Marsha is the only NO vote in the TN Delegation

on the additional $2 billion for cash for clunkers. THANK YOU Marsha for standing up for taxpayers. HERE is the vote.

I guess Jim Cooper has come full circle from deficit hawk to portly porker. And Zach Wamp....have you heard about that small matter of a $2 trillion deficit????

John Tanner says constituents are DUMB as rocks

John Tanner just doesn't understand WHY!!! his constituents don't appreciate all his good intentions to make their healthcare decisions for them. Ole John clearly believes his hillbilly constituents simply don't have the gray matter to understand all the complicated goins on in our nation's Capital.

Link

"The Blue Dog mentality is best described from my standpoint as, on economic and finance, center right, and on social issues, center left,” says Rep. John Tanner (D-Tenn.), a Blue Dog veteran of more than 20 years of battles in the House. “It’s harder to communicate maybe than in a more compact district, but I think in a Southern rural district, there is a certain level of trust, I guess, if people feel like they know you.”

He said the message has been lost that Democrats want to lower both the costs for the government and the “premiums for people who are buying insurance now.”

“People think this bill will do something to them rather than for them. People call the office and say I don’t want a government-run program, I like Medicare just the way it is. And you have to explain: Medicare is a government program.

“Change is hard, and this is big change that is being talked about, so you naturally have people who are uneasy and nervous.”

Jobs "estimates" reach new heights of Tom Foolery

The Obama administration has tried to keep a collective straight face when talking about "saved" jobs while knowing full well that any such "estimates" are fantasies at best and con games at worst.

Even the number of actual jobs created are being wildly over estimated as pro publica points out.

Link

As we’ve reported before, figuring out how many jobs the stimulus has created or saved is one of the key measures of its success — and a tricky business.

The committee touted its estimate in a news release in advance of a hearing today on the progress of stimulus projects. The chairman, James Oberstar, D-Minn., said the stimulus has “already begun to play a key role in putting people back to work.” The release credited stimulus transportation projects with 49,377 jobs.

Jim Berard, spokesman for the House panel, said the estimate simply reflects what states reported. “We’re not trying to mislead anybody,” Berard said.

The committee reached its total by adding up the number of people who’ve worked on stimulus-funded highway or transit projects. Last week, we reported on the problems with simple head counts.

Besides failing to distinguish between part-time and full-time jobs, head counts are subject to another error: Construction workers often rotate among projects, which can lead to double- or triple-counting when project totals are added together. State workers who oversee multiple projects also can be counted more than once.

50 Greatest Coaches of all time: Pat Summit is 11th

in this ranking.

Link

1. John Wooden, college basketball
2. Vince Lombardi, NFL
3. Bear Bryant, college football
4. Phil Jackson, NBA
5. Don Shula, NFL
6. Red Auerbach, NBA
7. Scotty Bowman, NHL
8. Dean Smith, college basketball
9. Casey Stengel, MLB
10. Knute Rockne, college football

11. Pat Summitt, women's college basketball
12. Paul Brown, NFL
13. Joe Paterno, college football
14. George Halas, NFL
15. Chuck Noll, NFL
16. Bob Knight, college basketball
17. Joe Gibbs, NFL
18. Tom Landry, NFL
19. Mike Krzyzewski, college basketball
20. Bill Belichick, NFL

The Obama favor factory pumps out another one

As Government grows larger it becomes more and more and more corrupt.

Link

As everyone else’s taxes rise, one favored outfit may not have to pay federal taxes for years: General Motors. In another sweet deal from its benefactors on Pennsylvania Avenue, the government-owned car company is set to profit from billions of dollars in tax breaks not available to other businesses in the same predicament.

$1.6b Tax Break for Trial Lawyers

Trial lawyers make billions and contribute millions to Obama and Democrats. Virtually every new piece of legislation proposed by Obama or the Democratic Congress contains new ways for trial lawyers to sue and enrich themselves.

However, this piece of legislation takes it to a new level.

Link

Specifically, the proposal would enable plaintiffs' lawyers to deduct loans to clients to cover litigation expenses as made, rather than at the conclusion of the litigation. The estimated value of the tax code revision is $1.6 billion.

Lincoln Davis among most vulnerable Blue Dogs

according to this analysis in the UK Guardian.

Davis' margin of victory was 21 points. In his district McCain beat Obama by 30 points (an MVM of -9.) See article for full explanation.

Link

43.Tennessee, 4: Lincoln Davis, 59-38; McCain, 64-34; MVM, -9

Newly redesigned TnTeaParty.org website

Link

Congrats to everyone who worked on the redesign, it looks great. Lots going on.

Recess Rally for Aug. 22 at the district office of EVERY US Congressperson to express opposition to Government Heahcare

Join Joe the Plumber and many more at the Friday Sept. 18 American Liberty Rally downtown Nashville.

Top 1% now pay more than bottom 95%

Link

Indeed, the IRS data shows that in 2007—the most recent data available—the top 1 percent of taxpayers paid 40.4 percent of the total income taxes collected by the federal government. This is the highest percentage in modern history. By contrast, the top 1 percent paid 24.8 percent of the income tax burden in 1987, the year following the 1986 tax reform act.

Remarkably, the share of the tax burden borne by the top 1 percent now exceeds the share paid by the bottom 95 percent of taxpayers combined. In 2007, the bottom 95 percent paid 39.4 percent of the income tax burden. This is down from the 58 percent of the total income tax burden they paid twenty years ago.

To put this in perspective, the top 1 percent is comprised of just 1.4 million taxpayers and they pay a larger share of the income tax burden now than the bottom 134 million taxpayers combined.

Bart Gordon strikes a Deal

That's Bart in the center of the picture, having struck a deal where the Government will come to be in complete control of our healthcare choices. Thanks Bart, not sure who you are working for but it sure as hell isn't your constituents.

Link

The most important part of today’s deal isn’t about the substance of the bill, it’s about timing. In exchange for dropping some of their objections, the Blue Dogs have won a guarantee from Democratic leaders that they won’t bypass their committee and rush the bill to the House floor for a vote before leaving for recess on Friday. Beyond their policy disagreements, one of reasons the Blue Dogs have been so reluctant to move forward wit the health care bill is that they don’t want to have to place a tough vote on a public option if the Senate is just going to scrap it eventually. Under today’s agreement, both the House and Senate will go into the August recess with their health care bills fully out of committee and ready for floor action.

The Government has mismanaged....

Putting

1-the ever politicizing President and Congress,

2-the Unionized Federal Bureaucracy,

3-the Hundreds of Lobbyists, and

4-the Hundreds of Special Interest Parasites that feed off our tax dollars,

in charge of OUR healthcare would be INSANITY!!!

Link

The Government Has Mismanaged...

The government has mismanaged the Post Office and is now set to cover up its mistakes with a bailout.

The government has mismanaged the Highway Trust Fund and is now set to cover upits mistakes with a bailout.

The government has mismanaged Amtrak, which is chronically unprofitable, and is set to cover up its mistakes with a bailout.

The government has mismanaged the Social Security Trust Fund and is ignoring its responsibility to fix the program.

The government has mismanaged the Medicare and Medicaid programs and is ignoring its responsibility to fix the programs.

I could probably think of several more examples, but with this lousy track record, do we really want this same government to make medical decisions on our behalf by nationalizing health care?

Candidate uses webcam to show tax effects

Link to Camera "Massbackwards"

Link

A Massachusetts Republican gubernatorial candidate is tracking shoppers to see if New Hampshire businesses are taking Bay State sales tax dollars.

Republican Christy Mihos has set up a camera that links to his Web site a streaming video of every car crossing the state border into Salem's Route 28 retail strip where shoppers pay no sales tax. This brings attention to the Massachusetts sales tax that on Aug. 1 will increase by 25 percent, from 5 percent to 6.25 percent.

Now, the Govt wants to regulate ALL speech

Link

(The) Austin (case), clumsy and disingenuous as it is, nonetheless only alters that rule for corporations, and presumably unions. Now the government seeks to alter the rule for all, allowing it to regulate all political speech that supports or opposes a candidate's election. Under the government's proposed rule, not even actual gratitude is required before the government can limit speech — it is enough that the government thinks that in some cases legislators might feel gratitude.

Obama's coattails aren't big enough

Link

Obama's coattails aren't big enough for Corzine to glide on, and I don't think any amount of money is going to convince people that he deserves another chance to fail at his duties.

Obama should concede this one, and run away as fast as he can.

Corzine is ripe to fall.

Public Servants acting badly

Firefighter shoots cyclist in the head

Police Officer draws weapon over slow service at McDonalds

American Majority Online Training for Candidates

and activists who are committed to individual freedom through limited government and the free market. This is an extraordinary resource for candidates and activists.

Link

Introduction: Whether you are an individual considering running for elective office, a college student wanting to make a meaningful contribution, or a citizen interested in affecting change in your state or local community, American Majority Training Programs have something for everyone. American Majority’s on-demand educational courses deliver compelling insights and on-target advice to help you manage every aspect of the planning process, development of communication strategy, and implementation of successful tactics.

Bart Gordon, more liberal than....

Dennis Kucinich, Nancy Pelosi, Barney Frank, Rahm Emanuel and Henry Waxman.

According to ratings by groups that value fiscal responsibility and efficient government.

National Taxpayers Union
In 2007 Bart Gordon had a rating of 7%, an F. (100% being the most conservative). His ranking was more liberal than Dennis Kucinich.

Citizens Against Government Waste
In 2007 Bart Gordon had a rating of 5% (100% being the most conservative). His ranking was more liberal than Nancy Pelosi and Barney Frank.

Club for Growth
In 2007 Bart Gordon had a rating of 12% (100% being the most conservative). This was more liberal than Rahm Emanuel and Henry Waxman.

Obamacare means twice as many Med mistake deaths

Link

Given the size of the US population, if government practice guidelines and pay for performance metrics are as successful under ObamaCare as they have been in Britain, expect the number of US deaths from medical errors to almost double to 360,000 a year.

Ethanol Fraud means Green Fuel Promises Go Bust

Link

When the EPA recently issued a report anticipating 100 million gallons of cellulosic ethanol production in the U.S. by 2010, it was including 70 million gallons from an Alabama company called Cello Energy.

That's 70 percent of the total U.S. production from one relatively small company, per the EPA.

Bad Move

The government didn't factor in ethanol fraud.

Turns out the Cello was just found guilty in a federal court in Alabama of civil fraud for lying to a major investor about the state of its ability to make ethanol from grass and other woody, non-food materials.

The jury ordered Cello principals to pay $10.4 million in damages after witnesses testified that the "cellulosic" fuel the company was showing to investors was actually fuel derived entirely from petroleum.

Is it time for Socialized Pet Care? Costs are rising

Link

Not everyone can sign up for expensive pet care. After dropping $1,500 to have a malignant tumor removed from Misty, their 2-year-old beagle, Mike and Cindy Santay of Downers Grove opted against the follow-up $5,000 radiation treatments. Their three children attend private school, and they couldn't justify the expense.

"The first thing was the money," said Cindy Santay, 46.

50 cents for a 1st Class Stamp? Likely

Link

"(Amercians) are less free. Who wants more of that"

Link

So this might be an unarticulated public fear: When everyone pays for the same health-care system, the overseers will feel more and more a right to tell you how to live, which simple joys are allowed and which are not.

Americans in the most personal, daily ways feel they are less free than they used to be. And they are right, they are less free.

Who wants more of that?

Wash Post profiles the Free Staters

Link

"I want to excite you to take hold of your liberty," Dan Itse, a New Hampshire legislator, tells more than 70 who fill the campground's TV room for a Friday afternoon declaration of state's rights to freedom from federal control. "You're the only one who can defend your liberty in the end."

The threat of overreaching government is not new, Free Staters say, but it is rising. They wonder if more Americans aren't starting to realize that, too - before it's too late.

Last fall's protests against the economic bailout has been followed by public disapproval of the Obama's administration takeover of General Motors. In 36 states, legislators have introduced resolutions modeled on Itse's declaring their sovereignty over matters including the right to bear arms, citing the Constitution's 10th Amendment, which delineates the federal government's powers. Free Staters approve - though they are distrustful of most politicians.

Still, they are convinced the country will eventually recognize the truth. Just have a look, says Free Stater William Domenico, pointing to 18 fresh recruits from Florida, North Carolina and beyond, piling off a bus after a day's tour.

"Why?" asks Domenico, himself a refugee from an over-licensed life in Colorado. "Because they want government off their backs."

The Post Office is an anachronism, a very expensive

anachronism. The only thing going for them is billions upon billions in taxpayer money, loads of lobbyists, and a huge amount of political power. Will they go away gracefully, like any other failing enterprise?

Of course not, they will drain us dry, like Amtrak, living on in a ghoulish form somewhere between irrelevance and a respecful demise.

Link

Combine the impact of new technologies with the gut punch of the recession, and in the past year alone, the Postal Service has seen the single largest drop-off in mail volume in its 234-year history, greater even than the decline from 1929 to 1933 during the Great Depression. That downward trend is only accelerating. The Postal Service projects a decline of about 10 billion pieces of mail in each of the next two years, going from a high of 213 billion pieces of mail in 2006 to 170 billion projected for 2010.

The situation is so dire that the Postal Service, which is projecting a $6 billion shortfall by the end of September despite a recent postage rate increase, will go to Congress this month to seek emergency relief, looking to cut home mail delivery from six days a week to five. Already, the Postal Service has cut hours at hundreds of post offices across the country, including 56 of the Washington area's 386 outlets. It has consolidated routes, dropping 158 delivery routes locally, offered workers early retirement and imposed hiring and salary freezes. Still, said Postmaster General John E. Potter, the service is in "acute financial crisis."

"The urge to save humanity is always a false front for the urge to rule it."

Link

"The surge in global temperatures since 1977 can be attributed to a 1976 climate shift in the Pacific Ocean that made warming El Nino conditions more likely than they were over the previous 30 years and cooling La Nina conditions less likely" says co-author de Freitas.

"We have shown that internal global climate-system variability accounts for at least 80% of the observed global climate variation over the past half-century. It may even be more if the period of influence of major volcanoes can be more clearly identified and the corresponding data excluded from the analysis."

These findings are largely being ignored by the mainstream media. They simply don't fit the worn narrative that man is dangerously warming the Earth through his carbon dioxide emissions and a radical alteration of Western lifestyles mandated by government policy is desperately needed.

"things have never looked as bad as they do now"

Link

"For years, we've been warning that the budget was out of balance over the long-term and we should act while there was still time," said Maya MacGuineas, President of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. "Well guess what? Time is quickly running out. We're drowning in unprecedented levels of red ink and there is no plan to fix the situation."

[...]

"Having spent over a decade worrying about budget deficits, I can quite honestly say that things have never looked as bad as they do now. We need to be focused on slowing spending and finding better ways to raise revenue, not on cutting taxes and introducing new entitlement programs," said MacGuineas. "We can either make these hard choices now, on our own terms, or we can make them in a panic on the heels of a full-blown fiscal crisis."

America during the Obama Administration???

"some say to survive it you need to be as mad as a hatter"

Hugo Chavez does what others thought impossible

Socialism has failed time after time after time after time after time after time...

Link

Caracas, July 22 - Venezuela, a traditional coffee exporter that boasts one of the best cups of java in South America, may have to import coffee for the first time ever this year or face shortages, industry experts said.

[...]

On-and-off food shortages for years have dogged the government of President Hugo Chavez, a former paratrooper who has nationalized several industries and expropriated land as part of his socialist revolution.

Critics point the finger at price and foreign exchange controls that have slowed investments in expansion and maintenance and eroded productivity. The government blames shortages on speculation by the private sector.

A shortage of milk and beef contributed to Chavez losing a referendum in 2007 that would have granted him vast new powers.

Last week, Agriculture and Land Minister Elias Jaua said that the shortage of coffee, rice and sugar was due to climatic reasons. Imported sugar would reach the domestic market in coming days and the government will announce a host of measures to ensure the coffee supply, he said.

McClatchy news says we distrust Lying politicians

Ya think???

Don Boudreaux says it best: via John Stossel, via Insty

To the Editor:

If an armed man breaks into your house, confiscates money from your wallet, insists that he and his goons are blessed with a grand vision of how you and your family should be provided with health care, and commands you to do as he orders, would you believe his promise to keep armed intruders "out of health care decisions"? ("Text: Obama's Remarks on Health Care," July 22).

Of course not.

So why isn't the entire country furious at being insulted by Pres. Obama's patently absurd claim that his efforts to give government a greater role in paying for health care will "keep government out of health care decisions”?

Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux
Chairman, Department of Economics
George Mason University

As seen on the Interstate Yesterday-Hands OFF

Now, comes the "compromise" phase of

Healthcare Reform and, true to the sausage factory, we (meaning everyone, no matter what side of the debate you happen to perch) will get a half-assed compromise that will be what NOBODY wants.

The Republicans have been pulling out the "you will hurt seniors" card by suggesting that Medicare will be hurt by the Dems plan. So the Dems are buckling like Republicans when you call them uncharitable, i.e., like a deck of cards.

I got news for you, Medicare is already a train wreck.

If this healthcare reform monster passes in ANY form, it will be a bloody disaster.

The Legislative process, at any level, is the absolute worst way to make fine grained decisions. These decisions should be made by individual CITIZENS, not a bunch of grandstanding politicians and power hungry bureaucrats who are being egged on by a bunch of greedy lobbyists. How has the Federal Govenment gotten this far out of our control??

TN Supreme Ct says Crack Tax is Unconstitutional

Link

Basically, the majority said that illegal drugs are not subject to taxation under the state constitution, which authorizes taxes on "merchants, peddlers and privileges." The tax is on possession, they reasoned, not sales so the possessors are not merchants or peddlers. And since possession of the products in question is outlawed, it's not a legal privilege subject to taxation.

The majority did reject arguments that the law violates the U.S. Constitution's provisions against self-incrimination and double jeopardy. In theory, that means the Legislature could revise the law - as in making the tax apply to sales of the drugs - and the statute could pass legal muster.

Another GOP Pres Poll

Link

	All	Rep.
Condoleezza Rice	32%	45%
Mike Huckabee	29%	54%
Sarah Palin	25%	53%
Mitt Romney	24%	44%
Newt Gingrich	16%	35%
Ron Paul	15%	16%
Michael Steele	5%	10%
Gary Johnson	3%	4%

Source: Angus Reid Strategies
Methodology: Online interviews with 1,000 American adults, conducted from Jul. 16 to Jul. 18, 2009. Margin of error is 3.1 per cent.

Natural Gas is getting Cheaper and Cheaper

Link

So, what does this all mean? The natural gas glut that we’ve flagged shows no signs of letting up. Indeed, if anything it’s getting worse. The U.S. Energy Department reported on Thursday a lot of gas in storage and natural gas prices can’t seem to break above the $4 a million British thermal unit level.

Bungee Jumping Elephants

“They even found a way to tax taxes.” in N Carolina

Politicans always worry about Government budgets. Sure would be nice if they took a little time to worry about family budgets.

Link

House and Senate Democrats, who have controlling majorities in the legislature, agreed to both measures this week as part of a $980 million tax package to cope with the budget deficit facing North Carolina.

That would be coupled with cuts in state spending, but Democratic leaders say the tax increases are needed to avoid more devastating cuts to education and social services.

The sales tax increase would be paid in small increments whenever people make a purchase. But when tax time rolls around next year, N.C. residents would be forced to calculate the taxes they owe the state and then add an additional 2 percent.

“I'm not making ends meet as is. I'm at the point where I'm cutting out necessities now,” said Jill Kelley, who works for Wells Fargo in uptown Charlotte, adding that she's even started skipping lunch at work.

Taking the "affordable" out of Housing

"Affordable housing" is a silly, meaningless term that politicians love to use so they can appear big hearted with the taxpayer's money. Apparently a former Dallas Mayor thought it meant the developer could afford to pay a bribe.

Link

Developer Brian Potashnik told jurors in the Dallas City Hall public corruption trial Wednesday that he was guilty of "crossing a line" and that he felt pressure from former Mayor Pro Tem Don Hill to pay bribes to ensure that his affordable-housing projects were approved.

In highly anticipated testimony, Potashnik said he was unaware that Sheila Farrington was Hill's mistress when he agreed to Hill's suggestion that he hire her as a $14,000-a-month consultant on his development projects.

Hill and Farrington have since married and are both defendants in the case. Hill, his wife and Hill's appointee to the city plan commission, D'Angelo Lee, are all accused of soliciting money from Potashnik and another developer.

As always, it's ALL about the CASH, YOUR Cash

Packed agenda leaves lobbyists loaded

Blue Dogs fill their Bowls with Cash

Absolutely Amazing 3-D Drawing Software

Link

Oh YEA, lets put Govt in charge of Healthcare

so it can be politicized by every demagogic politician, so it can be turf protected by every bureaucrat, so public employee union bosses can suck up more union dues like so many leaches, so lobbyists can grow rich by peddling healthcare taxpayer dollars, and so trial lawyers can get even richer by suing private sector care out of existence.

Oh YEA, lets put a "benevolent" Government in charge of our health.

Link

In past years, New Jersey has seen more than 100 corruption-related arrests of public officials. There was no word on the specific charges against those being rounded up today, but a press conference is scheduled for noon.

100 Things Your Kids May Never Know About

Link

Computers and Videogaming

1. Wires. OK, so they’re not gone yet, but it won’t be long
2. The scream of a modem connecting.
3. The buzz of a dot-matrix printer
4. 5- and 3-inch floppies, Zip Discs and countless other forms of data storage.
5. Using jumpers to set IRQs.
6. DOS.
7. Terminals accessing the mainframe.
8. Screens being just green (or orange) on black.
9. Tweaking the volume setting on your tape deck to get a computer game to load, and waiting ages for it to actually do it.
10. Daisy chaining your SCSI devices and making sure they’ve all got a different ID.
11. Counting in kilobytes.
12. Wondering if you can afford to buy a RAM upgrade.
13. Blowing the dust out of a NES cartridge in the hopes that it’ll load this time.
14. Turning a PlayStation on its end to try and get a game to load.
15. Joysticks.
16. Having to delete something to make room on your hard drive.
17. Booting your computer off of a floppy disk.
18. Recording a song in a studio.

Taxpayer funded 'man cave' at N.Y. Capitol

Link

A spokesman for the state Inspector General Joseph Fisch said Louis Marciano, 50, a supervisor with the state Office of General Services, and Gary Pivoda, a cleaner who works under him, allegedly used taxpayer dollars to transform a maintenance area in a Capitol garage facility into a "man cave" with a TV, board games, DVDs, couches, rolling papers and marijuana scales, the New York Post reported Wednesday.

The spokesman said the investigation was sparked by the cumulative overtime payouts of $28,400 the two men have collected during the past five years.

Competition: Toyota Robot faster than Honda

Link

Obama refuses to disclose visits by health executives

Link

Reporting from Washington -- Invoking an argument used by President George W. Bush, the Obama administration has turned down a request from a watchdog group for a list of health industry executives who have visited the White House to discuss the massive healthcare overhaul.

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington sent a letter to the Secret Service asking about visits from 18 executives representing health insurers, drug makers, doctors and other players in the debate. The group wants the material in order to gauge the influence of those executives in crafting a new healthcare policy.

Court says Online Reporter is "part of the media"

Link

The reporter, Joe Kaufman, sought a pre-trial appeal of a lower court's refusal to dismiss defamation charges against him. In Texas, members of the media have an automatic right to pre-trial appeals if the claim is rooted in the First Amendment. The plaintiffs -- a coalition of seven Islamic associations -- challenged whether Kaufman is a journalist because his work appeared on the Internet.

The defamation claim comes from an article Kaufman wrote for Front Page Magazine, an online publication of the David Horowitz Freedom Center. The article was about Muslim Family Day at Six Flags Over Texas and highlighted links between one of the event's sponsors, the Islamic Circle of North America, and third-parties with connections to terrorism. The plaintiffs are other Islamic groups that were listed as sponsors on an promotional flier but were not named in the article. The Islamic Circle of North America did not sue.

The Texas Court of Appeals in Forth Worth (2nd Dist.) looked at multiple factors to determine that Kaufman qualified as a member of the media. Those included the nature of the work published, the frequency with which Kaufman writes and the editing practices of the magazine. The court also noted that the state's recently passed shield law specifically includes electronic media.

The court then dismissed the libel charge. It found that the plaintiffs could not successfully claim that the allegedly defamatory information was "of and concerning" them, a necessary element to proving libel.

Mid TN Mass Transit = MASS TAXES

Mass Transit = Maximum boondoggle

Link

The mayors did not discuss what type of tax they might propose.

A mayor from a Denver suburb told the group about the successful mayors’ caucus in her area that helped create that region’s light rail system. She also warned the group to make sure whatever tax they use will sustain itself. The Denver area’s $4 billion light rail system is suffering a $2 billion shortfall, due to sales tax revenues dropping during the recession.

Oakland CA votes to be first City to tax Marijuana

Link

Scheduled to take effect on New Year's Day, the measure created a special business tax rate for the pot clubs, which now pay the same $1.20 for every $1,000 in gross sales applied to all retail businesses. The new rate will be $18.

Oakland's auditor estimates that based on annual sales of $17.5 million for the four clubs, it will generate an estimated $294,000 for city coffers in its first year.

The Ladies join the guys in Korean Parliament fight

Maybe they could build the Parliament in the form of an octagon and have Mixed Martial Arts matches. It would be the mother of all reality TV shows.

Govts defrauding Govts over Healthcare

New York State and City to pay record fine to Federal Government. Hey!! This is more "savings" Obama can use to buy even more Government Healthcare.

Link

WASHINGTON, July 21 (UPI) -- New York state and New York City agreed to pay a record $540 million to settle allegations they filed false Medicaid claims, the U.S. Justice Department said.

State and local officials allegedly submitted claims for reimbursement for school-based healthcare services provided to Medicaid-eligible children from 1990 to 2001, the Justice Department said Tuesday in a news release.

The settlement is a record federal recovery for the Medicaid program, Justice Department officials said.

The settlement resolves allegations that the state of New York knowingly failed to provide proper advice on requirements for a service to be eligible for coverage by the Medicaid program and failed to monitor districts and counties for compliance as required, among other things.

Databases and eResources in Library of Congress

Link

More Obama fantasies

Barack Obama says he can "pay" for healthcare reform with savings from the two existing Govt Healthcare programs, Medicare and Medicaid??????

So...we are going to pour billions more into Govt Healthcare, the same Govt Healthcare that now costs $300 billion too much????

This is worse than Bill Clinton's tortured logic.

Link

Calling Medicare and Medicaid “one of the greatest threats to our federal deficit,” President Obama used his weekly address to announce savings in Medicare and Medicaid that the administration said will generate more than $313 billion over 10 years for funding health care reform.

The savings, coupled with a $635 billion “down payment” already outlined in the fiscal year 2010 budget would add up to roughly $950 billion toward paying for health care reform.

Headline of the Day

Link

Brad Pitt as a "Tennessee Hillbilly"

Call out the Govt Funeral Police. "the People" are

trying to have funerals in their own homes.

Call the local health police to stop this horribly unsanitary practice

Call the Funeral Home Lobbyists to bribe their Congressmen to criminalize the grieving family

Call the Coffin Makers Union to throw up a picket line

Link

Instead, Mr. Roe’s children, like a growing number of people nationwide, decided to care for their father in death as they had in the last months of his life. They washed Mr. Roe’s body, dressed him in his favorite Harrods tweed jacket and red Brooks Brothers tie and laid him on a bed so family members could privately say their last goodbyes.

The next day, Mr. Roe was placed in a pine coffin made by his son, along with a tuft of wool from the sheep he once kept. He was buried on his farm in a grove off a walking path he traversed each day.

“It just seemed like the natural, loving way to do things,” said Jennifer Roe-Ward, Mr. Roe’s granddaughter. “It let him have his dignity.”

Military Airplane Nose Art

Link

Illustrated Zoologies and Related Works, 1550-1900

Link

It had to happen: Federal Toilet Paper Tax

Link

- 3% excise tax on items disposed of in wastewater, such as toothpaste, cosmetics, toilet paper and cooking oil: These products wind up in the water stream and require clean up by sewage treatment plants.

- 0.5% excise tax on pharmaceutical products.

- 0.15% tax corporate profits over $4 million.

- 4 cent per container excise tax on water-based beverages.

Bredesen Party Bunker Update from TCPR

The Future of Obama Mass Transit?

Link

The Bloom is off the Rose, The Halo is Dimming

Link

Like most Fed Agencies, GM can't get enough

of our money.

Link HT: ACK

In April, May, and June, GM spent $2,760,000 on lobbying according to its Q2 lobbying filing, compared to $2,800,000 in the first quarter. A GM spokesman pointed out to me that the first quarter number already reflects some downsizing -- the company terminated four lobbying accounts at the end of 2008 and the beginning of 2009. GM terminated the rest of its contracts in early June, but still paid some of these firms the same fee it had paid previous quarters.

New Non-Govt web site to Follow Fed Govt Regulations

How are Federal Agencies micro-managing your life? In more ways than you can possibly imagine.

Link

Regulations.gov is the federal government’s main outlet for making regulations public. It is also less than user-friendly. Finding what you’re looking for is next to impossible.

As a way of leading by example, the Mercatus Center’s Jerry Brito and programmer Peter Snyder have launchedOpenregs.com. Unlike the government site, it is superbly organized and easy to navigate. Check it out. Keeping track of new regulations just got easier.

58% of all UTC Students never Graduate

How many more taxpayer and tuition dollars will we throw down this toilet before we demand better outcomes?

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Like many regional universities with lower admissions standards, UTC accepts many students who might not get into other schools.

But once it gets them in, the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga struggles to get them out with degrees.

UTC graduates only 42 percent of its students, far below the graduation rate of schools with similar admission standards, a new study shows.

“Schools often blame their students, saying that they are not well prepared and that their school’s mission is take unprepared students and give them a chance,” said Mark Schneider, vice president at the American Institutes for Research and author of the Diploma and Dropouts report.

“The problem with that argument is that there are schools that take on the same kind of students and are graduating many more of them,” he said.

Another "Green" utopian alternative fuel goes bust

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The not-with-a-bang-but-a-whimper end to BP’s jatropha adventure underscores a couple of key points. First, the inedible but hardy plant that just a few years ago seemed like it could revolutionize biofuels has turned into a bust. The initial attraction was that it grows on marginal land, so it wouldn’t compete with food crops. But marginal land means marginal yields. And jatropha turned out to be a water hog as well, further darkening its environmental credentials.

Second, for all the ink spilt over jatropha—and Big Oil’s interest in biofuels in general—the value of some of those investments really is miniscule. D1 Oils will buy out BP’s half of the venture for 500,000 pounds—less than the price of a nice apartment in London—even though the joint venture is apparently worth more than 7 million pounds.

And this wasn’t a piddling venture, as far as jatropha experiments go: Reuters notes that BP and D1 Oils planted more than 200,000 hectares of the stuff—25% of the worldwide jatropha planting.

The Goldman Sachs Bailout Scandal continues to unfold

and the Obama administration continues to place GS cronies in their administration so the billions will continue to flow.

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So what’s wrong with Goldman posting $3.44 billion in second-quarter profits, what’s wrong with the company so far earmarking $11.4 billion in compensation for its employees? What’s wrong is that this is not free-market earnings but an almost pure state subsidy.

Last year, when Hank Paulson told us all that the planet would explode if we didn’t fork over a gazillion dollars to Wall Street immediately, the entire rationale not only for TARP but for the whole galaxy of lesser-known state crutches and safety nets quietly ushered in later on was that Wall Street, once rescued, would pump money back into the economy, create jobs, and initiate a widespread recovery. This, we were told, was the reason we needed to pilfer massive amounts of middle-class tax revenue and hand it over to the same guys who had just blown up the financial world. We’d save their asses, they’d save ours. That was the deal.

Hyperlocal London Blogs

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Here are some Hyperlocal London Blogs:

853

BlackHeath Bugle

Faded London

Karl Dean, Jim Cooper. Phil Bredesen, Barack Obama

ALL four of these gentlemen chose to REJECT the public schools that were available for their children. Their precious children, for whom they want ONLY the best like any parent, deserved private schools, they believed.

So, its not too big a surprise that Senators, when given a chance to choose the new and improved Obamacare, said......ya know, I don't think so.

While Al Gore blows smoke, the Free Market uses

energy more efficiently year after year after year after year.

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Public Housing, Communist Style

A great visual metaphor for government health care.

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The New Game of Doctor

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Cap and Trade will look like THIS

The Turkish Government responded to the latest gas price decline by increasing taxes.

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The resentment over the most recent increase in the special consumption tax (ÖTV) on fuel products, offsetting the previous drop in the prices of gasoline and diesel with the introduction of price ceilings several weeks ago, is growing.

As the salvos of consumers continue, representatives of the fuel distribution industry have also started to condemn the Finance Ministry's tax hike decision, even accusing the government of using the launch of price ceilings as a means to pretend it is actually concerned about consumers' interests.

After several warnings to obey the rules of pure competition, the Energy Market Regulatory Authority (EPDK) imposed a system of maximum price limits for the fuel market last month; this move caused the prices of gasoline and diesel to drop by over kr 20 overnight.

Solar goes the way of Ethanol, down

Time for the solar industry to hire more lobbyists and whine about a bailout.

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The downturn in demand highlights another serious issue that was clearly emerging last year: The industry presently has far too much supply. During the solar boom of the last few years, demand consistently outstripped supply, and essentially every solar panel produced was sold. Solar companies could increase sales as quickly as they could expand production, all the while at very profitable levels. Not surprisingly, new entrants flooded in, and existing companies expanded rapidly, with the whole industry planning as if high double-digit growth were set to continue indefinitely.

Obamacare will be another broken promise

and a bloody disaster.

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PRESIDENT Obama promises that "if you like your health plan, you can keep it," even after he reforms our health-care system. That's untrue. The bills now before Congress would force you to switch to a managed-care plan with limits on your access to specialists and tests.

Two main bills are being rushed through Congress with the goal of combining them into a finished product by August. Under either, a new government bureaucracy will select health plans that it considers in your best interest, and you will have to enroll in one of these "qualified plans." If you now get your plan through work, your employer has a five-year "grace period" to switch you into a qualified plan. If you buy your own insurance, you'll have less time.

[...]

Shockingly, only a portion of the money accumulated from slashing senior benefits and raising taxes goes to pay for covering the uninsured. The Senate bill allocates huge sums to "community transformation grants," home visits for expectant families, services for migrant workers -- and the creation of dozens of new government councils, programs and advisory boards slipped into the last 500 pages.

If we have Hate Crimes why not Love Crimes?

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The Alice in Wonderland Administration

The Government can tax and borrow and spend it's way to prosperity?

Cap and Trade will create jobs?

Government Healthcare will save money?

Nurse Pelosi, more Leaches STAT

HT: TaxGuru

The Politicizing of the Press Begins

Link HT: Newsalert

The mayor said the loan is not an attempt to garner favor from the Banner, which focuses on the black community and has often covered Menino critically.

“This is about me helping a business that is very important to the minority community,’’ Menino said. “I will step up any time and help any business in this city. I’m trying to help a business survive. Tell me if that’s wrong.’’

Lamar thinks local museum spending is unconstitutional?

and Corker says yes it is??? This is a head scratcher.

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In what may have been the first-ever motion of its kind, Coburn raised a point of order against this project in the fiscal 2010 Legislative Branch appropriations bill, asserting that it violated the Constitution. Coburn's reasoning: Article I, Section 8 spells out the specific authority of Congress to spend money, and nowhere does it mention local museums. In addition, the 10th Amendment gives the states all powers not granted to Congress, thereby blocking Congress from spending money for just any purpose it decides is appropriate.

Obama threatens Arizona over Senator Comments

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In a coordinated response to comments made by an Arizona Republican senator calling for a the stimulus bill to be halted, the Obama administration this week coordinated a series of letters to the governor of Arizona, with the implicit message: put up or shut up.

Arizona Republicans responded that the White House was bullying their state.

[...]

LaHood, a former Republican congressman, said that the $48 million in the stimulus bill for infrastructure includes $520.9 million for Arizona highway projects
"creating good-paying jobs and rebuilding America for the future."

Salazar said that Arizona has $320 million in interior funds headed her way.

Donovan said that if the $73 million in HUD funds headed her way were canceled, "the following awards would not be made: $14 million in Community Development Block Grant money; $22 million in Homelessness Prevention and Rapid Re-Housing; $32 million in the Tax Credit Assistance Program; and over $3 million in Project-Based Rental Assistance. Much of this funding is scheduled to be obligated in the next 10 days."

Vilsack said that the Agriculture Department "announced over $230 million in funding for Recovery Act projects in Arizona….If we cancel projects that are not currently underway, here are a few examples of Arizona projects that would not be funded: $45 million to provide approximately 500 single-family housing loans;
$1.4 million to develop systems for converting wood to energy; $17.6 million in Forest Service funding benefiting Apache County; Five years of increased Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits for Arizona."

Healthcare Monopoly = Education, Amtrak, Postal Monopoly

The results of the nearly complete monopolies that Government holds in education and mail delivery and passenger trains is a very good predictor of what healthcare will look like in 5 years if Obamacare passes. It will be more expensive and much less effective in delivering results. In short, it will be a bloody disaster.

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Far from being an engine of wealth creation, the education system is bleeding the economy to death. The U.S. spends 2.3 times as much per pupil in real, inflation-adjusted dollars as it spent in 1970, but the return on this ballooning investment has been less than nothing.

Student achievement at the end of high school has been flat for nearly 40 years, according to a recent study by the Education Department, while the graduation rate fell over the same period, according to a report by James Heckman, a Nobel laureate economist.

If the efficiency of U.S. public schooling had merely remained at its 1970 level, the country would enjoy the equivalent of an annual $300 billion tax cut.

"a puerile amalgam of exploded imbecilities"

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As one of the most astute Americans ever to live, H.L. Mencken, observed about the New Deal, "It is a puerile amalgam of exploded imbecilities, many of them in flat contradiction of the rest." And among the imbecilities that Mencken highlighted was the very one that Mr. Glaeser warns against. Mencken described it as a proposal "to lift the burden of debt by encouraging fools to incur more debt."

Rapper Foxy Brown Owes IRS $641,000

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Foul-mouthed rapper Foxy Brown, who spits beats and loogies with equal skill, might be a "Big Bad Mamma," but she's not as tough as the tax man. Records show Brown (real name Inga Marchand) owes $641,558 in federal taxes in the state of New York.

Gov Perdue Proposes Golf and Recreation Tax

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Perdue said the tax would only be temporary to help balance the budget.

The Carolinas PGA is on a campaign against the tax. Ricky Murphy, with the Carolinas PGA, said the state's golf industry pumps in $5.5 billion statewide. He said the golf business employs nearly 70,000 across the state, all of whom face the prospect of losing their jobs if the tax goes into effect.

"This proposed tax would be negative and drive people away from golf, shrink the business of golf, shrink hospitality and travel and tourism in our state," Murphy said.

Lobbyists Employing the Homeless in DC

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By 9 a.m., more than 100 people are lined up for the hearing. Only 10 seats are available to the public, and the first 10 spots are held by line-standers. The rest are shut out.

Though the practice is controversial, Gomes said it has lifted him from life on the street.

"Sitting in the halls of Congress made me feel a little better," he said. "It elevated me and made me feel like, well, you know, maybe I do belong here, maybe I can contribute even at that little minute level."