California: The Crazy State

If you're over 18, don't expect to get a job babysitting in CA.

From The Union.com
Babysitting bill in Calif. Legislature
Office of Sen. Doug LaMalfa
Special to The Union

How will parents react when they find out they will be expected to provide workers' compensation benefits, rest and meal breaks and paid vacation time for…babysitters? Dinner and a movie night may soon become much more complicated.

Assembly Bill 889 (authored by Assemblyman Tom Ammiano, D-San Francisco, will require these protections for all “domestic employees,” including nannies, housekeepers and caregivers.

The bill has already passed the Assembly and is quickly moving through the Senate with blanket support from the Democrat members that control both houses of the Legislature – and without the support of a single Republican member. Assuming the bill will easily clear its last couple of legislative hurdles, AB 889 will soon be on its way to the Governor's desk.

Under AB 889, household “employers” (aka “parents”) who hire a babysitter on a Friday night will be legally obligated to pay at least minimum wage to any sitter over the age of 18 (unless it is a family member), provide a substitute caregiver every two hours to cover rest and meal breaks, in addition to workers' compensation coverage, overtime pay, and a meticulously calculated timecard/paycheck.

Failure to abide by any of these provisions may result in a legal cause of action against the employer including cumulative penalties, attorneys' fees, legal costs and expenses associated with hiring expert witnesses, an unprecedented measure of legal recourse provided no other class of workers – from agricultural laborers to garment manufacturers. (On the bright side, language requiring an hour of paid vacation time for every 30 hours worked was amended out of the bill in the Senate.)

Unfortunately, the unreasonable costs and risks contained in this bill will discourage folks from hiring housekeepers, nannies and babysitters and increase the use of institutionalized care rather than allowing children, the sick or elderly to be cared for in their homes. I can't help but wonder if that is the goal of AB 889 – a terrible bill that needs to be stopped.

More information on the text and status of the bill can be accessed from my webpage at senate.ca.gov/lamalfa.

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My Schedule of Regular Posts:
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*Monday through Friday afternoon - List of topics Limbaugh discussed on his program that day
*Monday through Friday throughout the day - My posts on anything that I feel like talking about. At least one or two a day, sometimes more.
*Saturday through Sunday morning - An addition to my booklist of political books - covering Democrats, Republicans and other interested parties.

Poll Power: Who Should Be the Next President?

I've just discovered a site called Polldaddy.com which allows people to post their own polls.

This is an experiment, we'll see how much interest there is:

President to Move Jobs Speech at Request of Boehner

Rush, Hannity and even O'Reilly I think were today castigating Obama for announcing that his speech would be held on the same night as the Republican debate.

But as you see in Update 6 below, from blog.chron.com (Houston Chronicle), the President sent his request to Boehner who made no demur! It was only after the speech date and time were announced publically that Boehner started to raise a fuss.

Of course one wonders why Obama or his handlers even wanted that date in the first place. They must have known when the Republican debate was taking place - why even try to schedule the speech on that day?

Here's the initial report:

THE EARLIER ANNOUNCEMENT: President Barack Obama will make his long-awaited speech about jobs Wednesday night to a joint session of Congress at the same time that the Republican presidential candidates are scheduled to debate at the Reagan Presidential Library in California.

While the debate isn’t the first Republican debate of the cycle, it is the first since Gov. Rick Perry entered the presidential contest, and polls have shown him taking a commanding lead in the race for the GOP nomination. Political observers have said that the debate could provide crucial insights into how Mitt Romney’s and Michelle Bachmann’s campaigns plan to deal with Perry’s surging candidacy.

In his letter to House Speaker John Boehner requesting the joint meeting of both houses of Congress, Obama wrote that he will unveil a series “bipartisan proposals” that Congress can take up immediately to “rebuild the American economy.”

However, with a presidential address to a joint session of Congress scheduled on the same night, at the same time, it’s likely that any press generated from the debate would be drowned out by the developments in Washington.

CBS News White House correspondent Mark Knoller reports that White House spokesman Jay Carney said that the debate was “not enough of a reason” to change the timing of the president’s speech.

Politico’s Glenn Thrush reports that Carney said that the NBC News/Politico debate was “one debate of many” and that it didn’t influence the scheduling of the speech.

Still, longtime Washington writers said that scheduling the speech on top of the debate could be politically advantageous for the president and that it could even lead to a better debate that features fewer canned answers.

Slate’s John Dickerson tweeted that the scheduling makes sense “if you want the election to be a choice and not a referendum.” He also tweeted “if your pose is I’m Mr. reasonable president offering ideas supported by both parties [extra loud] denunciations @ GOP debate is maybe a strong foil.”

Karen Tumulty, a longtime political reporter with The Washington Post, tweeted, “Downside for GOP candidates: Prez speech will scramble their debate prep. Upside for the rest of us: Maybe fewer canned lines.”

The thing is, apparently the President asked about this date, and at the time, Boehner made no objection to it. It was only after the date was announced to all, that he started protesting.

Because:

UPDATE 3: CBS News reporter Mark Knoller tweets that a White House official says that Boenher’s office was consulted before the announcement and that no objection or concern was raised.

It’s the latest volley in a back and forth between the White House and the House Speaker John Boehner’s office over if the usual procedure for a joint address to Congress had been followed.

and

UPDATE 4: And now we have the pushback to the pushback - Politico’s Mike Allen tweets “Boehner office says White House ignored protocol: ‘No one in the Speaker’s office…signed off on the date the White House announced today’”

NBC’s Domenico Montanaro sums up the argument between the White House and the Speaker’s Office this way: “We apparently have a semantic argument between “signed off” and “raised an objection” bw WH and Boehner’s office[.]”

and

UPDATE 5: Let’s call this the pushback to the pushback to the pushback (and Washington wonders why the general public gets fed up with them) – CBS News’ Jill Jackson quotes a senior Democratic aide who told reporters “the childish behavior coming out of the Speaker’s office today is truly historic.”

and
UPDATE 6: NBC reports: Boehner’s office confirms they did not raise objection when the White House floated the date, but in released letter released “after we had time to examine what they were proposing.” Boehner’s office insists this was about logistics, not personal.
and
UPDATE 7: The standoff between the Speakers Office and the White House ends with the President agreeing to address a joint session of Congress on Thursday evening.

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My Schedule of Regular Posts:
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*Monday through Friday afternoon - List of topics Limbaugh discussed on his program that day
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*Saturday through Sunday morning - An addition to my booklist of political books - covering Democrats, Republicans and other interested parties.

The MLK Monument on the Washington Mall

Rush gets a dig in that it was "the Chi Coms" who sculpted the MLK statue. Well, it wasn't all of China, it was one sculptor who just happens to be Chinese and lives in a country that is communist.

Story #5: Controversy Over ChiCom-Made MLK Monument

RUSH: Kevin in Green Valley, Arizona, asked me, "Why was the Martin Luther King statue made in China and no one's saying anything about that? I know Maya Angelou is coming out talking about the quote being shortened." He's really done it now. Now he's really done it. Wait 'til Andre Carson hears that a guy who was "lukewarm in the Tea Party" but now full bore wants to join the Tea Party, called here and then talked about the Martin Luther King memorial being made by the ChiComs.

The truth is what sets these people off. (interruption) Yes, there's a controversy over the statue because it looks Asian and that it's white. I'm fully aware of it, Snerdley. Right before the break, Snerdley asked me -- and it kind of frosts me when Snerdley asks me if I know something. I mean, who am I? You know, I'm not a potted plant here. So Snerdley asked me if I knew that people were complaining that the Martin Luther King memorial had -- well, some people looked at it and thought they saw Asian facial characteristics in the carving. I knew that, and others were complaining that it was white and not dark granite or something, that it was white. Now, the Martin Luther King statue was made by the ChiComs 'cause it was $8 million cheaper to make in China. Did you know that? Okay, see? All right, see, well, I did. One of the reasons, it was $8 million cheaper -- (interruption) yeah, it's a big reason. It was $8 million cheaper.

Now, you people judging this thing on the color, I had to laugh. There were people seriously upset that the Martin Luther King statue was white. I think that we should judge the statue by the content of its carving, not the color of its surface, but that's just me. Well, that's just some people's opinion. The Asian thing -- (interruption) what do you mean how am I gonna get around it? I'm not asserting it. I'm just saying some people look at it and see Asian influences. I'm not saying so. The stone actually has a pink tone, but if you take a picture in the right light, usually shot in shadow, that will make it look darker, and everybody will be happy. (interruption) None of the questions predating this? Okay, ask a serious question. What can we do in this country cheaper than -- (interruption) well, yes, the ChiComs cannot build warships yet. The ChiComs cannot build aircraft. They still buy their aircraft from Airbus or Boeing, although the ChiComs are very proud, though. They do have like a 30-year-old aircraft carrier they're refurbishing and they're very proud of that. It's strictly a matter of labor.

Do you know what the iPhone would cost -- I read this, I can't remember where nor how long ago, the iPhone would cost something close to $2,000 if it were manufactured here at union wages. By the time you take the parts and assemble them, same amount of time it takes in Shenzhen with most of the iPhones, iPads are made, costs close to $2,000. Now, the Wall Street Journal, you ask me what did we make better? I'm not kidding you, you're gonna think I'm making this up. (laughing) I was afraid you'd mention this. (laughing) The Wall Street Journal says that the United States still makes the best paper clips. (laughing) I am not making it up.

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My Schedule of Regular Posts:
*Monday through Friday morning - schedules of President, VP and Secretary of State and her diplomats
*Monday through Friday afternoon - List of topics Limbaugh discussed on his program that day
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*Saturday through Sunday morning - An addition to my booklist of political books - covering Democrats, Republicans and other interested parties.

What Does The Tea Party Want for Black America?

I'd say the Tea Party, and the Republicans, want to put an end to Black America, sure. But they want to replace it with.... America. Non-hyphenated America. An America where everybody embraces education, everybody embraces the middle-class lifestyle or above, and everyone works to get out of poverty instead of sitting back and living off the government teat.

Is it all black America's fault? No, no more than it is all the fault of the Native Americans, or of the Brown Americans, the Yellow Americans, or the White Americans.

Once you've been put on the government teat and lived there for three generations, any knowledge that there's any other way to live has pretty much dissipated - regardless of all the good role models on TV and in the movies - which are counterpointed by the bad role models in the rap industry, TV sit coms, and advertising media.

Anyway, today Rush spoke out about what ANdre Carson of Indiana had to say about the Tea Party.

RUSH: First, ladies and gentlemen, how many of you have ever heard of a member of the Congressional Black Caucus Andre Carson? Andre Carson, Democrat from Indiana, he is the Congressional Black Caucus chief vote-counter. He is also, I believe, the second Muslim to serve in Congress, Keith Ellison from Minnesota being the first. And Mr. Carson, member of the Congressional Black Caucus from Indiana, says that Tea Partiers on Capitol Hill would like to see -- this is from The Politico, by the way -- Mr. Andre Carson said that Tea Partiers on Capitol Hill would like to see African-Americans hanging from trees. He accuses the movement of wishing for a return to the Jim Crow era. We have audio sound bites in case you doubt me, in case you think I'm making this up. This is the new civility of the Democrat Party. This is August 22nd. So basically nine days ago, it's taken that long for this to surface. Nine days ago in Miami during a Congressional Black Caucus town hall, the whip, Congressional Black Caucus whip Andre Carson, Democrat, Indiana spoke. Now, it's a cheap microphone, and I think this is Internet quality, but here's what he said.

CARSON: This is the effort that we're seeing of Jim Crow. Some of these folks in Congress right now would love to see us as second-class citizens.

AUDIENCE: Yeah!

CARSON: Some of them in Congress right now with this Tea Party movement would love to see you and me -- I'm sorry, Mr. Chairman -- hanging on a tree.

RUSH: So he said it. This is the new civility of the Democrat Party. We actually had a member of the Congressional Black Caucus suggest that Tea Partiers in Washington would like to see blacks like him hanging from trees. I wonder if Mr. Andre Carson is -- (interruption) He's probably unaware, Mr. Snerdley, that blacks in the south were hung from trees by Democrats. Do you think he knows that? Do you think Andre Carson knows that it was Democrats who did the lynching? Do you think Andre Carson knows that it was Democrats who hung blacks from trees? You think he knows that? You really do? Well, that just makes him even more disingenuous. Well, if you didn't know it, folks, it is true, blacks in the south were lynched by Democrats largely because they might have voted Republican.

If you were black, you could get lynched, you could be hung from a tree by Democrats if you voted Republican. In fact, white Republicans were the first targets of southern lynch mobs, especially the terrorist arm of the Democrat Party which is known as what? The Klan. The Ku Klux Klan was the terrorist arm of the Democrat Party. The Democrats terrorized white people who tried to help black people. The Democrats of the south were the ones doing all the lynching, Mr. Carson. Meanwhile, it's ridiculous to have to even point this out, no evidence that the Tea Party's lynched anybody. This is how discombobulated these people are. And of course you hear the audience reaction, "Yeah, baby, yeah!" Language of jihad? Well, it does sound like Jihadist language in you look at it in a certain way.

Now, they went to Andre Carson, "Did you really mean this?" And Carson's staff said, "Yep, the congressman stands by his remarks since the Tea Party has gutted nutrition services for the poor." That's what he said is the reason for the comment. Now, you and I all know that not one nutrition program has been gutted much less even cut. According to the General Accounting Office in 2008 the federal government had 18 separate food programs that spent 62 and a half billion dollars every year to feed the poor, and they have been hugely expanded by the Obama regime. In fact, somewhere here in my stack, ladies and gentlemen, the federal government has an outreach plan if your food stamps were wiped out by the hurricane, here's where you go to get them replaced. If you went out and bought food with your food stamps and if your food happened to get flooded along with your flooded food stamps, this is where you go to have it redeemed.

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My Schedule of Regular Posts:
*Monday through Friday morning - schedules of President, VP and Secretary of State and her diplomats
*Monday through Friday afternoon - List of topics Limbaugh discussed on his program that day
*Monday through Friday throughout the day - My posts on anything that I feel like talking about. At least one or two a day, sometimes more.
*Saturday through Sunday morning - An addition to my booklist of political books - covering Democrats, Republicans and other interested parties.

31 August 2011, Wednesday, Rush Limbaugh Headlines

The left hand "Countdown" is an actual clock counting down.


--Countdown to Obama Jobs Speech
Media hyperventilates in anticipation of another speech.

--Democrat Congressman Says Tea Party Wants to Lynch Blacks
The new civility of your modern Democrat Party.

--Pelosi Goes Nuts on the "Rich"
Crazy conspiracy theories from the former Speaker.

--The Left is Petrified of Rick Perry
They'll always tell you who they fear. It's not Romney.

--Boehner Should Reject Obama's Request for Joint Session Speech
Republicans must put Obama in his place on this.
• Update: Boehner Rebuffs Obama Request
Fox News: Barack Obama Schedules Latest Jobs Speech on Same Night as Republican Debate

--Obama Regime Targets Enemies
Is it really that simple? Yes, it's really that simple.

--Another of Obama's Green Energy Scam Companies Goes Bankrupt
Obama touted Solyndra in 2010. Now they're belly up.

Stack of Stuff Quick Hits Page
» Obama Justice Blocks Merger of AT&T and T-Mobile
» Did Obama Steer Irene to the White State of Vermont?
» S&P Rates Subprime Loans Higher Than US Gov't
» IRS Figures: Where Have All the Millionaires Gone?
» Controversy Over ChiCom-Made MLK Monument
» WSJ: America Leads World in Paper Clip Production

--Cambridge Adams Limbaugh
Already good potty training reports on the new puppy.

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My Schedule of Regular Posts:
*Monday through Friday morning - schedules of President, VP and Secretary of State and her diplomats
*Monday through Friday afternoon - List of topics Limbaugh discussed on his program that day
*Monday through Friday throughout the day - My posts on anything that I feel like talking about. At least one or two a day, sometimes more.
*Saturday through Sunday morning - An addition to my booklist of political books - covering Democrats, Republicans and other interested parties.

31 August 2011, Wednesday, Pres and VP Schedule

http://www.whitehouse.gov/schedule/president
9:30 am The President receives the Presidential Daily Briefing
Oval Office
Closed Press

10:00 am The President meets with senior advisors
Oval Office
Closed Press

10:35 am The President holds an event to call on Congress to move forward in a bipartisan way to pass a clean extension of the Surface Transportation Bill
Rose Garden
Open Press

http://www.whitehouse.gov/schedule/vice-president
6:45 pm The Vice President and Dr. Jill Biden host a reception with leaders of labor organizations
Naval Observatory
Closed Press



12:00 pm Press Briefing by Press Secretary Jay Carney
James S. Brady Briefing Room
Open Press



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My Schedule of Regular Posts:
*Monday through Friday morning - schedules of President, VP and Secretary of State and her diplomats
*Monday through Friday afternoon - List of topics Limbaugh discussed on his program that day
*Monday through Friday throughout the day - My posts on anything that I feel like talking about. At least one or two a day, sometimes more.
*Saturday through Sunday morning - An addition to my booklist of political books - covering Democrats, Republicans and other interested parties.

Rush on Chief Justice Clarence Thomas

Rush had a great deal to say about Clarence Thomas today - these two men are great friends, and Thomas presided over Rush's second marriage.

There's a link on the transcript page to buy Thomas' memoir, My Grandfather's Son. If interested, check it out at Amazon.com.

RUSH: There's a great piece in the New Yorker by Jeffrey Toobin. You know what's about? It is the most amazing story, a story I never thought I would see, although I know why it's been written. It is a story about how Clarence Thomas is the driving intellectual force of the United States Supreme Court. Clarence Thomas and his wife, Ginni, are the two people working the hardest to stop Obamacare. It is Clarence Thomas that provides the guidance for Antonin Scalia, not the other way around, according to this story by Jeffrey Toobin.

RUSH: Walter Russell Mead has reviewed the Jeffrey Toobin piece in the New Yorker about Clarence Thomas, and Walter Russell Mead's thesis -- and, folks, I gotta tell you, you're gonna be as stunned as I was when you hear this. Walter Russell Mead's thesis of Toobin's article is that Clarence Thomas, while being completely smeared and underestimated by the left, may well have already laid much of the intellectual groundwork necessary to bring down the New Deal era scaffolding around the Constitution, may have already laid the groundwork for repealing Obamacare.

Here's a quote from the Toobin story: "In several of the most important areas of constitutional law, Thomas has emerged as an intellectual leader of the Supreme Court. ... When it comes to the free-speech rights of corporations, the rights of gun owners, and, potentially, the powers of the federal government; in each of these areas, the majority has followed where Thomas has been leading for a decade or more. Rarely has a Supreme Court Justice enjoyed such broad or significant vindication." I know you're asking, "Wait a minute. They impugn this guy, he's an idiot, he doesn't say anything in oral arguments, he does nothing but copycat Scalia. What is this?"

I'll tell you what it is. It's the truth. And the reason that they are getting to the truth now is because what's Toobin's doing with this piece, he's alerting the left to start targeting ethics complaints against Clarence Thomas to try to knock him out of the Obamacare decision. They are gonna try to force Clarence Thomas to recuse himself or to force himself out of the decision making precisely because what they've written about Thomas is true. He is intellectual giant; he has laid the groundwork, and he could lead the court to repealing Obamacare, and that's why they're doing the story now, to try to alert the left to ratchet up their attacks on Justice Thomas anew.

Read the entire transcript at Rush's side.
http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_083011/content/01125111.guest.html

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My Schedule of Regular Posts:
*Monday through Friday morning - schedules of President, VP and Secretary of State and her diplomats
*Monday through Friday afternoon - List of topics Limbaugh discussed on his program that day
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*Saturday through Sunday morning - An addition to my booklist of political books - covering Democrats, Republicans and other interested parties.

Fast and Furious Folk Get Promotions Instead of Prison

This was actually news a few weeks ago. The people in charge of this botched operation that has resulted in the deaths of hundreds of innocent Mexicans as well as Americans, should be on trial for their incompetence, not getting raises and getting promoted.

Story #6: Fast and Furious: ATF Director Moved to New Job

RUSH: Hey, guess what, the head of the ATF is gone, Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. The guy's name is Kenneth Melson. The bureau's acting director on Wednesday will move to the Office of Legal Policy where he'll be a senior advisor on forensic science. So he's not gone. They're just moving him and they're keeping him on the payroll. This is the guy ostensibly behind the Fast and Furious operation. It's called getting him out of the way before the election. They're making him the fall guy but they're taking care of him, basically. 'Cause we all know what this was. This was a back door attempt to get gun control back in this country, precisely because they've lost it legally at the Second Amendment level.

There have been a lot of horrific crimes in Mexico recently - drug cartel members setting fires to casinos etc., committing mass murder against innocents.

What can be done? My own thought is to send a squad of Marines into the country to kill them all.

According to the President of Mexico, it is the US's instatiable desire for drugs that is also partly to blame. A while ago I would have scoffed at this, but really, isn't it true? And its not the poor that are buying most of these drugs. The middle class and wealthy are the ones who buy this crap...

Below is an article about US drug users.... albeit 10 years old...
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/drugs/buyers/whoare.html#ixzz1WZZlxsgG

According to the National Household Survey on Drug Abuse, in 1999 an estimated 14.8 million Americans (see the chart) were current illicit drug users, meaning they had used some illicit drug during the month prior to the survey. This represents 6.7 percent of the population 12 years and older. This number is down more than 50% from the peak year of 1979 when 25 million people (14.1% of the population) were using illegal drugs.

In 1999, more than 4 million of the drug using population were hardcore users: 3.3 million chronic cocaine users and 977,000 chronic heroin users, according to Office of National Drug Control Policy estimates. While casual use of illicit drugs, and cocaine in particular, has fallen dramatically (see the chart) since the early 1980s, the number of hard-core users of cocaine and heroin has remained virtually unchanged.

In terms of age ranges, the highest rate of illicit drug use is found among older teens: the 1999 Monitoring the Future study found that 22% of 10th graders and 26% of 12th graders reported using an illicit drug in the past month.(5) They are closely followed by young adults; the Household Survey found that 20-21% of Americans aged 18-20 reported past month use of some illicit drug.

Men have consistently had a higher rate of drug use than women. In 1999, 8.7% of men were current users of illicit drugs, compared to 4.9% of women. Among children aged 12-17, the rates for boys were only slightly higher than those for girls. (8.4% vs. 7.1%)

Of the major racial/ethnic groups, the rate of drug use is highest among the American Indian/Native American population (10.6%) and those reporting mixed race (11.2%), followed by African Americans (7.7%), Hispanics (6.8%), whites (6.6%). The lowest rates are found among the Asian population. (3.2%). [Note, 6.6% is only 1.1% lower than 7.7%. Not a lot of difference.)

Drug use rates have historically been highly correlated with educational status, and remain so. College graduates have the lowest rates of current drug use (4.8%).

Drug use is more prevalent in metropolitan than non-metropolitan areas, and higher in the West (7.9%) than in the Northeast (7.4%), Midwest (6.7%), or South (5.6%).

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My Schedule of Regular Posts:
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*Monday through Friday afternoon - List of topics Limbaugh discussed on his program that day
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*Saturday through Sunday morning - An addition to my booklist of political books - covering Democrats, Republicans and other interested parties.

President Obama didn't ride on the buses during the "Bus Tour"

Well, I wonder if Rush will have to eat his words tomorrow. Below is his quote from the show today, in which he says the President wasn't actually aboard the two buses during his recent bus tour, but rather went from town to town in Air Force one.

I checked the article he was reading from: http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=45857 , and while the top of the article still claims Obama took Air Force One everywhere, at the very bottom they have an "UPdate" which points out that it is very unlikely that Obama flew from place to place in Air Force one, because there would have been so much publicity of him landing at local airports that it woudl never have washed.

So we'll see Rush admits he was wrong to quote this, tomorrow.

Here's what Rush had to say about it:

Story #3: Fraud: Obama Didn't Ride Buses During Bus Tour

RUSH: By the way, did you know that Obama did not ride on the bus during the bus tours? I've got it here: "To facilitate Obama’s 'bus tour' of midwest America, the Secret Service bought two large buses and set about customizing them to fit the security needs of the president. The buses sport bulletproof black windows, puncture-proof tires, five-inch thick doors, and their own oxygen supplies ... And the Secret Service had to train agents specially to drive them.

"'Agents will be taught to back up at very high rates of speed using just the mirrors on either side,' says Ronald Kessler, author of In The President's Secret Service. 'It really takes guts to do that.' White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said that the buses were necessary because 'The president needs to get out in the country and meet with real folks in real places.' ... But here's the thing: Apparently President Obama only rode the buses for a couple of miles at a time, spending the rest of the time flying from community to community in Air Force One. What's more, the buses were flown from stop to stop as well." He didn't save any gas, didn't save anything. They're putting the buses on transport planes! The whole thing was a fraud. Obama's on the bus for a mile or two at a time.

There was no bus tour. (laughing) What do you mean, "What's the point?" Imagery! Imagery, Snerdley, pure and simple. It's getting out amongst the people, Snerdley. That's the whole point of this. (laughing) But he wasn't in the buses. (interruption) Well, no, no. It wasn't a waste of money because one of the buses is going to be used by the eventual Republican nominee, whoever wins the Republican nomination will use one of the buses to do his bus tours -- and Obama will use the other one. (laughing) Look. Look. I know.

And here's the article that debunks it:
Update: Blogger "Coldwarrior" strongly doubts the reports of aerial bus transportation, and offers some careful Google map work to disprove it:

First, just take a look at the route. It was relatively short (about 380 miles with a total drive time of under 7 hours from Cannon Falls to Alpha, IL) and the confirmed stops along the way were in some cases only 22 or so miles from each other and, it appears, the furthest distance between two stops was about 59 miles (Decorah, IA to Guttenberg, IA). I plotted on Google Maps the cities he went through, in this order: Cannon Falls, Zumbrota, Chatfield and Harmony, MN; Decorah, Guttenberg, Peosta, Maquoketa and Le Claire, IA; and Morrison, Atkinson, Galesburg, Alpha and Peoria, IL.

Here's a link to a Google Map showing all the places he visited: http://g.co/maps/4kmv

Here's the official route as it was announced: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/08/15/tune-president-obamas-town-hall-meetings-week and the itinerary for some of the events are also set forth, with the dates, locations and times.

That's about all you'd need to debunk this. I was under the impression, as you may have been, that this "bus tour" was a long, long trip deep into Iowa and then all the way across Illinois, but it wasn't. It was a trip that could have been covered in less than a day with a stop every 35 to 45 miles on average.

Because the distances between some of his stops were as few as 22 miles, and there's plenty of photos and videos showing him in all of these locations, practically it would have taken longer to get to an airport, load up, take off, land, unload, etc. than to simply just make the drive. And, as you'll see, there just aren't the kind of airfields need in that part of the country. I know. I've driven much of the route over the years.

So, secondly, even if they had wanted, despite the short distances involved, to fly the buses and/or Obama ahead to the next stop, there simply are not enough airfields in that area of the country that could handle the aircraft involved (certainly not the 747 AF1 and not the C-5A or C-17 cargo aircraft that would have been needed for the buses).

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My Schedule of Regular Posts:
*Monday through Friday morning - schedules of President, VP and Secretary of State and her diplomats
*Monday through Friday afternoon - List of topics Limbaugh discussed on his program that day
*Monday through Friday throughout the day - My posts on anything that I feel like talking about. At least one or two a day, sometimes more.
*Saturday through Sunday morning - An addition to my booklist of political books - covering Democrats, Republicans and other interested parties.

30 August, 2011, Tues, Rush Limbaugh Headlines

--Wild Guess: Obama to Propose $1.6T in New Stimulus Spending
Doubling down on failure in an attempt to buy votes.

--Recycled: Obama Promised Post-Vacation Jobs Plan in 2010
How stupid does this regime really think we are?

--Carney: We're "Fairly Confident" Hillary Won't Run Against Obama
Rumblings: From this show to the White House briefing!

--Vice President Cheney Calls In
A remarkable half-hour conversation with a great man.
• Book: In My Time: A Personal and Political Memoir

--Toobin Alerts the Left to Ratchet Up Attacks on Justice Thomas
Why liberals suddenly recognize his intellectual heft.
Toobin: The Thomases vs. Obamacare
Mead: Thomas and the Amendment of Doom

--Green Jobs: Money Laundering Scam for Democrats and Unions
In Seattle, a $20 million grant spent to create 14 jobs.

--Obama's Illegal Alien Uncle Omar Arrested for DUI in Massachusetts
Why don't we ever hear anything about his relatives?

Stack of Stuff Quick Hits Page
» Black Leaders Turn Up Heat on Obama
» MLK Daughter on Lincoln and Her Daddy
» Fraud: Obama Didn't Ride Buses During Bus Tour
» Moochelle Spending Wild Money on Vacations
» From Dogs to Riches: Michael Vick Cashes In
» Fast and Furious: ATF Director Moved to New Job
» Megyn Kelly Interviews Affirmative-Action-for-Ugly Writer

--Cambridge Adams Limbaugh
Introducing the newest member of the Limbaugh family. (A sheepdog)

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My Schedule of Regular Posts:
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*Monday through Friday afternoon - List of topics Limbaugh discussed on his program that day
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*Saturday through Sunday morning - An addition to my booklist of political books - covering Democrats, Republicans and other interested parties.

President going to Minneapolis for the day

The President is going to Minneapolis today to attend the American Legion Annual Conference. He's going to stay in the city for a whole hour, apparently, before flying back and arriving back at the White House at 3:45 pm with nothing else forhim to do all day....

For a one hour speech he couldn't stay *in* the White House and transmit it live to that location? He actually has to be there?

Using energy and a carbon footprint that the Vice President will doubtles bemoan as he addresses the National Clean Energy Summit 4.0, being held in Las Vegas, Nevada.


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My Schedule of Regular Posts:
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*Monday through Friday afternoon - List of topics Limbaugh discussed on his program that day
*Monday through Friday throughout the day - My posts on anything that I feel like talking about. At least one or two a day, sometimes more.
*Saturday through Sunday morning - An addition to my booklist of political books - covering Democrats, Republicans and other interested parties.

30 August, 2011, Tues, Pres and VP Schedules

http://www.whitehouse.gov/schedule/president
8:45 am The President departs the South Lawn en route Joint Base Andrews
South Lawn
Open Press

9:05 am The President departs Joint Base Andrews en route Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota
Travel Pool Coverage

11:25 am The President arrives Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota
Local Event Time: 10:25 AM CDT
Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport
Open Press

11:55 am The President delivers remarks at the American Legion Annual Conference
Local Event Time: 10:55 AM CDT
Minneapolis Convention Center
Open Press

1:15 pm The President departs Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota en route Joint Base Andrews
Local Event Time: 12:15 PM CDT
Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport
Open Press

3:30 pm The President arrives Joint Base Andrews
Travel Pool Coverage

3:45 pm The President arrives the White House
South Lawn
Open Press


http://www.whitehouse.gov/schedule/vice-president
1:45 pm The Vice President delivers remarks at the National Clean Energy Summit 4.0
Local Event Time: 10:45 AM PDT
Aria Resort and Casino at City Center, Las Vegas, Nevada
Open Press

7:15 pm The Vice President attends an event for the Democratic National Committee
Local Event Time: 6:15 PM CDT




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My Schedule of Regular Posts:
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*Monday through Friday afternoon - List of topics Limbaugh discussed on his program that day
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*Saturday through Sunday morning - An addition to my booklist of political books - covering Democrats, Republicans and other interested parties.

Stealing 7 cents is no big deal?

I was kind of puzzled by a headline on Drudge this morning:

15-yr-old gets up to 6 years for 7-cent robbery...

The headline makes you think that the kid stole something worth 7 cents from a store or something.

Not so. The 15 year old and his accomplice attacked a 75 year old man, knocked him to the ground, punched him and kicked him. The guy could easily have had a heart attack and died. He didn't, but his psyche might well be destroyed, now that he knows his age is no protection against young kids attacking him.

And how much did he have in his pockets after all this?

7 cents.

I'd say this kid serves to go to jail for the rest of his life, because he clearly has no humanity. But he's going to juvenile prison for 6 years.

The fact that all he got was 7 cents does not make his crime any less serious. Indeed, it makes it more serious - that he'd be willing to kill a man for 7 whole cents...

http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2011/08/syracuse_15-year-old_gets_two.html

SYRACUSE, N.Y. -- A 15-year-old Syracuse boy will spend the next two to six years in juvenile detention and the rest of his life as a felon as a result of his sentencing today for a robbery that netted him and an accomplice seven cents.

Onondaga County Judge William Walsh rejected a defense lawyer’s request to treat Anthony Stewart, of West Onondaga Street, as a youthful offender. That means his felony conviction will remain on his permanent record.

Walsh said he might have ruled differently if Stewart had pleaded guilty, as did his accomplice, Skyler Ninham, 16. Earlier this month Walsh sentenced Ninham as a youthful offender to one and one-third to four years in state prison. Stewart, who is not old enough for prison, will be sent to a juvenile detention facility.

Both Ninham and the 73-year-old robbery victim identified Stewart as a participant in the crime, Walsh said. “And yet you still denied it,” Walsh said to Stewart. “Well, that cost you.”

Anthony Stewart Sentencing
Anthony Stewart, who robbed a Syracuse man for 7 cents, was denied youthful offender status in Onondaga county Court. Dick Blume/The Post Standard

Stewart was convicted by a jury of first-degree robbery in July, two days before Ninham pleaded guilty. According to prosecutors, Stewart and Ninham ran up behind the victim Dec. 22 and knocked him to the ground. Ninham kicked the victim and Stewart punched him in the face, breaking his glasses, before the victim handed over the seven cents in his pocket, prosecutors said. The two teens had handguns, which Stewart later said were BB guns, prosecutors said.

Lawyer Laurin Haddad, who represented Stewart, said afterward that she was disappointed by the judge’s decision to deny youthful-offender treatment. In a presentencing report, a probation officer also recommended treating Stewart as a youthful offender.

“For seven cents, now you’re making someone a felon for the rest of his life,” she said.

No. For attacking an old man, knocking him to the ground, kicking him and punching him, clearly not caring whether he lived or died, he's being made a felon.

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Who Needs A Teleprompter to Speak for 3 Minutes?

From The Examiner - Campaign 2012: Three minutes, two teleprompters

President Obama required two heavy-duty teleprompters on Monday during a three-minute speech in which he nominated Alan Krueger to serve as chairman of his Council of Economic Advisers.

"I am very pleased to appoint Alan and I look forward to working with him," Obama said, staring at the large, flat-screen monitor to his right, then shifting his eyes to the teleprompter on his left. "I have nothing but confidence in Alan as he takes on this important role as one of the leaders of my economic team."

Krueger stood silently to the right of Obama as the president spoke. Krueger will replace Austan Goolsbee, who recently stepped down as chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers. A professor at Princeton University, Krueger served two years in the U.S. Treasury Department under Obama. He also served as chief economic adviser for the Labor Department during the Clinton administration.

Obama did not give Krueger a chance to make any comments on Monday.

To put it in a less prejudicial way, Krueger did not choose to speak on Monday!

Nevertheless, was it really necessary to have a teleprompter? (Obviously, if you're going to have one you need two, so you can look from one to the other for the appropriate camera angles.)

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My Schedule of Regular Posts
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Of course entitlement spending is the problem

Story #5: Byron York: Entitlement Spending Isn't the Problem

RUSH: I mentioned in the previous hour that Byron York, a week ago last Monday, had a piece posted at the Examiner: "Spending, Not Entitlements, Created Huge Deficit -- It's conventional wisdom in Washington to blame the federal government's dire financial outlook on runaway entitlement spending. Unless we rein in Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, the conventional wisdom goes, the federal government is headed for disaster. That's true in the long run. But what is causing massive deficits now? Is it the same entitlements that threaten the future?
"Yes, say some conservatives who favor making entitlement reform a key issue in the 2012 campaign. 'We're $1.5 trillion in debt,' Weekly Standard Editor Bill Kristol said Sunday, referring to this year's projected deficit. 'Where's the debt coming from? It's coming from entitlements.' There's no doubt federal spending has exploded in recent years. In fiscal 2007, the last year before things went haywire, the government took in $2.568 trillion in revenues and spent $2.728 trillion, for a deficit of $160 billion."

Now, stop and think of this. In 2007, which was a Bush year, the deficit was $160 billion. Four years later, "according to Congressional Budget Office estimates, the government will take in $2.230 trillion and spend $3.629 trillion, for a deficit of $1.399 trillion." From $160 billion to $1.4 trillion in four years. So the question is, is that because of entitlement spending, that somehow Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid just go wild the last four years? Social Security hasn't, as you know, they've been saying there hasn't been any inflation. So there had been no COLAs, cost-of-living adjustments. So how do you go from $160 billion-dollar deficit to a $1.4 trillion deficit? How do you do that?

"Was there a steep rise in entitlement spending? Did everyone suddenly turn 65 and begin collecting Social Security and using Medicare? No: The deficits are largely the result not of entitlements but of an explosion in spending related to the economic downturn and the rise of Democrats to power in Washington. While entitlements must be controlled in the long run, Washington's current spending problem lies elsewhere." It's in the Oval Office. It's with Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid.

"A lot of the higher spending has stemmed directly from the downturn. There is, for example, spending on what is called 'income security' -- that is, for unemployment compensation, food stamps and related programs. In 2007, the government spent $365 billion on income security. In 2011, it's estimated to spend $622 billion. That's an increase of $257 billion. Then there is Medicaid, the health care program for lower-income Americans. A lot of people had lower incomes due to the economic downturn, and federal expenditures on Medicaid -- its costs are shared with the states -- went from $190 billion in 2007 to an estimated $276 billion in 2011, an increase of $86 billion. Put that together with the $257 billion increase in income security spending, and you have $343 billion. Add to that the $338 billion in decreased revenues, and you get $681 billion -- which means nearly half of the current deficit can be clearly attributed to the downturn.

"There is no line in the federal budget that says 'stimulus,' but Obama's massive $814 billion stimulus increased spending in virtually every part of the federal government," and raised the baseline. So the point of Byron York's story here is that while a lot of people, including Republicans, are focused on entitlements, we gotta get entitlements under control, they are 60% of the budget. No question that's true, but they are not the reason we have gone up to 14.3, now 16 because of the debt limit being raised, $17 trillion national debt. It is not entitlements that have done this, it is the Democrat Party. It is Barack Obama. And I think this is fascinating point.

Now, it might take an issue away from the Republicans who are focusing on entitlement reform, but then again it might be helpful. Entitlement reform is a "third rail." I mentioned to you earlier, Celinda Lake, respected Democrat pollsterette, says that there's a 10% chance that Obama won't be the nominee. Well, now, if you look at the entitlement spending here, you cannot explain all of this. The regime wants to focus on entitlement reform, they want the Republicans to take the blame for it, and yet Obama proposed some entitlement reform as part of the raising of the debt limit deal -- and that's when the Democrats started defecting, and that's when there was real anger from people like Pelosi and Reid and the Reverend Jackson and Sharpton.

When he actually mentioned cutting some entitlements, that's when all this scuttlebutt of genuine anger from the left at Obama began. Now we're at a point where Celinda Lake says there's a 10% chance he won't be the nominee, pull an LBJ? Ten percent is 10%. That's 90% he will be, but it is being discussed. Entitlement reform and his willingness to entertain that has caused real friction between him and his buds on the left. So if the focus of this is spending, which is the reason for the Tea Party and its existence and its growth -- and believe me, the Tea Party is continuing to grow; and believe me on this: The Tea Party is drinking tea. Heh heh.

I happen to know from TwoIfByTea.com, our tea. We have evidence. But anyway, the point is that if the focus can be taken away from entitlement spending and properly put on Obama in the campaign, it takes all this danger of being associated with entitlement reform, third rail of politics, off the table. I think it would be a brilliant move for the Republican presidential nominee, whoever it ends up being. Go ahead and talk about entitlement reform. Over the long haul, it obviously has to happen. But it doesn't explain this massive indebtedness. Obama is solely -- and the Democrat Party is solely -- responsible for that, and that is a point worth being made and pounded until people understand it instinctively.

So basically what Byron York is saying in his piece, in a nutshell, the increase in spending was from unemployment, Medicaid, and the stimulus -- and Obama wants to extend all of those. That's how he's gonna get us out of the recession. That's what his plan is! His jobs plan is coming next week. Everybody is waiting with bated breath. Remember that? It's his big jobs plan, and you know it's going to be Stimulus 2. I have not forgot -- I predicted it before I left on vacation -- and it's gonna be double. I'm telling you, he's gonna request a stimulus in the range of 1.5 to $1.6 trillion. The Republicans will oppose it, which is exactly what Obama wants. So he can say, "Look, my plan would work except they're standing in the way of it. Republican obstruction! They don't want help for the unemployed, they don't want help for the sick." I know that's what the plan is, and then it's gonna get really vicious once we have a nominee. Mark my words. Don't doubt me.




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Time To Kill All the Lawyers....

I kid. I kid.

But this is just ridiculous. Encouraging people to sue for discrimination because they didnt' get a job because they're ugly?

For one thing, I dislike that term, ugly. I'd say a lot of people are ugly inside, but outside, very few people are ugly, except perhaps the extremely deformed. Most people beautiful, pretty, "not bad" or plain.

There are only two people in life - attractive and unattractive. An attractive person can be pretty or plain. An unattractive person can also be pretty or plain - does this handsome or pretty person whine, act like a jerk, etc.?

And in any event....the study is flawed. It is the TALL people who get the jobs and the power. The short people who get the short end of the stick.

In any event, it looks like this guy - Daniel S. Hamermesh, an economist at the University of Texas, Austin, is probably also a lawyer, or at least has a lot of friends who are lawyers, for whom he wants to ensure a never-ending supply of money via lawsuits.

Ugly? You May Have a Case
By DANIEL S. HAMERMESH
Published: August 27, 2011
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Daniel S. Hamermesh, a professor of economics at the University of Texas, Austin, is the author of "Beauty Pays," published this month.

BEING good-looking is useful in so many ways.

In addition to whatever personal pleasure it gives you, being attractive also helps you earn more money, find a higher-earning spouse (and one who looks better, too!) and get better deals on mortgages. Each of these facts has been demonstrated over the past 20 years by many economists and other researchers. The effects are not small: one study showed that an American worker who was among the bottom one-seventh in looks, as assessed by randomly chosen observers, earned 10 to 15 percent less per year than a similar worker whose looks were assessed in the top one-third — a lifetime difference, in a typical case, of about $230,000.

Beauty is as much an issue for men as for women. While extensive research shows that women’s looks have bigger impacts in the market for mates, another large group of studies demonstrates that men’s looks have bigger impacts on the job.

Why this disparate treatment of looks in so many areas of life? It’s a matter of simple prejudice. Most of us, regardless of our professed attitudes, prefer as customers to buy from better-looking salespeople, as jurors to listen to better-looking attorneys, as voters to be led by better-looking politicians, as students to learn from better-looking professors. This is not a matter of evil employers’ refusing to hire the ugly: in our roles as workers, customers and potential lovers we are all responsible for these effects.

How could we remedy this injustice? With all the gains to being good-looking, you would think that more people would get plastic surgery or makeovers to improve their looks. Many of us do all those things, but as studies have shown, such refinements make only small differences in our beauty. All that spending may make us feel better, but it doesn’t help us much in getting a better job or a more desirable mate.

A more radical solution may be needed: why not offer legal protections to the ugly, as we do with racial, ethnic and religious minorities, women and handicapped individuals?

We actually already do offer such protections in a few places, including in some jurisdictions in California, and in the District of Columbia, where discriminatory treatment based on looks in hiring, promotions, housing and other areas is prohibited. Ugliness could be protected generally in the United States by small extensions of the Americans With Disabilities Act. Ugly people could be allowed to seek help from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and other agencies in overcoming the effects of discrimination. We could even have affirmative-action programs for the ugly.

The mechanics of legislating this kind of protection are not as difficult as you might think. You might argue that people can’t be classified by their looks — that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. That aphorism is correct in one sense: if asked who is the most beautiful person in a group of beautiful people, you and I might well have different answers. But when it comes to differentiating classes of attractiveness, we all view beauty similarly: someone whom you consider good-looking will be viewed similarly by most others; someone you consider ugly will be viewed as ugly by most others. In one study, more than half of a group of people were assessed identically by each of two observers using a five-point scale; and very few assessments differed by more than one point.

For purposes of administering a law, we surely could agree on who is truly ugly, perhaps the worst-looking 1 or 2 percent of the population. The difficulties in classification are little greater than those faced in deciding who qualifies for protection on grounds of disabilities that limit the activities of daily life, as shown by conflicting decisions in numerous legal cases involving obesity.

There are other possible objections. “Ugliness” is not a personal trait that many people choose to embrace; those whom we classify as protected might not be willing to admit that they are ugly. But with the chance of obtaining extra pay and promotions amounting to $230,000 in lost lifetime earnings, there’s a large enough incentive to do so. Bringing anti-discrimination lawsuits is also costly, and few potential plaintiffs could afford to do so. But many attorneys would be willing to organize classes of plaintiffs to overcome these costs, just as they now do in racial-discrimination and other lawsuits.

Economic arguments for protecting the ugly are as strong as those for protecting some groups currently covered by legislation. So why not go ahead and expand protection to the looks-challenged? There’s one legitimate concern. With increasingly tight limits on government resources, expanding rights to yet another protected group would reduce protection for groups that have commanded our legislative and other attention for over 50 years.

We face a trade-off: ignore a deserving group of citizens, or help them but limit help available for other groups. Even though I myself have demonstrated the disadvantages of ugliness in 20 years of research, I nonetheless would hate to see anything that might reduce assistance to groups now aided by protective legislation.

You might reasonably disagree and argue for protecting all deserving groups. Either way, you shouldn’t be surprised to see the United States heading toward this new legal frontier.

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Saturday through Sunday morning - An addition to my booklist of political books - covering Democrats, Republicans and other interested parties.

29 August 2011, Monday, Rush Limbaugh headlines

--Irene: A National Embarrassment
A lesson in modern media hype, templates and lies.

--With Obama Slowdown Here to Stay, Regime Will Sling Dirt in 2012
They'll do anything they can to get the country roiling.

--Scientists: Aliens May Destroy Humanity to Protect Themselves
Idiot earthlings pollute the universe; must be stopped.
UKG: Greenhouse Gases Could Tip Off Aliens

--Uglo-American Affirmative Action?
The New York Times puts it out there and they're serious.
NY Times: Ugly? You May Have a Case

--Powell Won't Abandon Obama
The model Republican sours on Bam? Don't buy it.

--Programming Note: Vice President Dick Cheney will join the show tomorrow to discuss his new book.
• Buy It: In My Time: A Personal and Political Memoir

--We Can and Must Oppose Obama with Open, Honest Conservatism
Back in 2009, Bill Shatner asked, "How do you know?"
Politico: Jeb Bush Warns on Hitting Obama
• Flashback: Shatner's Raw Nerve, Transcript & Video

--White Guilt Propelled Obama in '08 and They Want to Gin It Up Again
They're starting to talk about Rush, Obama and race.

Stack of Stuff Quick Hits Page
» Algore: If You Oppose Global Warming, You're Racist.
» Obama Secretly Executes Backdoor Amnesty
» Maxine Waters Tells the Tea Party to Go to Hell
»Only 17% Hold Positive View of Federal Government
» Byron York: Entitlement Spending Isn't the Problem
» Old Playbook: Politico Asks, "Is Rick Perry Dumb?"
» Obama Uses Two Prompters for Three Minute Speech
» A Weather System of Color: Tropical Storm Jose

--Limbaughs to Welcome New Puppy
We're awaiting the arrival of Cambridge Limbaugh.

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My Schedule of Regular Posts:
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*Monday through Friday afternoon - List of topics Limbaugh discussed on his program that day
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*Saturday through Sunday morning - An addition to my booklist of political books - covering Democrats, Republicans and other interested parties.

Mass Destruction Is A Message From God?

Lots of people believe it. God destroyed New Orleans via Katrina because the US is tolerant of gays, according to Pat Robertson. (Why he couldn't have spared the city and just destroyed gay businesses, and maybe throw in a few heterosexual pornography shops, to make his intent unmistakeably clear, I do not know).

Now we've got Michele Bachman saying Hurricane Irene and last weeks's earthquare were a message from God that Washington has to change its policies.

Sorry, but that's just stupid, and if this woman was ever a front runner for becoming the President, she's surely lost it now.

If God wants to send messages, why not make them unmistakeable and easy to interpret? If he can send a whole earthquake, surely he could send a localized earthquake. Take out the mosque at Ground Zero (by making the ground sink at the location where they want to put it) and leave every other building standing, for example. That would be an unmistakable message.

But a hurricane...something that has happened every year for decades? An earthquake, something that has happened every year for decades. Sure, the last powerful earthquake of that magnitude was in 1944...I wonder what message god was sending then?

From Yahoo News: Bachmann: Irene is God's message for Washington

MIAMI (Reuters) - For Republican presidential candidate Michele Bachmann, Hurricane Irene and last week's earthquake in the eastern United States were a message from God that Washington needs to change its policies.

Even as Irene was beginning its raking course up the East Coast over the weekend, which killed 21 people and caused widespread flooding and power outages, Bachmann told senior citizens in Poinciana, Florida, on Saturday that the hurricane was an "act of God" that Washington should heed.

The Minnesota congresswoman, who has gained media prominence for her fiery attacks on Democratic President Barack Obama and against big government, recalled Washington and the east had already felt a 5.8 magnitude earthquake on Tuesday.

"Washington, D.C., you'd think by now they'd get the message. An earthquake, a hurricane. Are you listening? The American people have done everything they can, and now it's time for an act of God and we're getting it," she said, drawing some laughs from her audience.

Bachmann is a favorite of the fiscally conservative Tea Party movement and of religious social conservatives, but recent Republican presidential contender polls have shown her lagging behind Texas Governor Rick Perry and moderate Mitt Romney, who appeals to the party's business wing.



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29 August, 2011, SoS Clinton and Staff schedule

No schedule for them. Apparently they don't return to work (or the person who is doing their schedule doesn't return to work) until the first week of September.


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My Schedule of Regular Posts:
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29 August 2011, Monday, Pres and VP Schedule

http://www.whitehouse.gov/schedule/president
10:15 am The President receives the Presidential Daily Briefing
Oval Office
Closed Press

11:00 am The President makes a personnel announcement
Rose Garden
Open Press

12:10 pm The President meets with senior advisors
Oval Office
Closed Press

12:45 pm The President and the Vice President meet for lunch
Private Dining Room
Closed Press

http://www.whitehouse.gov/schedule/vice-president
Monday, August 29 2011All Times ET Next
12:45 pm The President and the Vice President meet for lunch
Private Dining Room


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Gore: Global warming skeptics are this generation’s racists

From the Daily Caller: Gore: Global warming skeptics are this generation’s racists

One day climate change skeptics will be seen in the same negative light as racists, or so says former Vice President Al Gore.

In an interview with former advertising executive and Climate Reality Project collaborator Alex Bogusky broadcasted on UStream on Friday, Gore explained that in order for climate change alarmists to succeed, they must “win the conversation” against those who deny there is a crisis. (RELATED: Bill McKibben: Global warming to blame for Hurricane Irene)

“I remember, again going back to my early years in the South, when the Civil Rights revolution was unfolding, there were two things that really made an impression on me,” Gore said. “My generation watched Bull Connor turning the hose on civil rights demonstrators and we went, ‘Whoa! How gross and evil is that?’ My generation asked old people, ‘Explain to me again why it is okay to discriminate against people because their skin color is different?’ And when they couldn’t really answer that question with integrity, the change really started.”

The former vice president recalled how society succeeded in marginalizing racists and said climate change skeptics must be defeated in the same manner.

“Secondly, back to this phrase ‘win the conversation,’” he continued. “There came a time when friends or people you work with or people you were in clubs with — you’re much younger than me so you didn’t have to go through this personally — but there came a time when racist comments would come up in the course of the conversation and in years past they were just natural. Then there came a time when people would say, ‘Hey, man why do you talk that way, I mean that is wrong. I don’t go for that so don’t talk that way around me. I just don’t believe that.’ That happened in millions of conversations and slowly the conversation was won.”

“We have to win the conversation on climate,” Gore added.

When Bogusky questioned the analogy, asking if the scientific reasoning behind climate change skeptics might throw a wrench into the good and evil comparison with racism, Gore did not back down.

“I think it’s the same where the moral component is concerned and where the facts are concerned I think it is important to get that out there, absolutely,” Gore said.

Gore also took shots at Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who has lambasted climate change alarmists on the presidential campaign trail, and at other politicians who dare to question the veracity of global warming science.

“This is an organized effort to attack the reputation of the scientific community as a whole, to attack their integrity, and to slander them with the lie that they are making up the science in order to make money,” Gore said.

Ironically, back during Perry’s days as a Democrat, the Texas governor supported Gore in his 1988 presidential bid. Perry became a Republican in 1989.

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Talk about worthless children

In reading this article, I was reminded of the dry cleaning debacle from a few years ago. A dry cleaning store had lost a guy's $200 pair of pants. Instead of allowing the store to reimburse him for the pants, the guy sued for millions of dollars. The dry cleaning folks had to get a lawyer, it cost them hundreds of thousands of dollars and they had to close one of their two stores, before the complaint was dismissed. (The guy who brought it was a lawyer and judge, representing himself, and wanted to bill them also for his legal fees - he was charging himself a lot of money.)

The thing is the claim was so bogus that it should never have seen the light of day in a courtroom - not one second's worth of light, and yet it did see the light of day, for over a year.

This is the same thing. How a judge could look at what these kids were complaining about and say, "Sure, let's let's spend six months seeing if we should sue your mom" -ludicrous.

Not being a mom myself, I don't know how this particular mother feels. But if it were me, I'd drag them each into a bathroom and give them a swirly in a feces filled toilet bowl.

Adult children’s ‘bad mothering’ lawsuit dismissed
Chicago • Raised in a $1.5 million Barrington Hills, Ill., home by their attorney father, two grown children have spent the last two years pursuing a unique lawsuit against their mom for "bad mothering" that alleges damages caused when she failed to buy toys for one and sent another a birthday card he didn’t like.

The alleged offenses include failing to take her daughter to a car show, telling her then 7-year-old son to buckle his seat belt or she would contact police, "haggling" over the amount to spend on party dresses and calling her daughter at midnight to ask that she return home from celebrating homecoming.

Last week, at which point the court record stood about a foot tall, an Illinois appeals court dismissed the case, finding that none of the mother’s conduct was "extreme or outrageous." To rule in favor of her children, the court found, "could potentially open the floodgates to subject family childrearing to ... excessive judicial scrutiny and interference."

In 2009, the children, represented by three attorneys including their father, Steven A. Miner, sued their mother, Kimberly Garrity. Steven II, now 23, and his sister Kathryn, now 20, sought more than $50,000 for "emotional distress."

Miner and Garrity were married for a decade before she filed for divorce in 1995, records show.

Among the exhibits filed in the case is a birthday card Garrity sent her son, who in his lawsuit sought damages because the card was "inappropriate" and failed to include cash or a check. He also alleged she failed to send a card for years or, while he was in college, care packages.

On the front of the American Greetings card is a picture of tomatoes spread across a table that are indistinguishable except for one in the middle with craft-store googly eyes attached.

"Son I got you this Birthday card because it’s just like you ... different from all the rest!" the card reads. On the inside Garrity wrote "Have a great day! Love & Hugs, Mom xoxoxo."

In court papers, Garrity’s attorney Shelley Smith says the "litany of childish complaints and ingratitude" in the lawsuit is nothing more than an attempt by Garrity’s ex-husband to "seek the ultimate revenge" of having her children accuse her of "being an inadequate mother."

"It would be laughable that these children of privilege would sue their mother for emotional distress, if the consequences were not so deadly serious for (Garrity)," Smith wrote. "There is no insurance for this claim, so (Garrity) must pay her legal fees, while (the children) have their father for free."

Messages left for Smith were not returned. Steven A. Miner, reached by phone, did not comment. In court papers he said he only filed the lawsuit after much legal research and had tried to dissuade his children from bringing the case.

The Cook County judge who ruled on the case, Kathy Flanagan, declined to assess sanctions against Miner, but said the lawsuit amounted to nothing more than children "suing their mother for bad mothering."

DePaul University law professor Bruce Ottley, who co-wrote a textbook on Illinois tort law, says courts have long carved out an exception to family members suing each other, barring any extreme conduct.

"If junior slips on the rug in the living room and sues mom or dad, that can’t happen," Ottley said.

He said such emotional distress damages are a way for the legal system to address situations — sexual harassment for instance — where there is no physical harm. But those bringing a case to court must prove the conduct was outrageous.

"The fact that it is such a high standard, it doesn’t succeed very often," Ottley said.






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Drug Cartels Prosper, While Guitar Makers Get Harassed

Guitar Frets: Environmental Enforcement Leaves Musicians in Fear
Federal agents swooped in on Gibson Guitar Wednesday, raiding factories and offices in Memphis and Nashville, seizing several pallets of wood, electronic files and guitars. The Feds are keeping mum, but in a statement yesterday Gibson's chairman and CEO, Henry Juszkiewicz, defended his company's manufacturing policies, accusing the Justice Department of bullying the company. "The wood the government seized Wednesday is from a Forest Stewardship Council certified supplier," he said, suggesting the Feds are using the aggressive enforcement of overly broad laws to make the company cry uncle.

It isn't the first time that agents of the Fish and Wildlife Service have come knocking at the storied maker of such iconic instruments as the Les Paul electric guitar, the J-160E acoustic-electric John Lennon played, and essential jazz-boxes such as Charlie Christian's ES-150. In 2009 the Feds seized several guitars and pallets of wood from a Gibson factory, and both sides have been wrangling over the goods in a case with the delightful name "United States of America v. Ebony Wood in Various Forms."

The question in the first raid seemed to be whether Gibson had been buying illegally harvested hardwoods from protected forests, such as the Madagascar ebony that makes for such lovely fretboards. And if Gibson did knowingly import illegally harvested ebony from Madagascar, that wouldn't be a negligible offense. Peter Lowry, ebony and rosewood expert at the Missouri Botanical Garden, calls the Madagascar wood trade the "equivalent of Africa's blood diamonds." But with the new raid, the government seems to be questioning whether some wood sourced from India met every regulatory jot and tittle.

It isn't just Gibson that is sweating. Musicians who play vintage guitars and other instruments made of environmentally protected materials are worried the authorities may be coming for them next.

If you are the lucky owner of a 1920s Martin guitar, it may well be made, in part, of Brazilian rosewood. Cross an international border with an instrument made of that now-restricted wood, and you better have correct and complete documentation proving the age of the instrument. Otherwise, you could lose it to a zealous customs agent—not to mention face fines and prosecution.

John Thomas, a law professor at Quinnipiac University and a blues and ragtime guitarist, says "there's a lot of anxiety, and it's well justified." Once upon a time, he would have taken one of his vintage guitars on his travels. Now, "I don't go out of the country with a wooden guitar."

The tangled intersection of international laws is enforced through a thicket of paperwork. Recent revisions to 1900's Lacey Act require that anyone crossing the U.S. border declare every bit of flora or fauna being brought into the country. One is under "strict liability" to fill out the paperwork—and without any mistakes.

It's not enough to know that the body of your old guitar is made of spruce and maple: What's the bridge made of? If it's ebony, do you have the paperwork to show when and where that wood was harvested and when and where it was made into a bridge? Is the nut holding the strings at the guitar's headstock bone, or could it be ivory? "Even if you have no knowledge—despite Herculean efforts to obtain it—that some piece of your guitar, no matter how small, was obtained illegally, you lose your guitar forever," Prof. Thomas has written. "Oh, and you'll be fined $250 for that false (or missing) information in your Lacey Act Import Declaration."

Consider the recent experience of Pascal Vieillard, whose Atlanta-area company, A-440 Pianos, imported several antique Bösendorfers. Mr. Vieillard asked officials at the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species how to fill out the correct paperwork—which simply encouraged them to alert U.S. Customs to give his shipment added scrutiny.

There was never any question that the instruments were old enough to have grandfathered ivory keys. But Mr. Vieillard didn't have his paperwork straight when two-dozen federal agents came calling.

Facing criminal charges that might have put him in prison for years, Mr. Vieillard pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of violating the Lacey Act, and was handed a $17,500 fine and three years probation.

Given the risks, why don't musicians just settle for the safety of carbon fiber? Some do—when concert pianist Jeffrey Sharkey moved to England two decades ago, he had Steinway replace the ivories on his piano with plastic.

Still, musicians cling to the old materials. Last year, Dick Boak, director of artist relations for C.F. Martin & Co., complained to Mother Nature News about the difficulty of getting elite guitarists to switch to instruments made from sustainable materials. "Surprisingly, musicians, who represent some of the most savvy, ecologically minded people around, are resistant to anything about changing the tone of their guitars," he said.

You could mark that up to hypocrisy—artsy do-gooders only too eager to tell others what kind of light bulbs they have to buy won't make sacrifices when it comes to their own passions. Then again, maybe it isn't hypocrisy to recognize that art makes claims significant enough to compete with environmentalists' agendas.




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Nothing wrong for a call to service but...

President Obama, back from his multi-million dollar vacation on Martha's Vineyard (and Sean Hannity, you have got to *stop* attempting a Boston accent)and has now made a speech calling on people to get more involved with volunteer organizations.

Well, presumably he's talking to the youth of the country, since the older generations have always volunteered. (Of course when I say the youth of the country, that was generally theee generations removed from the old folk. But now that so many 13 year olds are having babies, the youth of the country actually consists of 2 generations. (babies, teenage parent(s), young adult, middle age, senior) and teenagers and young adults aren't volunteering because they've got their babies to care for on no money and of course no education...).

Well, that's a rant for another time. Point is, if you're going to call for somebody to give up their time and money to help others, it might be more politic not to do it after you've just come back from a vacation (think of how many starving mouths the cost for your vacation would have fed....) and of course 20% of the US is out of work anyway. Put them on workfare, says I. If they're able bodied, make 'em work for their money.

A guy a couple of weeks ago called for the re-founding of the WPA and the CCC (Works Progress Administration and the Civilian Conservation Corps.) Those were two organizations founded by Roosevelt during the Depression. Rush scoffed at this several times on his program, but I wonder...is it really such a bad idea? Get those able-bodied folks on welfare to go out and clean grafitti off of places, pick up trash on the sidewalks, mow the lawns in abandoned lots, etc. Would that be so bad?

Anyway, here's the text from Obama's speech today.

Obama Invokes 9/11 In Call To Volunteer Service To Country
In just two weeks, we’ll come together, as a nation, to mark the 10th anniversary of the September 11th attacks. We’ll remember the innocent lives we lost. We’ll stand with the families who loved them. We’ll honor the heroic first responders who rushed to the scene and saved so many. And we’ll pay tribute to our troops and military families, and all those who have served over the past ten years, to keep us safe and strong.

We’ll also recall how the worst terrorist attack in American history brought out the best in the American people. How Americans lined up to give blood. How volunteers drove across the country to lend a hand. How schoolchildren donated their savings. How communities, faith groups and businesses collected food and clothing.

We were united, and the outpouring of generosity and compassion reminded us that in times of challenge, we Americans move forward together, as one people.

This September 11th, Michelle and I will join the commemorations at Ground Zero, in Shanksville, and at the Pentagon. But even if you can’t be in New York, Pennsylvania or Virginia, every American can be part of this anniversary. Once again, 9/11 will be a National Day of Service and Remembrance. And in the days and weeks ahead, folks across the country—in all 50 states—will come together, in their communities and neighborhoods, to honor the victims of 9/11 and to reaffirm the strength of our nation with acts of service and charity.

In Minneapolis, volunteers will help restore a community center. In Winston-Salem, North Carolina, they’ll hammer shingles and lay floors to give families a new home. In Tallahassee, Florida, they’ll assemble care packages for our troops overseas and their families here at home. In Orange County, California, they’ll renovate homes for our veterans. And once again, Michelle and I look forward to joining a local service project as well.

There are so many ways to get involved, and every American can do something. To learn more about the opportunities where you live, just go online and visit Serve.gov. Even the smallest act of service, the simplest act of kindness, is a way to honor those we lost; a way to reclaim that spirit of unity that followed 9/11.

"On this 10th anniversary, we still face great challenges as a nation. We’re emerging from the worst economic crisis in our lifetimes. We’re taking the fight to al Qaeda, ending the war in Iraq and starting to bring our troops home from Afghanistan. And we’re working to rebuild the foundation of our national strength here at home.

"None of this will be easy. And it can’t be the work of government alone. As we saw after 9/11, the strength of America has always been the character and compassion of our people. So as we mark this solemn anniversary, let’s summon that spirit once more. And let’s show that the sense of common purpose that we need in America doesn’t have to be a fleeting moment; it can be a lasting virtue—not just on one day, but every day."



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US Government Provides Low Cost Flood Insurance

Why have people been building in flood plains, for decades? Why do people rebuilt houses in flood plains once their first house has been destroyed? Why, because the government pays them to do so.

See below this article for the Wikipedia entry on the Flood Insurance Program.

From CNN Money: Hurricane Irene: Insurance nightmare awaits homeowners

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- As Hurricane Irene bears down on the East Coast, many Americans are preparing for the worst. But whether they are covered for the ensuing damage is another matter entirely.

Between Wilmington N.C. and Boston, there are nearly 1.9 million residences and businesses that are at risk of storm surge flooding, according to CoreLogic, the financial analytics company. And nearly half of those properties lie outside of a designated flood zone and are likely to lack flood insurance.

Mortgage lenders require homes that lie within designated flood zones to be covered by flood insurance. This low-cost coverage -- which runs as low as $129 a year -- is provided by the federal government and purchased through insurers like Allstate Insurance and Farmers Insurance Group.

But homes outside of flood zones often go uncovered, mainly because homeowners don't realize that their existing policies don't cover floods or because they don't feel their home are at risk.

"Many Americans underestimate the risk of flood damage [from a hurricane]," said Michael Barry, a spokesman for the Insurance Information Institute.

According to Barry, only 20% of all U.S. homes are covered by flood insurance.

Insurers bracing for Hurricane Irene
Regular homeowner's insurance policies will pay for losses from wind, say if a roof blows off or a window comes crashing in, but they won't cover damage due to flooding, according to Barry.

To cover floods, homeowner's need to buy a separate flood insurance policy that covers damage specifically from flooding due to a storm surges, torrential rains or other acts of nature.

The National Flood Insurance Program
The National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) is a program created by the Congress of the United States in 1968 through the National Flood Insurance Act of 1968 (P.L. 90-448). The program enables property owners in participating communities to purchase insurance protection from the government against losses from flooding. This insurance is designed to provide an insurance alternative to disaster assistance to meet the escalating costs of repairing damage to buildings and their contents caused by floods. As of April 2010, the program insured about 5.5 million homes, the majority of which were in Texas and Florida.

Implementation
Participation in the NFIP is based on an agreement between local communities and the federal government which states that if a community will adopt and enforce a floodplain management ordinance to reduce future flood risks to new construction in Special Flood Hazard Areas (SFHA), the federal government will make flood insurance available within the community as a financial protection against flood losses. The SFHAs and other risk premium zones applicable to each participating community are depicted on Flood Insurance Rate Maps (FIRMs). The Mitigation Division within the Federal Emergency Management Agency manages the NFIP and oversees the floodplain management and mapping components of the Program.

The intent was to reduce future flood damage through community floodplain management ordinances and provide protection for property owners against potential losses through an insurance mechanism that requires a premium to be paid for the protection. The NFIP is meant to be self-supporting, though in 2004 Congress found that repetitive-loss properties cost the taxpayer about $200 million annually. Congress originally intended that operating expenses and flood insurance claims be paid for through the premiums collected for flood insurance policies. NFIP borrows from the U.S. Treasury for times when losses are heavy, and these loans are paid back with interest.

Since 1978, the National Flood Insurance Program has paid more than $38 billion in claims (as of March 31, 2011). More than 40 percent of that money has gone to residents of Louisiana.

Amendments
The program was first amended by the Flood Disaster Protection Act of 1973, which made the purchase of flood insurance mandatory for the protection of property within SFHAs. In 1982, the Act was amended by the Coastal Barrier Resources Act (CBRA). The CBRA enacted a set of maps depicting the John H. Chafee Coastal Barrier Resources System (CBRS) in which federal flood insurance is unavailable for new or significantly improved structures. The program was further amended by the Flood Insurance Reform Act of 2004, with the goal of reducing "losses to properties for which repetitive flood insurance claim payments have been made."

Criticisms
As critics predicted, the NFIP encouraged people to locate in areas more susceptible to flood damage. Prior to the NFIP's existence, insurance coverage for flood losses was not provided by any private insurance carriers. Insurance losses stemming from flood damage were largely the responsibility of the property owner, although the consequences were sometimes mitigated through provisions for disaster aid. Today, owners of property in flood plains frequently receive disaster aid and payment for insured losses, which in many ways negates the original intent of the NFIP. Consequently, these policy decisions have escalated losses stemming from floods in recent years, both in terms of property and life.

Moreover, certain provisions within the NFIP increase the likelihood that flood-prone properties will be occupied by the people least likely to be in a position to recover from flood disasters, which further increases demand for aid. Some factors contributing to increased demand for aid are:

--Flood insurance for properties in flood prone areas is mandatory only to secure loans, which makes it somewhat more likely that flood prone properties will be owned by seniors who have paid off their mortgages, or investors who have acquired the property for rental income.

--Flood insurance only covers losses for the owner of the property, and claims are subject to caps, which further increases the likelihood that the property will be occupied by renters rather than the property owner.

--Flood prone properties are more likely to be offered for rent because of the owners' increased risks and/or costs associated with occupying the property themselves.

--Flood prone properties are more likely to be offered for rent at a discount, which attracts lower income groups, seniors, and infirm groups.

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My Schedule of Regular Posts:
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