Tragedy at Fort Hood

Words cannot express our solemn sympathy for the families of those murdered at Ft. Hood, and the outrage we have at the incident.

We only wish the President would have shown the same reverence at the tragedy. When he spoke about the incident at a previously scheduled appearance, President Obama spent the first two minutes joking with the press and giving “shout outs” to people in attendance before addressing the atrocity. Mr. President, this is unacceptable.

He also came out and said that we shouldn’t “rush to judgement” about the motivations of the traitorous Major Nidal Malik Hasan. So we spent a full week looking over the headlines:

• Fort Hood Shooter Tried to Contact al Qaeda Terrorists, Officials Say
• Hasan may have wired money to Pakistan
• Fort Hood Shooting Suspect Hasan Had Contact With Radical Islamic Cleric in Yemen
• Radical 9/11 Cleric Linked to Fort Hood Shooter
• Official: Nidal Hasan Had “Unexplained Connections”
• Major Malik Hasan Caught On Store CCTV Hours before shooting spree (The full-white dress in Islam symbolizes detachment from all of the trimmings of the world; it is part of a purification ritual.)

After reading these — and other — stories, we are willing to say what the Obama administration doesn’t have the guts to say: Nidal Malik Hasan was a radical Islamic terrorist. He committed an act of Islamic jihad against the United States. He is a traitor and should be executed. Terror has come home, and the soldiers at Ft. Hood died in the Global War on Terror. As such they deserve the purple heart, at the very least.

In the meantime, the White House has failed to call this incident an act of terrorism. Instead of investigating Hasan’s ties to terrorism, they’re sending Attorney General Eric Holder to give a keynote speech at a coalition that includes the local branch of the Council on American-Islamic Relations… despite the fact that the FBI has formally severed contact with CAIR because of its ties to radical Islamic organizations such as Hamas.

Who said politicians don’t work hard?

Y’know, politicians get a bum rap. They get made fun of because the number of days they work averages about 130 days a year. They get criticized that they get paid too much (starting salary: $174,000 per year) and have a generous retirement plan. But while you may criticize them, they were working hard last weekend in the House of Representatives! Oh yes, while you were catching up on housework, attending birthday parties or weddings, going to church, and enjoying the last good weather before winter hits, the House was hard at work. They were busy passing the 2000+ page healthcare bill at 6pm last Saturday night, when they knew people wouldn’t be paying attention.

Were they busy reading the bill? No. At 10 minutes per page, it would have taken about 333 hours, or almost 14 non-stop days with no sleep and no bathroom breaks just to read it. And since the final language of the bill wasn’t done until just hours before the vote…. it makes it quite impossible for even a speed-reader to read, much less comprehend the bill. Interestingly, the mainstream media has ignored the fact that Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi said on September 24th that she was “absolutely committed” to publishing the final language online for 72 hours before calling for a vote, then swiftly broke that promise.

Now let’s say that you decide that you don’t want to buy the government insurance, for whatever reason. What’s the penalty for “willful failure to pay”? Well, it ranges from a misdemeanor with a $25,000 fine and a year of jail to a felony with a $250,000 fine and five years in jail. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates that the lowest cost of a family healthcare plan will cost $15,000. (Anyone remember when the CBO has overestimated a cost? We can’t either.) This is what they call providing “affordable” healthcare for all? So what does President Obama have to say about this? “There’s nothing wrong with a penalty.”

For what it’s worth, the Competitive Enterprise Institute has a lovely article about what the Wall Street Journal calls “the worst bill ever.”

We still think there needs to be 13 days of debate per page of any bill in Congress.

Haves and have nots

There are two news bits this past week that initially seem unconnected, but really are.

A story came out about a recent research report that showed there are 237 millionaires in Congress.

And then there’s the news about the 10.2% unemployment rate, economists’ predictions that unemployment is going to 13%, and the un-reported statistic that the unemployment rate in the US is now higher than Europe’s.

So it seems that there was one thing John Edwards had right: there are two Americas: the rich Political class, and the rest of us whom they tax to pay for their lavish lifestyles.

No, really?!

A recent article states that errors, incomplete data, and estimates were used to produce a federal government report on the number of jobs created by the stimulus funds. As a result, the federal report on the number of jobs created by the stimulus had exaggerated numbers. Are you surprised? We aren’t either.

The fact is, the best thing that government can do to help stimulate jobs and the economy is to get the hell out of the way. Stop with the handouts. Stop with the bailouts. Stop with the subsidies, the Earned Income Tax Credit, the food stamps, the Medicaid, the SCHIP, the Section 8 housing, and the welfare, and stop with the taxes that pay for them. Governmental interference has created a “poverty trap” where there is no incentive for people toward the bottom of the income ladder to work harder to get up the ladder. Sadly, the entire purpose of the government is to create more people who are dependent upon the government, so the government can get bigger.

Indoctrination? What indoctrination?

A growing trend in this country is the number of public schoolchildren — young public schoolchildren — who are being taught to praise Dear Leader President Obama. What he deserves praise for, we’re not quite sure… he hasn’t really done anything yet except host a beer summit and host lots of parties at the White House, but we digress. Eleven new videos have been uncovered of schoolchildren being taught songs that praise Obama. We remember being taught songs in elementary school that praised the United States… songs about the founders, songs about the flag, songs about what a great God-blessed country we live in. These songs are now being replaced with songs that praise the president. There is a precedent for this: in North Korea children sing to praise Kim Jong Il; in Nazi Germany children were taught songs praising Hitler; and under Lenin, children sang the praises of dear old Vladimir. Now there are 7-year-old kids making canvassing calls for Barack Obama, and followers of Dear Leader the President were told on Halloween to “give trick-or-treaters a flier about President Obama’s Health Reform Plan and a ‘Health Reform NOW’ sticker” and “give them a healthy snack too as a way to remind them about how important health reform is!”

People: this is indoctrination, pure and simple. If you have kids, be very, very involved in what they’re being “taught” in school.

Now for some good news

It wasn’t easy, but we found some good news for you. No, really!

Maybe it was the handling of the Ft. Hood massacre. Maybe it was the healthcare bill or the growing unemployment numbers. We’re not sure what it was, but Obama’s approval ratings are dropping like a rock. We couldn’t be happier. Well, we could be… after all we’re stuck with him for three more years, and un-doing the mess he’s creating will take twenty years or more. But at least we get to say to all those people who are having voter’s remorse: “We told you so.”