possible by PA 4 [the new, stronger law]?

* Pontiac contracted out its police force to Oakland County and saved $2 million annually while increasing enforcement personnel in the city;

* Pontiac contracted fire duties to Waterford Township and expects to save more than $3 million a year; and

* The city consolidated 87 city health care plans to one; saving $5 million annually while still offering very generous benefits at a cost of $20,000 per employee.

Any supporter of regional cooperation must logically support a stronger Emergency Manager law.

Employee benefits are a major expense in most local government units. But don't take my word for it, let's visit the problems faced by Lansing Mayor Virg Bernero:

Lansing taxpayers will foot the bill for more than $16 million in fringe benefits – including retirement and health care – for Lansing police officers in the next year, according to budget documents obtained by MLive.com.

That's nearly $3 million more than they'll pay in salaries for officers in the same time frame.

Responsible local governments will never need an Emergency Manager. Corrupt and/or irresponsible local governments have demonstrated they desperately need a strong Emergency Manager law: A law that gives them the tools needed to prevent fiscal collapse.

You will recall a "Public Safety" millage was passed in Lansing in 2011; targeted for police, fire and roads. Without it, Lansing residents were told public safety would suffer and policemen and firemen would face layoffs. Turns out most of that money will go for "Pension Safety." Even Virg Bernero gets it:

Out-of-control pension costs are seriously undermining our ability to continue providing essential city services and threaten our ability to keep police officers and firefighters on the job protecting our residents. We must take action sooner rather than later to control these costs or we will be in a very serious predicament very quickly.

...Bernero has said more than two-thirds of the new revenues generated by a voter-approved millage have been dedicated to health care and pension costs.

Without concessions from the unions, the city would have to use all the millage funds to cover the increased retirement and health care costs, and supplement that with money from the city's general fund, the administration said in the release.

The millage is expected to generate about $7.6 million annually.

This issue boils down to whether Lansing keeps a promise on police pensions or is forced to continuously downgrade public safety. In the private sector, this choice is known as bankruptcy vs. reinvention.

I'm not happy when a promise isn't kept, but I understand that if keeping it is not sustainable, everyone will end up with nothing.

Stein's law applies: "Something that can't go on forever will stop." The question is whether it will stop because adult decisions are made, or because it collapses in chaos. Bernero is suggesting an adult decision. The unions, like those in Detroit, prefer their perks to keeping police on the beat. Bernero:

"We can't force changes if we have a contract in place. We have to honor the contract, and I don't want to have to lay off anymore officers."

"We're saying in a time like this, put (funds) into a Police Officer Preservation Fund because our challenges are getting worse from year to year," Bernero added. "I don't want to have lay off anymore officers. If I had one rallying cry it's no more layoffs."

Lansing has been realistic, relatively, in addressing this issue, though battles with the unions continue. Union parasites may prefer keeping the promise alive until their host collapses. I do not.

The current Emergency Manager law should be retained by voting "Yes" on Proposal 1.

#Votefraud

Democrats say voter ID laws are unnecessary, but there seems to be enough #Votefraud for them to have advisors on how to go about it

NO! 2 4

That title is intended to make it easy for you to remember to vote NO! on the two most dangerous proposals on the Michigan ballot. If you do nothing else, remember: NO! 2 4.

You will bring your own opinon about the present day contribution of public-sector unions to this post, and will probably leave with that unchanged. However, the world has changed and the response of the public sector union elite has been unconscionable. They have decided exploitation is fine, as long as it's taxpayers being exploited. That's Proposal 2; To enshrine collective bargaining rights in Michigan's Constitution.

For better or worse it's been decades since the UAW had to strike. The Pinkertons haven't busted a strike, or a head, in nearly a century. Nine year olds haven't been forced to work 7 day-a-week, 18 hour shifts in coal mines since before Dickens' wrote about it. In any case, none of those memes apply to any government workers in this country today. And they never did.

Here's a fact that does apply: It has been 70 years since Big Labor and Big Government denounced the idea of public sector union collective bargaining. Proposal 2 runs counter to the considered opinion of that champion of collective bargaining and creator of the New Deal, President Franklin Roosevelt. On August 16, 1937 he wrote to Mr. Luther C. Steward, President, National Federation of Federal Employees, as follows:

All Government employees should realize that the process of collective bargaining, as usually understood, cannot be transplanted into the public service. It has its distinct and insurmountable limitations when applied to public personnel management. The very nature and purposes of Government make it impossible for administrative officials to represent fully or to bind the employer in mutual discussions with Government employee organizations. The employer is the whole people, who speak by means of laws enacted by their representatives in Congress. Accordingly, administrative officials and employees alike are governed and guided, and in many instances restricted, by laws which establish policies, procedures, or rules in personnel matters.

Even the labor movement considered the idea of public employee collective bargaining an idiotic idea. George Meany, president of the A.F.L.-C.I.O had this to say in 1955: "It is impossible to bargain collectively with the government." He meant that collective bargaining with the government was like two wolves and a sheep debating on the dinner entrée. "Bargaining," as it is commonly understood, involves two parties discussing their differences. It does not mean two parties deciding how a third party should be exploited.

Public sector union collective bargaining has brought us the highest cost for education in the world along with less than mediocre results. Despite the economic conditions in this country, and despite the fact that 40% of Chicago high school graduates are functionally illiterate, the teachers in Chicago just got a 17% increase in pay: As a result of a strike FDR would have considered illegal and immoral.

The consequences of collective bargaining with government are bankrupting Illinois and California due to skyrocketing pension and retiree health insurance costs.

Since 2002, for every $1-an-hour pay increase, public employees have gotten $1.17 in new benefits; private-sector workers, meanwhile, have received just 58 cents in added benefits.

We know the financial impact of Proposal 2 would be huge, but what about changes to existing law? As the MEA has noted, Proposal 2's Amendment to Michigan's Constitution could effectively repeal many laws, unexceptional in the private sector, regarding employment:

The new prohibited bargaining topics created by 2011 PA 103 and included in Section 15(3) of PERA would NO LONGER exist. This law currently prohibits bargaining over the decision or impact concerning the following subjects:
a. The placement of teachers;
b. Personnel decisions for teachers during a reduction in force, recall or hiring after a reduction in force, as set forth in MCL 380.1248;
c. Teacher evaluation systems, including the format, timing or number of classroom observations, as set forth in MCL 380.1249 and in the Teachers’ Tenure Act.
d. Teacher discipline policies, which may NOT include a standard different than the arbitrary and capricious standard; and
e. Performance-based compensation systems for teachers, as set forth in MCL 380.1250
f. Notification to parents and legal guardians that children are being taught by ineffective teachers, as required by MCL 380.1249a.

Wow. And that's just the MEA's early analysis.

There is, in fact, no way to be sure about all the laws which would be retroactively repealed. The audacity of this power grab by the public sector union elite is matched only by its venality.

Proposal 2 would have us place collective bargaining rights in the Michigan Constitution. This is a pre-emptive strike by public sector unions, notably the SEIU and MEA, to prevent right-to-work legislation ever being passed in Michigan.

If Michigan wants to emulate the financial basket cases in Sacramento and Springfield we should put this fiscal time bomb into our Constitution. If we want to roll the dice on what laws the MEA wants repealed we should vote for it. Me? I'd rather we didn't make the whole state into Detroit. A vehement NO!! on Proposal 2.

With Proposal 4, we have yet another example of public sector union greed and corruption. Proposal 4 is an attempt to Constitutionalize Jennifer Granholm's stealth gift of $30 million to the SEIU. The SEIU dearly wants to re-institute the dues Granholm helped it loot from private citizens who had no interest in SEIU "representation."

The SEIU wants to perpetuate a fake union in order to skim dues from government payments to individuals who provide home care for their own relatives. To grab this money, SEIU is willing to reduce the funds available for care by extracting dues from self-employed citizens who don't want to be SEIU members. "They didn't build that," so the SEIU must be paid. This is the best argument for a right to work law we'll see any time soon.

While the MEA is circulating ideas that Proposal 2 would overturn prohibited bargaining topics created by PA 103, such as teacher discipline, Proposal 4 requires background checks on people providing care for their own relatives. Those checks will initially be vetted by SEIU appointees. This amendment is designed to accomplish two things: 1-Restraint of trade in order to 2- fill the coffers of a corrupt and venal union. NO!! on Proposal 4.

Why have medical and education costs risen so much faster than everything else?

Because the government distorts the market.

The Central State directly spends over $1 trillion a year on Medicare and Medicaid, and controls private spending with rules and regulations.

As for college costs: could their incredible expansion have anything to do with the Central State backing $1 trillion in student loans?

Not to mention that student loans cannot be discharged via bankruptcy, a big incentive to lenders. "Safer than houses," so to speak.

I include one chart, but read the whole thing at the link:
The Source of High Inflation: Government Spending

In the case of energy, the cause is the decline in value of the world's reserve currency - a result of printing too much of it.

YES on Proposal 6.

I am unconvinced that we need a new bridge and I am certain that the guarantee Michigan "will never pay anything" can easily be subverted in the future. This bridge agreement is nothing more than an executive decree. I would vote against building the bridge if I had the opportunity, but I have a hard time amending the Constitution for that narrow purpose.

Here are some of the arguments for and against.

A Canadian who doesn't like the agreement (would vote "YES" on Prop 6):
The PM/Governerd Non-Agreement DRIC Agreement
Governerd’s Bill 411: How Michigan Taxpayers Really Pay For DRIC

It is worth asking why Canada is willing to pay for the whole thing. Apparently, it will provide for better long range transport of goods landed at Halifax, Nova Scotia. Those goods would otherwise most likely pass through the Port of New York. Canada has an economic reason to fund, and control, this bridge: Competing with an American port.

The opposition to Proposal 6 seems to be composed mostly of ad hominem attacks and arguments that the agreement absolutely means Michigan will never pay anything.

Unfortunately, while Michigan may not be required to pay, neither is it prevented from finding creative ways to pay. As State Representative Paul Opsommer pointed out in the LSJ today, "[There is n]o ban or limit to the creation of a community benefits program for Detroit and Windsor. During House discussion, Detroit wanted $100 million with no strings attached."

I very much dislike amending the Constitution to require votes on bridges. However, in the course of writing this post, I have changed from a NO to a YES on Proposal 6.

The manner in which Governor Snyder has foisted this deal on Michigan should be challenged, and is the greater of two evils. I'm holding my nose and voting YES on Proposal 6.

The American people are easily misled... err... confused

What Mr. Clinton is saying is that a majority of Americans can't tell the difference between the word "Is" and the word "is." He should know.

It depends, don't you see.

NO on Proposal 3.

Michigan voters are faced with 6 ballot proposals in the November election.
Proposal 1: Referendum on the Emergency Manager Law
Proposal 2: The 'Protect Our Jobs' Amendment
Proposal 3: '25 x 25' Renewable Energy Standard
Proposal 4: The Unionization of Home-Based Caregivers
Proposal 5: The Two-Thirds Majority Tax Limitation
Proposal 6: The International Bridge/Tunnel Voting Requirement

I will have something to say on each of these. I start with Prop 3, because I have serendipitously found some dots related to it. These dots connect themselves.

Germany's wind power chaos should be a warning to the UK

Because renewable energy must by law have priority in supplying the grid, the owners of conventional power stations, finding they have to run plants unprofitably, are so angry that they are threatening to close many of them down. The government response, astonishingly, has been to propose a new law forcing them to continue running their plants at a loss.

No one is allowed to "go Galt" in Germany. A warning to the UK, certainly, and to Michigan: The Projected Economic Impact of Proposal 3 and Michigan’s Renewable Energy Standard

Unfortunately, wind-power fits perfectly with the president's plans for redistributing wealth and ensuring “…Electricity Rates Would Necessarily Skyrocket”.



As it happened, the president couldn't get Cap and Trade passed. Instead, he loosed the dogs of regulation at the EPA.

Without cheap and effective energy storage, wind-power will never fill more than a niche. It may increase greenhouse gases by forcing the real power plants to run at idling speeds. Wind-power dependency will reduce the reliability of the grid.

Proponents must necessarily purport to know precisely the best alternative energy technology 13 years from now. This is spectacularly risible, given the result of their taxpayer funded bets on the ethanol and battery corporatists. A Constitutional amendment to enforce such a fever dream vision is incredibly stupid.

Proposal 3 is a very bad idea. I am voting NO.

Diplomatic note to the shores of Tripoli:

While the United States of America thoroughly condemns images that offend your exquisite religious sensitivities, it is our official position that use of RPGs at film festivals is overzealous. We have therefore withdrawn our Ambassador.

Notwithstanding that sanction, and as a show of good faith, we have given a "two thumbs down" rating to the perpetrator of the most recent offense against The Prophet Mohammed. See attached photograph. The United States therefore expects all film related festivities in the Middle East and Africa to cease being hosted on US soil.

To further encourage a return to normal relations, the President of the United States will issue an executive order banning showings of the movie "Zero Dark Thirty." As you may know, this film documents the death of Osama bin-Laden. The rumor that President Obama's Administration directly co-operated in the making of that film must be stopped.

Below you will find reporting indicating that the American people fully support our initiatives.

Yours Truly,
Hillary Rodham Clinton
Secretary of Statism

Alleged 'Innocence of Muslims' filmmaker taken in for interview

Pay No Attention to the Burning Flags, Stormed Consulates, and Dead Americans . . .
By Victor Davis Hanson

Raging crowds and Islamic wrath could not possibly be connected to the enlightened Obama administration or, more generally to a U.S. that has been “reset” on his watch — given the three years of laborious Muslim outreach and the long-ago departure of George Bush. So we are to think away all those burning flags, stormed consulates, and dead Americans, and instead remember that the violence “is a response,” a sort of cry of the heart against a couple of America-residing video makers — and has nothing much to do with any anger at well-meaning Americans per se.

The Unofficial Campaign’s Latest Disinformation Offensive
Paul A. Rahe

The American people cannot be allowed to discover that Barack Obama’s policy of appeasement has persuaded our enemies that we are weak and feckless and has elicited aggression on their part. Nor can they be allowed to learn that Hillary Clinton and our minions have been grossly negligent with regard to the security of our embassies, consulates, and other installations in the larger Muslim world. Instead, we must ignore the spirit of the First Amendment and vent our wrath on an inept Coptic Christian immigrant from Egypt.

Hard to believe

...it's been 11 years.

Illegal immigrants being pwnd, Democrats committing vote fraud, Useful idiots calling for confiscation of all profits, Union bosses lying about their employers, God is dead to Democrats, Women defined as vaginas

Just a day at the Democrat's convention.

Young face put on illegal immigration at DNC
“I’ve had to live almost my entire life knowing I could be deported just because of the way I came here.” And "how you came here," that would be… illegally? Same with how you stay here?

Just whose votes does Obama expect to gain by suing Arizona, or issuing that executive "no deportation" order? A possible answer:
State Rep. Hudson Hallum, 3 Others Plead Guilty to Election Fraud

Democrats loudly proclaim there's no such thing as vote fraud, and call Republicans racists for mentioning it. But, is there any reason to believe arranging for illegal immigrants to vote would have caused Hudson Hallum the slightest pang of conscience? Is there any reason to believe the president's executive order was not crassly political in its timing? He could have done it over 3 years ago if he thought it about justice or compassion.

DNC delegates: Let’s ban corporate profits!
And these are people supposedly knowledgeable about politics and business? They are selecting THEIR candidate for the most (as yet) important job in the world.

Steelworker Featured at DNC Didn’t Work for Bain
They've got commercials where Democrat operatives claim to have converted from the GOP, why not someone who prevaricates about where he worked?

On the removal of "God," and "Jerusalem" from the platform. First, the floor vote was obviously a fraud. Second, the President either knew about it and agrees, or didn't know about it and is incompetent. On his record, I lean toward believing the former - his acolytes made it clear they (also) don't like people "clinging to religion," or calling Jerusalem the capital of Israel. As if it was their decision rather than Israel's.

Then, there's the nearly incoherent speech by Sandra Fluke. Ms Fluke became famous because Rush Limbaugh used the word 'slut' to describe her demand that you pay for her birth control pills. Slut is imprecise, because it leaves out the Federal pimp. I'd say 'cheap whore to big government.' Cheap, because the contraceptives she wants your Uncle Sam on the hook for cost 4 bucks a month. Whore, because it's not about wanting to have sex, it's about making someone else pay for it.

DNC delegates: Let’s ban corporate profits!
And these are people supposedly knowledgable about politics and economics? They want to say Obama's" "You didn't build that," is taken out of context? They ARE the context.

Steelworker Featured at DNC Didn’t Work for Bain
They've got commercials where Democrat operatives claim to have converted from the GOP, why not someone who prevaricates about where he worked?

The Democrats think these ideas are good ones for their brand. Consider that while (if) you're watching the soaring rhetorician accept his annointment tonight.

Ironic?

Add obeisance to Barack Obama to its historical tendencies, and one expects the New York Times means this article to show that Obama works extremely hard to become super-competent at anything he does.

What is actually demonstrated is that Barack Obama is an egomaniacal poseur with a perhaps significant ADHD component. As a bonus, the contrast between his supposed super-competency and his actual job performance lurks, smiling like the Cheshire cat, between each and every line of the story. Either the author and editors have a most sublime sense of irony, or they are utterly ignorant that the word "irony" exists. There is no middle ground. The story is brimming with lines that a vehement Obama supporter should see as outrageous criticism. Much as I hate to send any traffic to the NYT, it is well worth reading the whole thing for laughs. Or what would be laughs if this guy was not President.

An example - possibly the least - "If he [Obama] picks up something new, at first he’s not good, but he’ll work until he gets better." Apparently, this is considered remarkable in elite Democrat circles, and deemed quotable by the NYT.

And - "So perhaps it is not surprising that he [Obama] cites not just his record, but also every other accomplishment he can think of." Cite his record? He hasn't mentioned Obamacare or Libya since 100 rounds of golf ago. No wonder he hypes his ability to deliver “the best rendition ever” of “Green Eggs and Ham...” No word on whether he used a teleprompter for that.

Overconfident past the point of arrogance. Disdainful of his opponent. Just how we want him to enter the debates - thinking the chair he's sitting in isn't actually devoid of occupancy.

P.S. As I reread the first two paragraphs, I'm thinking maybe the NYT does understand irony. This is a remarkably snarky introduction:

As Election Day approaches, President Obama is sharing a few important things about himself. He has mentioned more than once in recent weeks that he cooks “a really mean chili.” He has impressive musical pitch, he told an Iowa audience. He is “a surprisingly good pool player,” he informed an interviewer — not to mention (though he does) a doodler of unusual skill.

All in all, he joked at a recent New York fund-raiser with several famous basketball players in attendance, “it is very rare that I come to an event where I’m like the fifth or sixth most interesting person.”

If he's lost the New York Times, he's lost the east coast condescending leftist elite, and maybe some of their toadies in fly-over country.

National #EmptyChairDay