Tag Archives: Misc. Gov’t Stuff

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Agenda list? What list?

Agenda disappears from Obama Web site

President-elect Barack Obama over the weekend scrubbed his transition Web site, deleting most of what had been a massive agenda for his first term that appears on his campaign’s site.

Gone from Change.gov are the promises on how an Obama administration would handle 25 agenda items — from Iraq and immigration to taxes and urban policy — which the campaign first laid out on the Web site www.BarackObama.com.

As The Washington Times first reported Monday morning, the official agenda on Change.gov has been boiled down to one vague paragraph proclaiming a plan “to revive the economy, to fix our health care, education, and social security systems, to define a clear path to energy independence, to end the war in Iraq responsibly and finish our mission in Afghanistan, and to work with our allies to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon, among many other domestic and foreign policy objectives.”

“We are currently retooling the Web site,” said Obama transition spokesman Nick Shapiro.

Right…can’t be troubled by any pesky specifics now that they have the big enchilada.

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Governmental Greed Unlimited

Two instances recently where the government, in the form of Congress, is casting about, desperately searching for ever-more sources of money to latch on to, in spite of (or perhabs BECAUSE of) its demonstrated inability to account for what it already spends. As the first of these pieces notes, this is in keeping with “Sutton’s Law” – interesting that one of the best comparisons to make of Congress is with a bank robber.

Willie Sutton Goes to Harvard
By George F. Will

Washington is having a Willie Sutton Moment. Such moments occur when government, finding its revenue insufficient for its agenda, glimpses some money it does not control but would like to.

Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) and Rep. Peter Welch (D-Vt.) recently convened a discussion of how colleges and universities should be spending their endowments. Grassley, who says more than 135 institutions each have endowments of more than $500 million, says perhaps they should be required to spend 5 percent of those endowments each year. Welch has introduced legislation to require that percentage to be spent to reduce tuition and other student expenses.

This government reach for control of private resources comes even though last year colleges and universities spent, on average, 4.6 percent of their endowments. Furthermore, most endowments are too small to be a significant source of captured money.

…but why should that last detail matter to the Donk legislooters? A few billion here, a few billion there…eventually it starts to add up!

The next one is even worse, because in THIS patently shameless rip-off scheme, the —(insert favorite epithetic description here)— Donks are taking aim at INDIVIDUAL’S 401K and IRA accounts. Why? Again, the answer would seem to be…that’s where the money is, and besides, it’s a nifty way to move ever onward in the left-Lib’s on-going effort to bring about a New Socialist Utopia by redistributing our wealth…such as it is. (Hey – it’s THEIR wording, not mine!)

Dems Target Private Retirement Accounts

Not only do the Social Democrats (Donks) oppose the barest hint of privatising Social Security, they want to force the private means of people to plan for and provide for their own retirement away, and roll it into a Big Government Fund under the benign management of that acme of bureaucratic efficiency – the Social Security Administration! (gag! retch! choke!)

Democrats in the U.S. House have been conducting hearings on proposals to confiscate workers’ personal retirement accounts — including 401(k)s and IRAs — and convert them to accounts managed by the Social Security Administration. Triggered by the financial crisis the past two months, the hearings reportedly were meant to stem losses incurred by many workers and retirees whose 401(k) and IRA balances have been shrinking rapidly.

The testimony of Teresa Ghilarducci, professor of economic policy analysis at the New School for Social Research in New York, in hearings Oct. 7 drew the most attention and criticism. Testifying for the House Committee on Education and Labor, Ghilarducci proposed that the government eliminate tax breaks for 401(k) and similar retirement accounts, such as IRAs, and confiscate workers’ retirement plan accounts and convert them to universal Guaranteed Retirement Accounts (GRAs) managed by the Social Security Administration.

The logic – or lack of it at work here is stunning:

Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., chairman of the House Committee on Education and Labor, in prepared remarks for the hearing on “The Impact of the Financial Crisis on Workers’ Retirement Security,” blamed Wall Street for the financial crisis and said his committee will “strengthen and protect Americans’ 401(k)s, pensions, and other retirement plans” and the “Democratic Congress will continue to conduct this much-needed oversight on behalf of the American people.”

In other words, they are looking to protect 401(k)’s, pensions, and IRA’s by TAKING THEM AWAY FROM INDIVIDUALS AND PLACING THEM INTO A NEW GOVERNMENT PROGRAM!!!!! W.T.F.?????

Ghilarducci’s plan first appeared in a paper for the Economic Policy Institute: Agenda for Shared Prosperity on Nov. 20, 2007, in which she said GRAs will rescue the flawed American retirement income system (www.sharedprosperity.org/bp204/bp204.pdf). The current retirement system, Ghilarducci said, “exacerbates income and wealth inequalities” because tax breaks for voluntary retirement accounts are “skewed to the wealthy because it is easier for them to save, and because they receive bigger tax breaks when they do.”

Lauding GRAs as a way to effectively increase retirement savings, Ghilarducci wrote that savings incentives are unequal for rich and poor families because tax deferrals “provide a much larger ‘carrot’ to wealthy families than to middle-class families — and none whatsoever for families too poor to owe taxes.”

How unfair is this? People who don’t pay taxes can’t get a ttax deferral! It’s a cruel system that Social Justice demands reform of…at least according to this Donk moonbat.

GRAs would guarantee a fixed 3 percent annual rate of return, although later in her article Ghilarducci explained that participants would not “earn a 3% real return in perpetuity.” In place of tax breaks workers now receive for contributions and thus a lower tax rate, workers would receive $600 annually from the government, inflation-adjusted. For low-income workers whose annual contributions are less than $600, the government would deposit whatever amount it would take to equal the minimum $600 for all participants.

In a radio interview with Kirby Wilbur in Seattle on Oct. 27, 2008, Ghilarducci explained that her proposal doesn’t eliminate the tax breaks, rather, “I’m just rearranging the tax breaks that are available now for 401(k)s and spreading — spreading the wealth.”

All workers would have 5 percent of their annual pay deducted from their paychecks and deposited to the GRA. They would still be paying Social Security and Medicare taxes, as would the employers. The GRA contribution would be shared equally by the worker and the employee. Employers no longer would be able to write off their contributions. Any capital gains would be taxable year-on-year.

Analysts point to another disturbing part of the plan. With a GRA, workers could bequeath only half of their account balances to their heirs, unlike full balances from existing 401(k) and IRA accounts. For workers who die after retiring, they could bequeath just their own contributions plus the interest but minus any benefits received and minus the employer contributions.

Has anyone done such a thing before…yes, there IS a very recent historical precedent:

On Oct. 22, The Wall Street Journal reported that the Argentinean government had seized all private pension and retirement accounts to fund government programs and to address a ballooning deficit. Fearing an economic collapse, foreign investors quickly pulled out, forcing the Argentinean stock market to shut down several times.

…and discouragingly, they apparently didn’t learn anything after a previous bout of fiscal piracy that didn’t work out well either:

More than 10 years ago, nationalization of private savings sent Argentina’s economy into a long-term downward spiral.

The spirit of Marx is alive and well in Washington, D.C.

The majority of witness testimony during recent hearings before the House Committee on Education and Labor showed that congressional Democrats intend to address income and wealth inequality through redistribution.

The piece goes on to quote a number of cases where the testimony runs unequivocally in the direction of income redistribution programs, including pronouncements (on video) to that effect from the now President-Elect, B.O. himself.

May God have mercy on the United States…because the Democrats sure won’t!

F.E.T.E.

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Congressional GOP Continues Spinal Development Program

Republican anger at ‘financial socialism’

The GOP in Congress is continuing to show encouraging signs of gumption, continuing the more aggressive opposition to libDonk moonbattery that was started by their unofficial continuation of the House session while the Donks went home for a fall break. It’s noteworthy that that exercise concerned the Donk blockage of off-shore drilling…said blockage now to be abandoned in response.

One can hope that their opposition to the Donks’ and Bush’s new-world-order style of financial centralization to bail out their good ole’ buddies achieves similar results.

Congressional Republicans on Tuesday voiced their strongest objections to date about the Bush administration’s $700bn financial rescue plans, dealing a blow to White House ambitions for them to be quickly approved.

As Hank Paulson, Treasury secretary, and Ben Bernanke, chairman of the Federal Reserve, predicted grim consequences if the plan were rejected, the Republicans’ Senate leadership called for new provisions on executive pay, which the administration opposes, while others cast doubt on the whole package.

  Ben Bernanke and Christopher Cox of the SEC

“We are going to advance taxpayers’ dollars, and government ends up in effect taking an equity position in businesses,” Mitch McConnell, Senate minority leader, said. “I think the taxpayers should expect no less than strict limits on the type of executive compensation that might be possible for those involved in these partially government-controlled enterprises.”

“…taking an equity position…” In other works becoming (at least part) owner…in effect socializing the hosed-over finance industry.

Growing Republican doubts will make it harder for momentum to build in favour of the proposal.

The heavy hand of governmental intervention and social engineering caused the generation of much of the toxic-grade mortgage debt that underlies the current difficulties. More of that hand intervening in the mess can only prolong the readjustment, and will make the ultimate resolution of the problem(s) all the more severe and painful. These plans need to die a rapid death, so the economy can have a chance of correcting the effects of previous interventions.

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Students the Same; Tests Get Stupider!

Girls = Boys at Math

Zip. Zilch. Nada. There’s no real difference between the scores of U.S. boys and girls on common math tests, according to a massive new study. Educators hope the finding will finally dispel lingering perceptions that girls don’t measure up to boys when it comes to crunching numbers.

“This shows there’s no issue of intellectual ability–and that’s a message we still need to get out to some of our parents and teachers,” says Henry “Hank” Kepner, president of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics in Reston, Virginia.

It won’t be a new message. Nearly 20 years ago, a large-scale study led by psychologist Janet Hyde of the University of Wisconsin, Madison, found a “trivial” gap in math test scores between boys and girls in elementary and middle school. But it did suggest that boys were better at solving more complex problems by the time they got to high school.

Now, even that small gap has disappeared, Hyde reports in tomorrow’s issue of Science. Her team sifted through scores from standardized tests taken in 2005, 2006, and 2007 by nearly 7 million students in 10 states. Overall, the researchers found “no gender difference” in scores among children in grades two through 11.

This all makes sense to the Chief, based on his 26 years in the science classroom. This piece goes on to point out that the REAL problem is in the testing.

The study’s most disturbing finding, the authors say, is that neither boys nor girls get many tough math questions on state tests now required to measure a school district’s progress under the 2002 federal No Child Left Behind law. Using a four-level rating scale, with level one being easiest, the authors said that they found no challenging level-three or -four questions on most state tests. The authors worry that means that teachers may start dropping harder math from their curriculums, because “more teachers are gearing their instruction to the test.”

This is a real issue, and one of the major flaws in the NCLB approach. The Chief was involved in South Dakota’s efforts to bring the testing in line with the states science standards…which are pretty good, and which also include higher level type three and four items noted above.

In the assessment project, we were instructed NOT to attempt to address these levels of competence in NCLB-related testing, since THERE IS NO WAY TO PROPERLY EVALUATE THE ATTAINMENT OF THESE ON THE TYPE OF “OBJECTIVE” TESTING USED FOR ESTABLISHING NCLB COMPLIANCE.

The same thing applies in math as it did for science. While the Chief has no objection (quite the contrary!) to establishing and maintaining high educational standards, the NCLB approach is fatally flawed. Unfortunately, there is no easy, concise, quick fix that readily lends itself to a bureaucratic type of approach. IMHO not only is this the case, but it is the INEVITABLE outgrowth of the establishment and growth of the massive Federal education bureaucracy of the Dept. of Education, which in turn drives a similar growth in the administrative infrastructure at the state and local levels in order to “document” compliance with the Federal mandates.

Reagan was right – abolish the US Dept. of Education!

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House Democrats Proclaim Socialist Goal

House Democrats call for nationalization of refineries

The Democrats in the House are showing their true colors: Red!

House Democrats responded to President’s Bush’s call for Congress to lift the moratorium on offshore drilling. Among other things, the Democrats called for the government to own refineries so it could better control the flow of the oil supply.

They also reasserted that the reason the Appropriations Committee markup (where the vote on the amendment to lift the ban) was cancelled so they could focus on preparing the supplemental Iraq spending bill for tomorrow.

At an off-camera briefing, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) said the same. And a senior Republican House Appropriations Committee aide adds that “there were multiple reasons for the postponement” including discussion on the supplemental. But the aide said there was the thought that Democrats may wish to avoid a debate today on energy amendments.

Here are the highlights from briefing.

Rep. Maurice Hinchey (D-NY), member of the House Appropriations Committee and one of the most-ardent opponents of off-shore drilling: “We (the government) should own the refineries. Then we can control how much gets out into the market.”

…no doubt in accordance with their Soviet style “First 5-Year Plan”

HUH? Like we want the GOVERNMENT to control “how much gets into the market”??? This from the folks who say we need to cut back on our use of automotive transportation, and limit the use of petroleum in the name of the quasi-religious myth of human-mediated glowbull warming? The same government that has the pattern of spending more for less results on a habitual basis?

G-d help us all if they pull this one off!

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Foggy Bottom Boys Caught Again

Univ. of Cal. Backs Down from ‘No Jews Allowed’ Program

A U.S. State Department-funded University of California program which provides business training for residents of the Middle East specifically excluded Israeli Jews – until Jewish journalists protested.

Although the lead refers to U.C., the program in question was set up with the selection criteria established by none other than the Foggy Bottom Boys at the US State Department.

A U.S. State Department-funded University of California program which provides business training for residents of the Middle East specifically excluded Israeli Jews – until Jewish journalists protested.

It’s obvious what the intent was here, and obvious that even the Foggy Bottom Boys couldn’t get away with this degree of overt anti-Semitism, no matter what their normal inclinations may be when left to their own devices.

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Canucks Shifting Health Care Plans

In reversal, Canada dabbles with health care privatization

As Michael Moors latest cinematic fantasy illustrates, the US left is driving full tilt for socialized medicine. One of the alleged positive examples that they say we should emulate is the system implemented in the Great White North. Unfortunately, they are about to be mugged by reality, as Canadians start to re-privatize their system. It seems like enough socialistic inefficiency and shortage is finally enough, and the Canucks still have enough gumption to push for a restoration of choice.

Canada, once considered the bedrock of national health care systems, is in the beginning stages of change toward free-market health insurance. But in a country where free health care is an afterthought, change comes slowly.

For the first time, private health care clinics are proliferating throughout Canada and arguments for allowing private physicians to practice freely are being heard.

“You are seeing the Medicare orthodoxy of the last 30 years being questioned in Canada,” said Dr. David Gratzer, a registered physician in Canada and the U.S., and senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, a nonprofit public-policy think tank. “Over the last two years, the health care system has dramatically changed to allow more private health care.”

Now, if we can just keep Hillary et al from shoving the failed socialistic model down our throats…

SD Politics

Thune: Fairness Doctrine – NOT!

Reject Orwellian Calls for Broadcast ‘Fairness’

SD GOP Senator John Thune has rhetorically smacked one out of the park concerning the recent ongoing Republocratic Demmican discussions of the restoration of the so-called “Fairness Doctrine”.

From its birth, our nation has put a high value on independent thought and freedom of speech. Our Founding Fathers themselves saw their lot as conscientious insurrectionists seeking freedoms they believed were inalienable rights. They understood the importance of permitting freedom of conscience whether it be in the religious, political, or social sphere. Today we continue to fight to preserve these freedoms both here at home and in many dark corners around the world.

Unfortunately, some in Washington DC are reviving an old idea that the government can, and should, regulate the reporting of news, information and ideas. If we take them at their word, they are doing it in the name of “fairness.” But if we look deeper, we may see motives not nearly so noble.

From this excellent start, Sen. Thune goes on to trace the history and effects of the so-called Fairness Doctrine, before concluding:

Since 1987 we have seen even greater growth in how we get news and information including the rise of talk radio, internet news sites, and blogs, yet some critics on the left are calling for the reinstitution of the Fairness Doctrine. The efforts of these critics, who are especially offended by the success of conservative talk radio, should be rejected. Our support for freedom of conscience and freedom of speech means that we must support the rights granted to even those with whom we disagree. Giving power to a few to regulate fairness in the media is a recipe for disaster on the scale that George Orwell so aptly envisioned.

I for one will strongly oppose any efforts to bring back the Fairness Doctrine or other policies similar to it. I have introduced legislation that would prohibit the FCC from reinstituting these policies, which is a good first step. I know the hair stands up on the back of my neck when I hear government officials offering to regulate the news media and talk radio to ensure fairness. I think most Americans have the same reaction. That is why I will do my part to ensure speech remains free and that Americans can continue to debate the issues of the day through our diverse forms of media in a free and open manner.

Hear, hear!

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Bureaucrats Gone Wild

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Proposed OSHA Regulation Threatens Firearm and Ammunition Industry

YIKES! Coming back from camping with Scouts and finding THIS was a rude re-awakening to the reality of contemporary bureaucracy at its worst.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), the government agency charged with assuring the safety and health of America’s workers, is proposing a regulatory rule affecting the manufacturing, transportation and storage of small arms ammunition, primers and smokeless propellants.

Warning – If you go to look at the proposed rulemaking, be prepared for a masochistic immersion in bureaucratic legalese at its worst.)

As written, the proposed rule would force the closure of nearly all ammunition manufacturers and force the cost of small arms ammunition to skyrocket beyond what the market could bear—essentially collapsing our industry. This is not an exaggeration. The cost to comply with the proposed rule for the ammunition industry, including manufacturer, wholesale distributors and retailers, will be massive and easily exceed $100 million. For example, ammunition and smokeless propellant manufacturers would have to shut down and evacuate a factory when a thunderstorm approached and customers would not be allowed within 50 feet of any ammunition (displayed or otherwise stored) without first being searched for matches or lighters.

This is just nuts! Imagine too, if they are doing this with a semi-Rebublican in the White House, what will they be going for if a Donk were there? (Shudder!)

China Watch

ChiCom Chems Adulterate Human Food Chain

Poisoned pet food now on the human dinner table

You just HAD to know that this was going to be the outcome of this situation.

“Tainted-gluten-fed-pork has hit the dinner plates of humans, according to www.denverpost.com. “California officials have revealed that the contamination got into the food chain. About 45 residents ate pork from hogs that consumed animal feed laced with melamine from China. Melamine is used to make plastics, but it also artificially boosts the protein level and thus the price of the glutens that go into food.” (denverpost.com, April 29, 2007).

As always, the gummint is looking out for us:

Even after Captain David Elder of the FDA said, “The combination of melamine and cyanuric acid is of concern to human and animal health,” the FDA is saying that the recall of thousands of hogs was not warranted. (Italics, canadafreepress.com).

“Nope, nothing going on here folks. Don’t be alarmed…sit back and watch American Idol some more. Everything is being taken care of.”

Yeah. Right. SURE it is.

Given the way authorities have handled the contaminated pet food outbreak to date, we should be worried, very worried.

As Ann Hahn, of Atlanta wrote to Canada Free Press (CFP), “Pet owners believe we should all be very, very concerned. Why? Because cyanuric acid is a hydrolysis product of melamine. Melamine in and of itself is all right as long as you don’t eat it and your body metabolizes it. And notwithstanding the fact that the wheat gluten imported by ChemNutra in the Menu Foods pet food recalled was “human grade”.” (Emphasis added.)

And the scary chain of events that got its start months ago doesn’t even end there. We know where the tainted-gluten-fed pork is. Ergo, we know too where the wheat gluten-tainted pet food went. It went into the pigs. The pigs went into the human food supply.

“In a joint statement, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) stressed, “We are not aware of any human illness that has occurred from the exposure to melamine or by its by-products.” They added that they have identified no illnesses in swine fed the contaminated feed.” (Forbes.com, April 29, 2007).

Meanwhile, we’re told “let’s just ignore the 800 lb. gorilla in the room”:

No statement from either party about why salvaged pet food known to be contaminated was fed to farm animals.

After tracing more of the ChiCom business connections, the piece concludes with this:

The contaminated pet food which made ill and even killed off an untold number of cats and dogs and was then fed as “salvaged” food to hogs–which some 45 people have eaten–is a cautionary tale whose end could bring disaster for the human populations of North America, Puerto Rico and South Africa.

Bon appetit!

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Help from the Government?

RECEIVED FROM AN E-MAIL CORRESPONDENT:

A Montana cowboy was over-seeng his herd in a remote mountainous pasture, when suddenly a brand-new BMW advanced out of a dust cloud towards him. The driver, a young man in a Brioni suit, Gucci shoes, Ray Ban sunglasses and YSL tie, leans out the window and asks the cowboy, “If I tell you exactly how many cows and calves you have in your herd, will you give me a calf?”

The cowboy looks at the man, obviously a yuppie, then looks at his eacefully grazing herd and calmly answers, “Sure, Why not?”
The yuppie parks his car, whips out his Dell notebook computer, connects it to his Singular RAZR-V3 cell phone, and surfs to a NASA page on the Internet, where he calls up a GPS satellite navigation system to get an exact fix on his location which he then feeds to another NASA satellite that cans the area in an ultra-high-resolution photo.

The young man then opens the digital photo in Adobe Photoshop and exports it to an image processing facility in Hamburg, Germany. Within seconds, he receives an email on his Palm Pilot that the image has been processed and he data stored.

He then accesses a MS-SQL database through an ODBC connected Excel Spreadsheet with email on his Blackberry and, after a few minutes, receives response.

Finally, he prints out a full-color, 3-page report on his miniaturized HP LaserJet printer and finally turns to the cowboy and says, “You have exactly 1,586 cows and calves.”

“That’s right. Well, I guess you can take one of my calves,” says the cowboy.

He watches the young man select one of the animals and looks on amused as he young man stuffs it into the trunk of his car.

Then the cowboy says to the young man, “Hey, if I can tell you exactly what your business is, will you give me back my calf?”

The young man thinks about it for a second and then says, “Okay, why not?”

“You’re a Congressman for the U.S. Government,” says the cowboy.

“Wow! That’s correct,” says the yuppie, “but how did you guess that?”

“No guessing required.” answered the cowboy. “You showed up here even though nobody called you; you want to get paid for an answer I already knew, to a question I never asked. You tried to show me how much smarter than me you are; and you don’t know a thing about cows…this is a herd of sheep.

Now give me back my dog.”

LOL

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View from an Alternative Reality

Border chief defended on ‘no confidence’

Here is a clear case for someone looking at the noonday sun and proclaiming it to be midnight! This moves the Border Patrol management into some other universe than the one that actually exists these days on the border.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner W. Ralph Basham says a “no-confidence” vote against Border Patrol Chief David V. Aguilar by leaders of the agency’s rank and file is “derisive, detrimental and blatantly unfair” and wants to meet with union leaders to tell them the chief is the right man for the job.

Right. Like his words are going to fix everything up after years of counter-productive management filtering down from the higher managers, like maybe the Customs and Border Protection Commissioner. My guess is that his credibility will be at least zero, if not moving into the domain of negative numbers.

“From my personal experience, I do not believe the rank-and-file agents have lost confidence in this chief,” Mr. Basham said.

Some people still believe the earth is flat, that we never went to the moon, and that 9-11 was a (U.S.) government plot too…but that doesn’t mean their beliefs have a basis in reality! Besides, having worked for the Feds for a long time, the Chief has observed that higher management rarely has any SERIOUS personal interaction with the people actually doing the job…most of such “contact” is generally carefully controlled, sort of on the order of a Potemkin Village type show.

Mr. Basham said. “I would very much like for the union to come to the table, have a dialogue at this time of great challenge and great opportunity. I’m extending my personal invitation and laying my personal reputation on the line.”

Excuse me? Based on the state of the border, and Border Patrol these day, the Chief has to wonder just WHAT personal reputation is there to lose anymore? I mean, when border agents are thrown to the wolves, prosecuted, and imprisoned for doing their jobs, all on Basham’s watch, his personal (professional) reputation is pretty much D.O.A. at this point.

Not to fear, the effort to blow smoke up their rectal orifice doesn’t impress the Union:

But National Border Patrol Council President T.J. Bonner yesterday called Mr. Basham “a political hack who blindly supports the president’s ill-conceived immigration agenda without regard for the damage it does to the mission of the agency and the security of our borders.”

Well spoken! The Chief heartily concurs!

Mr. Bonner said the council leadership, which represents all 11,000 non-supervisory Border Patrol agents, is willing to talk with Mr. Basham, but has “serious doubts” about his sincerity. “He appears to be far more concerned about the public perception of the bureau’s leadership than the underlying problems that led to the vote of no confidence,” he said.

Shocking! Such a thing in OUR government!

The rest of the piece has more pot-shotting between the managers and the union.

As far as the Chief is concerned, the Biblical test tells one what they need to know about the situation: …”by their fruits ye shall know them.” The border is broken.  ’nuff said.

SD Politics

Basic Government

Where the Rubber Meets the Road

Just a reflection on recently attending the annual township meeting for Moody County’s Fremont Township

A lot of people in Political Science in academia and elsewhere, have a tendency to praise the New England Town Meeting as being an example of the most fundamental form of democracy.

I haven’t noticed much comment on the township system and meeting that we have here…which are almost exactly the same thing, but which all too many seem to ignore.

It’s really rather awesome the relative amount of power that one has just by showing up and participating in these meetings…multiplied all the more by what all too often is low participation. The Chief has heard about township meetings attended by the board, and just a few other people. Guess who makes the decisions in those cases? One person present, one vote!

It’s the same thing with the county Republican and Democratic committees. I know SOME counties have a good turnout…others not. If not the default for organizing and directing the party organizations is up to whoever has enough gumption to get out of the Lazy-boy and go to the meetings.

And then we all too often complain about political outcomes that we don’t like.

These opportunities are just as important, and in many cases even more effective in an immediate way than is voting in general elections. In our, and other townships, the matters discussed directly and literally deal with what happens where the rubber meets the road – as snow is plowed, roads graveled, and then graded for maintenance.

It’s well worth a bit of time to participate, and the whole process is better for it, especially if as is claimed, all politics is local.

’nuff said.

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A Modest Proposal:

Front-loading primaries really bad idea

This is in the Aberdeen American News from South Dakota Politics‘ Ken Blanchard. Occasionally the Chief has reservations about some of his comments – but he hit the bull’s eye here, and has a very interesting idea to reduce some of the idiocy of the current Presidential electoral process.

First the kick-off:

One of my grad school professors described the simple rule by which his German grandfather approached child-rearing: Find out what the children are doing and make them stop. I sometimes think that rule should be applied vigorously to Congress and to state legislatures whenever they are in a mood to reform our political institutions.

Hear, hear!

This idea is great – probably too rational to ever be adopted, but its still neat to know that it’s there:

If you really want reform, the way to do it is divide the states into five groups, each including large and small states from every region of the country. Each group would be assigned the first Tuesday of some month from February to June. In subsequent elections the order would be rotated, so everyone gets to go first sooner or later. The purpose would not be to benefit one party or another, or any state over the others, but to do what is best for the Republic.

“…what is best for the Republic.” What a concept! Far too radical for the Congresscritters I fear.

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Just Say “NO!” to Presidents’ Day

WASHINGTON’S BIRTHDAY!

This was a moment of enlightenment to the Chief:

In some circles, today is observed as “Presidents’ Day,” jointly recognizing Presidents George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, but it is still officially recognized as the anniversary of “Washington’s Birthday”….Matthew Spaulding, a Heritage Foundation scholar, reminds: “Although it was celebrated as early as 1778, and by the early 19th Century was second only to the Fourth of July as a patriotic holiday, Congress did not officially recognize Washington’s Birthday as a national holiday until 1870. The Monday Holiday Law in 1968-applied to executive branch departments and agencies by Richard Nixon’s Executive Order 11582 in 1971-moved the holiday from February 22 to the third Monday in February. Section 6103 of Title 5, United States Code, currently designates that legal federal holiday as ‘Washington’s Birthday.’ Contrary to popular opinion, no action by Congress or order by any President has changed ‘Washington’s Birthday’ to ‘Presidents’ Day’.”

Hey, that’s enough for me! How much do I REALLY think of George Washington? Enough to name my son after him, that’s all.