Obviously you’ve never been aboard a USN nuclear powered submarine. :42:
The only decent parts of our governments are the ones that are actually authorized under the Constitution. The Military is Constitutional. Obviously I don’t agree with all the wars and the amount of funds that go to the Military, but I feel that the Military is the only part of the government that strives to have quality people in it. Generally the people that go into the military, do so because they hgave a deep love and commitment to this country. I can refuse to support the wars, but I will never refuse to show honor to the men and women that are in the military.
The Bureaucrats on the other hand… To hell with them.
I just stumbled across this quote from Thomas Jefferson that I thought is relevant today.
It was a message to John Marshall after the Marbury vs Madison case
“You seem to consider the judges as the ultimate arbiters of all constitutional questions; a very dangerous doctrine indeed, and one which would place us under the despotism of an oligarchy. Our judges are as honest as other men, and not more so. They have, with others, the same passions for party, for power, and the privilege of their corps… Their power [is] the more dangerous as they are in office for life, and not responsible, as the other functionaries are, to the elective control. The Constitution has erected no such single tribunal, knowing that to whatever hands confided, with the corruptions of time and party, its members”
I wonder what Thomas would say today.
One of my favorite writers has put his finger on the root of all evil. Lovely article, well researched as always, and extremely accurate at pointing out the ball and chain around our public fund’s neck.
Unfortunately, it’s not a surprise to see how banks manipulate the whole financial system. I’m not really politically active but such articles make me show my sympathy to ‘Occupy’ movement.
Sorry to interrupt the discussion of banks, but…
…there was some dramatic news over the weekend regarding the incomprehensible Roberts Supreme Court decision.
So, let me insert it here, and then we can return to the banks, and “Too Big to Fail”.
CBS Legal Correspondent Jan Crawford has broken a story suggesting that, sometime between March and June, Chief Justice John Roberts caved in to outside pressures, and changed his position and his vote on ObamaCare — from “unconstitutional” to “constitutional”.
Crawford is alone in reporting this story, and her sources are two unnamed persons inside the Supreme Court.
The information allegedly revealed by these sources is supposed to be highly confidential. And, in fact, leaks of this sort from the Supreme Court are extraordinarily rare.
Adding to the intrigue, CBS News is notorious, along with the rest of the mainstream media, for being “in the tank” for Obama. So, can we believe anything coming out of CBS News?
It would appear that confirming the Crawford story is next to impossible. So, what to make of it? Judge for yourself.
Here is the Jan Crawford story from the CBS [I]Face the Nation[/I] website —
Ann Coulter on Obama, Holder, and Fast-and-Furious
Ann Coulter - June 27, 2012 - THE BIGGEST SCANDAL IN U.S. HISTORY
•o•o•
[I]I have news for Obama — Gun Control means Hitting What You Aim At.[/I]
A complete roster of the “unemployed” in this country includes:
• workers who are currently drawing unemployment benefits from the government (which implies that they are actively seeking full-time employment, because that search is one of the conditions for qualifying for benefits)
• so-called “short-term discouraged” workers, who may or may not have exhausted their unemployment benefits, and currently are not actively looking for full-time employment
• those forced to work part-time jobs, because they cannot find full-time employment
• so-called “long-term discouraged” workers, who have exhausted their unemployment benefits, and have given up looking for employment
If the government totaled up all the people in these 4 categories, and reported the resulting Total Unemployment Rate, the anger and dissatisfaction this would inspire in the general population would constitute a major threat to the government. So, they fudge the numbers, by simply ignoring some the unemployed.
Their first trick was to eliminate “long-term discouraged” workers from the government statistics, on the theory that they have fallen completely through the cracks. They’ve been unemployed for so long that they possibly never will find employment again. So, from now on, as far as the government is concerned, they just don’t exist. The resulting fudged unemployment numbers looked better; so, for a long time, the government reported those fudged numbers.
When even the fudged unemployment numbers started to look bad, month after month, the government decided to use another trick: eliminate from the tally “short-term discouraged” workers, and those forced to work part-time jobs (because they can’t find full-time jobs).
This totally fake unemployment number is the number currently reported as the “official” unemployment rate. It’s the number released in the infamous Non-Farm Payroll Report. Markets become partially paralyzed, waiting for the fake number to be released. And then, in some markets, traders piss all over themselves when they actually see the fake number. The government calls this fake number the U3 Unemployment Figure.
[B]Today’s “official” (U3) fake number was 8.4%, “seasonally adjusted” to 8.2%.[/B]
They still tally and report the previous fake number, which they call the U6 Unemployment Figure. But, they don’t want you to pay attention to it, because that number is pretty scary.
[B]Today’s U6 number was 15.1%, “seasonally adjusted” to 14.9%.[/B]
As for a true measure of unemployment in this country — the Total Unemployment Rate — the government pretends it doesn’t exist, never did, and never will.
[B]Dr. John Williams calculates the true number to be 22.6%.[/B]
He calls this number the “SGS - Alternate Unemployment Rate”. (SGS stands for Shadow Government Statistics.)
Here’s how the government’s two fake numbers (U3 and U6), and the Total Unemployment Rate (the Williams SGS - Alternate Unemployment Rate) compare, when plotted together on one chart:
I have no doubt these figures you present are correct Clint.
My question to you is: were these figures substantially different under the Bush administration? I imagine this is more a general societal problem than something to be pinned at Obama or the Democrats?
You are absolutely correct, Magnus.
This chart illustrates manipulation of public perception by the Ruling Class, not specifically by the Obama Regime.
In fact, you could draw vertical lines on the chart, dividing it into three time periods:
1994 - 2001 — most of Clinton’s two terms (which actually began in January 1993)
2001 - 2009 — all of G.W. Bush’s two terms (which began in January 2001), and
2009 - present — 3½ years of Obama’s term (which began in January 2009)
The three measures of unemployment run in nearly parallel fashion over the first 2/3 of the chart (through the end of 2007). Then, the financial crisis hits full force in 2008, and the three lines turn sharply upward — still parallel, kinda.
But then, look at the divergence beginning about August or September of 2009, when the government’s fake numbers started to turn down, while the real number continued upward. Can we all say [B]ma•ni•pu•la•ted[/B]?
The frightening upturn (in all three measures) beginning in 2008 was not [I]caused[/I] by Obama, but it is dramatic evidence of his [I]failure to deal with an inherited problem.[/I]
This is the sort of crap that we’re up against:
“If you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that —
somebody else made that happen.”
Obama, speaking Friday, July 13,
at a campaign event in Roanoke, Va.
America, we need to get rid of this foreign-born, dog-eating socialist.
Replies to Obama’s “you didn’t build that” statement
[B]BARACK OBAMA:[/B] “If you’ve got a business — you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen.”
[B]JACK GILCHRIST:[/B] “My father’s hands didn’t build this company? My hands didn’t build this company? My son’s hands aren’t building this company? Did somebody else take out the loan on my father’s house to finance the equipment? Did somebody else make payroll every week or figure out where it’s coming from? President Obama, you’re killing us out here. Through hard work and a little bit of luck, we built this business. Why are you demonizing us for it? We are the solution, not the problem. It’s time we had somebody who believes in us, someone who believes that achievement should be rewarded, not punished. We need somebody who believes in America.”
[B]MITT ROMNEY:[/B] “The idea to say that Steve Jobs didn’t build Apple, that Henry Ford didn’t build Ford Motor, that Papa John didn’t build Papa John Pizza, that Ray Kroc didn’t build McDonald’s, that Bill Gates didn’t build Microsoft … to say something like that is not just foolishness, it is insulting to every entrepreneur, every innovator in America and it’s wrong.
President Obama attacks success and therefore under President Obama we have less success and I will change that.”
That is an appalling quote from Obama, and surely amazingly self-defeating, especially in an election year. Whatever his politics, I never thought of him as a stupid man, yet to give his opponents ammunition like that is amazing. Quite apart from his statement being entirely wrong, it’s surely one of the biggest election year own-goals in recent memory? It’s almost as though he doesn’t want to win, if he’s going to come out with indefensible, demotivational garbage like that.
I’ve never bought those calling Obama a socialist, but this quote has got me wondering. Maybe it’s taken out of context though, if not I agree it’s incredibly self-defeating.
I agree with you, and context can obviously change perception and meaning, used either deliberately or just through coincidental interpretation. So I went on YouTube, I don’t know if I can post a link on here, but I just googled the quote, followed the links, and got to a 35 second YouTube clip that shows the buildup to the quip.
I have to say it doesn’t look good for Obama. He starts out making the point, effectively, that no man is an island, that each individual’s achievements have received contributions from others, such as the teachers etc with whom we have interacted in the past. I can see what he is saying, trying to make the same ‘big society’ point that our own current Government made during the last election campaign. However, he then goes on to state, quite baldly, that ‘if you have a business, you didn’t build that’. Now maybe he got caught up in the moment, maybe he deviated from the brief/prepared speech, whatever, but I have to say that I was pretty shocked at it, as frankly it does seem to tally with the majority of the news coverage.
However much I agreed with the sentiment behind some of his buildup, that most of us (although he says all, which I disagree with) have benefitted from teachers, parents etc, that those people have contributed to our makeup and, therefore, have contributed to our preparedness to achieve whatever we have in life, I passionately disagree with his statement - and he presents it as bluntly as it sounds - that if you have a business then you did not build it, somebody else made that happen. That is nonsense, and pretty offensive to the many people who have built something from nothing, who have done their bit to provide for their families, communities etc. Particularly in the current climate, where such things are much tougher than one might hope.
I have just read the autobiography of one of our own entrepreneurs, Alan (now Lord) Sugar, who went from being a kid in a working class part of London in a state-owned apartment to being a billionaire running his own multinational, and if anything he stuck to his guns in the face of a lot of people - not least his own father - telling him that he [I]couldn’t [/I]build it.
So having researched the ‘context’ angle that you so rightly raised - and I did look at more than just the one clip! - I have to say that in my opinion this is the electoral own goal that it first appeared, and pretty demoralizing for anyone in the US who is struggling with the current climate and trying to keep forging ahead.
Sorry to ramble on, he just p*ssed me off!
ST
Perhaps, what he should have said, was that the business you built was made possible by the society around you. I watched the youtube vids now as well and I think you’re right - he tries to make a case for ‘big society’ but it comes out all wrong. He’s not at all the great speaker I’ve seen before in this clip.
His speech gives a sour taste of ‘the nail that sticks up gets hammered back down’ to me, which seems very un-American thinking to me. In Sweden nobody would have raised an eye-brow over this, but the more I speak to Brits and Americans, the more I find myself adopting a more American view of things.
Lol I know what you mean - In my previous career, I worked in various parts of the world, including a few periods of time in Stockholm, and I think we Brits and Americans tend to take these things a little more seriously than many. Which makes it all the more amazing that our politicians keep coming out with stuff like this!
Well if it means anything I happen to have to drive by the convention center where Obama gave a speech here in jacksonville yesterday. Although I can not say I regret missing the speech as I had better things to do like go home and play with the kids but I couldnt help but notice there was not very many Obama signs.
That has to be a little disheartening when you are the president and your opponent didnt even show up and still had more signs than you did
Questions from an outsider 
Bailing out Banks is State Socialism?
Bailing out auto companies is State Socialism?
Bailing out Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac is State Socialism?
Bailing out AIG is State Socialism?
Obamacare is State Socialism?
FoodStamps are State Socialism?
I remember the time when I used to look up to US citizens because their entrepreneurship and minimal dependence on the government…
P.S. I am not trying to be confrontational