PolifrogBlog

There is no free in liberty.


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Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Another "Open Minded" Liberal Journalist, Lex Alexander...

polifrog



Lex has apparently discovered a few "facts" as he calls them:


  • Intelligent Design: It’s a crock.
  • Rush Limbaugh: Yeah, he’s a racist.
  • Torture: Always a bad idea.
  • George W. Bush should have been impeached.
  • Fox “News”: Biased. (And, no, I’m not talking about people who are paid to have opinions, like Hannity and O’Reilly; I’m talking about the actual news operation.)
  • Sarah Palin: idiotic, self-absorbed, paranoid and a whiner. No link needed; after 50 years on this planet, I’m perfectly capable of distinguishing these characteristics on my own. UPDATE: Aw, heck, here’s one link. ANOTHER UPDATE: Aw, heck, here’s another.
  • : too many links to even begin to list them. And if you’re going to suggest that the hacked e-mail proves global warming is a “hoax,” you have to show specifically which of the 30,000+ climate-science studies have been refuted by them. Go on. I’ll wait.
  • Birtherism. Hawaii has the birth certificate, and if you seriously want to argue this, you also have to argue away the birth announcement in 1961 newspapers. And, no, “time travel” is not a winning argument in this dimension.


My focus is bullet seven, anthropogenic global warming

Assuming a posture of confident arrogance in the matter of a hypothesis is a risky business (assuming it fact is stupid), yet this appears to be Lex's stance in the face of rejection of the hypothesis by the meteorological community, in the face of multiple scandals that have delegitimized leading scientific proponents of the hypothesis, and most bafflingly in the face of a hypothesis that has failed nearly all, if not all, predictions.

With ossified non journalists like Lex posing as society's questioners it is no wonder the press is no longer trusted.





Note: I am open to any and all challenge.
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Dick Morris - Obama WILL Loose...

polifrog








The battle for the nomination in the Republican party is not an indication of weakness but of process and when we enter the general the obviousness of what Dick Morris says in the video above will become apparent.




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Romny Lets Michigan Know They Were Dupes For Believing Him: "We will fight to get health care for all Americans"...

polifrog



No, I don't believe Romney when he says he will kill ObamaCare.

Via Right Scoop:







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Although All Religions Should be Allowed to Inform Governance, None Should Stand Above Any Other...

polfrog




... unfortunately even Our Judges frequently forget that.


Pamela Geller:

Back in October, I reported on Ernest Perce, a parade-goer wearing a "Zombie Muhammad" costume while marching in a local Pennsylvania Halloween parade. He was viciously attacked and choked by Talaag Elbayomy, a Muslim (who was enforcing the sharia -- he assumed that it was illegal in this country to insult Muhammad). "He grabbed me, choked me from the back, and spun me around to try to get my sign off that was wrapped around my neck," reported Perce.
Last week, an American judge in Pennsylvania, Judge Mark Martin, ruled on the case and sided with the Muslim, and said that the victim would have been put to death in Muslim societies for his "crime."

Martin told Perce: "Having had the benefit of having spent over two and a half years in predominantly Muslim countries I think I know a little bit about the faith of Islam. ... In many Arabic-speaking countries something like this is definitely against the law there. In their society in fact it can be punishable by death and it frequently is in their society."
So what? This is America, where we don't have to obey the Islamic blasphemy laws -- at least not yet. But Martin went on to reveal why he was ruling against the victim: "Then what you have done is you have completely trashed their essence, their being. They find it very very very offensive. I'm a Muslim, I find it offensive." He now denies that he is a Muslim, but that's what he said.

Ultimately, it is irrelevant if the judge is or isn't a Muslim. What is germane is his sharia ruling, which is worse if he's not a Muslim. In Islam, sharia supersedes all man-made laws. It is the law of Allah, so one might understand (though not condone) a Muslim judge defaulting to sharia. But an American judge admonishing an infidel victim while holding up the Koran is shocking. You hear the Koran slam down in the audio of the court proceeding. Martin also told Perce: "You're way outside your boundaries or First Amendment rights."
Perce had video of the attack, but Judge Martin refused to allow the video into evidence. The judge refused even to look at the video, saying that he had heard enough and that there were two conflicting stories. In sharia, in any conflict between a Muslim and a non-Muslim, the Muslim is always right. Martin ruled for Elbayomy.

It gets worse...


Read the rest at American Thinker.


Here is Allen West commenting on Muslims sending messages to one another by writing in their Korans.  They defile, yet we apologize:

when tolerance becomes a one way street, it will lead to cultural suicide.








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Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Frogs Don't Cry -- Or do They?

polifrog



I posted a toon of a crying frog lamenting liberty lost the other day representing my limited blogging time lately.

Anyway, the post has produced a surprising number of hits from folks looking for "Crying frog". I was curious; what were they searching for?

I think the video below is what they are looking for:



My brother and I played with a lot of frogs in our youth. They never cried.




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Monday, February 27, 2012

Contraceptive Mandate = ObamaCare

polifrog




If Obama thought there was political advantage to be gained through the contraceptive mandate he was wrong. Not only has he further awakened the religious and social conservatives, but he has reminded Americans that we hate ObamaCare.

Dem. Rep.
Well, basically, we’re not looking to the Constitution on that aspect of it.






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The Con Man...

polifrog








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Sunday, February 26, 2012

Santorum Applauds Separation of State From Church over Separation of Church and State With Stephanopoulos...

polifrog





Santorum gets it right on the concept of "separation of church and state". It is not absolute. My only quibble is that I wish he described how it is not absolute in a bite worthy way: when he denies the "separation of church and state" he should rephrase it as a separation of government from church, as church should not be rejected from having a role in our representative democracy.

I don’t believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute. The idea that the church can have no influence or no involvement in the operation of the state is absolutely antithetical to the objectives and vision of our country. This is the First Amendment. The First Amendment says the free exercise of religion. That means bringing everybody, people of faith and no faith, into the public square. Kennedy for the first time articulated the vision saying, no, ‘faith is not allowed in the public square. I will keep it separate.’ Go on and read the speech ‘I will have nothing to do with faith. I won’t consult with people of faith.’ It was an absolutist doctrine that was foreign at the time of 1960.

...

To say that people of faith have no role in the public square? You bet that makes you throw up. What kind of country do we live that says only people of non-faith can come into the public square and make their case?

That makes me throw up and it should make every American who is seen from the president, someone who is now trying to tell people of faith that you will do what the government says, we are going to impose our values on you, not that you can’t come to the public square and argue against it, but now we’re going to turn around and say we’re going to impose our values from the government on people of faith, which of course is the next logical step when people of faith, at least according to John Kennedy, have no role in the public square.


video platformvideo managementvideo solutionsvideo player






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Friday, February 24, 2012

This Frog Mourns Liberty Lost...

polifrog





The sparse posting will continue for a few days more...




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Thursday, February 23, 2012

More Smile Files...

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Rush Goes Off on Some Idiot Who Believes Religion is a Threat...

polifrog



When the Obama administration attempts to strip American religious diversity from our nation via the contraceptive mandate, and attempts to dictate the selection of church ministers prompting a Supreme Court rebuff that united the court in opposition to the Obama administration it is that administration that is a threat to America.





Welcome Home

Embracing Immorality in the Avoidance of Shame...

polifrog




The left fears shame as a form of coercion.

But what is the source of that shame? It is the result of one's inability to meet the morality of their society. The left seems to believe that it is best to remove morality and embrace immorality so as to avoid shame.

I disagree.

There is no shame in striving for morality and falling short. The real shame is in embracing immorality while accusing those who strive for morality and fall short of hypocrisy.



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Newt Comments on Obama's Support for Infanticide...

polifrog





Obama's infanticide finally makes it to national TeeVee four years late.



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Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Republican Primaries -- Pro Wrestling, A Difference Without a Distinction to CNN...

polifrog





CNN Opens the debate with...
Santorum -- "The Late Contender"

Romney -- "The Long Distance Runner"

Gingrich -- "The determined Challenger"

Paul -- "The Delegate Hunter"

Sigh.

Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Feeling Rejected by the Gentry GOP?

polifrog



RiewhlWorldView

After significant Tea Party-fueled gains in 2010, for all practical purposes, the establishment GOP has ignored and even tried to mitigate that force with little more than lip service as repayment for their support. Now, they want to kick out the Christian asses that sit in their phone banks and the Christian soldiers that do the grunt work for their campaigns.


My clock is so tickn'.




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Smile File Toons...

polifrog



Is he flipping us off?










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Tweet of the Day:

polifrog



Yeah, it's early...

How many EU officials does it take to change a light bulb? None. There's nothing wrong with the bulb; its condition is improving every day

What's up with the zerohedge twitter profile pic?



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Is the Hostage Crises in Egypt Still a Hostage Crises in a Forest of Silent Media?

polifrog





To be clear, there is a hostage crises in Egypt.

Commentary:
It may not be the equivalent of the Iranian Hostage Crisis of 1979-81 or the subsequent seizures of American citizens in Lebanon, but the Obama administration has a hostage crisis of sorts on its hands, and how it handles it will be of considerable importance not only to the president’s standing but the country’s.

This crisis has come about because the transitional regime in Egypt has decided to put on trial 19 Americans and two dozen others who are guilty of the apparent crime of trying to develop civil society and democracy. Seven of those defendants, who will go on trial on Friday, are actually in Egypt and unable to leave as long as the proceedings go on. Several have sought refuge at the U.S. embassy, like Cardinal Mindszenty, who lived in the U.S. embassy in Budapest for 15 years to escape Communist persecution. Those held hostage include Sam LaHood, son of a cabinet member, who is head of the International Republican Institute’s Cairo office.

Fox had this:



  • NBC -- Nothing
  • CBS -- A local story of two hostages released titled "Bay Area Women Taken Hostage In Egypt Recount Ordeal"
  • ABC -- Nothing
  • CNN -- Nothing
  • CNBC -- Nothing







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What if This Election is the Last Chance for the Republican Party to Reflect Conservative Interests...

polifrog




...and we end up with Romney?







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Monday, February 20, 2012

We Have Seen Our Future and it is Them...

polifrog



EvilBloggerLady: (more at the link)
A glorious civilization, now in ruins...
The Way the Greeks Live Now, by Russell Shorto.  Life goes on in Greece, but not as good as it was.  It shows (again) that Robert Heinlein was right about TANSTAAFL:  "There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch."  Eventually we all will pay. 


Yo, a Heinlein reference.





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Why Doesn't the Lefty Care About Religious Liberty?

polifrog



American Thinker:
Neither writer betrays a particle of comprehension of what religious liberty even looks like. The problem isn't stupidity. Far from it. What they betray is lack of interest.

A cabal of atheists pushing an atheocratic state does not a secularist make.



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Saturday, February 18, 2012

Liberty is What You Do For Yourself, Not What Government Can Make Others Do For You...

polifrog



Do you prefer a nation of monuments glorifying the successes of private citizens or a nation of monuments ingratiating itself to politicians? The first begins with equality of opportunity while the latter begins with equality of outcome, well, except for the politicians the monuments glorify.






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Friday, February 17, 2012

Friday Night Smile File...

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ObamaCare Polling Over Time...

polifrog



It will be interesting what impact the Obama contraceptive edict has on the trend in the snapshot below over the coming weeks.

HuffingtonPost Interactive:







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Allen West: The Democrat Appetite for ... Slavery....

polifrog



I believe Democrats have, not so much an appetite for slavery, as an appetite for the votes of immoral constituencies that subjugate the rights of others. Where once Democrats benefited electorally from defending slavery, they now benefit electorally from crushing the rights of the unborn.

However, one can not deny the strength of West's words...






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More Leftist Athocracy...

polifrog



Commentary Magazine:

In response, Pelosi said, “Yes, I think that all institutions who cover, who give, health insurance should cover the full range of health insurance issues for women.”

This is liberalism/progressivism in its purest and most undiluted form. It does, in fact, want to weaken and eventually replace civil society and expand the reach of the state even into the internal life of the church. And it no longer even attempts to disguise its aims.

The American people can’t say we don’t know what the end game here is.






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The Left is Out of Step With Our Depression Era Nation...

polifrog



The contraceptive mandate on the left is oddly a discussion about women with jobs, not women without jobs.

Does the left really want to make the debate about "free" contraceptives for the employed, those most likely to be able to afford it?

That side of the debate should at the very least be about women and men without jobs, the very women and men who are less able to afford contraceptives and for whatever reason are unwilling to take advantage of free contraceptives at Planned Parenthood. Bizarrely it is not.

I mean, really, "free" contraceptives for women and men but only if you have or can get a job in an economy that provides no jobs or even worse, continuously fewer jobs relative to the total population?

One might think the left is disingenuously playing politics.


[Welcome Daily Pundit Readers]



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Charting Prosperity and Divorce Rates Amid the Sexual Revolution...

polifrog




I find this chart telling. 




Why the sexual revolution continues to  considered an American success is truly bizarre.  It is inescapable; liberalism is breaking America socially and economically.


Cafe Hayek:

As I have written many times, rising divorce rates in the 1970′s for example, meant that the number of households in the US grew 26.7%. Population grew only 11.5%. There was an increase in the number of households as one household became two. If both people were working, that alone would likely decrease median household income. If only one of the spouses was working, it was usually the man. The former wife found herself in the labor force unexpectedly. Her income is likely to be below the median. Both of these effects create new households with incomes below the median, dragging down the median over time.






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Creeping Ossification ...

polifrog




Ace:

I'm angry that someone put into my head the reflexive thought: Of course you mustn't do that; you aren't Allowed.

And once you've accepted that basic regime of requiring permission and licensing to do most everything in your life-- that makes it quite easy for the state to simply begin forbidding you to do whole categories of things altogether.

After all, you've accepted you need a license to do this or that, and that license can only come from the government. And if the government then refuses-- well, it's up them, isn't it? They have the right to deny you, right?

But did they?

When did they accumulate this power?

Just over the course of long decades, as a result of a thousand laws passed For the Public Good, and millions of decisions that it just wasn't worth fighting over.

Is a State License for Interior Design necessary? It is for those who profit from limiting access to labor.



Hey! With jobs being so scarce why not free people to work.  Fluid labor markets are best for a nation.




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Thursday, February 16, 2012

Obama's Accounting Tricks and Gimmicks -- Trimmicks

polifrog




Paul Ryan deconstructs the Obama administration's budget:
If this is how we measure reality then heaven help us.



A free stuff campaign document.



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Obama Administration Selectively Denies Loan Forgiveness Based On Religious Affiliation...

polifrog





Lost in the attention garnered by Obama's mandate to compel the Church to act against its conscience concerning contraception, the Obama administration has decided to further displace the church in the public square by supporting government pubic service at the expense of religious public service.


Audrey Hudson

The federal government will no longer forgive student loans in exchange for public service if that service is related to religion, according to a new Education Department rule from the Obama administration.

The Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) program announced the change Jan. 31 with little fanfare, while most of Washington was focused on the new ObamaCare rule requiring religious organizations to provide free birth control through health insurance.

Obama continues what has been a decades long struggle to remove religion from the public square and leave us with the de facto government establishment of atheism. With the establishment of atheism in America we will no longer be able count ourselves a secularist democratic nation for we will no longer be a nation of tolerance for all religions, but rather a nation of increasing intolerance toward religion. We will transition from a secularist nation of religious inclusion to a nation of religious exclusion, an atheocracy.


There has never been and never will be an atheocratic democracy, for democratic ideals demand that all individuals and all groups be allowed to inform governance while atheocratic states demand the marginalization of religious groups. In this case it takes the form of stripping the positive incentive represented by the forgiveness of student loans from churches while leaving those incentives in place for others. This weakens the church relative to the friends of governance and we will see less church related public service in the public square.

America is loosing its democratic soul.



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Trillions of Stimulus and Where Are the Jobs?

polifrog



Obama is a Keynesian and Keynesian solutions created the Great Depression, the lost decade Lost Two Decades, and the chart below:





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Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Scoring Santorum...

polifrog




The Right Scoop makes the point that when sifting through a candidate's record we all find problematic moments, however when a candidate's record is taken as a whole and compared with the options a more honest reading of the record may emerge. This seems to be the case with Santorum.

One of my fears is that he could repeat Bush 2. This report from the The Weekly Standard allays my fears to a degree:

NTU’s (scoring paints a radically different picture of Santorum’s 12-year tenure in the Senate (1995 through 2006) than one would glean from the rhetoric of the Romney campaign. Fifty senators served throughout Santorum’s two terms: 25 Republicans, 24 Democrats, and 1 Republican/Independent. On a 4-point scale (awarding 4 for an A, 3.3 for a B+, 3 for a B, 2.7 for a B-, etc.), those 50 senators’ collective grade point average (GPA) across the 12 years was 1.69 — which amounts to a C-. Meanwhile, Santorum’s GPA was 3.66 — or an A-. Santorum’s GPA placed him in the top 10 percent of senators, as he ranked 5th out of 50.

Across the 12 years in question, only 6 of the 50 senators got A’s in more than half the years. Santorum was one of them. He was also one of only 7 senators who never got less than a B. (Jim Talent served only during Santorum’s final four years, but he always got less than a B, earning a B- every year and a GPA of 2.7.) Moreover, while much of the Republican party lost its fiscal footing after George W. Bush took office — although it would be erroneous to say that the Republicans were nearly as profligate as the Democrats — Santorum was the only senator who got A’s in every year of Bush’s first term. None of the other 49 senators could match Santorum’s 4.0 GPA over that span.





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Is the Tea Party Gone? Rick Santelli ...

polifrog



Santelli

...the Tea Party conservatives they’re working state houses, the governorships, the mayorships, the Senate, the House. See, they understand, they’ve read the Constitution. If you want to make a difference, don’t go break windows, okay?




I would add that it is only after the Tea Party has exerted its influence  in the  "state houses, the governorships, the mayorships, the Senate, the House" that it will have the influence and focus to internally impact the presidential nomination process.





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Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Why Did Ed Cone Say: "Thus my opposition to outlawing contraceptives."

polifrog




Update:

Clearly Ed Cone got the memo that a false meme was in the making and chose to lend his credibility to its construction by attempting to steer his thread in a desired direction. In so doing he lent his credibility to the construction of a lie that he could not support.
==============================

No one is trying to outlaw contraceptives nor is anyone running on a platform that calls for the outlawing of contraceptives.

Many days after the contraceptive mandate had been issued and reaction to the mandate had begun to boil over the normally news and issue sensitive Ed Cone finally waded into the controversy on the 12th of February. Yes, I had been waiting for the appearance of the tread so as to steer the narrative as best I could. 


In response to  my second comment Ed Cone had this to say:

Agreed, "a one-size-fits-all solution for our diverse nation of individuals" is bad, and individual liberty is worth preserving.
Thus my opposition to outlawing contraceptives.

Huh? Where did that come from? There was no previous comment that suggested outlawing contraceptives.  There was nothing in the post that suggested a ban on contraceptives.  The closest thing I found was the lede in an article via the link that was added as an update.

McConnell: GOP Will Fight To Let ANY Employer Deny Birth Control Coverage

Not satisfied with President Obama’s new religious accommodation, Republicans will move forward with legislation by Sen. Roy Blunt (R-MO) that permits any employer to deny birth control coverage in their health insurance plans, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) said Sunday.

I replied to Ed Cone:

Read your links, not the lede:

The Blunt amendment he was specifically referring to would “ensure that health care stakeholders retain the right to provide, purchase, or enroll in health coverage that is consistent with their religious beliefs and moral convictions” under the Affordable Care Act.
The exchange was bizarre.  But it was no less bizarre than this exchange Romney had with Stephanopoulos during the New Hampshire debate:




Last night Dick Morris  presented his read of the situation on Hannity:



Dick should have sent a big h/t to Legal InsurrectionI do.

Why the contrivance, "Thus my opposition to outlawing contraceptives"? Just what is your game, Ed?

Because it looks like the coordinated  hatching of a false meme, Ed.









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The State as God...

polifrog




"The State as God" may be a better way of describing government's displacement of religion in the public square than my preference for The Establishment of an Atheocratic State ... I don't know, but it is the same idea.

An Ex-Con's View:

Secretary Sebelius, by her policy mandating these actions, creates a violation of the primary directive of the 1st Amendment against the establishment of religion. Her policy sets the government as the arbiter of religious expression and belief by requiring all religious institutions, employers and affiliated employers to provide these services to their employees. This creates and sets the government as a religion in and of itself and requires all citizens to follow the dictates of the government religion.

This also violates the second clause of the 1st Amendment regarding the “free exercise thereof…”. The mandate violates this section in that it compels all, regardless of religious belief, to adhere to the governments mandated beliefs.

The State as God is the result. Will we see the imposition of this on our Republic? Will “We the People” allow our rights to be erased in this manner?

Yesterday, White House Chief of Staff Jack Lew, in an interview on “Fox News Sunday” stated:

“We have set out our policy. We are going to finalize it in the final rules, but I think what the president announced on Friday is a balanced approach that meets the concerns raised both in terms of access to health care and in terms of protecting religious liberties, and we think that’s the right approach.

Really? The only protection of religious liberties is that we must follow the edicts of the “Pope of DC”, (the President) and the appointed members of his administration.







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Daniel Hannen at CPAC Describes Our European Future of Social Failure...

polifrog




It is too bad he is ignored by so many in America:








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Dick Morris Parrots Legal Insurrection's Recognition of Liberal Myth Making During the Debates...

polifrog





Very compelling:



But there is no (h/t Legal Insurrection) by Morris.





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A Negative Meme Lacking a Conservative Official is A Meme Not Yet Mature...

polifrog





America's tent cities, BBC...

One of the largest tented camps is in Florida and is now home to around 300 people. Others have sprung up in New Jersey and Portland.

...

These tent cities - and this level of poverty - are images that many Americans associate with the Great Depression.

Unemployment in America today has not reached the astronomical levels of the 1930s, but barring a short spike in 1982, it has not been this high since the Depression era.

There are now 13 million unemployed Americans, which is three million more than when President Barack Obama was first elected.

The stark reality is that many of them are people who very recently lived comfortable middle-class lives.

These will never be called ObamaVilles, ObamaBoroughs, or ObamaBurghs.  They will be  called  SantorumShanties, RomneyVillas, or GingrichVilles.

A meme requires seasoning.




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Amid the Contraception Mandate Controversy is This -- A Reminder From Rep. Pete Stark...

polifrog




The contraception mandate is the product of ObamaCare and during the debate over ObamaCare Rep. a constituent asked Pete Stark what government could not do.  He said:
The federal government, yes, can do most anything in this country.





Constituent: “How can legislation such as this be constitutional when it seems to be in direct conflict with the 13th amendment? ...And ...if this legislation is constitutional, what limitations are there on the federal government’s ability to tell us how to run our private lives?”

Stark: “I think there are very few constitutional limits that would prevent the federal government from rules that could affect your private life.”

Constituent: “My question is: How can this law be constitutional?—but more importantly than that—if they can do this, what can’t they?...Is your answer that they can do anything?”

Stark: “The federal government, yes, can do most anything in this country.”




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Moodys Slaps Europe With Downgrades -- Yawn...

polifrog




Well, yawns certainly seem to be the response compared with previous downgrades.

From the Moodys PDF:

Moody's actions can be summarised as follows:
- Austria: outlook on Aaa rating changed to negative
- France: outlook on Aaa rating changed to negative
- Italy: downgraded to A3 from A2, negative outlook
- Malta: downgraded to A3 from A2, negative outlook
- Portugal: downgraded to Ba3 from Ba2, negative outlook
- Slovakia: downgraded to A2 from A1, negative outlook
- Slovenia: downgraded to A2 from A1, negative outlook
- Spain: downgraded to A3 from A1, negative outlook
- United Kingdom: outlook on Aaa rating changed to negative





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On That Gender Pay Gap That Isn't....

polifrog




We are told that there is a pay gap that favors women. Is that your experience?

Time


But the new study suggests that the gap is bigger than previously thought, with young women in New York City, Los Angeles and San Diego making 17%, 12% and 15% more than their male peers, respectively. And it also holds true even in reasonably small areas like the Raleigh-Durham region and Charlotte in North Carolina (both 14% more), and Jacksonville, Fla. (6%).

Just to be clear, these numbers represent how much more a woman makes than a man assuming they are unmarried, childless women under 30 who live in cities.




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Monday, February 13, 2012

More Santorum Polls...

polifrog





With the polls coming at a brisk pace it hard not to notice that Santorum has been doing well, but this well?


And it doesn't end with national popularity. In Michigan despite Romney's home field advantage:

Rick Santorum's taken a large lead in Michigan's upcoming Republican primary. He's at 39% to 24% for Mitt Romney, 12% for Ron Paul, and 11% for Newt Gingrich.





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Jack Lew - White House Chief of Staff and One Time Budget Director Under Clinton and Obama Lying...

polifrog




Administration Hubris submits a budget bound only by fantasy and surrounds it with ridiculous lies. Lies.






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Newt on Anti Catholic Bigotry During New Hampshire Debate...

polifrog




Newt was absolutely correct here and hits a theme I have returned to numerous times, the intentional displacement of religion by governance:



Given the current debate over the contraception mandate and the fact that such a mandate would force religious institutions out of the services they provide if they are to stay true to their beliefs, Newt was spot on.

However, Illegal Insurrection draws further conclusions of possible collusion between media and liberal governance. Just why did Stephanopoulos bizarrely ask about contraception month ago? Romney was clearly baffled by the question, as it seemed at the time to be entirely hypothetical.





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Palin -- I've Created More Jobs for Impersonators Than Obama Has Created Jobs...

polifrog




Let's watch. (Must we?)



Via GatewayPundit

Sunday, February 12, 2012

Is This Where Western Civilization and Democracy Both Begins and Ends?

polifrog



Is is a sad thing for a society to vote itself into dependancy for all the right reasons.

Athens:






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Nugent vs. Piers Morgan on That Gun Thing...

polifrog




Never enter an interview without stats and sources:


Via MoonBattery



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Our Future of Un-American Mandates, Edicts, and Decrees Via the Affordable Care Act...

polifrog




The Obama administration issues an order, a decision, a mandate, an edict, a decree, via HHS --- the recent contraception mandate, for example.

Think about that.

Why does our nation debate this? Is this a decision up for discussion? Is it part of a bill that is working its way through congress and is vulnerable to the support of our representatives and, hence, us? Do we have even indirect influence over this edict?

Admittedly, we once had influence over an amorphous something as a bill but we had to pass it to see what was in it.

What was in it? Something decidedly unAmerican. Law by edict. Law by decree. Law that can be changed by the president to "accommodate" the Constitution.

Yet, we get gibberish such as "the morality of modern conservatism focuses on the crotch: abortion, contraception, homosexuality, premarital sex, and on and on " when conservatives are forcing none of this on America.

And this is our future: we will be free to discuss issue after issue just like this one, each a one-size-fits-all solution for our diverse nation of individuals. And we will each time hear the cries of diversity sheered from America as individual liberty is lost. And throughout we will be free to discuss and discuss issue after issue until we feel the placebo of influence on one another. But discussion and influence on one another is not influence over governance and without control, without influence in governance, who gives a rat's ass?




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Saturday, February 11, 2012

Brave Man Breitbart ...

polifrog




Occupy enslaves each and every one of us when they collectively feed off of our individually earned productivity.

So, yes, I love it and I live it.
Embrace the brave.

Breitbart to Occupy:
Behave yourselves. You are freaks and animals. Stop raping people. You Freaks; you filthy freaks.





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Friday, February 10, 2012

PPP - Santorum Takes the Lead Nationally and in Michigan...

polifrog



Only tweets until morning:

Nationally Santorum seems to have captured the lead. But beyond the margin of error? "Healthy" would suggest so:

We're going to have our new national GOP poll, showing a pretty healthy Santorum lead, out tomorrow morning


And in Michigan:

Santorum topping Romney on the first night of our Michigan poll. This may be the biggest surge yet







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Will I Stop Poking the Corpse of Occupy? Nah....

polifrog



...these clowns are simply too much. Trucking in the protestors at $60 a head is not a movement. There are, however, "movements" that occupy does represent:




USAToday:

Future political operatives might view it as a case study in how not to organize a lasting movement.

...

... after successfully tapping into this vein, the Occupiers chose a course best described as doing nothing. They did nothing day after day, week after week, under the mistaken belief that camping in public plazas would prompt some kind of action from others.

...

The Occupiers lacked identifiable leaders and clear goals. And they presented bewildering messages to the public, epitomized in the irony of people sitting idle to protest those who had made fortunes.





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It Sucks That There is no Utopia and it Sucks That We Conservatives Must Expose That Liberals are Utopianists That Trade Liberty for Free Stuff...

polifrog



Bill Whittle:



There is no free in liberty.




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All Your Moral Are Belong to ObamaCare -- Welcome to ObamaCare...

polifrog




We are not a one-size-fits-all nation.

WSJ Editorial:

The entire thrust of ObamaCare is to standardize benefits and how they must be paid for and provided, regardless of individual choices or ethical convictions.

...

...But the rule is already final. HHS tried to sell it as a compromise when it was announced, and in any case HHS would revive this coercion whenever it is politically convenient some time in Mr. Obama’s second term. Religious liberty won’t be protected from the entitlement state until ObamaCare is repealed.



Welcome to ObamaCare...




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Obama Conceded Nothing on the Contraception Mandate....

polifrog



Washington Post
:

Seeking to allay the concerns of Catholic leaders,President Obama on Friday announced an adjustment to its health-care rule requiring religiously affiliated employers to provide contraceptive coverage to women.

Women still will be guaranteed coverage for contraceptive services without any out-of-pocket cost, but will have to seek the coverage directly from their insurance companies if their employers object to birth control on religious grounds.


How is this an accommodation? Employees of the church will go to the same insurance company that their employer, the church, uses to receive "free" birth control that is paid for by the customers of the insurance company, the churches included.

Can a church choose a different insurance company that does not dispense contraceptives? No. All insurance companies will be subject to this decree, therefore churches will have no options.

This is ObamaCare.





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The Contraception Mandate is Really About ObamaCare Awfulness...

polifrog





We repeatedly hear words to the effect that the Contraception Mandate is an Obama administration decision, decree or executive order. Huh? Under what authority?

The authority comes from ObamaCare. That means, simply put, this "contraception issue" is not about contraception, but rather a fundamental clash between ObamaCare and 1st amendment rights. ObamaCare is imposing  one-size-fits-all solutions that does not fit all and never will. Catholics by definition are restrained by religious belief from supporting contraception yet ObamaCare is forcing the Catholic church to break its own religious doctrine.

We are a diverse people in this nation. Why does Obama repeatedly disrespect our diversity?

  • The Obama justice department attempted to force religious institutions to hire and fire without regard to the employee's religious beliefs. (Forced Hiring)
  • Catholic churches were not allowed to opt out of ObamaCare based on conscience clause due to abortion. (Forced Abortions)


All your moral are belong to us.





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Our Atheocratic Media is Blind to the Religious Conflict With ObamaCare...

polifrog



This is not a contraception issue, it is an ObamaCare issue.
Watch ObamaCare in action.

'Explain this religious freedom thing to me, no really, explain it to me.'






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Thursday, February 9, 2012

Amity Shlaes on Half Time in America...

polifrog




Amity Shales:

Rather, the Super Bowl ad infuriates because Eastwood, like so many others before him, gets the story backward. What’s wrong with the auto industry isn’t that it failed to create jobs. What’s wrong is that it emphasizes jobs over general growth itself.


There is iron in these words.

Jobs for the sake of jobs does not create productivity.




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More of the Failure of Economies Driven vs. Economies Ridden...

poifrog





Nicole Gelinas:
Because Europe has ignored the market’s pleas, and refused either to assume countries’ debts or to allow them to default, it has increased the chances that the euro will disintegrate. That could trigger a credit crisis more severe than the 2008 meltdown. It would be a reminder that the longer governments repress market discipline, the more painful a return to it is. But despite the pain, such a correction looks increasingly likely—and necessary. Greece, for instance, could then create a new, devalued drachma and pay back its debt more easily in the cheaper currency. That cheaper currency, coupled with the measure of certainty that comes with cutting losses, would soon attract investment and jobs. And the departure of the hated technocrats could help Greece look within and achieve the labor-force and tax reforms that it needs.

The American financial crisis was no more a failure of free markets than the European crisis was. Just as investors tried to signal that something was wrong with the euro, they tried for decades to show that something was rotten in American finance. The rot remains, but Washington has spent the past two years demonstrating that it would rather distort or block market signals than rely on them. This strategy thwarts economic recovery.


[Welcome Daily Pundit Readers]




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Wednesday, February 8, 2012

No Backdown on the Contraception Mandate...

polifrog





[Added]
On Hannity:
When religious freedom was weighed against access to birth control -- why did freedom loose?

ABC:
President Obama “reinforced” his stance on the controversial contraception mandate while speaking at the Democrats’ annual retreat at Nationals Park in Washington, D.C. today, Senate Democrats said.

The retreat was closed to media.

Following President Obama’s speech at the retreat, a small group of Senate Democrats, mostly women, left the retreat early in order to hold a news conference on Capitol Hill to counter the Republicans’ news conference today at which they called for the mandate to be overturned.

Democrats said they will “fight strongly” to keep the mandate in place.

Interesting.

On the one hand the discussion is no longer the economy, but on the other hand this brings to the forefront another looser for Democrats ... Obamacare. Forcing Americans into a framework of limited choices is a looser every time.

There is also this:

“The power to decide whether or not to use contraception lies with a woman – not her boss,” said Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y. “What is more intrusive than trying to allow an employer to make medical decisions for someone who works for them?”
Actually the power of where a woman chooses to work lies with a woman.  The real loss choice is the diminished choice available for all as one size for all solutions are foisted on a diverse society.

American  diversity simply does not matter when it comes to social solutions.




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An Economy Driven as Opposed to An Economy Ridden...

polifrog



Nicole Gelinas:
In the years leading up to 2007, the rules necessary to govern a flourishing market economy broke down, producing a financial and economic crisis. Rather than responding to the crisis by fixing those rules, the West aggressively repudiated market economics, and the repudiation continues to this day. Through their actions, which have lately involved everything from European debt to the American financial system to house prices in Britain, government officials around the world have revealed a disturbing assumption: that they can decide how to allocate resources better than markets can. No longer, it seems, do Western governments use investor signals as valuable feedback in devising effective policies; instead, they ignore those signals and plow ahead with their policymaking, leaving chaos in their wake. Often, in fact, public officials actively mute market signals in a vain but destructive attempt to impose their own will on struggling economies.

The rejection of markets helps explain the strange inertia of 2011. Across the free world, the year went out just the way it had come in....




H/T Politics et al





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12 Weeks Old, Human, and Pleading for Liberty Defended...

polifrog






Liberty was once denied by Democrats based on color, now it is denied based on age...



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Oh, That Trendy Justice Ginsburg...

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Santorum Trifecta...

polifrog


Yep! He got Colorado!

Final numbers to come.

Update--
 40.2 Santorum
 34.9 Romney





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Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Renee Ellmers Finally Produces Some Political, uh, Heh...

polifrog



I believe Rep. Ellmers has grown comfortable in her new role:







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Now it's Reason's Turn to Parody Half Time in America....

polifrog




Did Clint accidentaly help turn an election?






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Minnesota Also Called for Santorum...

polifrog



Two out of three states for the night have gone for Santorum over Romey.  That makes two big wins for Santorum.  Especially so for Minnesota which went for Romney by 19  over McCain in 08. Consider also that Romney is well behind Ron Paul on Minnesota.


In the case of Missouri, Newt was not one of the choices.  This proves that Newt's votes will go Santorum rather than Romney when he is not included on the ballot.

Bad, bad night for Romney.

Interesting night.




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Missouri Called for Santorum --- Entered the Night With Momentum...

polifrog




It appears that Santorum went into the night with momentum.  The expectation of 45% turns out to be 55%.

Although not called, in  Minnesota  Santorum also leads with 45% but entered the night with the expectation of around 35%.

This bodes well for Santorum in Colorado.  Although he currently leads in Colorado, high population  areas have yet to be counted.

Word for the night Momentum...





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Watch the Returns on Google...

polifrog



At  top right there is a pull down menu of states one can select from. Below is Missouri showing Santorum in the lead with 52% and Romney at 26%.

Nifty.


It is google, so watch your privacy.




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Some Santorum Polls...

polifrog




Via PPP, in Missouri Santorum has 45% to Romney's 32% and Paul's 19%. With Newt not on the ballot in Missouri the anti Mitt vote is less divided and we get a glimpse of Romney's soft conservative weakness. Romney seems to gain little from Newt when Newt is absent from the race.

Newt is, however, in contention in Minnesota. But there too Santorum leads but only with 33%, followed by Romney with 24%, Gingrich at 21% and Paul at 20%.

In Colorado Romney leads with 37%, Santorum with 27%, Gingrich 21%, and Paul 13%.

Then, of course, there is excitement or momentum to consider:














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What Clint Eastwood Was Expected to Say ...

polifrog



Rush:



It may be halftime in America but we're down by 16 trillion...





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There Is No Free In Liberty...

polifrog


Via iOwnTheWorld:





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Monday, February 6, 2012

There is no Defense for Abortion --- None...

polifrog




A woman's right to her body  extends only so far as those rights do not infringe on the rights of her child.  That we do not recognize the right of the unborn to have life as more immoral than slavery speaks to an American rot. In the final analysis slaves were, at least, granted life.


I am less infatuated with any woman's uterus than the fact that the American uterus is more deadly to Americans than Iraq, as well as the fact that the the left that is apparently okay because it's a woman's choice rather than Bush's.

George Will - The DC Caller:
...historians will marvel that American liberalism in the first part of the 21st century is defined as defense of abortion.



Marco Rubio:






[Edited for clarity]
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Why Keynesianism is Wrong...

polifrog




It created the Great Depression, Japan's lost decade two decades, and now it is back in America.  We are living through America's Second Keynesian Depression...





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There is No Free in Liberty...

polifrog




McNaughton Fine Art



H/T Daily Pundit


There is no free in liberty.







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Smile File Frowns...

polifrog















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Where Once Chrysler Lead the World, They are Now an American Dependent...

polifrog



Compare and contrast the two videos.  The first is an example of a strong forward looking corporation leading the world but forced to turn away from a possible future by regulation and future union costs, the second of the same corporation latter struggling within that regulation as well as abusive unions and dependent not just on overt and misplaced  appeals to  American  patriotism, but the American government itself when it claims "we rallied around what was right and acted as one".

Witness  American  exceptionalism :




 and its embrace of socialized failure:






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Sunday, February 5, 2012

How Stupid is Richard Burr? So Stupid as to Reject an Anti Insider Tradeing Bill for Congress...

polifrog




How many bad votes can a single representative make?  There was his vote on DADT, his penchant for earmarks ($105,803,000 in fiscal year 2010 ranking 61st out of 100 senators) and the Food Safety Modernization Act, but with or without  an election around the corner, why make a stand on this? 

Big Government:
The third dissenter to the ban on congressional insider trading was Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC).  According to Sen. Burr, the STOCK Act “does no more than codify what existing law says.  It’s ludicrous.“   Sen. Burr called the legislation “insane,” equated the measure to passing a law requiring citizens to get a driver’s license (which already exists), and called himself and Sen. Tom Coburn “brave” for standing up against the ban.




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Marco Rubio on the Constitutional Immorality of Abortion...

polifrog




A woman's right to her body only extends only as far as the rights of her child.  That we do not recognize the right of the unborn to live as more immoral than slavery speaks to an American rot. In the final analysis slaves were, at least, granted life.

Marco Rubio:







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Romney's Nevada Win?

polifrog





Last night (early morning really) with around 40% of the count in Romney was "winning" with 42%.

  • In 2008  he won Nevada with 51%.
Whoopee!

(I put off this post, though, in hopes for a complete count being in by this morning.  It isn't . What's up?)






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Pop Keynesian Solutions for the Euro Via Zero Hedge...

polifrog




H/T MaggiesFarm.
ZeroHedge:




No.  An economy can withstand the cost of only so much socialization.  Whether that economy is a city, a nation, a group of nations or beyond, the high costs of socialized economies are invariably pushed to higher and higher  bureaucratic levels in the search to socialize  their unproductivity to  the productive. Eventually they run out of the productive.

And where once there were boarders that effectively contained the costs of a socialized economy to a single nation, the euro perforated those boarders allowing nations like Greece to appear more solvent than they were. As a result we are witnessing the absurdity that is the socialization, across national boarders, of the failure of individual socialized economies.  We are now not just witnessing a nation helping a locality within its boarders, or Germany lending a hand to a member Euro state, but the United States helping socialize the cost of the failure of the European experiment in Social Democracy.

Why support the promotion of failure?

Later in the cartoon we the the nonsense of the deflationary spiral argument raised ... People get nervous and stop all spending? BS. Spending falls to the minimum necessary level. If that is a crash, it is a crash to reality. Only from that point, the point at which prices once again accurately convey demand information, can growth begin again.

And that is the answer.  Let the market work, let the failure that is socialism die.

There is no free in liberty.





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Saturday, February 4, 2012

Allen West on That BLS BS....

polifrog



Via Ace:
"Can someone tell me how employment in the black community has improved at a rate three times the national average in just a few months?? With numbers like today, urban communities should be well on their way to economic recovery then! There is something suspicious about the job numbers released today and it has me very concerned," West wondered Friday. "Is this dramatic supposed decrease in black unemployment a result of job creation or is someone playing around with the census numbers??"
But economists immediately shot his suspicions down as "unfounded" and "paranoid."
Wait, no they didn't.
Economists reached by The Hill for comment couldn't fully explain the unemployment rate change for the black community. William Darity, a professor of public policy at Duke University specializing in African-American studies and economics, wrote in an email to The Hill that the decline could have been due to a smaller labor force. He called the drop an "unbelievably dramatic drop" but didn't rule out the possibility of someone tampering with the numbers; he said there was no evidence one way or the other.




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Bill Whittle - The Grand Jihad...

polifrog




The world will be ordered in some fashion; Capitalist (secular), Statist (Atheocratic), or Islamic (Theocratic).







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Zo on Juan's Baseless Accusations of Racism...

polifrog




When the charge of racism lacks proof, the charge of racism is, itself, racist.







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Just Sayin'

polifrog



I am less infatuated with any woman's uterus than the fact that the American uterus is more deadly to Americans than Iraq, as well as the fact that that is apparently okay because it's a woman's choice rather than Bush's.





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Friday, February 3, 2012

"Canada? No, that's a state." -- The Failure of Universal Education...

polifrog




These kids show us that when knowledge is offered without cost to the recipient, it is devalued by the recipient. And when knowledge is devalued by the recipient no amount of spending on education can solve the resultant ignorance.





One wonders if there is not an efficiency in teaching the only those interested.





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Just Sayin'...

polifrog




Illegal alien is to undocumented resident,

as

Drug pusher is to undocumented pharmacist.




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More BLS BS...

polifrog




Too poignant to post in part.

By Bill Wilson

Once again, the civilian labor force participation rate has declined, from 64 percent to 63.7 percent in a single month. Since January 2009, it has declined from 65.7 percent, resulting in approximately 4.7 million people no longer being counted towards the unemployment rate. If they were included, the real rate of unemployed working age adults would be 11.01 percent, and the underemployed would be 17.6 percent.

Overall, that includes the 12.7 million people that BLS says are actually unemployed, and then 4.7 million who have given up looking for work, plus another 10.5 million who can’t find full-time work. All together, there’s 28 million working age adults who simply cannot find work in the Obama economy.

It is hard to separate the continued obfuscation of this harsh reality by the government from the fact that we are now in an election year.


Government lies. That is what it does.







Charts via ZeroHedge.




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