Anyone been watching the Olympics

I've sloughed off in my posting here, and once again I apologize.

What can I say, it's winter. I wonder if I have seasonal (something) disorder? I look out at the grey skies and the snow and dread going out into the cold, and what is more awful, the wind.

Then I cocoon in my house and don't do anytihng...

Well, Olympics are over, the United States lost the medal battle (I think we finished with a medal count that puts us in third place, because of the failure of any of our speed skaters to live up to expectations...)

The meltdown (ha, hah, is that a pun?) of our speed skaters could perhaps have been anticipated - they trained on hard ice and the ice at Sochi was soft...so it had nothing to do with their suits, after all!

‘Endangered’ Mouse Could Delay Flood Recovery

It's like we're living in the Twilight Zone. I admit I'd prefer NEW construction to stop to protect the habitats of wild animals - but when you've got an already existing town that needs to repair itself and it can't because of a mouse - not a wolf or a lion or a tiger or a bear but a mouse - not as bad as a fish, buts still, it's ridiculous.

FEMA's going to pay for the litigation?  And where are they going to get the money for that? OUR TAX DOLLARS!

From: http://denver.cbslocal.com/2014/02/04/endangered-mouse-could-delay-flood-recovery/

WELD COUNTY, Colo. (CBS4) – The Federal Emergency Management Agency is warning that many flood repair projects could be delayed because they are in an endangered mouse’s habitat.
The Preble’s meadow jumping mouse is listed as a threatened species, which means it and its habitat are protected by federal law. Its habitat lies along rivers and stream beds where flood repairs are underway.
The news upset Colorado State Rep. Jerry Sonnenberg, who represents many of the flooded communities. He sent a letter to Colorado’s congressional delegation asking it to intervene saying the federal government has put a mouse ahead of Colorado families.
“We’re holding up the ability to redo safe drinking water, to rebuild sewage treatment facilities so we can keep sewage out of the rivers, trying to have a safe environment because of a mouse,” said Sonnenberg.
According to him, communities have to delay repairs after FEMA issued a warning that local governments could lose federal funding if they violate the Endangered Species Act.
The mouse is causing controversy with some Colorado scientists, saying it isn’t even endangered.
“This mouse has cost millions of dollars to Colorado taxpayers already. It threatens the livelihood of agriculture and now it’s threatening flood recovery efforts. This is absolutely incredible,” said United States Rep. Cory Gardner.
Gardner, whose district was hit hard by the floods, wrote a letter to the United States Fish and Wildlife Service asking for a waiver from the Endangered Species Act. Fish and Wildlife said that so far projects have only been delayed a couple days. However, Gardner said flooded communities can’t afford any delay as they race to make repairs before the spring runoff.
“The fact that so many people were impacted, thousands of people lost their homes or had their homes damaged, and here we are having federal relief dollars held up by a mouse that may not even be endangered. It’s absolutely ridiculous,” said Gardner.
Gardner said that if Fish and Wildlife doesn’t grant a waiver quickly he will draft legislation.
A Weld County commissioner said he asked FEMA two months ago about the mouse and was told it wouldn’t be a problem.
FEMA said that it is simply following federal law and that it has added staff to expedite the process and will pay for any mitigation necessary to accommodate the mouse habitat.

New blog: Collecting Amelia Earhart

I've started a new blog called Collecting Amelia Earhart.

http://collectingameliaearhart.blogspot.com/  is the URL.

If you're interested in women in aviation or Amelia Earhart, check it out.

Amnesty and Poverty

Below is just about half of Rush's comments on amnesty... it is scary.

As Rush points out - if we let poor, unskilled people into this country - they won't become rich, we will become even poorer.
 

RUSH:  Look, I don't care how you slice it, folks, it just doesn't make any sense.  Even the most accepted, and some might say logical explanation, it doesn't make sense, and here's what it is.  Why are the Republicans willing to commit suicide?  Because that's what it is.
Let's review.  Last fall, remember, leading up to the government shutdown, the Republican Party leadership is making sure they're out there, they're publicly saying, "Focus on Obamacare. Get rid of Obamacare. We gotta get rid of Obamacare."  They wanted us to think that's what they're focusing on, and do not lose sight of it.  Mike Lee and Ted Cruz pop up and take 'em seriously and it results in a government shutdown. The Republican Party leadership goes absolutely batty, "Oh, my God, you're killing us! We're gonna get blamed for shutting down the government and people love the government. People don't want the government shut down, oh, my God, oh, my God."

Now they've done a total flip-flop and to heck with Obamacare. They don't seem to care at all even though it's failing, even though it's ripe.  I mean, it's never been -- and it's been this way for a long time -- it's never been a greater opportunity for the Republican Party to connect with a majority of Americans across the spectrum.  The opposition to Obamacare knows no bounds.  People from all income levels, people from all walks of life, all religions, all creeds, all three sexes, it doesn't matter, there are opponents, and they are the vast majority.  And it is getting bigger.  And the Republicans who last fall said "Don't do anything to take the focus off that," have now taken the focus off that and have shifted to amnesty!
If you look at national polls, you find that amnesty is important to 3% of the population.  Obamacare polls at the top of issues the American people think are important, need to be addressed, fixed, done something with.  The minute that polling data comes out, we drop our pursuit of Obamacare, which was tepid anyway as a party, and now we've shifted at our retreat, which is a good name for what's happening here, retreat, to amnesty and advancing amnesty.  It doesn't make any sense.
Let me give you some numbers.  Phyllis Schlafly has a report coming out where she has looked at just reams of polling data and other demographic data on illegal immigrants.  Ann Coulter used some of it in a column that she wrote about this earlier this week. She made the point that Phyllis Schlafly's report was embargoed, but Coulter said (paraphrasing), "I don't care, it's too important. I'm gonna use it anyway." So she did.
Phyllis Schlafly put this together and here are just some of the highlights of this.  "According to a Harris poll, 81 percent of native-born citizens think the schools should teach students to be proud of being American. Only 50 percent of naturalized US citizens do."  Naturalized citizens equals immigrants, legal, illegal, whatever.  This is a huge problem.  That is major.  It cuts against the notion that there is assimilation.

You know, I wrote Rush Revere and the Brave Pilgrims.  I love this country.  I want everybody to love this country.  It is the greatest country human beings have ever devised.  It's the greatest way to organize life.  It's the greatest way to organize business.  It's the greatest way to organize society that has ever been done on the face of the earth, in the course of human history.  There is every reason in the world not to just be proud of it, but to love it.  And I want everybody to.  The problem is that young people in public schools are being taught not only not to love the country, but they're being lied to about how the country was founded, why it was founded, who founded it, and what its purpose is.  They're telling young people this country has not warranted its superpower status, that we've discriminated, that we've killed, that we've been racist and bigoted, slave state, still are, you know the drill.
The multicultural curriculum has taken over and this country's beaten up, and there's no counter to it, talking about push-back or opposition.  That's why I wrote the book.  There was a mission behind the book.  This wasn't just to sell a book or come up with a different way of doing a book after having done two prior.  There's a mission here.  We've lost education.  We've lost pop culture.  We've lost books, movies, television shows, music, this kind of thing.  It's a little attempt here to forge the truth, to insert the truth into young skulls full of mush.  So 81% of native born citizens think the schools should teach students to be proud of being American.

Why is that even controversial?  Do you understand, to the left, that is controversial, because of the word "force."  Not "force," but "should."  That equals force to them.  They should teach students to be proud of being American.  Damn right they should.  But, no, they teach them to feel guilty about it.  But the point is only 50% of naturalized US citizens do.  See, my take is, we ought not be granting citizenship to people that don't love the country.  We ought not be granting citizenship to people that don't understand the history of this country.  We ought not be granting citizenship to people that don't understand the preamble to the Declaration, to the Constitution. We shouldn't be granting citizenship to people who come here and want to undermine it.
But we do, in the interest of the fairness and multiculturalism and being nonjudgmental and all this.  But the real reason we do is because the people granting citizenship to people like this share that opinion:  This is no place special.  And that's what's so damn frustrating and inconceivable about the Republican Party wanting to open the country up to this kind of immigration.  It just doesn't make any sense!  It's the end of the Republican Party. It's the end of the country as we know it. It doesn't make any sense, in the traditional way of judging this.
Now, there are other ways that it does make sense, and they're not pretty.  I touched on some of those yesterday.  But let me keep on with the Phyllis Schlafly data.  "While 67 percent of native-born Americans believe our Constitution is a higher legal authority than international law, only 37 percent of naturalized citizens agree."  Meaning, 63% of people that we are granting citizenship to do not accept, probably don't even understand, and do not believe that our Constitution trumps international law. 

Now, you may be thinking, "Well, who are we to say --" I'll tell you what it means.  It means that international law should trump the Constitution, meaning whatever some nefarious body somewhere like the UN wants to say should govern our country.  That's what it means.  That's why it's important.  Again, saying that the Constitution should trump international law is not us bragging.  It's not us saying we're smarter and better at all.  It is us recognizing our uniqueness and attempting to preserve it, for which there should never be an apology.
But why are we subjecting ourselves to these challenges?  They're unnecessary.  We do not need to be granting citizenship to people who essentially don't agree with nor understand nor love the country they're coming to.  So I don’t understand the point.  For those of you who think, "Well, Rush, this is the only way we're gonna attack poverty. It's the on me way we're gonna attack income inequality. Everywhere in the world is as poor as it can be."
We are not gonna wipe out world poverty by letting everybody that's poor into this country.  We're just gonna become one of them if that happens.  It cannot be done, folks.  There is too much poverty all over the world.  The numbers of people that live on less than $2 a day is huge -- although, although, Herbert Meyer, who was an official with the Reagan administration (we've talked to him, interviewed him for the Limbaugh letter), one of the things that he says is this.
One of the most remarkable things that's happening, and I've seen it now in two or three other places, is that poverty is slowly being eradicated -- real, real abject poverty.  We're not doing it with immigration, is the point.  We're not doing it by letting people into this country.  I've told you about the guy at the golf tournament I was with, my friend in California who lost it and walked out on this major international media figure you would know.
His only reason for supporting illegal immigration and amnesty was, "If somebody wants to come to my country and improve their life, who am I to stand in their way?"  You're not doing that. We cannot improve people.  We have to change the way they live, where they live.  We have to change systems that govern them where they live.  The problem with poverty is an unequal distribution of capitalism in the world.