Pope Francis, Income Equality, Poverty, and Capitalism :: The Circle Bastiat

Pope Francis, Income Equality, Poverty, and Capitalism :: The Circle Bastiat: "The graph shows that the poorest 10 percent receive, on average, the same percentage of total income in more and less free market countries.  Where there is a major difference, however, is in the amount of income. If you are part of the poorest 10 percent, it does not matter if you live in one of the least free countries or in one of the freest countries, your group will receive about 2.6 % of total income. However, if you live in one of the less free countries you will have to live with 932USD per year, while doing so in a free country you will have an annual income of 10,556USD. This is not a minor detail."

"As can be seen, on average, the freest economies have a better distribution of income"

"The “poor” sector in the United States, for example, has an income above 60 % of the world’s population."

"the lower income quintiles are, on average, increasing their income at a higher pace than the higher quintiles"

"The freest countries on average have less child labor and lower levels of pollution. The third graph shows that the least free countries, on average, produce deforestation while freer, on average, are reforesting their lands."

"First, advocates of free market do not hold that such an economic system is perfect. But it does not help wealth creation and poverty reduction to promote market interventions with worse results than free markets because free markets are not perfect."

Is Justice Only for Those Defendants Who Can Pay for It? | Cato Institute

Is Justice Only for Those Defendants Who Can Pay for It? | Cato Institute: "Prosecutors “have a power that no other litigant has: the ability to reward witnesses for providing information or testimony by granting immunity from prosecution, dismissing or reducing charges, or informing sentencing judges of cooperation.”"

U.S. Prisons Thriving on Jim Crow Marijuana Arrests | Cato Institute

U.S. Prisons Thriving on Jim Crow Marijuana Arrests | Cato Institute: "“Between 2001 and 2010, there were over 8 million pot arrests in the U.S. That’s one bust every 37 seconds and hundreds of thousands ensnared in the criminal justice system … Marijuana use is roughly equal among blacks and whites, yet blacks are 3.73 times as likely to be arrested for marijuana possession”"

“For years, police in New York and Chicago have arrested more young blacks and Latinos for simple marijuana possession than for any other criminal offense whatsoever.”

"Such dramatic and widespread racial disparities are clearly not the product of personal prejudice or racism on the part of individual police officers. This is not a problem of training or supervision or rogue squads or bad apples."

No 'A' for Effort | Cato Institute

No 'A' for Effort | Cato Institute: "So many defenses of big government in the face of repeated failure seem to boil down this: Don’t judge us by results, judge us by our good intentions."

Oh, SNAP: Congress Hasn't Gone Far Enough to Cut Food Stamps | Cato Institute

Oh, SNAP: Congress Hasn't Gone Far Enough to Cut Food Stamps | Cato Institute: "as recently as 2000, this program cost just $18 billion annually and covered just 17 million Americans. Today, roughly 48 million Americans receive food stamps at a cost of almost $83 billion per year.

That amount already is scheduled to decline to roughly $73 billion by 2023, in part because increases included in the 2009 stimulus bill expired last month. The reported compromise would reduce this spending by an additional 1.3 percent, which still would leave total food-stamp spending at $72 billion in 2023. That’s roughly the same level as it was in 2011, not a year known as “the Great American Famine.”"

"the vast majority of the proposed cuts come from closing the so-called Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, or LIHEAP, loophole, which allows states to increase benefits for individuals who also receive utilities assistance. Approximately 16 states have used this loophole to leverage nominal (as little as $1) LIHEAP payments into an increase in a household’s SNAP benefits. Reports indicate that the congressional compromise would require states to provide LIHEAP benefits of at least $20 in order to qualify for the exemption, preventing them from manipulating the system to increase federal payments."

"Currently, 44 states have waivers that allow them to forgo the program’s requirements that food-stamp participants work, or at least be actively looking for work. As a result, in 2011, the most recent year for which data is available, only 27.7 percent of nonelderly adult participants were employed, while another 28 percent reported that they were looking for work."

"In fact, the Government Accountability Office found that “the literature is inconclusive regarding whether SNAP alleviates hunger and malnutrition for low-income households.” Similarly, a study for the U.S. Department of Agriculture found for nearly all vitamins, minerals and macronutrients assessed, the dietary intake among SNAP participants was comparable to that of nonparticipants."

Will Paul Ryan and GOP Budget Negotiators Snatch Defeat from Jaws of Victory? | Cato Institute

Will Paul Ryan and GOP Budget Negotiators Snatch Defeat from Jaws of Victory? | Cato Institute: " A majority of the Republican caucus presumably understands that they hold a winning hand and they’re content to maintain current law and let the sequester continue.

But the Republicans on the Appropriations Committee tend to dislike the sequester since it reduces their ability to spend other people’s money in exchange for political support."

What to Do If and When Obamacare Collapses | Cato Institute

What to Do If and When Obamacare Collapses | Cato Institute: "The most effective plan for most people to cover health care costs probably would include the following elements:

(A) A major medical insurance policy for catastrophic expenses

(B) A high deductible to minimize insurance premiums

(C) A tax-advantaged health savings account built up with regular contributions to cover medical expenses below the deductible

(D) A guaranteed-renewable (sometimes referred to as non-cancellable) feature that means the insurer will continue covering a policyholder regardless of medical conditions, as long as premiums are paid on time

(E) A health-status feature to protect against the risk that future premiums might rise significantly if a policyholder develops medical conditions involving higher medical expenses

(F) All insurance policies should be owned by the insured, not their employers or anyone else. This means wherever one might move, the insurance policies will follow. Similarly, divorce won’t result in the loss of health insurance.

(G) Each health insurance owner should receive a standard deduction for health insurance premiums on his or her federal income tax return."

Congress Should Abolish the TSA -- It's Time to Privatize Airport Screening | Cato Institute

Congress Should Abolish the TSA -- It's Time to Privatize Airport Screening | Cato Institute: "Studies have found that TSA’s screening results have been no better, and possibly worse, than that of the private screeners. And a House report in 2011 found that private screeners at San Francisco International Airport were far more efficient than the federal screeners at the Los Angeles International Airport."

WORLD | Carbon goes green | Daniel James Devine | Nov. 30, 2013

WORLD | Carbon goes green | Daniel James Devine | Nov. 30, 2013: "To a plant, carbon dioxide is food. But the gas has a counterintuitive effect on a plant’s metabolism: The more CO2 in the air, the less water a leaf needs."

"researchers estimated that warm, dry areas were 11 percent greener than they would have been had CO2 remained constant since 1982.

The long-term effects of this greening are hard to predict, but scientists speculate it could prevent soil erosion, increase plant life in deserts, and increase forest cover. On the other hand, it could increase fuel for forest fires, and provoke unexpected changes in habitats, requiring wildlife—or farmers—to adjust ways of living."

Johnson Comments on President's ‘Fix It’ Speech - Press Releases - Newsroom - Ron Johnson, United States Senator for Wisconsin

Johnson Comments on President's ‘Fix It’ Speech - Press Releases - Newsroom - Ron Johnson, United States Senator for Wisconsin: "In contrast, the president’s latest idea has a crucial flaw: It is short-term. He proposes letting people keep their plans for one year only. After that, apparently, they’d again be forced onto costlier, less satisfactory Obamacare plans. People don’t need a health-care solution just for the next year. We need to think long-term."

School starting age: the evidence | University of Cambridge

School starting age: the evidence | University of Cambridge: "tudies have compared groups of children in New Zealand who started formal literacy lessons at ages 5 and 7. Their results show that the early introduction of formal learning approaches to literacy does not improve children’s reading development, and may be damaging. By the age of 11 there was no difference in reading ability level between the two groups, but the children who started at 5 developed less positive attitudes to reading, and showed poorer text comprehension than those children who had started later. In a separate study of reading achievement in 15 year olds across 55 countries, researchers showed that there was no significant association between reading achievement and school entry age."

Death row inmate's wish raises ethical questions | Fox News

Death row inmate's wish raises ethical questions | Fox News: "They worry that such practices would make judges and juries more likely to hand out death sentences."

The Fourth Obamacare Shock Wave Is about to Reach Us | Cato Institute

The Fourth Obamacare Shock Wave Is about to Reach Us | Cato Institute: "Government-run Romneycare — the model used for Obamacare — was enacted in Massachusetts in 2006, and a recent survey by the Massachusetts Medical Society found that half the state’s primary care practices aren’t accepting new patients. At practices accepting new patients, the average wait to see a family physician is 39 days, and the average wait to see an internal medicine physician is 50 days.

Because so many people in Massachusetts don’t have a doctor, there has been a sharp increase in the number of emergency room visits. Stressed-out emergency room nurses are talking about possible strikes."

"according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the number of doctors who no longer accept Medicare patients has tripled during the last three years"

"Some doctors go off networks and continue their usual routines, but they accept only cash, checks or credit cards. Such doctors seem to cut their prices about 50 percent, since they don’t have all the billing paperwork and the staff needed to handle it, and they don’t wait months to get paid by Obamacare, Medicare or Medicaid."

Chained CPI Chains Taxpayers - Campaign for Liberty

Chained CPI Chains Taxpayers - Campaign for Liberty: "Thus, the government decides your standard of living is not affected if you can no longer afford to eat steak, as long as you can afford to eat hamburger."

Former prosecutor gets jail for wrongful conviction | Fox News

Former prosecutor gets jail for wrongful conviction | Fox News: "A former Texas prosecutor who won a conviction that sent an innocent man to prison for nearly 25 years agreed Friday to serve 10 days in jail and complete 500 hours of community service.

Ken Anderson also agreed to be disbarred and was fined $500 as part of a sweeping deal that was expected to end all criminal and civil cases against the embattled ex-district attorney, who presided over a tough-on-crime Texas county for 30 years.

Anderson faced up to 10 years in prison if convicted of tampering with evidence in the 1987 murder trial of Michael Morton, who wrongly spent nearly 25 years in prison."

Government Can’t be Trusted With the Death Penalty - Marc Hyden - Mises Daily

Government Can’t be Trusted With the Death Penalty - Marc Hyden - Mises Daily: "Nationally, more than 140 people have been wrongfully convicted and released from death rows since 1976 while many others were most likely wrongfully executed."

"the appeals process that is currently in place is there not to introduce new evidence but to ensure the convicted was given a fair initial trial"

All you had to do was Ask | Douglas Boyce III

All you had to do was Ask | Douglas Boyce III: "Many times people have offered to help, if all I did was ask. But too many times I’ve been, ‘I don’t want to impose’, ‘I don’t want to take them away from their family time’, I don’t want to [ fill in the excuse ] .
I thought to myself last night, how many times have I been like that scout where the only thing stopping me from completing a task was my stubbornness to ask for help."

As Europe erupts over US spying, NSA chief says government must stop media | Glenn Greenwald | Comment is free | theguardian.com

As Europe erupts over US spying, NSA chief says government must stop media | Glenn Greenwald | Comment is free | theguardian.com: "If the German and French governments – and the German and French people – are so pleased to learn of how their privacy is being systematically assaulted by a foreign power over which they exert no influence, shouldn't they be offering asylum to the person who exposed it all, rather than ignoring or rejecting his pleas to have his basic political rights protected, and thus leaving him vulnerable to being imprisoned for decades by the US government?"

"The head of the embattled National Security Agency, Gen Keith Alexander, is accusing journalists of "selling" his agency's documents and is calling for an end to the steady stream of public disclosures of secrets snatched by former contractor Edward Snowden.

"I think it's wrong that that newspaper reporters have all these documents, the 50,000 – whatever they have and are selling them and giving them out as if these – you know it just doesn't make sense," Alexander said in an interview with the Defense Department's "Armed With Science" blog.

"We ought to come up with a way of stopping it. I don't know how to do that. That's more of the courts and the policy-makers but, from my perspective, it's wrong to allow this to go on," the NSA director declared."

Pro-Union, Crony-Capitalist Thinking Dooms Another Employer - Christopher Westley - Mises Daily

Pro-Union, Crony-Capitalist Thinking Dooms Another Employer - Christopher Westley - Mises Daily: "The trade-off is that the millions of dollars and incentives that go to these firms come from conscripted funds that would otherwise be directed privately in the form of investment or consumption. These unseen effects include investment projects foregone — perhaps in Lawrence County itself — in order to fund the EDO’s redistributive policies. Forcing taxpayers to finance economic development, as opposed to allowing savers to direct their resources to projects they believe will reflect their highest valued use"

"workers and politicians have called for the state to intervene to stop International Paper from shutting down, arguing that if conscripted capital partly financed the Honda plant in Lincoln, why can’t it also save paper jobs in Northwest Alabama? They forget, however, that International Paper does not exist to maximize employment or wages but to satisfy consumer demand, and that corporate graveyards are filled with firms that lost their focus on the latter."

To Save the Submarines, Eliminate ICBMs and Bombers | Cato Institute

To Save the Submarines, Eliminate ICBMs and Bombers | Cato Institute: "The sea leg of the nuclear triad by itself is a more powerful deterrent than that possessed by nearly any other nation in the world. Russia retains a relatively large arsenal, but no other country is capable of deploying more than a few hundred nuclear warheads. A single Ohio-class submarine can carry up to 192."

Supreme Court Teaches Students They're outside Constitution | Cato Institute

Supreme Court Teaches Students They're outside Constitution | Cato Institute: "“On April 22, 2010, the principal of Central High School (in Springfield, Mo.) announced over the public address system that the school was going into ‘lockdown’ and that students were prohibited from leaving their classrooms.

“School officials and agents of the Greene County Sheriff’s Department thereafter ordered students in random classrooms to leave all personal belongings behind and exit the classrooms (despite the previous order). Dogs were also brought in to assist in the raid.

“Upon re-entering the classrooms, students allegedly discovered that their belongings had been rummaged through.”"

"These searches were conducted without any individually cited suspicions of wrongdoing by any of the students"

Republicans' Errors May Lead to Higher Federal Spending | Cato Institute

Republicans' Errors May Lead to Higher Federal Spending | Cato Institute: "The Republicans could have passed a short-term continuing resolution that maintained spending at the lower levels required by sequestration and raised the debt limit temporarily, giving them plenty of time to continue attacking Obamacare in the months leading up to the next showdown.

Instead, the Republicans proposed — and Democrats reluctantly accepted — spending levels that are $20 billion above the sequestration level."

Seattle seizes elderly woman's parking lot to turn it into -- a parking lot | Fox News

Seattle seizes elderly woman's parking lot to turn it into -- a parking lot | Fox News: "”In this case, the city of Seattle is using eminent domain to seize a parking lot, so they can use it as a parking lot,” Morgan said. “There’s no public good in that at all.”  "

Using drones to kill people for doing calisthenics - CSMonitor.com

Using drones to kill people for doing calisthenics - CSMonitor.com: "On Jan. 14, 2010, a gathering of 17 people at a suspected Taliban training camp was struck after the men were observed conducting “assassination training, sparring, push-ups and running.” The compound was linked “by vehicle” to an al-Qaeda facility hit three years earlier. On March 23, 2010, the CIA launched missiles at a “person of interest” in a suspected al-Qaeda compound. The man caught the agency’s attention after he had “held two in-car meetings, and swapped vehicles three times along the way.” Other accounts describe militants targeted because of the extent of “deference” they were shown when arriving at a suspect site."

"Frequently a target is at home with family, or meeting with local tribal figures who aren't remotely interested in attacking US interests, when the hellfire missiles come knocking."

Federal government to stop printing nautical charts | Fox News

Federal government to stop printing nautical charts | Fox News: "Nowadays, most people instead use the on-demand maps printed by private shops, which are more up-to-date and accurate, Smith said.

Still, NOAA sells about 60,000 of the old 4-by-3-foot lithographic maps each year for about $20 apiece, the same amount it costs to print them."

White House national security aide fired for Twitter account that criticized administration | Fox News

White House national security aide fired for Twitter account that criticized administration | Fox News: "A White House national security official has been fired for running a Twitter account that was harshly critical of the Obama administration.

Jofi Joseph served as non-proliferation director at the National Security Council and was involved in nuclear negotiations with Iran."

Free speech? Tolerance?

Debt Ceiling Deal: DC Wins, Americans Lose - Campaign for Liberty

Debt Ceiling Deal: DC Wins, Americans Lose - Campaign for Liberty: "Instead of setting a new debt ceiling, it simply “suspended” the debt ceiling until February. This gives the administration a blank check to run up as much debt as it pleases from now until February 7th. Congress can “disapprove” the debt ceiling suspension, but only if it passes a resolution of disapproval by a two-thirds majority."

Debt-Ceiling Deal: Overlooking the Real Problem - Campaign for Liberty

Debt-Ceiling Deal: Overlooking the Real Problem - Campaign for Liberty: "all Republicans got from the deal is a promise the Obama administration will obey the law"

Five Lessons from the Shutdown | Cato Institute

Five Lessons from the Shutdown | Cato Institute: "Greece is on life support by international aid and with little hope for the future.

Now ask yourself a rhetorical question. Wouldn’t it have been preferable if there was some sort of mechanism, say, fifteen years ago that would have enabled some lawmakers to throw sand in the gears so that the government couldn’t issue any more debt?"

"Instead of debating how to expand government or how to raise taxes, we had a battle over Obamacare."

Breastfeeding Mo. mom facing penalties for bringing son who doesn't take bottle to jury duty | Fox News

Breastfeeding Mo. mom facing penalties for bringing son who doesn't take bottle to jury duty | Fox News: "But when she showed up in September, she brought along her son, Axel, hoping the judge would grant an exemption. Instead she received a court order saying she "willfully and contemptuously appeared for jury service with her child and no one to care for the child."

Jackson County Presiding Judge Marco Roldan declined to discuss Trickle's case, but he said breastfeeding mothers can pump or nurse on breaks or bring someone along to care for their children when serving as jurors."

Save the Knives for ObamaCare: Four Ways to Actually Defund the ACA | Cato Institute

Save the Knives for ObamaCare: Four Ways to Actually Defund the ACA | Cato Institute: "The 34 states that have refused to establish Exchanges can actually block the IRS’s illegal ObamaCare taxes legislatively by suspending the licenses of insurers that accept the illegal subsidies. Since no insurer would then accept one, not a single employer in the state could be hit with the employer-mandate penalties those subsidies trigger."

"the IRS did almost no analysis of the law before deciding to tax, borrow, and spend $700 billion without congressional authorization"

Quotes

Honor is better than honors. - Abraham Lincoln

Lottery: A tax on people who are bad at math. - Ambrose Bierce

One man with courage is a majority. -- President Thomas Jefferson

If you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything.

When an old person dies, a library is lost. - Tommy Swann

Living on Earth is expensive, but it includes a free trip around the sun

The farmer allows walkers to cross the field for free, but the bull charges.

Life Doesn't Come With An Instruction Book - That's Why We Have Fathers. - An Anonymous Dad

Live in such a way that you would not be ashamed to sell your parrot to the town gossip. - Will Rogers

Men will spend their health getting wealth; then gladly pay all they have earned to get health back. - Mike Murdock

In matters of style, swim with the current; in matters of principle, stand like a rock. - Thomas Jefferson

Why is it that when we talk to God we're said to be praying, but when God talks to us we're schizophrenic? - Lily Tomlin

A child is not likely to find a father in God unless he finds something of God in his father. - Glen Wheeler

Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear. - Mark Twain

Always vote for principle, though you may vote alone, and you may cherish the sweetest reflection that your vote is never lost. -- President John Quincy Adams

"Nothing is gained, everything is lost, by subordinating principle to expediency. -- William Lloyd Garrison, abolitionist newspaper editor, 1805-1879

Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves, and, under a just God, cannot long retain it. - President Abraham Lincoln, from a letter, 1859

Did you know that dolphins are so intelligent that within only a few weeks of captivity, they can train humans to stand at the edge of the pool and throw them fish?

bumper sticker: Alcohol and calculus don't mix. Never drink and derive.

Let the refining and improving of your own life keep you so busy that you have little time to criticize others. - A wise Dad

Most of us spend the first six days of the week sowing wild oats, then we go to church on Sunday and pray for a crop failure. - Fred Allen

Quit griping about your church; if it were perfect, you couldn't belong. - Msgr. Joseph P. Dooley, Martins Creek, Pennsylvania

If a church wants a better pastor, it can get one by praying for the one it has. - Rev. Robert E. Harris

Every evening I turn my troubles over to God - He's going to be up all night anyway. - Donald J. Morgan, Columbus, Ohio

I don't know why some people change churches - what difference does it make which one you stay home from? - Rev. Denny Brake

Young man, the secret of my success is that at an early age I discovered I was not God. - Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

Some minds are like concrete, thoroughly mixed up and permanently set. - Rev. Denny Brake

For many little girls, life with father is a dress rehearsal for love and marriage. - David Jeremiah

Happy is the child who happens in upon his parent from time to time to see him on his knees; or going aside regularly, to keep times with the lord.- Larry Christenson

O, Lord... Build me a son whoes heart will be clear, whose goal will be high, a son who will master himself before he seeks to master other men; one who will reach into the future, yet never forget the past. - General Douglas MacArthur

A young successful attorney said: The greatest gift I ever received was a gift I got one Christmas when my dad gave me a small box. Inside was a note saying, "Son, this year I will give you 365 hours, an hour every day after dinner." My dad not only kept his promise, he said, but every year he renewed it and it's the greatest gift I ever had in my life. I am the result of his time.

Every human being on this planet has someone who s/he disagrees with -- a spouse, a parent, a child, a boss, an employee. It is amazing that a parent can walk into a teenager's room, blow his top about the messiness of the room, the irresponsibility of the child, the impossibility of finding anything, the health hazards and the lack of consideration for others -- and expect his child to say, "Gee, Dad, I never thought of that before; thank you for pointing it out. I am definitely going to change!" When that doesn't happen, the parent often figures that maybe next time if he yells just a little bit louder, the message will get through. (Insanity is defined as doing the same thing and expecting different results.) - Rabbi Kalman Packouz

"Why, it appears that we appointed all of our worst generals to command the armies and we appointed all of our best generals to edit the newspapers. I mean, I found by reading a newspaper that these editor generals saw all of the defects plainly from the start but didn't tell me until it was too late. I'm willing to yield my place to these best generals and I'll do my best for the cause by editing a newspaper." -- Robert E. Lee

Mrs. Whittle on April 14th, 1996

I got parts of this poem from Mrs. Whittle on April 14th, 1996

You will not see the true light,
You will not sit at God's throne,
Without the cross in your sight,
with your heart, not as a drone.

Listen to the true call.
The call of God the Son.
Prick your ears up straight and tall.
Leave your ways and after him run.

Heart Road

There were Old when there were New.
The Old are No More and the New are Old.
Now the New are gone as the dew,
And you will be old and cold.

No No More old only ever more.
Some No More have more that some.
Some No More serve ever under the roar,
And some serve sver under the Son

You the New and you the Old,
Come and pore over your sore.
Will you recieve the ever Son cold?
Will you reign forever more?

Follow the Son, righteous and bold.
Start when new before you're stone.
Tis not easy to change when old.
Habits when new harden like bone.

Grow and learn.  Prolong your life.
Wisdom and understanding seek.
Read the Word and meditate.
You will learn the way of the meek.

Pity the Poor and walk upright.
Ear hear and hand keep the law.
Rejoice for glory in God's sight.
You will honor your Ma and Pa.

Confess and forsake thy sin.
Always fear the wrath of God.
Covet not of thy friend or kin.
Happy and saved from the rod.

No More will you graduate.
Eternal joy at his face.
Eternity is not fate.
You have fought and won the race.


    This is the first poem that I can remember every writing, so 
please tell me what you think.  I wrote it on Thursday night, April
12, 1996.  If you didn't get much out of it, some notes on it follow.


** Law of Death
There were Old when there were New.
 In the past there were old people and new(young) people
The Old are No More and the New are Old.
 The old people are dead(No More) and the new people are old
Now the New are gone as the dew,
 Now the people that were new are dead
And you will be old and cold.
 You too will follow their footsteps and become old and die

** Afterlife
No No More old only ever more.
 Once dead, people don't grow old, but their spirit is eternal
Some No More have more that some.
 Some dead are better off that others
Some No More serve ever under the roar,
 Some dead are under the roar of the lion(Satan) for eternity
And some serve sver under the Son
 Some serve under the Son of God for eternity

** Question
You the New and you the Old,
 You who are old and you who are young
Come and pore over your sore.
 Think about your sin and it's effect
Will you recieve the ever Son cold?
 Will you coldly recieve the Son of God?
Will you reign forever more?
 Will you reign with the Son for all eternity

** Answer
Follow the Son, righteous and bold.
 Follow the Son of God with righteousness and boldness
Start when new before you're stone.
 Start when you are young before you are set in your ways
Tis not easy to change when old.
 It isn't easy to change your ways when you are old
Habits when new harden like bone.
 Habits that you form when you are young will stay with you

 It is now assumed that you have followed the Son

** School
Grow and learn.  Prolong your life.
Wisdom and understanding seek.
 Seek wisdom and understanding
Read the Word and meditate.
 Read the word of God and meditate on it
You will learn the way of the meek.

** Public Life
Pity the Poor and walk upright.
Ear hear and hand keep the law.
 Listen to the law of God and the law of the land and do them
Rejoice for glory in God's sight.
You will honor your Ma and Pa.

** Private Life
Confess and forsake thy sin.
 Confess and stop your sin
Always fear the wrath of God.
Covet not of thy friend or kin.
 Don't try to get the posessions of others
Happy and saved from the rod.
 You will be happy and you won't be punished

** Your reward
No More will you graduate.
 When you die, you will graduate from your physical body
Eternal joy at his face.
 You will have eternal joy in God's presence
Eternity is not fate.
 What happens to you in eternity is not determined by fate
 It is determined by what you do now
You have fought and won the race.
 (I'll leave the last line up to you)

Walking on hands

Charlie was a fine fellow who loved to play outdoors and fish and swim. He really enjoyed life. His only problem was that he had a deformed foot and couldn't run. Sometimes he even had trouble walking and tripped but he didn't let that bother him because he could do many things that he enjoyed.
Sometimes other kids at school would make fun of him but he tried to ignore it. A boy named Jerry once told him that his foot was so bad that he should walk on his hands instead. Everyone laughed at him. Even though he tried to laugh with them it really hurt.
He began to wonder if maybe he was born to walk on his hands. He tried walking on his hands a few times but it was hard. He tried more and he got better but he also got hurt a lot from falling and got cuts on his hands. Soon he started walking on his hands at school. People really started to look at him funny and laugh at him but he knew that is how he was born. When people laughed at him sometimes he would tell them that he was born that way and they should accept him as he is.
After a while he found other people that walked on their hands and he felt better and accepted when he was around others who were born to walk on their hands. If anyone laughed at them they would tell them that they were born that way and that they would have to deny who they are to walk on their feet. They were finally free and living the way that they were designed to live but the freedom had a few problems -- they still got hurt often.
Many had sores on their hands from the rough ground and bruises from falling. They often got nose bleeds from being upside down so often. Some people would tell them that they weren't born that way, that it was hurting them, and that they could walk on their feet if they tried but that made them feel rejected so they called them hand-walker haters. Once a hand walker name George did learn to walk on his feet again but they denied that because they knew that they were born to walk on their hands.
Charlie finally got acceptance by accepting that he was a hand-walker but he died just a few years later because of an accident where a nose bleed distracted him and he fell off of a balcony. Unfortunately many hand-walkers died similar deaths. Charlie got acceptance in hand-walking but it hurt him time and time again and finally killed him.
--James Stauffer
March 22, 2005

Yale prof: Tea Partiers know more science than you think | Technically Incorrect - CNET News

Yale prof: Tea Partiers know more science than you think | Technically Incorrect - CNET News: "those who professed to be Tea Party members had a positive correlation with scientific smarts.
Those who described themselves as merely Republicans had a negative correlation. The correlations were not large, but they were there."

"Kahan insisted that those of a more leftward political bias had the highest positive correlation."

Cyclone Phailin Kills 17, Affects 9 Million - Gospel for Asia

Cyclone Phailin Kills 17, Affects 9 Million - Gospel for Asia: "Electricity has been turned off in 12 Odishan districts and may take a week to turn on again, and communications are severely limited.
With many roads either collapsed or blocked by trees, officials are still waiting to see the extent of the damage along the coast. Some estimate 236,000 homes are damaged."

Lunch is free for all students in some Florida schools, due to new federal program | Fox News

Lunch is free for all students in some Florida schools, due to new federal program | Fox News: "schools and even entire districts can now receive free breakfast and lunch if 40 percent or more of students’ families are identified as low-income"

State DNR refuses federal directive to close some popular parks

State DNR refuses federal directive to close some popular parks: "The park service ordered state officials to close the northern unit of the Kettle Moraine, Devil's Lake, and Interstate state parks and the state-owned portion of the Horicon Marsh, but state authorities rebuffed the request because the lion's share of the funding came from state, not federal coffers."

"Even though federal lands such as the Apostle Islands National Lakeshorehave been shuttered, the DNR issued a statement saying all state parks, trails and other recreational properties were open and not affected by the federal government's budget problems.

The agency also reopened a boat launch Wednesdayat Wyalusing State Park on the Mississippi River. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service closed the launch on Tuesday because it was on federal land.

But in a sign of defiance, the DNR removed the barricades at the landing, saying it had the legal authority to operate the launch under a 1961 agreement with the federal government.

On Tuesday, vast swaths of land were closed by the federal government because of the budget stalemate.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service closed all its properties, including the Upper Mississippi National Wildlife Refuge and the Horicon National Wildlife Refuge. The agency said that fishing and hunting on those lands were prohibited."

"The federal agency provided the DNR $701,000 for the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, according to the DNR. The DNR said the majority of money for the parks comes from the state and that it would usestate funds to continue operations."

"Cruises to view the Apostle Islands continue, but the boats cannot go within a quarter-mile of the islands, according to David Eades, executive director of the Bayfield Chamber of Commerce and Visitor Bureau. He said a gate had also been put up on the road leading to sea caves on the shoreline."

John Tate: Our nation has been in default for a long time - Campaign for Liberty

John Tate: Our nation has been in default for a long time - Campaign for Liberty: "By its very nature, raising the debt ceiling means acknowledging our inability to make good on the checks we’ve written.  The only way to pay Peter is to hope Paul does us another solid."

"If the ceiling is not raised by October 17, and the federal government loses its borrowing authority, Lew noted, “we will be left to meet our country’s commitments with only the cash on hand and any incoming revenues.”"

Education Week | Cato Institute

Education Week | Cato Institute: "The most useful figures for comparing school districts of varying sizes are the annual per-pupil expenditures (PPE). However, half of all state education departments report PPE figures that leave out major cost items such as buildings, interest on debt, and pensions, thereby significantly understating what is actually spent."

"A recent survey by Harvard University’s Program on Education Policy and Governance found that the public’s average estimate of the annual cost per student in public schools nationwide was only $6,680. The true cost is more than double that estimate, at nearly $14,000 per student annually"

Focus on the Debt | Cato Institute

Focus on the Debt | Cato Institute: "interest on Treasury debt accounts for only 6.5 percent of federal spending. But paying interest on bonds — not discretionary spending — is a binding legal obligation. Failure to extend the debt ceiling on some specific date would neither require nor permit the Treasury to “default” on obligations to creditors — including the Federal Reserve, which holds twice as much U.S. debt as China does. But getting past October 17 with a debt ceiling unraised would require cutting other spending by some $12.3 billion per week while the impasse lasted."

Syria: It Wasn't Isolationism | Cato Institute

Syria: It Wasn't Isolationism | Cato Institute: "In Bosnia, for example, the United States held off intervention on the ground until hostilities had ceased, and, even then, the public was anything but enthusiastic when American peacekeeping soldiers were sent in. Bombs, not boots, were sent to Kosovo. In Somalia, the United States abruptly withdrew its troops when eighteen of them were killed in a chaotic firefight in 1993. The United States, like other developed nations, has mostly stood aloof in many other humanitarian disasters such as those in Congo, Rwanda and Sudan. The country did get involved in Libya, but the operation was strained and hesitant, and there was little subsequent enthusiasm to do much of anything about the conflict in neighboring Mali.

This perspective is seen most clearly, perhaps, when pollsters presented Americans in 1993 with the statement, “Nothing the U.S. could accomplish in Somalia is worth the death of even one more U.S. soldier.” Fully 60 percent expressed agreement. This is not such an unusual position for humanitarian ventures. If Red Cross or other workers are killed while carrying out humanitarian missions, their organizations frequently threaten to withdraw, no matter how much good they may be doing."

Government Waste Stifling Growth Worldwide | Cato Institute

Government Waste Stifling Growth Worldwide | Cato Institute: "In America, and now in most of the rest of world, people naturally assume that they are going to live better than their parents; but until the beginning of the Industrial Revolution less than 250 years ago, this was not true for most of mankind. The only way one could expect to get richer was if someone else got poorer — and so deep was that mindset we still see the remnants in those who have socialist leanings today. It was not until the later part of the 19th century that the average European city dweller lived better than those who lived in Rome 1800 years earlier. It has only been a few decades since much of Asia has enjoyed sustained real economic growth, and less than two decades since much of Africa has been on a growth path. So, looking into the reasons for the current slowdown in economic growth is much more than an academic curiosity, because slower growth means more people with inadequate food and shelter and with lack of real opportunity."

Bind Us Together? Not in Public Schools | Cato Institute

Bind Us Together? Not in Public Schools | Cato Institute: "When government makes decisions, it is very often a zero-sum game — either you get what you want or someone else does — and that is a recipe for harmony-shredding conflict."

"Take the president’s health-care law, arguably the biggest single increase in federal power in decades. It is probably also the most divisive; having caused rage-filled town halls before it was rammed through on a purely partisan vote, it now drives much of the current federal paralysis.

Basically, the more that government does, the more inevitable divisive warfare becomes. Government action forces everyone into the political arena to determine who gets what from whom, rather than letting people freely choose with whom they’ll interact, and freely choose to cooperate for mutual advantage."

"With extremely diverse people now placed under unified governance, today we see constant conflict over numerous values-laden, intensely personal matters, including religion in the schools (or lack thereof); portrayals of different races and ethnicities in curricula and texts; student speech rights; reading selections; and the list goes on.

Indeed, the Cato Institute has been tracking public-schooling battles since 2007 and has posted a map (with ongoing updates) identifying hundreds of “values” battles across the country. And those are just the throwdowns that have received relatively prominent media attention."

"Superintendent Dennis Carlson concluded that being a district designed to incorporate very diverse people was the root cause of the seemingly inescapable conflict. Then he said, “It’s not a battle we want to fight. That’s not why we’re here.”

Sadly, Mr. Carlson is wrong: Forcing diverse people together is why public schools are here, as Horace Mann himself proclaimed. But as we are learning the hard way, not just in education but across politics, government control often does not yield harmony."

#FAIL -�Less than 50 Sign Up for Obamacare in Wisconsin - Right Wisconsin - Conservative politics and perspective powered by Charlie Sykes

#FAIL -Less than 50 Sign Up for Obamacare in Wisconsin - Right Wisconsin - Conservative politics and perspective powered by Charlie Sykes: "The number of people who have signed up for individual plans in Wisconsin through the online exchange is "under 50," according to Dan Schwartzer, deputy commissioner at OCI."

"an insurer has to pay a 3.5 percent fee to be listed on the exchanges. Then there is a lot of trust involved in the subsidies. An individual would only pay a portion of the premiums to the insurer, and then the rest would come in the form of subsidies from the federal government through the IRS."

Girls 'harassed' in school bathroom by transgender student told his rights trump their privacy | Mail Online

Girls 'harassed' in school bathroom by transgender student told his rights trump their privacy | Mail Online: "the students are being threatened with removal from sports teams or even hate crime charges if they continue to voice concerns, said the site"

There Is Life after Default - Peter G. Klein - Mises Daily

There Is Life after Default - Peter G. Klein - Mises Daily: "selling assets at fire-sale prices under dire circumstances is far from the best option, but as this literature points out, it is often better than bankruptcy or liquidation. One of the best-known results (documented by John and Ofek) is that asset sales tend to increase firm value when they result in an increase in focus. Would it really be so bad if the US government sold off some foreign treasuries and currency, the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, its vast holdings of commercial land, and other elements of its highly diversified and unaccountably bloated portfolio?"

Student says she was suspended for acting as designated driver | Fox News

Student says she was suspended for acting as designated driver | Fox News: "a friend of 17-year-old Erin Cox messaged her and said she was too drunk to drive home from a party she was attending "

"Cox drove to the home and snaked through a crowd of teens to find her friend. But shortly afterward, police from Boxford, Georgetown, North Andover and Haverhill arrived to break up the party"

"Cox claims she didn’t drink at the party and was cleared by police, who said she was not in any possession of alcohol"

Shutdown EPA workers clean up a river anyway - CSMonitor.com

Shutdown EPA workers clean up a river anyway - CSMonitor.com: "Scientists with the Water Protection Division of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in Atlanta may be out of a paycheck for now, but they're not giving up on service.

On Oct. 8, 15 staffers from the agency's Atlanta office headed down to a trash-filled urban stream that a local business owner had complained about, and cleaned it up."

Since they will probably be paid for their time during the shutdown, it's nice to see them still helping.

Panicked Food Stamp Shoppers Clean Out Walmart Shelves | Independent Journal Review

Panicked Food Stamp Shoppers Clean Out Walmart Shelves | Independent Journal Review: "From 7 to 9 p.m., people were loading up their carts, but when the cards began showing limits again around 9, one woman was detained because she rang up a bill of $700.00 and only had .49 on her card. She was held by police until corporate Walmart said they wouldn’t press charges if she left the food.

At 9 p.m., when the cards came back online and it was announced over the loud speaker, people just left their carts full of food in the aisles and left. Walmart employees could still be seen putting food from the carts back on the shelves as late as Sunday afternoon.

So, Walmart attempts to help needy families buy food during a computer glitch that prohibits the company from checking EBT card balances – and this is what happens. Yet, the left rants about “corporate greed.”"

'via Blog this'

PLOS Medicine: Why Most Published Research Findings Are False

PLOS Medicine: Why Most Published Research Findings Are False: "Simulations show that for most study designs and settings, it is more likely for a research claim to be false than true. Moreover, for many current scientific fields, claimed research findings may often be simply accurate measures of the prevailing bias."

The Public Demonization of Bisphenol-A: I Smell a Rat | Cato Institute

The Public Demonization of Bisphenol-A: I Smell a Rat | Cato Institute: "The average human dietary exposure is about 0.3 micrograms/kilogram of body weight for infants. The rats got 250. Not through the tummy, either."

Concentration matters: If you give someone too much of even a good thing, they will die.

8 Lawmakers Arrested at Immigration Protest - NYTimes.com

8 Lawmakers Arrested at Immigration Protest - NYTimes.com: "The lawmakers, all Democrats, were detained by the Capitol Police after they stood silently in a line in the middle of a street that borders the Capitol lawn, blocking traffic."

It's one thing to say your piece -- quite another to just bother other people.

An Opening to Iran? - Campaign for Liberty

An Opening to Iran? - Campaign for Liberty: "I have been saying for years that we should just talk to the Iranians. After all, we talked to the Soviets when they actually had thousands of nuclear missiles pointed at us!"

Obamacare's Real Glitch | Cato Institute

Obamacare's Real Glitch | Cato Institute: "After one week of the exchanges, Kentucky was being widely hailed as leading the country in Obamacare enrollment. Still, just 8,309 people had signed up, about 0.2 percent of the state’s population, and just 1.3 percent of the estimated 650,000 Kentuckians without insurance."

"Fewer than 500 people had enrolled in Connecticut as of late last week, and just 366 in Rhode Island."

"Obamacare needs large numbers of young and healthy people to sign up in order to offset the cost of covering older and sicker people. If those young people don’t enroll — by some estimates, the administration needs at least 2.5 million — the entire insurance pool could collapse amidst what actuaries refer to as a “death spiral.” "

"A study by Avalere Health found that Obamacare’s “affordable” bronze plans had an average deductible of $5,150, more than four times higher than the average deductible in employer-sponsored coverage this year."

"The CBO recently warned that due to the law, the equivalent of 800,000 full-time workers will leave the labor force over the next ten years."

"If those [Medicare] reimbursements are limited as the law mandates, Medicare will pay physicians less than Medicaid by 2020, and, by mid century, will be reimbursing providers barely half as much as private health insurance, well below the actual cost of providing care. In effect, physicians will be losing money every time they treat a Medicare patient."

Honk if You Love the Mass-Produced Automobile | Cato Institute

Honk if You Love the Mass-Produced Automobile | Cato Institute: "According to data from the Bureau of Transportation Statistics—counting both user costs and subsidies—public transportation costs nearly four times as much per passenger mile as driving, while Amtrak costs well over twice as much."

"By tripling urban travel speeds, autos gave workers access to better jobs and employers access to a wider pool of workers, contributing to a huge increase in worker productivity."

"Automobiles relieved people of the need to live in cramped tenements that were within walking distance of their jobs. By giving workers access to cheap, unregulated land at the urban periphery, cars contributed to a 50% rise in home ownership rates since 1940. Cars also gave everyone access to a huge variety of low-cost consumer goods. In 1913, the average grocery store had fewer than 500 products for sale; today, the average is more than 20,000."

"Cars were an essential ingredient in both the civil rights and women’s rights movements. The Montgomery bus boycott succeeded because enough blacks owned cars that they could share rides to work with former bus riders. Women’s rights became a certainty when enough families owned two cars so that both spouses could drive to work."

"Before cars, trucks and tractors replaced animal power, farmers devoted close to a third of their land to relatively unproductive pasture. Since 1913, close to 200 million acres of that pasture has been converted to productive crop or forest land. By comparison, all the low-density suburbs in America occupy well under 100 million acres."

"For example, in 1912, fewer than one out of 4,000 Americans visited Yellowstone Park; last year, it was more than one out of 100. Autos greatly contributed to human health and safety. Thanks to paved streets and automotive technology, fire departments and paramedics save hundreds of thousands of homes and thousands of lives each year.

When Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast in 2005, New Orleans had the second-lowest per-capita auto ownership of any major city in America. As documented in news reports at the time, a result of the immobility was tragedy as hundreds of people died and tens of thousands were stuck in the city. When Hurricane Rita hit Houston a few weeks later, autos allowed four million people to evacuate with almost no casualties."

New Air Force cargo planes fly straight into mothballs | Fox News

New Air Force cargo planes fly straight into mothballs | Fox News: "The Pentagon is sending $50 million cargo planes straight from the assembly line to mothballs because it has no use for them, yet it still hasn’t stopped ordering the aircraft, according to a report."

"with almost all sent directly to Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson, where some 4,400 aircraft and 13 aerospace vehicles, with a total value of more than $35 billion, sit unused."

"Ohio's senators, Democrat Sherrod Brown and Republican Rob Portman, were both defenders of the C-27J when 800 jobs and a mission at Mansfield Air National Guard Base depended on it. Brown urged the military in a 2011 letter to purchase up to 42 of the aircraft, saying too few planes "will weaken our national and homeland defense." "

Cameron's Home-Buying Bungle | Cato Institute

Cameron's Home-Buying Bungle | Cato Institute: "Borrowing a sizable amount of money can easily make a family vulnerable to unexpected unemployment or income shocks, especially after paying a large deposit on a new house. In the aftermath of the financial crisis, Americans who saw their houses foreclosed learned this the hard way.

Moreover, because the costs of selling a piece of real estate are substantial, home ownership also creates a disincentive to labor mobility, tying people to places that may not have the best economic opportunities a decade or two from now. It may not be a coincidence that Spain, with a home ownership rate of 80%, suffers from 25% unemployment."

"In the end, the more important question seems whether people have access to affordable, convenient, good-quality housing. If that’s not the case, a reasonable government policy ought to encourage growth in the supply of the physical housing units, thereby making them more affordable both to renters and home buyers."

"This includes not only scrapping various land-use restrictions, but also urban-planning regulations that currently make it difficult to put up tall residential buildings."

Immigration Is Good for Wisconsin's Economy | Cato Institute

Immigration Is Good for Wisconsin's Economy | Cato Institute: "Even if supporters of reform got their pie-in-the-sky wishes, immigrants would only temporarily drive down wages, and that’s only if they compete directly with American workers. That rarely happens because, for the most part, immigrant and American workers have different skills.

A third of immigrants have less than a high school degree, but only 8% of U.S.-born American workers do. Immigrants with less than a high school degree just don’t compete with U.S.-born educated workers.

In addition, immigrants tend to speak English poorly, at least initially, so many specialize in jobs that don’t require much English. That creates opportunities for Americans to specialize in jobs that require English proficiency, jobs that also pay more."

"As unauthorized immigrant workers were weeded out of the Arizona workforce, an exodus of 130,000 since 2007, very few Americans took their places. Unauthorized immigrants left the state and took their jobs with them."

The Government (Non) Shutdown | Cato Institute

The Government (Non) Shutdown | Cato Institute: "Democrats have already agreed to support a continuing resolution at a funding level that is lower than they originally desired. Although I was initially concerned that the opposite would be the case, the House GOP’s willingness to go to the mat over Obamacare probably enabled this small win for taxpayers.

As it stands, Democrats are willing to fund those portions of the government that require annual appropriations at $986 billion (on an annualized basis), which is essentially the same figure that the House GOP proposed. On the downside, because that figure originally proposed by the GOP would still be above that which the still-in-effect sequestration would allow for the new fiscal year ($967 billion), the stage would be set for another round of wailing and gnashing of teeth over the mandatory cuts in January."

Shutdown Problems: Brought to You by Big Government | Cato Institute

Shutdown Problems: Brought to You by Big Government | Cato Institute: "Roughly 80 percent of federal workers will continue to go to work.

Moreover, it’s not as if this hasn’t happened before. In fact, between 1977 and 1996, there were 17 government shutdowns, ranging from 1 to 21 days. Yet somehow the Republic survived."

It’s Amazingly Simple to Balance the Budget | Cato @ Liberty

It’s Amazingly Simple to Balance the Budget | Cato @ Liberty: "we can balance the budget in just three years if spending grows by “only” 1 percent per year

The chart also shows that you can balance the budget in just four years if spending is allowed to grow “just” two percent annually.

And if you for some reason think that the burden of government spending should rise faster than inflation, then we can balance the budget in seven years by restraining spending so that it grows 3 percent each year."

"we’ve actually enjoyed two consecutive years of government spending being lower than it was the year before. Something to keep in mind just in case you thought the Tea Party didn’t make a difference or if you didn’t think sequestration was a big victory."

'No Place to Hide' from NSA, Then or Now | Cato Institute

'No Place to Hide' from NSA, Then or Now | Cato Institute: "In one case, for example, “on the subject’s first day of access to the SIGINT system, he queried six email addresses belonging to a former girlfriend, a U.S. person.” He got a demotion and two months’ reduced pay.

In 2008, a former Navy intercept operator stationed at a NSA facility described how his colleagues used to pass around highlights of soldiers’ phone calls home from Iraq.

The word would go out that “there’s good phone sex or there’s some pillow talk, pull up this call, it’s really funny.”

LOVEINT abuses are comparatively small-time, but they hint at the dangers endemic to our burgeoning Surveillance State: Information is power; the modern NSA’s capabilities are indescribably powerful and power corrupts."

Bankrupt Ideas Lead to Bankrupt Governments | Cato Institute

Bankrupt Ideas Lead to Bankrupt Governments | Cato Institute: "During the second Clinton administration, federal spending was about 20 percent lower as a percentage of GDP than it is now. Yet I do not recall starvation among the American people, nor the acutely ill being thrown out of hospitals because they could not pay, nor children not finding schools to attend. It did not happen, nor did it happen from the end of the Civil War until World War I, when federal spending was only about 3 percent of GDP, in contrast to today’s 22 percent."

"Mrs. Pelosi may think there is nothing more to cut, but her own government continues to find huge waste. Medicare fraud and abuse alone now costs more than $115 billion per year, and even though the problem is well known, it persists decade after decade, as Mrs. Pelosi and her colleagues do nothing to stop it. But then, again, it is not their money that is wasted. According to the Congressional Research Service, the U.S. government has 77,000 unused or underused buildings that cost taxpayers $1.67 billion annually to operate and maintain."

Silent Circle: NIST encryption standards untrustworthy | Security & Privacy - CNET News

Silent Circle: NIST encryption standards untrustworthy | Security & Privacy - CNET News: "A 2007 presentation by two Microsoft researchers called into question the standard's algorithm -- Dual Elliptic Curve Deterministic Random Bit Generation, aka Dual_EC_DRBG -- and raised the possibility that it offered a back door into encrypted communications to someone who knew specific secret numbers.
"If you know the secret numbers, you can completely break any instantiation of Dual_EC_DRBG," said security researcher Bruce Schneier in a blog post about Dual_EC_DRBG at the time."

Who's still offline and why? The real reasons | Internet & Media - CNET News

Who's still offline and why? The real reasons | Internet & Media - CNET News: "The US still has a "digital divide," but it's not the one most people would imagine. According to the survey, the most significant factor is age: Nearly half of non-users are age 65 or older. Education is the second-most important factor -- more than 40 percent do not hold a high school diploma. Other factors, including sex, race, income level, and geographic location, are less significant, and continue to decrease."

"the most frequently reported reason given by Americans who do not to use the Internet is that it isn't relevant to them. Usability was the second-most cited reason. Together the two accounted for 66 percent of those who are not online. Price and availability were the least-important reasons."

"Although 4G and other networking technologies can and do deliver speeds that exceed the FCC's broadband threshold, the agency excluded mobile entirely from its statistics on access, citing a lack of "reliable" data on precisely how many of the 19 million could or even do get service from mobile broadband providers.
Rather than estimate, the FCC simply counted the entire wireless industry as zero."

"Including data on mobile broadband access provided in the FCC's report but left out of its calculations, the number of Americans without any home broadband provider falls as low as 5.5 million. That's less than 2 percent of the population.
To put that number in perspective, consider that landline telephone service never achieved more than 95 percent (PDF) adoption in American homes. Indeed, according to the US Census Bureau, more than 3.5 million Americans still lacked complete indoor plumbing as recently as 2011. Yet universal telephone service has been the policy of the US since the formation of the FCC in 1934. And public efforts to improve household sanitation predate the founding of the Republic. "

America Can Aid Syrians without Military Intervention | Cato Institute

America Can Aid Syrians without Military Intervention | Cato Institute: "So far, neighboring Lebanon, Jordan, and Turkey have taken in more than 1.7 million of the refugees. Sweden has announced that it will grant permanent residency to the 14,700 Syrian refugees already there, as well as some subsequent arrivals. Germany has also decided to take in 5,000 Syrian refugees.

In contrast, in 2011 and 2012, the U.S. allowed just 374 Syrians to gain asylum status, while only 60 refugees were approved."

"The United States used to be the world’s safety net for refugees, especially religious ones. The Pilgrims fled the Netherlands, Irish Catholics escaped English oppression, Jews from Eastern Europe escaped pogroms, and Armenians fled genocide and war to settle in California. But then America changed its immigration laws in 1921, and the government shamefully turned away German Jews fleeing Nazi Germany and Chinese fleeing the Japanese invasion.

The United States could help avoid an even worse humanitarian crisis in Syria by guaranteeing TPS status to all peaceful Syrians who make it to the U.S. It’s important to note that TPS is not a green card and cannot lead toward citizenship. Furthermore, any war criminals or individuals affiliated with criminal or terrorist activity would be excluded. TPS status could be a game-changer for Syrians and it could be done just by changing a few words in the U.S. code."

Three Defunding Myths | Cato Institute

Three Defunding Myths | Cato Institute: "In reality more of the government is likely to stay open than to close. For example, government activities that have “some reasonable and articulable connection between the function to be performed and the safety of human life or the protection of property” will continue regardless of whether Congress passes a CR. This includes not only such obvious things as military operations and homeland security, but also air-traffic control, health care at Veterans Administration hospitals, law enforcement and criminal investigations, oversight of food and drug safety, nuclear safety, and so forth. In fact, much as we might wish it otherwise, even the IRS would continue to function under such a “shutdown.” Moreover, since entitlement programs, like Social Security and Medicare, are not subject to annual appropriations, they would also continue."

Insider Trading at The Federal Reserve and Investment Giants? - Campaign for Liberty

Insider Trading at The Federal Reserve and Investment Giants? - Campaign for Liberty: "Holding 91 percent of your assets in one thing is extremely risky. Unless, you have inside knowledge that the government is going to continue pushing prices higher in perpetuity."

The IPCC Political-Suicide Pill | Cato Institute

The IPCC Political-Suicide Pill | Cato Institute: "How does it back down from a quarter-century of predicting a quarter of a degree (Celsius) of warming every decade, when there’s been none for 17 years now?"

"the reigning suite of climate models has now officially failed, with the difference between them and reality now statistically significant at the 1-in-20 level"

Counting the High Cost of Obama's Libya, Syria Debacles | Cato Institute

Counting the High Cost of Obama's Libya, Syria Debacles | Cato Institute: "As political scientist Alan J. Kuperman recently explained, NATO intervention “increased the duration of Libya’s civil war by about six times and its death toll by at least seven times, while also exacerbating human rights abuses, humanitarian suffering, Islamic radicalism, and weapons proliferation in Libya and its neighbors.”

In a new article in the journal International Security, Kuperman tallies up the meager benefits and considerable costs: “Human rights conditions in post-intervention Libya,” which according to Human Rights Watch include abuses “ ‘so widespread and systematic that they may amount to crimes against humanity,’ are considerably worse than in the decade preceding the war.”

The Washington Post’s recent look at Libya two years after the revolution describes a hellscape “governed” by hundreds of armed militias, where “even minor disputes escalate into frequent gun violence on the streets.”"

"thousands of portable surface-to-air missiles, useful for shooting down civilian aircraft, have been “privatized,” with some possibly in the hands of terrorists.

Outside Libya’s borders, Kuperman notes, “the most obvious negative impact has been in Mali,” where Tuareg soldiers with Moammar Gadhafi’s former security forces fled with their weapons and sparked an insurgency in the country’s north."

"hopes for outside aid encourage risk-seeking behavior by those expecting rescue.

“When NATO started bombing Libyan forces in March 2011,” Kuperman writes, “Syria’s uprising was mainly nonviolent and its government’s response — although criminally disproportionate — was relatively circumscribed.

But after Gadhafi’s fall, “in the summer of 2011, Syria’s uprising turned violent,” with “a fifteenfold increase in the killing rate” by 2013."

Politics: HR 2300: Yes, there is a Republican plan to replace ObamaCare | Best of Cain

Politics: HR 2300: Yes, there is a Republican plan to replace ObamaCare | Best of Cain: "Even during the ObamaCare debate, there were any number of Republican proposals. The most significant one at the moment was recently introduced in the House of Representatives by U.S. Rep. Tom Price (R-Georgia), a doctor who is the lead sponsor of HR 2300. He calls it Empowering Patients First.

The basics of the bill are these:

It extends tax deductions for health insurance to those who buy as individuals, thus eliminating the perverse incentive that favored employer-purchased insurance.
It gives patients true portability by making them the owners of their insurance – not their employers.
It gives doctors the real power to make treatment decisions, not insurance companies or the government.
It reforms medical liability laws and thus saves money by reducing the practice of defensive medicine."

How Europe's Economy Is Being Devastated by Global Warming Orthodoxy | Cato Institute

How Europe's Economy Is Being Devastated by Global Warming Orthodoxy | Cato Institute: " The German government has arranged for renewable energy producers to sell the power grid their electricity at more than 6 times the wholesale electricity market rate."

"The most bizarre case involves an offshore German wind farm about nine miles from the North Sea Island of Borkum, where diesel engines make the blades spin."

“More than one third of Germany’s wind turbines are located in the eastern part of the nation where this large concentration of generating capacity regularly overloads the region’s power grid, threatening blackouts. In some extreme cases, the region produces three to four times the total amount of electricity actually being consumed, placing a strain on the eastern German grid. System engineers have to intervene every other day to maintain network stability.”

"Austria imports nuclear power from the Czech Republic to pump water uphill, then lets it flow downhill through turbines, generating hydropower for Germany"

Why Do Our Military Installations Remain “Gun Free Zones?” - Absolute Rights

Why Do Our Military Installations Remain “Gun Free Zones?” - Absolute Rights: "if there is any place in the United States where firearm restrictions should have worked at preventing a shooting tragedy, it is the Navy Yard -- a highly secure military installation in a city with some of the most stringent gun control laws in the nation; not to mention the most advanced security systems on the planet."

Senator Rand Paul's testimony before Senate Judiciary Committee on “Reevaluating the Effectiveness of Mandatory Minimum Sentences.” - Rand Paul 2016 | U.S. Senate | Rand Paul 2016 | U.S. Senate

Senator Rand Paul's testimony before Senate Judiciary Committee on “Reevaluating the Effectiveness of Mandatory Minimum Sentences.” - Rand Paul 2016 | U.S. Senate | Rand Paul 2016 | U.S. Senate: "If I told you that one out of three African-American males is forbidden by law from voting, you might think I was talking about Jim Crow 50 years ago.

Yet today, a third of African-American males are still prevented from voting because of the War on Drugs."

"The majority of illegal drug users and dealers nationwide are white, but three-fourths of all people in prison for drug offenses are African American or Latino.

Why are the arrest rates so lopsided? Because it is easier to go into urban areas and make arrests than suburban areas.

Arrest statistics matter when applying for federal grants. It doesn’t take much imagination to understand that it’s easier to round up, arrest and convict poor kids than it is to convict rich kids."

"John Horner was a 46-year-old father of three when he sold some of his prescription painkillers to a friend.

His friend turned out to be a police informant, and he was charged with dealing drugs. Horner pleaded guilty, and was later sentenced to the mandatory minimum of 25 years in jail.

Edward Clay was an 18 year old and first time offender when he was caught with less than 2 ounces of cocaine. He received 10 years in jail from a mandatory minimum sentence.

Weldon Angelos was a 24-year-old who was sentenced to 55 years in prison for three marijuana sales.

Federal Judge Timothy Lewis recalls a case where he had to send a 19-year-old to prison for 10 years for conspiracy. What was the “conspiracy?”

This young man had been in a car where drugs were found. I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty sure one of us might have been in a car in our youth where someone might’ve had drugs.

Before the arrest, this young man was going to be the first in his family to go to college."

The Rational Choices of Crack Addicts - NYTimes.com

The Rational Choices of Crack Addicts - NYTimes.com: "“Eighty to 90 percent of people who use crack and methamphetamine don’t get addicted,” said Dr. Hart, an associate professor of psychology. “And the small number who do become addicted are nothing like the popular caricatures.”"

" “They didn’t fit the caricature of the drug addict who can’t stop once he gets a taste,” Dr. Hart said. “When they were given an alternative to crack, they made rational economic decisions.” "

"when he raised the alternative reward to $20, every single addict, of meth and crack alike, chose the cash. They knew they wouldn’t receive it until the experiment ended weeks later, but they were still willing to pass up an immediate high."

“If you’re living in a poor neighborhood deprived of options, there’s a certain rationality to keep taking a drug that will give you some temporary pleasure,”

“Addiction always has a social element, and this is magnified in societies with little in the way of work or other ways to find fulfillment.”

" “Eighty to 90 percent of people are not negatively affected by drugs, but in the scientific literature nearly 100 percent of the reports are negative,” Dr. Hart said. “There’s a skewed focus on pathology. We scientists know that we get more money if we keep telling Congress that we’re solving this terrible problem. We’ve played a less than honorable role in the war on drugs.” "

Study says wind farms have killed 'alarming' number of eagles in past 5 years | Fox News

Study says wind farms have killed 'alarming' number of eagles in past 5 years | Fox News: "wind farms in 10 states have killed at least 85 eagles since 1997, with most deaths occurring between 2008 and 2012, as the industry was greatly expanding. Most deaths -- 79 -- were golden eagles that struck wind turbines. One of the eagles counted in the study was electrocuted by a power line."

"the scientists said their figure is likely to be "substantially" underestimated, since companies report eagle deaths voluntarily and only a fraction of those included in their total were discovered during searches for dead birds by wind-energy companies. The study also excluded the deadliest place in the country for eagles, a cluster of wind farms in a northern California area known as Altamont Pass. Wind farms built there decades ago kill more than 60 per year."

Senator Johnson and Staff File Comment to OPM’s Proposed Rule - Press Releases - Newsroom - Ron Johnson, United States Senator for Wisconsin

Senator Johnson and Staff File Comment to OPM’s Proposed Rule - Press Releases - Newsroom - Ron Johnson, United States Senator for Wisconsin: "The answer is not to protect the privileged few here in Washington from this legislation. The answer is to repeal a law that is fundamentally flawed, is driving up health insurance costs, is impossible to implement efficiently, and is increasingly unfair to the American people."

Unwise and Undeterred | Cato Institute

Unwise and Undeterred | Cato Institute: "The president was naive when he supported the election of Mohammed Morsi as president of Egypt. He assumed that having a democratically elected leader would result in greater freedom for the Egyptian people, while ignoring the fact that many democratically elected leaders have turned into oppressors — such as Adolf Hitler in Germany and Hugo Chavez in Venezuela. Mr. Obama often and unwisely confuses democracy with liberty, seemingly not realizing that the goal is liberty."

"It is hypocritical to argue that we need to attack Mr. Assad for humanitarian reasons, but not Kim Jong-un."

"If Syrian government officials — other than diplomats — were notified they were liable for arrest by the non-allies of Mr. Assad anytime they left Syria, it would exert pressure for a change in behavior."

Federal wildlife officials plan to crush more than 6 tons of seized ivory in Denver next month | Fox News

Federal wildlife officials plan to crush more than 6 tons of seized ivory in Denver next month | Fox News: "The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said publicly crushing the expensive smuggled tusks and carvings is part of an effort to put an end to what has become a $10 billion illegal industry."

How does reducing supply help?!? It will just drive up the price and therefore the risks that smugglers and poachers will take!

The Post Office Is Broke: It's Time to End Washington's Postal Monopoly | Cato Institute

The Post Office Is Broke: It's Time to End Washington's Postal Monopoly | Cato Institute: "The system reflects the typical government attitude: customers are to be captured by coercive laws, not attracted by innovative goods and services."

"USPS is exempt from taxes, regulations, and even parking tickets."

"complain that the post office is forced to prefund its employees’ retirement. Although the practice is common in the commercial world"

Where Are Protests against Murders of Christians? | Cato Institute

Where Are Protests against Murders of Christians? | Cato Institute: "“For the first time in 1,600 years, they didn’t pray this past Sunday at the Virgin Mary and Anba Abraam monastery in a village in southern Egypt.

“Islamists firebombed and looted the monastery, which dates back to the fifth century. For good measure, they destroyed a church inside. They then announced that they would be converting the monastery into a mosque”"

Another Failed Gun Control Experiment | Cato Institute

Another Failed Gun Control Experiment | Cato Institute: "…why didn’t the gun-control lobby warn legislators in 1998 that adopting the toughest gun law in America would do Massachusetts no good unless every surrounding state did the same thing? Far from explaining why the new law would do nothing to curb violent crime, they were positive it would make Massachusetts even safer. …But crime in Massachusetts didn’t just continue, it began climbing. As in the rest of the country, violent crime had been declining in Massachusetts since the early 1990s. Beginning in 1998, that decline reversed — unlike in the rest of the country. …Guns-across-borders might have explained homicide levels in Massachusetts continuing unchanged. But how can other states’ policies be responsible for an increase in Massachusetts homicides? Relative to the rest of the country, or to just the states on its borders, Massachusetts since 1998 has become a more dangerous state. "

Marijuana, Sex and Amsterdam | Cato Institute

Marijuana, Sex and Amsterdam | Cato Institute: "In 2009, the past year marijuana use rate was 11.3 percent in the United States but only 7.0 percent in the Netherlands. This does not prove that legalization lowers drug use; many other factors are at play. But these data hardly support the claim that prohibition has a material impact in reducing use."

Voting Rights Ruling not a Step Back | Cato Institute

Voting Rights Ruling not a Step Back | Cato Institute: "The only difference from the Section 5 regime is that the government will now actually have to prove the existence of systemic discrimination. If Holder can meet that standard, it will undermine the administration’s claim that the Supreme Court made it impossible to enforce voting rights. If he can’t, isn’t that a good thing?"

Fannie & Freddie vs. Wall Street? That's Wishful Spin | Cato Institute

Fannie & Freddie vs. Wall Street? That's Wishful Spin | Cato Institute: "If you combined the required capital for both Fannie Mae and Bank A, the financial system is still holding less than half as much capital than if mortgages were held whole on bank balance sheets.

Had all single-family mortgages been held whole on bank balance sheets in 2006, our financial system would have held over $210 billion in additional capital, not far off from the $205 billion obligated under TARP’s bank capital purchase program.

The primary function of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac has long been to allow banks an avenue for transferring the credit risk of their mortgages to the taxpayer."

Welfare for the Non-Poor | Cato Institute

Welfare for the Non-Poor | Cato Institute: "In 1965, transfer payments from the federal government were equivalent to less than 10 percent of all wages and salaries paid in the United States. As recently as 2000, that figure was just 21 percent. Today, transfer payments are equivalent to almost 35 percent of all salaries and wages. And these payments are not going just to the poor. In 1979, for example, more than 54 percent of federal transfer payments went to the poorest 20 percent of Americans. Today, less than 40 percent does.

And, if one includes payments to government contractors and salaries of federal employees, roughly 97 million Americans — 31 percent of the population — receive more than half their income from the government."

"the federal government spent almost $100 billion on corporate welfare last year"

"many of the loudest critics of welfare for the poor are the quickest to object when future Medicare cuts are discussed"

Coase and Immigration | Cato Institute

Coase and Immigration | Cato Institute: "The government is unable to determine an efficient tax rate to internalize the costs of production. Government agents have their own motivations and incentives that do not coincide with creating efficient Pigouvian Tax rates. Politicians want to get elected, which means they could support tax rates based on their constituent’s desires. Those constituents will have complex incentives that have little to do with finding a tax level that minimizes the costs of pollutions to an efficient level. Some bureaucrats will want higher taxes to extend their revenue while others will think it weakens their control if taxes replace command and control regulations. If a tax is imposed on carbon dioxide and it turns out to be based on a faulty understanding of the science of climate change, the government will not surrender a large source of revenue."

"Immigration from 1990 to 2006, at worst, decreased wages for a quarter of Americans by around 3 percent but raised them by over 1 percent for 75 percent of Americans."

"language assimilation proceeds very rapidly in the U.S., driven by the roughly 20 percent increase in wages that immigrants can expect from learning English"

What Should You Do if You're Threatened by a Mass Murderer? | Cato Institute

What Should You Do if You're Threatened by a Mass Murderer? | Cato Institute: “Of the pre-Columbine rapid mass murders,” he explained, “the average killing time was 11 minutes, (ranging from 2 examples of 4 minutes, to one example of 20 minutes). Among the known times of post-Columbine rapid mass murders, the average time was down to 8 minutes. Now the average killing time is only about 6 minutes.”

"The odds are that an officer won’t be able to stop much if any killing."

"Ron Borsch, with three decades of police experience, has reported many important findings about rapid mass murders. For instance:

Although the overall murder rate declined by about 50 percent since 1980, the annual number of rapid mass murders has nearly quadrupled since Columbine.
A rapid mass murderer’s apparent aim is to kill as many people as possible in a short period of time. Such killers are rarely interested in negotiation.
These killers tend to be cowards, because they generally favor gun-free zones where few, if any people, are likely to resist their attacks with force.
 Most common targets: 41 percent of rapid mass murder attempts occur at educational facilities — 31 percent at K-12 schools, 10 percent at colleges and universities, so killers prefer facing little children rather than big guys.
By comparison, 7 percent of rapid mass murder attempts occur at offices, 6 percent at churches, 5 percent at eating places, 5 percent at malls, 4 percent at factories, 4 percent at government offices, 3 percent at hospitals, 2 percent at grocery stores, 2 percent at post offices and 1 percent at bars and night clubs.
62 percent of rapid mass murder attempts are stopped by civilians on-site– not police based off-site.
76 percent of successful civilian attempts to stop rapid mass murder are initiated by one individual.
About two-thirds of civilians who stop a rapid mass murder attempt are unarmed.
38 percent of rapid mass murder attempts are stopped by police.
73 percent of successful police attempts to stop rapid mass murder are initiated by one individual."

"Governments can’t even keep illegal guns out of jails and prisons where government has more direct control over people than anywhere else."

"Survivors are most likely to be those who take initiative, try to protect themselves and fight if necessary."

Big Business, War, and Rothbard’s Class Analysis - Justin Raimondo - Mises Daily

Big Business, War, and Rothbard’s Class Analysis - Justin Raimondo - Mises Daily: "the biggest capitalists have been the deadliest enemies of true capitalism. For virtually all of the alleged social “reforms” of the past fifty years were pushed not only by “idealistic” Leftists, but by the very corporate combines caricatured as the top-hatted, pot-bellied “economic royalists” of Wall Street."

What Ruined Obama's Credibility? Obamacare | Cato Institute

What Ruined Obama's Credibility? Obamacare | Cato Institute: " 15,000 husbands and wives of UPS workers who are being kicked off their spouse’s policy"

"The University of Virginia also announced that it was dropping spousal coverage for those with access to other insurance. (And even after that measure, Obamacare will be adding $7.3 million to its health-care costs next year.)"

"According to the benefits consulting firm Towers Watson, 12 percent of employer plans will not include spousal coverage next year, three times as many as in 2013."

"Universal Studios recently announced that it was dropping coverage for some part-time workers. Similarly, Wegman’s Supermarkets has eliminated its health-insurance plan for part-time employees.

Meanwhile, in New Jersey at least 106,000 people currently insured under what are known as “basic and essential” health-care plans will likely lose their coverage because those inexpensive plans don’t meet Obamacare’s mandates."

"This has caused Joseph Hansen, president of the 1.2-million-member United Food and Commercial Workers, to warn that Obamacare will “destroy the foundation of the 40-hour work week that is the backbone of the middle class.” "

The Three Types of Austerity - Frank Hollenbeck - Mises Daily

The Three Types of Austerity - Frank Hollenbeck - Mises Daily: "Of course, “planned” cuts are not actual cuts. Four years after the crash of 2008, the UK government had only implemented 6 percent of planned cuts in spending and only 12 percent of planned cuts in benefits. In almost all European countries, government spending is higher today than it was in 2008. A new study by Constantin Gurdgiev of Trinity College in Dublin examined government spending as a percentage of GDP in 2012 compared with the average level of pre-recession spending (2003–2007). Only Germany, Malta, and Sweden had actually cut spending."

"A more recent example of similar tactics is Latvia which followed a similar strategy in 2009-2010. It cut government spending from 44 percent of GDP to 36 percent. It fired 30 percent of the civil servants, closed half the state agencies, and reduced the average public salary by 26 percent in one year. Government ministers took personal wage cuts of 35 percent, although pensions and social benefits were barely reduced and the flat tax on personal income was left untouched at 25 percent.

The Latvian economy dropped 24 percent in two years, but rebounded sharply in 2011 and 2012 with yearly real growth of over 5 percent. Unemployment hit 20.7 percent in 2010, but has steadily declined to a little over 12 percent today. Because the cuts prompted deregulation, Latvia enjoyed a boom in the creation of new enterprises in 2011. It was able to transition from a bloated construction sector to a vibrant economy of many small- and medium-sized enterprises.

Latvia borrowed heavily from the IMF, and was criticized in 2009 for its overly aggressive economic strategy. Latvia recently repaid its loan to the IMF three years early, indirectly silencing its critics."

How Mischievous Obama Administration Officials Scuttled an Important Supreme Court Case | Cato Institute

How Mischievous Obama Administration Officials Scuttled an Important Supreme Court Case | Cato Institute: "A deal was struck where the city would drop their Supreme Court appeal in exchange for the federal government not supporting the lawsuit against the city.

That, at least, was the finding of a report from the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform."

Should America Enter Syria's Hell? | Cato Institute

Should America Enter Syria's Hell? | Cato Institute: "Civil wars are particularly resistant to outside solution. The antagonisms run deep and there often are multiple parties, none of whom may want peace."

How the State Destroys Social Cooperation - Gary Galles - Mises Daily

How the State Destroys Social Cooperation - Gary Galles - Mises Daily: "when government mandates employer-provided “free” benefits, employers then reduce other parts of compensation that many workers may actually value more than the mandated benefits, to “pay” for them. Or employers may simply hire fewer workers."

Massad Ayoob » Blog Archive » ZIMMERMAN VERDICT PART 17: THE COPS

Massad Ayoob » Blog Archive » ZIMMERMAN VERDICT PART 17: THE COPS: "The next time some tells says “Never talk to the police, they’re your enemy,” remember each and every one of those honest members of the criminal justice system who stood up, told the truth, and did their duty.  The next time someone tells  you that the police are the mindless minions of the Gestapo/Leviathan/The Zionist Occupation Government/The Man (pick one as suits the given agenda), remember the ones who were severely and unmeritoriously punished for having fulfilled their oath and hewed to the truth.  And remember the role they all played in getting that truth across to the jury, and helping to acquit an innocent man who, by every objective analysis of the evidence, was wrongly accused."

Who's a victim? More law enforcers treating homegrown prostitution as human sex trafficking | Fox News

Who's a victim? More law enforcers treating homegrown prostitution as human sex trafficking | Fox News: "more lawmakers, police and prosecutors across the country are starting to shift their view on this, too. Increasingly, they are focusing on arresting traffickers and customers (pimps and johns, as it were) and on getting help for prostitutes."

Microsoft, Google to sue over FISA gag order | Politics and Law - CNET News

Microsoft, Google to sue over FISA gag order | Politics and Law - CNET News: "Stonewalling by the Department of Justice has led Google and Microsoft to decide to file a lawsuit so that they can publicly discuss Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court-approved surveillance orders."

Microsoft and Google working together for a good cause!

Mom of peanut allergy victim: Her last words were 'I'm sorry' | Sacramento News - KCRA Home

Mom of peanut allergy victim: Her last words were 'I'm sorry' | Sacramento News - KCRA Home: " "We had denied our daughter birthday treats in the classrooms. We read every food label looking for peanuts. This is not helicopter parenting. This was us trying to keep our children alive," Joanne Giorgi said."

Why Wal-Mart Will Never Pay Like Costco - Bloomberg

Why Wal-Mart Will Never Pay Like Costco - Bloomberg: "Costco really is a store where affluent, high-socioeconomic status households occasionally buy huge quantities of goods on the cheap: That’s Costco's business strategy (which is why its stores are pretty much found in affluent near-in suburbs). Wal-Mart, however, is mostly a store where low-income people do their everyday shopping."

Glenn Jacobs: Defunding ObamaCare is serious business - Campaign for Liberty

Glenn Jacobs: Defunding ObamaCare is serious business - Campaign for Liberty: "Unlike our personal dealings, in which compromise usually means both sides get something positive out of the deal, political compromises often benefit politicians at the expense of the rest of us. Whatever political favors the Democratic and Republican establishments get out of Obamacare will leave a majority of middle-class Americans holding the bag."

The NSA and Its “Compliance Problems” - Ben O'Neill - Mises Daily

The NSA and Its “Compliance Problems” - Ben O'Neill - Mises Daily: "For ordinary citizens, “compliance problems” with the law are better known as “crimes” (or possibly civil wrongs) and these lead to judgment debts, fines, and possibly even jail time, depending on the severity of the lack-of-compliance. But for government officials such notions are irrelevant — legal compliance problems are just something you file a report about, and send to another bureaucrat higher up in the government chain, so that he can bury it on his desk."

"[The NSA] has claimed that it may collect any and all information it wishes without any warrant or restriction, and that this does not constitute real “collection” of data unless the database is later queried. In other words, collection of data is not really collection of data, so long as the data sits idle and is not accessed. It has then claimed that querying of its databases is only ever done under warrant and only under circumstances where there are specific facts to yield a reasonable suspicion of terrorist activity."

"The agency then operates above the law, in the sense that its agents are pre-emptively acquitted of lawbreaking, on the grounds that some degree of non-compliance with the law is expected."