This is The Fight

Here's a quick video showcasing the clear and powerful message of Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey. It was taken from the final moments of a Townhall in Robbinsville. Where's Robbinsville you ask? I don't know. But this video is so good. Take a gander:



Bring it!

This is Where They Want Us to Go!

I was reading through some articles today, and I found something truly horrific.

It's an article from the Daily Mail, and it documents an incident that happened some time ago where a baby was born at 21 Weeks and 5 days into the pregnancy. This happened in Norfolk, England. What allegedly took place after the baby was born is heartbreaking.

A word of warning; the article contains pictures of a small premature child, and I would caution anyone to use their discretion in viewing them.

Sarah Capewell, the mother of the premature baby from the article, alleges that when the baby was born, the doctors and medics refused to treat him because it was against the State's guidelines to treat a baby born before 22 weeks. So, Miss Capewell's baby was just two days shy of being allowed to live...two days. I've included some quotes below.

"Miss Capewell, 23, said doctors refused to even see her son Jayden, who lived for almost two hours without any medical support.

She said he was breathing unaided, had a strong heartbeat and was even moving his arms and legs, but medics refused to admit him to a special care baby unit."

The article goes on...

"She said: 'When he was born, he put out his arms and legs and pushed himself over. A midwife said he was breathing and had a strong heartbeat, and described him as a "little fighter".

I kept asking for the doctors but the midwife said, "They won't come and help, sweetie. Make the best of the time you have with him".'

She cuddled her child and took precious photos of him, but he died in her arms less than two hours after his birth."

I encourage you to read the full article, if for nothing else, to help hit home what President Obama, Harry Reid, and Nancy Pelosi have in mind for us in America.

When the President backed down from the "Public Option" last week, I thought we might be onto something, but then I read this earlier, and I realize that these thugs will stop at nothing to force their ideology on to all of us.

From Jake Tapper's blog at ABC news (not a typically conservative gentleman):

"Both leaders told the president that despite the difficult rough and tumble of the legislative process in the last few weeks, they are optimistic that both the House and Senate can pass health care reform legislation.

What will be in the bill remains an open question, though after the meeting, Reid told reporters that 'we're going to do our very best to have a public option or something like a public option before we finish this work.'”

I've signed the petition at freeourhealthcarenow, and I've urged all of you to do so as well. Also, calling your representatives in Congress might help, unless you have someone like Harry Mitchel of AZ - who is totally useless.

Beyond that, get the word out - talk to people you meet, or to people you already know. A few weeks ago, I started a conversation with a Russian immigrant whom I worked with, and her and a coworker and I discussed both the U.S.S.R. and the current state of affairs in this nation. The lady from Russia was very serious when she said that she "smells Communism coming" and that she "doesn't ever want to go back to a State-run Insurance". If we open our mouths and shed as much light on what is happening as possible, I think we'll win the hearts of those good and decent people in this, our beloved country.

There are good people out there that just don't pay as much attention as they should, but given the truth, they'll see the light, and want to fight what's going down on Capital Hill.

I certainly hope that we can have some effect in setting this country back on the right track, or as close to it as possible.

Carry on.

The Freedom to Choose

By Spring

George Washington and John Adams founded this country because they were living under tyranny of England. They were being denied many freedoms, such as the freedom to worship how and where they chose. The current public school system and the push to make public schools the dominating choice takes away similar freedoms to choose, as parents, what’s best for our children. Not everyone in this nation has access to thriving, successful charter or public schools or can afford the tuition of private schools.

Think about how we are handling education and how the same concept applied to any other system in our society would be dictatorial. For example, what if instead of paying for food directly you were taxed and then given a dollar amount by the government to buy groceries. But, you can only buy groceries from a certain store depending on where you live. The food at your store is old, over processed, full of trans fats and sugars, and the store has no produce. The children eating this food are weak and sick. This would be appalling; the government would be oppressing these people and taking away their freedom to choose! This is not how it works in regards to food even when we are talking about government subsidized food stamps. With food stamps a family is given a dollar amount and they can take that money to whichever store they chose and buy the food they want for their family. But this oppressive scenario IS exactly how it works with education. In most cases, if you want your tax dollars to pay for your child’s education, you have no choice but to send her to the school dictated by the government.

There is enormous room for improvement in our educational system. Hardly any system in the United States is more backward. There is no other aspect where people who live in low-income neighborhoods are so disadvantaged as in the kind of schooling they can get for their children.(1)

About 90% of children in the US go to public schools but parents are increasingly seeing schools become an area of governmental control and are concerned about the political agendas that are being taught to their young children. The problem is that, as the system has become more centralized, power has moved from the local community (families) to the school district, to the state, and then to the federal government.

We’ve all seen the dismal result of centralized public schools controlled by bureaucrats: some relatively good government schools in high-income suburbs and communities; very poor government schools in our inner cities with high dropout rates, increasing violence, lower performance and demoralized students and teachers.

Supporters of a public education system focus on the plight of the poor. How is the education, or lack thereof, for those youth in the poorest inner cities going to help them live the “American dream”, when the quality of the education they are receiving is keeping them down.

One of the most promising way to fix this serious problem is school vouchers. A school voucher is a certificate issued by the government by which parents can pay for the education of their children at a school of their choice, rather than the public school to which they are assigned because of their address.(2) Parents take the tax money that is to be spent on their child’s education and use it to pay for the school of their choice. The money follows the child. Every child in America receives a voucher, every child receives an education, and every parent is given the freedom to choose.

What would happen if this sort of system were to be put into place nation wide? It would promote free market competition among schools of all types, which would provide schools incentive to improve. Successful schools would attract students, while bad schools would be forced to reform or close. The goal of this system is to localize accountability as opposed to relying on government standards. You would no longer have to be forced, whether you like it or not, to accept the service of the public schools, functioning as a monopoly; and public schools in many areas of this country are by definition monopolies.

The business community has a major interest in expanding the pool of well-schooled potential employees and in maintaining a free society with open trade and expanding markets around the world. Both objectives would be promoted by the right kind of voucher system.

Finally, as in every other area in which there has been a transfer from government to public control, the privatization of schooling would produce a new, highly active and profitable private industry that would provide a real opportunity for many talented people who are currently deterred from entering the teaching profession by the dreadful state of so many of our schools. This means, in general, better, more qualified teachers.

Just imagine if you had the FREEDOM to choose from several different, well functioning schools that were teaching in a way that you felt your child would thrive. You could choose a school where morals were taught and it would be paid for by your tax dollars.

Vouchers would reduce division of society according to class, they would build competition, and they would restore control to the people most competent to decide on children’s education: their parents!(3)

Among the strongest critics of the voucher program are public school teachers’ unions, most notably the National Education Association (the largest labor union in the USA) which has spent millions litigating and lobbying against vouchers. Simple reasoning tells you these unions are working for teachers—not kids and not YOUR kids. Teachers' unions are bitterly opposed to any reform that lessens their own power, and they have acquired enormous political and financial strength that they are prepared to devote to defeating any attempt to adopt a voucher system. It would result in a loss of their control. Public schools are NOT free and are not paid for by the government! It is paid for with taxpayers money; our money. We are paying for the education our children receive through the public school system and on top of that, subsidizing the education of children whose parents don’t pay taxes. We happily do so to ensure that every child in this great nation receives the blessing of an education. We have the right to choose how OUR money is being spent on the education of OUR children.

There are many places in the US where the voucher system is being used. The city of Milwaukee, Wisconsin led the way in 1990 and now has nearly 15,000 students using vouchers. The 2006-2007 school year will mark the first time in Milwaukee that more than $100 million will be paid in vouchers. Twenty-six percent of Milwaukee students will receive public funding to attend schools outside the traditional Milwaukee Public School system.

Utah voted on a state-wide universal school voucher system providing a maximum tuition subsidy of $3000 which was passed in 2007, but voters repealed it in a statewide referendum before it took effect. Education advocacy groups from all over the country poured campaign funds into Utah, where voters were to cast ballots in a referendum to repeal school vouchers. It's sickening to sick to think that Utah was so close to doing something so revolutionary that would lead our nation in a movement that would change so many children’s lives for good and finally brake the poverty cycle: so close. The teachers’ unions fought hard for the referendum; they do not want to lose their power and control. If Utah passed this other states would see its success and want to adopt a similar program. The union also fought hard to shoot down similar attempts in California and Florida as well as many other places. As soon as there is a desire from parents for better education, through school vouchers, like an iron fist, with all its strength, the teachers’ unions pound out any threat to weaken their monopoly.

Every child in this country has a right to receive an education; it is one of the things that makes America the greatest nation on this earth. We don’t have to blindly send our children to public schools as the only option to supporting education for all children. This country was founded on government of the people, by the people, and for the people. We cannot let groups that don’t have any children’s best interest at heart strong arm those who do. We can and must let our voices be heard on this nonpartisan issue and make the education system in America better for all children… our children.

As resourceful parents we can make the most of our educational system. We can volunteer in the schools; we can supplement our children’s public education at home. If you live in places like Utah or Arizona you may have access to good charter and public schools. If you feel like you don’t want your child in the public school you can homeschool. But, what about the truly impoverished families and children in America? They don’t have thriving charter schools in their inner cities, they can’t afford private schools. What about the parents who are working two jobs and can’t volunteer at school or the single mom who is working to make ends meet and doesn’t have any other options? The only choice they have is to send their precious child to a failing school full of drugs, sex, and violence. They are helpless, these children are helpless. What about them? There is a better way. We can stand up for these children and we must. That is the American dream!

Notes:

1. Public Schools: Make Them Private CATO Briefing Paper

2. School Voucher Wikipedia

3. School Vouchers-The Next Great Leap Forward WSJ, July 9 1998

The Great American Ponzi Scheme

Bernard Madoff is expected to plead guilty on Thursday to charges that he defrauded investors in one of the largest ponzi schemes in US history.  This scheme is second only to our current Social Security system scheme (or shall we say Social InSecurity). By pleading guilty, Madoff is not required to tell prosecutors where all the money is.  So, thousands of investors will both not receive the interest promised them...they won't receive the principle that they invested.  Pretty sad...these unfortunate souls are in some cases out their retirement savings.  

Luckily they can still count on the retirement promised by the greatest American Ponzi scheme ever: Social InSecurity!  

Social InSecurity was part of FDR's New Deal and was implemented "supposedly" to eliminate the rising number of older adults living in 

poverty.  (It is worth noting that much of the New Deal was tossed out by the  Supreme Court as unconstitutional, but that Social InSecurity was not because FDR stacked the courts with New Deal judges who would support his "policies.")  The idea that Social InSecurity would pay for the retirement of all Americans is a farce, since the retirement age at conception of the program was greater than the average life expectancy for Americans.  

This means that for every American who actually lived to the age of retirement and started collecting benefits, there were ample workers paying into the system.  As we get closer to a 2:1 

ratio of workers to retirees, we can expect to see Social InSecurity taxes increase and benefits cut-great fun for the whole family :)  (I'd like to send a shout out to FDR for creating unconstitutional programs to treat a temporary ailment, while making that ailment last for over a decade while at the same time creating even worse problems in the future!)

But wait, that is my money that I paid into the system...shouldn't I be able to get the benefit of my investment?  Well...no, you shouldn't according to the courts, no one has any legal right to Social InSecurity.  This means that you can be denied benefits, or worse yet, if the system were to go belly up and Congress can say, "Oh well, thanks for the years you payed in, see you at your new greeter job at Walmart."  

To put this in perspective, if you think that you are going to get a better retirement from investing in Social InSecurity you are like Phyllis Weaver from the greatest 80's movie ever made by Weird Al: UHF.  

Phyllis Weaver has just won a Red Snapper on Wheel of Fish...and this is how the rest of the scene goes down:

Kuni (karate instructor and host of Wheel of Fish): Ahhh, a red snapper.  Mmmmm, very tasty. Okay, Weaver, listen carefully.  You can hold on to your red snapper...[Hiro-San emerges, carrying a table with a box]...or you can go for what's in the box that Hiro-San is bringing down the aisle right now!  What's it gonna be?

[Phyllis Weaver has difficulty in choosing as the audience point to the box]

Phyllis Weaver:  I'll take the box.  The box!

Kuni:  You took the box?  Let's see what's in the box!

[Hiro-San opens the box; the audience gasps.  There is silence]

Kuni:  Nothing!  Absolutely nothing!  STUPID!  You're so STU-PIIIIIIID!

We are all so STU-PIIIIIIID for thinking that Social InSecurity will provide a quality retirement for us.  Chances are that it will be 

defunct, and you will be living in a spare bedroom at your oldest daughter's house.  That's because we are following the crowd in giving our very tasty red snapper to the Government for what is inside the box...you know the rest!  

Also, we allowed ourselves to be lulled into the entitlement mentality that everyone has the right to idle away the golden years sitting on some beach somewhere...or in some rocking chair in a living room in Sun City, AZ.  

So, it looks like we were all duped into believing in a system that's a sham...but wait, messiah was just elected president!  He and only he can fix Social InSecurity, provide universal healthcare, magically create universal education from birth through college, and save the world from global warming!  On second thought, he has the substance and experience that is found inside Hiro-San's box: NOTHING!!!!  He represents the worst of the entitlement movement which would give each American the "right" to claim financial support from every other American.  

How did we get to this point?  The thought used to be that parents work hard to provide more for their children than they had growing up.  Now, in the twisted Bizzaro World, parents are claiming the future earnings of their children so they can sustain their own standard of living. In Bizzaro World we recently passed the "American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009." In the real world, this is known as the "American Robbing from our Kids While Calling it a Reinvestment Act of 2009 Which is Soon to be Followed by a Similar Act of Stealing from our Kids Act of 2010."  So, in honor of such acts, I propose that for the next few years at each child's birthday, we give little Johnny or Jane their own Hiro-San's box of nothing, and buy ourselves a new pair of leather shoes or something else "we deserve."

Oh yeah!  Let's do something about Social InSecurity too before we get left out in the cold by the greatest ponzi scheme in American history.

Possible solutions: personal retirement savings (although this doesn't look too attractive right now with the way the markets are responding to Obama's financial moves), families taking care of their elders, charitable organizations which assist the elderly, or working till you die (FDR did).