The Paul Tsongas Memorial Pander Bear Award 04/30/08
As you can imagine, it has been extremely difficult to choose an award winner with the two Democrat POTUS candidates locked in a death match. Even though Obama preaches “new politics”, he has shown himself to be no slouch when it comes to down and dirty “old politics”.
But as it turns out, I have my very first bipartisan Memorial Pander Bear Award—-to John McCain and Hillary Clinton. Let’s hear it for “working (and pandering) across the aisle”!
The award is for the awful idea the federal government should waive the federal gas tax of 18.4 per gallon on gasoline and 24.4 diesel tax from Memorial Day to Labor Day. Oh, yeah, that will fix our energy problems that began during the Carter Administration.
Not one economist endorses this shameless bit of pandering and all say it will make matters WORSE! But when you’re a politician on the hunt for votes, economists , and the long term policies and solutions that will solve our problems, be damned!
McCain set forth this idiotic idea on April 15th in a speech about his economic policies, but recently Hillary Clinton also endorsed the idea.
Hillary Clinton and John McCain (and Barack Obama who proposed this idiotic idea when he was Illinois State Senator, but wised up): The Pander Bear salutes you!
Mommas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Cowboys
Instead, encourage them to become bureaucrats.
Governments added 76,800 jobs in the first quarter of 2008 while private companies shed 286,000 jobs during the same time period.
At this rate, we’ll all be working for the government and getting a taxpayer funded paycheck—just like Europeans!
Back From The Grave And Ready To Party
Last fall to early this year, Ron Paul was a hot item—his fundraising ability was astounding and he had an army of committed supporters.
But at some point this year, he abandoned POTUS politics in order to defend and protect his Texas congressional seat from a challenger, which he did.
Ron Paul may have given up running for POTUS but his supporters are still mixing it up—-lately at the Nevada GOP convention.
Here’s the Las Vegas Review-Journal lede:
“The state Republican convention was called off Saturday evening without electing national delegates, prompting protests from a record crowd that included many supporters of presidential candidate Ron Paul.”
The GOP establishment evidently was expecting a rubber stamp for McCain but the Paulites had a different idea since they appear to have a large share of the 1347 state convention delegates.
Paulite quote: “(The establishment) hijacked the party away from the people…(w)e were winning and they shut it down.”
Establishment quote: “Unfortunately, with the rule changes implemented this morning, we did not have time to complete the process…(w)e had to temporarily recess the convention.”
Paulite spin: “The idea that the party leaders would have a completely different agenda that goes against the people just blows me away.”
The Establishment spin: “The Ron Paul contingent constantly nitpicks and delays things on purpose so that all the old people leave and they can take over.”
What a hoot! Young people win because old people can’t stay up late— I love it!
Paul was there and insisted “(t)he campaign continues.”
I say power to him—it seems there have been several of these kerfuffles in other states, and let’s hope it continues. Compared to the hot and heavy Dem POTUS race, the GOP POTUS race has become ZZZZzzzzz.
So you rock on with your bad self Ron Paul—and you Paulites, too—we old people need the stimulation!
This Should Poll Well
At a Q & A session after his speech today at the National Press Club in DC, Jeremiah (God DAMN America) Wright, who was Barack Obama’s pastor for 20 years, married him to Michelle and baptized his two daughters, had this to say:
“I said to Barack Obama last year, ‘If you get elected, November 5th, I’m coming after you because you’ll be representing a government whose policies grind under people’…”
Also, “(Obama) didn’t distance himself from me. He had to distance himself, because he’s a politician, from what the media was saying I had said, which was [portrayed as] anti-American…(Obama) did, as I said, what politicians do.”
Gee, I can’t wait until God DAMN America is the law of the land, and really, if Obama’s own pastor of 20 years doesn’t believe what he says, why the hell should the rest of us?
Hmmmmmm. Is Karl Rove advising the good Reverend Wright?
Quote Of The Day
From former Augustana College professor Jim Winship concerning the prospects for Republicans in the 17th Congressional District:
“If Andrea Zinga can’t unseat Evans in failing health and then two years later can’t defeat Phil Hare in his first run for office, even when there are lingering resentments over the process that gave Phil Hare the nomination, then the future is pretty bleak for almost any Republican candidate”.
Tell Me Why 2.0
Phil Banaszek, co-chairman of the RICO task force on poverty, which includes representatives from the county board, city officials, area schools, court services, a work force development board, United Way and the llinois Quad City Chamber of Commerce, had this to say about Rock Island County being moved off the statewide poverty warning list to the poverty watch list:
“I know in the past couple of years, we’ve seen improvement in the graduation rate for high schools in the area, which is a plus, and unemployment figures have improved…We’ve been moving progressively…(w)e’ve been working with schools more, to get closer to where they can help people out.”
What The Heartland Alliance’s Mid-America Institute on Poverty report said:
1. County high school graduation rate was the same as last year.
2. The total number of people in poverty and the percentage of children in poverty GREW by 1900 people and 3% compared to last year.
3. The county unemployment rate was UP 0.6% from last year, and the total poverty rate was 1.4% HIGHER than last year.
4. The good news was that 1.5% less teenagers got knocked up this year.
So why is Banaszek so pleased?
More taxpayer financed jobs for academics and bureaucrats:
“The task force is working with Western Illinois University and Black Hawk College to secure funding for a full-time coordinator to head anti-poverty efforts.”
Sheesh!
Tell Me Why
The good news is that Rock Island County has been moved off the Illinois poverty warning list. The bad news is that RICO remains on the poverty watch list.
But still, progress is progress. Unfortunately, the D/A article gave us no clue as to what caused the improvement.
The benchmarks are:
1. High school graduation rates
2. Unemployment figures
3. Teen births, and
4. Overall poverty rates. (?)
This article reads like a press release. This is the county board chairman’s rah-rah: “We’ve been moving progressively…(w)e’ve been working with schools more, to get closer to where they can help people out.”
Huh? What? The report says county high school graduation rate stayed the same. Why didn’t Jonathan Turner ask what “progressively…where (schools) can help people out” meant? Did schools NOT progressively help people out before? In fact, Turner never asks specifics about any of these claims or what The Task Force as done to effect change—-he seems happy to just be a stenographer for the government. Sheesh!
The report also says that the total number of people in poverty and the percentage of children in poverty GREW since last year; that the unemployment rate was UP from the previous year. Only the teen birth rate was lower than last year, down by 1.5%.
So, you might be asking why the rosy spin from the county board chairman? The answer is that unemployment for bureaucrats is going DOWN!
The (literal) money quote:
The task force is working with Western Illinois University and Black Hawk College to secure funding for a full-time coordinator to to head anti-poverty efforts.
More jobs and taxpayer money for academics and bureaucrats! Woo! Hoo! That’s a sure cure for poverty in RICO.
Sheesh!
In The Interest Of Gender Equality….
…on Wednesday I blogged about penis theft.
So today, I saw this headline:
Menstrual Blood Shows Heart Repairing Stem Cell Properties
The lede:
Scientists in Japan have discovered that cells taken from menstrual blood can be cultivated in the lab and used like stem cells to repair damaged heart tissue.
I’m wondering who would think to look THERE for heart tissue repairing stem cells? I’m all for using non-fetal tissue for stem cell research, but this is just weird science. Sheesh!
