Is the labor movement about to become re-acquainted with the mob? It seems the incoming head of the AFL-CIO, Richard Trumka, has himself confused with Don Corleone from The Godfather.
Imagine a business leader openly saying this about politicians: "We need to stand by our friends, punish our enemies and challenges those who, well, can't seem to decide which side they're on."
If a business leader said this, he would be pilloried in the press and likely called in front of Congress and given the third degree...and perhaps more.
Yet, when the unions' soon-to-be-coronated boss of bosses says: "We need to be a labor movement that stands by our friends, punishes its enemies and challenges those who, well, can't seem to decide which side they're on," the press reports it as though it is merely another news story on the health care debate.
No reporter questions about the audacity of threatening members of Congress, not even a raised eyebrow, nor a whimper of dissent. No question about the appropriateness of the remarks or the boorishness of the manner in which Trumka views elected officials.
Of course, then again, we're talking about Richard Trumka, the same union boss who twice pled his Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination for the Teamsters money-laundering scandal a decade ago.
While it's still too early to predict a downfall of the socialists, collectivists and statists (aka the Democrats) in the 2010 mid-term elections, Politico is reporting that the Dems' possibility to lose House seats could reach into the double digits.
After an August recess marked by raucous town halls, troubling polling data and widespread anecdotal evidence of a volatile electorate, the small universe of political analysts who closely follow House races is predicting moderate to heavy Democratic losses in 2010.
Some of the most prominent and respected handicappers can now envision an election in which Democrats suffer double-digit losses in the House — not enough to provide the 40 seats necessary to return the GOP to power but enough to put them within striking distance.
Roll up your sleeves. There's a big panic being spread by governments around the world to ensure that citizens submit to letting their governments vaccinate them against the Swine Flu (H1N1) "pandemic".
In an attempt to scare Americans, the White House issued a fishy warning that up to 90,000 Americans may die of Swine Flu during this winter's flu season. This represents slightly more than twice the number of Americans who died in car accidents in 2008 and less than a quarter of obesity-related deaths that occur every year.
Yet, even with this dire warning, U.S. government officials aren't being consistent with their rumor-mongering scare tactics.
On Sunday, for example, the Centers for Disease Control announced that, this past Spring, 10% of all New Yorkers (about 800,000) had swine flu disease. Yet, Gotham City's streets aren't littered with the bodies of the dead or dying that we're led to believe will happen if we don't submit our veins to the government's needles.
The Cure May Be Worse than the Disease
Among the many concerns about the Swine Flu issue is having the federal government dictate a mandatory vaccination program.
“It comes down to the most fundamental of all freedoms. If government can force potentially dangerous substances into our bodies what, then, can’t government do to us?” asked Constitution Party National Committee Chairman Jim Clymer.
Dangerous Substances?
What Clymer (and others) are talking about is the potentially deadly consequences (literally) of the H1N1 vaccine.
In fact, according to GlobalResearch.ca, the CDC may even find the "collateral damage" acceptable:
This means that if the entire U.S. population is vaccinated (a stated goal of the CDC), we are to assume as a fact that 30,000 Americans will suffer debilitating or lethal side effects. Apparently the CDC considers this an acceptable level of collateral damage.
The FDA has announced that a vaccine will be accepted if it creates antibodies in 4 out of 10 recipients (40%), with at least 70 percent of those 4 achieving an antibody level believed to provide benefit. This means that an acceptable vaccine candidate would provide “protection” for 28% of vaccine recipients (70% of the 40%), or less than 3 in 10 recipients. The requirement drops to 18% efficacy for those over 65 years of age (60% of 30%).
So here are the facts, as documented by the CDC and the FDA:
As many as 30,000 Americans will be harmed by the novel H1N1 vaccine.
The vaccine may be ineffective in more than 7 out of 10 recipients.
And in case you think I am alone in my concerns, here is what several vaccine experts associated with the CDC and the U.S. government say on the subject.
"I am very skeptical of finishing vaccine before we know the appropriate dose to be included in each inoculation, before immunogenicity studies are complete, or before safety assessments have been finished," William Schaffner, MD, Chairman of the Department of Preventive Medicine at Vanderbilt University and a member of the CDC Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), wrote in an recent e-mail. [Emphasis in orginal.]
Perhaps this is why President Obama's Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius gave legal immunity against lawsuits that may arise to the makers of the vaccines. According to FoodConsumer.org:
The last time the government embarked on a major vaccine campaign against a new swine flu, thousands filed claims contending they suffered side effects from the shots. This time around, they will have no recourse.
The potential for fatal side effects may also be why, according to the video below, the makers of the vaccines aren't taking it themselves.
With all of the evidence mounting toward a government-induced panic and a constitutionally-questionable mandatory vaccination program, the real question becomes: Why would the U.S government want to subject the citizenry to such dangerously piggish tactics?
President Obama's supporters hope to recapture the energy of last year's triumphant election campaign in a bid to regain control of the health-care debate, planning more than 2,000 house parties, rallies and town hall meetings across the country over the next two weeks.
The effort comes as a result of the Left's unexpected resistance from Americans to nationalize the nation's health care system.
Astro-turf planners, such as the DNC's Organizing Against America are planning this last minute push, knowing that the majority of Americans are against having the federal government dictate their health care choices, while forcing the nation into bankruptcy by spending more than the country can afford.
It is very easy to say this with a straight face: For at least six out of the eight years of the Bush presidency, the media was less than friendly with the president. In fact, some could say the press was overtly hostile to the Bush Administration.
Yet, in all those years of the blood sport that became known as 'Bush Bashing' never did the former president say to one of those who were critical of him: 'I hope you go out of business.'
Yet, that is what Senate Majority Harry Reid allegedly told the Director of Advertising of the Las Vegas Review-Journal last Wednesday at a Chamber of Commerce meeting.
Then, later, according to the Review-Journal, Reid said he wanted to let everyone know that he wants the Review-Journal to continue selling advertising because the Las Vegas Sun is delivered inside the Review-Journal.
These two remarks prompted a scathing rebuke from the publisher of the Review-Journal wrote:
This newspaper traces its roots to before Las Vegas was Las Vegas.
We've seen cattle ranches give way to railroads. We chronicled the construction of Hoover Dam. We reported on the first day of legalized gambling. The first hospital. The first school. The first church. We survived the mob, Howard Hughes, the Great Depression, several recessions, two world wars, dozens of news competitors and any number of two-bit politicians who couldn't stand scrutiny, much less criticism.
We're still here doing what we do for the people of Las Vegas and Nevada. So, let me assure you, if we weathered all of that, we can damn sure outlast the bully threats of Sen. Harry Reid.
....
Such behavior cannot go unchallenged.
You could call Reid's remark ugly and be right. It certainly was boorish. Asinine? That goes without saying.
But to fully capture the magnitude of Reid's remark (and to stop him from doing the same thing to others) it must be called what it was -- a full-on threat perpetrated by a bully who has forgotten that he was elected to office to protect Nevadans, not sound like he's shaking them down.
No citizen should expect this kind of behavior from a U.S. senator. It is certainly not becoming of a man who is the majority leader in the U.S. Senate. And it absolutely is not what anyone would expect from a man who now asks Nevadans to send him back to the Senate for a fifth term.
If he thinks he can push the state's largest newspaper around by exacting some kind of economic punishment in retaliation for not seeing eye to eye with him on matters of politics, I can only imagine how he pressures businesses and individuals who don't have the wherewithal of the Review-Journal.
For the sake of all who live and work in Nevada, we can't let this bully behavior pass without calling out Sen. Reid. If he'll try it with the Review-Journal, you can bet that he's tried it with others. So today, we serve notice on Sen. Reid that this creepy tactic will not be tolerated.
We won't allow you to bully us. And if you try it with anyone else, count on going through us first.
That's a promise, not a threat.
And it's a promise to our readers, not to you, Sen. Reid.
Clearly, the Las Vegas Review-Journal understands the how to handle a school-yard bully like Harry Reid.
Al Gore has made a name for himself. From Senator to Vice President to almost-President to an Enviro-Cult Leader to Concert Promoter and Nobel Prize winner. He's quite a guy.
In fact, he has become something of a celebrity you might say. If you doubt that, just ask any of his tree-hugging worshippers and they might just throw their tofu shake in your face. At least that is the impression that Peter Foster gets as he writes in his piece: Peter Foster: The man who doubted Al Gore.
Foster, it seems, isn't buying all that Big Al has to sell and writes:
If one were to think of current candidates for the most disastrous of faux pas, surely none could be greater than “The Man Who Expressed Skepticism About atastrophic Man-made Global Warming.” Not merely do mouths gape, but eyes roll at any dimwit’s failure to grasp that there is “consensus” on the issue. Indeed, to dissent is seen not merely as evidence of mental deficiency but moral turpitude.
....
It conforms to a broad view — long and fondly promoted by fans of Big Government — that capitalism is essentially short-sighted and greed-driven (just look at the subprime crisis!). This stance is not merely appealing to activist politicians and bureaucrats, it is pure gold for the vast and growing army of radical NGO environmental lobby groups, whose raison d’être — and fundraising — are closely related to the degree to which nature is seen to be “endangered.” It is also appealing to rent seeking businessmen who see the profit potential in the vast array of controls and subsidies.
Nevertheless, most ordinary people reasonably imagine in the face of such a weight of “authority” that the case must be closed. It isn’t. For a start, the weight of authority is based on the political doctoring of studies that are in any case designed to countenance no other conclusion than that man-made carbon dioxide drives the climate. Moreover, the very fact that the theory’s promoters are so reluctant to actually engage in scientific debate (No time to talk. Must act!) is highly suspicious.
However, once you get people believing in “authority,” then you’re pretty much home and dry. Authority relieves us of the anxiety of uncertainty and the pain of thought. If the issue can also be portrayed as “moral” (millions of poor people dying from biblical droughts and floods!) then to question it is not merely cause for rejection but censure. Skeptics must be either crackpots or in the pay of Big Oil or Big Coal.
A brilliant article and worth sharing if, for no other reason than to draw the ire of those who drink the snake oil that Al Gore and the rest of his enviro-cult followers are selling.
A picture is worth a thousand words and this graph says a lot about the direction the United States is heading.
The Heritage Foundation's blog The Foundry has an interesting blogpost regarding the debt that you and your children and their children will be paying as a result of the U.S. government's spend, spend spend policies.
Among the points they make:
Federal spending is up 57 percent since 2001.
In 2009, Washington will spend $30,958 per household–the highest level in American history–and under President Obama’s budget, the figure will rise above $33,000 by 2019.
The White House brags that it will cut the deficit in half by 2013. The President does not mention that the deficit has nearly quadrupled this year. Merely cutting it in half from that bloated level would still leave budget deficits twice as high as under President Bush.
The public national debt–$5.8 trillion as of 2008–is projected to double by 2012 and nearly triple by 2019. Thus, America would accumulate more government debt under President Obama than under every President in American history from George Washington to George W. Bush combined.
For those who don't mind working for the government 50% or more of your time, you should have no problem with these figures.
On this August evening 2009, we are pleased to launch Dienekes' Place.
Our purpose is very simple:
To expose tyrants, despots, and other malignant tumors on Man's right to exist for his own sake
To fight for freedom from tyranny
To provide a refuge for fellow freedom fighters to seek solace and comfort in the words found on these pages
To provide a forum for those who share in the values of freedom, individual rights, and the free-market
While the fight we are embarking on is for justice, for our freedom, for our nation's freedom, and for our children, we will enjoy with relish the fight, for our enemies may be many, our weapons are guided by reason and our wit is razor sharp.
DIENEKES' FAVORITE QUOTES "In any compromise between food and poison, it is only death that can win. In any compromise between good and evil, it is only evil that can profit." - Ayn Rand
Nearly 2500 years ago, a small army of warriors and their allies engaged in a battle against tyranny—freedom against slavery.
Without this battle, it has been said, Western Civilization and Democracy would never have been born.
Indeed, were it not for the Battle of Thermopylae in the year 480 B.C., America could never have existed.
And, here is the story of Dienekes:
Although extraordinary valor was displayed by the entire corps of Spartans and Thespians, yet bravest of all was declared the Spartan Dienekes.
It is said that on the eve of battle, he was told by a native of Trachis that the Persian archers were so numerous that their arrows would blot out the sun.
Dienekes, however, undaunted by this prospect, remarked with a laugh:
Is the labor movement about to become re-acquainted with the mob? It seems the incoming head of the AFL-CIO, Richard Trumka, has himself confused with Don Corleone from The Godfather.
