No, I'm Sorry, We Didn't Lose

Someone asked the owner of a business what his stance was on Gay Marriage.    The owner of this restaurant is clearly an Evangelical Christian and everyone knows it.  He answered the question.  All hell broke loose.  Mayors in certain cities across the country, threatened to deny this business permits to build new branches, because he was asked and answered a question.  He didn't bring it up, he only answered, honestly.  


A News Talk Show host suggested a "Support this business" day.  That day was Wednesday, August 1.


By now, I'm sure you know I'm talking about Dan Cathy, Chick-Fil-A, and the Chick-Fil-A Appreciation Day.  I went to Chick-Fil-A on Wednesday.  I posted a facebook status.  Yesterday, a friend wrote a post that made me delete him on facebook because it was so highly offensive.  He told us that whether we supported or protested we all lost.  Why?  Because in the time we were protesting or supporting we could have been doing something better with our time.  Like working in a soup kitchen.  


The implication was we should have stayed home and written letters to our Congressman and then done something for the poor and needy and destitute. I left a comment, but what I really should have done was said "are you?".   


The first amendment to the Constitution gives us the right to Free Speech, Freedom of the Press, Freedom of Religion and Freedom to Peacefully Protest. Many people who went to Chick-Fil-A did so because they support traditional marriage.  A whole bunch more went because we believe we have the right to state our opinions without blowback from the government.  When mayors of cities threaten to shut a business down or refuse to allow them to build new branches based on the beliefs of the owner?  Free Speech is in jeopardy.   I have always said, if you don't like what a business stands for or where it puts its money, don't shop there.  That's your right.  But the Government does not have the right to regulate business based on the beliefs of the owners.  Period.  So I went to Chick-Fil-A.  Some protesters when to Chick-Fil-A.  And no, we did NOT lose.  We won, because we were exercising our freedoms.


My family gives money away to the poor and needy.  We support organizations that help the depressed and suicidal.  I've sat by the bedside of a friend who died of cancer.  And my hour long excursion into Chick-Fil-A didn't take away from any of that, thank you very much.  I'd like to ask my friend when he's going to see a movie or doing Karaoke every week, or hanging out in a bar, isn't that more of a waste of time when he could be doing all those things he told us we should have been doing?  Protesting/Supporting something you believe strongly in is NOT a waste of time.  It's a right our founding fathers felt so strongly about, they put it in the Constitution.  


But here's the other rub.  He says if we really cared about free speech, how could we be supporting a business who supports denying citizens a basic inalienable right? Because if you can't speak out without fear of reprisal, who's going to speak out for those people?  If you take away our freedom to speak our opinions, every other freedom we have falls away.  That freedom is the benchmark of our continued Republic.  And when we come to together to stand up for that, we are NEVER losing. 


Until Next Time....

The Coverup or the Crime?

In what Attorney General Eric Holder called the possibility of a "constitutional crisis", the House or Representatives Government Oversight Committee ruled that the Attorney General was in Contempt of Congress.  They claim he failed to provide documents they issued a subpoena to obtain.  After 7 months of back and forth over this, President Obama claimed Executive Privilege over those documents.  

Mostly, the media has either failed to mention this at all, or if they have mentioned it, it's been to mention it's an entirely partisan issue.  Some talking heads, like Al Sharpton, believe it's proof of racism against Eric Holder.

This is what I know, from what little reporting has been done. (And that by the alternative media.)

Operation Fast and Furious was designed to allow guns to be bought by Mexican Drug Cartels.  Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry is dead.  300 Mexican citizens are dead.  And, unless I'm missing some vital piece of information, I'm not entirely sure what the purpose was of this operation.  There were no tracking devices put in these guns.  They were actually sold to straw purchasers, and allowed to be then sold off to the Drug Lords.  After that, I'm not sure what the intention was, but it wasn't just a botched law enforcement operation.  It's design and execution were flawed from the start.  It bears no resemblance to Operation Wide Receiver, which was designed not only to apprehend those buying guns illegally, but also selling them.  The weapons were designed to be tracked, and the operation was performed with the full consent and aid of the Mexican Government.

So, I'm still trying to figure out what the purpose of this all was, as was, I believe, Congress, when our Attorney General lied to Congress.  First he claimed he was unaware of the operation until a few weeks prior to the start of the Congressional Investigation.  That turned out to be a lie, and the letter stating that the DOJ wasn't involved was retracted by...the DOJ.  Then they claimed it was an extension of the operation under the Bush administration, a claim they once again had to walk back.

Congress couldn't even figure out what the Operation was really for, or who authorized it, because the Attorney General couldn't be bothered to tell the truth.  

Now, after seven full months of stonewalling on a set of documents, suddenly, those documents fall under Executive Privilege.  If someone wants to complain about wasted money, they could start there.  If those documents really fall under Executive Privilege, didn't they know that seven months ago?  Why now?  The other interesting question raised, is that, if the President was unaware of any of this, as he claimed, how exactly do those documents fit Executive Privilege?  That's not something that can be granted to the Attorney General, it has to be about the President, his immediate staff or the Vice President. 

Back during the Watergate Scandal the saying of the day was "It's the Coverup, not the Crime."  Of course, the crime was a paltry breaking and entering.  And the Coverup was far worse.  In this case, the crime is atrocious.  The Coverup of the crime, just makes it that much worse.

We should all be asking, what did the White House know, and when did they know it?  More importantly, was the President aware of this all along, and if so, why was it allowed to continue when it was obvious that it was killing innocent people?

It's the Coverup and the Crime.  

Real Feminism?

What is real feminism?  I've been pondering this question since I read an article by Elizabeth Wurtzel, best known as the author of Prozac Nation.  The original feminists were the women who campaigned for suffrage, that is, the woman's right to vote.  They campaigned on women having equal status as citizens of the United States.  Equal status.  As women began to leave home and join the workforce, it became necessary for them to campaign for equal pay.  

I believe women can do anything they put their minds to.  I believe they should be paid the same as their male counterparts.  But more, I believe that women should be treated as equals, with ability to make their own choices in life, and be respected for those choices.

Ms. Wurtzel doesn't feel the same way.  You see, she just wrote an article telling people that being a stay at home mother is not a job.  She inferred that women who stay at home are dumb, and if they aren't, then she believes they should get off their rear ends and get a job.  She blames this all on the 1% SAHMs (Like Anne Romney), because that's all she knows.  I didn't live in Mrs. Romney's house, but I do imagine wealthy people have nannies, and babysitters, and maybe they get mani/pedis and go to fancy exercise classes.  I don't know. I don't know any 1%ers.

Ms. Wurtzel, who may herself be a 1%er...or at least a 5%er, is surrounded by people just like her.  So she has no idea that mothers in small towns still stay at home.  That they sacrifice those mani/pedis and exercises classes, so they can stay home.

My mom stayed home until I was in 5th grade.  The first time we went to Disney World, she didn't buy a pair of underwear for 2 years to save the money.  She made a lot of our clothes.  We didn't eat steak for dinner every night.  Simply put, we couldn't afford to do that on one income.

I'm a SAHM right now.  We do without a lot.  We never go out to eat.  It's a treat for the kids to get a "snack" on the way to softball games.  My kids aren't out every night of the week at some new place with their friends.  We don't go on fancy vacations.  We have a roof over our heads, food on our table, clothes on our back.  We don't have a lot of extras.  That's a sacrifice we all make so I can stay home.  The best thing I can hear is my 15 year old not complaining, but saying "Mom, I don't want you to go back to work".  She'd rather I was home.  So I'm willing to do without.

Ms. Wurtzel has NO idea, how many women would love to NOT have to work so they could stay home with their kids.

So she sits down and pens a ridiculous article, basically alienating anyone who isn't in that top tier of people.  

We aren't feminists, because we don't work.  

Well, Ms. Wurtzel, I AM a real feminist, because I applaud your choice to work, and to succeed.  I applaud those women who sacrifice to stay home.  I applaud those women who are exhausted because they have to work, and yet they come home and put 100% effort into their children too.  I applaud the women willing to join the military.  I applaud women who make their own choices, and I would stand up for their right to do so.  Such a shame that you don't.

Healthcare anyone?

Rather than bloviate I'm just going to give you a few statistics about healthcare in countries that provide universal healthcare.

We'll start in the U.S in the great state of Mass.
After implementing their statewide Universal care, emergency visits rose by 7% and costs by 18%

France:  The workers pay 19% in taxes for their "universal" healthcare, and yet 90% choose to pay extra for supplemental private insurance.  

Italy: The average wait time for a mammogram?  70 days.

Uk: Wait times in emergency rooms?  4 hours.  Wait times in the ambulance?  Up to 5 hours.  Total time?  9 hours.
Some hospitals encouraging "turning over bed sheets" to save money.
Half of the dentists in the UK will not accept people on the government health program.
Wait time for surgery?  Six months.
NICE gets to decide if your life is worth living.  For instance, the cancer drug, Tykerb, which delays the progression of breast cancer is deemed "too expensive". 
Around 20% of patients with treatable colon cancer are considered incurable by the time they get treatment.

Canada: It used to be illegal to go to non government health facilities, until their supreme court ruled that "access to a waiting list is not access to healthcare."  Hmmm....

Cuba: Uses induced abortion to lower it's infant mortality rate.  That would be almost funny if it wasn't totally sick.

Greece: Has 600 general practitioners.  They need 6,000 to function.  It's so bad, patients BRIBE doctors to get appointments.

US: 36 of the last 43 Nobel Prizes in Medicine were awarded to someone from the U.S.  

We Have A Revenue Problem

Or so we keep hearing.  Even people who have never commented politically, are appearing on my facebook timeline, telling me the country doesn't have a spending problem, it has a revenue problem.

So, do we really have a revenue problem?

My argument is no, we don't.  John F. Kennedy cut taxes.  Revenue increased.  Ronald Reagan cut taxes, Revenue Increased.  George W. Bush cut taxes, revenue increased.  Don't believe me?  Instead of just listening to the hype on the news, go look.  The numbers are available.  Do some research.  It's there to see.  Why is this the case?  Because when you tax corporations and rich people, they can afford fancy lawyers who can find every loophole necessary to protect their money.  So they pay less taxes.  Of course Warren Buffet doesn't mind if taxes are raised for rich people, because he knows he can afford 40 tax lawyers that will make sure he never has be pay an extra cent.  He knows that by peddling class warfare, he can help someone get elected, and still not have to pay a dime.   So we lower the threshold to $250,000 and now your small business owners, who can't afford tax lawyers get stuck with higher taxes.  To stay above water, they don't hire new people.  No jobs = less revenue.  Yes, yes it does.  If you aren't making money you can't pay taxes.  So a year goes by and we have no new revenue from that avenue, so we keep lowering the income threshold until the middle class is footing the bill.  We can't afford tax lawyers either.  We don't own businesses.  We just pay our taxes as they continue to go up.  That's how the "raising taxes" thing works.  You really want to increase revenue.  Flat tax.  No deductions.  No loopholes.  Works for me.

If you think we have a revenue issue, then I suggest you look hard at your monthly budget and figure out if you can afford and want to pay more, and then I urge you to just send a check to the government for that extra money.  I bet more than half the people screaming about revenue are not going to even consider that.  Or better yet, just tell the government you don't want your tax refund.  They can keep it.  Are you willing to do that?  If not, then stop advocating the spending of other people's money, assuming you will not have to pay.  Trust me.  You will.

We have a SPENDING problem.  A huge one.  Medicare is more costly than the national defense budget.  Medicare costs more every year than the Iraq War... times 5. yes... more than 450 BILLION dollars.  Every year.  And now we have yet another healthcare plan that will add to that. Social Security is going bankrupt.  When someone tells you the trust fund isn't empty, it's filled with t-bills?  Guess what they are?  Money the government OWES ITSELF.  Hello?  Where is that money going to come from?  They took social security funds to pay for other things. (Side Note:  That's how Bill Clinton got a surplus...he was counting the social security trust fund.)  We hemorrhage money in this country, and the only solution is to...raise taxes.  But it DOESN'T work.  It has NEVER worked.  You want to raise taxes?  Fine.  For every DOLLAR in taxes you raise, you need to cut a dollar out of the federal budget.  EVERY one.  Then I'm on board.  But there's no way I'm paying more taxes, so the government can keep throwing away money.  Forget it.

(One more side note:  the current President voted, when he was in the Senate, to raise taxes on anyone making more than $50,000.  How long do you think before that becomes "necessary" for our revenue problem to be solved).

(Another Side Note: Maybe we could slash public pensions... instead of the Military's Benefits.  He suggested slashing Military Benefits for Retirees, while continuing to feed public pension slush funds).

Stop with the revenue problem, people.  The only way government gets money is taxes.  If you over extend yourself, do you go ask your boss for a percentage raise to cover it?  No, because he'd laugh at you.  So what makes it right for the government to overextend itself and then ask US to pay for it?  Cut spending.  Then if we need to raise taxes to whittle down the deficit, I'm fine with that.  But spending cuts HAVE to come first.

The Results of Affirmative Action

There are posts all over the internet about Elizabeth Warren and her claim to Cherokee heritage.  I hear a lot of talk about how she lied, and how that lie may end up costing her an election.  It may, it may not.  Politicians lie, everyone knows it, and they still elect them.

What I don't hear people talking about, is why someone would falsify a claim to minority status.

I have your answer, and I'm very surprised more people aren't talking about it.  The Answer: Affirmative Action (no no, it's not 42).

Affirmative Action may have had it's place, but the only thing it does now is single out certain races/genders/religions, and hands them special benefits.  Not the same benefits, special benefits.  All while assuring these Affirmative Action candidates that, without this policy, they couldn't possibly be on an equal playing field.  Maybe the left is right.  Maybe racism IS alive and well, and it's best representation is Affirmative Action. 

Why would Ms. Warren claim Cherokee Heritage? Maybe because in doing so she got a better student loan interest rate.  Maybe because it made it more likely that she'd get that job at Harvard.  Maybe she just wanted to have the same shot all those Affirmative Action candidates get.  If it turns out that she lied, which by all facts to this point it looks like she did, this isn't an excuse.  But surely we can start seeing Affirmative Action as a roadblock to the "colorblind" society Martin Luther King, Jr. envisioned.

Now we move on to the latest Breitbart scoop, that an author biography of President Barack Obama stated he was Kenyan born.  I am NOT a Birther.  I have no reason to believe that President Obama is not a U.S. Citizen.   We are hearing this was a fact checking error.  Well, it was a 17 year long fact checking error, and if a literary agent can make an error that big, maybe they shouldn't be a literary agent.  I have also heard numerous authors state that author biographies are always given to the authors to proof.  I have reason to believe that President Obama told people he was Kenyan born, because it would have opened up a bunch of special benefits to him.  Are his college transcripts sealed because they might prove he applied to Ivy League Universities as a Foreign Student? (which, by the way, opens up a whole other set of special benefits.)  And if that's the case, he lied.  And if he lie, once again we have to ask why, and the answer I'm coming up with is...Affirmative Action.

How sad is it, that people feel they have to lie just to have the same options as other people?  How do we not see that this policy not only erodes our culture, makes people believe they can't really obtain their goals on their own merit, and singles out races for special treatment, but it encourages people to be less than honest in the hopes of obtaining something more than they would get otherwise?

Tolerance Anyone?

Tolerance (n): 

a fair, objective, and permissive attitude toward those whose opinions, practices, race, religion, nationality, etc., differ from one's own; freedom from bigotry.

That's a dictionary definition of the word. Fair, Objective, Permissive attitude.  What is missing from that definition is the word: acceptance.  

Acceptance (n):

favorable reception; approval; favor

When you look up those two words in the thesaurus, they are not synonomous. For those who need a small grammar lesson, synonyms are words that mean the same thing.  Tolerance is not equal to acceptance.

Why the small lesson in the English Language?  It's important to understand that over the course of time, our news media, our politicians and our activists have changed the meaning of the word tolerance.  To them, tolerance means acceptance.  Tolerance means we don't only have to allow people to live the way we choose, we have to tell them it's fine to live that way, and that their belief system is just as right as ours.  We don't have to tolerate, we have to accept.

Here's the footnote:  We have to tolerate.  They don't.  

Recently, an anti-bullying speaker, Dan Savage, spoke at the National High School Journalism Convention.  While speaking of anti-bullying, he proceeded to have a high octane rant against Christianity.   "We can learn to ignore the bullshit in the Bible about gay people."   At that point, several Christian students got up and left the room.  After continuing his screed against the Bible, he proceeded to call those who left during his speech, pansy-assed.  I didn't hear the whole speech.  I'm sure he said some good anti-bullying stuff.  Problem was, in the midst of that, he chose to bully high school students who believe the Bible.  The media came out in force (at least the mainstream portion of it), to defend Dan Savage.  Dan Savage doesn't have to accept what other people believe.  Dan Savage doesn't even need to be tolerant of what other people believe.  According to our 4th branch of government, Dan Savage can do what he did, and really, no one should complain.

On the other hand, if say, Rush Limbaugh stood in front of a group of students and told them "we can learn to ignore the bullshit the Gay community has to say about Christians", what do you think the reaction would have been?  What if I stood up and said "We can learn to ignore the bullshit Jessie Jackson says about race.", what would people say about me?  I can think of a few words that come to mind.  Bigot.  Racist.  Intolerant.  

I was waiting to hear where Dan Savage said "We can learn to ignore the bullshit in the Koran about gay people". I'm still waiting.  

The only thing in this country you don't have to be tolerant of, is Christianity.  And I mean tolerance, not acceptance.  Christianity is a faith.  Some people have it, some people don't.  No one needs to accept the tenets of a faith they don't have.  But in the great United States, you don't even have to tolerate that people have those beliefs.  You are permitted to bully them all you want.  No tolerance necessary.  We made Columbine into a message on the evils of Gun Ownership, passing over the fact that people died for simply admitting they believed in God.    In Paducah, KY, at Heath High School, 3 students were killed and 5 injured, shot by a student while they were praying in front of the school.  No cries of "hate crimes" or "bigotry" in that one.  (In truth, the student turned out to have a mental disorder.  But still, we seem to put people on trial for hate crimes all the time, even if they aren't really hate crimes).  In Texas, a man walked into Wedgewood Baptist Church and opened fire during a church service.  Before doing so, he shouted anti-religious statements.  And yet, most news media headlined it with "the reason for the shooting is unclear".  

If it's someone who could have possibly been a Christian or Conservative or White, the motive is clear before the bodies hit the floor.  But if someone walks into a church, shouting anti-religious sentiments and killing people while they pray, the reason is unclear.  

Tolerance is a catch phrase.  It's used by our celebrities and our politicians, and it's the favorite word of almost anyone who leans a bit to the left.  And yet, the people shouting tolerance the loudest, are so intolerant of Christianity, they can't even admit someone may shoot Christians simply because they are...Christians. They cry for tolerance while labeling tea party members "teabaggers". They cry for tolerance while calling Christians and Conservatives fascists and little Hitlers.  They cry for tolerance while telling the precious few in their inner circle that people who don't believe like they do are bitter, angry, religious nut jobs who are ignorant and stupid. The people screaming the most about open-mindedness and tolerance, turn out to be the most close-minded intolerant people of all.  Yet it's acceptable because they are only intolerant of those crazy Christians, right?

Tolerance anyone?