About Canon Law Prosecution of Priest/Pedophiles

There's plenty of un-informed yappaflappa going on about the Church's procedures regarding priest pedophiles.

If the facts would help, here are a few which are relevant from an interview with the chief Church prosecutor of such crimes:

It may be that in the past – perhaps also out of a misdirected desire to protect the good name of the institution some bishops were, in practice, too indulgent towards this sad phenomenon. And I say in practice because, in principle, the condemnation of this kind of crime has always been firm and unequivocal. Suffice it to recall, to limit ourselves just to last century, the famous Instruction "Crimen sollicitationis"....

A poor English translation...has led people to think that the Holy See imposed secrecy in order to hide the facts. But this was not so. Secrecy during the investigative phase served to protect the good name of all the people involved; first and foremost, the victims themselves, then the accused priests who have the right – as everyone does – to the presumption of innocence until proven guilty. The Church does not like showcase justice. Norms on sexual abuse have never been understood as a ban on denouncing the crimes to the civil authorities.

[Q]: ...that document is periodically cited to accuse the current Pontiff of having been – when he was prefect of the former Holy Office – objectively responsible for a Holy See policy of covering up the facts.

A: That accusation is false and calumnious.

Now follows a very humble (and embarrassing) admission which SHOULD force Rembert Weakland (among dozens of other US Bishops) into a desert community of monastics:

Between 1975 and 1985 I do not believe that any cases of paedophilia committed by priests were brought to the attention of our Congregation.

Things changed when Ratzinger, well-nicknamed "God's Rottweiler" got a chance to make things happen.

...Only with the 2001 motu proprio did the crime of paedophilia again become our exclusive remit. From that moment Cardinal Ratzinger displayed great wisdom and firmness in handling those cases, also demonstrating great courage in facing some of the most difficult and thorny cases, "sine acceptione personarum." Therefore, to accuse the current Pontiff of a cover-up is, I repeat, false and calumnious.

Procedurally,

If the accusation is well-founded the bishop has the obligation to investigate both the soundness and the subject of the accusation. If the outcome of this initial investigation is consistent, he no longer has any power to act in the matter and must refer the case to our Congregation where it is dealt with by the disciplinary office.

So. How many?

Overall in the last nine years (2001-2010) we have considered accusations concerning around three thousand cases of diocesan and religious priests, which refer to crimes committed over the last fifty years...

Here's the breakdown:

...We can say that about sixty percent of the cases chiefly involved sexual attraction towards adolescents of the same sex [ephebophilia], another thirty percent involved heterosexual relations, and the remaining ten percent were cases of paedophilia in the true sense of the term; that is, based on sexual attraction towards prepubescent children. The cases of priests accused of paedophilia in the true sense have been about three hundred in nine years. Please don’t misunderstand me, these are of course too many, but it must be recognised that the phenomenon is not as widespread as has been believed.

On trials and punishments:

Currently we can say that a full trial, penal or administrative, has taken place in twenty percent of cases, normally celebrated in the diocese of origin – always under our supervision – and only very rarely here in Rome. We do this also in order to speed up the process. In sixty percent of cases there has been no trial, above all because of the advanced age of the accused, but administrative and disciplinary provisions have been issued against them, such as the obligation not to celebrate Mass with the faithful, not to hear confession, and to live a retired life of prayer. It must be made absolutely clear that in these cases, some of which are particularly sensational and have caught the attention of the media, no absolution has taken place. It’s true that there has been no formal condemnation, but if a person is obliged to a life of silence and prayer, then there must be a reason…

Doh.

In the other 20% of the cases, half of the priests were dismissed from the clerical state ("defrocked" is the inaccurate but usual term), and in the remaining half, the priests themselves asked for formal dismissal from the clerical state.

The US accounted for 80% of the 3,000 cases...

What is the obligation of Bishops regarding reporting to civil authorities?

In some English-speaking countries, but also in France, if bishops become aware of crimes committed by their priests outside the sacramental seal of Confession they are obliged to report them to the judicial authorities [Under civil law. But remember that Church law does NOT obviate this requirement]. This is an onerous duty...

HT: Father Z

Another Really Tough Production Schedule

Somehow, the Prestigious West Side Parish wasn't able to get this into their bulletin.

You know, printing up 1000 copies in only 2 business days is damned difficult.

So I'll help them a bit.

...Genuine health care reform is being blocked by those who insist on reversing widely supported policies against federal funding of abortion and plans which include abortion,...

USCC urges Catholics to act today.

"Sr." Keehan Becomes a Liar

One supposes that for $800K++/year in Washington, lying is part of the job.

Some nun named Keehan earns $800K++, is in Washington, and....mirabile dictu....lies.

To justify the Catholic Health Association's support for the pro-abortion bill, Keehan misrepresented the language in the Senate measure the House plans to railroad through its body next week

The NRLC (not a Catholic organization) differs.

Douglas Johnson, legislative director for National Right to Life, spoke with LifeNews.com about Keehan's statement and dismissed the so-called segregation of funds as an accounting gimmick.

"The House and Senate bills do not merely differ on a 'technical issue,'as Carol Keehan would have people believe," he said. "This is another regrettably attempt to minimize the substantive issues involved in order to smooth the way for the Obama legislation."

"In reality, the Senate bill contains multiple pro-abortion provisions, which in total constitute the most pro-abortion single piece of legislation to reach the House floor since Roe v. Wade," Johnson added.

We've published the entire NRLC backgrounder here.

You decide: who's the liar?

Talk About "Greedy" Executives!

PowerLine has the story.

Congress will not investigate.

Deemage Damage

Should take about.......ohhhhhhh.........40 seconds for the first lawsuit to hit a Federal Court.

Democratic leader Rep. Chris Van Hollen admitted today on FOX News Sunday that democrats will use the unconstitutional “Slaughter Rule” to ram their pro-abortion nationalized health care bill through Congress. Democrats announced this tactic last week. They will pass the bill without voting on it.

It will be "Deemed passed."

In the Slaughter Solution, the rule would declare that the House “deems” the Senate version of Obamacare to have been passed by the House. House members would still have to vote on whether to accept the rule, but they would then be able to say they only voted for a rule, not for the bill itself. --Doug Ross

That stink is, in fact, s*&^. And that ain't "deemed" so; it IS so.

HT: Gateway

How to Save Money on HealthCare

Nope. Not Obama/AbortoCare.

Torinus has a very good suggestion.

He begins with legislation introduced by Sullivan (D) and Richards (D), which would require that 'doctor prices' be made public. We agree that it's a start.

The new law will require hospitals, clinics and doctors to make available median prices. What that will mean in the real world is that providers will list their charges - their retail prices - and then show an average discount across all procedures.

But Torinus prefers that the law require "bundling" prices be made public, too.

If prices were bundled, payers, including consumers, could track price increases a lot more effectively. The present system allows invisible and runaway prices.

And the huge variations in prices - as much as 300% in the Milwaukee area - would jump out at consumers. If a hospital price for a hip replacement is $18,000 at one highly rated facility, why would anyone buy at $40,000 at another hospital in the same region?

Because of the fog, payers often get that costly decision wrong. The opacity keeps the overpriced facilities in business.

OK. We know that.

...there's still a lot of work to do on the transparency front. The real end game has to be bundled prices, which include all costs for an episode of care. Get rid of the multitude of line items, which makes bills undecipherable. Get to one bill for everything to do with a procedure, say $25,000 for a new hip.

Torinus managed to get that deal, "bundling prices" with his insurance broker, so all his employees know where the best price (AND QUALITY) is. Good work, John!

So: how to get "bundling" prices, not just 'doctor' prices, out in the open?

Wisconsin could make its prices for buying health care for its own employees and for Medicaid recipients public record. Because of its large claims base, state government could pull the line items together and publish bundled prices for state employees and Medicaid.

The discounts for state employees would be different than for other plans, but not that much different. The Medicaid prices would provide a benchmark on the low end of the pricing spectrum.

A very good idea, indeed.

Feingold's PorkVote--for OTHER States

"Mr. Principles," Feingold, doesn't talk much about this, does he?

The Senate-approved health measure lawmakers hope to send to Obama soon would steer $600 million over the next decade to Vermont in added federal payments for Medicaid and nearly as much to Massachusetts.

Connecticut would get $100 million to build a hospital. About 800,000 Florida seniors could keep certain Medicare benefits. Asbestos-disease victims in tiny Libby, Mont., and some coal miners with black lung disease or their widows would get help, and there are prizes for Louisiana, the Dakotas and more states.

Feinie voted for this crap while telling us that 'it's health care.'

Nice work, Rusty.

Teh Won's HealthCare: Not Wanted Here

You could cherrypick, or you could read the actual polls.

If you look at the 12 most recent independent polls on Pollster.com, you'll find every one of them shows that more people oppose health care reform than support it, and most of the polls show a significantly wider margin of opposition than Benenson [a White House propagandist] suggests.

Four of the dozen polls were by Rasmussen, and they generally show a wide margin of opposition. But the Quinnipiac poll showed a 19-point margin of opposition; the Pew poll showed a 12-point margin, the PPP poll an 11-point margin, the Public Opinion Strategies poll a 12-point margin, the Newsweek poll a nine-point margin, and the Ipsos poll a six-point margin.

However, it polls MUCH better in QueenNancy's private office.

HT: Examiner

The Logic of AbortoCare

A few days ago, Stupak mentioned that (D) 'leadership' wants paid-for abortions in ObamaCare because, after all, less people = less cost.

In response, Dan Riehl:

Isn't It Time To Euthanize Reid's Wife?

Well, now.

If Democrats want so badly to abort babies because of it, why are we bothering with someone who has a broken neck and back at 69? It sounds to me like she's pretty well used up and has probably been living off the taxpayers for plenty of years to begin with. Aren't we at least going to get a vote on it?

Snarky? Yes. Wrong-headed? Yes, if you take him seriously.

Logically consistent with Obama/AbortoCare?

Yup.

HT: The Winning McCain

"Kill the Bill" in Twin Cities

THOUSANDS show up in pretty damn cold weather in the Twin Cities.

...Minnesota Majority staged the rally on the state capital mall to hear Reps. John Kline and Michele Bachmann speak to the gathered opponents of the overhaul of the health-care system, as well as several other speakers — including me. --Ed Morrissey

The AP report reported "at least hundreds" while the Strib reported "thousands". Pictures at the link--looks like the April 15th Madistan rally--which was well over 4,000 people.

Meantime, coffee shops sold about 40 cups to the Astroturf "coffee party"...see below.

Astroturf "Coffee Party" a Bomb

Gee.

The astroturf "Coffee Party" bunch is off to a flying........umnnnhhh.........thud.

5 in one DC location.

30 in St. Louis.

5 in North Carolina.

Really a wildfire-enthusiasm thing, eh?

Massingale Spew: "ObamaCare Good!!"

One of the local rebels endorses Abort-o-Care.

“We believe that the provisions below provide extensive evidence that longstanding restrictions on federal funding of abortion have been maintained. Furthermore, this bill provides new and important supports for vulnerable pregnant women,” the letter states.

(signed) Bryan N. Massingale, S.T.D.
President, Catholic Theological Society of America
Associate Professor of Theology
Marquette University

Not the first time that Massingale has been dead wrong about something. He kinda likes gay "marriage", too.

Kondratieff's Pessimism

Long article here, but worth the read, if only because it reviews the history of Sep/Oct '08--and asks a few questions about those days.

To get you started:

The second fateful date to remember was October 7, 2008, when the UK almost collapsed. Bank of England Governor, Mervyn King, describes the situation: "Two of our major banks which had had difficulty in obtaining funding could raise money only for one week then only for one day, and then on that Monday and Tuesday it was not possible even for those two banks really to be confident they could get to the end of the day."¹⁰ This was the justification given for the Bank of England to provide secret loans of £61.6 billion to The Royal Bank of Scotland and HBOS to maintain solvency.¹¹ Amazingly, news of these loans was never revealed until November 24, 2009, more than one year later.

Recalling that fateful day, David Soanes, Managing Director of UBS Bank, and part of the group assembled to assist with the UK government’s crisis response, stated, "We only really knew by probably about seven o’clock at night (October 7, 2008), that we, that everyone was going to get through to the next day."¹² These revelations raise new questions about the true scope of bailouts undertaken by the major governments at the time. Lord Myners, the UK Financial Services Secretary, alluded to similar covert banking operations conducted by the European Central Bank and the US Federal Reserve.13 We have no idea what he is referring to, but we would certainly be interested to learn more.

So would we all!

The "Volcker Rule"

Just the last few grafs from a story about Volcker and his 'rule'.

"Volcker's biggest objective is to make sure that risk-taking, especially proprietary risk taking done in proprietary institutions does not fall back on the taxpayer as the ultimate supporter," Blinder said. "And he is 100 percent right about that."

Whatever happens, Volcker's Rule has made an impact already, says Donaldson.

"It's easier to pass reform lite," he said. "It's not so easy to go to another level. That is what I think the so-called Volcker Rule has done. I think it opens up a discussion that hasn't been there before and I think it needs to be discussed."

If the Volcker Rule is shot down, the U.S. Congress could face an unusual challenge.

"I tell you sure as I am sitting here, that if banking institutions are protected by the taxpayer and they are given free rein to speculate, I may not live long enough to see the crisis," Volcker told Congress last month. "But my soul is going to come back and haunt you."

The big-boy-banks don't like the idea at all. I don't blame them; if you can get a sucker to pay up when you lose a bet, the party keeps going on.

Chris Dodd is writing his own bill, which will not likely include the Volcker Rule. But as Ritholtz (and I) told you, Dodd has been in the pockets of the big-boy-bankers for years decades.

HT: Ritholtz

In a Nutshell

"Need Oil? Gasoline? Fuggedaboutit!": Obama

It's not really difficult to agree with those who opine that Obama simply wants to demolish the US economy.

The Obama administration’s six-month delay in approving new offshore drilling leases in federal waters will become a new three-year ban, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar quietly told reporters last Friday. Which means that no new oil and gas leases will be approved during President Obama’s term even though two –thirds of the American public supports such activity, according to a December 2009 Rasmussen poll.

So we will continue to pour dollars into Canada, Mexico, and Arabia.

You know: rely on foreign sources for critical commodities.

The Obama HopeyChangey!!

HT: Lott

Cdl Schoenborn Said What?

The Daily Mail seems to think that Cdl Schoenborn wants to end priestly celibacy.

Cardinal Schoenborn said: 'The causes of sex abuse by priests? These need to be found in priest training, as well as the question of what happened in the so-called sexual revolution of 1968.

'It also includes the issue of priest celibacy and the issue of personality development.

'It requires a great deal of honesty, both on the part of the Church and of society as a whole, a change of vision.'

Perhaps the original (German) was more clear.

In any case, dumping celibacy is NOT a 'cure'; homosexuals--the vast majority of abusers--are not inclined to marry women, and there are plenty of married clergy in other denominations who have abused women.

Sorry, Cdl. You're wrong on this, if the Daily Mail's take on your statement is accurate.

March 16th: BE THERE!

If you have a little time, and you value the America you know, here's something to do.

Tea partiers will also "surge" on Capitol Hill Tuesday as a show of opposition to the Democrats' health-care reform. FreedomWorks is planning a March 16 rally called the "People's Surge Against Obamacare 2.0" outside the Cannon House office building located at Independence Ave. SE and New Jersey SE. The group will rally from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. People will be bused in from various parts of the country.

"We'll probably have at least 1,000 if not more people coming in to this event," FreedomWorks' director of federal and state campaigns, Brendan Steinhauser, told WND. "We're telling people to go right into the three House office buildings: Cannon, Longworth and Rayburn. Find your congressmen, whether they are in the cafeteria, their offices, in the halls or hiding under their desks, and tell them to vote no. It's very simple."

If you live in a district represented by an (R), you won't have to help them understand how to vote. The better plan is to find Obey, or Kagen, or Kind, and "help" them out.

Pitchforks, rope, tar, and feathers are optional.

BATF, Go Away

Finally!!

Wyoming has joined a growing list of states with self-declared exemptions from federal gun regulation of weapons made, bought and used inside state borders – but lawmakers in the Cowboy State have taken the issue one step further, adopting significant penalties for federal agents attempting to enforce Washington's rules.

According a law signed into effect yesterday by Democratic Gov. Dave Freudenthal, any agent of the U.S. who "enforces or attempts to enforce" federal gun rules on a "personal firearm" in Wyoming faces a felony conviction and a penalty of up to two years in prison and up to $2,000 in fines.

Apparently somebody read the 10th Amendment out there.

"Too Much Work" to Verify Employment Eligibility?

Seems like Jerry King is overloaded. Get out your crying towel.

Contractors wonder why they should be forced to use a federal E-Verify system with documented flaws in spotting unauthorized workers.

I-9 forms, contractor registrations, prevailing wage reports and other state documents are good enough, said Jerry King, comptroller for Wisconsin Rapids-based Eagle Construction Co. Inc. Requiring use of E-Verify, he said, just adds to the mountain of work required to do business.

“How much information do they need about us?” King said.

Enough to know that you're hiring LEGALLY, Jerry, you twit. You know, and I know, that the I-9 doesn't verify eligibility, Jerry.

Stupak: "It's......Unhealthy"

Stupak:

“This has really reached an unhealthy stage,” Stupak says. “People are threatening ethics complaints on me. On the left, they’re really stepping it up...."

That follows this:

What are Democratic leaders saying? “If you pass the Stupak amendment, more children will be born, and therefore it will cost us millions more. That’s one of the arguments I’ve been hearing,” Stupak says.

"Unhealthy", indeed.

"Fatal" is the correct word, Congressman.

Klavan Strikes Again

This guy is really, really, good.

HT: The Winning McCain

The Path Forward for ObamaCare and the Revolution

So here's the latest from Ace.

...it looks like House Democrats won't have to vote directly on a Senate bill they really don't like. The speaker hasn't made a final decision, but she told her rank-and-file during the meeting that the plan now is to craft a rule that would "deem" the Senate bill passed once they approve the package of fixes.

That means they would vote on the rule and the so-called reconciliation package, which would make changes to the Senate bill and only requires 51 votes to pass in the Upper Chamber. In addition, the package of changes would also include a student lending bill that was paired with health care through the reconciliation process, leaders told their members on Friday.

All of this could change if the speaker faces major resistance from her rank-and-file, but it would mean Democrats won't be forced to cast a vote specifically in favor of the Senate bill, which included a series of controversial deals. During the meeting, party leaders reassured lawmakers that two of the most controversial deals -- the so-called Cornhusker Kickback and more Medicare Advantage money for Florida -- would be stripped out. But it appeared that additional Medicaid money for Louisiana and a $100 million hospital grant program requested by Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) will both stay in the final bill.

So the Louisiana (Re-) Purchase remains, as does a shiny new $100MM hospital for Chris Dodd's (D-Walking Dead) state of Connecticut.

Ready on the firing line! Lock and Load.

For the Incredulous: Yes, ObamaCare DOES Require Taxpayer Support of Abortion

Long title, even longer post, but directly quoted from Nat'l Right-to-Life Committee backgrounder on the current ObamaCare proposal.

What follows is a thumbnail sketch of the major abortion policy problems in the Senate-passed health care bill (H.R. 3590).

-- The Senate bill departs from longstanding federal policy by authorizing tax subsidies to help tens of millions of Americans buy private health plans that could cover abortion on demand. Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Ne.) attached to this provision a badly flawed requirement under which anyone enrolling in such plan would be required to make separate payments into an abortion fund. In a recent statement, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (which strongly opposes the bill) said, "The bill requires each American purchasing such a plan to make a separate payment to the insurer every month, solely to pay for other people's abortions. This is an enormous imposition on the consciences of the millions of Americans who oppose abortion." In its first analysis of the Nelson language, NRLC recognized it as a convoluted bookkeeping scheme inconsistent with the principles of the Hyde Amendment. In January, Senator Barbara Boxer (D-Ca.), a pro-abortion leader in the Senate, assured McClatchy News Service that the abortion surcharge requirement is only an "accounting procedure," and DHHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius also assured pro-abortion listeners that the Nelson language was of no consequence. Yet today, in an effort to entice pro-life Democrats in the House to vote for the bill, the White House and Democratic leaders are working on "convincing as many as a dozen antiabortion Democrats in the House that abortion language in the Senate bill is more stringent than initially portrayed," according to a report in the March 5 Washington Post. The bottom line is that a vote for the Senate bill is a vote to subsidize the purchase of health plans that cover abortion on demand -- a sharp break from the principles of the Hyde Amendment and the Stupak Amendment.

-- The Senate bill would establish a new program under which a federal agency, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), would administer private "multi-state" plans. It has been reported that the bill guarantees that one plan will be available everywhere that does not cover abortion. In fact, it guarantees no such thing, because even this narrow requirement is rigged to depend on annual renewal through a separate appropriations bill. Moreover, other plans in the federally administered program would be allowed to cover all abortions -- a break from the policy that has long governed the Federal Employees Health Benefits program, which is also administered by OPM. A vote for the Senate bill is a vote to put the federal government in the business of administering health plans that cover abortion on demand.

-- The Senate bill would empower federal political appointees to expand access to abortion by federal administrative decrees. The bill contains a bewildering array of provisions that grant authority to the Secretary of Health and Human Services and other federal entities to issue binding regulations on various matters. One analyst recently wrote that the Senate bill “contains more than 2,500 references to powers and responsibilities of the secretary of health and human services,” to say nothing of other federal authorities. Some of these provisions could be employed in the future as authority for pro-abortion mandates, requiring health plans to cover abortion and/or provide expanded access to abortion, unless there is clear language to prevent it. One clear example is the Mikulski Amendment, under which any service listed as a "preventive" service by the Department of Health and Human Services must be provided (without copayments) in all types of private health plans. (Sec. 1001, pp. 20-21.) Sen. Mikulski refused to modify her amendment to exclude abortion from the scope of this mandate authority. (The Nelson-Hatch-Casey Amendment, similar to the Stupak-Pitts Amendment, would have prevented abortion mandates or subsidies under any provision of the bill -- but that amendment was tabled, 54-45, on December 8, 2009.) A vote for the Senate bill is a vote to empower federal political appointees to mandate unlimited abortion coverage in most private health plans.

-- The Senate bill would reauthorize all federal Indian health programs, without including language to prohibit funding of elective abortion, even though such an amendment (the Vitter Amendment, similar to the Stupak Amendment) was approved by the Senate when it last considered Indian health legislation on February 26, 2008. There is a clause in the Senate health bill [Sec. 10221, pp. 2175-2176] that has been misrepresented as an abortion restriction, but it actually contains no policy standard on abortion funding -- it merely "punts" the question to the annual appropriations process, an unacceptable approach. A vote for the Senate bill is a vote to open the door to future federal funding of abortion on demand through all Indian health programs.

-- The Senate bill lacks language to protect health care providers from being penalized for refusing to participate in providing abortions (known as the "Weldon language"), even though such language was approved by the House Energy and Commerce Committee and was included in Speaker Pelosi's original bill even before adoption of the Stupak Amendment. (See Section 259 of the House-passed H.R. 3962.) Yet, because such language is offensive to the pro-abortion lobby, it was excluded from the Senate bill. A vote for the Senate bill is a vote to abandon the strong position that the House took in favor of protecting the conscience rights of pro-life health care providers.

-- The Senate bill, due to a last-minute amendment, provides $7 billion for the nation's 1,250 Community Health Centers (CHCs), without any restriction whatever on the use of these federal funds to pay directly for abortion on demand. (These funds are both authorized and appropriated by the bill, and thus would be untouched by the "Hyde Amendment" that currently covers Medicaid funds that flow through the annual Health and Human Services appropriations bill.) Two pro-abortion groups, the Reproductive Health Access Project and the Abortion Access Project, are already actively campaigning for Community Health Centers to perform elective abortions. In short, the Senate bill would allow direct federal funding of abortion on demand through Community Health Centers. A memorandum documenting this issue in further detail is posted here: http://www.nrlc.org/AHC/NRLCmemoCommHealth.pdf

In a recent statement, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops noted that this provision alone could lead to "hundreds of thousands of abortions per year that taxpayers would be forced to pay for." In a story published in the March 4 Washington Times, Congressman Diana DeGette (D-Co.) called this concern "patently false," but White House spokeswoman Linda Douglass took a different tact, admitting at least the possibility of what she referred to as a "drafting issue that requires a technical change . . ."

-- The Senate bill contains additional pools of directly appropriated funds that are not covered by any limitations regarding abortion, including $5 billion for a temporary high-risk health insurance pool program (Sec. 1101 on pages 45-52) and $6 billion in grants for health co-ops (Sec. 1322, pp. 169-180). Only bill-wide, permanent language, such as the Stupak-Pitts Amendment, can ensure that none of the vast amounts of federal money authorized and appropriated through the Senate bill are tapped by pro-abortion political appointees and bureaucrats to pay for abortion.

Catholic Gals "Gone Wild"? Not Really

There was a fair amount of heavy breathing about a "study" which indicated that ladies of the Catholic persuasion were more inclined to 'hook up' than others, during their college years.

Umnnnhhh...

• A “hook up” is very widely defined as “when a girl and a guy get together for a physical encounter and don’ necessarily expect anything further” (p. 540). As the authors caution, “‘Hooking up’ may refer to a broad range of physical acts ranging from kissing to sexual intercourse” (p. 548). It is difficult to know just what respondents are reporting in responding “yes.”
• The study, published in 2009, is based on a telephone survey conducted in 2001.
• The sample is national and consists of randomly selected women attending four-year colleges at that time (men are not included in the sample).
• The original sample includes 1,000 respondents at 195 colleges and universities. After removing Mormon respondents and colleges and accounting for non-response to questions used in the analysis there are 919 respondents studied.
• A total of 38% of the 919 respondents reported that they had “hooked up” since they began college.
• A total of 31% of women in the sample are Catholic (287 respondents)—yet most of these respondents attend non-Catholic colleges and universities.
• Only 6% of all respondents—Catholic and non-Catholic—attended a Catholic college or university (52 respondents).
• Thus, there are only interviews with 39 Catholic women attending Catholic colleges in the study. A conservative estimate of the number of Catholic women attending Catholic college at the time is 85,000. The margin of sampling error for 39 interviews generalizing to a population of 85,000 is +/- 15.7 percentage points.
• Furthermore, these large margins of error are compounded by the small number of Catholic colleges these women attended at the institutional level. The randomly selected respondents ended up only being in attendance at a total of 16 Catholic colleges and universities when more than 240 existed at the time (resulting in a margin of sampling error at the level of the institution of +/- 23.7 percentage points).

Evidently the scientific method for finding AGW has adherents in the social sciences, too.

HT: CVA

Ritholtz on the Lehman Fraud

Barry Ritholtz describes himself, accurately, as a 'non-partisan' observer. Most of the time that's easy, as he writes about Wall Street matters, which are generally non-political. It's hard to paste a (D) or (R) label on quantwonk work.

Here's his take on the Lehman fraud which we mentioned earlier.

Once again, the investing public learns — after the fact — the basic truisms of modern markets:

-Major accounting firms are worthless to investors. They were either unable or unwilling to detect fraud amounting to 50 billion dollars. The incompetents at Ernst & Young deserve the same fiery death as Arthur Anderson; Whether they are hired guns or paid whores, they — like the rating agencies — are worthless to investors.

-Corporate management engages in fraud all too regularly: Am I reading this correctly — that Dick Fuld’s defense will be “I didn’t know that Lehman was a giant Ponzi scheme, and I was unaware we were hiding billions in bad debt and leverage off balance sheet?” [Fuld was the CEO of Lehman]

Based on the release of the bankruptcy court report, LEH was technically insolvent perhaps years before it collapsed;

-The Shortsellers turn out to be the good guys. Consider the absurdity fraud of “protecting” the bankster frauds — fromt he truth, as revelaed by Einhorn et. al.

-The SEC is utterly incapable of comprehending how markets function. They believe the criminals who commit the fraud, and ignore the whistleblowers who uncover it;

-The ban on short selling is an indictment of the inability of the SEC to understand WTF is going on, and a reward to the criminal corporate management teams;

-The Media did a terrible job uncovering the fraud as well. Some media folk were used by CEOs. Some of the TV press who relied on access to their subjects, actually rallied to the defense of these CEOs, including Fuld, and trashed the short sellers. Most notably Charlie Gasparino from his CNBC days, but their were others as well.

-The Analyst community, for the most part, failed as well. The few who publicly acknowledged the debacle were notable for being so far outside of the herd. 95% of them were wrong.

Pathetic

All in all, the entire system failed. The situation is utterly disgusting, and if the investing public pulls its money out of the completely corrupt public markets for a generation or more, it would not surprise me . . .

Other than that, things are just fine and dandy.

Solicitation for Bids, U S Dep't of Education

Apparently the education biz is changing.

The U.S. Department of Education (ED) intends to purchase twenty-seven (27) REMINGTON BRAND MODEL 870 POLICE 12/14P MOD GRWC XS4 KXCS SF. RAMAC #24587 GAUGE: 12 BARREL: 14" - PARKERIZED CHOKE: MODIFIED SIGHTS: GHOST RING REAR WILSON COMBAT; FRONT - XS CONTOUR BEAD SIGHT STOCK: KNOXX REDUCE RECOIL ADJUSTABLE STOCK FORE-END: SPEEDFEED SPORT-SOLID - 14" LOP are designated as the only shotguns authorized for ED based on compatibility with ED existing shotgun inventory, certified armor and combat training and protocol, maintenance, and parts.

In the Good Old Days, all Sr. Mary Rosarybeads needed was a solid-wood ruler.

Note well that barrel-length. It's illegal for U S citizens to have one that short.

HT: MoonBattery

Data Games from WI DWD

Seems that the Wisconsin Dep't of Workforce Development kinda switches its data-source now and then.

The most recent announcement yapped about a 'gain' of jobs.

But:

...the unadjusted data ... shows 289,900 Wisconsinites out of work, up from 251,300 a month earlier, and a net loss of 71,700 nonfarm wage and salary jobs from the last month, and once again more government jobs (420,600) than manufacturing jobs (417,600). --(Un-named super-secret source)

The DWD release used "seasonally adjusted" data in its release.

However, DWD was perfectly happy to use "unadjusted data" in its headline for the April '09 release.

Lemmeeeseeee heah, Gomer......s'pose it has something to do with the Bush=Bad, Obama=Good thing?

Heaven forfend!

Other Planet Watch: Obama Speaks

He has to be living on a different planet.

As we were driving in, I was saying, boy, it’s just good to be back in the Midwest, this is about as close as I’ve been to home in a while. And part of the reason it’s just good to be back is because Washington is a place where tax dollars are often treated like Monopoly money — they’re bartered and traded, and they’re divvied up among lobbyists and special interests, and where waste — even billions of dollars of waste — is accepted as the price of doing business. When we proposed, by the way, those $20 billion in cuts last year, we were ridiculed by the press, said, “Ah, that’s just a spit in the bucket.” Now, I don’t know about here in St. Charles, $20 billion, that’s real money, isn’t it? --Barry Obama in St Louis yesterday

An observer (Gateway) from the planet WE live on notes:

The last time Obama used his “Monopoly” line was the same day he proposed another record spending bill that cost taxpayers $3.8 trillion and raised the national deficit to $1.6 trillion.

Uh-huh.

Damn Near Russia, Part 23,465: We Have a Secret!!

It's an old story, but some of you may not have seen this.

Kewaunee resident Mike Rodrian can relate. The DNR in 2005 told him to stop construction of a storage shed on his property because he was building on wetlands.

“I got all the permits to do it from the town and county and had already spent over $40,000 building it,” Rodrian said. “I had the concrete poured, the walls up and the trusses on, and then the DNR came in and said I had to stop and basically tear it down.”

Rodrian refused, which prompted a state lawsuit the Wisconsin Department of Justice ultimately dropped. The state dropped the case, Rodrian said, because a DNR representative had taken pictures of his property before and during construction without telling him to stop before work began.

That's an excerpt from another story. A leggie has proposed that DNR be required to issue 'wetlands maps' to property-owners on demand, instead of hiding in the bushes and suddenly deciding that "you can't build here."

DNR evidently thinks that wetland locations are secrets that only THEY can know--until you've spent wasted a bunch of money.

My question: Why hasn't this been in force up to now? Question Two: Why doesn't DNR share its knowledge with the local units of Government?

Whassamatta those idjits?

HT: FoxPolitics

Statism? You Decide

HopeyChangey has a new changey in mind.

The nation’s chief executive extols the virtues of mandatory DNA testing of Americans upon arrest, even absent charges or a conviction. Obama said, “It’s the right thing to do” to “tighten the grip around folks” who commit crime

The red-highlight is the important word.

I'll remind you that in the City of Milwaukee, one can get arrested for failure to pay parking tickets.

(And by the way, who's going to PAY for those millions of DNA tests, not to mention the umpty-hundred new labs to process them?)

It's possible that Obamamamama is just utterly stupid and was overcome with emotion when he made his statement.

It's also possible that Obamamamama is a Statist.

Of the two, the evidence leans heavily to "Statist," but "stupid" remains in the mix.

HT: Ace

New Tax to Pay for ObamaCare

The article does not make it clear whether this provision is in the Senate bill, (which has to be cleared by the House.)

A stealth provision in President Obama’s latest healthcare proposal dramatically increases taxes on the wealthy — extending Medicare taxes for the first time to “unearned” investment income.

The new 2.9 percent tax would apply to interest, dividend, annuity, royalty, and rent payments.

Under current law, Medicare payments come from salaries alone.

But Obama wants a Medicare tax to be paid on the investment income accrued by individuals making more than $200,000 a year and couples making more than $250,000.

It might also include capgains, raising THAT rate to 22.9%.

Lehman Collapse: JPMorgan, Citi Did It?

Yesterday we mentioned that Lehman was cooking its books.

Today it emerges that Citi and JPMorgan fitted Lehman with a noose and perhaps tightened it a bit too much.

-- JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Citigroup Inc. helped cause the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. by demanding more collateral and changing guarantee agreements, a bankruptcy examiner said today in a report. --Bloomberg

There's plenty more at the link. Yes, E&Y is named again.

Look for prosecutions to follow.

Surprise! Holder Shut Down ACORN Investigation

Some people get investigated. Others don't. Fitton's Judicial Watch:

...According to Corelli, on August 1, 2008, her office received 1,200 ACORN voter registration cards from the Secretary of State’s office. Over 300 of these cards were rejected because of “duplicates, underage, illegible and invalid addresses,” which “put a tremendous strain on our office staff and caused endless work hours at taxpayers’ expense.” Corelli claimed the total cost of the extra work caused by ACORN corruption was $20,000. Likewise, Borges contended that: “The organization ACORN during the summer of 2008 conducted a registration drive which has produced over 100 rejections due to incomplete forms and individuals who are not citizens…” Among the examples cited by Borges was a seven-year old child who was registered to vote by ACORN through the use of a forged signature and a fake birth certificate claiming she was 27-years old.

The FBI and Department of Justice opened an investigation. However, the Obama Justice Department, while noting that ACORN had engaged in “questionable hiring and training practices,” closed down the investigation in March 2009, claiming ACORN broke no laws.

With the possible exception of Title 42, USC 1973 (gg) which seems to address that situation.

ObamaCare Will Be Aborto-Care

AP reports:

Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman said Thursday that the leadership will try to secure the necessary 216 votes to pass the bill without reworking the divisive abortion provision.

Well, then. I guess the USCC knows what to do.

HT: WashExaminer

Lehman Crooks Are More Equal ....

Sure enough. Lehman's Big Kahunas were cooking the books.

TurboTax Timmy, Ernst&Young, Bernanke, and the Bush SEC just kinda ignored it even though they KNEW ABOUT IT.

Not to worry. They still prosecute that sort of activity--if you're not a Big Kahuna, or E&Y, or the Chairman of the Fed, or the Sec/Treasury, or one of their pals.

Lehman employed off-balance sheet devices, known within Lehman as “Repo 105” and “Repo 108” transactions, to temporarily remove securities inventory from its balance sheet, usually for a period of seven to ten days, and to create a materially misleading picture of the firm’s financial condition in late 2007 and 2008

...the Examiner questioned Lehman executives and other witnesses about Lehman’s financial health and reporting, a recurrent theme in their responses was that Lehman gave full and complete financial information to Government agencies, and that the Government never raised significant objections or directed that Lehman take any corrective action.

Club Fed for you. Others, not so much.

HT: Ticker

More from Bloomberg here.

Another (D) Worker Achieves Fame

Heh.

Al-Qaeda terrorist, Sharif Mobley, was arrested in Yemen earlier this year. The New Jersey man shot two men at a hospital in Yemen over the weekend after being arrested in the company of several al-Qaeda members. Sharif Mobley, 26, was quietly detained earlier this year by Yemeni authorities.

You'll have to go to the link to find out whose campaign paid him for "election day activity."

HT: Gateway

Hoooooboy. O'Keefe PWNS Housing, Urban Development

This will be a lot of fun when it's out there.

Late last year, O’Keefe and fellow activist Joe Basel went into the Detroit and Chicago offices of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) with a hidden camera. They pretended to be scam artists, asking employees there to participate in a complex kickback scheme involving federal incentives for first-time home buyers. In the excerpted footage shown to me by O’Keefe, the staffers seemed only to happy to comply.

The law says that the tax credit maxes out at $8,000 for an $80,000 home. On the tape, O’Keefe asked a staffer, “What if I bought a place for $50,000, but the seller and I agreed to write down $80,000 as the purchase price?”

“Flip it any way you want,” the staffer replied.

What if the place is worth much less — like only $6,000?

“Yup, you can do that.”

Check the combox at the link (above). LeftOWackies don't like it when their Social Programs are stuck like a fat pig before consumption.

HT: AOSHQ

Fair Warning to the USCC's "Rights" Crowd

Roeser is right, you know.

...I come now to the injunction a good many Catholic prelates use: “The right to health care” where they sanction its passage by justifiable might. None other than one of my favorites used it the other day—Archbishop Charles Chaput of Denver. He spoke at Houston Baptist University.

Most of what Archbishop Chaput said made good sense—but like many other prelates of good will, when he turned to the subject of health care. He said this: “First, while access to decent health care may not seem to be a `right’ in the same sense as our rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, the Church does see it as a right.

TO WHICH WITH RESPECT, I SAY “REALLY?” SHOW ME WHERE THE CHURCH PROCLAIMS THE STATE MUST EXTEND IT.

Well, yes. There is no such teaching in Church doctrine. (The Beatitudes have no language specifying Statism, for the information of the LeftOWackies who inhabit rectories, chanceries, and all the other usual-suspect places....)

And Tom's not done yet.

Make no mistake: I thoroughly support the efforts of prelates and the USCCB to keep the evil of abortion out of universal health care. But at the same time I believe that it is also incumbent on the Church and its churchmen to emphasize that state assumption of private functions runs the risk of incurring a collectivist theory of morality.

Finally, it occurs to me that maybe our prelates are so cavalier about “rights” they urge the state to assume stems from the fact that their dioceses and they themselves in contradistinction to all of us, are tax exempt. I guarantee you this: If they keep this up, there will be enough backlash in this country to insist that they too share the burden of the rest of us taxpayers.

That’s something for them to ponder and ponder well. They may then reflect on how many state mandated “rights” are required.

The "collectivist theory" Tom mentions is quite au courant--a variant, "liberation theology" was smacked down hard by JPII, who was partially successful. It's a category-error class mistake, essentially confusing personal responsibility with State responsibility; an extension of "welfare" to the Nth degree.

It's about time that Bishops with common sense (such as Bp. Nickless of Sioux City) start a vigorous campaign to assist their brother-Bishops in understanding Church teaching and Statism.

Who IS the TEA Party?

Well, the folks in the TEA Party movement are not exactly ignorant homophobe gun-toting redneck racists. They are, as mentioned in a previous post, the "leave us ALONE!!" people.

A recent poll, commissioned by the National Review Institute and conducted by John McLaughlin and Associates, dispels the claim that the Tea Party is a backwoods fringe movement.

...26 percent voted for Obama, 25 percent are registered Democrats, 36 percent are college graduates, 26 percent are urbanites, and 40 percent make over $60,000 annually. The movement is not an angry-male thing: 50 percent are women. Religious affiliations also reflect America: 60 percent Protestant, 28 percent Catholic, 2 percent Jewish. Sixty-nine percent attend religious services regularly. On the abortion issue, 68 percent are pro-life, 26 percent pro-choice.

But then, those who despise the TEA Party people know that. Which is why they spend all their efforts maligning, slandering, libeling, and otherwise doing their damndest to erase the facts recited above.

Other stuff worth knowing:

A vast majority of the Tea Party sympathizers support individual initiative and oppose government intervention, believe Washington Democrats are spending too much time pursuing their Big Government ideology, and think Congress has exceeded the Constitutional limits of its power. They also hold that the present financial crisis and recession were caused by reckless bank practices; by federal policies that promoted poor choices and irresponsible borrowing by people who could not afford to repay their mortgages. As for health care, 74 percent believe the Obama legislation will make health care worse for most Americans, 76 percent say it will increase healthcare costs, and 92 percent are concerned that it will increase the size of the federal deficit.

Finally, a whopping 87 percent of Tea Party folks are “very likely” to vote in the 2010 election for U.S. Congress.

Think Kind, Kagen, Obey, and Feinie are worried? Damn RIGHT they are.

There's even more at the link.

HT: Catholic Thing

Second Thoughts on the DC Diocese' Decision

The government of Washington DC mandates that employers cover gay "spouses" identically to coverage of actual marriages.

Following this mandate, the DC Diocese decided to drop all "family" coverage for its employees. Canonist Ed Peters has some reservations about that.

...First, the archbishop's fears about his coming across as legitimizing "same-sex marriage" unless he cuts off spousal benefits seem misplaced: no action performed under compulsion can be construed as necessarily signaling approval or agreement with such action

Second.........what appears to be a very promising case to fight this intrusive legislation is being squandered by the archdiocese's capitulation to the policy

Third, as it stands, the archdiocese's decision does not deny a single gay-couple coverage, but it does deprive people who are trying to live in accord with Church teaching on marriage and the family the dignity of having their vocation recognized in something besides papal encyclicals and catechisms

I tend to agree with Peters, although it would cost the Diocese a buncha bucks to go to court with this. They could argue that the Diocese will provide family benefits to those who are married in the eyes of the Church, and assert that the First Amendment protects that decision.

Phil Gramm's Anchor

Phil Gramm runs his mouth a lot about NOT instituting regulations on financial houses such as GoldmanSachs, Citi, BofA, (etc.)

That's because Phil has this....umnnnhhh....... anchor around his foot.

Radical derivative deregulation had a bastard birth: On the eve of a holiday break, Texas Senator Phil Graham attached a budget bill rider titled the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000. This was done at the behest of his wife Wendy, who was a member of the Board of Directors of Enron.

What the CFMA did was create a unique financial product. Derivatives and Swaps entered a world where they were treated very differently from all other financial products. Stocks, bonds, options, futures all follow specific rules. Securitized derivative products (collaterallized paper such as CDOs, CMOs, CLOs, etc.) and Credit Default Swaps (CDSs) do not.

Gramm now attempts to defend the indefensible.

He'd be better off simply cutting the anchor free.

HT: Ritholtz

Helpful Signs

This keeps violent solutions to a minimum.

HT: MoonBattery

Didn't See This on State-Run Media, Did'ja?

All you saw was vid of Obamamamamama doing his 'fight-song' routine about healthcare.

No mention of the two thousand ++ demonstrators protesting ObamaCare outside, was there?

Will Flynn Demolish the Police Department?

Badger Blogger/Melnick runs an expose on new MPD 'thinking' installed by Ed Flynn. Here's a part which struck me as very significant:

The mentality of “there’s nothing a detective does that can’t be done by a patrolman” ignores three hallmarks of good investigations: experience, training and specialization. Detectives working in various specialties, like Sensitive Crimes or Homicide, go to specialized training. They work certain types of crime day-in, day-out…they become good at what they do. Flynn’s approach sends the message, “none of that matters…anyone can do this job.”

Another hallmark of good investigations under assault is specialization. Prior to Flynn, the organizational chart of the MPD broke detective assignments down into categories like Robbery, Property Crime, Violent Crime, Homicide, etc. Soon, the distinctions will be made based upon geography…not type of crime. So, just like the expectations made of the patrolmen, detectives will soon be expected to be jacks-of-all-trades…master-of -none.

Most private businesses have 'specialty' professionals--whether in purchasing/materials, HR, or manufacturing--because these individuals have experience and knowledge which others (even other generalist professionals) simply do not have. It is the same in banks and in CPA and law practices.

Yes, there are certain 'common skills' which all cops (and others) must have. But Flynn has embarked on a dangerous course for Milwaukee and its citizens.

Plenty more at the link, other excellent points. Read it all.

"Leave Us Alone" v. the (D) Coalition

Attended a small gathering last night. Was privileged to hear a nationally-know political activist give a rundown on the current situation.

His assessment of the TEA Party gang?

They are the "Leave Us Alone" segment of Americans--which he distinguished from the "Give Me the Pie" Americans.

And there's something else he said which was very interesting.

He all-but-predicted the demise of the (D) coalition, which he characterized as 'a group of special interests', each attempting to get at that "pie" in the middle of the table.

But the pie is not big enough to sustain all of them--therefore, they will start (metaphorically) eating each other.

Maybe he's an optimist, but I doubt it.

By the way, he's another who believes that

IT'S THE SPENDING, STUPID!!

If ObamaCare Passes....

It's entirely possible that the ObamaCare Pig will make it through.

In which case, the State of Wisconsin and ALL its political subsidiaries should drop their health insurance coverage at the earliest possible date and pay the 8%-of-salary fine.

The Statists will get their way: ObamaCare.

The taxpayers who remain in Wisconsin will see a huge reduction in public-employee compensation cost--which translates to tax reduction.

I'd also recommend that the State and its subsidiaries drop the coverage regardless of union-contract language.

Let them sue.

A Bomb Left for Walker

When, at long last, the criminal enterprise reign of James Earl Doyle ends, his successor will have a little bomb sitting on the desk.

Benefits paid to unemployed workers will have to be cut and taxes on struggling businesses will have to go up to pay for a staggering number of claims due to the recession, Wisconsin lawmakers were told Wednesday.

Won't happen until 2011 or 2012.

The amount of wages that could be taxed went up this year and is scheduled to go up again in 2011 and 2013. Overall tax rates also increased in 2010 and businesses will be subject to a special assessment starting in 2011 to begin paying off the interest on the money borrowed from the federal government, the advisory council letter to lawmakers said.

The assumption that 'taxes will go up' is based on another assumption: that the next Administration will continue the usual wasteful spending.

Don't bet on that.

They STILL Don't Have the Votes, So They'll Cheat

Un-frickin'- believable.

House Rules Chairwoman Louise Slaughter is prepping to help usher the healthcare overhaul through the House and potentially avoid a direct vote on the Senate overhaul bill, the chairwoman said Tuesday.

Slaughter is weighing preparing a rule that would consider the Senate bill passed once the House approves a corrections bill that would make changes to the Senate version.

That is un-constitutional, and apparently would allow any US citizen who 'is negatively affected' by the law to sue to void the damn thing.

HT: Ace

Condescension, Thy Name is "Priest"

Here's an example of flagrant and abusive condescension.

A parish priest responded to a parishioner's email about ObamaCare.

It is so unfortunate that you have such a myopic vision and have made the conscious decision to NOT learn anything about Social Justice, that you would rather listen and believe the words of Hannity and Limbaugh rather than [local bishop's name] or any Roman Catholic authority on the teachings of the Catholic Church especially in the area of Social Justice and the Social gospel.

I was contacted by Bishop _____ and [another bishop's] Secretary. They both were disappointed in your mindset and your refusal to learn what the Catholic Church actually teaches. I pray that someday you will spend the time and effort to learn, understand and comprehend the Church's view on Health Care Reform, Immigration Reform, and the understanding that the Body of Christ isn't made up of only those people you believe to be given the recognition. With that being said, I do not want you to send me any E-Mails or forward any articles that are contrary to the teachings of the Church. I pray that God may have mercy on you (emphasis added).

Besides the (somewhat juvenile) writing style and the Holier-Than-Thou-By-At-Least-Several Orders of Magnitude asininity, the priest offers nothing--NOTHING--to support his position, aside from a document of USCC.

Which document, by the way, has NO moral standing (aside from the life issues). In other words, the USCC has an opinion.

That's about it. Woop-tee-doo.

On two other (different) topics, I've seen exactly that attitude from priests, who seem to think that Ordination, ipso facto, brings near-infallibility to their little heads--so much so that no amount of experience, education, or knowledge of a layperson is deserving of much more than a haughty little *sniff*.

HT: Inside

Who's Reading Drudge?

Easy.

All the pols:

The [Drudge Report] was seen 149,967 times since March 1st from users at senate.gov and 244,347 times at house.gov. [There were] 10,825 visits from the White House, eop.gov," the Drudge Report wrote.

Yah. PowerLine's right: it's O.-C.D.

HT: PowerLine

TEA Parties Rev It Up

Barry the RabbleRouser is in St Louis.

And he's not alone. The TEA Party folks are reacting.

They were expecting 600…… 1,800+ SHOWED UP TODAY!:—- New Count— 2,225 TURNED OUT TODAY!!

That's at 0945 this morning. Middle of the day, folks.

More tonight at 5:30 this evening, downtown St Louis.

HT: Gateway

RahmAJamma THIS, Barry!

This will be a "make my day" moment if the (D) critters manage to jam it through.

Fifty-seven percent (57%) of voters say the health care reform plan now working its way through Congress will hurt the U.S. economy.

Two-out-of-three voters (66%) also believe the health care plan proposed by President Obama and congressional Democrats is likely to increase the federal deficit. That’s up six points from late November...

Eighty-one percent (81%) believe it is at least somewhat likely that the health care reform plan will cost more than official estimates. That number includes 66% who say it is very likely that the official projections understate the true cost of the plan.

Seventy-eight percent (78%) also believe it is at least somewhat likely that taxes will have to be raised on the middle class to cover the cost of health care reform. This includes 65% who say middle-class tax hikes are very likely, a six-point increase from late November.

Fifty-nine percent (59%) of voters say cost is the biggest problem with health care. But 54% believe passage of the proposed health care legislation will lead to higher health care costs.

Go ahead. Try ramming it through. The consequences will be significant, perhaps severe, and certainly near-instantaneous.

HT: ACE

Tommy Should Consider This

This ad would roll right off the tongue of Paul Ryan.

Tommy should consider it (with a couple of changes), and so should Sean Duffy and whoever emerges in the Valley district.

Rubio's right, you know.

Doylet Line ChooChoo to Cost Taxpayers MORE

There's so much wrong with Doylet-Think that it's impossible to fisk it briefly.

High-speed rail critics are overstating the fare likely to be charged on a planned train line connecting Milwaukee and Madison, a top state Department of Transportation official says.

...Chris Klein, executive assistant to state Transportation Secretary Frank Busalacchi, said riders wouldn't pay a $33 fare "unless it includes dinner and drinks." The high-end figure was developed before state officials knew the federal grant would cover the full cost of the project, including buying trains, which will avoid the operating costs of renting them from Amtrak, Klein said.

$10 bucks for "dinner and drinks"? Well, yah. After all, the riders will be lobbyists and lawyers. You don't expect them to pay full price for meals and cocktails, do you?

Transportation officials expect the actual fare will be closer to the low end of the range and comparable to the fare for Amtrak's Milwaukee-to-Chicago Hiawatha line, which now charges $22 each way

Oh. Nevermind!

So the taxpayer subsidy will be larger, right?

Sure. That'll sit well with us peons.

The Other Planet: FCC

You're going to take the Internet, whether you like it or not.

It's the federal government's job to get everyone online, whether they like it or not.

That was the consensus of a summit jointly held by the Federal Communications Commission and the John S. Knight Foundation. The three and a half hour “Digital Inclusion Summit,” held in Washington, D.C.’s Newseum and emceed by FCC Chair Julius Genachowski, pushed the trope that the “underserved” must receive broadband access through government assistance.

That's despite this:

In a survey taken by Pew, one in three consumers who lack Internet simply do not want it. Of current dial-up users, about 62 percent have no interest in subscribing to broadband.

The alternative-reality discussion included such ideas as using Americorps workers to "help" people to get online--at broadband speed.

HT: WashExaminer

Fishing Lake Michigan? Maybe Not!

Interesting news:

The Obama administration will accept no more public input for a federal strategy that could prohibit U.S. citizens from fishing the nation's oceans, coastal areas, Great Lakes, and even inland waters.

This announcement comes at the time when the situation supposedly still is "fluid" and the Interagency Ocean Policy Task Force still hasn't issued its final report on zoning uses of these waters.

You read that right. Sport fishing (not just commercial) will be curtailed.

"Now we see NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) and the administration planning the future of recreational fishing access in America based on a similar agenda of these same groups and other Big Green anti-use organizations, through an Executive Order by the President.

We are dealing with VERY strange creatures--Big Green and Obama.

HT: WashExaminer

To M-16 or Not To M-16: What Is the Caliber?

The discussion rages on.

This link provides some interesting info. Apparently the M-16 family does NOT like heavy full-auto use (jams-a-lot) and that .223 just doesn't do the job after 500 yards--or maybe after 300 yards.

Nugget: a ~.270 has been regarded as 'ideal' since WWI.

Natch, the Armed Forces don't provide that as a standard-issue caliber.

HT: Captain

Dirtball (D) Games in Wisconsin

Steve reports:

Rep. Bill Kramer (R-Waukesha) tipped me to this little power freeze, known as AB 787 introduced into the Assembly to keep control of the Office of the Commissioner of Insurance for another three years after losing the governor’s office. To wit, it changes the appointment from an “at the pleasure of the governor” appointment to a fixed 4-year appointment ending in the third year of the governor’s term.

When you elect dirtballs, you get dirtball politics.

In order to find out who put the current language in place, you have to see Steve's blog.

Is Flynn Burying Barrett's "One Name?

While MPD Chief Ed Flynn seems to have a no-nonsense approach to crime, perhaps that doesn't apply to ALL crime.

Like, for example, Tommy Barrett's see-no/hear-no/speak-not about vote fraud.

Milwaukee police officers sat on their hands for months last year instead of investigating possible voter fraud cases from the 2008 general election.

Bice goes on for a while before we get to the REAL information. (Albrecht is the City's Deputy Election Director. Landgraf is the Ass't DA responsible for prosecuting voter fraud.)

"I believe the batch, which included the voter registration application and the corresponding returned (address) card, probably numbered around 400-600 (out of approximately 60,000 EDRs)," Albrecht wrote, using an acronym for election day registrations. "Any idea as to the status of these?"

Landgraf responded that Milwaukee police had responsibility for looking into these cases. It's not unusual for many of these postcards to be returned, officials said Friday. The cards may not be deliverable because voters move or the address may be recorded or typed inaccurately.

The prosecutor then said cops had put election-related matters on the back burner for the first half of last year.

"We obtained MPD's attention in May or June, at about the same time when the Department of Justice (Division of Criminal Investigation) stepped up to start the work that MPD should have commenced immediately after your referrals," Landgraf wrote.

"We obtained MPD's attention....." is codespeak for "They really don't want to do this work..."

To Bice (and any other observer) there's a good reason that the rank-and-file coppers were avoiding this as though it were nuclear waste: Flynn doesn't like his guys playing with political stuff, especially when that stuff splatters mud (or whatever) all over Tommy Barrett.

Gee. No WONDER it's so hard to come up with "Just One Name."

Somebody's burying the bodies.

Iceland's "Nope"

Iceland's population responded "Nope!" when asked to bail out a bank. (Also mentioned here by Owen.)

As the U.S. Congress had done before them, the politicians in the Icelandic parliament approved legislation covering the losses of a private Icelandic bank, a bill that would have cost every Icelander $16,400. But thanks to the brave resistance of their president, the Icelandic people took full advantage of their more democratic system to vote down the Icesave bailout on March 6. A full 93 percent of them voted against handing over $5.3 billion, nearly half their annual GDP, to repay the Dutch and British governments. The Icelandic people rightly questioned why they should be held responsible for reimbursing Dutch and British depositors who were compensated by their governments for their failed savings on behalf of a private bank whose largest stockholder was based in London.

Hmmmmnnnnmmm.

Woopsie! Racine to Pay $10K in Bad Arrest

Judgment entered Friday against:

James Doyle, City of Milwaukee, City of Racine, and 3 Racine police officers.

Frank was unlawfully arrested and his firearm illegally siezed. He was later released without being charged.

Wisconsin Carry filed suit on Frank's behalf for his unlawful detainment, arrest, and seizure of his firearm.

Frank was lawfully open-carrying on his own porch when Racine Police, who were
summoned to his neighborhood on an unrelated call, observed and questioned Frank
because he was open-carrying. After a few minutes of increasingly aggressive
questioning Frank exercised his right to remain silent and was subsequently
unlawfully arrested for obstruction of justice for refusing to give his name. In
the state of Wisconsin no law allows officers to arrest for obstruction on a
person's refusal to give his or her name. "Mere silence is insufficient to
constitute obstruction. Henes v. Morrissey, 194 Wis. 2d 339, 533 N.W.2d 802
(1995)"

While I'm not an "open-carry" kinda guy, unlawful arrests and siezures aren't good, no matter the circumstance.

(Details at www.wisconsincarry.org, 10/16 blog entry.)

Hopey-Changey Writ Large in Red Ink

Not exactly news, (Friday dump), but hey.

President Barack Obama’s budget will lead to deficits averaging nearly $1 trillion over the next decade, the CBO estimated Friday.

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) said President Barack Obama’s budget would lead to annual deficits averaging nearly $1 trillion for the next decade.

The estimates are for larger deficits than the budget shortfalls expected by the White House.

IOW, even vigorous massage couldn't get out the red marks.

And that's WITHOUT HopeyChangeyHealthCare.

HT: HotAir/Greenroom