Puerto Rico, another democrat socialism failure

So, American taxpayer, Puerto Rico is going to “restructure” their debt, which built up under democrat leadership to an untenable level, bailout time! WJC juices up the CRA, threatening banks and mortage companies to loan to those who can’t afford a loan, unscrupulous people take advantage and 2008 happens.  Will the political leaders be held to account by Bernie, or 1/26th American Indian senator, or former secretary of state, don’t hold your breath.  Somehow they will find a conservative to blame.

Now, if the plan Congress is debating goes into effect a reasonable path forward may actually take place, the state can renegotiate their debt and bondholders may not take a haircut.  Lots of maybes.  The same thing happened in Washington, DC, in the 1990’s after decades of democrat leadership. Deju a vu all over again.

Why can’t those who love Hillary and Bernie see the writing on the wall, the more government we have the worse things will get. Santana said, paraphrasing, those who refuse to study history are doomed to relive it.

Teachers, Tenure, Kids Suffer

“California’s Supreme Court has the opportunity to make a civil-rights breakthrough by agreeing to hear a landmark case that challenges teacher tenure laws on equal protection grounds.”  The opening sentence in a WSJ article today, editorial page.  The article goes on to say that six students have sued California because lousy teachers are moved to low income schools since getting rid of them takes forever, is almost impossible and very costly.

The first trial judge agreed, it was appealed-supported by the idiot governor Brown and the unions of course-and the appeals court vacated the ruling.  Now it goes to the supreme court.

The web if full of more detail, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/news/vergara-v-california/, Huffington even agrees!

When will the money and power of the teachers unions stop protecting lousy teachers, our education results have been sliding for years, from in the high single digits to low 10’s when compared with our global competitors.  Wake up America!  Our youth are being screwed.

When does anyone deserve a lifetime job?  The rest of us sure aren’t. Academic freedom my butt, this is pure power and money.

Living in Alabama we are starting to see a change, not much yet, but the local union, the AEA, spent $40 million in the last cycle and all the candidates lost and the NEA had to come in and take over the union.

What are the results?  That is the question.

The next US president must carry a big stick

The above title is from the American Enterprise Institute, a non partisan, conservative think tank, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Enterprise_Institute.

The battle over the American military presence overseas, and in the seas has been raging since 1787. The Federalists and “Republicans” of the time had long and bitter battles in Congress and in the country over whether or how we should be involved. As the various sides gained power their policy would be put in place, sometimes successfully, Barbary Pirates, WW 1 and 2; sometimes not so successfully, Vietnam.

With the probability of national wars receding, hopefully, we face however a much heightened threat of “Asymmetric” warfare. What should we do? Put troops in Iraq? Pull our soldiers out of Korea and Europe? Mothball our aircraft carriers, or build more?

One thing for sure, not being prepared to fight has encouraged idiots with power and money to kill others expecting us and our “allies” to do nothing.  The examples of this are too numerous to mention, but just a few, Rwanda-Kuwait-Poland-Manchuria-Korea.

Turning our back on the responsibility to be strong is foolish; Bernie, HRC and my fellow libertarians. The responsibility to have a respectful and strong diplomatic arm is as important as the military, so to keep us out of conflict, Donald.

With our win-lose attitude in Congress and the executive branch I have little hope that passions will lose to reasoned thought. Sad. So many lessons of history both sides are ignoring.

The article below from AEI is reasoned, please take some time to read.

Peace

http://www.aei.org/publication/the-next-us-president-must-carry-a-big-stick/?utm_source=paramount&utm_medium=email&utm_content=AEITODAY&utm_campaign=060316

Socialism Is For The Uninformed

Thomas Sowell (born in 1930, dropped out of high school, joined the marine corps, then obtained numerous degrees, wrote a bunch of books on economics, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Sowell) penned an article with the above title.

Wanting something has nothing to do with getting it done unless  you focus on data that demonstrates what actually accomplishes the goal. Health care, or the ACA, was going to get everyone on insurance AND reduce the cost to all. NEITHER HAPPENED. Public housing was going to help those in poor housing. NEVER HAPPENED…..

This article highlights the lack of seriousness of “The Bern” proclamations, he doesn’t talk about if anything he is proposing has ever worked, IT HASN’T. HRC is close behind with proposals that have never worked. The Donald is in the same camp.

I know everyone is pissed off, I am also. But heaven requires us to do something that may actually accomplish a goal, that means our political “leaders” must have conversations rather than fire fights to try various things that actually produce the result.  The amazing thing is, both sides of this war agree mostly on what needs to happen.

Grow up people.

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/436022/bernie-sanders-fans-dont-bother-think?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Saturday%20Best%20of%206/4&utm_term=VDHM

 

Fannie, Freddie and an Outbreak of Amnesia

Douglas Holtz-Eakin penned the above title in a WSJ article on 25 May, 2016. The gist; During the 2008 financial imbroglio these two “government sponsored entities” were put into conservatorship with the taxpayers contributing $188 Billion to bail them out. These two agencies buy mortgages and package them to sell as bonds.

The hope was they would be reconstituted and run better next time. Someone was smoking something in the cloak room to hope for that, they are giant honey holes for Congress to “reform society” and put their friends in place. Being government they get lower interest rates than banks and if they mess up WE get the bill.

Fanny and Freddie are the very embodiment of crony capitalism that the Bern, HRC and the Donald rant about.  They are a defacto state owned enterprise in the United States, kind of like China, or our friend Putins’ place.

Why is it that it has become a right to own a house? If we agree home ownership is a good thing is there a better way to put forward that policy without exposing the taxpayers to this kind of risk, maybe a more free market oriented solution? Maybe cities looking at how much cost they load on builders that increases the cost of housing by 20-30-40%. Maybe renting is a better idea than buying at certain times in your life.  Maybe being more vertical is a good idea, seems to work in New York.

Driving a social policy through by threatening banks with regulation and fine hell has been proven to be stupid.

Tired of Politicians Tearing Down

I am 69. I served in the military, I serve the community in various ways, I serve in my choice of religious institutions, I serve my family, I serve my customers, I serve, you.

I am so sick of national politicians who win elections by tearing down the U.S. “We are going to fundamentally change this country. The first time in my life I have been proud of my country. Those people are dummies, can’t negotiate well. Wall Street are a bunch of crooks. What difference does it make now, anyway.”  First prize to the first person who correctly identifies who said what. And the people that don’t tear down the country, or their opponent, are not elected to highest offices.

Joe Rosenberg wrote an editorial in the WSJ a while ago, talking about the collective economy he experienced first hand, Israel, or through friends, relatives or through people he met, Europe, Russia, China. All stole liberty from people, liberty to pursue happiness as they see fit.  Capitalism has raised billions of people out of poverty, not government controlled economics.

He says, “Bernie Sanders and I are poster children for what poor Jew from Brooklyn or Germany can accomplish… Please stop tearing down the country that has been so good to both of us” (and millions of others-my comment).

Benjamin Franklin famously said to a person outside of the hall where our constitution was just barely passed. “You have a republic, now let’s see if you can keep it.”  To keep we all have to serve one another, not take from one another. We have to love one another enough to compromise. Please.

 

 

A Hollywood Hit Job on Clarence Thomas

The above title is from an article by Stuart Taylor Jr. (author and non resident senior contributor to the Brookings Institute). He talks about the HBO offering “Confirmation” focused on the 25th anniversary of the confirmation hearings of Clarence Thomas for SCOTUS.

“Despite the a surface appearance of fairness, “Confirmation” makes clear how it wants the hearings to be remembered: Ms. Hill told the whole truth and Mr. Thomas was thus a desperate, if compelling liar. Her supporters were noble; his Republican backers were scheming character assassins.” Quoting the article.

I guess it is OK to make a movie purported to be factual when it is not, “The Butler” comes to mind, anything by Oliver Stone, Roger Moore, etc. Why is it that our media, which includes Hollywood, determines it is OK to put out stuff that is so biased as to be actual lies, or just selective in which facts it presents and feels OK to say, “based on a true story” as their license.

Dramatic license doesn’t give anyone the right to misrepresent the facts of a case.  If you are going to make a movie, or show, about a factual event please tell us your bias, as noted above, or make it a documentary and present both sides.

The article last year about a rape at U. Va. is an example. A young, needy woman created a story in order to attract the attention of a young man, and Rolling Stone then proceeded to blow her insecurities into a giant story.  The magazine is being sued, as well they should be as Columbia School of Journalism even agrees they were negligent.  The reporter, Ms. Erderly, is still writing for the magazine.

“Rolling Stone publisher Jann S. Wenner told The New York Times the article was flawed, but “represented an isolated and unusual episode.” Wenner told the Times that Erdely would continue as a freelance writer and that Managing Editor Will Dana, the article’s editor Sean Woods and the fact checker, who was not named because she had no decision-making ability on publication, would not be fired.
Breaking News at Newsmax.com http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/erdely-reporter-apologize-university-of-virginia/2015/04/05/id/636540/#ixzz49O1JyWsJ ”

The young woman “Jackie” was not prosecuted for slander, libel, etc. The fraternity has suffered mightily, The University has gone through massive turmoil. “Jackie” has walked away from the consequences, even Michael Smerconish recently spoke about her culpability.

Has our media learned anything?  Probably not. We need to be our own fact checkers!  Facebook just this last week has been accused of bias in reporting the news.  Everyone is aghast. Well don’t be, everyone is biased, some do a better job of trying to present both sides, most don’t.

 

 

The EEOC Whiffs-Again

The above title is from the editorial page of the WSJ for May 21-22, 2016. It talks about the EEOC losing a case at SCOTUS 8-0. Even with four progressive leaning judges, CRST Van Expedited v. EEOC. That comes on top of a 9-0 ruling in in 2012, Hosanna-Tabor v. EEOC.

If you can’t get legislation by leading a divided Congress, just sue people.

CRST was also awarded legal fees, $4.7 million dollars, of our taxpayer money!

You would think that government attorneys would think first about whether a case has merit based on precedence before moving forward, or spend someone else’s money going to court.

Good for SCOTUS.

Changing an NFL Team’s Name Won’t Fix Indian Schools

The above title is from the May 21-22 WSJ by Naomi Schaefer Riley. There has been a lot of hoopla about the Redskins name, how insulting it is to native Americans. Well, according to a Washington Post poll, 90% of native Americans are not offended.  Much ado about nothing?

Concurrently the Education Secretary John King announced a $100,000 grant to the Crazy Horse School of the Oglala Sioux tribe. More money won’t help much as plenty of money has been sent to the schools, as Ms. Riley states in her article.

The schools score half as well as other schools in South Dakota. Nepotism, a lack of accountability, no alternatives like charter schools, unenforced truancy laws, social promotions, etc. Sound familiar, maybe not to the same extent, but familiar for sure. While adults posture over tenure, staff jobs, keeping low performing schools open, unenforced discipline the children who want to learn are sacrificed by the adults.

Some Teach for America teachers were let go because “they are too white. They think Western.” Adults fighting their battles over who teaches their kids reading, writing and arithmetic.

Education is at the core of many of our issues in our country, yet the current administration and the Bern says global warming is at the top of the list. No guts to tell the truth.

Leonardo gets award for environmental action, builds a “green” resort-bring money-lots of it.

At the world economic forum in 2016 DeCaprio got an award for his environmental work, good for him.  In 2018 his development called “Blackadore Key” in Belize will open.

The Key is billed as a “Restorative Island”, totally powered by renewable energy, increases the biological health  of species, sustainable practices, etc.  Great, for those .1% of people who can afford $5-10 million prices tags. The rest of us can eat cake.

Sustainable practices and reducing emissions should be part of our path going forward.  How about  balancing costs so that entire swaths of the economy are not eliminated without a plan to assist those affected. This sounds like Stalin and the Cossack’s to me.  http://assumptionarticles.homestead.com/files/LIENTZhtml.htm.