The In$ide $tory Of Handing Over Our Pen$ion$ To Wall $treet.

Because Social Security is getting cut down, you choose to put your money in an IRA…  Since doing percents are easy with amounts starting with a one and ending in zeros, let us assume you choose to put $100,000 in an IRA for 20 years…. The Wall Street firm will charge you 2%. You think, $100,000?  2%, ok … $2,000 over 20 years that’s nothing.. I’ll still have 98% plus interest over 20 years…

You think?  This is Wall $treet we’re talking about……

So take this interest compounding calculator. … Seriously, you need to do this.  Right click it into a new tab  so your computer doesn’t have to download flipping back and forth….

Add $100,000 as principle.   No new additions on the first round.  Time Frame: 20 years. For the interest rate put in negative 2. Since you are going to be receiving only 98% of your earnings on a yearly basis, a negative 2 works better than having to do the extra step latter and subtracting two totals.

Hit total…  At 2% compounded off that $100,000 you originally placed,… after commissions all you will have left is $66,760… Wall $treet takes 1/3 of what you earn…..

Not convinced?  Let’s go a different way.  Let’s say you will average 7% increases with a 2% commission… We’ll do it in two steps.  We will use the calculator to figure out what we would have earned at 7%, and again, what we would have earned at 5%.  We will subtract the two to see how much Wall $treet is taking out from your future…

At 7% increases we would have earned $386,968 over 20 years with no additions after the initial deposit.  At 5% increases our total maxes out at $265,329.   That 2% costs us…..$121,639 dollars…. The same 1/3  as above….

The argument can be made that since we agreed to it in the beginning and never got it, the commissions really doesn’t cost us anything.  But if we change the wording so we say that it costs us $121,599 in “potential earnings” that clears that hurdle and if probably a more truthful line..  But there is no question …. these calculations show us how much Wall $treet intends to make when our retirements go their way instead of coming through Social Security….

We now remember why Franklin D. Roosevelt went with Social Security in the first place.  Those who saved across all their lives, can not afford to live after they stopped working.

Sweeney Smokes Crack A Second Time In Blindly Following Corporate Education’s Assesments

Remember Sweeney?  That character who was lampooned across the nation for his nonfactual support of Kinder-Morgan’s taking over our port?   Instead of being objective, his editorial board pieces are that of a pinch hitter for an administration again caught on the wrong side of an issue!  Remember the jokes? The aside comments that he has lost his touch?  Remember all the snide references that he must be on crack?

It is to those references (sincerely I doubt he does crack) and the acknowledgement that in popular culture today that phrase is often applied to everyone who tries to reform facts into a fairy tales, that I attached his name to it in the title…

In Sweeney’s defense through the manipulation of language, one can say anything.  Granted.  Romney certainly tried that tact. And the truth came out to hurt him.  ”Jeeps in China”, my ass. “Benghazi was all Obama’s fault”, my ass.

So as old as Sweeney is, (he seems to mean well ), the facts he uses are simply not true…  If you put bad in, you get bad out.  Now if I were an aged,old authority figure, and if you were deemed childlikely to accept what I say is true, … I can tell you about a jovial man living at the North Pole, who has nine reindeer that fly and travels the world in one night delivering presents to every boy and girl in the world,… and of course you are going to look up at me with wide big eyes and go “wow, so that is how its done…”.

Alas, poor Sweeney, he doesn’t have the same beguiling audience.  Instead we have facts that show the opposite….

One of the facts WE the People have, is that the tests results coming from districts using this plan that show great results, were all obtained through cheating by high officials changing the answers over to correct ones after the students had taken them.

Two:  teachers under this system are spending too much time explaining to their superiors everything they do in order to be evaluated,  instead of teaching.  More time is spent in evaluation, than on lesson plans.  This hurts teacher. This hurts student.

Three: the curriculum being forced upon these classrooms is far inferior to what teachers themselves are able to dole out.  Education only works when a student’s interest is held.   These corporate templates are as interesting as your corporate financial  meetings.  Teachers do a much better job.

Four: low income students don’t have technology the rest of us take for granted.  Broadband costs money. Computer power costs money. Software costs money. Laptops cost money. Notebooks cost money.  The best way to raise low income students scores is to put them on par with students who have technology.  You can’t just tell someone how to log in and expect them to remember it whenever they next  see a computer.  They have to do so to learn how.

Five.  Testing at the beginning, the middle, and the end, is a great tool.  It evaluates a student’s progress over time.  BUT!  Holding a teachers job accountable to results over which they have absolutely no control, means…  a) all teaching by that teacher is geared to only what will be on that test… and b) since poor scores demand the loss of one’s livelihood,  rampant cheating is bound to occur…. We saw this in Atlanta, Texas, and DC.

Six.  The only proven and effective way to improve teaching, is to increase the number of teachers so there are 11 students per teacher.  Teaching is a personal science, like counseling, psychology, and doctor’s visits.  Without a personal relationship between teacher and student, there is no incentive to learn.  Studies as well as our personal experience, show that if we aren’t psyched to learn, we don’t….

Seven.  The students who do the poorest are the ones who have the largest social dishevel in their lives.  A person from this background can learn from a teacher just as easily as anyone else, if he believes the teacher is pulling for them, and they don’t want to let that teacher or their peers down.  That can and does  happen with a 11-1 ratio…

Eight.  Teachers DO NOT GO  into teaching to get rich.  They go to help children learn.  If you don’t know this, you have no human right to ever write another editorial on education.  That is just plain stupid not to know.  If you want to motivate teachers, the best way is to give them MORE resources with which to teach….  More maps, more books, more software, anything to provide more excitement to their classrooms.

Nine.  We all incorporate what we learn, into the categories we already have inside our heads.  Being an inner city child with no mother (on crack), no father (never knew him), living with grandma (forgets who I am sometimes), dodging getting beaten up by the drug lords every time you walk home from the bus to porch (its safe in the morning; they’re still asleep), disappearing when the molesting uncles happen to drop by, … reading about Sally having to choose between buying a candy bar or putting  all her cents into a piggy bank, doesn’t cut it.  You’d think Goldman-Sachs created the curriculum (they paid for it)…

Enough background…..  At least you know Sweeney is on metaphorical crack  just like he was with Kinder Morgan. (Panama Canal ships sailing up the Delaware, Sheesh)….

The heart of the matter lies in the News Journal’s phrase….Teachers that have earned highly-qualified credentials..

One would think that having a master’s degree or a doctor’s degree in education would qualify…  But no. Mr. Sweeney, it does not.  Mind if  WE, the People interrupt for a second to ask  if you happen to have a masters degree?  A doctor’s degree?  Is it in education?  No?  So, tell us again,  what makes you such an expert can we ask?  We, the People are dying to know.

Now get this.  To be one of these  ”teachers that have earned highly-qualified credentials”  you have to first have attended a corporate seminar, one from a pandering company to which the state paid $180 dollars a person; you have to sit through 6 hours of power-point presentations; your  know-it-all instructor was just hired out of college by this corporation, and they proceed to tell you everything ever known about teaching without ever having been in a classroom. After this, you then take a test, having been given the answers ahead of time by clues of where the instructor casually says “this will be on the test”, and then, if you passed, you get a certificate saying you are a teacher with highly-qualified credentials.  Just like that.   You are now a highly qualified credential teacher; so who needs a masters, who needs a doctorate, who needs to read a stinkin’ Gannett publication? You got all the knowledge anyone ever needs to know.  You got a certificate that cost the state $180 dollars!….  You are now, eligible for a bonus… (if we (the DOE)  like you enough we choose to give it to you…

So if there are 8640 public school teachers in Delaware, at a cost of $180 per teacher, over time this company that originated out of nowhere, helps itself to $1.5 million dollars of our annual budget…   Now, not counting for the printing I can buy 8,000 sheets of  8 X 11  pieces of  24 lb. paper for around $71 dollars at Wal*Mart.  It would only take 20 sheafs of printer paper.   So to dole out $71-80 worth of pieces of paper printed with the words “Congratulations, You Are Certified“, our state is investing $1.5 million of your dollars… Why?  Can you say umm … kickback?  Personal favor?  Thanks for all you did back then?

In case one hasn’t been paying attention to the educational field, one would know that in the Christina district primarily due to our economy there are very few vacancies open from year to year.  One would also know, that in the  Christina district we have really good teachers practically in every classroom, who do better than the job that is expected except when they have to pull themselves away to do RTTT paperwork and explain to their evaluators how they are reinventing the wheel of teaching, or are on a pilot program teaching the Common Core agenda and cannot deviate.

So the Christina Board says this is ridiculous.  The Christina Board recognizes that teachers with a lifetime of experience, with masters and doctors degrees, know more about education then some punk out of college who passes the corporate litmus test.  After all, one would think, right?

The DSEA representing ALL THE TEACHERS IN DELAWARE,  and the Christina Education Association are fully backing the Christina Board on this.  As stated, teachers primarily want to teach.  This state program is very, very bad for teaching….  Although Mr. Sweeney might think otherwise, what teachers think, matters.  Especially if they are the ones teaching our kids.

Teachers are our most valuable resource as a society.  They are more important than our President.  They are more important than our Governor.  They are more important than any Mark Murphy or Lillian Lowery.  They are more important than the head of Goldman Sachs.  What?  You scoff?

Tell me, Mr. Sweeney?  When you look in the mirror in the morning… what president do you thank for making you who you are?   “Aww… Richard Nixon… Thank you so much for your leadership which was soooo inspiring, it made want to be like you…. I’m eternally grateful for all you did to inspire me, coach me, teach me, and give the the building blocks to make me as I am”   But sincerely, like all of us, I would damn well bet that somewhere in your growing up, there was one teacher or two, who is responsible for everything you’ve become.

In the book of We, the People … that teacher out ranks any governmental official…. any day…

I’ll close with an analogy to a story told long ago…  A woman was brought before Jesus accused of adultery.  They asked what should be done to her.  Jesus asked who was condemning her… knowing they too would be guilty of adultery if they admitted.  They left.  Jesus asked her, “who has condemned you?”  She looks around, and says ” no one Sir.”   “Then neither will I condemn you.  Arise, Go, and sin no more…”

It would be wise for Mr. Sweeney to remember this, before he goes writing his next editorial condemning the wrong people………..

Victimized By the Media Circus……

I just watched a video over at DelawarePolitics.Net on gun control.  The panel was composed of people I’d seen on television across the range of my life, both as adult and child…

Every one had an opinion… and on cue they gave it.   Funny thing for me, was that over the course of my life, had at intervals you’d picked me out and placed me in those chairs,  I too could have argued eloquently for each of those peoples positions…

But the thing is, I evolved.   Something these talking heads do not seem to do…  Can this be humanly possible?  Or is it a telling sign that we are getting played?….

And why when we were growing up, it was young men arguing around the table in black and white, and now it is the same men now old, arguing the exact same things in digital high definition,  around a similar table?   Where are today’s young people?  I certainly respect wisdom, and a wise person would say that what was good in the past ie. listening to our young, should be just as good in our present….

Which brings up the same question.  Are we getting played?

Is the reason we have the same people because they can be counted on by now, not to evolve?   Walter Cronkite shook the world when he surprised everyone and sided with the “hippies’” against throwing our children’s lives based on a lottery into the jungles of southeast Asia….  Heaven help corporate America were a top CNBC analyst to came out that raising taxes on our wealthy would do four times more good than the harm it purportedly is supposed to cause.

Better to stick to today’s  “old man” who has been saying the same thing ever since Reagan was president… just that he wasn’t old back then….

People do evolve.  And whereas we have lived through the conservative’s dream world going on 13 years now, it has not yet worked and it is getting old.  But it is only on the fringe of society where the truth is actually being told, and yet, that voice never gets on a show…  Never.  Instead it is…. “what’s that old guy’s name?  Yeah, him.  Let’s see if we can get him on.”

Is this inertia, or just laziness stemming from not wanting to use one’s brain too early in the morning?   Or are we manipulatively getting played into thinking we are seeing something live and on the cutting edge, but instead it has been scripted for years…

The premise of the movie Hunger Games is that the spectacle of children killing each other is played out on public TV to preoccupy the enslaved societies and distract them from the reality of their condition.   In the movie unknown to all the viewers,  the entire event is scripted by technocrats who choose the winners and losers and get to control the environment within the game that can make or break them….

A winner emerges eventually as planned, unless of course, they outsmart the controllers and do something completely unforeseen, capturing the title away from what was to take place.

In the movie, the populations all think they are watching reality TV.  Except it is not real.  It is a show, scripted for a finale that captures the viewers attention like every “reality” show written for the screen today….

So are we likewise being played?

There comes a time when it becomes obvious.   On guns now is one of those times.  92% of Americans want gun laws toughened…..  92%.   Yet on every media, and in Congressional reports, we are told it is neck and neck and that gun control is losing to the NRA….

Yet 92% of Americans prefer gun control… yet we are being told that gun control is losing to the NRA even though 92% of Americans support gun control and don’t want it to succumb to the NRA…. 92%.

In the real world, this would not be happening.  Instead, 9 panelists would be arguing for gun control, and one stalwart, would be arguing against it…  9 to 1…..  But nowhere do we see the real world portrayed.  It is not on TV.  It is not on the internet.  It is certainly not in Congress….

Why don’t they portray the real world?

Because Newtown wasn’t supposed to happen.  We were not supposed to want, at a level of 92%,  responsible gun control…

In Delaware we had something similar now going on 5 years ago.   92% of Delaware wanted off shore wind… 92%…  Four people in General Assembly opposed.   Tony DeLuca, Thurman Adams, Charlie Copeland, and Harris McDowell…  All for selfish reasons.   These four, now gone (not all dead), tried every trick to turn the tables on that tide of 92% of Delaware that wanted offshore wind off  the coast of Rehoboth Beach….   I remember that time well.  We were definitely played with false information, lies, fabricated reports, buried legislation,  and a willing News Journal that went along with everything the “four horsemen” said.

But the one thing they could never get around….  was that 92% of Delaware’s population wanted the benefits of offshore wind…..

Due to persistence, the tide turned, and the 92% won….

We are definitely being played.  There are good people from Newtown, Connecticut  now in Washington DC, arguing their cases for gun control in a virtual media silence.

We at home, turn on our TV and see gun control getting beaten up by the NRA…

The 92% are getting played…..

Breaking: Benghazi/Petreaus Downfall Was A Set Up

• In case you are waking up, you won’t get this story until noon.

The Daily Mail London just opened a can of worms on Benghazi….

Breaking News: The Daily Mail is reporting from inside sources that General Petreaus and the Ambassador Stevens were not informed that parts of the CIA had one day before, attacked the very same group of Libyan insurgents who returned the next day to attack at Benghazi. Furthermore, the Petreaus scandal was orchestrated by a rogue element of the CIA itself(7th floor) who were the ones behind the pushing of the FBI into investigating General Petreaus bedside manners.. (remember that fishiness of how the rogue FBI agent kept pushing his superiors? It makes sense now.)

Now get this. The same John Brennan who just testified to become the next CIA director, was who ordered the clandestine attacks the night before and who did not brief Petreaus, or the official side of the CIA, that they had done so.

So not only are Republicans completely wrong on Benghazi, they are now laughingstocks for every single word they said about it….

• We did know about the security threat.
• We did do something about it.
• We didn’t tell Obama, Clinton, Panetta, or Petreaus.
• All were in the dark, not to propagate deceit, but because they had no idea….

Every Republican needs to apologize to every Democrat starting now by getting down on their knees, and bowing their head to the ground in supplication… (Dick Morris can lick our toes).

One always fails if they bluster against competent people when all they have is their own hot air.  That’s why good Democrats always win over bad Republicans.

…And The Vortex Over The Arctic… Was Rent In Two.

January 1-3

January 11-13

I getting a bad feeling about this. Who can tell us? What’s this mean?

Btw. There is a monster hurricane approaching Alaska with a low of 943mb. Category 4 if it were an actual hurricane. It is so huge it would stretch from the East Coast of the US to Denver.

Romney Staffer Admits: Television Reality Show “Storage Wars” Inspiration for Campaign Tactics

Courtesy of A&E’s Storage Wars

Now along with the binder’s flap, a staffer on Romney’s team used the Storage Wars themed show to describe Romney’s economic plan….

In this show, bidders get a minute to look at a storage locker, and then bid on its contents, mostly unseen. Sometimes they get lucky. Usually the hit nothing but dirt…. sometimes spectacularly.

But its the idea that we gamble on not knowing , simply making a bet that we don’t know how it will work out.

Only problem is, we tried that once. His name was George W. Bush.

Doesn’t it make more sense to put our faith into something that IS working, and tweak it a little so it works a little faster, than throw away all this progress and put our bet on something we have no idea of what we will soon be getting?

Liberal Media Slams Mitt Romney As Incompetent……

I’ll let others speak for me here….

 

Peggy Noonan:  Wall Street Journal. 

“It’s time to admit the Romney campaign is an incompetent one. It’s not big, it’s not brave, it’s not thoughtfully tackling great issues. It’s always been too small for the moment. All the activists, party supporters and big donors should be pushing for change. People want to focus on who at the top is least constructive and most responsible. Fine, but Mitt Romney is no puppet: He chooses who to listen to. An intervention is in order. ‘Mitt, this isn’t working.’”

 

David Brooks:  New York Times.

“Romney, who criticizes President Obama for dividing the nation, divided the nation into two groups: the makers and the moochers… The Republican Party, and apparently Mitt Romney, too, has shifted over toward a much more hyperindividualistic and atomistic social view – from the Reaganesque language of common citizenship to the libertarian language of makers and takers… He’s running a depressingly inept presidential campaign.”

 

Billy Kristol:  The Daily Standard

“It’s worth recalling that a good chunk of the 47 percent who don’t pay income taxes are Romney supporters—especially of course seniors… as well as many lower-income Americans (including men and women serving in the military) who think conservative policies are better for the country even if they’re not getting a tax cut under the Romney plan. So Romney seems to have contempt not just for the Democrats who oppose him, but for tens of millions who intend to vote for him.”

 

Matt Miller:  Washington Post

“Those in the 47 percent who aren’t seniors or veterans are mostly poor workers whose payroll taxes, at 15.3 percent (since the employer side of the tax effectively comes out of workers’ wages), leaves them taxed at a higher rate than was Mitt Romney on his $20 million income last year… To be so insultingly tone deaf and self-destructive even while being dead wrong and hypocritical on the substance is a perverse sort of accomplishment. It’s not easy to be this bad.”

 

Dick Morris:  Fox News

 

“There is no sin greater in a presidential race than telling the truth. Romney is being excoriated for accurately describing the situation in America today. Painting with broad strokes will do many individuals an injustice. But the fact remains that our electorate is basically bifurcated into those who pay taxes and those who receive benefits… Why do so many people feel Romney will be better at improving the economy and yet still plan to vote for Obama? The answer is that they care more about preserving their entitlements than about improving the economy.”

 

DelawarePolitics.net 

In the voice of the Republican Party, there is not one mention of Mitt Romney in any article on their front page, going all the way back to Sept. 7th.  Like they are embarrassed about him or something….

 

If everyone hates him, why would anyone in their right mind want to vote for him?

 

 

Hey Romney! Walk Like An Egyptian….

As usual… when you tie a cow bone to a string, and a string to a used broom handle, and then, dangle that string before an American Reporter…  they jump up and down like Pomeranians…. “yip, yip, yip”…  hind leg dance…. “yip, yip, yip”.

99.0% of American news media coverage is focused on Romney the man.   And with an election approaching it is probably safe to attribute that to human nature…  Even I was  sucked in for a while.  But being an election year, that makes it rather hard for our government (yes it is still intact) to rectify its newest foreign relations problem, the  Arab Inflammation as it is now beginning to be called….

Since the more intelligent of our species tend to browse these pages, lets investigate the history, and delve into both short and long term solutions.   This may be long.

No matter what the crises,  and no matter at what level, there are some elements of truth that remain consistent.  Lack of communication always creates problems; it never solves anything.  Are you divorced?  Could be perhaps that better communication might  have prevented it?  Are you fired?  Could be perhaps that better communication might  have prevented it?  Are you in competition at work over something?  Gee, wouldn’t all being on the same team working together be much better?

In fact, most wars are started over misunderstandings.  The only truly reasonable excuse for starting a war, is…. “you have something I want, and I’m taking it by force”; and the other side’s response is… “over my dead body….”

That is one,  boiled-down reason for starting a war.

Every other excuse is superfluous.  It doesn’t  mean we don’t sometimes go to war for superfluous reasons…  But all those silly reasons can somehow be twisted back to that maxim mentioned above:   “You have something I want, (___________), and you won’t give it up unless I force you, It.. is.. on….”

There is one more thing to keep in mind.  A lot, a lot, a lot of people make a lot of money when there is fighting going on…  Therefore even in very peaceful times, you will hear made-up reasons as to why we should go to war…   They are created around boardroom tables,  they are fed to gullible people, then those people are whipped up by whips, and the leaders have no choice but attend to their follower’s needs or get replaced….   Some of those:

Pride, Prestige, Patriotism, Patrimony, Alliances, Reputation, Religion,  and Idiocy, all get exploited to further the economic gains of those few involved in producing war’s items.

This movie now at the epicenter of global outrage is a case in point.  Have you ever noticed how these hate religions now popping up in the USA preaching  hate, and have no sense of decency (as in protesting at military funerals) are always boasting they were founded by “former Marines”?  Steve Klein who produced this latest clip, is no exception.  Whether true or not, he is definitely boasting it.

Now, we all know someone who is a man of the cloth.  Some of us  are lucky enough to know many from across a very wide religious spectrum.  Not just the European religions, but those also spread across other continents and yes, sub-continents.  No matter what the name of the God is, to which they pay reverence, in every form of a religion there are consistently two types of preachers.  Those who are there for themselves; versus those who are there to help others.  No religion is immune; no religion just has only one side.

Therefore, something like this hate group, which only does have one side, fails the test of all religion.  How does or will it’s philosophy make all people better?   How could any religion that you know,  show sodomy of young children? Really?  How could any religion that you know, show cunnilingus?  Really?  As a religious person, you might at some point in your life have to allude to it, but actually show it?  It goes against your own core.   Even if you were using those scenes to put down someone else or describe evil,  as long as you had any religious bone in your body, you couldn’t do that.  Just couldn’t.  You would be worried about your own life in the hereafter.

So who could?

Is it just me, or did anyone else notice that all the acts portrayed in this movie were the exact same ones used at Abu Ghraib  in Iraq by our counter-intelligence staff as forms of torture?   Women’s periods, homosexuality, child molestation, cunnilingus, sexual arousal, falsifying  the Prophet…. Someone from that environment has a history of knowing exactly what hot buttons these are to Islam’s believers.  And I bet, they could even rank them in order of effect.  Someone from that environment who has perfected that technique upon individuals,  who has crafted the technique to elicit the desired responses, has now for whatever reason, chosen to use a broader medium, Youtube,  to foist that  knowledge upon 1/7 th of the world’s population.

It is pretty obvious to all, that this film’s raison d’etre comes from some intelligence or military network, and the easiest way to mask those origins is the time-honored way of using the untraceable networks in religion.

And from those of us who know people, (you know, like that sixth sense of when you walk into your home, and something has been done, you know who did it because you know they are the only one whose framework is wired as such that they could think of it?)  the one place on earth where you are guaranteed to find people who would see no qualms with using anything in this film to achieve their end, and who also would profit from a holy war involving West versus East,  is Arlington, Fairfax County, Virginia.  Incidentally (for those of you outside the Beltway) that is the home of the Pentagon and the headquarters of what a really good man, Eisenhower, once called the ” growing military-industrial complex.”  That is where the focal point of finding who is behind this, by the investigations of the fourth estate,  by he next wave of investigative hard copies for sale at Barnes & Noble, should be aimed.   Weird, fake, made-up  religious groups are just the patsy. They don’t make a penny if we suddenly go to war.

But to return the focus,  why the Arab violence over some really dumb film made by someone supposedly in California that surfaced and we didn’t even know about it,…  create such a fracas?  And can any of it be blamed upon any administration?

To understand the answer, there is one important thing you have to understand about Arab governments.  They killed all the liberals off a long time ago.  As autocratic powers,  anyone who challenged their religious government or was thought to one day possibly have the future presumption to challenge the religious government in the future, was made to disappear.   There are no liberals to provide a balance in Arab populations.   To even imagine what that is like as an intellectual exercise, imagine a society where there were no Democrats to say, “hey, that is not right!”  Imagine an America ruled by only Republicans headed by the Tea Party.  Give all the money to the wealthy?  No problem.  Take all the money from the middle class?  No Problem.  Instigate wars and draft and send the middle class out to fight them?  No problem.  Cut your benefits because you don’t worship our God?  No Problem.

Arab countries have what we consider as our center, anchoring the left end, and the caliphate anchoring the right.  In that environment it is easy to see, that the middle, is one who conforms with the caliphate, but provides a little balance against them by nuancing the edges.

Both Ronald Reagan and Romney would be too liberal to govern Egypt today.  Paul Ryan would be about right in the center.

Against this, no leader can go against the Caliphate.  It will take the development of a large cadre of liberals to rebalanced the power structure of every Arab nation, in order to deal with them in a rational and secular method….

It is to that development that the American foreign policy needs to point.   The very fact that America itself  has as large liberal population, speaks solidly that a free environment, wisdom tends to flourish and rise to the top.

The easiest and simplest method to accomplish this task, is to figure how to combine these liberal aspects and marry those to Islamic principals.  After all, how can the Caliphate denounce Islamic principals?  When we stress a policy we believe will help the Egyptian people become stronger,  we need to provide the Muslim framework coupled to it so they see it as part of their religion.  Failure to do so,  makes all our good ideas appear to be nothing but a method of control…  We laugh at that over here, but in our history, whenever someone tried to control how our money was spent, how our possessions belonged to us, whenever someone “far away” tried to control our life, we rebelled.  (A lot to think over in that sentence).

That is human nature.

Another prime factor that pushes Arabs to embrace the caliphate, is shame.  Yes, shame.  It is unspoken to foreigners and one has to deeply know someone who Arab before he is let in on a secret.  There is shame at being an Arab.  When one looks across the spectrum of the Muslim world, who are the successes?  Turkey.  Iran. Indonesia. Malaysia.  None of these are Arab.  Compare those successes  to Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Qatar, Ali Dubya, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, and of course, now Syria?

There appears something to be really wrong with being an Arab… Really wrong. “Why can’t we get it right” is on every Arabs mind twenty-four seven.

Of course the four success stories have outside influence.  Turkey has tried hard to win EU status.  The changes it had to undergo to get there are what has propelled it forward.  Iran is Persian and as a former US satellite under the Shah, had enormous gains in infrastructure, and has been able to maintain and grow it primarily because it did keep its intelligent liberal and social force intact. The two eastern Asian countries have embraced democracy and are flourishing as a result.

Turkey is the player in Palestine.  Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Iraq, and Iran, are concerned about what Turkey does.   Iran is challenging the USA.   Palestine, Saudi, the Gulf Region, Russia, China, India, Pakistan, are day to day, concerned about what Iran is doing.   Indonesia has economic clout. China, India, and Australia keep tabs on it.

Against this.  Egypt can’t control what happens on the Sinai Peninsula.

The creators of the concept of  empire-building 7000 years ago,  a brave wonderful people who ruled the entire known world at that time , now, can’t control what happens on the Sinai Peninsula.   It hurts.   Just like it would hurt us to go to China in fifty years (5 if Romney gets elected) with hat in hand, asking for money to buy some food for our citizens.  Yes, we will have to do it so we can live… and yes, we will be grateful for our politicians who brought back the goods, but yes, it will hurt our pride still the same.

This feeling is exploited by the Caliphate.  ”Join us and be great again.  As Mohamed hath declared, we will be feared.”  or something along those lines.   So set fire to a few cars, and whoa….  television crews pop up all over your city. You are important.  Set a few more and the leader of the entire world, the most powerful person in humanity, the President of the United States, is asking to meet your feeble countries leader.. He’s asking you (for a change), not the other way around, remember?  Where you had to take a number, and then do your best to convince him to put you on his busy schedule?

Suddenly you are powerful again.  It feels good.

How does or can the US combat that influence?

Ahh ha, the trillion dollar question with no yet known answer.  But here is what not to do.

One, go to war.  That solidifies resentment, and even upon a total USA victory, you did nothing but simply reinforce the root of the problem.  They are still ashamed of how weak and non-influential they are.  And all you did, was just shove that in their face one more time again.

Two, use shame.  It too solidifies resentment.  It too, builds resolve against us.

Three,  isolation.  It proves the Caliphate was right.  We, the West, obviously cannot be trusted.  Look how quickly we turn our backs. Better to suffer in squalor of poverty and abuse, but have consistent attention, than  it is to “flee to what they know not of”.  (Battered Spouse Syndrome).

So the one method that will work, and ironically Arabs are so good at this, is to make it our policy to divide and conquer, to separate the Arab’s well-being apart from their religion.   We use the rewards of recognition,  of extending equality, of true respect,  and bestow that upon the elements of the country who are not so inclined to follow the 1000 year admonitions of the Caliphate.

Somewhere in the future, someone there will stand up, and say:  ”wow, look at all the rewards I was able tol get by disavowing the Caliphate!  How prosperous are you, who are still following them?’

Crazy as this sounds, if Obama were to visit Egypt,  not in an official capacity, but to tour the ancient ruins, and make a few remarks of how inspiring it was to see people of ancient times who then were so far ahead of  everyone else, so advanced, and to hope that he would live to see the day when the entire known world may once again come together and be prosperous as the known world was back in that time, some indirect captured  off- mic comment  like that would go a long way to counter the influence the caliphate now has over the Egyptian people.  An influence no one there really wants, but all there are powerless to now obstruct .

We then open up American colleges and universities to Egyptians, and pay their way.  We then advise them on regional disputes but allow them to make their own mistakes and revel in their own successes.

We help make Alexandria the financial headquarters of the Eastern World.  No where else, except  Israel and Iran, will you have access to a smarter bunch of people.

We then  invite their soccer teams to tour America and compete against our National League….

We invite their military to Fort Ord to teach them our desert techniques and partner with them.

All of these are aimed at building up the pride of the Arab and Egyptian.  With self pride and self confidence,  one is never defenseless.  One can grow on its own.  And as their national pride over their own accomplishment grows within themselves, the old ideas of the Caliphate are seen in their true perspective, as being  over 1000 years old.

With the Arab Spring, the USA has inherited a foster home full of growing young rambunctious teenage boys.  We have the duty to grow them into men.  As with any dad, sometimes you will have to be tough.  But to succeed, your goal has to be clearly that you do not wish to turn them into carbon copies of you, clearly.  Instead, you wish to give them the tools and advice they will need to chose, to pick through all the options in order to decide who and what they want to be.  But as it is with every child, it is always those honest and non-bullshit moments of tenderness that we remember which are actually the ones that  make the real difference in our lives.

The US Foreign Service is being very ably guided.  If  we threw our own children out on the streets to fend for themselves, every time they got mad at us, we’d have a very sorry, poor, and sinful society right now.   Obviously we don’t do that to our own flesh and blood for good reason.  Instead, we set the limit. We contain the anger. We provide a better alternative. We let them make their decision.  Then we provide the consequences, good or bad, for that decision they chose to make.  That is exactly what we are doing on the global scale under the able leadership of Obama and Hillary Clinton, and the public servants who make up our State Department, many who were hired by the previous Republican Administration.

The Republicans are trying to capitalize on violence right now.  As expected, they are failing miserably.  It would be wise to remember that it was the fruits of their philosophy that gave us  9/11, Iraq, Afghanistan, Al Qaeda,  Iran,  and super-de- dooper high oil prices.  They also sent trillions to the development and building of the tools of war.

The Democrats are responsible for calming the Balkans.   How is that going now?  Exactly.

We are on the right track.  Romney is on the wrong.  What we have accomplished so far in three years, will be views by historians as amazing.  We have inherited a home of children who have no dad, or mom.   We have the obligation to make them full members of society.  It will be a miracle if we get them all to succeed, some kids break bad.  But the obligation is there nevertheless to try for a 100% success rate.

The fact that Romney doesn’t “get it” and Obama does, is reason enough not to vote for Romney. The fact that Romney’s foreign advisors are the exact same hard core right wing people (Boulton? Seriously?) that embarrassed the USA of the Bush administration over it’s 8 years of  activity,  is reason enough NOT to vote for Romney.

You in the military-industrial complex can yell, scream, holler, hoot, high-five all you want.  But when it comes down to facts.  Romney is very bad for this country.

Mitt.  You’ve never heard of the “Bangles”?  I don’t believe it. You copy her eye motions exactly when you are before a camera.

Tony DeLuca: Or How To Buy A District’s Votes

If Tony DeLuca was in a Warners Brother’s cartoon, he would be the little red devil flirting above the head… Karen Petersen, his Senate antagonist, would be the winged, angelic figure, flirting about the other ear…

Recently Karen was alluding to Tony DeLuca when she said…. “When any member of the Senate abuses power, we have not only the right, but the obligation to elect a better representation. The 11th District deserves a Senator who has integrity, a good work ethic, a record of community service, and a desire to serve the people who elect him…. “ She obviously supports Tony DeLuca’s opponent.

Recently someone in Tony DeLuca’s District was quoted:… .. “I never heard of the guy and now I get 5 pieces of mail a day from him!!!… You say fourteen years!!!!! And I never heard of him? That’s ridiculous.. He’s got to go…”

Which to this intriguing mind, begs the question: How is this guy able to be keep getting reelected?

Naturally one pulls up his campaign finance forms….

As of the 30 day financial report, Anthony had raised $48,760… That is to be expected… When you single handedly control which bills get onto the floor to be voted upon in the corporate capital of the world, $48,760 is really not that much… One would certainly expect the maximum contribution allowed from corporations with names like Axcess Financial Services, Inc., Artesian Water, Advance America (Spartanburg, SC); Cozen O’Conner First State PAC (1900 Market Street, Phila. PA); DELBANKPAC, Delaware Association of insurance&Financial Advisors PAC; Delaware Automobile and Truck Dealers Association; Delaware Park Management Company; Delaware Standardbred Owners Association; Delaware Supermarkets; Franklin Strategies; MacFarlane Group Inc (Mission KS); NRG Energy (Princeton NJ); Orrick, Harrington& Sutcliffe.LLP (San Francisco,CA); PLF Properties (Mission KS); Pilots Association for Bay and River(Columbus Blvd,Phila.PA); Retail Services and Systems (Potomac, MD); Senate Victory PAC (209 Linden Ave. Wilm); THE PAC (1201 N. Orange Street); The Committee for a Better Future; The Hertich Family of Automobile Dealerships (Seaford); United Distributors of Delaware; Wilmington Trust Corp PAC…….. and that is just up through August… The next report, the 8 Day report, gets turned in… now in fact… The election is in 6 days…..

Hmmmmm…. Has anyone seen the 8 Day Finance Report for Anthony DeLuca 2012? Hmmmmmm…. It seems to be missing…. Let’s check the calender one more time…. Let’s see… The election is on Tuesday, right? That is September the 11th. So… one day would be the tenth, one more the ninth, then the eighth, seventh, sixth, and today. … I count six days, which means,,, ELECTION LAW VIOLATION? … go figure it was on the President Pro Tempore of the Delaware General Assembly, Mr $48,760 himself….

Hmmmm, maybe it’s a glitch within the Elections Office….

Anyways, the point being made, is that if Tony has not been seen in his district, and if there are no addresses within his district who support him on his campaign finance forms, and he has the maximum being dumped into his campaign from groups in Mission, KS; Spartansburg, SC; San Francisco, Market Street in Philly, not to mention the global corporate capital of the world, ….. who exactly is he spending all his time working for?

So back to my original question…. How does one then, buy a District’s Vote?

Expenditures: Campaign Finance Form. 30 Day Primary……

People in the 11 District have received on the average, one campaign piece per day… They are slick pieces that extol Tony’s virtues as a community organizer (cough, cough)… as a champion for open government (cough, cough); as a labor supporter (cough, cough); as someone tight fisted with government’s money (golf courses, cough, cough); as an educational leader (cough, cough); as an anti industrial friend of the environment (Valero cough, cough); as a fearless labor negotiator who stands up for the working man while he cuts their salaries (cough, cough)…. These come flying in at one a day… One a day? I exaggerate… try two a day… You can tell you are in Tony DeLuca’s district because when you look down the street all the mailboxes are tipping sideways…..

Expenditures: Tony DeLuca 30 Day Primary 2012

787 8th SE Suite 202 Washington DC 20003 $6887.50 8/10/2012
737 8th SE Suite 202 Washington DC 20003 $3443.75 6/26/2012
737 8th SE Suite 202 Washington DC 20003 $3770.00 7/31/2012
737 8th SE Suite 202 Washington DC 20003 $10,875.00 7/18/2012
737 8th SE Suite 202 Washington DC 20003 $3987.00 7/18/2012
737 8th SE Suite 202 Washington DC 20003 $3987.50 7/17/2012

Aggregate Total of money leaving Delaware and going to Washington Dc to this address?

$32,951.25 going to a Petel & Company….

Patel & Company to whom you pay a fee, and they create an “image” of a candidate who really does not exist in real life…. I gotta admit. They do a good job and the CEO is “hot”… I hope this piece steers some credible business their way… Because they do a good job. The Tony DeLuca in everyone’s mailbox is not… the Tony Deluca they have had as their Senator for the last fourteen years…. Yep… Fourteen years of an invisible presence… Well, I shouldn’t say invisible…..

The Lobbyists sure see enough of him….. Lol…

And that, my friends, is how you buy a district’s votes…..

I Am Looking For A New Sensation……

(I know who reads this blog… that is a treat for you, from the archives of yesteryear….)

This is a theory, but I’ve seen the cracks… Sort of like predicting an earthquake from a series of tremors….
Today Chris Matthews broke from script with Andrea Mitchel and just ranted truth….

We know the American media has scripted every political show it brings on. It is all to present an image… In this case we fully expect the media to take up the fight the Republican Convention failed to advance. That message, you are worse off, it is all Obama’s fault, Romney is the only Grand Wizard who can lead us out…….

It falls apart on three fronts…

One not all of us are worse off than 4 years ago… If your income primarily derived from capital gains, you have never had a better four years. If your income comes from the stock market, you have never had a better four years. With taxes so low, and profits so high, there never has in the lifetime of America, been a better time to be worth more than 10 million…..

For the rest of us, it’s a different story; it’s hard supporting millionaire on an income under $50,000 a year…….

The second plank doesn’t hold up well, as Ryan soon found out… What Ryan didn’t get, was it is easy to lie in Congress… all you have there are DUMB reporters who write down what you say… and then, no one ever reads it…. It is different on National Television to say…. Obama caused the debt ceiling to lower when actually the person responsible for having Standard and Poors report say “the US Government was hopelessly deadlocked” was …. the same Paul Ryan? Why yes… it was… ( Didn’t realize we were paying attention back then, did you?) So, the American people at least know that Obama has been on their side, and if it weren’t for the Tea Party, the 9/11 Patriots (fake groups supported by billionaires) and Republicans, we WOULD be better off than 4 years ago, even if we WERE making under 10 million dollars…..

The third plank that crashed and burned, was that Mitt Romney was the Grand Dragon who would lead us out of the Economic Wilderness…. When pressed as to how, he gave the standard Republican’s 1st grade answer, … “I don’t know,” and then changed the subject of the question….

Today he put his plan on-line… For the expediency of time, I’m going to take one plank to show you how much thought he actually put into it before rolling it out to a public, that… does remember…

Under energy. Mitt says… We will roll back all regulations preventing the development of coal.

Well, being knowledgeable of some of those regulations on coal, which weren’t there in the beginning but were put there by people to curb the excess that unregulated coal production caused…… Here are a few of those….

Ewwww. You want to take us back to that? Mr. Romney…. America has its rules in place for a reason… China doesn’t have any rules… We don’t want to live like China…..

This is the best Romney can do…

The new sensation is that the media is starting to crack. Journalists fed up over not doing journalism by their bosses, are beginning to suffer the curse of Judus, and realize that they were the direct cause that led to all that happened…

My message to them… Repent while you still can…..

We can watch it on TV…. They have a knowledgeable audience this session, who can smell a media lie when it gets shoved into their face…. The brave ones are jumping ship now…..

(and how I do harken back to when guitar chords ruled the song….)