Barack Obama wants to raise the fuel efficiency standards for cars and give more states the power to set their own standards. He clarifies that
“Let me be clear: Our goal is not to further burden an already struggling industry,” Obama said. “It is to help America’s automakers prepare for the future.” (LINK)
Whenever he says, “Let me be clear”, it is usually followed by a reversal of a prior position or something totally incomprehensible. His proposed actions with further burden the auto industry. When he says he wants to help them prepare for the future, what he is really saying is
I have selected the future for America. I have a vision of the future and damn it, I don’t care how much it is going to cost, you are going to make my vision come true.
Be prepared for change. Barack Obama wants to change the world. God help us.
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
Free Markets on January 26th, 2009
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger wants to extend the state sales tax to more services, including golf. The retired golfers of California are rightly angered by this proposal. Golf is the only exercise many older people get.
There are no California taxes for skiing, hockey, bowling or any other sport. Just golf.
Let’s forget age for a minute, because age is not the defining characteristic I see on the golf course. The one overwhelming trait found roaming the course is WHITE MEN, the only classification or group that you can openly attack and get away with it.
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
Common Sense on January 26th, 2009
Read about the Philadelphia’s warming back in 1790
JANUARY 1790 The average or medium temperature of this month was 44 degrees This is the mildest month of January on record. Fogs prevailed very much in the morning but a hot sun soon dispersed them and the mercury often ran up to 70 in the shade at mid day. Boys were often seen swimming in the Delaware and Schuylkill rivers.
Steven Goddard has made a correlation between the suns activity and the unusually high tempertures. (LINK)
Nancy Pelosi had this to say about the contraception money in the stimulus bill on ABC’s “This Morning” show,
Well, the family planning services reduce cost. They reduce cost. The states are in terrible fiscal budget crises now and part of what we do for children’s health, education and some of those elements are to help the states meet their financial needs. One of those – one of the initiatives you mentioned, the contraception, will reduce costs to the states and to the federal government.
Does government spending help the economy or not? Money spent on health care filters throughout the economy. When you have a baby, the doctors and nurses get paid, the people who make baby food and products have a new customer and the mother is one less worker looking for a job.
How does spending more money that we don’t have on alternative energy (which the government has done for years with no success) help the economy, but investing money in a new life that will one day help to fund social security hurt the economy? I would say that the real “investment” is the baby, not the big government spending programs.
The Democrats have no principals. They bend to whatever fits their current big government policies.
There are weather stations all over the country collecting surface temperature. Anthony Watts of “Watts up with that” blog has been spearheading an effort to examine the stations to see if they comply with the standards. What he has found is shocking.
He has classified them in 5 categories. 69% of the surface temperature stations fall in the bottom two categories. This means they have artificial heat sources within 10 meters of the station. (LINK)
Here’s a sample of substandard station
ACORN is one of the most dangerous groups in the United States. They actively pursue an agenda of voter fraud. They have been convicted time and time again for tampering with our electoral process. Their punishment will be billions of dollars in federal bailout money.
In addition to their radical agenda to undermine our system, they also spearheaded efforts to intimidate banks into subprime loans that they otherwise would not have approved. Pressure from Democrats and radical groups were a substantial contributing factor to the overprice housing market that collapsed and brought down the rest of the economy with it.
John Boehner is the minority leader in the House of Representatives. He is warning of a plan by the Democrats to reward these dangerous radicals.
Incredibly, the Democrats’ bill makes groups like ACORN eligible for a $4.19 billion pot of money for “neighborhood stabilization activities.† Funds for this purpose were authorized in the Housing and Economic Recovery Act, signed into law in 2008.  However, these funds were limited to state and local governments.  Now House Democrats are taking the unprecedented step of making ACORN and other groups eligible for these funds: (LINK)
You can create a lot of havoc with 4 billion dollars. That is exactly what ACORN will do. These people do not believe in free market capitalism. I don’t even think they believe in elections. They will cheat and intimitate for one purpose…power.
Scary stuff.
Nothing is ever easy…at least for me.
I have a whole new respect for Joe the Plumber.
Last night, I discovered my shower dripping. The last time we had a shower drip, my wife called a plumber. He charged us over $100 to replace a $20 valve cartridge. As far as I was concerned, he undid a couple of screws, pulled out the cartridge, put in the new one and made of with $100 for 5 minutes of labor.
I vowed to take care of it myself. I am Mr. Fixit after all.
We pulled out the paper work from when we bought the house. My wife is very organized. She keeps things like warranties on plumbing fixtures. The paper work that we sent in was for a Moen 1225 valve. I drove to Home Depot and they had a 1220, but not the 1225. No problem. I drove about 1/2 a mile up the road and bought the 1225 from Lowes.
When I got home, it was obvious that I had the wrong valve cartridge. I jumped on the Internet and found that I needed the 1220. Back in the truck and off to Lowes. They gladly let me return the cartridge even though I had opened the package, but they did not have the Moen1220 cartridge I needed…so back down to Home Depot.
I bought the Moen 1220 at Home Depot and drove home.
The instructions were simple. The replacement came with a removal tool. It is a little plastic piece that fits over the stem and allows you to turn the cartridge. Being mechanically inclined, I figured out that you have to break the cartridge tabs to accomplish this. It’s not in the instructions, but there was no way that thing was turning as it was. Once the tabs were broken off, the cartridge turned with a little effort. So far…so good.
Next the instructions show the cartridge being pulled out with pliers. It started to come out, but stopped after about 3/4″. I pulled and pulled. I was starting to sweat. I was afraid that it would let loose and I would go flying through the glass shower stall. I pulled some more. I tried to pry it out, but still no luck.
It was time to go back to the computer for advice. Apparently a lot of other people have had trouble pulling out old Moen cartridges. They all recommended buying the cartridge puller tool. They all used it once and wanted to sell the barely used tool. I neither had the time to buy something online, nor the inclination to drive back to Home Depot.
How hard could it be to make a puller tool. I found a long #10-24 screws and an aluminum bar. All I needed to do was drill and tap a hole through the bar and I would have a home made puller tool. I looked and looked, but I could only find my barely used tap and die set. Now I know what to ask my wife for my birthday. I’m going to have to spec out this present for her.
I was really starting to whine about this job. At this point, my wife informs me that the plumber had a hard time pulling out the cartridge too. Now she tells me!
I have had it. I took my vice grips and channel locks upstairs. I put the vice grips on the stem and the channel locks on the outside of the cartridge. I pulled the vice grips and turned the cartridge back and forth with the channel locks. IT WORKED! The sucker popped out.
The rubber on the inside was gone. It was gumming up the whole “just slide out the cartridge” phase of the job. It took needle-nose pliers to yank the rubber out from the slots in the valve body.
Now, all that is left is to slide in the new cartridge, put the retaining clip back in and turn on the water. Hold on! The retaining clip needs to be deburred, and four hands would helpful for this job…three for screwdrivers and one for the flashlight. I eventually fight it into position. Another 30 second jobs takes 15 minutes.
Time to turn on the water. Oops. The knob is upside down. I took the knob off and turned the stem 180 degrees. Screw the knob back on and NOW I am done. Just in time for Chinese takeout that my wife just brought home.
After dinner, my daughter ran up the stairs to let me know there was a puddle on the craft table in the basement. It just happens to be right under the pipes that run up to the shower. The knob comes off one more time. There is no signs of a leak at the valve. I’m hoping the puddle came from the water that dripped out of the valve when I was yanking on it hours ago. It is going to be a long night watching for drips in the basement. The way this job is going, I am expecting a soldered joint to let loose a torrent of water…at about three o’clock in the morning.
My 5 minute plumbing job turned into an all day ordeal. Such is my life. Nothing is as easy as I think it will be. Maybe next time, I will organize the community and petition for a plumber to take care of my problems at taxpayer expense. That’s what our great leader (the community organizer) would do.
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
Common Sense on January 25th, 2009
Barack Obama wants to create jobs. His plan calls for hundreds of thousands more government employees. (Note: Jobs and employees are two different things. You can have two employees do one job). Those are the only type of “jobs” the government can really make. This will take us down a disastrous road.
Once these jobs are created, they will be unionized. They will come with government benefits including pensions. We will strap our children with the duty to pay these pensions. Paying benefits to people who no longer contribute is what is crippling the auto makers. Barack Obama will extend this failure to more of the economy.
Government works slowly, and that is a good thing. If the government made quick changes all the time, citizens and business would be left paralyzed wondering what changes would come next. When the government does act quickly, the result is often fraud on a massive scale. After Hurricane Katrine, the Bush Administration flooded the area with money. The stories of outrageous fraud and massive waste soon followed.
In some cases, the government works slowly because of legal reasons or for national security. There was a big stink over President Obama using a Blackberry. Can you imagine how many people were involved. There were lawyers to make sure that all his email are stored and backed up in compliance with federal law. The national security personnel had to worry about hackers breaking in or snooping. I’m sure his transmissions will require some top secret encryption. The same holds true for the entire computer system at the White House. The new “tech savvy” White House staff will scratch their heads wondering why the White House is so outdated. That’s government.
In addition to many rules that must be followed, many government workers are notoriously inefficient. People who takes chances in government are punished, not rewarded. Government work (money) is issued using political calculus. Financial considerations and common sense are often overlooked. John Murtha sends a lot of money (and jobs) back to his district because he is a powerful force in the Congress, not because his district is loaded with worth recipients.
We can’t afford the government we have now and Obama wants to increase the size of government. If “small government” Republicans grew the size of government (slightly), what will happen when we have a president who sets out to increase the size government? We will be moving the labor pool, which has been steadily increasing productivity for years, back to a system that moves at a continental drift pace. That can’t be a good thing.
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
Free Markets on January 25th, 2009
Barack Obama wants to fund abortions all over the world. He has reversed George Bush (who reversed Bill Clinton, who reversed Reagan) on the funding of international “family planning”.
It begs the question, what is Barack Obama trying to stimulate?
The serious question is, why should we be funding family planning in other countries? We are running a huge deficit. We don’t have the money to pay for it. That means our children…our families…will be paying for it.
Barack Obama says that “It is time we end the politicization of this issue”. That is exactly what he is doing. The reality is that eliminating the ban will enabled the government to send even more money to Planned Parenthood. I guess killing babies doesn’t pay well and can only survive with government subsidies.
The hard left liberals with socialist tendencies like to say that the faltering economy is an indicator that free markets don’t work. Their solution is more central control. Can that be true?
This recession is not a failure of market economics. It is a reassertion of market economics after a decade in which we paid ourselves more than we were producing, and funded it precariously and temporarily by complicated credit instruments that it took a while for the market to rumble. Matthew Parris
Now think about what would happen in a more regulated market. The politicians would never ask voters to suffer the hardships of an economic slow down. Politicians don’t create wealth. They simply redistribute it. Without a market correction, politicians would continue to redistribute money without creating wealth until the system finally collapsed for real.
The economic slow down is the market working…not failing.
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
Free Markets on January 24th, 2009
The Democratic Undergound has long been a place for extreme liberals to voice their opinions. Every once in a while I drop by (yes, I’m a troll) to read what they have to say. I always click away, shaking my head in disbelief.
Tonight I thought I would drop in to see what they were discussing now that Democrats control the Presidency and both houses of Congress. Here’s what I found:
…I believe that hate speech, such as that which has been practiced for decades by right-wing propagandists like Limbaugh over the public airways, presents a real threat to our freedoms, our constitution and our country.
Limbaugh and the others are presently doing everything possible to undermine the legitimacy of Barack Obama’s presidency.  (LINK)
Isn’t that special. Critizing a Republican President is loyal opposition. Critizing Barack Obama is hate speech that undermines the “legitimacy of his presidency”.
Liberals have just won two straight elections cycles, yet they insist that conservative talk radio is an evil force that is ruining the country. If talk radio is so powerful, how did Barack Obama get elected?
Far-left-liberals must be the most unhappy people in the world. It would be nice if we could believe that they would stay on the fringe where they belong. Unfortunately, the Democrats have a long history of regulating speech and ignoring the Constitution. Woodrow Wilson signed some of the most repressive legislation with respect to free speech in the nation’s history. He was the first president to openly disparge the Constitution, saying it was pre-modern, cumbersome, and open to corruption. Wilson then made it a crime to critize the Constitution.
Free speech for them…not for you. That has been the liberal dream for a very long time.
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
free speech on January 23rd, 2009
According to his wife, George Stephanopulos cried on Inauguration Day (LINK). What a wimp.
<sarcasm on> No Liberal bias at ABC…that’s for sure <sarcasm off>
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
Liberal Bias on January 22nd, 2009
I am not hoping Barack Obama fails, but you must define success and failure before that statement means anything.
If Barack Obama decided to negotiate with Iran, that alone will not be a failure. It will be a failure if Iran builds a nuclear bomb during his term.
If Barack Obama decides to let everyone at Gitmo go, that will not be the failure. The next terrorist attack will be the Obama’s failure.
For me, freedom is not something that is negotiable. If the economy comes roaring back but all my efforts are confiscated by the government, then I will deem that Barack Obama is a failure.
He will also be a failure if the economy is “stimulated” by shifting the burden to the next generation.
On the otherhand, if we remain safe from foreign enemies and the economy turns around without trashing the Constitution, without confiscating on unfair amount from working Americans or without placing the burden on generations to come, then I will consider Barack Obama a success.
Do I wish him success? Certainly…but my definition of success is likely to differ greatly from many other people.
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
President on January 22nd, 2009
Hilary Clinton was approved by a Senate vote today for Secretary of State with a vote of 94-2 (LINK). Both votes against Senate Clinton were cast by Republicans.
Just for a reference, Condoleezza Rice (who spent her life studying foreign policy) was approved with a 85-13 vote (LINK). All 13 votes against her were from Democrats. OK…One was from Jim Jeffords, but he is certainly not a Republican.
By all measures, I would say that Dr. Rice, whose past experience included teaching foreign policy before being the National Security Adviser, was more qualified than a former first lady and a Senator. That’s not to say, Mrs. Clinton doesn’t have any experience. She has some experience, but Dr. Rice spent her adult life in foreign affairs.
There are legitimate concerns regarding Mrs. Clinton. There are many donations to President Clinton’s library from foreign countries. There is a very real chance for a conflict of interested. The most the Democrats could muster against Condi Rice was, “Concern…whether or not she would be able to carry out her diplomatic duties effectively given her close relationship with the president.”
This vote is a bench mark of how the parties operate. Republicans believe the President has a right to select his advisers. Democrats only feel that way when they are in power.
Obama has gone out of his way to have himself compared to Abraham Lincoln. He gave a speech in front of the Lincoln Memorial. He even wrote in a train on his way to Washington. (What century are we living in?)
On Obama first day he did something that Lincoln would never do.
A draft executive order made clear the new president intends to go further. It called for closing the facility within a year, releasing some of the 245 detainees still there and transferring others to different sites for trial. (LINK)
Lincoln used special war time powers to suspend habeas corpus. He certainly would disagree with Obama on this issue.
For years we have heard how George Bush has shredded the Constitution. Barack Obama was a Constitutional professor. He is aware of this clause in Article One
The privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion, the public safety may require it.
I’m not a professor, but I would say that the threat posed by terrorists is a “public saftey” issue…and Obama is nothing like Lincoln.
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
President on January 21st, 2009
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