TIME TO DERAIL AMTRAK SUBSIDIES
An Amtrak train bound for New York May 12 derailed a few minutes after leaving Philadelphia, killing 8, injuring more than 200 of 243 passengers and crew. The crash could have been prevented if more had been spent on infrastructure, journalists speculated before investigators from the National Transportation Safety Board reached the site. The train was going more than twice the speed limit of 50 mph as it entered a sharp curve at Frankford Junction, NTSB investigators said. The train sped up as it entered the curve. Positive Train Control - which forces trains to slow if the operator ignores speed limits - was installed along that section of track, but wasn't turned on, Amtrak said. Amtrak is getting $1.4 billion this fiscal year. Republicans want to reduce that by $200 million, but propose no cuts in the portion of its budget that funds safety. Democrats imply "budget cuts" were to blame even though cuts not yet made couldn't possibly be responsible. Their ghoulish demagoguery diverts attention from the misplaced priorities and (in)competence of Amtrak's management.
HALF-FULL REPORT 05/15/15
What is going on around here? Whatever the Pubs are drinking on Capitol Hill, they need to keep drinking it. This week, we present the House of Good News. There are four examples, ending with Speaker John Boehner yesterday (5/14) showing the world how to deal with The Lying Swine. You're gonna love it... More good news in the Karma Payback department: Tuesday (5/12) - Obama Accused of Being Sexist by Chairwoman of NOW... In the I'm-As-Shocked-As-Claude-Rains department is this poll released on Monday (5/11): Democrats now view socialism as favorably as they view capitalism. As? As?? This is a fun and hopeful HFR - which is why a high school kid is the Hero of the Week. We worry about America's future with good reason. But there are also good reasons for optimism as well. Here's a great example... And there's another example of American ingenuity and insight that you'll find fascinating, funny, and mind-bending thoughtful. Here's The Bike You Can't Ride...
THE “WHITE PRIVILEGE” SCAM IS ANTI-WHITE RACISM
"White masculinity is THE problem for America's colleges," said Saida Grundy, professor of sociology and Afro-American Studies at Boston University, in an indiscreet tweet. Whites have had it better than peoples of color, men have had it better than women, so white male students should be made to "check their privilege," say many college administrators, professors and students - chiefly those in ethnic and gender studies. The irony of arguably the most sheltered, cosseted and subsidized among us demanding that others "check their privilege" is lost upon them. What they call "privilege" is really "a consequence of hard work, of delaying gratification and of sacrifice," said Art Schlichter, a retired Army officer turned trial lawyer. "If we have privilege, it was earned at Bunker Hill, Gettysburg and Normandy," he said. It's a function of character, not of "skin tone or the number of vowels in your name." Let's face it -- "white privilege" is a guilt-mongering racist scam.
EXPOSING THE SECRET TO THE WARMIST HOAX
Well, it finally happened. Somebody let the Fascist cat out of the Warmist bag. Of course, TTP has being doing this for 10 years, starting with Solar Warming (September 2005). Now, however, someone with a global megaphone has said it too, and with crystal clarity. That someone is Maurice Newman, Australia's most prestigious business leader and Prime Minister Abbott's close personal advisor. Newman, in Oz's largest national newspaper, "touched to the point" on Warmism just as precisely as Ronald Reagan did when he identified the Soviet Union as an "Evil Empire." To say it's caused a Total Libtard Meltdown Down Under is a gross understatement. Here it is in full, for it's important you read it all, And here's how, with just four words, Prime Minister Abbott can now bring a lot more freedom into the world.
THE MIDDLE EAST RUNS OUT OF WATER
A ranking Iranian political figure, Issa Kalantari, recently warned that past mistakes leave Iran with water supplies so insufficient that up to 70 percent, or 55 million out of 78 million Iranians, would be forced to abandon their native country for parts unknown. Many facts buttress Kalantari's apocalyptic prediction: *Once lauded in poetry, Lake Urmia, the Middle East's largest lake, has lost 95 percent of its water since 1996, going from 31 billion cubic meters to 1.5 billion. *What the Seine is to Paris, the Zayanderud was to Isfahan - except the latter went bone-dry in 2010. *Over two-thirds of Iran's cities and towns are "on the verge of a water crisis" that could result in drinking water shortages; already, thousands of villages depend on water tankers. Nor are Iranians alone in peril; many others in the arid Middle East may also be forced into unwanted, penurious, desperate exile. With one unique, magnificent exception, much of the Middle East is running out of water due to such maladies as population growth, short-sighted dictators, distorted economic incentives, and infrastructure-destroying warfare. Some specifics:
FROM HELPLESS DISASTER TO SOLVABLE PROBLEM
When we approach any problem, how we approach it begins with an idea, a belief, a story about what that problem is, and what needs to be done about it. To considerable extent, we can choose the fundamental belief or premise from which we approach any problem... and how we frame a problem can be the very key to success or failure. Currently, the widely accepted premise is that psychological problems - depression, anxiety, obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), addictions et al - are abnormal phenomena. They don't belong here. They were brought to us by some unfortunate circumstances - an unhappy childhood, a personal weakness, a society that's sick. They're polluting the system, like a harmful bacteria or virus, and we want all trace of them eliminated immediately. What if that premise is wrong? I've been working with people as a teacher, a marriage and family therapist, and a life coach for 35 years now. I started with that premise of problems as aberrations - the "disease model" of psychology. I don't buy it anymore. Let's explore a different premise, and see where it takes us. The explorations starts with asking certain questions.
FROM RUINS TO VIBRANCY
Gdansk, Poland. Over the past 1,000 years, this city on the Baltic has gone through cycles of great prosperity and almost total destruction. This is the city where World War II began 76 years ago on Sept. 1, 1939. And this is the city where the fall of European communism began in 1980. This past week, several leaders of Eastern and Central European nations came to Gdansk to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II at the Monument to the Fallen Shipyard Workers of 1970, who were shot by the communists for merely peacefully protesting their conditions. They were also here to celebrate their liberation from the Soviet Empire and the blossoming of their economies ever since. No where can you see that blossoming more vibrantly than in Poland. There surely is a lesson here for America when it must soon attempt to rise from the economic and social ruins of the Obama Presidency.
WHY POLLSTERS DON’T UNDERSTAND VOTERS
The surprise victory of Britain's Conservative Party in the election last Thursday (5/7) was a grave embarrassment to all 11 of the UK's biggest pollsters, who predicted the Tories would lose narrowly, or barely eke out a win. "In all my years as a journalist and strategist, I've never seen as stark a failure of polling," said David Axelrod, President Obama's campaign guru, who advised the Labour Party ("labor" spelled the Brit way). Axelrod, you'll enjoy hearing, returned to the US humiliated by his own failure. The British election was just the most recent surprise for pollsters globally, who badly underestimated Likud's strength in the Israeli election March 17; badly underestimated how well Republicans would do in the 2014 midterm elections. Why have pollsters become so bad at understanding voters recently? There are many proposed explantions, but ine stands out.
HALF-FULL REPORT 05/08/15
FATWA, FEAR, AND FAILURE IN IRAN
Serious undertakings by the Mullah Regime in Tehran require specific authorization from the supreme leader, Obama's pen pal Ali Khamenei. An excellent Iranian source, with an excellent track record on such matters, informs me that the supreme leader issued a fatwa on April 14th to two of Iran's most powerful killers, Generals Mohammad Ali Jafari (head of the Revolutionary Guards), and Qassem Suleimani (head of the Quds Force), authorizing them to take any and all actions to destroy the Saudi royal family and its regime. It's a big deal. Khamenei's move against the royal family is quite audacious, and could bespeak several very different convictions. He might believe that the strategic tide is running in his favor, and hence the moment favors a dramatic push against the Sunni king. Contrariwise, Khamenei might be concerned that things are going badly, and thus that he needs some spectacular victory to rally his own people and the turbulent jihadis in the region. For even though things are going swimmingly with Washington thanks to Obama, dark clouds are looming over the supreme leader's downtown palace. The seemingly relentless march of the Iranian hegemon across the Middle East and big chunks of Africa is stalled, blocked, or actually losing. Here's what's going on.