Current Events

Christmas in July

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A couple making $149,999 a year with one child between six and seventeen gets $250/month?  And the rationale is it will reduce child poverty — really? Folks doing simple arithmetic of 39 million households getting the lowest of $250/month come to $9,750,000,000. Count the zeros, that’s 9.75 billion dollars a month, paid for by. . . . . .? And it lasts through till the end of the year.

Question,  is a child of a couple who make just short of $150,000  living in poverty?  Really? Oh well, surely the government would know; I mean their our leaders, right?

By: G. Maresca

Congressional Democrats approved an expanded version of the Child Tax Credit that was part of the American Rescue Plan and did so without bipartisan support.

On July 15th, the IRS began depositing $300 a month for every child under six and $250 for each child up to 17. This latest round of monthly cash infusion from Washington is for parents making under $75,000 per year, and for those parents filing jointly who earn less than $150,000 per year. Nearly, 39 million households, covering 88% of American children will receive the monthly outlays, according to USA Today.

Democrats maintain the payments will reduce child poverty, as if the absence of money were the problem. Democrats have thrown trillions at poverty starting with Lyndon Johnson’s “Great Society,” which is nothing short of Jim Crow 2.0.  and on its fourth generation of undermining the family. Cash helps but rarely addresses the underlying issues that money cannot solve.

This roguish cycle of government dependence is renewed by each subsequent generation of welfare recipients who teach their children, probably from a multitude of fathers, that they are entitled to the fruits of somebody else’s labor. Every welfare program must be tied to positive behaviors with a time limit on benefits. It should not be a lifetime annuity.

Replacing the father with government has done tremendous harm to women and children. Nearly 90% of incarcerated males grew up in fatherless homes. Contrary to the Left’s ridicule of American patriarchy, the problem is not that we have too much of it but not enough.

This so-called stimulus spending is an investment in buying future votes all in the name of compassion. Taking from those who work in order to provide for those who don’t to buy their votes is ideological theft. Democrats have made vote buying an art, while making voting more haphazard by not requiring ID – all to their benefit.

Such shenanigans are an integral part of keeping Democrats permanently in power. Provided Democrats can maintain their slight edge in the House of Representatives and retain Vice President Harris’s tiebreaker vote in the Senate in 2022, these apparatchiks will not only remain in power but solidify it.

If you believe monthly free cash will end poverty, your perception of human nature is wanting. A prime symptom of leftist derangement syndrome is believing poverty is solely based upon the lack of cash. Poverty is rooted in a plethora of issues that largesse ignores but certainly reinforces. Democrats have always been more fixated on symptoms than causes.

This cash infusion will not move the poverty level one percent because tax credits are not factored into the poverty rate. The same holds true for food stamps, Medicaid, Section 8, and earned income tax credits that total into the hundreds of billions annually – none of it counts.

The Leftist tradition of not holding anyone accountable for their contribution to their circumstance’s reigns. When bad behavior involves guns, the gun is at fault, not the humans who use them. When those who created their circumstances fail, it is society’s fault. This results in a one size fits all bureaucratic government program that only contributes to the nation’s decline.

Ian Smith, the New Jersey gym owner who refused to close his gym during the pandemic, summed it up this way: “Everything the government is doing right now is designed to make you fat, weak, stupid, depressed, lazy, and reliant on crumbs they wipe off their plates. Health replaced by pharmaceuticals. Education replaced by programming. Hard work replaced by handouts. These people hate you.”

Once acquainted with systematic direct deposits from everyone’s favorite Washington Uncle, less and less people will oppose them. One of the malevolent attributes of socialism is how it takes advantage of people by claiming to help them.

Democrats have always needed a dependent class to maintain their relevancy and hold on power. These longstanding attributes are now devolving into a dependent country.

The Child Tax Credit deposits are to expire at the end of the year, but Biden is hoping to extend them until 2025, the next presidential election. How is that for political expediency?

Sporting aviator sunglasses, Biden is Santa Claus, and every day is Christmas in America.

What’s not to like?

 

Originally posted 2021-07-24 11:34:37.

Recent Posts

Cubans – My Opinion

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Cubans Are Fed Up With Communism. Democrats Aren’t So Sure.

Folks, I have some personal knowledge about this issue — I’ve been there!  We belong to Faith United Methodist Church, Fort Myers, Florida. Two years ago I was offered an opportunity to go on a mission trip to Cuba, (pronounced as Ku-Bah with a short U). While I had been to Cuba a few times during my career, I was packing a weapon guarding Guantanamo, I had never been inside the country, or any communist country for that matter; therefore I jumped at the chance. No surprises.

I expected eveything I saw, except such severe rationing of everything. Cuba’s primary agricultural product is sugar cane, so why is sugar so tightly rationed?  It is exported, that’s how the country survives economically. Another example, here is the meat department in a  town’s local grocery store.

If you are not there at the very hour the meat is put out, sorry. This is what you will eat and what we ate everyday.

Everyone lives by needs only, not desires; there are no such thing as wants. Examples, what’s missing in these photos?

 

 

 

The passenger does not see when it is raining, one doesn’t need a toilet seat, and regardless how many outlets a light fixture has, it only needs one bulb to see.

Our sponsor was a district head of the local Methodist churches; fifty-six of them! There are literally 1000’s throughout the hinterlands. Plus, so many other denominations are there as well. After seeing how many of these  mission churches there are, I came away convinced it was only a matter of time when the population would become educated, God loving, and  wanting to fill wants, not just needs. That. my friends, is what I believe you are seeing now, and it will only get worse. The government “tolerates” these mission churches for they know they best not try to shut them down. Without them those in the hinterlands could not survive. In effect, these churches provide a service the government cannot provide, but you can bet their are a deep thorn in their side.

This trip  simply reinforced to me these liberals who tout socialism, need to go there. And I don’t mean Havana, go to the hinterlands where we went. But they won’t as they know better; they want the U.S. to be degraded to the level of Cuba

Just prior to our arriving Raul’s gay daughter wanted to get married. All the mission churches form all the denominations banded together and produced a petition stating they would not perform a gay marriage as it was against their religions. So in retaliation Raul cancelled all religious VISAS; therefore, days before we were to leave we had to change ours to a Visitors VISA, and when we arrived we had tell a fib and tell the very inquisitive custom agents we were there just to visit. We found this sign posted on the door of every church we visited.

She was married, but not by one of the mission churches. These churches have filled a vacuum in Cuba and their flock gets larger by the day

AOC and her band of swamp creatures need to go there for a real look-see, they “might” learn something but I seriously doubt it. The regime would not dare show them the hinterlands, but the folks out there are getting restless by the day and learning there is life out here in the world; they see it daily with all the many mission trips.

From the Daily Beast

Matt Lewis Senior Columnist

Done with being hungry, unemployed, without water, without power”—as one 88-year-old protester put it—thousands of Cubans are, after 60 years of oppression, taking a brave stand against an authoritarian regime quick to crack down on dissent. As unprecedented street protests aimed at Cuba’s vengeful Communist government have continued, here in the comfortable confines of American politics, the Democratic Party risks blowing yet another opportunity to seize both the center and the moral high ground at a time when those have been largely abandoned by the GOP.

Who or what is stopping them from simply assuming this position as America’s mainstream, majority party? A small, but young and energetic and growing band of activists with outsized influence who support radical causes like CRT, “defund the police,” and socialism. (Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, like Bernie Sanders, prefers the label of democratic socialist.)

On important issues as diverse as crime and infrastructure, Joe Biden has had to walk the line between appeasing this base and delivering on his promise of being a centrist. The result tends toward a mushy compromise that is passable, but during a news conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Thursday, he delivered. “Communism is a failed system—a universally failed system. And I don’t see socialism as a very useful substitute. But that’s another story,” he said.

Better late than never. The danger, as Marc Caputo warned, was that the president “could blow it by being too slow to move, too timid in his actions or by embracing the messaging from progressives who have been reluctant to denounce the Cuban regime in strong, unqualified and moralistic terms.”

Cuba is a wedge issue, and if you doubt this issue still resonates, think again. One of the reasons Biden became the Democratic nominee was Bernie Sanders’ past praise for Fidel Castro. Likewise, California Rep. Karen Bass’s 2016 praise of Castro (“the passing of the Comandante en Jefe is a great loss to the people of Cuba”) helped scuttle talk of her being Biden’s running mate. She walked that back in 2020, but it was too little and too late to resuscitate her vice presidential ambitions.

That’s not one but two high-profile Democrats (one of whom came within a whisker of being his party’s nominee and still retains enormous influence) who had high praise for a Communist country and its bloodthirsty dictator. As much as the dark and authoritarian strains of America’s right-wing extremists have been rightly scrutinized, the left harbors its fair share of radicals.

For example, before Biden’s comments, Black Lives Matter (specifically, the group operating under that name founded by Patrisse Cullors, Opal Tometi, and Alicia Garza) posted a statement blaming the U.S. government for Cuba’s problems that Cuban citizens are bravely taking to the streets to protest.

“Black Lives Matter condemns the U.S. federal government’s inhumane treatment of Cubans and urges it to immediately lift the economic embargo,” it reads. They are literally blaming America first.

To be sure, U.S. sanctions are squeezing Cuba (along with COVID and reduced support from Venezuela). But the fundamental problem is the communist system’s failure to deliver on its utopian promise by modernizing its economy. Cuba, not America, is responsible for the disastrous decision to develop their own COVID vaccine (instead of joining COVAX, the World Health Organization’s sharing program). By blaming America, progressives are parroting the communist regime’s own propaganda talking points even as lots of mainstream Democrats—like Rep. Gregory Meeks—are using the protests as an opportunity to call on the U.S. to end sanctions.

So why are they doing it?

Some of the radicals truly believe America is to blame. For others, it’s a political calculation. “There’s a concern by some in the party that if we condemn what happens in Cuba that we’re somehow making a moral judgment on the most progressive elements of our party who have described themselves as Democratic socialists,” z, a former Democratic state representative who is the son of exiles, told Caputo. “That concern about offending certain progressive elements in the party is why you see statements of the kind from the likes of Congressman Meeks.”

Squeezing Biden and the Democrats from the other direction, many Floridians are emotionally invested in these Cuban protests. “‘Where is Biden? Where is Biden,’ shouted Cuban-American demonstrators Tuesday in Tampa,” according to the Miami Herald.

This isn’t just a few protesters who can be easily ignored. There’s a good argument to be made that Elian Gonzalez defeated Al Gore in 2000. Since that time, though, Democrats talked themselves into the notion that Florida had changed, that Cuban Americans weren’t as important a slice of the Florida Hispanic community as they once were, and that younger Cuban Americans have different political sensibilities. Just as 2016 shattered notions about the “coalition of the ascendant,” meaning they could ignore working-class whites, this assumption about Cuban Americans seems premature at best.

A lot of emphasis has been put on Biden saying the right things, but while a Democratic president and party expressing solidarity with the protesters is helpful, it is not sufficient. The real test is action. One obvious thing America should do is open our doors to Cuban refugees, yet the Biden administration is warning that “if you take to the sea, you will not come to the United States.” Would the Biden administration really turn away Cubans fleeing persecution, and risk the political fallout that could entail? We may find out.

A more helpful and proactive idea comes from Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is now calling on Biden to help restore Cuba’s internet access, which has been blockaded by the regime; this action alone would be instrumental in helping protest organizers and allowing the world to see any retribution. On Thursday, Biden gave a nod in this direction, saying: “We’re considering whether we have the technological ability to reinstate that access.”

Will Biden answer the call? His decision will have both moral and political implications. The stakes are high.

As Miami Herald columnist Fabiola Santiago puts it, “Before Trump, Cuban Americans twice voted for Obama. If Democrats bungle the bloodshed in Cuba, they will forfeit Cuban-American voters forever—and they will deserve it.”

I’m highly disappointed this article failed to touch on the effect these missions have had on the current state of affairs in Cuba. I firmly believe they are awakening the people.; I’ve seen it first hand. Oh and bear in mind they have yet to taste a Big Mac or a  Coke LOL. Is anymore wondering why Joey the puppet doesn’t want Cuban immigrants entering the U.S.? Who would they vote for? Go figure. 

In sum, Cuba is a country stuck in the 20th Century (1900’s), with a little 21st Century mixed in (2000’s), and a very small touch of the 22nd Century (2100’s). The more these missions provide of the  latter two centuries, the worse it’s going to get for the government.

Our Taxi.  By the way, he had a cell phone.

Originally posted 2021-07-17 16:11:27.

Current Events

Immigration – AGAIN!

Oaky, here we go again with the immigration issue. What’s the issue? Well, to begin, we don’t have an immigration policy in this country. Oh, forgive me, yes we do have a system, but can anyone tell me exactly what that system is? I am sure we all know immigrants who applied through the “system”  and took them years to be vetted and eventually allowed to become an American citizen. 

But the “system” we have today is based solely on political leanings. Mexicans at our southern border will eventually become democrats,. Come on, you know it, everybody knows it, especially since the creatures in the swamp will kowtow to their every needs, provide them with all sorts of benefits paid for by you and me. So why would they not vote for those who accepted them? They surely would not vote for those of us who try our best to keep the interlopers out! Agreed?

Okay, so know what about Cuban immigrants. Which way would they lean? Ahh, now we see a different set of immigrants and a different “system.” So, does it not surprise anyone that the douchebag in charge, who by the way, happens to be a Cuban immigrant himself said they will not be allowed ashore in America. 

This whole immigration thing is laughable and very simple. If you lean left come on in, if you lean right. get the hell out of here.

About this thing called immigration

by bunkerville

US immigration is unnecessarily complex. It has evolved into a patently unfair system to everyone who enters the system honestly and with good intent — who seeks lawful admission.  It favors those who skip ahead of everyone else and go to the head of the line.  US officials created this problem; illegal invaders only take advantage of an opportunity handed to them by political leaders who are either nefarious in their intent or incompetent.  You know, people like Biden/Harris whom the American people overwhelmingly elected. If our immigration system is broken, then we broke it.

This must change.  No one has a right to come here, but if immigrants knock on our door, it must be in accordance with our laws and procedures.  Yes, we need a border wall, but we also need a commitment to our immigration system.  No one must come here by cutting in front of the line.  No one must come here who cannot contribute to the American economy, who will not embrace American values, and who will not assimilate American society.  No “child” must come here without their mother or father.

There is no question that the United States of America is the best place on the planet to live, but does that mean that everyone who lives in a nation less vibrant than our own has a case for political asylum?  If everyone who lives in a country ruled by petty dictators or religious despots has an asylum claim, then literally two-thirds of the world’s population will soon show up at our door.  There ARE limits, after all, to the number of immigrants our economy can support.  People who do not/will not speak our language, who are not educationally prepared for the challenges of our economy, and who know less about our values than they do about speaking in English simply do not have a realistic expectation of success.  Note: most Latin Americans are illiterate in their own language. At some point, we must acknowledge that there are (pragmatically) limited opportunities for goat-herders-turned taxi drivers in Newark.

Although with that said, from a historical point of view, the cultural differences between Spanish and Anglo immigrants could not be more unambiguous.  I can readily see why Democrats are anxious to accept tens of thousands of Latinos as potential citizens: they are far more inclined to do whatever the government tells them than people of British stock. It also occurs to me that for every individual who runs away from their own country, whatever those conditions are, there is one less person available to fight for meaningful change in the land of their birth and cultural heritage.

Secretary Mallorcus told us that Cubans must not be allowed to come to the United States.  Shouldn’t this standard apply to every immigrant who is trying to jump ahead in line or who files a frivolous petition for asylum?  Should we return all such people to their home country (or, as he suggested, a third country) until US officials process their claim in an orderly fashion?  Note: I’m not sure how French-speaking Haiti would be a good fit for immigrants from Guatemala, but that was his idea, not mine.  I suspect there are few Spanish-speaking countries in the Americas willing to accept Guatemala’s problems.  Nor should we.  What we observe unfolding along our southern borders is only a “humanitarian crisis” because we’ve made it into one.

Sending people back to their home country for processing reinforces the traditional process of putting the names of people hoping to immigrate to the US on a waiting list, which is the only way we have of properly vetting applicants for admission to the United States.  There is an exception to every rule, of course, but exception must not become the rule.  We must maintain an orderly process of immigration.

Notice that tens of thousands of people, having spent their entire lives living in a communist/socialist country, suddenly appear on our southern border demanding entry to a country in which half of the population can support a communist/socialist administration.  Is this not an example of politically compliant people trying to leap from a frying pan into a fire?  I find the whole situation very odd, and I wonder why we Americans think we need more communists in our country rather than fewer.

Mustang also blogs at Fix Bayonets and Thoughts From Afar

Originally posted 2021-07-16 11:48:32.

Current Events

End of Critical Race Theory

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From the American Thinker. Lord, I pray he is correct!

 

By Gamaliel Isaac
July 11, 2021

Critical Race Theory is liable to end for reasons very similar to the reasons the Salem witch trials ended.

In January 1692, nine-year-old Elizabeth (Betty) Parris and 11-year-old Abigail Williams (the daughter and niece of Samuel Parris, minister of Salem Village) began having fits, including violent contortions and uncontrollable outbursts of screaming. After a local doctor, William Griggs, diagnosed bewitchment, other young girls in the community began to exhibit similar symptoms.

A special court, the court of Oyer and Terminer convened in Salem to hear the cases; and based on spectral evidence the first convicted witch, Bridget Bishop, was hanged that June. Eighteen others followed Bishop to Salem’s Gallows Hill, while some 150 more men, women, and children were accused over the next several months.

Opposition to the trials grew as the family and friends of more and more villagers were accused of witchcraft, including the wife of Governor William Phips.  Governor Phips saved his wife by dissolving the Court of Oyer and Terminer and moving all trials to a higher court. This superior court did not allow “spectral evidence” and, since most of the earlier accused witches had been executed due to this evidence, any remaining witches were all ruled innocent.

The tide is turning against Critical Race Theory as those who endorse it become its victims.  Most teachers and staff of New York schools went along with the CRT craze, because they were afraid they would lose their jobs if they spoke out against it.  In fact even George Davison, the headmaster of New York’s Grace Church school that teaches CRT did not dare admit that he had said in a private conversation with Paul Rossi, a teacher at his school, that “we’re demonizing kids, we’re demonizing white people for being born.”  Instead, Davison accused Rossi of misquoting him.  Rossi released an audio recording proving his account was accurate after which Mr. Davison, perhaps with some persuasion from his school, decided to retire.

As is well known, revolutions eat their early supporters.  Appeasing the CRT crusaders may protect the jobs of teachers and staff in the short term, but in the long term, CRT will destroy them.  That is because the goal of the CRT crusaders is equity and achieving equity requires that the jobs whites have be transferred to people of color.

Teachers in the New York High School of Public Service experienced this directly after principal Paula Lev said she was going to get rid of white teachers and fired one of them.  According to the New York Post, the teachers had overwhelmingly supported anti-racism and equity.  These same teachers became its predictable victims.  Prior to this the faculty had no problem teaching Critical Race Theory and dividing the school by race.  Belatedly according to the Post, the faculty is rebelling, charging in a vote of no-confidence that Lev has “flagrantly but unsuccessfully attempted to divide our school by race.”

As more and more white workers find that their allegiance to equity and anti-racism is no protection, the day grows closer to when Critical Race Theory will go the way of the Salem Witch Trials.  The best way to hasten that day is for maximum publicity to be accorded the fate of those who appease the CRT revolution in vain.

Wake up America!!

Originally posted 2021-07-12 15:44:25.

Current Events

Supreme Strikeout

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Good day Folks. Before I talk about today’s post allow me to admit to a gross screwup. I posted earlier in the week an oath I believed  was the commissioning oath at USMA. However, had I done my due diligence, I would have discovered it was the Oath of Admissions given to newly joined cadets. Therefore, I removed it. I apologize profusely as I should have done my research as I always do, but failed to this time. I shall not do so again. That is my literary  responsibility.

However, even though it was their admissions oath, I still take exception to its wording. It is very telling about what the USMA plans to teach these young sponges.  If you goggle it and listen to it carefully, I suspect you will find it “strange” to whom they are pledging allegiance.

Now to the post. Once again Greg comes through with a barn burner. Makes me wonder why we even have a Supreme Court if they cannot answer the mail in a manner that solves the issues instead of leaving them open to further interpretation and litigation. Roberts has always been and continues to be a weak Justice in my book. He was appointed by the young Bush.

By Greg Maresca

Supreme Court decisions are national news but a 9-0 decision in today’s world of partisan politics is an anomaly. Fulton v. City of Philadelphia was based on discrimination of the Free Exercise Clause of the Constitution’s First Amendment and although unanimous, religious liberty still hangs in the balance.

In 2018, despite a critical need for foster families, the city of Philadelphia prohibited Catholic Social Services (CSS) from providing foster care. CSS had been at it for over two centuries long before fostering was a government service. Holding fast to Catholic moral teaching, CSS excluded gay couples from participating. Moreover, CSS will not place children with unmarried heterosexual couples either.

The kicker is no gay couple has ever asked CSS for foster service because 27 other organizations throughout Philadelphia already do. As other Philadelphia foster care Christian ministries surrendered to the city’s demands, CSS chose to fight claiming their First Amendment rights were violated.

CSS lost at the Third Circuit but were vindicated last month by the Supreme Court.  All nine justices agreed Philadelphia violated the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment.

Chief Justice John Roberts wrote CSS’s work is not “public accommodation,” since “certification as a foster parent . . . is not readily accessible to the public.” Philadelphia’s fault was not in excluding a ministry that follows biblical morality, but not considering it to be “public accommodation.”

Herein lies the crux of the issue.

Justices Thomas, Alito and Gorsuch panned the vulnerability of Robert’s words since it fails to answer the greater question of religious liberty protections for Christian ministries. All three justices are constitutional originalists.

Roberts has routinely sought unanimous consent while deciding on specifics and diluting principle. Such jurisprudence only guarantees future litigation. Roberts is so bound to legal precedent that writing clearly on Constitutional matters is nearly impossible. His fear of originalist context would rule Dred Scott as still relevant.

This is what morally confused thinking produces.

There is much to be said for distinct moral clarity when laws are written and adjudicated.

The powers that be are too willing to compromise on principle to make it appear fair to both sides. Eventually, there will be no principles left worth defending.

Roberts is arguably one of the weakest chief justices in the court’s history.

The unanimous ruling has little significance, as Alito wrote, “This decision might as well be written on the dissolving paper sold in magic shops. The City has been adamant about pressuring CSS to give in, and if the City wants to get around today’s decision, it can simply eliminate the never-used exemption power. The Court has emitted a wisp of a decision that leaves religious liberty in a confused and vulnerable state.” In its future dealings in foster contracts, Alito asks, “What if it simply deletes the exemption clause? Voilà,” Alito writes, “today’s decision will vanish, and the parties will be back where they started.”

The Court has once again struck a glancing blow for religious liberty rather than establishing a rock-solid precedent.

Just last week the court refused to hear Arlene’s Flowers, Inc. vs. Washington, another case where fighting for one’s religious liberty ends without justice while damaging one’s livelihood. Colorado baker Jack Phillips is still a target after he won his Supreme Court case and the Little Sisters of the Poor have had to make two court appearances.

Given the left’s enmity to religious liberty, the nation is in desperate need of a Supreme Court that must boldly defend it.

How pathetic that any of these cases had to petition the Supreme Court, let alone make a trip to court at all.  Throughout this litigation, the charitable works of CSS were partially derailed hurting the very people the leftists in Philadelphia claim to care about.

How many times does the Supreme Court have to decide in favor of the religious before the harassment ends?

The Supreme Court whiffed a grand opportunity to protect religious liberty more convincingly.

Here’s hoping they will not miss the next one because there will be a next one.

Such proceedings only underscore how our ultimate trust lies not with the Supreme Court, the Congress, or who sits in the Oval Office, but in Divine Providence.

Amen

 

Originally posted 2021-07-08 16:12:42.

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