April 18, 2010

Sunday inspiration

I needed a pick-me-up today, and nothing does better than this video. This is from Pope Benedict XVI’s first visit to the United States, and the US Army Chorus performed the Battle Hymn of the Republic. When I first heard it, it brought me to tears. Even now, two years later, it still gives me goosebumps… particularly this line:

In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea
With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me
As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free
While God is marching on

The entire song is beautiful, and that section in particular awe-inspiring, but the strength of their conviction as they sing that one line always gets to me. It’s powerful and beautiful and inspirational. It reminds me of just why our men and women in the military are such heroes. Think about that line again.

As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free

Our Marines, soldiers, sailors and airmen join the military willing to make that sacrifice. They join, willing to sacrifice their lives, to protect our freedoms and to bring freedom to others. We should never forget that.

So, enjoy this video and hopefully, you’ll be as inspired by it as I always am, every time I hear the beauty of this performance.

Cross-posted from Cassy’s blog. Stop by for more original commentary, or follow her on Twitter!

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» Filed Under Christianity, Heroes, News, Patriotism, Video, military

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Fish Wrap: Say, Those Insurance Fixes Don’t Work Too Well In New York

Apparently, the Times is interested in dropping a few bombshells this weekend. First you have the “Gates Says U.S. Lacks Strategy to Curb Iran’s Nuclear Drive,” which others have covered, and then there is this, which basically says that the provisions of ObamaCare are doomed to failure

When her small executive search firm in New York City canceled its health insurance policy last year because of the recession and rising premiums, April Welles was able to buy her own plan and still be covered for her cancer and multiple sclerosis.

She was lucky to live in New York, one of the first states to require insurance companies to offer comprehensive coverage to all people regardless of pre-existing conditions. But Ms. Welles, 58, also pays dearly: Her premium is $17,876 a year.

“That’s a lot of groceries,” she said.

New York’s insurance system has been a working laboratory for the core provision of the new federal health care law — insurance even for those who are already sick and facing huge medical bills — and an expensive lesson in unplanned consequences. Premiums for individual and small group policies have risen so high that state officials and patients’ advocates say that New York’s extensive insurance safety net for people like Ms. Welles is falling apart.

Unplanned consequences. The entire craptastic piece of legislation is a lesson in unplanned consequences. Heck, even the parts that are planned, namely, those that force or incentive people and companies to dump their insurance and purchase through the exchange, are having consequences, such as companies like AT&T, Verizon, and Caterpillar reporting non-cash hits. You can bet your bottom dollar – which Uncle Barack will be soon taking – that there will be plenty more “un-planned consequences.”

The problem stems in part from the state’s high medical costs and in part from its stringent requirements for insurance companies in the individual and small group market. In 1993, motivated by stories of suffering AIDS patients, the state became one of the first to require insurers to extend individual or small group coverage to anyone with pre-existing illnesses.

New York also became one of the few states that require insurers within each region of the state to charge the same rates for the same benefits, regardless of whether people are old or young, male or female, smokers or nonsmokers, high risk or low risk.

Healthy people, in effect, began to subsidize people who needed more health care. The healthier customers soon discovered that the high premiums were not worth it and dropped out of the plans. The pool of insured people shrank to the point where many of them had high health care needs. Without healthier people to spread the risk, their premiums skyrocketed, a phenomenon known in the trade as the “adverse selection death spiral.”

Hey, I wonder what would happen if New York allowed insurers to charge according to risk, stopped requiring insurers to cover every type of medical condition for every person. They could, say, not require Hysterectomy coverage for 18 year old men. Just imagine if there were nationwide pools for small businesses and individuals. I wonder if anyone has made any of those suggestions, among others?

“You have a mandate that’s accessible in theory, but not in practice, because it’s too expensive,” said Mark P. Scherzer, a consumer lawyer and counsel to New Yorkers for Accessible Health Coverage, an advocacy group. “What you get left clinging to the life raft is the population that tends to have pretty high health needs.”

And there in lies the problem with liberal policies: they are long on theory, but, rarely actually work. The Left is more interested in good intentions. Positive results? Not so much. Witness their 40+ year “War on Poverty,” which has been a miserable failure. New York has the highest premiums in the country. With ObamaCare, they will soon have the other 57 states, er, 49, join them.

Crossed at Pirate’s Cove. Follow me on Twitter @WilliamTeach

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April 17, 2010

Sam Adams, Andrew Breitbart, and Me: The Third Annual Sammies Awards, a Report

-By Warner Todd Huston

The Sam Adams Alliance, a free-market think tank that specializes in encouraging new media, held its third annual Sammies awards in beautiful downtown Chicago last Friday, April 16. This year the event hosted a visit by the Wall Street Journal’s John Fund and featured a keynote address by media maven Andrew Breitbart. And somewhere in the back of the room was little old me, your humble correspondent, there to report on the events of the night.

The Sammies are given to outstanding bloggers, community activists and purveyors of traditional American freedoms all of whom come from humble beginnings. Whether a frustrated mom, a put-upon property owner, or a school teacher that started a blog that ended up holding governments to account, the Sammies awards are intended to encourage citizen journalism, citizen activism, and organizing to affect our governments.

The Chicago Cultural Center, formerly the Public Library

This year’s event was held in the Chicago Cultural Center, formerly the building that housed the Chicago Public Library. The diner was beautifully laid out right under the famous stained glass dome created for the building by Tiffany’s of New York in 1897. We gathered beneath this great glass dome that is the spectacular feature of the Preston Bradley Hall of the Cultural Center.
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NASA Employees not Allowed to Obama’s NASA Speech

Most likely because they would all boo and hiss at him, and perhaps yell out “you lie”! That’s what the speech was. A lie. He promises to create jobs when he is actually destroying thousands of jobs. My father-in-law is one of them. Only a few years from retirement working on the external fuel tank, he will soon be unemployed. Thousands of new jobs? B.S. These jobs are imaginary ones. So, no wonder he didn’t want to give this speech to their faces.

BARBREE: …I’m a little disturbed right now, Alex. I just found out some very disturbing news. The President came down here in his campaign and told these 15,000 workers here at the Space Center that if they would vote for him, that he would protect their jobs. 9,000 of them are about to lose their job. He is speaking before 200, extra hundred people here today only. It’s invitation only. He has not invited a single space worker from this space port to attend. It’s only academics and other high officials from outside of the country. Not one of them is invited to hear the President of the United States, on their own space port, speak today. Back to you Alex.

WITT: Alright Jay I can understand why that would certainly get you a bit upset. I will say, on behalf of the Obama administration, they contend that 2500 new jobs will be created, even more, they say, than the 2012 Constellation would have created, that program. So I know all this remains to be seen, but understandably we get why you’re upset, right now. Along with many others down there. Let’s see if the President clears that up later today. Jay thanks so much.

Obama has no shame.

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» Filed Under Bald-face lies, Barack Obama, Democrats, Economy, Government malfeasance/misfeasance, News, President, Science/pseudo-science, Socialism, Unemployment, Video, liberalism

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Jessica Valenti: College is totally worth killing babies over

Wednesday, Lori Ziganto (one of my favorite bloggers) wrote a brilliant piece in response to an article Jessica Valenti wrote on Feministing. Another Feministing author, Lori, had heard about the ad campaign called “Abortion Changes You” last month that was putting ads on the New York subway.

Here is what the ad looks like:

Considering feminists cannot abide anything that might paint abortion in a negative light, this made Lori VERY angry. She explained that somehow, this ignores the experiences and reactions women have had with and from abortion.

I’m all for validating and honoring the experience of women who have had an abortion. But there are already TONS of really great support systems for women who have had abortions that are equipped to address a RANGE of post-abortion emotions and outcomes- glee, relief, guilt, sadness, loss, pride, no reaction at all, or a million other possibilities. When an ad campaign chooses to ignore these very real experiences of women who have had abortions, you have to assume that they have an agenda other than helping real women.

Perhaps Lori was blinded by her “ZOMG SOMEONE IS ATTACKING ABORTION YEAAAAARRRGHHHHH!” rage, but the whole point of this ad campaign is to point out how abortion can affect a woman. I know — all things negative relating to abortion must be kept super-secret. But here in the real world, when it comes to medical procedures, most normal women like to know exactly what will be done to them and what the possible risks and repercussions could be. Normal women, even pro-abortion women, don’t see abortion as something to be taken lightly. They don’t look at it the way radical feminists do. Impossible for feminists to understand, I know.

Well, this week, Jessica found out that someone had committed vandalism and defaced the ad. Of course, this just made her day.

Here is what it looked like after it was defaced:

Jessica’s response was to call the vandal a “pro-choice hero” and “Love. It.”

And this is where Lori got involved. She wrote a great post about the whole controversy.

A very mild ad, indeed. And an accurate one; abortion does change you. While feminists sneer at the idea of post-abortion syndrome, it does exist. And if they actually cared about women, they’d admit that fact and would stop encouraging women to have abortions without disclosing the trauma that can occur to the woman.

It’s clear that they don’t care about the dead babies, but they also need to stop insisting that they are For Women ™ , when they most obviously are not. You see, feminists, an unborn baby is not just a clump of cells. Many women who abort their babies, therefore, suffer intense pain and immense guilt. Their entire lives.

They may just be nutty wing nuts to you, but they are real people with true feelings. Because you do nothing but sneer at those feelings, in fact lie about their very existence, your For The Women card is hereby pulled. You are more concerned with one Supreme Court case, that you constantly use as a wedge and a pawn, than you are with actual women.

Jessica has now responded by attacking Lori Ziganto. And while I’m sure she and her fellow feminist zombies thought their responses were just so super intelligent and better than Lori’s post, all they really did was prove Lori’s point.

Going to college is a matter of “convenience”? Really? Women want higher education for “co-ed fun”?

I always wondered what anti-choicers meant when they said women get abortions “for convenience.” Did they think that women were procuring lunchtime abortions so they could go out and booze it up that night? That women didn’t feel like gaining weight and that ending the pregnancy would be so much easier? I figured that they had this bizarre fictitious woman in their minds and that they didn’t recognize the complex, personal, and often selfless reasons women decide to get abortions. But I was wrong.

It isn’t that anti-choicers don’t understand why women get abortions – it’s that they care so little about women’s lives that any reason given to obtain an abortion is seen as “convenient.”

Some things that are convenient: Providing for your existing children. Going to college. Having enough money to eat, pay rent, keep the electricity on. Not dying.

So yeah, I guess I would “rejoice” over women obtaining abortions when it’s convenient. (The inaccessibility of abortion for too many women makes actual rejoicing impossible.) Whether it’s for health, financial, and educational reasons – or simply not wanting to have a child yet – it would absolutely thrill me if women’s life decisions were respected, accepted and supported. But instead, we live in a world where a woman’s desire for something as basic as education is mocked as selfish. And we’re the ones who are “anti-woman”? I think not.

Reproductive health and justice is one of my strongest passions (I work with Planned Parenthood). When people try to block abortion access, I start crying and it’s hard for me to stop. I am still shocked at the huge disregard anti-choicers have for womens lives. They really do have no regard for human life, because, guess what? women are human. This: “Some things that are convenient: Providing for your existing children. Going to college. Having enough money to eat, pay rent, keep the electricity on. Not dying.” made me tear up. And honestly, if I were to become pregnant right now, I would get an abortion because I need to finish college and have enough money to eat, pay rent, and keep the electricity on. I am also bipolar, and I would have to stop taking my medication if I were to have a baby, which would be downright dangerous. Thanks for the post, Jessica.

But the point is that 4 years of college means a completely different life than a life w/o 4 years of college and anyone who doesn’t recognize that is either living in a dreamworld or is being deliberately obtuse. There is nothing “everyday” about going to college – it’s an incredible privilege that changes people’s lives.

And here we go, with feminists making women perpetual victims yet again, rather than empowering them. Jessica and her fellow zombies cannot seem to wrap their minds around the idea of a woman having a child and going to college at the same time. I know, I know — insanity, right? But somehow, my mother was able to work full-time, raise two children, have a loving marriage, and get her college degree. Somehow, several of my friends are raising children and getting their degrees. Where are the feminists encouraging women to do both? Heck, they don’t even have to raise the baby. There’s always adoption, the option that you’ll never hear someone like Jessica Valenti champion. If the college-aged girl wasn’t ready for a kid, all she’d have to do was carry the baby for nine months while she went to school and then she could help a couple who can’t have children make a family. But if a girl gets pregnant and it’s “inconvenient”, all feminists like Jessica Valenti can do is scream at the girl to HAVE AN ABORTION! HAVE AN ABORTION! Sometimes, you don’t get pregnant at a convenient time. I get that. It doesn’t mean that you have to choose between going to college or having a baby. But that’s the only option given to women if they listen to feminists. They have to choose either college or their child, because presumably, having a child at an inconvenient time would be the WORST THING EVER!!!

Look, I know all about not wanting to have a baby at a certain time. I’m engaged, but my fiance is a Marine with an upcoming deployment. If I got pregnant now, the baby would be born while Matt was in Afghanistan. I do not want to go through a pregnancy by myself, and I do not want Matt to miss the birth of his first child. I don’t want him to come home to the son or daughter he’s never met. We also don’t have a lot of money to be raising a child right now. A baby just is not in our plans at the moment.

But it could happen. And if it did, you can bet your a** that abortion would never be an option for us. We would find a way to make it work. Why do feminists never present that as a viable option for women?

It’s like they practically salivate over the thought of another woman getting an abortion. I don’t know why, but it’s sickening how much feminists try to actively convince women to have abortions. And of course, never mentioned is the option of not getting pregnant if you absolutely cannot handle a baby at the moment. There’s birth control, and if you can’t afford that, the solution is simple: don’t have sex. But of course, telling a feminist that women shouldn’t have sex if they aren’t ready for a baby might make their head explode. I mean, really, dare you tell women that they should keep their legs shut if they aren’t ready to get pregnant?! Believe it or not, there is an element of personal responsibility at play here. The whole feminist philosophy is disgusting. They tell women to sleep around like men do. When women then get unintentionally pregnant (usually while unmarried), they tell the women to just kill the damn burden growing inside of you and throw it out like refuse. And NO, don’t you dare do any research about abortion, what your baby looks like, or the effect having an abortion can have on you. Just kill the damn thing and get back to your Womyn’s Studies classes because college is the MOST. IMPORTANT. THING. EVER! And no, you cannot do both, you must choose between being a pregnant, barefoot housewife in a kitchen or being a smart, single, feminist womyn with a degree in Gender Studies. If you have the baby you are contributing to the partiarchy! And you will be a victim! Do what we say! Don’t think for yourself!

It’s sickening, truly sickening.

All of this just goes to show how far feminism has fallen. Feminists were once made up of smart, strong women (who, incidentally, despised abortion and rightfully saw it as evil) who were fighting for real gender equality — the right to vote, to get an education.

Now, feminists crusade for abortion. It’s their number one cause. And they don’t even want women to be informed. They don’t want women seeing ultrasounds first because they know it’ll influence them to have the baby. They don’t want women learning that abortion can have devastating physical and emotional repercussions. They don’t want abortion to be “safe, legal, and rare”. Lori’s post showcased another example of a feminist accidentally exposing that trust, and it pissed Jessica Valenti off. Feminists don’t want women to be able to choose what’s best for them; they want women choosing abortion. I can only assume it’s because if women stop choosing abortion, then feminists will lose their last grip on relevance in today’s society. Getting the truth out about abortion and its possible effects, as the “Abortion Changes You” campaign does, terrifies and angers feminists.

It’s pathetic and disgusting, that someone would actually encourage abortion — the murder of the unborn — solely to help maintain their own grip on power and relevance in the world. Anything that harms the pro-abortion movement really is just harming modern feminism. And this ad is just another crack in the feminist “we help womyn” facade.

Cross-posted from Cassy’s blog. Stop by for more original commentary, or follow her on Twitter!

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» Filed Under Abortion, Culture of Death, Moral Relativism, News, Planned Parenthood, feminism, liberalism

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Teachers forcing boys to cross-dress is wrong, even if they’re wearing jeans

Over the past week, there has been a big controversy regarding a grade school in Maple Shade School District in Burlington County, New Jersey. A teacher recently sent home a letter to parents telling them that there was going to be a fashion show in which the history of women’s clothes could be modeled. All students were required to participate by dressing up in women’s clothes, even the boys. Some parents were, of course, upset and complained. This caught the eye of Warner Todd Huston, who wrote about it on Monday.

The cross-dressing day is to take place April 16 to coincide with the gay activist’s school event called “Day of Silence,” a nation-wide effort ostensibly meant as an anti-bullying program. However, the real purpose of the event is an effort to spread the homosexual agenda in our schools. Singer Lance Bass, who “came out” not long ago, is featured in one of the videos sent to schools to get kids interested in the event and several prominent gay groups are pushing the idea. The Day of Silence event was created by a gay advocacy group named GLSEN (the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network).

According to one parent on FaceBook, the district has been indulging a politically correct agenda for quite a while. In order to excise Christian references in the school, they’ve renamed St. Patrick’s day to “Leprechaun Day,” renamed Christmas to the “Winter Holiday,” and renamed Good Friday to “Spring Day.”

Parent Janine Patterson Giandomenico asks some salient questions.

How is dressing like a woman from any era going to teach him about history? Why not let him do a report, poster, or other project on this subject? If he was attending a vocational school in the field of textiles, women’s fashion, etc, then it would make sense. My son is adamantly opposed, and I don’t see how forcing my 9-year-old to cross-dress in front of the entire school body is going to teach him anything about Women’s History.

This is a pretty outrageous school event. Forcing grade school boys to dress up as women makes no sense whatever. Pushing the gay agenda while feminizing our young boys through a cross-dressing day? This isn’t your parent’s grade school celebration, for sure.

The school responded to the negative publicity and cancelled the event. The AP then wrote an article scolding Huston and defending the school.

Apparently, because the boys could wear jeans or pants, it’s really not that big a deal. Get it, homophobes? And so technically, they didn’t even have to dress as a woman, either!

The school even issued a letter “explaining” the whole thing. You can see the images here. I’ve left in the grammatical errors.

April 12, 2010

Dear Maude Wilkins Families,

March is National Women’s history month. The Advisory Council on Women in Burlington County sponsors a contest where Maple Shade schools have been the recipient of many awards. Maude Wilkins’ classes have studied the role of women in society over the decades and how their dress has changed with each role. The culminating activity for these lessons was to hold a fashion show to display the different eras of clothing. The fashion show was to be videotaped to submit our project for the awards.

I wanted to clear up any misconceptions about the clothing show. It was never our intention to have boys dress up as women. There are many different time periods that had women and men dressing in pants, suits, and even sweat suits. Students were just asked to dress as a time period, not a woman. The children were then being asked to identify their time period of dress.

At this time, we are cancelling the fashion show. The culminating activity for this project will ask all students to draw a picture of a person dressed in clothing from a time period of their choice. The time period must be noted on the project. The project will be handed in on Monday, April 19, 2010.

We apologize for any confusion or frustration this might have caused.

Sincerely,
Beth F. Norcia, Principal

This letter may perhaps be the worst CYA letter I’ve ever read. Parents only need refer back to the original letter sent out, which rather clearly stated that boys were supposed to dress up as women. They could wear pants, but they still needed to dress as women.

Dear Parents/Guardians,

Last month our students studied women in history. Every year we end the unit with a school wide activity. This year our culminating event will be a fashion show celebrating how women’s fashions have changed throughout the years. The fashion show will be on Friday, April 16, 2010. Attached is a packet of information describing different types of clothing women wore during different time periods. All students must participate in this activity as it will be an end of the unit assessment.

If your child is a young man, he does not have to wear a dress or a skirt, as there are many time periods where women wore jean pants and trousers. However, each child must be able to express what time period their outfit is from. Most of all, your child should have fun creating their outfit and learning about how women’s clothing has changed!

Sincerely,
Tonya Uibel

So the school’s position is basically that it’s A-OK to have a fashion show modeling women’s clothing because boys could wear jeans or trousers. This raises a lot of questions.

This fashion show was supposed to showcase how women’s clothing has changed over the years. Why have boys participate if they were going to dress as… well, boys? It seems like they’re still supposed to be representing women, even while wearing pants. So what were parents supposed to do then? Send their little boys to school with makeup on them? Jewelry? A Hannah Montana t-shirt and high heels? They might be wearing pants instead of a skirt, but it seems the intent was still for little boys to be cross-dressing. If they wanted boys to wear regular men’s clothing, then how would the fashion show be presenting women’s clothing throughout history? It seems like it would defeat the whole purpose, does it not?

On top of all this, it sounds like the fashion show would determine the grade each student received. So boys not only have to cross-dress, but they’re apparently being graded on how well they do it.

At best, this was a poorly executed school event, planned by thoughtless school officials who apparently couldn’t comprehend the possible controversy of telling parents their boys were required to cross-dress for a school event.

The school district is claiming that only the one parent complained, which is sad in and of itself.

It also quotes one poor little girl who couldn’t wear her can-can costume because of this mean parent who ruined it for everyone.

One third-grader, Elizabeth Heisler, said as school let out Wednesday that none of her classmates had seemed confused about whether boys were supposed to wear dresses. The cancellation of the fashion show means she doesn’t get to wear her red and black “can-can” dress to school on Friday.

The episode confounded her mother, Andrea Heisler.

“I would never think my son was going to come to school in an 1800s dress and petticoat,” she said.

I wouldn’t really trust the opinion of a mother who saw no problem letting her third-grade daughter wear a can-can costume out in public. Just so you know, the can-can was a dance that originated in the late 1800s featuring women lifting up their skirts and kicking their legs in the air, as well as provocative, suggestive body movements. I’m sure you’ve all seen the movie Moulin Rouge. Well, how many of you would want your eight-year-old girls emulating the prostitutes in that movie? Historically, can-can dancers usually were prostitutes, and performing the can-can was like a side act. In fact, it was commonplace for can-can dancers to do the dance without wearing underwear, so when they flashed their skirts… well, you can all imagine what was shown. Not exactly appropriate for an elementary school-aged girl, is it? This little girl’s mother was going to let her daughter basically wear a red and black hooker dress (see examples here). Not exactly the best example to use to bolster the credibility of this fashion show, is it? And again, maybe none of the male students thought they had to wear dresses. But if you’re dressing up like a woman, even in jeans, it’s still crossdressing. And no child should be forced to do that.

Despite the school’s lame attempt to whitewash the scandal, and the AP’s sneering at the controversy, this is wrong. Thank God there was one sane parent there who wouldn’t let her son undergo this warped social experiment. That’s exactly what this was, and it’s what thousands of schools across the country are doing. The feminization of our sons has got to stop. Many parents, though, are sitting here and looking the other way while their children are basically being brainwashed. It’s sickening. It’s the job of the parent to protect their children from this kind of gender engineering.

And yes, this is exactly why homeschooling is becoming so popular.

Cross-posted from Cassy’s blog. Stop by for more original commentary, or follow her on Twitter!

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Arizona ACLU Pitches Hissy Over New Law About Illegals

It’s been a while since we had a good ALCU losing their mule fritters story

Following a vote in the House of Representatives to dramatically expand police powers to stop, question and detain individuals for not having proper identification, the American Civil Liberties Union today condemned the passage of SB 1070.

“From business groups, faith leaders, and privacy advocates to municipal governments, police chiefs and prosecutors, Arizonans from all walks of life came forward to oppose the bill,” said Alessandra Soler Meetze, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Arizona. “We are extremely disappointed that House members chose to ignore the serious concerns they raised in favor of political expediency. History has taught us time after time that it does not pay to trade in our basic liberties for fear mongering. Arizona will unfortunately have to learn that lesson again.”

What liberties are we losing? If you are an American citizen, law or not, you can refuse to show papers. If you are NOT an American citizen, then you are not entitled to those protections. Period.

The bill requires police agencies across the state to investigate the immigration status of every person they come across whom they have “reasonable suspicion” to believe is in the country unlawfully. To avoid arrest, citizens will effectively have to carry “their papers” at all times. It also attempts to make it a state crime to violate the federal laws on registering with the Department of Homeland Security and carrying registration documents, curtails the free speech rights of day laborers, and encourages unchecked information sharing between government agencies. The bill will likely be transmitted to the Governor in the coming week after a vote on the Senate floor to reconcile the House version with a prior version that passed out of the Senate in February.

Why don’t they just come out and say they want unchecked illegal immigration?

“Instead of working on real solutions to the immigration crisis, our legislators have devised a proposal that is full of shortcuts,” added Meetze. “Contrary to what proponents of SB1070 say, the bill does not prohibit officers from relying on race or ethnicity in deciding who to investigate. Police untrained in the complexities of immigration law will have a green light to harass anyone who looks or sounds foreign.”

Complexities of immigration law? How about, you are here illegally, you get arrested and deported? Pretty simple to me.

The ACLU said that the provision that makes it a state crime to violate federal registration laws will likely be found unconstitutional. The Supremacy Clause gives the federal government exclusive power to regulate our borders, and with very few exceptions, states are not free to create their own laws regulating immigration.

The federal government may have the right to regulate our borders, however, states have a constitutional right to deal with what is going inside their states. And if the federal government will not deal with illegals, the states most at risk will. You would think the ACLU would be concerned with the rights of Americans first, such as, say, not to be raped, robbed, and killed by illegals.

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» Filed Under 10th Amendment, ACLU, Border Control/Homeland Security, House, Illegal Aliens/Immigration, News, State Government, State Sovereignty, States Rights

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Arizona Does Away With Need For Concealed Carry Permits

What do you think of this idea?

Starting later this summer, U.S. citizens 21 and older can begin carrying a concealed firearm without a permit in Arizona.

Gov. Jan Brewer signed Senate Bill 1108 into law Friday afternoon. It eliminates the requirement for a concealed-carry weapons permit, but does require gun owners to accurately answer if an officer asks them if they are carrying [a] weapon concealed. It also allows officers to temporarily confiscate a weapon while they are talking to an individual, including during a traffic stop.

“I believe strongly in the individual rights and responsibilities of a free society, and as governor I have pledged a solemn and important oath to protect and defend the Constitution,” Brewer said in a news release. “I believe this legislation not only protects the Second Amendment rights of Arizona citizens, but restores those rights as well.”

“If you want to carry concealed, and you have no criminal history, you are a good guy, you can do it,” bill sponsor Sen. Russell Pearce, R-Mesa, has said of his bill. “It’s a freedom that poses no threat to the public.”

One would still have to go through a federal background check in most cases, and you would need a permit to bring a concealed firearm into a restaurant or bar, or to another state. On the flip side

But (Retired Mesa police officer Dan Furbee, who runs permit classes) said what really concerns him is that the new law will allow people who have had no education about Arizona’s laws and no training on the shooting range to carry a concealed gun. The eight-hour class currently required to get a permit includes information on state law and gun safety, as well as requires students to be able to hit a target 14 out of 20 times.

Hmm, he could have a point. But, then, if you chose to carry, you should take the responsibility on yourself to become educated on the law, especially if you are a newbie. I bet if those people who offer permit classes would charge a little less, they would still get some people to enroll.

On the flip side of that, how often does one read about problems with concealed carry in Vermont and Alaska, which have long required no permits? You know it would be national news if people were constantly using concealed handguns in a lawless manner in those two states. As a matter of fact, both states have some of the lowest crime rates in the nation.

What’s your take?

Crossed at Pirate’s Cove. Follow me on Twitter @WilliamTeach

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» Filed Under 10th Amendment, 2nd Amendment, Constitution, Guns, News, Property Rights, State Government, State Sovereignty, State's Constitution, States Rights, U.S. Constitution, firearms freedom acts

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April 16, 2010

Support Immigration Reform, Not Limitation

Immigration isn’t wrong: entitlements are wrong.
Mitch Blatt writes conservative columns at MitchBlatt.com where you can download his ebook.

Conservative arguments about illegal immigration are not really about immigration; they are about entitlements and government-power.

Let’s look at one of the most often referenced arguments: the fact that some immigrants take welfare and entitlements without contributing into the system.

Allen West, candidate for Florida’s 22^nd district, said this at a tea party on April 15, 2010:

“If an amnesty bill comes through, that means 12-15 million new citizens that the ACORN and the SEIU machine will get out there and register them to vote. And guess what? Are they going to be in the production class? No, they’re going to be in the entitlement class.”

If immigrants receive too much money in entitlements, that’s not a problem with immigration, it’s a problem with entitlements.
Read more

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» Filed Under 10th Amendment, Amnesty/Immigration reform, Illegal Aliens/Immigration, Libertarianism, Multiculturalism/PC, News, Political Correctness, Political prostitution, Social Engineering, Socialism, Stupidity, Taxes, Welfare, social parasites

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Cokie Roberts: Japanese Interment Was an Immigration Issue?

-By Warner Todd Huston

Why is it that lefties always get history wrong? The Jewish World Review recently published an editorial by NPR commentator Cokie Roberts and her hubby meant to urge the country toward “comprehensive” immigration reform by praising America’s history of immigrant labor. But even as much of what the two Roberts say is dead on, there are still a few glaring errors, one of which is their claim that Japanese interment during WWII was an immigration issue.

Cokie, whose full name is a mouthful — Mary Martha Corinne Morrison Claiborne Boggs — garbled history at the tail of her piece by saying that the interment of Japanese during WWII was little but “anti-immigrant sentiment.”

American history has been scarred by outbursts of anti-immigrant sentiment… In the 1940s, we interned Japanese-Americans living on the West Coast.

But this is an absurd statement to make. Japanese Americans were not interned into holding camps during WWII merely because they were immigrants, it was because their distant fellow Japanese relatives were at war with us. In fact, Franklin Roosevelt also interned Germans and Italians in similar camps, though in lesser numbers, because he was worried that they might be enemies within. This was no “anti-immigrant sentiment,” it was war. Right or wrong, it was war.

Of course, the Robertses piece was also a bit misleading in another way. The pair tout immigration as the “answer” to economic decline and urge immigration reform this year but they conflate two important immigration issues as one and the same when they aren’t.

The editorial focuses on the need for highly educated immigrant workers all of whom need a better, more responsive H-1B visa program. Here I agree wholeheartedly with the piece. We do need to reform our H-1B visa program so it better fits the needs of American businesses. But the problem is that Roberts then lumps this issue in with the whole of the Democrat’s immigrant agenda.

Farsighted legislators such as Democratic Sen. Charles Schumer and Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham have recently proposed awarding green cards to immigrants who receive advanced degrees here in science, engineering or technology. President Obama has endorsed the idea, and Sen. Harry Reid, the Democratic leader, has promised to take up immigration reform this year.

Notice how Roberts mentions the visa issue, then lumps it right in with Harry Reid’s promise to “take up immigration reform this year” as if it is one and the same? This misleads because the two, the visa issue and the Democrat’s “reform” agenda, are not necessarily one and the same.

Yes, let’s address the H-1B visa problem, but, no, we do not need to accept the Democrat’s whole amnesty agenda because that agenda does not in any way help U.S. business find those highly educated foreign immigrants. In fact, the amnesty ideas of Democrats would simply admit millions of uneducated and undesirable immigrants to enter and stay in this country to the detriment of everyone.

The two Roberts should have taken greater pains to distance their subject (that of the need for highly educated immigrants) from the Democrat’s full “comprehensive reform” agenda which does little to solve the problem that the Robertses wanted to address.

It is a singular failure that reveals their own bias in favor of Democrats and their legislative agenda and serves to damage their own supposed desire to improve the H-1B visa situation.

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Posted by Warner Todd Huston at 4:21 pm | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)

» Filed Under Amnesty/Immigration reform, Barack Obama, Democrats, History, Illegal Aliens/Immigration, Journalistic Prostitution, Liberal Media/Bias, News, Senate, Social Engineering, Socialism, harry reid, liberalism, social parasites

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Postal Service May Cut Saturday Delivery To Fight “Climate Change”

No, seriously

Facing ongoing, massive financial losses, the United States Postal Service (USPS) has said that a cut in Saturday service would help the service do its part to stem the effects of manmade climate change.

In its proposal, the service said that CO2 emissions by its vehicles and facilities could be slashed by up to 503,000 metric tons per year. The majority of that would be as result of the reduction in use of rural and local delivery vehicles with highway vehicle usage accounting for most of the rest.

Calling it “a greener Postal Service,” the USPS said the reductions in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions would be the equivalent of taking between 60,000 and 96,000 cars off the road for a year. In all, the cuts in GHG would cut the CO2 emissions for the Postal Service by 3 to 5 percent.

Of course, the fact that they wouldn’t actually be doing their, you know, jobs would mean little. With the climate alarmists, mostly liberals, it is all about intentions, not results.

Electronic communication has taken a toll on the Postal Service and a switch to five day delivery is seen as a way to try to return it to solvency. By using a ‘green’ argument, the USPS is hoping to win over the support of Congress and the American people while it battles the powerful labor unions that are resisting the loss of 40,000 jobs.

Heck of a good point, which could win over a good chunk of the alarmist population, otherwise known as kool aid drinking sheeple.

Elsewhere, now the kool aid drinkers are claiming the “missing heat” may affect the world later. Sigh.

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Posted by William Teach at 9:49 am | Comments (6) | Trackbacks (0)

» Filed Under Agenda based science, Collapsing Science, Global Warming, Government, Government malfeasance/misfeasance, News, Science/pseudo-science

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Obama On Space Exploration And Gay Visitation Rights

Happy Friday! I bet you never knew this about Dear Leader, vis a vis space exploration

“The bottom line is, nobody is more committed to manned spaceflight, to human exploration of space than I am,” he said in a speech to about 200 attendees of a White House-sponsored space conference here.

There’s probably a joke in there about Obama smoking pot earlier in life, but, no one? How about the astronauts and the people who work for NASA and other companies involved in the space program? Once again, he has made something All About Obama. And would you be surprised by this?

Strikingly, Mr. Obama used the speech to blame his predecessors for lacking leadership on space policy and the critics of his own plan for failing to recognize that times have changed. NASA’s budgets, he noted, have “risen and fallen with the political winds.” That appeared to be a shot at President George W. Bush, who announced a new plan for NASA after the Columbia disaster and barely mentioned space policy again for the rest of his presidency.

He. Just. Can’t. Stop.

Next up

President Obama mandated Thursday that nearly all hospitals extend visitation rights to the partners of gay men and lesbians and respect patients’ choices about who may make critical health-care decisions for them, perhaps the most significant step so far in his efforts to expand the rights of gay Americans.

The president directed the Department of Health and Human Services to prohibit discrimination in hospital visitation in a memo that was e-mailed to reporters Thursday night while he was at a fundraiser in Miami.

Administration officials and gay activists, who have been quietly working together on the issue, said the new rule will affect any hospital that receives Medicare or Medicaid funding, a move that covers the vast majority of the nation’s health-care institutions. Obama’s order will start a rule-making process at HHS that could take several months, officials said.

On one hand, I agree with this. If two people love each other, why should anyone stand in their way? This is America, which is supposed to be the land of the free. If it doesn’t harm someone else, why should we care? Visitation rights and care rights should be extended. But, that is where it becomes a sticky widget.

First, remember when Executive orders were decried when Bush was president?

Second, as James Joyner points out, this actually should have come from the legislature, going way beyond any sort of clarifying instruction on existing law. As I point out, this should have rightly come from State legislatures, per that pesky Constitution thing.

Third, notice that Obama does this on the pretext of hospitals that receive Medicare or Medicaid funding. This is one of those issues that we have been complaining about, namely, that the government will use tenuous links to healthcare to link issues and force resolutions. In other words, the creeping intrusion of government control.

Finally, as it stands now, those rights have always been reserved for family members, including the person the patient is married to. This would extend extra rights to gays, lesbians, and transgenders not held by heterosexual couples. If a woman went to the hospital and claimed the man in the hospital bed was her “partner,” the hospital would deny visitation and patient care decisions. If a gay man went in and said he was the partner of the male patient, they would have to extend visitation and care decisions. That is wrong. The order should have been limited to those who are joined under the eyes of the law (and, yes, I do support civil ceremonies for gays. This is America, etc and so on).

Actually, many gays should be very worried about the broadness of this order. Seriously, do you want the person you just broke up with in a screaming match with much broken dishes who slashed your tires the other day being able to come into the hospital, claim they are your partner, and decide that what you really need is a high colonic and a body shave?

Crossed at Pirate’s Cove. Follow me on Twitter @WilliamTeach

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Posted by William Teach at 8:36 am | Comments (2) | Trackbacks (0)

» Filed Under Barack Obama, DOMA, Dems In Charge: Now What?, Fascism, Government corruption, Government malfeasance/misfeasance, Government tyranny, Healthcare, Homosexual Agenda, Hypocrisy/Situational Ethics, Illegal Activities, Journalistic Prostitution, Libertarianism, Marriage, Moral Relativism, Nanny State, News, Political Correctness, Secular Humanism, Social Engineering, Unconstitutional, extortion/blackmail

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April 15, 2010

Senate Dems Prepare to Sneak Through Tax & Charade

The coup de grâce to our capitalist economy, Cap & Trade, has gone under the radar, but is still in play. This outrageous act of sabotage (“likely to be the biggest tax in American history” per the Wall Street Journal) passed the House, and prior to being thrown out of office this fall, Harry Reid plans to get even with the voters by slipping it through the Senate for Comrade Obama’s eager signature.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) is about to take over as stage manager in the uphill push to pass comprehensive climate and energy legislation.

Whenever the word “comprehensive” appears in any Big Government undertaking, the American people are in for serious pain.

In an effort to keep the bill in Reid’s hands, the sponsors — Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) won’t officially introduce the bill in the Senate when they unveil it to the public next week.

Remember Lieberman’s participation in this unfolding catastrophe next time someone tries to pass him off as a moderate or a man of principle. If he would take part in Al Gore’s alarming attempt to seize power after losing the 2000 election, it’s unsurprising he would crawl into bed with the likes of Hanoi John Kerry and the quintessential moonbat RINO Lindsey Graham.

Even some Democrats smell a decomposing rat:

Already, some senators also are raising red flags about the committee process, which they warn may be circumvented if the Kerry-Graham-Lieberman proposal moves directly into Reid’s office.

“These bills need to go through committee,” said Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.). “If you’re talking about making major deals on energy policy, it needs to go through the Energy Committee. If you’re making major deals on tax policy, it needs to go through the Finance Committee. I mean, if you want to get it done.”

But things are done differently, now that we have Obamunist “transparency.” Draconian bills that will radically lower our standard of living are rammed through by any means necessary, with details kept hidden.

If the Dems could impose the intensely unpopular ObamaCare debacle, Tax & Charade ought to be a cinch, since unscrupulous Repubics (Lettuce McStain, Newt Gingrich) have shown a willingness to climb aboard the ecofascism bandwagon. According to Frank O’Donnell of Clean Air Watch,

So far, there are no Republican big dogs willing to sniff Reid’s hind quarters on this issue.

Apparently Grahamnesty, who has lodged his snout halfway up Reid’s colon, doesn’t count as a big dog. But his traitorous example will not be helpful when it comes to corraling other RINOs.

Hat tip: Yid With Lid. On a tip from Gj Ferra. Cross-posted at Moonbattery.

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» Filed Under Agenda based science, Anti-Americanism, Anti-Capitalism, Article I section 8, Barack Obama, Cap & Trade, Communism, Congress, Democrats, Economy, Fascism, Global Warming, Government corruption, Government malfeasance/misfeasance, Government tyranny, House, Nanny State, News, Political prostitution, President, Property Rights, RINOS, Science/pseudo-science, Senate, Social Engineering, Socialism, States Rights, Taxes, Totalitarianism, U.S. Constitution, Unemployment, Unequal taxation, environmental activists/terrorists, harry reid, liberalism, man-made science, political suicide, social parasites, taxation without representation, transparency/accountability

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Race Baiting at Philly Tea-Party: Anti-Tea Party Democrats No Better than Fred Phelps?

-By Warner Todd Huston

On March 6, former George H.W. Bush speechwriter Michael Johns was speaking before a tea party gathering in Philadelphia when someone from the audience took exception to the fact that during his address he did not say “President Obama” but merely called him Mr. Obama. The heckler screamed a racial slur at Mr. Johns calling him a “white boy.”

“It’s President Obama, President Obama, white boy, President Obama,” the heckler yelled. Apparently this heckler did not recall the many times the Old Media called President Bush “Mr. Bush” all those eight years, but, there you have it. (There is a video of Mr. Johns’ full speech at YouTube)

Mr. Johns reacted well by not engaging this creep and asking him to say his piece after Mr. Johns was done, but otherwise carrying on.

This incident neatly fits with the plans by Democrats and anti-tea party folks to disrupt tea party events the nation over. We recently had news of an effort by one fellow that claimed that he had some 60 members across the nation gathering forces to crash the tea party. This guy plans to “dismantle and demolish the Tea Party.”

In New Hampshire, former Democratic State Party Chairman Kathy Sullivan has taken to emailing cohorts to infiltrate tea party events in the Granite State with birther signs to try and make it seem as if tea party attendees question Obama’s place of birth.

Former Democratic State Party Chairman Kathy Sullivan is heading up the search, the source said. Sullivan has been calling and e-mailing liberal activists trying to get them to attend tea parties in different parts of the state and hold signs denying the authenticity of President Barack Obama’s birth certificate and make racially disparaging comments to reporters.

One might also remember back in April of 2009 when ACORN announced efforts to infiltrate and disrupt tea party events by making it look like they were racist tea partiers. The Huffington Post even got into the act by trying to get their bloggers to go to tea party events.

This all begs a question, though. Can anyone recall any conservative groups making plans to “infiltrate and disrupt” anti-war rallies? Did any tea party group try to falsely portray themselves as lefties at their rallies in order for the Old Media to focus on them so that they could discredit the lefty protests? Was there any secret organizing of the right to attack the leftists at their protests? I don’t recall any, do you?

Yet, here is the left imposing itself on the tea parties? Is this much different than what the hatemongers at the Westboro Church under Fred Phelps does? Phelps’ people impose themselves uninvited on funerals, gatherings, and events in order to get their own hateful message across? Isn’t that what the left is doing here?

Are leftists just like Fred Phelps?

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Posted by Warner Todd Huston at 2:22 pm | Comment (1) | Trackbacks (0)

» Filed Under 1st Amendment, ACORN, Anti-Americanism, Anti-Capitalism, Anti-free speech, Barack Obama, Delusional Dupes and DUmmies, Democrats, Economy, Government malfeasance/misfeasance, Government tyranny, Hypocrisy/Situational Ethics, News, Racism, Tea Parties, Tea Party/Protests, Video, liberalism, race baiting

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Maureen Dowd: A Degraded State of Intelligent Discourse

-By Warner Todd Huston

I don’t write about Maureen Dowd simply because she rarely offers anything worthy of serious, intellectual discussion. I don’t claim any sort of high intellect for myself, of course, and don’t necessarily claim to be able to thoroughly judge the work of the deepest of thinkers but Dowd’s work is like the old saying about pornography in as much as when it comes to stupid prattle I know it when I see it.

Breaking my own no-Mo-Dowd rule, though, her April 10 column must be singled out as a prime example of just how silly, inconsequential, and, well, stupid Mo Dowd really is. In it she equated Radical, oppressive, dangerous Islam to today’s Catholic Church as if they were entirely equivalent in their treatment of women. It is astonishing that she thinks that radical Islam and the modern Catholic Church is indistinguishable in the way they treat women, but there you have it, she apparently really does.

Dowd started her April 10 column relating a recent encounter she had in Saudi Arabia with a “group of educated and sophisticated young professional women.” Dowd asked her hosts how they could stand living in that oppressive Saudi culture and she wondered how such “spirited women, smart and successful on every other level, acquiesce in their own subordination?”

But as she asked that provocative question, it struck Dowd that she, too, lived in such a culture.

I was puzzling over that one when it hit me: As a Catholic woman, I was doing the same thing.

I, too, belonged to an inbred and wealthy men’s club cloistered behind walls and disdaining modernity.

I, too, remained part of an autocratic society that repressed women and ignored their progress in the secular world.

I, too, rationalized as men in dresses allowed our religious kingdom to decay and to cling to outdated misogynistic rituals, blind to the benefits of welcoming women’s brains, talents and hearts into their ancient fraternity.

This ludicrous “reasoning” is outrageous for its complete emptiness of logic, reflection, and truth. But, let’s take a moment and see if Dowd has a point at all with her equating of oppressive Islam to western Catholicism, shall we?

Here is a list of just a few restrictions that Saudi women face on a daily basis:

They cannot drive cars
They cannot get too many jobs
They cannot wear their own selection of fashions (forced to war body covering abayas)
They aren’t allowed to speak in public
They have no right to vote
They are not welcome in government
They have no freedom of movement
They have their genitals mutilated as young girls
They are beaten by husbands routinely and have no legal recourse to stop it
They are beaten on the streets by “religion police” if they seem to be violating Sharia “laws”
They have little recourse to prosecute attackers for raping them
They cannot travel abroad without permission
They cannot join the clergy

Now, to be fair to Mo Dowd, let us look over a list of similar restrictions that western Catholics place on their women:

They cannot join the clergy

Yep, that’s about it.

Interesting, no? Those lists are oh, so similar, aren’t they? You’d be right to find Dowd’s equating the two religious traditions as ludicrous, to be sure. Yet in Mo Dowd’s tiny mind there is no difference between radical Islam and modern western Catholicism! It isn’t mere hyperbole but outright idiocy she evinces.

From this one can easily understand what an intellectual lightweight this woman truly is and why she simply isn’t worth the effort to talk about. But the saddest thing of all is that she has such a prominent position in the Old Media. Her work doesn’t measure up to the most hackneyed blogger’s work, yet she has become rich and famous for her blather. It really is a shame and a sham all at the same time.

Maureen Dowd is the best evidence we have of how far journalism has fallen.