The Mystery of BOcare Continues

I.R.S. Bars Employers From Dumping Workers Into Health Exchanges - NYTimes.com:

I can't understand what this article really says and I'm not sure that anyone can ... thus the continuing saga of manufactured uncertainty that craters business operations and individual planning in the current BO States of Amerika.

Many employers had thought they could shift health costs to the government by sending their employees to a health insurance exchange with a tax-free contribution of cash to help pay premiums, but the Obama administration has squelched the idea in a new ruling. Such arrangements do not satisfy Recent and archival news about healthcare reform.">health care law the administration said, and employers may be subject to a tax penalty of $100 a day — or $36,500 a year — for each employee who goes into the individual marketplace.

It seemed a certainty the way that the law was written that business would have little choice BUT to "dump employees onto the exchanges" since it would exchange a known fixed cost for a completely UNkown but growing future liability.  This was assumed to be the main reason that "the employer mandate" was delayed until late this year in hopes that the fallout of the 75% of Americans that have been covered under their employers finding that they no longer had coverage would be unhappy and vote accordingly ... the "other shoe" of the "if you like your healthcare you can keep it" lie of the year last year.

Andrew R. Biebl, a tax partner at CliftonLarsonAllen, a large accounting firm based in Minneapolis, said the ruling could disrupt arrangements used in many industries.
“For decades,” Mr. Biebl said, “employers have been assisting employees by reimbursing them for health insurance premiums and out-of-pocket costs. The new federal ruling eliminates many of those arrangements by imposing an unusually punitive penalty.”
When an employer reimburses employees for premiums, the arrangement is known as an employer payment plan. “These employer payment plans are considered to be group health plans,” the I.R.S. said, but they do not satisfy requirements of the Affordable Care Act.

Ok, so what has been working for 75% of the people for decades is now "not allowed", but what is?? At least I think we can all understand the following:

In a new regulation, the Department of Health and Human Services said it would provide financial assistance to certain insurers that experience unexpected financial losses this year. Administration officials hope the payments will stabilize premiums and prevent rate increases
 that could embarrass Democrats in this year’s midterm elections.

Certainly "The Party" (TP -- Democrat) doesn't want anything "that could embarrass Democrats in this year’s midterm elections." !! THAT we DO understand!! So there should be some major league payola to "do whatever it takes" to keep TP in as much power as possible! No matter what the costs to business and the 75% of folks that were doing just fine with healthcare prior to the BOcare fiasco!

So as near as I can tell, business and the rest of us are supposed to be left enough in the dark so that we don't discover the BIG LIE of BOcare screwing up healthcare for 75% of the people that used to be covered under their employers plans!
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BO Outs ACTUAL Covert CIA Agent

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/white-house-mistakenly-identifies-cia-chief-in-afghanistan/2014/05/25/ac8e80cc-e444-11e3-8f90-73e071f3d637_story.html

The disclosure marked a rare instance in which a CIA officer working overseas had his cover — the secrecy meant to protect his actual identity — pierced by his own government. The only other recent case came under significantly different circumstances, when former CIA operative Valerie Plame was exposed as officials of the George W. Bush administration sought to discredit her husband, a former ambassador and fierce critic of the decision to invade Iraq.

Well, slight differences: 

• Plame was in US driving in to CIA HQ at Langley every day, she was NOT undercover!
• She was NOT "exposed"  at all, she was NOT undercover!! Her name coming out was completely unrelated to any "attempt to discredit her husband". Not that it would take any work to "discredit him", his "report" to the CIA was 180 degrees at odds with what he published in the New Yorker!  The whole "discredit / punish his wife" was a media / TP fabrication that was in fact proven false by all the Special Council crap ...  the person that "inadvertently gave her  name"  was Richard Armitage, State Department  --

Somehow I'm absolutely positive that we can count on .00001% the interest in the BO link to ACTUALLY outing a covert CIA agent (a Federal Crime, 10 years in the slammer!), but it is clear that we can count on them for the same factual level of reporting!

Republicans Aren't American

More on “Republicans Aren’t American!” | Power Line:

This latest screech from Dean the Scream hasn't got all that much coverage -- likely so that the next time some Republican says something "uncivil", THAT can be reported to show how nasty the "right wing" is.

A couple points:

• Roosevelt points out "fascist", which of course is LEFT wing (National SOCIALIST Party, aka Nazi). He would have been more accurate having found himself a mirror, not that accuracy was ever one of his considerations. 
• None of the modern Republicans, even the Tea Party, are all that "right wing", meaning "small government". Sure, they don't want all healthcare to be less desirable than current VAcare, they would like to do something about yearly deficits of  close to $1T and they would like to see some sort of plan to make the current unfunded liability of $60T+ for FICA and Medicare square up eventually. Yes, that is what one calls "radical" these days, but it is FAR from anything that could even be imagined as "limited government".

So the latest Dean Scream will be mostly ignored in the press and the next time a Republican says anything less then fully worshipful of his holiness BO, they will be labeled "racist and reactionary" ... or just plain crazy.

Welcome to what used to be "America", 2014 edition.





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VAcare, BOcare? Are We Oblivious?

The Scandal at the VA Is Real, and Obama Is Ducking It - The Daily Beast:

There seems to be a certain lack of ability to make the obvious connection here. I thought we already had government health care for millions of our most honored, our veterans. I thought it was called the VA?

Isn't the VA an example of totally government managed health care that is SUPPOSED to be especially GOOD because it is provided to our veterans who risked their lives in defense of the nation and often suffered horrible wounds and other medical problems as a result???

Please tell me I'm wrong here, but if the VA, which has been around since the Civil War is so bad and so corrupt that 40+ veterans have DIED on the waiting list while the agency is busily trying to cover up how bad things are, while the erstwhile supposed leader of our nation finds out about problems on the NEWS,  what would the expectation of BOcare be??

I believe that anyone with their eyes open at all can already see. Constant delays in even getting a marginally operational website, sign ups well below projections, millions of people losing the healthcare they already had, costs way above projections, portions of the program delayed, and constant unconstitutional shifts in the law by executive fiat.  The list of woe is ALREADY is long and very nasty.

The VA has been around for 150 years! These problems are NOT "startup pains", they are part and parcel of bloated and out of control government bureaucracy that are well understood and have happened in EVERY government since at least the Roman Empire and were a SIGNIFICANT reason that America was founded with LIMITED GOVERNMENT. The list of things that government does "well" is pretty much "National defense, a common currency and a system of laws to protect private property and individual rights"!!

There are a number of reasons why limiting government is a VERY good thing!:

1. It produces vastly substandard quality of service
2. It is vastly more expensive
3. It is not responsive and in fact spends the majority of it's time covering it's failures and general corruption. 
4. It's primary function is GROWTH of itself and consolidation of it's power. 
5. Ultimately, unchecked government results in totalitarian control and/or the destruction of the nation that was so foolish to believe yet again in the siren song of "more stuff for me with someone else picking up the tab".

Folks, this is not rocket science! It ALWAYS happens! Maybe later, maybe it seems "hidden" (like the USSR for 70 years), but look at our balance sheet, look at what is happening over and over (IRS, NSA, Benghazi, Gun Runner, journalist records, etc). All we have to do is have our eyes open and THINK for OURSELVES just a TINY bit! Ignore the MSM weasels, they are just the propaganda arm of the Democrat Party (TP "The Party") anyway!

It seems that it is too late. Are neither we or our tiny remaining adversary media able to look at VAcare and BOcare and make the OBVIOUS connection!

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Cultural Euthanasia : Killing Memes, Amherst

History of biological warfare - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

Ran into a cultural meme being spread in our schools that has at least some basis in fact. APPARENTLY (I'm not going to take the time to look into this in detail) some BRITISH forces "knowingly" used blankets exposed to smallpox to purposely kill Indians. (the germ theory of disease was less well accepted than Global Warming currently is in the 17th-18th centuries, so "knowingly" is a stretch).

The meme is being spread in our schools as "AMERICANS purposely used exposure to smallpox to exterminate Indians". It came out as a "defense" of Islam's 9-11 attack and the potential of Islam using germ warfare against the West (possibly after having developed an antidote to either covertly inoculate their people a-priori, or to at least partially do so).

A few points need to be made:

• ALL people and cultures are at best a MIX of "good and evil". 
• Current media, past media, historians, educators, etc "pick and choose" what small percentage of the myriad of available "facts", "stories", "myths", "folk wisdom", "dreams", "analysis", etc will be poured into the mush that young people have to use as brains. 
• Current Arab schooling includes teaching their kids that "the Holocaust is a myth", along with the superiority of Islam, the Arab world view, the abuses heaped on their people by the Jews, the West, etc. 
• We actually USED to revere our Founders, the Constitution, even Columbus, "Western Civilization", Christianity, and the "American Dream". (how nasty of us!) 
• "Accuracy" in culture is and always will be WAY less settled than something simple like "Is the planet warming or cooling, and for extra credit, why?". 
• "Success" and "Accuracy" in things like culture have a very low, and possibly negative correlation. The same is true of individuals -- virtually everyone thinks that they are an above average driver, have above average intelligence, etc, AND it turns out that people with those very natural human beliefs turn out to be happier, better adjusted, have more friends, live longer, etc than those who have more "rational" (statistically valid) beliefs about their driving, intelligence, looks, etc. 

I find it questionable if any culture in human history has been so quick to pull out the negative cultural meme weapon, point it directly at their most vulnerable cultural location (their kids), turn it on "auto", and initiate steady fire at their own culture and country! 

In the thousands of years of human history there are many thousands of incidents of absolutely abominable pieces of behavior by individuals, tribes, religions, countries, areas, etc. On balance, one would have a very difficult time finding a nation that is on balance "BETTER" than at least the US was historically, and would have ZERO trouble finding thousands and thousands of WORSE cases ... this BTW includes treatment of "indigenous peoples" (see Genghis Khan for just one example) and slavery (See past and current Africa, current sex slavery, etc) . 

The aggressive euthanization of American culture by the left has to stand as the greatest destruction of a civilization since the Roman Empire! Perhaps once we turned to our own Holocaust of mass abortion of our most vulnerable, our suicide was just a matter of time. If you will willingly and legally kill your unborn, perhaps poisoning the minds of your youth is just par for the course.

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Lake Superior Still Has Ice

Lake Superior Still Has Ice! | WOODTV.com Blogs:

Remember all the hand wringing on Lake Superior water levels being low due to Global Warming. I love the following quote:

"The Great Lakes in a lot of ways have always been a canary in the coal mine," Cameron Davis, the senior adviser to the U.S. EPA on the Great Lakes, said last week. "Not just for the region or this country, but for the rest of the world."

Well, they are now back to their historical average, and I don't think we need to worry much about HIGH temps in the lake this summer!

Please do your OWN climate thinking!

1. If the great lakes are a "climate canary" in ONE direction, can "settled scientists" figure out that it must work in the OTHER direction as well? 
2. If this was record EARLY ice out, do you think you would have heard about it? 
3. When they try to re-brand to "Climate Change" ... "Oh, we MEANT that it would just oscillate quicker", go back and read some of their "settled pronouncements" ... that is NOT what they said, the linked "canary article" is a good example.

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Thank Fox News Obama is Aware (Now)

White House says Obama only learned of VA wait-list scandal on TV (just like the IRS, Fast and Furious and reporter snooping scandals) | Mail Online:

I can't verify that the specific source for BO to find out about all these scandals was Fox, but let's face it, the rest of the MSM isn't very interested on reporting on anything that doesn't reflect positively on the Great and Powerful BO!

So he discovered the VA situation by listening to the news as well as the IRS scandal, DoJ seizing reporters phone records and his own plane doing low passes over Manhattan ! Those are the ones that he PUBLICLY CLAIMS  he "only saw on the news".

It is very hard to even remotely imagine what kind of a massive joke a Republican president who constantly "only heard it on the news" would be.

Perhaps the government ought to send Fox the same amount  of subsidy they send Public TV and radio considering how ill informed our chief executive would apparently be without Fox!

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Good AGW Summary

President Obama's Global Warming Calculated Deception Means Democrats Have Abandoned Working People:

Since Global Warming is a political construct, as it becomes more and more evident that it is a hoax, the perpetrators that make a very tidy living off the fun house which they want to force us all to live in go into maximum double down. We may have just had the coldest 12 month period in "recorded US climate" No doubt less cold than "the little ice age" from 1750 to 1850 ... unsurprisingly, our records start at about the end of that and (SURPRISE!) show some warming!!!

The linked article is excellent and wanted to have it out here for future reference, the part that I thought it put in a bit of perspective is the current "sky is falling!" (in 200 years) assessment of sea level rising 6.6 FEET due to the West Antarctic ice sheet "falling apart".

Sea level has been rising, in fact, since the end of the last ice age, 12,000 years ago! But there has been no acceleration in the rate of that sea level rise for at least 200 years, as accurately reported at the Hockey Schtick website on May 6. Over that past 200 years, the long term, stable sea level rise has averaged a mere 6.6 inches per century, as measured by major tidal gauge studies. Yet, the Obama Administration’s National Climate Assessment tries to tell us that global sea levels could rise by as much as 6.6 feet by 2100, which would be 12 times the current long term average rate over the last 200 years! Moreover, a 2014 peer-reviewed study just published by Cazenave et al finds the rate of sea level rise has decelerated by 31% since 2002. That is consistent with a slightglobal cooling trend since that time, which some senior scientists predict could last decades. Are you seeing the calculated deception now?

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97% Climate Change Consensus Explained

Breaking: The “97 Percent Climate Consensus” Canard | Power Line

Basically, "If you are the kind of person that likes that kind of thing, this is the kind of thing you are going to like!"

1/3 of all climate change papers directly endorse human caused global warming, eg AGW--Anthropogenic Global Warming.  Of the people that WRITE THOSE PAPERS, 97.5  are in agreement on AGW!

Talk about good way to pick your sample! I wonder what percentage of Scientists that are Concealed Carry permit holders in MN believe that Concealed Carry should be legal? See, you could do that survey and say "99.999% of Scientists believe CC should be legal" and you would be on just as good a ground as the 97% figure!

If you want to understand why even quoting a "poll number" is absolute proof you are not practicing science, see http://shar.es/VfcZF.

Why is it again that I recommend being skeptical of the government and the press?
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#BringBackOurBalls :: SteynOnline

#BringBackOurBalls :: SteynOnline:



A more appropriate # than Mrs BO.



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Dog Whistle Politics: How Coded Racial Appeals Have Reinvented Racism and Wrecked the Middle Class

Dog Whistle Politics: How Coded Racial Appeals Have Reinvented Racism and Wrecked the Middle Class: Ian Haney López: 9780199964277: Amazon.com: Books:

Shortly after I was married I realized that my wife read bags of  "romance novels", so thought maybe I ought to read one to see what was up. What I learned is that men will never understand women, and vice-versa -- the wiring is simply different.

From time to time I read some books with a far left / "liberal" bias and have much the same experience -- the world views presented are simply too far apart for someone of a Christian / Conservative / Western Civilization / White / etc perspective to fully understand what is being presented.

I can only try however, so I'll do my best to cover what this author appears to be thinking / saying, but I can fully imagine someone that is far left / radically liberal / Black / etc just not being able to understand what I am saying in any real way.

For starters, one could read "What's the Matter With Kansas" -  it's all about "fake" social wedge issues",  or "Don't Think of an Elephant" - it's all about "bad" frames of thought,  and then slide into "Dog Whistle Politics" (DWP) -- it's all about race!!

So I kinda like the Dog Whistle Politics, DWP acronym, it could also stand for "Driving With Pallor" ;-)

The idea of DWP is that very nearly ANYTHING said by someone that doesn't follow the complete "New Deal / Progressive" dogma can be labeled as "coded racism", and thus discounted. Kind of like a "dog whistle" that is at a frequency that only the dogs can hear. With DWP, the myriad of "coded appeals" are only heard by the "dogs" (racists) ... only sometimes, maybe most times, even the "racists" don't know what they are hearing, but still react to it as the "coders" intend.

So "Welfare Reform" is racist -- because it is REALLY about giving less to Blacks. "Tough on Crime" is racist because it is REALLY about putting more Blacks in jail. Oh,  Blacks don't commit any more crimes than anyone else -- the reason they have a higher incarceration rate is, DEFINITELY racism, and it is like Global Warming, Gay Rights, or a host of other things -- if you claim to "think differently", you are stupid, evil or both! Oh, and likely RACIST!

... for race constitutes the dark magic by which middle-class voters have been convinced to turn government over to the wildly affluent, notwithstanding the harm this does to themselves. This book’s primary goal is to grab the attention of middle-class readers, white and nonwhite alike, to awaken them to the importance of race to their fate. We will not pull government back to the side of the broad middle until we confront the power of racial politics.

In order to understand the above, you have to understand the liberal brain a bit. There is NO HOPE for "the middle class" outside of radical continuance and acceleration of "New Deal / Progressive Politics"! The government MUST transfer wealth from the more successful to the less successful! There is no other way that "helps the middle class". (getting a job is a really a stupid idea)

If you think anything else -- like culture, work ethic, two parent families, competitiveness, the incentive of people being able to keep what they make, ANYTHING other than progressive dogma, then this book says you are either racist or the victim of DWP making you act against your interests without knowing why. ("conservatives fooling people" is a major theme of this book as well as "Kansas" and "Elephant")

 "Kansas" said that "false wedge issues" like abortion, gay marriage, etc caused people to "vote against their interests", "Elephant" says that it is "clever framing", but ALL are completely agreed that "progressive" politics is 100% in the interest of the middle class -- pay no attention to the fact that except for the short period after WWII where we were the only standing economic power on the planet, the "progressive" approach has brought the "middle class" nothing but consistent decline! (see LBJ, Carter and now BO)

This makes racial dog whistling a more complicated phenomenon than other sorts of surreptitious politics . It involves, as we shall see, three basic moves : a punch that jabs race into the conversation through thinly veiled references to threatening nonwhites, for instance to welfare cheats or illegal aliens; a parry that slaps away charges of racial pandering, often by emphasizing the lack of any direct reference to a racial group or any use of an epithet ; and finally a kick that savages the critic for opportunistically alleging racial victimization.

The cool thing about DWP is that ANYTHING can be labeled a "code", so rather than have to discuss nasty things like issues, results, alternatives, etc, the politician merely has to claim that your distaste for "Sharia Law", "Voter ID", "Immigration Policy", "Welfare", "Higher Taxes", ANYTHING is in fact a "coded dog whistle" that proves you are a RACIST! (so SHUT THE F**K UP! ... the standard "progressive" argument)

So to parse what is said above:
 1). You make a claim that "people that vote ought to have an ID" -- the DWP expert will label that your "punch".

2). The DWP guy "calls you out", tells you that you are using "coded racist appeals, so why don't you just say "N**R", because that is what you mean!" ... You, being a racist "dog whistler" of course will try to claim something lame  like "having people vote legally has nothing to do with race". The fact you tried to defend yourself is further proof you are a racist!

3). The KICK ... you may try to say something like "What the hell is going on? I talked about voter ID, you called me a racist, and now the discussion is supposed to be stopped because of the charge you made up? How can we have a discussion at all if everything is supposed to be about race?" ... which clearly PROVES you are a racist and are following a template laid down by Nixon in "The Souther Strategy". So there!

... to ensure broad prosperity government has four crucial roles to play: first, to help people weather the vicissitudes that easily plunge families into poverty, for instance job loss or ill health ; second, to provide escalators of upward mobility, such as quality schooling, higher education, and mortgage assistance; third, to build the nation’s infrastructure, thus laying the groundwork for the next great economic boom; and fourth, to rein in marketplace abuses through regulation , and to prevent excessive concentrations of wealth through progressive taxation.

The above is the core belief of the authors of this and the two other books I mention. GOVERNMENT is what does it all -- not culture, not capitalism, not technical expertise and competition, and certainly not entrepreneurship and innovation! NOPE, as BO let us know nobody does ANYTHING without MASSIVE help from the government! The people that deny that are "reactionaries", and usually racists (maybe always -- some of them may just not know/admit it yet). For the "progressive", just replace the Judaeo / Christian God with "government", and I believe that is pretty much their universe ... "Government is great, Government is good, we thank it for our daily bread ..."

What these three books say is that the quote above is obvious and totally true. To deny it is evil, just like denying Global Warming or Gay "marriage" (or lately not being just completely celebratory of a public gay kiss) ... there is simply no other way to think, and if you claim there is, then racist is one of the charges that can validly be leveled against you ... "coded hate speech", which may not be quite a crime yet, but if you read this book, it is very clear that it should be!

I DID read this book to the end ... I have a ton of highlights and notes from the entire book, but I've actually more than covered it here in it's particulars. What I didn't cover is the relentless grinding view that "it is all about race" and NOTHING about culture! Which often had me thinking in diatribe after diatribe of a few points:

• While other minorities ... Hispanic, Chinese, Japanese, etc are touched on, it is only in tiny and in fairly tenuous ways on specifics that would tie them to Blacks (eg the Japanese internment) What is NOT discussed is how all of the above have been FAR more generally successful in the US and elsewhere than Blacks due to CULTURE, not race! (more successful than whites too!)
  
• The focus on racism would make MUCH more sense if Africa was a model of great success to the planet yet Blacks in this country were struggling. Since that is NOT the case, it appears that although this author would STRONGLY argue that "race is primary", the real answer is in fact that culture and system of governance are what matter.
  
• I'd argue that Western Civilization, China, India, South Korea, East and West Germany (prior to unification), Hong Kong and on and on give us MANY examples of the importance of Culture and System of Government (and very clear differences due to System of Government with THE SAME racial/cultural content as in Germany), but NONE indicating that race is primary! This book seeks take a known failed government system (Socialism, which is the correct name for "progressivism) and to try change the subject to race for any that would question the guaranteed success of Socialism! (which has of course failed miserably again and again)

People need to be aware that this book (and the other two) exist in order to be aware of the basic dishonesty of the approaches, and to be prepared to be attacked by some who find this a way to cut off  discussion.

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Paying BO Works! GM $35 Million vs Toyota $1.2 Billion

GM to pay maximum $35 million fine for recall delay:

As I pointed out back in only March, I was pretty certain that GM CEO Mary Berra being a regular BO contributor and sitting with the First Lady at the SOTU was a good sign that GM would do MUCH better in the government intervention into their arguably much more serious and longer standing safety/recall issue than Toyota. There are lots of things you can do when your car starts "suddenly accelerating" (turn off the key, shove it in neutral, stand on the brake to name a few ...) ... when the key falls out, the column locks, and the engine goes dead on a corner at 60? Not so long a list!

WOW, was I right, and QUICK! I would have thought that BO and company would at least want to drag this puppy out until after this November, but I guess this is a solid indicator of just how much TP (THE Party, Democrat and MSM cronies) have the information cycle fully locked up. I suppose the other side is when you are shaking down your contributors, it is good to point out how well you take care of those that pay the man!

I can't even imagine the kind of legal fees this saved GM ... likely close to the amount of the Toyota settlement. Those lawyers like to GET PAID! ... and they have every right to it, they run the show as president, legislators, courts, and both sides of every legal dispute! Sweet! It makes the Mob seem like a bunch of schleps! They can only rough up or kill their adversaries ILLEGALLY, lawyers can take their money, jail them and even have them executed LEGALLY! Hey, it USED to be a free country, but we gave our liberties to the lawyers and now they have their way with us.

So how effective are well placed campaign contributions? Well in this case, unless Mary and company spent over $1.2B greasing BOs palms, they made out like BANDITS, because even not counting legal fees, their hit ought to have put Toyota's $1.2B to shame! Instead, they walk away with hardly a corporate "eye roll" at $35M!

Way to go GM! Bidness is bidness!

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The BO Retreat Progresses

 China defiant as US warns over sea row with Vietnam - Channel NewsAsia:

http://nationalinterest.org/feature/barack-obamas-legacy-problem-nation-retreat-10453

Both nature and nations deplore a vacuum, so it doesn't stay around long.

The current Socialist States of Obama is reminiscent of the old Superman movie where Superman decides to give up his exceptional abilities to get the girl, and of course gets beat up, plus no longer able to save the world -- duh.

Russia, Syria, China, Iran,  ... and no doubt Pakistan,  Saudi Arabia, and lots of more minor players ... eg Venezuela are all feeling like it is "Power Christmas", and there will be more. The US is right where BO wants us -- in the prison yard in pretty pink shorts holding our ankles. Will we be "loved"? Well, in once sense of the word, certainly!

Needless to say, many around the world and here at home are currently very happy about the prostration of the US. BO is obviously pleased -- "The Dreams from His Father" is nearly fully achieved. A once great nation has been brought low. That is an achievement that any "Citizen of the World" is sure to be proud of. We were mean to Indians and Blacks, we clearly deserve whatever treatment we get!

At least we don't have to be concerned about the eternal question of "will they respect us in the morning".

Don't worry, they don't.

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When Robert E. Lee Met John Brown and Saved the Union - The Daily Beast

When Robert E. Lee Met John Brown and Saved the Union - The Daily Beast:





Yet another book to read. I love the description of Lee in the article, a man could do much worse!

“a foe without hate, a friend without treachery, a soldier without cruelty, a victor without oppression . . . a Caesar, without his ambition, Frederick, without his tyranny, Napoleon without his selfishness, and Washington, without his reward.”

The article covers a lot of the ironic particulars of John Browns raid at Harpers Ferry ... Robert E Lee being called on to command the force to deal with Brown, J.E.B. Stuart taking him the message and assisting him in the action, George Washington's great grand nephew being one of Brown's hostages, both "Stonewall" Jackson and John Wilkes Booth being in the crowd t the execution of Brown, and a few others.



Well worth the read --- and having not yet read a biography of Lee, it could be that this is the one!







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Why The Moose is Fat (In addition to the obvious)

Why We Get Fat and What to do about it

It appears it may be at least in part essentially for the same reason that I froze on my SW Gold Wing trip. I'M GULLIBLE!

I've been a firm believer that it was 100% my fault due to "gluttony and sloth", although since I work out for an hour 4-5 days a week, it was never "heavy sloth". I certainly enjoy my food and have a good appetite, but nothing out of the ordinary -- I've known many much more slender folks that could out eat me.  I really saw no other option beyond 100% self blame (I'm not a martyr),  neither parent was heavy, it pretty much had to be gluttony and sloth!

Now I read a book that makes a pretty good case that Global Warming is far from being the only scam being run on us! This book goes WELL down the way of PROVING it is a scam, and why. It extensively covers how we went from completely understanding that carbohydrates and sugars cause insulin to rise which causes our bodies to store fat, to forgetting that fact, telling everyone to replace fats and protein with grains, and then saying that if they were fat it HAD to be due to some mix of 1). Gluttony (eating too much) or 2). Sloth (not burning enough calories)

This book makes an EXCELLENT case with statistical documentation, biology, and common sense that too many carbohydrates is GOING to make most people fat, and it is impossible to burn off and keep off fat by exercise. Raise your carb intake and the body stores fat. Try to exercise, and your body is going to demand you eat more and/or make you tired so you burn less calories. The author finds it no coincidence at all that our "obesity epidemic" got under way pretty much as soon as we went ton the "low fat / increase exercise" bandwagon. NOTE -- He makes very clear that being active is good for OTHER reasons, just not for losing weight!

The message of eighty years of research on obese animals is simple and unconditional and worth restating: obesity does not come about because gluttony and sloth make it so; only a change in the regulation of the fat tissue makes a lean animal obese.
Taubes, Gary (2010-12-28). Why We Get Fat: And What to Do About It (Kindle Locations 1486-1488). Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. 

There is A LOT of evidence like this in the book ... for humans and animals.

There is also a lot of information like this that WE ALL need to keep at the VERY FRONT of our minds. Humans do science, and humans are VERY fallible!

A more insidious problem is that all involved— the researchers, the physicians, the public-health authorities, the health associations—commit themselves to a belief early in the evolution of the science, arguably at the stage at which they know the least about it , and then they become so invested in their belief that no amount of evidence to the contrary can convince them that they’re wrong.
Taubes, Gary (2010-12-28). Why We Get Fat: And What to Do About It (Kindle Locations 2725-2727). Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. 

Scientists getting the idea that the planet is warming due to CO2 early on in there research --- nah, no evidence of that !

I was struck rather hard by the following personally, having religiously worked out 40-60min a day 4-5 days a week for 30+ years and having consistently had low HDL(the good cholesterol), a significant risk for heart attack, but having NEVER been told the obvious following fact by my doctor:

When you replace fat in your diet, even saturated fat, with carbohydrates, you lower your HDL, which means you make it more likely that you’ll have a heart attack, at least by this predictor of risk. Once again, if you give up scrambled eggs and bacon for breakfast and replace them with cornflakes, skim milk, and bananas, your HDL cholesterol, your “good” cholesterol, will go down, and your heart-attack risk will go up. If you’re currently eating cereal, skim milk, and bananas and switch instead to eggs and bacon, your HDL cholesterol will go up, and your heart-attack risk will go down.
Taubes, Gary (2010-12-28). Why We Get Fat: And What to Do About It (Kindle Locations 2759-2763). Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. 

You may ask, "Oh, come on, why would a physician not give someone clearly beneficial possibly life saving information if they knew about it? " How about this?

Physicians who tell their fat patients to eat less and exercise more, and particularly to eat the kind of low-fat, high-carbohydrate diet that the authorities recommend, will not be sued for malpractice should any of those patients have a heart attack two weeks or even two months later. The doctor who goes against established medical convention and prescribes carbohydrate restriction has no such safeguard.
Taubes, Gary (2010-12-28). Why We Get Fat: And What to Do About It (Kindle Locations 3200-3204). Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. 

Think about Global Warming -- if you start going against the "approved message" and you are in science or some related area, you become a "Denier" and ALL your judgement is called into question! If you are a Dr, it is WORSE, you may well be sued for malpractice and LOSE even though you are actually following true science rather than the current government funded "established medical convention".

So I enjoyed my bacon and eggs for breakfast this AM with no toast. I'm not going to "zero carbs", but I'm going to take a shot. I have a yearly physical coming up in early July where they always do blood work, so we shall see if there is any HDL improvement by then. I remember years ago when my LDL number showed up a little bad giving up ice cream as a common late night snack and going to cereal -- lovely. Both my weight and my numbers certainly got worse at that point, but the message was "must be age, or you are not working out enough"!

Why do I feel kind of like I did when I got caught in snow at Flagstaff all of a sudden?

In the meantime, please don't believe everything that ANYONE (even me) tells you, but ESPECIALLY not what Government / Academia / The Party (TP) tells you!!!