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TAX AND SPEND:

Remember when the Greeks ousted their PM and brought in a central banker to fix things? His government declared no new austerity measures are needed. Apparently this guy doesn't remember how easily Germans go to war.

"The deal includes provisions for banks and other private holders of Greek bonds to write off 50% of their Greek debt holdings — potentially cutting the country's debt by €100 billion and reducing the debt-to-GDP ratio to 120% by 2020 from an expected 161.7% this year . But the details have not yet been worked out, and negotiations have only just begun."

Does that make you feel more confident?

Federal debt tops $15 trillion. That's over $160,000 per US worker.

If Republicans pass this revenue plan, voters will blow a gasket.

Apparently we're supposed to be outraged that GE pays significant taxes in China but almost no taxes in the US. But there's a couple reasons for this. First, GE probably makes a ton of money in China, and it makes almost none in the US because China's economy is growing and ours is shrinking. Second, the US is an old government so moneyed interests have had centuries to insinuate themselves with government. Note GE's donations to Obama.

HEALTH CARE:

Thanks to government domination of Europe's health care system, antibiotic resistant super-bugs are sweeping the continent.

GLOBAL WARMING AND ENERGY:

It turns out El Nino is a bigger driver of global climate than previously thought.

POLICE STATE:

Microsoft tries to patent software that identifies and punishes obnoxious workplace behavior. Homeland Security will require it on every computer.

Is it coincidence that just as the government shut down Occupy protests all over the country, Twitter has buried the OWS hash tags?

POLITICS:

This is why Ron Paul's anti-establishment message continues to gain steam across the political spectrum.

"To outward appearances, it might seem as though the left and right have never been more at odds. And for the average man in the street, drawn to the Tea Party on one side or the Occupy movement on the other, this might be true. But it is not so true for elite opinion. The nation's high and mighty may be divided about many things, but on one point they often agree: Americans are still too darn free."

That's a terrible fact.

There's suddenly a lot of buzz about Ron Paul being competitive in Iowa. Maybe he won't be ignored in the next debate. Maybe he'll be attacked. Watch the CNN guy ask him when he stopped being a racist.

Gingrich under fire for accepting lobbying money from Freddie Mac, Big Med and Pharma, and ethanol and other big business.

Bachmann thinks the end of the world is at hand. I don't want anybody who believes that to be president.

Occupy protesters seizing more property.

"Mr. Lafferty, who has helped Occupy Los Angeles protesters look for indoor space, is now aiding the group to form a nonprofit foundation because, as Lafferty points out, “the city has arrangements with other nonprofits to lease space for as little as a dollar a year.”"

Now this is a positive sign.

MEDIA:

Why is Time publishing a hagiography on Hillary Clinton now? Maybe she really will replace Biden on the 2012 ticket. Notice how power is smart when Democrats use it to advance their interests but dumb when Republicans use it to advance their interests. That's because the mainstream media are cronies to Democrats.

Great fact-checking piece on Ron Paul out of Cincinnati.

LOCAL:

Another consequence of government looting us to economic collapse: suicides up 40 percent locally.

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REGULATION:

Insiders manage to escape from MF Global collapse while regulators claim to be clueless.

FEDERAL RESERVE:

Ben Bernanke says gold isn't money, but central banks are buying gold at the highest rate in 40 years.

EDUCATION:

If you thought the government take-over of school lunches would lead to better nutrition for children, I have some land in Florida to sell you. Congress declares frozen pizza is a vegetable.

GLOBAL WARMING AND ENERGY:

Obama's Energy Secretary denies that political considerations played a role in making the Solyndra loan. And Bill Clinton did not have sex with that woman, Lewinsky. What else is he going to say? This is why I say the most important job requirement of any politician is to be able to lie without conscience and get away with it over and over and over. Politicians must lie from day one about advancing their own interests, and they must lie about it every day all day, and the must be believable. Politicians are not like us. They are the worst of the worst people in the country.

In an excellent illustration of the totalitarian nature of the global warming frauds, the Australian government plans to fine any business that explains it had to raise its prices because of the new carbon tax.

"THE whitewash begins. Now that the carbon tax has passed through federal parliament, the government’s clean-up brigade is getting into the swing by trying to erase any dissent against the jobs-destroying legislation.On cue comes the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, which this week issued warnings to businesses that they will face whopping fines of up to $1.1m if they blame the carbon tax for price rises."

It's amazing how fast our civilization is deteriorating.

POLICE STATE:

The local city police chief says there's no record that sex crime witness McQueary contacted police. The name of the police force is confusing. It's called State College police, but apparently that have no jurisdiction over Penn State.

""He didn't come to State College police. The crime happened on campus and we don't have jurisdiction on campus," King said. "We've had no reports (of Sandusky sexually abusing someone) from anybody.""

Also,

"The university also has its own police force, and said they have no record of any police report filed by McQueary."

McQueary's character seems more and more questionable, and Paterno probably knew that. Or maybe the police are covering up. There's so much self-interest being exposed here, it's hard to know what to believe. That's why the rush to oust Paterno was such a disservice to him, the players, the school and to justice.

The EU shuts down nude scanners because of safety concerns. Don't expect the TSA to be as sensible.

FOREIGN POLICY:

All sanctions end up hurting the people but helping the ruling class, not just those on Iran.

"International sanctions aimed at Iran's nuclear program have hurt the country's middle class and caused factories to shut down while low-quality goods flood the country, say foreign policy analysts.But the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, the military unit that protects the Islamic regime and drives the nuclear program that sanctions are meant to impede, has profited and grown stronger under the sanctions, say the analysts."

This aggression by the US proves to the Iranian government why it needs a nuclear weapon to deter US aggression. We should end the sanctions to empower the Iranian people so they can create a more tolerance government.

POLITICS:

The Wall Street Occupiers blocked streets again. 177 arrested.

Tuesday I wrote:

"In a disturbing turn of events, Occupy protests all around the country were shut down in one night. It's like Obama or Soros gave the order, and local officials all around the country obeyed. That's just creepy. That isn't supposed to be able to happen. That leftist central planners can order the shutdown of all the Occupy protests in one night and have local authorities carry out that order with such efficiency shows a level of leftist central authority command and control over local authorities beyond what I thought existed in the US. This is truly frightening."

I told friends and family that Obama must have executes some secret order - secret directive 17 or something - to make this happen. It didn't take long for verification that a federal authority ordered the coordinated shutdown of the Occupy protests around the country.

"And according to one Justice official, each of those actions was coordinated with help from Homeland Security, the FBI and other federal police agencies."

And:

"According to Oakland Mayor Jean said that 18 cities coordinated police crack downs on Occupy protests."

That was pretty obvious, but I'm surprised participants have already confirmed it. This is why people tend to disbelieve conspiracy theories. People, especially people who covet the spotlight, are terrible at keeping secrets. At least one person recognizes how frightening this is:

"The 18 police action was a national, coordinated effort. This is a more serious development that one might imagine. Reader Richard Kline has pointed out that one of the de facto protections of American freedoms is that policing is local, accountable to elected officials at a level of government where voters matter. National coordination vitiates the notion that policing is responsive to and accountable to the governed."

Very scary.

Look how far out the AP goes to pretend this Occupy movement wasn't centrally planned. It also pretends the shutdown obviously coordinated shutdown was spontaneous.

"As concerns over safety and sanitation grew at the encampments over the last month, officials from nearly 40 cities turned to each other on conference calls, sharing what worked and what hasn't as they grappled with the leaderless movement."

Leaderless movement my butt. Obama literally called for protests, and they happened, and when he realized they were hurting him more than helping him, he ordered them shut down.

"To cheers and applause, Obama called on those gathered to "take off your bedroom slippers. Put on your marching shoes... shake it off. Stop complainin'. Stop grumblin'. Stop cryin'. We are going to press on. We have work to do.""

Right after that, his supporters started marching.

LOCAL:

MADD is not happy with the current level of the police state, and they want Ohio police to step it up a couple notches.

MISC:

This is a nice post explaining the relative success of the Bengals this year. Basically, Mike Brown has handed over a significant amount of power to Marvin Lewis. What is unsaid in this article is why: because the fans quit buying tickets. I've said for years that if the fans stop buying tickets and hit Mike Brown in the wallet, he would surrender control of the team in order to improve it and make more money or move the team and enable a better team to move to Cincinnati. This year season sales plummeted. Games didn't selling out for the first time in nearly a decade. As a result, Brown turned to Marvin to turn things around. But we shouldn't be complacent. Brown temporarily gave Marvin power when he first hired him only to undermine him when he became successful. If the fans come roaring back, Brown is likely to do that again. So for the sake of the fans, continue the boycott.

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TAX AND SPEND:

The US corporate tax rate is nearly double the world average. And politicians pretend they don't understand why jobs are going overseas.

EDUCATION:

School districts that spend less poisoned government money often have much more success. Imagine that.

GLOBAL WARMING AND ENERGY:

Obama administration pressured Solyndra to hold off layoffs until after the 2010 election, and it complied.

POLICE STATE:

Sarah Palin says alleged Penn State abuser should hang from the highest tree. Who needs those wasteful trial anyway? They're just a waste of money.

This report calls the Penn State witness a former Penn State quarterback, so Paterno probably knew him well.

"In the email, first obtained and reported Tuesday by The Morning Call of Allentown, Pa., McQueary said he "did have discussions with police and with the official at the university in charge of police" after the alleged incident.In the email, dated Nov. 8, McQueary said "I did stop it, not physically, but made sure it was stopped when I left that locker room," The Morning Call reported."

The more we learn, the more we learn that things were done well by the witness and Paterno, contrary to the lynch mob media reports whipped up by the government goons. Of course this guy may be lying too, but if he talked to police, there's almost certainly a record. This may be why the government didn't indict him. They simply failed to report he contacted policy because it didn't serve their interest in stirring up a lynch mob against Paterno.

"Attorneys Caroline Roberto and Tom Farrell said in a statement: "It's hard to imagine that after conducting a three-year investigation, and with what we believe is only one witness, Mike McQueary, to prepare to testify at the preliminary hearing, the Attorney General claims they aren't available.""

Of course the AG wants a delay. She wants to milk this for as long as possible. She wants the press to do her dirty work for her. She wants to do everything in and outside of her power to bias the jury pool as effectively as possible and to make sure everybody knows her name. Attorney general is a natural launching point to governor. Case in point:

"Gov. Tom Corbett took the case on a referral from the Centre County district attorney, Michael Madeira, in early 2009 while he was serving as attorney general."

You can bet the current AG has the same goal in mind, and if she wins this case, she'll probably become governor someday. If she loses, she almost certainly won't. So her future economic advancement is on the line. That's why she blew up this case into a media circus.

"Corbett bristled Tuesday when asked whether it was fair for people to criticize the pace of the probe."People that are saying that are ill-informed as to how investigations are conducted, how witnesses are developed, how backup information, corroborative information is developed, and they really don't know what they're talking about," he told reporters.
The attorney general's office declined to comment on the pace of the investigation."

The government can take all the time it wants to coerce all the witnesses it needs, then, unless the defendant is independently wealthy, is forced to deal with incomplete discovery and at the government's pace. It's ridiculous that this investigation has been going on for three years and is still incomplete. Nobody in the private sector would tolerate that.

FOREIGN POLICY:

Obama expands US military in Australia. Why do we have any military in Australia? Rhetorical question.

Map shows countries with US troops and bases. This is amazing. According to this map the US has troops in all but 46 counties.


POLITICS:

Congressional hearings biased in favor of lobbyists. What a shocker.

MEDIA:

In its attempt to boost the Occupy movement, the press covered up reports of sexual assaults.

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FASCISM:

What this author describes isn't classic socialism. It's fascism. To be fair, fascism is a form of socialism.

TAX AND SPEND:

The EU is proposing to blackout credit ratings to hide the terrible fiscal situation in Europe. Ignorance is bliss.

EDUCATION:

More evidence of the economic illiteracy of Harvard students.

POLICE STATE:

People are resisting TSA's intrusion into highway and bus transit systems. That's a signal for the FBI to find some dupe and coerce him into wanting to blow up a bus, then busting him to build up support for this new level of authoritarianism.


The Dept. of Justice has chosen to interpret the new anti-internet law such that violating the ToS of a site is considered a crime.


It's bad enough the Pennsylvania AG is using the Penn State sex abuse scandal to advance her own interests, but now a Democrat Congressman wants to do the same.


The Penn State witness claims he talked to police and he stopped the rape. You mean the government goons and their propagandists in the press got the story wrong? Say it isn't so.


POLITICS:


In a disturbing turn of events, Occupy protests all around the country were shut down in one night. It's like Obama or Soros gave the order, and local officials all around the country obeyed. That's just creepy. That isn't supposed to be able to happen. That leftist central planners can order the shutdown of all the Occupy protests in one night and have local authorities carry out that order with such efficiency shows a level of leftist central authority command and control over local authorities beyond what I thought existed in the US. This is truly frightening. It's obvious the leftist central planners figured out the ubiquitous violence inherent in leftist ideology was doing their cause more harm than good. The good news is that the media support for the movement, its cover-up of the violence and its subsequent attempt to minimize the violence by painting it as a fringe element failed. And we don't have to see those nasty shanty towns any more.


The Occupy violence against property continues:

"Some Occupy Wall Street protesters had already moved to another public space, owned by Trinity Church, at Canal St. and Sixth Ave., where they used bolt cutters to open a fenced-in area."

I suppose breaking & entering and trespassing are covered by free speech too. The Occupiers claim their movement is about free speech, but in fact it's about property right. The violence against property is trumpeted in the name of the movement.

"“Whose park? Our park!” protesters chanted. “They stole our freaking tents from the 99%!”"

No. Zuccotti Park belongs to Brookfield Properties. This is a protest against property rights.


Leftists don't just attack prominent conservative blacks, they do the same to prominent conservative gays.


Good news for Ron Paul in Iowa. Even more good news for Ron Paul in Iowa.

"The poll, conducted November 10 - 12 by the West Des Moines-based firm Selzer & Co, shows Cain in the lead with 20 percent, while Paul comes in at 19 percent. Romney wins 18 percent support, and Gingrich earns 17 percent. The margin of error is 4.4 percent."

That's great.


Fifty-seven Congressmen are in the 1 percent.


LOCAL:


My Google homepages shows this headline from the Dayton Daily News: "‘Occupy' might offer conditions to vacate Courthouse Square", but the pages gives a 404 error. The paper probably pulled the story since the Dayton Occupiers have been ousted. I just drove past Courthouse Square. There's still two tents standing and one guy holding a 99 percent sign. The other eight or nine tents that have been there for weeks are gone. There's still a port-a-potty to. I bet taxpayers are paying for that. Now that DDN story has returned.


One Occupy Dayton's protester's view of the Grand Illumination.

You Can’t Ban Nature

You Can’t Ban Nature
by Mark Luedtke

“Lions and tigers and bears, oh my! Lions and tigers and bears.” Forgive me. I watched the Wizard of Oz Friday night, and it was very scary. It had scarecrows, witches, and tornadoes in it. I think more Ohioans died while watching the Wizard of Oz on Friday than died during the entire Very Scary Wild Animal Release Crisis (VSWARC) near Zanesville a few weeks back. Fewer couldn’t have died since nobody died during the the VSWARC. Maybe we should ban the Wizard of Oz, scarecrows, witches and tornadoes. That would make me feel safer, and that’s all that matters, right?



You think I’m joking. I’m not. Lightning kills on average 57 people in America year. That’s two per year in Ohio. That’s two more than were killed by exotic animals during the VSWARC. Let’s ban lightning too.



Let’s ban ownership of exotic animals the same way government banned ownership of drugs. Think about how successful that’s been. Nobody uses drugs anymore, right? Nobody gets gunned down in the street over drugs since they were banned, right? It’s not like the war on drugs created a black market that’s responsible for half the crime in the US or anything. It’s so cool how government can change the laws of nature by simply banning something. So let’s ban tornadoes so they’ll never wipe out Xenia again. And let’s ban bears so we don’t have to be scared of them any more. Stephen Colbert would approve.



If you’re a ban lover, I have some land in Florida to sell you. Guaranteed to be free of crocodiles, alligators and pythons because the Florida government banned them. Only herd animals singing “Kumbaya” are allowed. That’s why the land is so safe and expensive, but I offer a discount to Occupy protesters.



Just joking.You can’t ban stupidity. You can’t ban suicidal activity. You can’t ban nature. Didn’t anybody see The Lion King? Don’t make me sing “The Circle of Life”.



This proposed ban would have had zero effect on this tragedy. It’s impossible to stop a man from opening cages then committing suicide. Only government proposes non-solutions to supposed problems that punish every citizen but do nothing to actually prevent the problem they claim to target. And is government going to ban the cougars, coyotes and bears running wild in Ohio too?

If passed, this ban would create worse problems. Remember how the ban on dog fighting kept Michael Vick from fighting dogs? A ban on exotic animals would increase their value and create a black market that empowered criminal gangs. That economic incentive would lead to more exotic animals in Ohio, and they would be kept in worse conditions. This would produce more crime, more animal cruelty and increase the danger of animal attack. Politicians can’t change the laws of economics. They can only pervert them to enrich themselves and their cronies to the detriment of the rest of us.



And it’s not just state politicians trying to capitalize on this tragedy. The Sydney Morning Herald quotes Tiger expert Leigh Henry, “I would say the current patchwork of laws in the United States regulating these captive tigers is inexcusable.” Expect national politicians to use this as an excuse to grab more power for themselves too.



I respect Jack Hanna for his expertise in handling animals, but I have no respect for him or anybody else as a lobbyist for bigger government. Notice Hanna is not trying to ban himself from controlling exotic animals, only others. But what’s to stop Hanna from releasing his wild animals? Hanna is using this tragedy to manipulate the public to convince politicians to quash his competition so he will become more wealthy and more powerful at the expense of the people. This is an object lesson showing how people manipulate voters and use the violence of government to advance their personal economic interests.



Some of you are probably offended that I have turned a tragedy into a farce. I respectfully disagree. Media actors and politicians have turned this unique, tragic event into a farcical propaganda piece for their personal gain. Because it was a unique event, it should have no influence on policy, but in typical government fashion, Governor Kasich, Jack Hanna and others are fear-mongering to advance their own economic interests at the expense of the people. I’m responding in kind.



The most important lesson we should learn from this tragedy is that people must be prepared to defend themselves and their families. The people are always the first defenders. Crooks don’t rob police stations. Training and arming yourself with a firearm is the best way to protect yourself and others from unforeseen attacks whether it comes from a standard criminal, terrorist or wild animal. When an attacker of any kind appears in your face, nobody can save you but yourself. Government’s pretense that it provides security undermines our willingness and ability to protect ourselves which makes us more vulnerable to attackers, not safer. Let’s learn the right lesson from this tragedy and strengthen our ability to protect ourselves instead of allowing government to make us more vulnerable by advancing its false sense of security at our expense.


Originally printed in the Dayton City Paper: Proposed Ohio Wild Animal Ban.

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SOCIALISM:

Remember when Democrats were in a froth over Wall Street bonuses? Despite asking for another bailout, taxpayer-owned Fannie and Freddie execs are getting far larger bonuses with no phony Democrat outrage.

When the NFL owners locked out the players, they disbanded the union. Now that the NBA owners have locked out the players, they are going to disband their union. Maybe this is a good idea for all workers.

TAX AND SPEND:

We often hear about silly expenditures by the Chinese government that don't lead to recessions because of the incredibly high rate of savings by the Chinese people, but this can't continue. For example, now we hear about the Chinese government building bizarre structures in the desert. Dare I predict they are for collecting energy?

Remember how the ruling class loved democracy until they bankrupted us? Now in Europe, since the people are tired of being looting into bankruptcy, not any more.

""What kind of democracy is this that announces a new prime minister without elections?" wondered Dora Papageorgiou, 30, who works in an office of a construction company in Athens."

Only fools thought the government served the people.

HEALTH CARE:

Supreme Court to hear Obamacare challenge.

Thanks to government's corruption of our food supply, study predicts ten percent of people in the world will have diabetes by 2030.

GLOBAL WARMING AND ENERGY:

After Obama delays pipeline from Canada, Canadian government begins negotiating to sell that oil to China instead of the US. This pipeline would create jobs and lower the price of oil in America, making people richer. Obama doesn't want to create jobs. He wants Americans to become poorer. So he blocked the pipeline. But I bet he gets overruled on this pretty quickly.

WAR:

Obama handing out no-bid war profiteering contracts just like Bush. They all do it. That's why the government is constantly waging war.

POLICE STATE:

Accused ex-Penn State coach accused of pedophilia admits to showering and "horsing around" with young boys, but claims he wasn't a pedophile. What is going on here? Has his lawyer decided the best way to save his life is to make him soften himself to the public?

POLITICS:

The mainstream media reports on the insider trading by members of Congress. Naturally, their proposed solution is all wrong. Congress shouldn't be barred from insider trading. Insider trading should be legal for everybody. The sooner information reaches the market, the more efficient the market becomes at allocating scarce resources. Also, we should get government out of our economy so the stock value of businesses would be based on the wealth they create instead of how much they lobby.

Newest list of Occupy destruction. How many people died the huge tea parties over the last few years? None. How many died so far at the tiny Occupy protests over the last two months? Four. Not to mention the rapes. And you thought leftists respected women more than people on the right. The short video is priceless.

As promised, I questioned the police supervisor about the Occupy Dayton protest, and he insinuated that the prosecutor was giving them special treatment. This makes perfect sense to me. Subsequently, it seems the ubiquitous violence, sexism and racism of the left has prompted a nation-wide crackdown. The local shantytown was being removed this evening as I drove by. It seems to me that the central planners have sent the message through the ranks to shut down these protests because the ubiquitous, leftist violence and disgusting behavior is hurting the leftist agenda. The Occupy Dayton movement created no problems, yet officials are shutting it down. This can only be the product of higher-up central planners.

This quote exposes the Obama fraud:

"By his own account, President Obama is the champion and protector of the little guy. He said last week he wants no one left “in a second-class status in this United States of America.” He’s “determined” to “make sure that nobody out there is going bankrupt just because somebody in their family is getting sick.” He’s committed to making Washington “responsive to the needs of people, not the needs of special interests [and] not just people who are hurting now, but also responsive to future generations.” Obama identifies himself with the 99 percent.Yet the winners in the nearly three years of Obama’s presidency are the big guys​—​big business, big labor, and big government. Corporate profits have reached record levels. The influence of the biggest labor unions has surged in Washington, where it matters most. The federal government has grown in size and reach."

Obama's goal is collapse this country under the burden of government, looting us until our economy collapses. And he's been very successful.

On the ethics of being a Congressman. Supposed you knew that a gang of 537 people were driving up and down the streets in a bus, running people over and feasting on their corpses. Supposed you railed against them. Of course, not all 537 people could drive. In reality only about 10 people drove, and they had guns and gold which they used to coerce the other 527 to support them. Now suppose somebody said you should replace one of the 527 and earn yourself some gold and provide a voice against running people down in the streets and feasting on their corpses. You know that the 10 would never listen to you. They'd use you as a tool to promote their own legitimacy until you were used up and they kicked you off the bus. But you could make lots of money along the way. What would you do?

MEDIA:

Even Dancing With the Stars is rigged. Apparently Ricky Lake isn't getting much audience response, the producers have informed the judges to rate her higher and everybody else lower to keep her on the show.

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FEDERAL RESERVE:

The euro rises because the government has managed to fool people once again for a short while. It won't last long.

EDUCATION:

The president of MIT wants you to believe that government creates innovation. The real reason she's saying this is since MIT's tuition is obscenely high, the last thing she wants is for student loans to be cut. She's no dummy.

HEALTH CARE:

An ex-big-food exec blames the businesses for unhealthy food. He completely misses that the government is the source of this problem. He can't see the forest for the trees.

FOREIGN POLICY:

The demonization of Iran has been going on for a while, but I feel like it's been stepped up a notch since the SEALs killed Osama bin Laden. Maybe it's just subjective. Maybe news outlets are filling the hole left by the no bin Laden stories with Iraq stories, but I think the government is intentionally spending more time demonizing Iran to keep Americans scared.

POLITICS:

The violent aspect of the Occupy movement is not the fringe. The entire movement is violent because the ideology is violent. They want government to use violence to steal the property of others. Anybody who wants to do that is violent, and any protests for that will inevitably turn violent. The media aspect of this is pathetic. Until a couple of days ago the mainstream media was ignoring the violence in hopes people wouldn't notice, but the violence is so pervasive everybody learned about it from other sources. So now the media is doing damage control for the movement, pretending it's just a fringe few committing the violence instead of inherent in the ideology. Contrast that with the fictional stories of racism and violence at tea party rallies that were run as real news in an attempt to smear the tea parties. The media bias is sickening.

MISC:

Easter Island giant heads have equally giant bodies buried underground.

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ECONOMY:

A list of Obama's big, failed policies.

TAX AND SPEND:

Explanation of the euro crisis.

The sovereign debt crisis in Italy forces PM to resign.

Study shows that government stimulus has no positive effect on job creation. Of course not. When government takes money out of the private sector in order to create parasitic jobs, it destroys more productive private sector jobs in the process.

Scary analysis of how much poorer zombie spending makes us.

"At the present pace, over the next 10 years, the real value of America’s output will fall nearly in half. Measured in terms of output, Americans will be only half as wealthy as they are today."

It's happening fast.

REGULATION:

Obama set a new record with federal regulations last year, and he's on pace to match it this year. Bush the Younger was the previous record holder, which he set five times.

FEDERAL RESERVE:

More banksters are coming out from behind thrones in Europe to sit on the thrones.

I heard this story about Ben Bernanke meeting the troops the other night, but I forgot about it. This is clearly an attempt by Bernanke to use the troops to boost his standing. Also, it's interesting he picked Texas. Remember when Rick Perry said Bernanke would get roughed up if he came to Texas? I also think this is a poke in the eye to Perry.

This article brings up a good question: Why didn't the Eurozone just kick Greece out? It would have greatly reduced stress on the other members, and it would have been an object lesson to them. They might have been afraid that Greece would quickly rebound which might lead to other member nations withdrawing.

"Just this past week, the shocking collapse of Wall Street trading firm MF Global showed that even after the 2008 crash, US federal regulators have utterly failed to assure the financial system’s safety.We learn that MF Global had leveraged its capital 35 or even 42 to 1, the same perilous ratio that brought down Wall Street’s titans in 2008. That means MFGlobal lent out or invested $35-42 for every dollar it held. That’s crazy Las Vegas behavior and a formula for disaster."

That's the first I've heard of this. I thought banks weren't making loans.

GLOBAL WARMING AND ENERGY:

People push back against smart meters, and California company recalls them. It's nice to see the occasional small victory against the ruling class.

POLICE STATE:

Airport shut down over plastic water bottle in trash.

It's nice to hear a rational voice talk about the Penn State situation.

"What I am about to say is that this wildfire was not necessary; this entire thing could have been handled with much less destruction and this is the result of Pennsylvania Attorney General Linda Kelly’s irresponsible actions and statements. I’ll repeat: Linda Kelly has almost single-handedly taken a bad situation and turned it into tragedy."

Absolutely. She whipped the press into a frenzy that is ruining innocent lives to advance her own interests. What would her interests be?

"I also support the right of someone to a fair trial, and Kelly’s irresponsible and, frankly, selfish, actions not only have destroyed lives at Penn State, but they also have effectively guaranteed that no jury from this side of Outer Mongolia even could begin to hear Sandusky’s case without damning pre-trial prejudice."

But it's not just that. She's using this tragedy to get a lot of press and buy votes. I bet she's using this is a launch pad to run for governor in a few years. Here's a good description of the complicity of the media:

"The other thing that Kelly has done has to take a story and help turn it into a "narrative," and journalists around the country have jumped on this, not caring if the "narrative" even is true. If it sounds like what happened in the infamous Duke Lacrosse Case, that is because we are seeing something very similar occurring.The Penn State "narrative" is "Joe Paterno let Jerry Sandusky sexually assault boys so that Paterno’s Penn State football program would not have its reputation damaged." The parallel "narrative" is that the "good old boys were protecting each other." Yet, we have no idea if either "narrative" is true. We don’t know, and that is why there should be real-live investigations, as opposed to inflammatory statements from officials that journalists dutifully copy as though they were Official Stenographers of the State."

It looks like Kelly has done worse than I thought.

"Kelly got indictments against Curly and Schultz for not reporting the alleged incident to police (and she says she might indict Spanier), and then got further indictments against them for perjury, as she claims they lied to the grand jury.As I see it, this is where Kelly not only has gone off the tracks, but also has acted destructively. According to Pennsylvania law, neither Curly nor Schultz are what the law calls "first responders," people who are required to report any claim or alleged incident of child abuse or neglect. For example, as a college professor, if any of my students even make an offhand claim about being abused, I must report that claim to the police, or I can be charged with a crime myself.
Curly and Schultz, however, did not fit into this legal category. Furthermore, according to the law under which they were indicted, the statute of limitations had passed. To make things even more complicated, the alleged victim in this incident is not even an accuser and no one knows who he is, nor has he "come forward," despite pleas from Kelly’s office."

Typical government lawlessness. This shows the destructing and self-serving nature of Kelly's press conference:

"Until Kelly decided to escalate the situation, the police were quietly investigating Sandusky, not seeking major publicity in the process. This was what police should have been doing, and at the end of their investigation, if they believed they had enough evidence, they could have arrested Sandusky and charged him with the assaults for which young men who say they were Sandusky’s victims have claimed he committed.Sandusky would have been arrested, and while I have no doubts that there would have been further investigations at Penn State, I also believe that if investigators believed that Paterno had looked the other way, he could have been permitted to retire at the end of this season without the show of force from the PSU board of trustees.Instead, we are treated to an awful show of riots, public accusations, and a situation in which it now is impossible for clear heads to prevail. I believe that this did not have to be the result, yet because Kelly wanted to ramp up the heat, she has sowed the wind, and what follows is the inevitable whirlwind."

Exactly.

This is a pretty good explanation of how the institutional structure caused the people at Penn State to do what they did. I still say that Paterno thought he was informing the police when talked to the AD. I'm sure he thought he was doing the right thing by going through proper channels. It wasn't like he had a victim. He didn't. It wasn't like he was the witness. The witness was a grad student who Paterno probably hardly knew, and he was accusing somebody Paterno knew well and respected. Paterno probably didn't believe the witness, but dutifully passed the report on anyway. The people I would fault most are the witness' father who told him to contact Paterno instead of the police and the guy who was in charge of the campus police but who decided not to investigate.

Now the sharks intend to sue Paterno because he's got money.

The incarceration rate in the US is a national disaster.

Praise for grand juries that investigate the state and resist prosecutors.

"Both before and after American Independence, "the grand jury's primary method for exercising its power was not rigorous review of facts, but nullification of validly enacted laws," Washburnobserves. They didn't dispute the prosecutor's presentation of the facts, but rather "the legislator's right to impose such laws, or at least the prosecutor's decision to enforce them in a given context.""

Today they act as rubber stamps for prosecutors while providing the illusion of legitimacy.

""Today, the grand jury is the total captive of the prosecutor, who, if he is candid, will concede that he can indict anybody, at any time, for almost anything, before any grand jury," wrote federal District Judge William J. Campbell in a 1973 law journal article calling for formal abolition of the institution on the grounds of redundancy. This isn't to say that the grand jury is considered useless by the prosecutorial caste: It helps maintain the pretense that prosecutors are servants of the public will."

The grand jury in this case is an incredibly rare exception.

More evidence that TSA's nude scanners cause cancer.

POLITICS:

The list of Occupy outrages grows with gun shots, broken legs, tuberculosis, lice and STDs. We know the Occupy protests are waning. I wonder if the naive socialists at these protests are beginning to see that this is what socialism produces.

Open letter from the 1 percent is pretty funny.

Obama has pulled back to even against a generic Republican with independents. Yikes. Where are these people's brains?

I always wondered why politicians wrote books before an election. I actually thought it was to promote their campaign, and maybe that's part of it. But now that I know they can use their campaign cash to buy their own books, I realize they do it so they can transfer campaign cash into their private bank accounts.

Prediction that the Republican establishment is intentionally trying to lose the 2012 presidential election in hopes that four more years of Obama will bring the small government conservatives back into the establishment fold. As dumb as that sounds, the freaks in Washington have egos the size of mountains, and they might really believe that. But this isn't necessary to explain their support for Romney and Perry and their antipathy toward Paul and Cain. The Republican establishment always supports the big government candidate and tries to destroy the small government candidates. That's been true my entire life, and I believe it's been true for over a century. They don't distinguish between the north-eastern establishment and the Taft wings of the party for nothing. And even when a small government guy like Reagan gets elected, the establishment comes in and runs things and grows the size of government. But I do agree that the Republican establishment is rapidly going extinct.

LOCAL:

Fears that Wright-Pat might suffer budget cuts. Wright-Pat is the only thing keeping this area afloat.

"The impact would be felt around the region: Wright-Patterson is the state’s largest single-site employer, and as of 2009 it accounted for one-sixth of the economy of the Dayton region.“If Wright-Patterson catches a cold,” said Gessel, “the region’s economy gets pneumonia.”"

That's a fact.

"The House Armed Services Committee predicts that if the supercommittee fails to reach an agreement — or if Congress doesn’t pass the committee’s proposal — Ohio’s active-duty military force of 8,261 would be cut by about 17 percent, or 1,377 jobs.The impact would be bigger for the state’s defense contractors: Of their 25,001 jobs, a quarter — 6,250 — would be lost under the mandatory cuts."

I'd rather see these folks doing productive work than laboring in the parasitic political economy, but most of the money for those jobs comes from out of state. That means they'll most like leave the state to work. Ohio's economy, especially around here, is so bad that I doubt they'll stay and work in the area.

"National defense is just one part of the federal budget facing deep cuts. At risk are federal research dollars that lead to cures for diseases, food safety programs that prevent devastating food-borne illnesses, and highway dollars that keep roads safe."

Baloney. That's some nice propaganda for the state.

"Deborah Gross of DaytonDefense, an organization representing some 300 companies that work with Wright-Patterson, said contractors in the region work on “the kind of science and engineering that are going to produce the capability to keep us safe in the future.”"

Does that seem excessive to anybody but me?

MISC:

Learn Austrian economics.

One typically overlooked consequence of government interference in our economy is the ever-increasing shadow work we're all forced to do.

Free kibbles

POLICE STATE:

Government goons and their media lynch mob allies have incited death threats against Penn State coach. They incite this kind of violence, then they pretend they're against it and act like they have the moral high ground. These disgusting, dangerous, self-serving hypocrites present themselves as prosecutor, judge, jury and executioner - no defense is allowed - then they try to disavow the consequences of their self-serving, irresponsible pronouncements. I'm boycotting ESPN for a while at least.


The Penn State trustees have displayed about the same amount of integrity as the Salem witch hunters, so I don't think they'll be able to restore integrity to Penn State.

"The arduous task of rebuilding Penn State's shattered image began Friday with a pledge to search for the truth by the university's board of trustees -- the group that fired football coach Joe Paterno and President Graham Spanier this week amid an unfolding child sex abuse case against retired assistant Jerry Sandusky."

Maybe they should have searched for the truth before they started hanging people.


WAR:


Obama says, "Our troops are coming home," referring to troops in Iraq. What he doesn't say is that he tried to keep them from coming home, but the Iraqis wouldn't let them stay.

Free kibbles

SOCIALISM:

Ninty percent of Long Island Rail Road union workers retire with disability. Standard socialist corruption.

ECONOMY:

US exports are up, cutting the trade deficit. That's a very rare and welcome piece of good economic news.

I don't know whether the people or Politico are getting this wrong:

"A majority of Americans see an increasingly large gap between rich and poor, and want the federal government to intervene in an attempt to address the disparity, according to a new poll on Wednesday."

Government intervention in the economy is the cause of this wealth gap, not the solution.

TAX AND SPEND:

Republican Bloomberg wants to raise taxes on everybody. There goes his chances at winning federal office.

It looks like the municipal bond meltdown is beginning. I wouldn't call it anybody's dream.

FEDERAL RESERVE:

Greece names former central banker as PM. The bankers are coming out behind the throne and sitting on it.

The cost of a traditional Thanksgiving meal has increased by 13 percent since last year. But hey, it's worth it to pay more for everything in return for all the economic growth we're getting from the Fed printing money, right? Thanks Fed.

GLOBAL WARMING AND ENERGY:

New study shows Greenland has been warmer than at present several times during civilization.

Obama administration busted for lying about Solyndra.

Reprint of a global warming alarmist article from January 2007 claiming that 4.5 billion people could die from  global warming by 2012. Back in reality, the world population just hit seven billion. How much you want to bet the people who made that prediction still have a job?

POLICE STATE:

It turns out the 1998 allegations were also referred to the police, but no chargers were filed.

"The grand jury also noted that the 1998 report involving Sandusky and boys in the showers was reviewed by University Police and Child Protective Services, with the blessing of Wendell Courtney, who at the time served as University Counsel and was (and remains) counsel to The Second Mile - though no criminal charges were ever pursued."

The more I read, the more disgusted I am with the vendetta against Paterno. What's amazing about this article is that the government stooges who held the press conference, the Pennsylvania Attorney General and Pennsylvania State Police Commissioner, basically presented the entire grand jury report to the press. In general, it's illegal to publicize grand jury information. This is to protect the defendant. The defendant has no power to challenge testimony in a grand jury, the prosecutor has all the control, and because of that the prosecutor can famously indict a ham sandwich. Maybe it's legal to publicize this stuff in Pennsylvania. If so, that's an abominable law. If not, these stooges broke the law. Prosecutors have immunity for all their illegal actions during a prosecution. In other words, there are no laws restricting the actions of prosecutors. And there was no reason relating to justice to have this big press conference in the first place. They could have quietly made their arrests and kept their mouths closed to give the defendants a better chance at a fair trial. But that's not what they wanted. They used the media to whip up a rush to judgment that guarantees the jury will be heavily biased in favor of the prosecution. They also are using Penn State and Joe Paterno to boost their own standing. This is government and media collusion and manipulation of the public in order to advance the police state at its worst.

Here's some info on grand juries.

"Access to state grand jury transcripts varies. In California, transcripts of grand jury testimony become public record once an indictment is returned, unless a defendant can show a reasonable likelihood that release of part or all of the transcripts would prejudice his right to a fair trial."

Maybe the same is true in Pennsylvania. But when wouldn't the release of grand jury testimony harm the defendant? In pretty much every trial I've ever participated in, the grand jury information was sealed. The defense couldn't even get access to it to challenge prosecution witnesses. So grand jury secrecy is another vague law the state uses to advance its own interests. The state keeps grand jury testimony secret when it advances its agenda, and it publicizes it when that advances its agenda.

"When the media seeks disclosure of a grand jury transcript, a court balances the government’s interest in secrecy against the public’s interest in disclosure."

Notice the defendant's interests don't matter.

Just to back this up, Nixon's grand jury testimony from 1975 was released today.

Libertarian making fun of Penn State fans for being angry over this. He's got it wrong. This fiasco at Penn State is the best publicized government-media collusion manipulating the people to advance the police state I can remember. I love it that people are angry at how the government stooges called a press conference, leaked all the grand jury info, and whipped up a media lynch mob against the alleged perpetrators and Paterno. I think the scales fell from the eyes of tens of thousands of people. Hopefully more. This is the silver lining to a bad situation. If it took a beloved football coach being scapegoated to make this happen, so be it.


The lynching of Joe Paterno continues with this report he contacted a lawyer. Given the way he's been treated by the media and the regents and the way government goons are using this case to their own advantage, that's the only intelligent thing to do.

ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION:

How Obama deals with illegal immigration and transparency.

"Chris Crane, president of the union that represents the nation’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers, has provided the House Judiciary Committee and Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) with what Crane says are internal ICE emails that back up testimony he gave in July and October that ICE headquarters had verbally ordered officers in the field not to arrest illegal aliens who did not have prior criminal convictions--even if they were fugitives evading deportation orders or were individuals who had illegally re-entered the United States after being deported and were thus committing a felony.“Increasingly, ICE headquarters leadership refuses to put directives to supervisors, agents and officers in the field regarding law enforcement operations in writing,” Crane told the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration in written testimony submitted on July 26.
“Orders and directives are given orally to prevent the activities of ICE's leadership from becoming public,” Crane, president of the National Immigration and Customs Enforcement Council 118, testified. “Agents and officers in the field are frequently under orders not to arrest persons suspected of being in the United States illegally."

He'll get away with it like he gets away with everything else.

POLITICS:

Rick Perry ripped for another cosmetic mistake. Who cares if he couldn't remember the name of one bureaucracy for a few minutes? Substance should matter, not style.

The daily rundown of Occupier violence.

Ann Coulter makes an interesting observation about Herman Cain and his accusers:

"Herman Cain has spent his life living and working all over the country -- Indiana, Georgia, Minnesota, Nebraska, Kansas, Washington, D.C. -- but never in Chicago. 
So it's curious that all the sexual harassment allegations against Cain emanate from Chicago: home of the Daley machine and Obama consigliere David Axelrod."

"Herman Cain has never lived in Chicago. But you know who has? David Axelrod! And guess who lived in Axelrod's very building? Right again: Cain's latest accuser, Sharon Bialek."

In other words, these political dirty tricks have Obama's finger prints all over them.

Our political process has become so corrupt and so manipulated by the media and the people who use them as tools, you can't tell whether any insider reports are true or not. This story about insiders wanting Cain to fire his campaign manager is a perfect example.

"“Mark Block has to go,” prominent conservative blogger Ed Morrisey of Hot Air wrote Wednesday morning. “If he’s not gone by tomorrow, no one will take this campaign seriously again — nor should they.”
A former Cain staffer agreed. “Mark Block has no regard for basic ethics or accounting practices,” said the staffer, who spoke on the condition of anonymity in order to speak frankly. When asked if Block was hurting Cain’s campaign and should be fired, that former staffer said, “yes.”"

So we're told that if Cain doesn't fire Block, we will not take his campaign seriously. They're telling us what to do as well as Cain. Maybe Cain is that bad a judge of character. Or maybe the other people are the bad characters. Most likely they're all bad characters.

MEDIA:

I'm also angry at the role the media played in pressuring the Penn State regents to make Paterno a scapegoat. If it wasn't for the rabid lynch-mob response of the media, Penn State could have let Paterno retire, and the institution would have been largely unscathed by these allegations. The guilty would have been punished. The institution would have moved on. But instead they crippled themselves to satisfy the media lynch mob. Who wants to coach at Penn State now? Who wants to play there? If these allegations are false, Penn State will probably never recover, and rightfully given how badly the regents treated Paterno. But true or false, the media lynch mob will remain high and mighty. But being the government's lynch mob sells.