Runaway Slave Movie: "The Size and Scope and Reach of Governemnt is the New Plantation"

Here is the trailer for a powerful documentary asking if the black community has traded one for of slavery for another. Vice President Biden was just called out for stoking the black community for his chains of slavery comment. 

This documentary noted that 'You don't need chains to be a slave' and suggests that Liberal (Democrat) policies have basically turned the greater black community (and the elderly for that matter) into their slaves, trading Government handouts for their votes. Think about it. What is the Democrats message about the 'Evil Republicans' - that they will take away your handouts. That you will have to support yourselves without Government entitlements. Without free Government healthcare. 

You have to wonder, after decades of Government programs to help the poor escape poverty, how is it that there are ever more poor people? More poor people who vote for Democrats. What is the product here?

Blacks are not the only one on the short end of the stick. Look at how those with taxable income are being treated. In short, they are evil. So are small business owners. the rich. Most everyone working, as long as it is not a Government job. As I covered before 'Democrats Hate Your Job'.

 


http://www.runawayslavemovie.com/

 
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Obama - The Petty President - Stuck on Tax Returns

I predict that by the time this election is all over, President Obama will be seen as the petty, disaster of a President that he really is. As it is, after a week of facing damaging campaigning, criticizing his raid of Medicare, failure to pass a budget during his presidency, and failure to even attempt to get Government spending under control, all he has to offer is more demands that candidate Romney release more of his tax returns.

Barack Obama's re-election campaign kept up pressure against Republican rival Mitt Romney on two fronts Friday, launching a new ad defending the president's record on Medicare while challenging Romney to release at least five years of tax returns. - MyWay News

Perhaps Romney should offer to release more tax returns in exchange for Obama releasing his Columbia transcripts.

After all, one of Obama's own Columbia classmates makes some serious allegations concerning the President's time at Columbia:

Here’s my gut belief: Obama got a leg up by being admitted to both Occidental and Columbia as a foreign exchange student. He was raised as a young boy in Indonesia. But did his mother ever change him back to a U.S. citizen? When he returned to live with his grandparents in Hawaii or as he neared college-age preparing to apply to schools, did he ever change his citizenship back? I’m betting not. If you could unseal Obama’s Columbia University records I believe you’d find that:

A) He rarely ever attended class.

B) His grades were not those typical of what we understand it takes to get into Harvard Law School.

C) He attended Columbia as a foreign exchange student.

D) He paid little for either undergraduate college or Harvard Law School because of foreign aid and scholarships given to a poor foreign students like this kid Barry Soetoro from Indonesia.

If you think I’m “fishing” then prove me wrong. Open up your records Mr. President. What are you afraid of? If it’s okay for U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to go on a fishing expedition about Romney’s taxes (even though he knows absolutely nothing about them nor will release his own), then I think I can do the same thing. But as Obama’s Columbia Class of ’83 classmate, at least I have more standing to make educated guesses. It’s time for Mitt to go on the attack and call Obama’s bluff. - The Blaze

Lets face it, all of this is one huge distraction. This is Obama's re-election campaign plan. Basically to attack his opponent and scare voters. He has to do this because he has no record to run on. At least none that win anyone over.... And not for anything, I doubt there is much that will change the mind if his current supporters. Their thinking is just not right...

P.S. Below is a screenshot of the actual Drudge homepage. The one above is a mockup.

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All In - ROMNEY / RYAN

I understand how conservatives would not be so excited about Republican nominee Mitt Romney. That said, his choice of Paul Ryan certainly re-centers his campaign into real conservative territory. Look, it really didn't matter who the Republican candidates were, it could have been Satan and that would have been who I would have voted for come November. Luckily, we have gotten much better. As liberal as Mitt Romney appears to be, he does seem to be in his heart a business man. You can see signs of this in his campaign in how quickly they act and how quickly they have forced the Obama campaign to react. This is good, the campaign should be run like a business.

In line with that, our country is going to have to make some tough choices in the next couple of years to fix our spending and entitlement problem. Paul Ryan has been one of the few Congressmen to step forward and suggest real and sustainable changes. All the Obama Administration and Democrats have been able to manage is increased spending and intentionally not adopting a budget for the last three years. On top of that, they have been playing games with the budget numbers that if they did the same thing in the private sector, they would be facing jail time.

Romney - Ryan is a much better choice than Satan and it is heads and tails better than the current disaster of a President running the country into the ground right now.

I'm all in. Lets win then. Then we can push those we elect to remember the real work that needs to be done. And that should start by removing all of the Obama political appointees.

Video found at Ace of Spades.

Bonus - At 1 minute into the ad, there is a shot of kids working a lemonade stand. I'm guessing that didn't end up in there by accident.

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Air and Space Museum - Space Shuttle DISCOVERY - Fisheye

Took a visit to the Air and Space Museum by Dulles Airport today and here are some fish eye photos. Click to enlarge.

Click here to view my previous photos of the Air and Space Museum.

Up-Close at the National Air and Space Museum

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"A federal law requiring advance notice of mass layoffs does not apply to" Government Layoffs...

I have never worked for the Government, other than my time in the US Navy Reserves. I have worked for a US Government contractor. This was on my last ship, the USNS SILAS BENT. At the time the management of the ship had just passed to a company called Dyne Marine Services. The company was eager to win over the merchant marine crew that they were going to send to the ship. They even flew us to their headquarters to tell us how great they were and how we were a part of the team. What they didn't tell us, was that the Fair Labor Standards Act didn't apply to the jobs that we were about to take.

The Fair Labor Standards Act 1938 (abbreviated as FLSA; also referred to as the Wages and Hours Bill) is a federal statute of the United States. The FLSA established a national minimum wage, guaranteed 'time-and-a-half' for overtime in certain jobs, and prohibited most employment of minors in "oppressive child labor," a term that is defined in the statute. It applies to employees engaged in interstate commerce or employed by an enterprise engaged in commerce or in the production of goods for commerce, unless the employer can claim an exemption from coverage. - Wiki

Now, I have no proof that their omission was done on purpose, but given that I personally asked if work over 8 hours a day and over 40 hours a week considered overtime in a room full of seafarers and company bigwigs to get confirmation that my comments were correct. What I did not ask, and what they did not offer, BUT MUST HAVE KNOWN, was that overtime would be paid as straight pay, not at 'time-and-a-half'. And why ask given that overtime for sailors means just that. Unless some sneaky bastard figures that their company can manage Government owned ships at a cheaper rate by screwing sailors out of their pay And keep in mind that sailing is 24/7, so we were all counting on a minimum of 16 hours overtime a week for simply standing watch on weekends. 

The crew had various ways of dealing with this financial setback. Many refused to work any non-mandatory overtime. I took the opportunity to work as many hours as possible. The Third Mate mad it a habit of being right at the gangway to welcome all new crew with the question 'Hey, did they tell you that overtime was at straight pay?' I have to say that it was pretty amusing to watch the smiles disappear off the faces of newly joining crew, even before they got off the gangway. (Given that this went on for 6 months, kind of suggests that the guys in the office doing the hiring were intentionally not informing new crew. It just goes to show you you really need to beware when a company tells you how great they are. They might be hiding something.) 

The reason I bring this up is the news that the Government is trying to delay layoff notices from going out to thousands of Government contractor employees until after the Presidential Election.

Under the WARN Act -- The Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act -- companies with more than 100 employees must give 60 days' notice if there is to be a mass layoff during any 30-day period for 500 or more employees (or for 50-499 employees if they make up at least 33% of the employer's active workforce). But in guidance issued on Monday, Assistant Labor Secretary Jane Oates said never mind about those pink slips: "Questions have recently been raised as to whether the WARN Act requires Federal contractors...whose contracts may be terminated or reduced in the event of sequestration on January 2, 2013, to provide WARN Act notices 60 days before that date to their workers employed under government contracts funded from sequestrable accounts. The answer to this question is 'no.' In fact, to provide such notice would be inconsistent with the purpose of the WARN Act." - CNSNews.com

The excuse given for this is that despite the cuts that are currently law, it is not possible to WARN anyone of layoffs because no specific projects or contracts have been officially notified that they would be part of the spending cut. Plus, Congress MIGHT actually repeal sequestration.

5. Application of WARN Act to Potential Sequestration. Although it is currently known that sequestration may occur, it is also known that efforts are being made to avoid sequestration. Thus, even the occurrence of sequestration is not necessarily foreseeable. In addition, the sequester’s impact on particular accounts will depend at least in part on Fiscal Year (FY) 2013 funding that Congress has not yet enacted. Perhaps more importantly, Federal agencies also have some discretion in how to implement the required reductions if sequestration were to occur. Given that Federal agencies, including DOD, have not announced which contracts will be affected by sequestration were it to occur, and that many contracts may be completely unaffected, the actual contract terminations or cutbacks that will occur in the event of sequestration are unknown. Thus, in the absence of any additional information, potential plant closings or layoffs resulting from such contract terminations or cutbacks are speculative and unforeseeable. - US Govt Notice (PDF)

I have to admit that this makes sense. Yes thousands of people are going to get laid off. You know that you are going to be one of them. And yet, nobody will know for sure until the very last minute. That is, unless their employers send them a courtesy warning in advance of any mandated by the law. Apparently this is something that employers can do. Imagine if you as a taxpayer or as a business owner started behaving on how Congress might act. You might end up receiving a fine or worse some jail time. But the Government, the rules do not apply to them, ESPECIALLY if there is a Democrat in office. Not that rules apply to a Republican in office, it is just that the Democrats (and the media) are very vocal in making sure Republicans don't get away with breaking the laws.

Anyway, I suspect that is is just some wasteful posturing on behalf of a Government lackey who either is trying to keep the current president in office or truly believes that in this case it's perfectly OK not to tell people that they are going to be without a job shortly after the election.

What I would like to see is the DOD actually announce which programs they plan to cut because of sequestration. Then the pink slips can go out, as they should. (Note: I am not in support of suck cuts to our National Defense. As it is, the DOD was the only Government Dept that I know of that was actively cutting their spending before this mess. The ax needs to fall elsewhere.)
 

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About Those Trillions Being Held In Tax Havens Around The World...

Given that about half of all Americans are not paying taxes and are now receiving benefits from the Government, and with things even worse in other countries, politicians and the press are trying to place blame on the lack of an unlimited supply of money to pay for these social programs on rich people who are somehow hiding assets from taxation in tax havens around the world:

The Tax Justice Network, a campaign group, estimated last weekend that as much as $21 to $32 trillion of financial assets are sheltered in offshore tax havens, representing up to $280 billion in lost income tax. - CNBC

First, while it sounds like a very large number, it is very deceptive. That is because, while some of the money is illicit and the beneficial owners are hiding the money from taxation, much of this money is there legally and that the beneficial owners do not owe any additional tax on these funds. 

Worse, look at the study's own estimate of lost tax revenue: 'up to $280 billion in lost income tax'. While in itself a large amount, it is still a mere 1% of the total. At the very least this story is just more evidence that the real problem is excess spending and not enough taxation (other than the growing percentage of the population escaping taxation entirely, and that is not the rich who already pay and pay more...).

Even worse, the potential amount of last tax revenue, assuming the 'best case' scenario, is not even 1/4 of the US 2012 budget deficit of 1.2 Trillion dollars. So even if this lost income tax could be recovered AND IF the US got all of the proceeds, it would not even make a difference in stemming the US's march towards bankruptcy. Greece itself would need just about  the whole amount to help dig itself out of their current fiscal crisis.

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Video - 'Obama Isn't Working'

Here is a grassroots campaign video making the case against re-electing President Obama.

As found on Ace of Spades Blog.

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Illegal Kinder Eggs and Illegal Aliens Learning to Fly...

You know, one thing that keeps Americans faith in their legal system is the belief that everyone is treated fairly. That said, the Obama Administration has been busy picking favorites. Americans are being harassed more and more, while at the same time our supposed leaders have been turning a blind eye when it comes to the offenses committed by their supporters and other interest groups, especially illegal aliens. Take the following two stories: Americans threatened with huge fines for daring to import chocolate eggs, available most everywhere else.

Chris Sweeney and his husband were driving home to Seattle after a recent trip to Vancouver when they were stopped at the border for more than two hours and threatened with thousands of dollars in fines for dangerous contraband in the trunk of their car. Their suspicious cargo? Half a dozen Kinder Surprise chocolate eggs, each filled with a tiny plastic toy - a childhood favourite in Canada but an illegal choking hazard in the United States. "I thought (the American border guard) had done his search and hadn't found anything, and he was joking with us," Sweeney, 35, told The Canadian Press in an interview Wednesday. "He wasn't joking." The popular German chocolate eggs are not sold in the U.S. because they are considered a choking hazard. They are also banned because the treats are considered adulterated food by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Sweeney said a border guard told him and his husband that they could be fined $2,500 per egg, and then ordered them to head to the port of entry, where they waited for more than two hours. "We really didn't know what was going to happen," he said. "I didn't know if maybe this was some really important thing that I just wasn't aware of and they were going to actually give us the fine of $15,000." But once inside, Sweeney said border staff later brushed off the offence and merely told them never to bring the Kinder Surprise eggs across the border again. - Canada.com

Illegal aliens learning to fly commercial Airplanes. No, not the 9/11 hijackers. This is going on today!

A loophole in U.S. Transportation Security Administration (TSA) regulations allowed the agency to approve flight training for 25 illegal aliens at a Boston-area flight school owned by yet another illegal alien, according to the Government Accountability Office (GAO). Eight of the attendees had entered the United States illegally, while 17 had overstayed their visas, according to a GAO audit, CNSNews.com reports. Six of the illegals obtained pilot’s licenses. The discovery of the flight school issues began when local police — not federal authorities — stopped the school’s owner on a traffic violation and then were able to determine that he was an illegal alien, according to CNSNews. - Newsmax

Are you kidding me? Teaching and issuing pilot certificates to illegal aliens. I thought this lesson was learned after we taught the 9/11 hijackers how to fly. Clearly not. Because after all, heaven forbid we do anything like enforce US immigration law.Maybe the illegal aliens can bring some Kinder Eggs with them.

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Helsinki City Apartment Bathroom - Part II

A couple years ago I had a post 'Helsinki City Apartment Bathroom' noting how small the bathroom in my Helsinki rental apartment was. Well, that bathroom was roomy compared to the closet of a bathroom I have in my current apartment. One thing to keep in mind when looking at these photos - the bathroom is SMALLER than it looks in the photos. It is so small, you can't turn around in the bathroom.

Oddly enough, this is a very roomy apartment. We are in downtown. Have two bedrooms and a large shower room.

See here 'Helsinki City Rental Apartment - Photos' for photos of my downright favorite rental apartment. I'm not completely sure, but I think this might be the second best rental apartment. Anyway, if you ever plan on staying in Helsinki for a week or more, you should consider rental apartments as an alternative to a hotel, especially if you are traveling with children.

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$9 Billion in ‘Stimulus’ - 910 Jobs OR 9,000 Millionaires...

The latest stimulus news is out and it is yet one more confirmation on what a disaster the program is/was:

(CNSNews.com) – The Obama administration distributed $9 billion in economic “stimulus” funds to solar and wind projects in 2009-11 that created, as the end result, 910 “direct” jobs -- annual operation and maintenance positions -- meaning that it cost about $9.8 million to establish each of those long-term jobs. - CNS News

You know what else this money could have been used to do - It could have simply been given to 9,000 Americans in million dollar chunks, in effect creating 9,000 millionaires. 

Worse, the story notes that the $9 billion also created 4,600 indirect jobs, which when added to the direct number is still thousands less than if the Government simply gave the money away as part of a lottery. 

My 2009 post 'Better way to Spend $825 Billion in the Name of Stimulus' notes that instead of using the stimulus money for projects, that it just might be better to simply use it for a lottery where there were 800,000 first prizes of a million dollars each.Would this have been fair? I think it would have been more fair than giving huge amounts of money to politically connected companies like Solyndra who just turned around and burned the cash.

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'No Child Left Behind Stupidity' - English Proficiency

My oldest is finishing up her last day of First Grade this week. This is also the time that I am completing papers for my youngest to start kindergarten in the fall.

One form that we had to complete for each of them contained questions on whether they could speak a foreign language and whether there were any foreign language speakers in the house. The form noted that if you answered 'yes' to these questions that your child would automatically be labeled a non-native English speaker (or something similar to this. I forget the exact designation).

I was hesitant to mention any foreign language skill for my daughter, simply because she was also a fluent native English speaker. After all, she was born here and basically her entire foreign language proficiency was the result of my wife being an army of one in teaching our daughter her native language. I was afraid that she would end up in some special treatment intended for actual foreign language speakers with limited English proficiency. However, since we did not want to lie on the form, we told the truth.

So our daughter was tested in Kindergarten on a 1 to 6 scale in her English proficiency and received a score of 4. The test results came with a two page explanation of the results. However the explanation was totally useless in determining how our daughter did in the exam because nowhere in the paper did it explain that 4 was the highest score a Kindergarten student can receive because at that level they do not test reading comprehension. Leave it to the Government to design a test where a child can get the highest grade while leaving the parents completely confused as to how their child could do so poorly on the test.

Upon learning the news that our daughter is doing fine, I wanted to remove her from this program. Her teacher noted that there was no harm in her participation and she was losing no time from the classroom. My wife agreed and I relented. Eventually, the testing will remove a student based on the result. However, the letter from the school noting that my daughter is now proficient in English, also declares her as 'formerly limited English Proficient (FLEP)'

So there you have it. The Government had classified my child as LIMITED ENGLISH PROFICIENT solely based on our declaration that she had the ability to speak another language and was in a household where at least one parent also spoke a foreign language. There was no testing done to ever determine if there was any limitation to her English proficiency. She had spent two years in pre-school. Never was there any comment concerning any problems with her language skills. This is all due to idiotic Government Regulations. 

Worse, I have no doubt that my daughter is now a stat supporting how great the school is in successfully turning children with limited English proficiency into proficient students. A stat that will now reduce how badly the number that fail to achieve that goal. Don't get me wrong, our local elementary school is great. However, they did nothing to improve her proficiency in relation to other native English-speaking classmates as she was a native speaker to begin with.

Well, I have learned my lesson. During the completion of the enrollment forms for my son, I have included a letter refusing to permit my son's participation in this program. Apparently the form produced a bit of consternation at the school, but it also resulted in discovery of a form that excludes my son's participation in this program. While my daughter is all good with participating in any sort of project or test, My son is a little more stubborn and the last thing I need is for him to notice that he is being testing when others are not. Because he will not take their exam or create some problem where there is none. I do believe in testing, but I am against senseless testing. And this program is needlessly creating students in need that don't exist.

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