Public Broadcasting’s Proxy War Against the Taxpayer
April 28, 2011 at 2:46 pm | Posted in NewsRealBlog | Leave a commentTags: Free Market, Legacy Amendment, minnesota public radio, MPR, NewsReal Blog, NPR, Public Broadcasting, Sales Tax, Socialism
by Walter Hudson, contributed to David Horowitz’s NewsReal Blog
In the great state of Minnesota, we have something called the Legacy Amendment which increased our state sales tax to create a slush fund for all kinds of extraneous goodies related to “outdoor heritage, clean water, parks and trails, and arts and cultural heritage.” The result has been increasingly odious lobbying efforts to claim a slice of that taxpayer pie. Legislators can’t seem to give the money away fast enough. As the state wrestles with a $5 billion budget deficit, funds raised by the Legacy Amendment go to such essential items as paying a science-fiction writer $40,000 to speak to an audience of 500 at a small town library.
Like Frodo’s quest to destroy the Ring, an effort is underway to repeal the Legacy Amendment in the same manner it was created, though a ballot initiative. In the meantime, the slush fund’s beneficiaries continue to squabble over the state’s fiscal crumbs like a hoard of orcs tearing at man-flesh.
Among them is Minnesota Public Radio. In a recent email to members, the public broadcasting organization pleaded for help in pressuring legislators to keep the gravy train flowing.
Who Parents the Parents? San Fransisco Set to Ban Infant Circumcision
April 27, 2011 at 12:00 pm | Posted in NewsRealBlog | 1 CommentTags: Child Abuse, Circumcision, domestic violence, NewsReal Blog, Parental Rights, parenting, parents, San Fransisco
by Walter Hudson, contributed to David Horowitz’s NewsReal Blog
The practice of infant circumcision, which carries particular religious significance for Jews, may be outlawed later this year in San Fransisco. A ballot initiative is underway which would ask voters whether to prohibit the practice in November.
The proposed new law would make it a misdemeanor to circumcise a person before they are 18-years-old.
“We don’t come at this from a religious angle,” Lloyd Schofield told the San Francisco Examiner. “We feel this is a very harmful thing. Parents are guardians. They are not owners of children. It’s a felony to tattoo a child.”
The effort is being taken seriously in light of last year’s ban of toys in McDonald’s Happy Meals. That move was enacted by the San Fransisco Board of Supervisors and provoked even leftist commentator Jon Stewart to call the city a “nanny state.”
PETA Worried About Heightened Criminal Penalties For Trespass, Theft, and Fraud
April 27, 2011 at 9:00 am | Posted in NewsRealBlog | 1 CommentTags: animal cruelty, Factory Farms, Farmers, Farming, Farms, Freedom of Association, Freedom of Speech, HF 1369, minnesota, NewsReal Blog, PETA, Property Rights, SF 1118
by Walter Hudson, contributed to David Horowitz’s NewsReal Blog
Is it possible that PETA, an organization which has equated the eating of animals to the lynching of black Americans, has something in common with the Tea Party? I wondered when I received an email from a fellow Tea Partier which had originated from the radical animal rights group.
House File (HF) 1369 and Senate File (SF) 1118, which are currently making their way through the Minnesota State Legislature, could subject whistleblowers to criminal prosecution for their efforts to expose animal abuse on factory farms. If passed, these bills would penalize those who report and expose cruelty to animals and would put them at risk of being charged with a misdemeanor or even a felony, sentenced to pay heavy fines, and ordered to serve jail time. This legislation is a desperate attempt by agriculture industry giants to prevent consumers from learning the truth about how animals on factory farms live and die.
As PETA presents it, these bills appear to attack freedom of speech. By saying they “penalize those who report and expose cruelty to animals,” PETA makes it sound like speaking against a factory farm will become a criminal offense. Were this true, the Tea Party would indeed find itself allied with PETA against these bills.
Arrest of Koran-Burning Pastor Terry Jones Brings Freedom of Speech Into Focus
April 26, 2011 at 9:00 am | Posted in NewsRealBlog | Leave a commentTags: Bill of Rights, Dearborn, Disturbing the Peace, First Amendment, Freedom of Association, Freedom of Speech, islam, Koran, Michigan, NewsReal Blog, Pastor Terry Jones, Property Rights, Protest, Terry Jones
by Walter Hudson, contributed to David Horowitz’s NewsReal Blog
The freedom of speech is perhaps the most popular among those cited in the Bill of Rights. The ability to express yourself without fear of fine or incarceration is essential to the maintenance of a free society. Jihad Watch director Robert Spencer, a prolific author on the topic of Islam, has an important article at Human Events suggesting that free speech may be endangered.
On Good Friday in Dearborn, Mich., the notorious Koran-burning pastor Terry Jones was jailed and fined for the crime of refusing to pay a so-called “peace bond” to cover the costs of extra police protection for Jones’ planned demonstration outside the Islamic Center of America in Dearborn. Judge Mark Somers also ordered Jones to stay away from the massive Dearborn mosque for three years.
Spencer points out that Jones was not the threat to public order that Dearborn authorities treated him as. Rather, the threat to public order was the prospect of violent reaction from Muslims.
… if Jones and his fellow protesters were not being violent themselves, wouldn’t the responsibility for any disturbance be upon those who decided to react to whatever Jones was doing by causing the disturbance?(…)
Crony Capitalism Keeps Cancer Patients from Care
April 26, 2011 at 7:44 am | Posted in Political | Leave a commentTags: Cancer, Crony Capitalism, health care, HF383, HF595, Minneapolis Radiation Oncology, ObamaCare
As a foreshadowing of the sort of government intervention which will ration care and cost lives as Obamacare is implemented, the House Health and Human Services Reform Committee shall today consider HF383, a bill which would extend a moratorium on radiation clinics until 2017.
The moratorium protects a government-enforced monopoly for Minneapolis Radiation Oncology. MRO has a doctor whose political contributions, when combined with his wife’s, make them to the 19th largest contributor in the state. Here’s what that influence buys them:
- Minnesota law currently FORBIDS the construction of new cancer radiation therapy clinics.
- The moratorium covers a 14-county area, which includes: Hennepin, Ramsey, Dakota, Washington, Anoka, Carver, Scott, St. Louis, Sherburne, Benton, Stearns, Chisago, Isanti and Wright. Continue Reading Crony Capitalism Keeps Cancer Patients from Care…
Raise the Roof: Jacking Up the Debt Ceiling Is Ghetto Fabulous
April 25, 2011 at 12:05 pm | Posted in NewsRealBlog | 1 CommentTags: Barack Obama, Debt Ceiling, deficit, federal government, National Debt, NewsReal Blog, Paul Ryan, Revenue, spending, taxes, tea party
by Walter Hudson, contributed to David Horowitz’s NewsReal Blog
We’ve all known people who just couldn’t handle money. It slips right through their fingers. They’re not just living check-to-check, but check-to-scheme. They’re always in debt, and always in crisis. They constantly need another loan to cover the last. They play silly little tricks, like cashing a check with insufficient funds, gambling that it won’t bounce before they can make a deposit. It’s a way of life where, no matter how much money they have at any given time, they are predisposed toward broke.
It’s bad enough when a friend or family member is that way. Unfortunately, we’ve got a federal government just as ghetto.
The Huffington Post recently reported that “conservative strategists” are advising the GOP to soft-pedal resistance to raising the debt ceiling. They warn that the consequences of a protracted fight could be adverse.
If the markets get spooked, U.S. treasury bond yields will spike, driving up interest rates and increasing the price of borrowing money for everyone from the federal government to municipalities to consumers, [former Treasury and White House official in the Bush administration Tony] Fratto warned. The cascading effects on the economy would be severe and long-lasting.
You don’t understand. I have to take out another credit card. If I don’t, I won’t be able to make payments on the five I already have out. I won’t be able to pay my other bills either. I’ll have to sell my car, find a cheaper place to live, get another job…
Echoes of the Tea Party Louder Than Whining Over Ryan Budget
April 24, 2011 at 10:00 am | Posted in NewsRealBlog | Leave a commentTags: budget, David Weigel, Government Unions, Labor Unions, Madison Protest, Michael Barone, NewsReal Blog, Paul Ryan, Public Employee Unions, Public Unions, spending, taxes, tea party, Town Hall, unions, Wisconsin
by Walter Hudson, contributed to David Horowitz’s NewsReal Blog
In the wake of passing Representative Paul Ryan’s budget plan, some members of Congress have hosted town hall meetings upon returning to their home districts. Slate’s David Weigel notes a curious lack of anger at these proceedings, particularly compared to the outrage over Obamacare which swept the nation during the August 2009 recess.
If the Ryan budget is so unpopular, where are the town-hall meltdowns?
The Washington Examiner’s Michael Barone takes a stab at the answer.
… One should note that there was some very loud—and violent and abusive—protest to Governor Scott Walker’s plans in Wisconsin. But organizing those protests was mostly the work of paid union staffers, not citizen volunteers, and the union folks were able to draw on street people/university town types who live in great numbers in Madison. The union folks, as Weigel notes, don’t seem to be sending people into town hall meetings.
If they were, it still wouldn’t impress as much as those angry constituents who were roused in droves to combat Obamacare. That’s because, as Barone points out, the ruckus at 2009 town halls was intrinsically motivated.
Taking a Page from Islamists’ Playbook, Anti-Tea Party Radical Demands Beheading of Business Owners and Conservatives
April 21, 2011 at 11:00 am | Posted in NewsRealBlog | Leave a commentTags: Andrew Breitbart, Arkansas, French Revolution, Guillotine, Left, leftist, Socialist, tea party, Terrorism, threat, violence
by Walter Hudson, contributed to David Horowitz’s NewsReal Blog
Last weekend, Tea Parties throughout the country held Tax Day rallies to protest bloated government budgets, ever increasing debt, and the ballooning entitlement state. Some among the Left were not content to let the Tea Party own Tax Day.
In Arkansas, an anti-Tea Party rally dubbed “Make Them Pay” took place on the steps of the state capitol. Jim Lendall, a former state representative and 2010 Green Party Gubernatorial nominee, was applauded when he took the podium to call for the beheading of businessmen and conservatives.
The French, inspired by our American Revolution, knew how to deal with the wealthy arrogant aristocrats. The French people built guillotines. Maybe we can park a guillotine in front of every chamber of commerce, corporate headquarters, bank, investment house, and Republican Party headquarters to remind them that democracy is about people, not profits. We need to tell them in one clear voice, ‘No more greed.’
The New Abolitionist: Dragging the Left to a Moral Argument
April 20, 2011 at 10:00 am | Posted in NewsRealBlog | Leave a commentTags: Abolition, Barack Obama, budget, huffington post, NewsReal Blog, slavery, Socialism, taxes, Wall Street Journal
by Walter Hudson, contributed to David Horowitz’s NewsReal Blog
Imagine an argument for the abolition of slavery based not upon natural law and fundamental human rights, but whether slavery is an effective means of production. Such an abolitionist might say, Slaves cannot be relied upon to produce all that the country requires. The subsequent debate would then center around the efficiency of slavery, rather than its morality.
That’s the character of our modern debate regarding taxation. The Wall Street Journal published an editorial on Monday demonstrating “the fiscal futility of raising rates on the top 2%, or even the top 5% or 10%, of taxpayers to close the deficit.” Confiscating all the taxable income of the top 10% of taxpayers will not close the deficit, they say. Taxes will therefore have to be raised on the middle class to maintain the entitlement state.
Jeffery Sachs counters from The Huffington Post. He claims that the “IRS data in fact prove exactly the opposite of what the Journal claims.”
I’ll leave it to the Journal to defend their math, not because their case lacks importance, but because it is entirely beside the point. While it may be prudent to highlight “the fiscal futility” of the Left’s tax-hiking impulse, the foremost argument against perpetuating the entitlement state is a moral one.
“Anti-Islam Extremist” Begs You to Read the Koran
April 20, 2011 at 8:36 am | Posted in NewsRealBlog | Leave a commentTags: Brannon Howse, CAIR, islam, jihad, Koran, Mansfield, Muslim, NewsReal Blog, Qur'an, robert spencer, tea party, Usama Dakdok, Worldview Weekend
by Walter Hudson, contributed to David Horowitz’s NewsReal Blog
Usama Dakdok with Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer.
Would you believe me if I told you I attended a bible conference where an Egyptian-born minister sold dozens of Korans to eagerly awaiting Christians? Believe it or not, that was the scene Monday night at a high school in Rochester, Minnesota.
Usama Dakdok is founder of The Straight Way of Grace Ministries, a Christian outreach to Muslims and herald of the threat posed by Sharia Law. He stood at the center of a recent controversy in Mansfield, Ohio, where the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) applied pressure to a school district where he was scheduled to speak. Superintendent Dan Freund caved to CAIR’s pressure, citing concerns for public safety. The Tea Party organization which organized the event pursued legal action against the district. The episode drew attention to Dakdok’s message and that of his critics.
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