We walked among the crosses

Where our fallen soldiers lay.

And listened to the bugle

As TAPS began to play.

The Chaplin led a prayer

We stood with heads bowed low.

And I thought of fallen comrades

I had known so long ago.

They came from every city

Across this fertile land.

That we might live in freedom.

They lie here 'neath the sand.

I felt a little guilty

My sacrifice was small.

I only lost a little time

But these men lost their all.

Now the services are over

For this Memorial Day.

To the names upon these crosses

I just want to say,

Thanks for what you've given

No one could ask for more.

May you rest with God in heaven

From now through evermore.

~ C W Johnson ~

^^^*^^^

To Our Heroes,

Thank You!

Locally Speaking

Hurricane Season Starts Early

Tropical Storm Alberto Forms Off The SC Coast
It’s Affect, Minimal

 <><><>*<><><>

 Myrtle Beach Lands Flights To Nine Cities

Myrtle Beach has landed nonstop flights to nine destinations this summer, including several cities in Ohio, West Virginia and Tennessee.

Vision Airlines, an 18-year-old air carrier, will start serving Myrtle Beach with flights to four cities in Ohio -- Cincinnati, Cleveland, Toledo and Columbus; Indianapolis; Louisville; Nashville; Springfield, Ill., and Clarksburg, W.Va., the carrier announced Thursday. The non-stop flights on 737 jet service will run from May 31 to Oct. 31.

The boost in flights comes as airlines traditionally ramp up for the busy summer travel season and in the wake of the demise of Direct Air, a Myrtle Beach-based carrier with popular flights to Columbus and six other cities from Myrtle Beach that is in Chapter 7 bankruptcy liquidation. Spirit Airlines, which carries half the passengers annually in Myrtle Beach, announced last week it would fly more frequently to two of its destinations - Niagara Falls, N.Y., and Plattsburgh, N.Y. The flights will run three times a week instead of just two.
Similar stories:

Vision Airlines, which used to provide service to Direct Air and is owed money by the now defunct carrier, was lured to Myrtle Beach by its strong tourism industry, with 14 million vacationers coming here a year, Vision spokeswoman Gini Strobel said. Direct Air’s demise wasn’t a factor in the decision to start service in Myrtle Beach, she said, though Vision Airlines did pick up some former Direct Air flights in other cities, including routes between Illinois and Florida.

“There is a lot of demand for travel to Myrtle Beach,” Strobel said. “Myrtle Beach is a great destination. It just seems like a great fit.

“We have our own strategy. We just look for top leisure destinations.”

Vision worked with the Myrtle Beach International Airport in picking the destinations, aiming to make it easier for tourists to get here without the long drive, Strobel said. It also gives locals a chance to visit friends and relatives in those cities, she said.

“We are confident they will work out,” Strobel said.

Vision and the Myrtle Beach airport have been working out details about the carrier starting service here for about a year, airport spokeswoman Lauren Morris said, adding that the airport is continuously looking to add capacity.

“We think that they picked some great markets - I’d say that the Ohio routes will be huge -- but that overall we are excited to welcome them all,” she said. “We’ve been in talks with Vision for about a year and adding the additional service has always been our priority. It’s always about reaching new and different potential visitors and getting them to experience Myrtle Beach as a great destination.”

Fares start at $109 in some markets.

-Myrtle Beach Online

Ragbag Headliners

Islamists Seek To Legalize Sex With The Dearly Departed

Egyptian husbands will soon be legally allowed to have sex with their dead wives — for up to six hours after their death.

The controversial new law is part of a raft of measures being introduced by the Islamist-dominated parliament. It will also see the minimum age of marriage lowered to 14 and the ridding of women's rights of getting education and employment. ...

TV anchor Jaber al-Qarmouty slammed the notion of letting a husband have sex with his wife after her death under the so-called "Farewell Intercourse" draft law. ... "This is very serious. Could the panel that will draft the Egyptian constitution possibly discuss such issues?" -The Washington Times

Food Stamps In Crosshairs Of Republicans' Plan To Save Military

The latest Republican plan to reconcile the budget and preserve defense spending extracts even deeper cuts from programs to help the poor and Americans still reeling from the recession.

Although spending levels for the budget were set in the Budget Control Act passed last summer in the deal to raise the nation's debt limit, Republicans are pushing ahead with another plan that cuts more while trying to prevent the beginning of $600 billion in cuts over 10 years to the growth of the defense budget.

They are doing so because the Super Committee, which was supposed to find $1.2 trillion in cuts on which everyone could agree, failed, leaving the slashing up to a pre-agreed sequestration plan that extracts half the savings from the military.

Unless Congress acts, the sequestration begins at the start of 2013. Democrats in the Senate are arguing that the Budget Control Act counts as a budget, and therefore they won't take up debate on a spending plan for 2013, much less address Rep. Paul Ryan's House budget resolution.

So instead, the House has embarked on a seldom-used reconciliation process. Its aim is to have at hand an alternative to the sequestration on the theory that the Senate will not want to allow the defense cuts either, and won't have its own plan.

In a memo sent to members Wednesday instructing them how to write their reconciliation bill, Republicans picked a number of targets, including extracting $80 billion from federal workers and $44 billion from health care. In all, it identifies $78 billion to cut in 2013, and details around $300 billion over 10 years.

But the memo spends the most time targeting the exploding cost of food stamps, on which more Americans rely than ever, at greater expense to the government than ever before.

Each month during fiscal 2011, an average of 45 million mostly poor Americans received benefits under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, at a cost of $78 billion to the federal government. Last year's SNAP participation represented a 70 percent increase from 2007, and the highest enrollment the program has ever seen. In that time, the cost of the program more than doubled.

The Congressional Budget Office, which issued a report on SNAP last week, expects enrollment to keep going up through 2014 before it levels off.

Two-thirds of the growth in the cost of the program was a result of increased eligibility -- and therefore increased enrollment thanks to the crashing economy. A fifth of the higher cost came from a boost in benefits provided by President Barack Obama's 2009 stimulus bill. Rising food prices and lower incomes among enrollees -- requiring larger benefits -- accounted for the rest.

Republicans want to take away the stimulus boost this year, saving $5.9 billion over 10 years. They note that Democrats were first to raid the extra stimulus funding for SNAP in order to pay for other bills, including a child nutrition bill that was a priority of first lady Michelle Obama's. Democrats promised to put the money back, but that seems unlikely.

Another way Republicans want to save money on food stamps is by restricting automatic eligibility for those already qualified for another program.

Three quarters of households receiving food stamps were "categorically eligible" in 2010, according to the CBO, meaning they qualified because they received benefits from programs like Supplemental Security Income or the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program, informally known as welfare. Households that are categorically eligible are often subject to less stringent means testing for food stamps. And some households are eligible for SNAP because of "broad-based" categorical eligibility, meaning they receive non-cash welfare benefits that can be as insignificant as a pamphlet.

That policy borders on fraud, according to the GOP. In their proposal document, Republicans describe their plan to restrict broad-based eligibility under a header suggesting the change would be one way to "stop fraud."

"It's really misleading to call this fraud because people are eligible -- no one's doing anything fraudulent," Elizabeth Lower-Basch, a senior analyst with the Center for Law and Social Policy, said in an interview.

Many households receiving food stamps because of broad-based eligibility could still pass SNAP income and asset tests -- states have their own rules, but the federal minimum standard is income no more than 130 percent of the federal poverty line and no more than $2,000 worth of assets -- but some would not. Restricting broad-based eligibility would cut off 1.8 million people per year and save $11.7 billion over 10 years. The savings would be higher, but some of the savings are lost because the change would increase administrative costs.

Republicans also want to shut down "Heat and Eat," which they describe as a loophole. It allows states to boost SNAP enrollees' benefit amounts if they're receiving heating assistance. About 16 states are abusing the interaction, Republicans say, by sending SNAP recipients tiny $1 or $5 checks under the Low-Income Heating Assistance Program in order to boost federal food stamp benefits. Cutting off "Heat and Eat" would save $14.3 billion over 10 years.

Advocates for the poor, see the cuts not only as an attack on poor people, but as extremely short-sighted. A key reason that advocates have pushed broad-based eligibility for years is that it cuts down on overlapping workloads for the administering agencies, and helps get people -- especially the working poor -- access to aid that they deserve under law. That aid often becomes inaccessible to people who don't have the time or knowledge to deal with multiple bureaucracies.

"The reason that it was put in place was because there were so many households who weren't able to meet the paperwork requirements, or frankly, because so many stressed caseworkers weren't necessarily helping clients get the full benefit of the value that they could," said Stacy Dean, a spokesperson for the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, referring to the Heat and Eat provisions. She also argued that ending the broader cross-eligibility standards would only mean local governments have to hire more people to do the same work while making it harder for people to navigate the system.

"It's redundant and wasteful, and it's just a barrier to eligible, needy people getting the benefits for which they are eligible," Dean said.

While SNAP rolls are expected to start falling after 2014, the military budget that the GOP is striving to protect will not, even with the sequester. According Larry Korb, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, if the sequester remains in place, the military budget will still grow by nearly 20 percent over the next decade.

With defense spending continuing to grow, advocates for the poor, like Dean, see something else in deep cuts aimed at the less fortunate.

"We believe the Ryan budget is an assault on the safety net," she said. –Huffington Post

Judge Judy - Here's Who You Support With Taxes

Politics

This should help us to better understand today's US Congress and politicians, who are both made up of mostly lawyers, and who enact the laws which govern us.

Lord’s prayer:………………………………………………….66 words.
10 Commandments: ………………………………………. 179 words.
Gettysburg address: ……………………………………….. 286 words.
Declaration of Independence : ………………………......1,300 words.
US Constitution with 27 Amendments : ……………....... 7,818 words.
US Government regulations on the sale of cabbage:........ 26,911 words

Source Unknown

Facebook Lobbies Washington To “Like” Spying on Users

Facebook, the social network behemoth that is about to become a multi-billion dollar company, has been lobbying for a proposed new U.S. law called the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA) that would allow companies to share information with government agencies. Zaid Jilani at the Republic Report has been digging up details on the Washington lobbyists who are helping Facebook

“Under CISPA, private companies may spy on user communications, whether stored or in transit, and freely pass personal information to the government as long as they claim a vague “cybersecurity” exception,” write Mark M. Jaycox and Lee Tien at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. “The bill also creates expansive legal immunity that makes companies and the government largely unaccountable to users. Companies ‘acting in good faith’ are also excused from all liability for engaging in potential countermeasures, even if they hurt innocent parties.”

This is not the first time that the U.S. Congress has tried to pass a dubious law on computer security in the name of stopping piracy. Last year, the Stop Online Piracy Act and the Protect IP Act – backed by Hollywood and opposed by Facebook, Google and Wikipedia – was defeated after a huge backlash. Opponents noted that the law – as drafted – would threaten freedom of speech and support Internet censorship.

Mike Rogers, a Republican from Michigan, and Dutch Ruppersberger, a Democrat from Maryland, are the sponsors of the new bill. Unusually for Washington, the two men work together well, according to the Washington Post. Rogers is a former Federal Bureau of Investigations agent who has been promoting the drone war, notes the Post, and the two men have the backing of people like Michael Hayden, former director of the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency. So it is small wonder that CISPA will help out the intelligence agencies by expanding their powers of surveillance.

Not surprisingly, activists like Avaaz are campaigning against CISPA and so is (surprisingly) the Obama White House, which has threatened to veto the bill if it makes it to the president’s desk.

But Facebook – which opposed the cyber-security bills last year – has decided to support CISPA. The proposed law “would make it easier for Facebook and other companies to receive critical threat data from the U.S. government,” Facebook’s Washington DC office posted on its blog. It would “impose no new obligations on us to share data with anyone –- and ensures that if we do share data about specific cyber threats, we are able to continue to safeguard our users’ private information, just as we do today.”

Well, many Facebook users would testify that the company actually does a very poor job of protecting user’s private information.

Zaid Jilani at the Republic Report points out that Facebook is actively paying a Washington lobby firm to lobby for CISPA. In his article titled “Dislike: Meet The Lobbyists Facebook Hired To Help The Government Spy On You” he reports on the people at Fierce, Isakowitz & Blalock that are working the halls of Congress to get the bill passed.

“What’s particularly interesting about all of these individuals is that every single one previously worked somewhere in the executive or legislative branches of the Federal government. They were paid by taxpayers to get the training and connections that now allow them to have high-paid lobbying jobs representing corporations,” writes Jilani.

After all, Facebook has a lot to gain from this such as the ability to “freely pass personal information to the government” and to be “excused from all liability even if they hurt innocent parties.”

On Friday, when Congress gets to vote, we will find out which members “like” Facebooks plans. -Pratap Chatterjee-CorpWatch

—–

Foot Note: Pratap Chatterjee is the author of two books about the war on terror: Halliburton’s Army: How a Well-Connected Texas Oil Company Revolutionized the Way America Makes War and Iraq, Inc. (Seven Stories Press, 2004). He is the executive director of CorpWatch and serves on the board of both Amnesty USA and the Corporate Europe Observatory. 

An American Hospital: The Most Dangerous Place?

Only 1 in 7 medical mistakes gets noticed and reported. Hospitals should adhere to basic safety measures used by other industries

Imagine you are sitting in first class on a plane, waiting for the plane to push off from the gate, when you see two people in uniform, the pilot and co-pilot, dash from the Jetway into the cockpit. A few seconds later, a voice comes over the intercom, saying, “This is Captain Jones, please be sure your seat belts are fastened. We’re ready for takeoff.” What crucial event could not have occurred in this scenario? The pilot and co-pilot did not go through their checklist of safety measures. Fuel tanks full? Check! Flaps up? Check! Checklists, along with scrupulous reporting of all accidents and near misses, have helped transform aviation from one of the most dangerous modes of transportation into one of the safest. Last year, there wasn’t a single fatal airplane crash in the lower 48 states.

From aviation to skyscraper construction to steel manufacturing, checklists and reporting of accidents have become an integral part of safety improvement in practically every complex and potentially dangerous human endeavor you can name. Every endeavor, that is, except for health care, which lags far behind other industries in terms of safety improvement.

The most recent evidence for this came out last week in a new report from the inspector general of the Department of Health and Human Services, which found that only about 1 in 7 incidents leading to patients being harmed in a hospital gets reported. The inspector general estimated that the true rate at which Medicare beneficiaries suffer an “adverse event” — a medical error or an infection acquired in the hospital — was 130,000 per month.

Hospital administrators have had plenty of time to do something about this problem, which first hit the news in 1999, when the Institute of Medicine issued a groundbreaking report, “To Err Is Human.” In that report, the institute estimated that more than 200,000 patients are killed each year by infections, medication errors or other adverse events. That makes medical mishaps the third leading cause of death in the U.S.

Some hospitals have made great strides in reducing errors and infections using — you guessed it — checklists. About 10 years ago, Dr. Peter Pronovost, an intensive-care specialist at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, and a team of colleagues put together a series of checklists for some of the most common procedures performed in the intensive-care unit. For example, they created a list of steps for how to put in a central line — a tube for delivering medication directly into a vein in the patient’s chest — in a way that reduced the risk of infection. They made a checklist to prevent patients on a ventilator, or breathing machine, from contracting pneumonia. When Pronovost was given a grant to get every ICU in the state of Michigan to use just three of his checklists, the result was 1,500 lives saved and the state of Michigan saved $100 million.

Today, there are dozens of checklists for many of the most risky procedures. Atul Gawande, a physician, even wrote a best-selling manifesto about the efficacy of checklists. So you’d think every hospital in the country would have instituted every single checklist it could. But they haven’t. Until they do, check out The Patient’s Checklist, a book that was just published, for some of the precautions patients and their families can take. And if you or a loved one lands in the hospital, ask for information about its safety record. A little more scrutiny will help push hospitals to do a better job. –Brownlee-Time

Foot Note: Brownlee, author of Overtreated, is acting director of the New America Foundation’s Health Policy Program.

Will The Newly Created “Killer Bird Flu” Someday Be Used As A Bio-Terror Weapon To Reduce The Population?

Most people have no idea how close we are to a biological doomsday.  All over the world, incredibly dangerous "superbugs" are being created by virologists and military researchers.  This reckless tinkering with nature will eventually cost millions of lives because it is inevitable that some of these "superbugs" will eventually get released either on purpose or by accident.  When the time comes, we will have absolutely no protection against them.  But a lot of these scientists don't seem to care about the risks.  In fact, a team led by Ron Fouchier at Rotterdam's Erasmus Medical Centre has created a "killer bird flu" that could kill hundreds of millions of people and they want to publish how they did it.  They don't seem to realize that this scientifically created "killer bird flu" could be easily replicated by those that would like to use it as a bio-terror weapon.  In particular, a "super flu" would make a great weapon for those that would like to dramatically reduce the population of the world without getting "blood on their hands".  Unfortunately, there are way too many people out there today (including many among the global elite) that actually believe that we need to get rid of most of humanity in order to save the earth.

A few years ago, a lot of people were really freaked out about the H5N1 bird flu, but it turns out that it is really, really hard to transmit H5N1 bird flu from human to human.

But if there was a way to make H5N1 spread much more easily among humans it could potentially be absolutely devastating.  So far, approximately 60 percent of all humans that have been infected with H5N1 have died.

Well, that is exactly what this team of European researchers has done.

The following comes from an article in the Independent....

    For the first time the researchers have been able to mutate the H5N1 strain of avian influenza so that it can be transmitted easily through the air in coughs and sneezes. Until now, it was thought that H5N1 bird flu could only be transmitted between humans via very close physical contact.

It would be hard to overstate how dangerous this virus would be if it got out.

In fact, one senior scientific adviser to the U.S. Government told the Independent that the "worst-case scenario here is worse than anything you can imagine".

Even the leader of the team that created this virus, virologist Ron Fouchier, has admitted that this "killer bird flu" is "probably one of the most dangerous viruses you can make".

So why in the world did they do it?

Why make a virus that could kill hundreds of millions of people?

This is such a reckless thing to do that it is hard to find the words to describe it.

Ah, but European authorities say that there is no reason to fear.

EU Health Commissioner John Dalli recently told journalists the following....

    "The Dutch authorities confirmed that the virus itself is stored in a very secured way and that the necessary permits were given and that the researchers are bound by a code of conduct"

But it has also been reported that there are no armed guards guarding the virus.

That almost sounds like a set up for a really bad science fiction movie.  You would think that with a "super virus" that could kill hundreds of millions of people they would be taking security a little more seriously.

Unfortunately, it is not just this European team that has been playing around with the H5N1 bird flu.

It has previously been reported that scientists at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control have been conducting experiments in which they infect ferrets with both the H1N1 swine flu virus and the H5N1 bird flu virus to see if they will come together and create a mutant super virus.

Once again, that sounds like something out of a really bad science fiction movie, but scientists around the globe are really monkeying around with these things.

Sadly, the end result of all this may be one of the greatest tragedies in human history.

Yi Guan is a top virologist at Hong Kong University, and he once helped isolate the SARS virus.  In a stunning interview with Science Insider, he detailed what it could mean for the world if H1N1 and H5N1 were to recombine into a mutant super virus....

    Q: It depends on further mutations?

    Y.G.: It depends on mutations and whether the virus further reassorts with other viruses—like H5N1. That could be a super nightmare for the whole world.

    Q: You’re talking about the Armageddon virus?

    Y.G.: The chance is very, very low that these two viruses will mix together, but we cannot rule out the possibility. Now, H5N1 is in more than 60 countries. It’s a panzootic, present everywhere except North America.

    Q: If the nightmare comes true?

    Y.G.: If that happens, I will retire immediately and lock myself in the P3 lab. H5N1 kills half the people it infects. Even if you inject yourself with a vaccine, it may be too late. Maybe in just a couple hours it takes your life.

But instead of heeding warnings such as this, scientists all over North America, Europe and Asia insist on playing God.

Let us just hope and pray that none of their "creations" gets unleashed upon the world any time soon.

Of course flu hype can also be used to frighten all of us into taking vaccines as well.

Unfortunately, most people simply do not realize that vaccines are also incredibly dangerous.

Today, bizarre new vaccine production methods are being developed all over the globe.  Some vaccines are now actually grown using dog cells, and others are grown using genetically engineered E.coli bacteria.

That doesn't sound good.

Plus, vaccines these days contain so many icky ingredients that it is amazing that anyone is still willing to take them.

The following list of ingredients in a typical flu vaccine comes from an article entitled "The Truth About The Flu Shot" by respected vaccine expert Dr. Sherri Tenpenny....

    Egg proteins: including avian contaminant viruses

    Gelatin: can cause allergic reactions and anaphylaxis are usually associated with sensitivity to egg or gelatin

    Polysorbate 80 (Tween80™): can cause severe allergic reactions, including anaphylaxis. Also associated with infertility in female mice.

    Formaldehyde: known carcinogen

    Triton X100: a strong detergent

    Sucrose: table sugar

    Resin: known to cause allergic reactions

    Gentamycin: an antibiotic

    Thimerosal: mercury is still in multidose flu shot vials

When we allow these ingredients to be injected into us, bad things happen.

For example, the CDC says that there was a 59 percent increase in autism among U.S. children in just a four year period earlier this decade.

In addition, huge numbers of women that have taken vaccines while pregnant have experienced miscarriages.

If you doubt this, just check out this article and the following comments: "Is The H1N1 Vaccine Safe? Shocking Stories From Pregnant Women Who Have Had Miscarriages After Taking The Swine Flu Vaccine".

Perhaps you have never heard that vaccines are bad for you.  Well, for much more on this topic I encourage you to check out this video....

In any event, if a "killer bird flu" gets released someday there is not going to be any vaccine on the market for it.

And what is even more frightening is the fact that there are a whole lot of people out there that would actually applaud if a "super virus" comes along and kills most of us.

In a previous article, I detailed the crazed obsession that the global elite have with reducing the population of the world by 90 percent or more.

The following are real quotes from members of the global elite about their desire for population reduction....

CNN Founder Ted Turner....

"A total population of 250-300 million people, a 95% decline from present levels, would be ideal."

Earth First co-founder Dave Foreman....

"My three main goals would be to reduce human population to about 100 million worldwide, destroy the industrial infrastructure and see wilderness, with it’s full complement of species, returning throughout the world."

World famous explorer Jacques Cousteau....

"In order to stabilize world population, we must eliminate 350,000 people per day."

The husband of Queen Elizabeth, Prince Phillip....

"If I were reincarnated I would wish to be returned to earth as a killer virus to lower human population levels."

The first Executive Director of the Sierra Club, David Brower....

"Childbearing [should be] a punishable crime against society, unless the parents hold a government license ... All potential parents [should be] required to use contraceptive chemicals, the government issuing antidotes to citizens chosen for childbearing."

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg....

"Frankly I had thought that at the time Roe was decided, there was concern about population growth and particularly growth in populations that we don’t want to have too many of."

The "new 10 commandments" on the infamous Georgia Guidestones....

"Maintain humanity under 500,000,000 in perpetual balance with nature."

New World Order architect David Rockefeller....

"The negative impact of population growth on all of our planetary ecosystems is becoming appallingly evident."

Professor of Biology at the University of Texas at Austin Eric R. Pianka....

"I do not bear any ill will toward people. However, I am convinced that the world, including all humanity, WOULD clearly be much better off without so many of us."

Mikhail Gorbachev....

"We must speak more clearly about sexuality, contraception, about abortion, about values that control population, because the ecological crisis, in short, is the population crisis. Cut the population by 90% and there aren't enough people left to do a great deal of ecological damage."

The philosophy that the world is way too overpopulated and that if something is not done about it the earth will be destroyed is being taught at colleges and universities all over the world.

All it would take for a major pandemic to start is for one crazed lunatic that actually believes this stuff to release a deadly "super flu" in a highly populated area.

That is what makes the overpopulation lie so dangerous.  There are people out there that are willing to do just about anything to "protect" the earth.  When you have millions of people that actually believe that humans are destroying the planet, it is inevitable that there will be some zealots out there that will actually try to do something about it.

We live in very dangerous times.

At some point, one or more of these "super bugs" is going to get out.

When it does, a lot of people are going to die.

Let us be thankful that it has not happened yet, and let us continue to prepare for the day when it does happen. –The American Dream

This Weeks Sound Off

Politically Correct – and Dead 

Senator Dick Durbin (D –IL) and some of his colleagues in Congress are trying to prevent U.S. law enforcement and intelligence organizations from teaching their personnel about the enemy.

Can you imagine not telling Americans about Adolph Hitler and the Nazi Party during World War II? Or failing to teach about Communism during the Cold War?

And yet today, ten years after we were attacked by jihadi Muslims in the name of Islam, Sen. Durbin and his colleagues are trying to ensure that our intelligence and law enforcement professionals will miss the next attack, just as they missed the preparations for 9/11 taking place right here on American soil.

Under Senator Durbin’s plan, we will be politically correct – and dead. For that will be the inevitable result of not teaching our intelligence and law enforcement professionals the nature of the enemy that attacked us on 9/11 and continues to plot future attacks on America.

Unlike Senator Durbin, I have actually lived in the Muslim world, and have studied Islam with a mujtahed – a recognized Islamic scholar.

As I wrote in my book Preachers of Hate: Islam and the War on America (Crown Forum, 2003), a struggle is underway for the soul of Islam between those who would revive the jihadi roots of the Koran and the hadith, and those who seek a reformation of Islamic traditions.

The reformists face a difficult battle, since they must walk away from a doctrine of violence, anti-Semitism, and persecution of non-Muslims that is openly expressed in Islam’s most sacred texts. The reformists are reviled by hate groups here in the United States and elsewhere who deem them apostates – which is punishable by death! - for not towing to Islamic orthodoxy.

While I certainly wish the reformists every success, we cannot base our national security on hope for a change in Islam.

Instead, we should be teaching law enforcement and intelligence professionals the doctrinal basis for the jihadi movement. They need to understand things such as the doctrine of abrogation, by which earlier “peaceful” statements of the Muslim prophet are cancelled (or “abrogated”) by subsequent calls to violence against non-Muslims.

Al Qaeda and like-minded groups who despise our freedoms believe that the call to violent jihad is a “duty” placed upon all Muslims by Islam’s own holy texts. We ignore this at our peril.

The New York Police Department and many state law enforcement agencies have turned to recognized Islamic law experts to put together a training curriculum that examines Islamic law by using authoritative Islamic texts.

I have examined much of this course material. Not only is it scrupulously factual; it demonstrates how Islamic concepts are being used by jihadi groups to recruit terrorists in our midst.

But if Senator Durbin gets his way, future generations of our law enforcement and intelligence professionals will be forbidden from learning the truth. Instead, they will be taught that Islam is a “religion of peace” that condemns terrorism, abhors violence, and wants to hold hands with Christians and Jews all night at the campfire.

That is precisely what happened with Major Nidal Hassan. Even though he told his colleagues repeatedly that his Islamic beliefs compelled him to kill Americans, they chose to ignore these warnings for fear of being labeled politically incorrect. Had they taken off their ideological blinders, 13 innocent victims at Fort Hood would be alive with their families today.

Our intelligence and law enforcement professionals are smart enough to understand the difference between the overwhelming majority of ordinary Muslims who do not subscribe to the ideology of Shariah law, and jihadi terrorists like Major Hassan whose goal is to create a world-wide Islamic state based on Shariah.

Muslims are not the problem; Islamic doctrine as exploited by groups such as al Qaeda and the Taliban is. And we need to know as much as we possibly can about that doctrine and how it can be defeated.

Seventeen years ago, along with an Iranian dissident ayatollah, I founded the Foundation for Democracy in Iran (www.iran.org), and have been working with Iranian dissidents ever since.

Iranians have been inoculated against the virus of Shariah law because they were its first victims. Iranian-Americans who fled to this country seeking freedom are among our best allies in this struggle to defeat the jihadi terrorist movement, which is today supported by the regime in Tehran, among others.

So I deny Senator Durbin the authority or the right to speak on behalf of Muslims. I deny him the right to preach about the doctrines of Shariah law. I ask you to join with ACT! For America so together we can defeat his politically-correct crusade against the truth-tellers. The lives of our loved ones depend on it. -By Kenneth R. Timmerman

Foot Note: Ken Timmerman is a best-selling author who has spent three decades investigating threats to our national security. He is the Republican nominee for Congress in Maryland’s 8th District, www.TimmermanForCongress.com.

Ragbag Headliners

People On Welfare Less Likely To Do Drugs Than Those With Jobs

We’ve learned a lot of really important things since Florida started drug testing those who applied for welfare benefits.  We’ve learned that drug testing is for the sake of children.  We’ve learned the state cares very little for the constitution.  We’ve also learned that politicians don’t think they should have the same standards applied to themselves, despite the fact that they are receiving taxpayer dollars, too.

Oh, and we learned that hardly any recipients were actually doing drugs.

Now, Florida lawmakers are standing by their decision, despite the fact that it’s costing the state far more money to actually do the testing than it is saving in not providing benefits.  But it’s totally worth it, because this wasn’t about money, it was about helping people.  The New York Times reports, “‘We had to stop allowing tax dollars for anybody to buy drugs with,’ said State Representative Jimmie T. Smith, a Republican who sponsored the bill last year. Taxpayer savings also come in deterring those drug users who would otherwise apply for cash assistance but now think twice because of the law, some argued.”

Oh, so it was about making people stop doing drugs?  Well then, maybe the state of Florida believes everyone should undergo mandatory drug testing in that case?  After all, as John Cole writes, “Just to put this in perspective, only 2.6% of the applicants used drugs, while the DOJ estimates that from 8-10.2 percent of the workforce is on drugs. In other words, far from being lazy shiftless drug addicts, they are, as a whole, cleaner than the general workforce. Which may seem odd to you, but if you think about it, it makes perfect sense. DRUGS COST MONEY. PEOPLE ON GOVERNMENT ASSISTANCE DON’T HAVE… MONEY. This is not rocket surgery.”

So, if Florida really believes it’s the state’s job to deter drug users, it’s time for a new bill.  Pee cups for everyone. –Care2

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Catholic Bishops’ Double Message

I identify entirely with my friend and colleague Melinda Hennenberger’s excellent take on the Vatican’s crackdown on American nuns. Indeed, I also liked what one commenter on her piece had to say: “The American Bishops should be washing the feet of American nuns and sisters!” Actually, all of us who are Catholic should honor the nuns. The Church would be lost without them. I hope to have more to say on this unfortunate Vatican statement next week.

It’s especially odd that a criticism of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious for apparently placing too much emphasis on Catholic social teaching came in the same week that the Bishops offered strong criticism of Rep. Paul Ryan’s budget (without mentioning Ryan by name). A letter signed by Bishop Stephen E. Blaire on behalf of his fellow prelates called on Congress to “protect essential programs that serve poor and hungry people over subsidies that assist large and relatively well-off agricultural enterprises.” He also said: “Cuts to nutrition programs such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) will hurt hungry children, poor families, vulnerable seniors and workers who cannot find employment. These cuts are unjustified and wrong.”

There is a real struggle going on in the Church right now between conservatives, who seem intent on making President Obama a target and downplaying the Church’s social mission, and more progressive Catholics, who think the Church should be placing even more emphasis on social justice and issue more emphatic rejections of budget cuts along the lines of Bishop Blaire’s letter. Conservatives have had the upper hand over the last few months, but Bishop Blaire’s statement can be seen in part as a response to the pushback from Catholic liberals who wondered where the Bishops have been in the ongoing budget fight. (Blaire, it should be said, has a strong social justice commitment of his own.)

My hunch is that the attack on the nuns will bring a lot more blowback from progressive Catholics. Up to now, Catholic conservatives have been especially aggressive in pushing the Bishops’ Conference to the right.  The Bishops will now be getting a lot more pressure from Catholics on the other side. I think conservatives will ultimately regret targeting the sisters. The nuns have a great many friends in the Church. –Washington Post Opinion

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Justice Scalia, Your Racism Is Showing
 
It’s impossible to have a debate about federalism and the relationship between the federal government and the states without, to some degree, harkening back to the ultimate issue of federalism in this country’s history, slavery. Yet that is exactly what proponents of Arizona’s controversial anti-immigrant law managed to pull off during oral argument before the Supreme Court, and by every indication the conservative wing of the court was more than happy to enable that historical whitewash.

Solicitor General Donald B. Verrilli had not yet even started his argument when Chief Justice Roberts made it clear what the court would not be discussing. The court would not be discussing racial profiling, despite the fact that racial profiling is at the center of the political dispute surrounding the bill and that racial profiling and the impact of the federalism arguments go hand in hand.

“I just want to make clear what this law is not about,” Roberts said. “No part of your argument has to do with racial or ethnic profiling, does it?” At this point Verrilli had an opening to explain to the court that yes, your honors, the issue of race and racial profiling, while not immediately briefed before the court, informs the very heart of the Arizona bill and therefore the very spirit of this argument before the Court. I won’t armchair quarterback here except to say that Verrilli appeared to make the same mistake here as in the health care arguments, and that is assuming that most of the justices exist in a world of law and not of Fox News politics.

For a case that wasn’t about race, the justices spent the remainder of the arguments talking about immigrants in the most racially charged and unflattering manner possible. Justice Scalia referenced the “invasion” of undocumented immigrants, comparing them to a roving band of armed thieves. Scalia even threw a bone to the nativists suggesting what the Obama administration was really looking for was a ruling that would allow the US to “enforce our laws in a way that pleases Mexico.”

When Verrilli did muster up the courage to suggest that Arizona’s Latino population was implicitly, if not explicitly targeted in the law, it was obvious that Scalia had never considered the possibility that many of the state’s Latinos are there lawfully. “Are you objecting to harassing the people who have no business being here? Surely you’re not concerned about harassing them.”

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Justice Scalia in all his unbridled racist glory.

Justice Elana Kagan recused herself from the case, which means there is a possibility the justices could split 4-4 on their decision. If that were the case then the 9th Circuit ruling striking the 4 provisions on appeal would stand. But there’s not a guarantee that will happen. Former prosecutor Justice Sonia Sotomayor was sympathetic to the state’s case and to the arguments that an overwhelmed local law enforcement should have the ability to act. She could very well side with the neo-Confederate wing of the court on this one.

A decision on the case is not expected until late June. –Care2

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Pelosi: Amend The First Amendment

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi on Thursday [April 19th] endorsed a movement announced by other congressional Democrats on Wednesday to ratify an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would allow Congress to regulate political speech when it is engaged in by corporations as opposed to individuals.

The First Amendment says in part: “Congress shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press…”

Television networks, newspapers, publishing houses, movie studios and think tanks, as well as political action committees, are usually organized as, or elements of, corporations.

Pelosi said the Democrats’ effort to amend the Constitution is part of a three-pronged strategy that also includes promoting the DISCLOSE Act, which would increase disclosure requirements for organizations running political ads, and “reducing the roll of money in campaigns” (which some Democrats have said can be done through taxpayer funding of campaigns). –Vision To America

Reggie

This is a real tear jerker, its long but worth the read ----

They told me the big black Lab's name was Reggie, as I looked at him lying in his pen. The shelter was clean, no-kill, and the people really friendly. I'd only been in the area for six months, but everywhere I went in the small college town, people were welcoming and open. Everyone waves when you pass them on the street.

But something was still missing as I attempted to settle in to my new life here, and I thought a dog couldn't hurt. Give me someone to talk to. And I had just seen Reggie's advertisement on the local news. The shelter said they had received numerous calls right after, but they said the people who had come down to see him just didn't look like "Lab people," whatever that meant. They must've thought I did.

But at first, I thought the shelter had misjudged me in giving me Reggie and his things, which consisted of a dog pad, bag of toys almost all of which were brand new tennis balls, his dishes and a sealed letter from his previous owner.

See, Reggie and I didn't really hit it off when we got home. We struggled for two weeks (which is how long the shelter told me to give him to adjust to his new home). Maybe it was the fact that I was trying to adjust, too.
Maybe we were too much alike.

I saw the sealed envelope. I had completely forgotten about that. "Okay, Reggie," I said out loud, "let's see if your previous owner has any advice."
____________ _________ _________ _________

To Whomever Gets My Dog:

Well, I can't say that I'm happy you're reading this, a letter I told the shelter could only be opened by Reggie's new owner. I'm not even happy writing it. He knew something was different.

So let me tell you about my Lab in the hopes that it will help you bond with him and he with you.

First, he loves tennis balls. The more the merrier. Sometimes I think he's part squirrel, the way he hoards them. He usually always has two in his mouth, and he tries to get a third in there. Hasn't done it yet. Doesn't
matter where you throw them, he'll bound after them, so be careful. Don't do it by any roads.

Next, commands. Reggie knows the obvious ones ---"sit," "stay," "come," "heel."

He knows hand signals, too: He knows "ball" and "food" and "bone" and "treat" like nobody's business.

Feeding schedule: twice a day, regular store-bought stuff; the shelter has the brand.

He's up on his shots. Be forewarned: Reggie hates the vet. Good luck getting him in the car. I don't know how he knows when it's time to go to the vet, but he knows.

Finally, give him some time. It's only been Reggie and me for his whole life. He's gone everywhere with me, so please include him on your daily car rides if you can. He sits well in the backseat, and he doesn't bark or complain. He just loves to be around people, and me most especially.

And that's why I need to share one more bit of info with you...His name's not Reggie. He's a smart dog, he'll get used to it and will respond to it, of that I have no doubt. But I just couldn't bear to give them his real name. But if someone is reading this ... well it means that his new owner should know his real name. His real name is "Tank." Because, that is what I drive.

I told the shelter that they couldn't make "Reggie" available for adoption until they received word from my company commander. You see, my parents are gone, I have no siblings, no one I could've left Tank with .. and it was my only real request of the Army upon my deployment to Iraq, that they make one phone call to the shelter ... in the "event" ... to tell them that Tank could be put up for adoption. Luckily, my CO is a dog-guy, too, and he knew where my platoon was headed. He said he'd do it personally. And if you're reading this, then he made good on his word.

Tank has been my family for the last six years, almost as long as the Army has been my family. And now I hope and pray that you make him part of your family, too, and that he will adjust and come to love you the same way he
loved me.

If I have to give up Tank to keep those terrible people from coming to the US I am glad to have done so. He is my example of service and of love. I hope I honored him by my service to my country and comrades.

All right, that's enough. I deploy this evening and have to drop this letter off at the shelter. Maybe I'll peek in on him and see if he finally got that third tennis ball in his mouth.

Good luck with Tank. Give him a good home, and give him an extra kiss goodnight - every night - from me.

Thank you,

Paul Mallory
____________ _________ _________ _______

I folded the letter and slipped it back in the envelope. Sure, I had heard of Paul Mallory, everyone in town knew him, even new people like me. Local kid, killed in Iraq a few months ago and posthumously earning the Silver
Star when he gave his life to save three buddies. Flags had been at half-mast all summer.

I leaned forward in my chair and rested my elbows on my knees, staring at the dog.

"Hey, Tank," I said quietly.

The dog's head whipped up, his ears cocked and his eyes bright.

"C'mere boy."

He was instantly on his feet, his nails clicking on the hardwood floor. He sat in front of me, his head tilted, searching for the name he hadn't heard in months. "Tank," I whispered.

His tail swished.

I kept whispering his name, over and over, and each time, his ears lowered, his eyes softened, and his posture relaxed as a wave of contentment just seemed to flood him. I stroked his ears, rubbed his shoulders, buried my
face into his scruff and hugged him.

"It's me now, Tank, just you and me. Your old pal gave you to me." Tank reached up and licked my cheek.

"So whatdaya say we play some ball?" His ears perked again.

"Yeah? Ball? You like that? Ball?"

Tank tore from my hands and disappeared into the next room. And when he came back, he had three tennis balls in his mouth. –Author Unknown

Skyscraper With Rotating Floors ~ Dubai's Da Vinci Tower!

 IF YOU THINK YOU'VE SEEN EVERYTHING, watch the amazing video.

The Da Vinci Tower (also known as Dynamic Architecture Building) is a proposed 313 m (1,027 ft), 68-floor tower in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

The tower is expected to be architecturally innovative for several reasons.

Uniquely, each floor will be able to rotate independently.

This will result in a constantly changing shape of the tower. Each floor will rotate a maximum of one full rotation in 90 minutes. The entire tower will be powered from turbines and solar panels, and five other buildings in the vicinity will also be provided with electricity.

The turbines will be located between each of the rotating floors. They will generate 1,200,000 kilowatt-hours of energy from the movement of the floors, and the solar panels will be located on the roof.

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Dynamic Tower, Dubai

Ladies Beware

New Mobile Phone Allows Perverts To See Through Your Clothes
I remember when I was a kid and watched Superman on televsion and wondered what it would be like to have his X-ray vision and see through walls.  Then there were the cartoons where someone had x-ray glasses that could see someone’s skeleton.  I remember the other boys in the neighborhood saying they wanted a set of x-ray glasses to see through the girls’ dresses.

Well, those perverted wishes are about to become a reality thanks to a new high technology computer chip being developed by researchers at the University of Texas in Dallas.  Dr Kenneth O, director of Texas Analog Center of Excellence and chaired professor of electrical engineering at UT Dallas announced that his team has developed a chip that utilizes a range of the electromagnetic spectrum that has never been used before and that it falls between infrared and microwave.

According to Dr O,

“We’ve created approaches that open a previously untapped portion of the electromagnetic spectrum for consumer use and life-saving medical applications.  The terahertz range is full of unlimited potential that could benefit us all.”

“CMOS is affordable and can be used to make lots of chips.  The combination of CMOS and terahertz means you could put this chip and receiver on the back of a cellphone, turning it into a device carried in your pocket that can see through objects.”

Among the applications suggested by Dr O would be the ability to see the studs in walls, identify counterfeit money, using breath analysis to diagnose certain dieses, monitor air quality for toxins and even scan for tumors in the human body.  The possibilities of the new terahertz chip are almost endless says the researcher,

‘There are all kinds of things you could be able to do that we just haven’t yet thought about.’

But they have thought about some of them as they claim the chip will not only see through walls, but also through wood, plastic and fabric.  With the decadence of American society and prevalence of perverts walking around, you know darn well that there will be those individuals who will use this technology with their cell phones looking through the clothes of women and possibly taking their photos as well.

This could well amount to the ultimate invasion of privacy as no one will know who or when someone will be looking through their clothes at their naked bodies.  The very concept turns Big Brother Watching into Big Brother Peeping.  Now someone needs to develop a fabric that will block the terahertz peeper technology in order to keep our wives and daughters from becoming the innocent object of some pervert. –Godfather Politics

'Civilization jihad' And Obama's Connections

Video series exposes ongoing plan to overthrow America from within

A new video series warns than an effort to overthrow the American system already is well under way through the “civilization jihad” of the Muslim Brotherhood, with the support of key U.S. government leaders, including Barack Obama.

Radical Muslims have penetrated “team Obama,” according to the series, which examines six individuals who have been allowed into high positions. The consequent danger is “acute,” according to the video makers.

Included in the conversation are the White House, director of National Intelligence, State Department, Justice Department, the Pentagon, Department of Homeland Security and NASA.

The 10-part course, “The Muslim Brotherhood in America: The Enemy Within,” was created by the the Center for Security Policy under the direction of Frank Gaffney. It has been posted on the Web.

Unveiled are the long-term processes of subversion and deceit through which the Muslim Brotherhood and Islamic extremists have infiltrated the American government and promoted their plan to implement Islamic law, or Shariah, in the United States and around the world.

Signs of capitulation already are evident in cases such as the Fort Hood massacre. The official military description of the attack by a self-described soldier of Allah, Nidal Hasan, who allegedly killed dozens at a Texas military base while shouting Islamic slogans, was “workplace violence.”

Bring yourself up to speed on the threat, at MuslimBrotherhoodinAmerica.com.

The film outlines the Muslim practice of taqiyya – deliberate lying to advance Islam. Rather than direct conquest, the video course explains that Muslims are using “civilization jihad, a form of warfare that employs manipulative financial techniques, lawfare, infiltration of our civil institutions and government, and insidious information dominance.”

The goal is the destruction of American society and a takeover by radical Muslims.

Most shockingly, the course shows that the process of subversion includes the takeover of portions of the American conservative movement itself, including filling key positions with members of the Muslim Brotherhood. According to the Muslim Brotherhood’s own internal documents, Islamic extremists are engaged in “a kind of grand jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within, sabotaging its miserable house with their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and God’s religion is made victorious over all other religions.”

In an interview with WND, Gaffney said the course “helps break the code on why we’re losing the war jihadists are waging on America.”

“I think it responds to the real confusion Americans feel about what is going on in this country,” he said. “They see reports of individual extremists killed, but then they suffer long waits at the airport because of ineffective and nonsensical TSA screenings, hear that the Islamic shooter at Ft. Hood was just a case of ‘workplace violence,’ and find out that the Muslim Brotherhood is telling the FBI what they are and are not allowed to say and do to fight terrorism.”

FBI Director Robert Mueller met with top Muslim Brotherhood operatives earlier this year to announce that hundreds of terrorism training documents and briefings that Muslims might deem offensive would be purged from the files.

Gaffney emphasizes that the enemy is “inside the wire,” and the course “connects the dots so that the American people will know the real story.”

See an introduction to the series [below]:

The course explains that even the language used by the Obama administration, “the endless apologies to people chronically offended,” are perceived by Muslims as acts of submission to Islam.

The series explain how many of the well-known Islamic groups operating now in America share the ideals of radicals abroad, including, “Islam is our creed, Allah is our objective, the prophet is our leader, the Quran is our law, jihad is our way and dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope.”

The strategy of the radicals includes keeping “infidels” ignorant, prohibiting “blasphemy,” demanding concessions, using educational tools, interfaith dialogue, Shariah-compliant finance, inserting Shariah into U.S. courts and placing Muslim Brotherhood partners in positions of influence.

Bring yourself up to speed on this threat, at MuslimBrotherhoodinAmerica.com. –WND

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Muslim Brotherhood in America: The Overview

From The Ashes Of 9/11

1 World Trade Center

18 Examples Of How They Are Coming For Our Free Speech

In the United States today, the First Amendment is under attack like never before.  Technological innovations such as the Internet have made it possible for average Americans to communicate directly with one another in ways that completely bypass the mainstream media, and this is making the elite very uncomfortable.  They have decided that they better come after our free speech before it is too late.  Right now, free speech in America is being chipped away at it in thousands of different ways.  On the one hand, you have the disciples of "political correctness" that want to make all forms of speech that are "offensive" to anyone against the law.  On the other hand, you have those that are obsessed with "national security" that want to ban all speech that is critical of the U.S. government or the U.S. military.  These twin forces are constantly seeking to push the First Amendment into a smaller and smaller box.  If you say the wrong thing in America today, your website might be shut down, you could be suspended from school, you may find yourself out of a job and there is now even a possibility that you could be arrested and shipped off to Guantanamo Bay without a trial.

Usually those that are targeted for their speech are those that the "establishment" does not like.  That would include free thinkers, political activists, libertarians, true conservatives and Christians.

Instead of seeing the value in allowing everyone to say what they think, we are being taught in America today that there is speech that is "acceptable" and speech that is "not acceptable".

If we allow this attack on the First Amendment to continue, eventually we will wake up in a country where our freedom of speech is totally gone.

The following are 18 examples of how the elite are coming for our free speech....

#1 Two bills currently going through Congress, the Stop Online Piracy Act and the Protect Intellectual Property Act, would give the U.S. government the ability to shut down literally millions of websites.

These bills are incredibly dangerous and if they are passed they could change the way that the Internet operates forever.

The following is from a piece that Google co-founder Sergey Brin recently authored about these new bills....

    "Imagine my astonishment when the newest threat to free speech has come from none other but the United States. Two bills currently making their way through congress -- SOPA and PIPA -- give the U.S. government and copyright holders extraordinary powers including the ability to hijack DNS and censor search results (and this is even without so much as a proper court trial)"

Any website that posts "infringing material" could be instantly shut down under these news laws.  For example, if one "infringing video" was posted on YouTube, the entire site could be taken down forever and permanently erased from Google in a matter of days.  That is how serious these new bills are as Brin noted later on in his piece....

    "While I support their goal of reducing copyright infringement (which I don't believe these acts would accomplish), I am shocked that our lawmakers would contemplate such measures that would put us on a par with the most oppressive nations in the world."

Can you imagine a world where there is no more YouTube, no more Facebook and no more Twitter?

That is what we could be looking at.

Sadly, many in the U.S. Congress seem absolutely obsessed with censoring the Internet.

U.S. Senator Chris Dodd once said the following....

    "When the Chinese told Google that they had to block sites or they couldn’t do [business] in their country, they managed to figure out how to block sites"

U.S. Senator Joe Lieberman has gone even farther.  Just check out what he once said....

    "Right now, China – the government – can disconnect parts of its internet in a case of war. We need to have that here too"

Not only that, U.S. Senator Joe Lieberman also recently asked Google to install a "terrorist button" on all Blogger.com blogs so that readers can easily flag "terrorist content" for authorities.

The Internet is under attack from Washington D.C., and if you love the Internet you need to say something while you still can.

Please contact your representatives in Congress and tell them that they must vote against these bills.

#2 Politicians all over the United States are using law enforcement authorities to shut down free speech that they do not like.  For example, during a recent meeting of the Pensacola City Council, a priest was nearly arrested after he calmly said some things that members of the city council did not like.  If you have not seen this video of the incident yet, you should really check it out.

#3 The First Amendment is especially under attack in our public schools.  For example, one group of high school athletes was recently suspended for "Tebowing" in the hallways of their school.

#4 The U.S. government is now encouraging children to spy on their parents as part of the "war on terror".  If a school official hears that a parent has said the "wrong thing" at home, that parent could potentially get labeled as a "potential terrorist".

#5 Even though tens of millions of Americans have found the information and products sold by Kevin Trudeau to be incredibly helpful, the FTC has mercilessly gone after him.  They have done everything that they can to shut him up and now he is being ordered to pay a ridiculous financial penalty of 37.6 million dollars.

#6 Hillary Clinton recently said that certain "political, cultural, and religious beliefs" are obstacles to promoting alternative lifestyles around the world and therefore must not be tolerated....

    "Now, raising this issue, I know, is sensitive for many people and that the obstacles standing in the way of protecting the human rights of LGBT people rest on deeply held personal, political, cultural, and religious beliefs"

#7 Some U.S. courts have ruled that it is unconstitutional to use the name of "Jesus Christ" during any official government meeting.  The following comes from a recent WorldNetDaily article....

    But the American Civil Liberties Union and Americans United for Separation of Church and State are standing by their victory in a U.S. circuit court decision that states even "a solitary reference to Jesus Christ" in invocations before the Forsyth County Board of Commissioners' meetings could do "violence to the pluralistic and inclusive values that are a defining feature of American public life."

#8 In North Carolina last year, a pastor was dismissed from his chaplain duties for praying in the name of Jesus.

#9 Down in Texas, the Department of Veteran Affairs actually tried to ban prayers that include the words "God" or "Jesus" during funeral services for veterans.

#10 Being able to engage in peaceful protests is one of the most important rights that the First Amendment protects.  But in recent years that right has been under attack like never before.  In a recent article I detailed some of the violence that law enforcement authorities have used against protesters in 2011....

    In recent weeks, we have seen law enforcement authorities brutally dragging female protesters to the ground by their hair.  We have also seen them use pepper spray, tear gas, rubber bullets and flash-bang stun grenades against protesters.  If this is how protesters are going to be dealt with from now in America, then we have completely lost the moral high ground.  How will we ever get other nations to take us seriously when we criticize their brutality against protesters when we are so brutal ourselves?

#11 As I have written about previously, the FBI is now systematically recording Internet talk radio programs all over the United States.  This is going to cause many Internet talk radio hosts to watch what they are saying.  After all, who wants a visit from the FBI?  The following comes from a recent article by Mark Weaver of WMAL.com....

    If you call a radio talk show and get on the air, you might be recorded by the FBI.

    The FBI has awarded a $524,927 contract to a Virginia company to record as much radio news and talk programming as it can find on the Internet.

    The FBI says it is not playing big brother by policing the airwaves, but rather seeking access to what airs as potential evidence.

#12 In Wichita, Kansas last year, a Christian minister was handcuffed and hauled off to jail by police for sharing the gospel and handing out tracts to Muslims on a public sidewalk.

#13 On June 18, 2010 two Christians decided that they would peacefully pass out copies of the gospel of John on a public sidewalk outside a public Islamic festival in Dearborn, Michigan and within three minutes 8 police officers surrounded them and placed them under arrest.

#14 As I have written about previously, a very revealing document obtained by Oath Keepers shows that the FBI is actually instructing store owners to report many new forms of "suspicious activity" to them.  Apparently the FBI now believes that the definition of "suspicious activity" includes "radical theology" and making "extreme religious statements".

#15 Last year, a high school student in Southern California was suspended for two days because he had private conversations with his classmates during which he discussed Christianity.  He was also banned from bringing his Bible to school ever again.

#16 A Christian consultant was recently fired by Bank of America and by Cisco because they discovered a book that he had written that expressed Christian viewpoints about social issues.

#17 Members of the U.S. Congress have been banned from saying "Merry Christmas" in any piece of congressional mail that is paid for by U.S. tax dollars.  Even if you do not celebrate that holiday, you should still be outraged at that infringement of free speech.

#18 Barack Obama recently signed a new law that officially designates the United States as part of the "battleground" on the war on terror.  This new law allows the U.S. military to arrest American citizens if they are suspected of being "potential terrorists" and to detain them indefinitely without trial.  So if the U.S. military comes and grabs your neighbor and ships him off to Guantanamo Bay, then this new law is probably to blame.

This new law is also going to have a huge chilling effect on free speech in America.

I have personally been contacted by several people that I know in recent weeks that are changing their behavior because of laws that have recently been passed.

It is not enough for the elite that they control Wall Street, most of the big corporations and the U.S. government.

They also want to shut all the rest of us up and keep us from complaining about it.

The elite literally want to control what we think and what we say.

We live in a country where political correctness is way out of control and where bureaucrats are constantly trying to push our free speech into a smaller and smaller box.

They are coming for our free speech my friends.

If you love free speech, and if you love the Internet as it currently exists, then you need to stand up and say something right now.

If we do not respond to these constant attacks on the First Amendment, then eventually we are going to lose it for good. –The American Dream

Ragbag Headliners

NYC Teachers Union Reinstates Alleged Molesters

What are parents to do when their child comes home from school with stories about "this creepy guy in my class" – and it turns out to be the teacher?

That’s a very real concern for parents with children in New York City public schools, where 14 teachers of highly dubious character have been reinstated to the classroom – and two others have been given "desk duty" – thanks to appeals by their powerful teachers union, the United Federation of Teachers.

NYDailyNews.com reports that 16 teachers "kept their jobs after being brought up on egregious charges, some sexual, some involving excessive personal familiarity with students." -The Washington Times

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Don't Wait For Federal Benefit Checks In The Mail

Mail drop: Social Security payments, other federal benefits, switching soon to direct deposit

Starting next year, the check will no longer be in the mail for millions of people who receive Social Security and other government benefits.

The federal government issues 73 million payments a month, but is phasing out paper checks for all benefit programs. So beneficiaries will have to get payments electronically, either through direct deposit or a debit card for those without a bank account.

The changes will affect people who receive Social Security, veterans' benefits, railroad pensions and federal disability payments.

Tax refunds are exempt, but the Internal Revenue Service encourages taxpayers to get refunds electronically by processing those refunds faster than paper checks. –Yahoo Finance

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Republicans Slash Food Stamps Just Because

In a largely symbolic vote that demonstrates the depths of Republican animosity toward the poor, a U.S. congressional panel approved about $33 billion in cuts over 10 years from food stamp benefits.

The cuts were advanced by the House of Representatives Agriculture Committee and are expected to die in the Senate, but not without first making sure Republicans get the chance to stick it to the poor at the expense of corporate industry. That’s because the committee’s proposal to tighten rules for qualifying for food stamps, formally known as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or SNAP, and repeal a 2009 increase to the program’s funding instead of reducing subsidies for farmers in the form of crop insurance payments.

Just how bad is the Republican proposal? Conservative Democrat and frequent-aisle crosser Rep. Collin Peterson (D-MN) was among the first to speak out against the cuts. “I would contend this entire process is a waste of time”. “Taking a meat ax to nutrition programs that feed millions of hard-working families in an effort to avoid defense cuts is not a serious way to achieve deficit reduction,” he said.

It’s also bad enough that the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, who think American nuns spend too much time focusing on anti-poverty initiatives, stepped in as well, writing to lawmakers on Monday asking that they preserve the funding. The nonprofit Food Research and Action Center said on its website on Wednesday that the restrictions could push up to 3 million people out of the food stamp program.

The committee pushed the cuts even though Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan’s (R) House-passed budget claims $30 billion in savings over 10 years could come from rolling back direct payments to farmers and crop insurance thereby leaving the real food subsidies intact. Of course,  farmers vote in important states for Republicans come November while poor Americans, given the scope of voter ID laws sweeping the country, clearly don’t represent the same electoral threat. –Care2