Florida - 2nd Among the 50 States in Job Growth

Where does Illinois rank? Florida is a Right-toWork state.

Hmmm.

Benghazi Killings Were Found to be Avoidable

Commissions were formed, millions were spent to find these Obama Administration killings to be avoidable. So sad. Millions of us thinking people knew that within the first few hours. Now that the killings were found by commissions to have been avoidable, what will our fearless leader do?

Guess what? He will sit on his thumb as ususal.

Corey Knowlton's Rhino Hunt

Corey, if you need another bodyguard, I'm available. I've always know that there are a lot of nuts running loose all over the world. Concealed carry nationwide can't come too soon for all who qualify. And those qualifications must be reasonable.

Putin,You Really Didn't Make This Factual Statement, Did You???

 

Forwarded to me by a friend.  Merle 

"Negotiating with Obama is like playing chess with a pigeon. The pigeon knocks over all the pieces, shits on the board and then struts around like it won the game." …

 

Vladimir Putin-2013

The Old America is Gone or Leaving Fast

 

True Conservatives will read this and weep. Yet there is much we can do before any next election. Get out the vote of common sense people though it appears we have less of those every year as so many ultra-liberal colleges turn out ultra-liberal graduates.

 

Merle

 

A very well written and reasoned piece—and I am afraid prophetic  and probably will come true.

 

 

 

This is excellent, but is a sad place to be. Please Read to the end. We Are Not Coming Back Please take a moment to digest this provocative article by a Jewish Rabbifrom Teaneck , N.J.  It is far and away the most succinct and thoughtful explanation of how our nation is changing. The article appeared in The Israel National News, and is directed to Jewish readership. 70% of American Jews vote as Democrats. The Rabbi has some interesting comments in that regard. Rabbi Steven Pruzansky is the spiritual leader of Congregation Bnai Yeshurun in Teaneck, New Jersey ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "The most charitable way of explaining the election results of 2012 is that Americans voted for the status quo - for the incumbent President and for a divided Congress. They must enjoy gridlock, partisanship, incompetence, economic stagnation and avoidance of responsibility. And fewer people voted. But as we awake from the nightmare, it is important to eschew the facile explanations for the Romney defeat that will prevail among the chattering classes. Romney did not lose because of the effects of Hurricane Sandy that devastated this area, nor did he lose because he ran a poor campaign, nor did he lose because the Republicans could have chosen better candidates, nor did he lose because Obama benefited from a slight uptick in the economy due to the business cycle. Romney lost because he didn't get enough votes to win. That might seem obvious, but not for the obvious reasons. Romney lost because the conservative virtues - the traditional American virtues – of  liberty, hard work, free enterprise, private initiative and aspirations to moral greatness - no longer inspire or animate a majority of the electorate. The simplest reason why Romney lost was because it is impossible to compete against free stuff. Every businessman knows this; that is why the "loss leader" or the giveaway is such a powerful marketing tool. Obama's America is one in which free stuff is given away: the adults among the47,000,000 on food stamps clearly recognized for whom they should vote, and so they did, by the tens of millions; those who - courtesy of Obama - receive two full years of unemployment benefits (which, of course, both disincentivizes looking for work and also motivates people to work off the books while collecting their windfall) surely know for whom to vote. The lure of free stuff is irresistible. The defining moment of the whole campaign was the revelation of the secretly-recorded video in which Romney acknowledged the difficulty of winning an election in which "47% of the people" start off against him because they pay no taxes and just receive money - "free stuff" - from the government. Almost half of the population has no skin in the game - they don't care about high taxes, promoting business, or creating jobs, nor do they care that the money for their free stuff is being borrowed from their children and from the Chinese. They just want the free stuff that comes their way at someone else's expense. In the end, that 47% leaves very little margin for error for any Republican, and does not bode well for the future. It is impossible to imagine a conservative candidate winning against such overwhelming odds. People do vote their pocketbooks. In essence, the people vote for a Congress who will not raise their taxes, and for a President who will give them free stuff, never mind who has to pay for it. That engenders the second reason why Romney lost: the inescapable conclusion that the electorate is ignorant and uninformed. Indeed, it does not pay to be an informed voter, because most other voters - the clear majority – are unintelligent and easily swayed by emotion and raw populism. That is the indelicate way of saying that too many people vote with their hearts and not their heads. That is why Obama did not have to produce a second term agenda, or even defend his first-term record. He needed only to portray Mitt Romney as a rapacious capitalist who throws elderly women over a cliff, when he is not just snatching away their cancer medication, while starving the poor and cutting taxes for the rich. During his 1956 presidential campaign, a woman called out to Adlai Stevenson: "Senator, you have the vote of every thinking person!" Stevenson called back: "That's not enough, madam, we need a majority!" Truer words were never spoken. Obama could get away with saying that "Romney wants the rich to play by a different set of rules" - without ever defining what those different rules were; with saying that the "rich should pay their fair share" - without ever defining what a "fair share" is; with saying that Romney wants the poor, elderly and sick to "fend for themselves" - without even acknowledging that all these government programs are going bankrupt, their current insolvency only papered over by deficit spending. Similarly, Obama (or his surrogates) could hint to blacks that a Romney victory would lead them back into chains and proclaim to women that their abortions and birth control would be taken away. He could appeal to Hispanics that Romney would have them all arrested and shipped to Mexico and unabashedly state that he will not enforce the current immigration laws. He could espouse the furtherance of the incestuous relationship between governments and unions - in which politicians ply the unions with public money, in exchange for which the unions provide the politicians with votes, in exchange for which the politicians provide more money and the unions provide more votes, etc., even though the money is gone. Obama also knows that the electorate has changed -that whites will soon be a minority in America(they're already a minority in California) and that the new immigrants to the US are primarily from the Third World and do not share the traditional American values that attracted immigrants in the 19th and 20th centuries. It is a different world, and a different America . Obama is part of that different America , knows it, and knows how to tap into it. That is why he won. Obama also proved again that negative advertising works, invective sells, and harsh personal attacks succeed. That Romney never engaged in such diatribes points to his essential goodness as a person; his "negative ads" were simple facts, never personal abuse - facts about high unemployment, lower take-home pay, a loss of American power and prestige abroad, a lack of leadership, etc. As a politician, though, Romney failed because he did not embrace the devil's bargain of making unsustainable promises. It turned out that it was not possible for Romney and Ryan - people of substance, depth and ideas - to compete with the shallow populism and platitudes of their opponents. Obama mastered the politics of envy – of class warfare - never reaching out to Americans as such but to individual groups, and cobbling together a winning majority from these minority groups. If an Obama could not be defeated - with his record and his vision of America , in which free stuff seduces voters - it is hard to envision any change in the future. The road to Hillary Clinton in 2016 and to a European-socialist economy - those very economies that are collapsing today in Europe - is paved. For Jews, mostly assimilated anyway and staunch Democrats, the results demonstrate again that liberalism is their Torah. Almost 70% voted for a president widely perceived by Israelis and most committed Jews as hostile to Israel . They voted to secure Obama's future at America 's expense and at Israel 's expense - in effect, preferring Obama to Netanyahu by a wide margin. A dangerous time is ahead. Under present circumstances, it is inconceivable that the US will take any aggressive action against Iran and will more likely thwart any Israeli initiative. The US will preach the importance of negotiations up until the production of the first Iranian nuclear weapon - and then state that the world must learn to live with this new reality. But this election should be a wake-up call to Jews. There is no permanent empire, nor is there an enduring haven for Jews anywhere in the exile. The American empire began to decline in 2007, and the deterioration has been exacerbated in the last five years. This election only hastens that decline. Society is permeated with sloth, greed, envy and materialistic excess. It has lost its moorings and its moral foundations.. The takers outnumber the givers, and that will only increase in years to come. The "Occupy" riots across this country in the last two years were mere dress rehearsals for what lies ahead - years of unrest sparked by the increasing discontent of the unsuccessful who want to seize the fruits and the bounty of the successful, and do not appreciate the slow pace of redistribution. If this election proves one thing, it is that the Old America is gone. And, sad for the world, it is not coming back." -- The problems we face today are there because the people who work for a living are outnumbered by those who vote for a living.

Belligerent Unions and Lack of Leaderswhip On Almost All Levels of Black:Leadership

This is a correct statement and the facts are there for anyone to see, hear or read and for anyone with a fair thinking mind.. Over the years, I have posted dozens of blogs on this subject that you should be able to find on my search bar in the top left hand corner of all blogs or if it doesn't appear, then on my most recent blogs. If you can't find, email me and I will guide you. I have visited dozens of schools, served on various boards in Peoria's poverty neighborhoods, read profusely, traveled widely and can see quite well the travesty of the past and current wars of poverty.

The failure of Johnson's war on poverty was intended to succeed with good black ans white  leadership. It didn't get the right leadership and it has been a miserable failure. The belligerent unions speak always about more and more for themselves despite economic conditions. And the belligerent blacks will blame the white people for anything that happens that doesn't line their pockets of build their prestige among those who won't accept learning.

When I owned my business (28) years, I was represented by the Teamsters Union for 22 of those years. The union and I negotiated seven 3 year contracts without a strike or walkout. My successor is still represented by the Teamsters, to my knowledge, and our relationship with this union, to my knowledge, has always been respectable.

There are many reasonable unions and an increasing number of competent black leaders.Then there are leaders who have FINALLY discovered that a lot of poverty is caused by the lack of parenting.

Wow, what a major discovery!!!

Just not enough leadership no matter how many "hi-faluting" degrees they have.

And not enough "right to work" states. Illinois is another miserable example.

So sad.

Illinois Pension "Reform"

Forwarded from the Illlinois Policy Institute. Merle

In December 2013, Gov. Pat Quinn signed a pension “reform” bill with many serious flaws. For example, it: barely makes a dent in the state’s unfunded pension liability; guarantees pension funding at the expense of taxpayers and all other government services; creates a fake 401(k) plan; doesn’t means test cost-of-living adjustments, or COLAs; still allows state workers to retire much earlier than private sector workers; and lets state workers contribute even less toward their own pensions than they do now.
One problem the new law does not have, however, is conflict with the Illinois Constitution’s Pension Clause – despite claims made in three new lawsuits challenging it.
Those lawsuits include Heaton v. Quinn, filed by current and retired participants in the Teachers’ Retirement System in the Cook County Circuit Court; Illinois State Employees Association Retirees v. Board of Trustees of the State Employees’ Retirement System, filed by members of various state pension plans in the Sangamon County Circuit Court; and Retired State Employees Association v. Quinn, filed by members of the State Employees’ Retirement System, also in Sangamon County.
All three suits allege that the law violates the Pension Clause because it makes modest reductions to annual increases in retiree benefits, commonly referred to as COLAs. The Cook County suit also alleges that the law’s increases in retirement age for some workers and its (generous) cap on pensionable salaries violate the Pension Clause.
The lawsuits’ claims don’t have merit. The COLA reduction doesn’t touch the benefits workers have already earned, but only limits increases going forward. COLAs are a way for the Illinois General Assembly to help retirees keep up with changes in the cost of living, which may fluctuate over time; by their nature, they’re not written in stone.
As for the higher retirement age, the Illinois Supreme Court has already held that the Pension Clause allows a change in workers’ retirement age even if it indirectly affects the benefits they will receive. And the pensionable salary cap – which, at more than $110,000 for participants in the Teachers’ Retirement System in 2014, is unlikely to leave anyone destitute – doesn’t violate the Pension Clause because it only affects benefits workers will earn for work done in the future, not benefits they’ve already earned.
Even those who didn’t support the pension “reform” bill should hope the lawsuits challenging it fail. The law Quinn just signed is not meaningful pension reform. If not even this tiny token gesture in the direction of reform can stand, it’s not clear how genuine reform could be upheld later. And if the state can’t enact true pension reform, it will be locked on its current collision course with insolvency and economic disaster, which definitely would not be good for state workers or retirees.
Fortunately, the Illinois Constitution is not on the challengers’ side, and the Illinois Supreme Court – which lately seems to know an unconstitutional law when it sees one – is likely to recognize that.

 

Jacob Huebert
Senior Attorney
Liberty Justice Center
Follow on Twitter

Common Core Put Together By a Lot of "Lack of Common Sense" People With Titles

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When I was honorably discharged from the Armed Services in 1947, I had a chance for a basketball scholarship from Hamilton University in upstate New York. At a weekend party, one of the fraternities, introduced me to a student with an IQ of 181. Later, over some beers, the guys said he was brilliant but lacked common sense. I believe Common Core was put together by the same type of people with "hi-faluting" TITLES.

 

Merle

 

From The Blaze, Friday, November 15, 2013. See http://www.the blaze.com/stories/2013/11/15/this-could-be-one-of-the-best-cases-ever-made-against-common-core-no-one-expected-it-to-come-from-a-high-school-student/

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EDUCATION

THIS COULD BE ONE OF THE BEST CASES EVER MADE AGAINST COMMON CORE - NO ONE EXPECTED IT TO COME FROM A HIGH SCHOOL STUDENT

By Jason Howerton

               

Speaking at a local school board meeting earlier this month, a Tennessee high school senior issued a brief and incredibly insightful address on the problems with Common Core standards.

Ethan Young, a student at Farragut High School in Knox County, Tenn., made his case as to why he believes the school district should drop the new national education standards, a set of guidelines that were never voted on by Congress, the Department of Education nor by local or state governments.

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SIDEBAR: (Related: Parents Fed-Up With Failing Grades Under Common Core Take Matters Into Their Own Hands) [SEE http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/11/15/fed-up-with-their-kids-failing-math-grades-under-common-core-these-parents-took-matters-into-their-own-hands/ ]

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"The president essentially bribed states into implementation via 'Race to the Top,' offering $4.35 billion taxpayer dollars to participating states, $500 million of which went to Tennessee," Young said. "And much like No Child Left Behind, the program promises national testing and a one-size-fits-all education, because hey, it worked so well the first time."

"If nothing else, these standards are a glowing conflict of interest and they lack the research they allegedly received," he added.

Young also argued that Common Core standards display a "mistrust of teachers," a line that prompted applause from the audience.

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SIDEBAR YOU TUBE:

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"I stand before you because I care about education, but also because I want to support my teachers," he said. "And just as they fought for my academic achievement, so I want to fight for their ability to teach. This relationship is at the heart of instruction, yet there will never be a system by which it is accurately measured."

The high school senior went on to argue that "standards-based education is ruining the way we teach and learn." He also revealed that legislators and administrators have told him "that's just the way things work."

Now, he's daring to ask: "Why?"

"I'm gonna answer that question: Bureaucratic convenience," he added. "It works with nuclear reactors, it works with business models, why can't it work with students? I mean how convenient, calculating exactly who knows what and who needs what. I mean, why don't we just manufacture robots instead of students? They last longer and they always do what they're told."

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SIDEBAR: "Somewhere our Founding Fathers are turning in their graves."

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The problem is, the extremely bright student continued, "education is unlike every other bureaucratic institute in our government" because the "task of teaching is never quantifiable."

"If everything I learn in high school is a measurable objective, I have not learned anything," Young proclaimed. "I'd like to repeat that. If everything I learn in high school is a measurable objective, I have not learned anything."

Government bureaucrats will never be able to measure "creativity, appreciation, inquisitiveness" but they are the "purpose of education," he lectured.

"Somewhere our Founding Fathers are turning in their graves - pleading, screaming and trying to say to us that we teach to free minds. We teach to inspire. We teach to equip, the careers will come naturally."

Watch Young's entire inspiring, must-see speech below:

GO TO:  http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/11/15/this-could-be-one-of-the-best-cases-ever-made-against-common-core-no-one-expected-it-to-come-from-a-high-school-student/

and scroll to bottom.

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--

Jerry P. Becker
Dept. of Curriculum & Instruction
Southern Illinois University
625 Wham Drive
Mail Code 4610

Carbondale, IL  62901-4610
Phone:  (618) 453-4241  [O]
            (618) 457-8903  [H]
Fax:      (618) 453-4244
E-mail:   jbecker@siu.edu

NCAAP And Belligerent Unions Are Helping Obama Kill Our Country

Governor LePage, if you said all these things, you are a man I would vote, Republican or Democrat Under any circumstance.  Merle

 

I wish this man would run for president, and we could vote him in to office!

 

Meet Maine 's New Governor--- In case you haven't heard about this guy before, his name will stick in your mind, Paul R. LePage! 
The new Maine Governor, is making New Jersey 's Chris Christie look timid. He isn't afraid to say what he thinks. Judging by the comments, every time he opens his mouth, his popularity goes up.

He brought down the house at his inauguration when he shook his fist toward the media box and said, "You're on notice! I've inherited a financially troubled State to run. Observe...cover what we do...but don't whine if I don't waste time responding to your every whim just for your amusement."

During his campaign for Governor, he was talking to commercial fishermen who are struggling because of federal fisheries rules. They complained that Obama brought his family to Bar Harbor and Acadia National Park for a long Labor Day holiday and found time to meet with union leaders, but wouldn't talk to the fishermen. LePage replied, "I'd tell him to go to hell and get out of my State." The Lame Stream Media crucified LePage, but he jumped 6 points in the pre-election poll.

The NAACP specifically asked LePage to spend Martin Luther King Day visiting black inmates at the Maine State Prison. He told them that he would meet with ALL inmates, regardless of race, if he were to visit the prison. The NAACP balked and then put out a news release claiming falsely that he refused to participate in any MLK events. He read it in the paper for the 1st time the next morning while being driven to an event and went ballistic because none of the reporters had called him for comment beScfore running the NAACP release. 
He arrived at that event & said in front of a TV camera, "If they want to play the race card on me they can kiss my ass", and he reminded them that he has an adopted black son from Jamaica and that he attended the local MLK Breakfast every year that he was mayor of Waterville. (He started his morning there on MLK Day.)

He then stated that there's a right way and a wrong way to meet with the Governor, and he put all special interests on notice that press releases, media leaks, and all demonstrations would prove to be the wrong way. He said any other group, which acted like the NAACP could expect to be at the bottom of the Governor's priority list!

He then did the following, and judging from local radio talk show callers, his popularity increased even more: The State employees union complained because he waited until 3 P.M. Before closing State offices and facilities and sending non-emergency personnel home during the last blizzard. The prior Governor would often close offices for the day with just a forecast before the first flakes. (Each time the State closes for snow, it costs the taxpayers about $1 million in wages for no work in return.)

LePage was CEO of the Marden's chain of discount family bargain retail stores before election as governor. He noted that State employees getting off work early could still find lots of retail stores open to shop. So, he put the State employees on notice by announcing: "If Marden's is open, Maine is open!"

He told State employees: "We live in Maine in the winter, for heaven's sake, and should know how to drive in it. Otherwise, apply for a State job in Florida !" 
Governor LePage symbolizes what America needs; Refreshing politicians who aren't self-serving and who exhibit common sense.

THE LAW IS THE LAW!

This is one of the better e-mails I have received in a long time! I hope this makes its way around the USA several times over!!!!!HERE IS WHAT Governor LePage said,

"THE LAW IS THE LAW So "if" the US government determines that it is against the law for the words "under God" to be on our money, then, so be it.

And "if" that same government decides that the "Ten Commandments" are not to be used in or on a government installation, then, so be it.

I say, "so be it," because I would like to be a law abiding US citizen

I say, "so be it," because I would like to think that smarter people than I are in positions to make good decisions.

I would like to think that those people have the American public's best interests at heart. 
BUT, he said, "YOU KNOW WHAT ELSE I'D LIKE?

Since we can't pray to God, can't Trust in God and cannot post His Commandments in Government buildings, I don't believe Government (Federal, State and Local) and its employees should participate in Easter and Christmas celebrations which honor the God that our government is eliminating from many facets of American life.

I'd like my mail delivered on Christmas, Good Friday, Thanksgiving & Easter. After all, it's just another day.

I'd like the" US Supreme Court to be in session on Christmas, Good Friday, Thanksgiving & Easter as well as Sundays." After all, it's just another day.

I'd like the Senate and the House of Representatives to not have to worry about getting home for the "Christmas Break." After all it's just another day.

I'm thinking a lot of my taxpayer dollars could be saved, if all government offices & services would work on Christmas, Good Friday & Easter. It shouldn't cost any overtime since those would be just like any other day of the week to a government that is trying to be "politically correct."

In fact....I think our government should work on Sundays (AFTER ALL, It was initially set aside for worshipping God....) because, AFTER ALL, our government says that it should be Just ANOTHER DAY...."

What do you all think???? If this idea gets to enough people, maybe our elected officials will stop giving in to the "minority opinions" and begin, once again, to represent the "majority" of ALL of the American people.

 

If this gets around the country a few times, perhaps we will see better days! ***************************

 

 

 

=

 

 

 

 

 

Bye, Bye, Governor Christie

He now has no chance of winning in 2016. He knew but he probably just suggested it. But ALL politics is dirty anyway, (with the Demos leading by far)  especially dirty in most of the liberal media. His chances of being our new president are about the same as for all possible Republican candidates mentioned to date. I wasn't a fan of his anyway.

Of course, anyone would be better than the cross between a Socialist and a Marxist we now have running this great country into the ground. He can't do it ALL alone. He needs a majority of his ilk to get this first step of his mission accomplished.

Blame George For Starting a War We Couldn't Win

Blame Obama for making sure that Iraq would eventually burst out in a Civil War. It's a'coming fast. Then what will the incompetent and his ilk do? And why isn't the liberal media giving us a day by day count of Iraqi civilians dead like they did when George was president?

Good question, you p_ _ _ _ _ _.

Widmer's Search Bar For Older Blogs By Title

Sorry I have not been posting but had problems finally resolved by Bradenton PC Repair. For free!! Nice guys. Anyway, the search bar you would use is in the upper LEFT hand side of any blog. For blogs on the water company buyout use "Water-logged, for museum, use PRM, Peoria Public School Dist #150, etc.