R - E - S - P - E - C - T

Earlier today, I read something that someone had posted expressing their concern about the total lack of respect shown to Barack Obama. They assumed that the disrespect is because he's black and anyone who criticizes him is a racist. I'm paraphrasing the comment, but y'all get the gist.

Someone else has read that same comment and replied that the disrespect and lack of confidence in him isn't because he's black (actually & factually, he's a mulatto), but because he's inept.

Anyway, I kept thinking about the disrespect shown by Democrats to former Pres George W Bush, Obama's predecessor. Many took great pleasure in calling him all sorts of names. Disrespect was shown when he was depicted as a monkey and that led to a lot of people calling him a "chimp". That disrespect is evident on a website, Democratic Underground.

Now then, I was no great fan of George W. Bush, but I much preferred him to the other choices which were available at that time and I much prefer him to the man sitting in the office now.

Here's a shortened listing of what they are calling "nick names" for the former president. The full list can be found on the Democratic Underground.

Baby Bush, Bogus Potus, Boy George, Campaigner in Chief, Captain Cowboy, Cheney's Sock Puppet, Chimp in Chief, Commander-in-Thief, Curious George, Dubya, Dumbya, El Busho, El Shrubbo, Fearful Leader, Flubya, George The 2nd, Georgie, Gutless Wonder, Idiot-in-chief, Junior, King George, Miserable Failure, Moron-in-Chief, Not My President, Oaf Of Office, President Bobblehead, Shrub, Shrubbo, Shrubya, Thief in Chief, Too Stupid to be President, Unelected Moron, Village Idiot, Witless Wonder...

So, for those griping about the lack of respect shown to Obama, please ask yourself, did you use any of Bush's nicknames? Were you one of those same liberals who now seem to have forgotten how the last president was treated and now you are offended because it's a Democrat president?

Before you call others racist because they are critical of Mr. Obama, take a long hard look at the record of disrespect for the office set by liberals for eight years, when you tolerated all of sorts of vitriol against a sitting president. I guess it comes to prove the old adage; we do reap what we have sown, don't we.

Ripple Effects

Everyone knows that if you toss a pebble into a pond, ripples extend outward from where it hit the water.  Other possible changes brought about by that pebble can include frightened fish from the pebble's descent; a splash from the pebble hitting the still surface of the pond; or a bird frightened by the plunk, the sound of the pebble hitting the water.  We know that our actions also affect others, ripples ever extending outwards. It is change enacted through a single and simple act...  the ripple effect.

The Democrats in Congress enacted what is erroneously called the Affordable Healthcare Act aka Obamacare. There isn't anything 'affordable' about it and it has cost many people.  The blame for Obamacare lies strictly on the shoulders of the Democrats as not a single Republican voted for it.  Nancy Pelosi's now famous comment, "You have to vote for it to see what's in it" resonates with her disdain for those people who voiced concerns about the act, those who wanted to read the massive bill before its passage.  But, no....  the Democrats rammed it through.

One PROMISE that people heard a lot from the White House, from the President's own lips was, "If you like your health care plan, you can keep it.  If you like your doctor, you can keep him."  We Americans have been hearing him say that for years, at least since 2009. Other highly ranked Democrats continually supported his statement.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said that Obamacare "means making sure you can keep your
family's doctor or keep your health care plan if you like it."

Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin told Americans, including those who were happily insured, "we are going to put in any legislation considered by the House and Senate the protection that you, as an individual, keep the health insurance you have, if that is what you want."

Harry Reid

And, let's not forget that Senate Budget Committee Chairwoman Patty Murray said: "If you like what you have today, that will be what you have when this legislation is passed."

They lied.  All of them.  Lies & fabrications...  An empty promise but one heck of a sales pitch and boy were Americans sold a bridge in the middle of the desert.

Now, the ripple effects from those lies and from the passage of the bill are being felt by one & all.  Here are some of the act's side effects.

1. Millions of people have lost their INDIVIDUAL health care plans, plans that they liked.  This number doesn't include those millions of people who are going to lose their insurance when the business mandates kick in AFTER the 2014 mid-term elections.
2. Obamacare taxes, mandates, regulations, and indirect costs on small- and medium-size businesses are directly impacting whether or not businesses can expand and hire. CBO Director Doug Elmendorf testified before the House Budget Committee that Obamacare will result in an estimated 800,000 fewer U.S. jobs. A survey of small to medium sized businesses, which was conducted by the US Chamber of Commerce showed that many businesses are already seeing increasing health care costs and, to cope, 31% of franchise and 12% of non-franchise businesses have reduced worker hours, a full year before the employer mandate goes into effect.
3. Health plans offered by colleges have been severely affected.  As of today, 9 New Jersey schools saw the cost of the health care plans they offered to students triple.  Students at Bowie State in Maryland saw the cost of their health care policies go from $100 to $1800 for two semesters. This is an increase of about 1500%.  Bowie State has dropped the plan.  Many colleges finding  have stopped offering health care policies to their students.
4. Obamacare adds 18 million people to Medicaid and it is estimated that by 2019, more than 80 million people will be on Medicaid. Taxpayers, who are already strapped by rising costs of essential goods will be footing the bill. 
5. Nearly 25% of ALL SENIORS rely on Medicare Advantage. Obamacare makes such deep cuts to the M.A. program, $455 Billion, that 50% of those seniors, who are currently covered, will lose their coverage. Where is that $455 billion going?  It's going to pay for Obamacare. 

Cancelled Coverage as of Nov 14, 2013
Article at Wall Street Journal

Obamacare is an unmitigated disaster.  The dysfunctional portal with its lack of security to our most personal information is only the 1st symptom.  It is a sinking ship and the rats are abandoning it in an act of self-preservation.  Remember who those rats are the next time they run for re-election.

I find myself torn...

As US citizens, we are supposed to be guaranteed a trial by a jury of our peers.  The gov't is supposed to arrest us, if at all possible.  It is not supposed to assassinate us.  Yet, the current administration has used drones to kill US citizens abroad. They've assassinated them as they were driving down the road, blowing them to smithereens...

Yes, it is true that SOME of those assassinated were traitors and had committed crimes against the state. They were bad people.  However, they were still citizens and, when they were killed, they were not shooting at anyone...  they posed NO IMMEDIATE THREAT.

I find myself torn...  And, in this case, as bad as SOME of these people were, I have to agree with the ACLU in that their civil rights, as guaranteed by the Constitution with regard to due process, were trampled by the current administration.   But, what else is new.  This administration has trampled upon our freedoms and rights since its first day in office, but this is sanctioned murder under the guise of patriotism...  of a fight against "terrorists".  And now it has been sanctioned, skeptically, by a Federal judge, Colleen McMahon (US District Judge, Southern District of New York).

In her 75-page ruling issued on Wednesday, January 2, one can hear her skepticism and the frustration in her written words, which declares the US Justice Department does not have a legal obligation to explain the rationale behind killing Americans with targeted drone strikes.  Judge McMahon wrote in her finding that the Obama administration was in the right by rejecting Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests filed by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and The New York Times for materials pertaining to the use of unmanned aerial vehicles to execute, to assassinate, to murder three US citizens abroad in late 2011.

"I can find no way around the thicket of laws and precedents that effectively allow the executive branch of our government to proclaim as perfectly lawful certain actions that seem on their face incompatible with our Constitution and laws while keeping the reasons for their conclusion a secret," she wrote. 

Having read the decision (linked above), there is NOTHING in it that prevents the killing of US Citizens on US soil... ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!  Make no mistake, this is an extremely dangerous precedent.

 “The Alice-in-Wonderland nature of this pronouncement is not lost on me,” Judge McMahon wrote, adding that she was operating in a legal environment that amounted to “a veritable Catch-22.”

Earlier, I stated that only "SOME" of the people killed in drone strikes were bad.  I stand by that statement as also killed in drone strikes were innocent bystanders and the son of al-Awlaki. It's unknown whether Awlaki's son, who was born in Colorado, was a terrorist or not.  He had no choice in his parentage and was executed strictly because of his parentage, as was his teenage friend who was visiting him. This was a 16 yr old kid, a kid who hadn't seen his father in 2 years...  A kid who snuck out of the house to try and find his father...  his dad.  I think Tom Junod, Esquire Magazine, covers the story of the kid the best and I find the quote below poignant.

"He was a boy who hadn't seen his father in two years, since his father had gone into hiding. He was a boy who knew his father was on an American kill list and who snuck out of his family's home in the early morning hours of September 4, 2011, to try to find him. He was a boy who was still searching for his father when his father was killed, and who, on the night he himself was killed, was saying goodbye to the second cousin with whom he'd lived while on his search, and the friends he'd made. He was a boy among boys, then; a boy among boys eating dinner by an open fire along the side of a road when an American drone came out of the sky and fired the missiles that killed them all."

What really, really bothers me about all this is that it appears we no longer live in the United States, a nation founded on personal freedom and the right to LIFE, LIBERTY, and the pursuit of happiness.  Instead, we have become a nation where the President of the United States has the last word in deciding who lives and who dies.  A President who has been quoted as saying that the decision to put Anwar al-Awlaki on the kill list — and then to kill him — was "an easy one".  Taking the life of another should NEVER be an "easy" decision.

Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, 1996-2012

Al-Awlaki's son, Abdulrahman, was a natural born United States citizen. He was NEVER on the "kill list".  He was NOT a member of Al-Qaeda.  He did NOT renounce his citizenship.  He was a 16 year old MINOR, a child by ALL LEGAL definitions.  His crime?  NONE except for being born of a father gone bad. So, why was the boy killed 2 weeks after his father?  That's right, he was NOT killed in the same drone strike which killed his father.  He was killed 2 weeks later.  

Where is the outrage?  

One has to wonder, especially after the Obama administration has threatened a journalist, Bob Woodward, who will be the next United States citizen to be targeted for assassination?  Will it be Bob Woodward because of his temerity to state that sequestration was Obama's idea and that Obama has "moved the goalposts"?  Or, will it be another United States citizen who has the temerity to defy Obama's efforts at gun grabbing?  Who refuses to pay increased taxes?  Who speaks out against this evil and abusive tyrant posing as a President?

Who will be next???

Results of a 50% tax Rate on the Rich...

Speaking of Obama's plan to tax the rich, in reality, the United Kingdom did exactly what Obama and the thieving Democrats propose to do here — pass a surtax on high-income earners.  In the UK, their new tax rate of 50% took effect at the beginning of the year. When it was passed, it was thought that the new tax would raise a billion pounds in extra revenue each month.  That is what was expected.  So, how did that work out?  Well, it is a fact that tax revenues have dropped by more than £500 million.

The self-assessment returns from January, which is when most income tax is paid by the better-off, were eagerly awaited by the Treasury and government ministers. It was expected that those returns would provide the first evidence of the success of the 50% rate.  It was the anniversary of the first year following the introduction of the rate.  However, the rate was not the success which they expected. What was expected to boost tax revenues from self-assessment by more than £1 billion, instead led to a loss of revenue.

The UK Treasury received £10.35 billion in income tax payments from those paying by self-assessment, a drop of £509 million compared with January 2011. Most other taxes produced higher revenues over the same period.

Senior sources said that the first official figures indicated that there had been “ maneuvering” by well-off Britons to avoid the new higher rate. The figures will add to pressure on the Coalition to drop the levy amid fears it is forcing entrepreneurs to relocate abroad.  Gee, that's a surprise... NOT!

The same will occur here.  Those with the means will reallocate their monies where they will be untouched.  And, the bulk of the increases will come from those small businesses and families that make less than $300,000 a year.  These people who will be hit are upper middle class.  They are not rich...  They are not Obama's buddies in the entertainment industry.  They are mom & pop operations.

The proposed increases, especially when combined with the taxes & penalties mandated by Obamacare, will lead to layoffs, business closures, etc.  It is bad for people, bad for business, and, most of all, very bad for the USA.

Political Ramblings

I'm very upset.  Our country is in trouble and I really don't care what side of the aisle one is on, we're in trouble.

While I'm not happy with the results of the election, I'm even more upset with the people - post election.  The tolerance that this country is known for is MIA (missing in action) and the least tolerant of the citizens appear to reside in the Democratic party, the winning political party.  Here's a for instance....

Because of my deep & abiding belief that this country, this "ship of state" being in dire distress, which is bad enough that it may cause the "ship of state" to sink, I've decided to fly our flag with the union down...  a clear sign of distress that any military person will recognize.  It isn't being done in protest and it is being done with the utmost respect for our country & our flag.  This country is in trouble and is in danger.  It is in danger from enemies, foreign and domestic.  It is in danger of going off a cliff to economic ruin.  It is in danger of being torn apart by political ideologues.  That is why I'm flying the flag with the union down.

Well, those who disagree, who believe that all is happy and well... that the Democrats in Congress and their Messiah, Barrack Hussein Obama, will lead them to the "Promised Land" of peace & prosperity... of "equality"...  to the "Promised Land" of Marx, who stated,

"From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs."  

Here is Marx's quote in it's entirety...

     "In a higher phase of communist society, after the enslaving subordination of the individual to the division of labor, and therewith also the antithesis between mental and physical labor, has vanished; after labor has become not only a means of life but life's prime want; after the productive forces have also increased with the all-around development of the individual, and all the springs of co-operative wealth flow more abundantly -- only then then can the narrow horizon of bourgeois right be crossed in its entirety and society inscribe on its banners: From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs!

    I have dealt more at length with the "undiminished" proceeds of labor, on the one hand, and with "equal right" and "fair distribution", on the other, in order to show what a crime it is to attempt, on the one hand, to force on our Party again, as dogmas, ideas which in a certain period had some meaning but have now become obsolete verbal rubbish, while again perverting, on the other, the realistic outlook, which it cost so much effort to instill into the Party but which has now taken root in it, by means of ideological nonsense about right and other trash so common among the democrats and French socialists.

     Quite apart from the analysis so far given, it was in general a mistake to make a fuss about so-called distribution and put the principal stress on it.

     Any distribution whatever of the means of consumption is only a consequence of the distribution of the conditions of production themselves. The latter distribution, however, is a feature of the mode of production itself. The capitalist mode of production, for example, rests on the fact that the material conditions of production are in the hands of non-workers in the form of property in capital and land, while the masses are only owners of the personal condition of production, of labor power. If the elements of production are so distributed, then the present-day distribution of the means of consumption results automatically. If the material conditions of production are the co-operative property of the workers themselves, then there likewise results a distribution of the means of consumption different from the present one. Vulgar socialism (and from it in turn a section of the democrats) has taken over from the bourgeois economists the consideration and treatment of distribution as independent of the mode of production and hence the presentation of socialism as turning principally on distribution. After the real relation has long been made clear, why retrogress again?" 1

To me, that sure sounds like Obama's "redistribution of wealth"2.

It seems that the citizens of the greatest nation in the world have elected a Marxist to a 2nd term as President. This is something that many of us in this nation suspected. After all, he nationalized several companies in the auto industry.  To counter the argument that the nation doesn't own General Motors anymore, it does.  As of November 2012, the "American taxpayers still own a 26 percent stake in G.M., the company is finding it tough to change its image as “Government Motors.”" 3

That New York Times article was preceded by an article in the Wall Street Journal dated Sept 19, 2012 which stated, "The government's authority over GM today isn't concentrated in the 500 million shares it still owns, which amount to a hefty but not controlling 26.5% ownership stake..." 4

What other Marxist tendencies does the current fearless leader have?  Well, the basic principles of Marxism are:

1. materialist interpretation of history: how history is a product of struggles between the social classes such as the rich versus the middle class and the poor
2. critique of capitalism: an economic minority (rich) control and manipulate the economic majority (middle class & poor)
3. adovcacy of proletarian revolution: to overcome the challenges faced by a working class, they need to start a revolution and gain political power (support of the Occupy movement, the "War on Women", etc.)

Yep...  The descriptions fit...  We are now living with a Marxist occupying the White House.

Nice going....

My Military Men

At this time, so close to Veteran's Day, I want to thank and to acknowledge the sacrifices made by members of my family, who served in the armed forces during World War 2, Korea, and VietNam.

My Dad

GM3c George Miller Jr
US Navy World War II

My mom's youngest brother, my uncle

PVT Thomas E. Struhar
US ARMY WORLD WAR II, KOREA

My husband, Rob Summerhill

Weapons Training (Rob is closest to camera)

Many thanks to all of our men & women in uniform, past & present.  May God bless you all.

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Interesting Videos of Obama's Speeches

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ge3aGJfDSg4  (redistribution of wealth)

http://youtu.be/IUfo-RxkXA8   (Obama on "Fairness")

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1. Marx, Karl (1875), Critique of the Gotha Program (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1875/gotha/ch01.htm) 
2. 
3. New York Times, November 12, 2012; Business Day (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/general_motors_corporation/index.html)
4. Wall Street Journal, September 19, 2012; Ed Whitacre: Time for 'Government Motors' to Hit the Road.  (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390444165804578006330477733900.html)

Presidential Popularity Graph

This image says it all. It is a graph showing how Barack Obama's popularity rating has gone from a high of 69% to it's present day low of only 44%. And, it continues to drop. The more he pushes his Socialist agenda, the faster his popularity dwindles away. Mr. Obama! The citizens of the USA do not want your Socialist agenda. This country has fought Socialism for a very long time. We didn't want it then and we sure as heck don't want it now! Please sir, CEASE and DESIST!

Obama & Fort Hood

To those who lost friends and family at Fort Hood, please accept my deepest condolances and my prayers for your loss. In addition, please accept my apologies for the man that is supposed to be President, but has proven to be pretty much anything but presidential.

When I heard that Obama was going to speak to the attack at Ft. Hood, I did not change the channel on the TV, but waited for words of comfort. I waited to see how Obama would handle such an attack on our men & women in the military, especially since he has no military background. I wondered if he would offer condolences. I wondered if he would visit them. There were many things I wondered. However, what I did not expect was his total crassness and lack of civility with regard to the killings! Please don't get me wrong, I have never been an Obama supporter, however, even so, this disgraceful exposition was beyond my comprehension!



OK... I understand he was at a conference for Native Americans. That's well & good. However, his comments about Ft. Hood should have been first. They should have taken priority over the conference & over his "shout out". Does he think he's on MTV? Duh!

Also, you would think he'd know & understand that Mr. Crow did not win the Congressional Medal of Honor. First of all, a military person is awarded the Medal, the highest commendation in our country, for valor and actions above & beyond the call of duty. It isn't won like a bowling trophy. Secondly, Obama is the one who presented Mr. Crow with the Presidential Medal of Freedom -an award which isn't even close to the Medal of Honor. Now then, I have to say that Mr. Crow is a Bronze Star recipient.

This display was a total disgrace. It is no wonder we are a laughingstock.