Far be it from me to complain but I’ve got to vent somehow. I travel around the West. Since I fly Delta that usually means flying on their Canadair Regional Jets manufactured by Bombardier. These jets have a flaw that drive me nuts. Periodically during the flight a deafening BING goes off. It is so loud that I actually feel pain in my ear. No matter where you sit you are no more than a couple of feet from the speaker.
I don’t understand why they have to be so loud.
These little devils will be the death of me. This is a case of like 30.
Try one of these bad boys.
1 almond, surrounded by creamy goodness, encased in a round cookie shell, coated with coconut.
There is a trend these days for truck operators dumping rocks down the freeway to try and indemnify themselves for the damage to OUR cars.
You can’t read the sign on the back of this truck but it says to stay back 300 feet and that they are not responsible for damage.
So in other words they want us to be a football field away from them. Since I’ve had rocks hit me while in adjacent lanes, if they are in the center lane (which both of these are), you can’t pass them.
I drove up along side one of these characters to take down their number. Remember, Harper Excavating for all your windshield needs.
I was in Southern California recently. I took this picture of a nice couple sun bathing. I hope he put lotion on the bottoms of his feet.
This makes me angry!! The guy who testified against Brian David Mitchell got paid half a million dollars by Utah tax payers. Who’s the bozo that in the authorized the use of this guy. Is there that big of a difference between spending life in prison vs. life in a mental institution? They couldn’t find an expert for $40,000.
“Dr. Michael Welner testified about his 205-page report, which concluded that the 57-year-old Mitchell was competent to stand trial, but suffers from an anti-social personality disorder, psychopathy and alcohol abuse.
Welner’s evaluation of Mitchell, for which prosecutors paid more than $500,000, was sought by the government after a federal prison hospital evaluator, Dr. Richart DeMier, said he believed Mitchell was not competent for trial.” http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504083_162-20024997-504083.html
“Dr. Michael Welner and his consulting firm, the Forensic Panel, were paid a jaw-dropping $242,966.74 for work on the second Yates trial.”
http://standdown.typepad.com/weblog/2006/10/michael_welner.html
As far as I’m concerned, Michael Welner is a predator as well.
“Congress shall make no law that applies to the citizens of the United States that does not apply equally to the Senators and/or Representatives; and, Congress shall make no law that applies to the Senators and/or Representatives that does not apply equally to the citizens of the United States “.
Notice I said “make” not “earn”?
_________________________________
Federal workers earning double their private counterparts
By Dennis Cauchon, USA TODAY
At a time when workers’ pay and benefits have stagnated, federal employees’ average compensation has grown to more than double what private sector workers earn, a USA TODAY analysis finds.
Federal workers have been awarded bigger average pay and benefit increases than private employees for nine years in a row. The compensation gap between federal and private workers has doubled in the past decade.
Federal civil servants earned average pay and benefits of $123,049 in 2009 while private workers made $61,051 in total compensation, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. The data are the latest available.
The federal compensation advantage has grown from $30,415 in 2000 to $61,998 last year.
Public employee unions say the compensation gap reflects the increasingly high level of skill and education required for most federal jobs and the government contracting out lower-paid jobs to the private sector in recent years.
“The data are not useful for a direct public-private pay comparison,” says Colleen Kelley, president of the National Treasury Employees Union.
I go through airport security all the time. The workers are pathetic. The official rules change regularly and they make up their own rules constantly.
What’s better, racial profiling or molesting millions of people every day?
TSA Pat-down Leaves Traveler Covered in Urine
‘I was absolutely humiliated,’ said bladder cancer survivor
By Harriet Baskas
msnbc.com
A retired special education teacher on his way to a wedding in Orlando, Fla., said he was left humiliated, crying and covered with his own urine after an enhanced pat-down by TSA officers recently at Detroit Metropolitan Airport.
“I was absolutely humiliated, I couldn’t even speak,” said Thomas D. “Tom” Sawyer, 61, ofLansing, Mich.
Sawyer is a bladder cancer survivor who now wears a urostomy bag, which collects his urine from a stoma, or opening in his stomach. “I have to wear special clothes and in order to mount the bag I have to seal a wafer to my stomach and then attach the bag. If the seal is broken, urine can leak all over my body and clothes.”
On Nov. 7, Sawyer said he went through the security scanner at Detroit Metropolitan Airport. “Evidently the scanner picked up on my urostomy bag, because I was chosen for a pat-down procedure.”
Due to his medical condition, Sawyer asked to be screened in private. “One officer looked at another, rolled his eyes and said that they really didn’t have any place to take me,” said Sawyer. “After I said again that I’d like privacy, they took me to an office.”
Sawyer wears pants two sizes too large in order to accommodate the medical equipment he wears. He’d taken off his belt to go through the scanner and once in the office with security personnel, his pants fell down around his ankles. “I had to ask twice if it was OK to pull up my shorts,” said Sawyer, “And every time I tried to tell them about my medical condition, they said they didn’t need to know about that.”
Before starting the enhanced pat-down procedure, a security officer did tell him what they were going to do and how they were going to it, but Sawyer said it wasn’t until they asked him to remove his sweatshirt and saw his urostomy bag that they asked any questions about his medical condition.
“One agent watched as the other used his flat hand to go slowly down my chest. I tried to warn him that he would hit the bag and break the seal on my bag, but he ignored me. Sure enough, the seal was broken and urine started dribbling down my shirt and my leg and into my pants.”
The security officer finished the pat-down, tested the gloves for any trace of explosives and then, Sawyer said, “He told me I could go. They never apologized. They never offered to help. They acted like they hadn’t seen what happened. But I know they saw it because I had a wet mark.”
Humiliated, upset and wet, Sawyer said he had to walk through the airport soaked in urine, board his plane and wait until after takeoff before he could clean up.
My wife just asked me….”have you ever had a doctor ask you what you had for breakfast or lunch?” I said, “No, that’s a good point.”
She then said, “have you ever taken an animal to the vet and been asked what you feed them?” I thought for a second and said, “every time.”
It seems odd doesn’t it?
It reminds me of the quote, “I can no more remember the books I’ve read or the meals I’ve eaten, but they made me.”
I haven’t blogged in over two months. I’ve just been too busy. However, Obama and his complete stupidity brought me back. Today in a so called “town hall meeting” sponsored by CNBC, he was speaking on repealing the Bush tax cuts.
“‘On average, millionaires would get a check of $100,000. It is an irresponsible thing for us to do. Those folks are the least likely to spend it,’ he said to applause.”
I have to thoughts on this ridiculous statement. Either he doesn’t understand economics 101 or he just can’t stand to let someone spend money he believes he should control.
There are certainly many liberals who just don’t understand economics. They think it is better for an economy to spend than to save? Does Obama spank his kids if they don’t spend 100% of their allowance? In the old days people believed that saving was good.
What does Obama think happens to saved money? Does he think all millionaires sleep on huge mattresses full of cash? Whether money is spent or saved it is put back into the system. Let’s take a minute to run through an example.
If I get $5,000 back in taxes and chose to save it, where does it go? If I put it in the bank, they will loan it out. Whoever gets the loan will spend it. They will likely spend it on something more worthwhile than junk at the mall.
I could also put the money in an eTrade account and invest it in Apple, Cisco or some other company. If I do that, where does it go? It goes to someone who owns those stocks and believes those stocks are going to fall. Once that person gets the money they will either spend it or buy another stock. They may even purchase an IPO. Initial Public Offerings are a means for companies to get cash to buy stuff. Stuff that is likely more worthwhile than junk at the mall.
No matter what, it will get spent. It still goes into the economy to drive production. Now I will admit that they money will have less velocity. It will not stimulate the economy as fast as a trip to the mall but it will still stimulate the economy.
My comments about “stuff more worthwhile than junk at the mall”, is important. What will make our country richer; the creation and subsequent purchase of bathing suit or the purchase of a hammer by a contractor? If the answer isn’t readily obvious then think about it a while.
I doubt Obama is really that stupid. He just wants to retain the money so he can hand it out to his own constituents i.e. wealth redistribution. Obama and other democrats have shown their true colors the last few months.
Here are a few quotes: “’Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., Sen., Kent Conrad, D-N.D. and Sen. Joe Lieberman, a Connecticut Independent who caucuses with Democrats, have all recently said that raising taxes — even for the rich — doesn’t make sense while the economy is faltering.’
‘Rep. Harry E. Mitchell, D-Ariz., said in a letter sent Friday to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi that he wants to make the Bush era tax cuts on capital gains and estate taxes permanent.’
‘Senate Budget Chairman Kent Conrad, D-N.D., a fierce deficit hawk, said last month that he would be reluctant to let anyone’s tax cuts expire just yet.
‘In a perfect world, I would not be cutting spending or raising taxes for the next 18 months to two years’ Conrad said”
“At least 38 House Democrats have now come out publicly in favor of at least a short-term extension of current income tax rates for couples earning more than $250,000 and individuals over the $200,000 threshhold — bucking calls from Obama and Pelosi to let taxes increase on wealthier Americans. Other Democrats have indicated privately that they prefer an extension instead of allowing rates to expire for top earners, and Maryland Rep. Chris Van Hollen, who heads Democratic campaign efforts, has argued behind closed doors for taking a political issue off the table by giving a short reprieve to wealthy folks before the midterm elections.”
So in other words, these guys see tax cuts as economic stimulators. The problem is that it interferes with their redistribution plans. They are normally happy to put the economy in the back seat but since they are going to be the ones getting the blame this time around, they are willing to cut taxes.
Now Nancy Pelosi is another story. I think she actually fits in the category of stupid. The other day she said, “The tax cuts at the high end have not produced any jobs; it only increased the deficit.” She actually seems to believe that tax credits for the poor stimulate the economy yet tax cuts for the wealthy do nothing.
I think economics and wealth distribution have formed a sort of lasagna in her head. They are now impossible to separate.
