Building a better bailout

Here’s a cure for the economic crisis.  Turn off the TV news.  I’m serious.  Then don’t bother to read the front or business pages of your newspaper, if you are one of the few people who still actually reads one.  Ignore the “HEADLINES” at your favorite home-page, and just skip to sports, or entertainment, or go Blog something.  Keep up on political issues other than this one.  And whenever possible look for stories that tell us why the government is more likely the problem and not the answer.  These are usually filled with things called ‘facts,’ ones that can be verified, and the tone tends to be less cataclysmic.  You may find yourself quite at ease, able to sleep at night, refreshed and able to take on new challenges.

 

No, it’s not perfect, but the 24/7 Newsertainment industry is such a complete waste of time—like a bunch of seagulls fighting over the last piece of bread—that getting away from the senseless noise they are making is usually all you need to get a handle on how un-cataclysmic this all really is.   They simply have no interest in your feeling safe or satisfied about anything.

 

 

Pardon my absence

Autumn has placed some unusual demands on my time, so I have not been available for frequent updates. 

I have also been front page blogging at NH Insider.com when the opportunity presents itself. You can access my blog there, from here.

I will be cross posting those blogs here, and vice -versa, as soon as I get all my pre-winter chores completed. (I need another week or so). 

The timing stinks with the election so close, but the house and the family have to come first.

Double Standard?

The 10^th circuit ruled that the State of Colorado could not (in a nutshell) set itself up in the business of defining what is or is not too religious, and as such, struck down a State law that prohibited financial aid to students applying to certain religious colleges.

…a federal appeals court ruled Wednesday that Colorado may not distinguish between sectarian and “pervasively sectarian” colleges to deny state funds to students in the latter category. Such distinctions, the court ruled, amount to illegal state preferences for some religious groups over others.

It’s an interesting decision. The article is here, and the circuit court’s decision is here.

But what really caught my attention was this closing statement by Barry Lynn. This from the article linked above.

Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, in an interview Wednesday night, agreed that the decision was significant, but criticized it as part of “an erosion” of the rights of Americans not to support religious education and belief with which they disagree.

“This will support universities set up precisely to promote the faith, and now they will be promoting it with tax dollars of people who disagree with their view,” Lynn said.

Really?

So if it is a problem when a student in need of financial aid, wants to use that aid to attend a religious university, why can’t we apply the same metric to other forms of government funding?  I happen to be against corporate welfare, in fact I’m against government welfare almost entirely.  I’m not a big fan of giving cash to people in a farm bill who don’t farm.  Wow, I could do this for days.  Why isn’t that prohibited based on “my views?” Particularlywhen things like farm bills, and Federal welfare are not even protected by the constitution?

But the point I really wanted to make—mostly because it will inflame the left wing masses—is that millions of government tax dollars are spent funding the already profitable Planned Parenthood.  Isn’t this promoting abortion with the tax dollars of people who disagree with that view? 

Based on Barry’s metric I believe it is.  No outrage from the left?  Not surprised.

Outrage we can believe in

Obama’s campaign is offended again.  (OMG!)

I just picked this up from the from the Concord monitor online.  It’s the latest cover of the New Yorker on which “radical positions” appear projected upon a caricature of the Obama’s–presumably in the living room of their posh Hyde Park domicile–asperhaps a parody of their real politics of meaning™?  Yes, that’s an American flag burning in the fireplace.

As this is the New Yorker I have to assume this is a parody of right wing concerns deigned to make the Right look like chicken-littles. 

 But it’s no surprise they are put-off.  But being offended is the one campaign ritual which Senator Obama has not had to come out and contradict.

…spokesman, Bill Burton, said: “The New Yorker may think, as one of their staff explained to us, that their cover is a satirical lampoon of the caricature Senator Obama’s right-wing critics have tried to create,” Burton said. “But most readers will see it as tasteless and offensive. And we agree.”

This cartoon has not sparked rioting among the faithful, and no American lives are believed to be in danger. (Not yet anyway)

What do Democrats eat?

My daughter was in a very short version of the play Annie with her Girl Scout Troop-at day camp.

At one point, after Big Daddy Warbucks invites President Roosevelt over for dinner he turns to his assistant and says, “Oh and Grace, find out what Democrats eat?”

I laughed out loud.   I’m not sure why I found it so funny.  I Just thought I’d share that.