Monday, August 8, 2011

Barker's Newsbites: Monday, August 8, 2011


Folks...

(*PAUSE*)

Unfortunately I was unable to find a song titled, "Die, All You Left Wing Incompetent Sons of Bitches Who Are Destroying My Country"

So...

Posted by at

12 comments:

William R. Barker said...

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111903454504576490693550927876.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_BelowLEFTSecond

After last month's debt-ceiling debacle, a critical mass of President Obama's harshest critics have gone from calling him socialism's evil genius to tagging him as merely a clueless community organizer who is in over his head.

Yet while the haggling over spending exposed many of the president's weaknesses, it seems a mistake to underestimate his collectivist instincts.

It may be true that if he cannot accomplish what he wants by decree, he loses interest fast. But it also remains evident that his worldview is largely aligned with the eternal struggle for an all-powerful state.

Observe U.S. foreign policy in Latin America over the last two and a half years: In particular, consider how Honduras took a beating from the Obama administration over its decision to remove a law-breaking leftist president in 2009, while Ecuador is getting little pushback from Washington as it steps ever closer to dictatorship.

This contradiction became pronounced last month when Ecuadoran President Rafael Correa, an ally of Venezuela's Hugo Chávez, used his control of the judiciary to win a lawsuit against a columnist and three directors of the Ecuadoran daily El Universo. They will have to pay him a total of $42 million, and each has been sentenced to three years in jail.

Mr. Obama's State Department is treating the Ecuadoran incident gingerly.

* HIL-AR-Y! HIL-AR-Y! HIL-AR-Y! HIL-AR-Y! HIL-AR-Y!

It issued a brief statement on the importance of a free press and said that it "join[s] the Inter American Press Association, the Committee to Protect Journalists, and others in expressing concern over the sentence in the El Universo case."

(*SNORT*)

* NOW... LET'S COMPARE AND CONTRAST:

In 2009, Honduras fought to save its democracy by removing then-President Manuel Zelaya, who had used street violence to try to extend his tenure in violation of his country's constitution. The Obama administration responded by pulling the travel visas of Honduras's Supreme Court judges, human rights ombudsman and members of Congress. It suspended most U.S. aid and supported the suspension of Honduras from the Organization of American States (OAS), which resulted in the cutoff of aid from international financial institutions.

(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)

When I called the OAS press office for a statement on the travesty in Ecuador, the person who came to the phone would only say that the OAS has "no comment."

It is hardly surprising. The credibility of that institution has been destroyed because, in the absence of U.S. leadership, Mr. Chávez and company have taken it over.

OAS Secretary General José Miguel Insulza, a washed-up Chilean Socialist, bends to every whim of his chavista task masters.

This brings us back to the question of where Mr. Obama's sympathies lie.

(*PURSED LIPS*)

A good clue can be found by comparing the aggression launched against Tegucigalpa (Capital of Honduras) with the timidity of the policy toward Quito (Capital of Ecuador).

August 8, 2011 at 10:15 AM
William R. Barker said...

* TWO-PARTER... (Part 1 of 2)

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111903454504576486690371838036.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEFTSecondBucket

* FOLKS... ALL OF THE FOLLOWING HAS LONG BEEN KNOWN TO ME... BUT JUST IN CASE ANY OF YOU WERE UNAWARE...

In 2007, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 27% of male full-time workers had workweeks of 41 or more hours, compared with 15% of female full-time workers; meanwhile, just 4% of full-time men worked 35 to 39 hours a week, while 12% of women did.

* FOLKS... HAVE YOU EVER HEARD THE TERM "PROOFINESS?"

Proofiness is the use of misleading statistics to confirm what you already believe. Indeed, the "women still earn on average only about 75 cents for every dollar a man earns" meme depends on a panoply of apple-to-orange comparisons that support a variety of feminist policy initiatives, from the Paycheck Fairness Act to universal child care, while telling us next to nothing about the well-being of women.

Let's begin by unpacking that 75-cent statistic, which actually varies from 75-cents to about 81-cents depending on the year and the study.

The figure is based on the average earnings of full-time, year-round (FTYR) workers, usually defined as those who work 35 hours a week or more.

[C]onsider the mischief contained in that "or more."

It makes the full-time category embrace everyone from a clerk who arrives at her desk at 9 am and leaves promptly at 4 pm to a trial lawyer who eats dinner four nights a week - and lunch on weekends - at his desk. I assume, in this case, that the clerk is a woman and the lawyer a man for the simple reason that - and here is an average that proofers rarely mention - full-time men work more hours than full-time women do.

Since FTYR men work more than FTYR women do, it shouldn't be surprising that the men, on average, earn more.

* THESE ARE STATISTICS, PEOPLE; INDIVIDUAL SITUATIONS OF COURSE VARY!

* To be continued...

August 8, 2011 at 11:00 AM
William R. Barker said...

* CONCLUDING... (Part 2 of 2)

[No one is saying] that all is gender-equal in the labor market. It is not. It also isn't to imply that discrimination against women doesn't exist or that employers shouldn't get more creative in adapting to the large number of mothers in the workplace. It does and they should. But by severely overstating and sensationalizing what is a universal predicament (I'm looking at you, Sweden and Iceland!), proofers encourage resentment-fueled demands that no government anywhere has ever fulfilled - and that no government ever will.

The way proofers finesse "full-time" can be a wonder to behold. Take a recent article in the Washington Post by Mariko Chang, author of a forthcoming book on the wealth gap between women and men. Chang cites a wage difference between "full-time" male and female pharmacists to show how "even when they work in the same occupation, men earn more."

* HOWEVER... (READ ON!)

A moment's Googling led me to a 2001 study in the Journal of the American Pharmacists Association concluding that male pharmacists worked 44.1 hours a week, on average, while females worked 37.2 hours. That study is a bit dated, but it's a good guess that things haven't changed much in the last decade.

(According to a 2009 article in the American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education, female pharmacists' preference for reduced work hours is enough to lead to an industry labor shortage.)

The other arena of mischief contained in the 75-cent statistic lies in the seemingly harmless term "occupation."

Everyone knows that a CEO makes more than a secretary and that a computer scientist makes more than a nurse. And most people wouldn't be shocked to hear that secretaries and nurses are likely to be women, while CEOs and computer scientists are likely to be men. That obviously explains much of the wage gap. But proofers often make the claim that women earn less than men doing the exact same job.

They can't possibly know that.

(*!!!*)

The Labor Department's occupational categories can be so large that a woman could drive a truck through them. Among "physicians and surgeons," for example, women make only 64.2% of what men make. Outrageous, right? Not if you consider that there are dozens of specialties in medicine: some, like cardiac surgery, require years of extra training, grueling hours, and life-and-death procedures; others, like pediatrics, are less demanding and consequently less highly rewarded. Only 16% of surgeons, but a full 50% of pediatricians, are women. So the statement that female doctors make only 64.2% of what men make is really on the order of a tautology, much like saying that a surgeon working 50 hours a week makes significantly more than a pediatrician working 37.

(*SNORT*) (*GUFFAW*) (*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD AT HOW DISINGENUOUS THE LEFT CAN BE*)

* FOLKS... THIS IS A LONG ARTICLE AND I'M GONNA LET THOSE OF YOU INTERESTED CONTINUE READING IT VIA THE LINK PROVIDED. IF THE LINK DOESN'T WORK, GOOGLE "KAY S. HYMOWITZ + WHY THE GENDER GAP WON'T GO AWAY". (BTW... THE PIECE ORIGINALLY RAN IN CITY JOURNAL - PERHAPS UNDER A DIFFERENT TITLE.)

August 8, 2011 at 11:01 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.cnbc.com/id/44058747

Standard & Poor's downgraded the ratings of government-sponsored enterprises Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac Monday...

* NOW IMAGINE THAT! DOWNGRADING ENTITIES THAT REGULARLY DEMAND BILLIONS IN FEDERAL BAILOUTS. (*SMIRK*)

Both Fannie and Freddie were lowered to AA+ from triple-A. The Federal Home Loan Banks were also cut to AA-plus.

* O-BAM-A! O-BAM-A! O-BAM-A! O-BAM-A! O-BAM-A!

S&P also cut ratings for several of the main arteries of the US financial system - the Depository Trust Co., National Securities Clearing Corp., Fixed Income Clearing Corp. and the Options Clearing Corp. - were cut one notch to AA-plus.

(*SARCASTIC CLAP-CLAP-CLAP*)

* ACTUALLY, THOUGH, FOLKS... IN ALL SERIOUSNESS... I TAKE THAT "SARCASTIC" BIT BACK. THESE DOWNGRADES ARE NECESSARY! THESE DOWNGRADES REFLECT REALITY! IT'S LONG PAST TIME THAT THIS NATION AND HER PEOPLE BEGAN LOOKING AT OUR SITUATION THE WAY IT IS, NOT VIA THE ROSE COLORED GLASSES OF THE PROGRESSIVES ON ONE END OF THE SPECTRUM AND THE WALL STREET INSIDERS ON THE OTHER.

* FACT IS FOLKS... (*SIGH*) (*PAUSE*)... BETTER LATE THAN NEVER... S&P IS DOING THEIR JOB!

August 8, 2011 at 11:25 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.nationaljournal.com/whitehouse/education-department-moving-forward-on-nclb-waivers-for-states-20110808

The Obama administration will take the next step toward creating a system that would offer waivers to states seeking "relief" from testing mandates in the No Child Left Behind Law...

* "WAIVERS...?" "WAIVERS...?" NOW WHERE ELSE HAS THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION BEEN HANDING OUT "WAIVERS" TO POLITICAL SUPPORTERS AND UNIONS; OH, YEAH...! OBAMACARE WAIVERS!

* BY THE WAY... WASN'T "NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND" A MAJOR TED KENNEDY INITIATIVE...? (RHETORICAL QUESTION... THE ANSWER IS "YES.")

President Obama had called on lawmakers to rewrite the law by the start of the new school yearPresident Obama had called on lawmakers to rewrite the law by the start of the new school year...

* WE'RE TALKING HARRY REID'S SENATE - WHICH HASN'T COME UP WITH A NATIONAL BUDGET PROPOSAL FOR OVER 800 DAYS!

Duncan warned in mid-June that his office was beginning to prepare regulations to offer waivers if Congress did not take action.

* BY WHAT AUTHORITY DOES THE EXECUTIVE BRANCH ISSUE WAIVERS? THIS IS NOT THE PARDON POWER OF THE CONSTITUTION. UNLESS PROVISION FOR WAIVERS IS IN THE EXISTING LEGISLATION THAN THIS ACTION BY THE ADMINISTRATION WOULD BE FLAT OUT ILLEGAL!

* BOTTOM LINE... OBAMA WANTS TO LOWER EDUCATIONAL STANDARDS - OR AT LEAST HIDE EVIDENCE OF FAILURES TO ACHIEVE SAME!

August 8, 2011 at 11:36 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://detnews.com/article/20110808/POLITICS02/108080356/30-000-college-students-kicked-out-of-food-aid-program-in-Michigan

Michigan has removed about 30,000 college students from its food stamp program - close to double the initial estimate - saving about $75 million a year, says Human Services Director Maura Corrigan.

(*CLAP-CLAP-CLAP*)

* WHO SAYS I NEVER POST GOOD NEWS...!?

Federal rules don't allow most college students to collect food stamps, but Michigan had created its own rules that made nearly all students eligible, said Brian Rooney, Corrigan's deputy director. As a result, the number of Michigan college students on this form of welfare made the state a national leader.

(*SNORT*)

* MY, MY... THE DEMOCRATS WHO PUT THAT "PLAN" INTO ACTION REALLY OUT-DID THEMSELVES!

Cutting off the students is part of what Corrigan says is an effort to change the culture of the state's welfare department and slash tens of millions of dollars of waste, fraud and abuse.

* BTW... CORRIGAN IS "ONE OF US" - A MEMBER OF THE FEDERALIST SOCIETY NO LESS!

"Maybe (students) could go get a part-time job - that's what I did," said Corrigan, a former justice of the Michigan Supreme Court who attended Detroit's Marygrove College and University of Detroit Mercy School of Law. "We want to encourage people to be self-sufficient, not to be dependent on the government," she said in an interview with The Detroit News.

(*STANDING OVATION*)

Corrigan, appointed by Republican Gov. Rick Snyder in January to head the $6.9 billion Department of Human Services, has also ordered administrators to start looking at applicants' assets, not just their income. That move follows an uproar after it was revealed Leroy Fick of Auburn remained eligible for food stamps and continued using them after he won $2 million in the state lottery TV show "Make Me Rich!" in June 2010.

(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)

Even after the recent removal of 30,000 college students from the food stamp program, close to 2 million Michigan residents - one in five - are on the program, Rooney said.

* LIBERALISM RUN AMOK!

* FOLKS... THE FOOD STAMP ROLLS ACROSS THE NATION NEED TO BE PRUNED. WE MUST FURTHER LOWER THE ELIGIBILITY CEILING. WE MUST ALSO BRING BACK THE CONCEPT OF "SHAME" SO AS TO PUSH PEOPLE NOT TO TAKE FOOD STAMPS IN THE FIRST PLACE, AND IF THEY DO, TO GET OFF THEM AS SOON AS POSSIBLE.

August 8, 2011 at 11:51 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AF_EAST_AFRICA_FAMINE?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2011-08-08-10-58-31

[A] top U.S. official said Monday...Washington [is] prepared to announce $100 million in new famine aid...

(*DRUM ROLL*) WAIT FOR IT... WAIT FOR IT...

Somalia[!]

* FOLKS... YA JUST CAN'T MAKE THIS SHIT UP! WE'RE BORROWING MONEY FROM CHINA TO SEND TO SOMALIA!

* HEY... FOLKS... HOW'S THAT HAITI AID WORKING OUT...?

(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)

August 8, 2011 at 11:59 AM
William R. Barker said...

* TWO-PARTER... (Part 1 of 2)

http://paul.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1903:super-congress-a-gift-to-k-street&catid=62:texas-straight-talk&Itemid=69

* BY THE HONORABLE RON PAUL (R-TX)

The Super Congress created by the recent debt ceiling increase deal is a typical example of something nefarious attached to a bigger bill that is rushed through Congress without giving Members ample opportunity to consider the full ramifications.

* OH... AND BTW... PAUL ISN'T EVEN ADDRESSING THE ISSUE OF THE CONSTITUTIONALITY - OR RATHER, UNCONSTITUTIONALITY - OF THE "SUPER COMMITTEE" OF 12 MEMBERS OF CONGRESS APPOINTED BY REID AND BOEHNER.

This commission may turn into an early Christmas present for the well-heeled lobbyists of K Street. This is because the commission presents a huge opportunity for lobbying firms to sneak their client's pet projects and issues into whatever legislation is created by the commission. The fact that automatic cuts to defense are named if the committee deadlocks simply signals to the military industrial complex to bring their "A-Game" to the lobbying effort.

(*NOD*)

One red flag I am constantly aware of in my position as a Congressman is that highly complex and convoluted legislation frequently has dangerous provisions hidden in the fine print. Elaborate legislative packages force lawmakers to take the bad with the good, and often if they refuse, they are accused of voting against the positive provision - never mind the blatant Constitutional violations in the bill...

(*WILD APPLAUSE*) THERE YA GO, RON! GOOD JOB! I'M NOT ALONE HERE...!!!

...the spending, the waste, and the unchecked expansion of government.

I don't usually have to read too much of a bill like that before encountering something unconstitutional, or simply unwise. Then I have to vote no.

* FOLKS... (*SIGH*)... NO BILL SHOULD BE LONGER THAN 8...10...12...15 PAGES TOPS. IN OTHER WORDS, NO LONGER THAN THE AVERAGE "EDUCATED" AMERICAN CAN ABSORB AND UNDERSTAND.

I have to vote no.... [but that] doesn't seem to be the case with a majority of legislators, unfortunately.

(*SAD NOD OF AGREEMENT*)

In order to ram through one special interest's favorable treatment or giveaway, a certain amount of horse-trading is done. The end result is mammoth bills with myriads of unrelated provisions that favor those with the best lobbyists at the expense of everyone else.

* To be continued...

August 8, 2011 at 2:50 PM
William R. Barker said...

* CONCLUDING... (Part 2 of 2)

The creation of a 12 member committee to preside over $1.5 trillion in spending decisions, and the exclusion of the rest of Congress also means lobbying firms can focus their efforts on an anointed few, which is certainly more manageable for them than having to deal with the entire Congress.

(*FACE LIKE I JUST SUCKED A LEMON*)

Every cut considered will, of course, have a recipient on the other end whose livelihood is being threatened. The probable outcome is that any cuts realized will be more a function of lobbying prowess than the merits or demerits of the actual programs on the chopping block.

(*SIGH*)

Make no mistake - I am enthusiastically for cutting government spending. The goal should be to eventually reduce government down to the size and scope of its constitutional limitations. However, the process of getting there must also be constitutional.

Concentrating such special authority to fast track legislation affecting so many special interests to a small, select committee is nothing more than an unprecedented power grab. Only fears of an impending catastrophe could have motivated Members to allow this legislation to be rushed through Congress. The Founding Fathers had strong feelings about taxation without representation and under no circumstances would they have felt excluding 98% of Congress from fiscal decisions was appropriate.

* HEAR! HEAR! EXACTLY RIGHT...!!!

I see nothing good coming out of this [Super Committee]. I suspect it will be highly vulnerable to corruption and special interests. No benefit can come from such careless disregard of the Founders' design.

* FOLKS... EVERY "YEA" VOTE FOR THE BOEHNER-MCCONNELL-OBAMA-REID-PELOSI BILL WAS A VOTE TO TRASH THE CONSTITUTION.

August 8, 2011 at 2:50 PM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.infowars.com/pollster-americans-are-pre-revolutionary/

* LISTEN... FOLKS... IF YOU DON'T VIEW INFOWARS AS AN "AUTHORITATIVE" SOURCE THAT'S FINE - BUT I'VE FOLLOWED THE LINKS AND INVITE YOU TO DOUBLE-CHECK THE FACTS FOR YOURSELF. THIS ARTICLE IS NO JOKE AND NO "RIGHT WING RAVING!"

* BTW... HAT TIP TO MY BUDDY "MIKE D." FOR FORWARDING ME THE LINK!

Amidst riots in central Europe that have now spread to London and a debt downgrade that threatens to plunge the United States into a double-dip recession, Americans’ lack of confidence in their leadership is so crippled that they are now “pre-revolutionary,” according to pollster Pat Caddell.

* PAT CADDELL IS A SERIOUS GUY... A WELL-RESPECTED LIFELONG DEMOCRAT.

A new Rasmussen poll shows that just 17 per cent of Americans believe that the U.S. government has the consent of the governed, an all time low.

“The number of voters who feel the government has the consent of the governed - a foundational principle, contained in the Declaration of Independence - is down from 23% in early May and has fallen to its lowest level measured yet,” according to Rasmussen.

(*SIGH*)

The poll was conducted before Friday’s U.S. debt downgrade, indicating that the figures could be even more dire in the aftermath of what some analysts believe is a precursor to a new great depression.

* BEFORE THE DOWNGRADE! BEFORE THE STOCK MARKET CRASH! JEEZUS...

This conclusion follows Pat Caddell’s observation last November that “a sea of anger is churning” amongst Americans who “want to take their country back” and that the nation stood on the brink of a “pre-revolutionary moment.”

* FOLKS... UNDERSTAND:

Back in early 2008, before the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the start of the financial crisis, we warned that inflation and economic uncertainty would cause a massive social dislocation, which would lead to riots globally. Gerald Celente and others repeated the warning in late 2008. Over the last 18 months, we have now witnessed such scenes across the Middle East and in France, Spain, Greece, Italy and most recently London. Indeed, the only major western country not to experience significant social unrest since the economic collapse is America, although anecdotal evidence of rising crime and thefts suggests a turning point could be just around the corner.

(*SHRUG*)

* FOLKS... RANDOMLY BROWSE THROUGH THE ARCHIVES OF THIS BLOG; LIKE IT OR NOT, WHAT YOU'RE READING NOW DOES INDEED JIBE WITH REALITY.

August 8, 2011 at 3:35 PM
Mike D said...

“The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants.
It is its natural manure.” Thomas Jefferson

August 9, 2011 at 7:28 AM
William R. Barker said...

Hey, Mike...!!!

Didn't see your post till now!

Thanks for commenting; thanks for sharing Jefferson's wisdom!

BILL

August 12, 2011 at 12:30 PM

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