The Activist Next Door

The Activist Next Door has MOVED

2009-08-13T12:05:00.002-05:00

The new website is

www.theactivistnextdoor.com

(I can't point this site to the new one or I lose my archives.) See you there!

Health Care Protests Across the State on Friday, August 14th

2009-08-07T18:51:00.004-05:00

Tea Party Patriots are planning rallys on Friday, August 14th across the state 11am-12pm

You can bet Obama's Oraganizers will be out too.

Go to this link and GET ACTIVE!!

http://teapartymn.com/current-events/81409-health-care-freedom-rally/

Parliment of Whores

2009-08-07T15:51:00.002-05:00

A friend just sent this on. His district votes for him, again and again. He calls them racist, they vote for him again and again.

Prediction

2009-08-07T13:16:00.002-05:00

Somewhere soon, police are going to arrest somebody at a town hall or protest for disorderly conduct.

President Obama will change his mind about police "acting stupidly", but he still won't apologize for playing the race card in the case of his friend Professor Gates.

Can I Have Your Phone Number, Senator?

2009-08-06T16:56:00.006-05:00

Does anybody else think it's really weird that Senator Al Franken apparently has no Minnesota office phone number listed anywhere online?

I've called his D.C. offices before, but I'm interested in doing some community organizing right here at home. Where is his office here?

I'm a google queen, help me out here.

Here's his Campaign Website with a P.O. Box and no phone listed:
http://www.alfranken.com/page/s/contact

Update: Senator Franken's Phone number is on his Senate website, I had looked there and missed it. (In my defense, it is sort of easy to miss as it's listed under the DC address).

320 HART SENATE OFFICE BUILDING
WASHINGTON DC 20510
Phone: 202-224-5641
MN Phone: 651-221-1016
E-mail: info@franken.senate.gov

Senator Klobuchar and each of our eight Representatives have very clear Minnesota office addresses and phone numbers listed on their websites.

Now can somebody help me find Senator Franken's MN office locations?

Good for the Goose

2009-08-06T15:30:00.004-05:00

I was just on "Organizing for America", Barack Obama's website. As I've said before, I'm learning from the President (how to organize).

Here's the message from B.O. yesterday:

This is the moment our movement was built for.

For one month, the fight for health insurance reform leaves the backrooms of Washington, D.C., and returns to communities across America. Throughout August, members of Congress are back home, where the hands they shake and the voices they hear will not belong to lobbyists, but to people like you.

Home is where we're strongest. We didn't win last year's election together at a committee hearing in D.C. We won it on the doorsteps and the phone lines, at the softball games and the town meetings, and in every part of this great country where people gather to talk about what matters most. And if you're willing to step up once again, that's exactly where we're going to win this historic campaign for the guaranteed, affordable health insurance that every American deserves.

There are those who profit from the status quo, or see this debate as a political game, and they will stop at nothing to block reform. They are filling the airwaves and the internet with outrageous falsehoods to scare people into opposing change. And some people, not surprisingly, are getting pretty nervous. So we've got to get out there, fight lies with truth, and set the record straight.

That's why Organizing for America is putting together thousands of events this month where you can reach out to neighbors, show your support, and make certain your members of Congress know that you're counting on them to act.

But these canvasses, town halls, and gatherings only make a difference if you turn up to knock on doors, share your views, and show your support. So here's what I need from you:

Can you commit to join at least one event in your community this month?

In politics, there's a rule that says when you ask people to get involved, always tell them it'll be easy. Well, let's be honest here: Passing comprehensive health insurance reform will not be easy. Every President since Harry Truman has talked about it, and the most powerful and experienced lobbyists in Washington stand in the way.

But every day we don't act, Americans watch their premiums rise three times faster than wages, small businesses and families are pushed towards bankruptcy, and 14,000 people lose their coverage entirely. The cost of inaction is simply too much for the people of this nation to bear.

So yes, fixing this crisis will not be easy. Our opponents will attack us every day for daring to try. It will require time, and hard work, and there will be days when we don't know if we have anything more to give. But there comes a moment when we all have to choose between doing what's easy, and doing what's right.

This is one of those times. And moments like this are what this movement was built for. So, are you ready?

Please commit now to taking at least one action in your community this month to build support for health insurance reform:http://my.barackobama.com/CommitAugust

Let's seize this moment and win this historic victory for our economy, our health and our families.

Thank you,
President Barack Obama

CAN YOU IMAGINE THIS COMING FROM A REPUBLICAN WHITE HOUSE??? I never saw an email like this in eight years of President Bush and we're only 6 months in with this guy.

The man contradicts himself in his own email, saying that some are making this a "political game" then saying "In politics, there's a rule that says when you ask people to get involved, always tell them it'll be easy"

This is ALL about politics, this is ALL about votes and the left-wing Democrats pushing to tip the country to the point where less than half the people have a federal income tax liability. You want to talk about mob rule? They want to push the country to the point where we can no longer afford to have the strongest military in the world. They want to tax and spend America into mediocrity. They are one-world-order communists. Yeah- I said it- communists.

You see folks, it's okay for the organizer-in-chief, the most powerful man in the free world, to ask people to get involved and show up to August recess meetings. But, it's not okay if you want to get involved show up to August recess meetings. Their people are good. You are bad. You will be narked on, you will the target of personal attacks, you are a brainwashed right-wing nut job.

Fish and Tips

2009-08-06T13:58:00.002-05:00

Great post today by "Lassie" over at Freedom Dogs on Obama's new domestic spy program.

Elitism and Disdain from the Left

2009-08-06T11:43:00.005-05:00

Republicans can't win- we're either hillbillies with missing teeth who shop at Wal Mart, or we're "the Brooks Brothers Brigade" as White House press secretary Robert Gibbs us.

Barbara Boxer's arrogance, as she stands there in her designer duds, is jaw-dropping.

The elitist attitude whereby the Obamas are hailed as "Vanity Fair's Best Dressed", but the common-folk aren't allowed to match a top and skirt....breathtaking.

By the way- I was at a protest yesterday- I sported a black knit skirt from Target with a white tee-shirt from Ann Taylor Loft. What I wore is inconsequential, what I videotaped is not.

More soon.

All in the Family

2009-08-05T14:51:00.000-05:00

Here's my sister on Fox and Friends a couple weeks ago, promoting her website, Gipper's List

And here's my brother Tom with DFL Don Shelby!

http://wcco.com/links/?plid=1113201#1113201

It's a strange new segment where Don poses as a shoe shiner on Nicollet Mall to engage people, although he does very little engaging in my opinion.

This link is the extended cut of what appeared on the news last night, as my brother said, "the longer, even more boring version"

Pretty cool to have such a politcally active bunch. You can bet we've had some pretty good dinner-table conversations.

Crushing Dissent

2009-08-04T23:02:00.005-05:00

The DNC sent out an email yesterday that said this:

The Republicans and their allied groups – desperate after losing two consecutive elections and every major policy fight on Capitol Hill – are inciting angry mobs of a small number of rabid right wing extremists funded by K Street Lobbyists to disrupt thoughtful discussions about the future of health care in America taking place in Congressional Districts across the country.

However, much like we saw at the McCain-Palin rallies last year where crowds were baited with cries of 'socialist,' 'communist,' and where the birthers movement was born – these mobs of extremists are not interested in having a thoughtful discussion about the issues – but like some Republican leaders have said – they are interested in ‘breaking’ the President and destroying his Presidency.

These mobs are bussed in by well funded, highly organized groups run by Republican operatives and funded by the special interests who are desperately trying to stop the agenda for change the President was elected to bring to Washington. Despite the headline grabbing nature of these angry mobs and their disruptions of events, they are not reflective of where the American people are on the issues – or the hundreds of thousands of thoughtful discussions taking place around kitchen tables, water coolers and in homes.

The right wing extremists’ use of things like devil horns on pictures of our elected officials, hanging members of Congress in effigy, breathlessly questioning the President's citizenship and the use of Nazi SS symbols and the like just shows how outside of the mainstream the Republican Party and their allies are. This type of anger and discord did not serve Republicans well in 2008 – and it is bound to backfire again.

This email should send a shiver up your spine. The power that the DNC has-- their party has the Presidency, the Senate and the House-- and yet they feel the need to use these awful scare tactics and lies.

This is designed to scare people like you and me into not getting involved with the townhalls. Stay home, stay out-of-it. Anyone who speaks out against their rush towards European-style socialism is an extremist. The rest of the people are having "thoughtful" conversations....but you are nuts. They will call us every name in the book to get us to stay home. Good luck with that.

These people don't get it. Most of the people showing up at these events (tea parties, town halls) aren't even affiliated with a political party. They're just ticked off. Really ticked off. They are some of the 60% of Americans who happen to have a federal income tax liability. They know that once that balance is tipped passed 50%, America is done. They are mad that the country is spending itself into oblivion. . They see friends and family losing jobs and don't see where new jobs will come from. They see the obvious answers; like drilling and nuclear for our energy needs, like encouraging competition to bring down costs in the health care industry, and they wonder why our elected officials are so clueless.

As far as conservatives like me-- well I'm just learning from the liberals, I'm just learning from our President. HotAir points out this from Obama's campaign last fall:

In Elko, Obama tried to anticipate his critics and called on the crowd of about 1,500 to sharpen their elbows, too.

“I need you to go out and talk to your friends and talk to your neighbors. I want you to talk to them whether they are independent or whether they are Republican. I want you to argue with them and get in their face,” he said.

A girlfriend of mine and I have been talking about renting a bus to get people to townhall meetings, another Republican I know has offered up his mini-van that seats seven. Yeah, those K-street lobbyists are funding this. Yeah, right. I wish I had some money for all of this stuff I do. I'm a Republican, I like to work to make money.

I'm a proud activist and "community organizer" and these threats only fuel the desire to organize taxpayers and citizens to speak up.

Oh, by the way, another thing I'm learning....how to find town hall meetings that aren't posted publicly for our two liberal Senators.

They want to crush any dissent. They will use any means necessary including the propoganda in the DNC email above. It's astounding, it's frightening.

Breaking News: Obama and Michelle Obama Make Vanity Fair's "Best Dressed" List

2009-08-04T10:07:00.004-05:00

Please note his eggplant scarf with burgundy tie...please note her hideous dark olive leather gloves with chartreuse dress. The enormous effort that goes into the Obama's "thrown together" looks is the antithesis of style. Read on:

Watching "The Today Show"-- the top 2 (of only 5 people discussed), on VF's "Best Dressed" list are Michelle and Barack Obama. They sent out ballots to 2,000 "fashion insiders" and suprise!!! The Obamas received the most amount of votes, not only this year, but EVER!

I had NO IDEA they were so well-dressed. Now, I will look at them in a whole new way and adjust my fall wardrobe choices acordingly.

On Michelle, Meredith Viera gushes, "Not since Jackie O. have two women made such an impact on fashion" (about Michelle and Carla Bruni)

The VF Editor adds, "She has brought back the dress" Really? I didn't know the dress was gone.

Jackie O. brought Paris-designers to the White House, she had a total sense of style and defined style. She wasn't dressed, she dressed. Nancy Reagan was the same way. They both also knew how to flatter their figures....Michelle just wears what some stylist puts together for her, carefully blending mall-brands with ultra-high-end-designers so that there is never a critique.

She seems to have no sense of what her style is. I'd much rather see her in some structured YSL power suits than flowy dresses- it's just not "her" and it's obvious. She looks best in (one of my favorite looks) a structured sheath...she should stick with that. She needs very little fluff and extra accessories with her stature. The circle skirts and high waist do not work with her hips (take it from a fellow pear-shaped girl.)

They keep trying to dress her like January Jones, from "Mad Men," they try so hard to make her retro.

Regarding Barack, the VF Editor says, "He has such natural ease and elegance...you just watch the way he rolls up his sleeves...you can see that he cares how he looks, but not too much."

Yeah, I'd say he doesn't care too much....

......and that's fine. I don't care how well-dressed the President is, but let's not pretend that he is worthy of the Vanity Fair honor. And Michelle- to be fair- has had some fashion hits, but just as many misses. Without the help they receive from the fashion industry, they wouldn't be able to dress their way out of a paper sack. And a paper sack would have looked far better than this:

Ellison Taking Heat in the 5th

2009-08-03T10:52:00.004-05:00

Wow- check out Keith Ellison's townhall meeting on Saturday.

This is in Minnesota's 5th Congressional District, the land-o-liberals.

Picked up this post from Lassie over at Freedom Dogs.

Cold War, Cold Beer

2009-08-02T22:36:00.003-05:00

Had a wonderful dinner with some good friends on Friday night. We were all venting about "The Messiah." I said something like, "Obama. The Beer Summit. I mean, Yalta, YALTA!!"

My friend Matt chimes in, "Reikevick!"

I counter "A beer in the Rose Garden. I don't get it, I don't get it! The Cold War. Reagan ENDED The Cold War! "

Matt then says profoundly, "One ends the Cold War, the other drinks Cold Beer"

It was the press who dubbed this the "Beer Summit", but it was squarely Obama's idea.

This guy is the community-organizer-in Chief all right, the minutia he gets into..."You should change your light bulbs", "I want Michigan to weatherize its houses", "The police in Cambridge acted Stupidly".

Obama makes Jimmy Carter, (a notorious micro-manager and small-idea guy,) look like Jack Welch.

GOP Matches DFL in Minnesota Voter Identification

2009-07-31T10:00:00.002-05:00

Wow- this is huge news. Politics in Minnesota reports that "Republican Party ID Matches Democrats for First Time in Minnesota Since October 2005"

I've been doing Voter ID calls lately. We're working to identify people who have previously refused to identify their political affiliation. The findings of the Survey USA poll reflect the local calls we've been making here in Eden Prairie.

A lot of people right now are also saying they are neither Republicans nor Democrats. People are fed up right now, that's for sure.

The GOP must LEAD, LEAD, LEAD. Lead with principles, don't compromise those principles. People follow leaders- regardless of ideology.

What would happen in local political debates if a GOP candidate simply said this:

"My opponent is a liberal Democrat who believes in higher taxes, more spending and bigger government as a solution to problems- I am a conservative Republican who believes in lowering taxes (for everyone who pays taxes), cutting government spending and smaller government because it is individuals who solve problems- not the government. This is what I believe, this is how I will vote, this is the promise I make to you."

I know this-- simply by the number of quality conservative blogs that keep popping up here in Minnesota-- that Republicans are finally "getting it." They're getting active, they're fighting back, they're being heard, they're influencing people. Every time a new conservative blogger starts up, (and I'm talking about fellow women conservative bloggers specifically,) you can bet another 20 women will soon be following her lead. Conservative women are going to be changing the GOP and it's starting now.

These numbers are exciting to me. We can change things.

Brotherhood of Man

2009-07-30T18:10:00.006-05:00

After seeing this picture, watching the ongoing news coverage of the "Summit" between Professor Gates and Office Crowley...

and reading that Gates and cop Crowley are related by way of Irish roots, I have been dancing and singing around the house...one great song, from one great show "How to Succeed in Business without Really Trying"....

Boy that one builds....and the lyrics? Brilliant!

One man may seem incompetent,
Another not make sense,
While others look like quite a waste
Of company expense.

They need a brother's leadership,
So please don't do them in.
Remember mediocrity is not a mortal sin!

I'm so happy right now, I've forgotten about all the worries of the day! Cap and Trade? Being Taxed into submission? Government-Run Healthcare?-- WHO CARES??

P.J. O'Rourke Twitters the Constitution

2009-07-30T16:46:00.002-05:00

Thanks Mary for sending this on.

From The Weekly Standard, read the entire article here.

Pre-A: We the people R the man. Here's how it rolls. Art1: Congress do law. Got Senate/House-o-Reps.

HR 2yr deal. Reps mst b 25, homie citz 7yrs. 1R per 30k pop/min 1R per St. St pop #s @10yrs. Guv pix subs. HR pix own bigs. HR impeaches Clinton.

Sen 6yr deal. 1/3 go @2yrs. 2Ss/St Mst b 30, homie citz 9yrs. VP tiebreaks. S gives Clinton a bye.

$ Bills fr H & pass S w/amends. Prez mst X or nix. 2/3H&S 2 nix nix

Cong power = Tax Mooch Tariff Green crd Chapt 11 Print $ Bust cons Pat pend Law up War on Hang pirates.

Cong power not = No habeas corp No x post facto law Free trade 4 Sts. Kings dukes for. poofters R bogus.

Sts pow not = For. treats Cust. duties @ other Sts. Go 2 war w/o say please

Art2: Prez 4yrs per Elec Col SAT score VP ditto VP subs. mst b nat born homie 35. Defnds Const & CnC Army Navy Air Force Marines

Prez pow = For. treats w 2/3S yes Appts Cabnt offs Ambs Sup Ct Js DoD brass w S yes Hi Cong Bye Cong St-o-Un add. No smoking.

Art3: Sup Ct rox Treason sux. Art4: Sts R cool Newbie Sts per Cong. Art5: Amend Con=2/3H&S+3/4Sts. Art6: US IOUs cool Const rox No God Squad

Art7: G2G TTFN. 9/17/1787. Bill-o-Rites TK :)

Flame on -church+guns. No GIs n cribz. No frisk w/o ProbCawz Due Pross rox Plea5th Get off my lawn SpeedTrialz w/jurstr. Pwr 2 D Peeps.

Twelve little tweets--all that's needed to run the richest, most powerful and most important nation in the world for more than 220 years.

GOP Housewife Conspiracy Part 2

2009-07-30T12:02:00.005-05:00

Eric Ostermeier over at Smart Politics posted this finding on his piece which analyzed the "Housewife Shell Game" that liberal bloggers accused the GOP of playing..."Grace Kelly", blogger at MN Progressive Project even asked "who the parents are" of the GOP housewives/donors.

It's also the case that the 3 GOP U.S. Representatives also raise significantly more money from SMALL donors than the 5 DFLers.
In Q2 2009, Kline, Bachmann, and Paulsen raised $148,253 in small (unitemized) contributions, while Oberstar, Peterson, Walz, Ellison, and McCollum collectively raised less than half that amount - just $69,333.

As these are unitemized funds, it is impossible to know from the FEC reports as to what percentage are coming from in-state and out of state among small donations.

Fascinating findings. So the GOP wins both small money and big money individual contributions hands down.

And for "Grace Kelly" (any money on how closely she resembles Grace Kelly?)-- my mother is a retired social worker and my dad an independent realtor, both on a fixed income.

Former housewife Nancy Pelosi's dad was a U.S. Congressman and her family's net worth is $19 Million.

GOP Housewife Conspiracy

2009-07-30T09:58:00.004-05:00

Just threw up this post over at Smart Politics, seems that the liberal bloggers believe there is a "GOP Housewife Conspiracy."

The comments are from an article that appeared yesterday on large donations by occupation.

As one of those housewives I can tell you that the bottom line reason that the donation is in my name is privacy- although I'm certainly giving that up now. Also, the women I know who donate this way are often times more politically active then their husband's are...Nancy Pelosi was a housewife too.

The fact that liberal bloggers would pick this part of your piece apart is enlightening.
As a conservative blogger, I found it interesting that your piece ended with the fact that the vast majority of large donations from actual Minnesota residents go to 3 Republicans, without pointing out the if/then truth that the 5 Democrats don't get that money- and have to rely on larger donors outside of Minnesota. Why is that? Why can't they raise larger donor money at home? Because they don't represent the interests of larger donors in Minnesota.

Although you've reviewed that in the past with Ellison, it would have been nice to see the same breakdowns for the entire MN Dem delegation.

The piece was a breakdown by occupation, but concluded:

"Overall, Kline, Bachmann, and Paulsen raised 75.1 percent of all large donor contributions from Minnesota residents to its eight U.S. Representatives last quarter."

Taxpayer-Funded Liberal Media Machine

2009-07-29T15:54:00.001-05:00

Here's the email I just received from Minnesota Public Radio:

When they return from summer recess, members of Congress will be set to debate several proposals for revamping the health care system. We want to learn whether the proposals on the table will solve the real problems you deal with in health care.

How has the health care system failed you? Share your experience with Minnesota Public Radio News.

The problems with the current health care system are too numerous to count. More than 45 million people lack insurance. Many million more struggle to pay for adequate health care.Yet the debate is hard to follow for even the savviest news consumer. We'd like to help engage you in the process by connecting your day-to-day health care concerns with the policy proposals being discussed in Washington.

To do so, we've teamed up with ProPublica, an independent, nonprofit investigative reporting newsroom, to explore whether Congress is addressing Americans' real, day-to-day health care concerns. Tell us how the health care system has (or hasn't) failed you. Share your story.

We look forward to hearing from you.

Thanks,

Andrew Haeg

Public Insight EditorMinnesota Public Radio News
ahaeg@mpr.org

Somebody else did the research on ProPublica-- here some of it:

ProPublica is the brainchild of Herbert and Marion Sandler, the former chief executives of the Golden West Financial Corporation, who have committed $10 million a year to the project.[2] The Sandlers hired Paul Steiger, former managing editor of the Wall Street Journal, to create and run the organization.

Because ProPublica received the vast majority of its initial funding through the Sandlers – known for donating heavily to left-wing advocacy groups – there were concerns that the organization would not maintain an independent and non-partisan editorial stance toward the subjects it investigates.[3] In addition, Slate senior writer Jack Shafer noted that Herb Sandler has given "hundreds of thousands of dollars" to Democratic party candidates over the years, as well as millions to left-leaning or progressive political advocacy organizations such as MoveOn and ACORN.[4] The Sandler Family Supporting Foundation has also made grants to Oceana, Rocky Mountain Institute, Environmental Defense and the Tides Foundation.[5]

Recent news partners have included 60 Minutes, CNN, USA Today, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the San Diego Union-Tribune, the Albany Times Union, the Newark Star-Ledger, the New York Sun, Huffington Post, Politico, Salon.com, Slate, MSN Money, MSNBC.com, Reader's Digest, Business Week, and Newsweek.com among others.

Herb Sandler has also given major bucks to Barack Obama. Interestingly enough, I also received an email from our dear leader today with a call to action to support Obamacare.

So we get an email from 501c3 TAX EXEMPT organization MPR today--an organization who received $5.5 Million from taxpayers last year--with the unabashedly leading question "How has the health care system failed you?" MPR coordinates with fellow TAX EXEMPT and left-wing founded/funded organization ProPublica to provide "insight".

The vast majority of Americans are happy with their medical care and their insurance coverage, 89% say they're happy with the quality of medical care they receive, 88% say their overall insurance coverage is good or excellent. 57% say they're satisfied with their own health care costs. But the media wants to push the lie that the vast majority of Americans are unhappy and unsatisfied...it leads to the other numbers in the polls which indicate although individuals are satisfied personally, they are not satisfied with the overall health care in this country.

When you have this type of machine that keeps pushing out the misinformation (which they accuse the other side of doing,) how are we supposed to actually solve anything?

King Case and his Minions

2009-07-29T12:19:00.001-05:00

Local liberal online magazine Prairie Home Living's interview with liberal City Councilman Ron Case is hilarious.

It's a fawning interview with the "rock star" of Eden Prairie politics.

4. PHL: As an Eden Prairie council member, how will you help make the city even more special than it is today, tomorrow and ten and twenty years from now? Do you have any goals for the city?

Ron Case: I think we need to look at cities around us whom we generally admire or others respect to find solutions to our current problems and a vision for where we'd like to go. Edina and Minnetonka, to name two of our neighbors, have a strong reputation for maintaining their quality of life and seem not to be overly burdened with an anti-tax movement within their citizenry. Through better and better communication and educational initiatives, we need to find ways to address people's concerns or perceptions that somehow our taxes or taxing structures are out of order, yet still pursue spending initiatives that will preserve our infrastructure, expand our opportunities to enjoy living in our community, encourage private investment in public amenities.

Mr. Case, I'm sorry you feel so "overly burdened" by an active group of Taxpayers "within the citizenry." But gee, aren't you the one who stuck a bunch of "The Low Tax Guy" stickers on your campaign signs last fall?

UPDATE: The Prairie Home Living website is down today, hmmm. So is the Writer's Rising Up website, hmmm. Good thing I know how to find indexed/cached sites now!

Here's the link of the interview that's now off the web (and I saved the page!)

More Poetry

2009-07-29T09:55:00.005-05:00

I'm thoroughly enjoying reading the poetry under yesterday's post.

I will declare a winner at the end of the week, I hope for many more entries.

My sister was having problems posting, so she emailed her submission:

I'd like to give a big shout out to Lord Byron on this one. I had to base it on my favorite poem ever. Well, one of the "top three" anyways...

HE talks in beauty, like the night
Of even existence and emission-free skies;
And all that’s best of lark and spite
Is hidden from his follower’s eyes:
Words mellow’d by the TOTUS might
Which Gibsy to questioners denies.
Some will get more, some will get less,
Socialism defined as grace
Beats beneath his muscular chest,
And softly brightens o’er his face;
For making us the same is His success
From car, to health, to dwelling-place.

Not with a push but with a plow,
So stealth, and smart, and eloquent,
The smiles that win the media’s glow.
We’ll tell of days in goodness spent,
To our children on whom He will bestow,
America the irrelevant.

And, from my brother-in-law. He doesn't follow Jim's rhyming rule, but still--so compelling.

Who is this friend that lectures me?
What causes him to care so much?
For me,
For mine,
For what I do;
Hold me,
scold me,
and eschew
those things he finds, in me, a flaw –
but not in he,
his hold, a clutch.

May I just say that these submissions (plus the two under the original post,) are so far superior than the local writers who are "rising up". And you know, you just know it took them weeks of thought to come up with their poems.

I love my readers.

Poetry Contest

2009-07-28T14:56:00.008-05:00

Due to reader demand, I think it's time for another poetry contest.

I found this dandy on the local Eden Prairie 501c3 group website "Writers Rising Up"

Mother Earth Cries

Listen to the suffering whispers of the trees
Why doesn't anyone worry about the dying bees
Global warming, toxic air, acid rain
Mother Earth screams out in pain
The plague of mankind too much to bear
Raping her resources; no one seems to care
Polar caps melt like ice cream on a summer day
Will our children have a safe place to play?
Seems always comes down to the mighty dollar
Why aren't we hot under the collar?
Haven't had a white Christmas in a year or two
Perhaps Mr. Winter like geese south flew
The blue marble spun long before man came along
Nature no longer sings its peaceful song
Peace was held for many years
Many laughs and many tears
The nations all sung a simple song
Praying and hoping for it to last for long
Suddenly a shot was heard
Round the entire mighty earth
A great war was given birth
People pleaded and fell on their knees
No longer barriers between the seas
The once fertile land was tore
The human race existed no more

Credit to: Alan Hasan Wittmer, Mayer, MN and the Writer's Rising Up Blog

Well, Robert Frost he is not, but I could do a splendid dramatic reading of it nevertheless and it's inspiring enough for a contest. We've had a haiku contest and limerick contest....this is just a "general" poetry contest as I can't tell what meter the poem above is written in, feel free to enlighten me.

Rule 1: Subject matter must encompass 1. Cap and trade/Global Warming and/or 2. Obamacare

Rule 2: You must say what you think the Writers are Rising up Against

All worthy submissions will receive their very own blog post. You could get discovered! (The economy's having an impact on the types of prizes I can offer.) I will also do a dramatic reading of the poem at a local restaurant with one drink on me. So, off we go....

Take No Prisoners, Make No Compromises

2009-07-28T13:34:00.006-05:00

Obama, Pelosi and their gang of liberals purposely fail to include:

1. Nuclear Energy as a part of the solution to the energy question

and

2. Tort reform as part of the healthcare equation--even with a government-run plan, you won't be able to sue the government, but you can still sue your doctor

Don't these facts demonstrate that THEY are the party so beholden to special interests (the enviro-lobby and the trial lawyers,) that they don't really care about the cost or effectiveness of any of the policies they advocate and pass into law? They only care about their money train.

Obama wants to pay doctors based on the quality of care they provide (I wonder if his doctor would get docked because Obama won't quit smoking?) Funny how pay-for-quality was decried by liberals and conservatives alike when it was under Bush "No Child Left Behind," but now it's the answer to our health care costs.

Can we pay politicians for the quality they provide?

Friday Fun

2009-07-24T10:30:00.002-05:00

I'm a pretty traditional girl in most things, but when I watched this video of a St. Paul couple's wedding, I couldn't help but smile.

What a joyous thing!

Law and Order

2009-07-23T22:36:00.004-05:00

Good piece in the WSJ today about the Gates arrest saga about the black Harvard Professor who was arrested, the friend of Obama who was the subject of the final question of last night's press conference on health care. The question from the hometown paper of President Obama, the Chicago Sun-Times. The question which painted the final picture of the evening, that reminded all Americans that Barack Obama is a black man and there is still too much wrong with how black men are treated in this country of ours. Those white Republicans are just keeping the black man down, standing in the way of health care reform.

I'm about to share with you a deep, dark secret from my past.

I was arrested-- Okay, I wasn't arrested, but I was thrown in the back of a cop car in college. Oh, yes I was.

I have a big mouth, always have. I was at my dear husband Todd's fraternity house-- it must have been my junior year in college. We were peacefully gathered for a party. It was a decent-sized party and as I recall I had been studying that night and arrived late. I had perhaps one beer- lucky for me- before the cops broke up the party. Two of them came into the Pi Kappa Alpha house and started addressing the large circle of coeds as the underage in the group nervously wondered whether they'd start busting people. I quietly ask a person next to me- "don't they need a warrant to be in the house?"

Big mistake. From about fifteen feet away, one of the officers marched over, grabbed me by the arm and literally dragged me out of the room and down the stairs while I kept saying, "Officer, what did I do? Please officer, what did I do? Please let me go, you're hurting me." He just bellowed "You G-damn college kids, you think you're so smart."

I'll never forget Todd's look of what did you do?/what are they doing to you? I actually laugh when I tell this story now. I wasn't laughing then, I started crying.

I was in the back of the car with two other guys from the fraternity who were also deemed culprits. One of them was about the sweetest guy you'd ever meet but he was an officer in the fraternity so I guess that was his crime.

Then there was a little good cop/bad cop. One of the officers saying "I'm going to bring you downtown, you're going to jail." I was really crying now. The other one assured me, "it's just a petty misdemeanor, just pay the ticket and it will be fine." They let us go after scaring the crap out of us.

Do you think I paid that ticket? Hell no, I didn't.

I went to the U of M Law Library the next day and looked up the ordinance under which I was cited...it was a Noise Ordinance and you needed to be the owner of the home in order to be charged with the crime. Oh, and it was a misdemeanor, not a petty misdemeanor as the officer told me. I headed to the Hennepin County Courthouse in my little green suit from Express and they assigned me a public defender. The judge threw out the ticket and misdemeanor.

Another story...when my brother was in college, he and a friend were walking back from a St. Joe's bar to his St. John's University campus. It was winter, a cop pulled up along side of them and asked if they wanted a ride. "Sure." Another big mistake, he drove them back to campus and then gave them both a breath-a-lizer test and cited them for underage drinking. Entrapment much?

My cousin was beaten by cops down in Arizona in his fraternity days. Beaten unconscious and left in a park-- I kid you not. So although I certainly respect the police, I know that they are individual human beings. There are good cops, there are not-so-good cops.

Oh- by the way....I'm white, my brother's white, my cousin's white.

Is there racism? Sure. Is there discrimination? Yup. Is there bias? Uh-huh. But I am so sick of the politically correct B.S. on the T.V. with this Gates story. I don't know all the facts, but I do know this: black people are not the only people who have to deal with over-reaching police. Was this guy dragged forcibly by the arm down steps and literally pushed into the back of a cop car by the cops? I was.

It was in his home you say?

One last story: my parents were staying at my sister's house a few years back. Her fax machine line somehow got crossed with her security alarm line and phoned in an alarm call in the middle of the night. Two cops entered the house with guns drawn and walked up the stairs. My dad heard the commotion, got up and heard "get your hands up in the air!" He did.

I'm not an attorney, I don't know the law that Gates was cited under so I can't make any judgements about the case. But I can judge the President of the United States and his continual use of the race card to advance an agenda.

I'm sick of it.

What $10,000 will buy you these days

2009-07-23T09:54:00.005-05:00

Another line from Obama that stuck out from last night's speech on Health care:

This is about the middle-class college graduate from Maryland whose health insurance expired when he changed jobs and woke up from the emergency surgery that he required with $10,000 worth of debt.

I wonder what that middle-class college graduate paid for college? If he were a Minnesota resident attending our public University of Minnesota, he would have paid actually $11,476 for tuition and fees for two semesters of education as an undergraduate. This doesn't include the costs of books or room and board.

For $11,476 you can sit in a classroom for seven months, write some papers and take some tests--or you can have your life saved. Hmmm. And I'm assuming Joe College Graduate went to a public University. Don't you wish the media would ask for more information on Joe College Graduate that Obama referred too?

A mere 14 years ago when I was at the University I paid $3,500 for one year of undergraduate Education. With inflation, that amount should be $5,086 today. Yet it's $11,476.

Here in Minnesota DFL legislators don't even think there should be caps on tuition. I continually ask this question:

Why do Democrats believe that the cost of health care should be "contained" and capped, but not the cost of public Education? You have a building cost, a teacher cost, what else?

Students, can you spell U-N-I-O-N?

Best for Me, Good Enough for You

2009-07-22T23:20:00.003-05:00

This line from the Obama's Press Conference tonight summed up perfectly what his health care plan is all about:

OBAMA: You know, I would be happy to abide by the same benefit package. I will just be honest with you. I'm the president of the United States, so I've got a doctor following me every minute...
(LAUGHTER)
... which is why I say this is not about me. I've got the best health care in the world. I'm trying to make sure that everybody has good health care, and they don't right now.

That's right, they want to take away the best health care in the world from the 350 Million Americans who have it today and in exchange give all of us "good-enough" health care.

A Reader Question

2009-07-22T15:48:00.006-05:00

Reader Jon takes one of my comments on health care -- that is should be affordable-- and asks what we should do about it. Good question-- here are my ideas:

1. Let people buy insurance from anywhere in the country- competition is the #1 problem- we need a huge pool of Americans in many plans to help bring down cost of insurance. You should be able to go online today and get quotes from dozens of companies competing for your business based on what you need and what you don't need.

2. People should pay out-of-pocket for regular appointments (annual exam, pediatric appointments, "do I have the flu?") insurance should be for hospitalizations, surgeries, cancer-care, etc. Paying at the doctor's office- that day- like most other businesses, including dentists- would save an enormous amount of money and when it's that transparent you can easily comparison shop doctors.

3. Move people off Medicare into private insurance plans-subsidize poor elderly where necessary

4. Raise Medicare eligibility age to 70- eventually 72 (should adjust with life expectancy)

5. Move to individual-based insurance vs. employer based by shifting tax benefits to individuals-- people should not be tied to jobs because of insurance, and employers should be paying the market rate for an employee not including the cost of insurance. There would be a transition period to make this happen.

6. Expand/encourage HSA's so people can see what they're paying and hold providers responsible for costs-- also covers larger deductibles which drives down monthly premiums-- this money can be accumulated over time to pay for larger expenses

6. Tort reform like that in TX where a board of physicians reviews cases before they go to court with caps on punitive damages

7. If you're on Medicare or Medicaid- and are obese- you should be required to lose weight in order to maintain eligibility. (Same could go for smokers, drinkers, other risky behaviors-- people have the freedom to live how they choose, but not if they're on a government plan-- hence the bigger issue with Obamacare.)

8. Stop providing state-funded health care to illegal immigrants- we can't afford it

9. Eliminate provider taxes- state taxes on the gross-receipts of a practice/hospital

10. Resident Physicians should be paid via the private sector-- not the government

11. Provide tax credits to individuals who pay insurance premiums for their parents, grandparents, children-- anyone they want--

12. Provide incentives to insurance companies to provide optopms for patients with pre-existing conditions

13. Anybody with an iPOD or Blackberry gets immediately removed from Medicaid

But most importantly, get the U.S. economy moving NOW by drastically cutting spending, cutting business taxes, cutting individual taxes so that we can get some jobs created other than "windmill builder."

If people have good jobs, they can afford health care insurance.

Look, I'm married to a doctor- I get that I have a bias. But, you know what? If all of this happened, I can guarantee you he'd make less money, not more. That's what would happen by moving toward a free market. But, he'd be taxed less too. Overall, he'd probably come out about even. Or- we can go the route we're going down now- he'll make more (because Obama's buying off the Docs as we speak), he'll be taxed more and we'll just keep printing the money to make it all happen.

This is just stuff off the top of my head and took me about 3 minutes-- wouldn't you think all the really smart guys in Washington could come up with something other than "Government pays for everyone who wants it?"

Minneapolis Republicans Endorse Green Party Guy

2009-07-21T21:10:00.001-05:00

I've always been interested in the mayoral race in Minneapolis. When we moved back to MN five years ago we wanted to live in Minneapolis-- somewhere near the 50th and Bryant area where my mom grew up or near the lakes. We looked at a few houses. I was willing to overlook the countless "End this War" and "Wellstone" yard signs, because Minneapolis has some great neighborhoods and I like the feel of the city. I couldn't, however, overlook the sky-high property taxes and crime statistics so here we are in the 'burbs.

Could Republicans realistically win in Minneapolis? A pipe-dream perhaps, but if Rudy Giuliani could serve two-terms in NYC-- anything can happen and it's up to the Republican party to produce solid candidates who--at minimum-- can force a debate about the issues that face Minneapolis.

I know there are Republicans in Minneapolis- some even post on this blog. Others live their secret lives in Kenwoood and near the Lakes, closeted. Perhaps they'd come out of the closet if the party could produce a serious candidate.

So what does the local party do? Endorse somebody who only three years ago ran as a Green Party candidate for Attorney General winning 2% of the vote... Somebody who only ONE MONTH ago told Minnesota Independent that he wanted somebody to challenge Betty McCollum FROM THE LEFT! Local musician "Papa" John Kolstad was endorsed last Saturday by the Minneapolis Republicans.

According to the Minneapolis City Republican Committee website:

The Minneapolis City Republican Committee intends to reverse the effects of decades of liberalism--taxation, government control, weak law enforcement, and anti-family policies--by electing Republicans to city offices who believe that common sense conservatism is the answer to the city's problems.

What on earth does the green party platform have to do with "common sense conservatism". These Republicans decry government control and endorse a candidate who wants universal, government-paid, government controlled health care. Say what?

In 2006 this was Kolstad's Platform: Kolstad supports a Single Payer style health plan, affordable housing, instituting strong enforceable environmental laws in MN, Campaign Finance Reform, Instant Run-off Voting, Proportional Representation, and ending Corporate Welfare.

Kolstad was the Chair for two years of the Minnesota Universal Healthcare Coalition for Pete's sake.

I hear that the local party not only endorsed this guy as a Republican, they encouraged him to run. I'm glad that local Minneapolis activists think this is some kind of joke. It's not. Minneapolis is a great city and deserves a legitimate Republican candidate. I'm all about local party control and firmly believe the party belongs to those who show up...it looks like the Minneapolis party now belongs to a bunch of liberals. That' s great. Something like this will take a lot of time to recover from...

Vanity Fair Piece on Palin

2009-07-21T08:54:00.003-05:00

I was at CVS the other day and Vanity Fair caught my eye-- Heath Ledger was on the cover. Isn't he dead? Wasn't that drug O.D. months ago? Was he even that big of a star? The L.A. Times dissected the piece and concluded that the move was to sell magazines.

But if VF really wanted to sell magazines they would have put a different person on the cover. The person who they lampooned inside the magazine-- Sarah Palin.

You can barely see it, but in the upper corner of the above cover it reads: "Sarah Palin: The Lies, The Meltdown, The Moosesized Ego". (I wonder if there was a similar pitch about Hillary Clinton?)

There are millions of women- like me- all over the country who would buy the liberal rag just to see Palin in an Annie Lebowitz photo shoot in some NYC makeup, hair and Oscar de La Renta. Of course, that star-treatment is only reserved for the Obamas, long before they were in the White House. Even their staffers score the same.

This fascinating personality and gorgeous face from the GOP--who would guarantee massive sales-- is never going to be given that honor....never. It truly reveals the agenda, doesn't it? Not like we didn't already know.

Instead, I skip buying the magazine and go online to skim the piece.

The article asks:

Perhaps most painful, how could John McCain, one of the cagiest survivors in contemporary politics—with a fine appreciation of life’s injustices and absurdities, a love for the sweep of history, and an overdeveloped sense of his own integrity and honor—ever have picked a person whose utter shortage of qualification for her proposed job all but disqualified him for his?

Interesting question, I have one too: How could America have picked a person whose utter shortage of qualification and friendships with terrorists and racists all but disqualified him for the job he sought? Anyhoo...

The article has a caricature of Palin with her requisite gun and moose, refers to her as the "sexiest" woman in politics twice-- the word beautiful is never applied, always sexy. Where are the feminists decrying this ongoing obsession with Palin's femininity to sublimally say "what a slut, what a whore," (or if you're David Letterman, not-so-subliminally.) The article calls her "the first indisputably fertile female to dare to dance with the big dogs", refers to her red high heels, on and on. All while basically saying she's a dunce.

Here's where I'm at with Palin these days-- I don't like that she resigned. I think you should finish a job that you're elected to do. The PR of her announcement was terrible and I'm wondering where she's coming from. But here's a little secret for the MSM-- every time you insult Palin with your "pat on the head-- she's just a sexy airhead" crap, you drive me to defend her...and I'm not the only one. Watch out.

A Liberal's View of Diversity

2009-07-20T19:45:00.001-05:00

Just saw this story on O'Reilly, but you don't need to hear any commentary on this, it speaks for itself.

Life and Death

2009-07-20T16:46:00.003-05:00

I'm praying.

That's about all we can do at this point in the game, pray. (That and pointlessly call our two liberal Senators I guess.)

I pray that we don't throw out a health care system that saved my mother's life when she was told she only had months to live because her cancer was so rare and "untreatable". That was two years ago now, she has no signs of cancer today. I've never read of a case- outside of the U.S.A.- with long-term survivors. In other countries, the aggressive treatment is rarely performed in time to produce results that American hospitals are seeing.

A system that treated leukemia in two children I know...both of whom are healthy today.

A system that got medicine to my dad so quickly when he had a stroke in January-- that his recovery has been astounding and nobody but very close family would even notice a difference in him even though he couldn't remember his children's names 6 months ago.

A system that helped my uncle fight for three years against pancreatic cancer so he could dance at his daughter's wedding and be with his high school sweetheart just a little bit longer.

A system that treated breast cancer and replaced my grandmother's hip twenty years ago-- she's 94 today.

Those are just examples from my little universe and I don't mean to make it "about me." It's about life, it's about quality of life and respect for life and the sanctity of life.

I remember reading "Black Hawk Down" a few years ago-- the book talked about how Somali soldiers had such little respect for American soldiers because they'd risk their lives to pull a fallen solider off the field of battle. It made no sense to them.

I suppose our health care system makes no sense to those from other countries either. We spend an enormous amount of money to fight cancer, no matter the form. We provide the highest level care to preemie babies, even the ones with a small chance of survival, even the ones with no money. We provide pacemakers for the elderly, even if they have other major health issues which may mean they won't be alive for long.

Why do Americans do these things? Seemingly illogical things... Because we know something. We know what we "don't know". We don't know when somebody's time on this earth is done. We don't know if they'll be in that 1% of survivors, or if they'll fall in the 99% of those who die from a disease or injury. Only God knows. (And even if you don't believe in God, let me repeat that: Only God knows.) There is always hope, no matter how small, that somebody can survive, and thrive, and live. We choose to bet on life. This is an American value of risking much for unknown return.

I thought Obama's words today were telling...that we must move forward quickly with universal health care and that we've talked the issue "to death." Obama is all about talking things "to death". But on this issue, he doesn't want to talk, (unless it's with his teleprompter at a town hall meeting with predetermined guests and questions.) "To death"....it sent a chill up my spine.

Isn't this worth a prolonged public debate? One or two photo-op meetings at the White House with insurance companies and doctors, is NOT acceptable. Bring everyone to the table, get out the calculators, reduce the burdens and regulations on the system and lower taxes for all of the stakeholders and figure this thing out.

Our health care system doesn't discriminate and provides care to all patients. It produces the best doctors and nurses in the world. Is there room for improvement? Definitely. Affordability is unattainable for some right now and that's not right. But creating a government "option" which will put private insurers right out of business is not the solution. We need less government involved in health care, not more. We need a system that reflects our values of freedom and our constant desire to be the best we can be. Americans don't want to be like Canada, or like Europe...we want to continue to be the greatest country in the world, a country that fights so hard for the cause of life. We need a health care system that reflects this value and the most fundamental value to America-- our freedom.

Wonkette SLAMS GippersList.com-- Oh, Yeah!

2009-07-17T11:26:00.004-05:00

Sorry for the lack of blogging.

It's been busy.

I was down at the Capitol yesterday for State Senator David Hann's formal announcement on his run for Governor.

I've also been trying- unsuccessfully- to get my sister Mary's Fox News interview for http://www.gipperslist.com/ ready to post. I have it on the computer, but can't get it edited for the blog. Ugh, I'm not technical. It's a good interview, so I'll keep working on it.

Gipper's List was picked up by the PR Wires this week. And so was TAND! From the Associated Content Piece:

Conservative talk show host Sean Hannity mentioned gipperslist.com shortly after the site went on-line last month according to "The Activist Next Door", followed by a launch on "Fox and Friends" today, a month later. So far their site has been standing up to onslaught of visitors. Funded by contributions, merchandise such as bumper stickers, and longer-run and featured ads, the site is simple and its message is simple: conservatives now have a place online to do business together.

But check this out: Bitter, Sad Liberal Wonkette TAKES AFTER GippersList.com. We knew these vicious attacks would start and we're so pleased that they're helping the website gain some P.R. Gipper's List was started by three friends with no budget. A very simple idea to "control what you can control" by giving your money to fellow conservatives vs. people who want to tax the living crap out of you.

I love that the crazy lefties see-fit to go after my sister and her friends as illiterate, homophobic racists.

I also love the TONS of comments by the readers of Wonkette. Seems that Gipper's List rubs these folks the wrong way. That's good. That's very good.

This from Associated Content: “Contacting the site’s owners means emailing the ‘gippergirls’, which heralds the fact that conservatives are not fitting the stereotype of ‘old white men.’”
Email? Please.. Nancy, Babs and Roberta are there to answer all questions you might have using rotary phones while guzzling Ensure.

Smoke Filled Roommate: I like how Associated Content just assumes that the handle GipperGirls means they’re not old white men. Because no one has ever used the internet to disguise their actual identities.

What a bunch of morons...they're the ones who can't figure out how to "google" and get the backstory on Gipper's List.

Ah, if only Gipper's DID have some rich old white dudes to give it some funding, then we'd REALLY tick off these libs.

Battle Hymm of the Baby Boomers

2009-07-14T22:00:00.002-05:00

Stolen from a Lassie post at Freedom Dogs (where I blog too!)

We were born into an age of infinite prosperity,
And we never saved a nickel.
We just spent incessantly.
Now we've postponed our retirement til the age of 93,
If nothing else goes wrong!
HOLY CRAP we're getting older!
We've pissed our youth away!

More Money, No Jobs

2009-07-14T21:37:00.004-05:00

Obama's sinknig $12 Billion of your tax money into Community Colleges...shouldn't Community Colleges be funded by the Community-- by the state? And, aren't we broke?

Community colleges are only two-year institutions, but the Obama administration says they could play a key role in helping boost the ailing economy for years to come.

President Obama also announced a goal of 5 million additional community-college graduates by 2020.

To underscore that contention Tuesday, the president unveiled the American Graduation Initiative, a 10-year, $12 billion plan to invest in community colleges.

This is ON TOP OF the Stimulus spending.

Perhaps we need more entrepreneurs and less students because we need some serious job-creation now-- not more government-created jobs.

What JOBS are all of these students going to have when they graduate?

Oh- per the article, one of the 4 points of the Obama plan is:

Modernization of community-college facilities, with $2.5 billion to help renovate facilities and keep up with maintenance costs. The renovations will create jobs, Obama said.

That's great. Fixing up Normandale will create jobs. Are these people serious?

They want to create a country where everybody's in school, you become a government-paid doctor, nurse, teacher, or social worker, you all pay high-taxes, but get a lot of time off....sound familiar?

Or Perhaps...

2009-07-14T19:06:00.004-05:00

I should skip that glass of wine and go out and do what Todd did today:

Preaching to the Choir

2009-07-14T18:23:00.003-05:00

Okay, all right, I've HAD IT.

If somebody sends me one more email or talks to me one more time about how frustrated they are with the Republican party I will scream. Actually, I just did scream to Todd.

I had a weekend with my brilliant Father-in-law who lectured me on what the party was doing wrong. What its candidates were doing wrong. Why so-and-so is the best person and so-and-so isn't. Why I didn't "get it". Yup. I listen to Rush too, I'm with you. Uh, huh, yup, I get it. But that's not good enough for certain folks...

I get emails daily from people telling me to do this-or-that, or say this-or-that, or make so-and-so do this-or-that. NEWSFLASH: You can only control yourself and your own actions.

If you don't like the way things are, then change things. Change things! Get involved with the Republican party. Oh, and if you happen to meet one person who you don't like or go to one meeting that isn't interesting, then stay involved. Don't give up, persevere. (Oh, and please see previous Norm Coleman blog post about one of my life's mottos: "Coffee's for Closers"-- meaning seal the deal, don't give up, win, win, win.)

I have news for folks and it may be shocking to some. There IS NOBODY ELSE but YOU to change things. There isn't some massive group of people who are going to magically do what you say.

Got it? Get it? Good.

Time for a glass of wine.

Tune In!

2009-07-14T13:08:00.002-05:00

My sister Mary (guest blogger at TAND,) is making her second appearance on big Fox News tomorrow!

She will be doing an interview at 8:45 am Eastern/7:45 am Central time on "Fox and Friends" for her latest idea "Gipper's List". www.gipperslist.com

The Fox folks heard about this idea to "Buy Conservative" and contacted her. Hopefully this helps the new site continue to grow.

Mary isn't one of the most creative people I know, she is the most creative person I know. She really should be making about a mil a year as a paid political speechwriter and marketing strategist. I'm proud of her!

Faces Only a Liberal Could Love

2009-07-13T21:54:00.002-05:00

.....and they both represent Minnesota. Uff dah

Sunday

2009-07-12T22:54:00.006-05:00

Had our boys baptised today...here's a nice picture from Pax Christi with Fr. Kennedy. (I was hoping he wouldn't remember me from the couple of emails I had sent him about-- oh, certain topics.) He's a nice man and a no-nonsense priest, he had 6 kids out of there in like 20 minutes. We had our parents as Godparents.

Speaking of Catholics...the Pope is calling for "redistribution of wealth" now too...great.

Following us off a Cliff

2009-07-09T09:07:00.004-05:00

Here's a great piece from a fellow blogger at Freedom Dogs on one of my favorite topics-- global warming.

What the writer says is true, Cap and Trade was passed with "deliberate speed." The same speed being applied to the health care legislation that's about to ruin our economy and quality of care in this country.

I listened to a bit of NPR's "Talk of the Nation" yesterday on the topic of a "public option" for health care. A caller says something like "we need a public plan, my daugter lived in Greece and the resident physician in her small village came to her house and gave her antibiotics when she was sick and he didn't even charge her. That's what we need."

Greece has 10 million people- our country is 30 times that size! We cannot afford to have government-run health care, that's a simple fact.

We have 300 million people in the U.S. of which only 8 million are chronically uninsured, (this does not include 10 million illegal immigrants.) We have a fantastic health care system where even the rarest of diseases are treated aggressively. A system where a poor child receives the same top-quality cancer care as a poor one. We can get the uninsured covered by incenting PRIVATE insurance companies to do so without one dime spent by the federal government. We can encourage families to pay for their 20-somthing-kids or their 80-something parents by giving them back their tax dollars to do so. We need to move more people OFF of government plans instead of moving people onto them.

So why move this direction at such speed? Purposely crippling the U.S. with needless legislation like Cap and Trade and expansion of public-option health care? Because, at the end of the day liberals want a weakened America that can't afford to be the world's superpower. We won't be able to afford a strong military, and that's exactly they way they want it.

Imagine You're a Liberal

2009-07-08T20:13:00.001-05:00

If you could make any law to prevent people from doing something that annoys you, what would it be?

I would institute passing lanes in shopping malls and strictly enforce the law that slower people keep to the right.

The Samonella Czar

2009-07-07T22:36:00.003-05:00

Obama Orders New FDA Crackdown on Salmonella, E. Coli

The Obama administration has created a new deputy food commissioner post within the FDA to oversee safety in the wake of the recent outbreak of salmonella in peanuts and peanut butter, which was blamed for dozens of consumer deaths and more than 700 illnesses in 46 states.

Dozens?

Didn't North Korea fire off a bunch of missiles last week?

Global Warming Means More Coyotes in Minneapolis

2009-07-06T21:35:00.004-05:00

Okay, now I've heard everything.

In May I posted about a coyote who jumped our backyard fence and made an appearance on our sport court and how the City of Eden Prairie basically could have cared less. Since then, I had another EP friend tell me that a coyote recently attacked her friend's older dog and it had to be put to sleep.

So I see an article in the Star Tribune today with the headline:

Rabbits, rabbits, everywhere: With so many yard rabbits this year, some homeowners have noted a corresponding increase in predator sightings in the city.

I think, "Interesting, maybe there's some good data on these varmints." A mere 30 seconds into reading the article I see this,

"Where there are lots of rabbits, there are plenty of nibbled gardens, girdled trees and angry homeowners asking: Why so many rabbits, and where will it all end?

Some have a hunch. They point to the weather: Rabbits are increasing because climate is changing and our winters are getting milder. They might be onto something.

Winters have been milder, according to the State Climatology Office. Rabbits might be getting in an extra litter under such conditions. That means more offspring starting down the reproductive path. Soon you have a bunny explosion.

The same paper just reported that 2008 was the coldest year since 1979. Since then, January has been the coldest since 1994. Februray-June has been average to below average temps. The winter prior of 2007-2008 ranked 38th coldest out of 113 years of records in Minnesota.

So "our winters are getting milder" except for the last two winters- which were not-- but the bunnies are overpopulated now-- which would mean that we just had a "mild" winter per the reporter's logic, except that we didn't.

Another great piece of journalism from the Strib.

Bad Shoe Day

2009-07-06T20:58:00.005-05:00

I was over at Nordstrom today doing a little preview shopping for the Anniversary Sale-- an awesome sale with 30-40% pre-season stuff. I don't pay retail!

I saw Mary LeHammer (from TPT's Almanac) while eating lunch at the in-store cafe. She was sporting a cute orange dress, but paired it with some really bad brown high boots...um, it's 85 degrees outside. Maybe save the boots for the other 9 months of the year when you can wear them in Minnesota.

Then-- while trying on some shoes myself-- I saw an old guy who was trying on a divine pair of 4" patent peep toe BCBG pumps. He was also sporting a Gander Mountain baseball hat. I guess duck-hunting and cross-dressing go together. He bought the shoes. The salesperson played it exceptionally cool, I myself was laughing away.

Poor thing. Stuck paying full retail at Nordstrom, because they're the only show in town who carries size 12 women's shoes.

Oy vey.

Some Friendly Advice for Norm Coleman

2009-07-05T20:00:00.003-05:00

Dear Senator Coleman,

I was one of those folks at last year's State GOP Convention who was heckling you. I was yelling "ANWR" from my front row seat in Rochester while my fellow delegate was elbowing me and pointing to the media not-so-far-away. The speech you gave that day sort of sealed your fate as it just-as-easily could have been given to a room full of Democrats with some very minor tweaks. You didn't have the base with you and without the base, (those troglodytes who actually make the phone calls and knock on the doors), you didn't have what it took to get over the finish line. You came close, soooo close.

I've always considered you a principled moderate, and a pretty smart guy too. You give some very eloquent speeches and you do have charisma. You seem like a nice enough man, so let me give you some advice that my very first boss gave me: Coffee's for closers.

Coffee's for closers. You lost to Jessee Ventura. You lost to Al Franken.

Now, don't get me wrong, I do believe this election was stolen. Those Dems just kept counting and re-counting until they found the votes they needed to pull ahead. What did you expect? That's how they roll. Only a couple thousand more votes and we wouldn't be here with this short clown representing us for six years. Yet, here we are.

The state party made a mistake by underestimating the competition. They pointed out his tax fraud, great point, but he was a Democrat. Democrats don't care, they were still going to vote for him. Then they ragged and ragged on jokes that a comedian made. Many in extremely poor taste, but the one about blasting old people into space to solve Medicare was funny. Really funny. It was- as they say- a joke. They didn't attack him on what matters most...what always matters most...the issues. Now they're putting an asterisk next to his name which is pretty lame. A wee bit immature and certainly not effective. Let Minnesotans keep that asterisk in their heads-- they're smart people, they will-- it doesn't need to be spelled out for them.

Now, none of that was your fault, Senator. But here's what is your fault. You ran to the middle with an Independent in the race and you lost. Losing's tough, really tough. But I have some very good news for you. There's a wonderful world outside of politics and it's waiting for you. You don't have to be a politician. Really, you don't. You can explore so many other career opportunities and I really think that may be for the best. Please don't run for Governor, it's just not a smart career move. You'd be banking on a sympathy vote, but the problem is the majority of the voting population has a very short-term memory. (9/11- what's that?) Last year's Senate election will be a distant memory next year as people will have much more important things to worry about, like their jobs.

I won't be a liberal, I won't sit here and whine for six years, "they stole the election." And I have a funny feeling a lot of Republicans feel the same way I do. We want our leaders to talk about our principles and why liberal ideas are illogical and only work in a classroom, not the real world. Or why the Minnesota DFL won't let us have choice for our schools, our doctors or our energy options. We want our leaders to educate people on why Obama is wrong and we are right. If they do that, we won't ever have to hinge an election win on a single absentee ballot from Worthington to Wabasha.

Yours Sincerely,
The Activist Next Door

What Freedom and Tyranny Mean to Liberals

2009-07-03T15:08:00.002-05:00

What does Freedom mean?

Well to me it is a feeling in my heart of knowing that God created me in his image, that he has granted me free will to choose the life I want to live. It is not something that any government bestowed upon me, it's in every beat of my heart. I am grateful to be born in a country where freedom is an ideal enshrined in our founding documents and it's something worth fighting for with vigilance.

I caught a segment on Fox 9 news last night featuring a handful of Service Employees International Union (SEIU) members presenting a written-on-poster-board-flag at Representative Betty McCollum's office...Rep McCollum wasn't even there, so don't ask me how this little PR stunt makes the evening news.

Rick Varco, SEUI Healthcare Minnesota's Political Director said something like "Our founders declared freedom from a tyrannical government," and then he said this:

“It’s time to declare independence from the tyranny of living under a broken health-care system,” ....

Varco believes the July Fourth holiday was a natural fit for highlighting the nation’s dysfunctional health-care system. “There’s that line in the Declaration of Independence about a ‘long train of abuses,’” he says. “That’s what the American people have suffered from this health-care system.”

How dare they. The long train of abuses as outlined in the Declaration of Idependence had to do with brash restrictions and constrictions on freedom. FREEDOM. To try to equate the goal to have government universally pay for our health care with the fact that we had a standing foreign army in our land is ridiculous. It's ironic that they quote the Declaration, which decried taxation without representation, as justification for raising taxes on only select American citizens.

Obama's health care plan is about one thing: Paying back the unions. And to the Unions it's about one thing, ensuring that health care is a right equal to the unalienable rights bestowed to us by our Creator: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

What we celebrate tomorrow is what our founders sacrificed in order to give us such comfortable lives where prosperity is ours for the taking. But to liberals it is about fighting for a country that looks more like the foreign shores from which our founders fled then the brave idea that is America.

Annoy a Liberal Thought of the Day

2009-07-02T13:13:00.004-05:00

Liberals believe in a "progressive tax system", but shouldn't the number progress from something other than 0%?

Bush actually removed millions of people from the bottom of the tax rolls and reduced tax rates for everybody, it's a huge liberal lie that his tax cuts only helped "the rich."

My proposal:

Actually tax everybody, we're "all in this together" Right? We all should "share the pain" Right? This could help bring in the much needed "revenue" that liberals say we need to balance budgets, (vs. cutting spending which is the conservative solution.)

So let's start with, say a 5% income tax for those at the bottom. You have to pay at least some percentage of your income to the government....at least if you want to vote. If you don't want to vote, you can keep on paying nothing. Sounds fair to me.

Enquiring Minds

2009-06-30T20:24:00.002-05:00

In last Friday's Star Tribune which featured an entire page dedicated to the Mark Sanford affair (on Page 3), yet no coverage of the historic House vote that day on Cap and Trade...I noticed something interesting in a sidebar:

The State, Columbia, S.C.'s daily newspaper, has been at ground zero of the case, indirectly triggering Sanford's admission Wednesday that he had been having an affair with a woman in Argentina.

Prodded by an anonymous tip, a reporter for the newspaper staked out the Atlanta airport Wednesday morning -- and promptly ran into Stanford getting off a flight from Buenos Aires.
Here's her account of the encounter:
www.thestate.com/sanford/story/839842.html

First of all, it's funny that the Strib would dedicate any local reporter on this story...why not just run something from the AP? Aren't they supposed to be strapped for resources? Didn't they just fire a bunch of writers? I guess there are still enough folks left that they could assign somebody to report on a story that only affects the people of South Carolina.

But more importantly, does anybody recall any paper--ANY-- tracking down John Edwards in Beverly Hills with the mother of his love child? Did any reporter stake out LAX or the hotel rooms where he met time and time again with his mistress? Did anybody ask why he lied about the affair while he was still on the campaign trail for President? Or- why Edwards hired this woman- who he met in a bar- as a paid campaign worker? One paper did, the National Enquirer, who now holds as much legitimacy as any other newspaper as far as I'm concerned.

The mainstream media admitted it was tipped off almost a year before the story finally broke.

Reading this account in Newsweek surely begs the question: "What did the media know and when did they know it?"

John Edwards was the Democrat's Vice Presidential nominee, he was a strong contender in the Democrat's bid for the White House DURING the time he was having the affair.

Look, Mark Sanford cheated on his wife. He was caught and he immediately admitted to the affair to the press. The main problem was that he left the country as a sitting Governor- and nobody knew where he was. What would happen if there was an emergency? Stupid. If I were in South Carolina, I'd be calling for his resignation.

But let me just point out that Bill Clinton and John Edwards lied again and again and again and only told the truth when their backs were right up against the wall. Bill Clinton "just lied about sex." No, he lied to a federal grand jury during testimony in a sexual harassment law suit and then lied again to the entire country while shaking his finger at us.

But, it's the Republicans who receive the brunt of the feigned shock from the media when clearly --time and again-- the people in our party tell the truth in these situations while theirs lie. Doesn't that count for something?

Believe me-- I'm not excusing the behavior-- it's all scandalous. Sanford is a grade-A FLAKE based on some of the stuff that's being said now. It sounds like a really bad soap opera and his wife would be absolutely nuts to stay with him. I know there are kids involved, but he has completely humiliated her and he doesn't love her and those four boys shouldn't see that as a role model for their future marriages.

But the real issue here is of a continued double-standard in the media. There seem to be so few enquiring minds in the journalism field today. Blinded by their personal politics, yet pretending they're not, reporters rarely demonstrate enough curiosity to break stories that affect their friends in the Democrat party. But, boy-oh-boy, they'll stake out an airport if it means they get to bring down a Republican.

A Must Read

2009-06-29T15:52:00.000-05:00

I'ts no secret that I've been a skeptic of catastrophic man-made global warming (CMMGW).

It simply doesn't make sense to me and I'm not anti-science.

Yes- God created the earth. But there is something to Darwin's theory. Look at a monkey-- now look at your husband--monkey--husband--monkey--husband. It makes some sense when you stop to think about it. Of course I believe there's divine intervention along the way and I think the two things can co-exist. Nevertheless Darwin is also theory and although we fight in the schools about what should be taught/what shouldn't be taught...we didn't try to throw our entire economy down the toilet in the name of finches.

Now the theory of catastrophic man-made global warming? It makes no logical sense and when I first heard about it I scratched my head like a monkey. You mean to tell me that by driving our cars and turning on a light switch we humans are going to warm the earth so such a degree that it's going to result in famines and floods? How could we possibly have that much of an impact on this massive planet? It's the sun, stupid.

Per scientists, there are urban heat islands that are causing some of the distortion in comparing temperatures records.

Too bad the idiot Democrats in Washington (how many are scientists by the way?) Can't bother with facts before passing such terrible legislation.

Here's a great Fortune Magazine interview with John Christy, one of the IPCC authors, that talks about the heat island effect. The IPCC is the United Nations Intergovernmetal Panel on Climate Change- the folks who brought you all of this stupidity along with numskill Al Gore. Remember- the IPCC are a bunch of government appointed scientists from around the world and here's a little factoid about how they work:

The word “consensus” is often invoked, and sometimes questioned, when speaking of IPCC reports. In fact, there are two arenas in which a consensus needs to be reached in the production of IPCC assessments; one is the meeting of the entire IPCC, in which unanimity is sought among government representatives. Even though such consensus is not required (countries are free to register their formal dissent), agreement has been reached on all documents and SPMs to date—a particularly impressive fact.

Wow- total consensus...kind of like how the Democrats work these days. If somebody voted against cap and trade it's possible that they accept some of the global warming theory, that the earth is warming, that humans may have some small impact They just don't buy into the idea that ruining our modern economy is going to solve that problem. Or that trying to reduce CO2 emissions without any mention of nuclear energy seems a teensy bit odd. However, if somebody voted for cap and trade then they would have to believe that global warming is an absolute certainty- right? Sort of a monolithic view, huh?

Doomsday

2009-06-26T18:30:00.006-05:00

This is unreal. I can't keep up. I can't even get my blog post together on Obama's terrible performance on Wednesday's prime time Universal Health Care Infomercial and they've already passed Cap and Trade through the House. (It passed by only 7 votes-- 8 Republicans voted for the bill.) KICK THEM OUT of the party today!

If you live in any of these states, I urge you to call your Republican leadership and tell them that you want these people out of office. This legislation was completely black and white and there's no way that any Republican should have voted for it.

Mary Bono Mack (Calif.), Mike Castle, Mark Steven Kirk (Ill.), Leonard Lance (NJ), Frank LoBiondo (NJ), John McHugh (NY), Dave Reichert (Washington), Chris Smith (NJ)

Here in Minnesota, here's what the worthless piece of garbage known as the Star Trib featured today:

3 Pages of Michael Jackson (including the front page)

1 Page of Farrah Faucett (page 2)

1 Page of Mark Sanford (page 3) By the way did John Edwards get one ounce of this coverage? Mr. If-we-knew-you-were-cheating-on-your-cancer-ridden-wife-Hillary-would-have won? No, that wasn't NEARLY as newsworthy. Forget about the astounding historical implications it has had.

1 Page of fluff on Michelle Obama and how she likes being the First Lady

They mentioned NOTHING today about this historic house vote on Cap and Trade except for a related, (and brilliant,) George Will column in the back of the paper. Reading the Strib today was like skimming through "Life & Style" and "OK" magazine in the grocery line.

This monster bill was 1,200 pages long! An additional 300 pages was added in the wee hours this morning...HOW did any of the FOOLS even read the legislation? Can you imagine such carelessness and thoughtlessness? But it's not thoughtlessness, it's completely contrived by the left wing nut-job multi-millionaire Al Gore types. They want us living in urban areas in 1,200 square foot apartments, driving tiny cars or riding light rail while they fricking jet around the world putting out more CO2 into the air then I would in a lifetime of driving my large SUV.

I'm sorry- I know there are a lot of Bush haters out there, (and you'll never catch me defending his spending), but please-- "No Child Left Behind" and "Medicare Part D" don't even come close to the amount of damage that this legislation is going to cause.

In yesterday's post I said that this was just another excuse to redistribute wealth, that low income folks would get subsidies...but, I didn't know it was going to be this bad until I heard some of the bill's language on Rush today. They are actually going to electronically transfer funds into the bank accounts of low income people every month, (at least low income people with bank accounts I guess.) The money is going to offset their "estimated loss of purchasing power" that will be caused by this bill. They acknowledge that there is going to be a lost of consumer purchasing power...unreal. Of course the taxpayers won't get any help to compensate this loss, unless we want to buy a $25,000 Prius that is.

We better start hoping global warming is real here in Minnesota, because we're going to have a hard time paying our heating bills here soon.

Pretend "moderate" Democrat Tim Walz (MN) voted for this one. If that can't help us win back the 1st Congressional District, boy I give up.

God, Help Us....They Passed It

2009-06-26T18:28:00.002-05:00

The kids are watching a cartoon so I hop on my computer to watch the House of Representatives live coverage...I see Waxman laughing, Pelosi smiling....

They passed it. They passed Cap and Trade. God help our economy.

We Knew This was Coming

2009-06-25T21:16:00.008-05:00

It's not a great shock that the King of Pop is dead at fifty. He's looked terrible for years and obviously had some health issues. I try not to think about what he became but remember fondly what he was...one of the most talented people to ever walk the earth. Justin Timberlake, Robin Thicke, Usher, amateurs all. Nobody, but nobody, moved like him. He didn't need a choreographer, he created all of the moves that people still try to mimic today.

I worshipped Michael Jackson in elementary school. Prince was for the very hip kids at that age-- my mom wouldn't let me listen to him because of his racy lyrics. Of course I love Prince now, (and so does she.) Madonna was, (note: WAS) very cool and I loved her too. But Michael, ah, Michael....

Here's the poster that was in my room when I was 10-years-old

Preppy, cute Michael. It was his poster and Dino Ciccarelli's from the North Stars-- I had a thing for curly hair I guess.

Like most 80's kids I loved "Thriller" and stayed up late to watch all of his award show performances. I learned to appreciate earlier Michael Jackson music later in life. I love the Jackson 5...is there any happier song than "I Want You Back"? Was there anything cuter than a young MJ?

The Jacksons were awesome too ..."Blame it on the Boogie"...another song that makes me sing, dance and smile every time I play it..check the video-- how cool is that 'fro?

"Off the Wall" is one of my favorite albums of all time. "Working Day and Night"-- so funky cool..one of the best intros ever.

But my favorite tune of all was this one-- the best...(and he never had a video for it!)

His life was a train wreck, he's gone, but his music will have me dancing until I'm dead in the grave.

Past the Point of No Return?

2009-06-25T10:38:00.006-05:00

Cap and Trade is absurd...."hey, let's tax ourselves just for the heck of it because the climate is warming, no it's cooling, no it's warming, What do you think?"

For the folks that don't understand what cap and trade means...we will be capping the amount of CO2 (yes the air we breath out,) that certain energy companies put out (the "bad"ones like coal) and they will have to pay another company (the "good" ones) for any amount over the cap that is emitted..."trade".

Here's a better summary of what's before Congress this week.

Remember folks: Global warming is a theory. It is not a proven fact that CO2 is warming the atmosphere nor is it fact that any warming that is occurring will lead to catastrophic weather events. It is theory. I've asked this question many times, haven't had an answer yet: When have we ever made public policy so detrimental to our economy based on a scientific theory?

This is the only thing that gives me hope that the absurdity that is Cap and Trade be made law is that liberal benefactor and early Obama supporter Warren Buffet thinks it's a terrible idea.

He's right, it is a regressive tax. The energy companies will push the cost down to the consumer, because this is what they do today with government-imposed taxes and fees. But we know what the game plan is here-- right? Lower income folks will have a problem paying the higher energy bills so they will be further supplemented with energy assistance programs (we already have these today,) which will be paid for by the rest of us. This is just another tool of the left to redistribute wealth in this country.

Of course the farmers have their exemption in place thanks to MN Congressman Collin Peterson (D). Of course other special interests will have their say in the final legislation and will lobby to change any provisions down the road. The only people who are going to pay at the end of the day are us-- the ever-more-endangered-secies that is the U.S. Taxpayer.

Our life expectancy in 1900 was 47 years old, today it is 78. We have an extremely high quality of life in this country, but that's not good enough for the lefties who bemoan our health system and warn that we're all going to perish from global warming.

More taxes on producing energy that fuels the United States economy. Proactively punishing progress. Ah, more irony.

You Tell 'Em Sister

2009-06-24T17:47:00.002-05:00

Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann addressing the House of Representatives on the mess that is now Government Motors. Worth a watch.

Ideological Tests at the U Part 3

2009-06-24T09:27:00.000-05:00

For all of those who have been following my reporting on the U of M School of Nursing's Essay Question. I finally have my answers.

Well-- no, not really. But I did get back a couple of documents from the Nursing School last week. I had requested "all data related to the decision to change the Masters of Nursing Program admissions essay question to one regarding Illegal Immigration".

Here is the question on the admissions application:

Statement: "It is appropriate for the state government to provide funding for health care and education of illegal immigrants."First, take the perspective of someone who agrees with this statement and provide rationale that supports agreement.

Next, take the perspective of someone who disagrees with this statement and provide rationale that supports disagreement.

Finally, indicate the position - either agreement or disagreement - that YOU support given what you know at this time. Provide rationale for your position, considering the validity of the rationale you provided previously for agreement and disagreement.

I wanted to understand how the decision was made to include such a controversial question and ideological test in their admissions process. (Thanks to the Nursing School staff who got this information to me very quickly and easily beat the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency in turnaround time for a Data Practices Request.)

First, I received meeting minutes from March 23, 2009. The only part pertaining to the question was this:

Online application updates. The fall 2010 applications are being updated and Mary Rowan requested feedback from the group regarding the MN essay questions and whether or not they need to be changed since there seems to frequently be redundancies in responses. Cathy Juve suggested adding a question similar to the ethics essay required on the DNP (Doctoral) application. Reneed Sieving motioned that the second question on the application be changed to be more of a point-counter point essay. Cathy Juve seconded, all approved. Laura Ducket and Mary Rowan will craft an appropriate question.

Lastly, I received a brief email exchange between Mary Rowan and another staff person at the Nursing School. Apparently the Illegal Immigration question is also used for admissions to the undergraduate Nursing honors program.

The only concern expressed in the emails is that somebody who applies to that program could possibly also apply to the Masters program and may have the same question posed twice. There was no concern that the question could be construed as an ideological test. No concern that the issue of illegal immigration is a political issue that has no relation to the practice of nursing.

I find great irony in the fact that an admissions committee- who feels so strongly about the need for a student to be able to argue both sides of a controversial issue, who feels so strongly about the ability to debate and provide valid rationale to support their views, who feels so strongly that nursing school is about turning out future leaders-- would spend no time--zero, zilch, none--in debating the merit and the potential problems that their new essay question poses. I guess their students need to be able to demonstrate intellectual curiosity, but they do not.

I could go on with this exercise and take it to the President's office, but I know he doesn't care. I'm quite confident that he would think that this question is just dandy. I'm sure if I dug around I'd find similar ideological tests are being required all over the University. I mean- a President who boldly defends a Professor who desecrates Catholic Eucharists and then blogs about it using University time and resources, (which is a clear conflict with Board of Regents policy) ain't going to care about the fact that the nursing school is--whether intentionally or unintentionally-- testing students on their political views for admission to the program. Nope.

A public University, my beloved alma mater, it makes me sad. I would hope when President Bruininks finally steps aside next year that perhaps things can change, but I'm not holding my breath.

So what to tell my conservative friend who wants to reapply to the program but can't bring herself to providing her true opinion on illegal immigration for fear that the admissions committee won't like her answer?

I can offer the advice of my mother, (another U of M almuna) "find other schools to apply to, forget it." Or I can offer the advice my husband, (also a U of M alum), "Play the game, just play the game. Tell them what they want to hear."

Hence why my dear husband has a M.D. on his wall and I'm a housewife.

So I Think I Can Dance

2009-06-23T15:30:00.002-05:00

Dear God,
If there is such a thing as reincarnation, then please let me come back as someone who can dance like this:

New Blog

2009-06-23T09:17:00.001-05:00

A friend forwarded this blog on...

I think my Prepublican readers will love it!

Awaken the Elephants

Get OVER Yourself!

2009-06-18T11:14:00.001-05:00

You have to be kidding me...

Another Hypocrite Bites the Dust....

2009-06-18T09:59:00.003-05:00

Nevada Senator John Ensign had an 8-month affair with a married staffer. Ensign's a well-known Republican leader and strong social conservative.

Maybe he and John Edwards can get a Georgetown bachelor pad together.

Ensign's wife is standing by him (just like Hillary). If Ensign truly cared about his marriage, he'd resign a job that requires him to be away from home for most of the year. He'd go home to his wife. Then the GOP could get a better, younger, more honest person in his place.

The issue has to do with political party certainly- I mean the GOP can't sit and tout "family values" (although have we been touting that lately?) and then not kick these guys to the curb when they act like this.

But, more importantly it's about very weak men in high-level leadership positions. This issue may also be about misuse of money as it appears Ensign may have been paying his mistress and her family inappropriate amounts of money as staff --she was his campaign Treasurer and her husband was employeed as Ensign's administrative assistant

Hampton was paid $162,000, almost the maximum allowed for aides

And their son was also employed by the campaign. Nice. I mean- come on dude- resign.

I'm going to give something to President Obama here. He loves his wife. He clearly loves his wife. I can't see him cheating on her in a million years. She's a strong woman and he's not afraid of that. Stability is a character strength. It's something that he and George W. Bush have in common and I appreciate it.

Preferential Treatment

2009-06-17T19:04:00.003-05:00

Interesting thing I found on the web about the U of M Masters of Nursing admissions process:

This is from a blog post from a student who is currently enrolled in the program. A male, Minnesota native who lived out-of-state for 10 years before applying for the program.

As far as where you take your prereq's, they really don't care. I had 3 to take and I took them all through online community colleges, one of which was not even in the state I lived in at the time. So don't worry about that.

After some time, I was told that I qualified for an interview. Normally, they want you to do this in person, but I asked if it would be ok to do a phone interview and they let me. About 3 weeks after the phone interview I found out that I was accepted.

.....Anyway, I took online courses through a local community college in Michigan (Oakland Community College) where I lived before I moved here to attend school.

Online Community College courses vs. courses taken within the University of Minnesota system. And a phone interview? The four women I know of didn't even qualify for an interview, let alone one over the phone. Again, current Minnesota residents and taxpayers.

Must be nice to be a man and get that free pass.

What a shame.

They Didn't....

2009-06-16T23:35:00.003-05:00

I was trying to fix formatting on my last post (Blogger formatting is such a pain), and accidentally deleted my original link in this paragraph:

Odd that the word "leader" appears nowhere on their program description. The Masters in Nursing is for people who have a non-nursing Undergrad so that they can prepare to be RN's.

So I go back and find the link tonight and as you can see- the word "leadership" very much appears in the program description. So do the words "moral and ethical issues".

Now, I could be wrong on this, but I worked on this blog post on and off all day and was on the Nursing School's website many times....and I swear those words weren't there earlier today when I linked it....unfortunately I have no screen shot to prove that.

The new link shows at the bottom of the page: Last modified on May 18, 2009

However, click back a couple pages to this one (the Nursing School Home Page) and you see: Last modified on June 16, 2009

Huh.

I would assume with web pages the "date modified" would be automatically changed? I don't know, perhaps I was seeing things earlier today....note to self: always save screen shots.

So I stand corrected...the program IS about leadership. Therefore, I'll take a reader's comment and point out that nonchalantly lying about your real opinion in order to gain perceived favor with an admissions committee is the antithesis of leadership.

Ideological Tests at the U Part 2

2009-06-16T15:44:00.015-05:00

My post last week about the recent change in essay question for admission to the U of M's Masters of Nursing Program program has received a lot of notice. Readers can't believe the audacity of the University to pose such a question let alone not provide any assurances to the students that this is not a test of ideology that could prevent them from being admitted into the program.

Here is the question:

Statement: "It is appropriate for the state government to provide funding for health care and education of illegal immigrants."

First, take the perspective of someone who agrees with this statement and provide rationale that supports agreement.

Next, take the perspective of someone who disagrees with this statement and provide rationale that supports disagreement.

Finally, indicate the position - either agreement or disagreement - that YOU support given what you know at this time. Provide rationale for your position, considering the validity of the rationale you provided previously for agreement and disagreement.

(The YOU in all caps is exactly as it appears on the U's website). You're supposed to do all of this in 2 double-spaced pages. Such constraints would lead to a debate with all of the intellectual quality of Cher's from the movie "Clueless".

I've had phone calls and emails about the post and wanted to give you more of the story.

I called the School of Nursing at the U a couple of weeks ago wanting to know about the decision to change the question from a more generic one that had been used up until now. I first spoke with Jamie Gearhart. I asked when and how the decision was made and inquired if I could speak to somebody on the committee that decided to add this controversial question to the admissions application. She didn't know exactly when the decision was made, but when I guessed "in the last six months", she said "yes".

She informed me that she took the meeting minutes and was there that day, although she was not a member of the committee. I said "Great, I'd like to get a copy of those meeting minutes"....she then told me I needed to talk to the Chairperson of the Nursing School's Graduate Admissions Committee, Associate Professor Renee Sieving.

Prof Sieving picked up the call, we spoke briefly. She said that the question I had was about their Doctoral program, I said "no, I'm looking at the questions for the Doctoral program and they are generic, this is for your Master's program. She requested that I schedule a call with her, which I did for the following week.

Sieving was recently featured in the Star Tribune and her area of research includes: "youth health promotion; prevention of multiple health risk behaviors (sexual risks, violence involvement, school drop-out) among adolescents."

Some of her published articles include:

Family and racial factors associated with suicide and emotional distress among Latino students. Journal of School Health

Young adolescent responses to different question formats assessing race/ethnicity (letter to the editor). Journal of Adolescent Health

The effects of race/ethnicity, income, and family structure on adolescent risk behaviors. American Journal of Public Health

Here's another one: Parents’ Beliefs About Condoms and Oral Contraceptives: Are They Medically Accurate?

which concluded: the more politically conservative a parent was, the less medically accurate his or her views typically were.

Fascinating findings.

Anyway-- I called Prof Sieving back the following week. She was polite enough, but the conversation just went around in circles. She initially said that the question was changed because there was "a lot of redundancy" using previous questions. This is interesting, because last fall there were two questions: 1. Describe how life experiences (e.g., personal, family, educational and work-related experiences) have prepared you for excellence in nursing.was about and 2. Given that there are many more applicants than can be admitted, discuss what makes you an excellent candidate for this intensive program.

Now they've combined those questions into one question and added the illegal immigration question. It's interesting to me that people trying to distinguish themselves as individuals sounded so much alike that there was "a lot of redundancy."

She stated that the purpose of the question was to give students a chance to logically lay out two sides of a controversial issue and that they didn't care whether students agreed or disagreed. If the purpose is to make sure somebody can debate both sides of an issue logically, then the third part about what they thought was entirely moot.

She kept circling back to "it's not our intention" (to test someones political views.) To which I kept replying, "Whether or not it's your intention, that is the consequence of posing such a question."

She also kept referring to the second half of the third part of the question which reads: Provide rationale for your position, considering the validity of the rationale you provided previously for agreement and disagreement. She seemed to be saying that this made the question fair.

Considering the validity of the rationale? Who determines the validity? Validity is truth that can be demonstrated- correct? Again, 2 pages-double spaced for the entire 3-part essay question.

I pointed out that I had several people look at the question and many were puzzled what such a question would have to do with the field of nursing, to that line she quickly snapped "Then they don't understand nursing."

Apparently I don't either.

There is certainly a new breed of nurse-activist/leader out there, that I know. State Representative Maria Ruud fits this mold as a card-carrying member of the Nurse's Union-- she uses her professional experiences to further a lefty political agenda.

Sieveg said that their graduates are taking on "leadership positions in the field of nursing" and they "must be able to understand perspectives on controversial issues related to health care." (And obviously in issues related to education too.)

Odd that the word "leader" appears nowhere on their program description. The Masters in Nursing is for people who have a non-nursing Undergrad so that they can prepare to be RN's.

At one point in the conversation Sieving said "I can tell that you are passionate about this issue." (Don't you love the passive aggressive, "it's just you who's crazy" move?) I replied "Actually some 70% of Americans cared enough about this issue, many of whom called Congress as recently as 2007", (I was wrong it was actually 62% of Americans who were either "very concerned" or "extremely concerned" with illegal immigration in 2007. But, I reminded her that my opinion on issue was neither here nor there.

Sieving then said that this was the type of question that would be asked in an ethics class in the program. I said that I could understand that the issue could be raised in a classroom once a student was in the program. (I mean these types of political questions are posed even if you're an Engineering major these days). But, I still thought it was unsuitable as a way to determine whether or not to a student should be admitted into the program.

Finally I shared with the Professor that my advice to a friend applying to the program would be to keep her answer murky and not give her real opinion about the issue to which Sieving replied, "And that would be fine." I said "No, it wouldn't be fine and that's exactly my point in raising this issue".

The University either wants individuals with no point of view, who they can easily mold, or they want prospective students to lie on an admissions application. Now do you want to talk about ethics?

Admission to the program should be based on merit, PERIOD. But we all know that's not the case in modern day academia. The application states:

"The School seeks to admit and educate a diverse student body, both in order to enrich the student's educational experience and to prepare them to meet the health needs of a diverse society."

Here are the admission statistics for the program. They admitted 21% men into the program when only 5% of nurses are men nationally. So my daughters would be given preferential treatment if they had born with a ......What nonsense! Affirmative action run amok.

The University complains to the legislature about lack of funding and continually increases tuition rates to the point where our public University is almost unattainable for many students-- yet they turn away perfectly qualified candidates which could help drive down costs for all.

I know for a fact that qualified students, with stellar academic records, who are lifelong residents of Minnesota, are being turned away from this program-- not even given the chance for an interview. They happen to be Caucasian women. Now let's say these same Caucasian women answer an essay question in a way that the committee sees as "closed-minded," how do they even stand a chance to get into our PUBLIC University?

I still have more to say on this, but I'm waiting for a response from the U. We're going on almost a week without any acknowledgement of my Public Data Request for committee members names and meeting minutes. Shouldn't this take about 10 minutes to send over? I wonder what valid rationale they have for the hold up.

Obama-Care

2009-06-16T09:30:00.000-05:00

I have a simple plan:

Let all of the AMA and other liberal docs go work for the government hospitals (and we will have government hospitals with the Pelosi/Obama plan--just like Canada) and let all of the conservative docs work for the privately run hospitals.

The liberal nurses union can join the liberal docs at the government hospital and the non-union nurses can join the conservative docs at the private hospital.

Problem solved.

Gipper's List Hits Instapundit!

2009-06-16T09:09:00.002-05:00

LIKE CRAIGSLIST, ONLY WITH REAGAN: Gipperslist.
Posted at 11:13 pm by Glenn Reynolds

Gipper's List

2009-06-15T16:38:00.002-05:00

Sean Hannity just mentioned http://www.gipperslist.com/ on his radio show! I scooped Sean Hannity :)

Go post your stuff now!

Gipper's List

2009-06-15T15:09:00.004-05:00

I'm so excited to be one of the first bloggers in the entire country to launch a new web site:

http://www.gipperslist.com/

Gipper's List is the brainchild of my creative sister, Mary. It's quite simply a "Craig's List for Conservatives." A pro-active protest against the liberals out there who want to take all of your hard-earned money using the power of government. Republican to Republican transactions.

I'm a big Craig's List user...just bought a very cool old set of leather bound encyclopedias for $20 from a woman in Eden Prairie a few weeks ago. I've bought and sold many times and never had a problem except when some crazy chick shopped my kid's clothing sale and stole things.

I also sold a sofa to an artist who lived in Linden Hills. We developed a brief friendship. She had a cute line of handmade children's clothing-- it wasn't cheap stuff, but I appreciated her work. I bought a couple things from her and encouraged her to be more aggressive with her business plan. We met a few times, she wanted some advice on getting her business to the next level. One day the state of the economy came up, she started bashing George Bush and Republicans. She later emailed me to invite me to one of her clothing shows, asking me to bring friends. I politely declined-- why would I help somebody who so hated my political party and what I stood for?

I also sold an armoire to a young couple...when I saw the Army bumper stickers I knocked down the price "Military discount".

This Gipper's List idea is a big one. Finally we have the option to support like-minded individuals who understand that hard work, success and achievement are good things. Who believe in the American Dream and way of life.

I'll be posting a lot more about this website soon....but go check it out!
http://www.gipperslist.com/

Breaking the Law

2009-06-14T16:01:00.004-05:00

My husband and I were driving home from downtown Minneapolis the other night when I realized I was breaking the law.

I was sitting in the back seat of our sedan and didn't have my seat belt buckled. Minnesota just passed another stupid nanny state law which requires every passenger in a car to be buckled up or they can be pulled over and fined $25.

Sometimes I buckle my seat belt when seated in the back seat, sometimes I don't. It's usually just a matter of not remembering to do it. I also have a habit of not buckling my seat belt when I'm driving until I'm pulling out of my neighborhood.

As I watched a guy on a motorcycle careening by our large 4-door sedan- I thought about the absurdity that he could do so without a helmet on and it would be completely legal. I, on the other hand, could be pulled over and ticketed.

I don't care if somebody doesn't want to wear their motorcycle helmet, that's their stupidity. So, why do people care if I'm wearing my seat belt in the back seat of my own car?

Finally

2009-06-12T09:44:00.005-05:00

I finally got a simple letter to the editor printed in the EP News this week. I can get a book published, but can't get a letter to the editor printed in a suburban newspaper without extreme effort.

I think it's been about two years since I've submitted anything. I had an experience back in the fall of '04, during the election, where they questioned me on my opinion and wouldn't print a letter I had submitted without editing major content. I made the case that Planned Parenthood was associated with Moveon.org, the editor debated me on the phone about it arguing that there was no connection. At the time Planned Parenthood's logo was on Moveon.org's home page, now they just share info via a PAC. Yeah, no connection. Anyway, I wouldn't let them take out the information, which would have weakened the argument I was making in the letter, so they didn't print it.

I know from several local Republican campaigns that the EP News purposely holds back letters, "fact checks" opinions and has even called the DFL caucus to tell them about letters to the editor from GOP candidates.

The letter I submitted on June 1st was about what I had heard Rep Maria Ruud (42A) say at a town hall meeting on May 30th. I blogged a bit about how she likes to use stories to make political points...My original letter read:

Ruud also claimed in the Star Tribune that the cuts to GAMC would result in 8,000 jobs lost. I can't come up with any facts to substantiate that claim, but did discover one job that may be lost- hers. At the same Town hall meeting, she explained that because of the cuts to the program, her department at Park Nicollet Hospital would be eliminated.

The fact-checking should have been calling Rep Ruud and asking her to explain what she meant. Perhaps the EP News could attend events and fact check her....oh, that would be called reporting, sorry.

It only took a week or so of waiting for the editor to "fact check" me...I was first called by the editor on June 2nd and told my letter would be in that week. I specifically asked "no edits?" and was told, "nope, just spelling out the word percentage, that type of thing," "Great!" I let them know that I'd keep it off my blog since they were going to print it that same week. Too easy, I thought though, after hanging up the phone.

On the afternoon of Wednesday, June 3rd, I get a voicemail that my letter would appear in the following week's edition and that the editor now had some questions for me. I called back the next morning (Thursday), and left a message back and I never got a returned call. I got an email at 5:08 pm Friday afternoon.

Here's the email:

I got your voicemail, thanks for calling back.I called Park Nicollet to confirm your point about the program being eliminated because of GAMC cuts and received the following response from a spokesperson:

"In regards to your question about cuts to GAMC, Park Nicollet is notrestructuring OB/GYN programs at our Brookdale and Minneapolis clinics dueto cuts in General Assistance Medical Care. These changes were already underconsideration and are not about budget cuts. They are about designing carethat can be delivered in a sustainable way in each community we serve."

"Our OB/GYN services vary greatly from community to community. And, in somecommunities, OB/GYN services are not provided at all. Park Nicollet currently provides OB/GYN services at 9 of its 17 primary care clinics. Inthe Minneapolis and Brookdale Clinic locations, Midwifery services have beenoffered for some time and will be expanded in the future. All of the OB/GYNdoctors and nurse practitioners from these two clinics will be relocated toother clinics over the coming months."

So, I'd like to give you the opportunity to rewrite that portion of your letter. If you have any questions, feel free to call me at the number below or 612-616-6701. I would need the changes by the end of the day Tuesday.

So- the EP News called Park Nicollet to disprove what I was saying that Ruud said?

I also believe they sent my letter to Maria Ruud- or her campaign. I can't prove it, and the EP News wouldn't answer any questions about it, but the way this all played out certainly leads me to that conclusion. Ruud had a commentary the week that my letter was supposed to be in which mentioned Methodist Hopsital in St. Louis Park being affected by the cuts, but not Park Nicollet. Then this week there was a letter right next to mine with a defense of Ruud on the same exact topic. All coincidence?

A friend of mine pointed out that I should use the EP News email from Park Nicollet to further strengthen the argument against Ruud- either she has a conflict of interest, or she purposely exaggerates to make political points. So, I took their advice and resubmitted the letter.

The effort to get a letter printed in a local paper is pretty ridiculous. I mean incredibly ridiculous, which is why I rarely send them in and exactly what they seem to want.

So, finally, two weeks after the town hall meeting that I attended, here is a letter to the editor of the local paper. It isn't online- only last week's edition. But here is the content.

Rep. Maria Ruud makes many claims regarding the DFL’s failure to craft a budget that could gain bipartisan support and prevent Gov. Pawlenty from single-handedly balancing the budget.

Her commentary in the May 28 Star Tribune laments that we are losing the “soul of Minnesota” because of cuts to the state’s General Assistance Medical Care. GAMC is a welfare program that provides payments to hospitals for poor patients who – for whatever reason – haven’t registered for existing government programs that they may qualify for.

Ruud said in the Eden Prairie News on May 28, “We voted against the poorest of the poor and then we voted to protect the richest of the rich.” Originally, Ruud voted against the DFL effort to create the fourth highest income tax rate in the nation, so she apparently supported “protection” of “the rich.” Then she changed her vote in the final minutes of the legislative session, claiming at the EP town hall meeting on May 30 that her constituents started saying “everyone needed to share the pain.”

The “soul” of Minnesota isn’t found in the halls of the legislature or in government programs, but if legislators truly wanted to fund this and other welfare, which encompasses 30% of the state budget, they would’ve worked on ways to fix programs months earlier when the governor proposed his budget. The GAMC program was growing 35% per biennium and in obvious need of reform, but the DFL’s only answer was “more money.”

Ruud also claims that the cuts to GAMC will cost 8,000 jobs. I can’t come up with any facts to substantiate that, but did discover one job that may be lost – hers. At the same town hall meeting, she explained that her department at Park Nicollet Hospital would be eliminated because of cuts to the program.

I’m sorry that Rep. Ruud could lose her job, but using her position as a state legislator to protect programs which directly contribute to her household income undermines her argument about responsible insurance programs for the poor. Oddly enough, while fact-checking this letter, the Eden Prairie News contacted a Park Nicollet representative who stated that “Park Nicollet is not restructuring OB/GYN programs at our Brookdale and Minneapolis clinics due to cuts in [GAMC]. These changes were already under consideration and are not about budget cuts.”

If it is true that the restructuring isn’t about budget cuts or GAMC, why is Ruud saying that her job may be lost because of GAMC reductions? If the restructuring is due to GAMC cuts, as she says, then she has a conflict of interest by supporting GAMC. If the restructuring isn’t related to GAMC, as Park Nicollet says, then Rep. Ruud is embellishing details at town hall meetings for some perceived sympathy and potential political gain while unintentionally giving the impression of a conflict of interest. Assuming Park Nicollet is correct, one begins to wonder what other flawed antecdotes and unverified “facts” Rep. Ruud is using to justify continued support of this unsustainable spending.

Republicans Announce an "All of the Above" Energy Plan

2009-06-11T09:26:00.002-05:00

House Republicans yesterday introduced legislation under the "American Energy Act"

I haven't read the entire bill, (then again neither do our Congressmen), but here are the talking points:

House Republicans recognize that as gas prices and home utility bills rise, American families are dealt an even greater economic hardship.
The Democrats' answer to the worst recession in decades is a national energy tax that will lead to higher energy prices and further job losses.
Thousands of dollars in extra energy costs and millions of jobs lost is a high price to pay for an energy policy that will do very little to clean up our environment.
The American people deserve better. The American Energy Act is an all of the above plan that will provide energy independence, more jobs here at home, and a cleaner environment.
The American Energy Act increases our domestic supply of energy by lifting restrictions on ANWR, the Outer Continental Shelf, and oil shale in the Mountain West.
The House Republican plan renews America's commitment to clean and emissions-free nuclear energy. The Department of Energy has stated the best way for utility companies to reduce carbon emissions is to increase their supply of nuclear energy.
Despite the enormous success of nuclear energy, no new nuclear reactor has been ordered since the presidency of Jimmy Carter. The House Republican plan builds on the success of nuclear energy by laying down a national goal of ordering 100 new nuclear reactors over the next twenty years.
Revenue generated by the sale of leases will be invested in renewable and alternative sources of energy. The House Republican plan also encourages conservation through proven tax incentives.
The American people don't want a national energy tax; they want energy independence. The House Republican plan is the comprehensive energy solution this country desperately needs.

Alternative energy innovation, exploration of our own resources, and 100 new nuclear facilities-- policy based on what we need and moving forward--gee, makes perfect sense to me.

On the Letterman Flap

2009-06-10T21:28:00.003-05:00

This MSNBC interview reminds me of the babe who did the Tea Party/CNN interview.

Best part, "That's actually happened to me, I'm fine I'm still here". She gets so upset, like a child not getting her way.

Great journalism- these women give us women a bad name.

Ideological Tests at The U

2009-06-09T10:04:00.001-05:00

So- here are the essay questions for entrance into the University of Minnesota Masters of Nursing Program:

PROFILE ESSAYS/STATEMENTS

Please respond to all of the following essay questions. Prepare your responses carefully, as they are your opportunity to tell the Admissions Committee about yourself in ways that might not be evident from your academic record. The School seeks to admit and educate a diverse student body, both in order to enrich the students' educational experience and to prepare them to meet the health needs of a diverse society. Student body characteristics that will enhance the diversity in the school include leadership qualities, a strong work record, community or public service record, special talents and interests, gender (males are underrepresented in the nursing profession), and a wide range of economic, social, racial/ethnic and geographic backgrounds.

Essay I: Given that there are many more applicants to the MN program than can be admitted, discuss what makes you an excellent candidate for this intensive program. Include experiences that have prepared you for a career in nursing and your career goals. (Please do not exceed 2 double-spaced pages.)

Essay II: Following instructions 1 – 3 below, prepare an essay in response to the statement below. (Please do not exceed 2 double-spaced pages.) If you cite any published sources provide citations within your response and complete references at the end of your response.Statement: "It is appropriate for the state government to provide funding for health care and education of illegal immigrants."

First, take the perspective of someone who agrees with this statement and provide rationale that supports agreement.

Next, take the perspective of someone who disagrees with this statement and provide rationale that supports disagreement.

Finally, indicate the position - either agreement or disagreement - that YOU support given what you know at this time. Provide rationale for your position, considering the validity of the rationale you provided previously for agreement and disagreement.

Can you believe this? Of course you can- it's liberal academia. Although they deny their bias continually.

The second question was recently changed from a more generic one.

More on this later....

What on Earth is This? Part 2

2009-06-08T08:51:00.003-05:00

Here's some of the Back Story on last week's "Earth 2100" ABC News Program from the company who produced the cartoon/sci-fi movie.

Working with a big company like ABC was thrilling because of their resources and large-scale vision (which includes numerous interviews with scientists,

The entire process was amazingly collaborative, with the plot points and characters emerging out of long brainstorming meetings. I really enjoyed sitting at the ABC studios conference table with the producers, fellow writers, editors, and production assistants, kicking ideas around.

(One thing I learned from the experience was to not let my writing get too precious — due to the many, many edits and revisions, not much of our original language remains in the script, though the scenarios and specific shots remain much the same.)

What's most interesting to me is that a news organization would promote outright lies in this program. Even if you accept the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's findings (which were entirely generated by computer models and are not able to be tested in any way), the program is full of holes.

This writer spells them out:

The evil that ABC did in broadcasting Earth 2100 will live on long after them. By presenting a fictional account of future global warming, they will make it far more difficult to do what we do need to do to combat global warming.

Earth 2100 predicts a temperature rise of 6 degrees Celsius by 2070. The UN's IPCC predicts between 2 and 4 degrees by 2100.

Earth 2100 predicts sea level rise of 3 to 7 meters by 2070. The IPCC predicts about 1 and a half feet by 2100. "The new report says rises could range from 18 cm to 59 cm."

Earth 2100 predicts melting of the Greenland ice cover. The IPCC says that they don't think that will happen, but if it does it will take over three thousand years.

So basically none of what was shown in the movie is going to happen, but ABC News felt compelled to help propagate the lies anyway. ABC News

2010

2009-06-07T14:13:00.001-05:00

For those of you interested in the Governor's race and who's in/who's out, here's a piece from the Star Trib.

Early Prediction from a Little Old Activist

2009-06-04T10:37:00.005-05:00

In the race for Governor- The DFL's best bet is cleary Margaret Anderson Kelliher. Minnesotans would love to put a woman in as Governor and although she's from ultra-lib Minneapolis, she grew up on a farm in Southern Minnesota where she was a 4-H member. She's also a Harvard Grad (not that I care, but liberals sure do).

Her liberal views, her bobbling of this legislative session may have an effect, but she looks so much like a nice Minnesotan that she can probably get around that. People have a very short memory. This legislative session- believe it or not- will not be on the radar in 2010.

Never under-estimate demeanor and style. Yes, I realize that it's comical that I'm using the word style in regards to the Speaker of the House-but that's exactly what it is.

Any of the following DFL candidates that are currently being discussed would be a dream for the GOP:

Corrput rich-guy Matt Entenza
Loser rich-guy Mark Dayton
Ridiculous liberal mayor of St. Paul, Chris Coleman
More ridiculous mayor of crime city Minneapolis, R.T. Ryback

Bring any of these guys on- bring on MAK and it will be a race.

Obama "Whiz Kid"

2009-06-03T21:33:00.003-05:00

Did you know that there's a 31-year-old in charge of dismantling GM?

Hi- I've never worked a day in the business world and I was a mid-level campaign staffer last year, but now I'm making recommendations on how to run GM. Wow.

Reminder- GOP Candidates Debate

2009-06-03T20:29:00.002-05:00

With Governor Pawlenty out in 2010- it is even more critical that we have the right leadership at the State Party. If you're interested in learning more about the candidates for State Chair, Deputy Chair, Secretary and Treasurer then be sure to attend tomorrow night's debate- here are the details:

The Voices of Republican Women (VOICES) is hosting a forum between the Minnesota Republican Party Leadership candidates for Chair and Deputy Chair.

Date: Thursday June 4, 2009
Location: Maple Grove Junior High (7000 Hemlock Lane Maple Grove, MN 55369)
Time: Mixer 6:30 p.m

Forum 7:00 p.m. – 9:30 pm

This forum is an opportunity for Delegates & Alternates of State Central Committee, Republicans and all others interested to hear directly from the candidates running for these critical leadership positions. The forum is designed to bring together candidates to discuss important issues relating to the Republican Party. It is an opportunity for each candidate to explain their position on important leadership issues, their vision for the future and how they would run the State Republican Party.

All Chair and Deputy Chair candidates have been invited to participate in the Forum. Secretary/Treasurer candidates have been invited to distribute material, give a short statement and respond to at least one pre-selected question. See the FaceBook link for the candidate list.There were will be a series of pre-set questions. There will also be an opportunity for the audience to submit questions to be asked of the candidates. We will also be accepting questions at the event, via FACEBOOK http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=161357190244&ref=ts#/event.php?eid=161357190244
and email (info@voicesofrepublicanwomen.org) .

The forum is open to the general public. All are welcome!

Liberal Logic

2009-06-03T08:58:00.002-05:00

So the Schubert Theatre in Minneapolis gets Obama stimulus money, but the 169/494 interchange does not?

Check out this quote and try not to laugh:

"I'm thrilled to be the last money in," said downtown-area Council Member Lisa Goodman. She noted that performers at the theater are often low-to-moderate-income and that dance tickets are cheaper than live theater on Hennepin. Mayor R.T. Rybak also lauded the council decision.

Bravo City Council! You are going to create more jobs for actors and bring down the prices of live theatre! Liberal elitist buffoons!

Obama-Ganda

2009-06-02T22:26:00.002-05:00

I was just telling Todd that it was weird how I just noticed the promos for "Earth 2100" a few days ago- it was like it was thrown together.

What exactly was the extent of the coordination between ABC and The White House on this show?

Remember Obama's paid "infomercial" before the election, now we see a free Obama infomercial for his radical climate change policies. What next a cartoon about our healthcare system with liberal doctors telling us we're all going to die if we don't do something now? It's a pattern, a pattern with this President.

Could it be that they know that Americans were finally seeing through the B.S. and it's a minority opinion that climate change is man-made? So- they throw this stupid movie together and try to ram it down our throats again- but this time it's more urgent telling us our children and grandchildren are ALL GOING TO DIE.

What on Earth is This?

2009-06-02T21:32:00.002-05:00

"Earth 2100" is on ABC right now (thanks for the tip, buddy M)...this is the most bizarre thing I've ever seen on network TV. I'm watching the last 30 minutes of the 2-hour special- my Direct TV info reads "Educational/Scientists predict the consequences of inaction"

This September, in Earth 2100, a dramatic ABC News 2-hour broadcast, the greatest minds across the globe will join together in a countdown to the year 2100 to tell us what we must do to survive the next century … And what may happen if we don't

I'm watching this, my mouth agape, A scientist says that by 2100 we're going to see an "official die-off" of the human race? It's a weird cartoon show with a narrator "Lucy" talking about a fictional world in 2100 interspersed with scientists giving commentary and then there are segments on climate change, renewable energy, mass transit, smaller cars, and talk of the President's agenda with his "Green Jobs" advisor. There are talks of sacrifice comparing our need to adopt the President's energy plan NOW with the fight in WW II. The CEO of Google is featured, Tom Freidman...they are showing pictures of tiny, tiny vehicles that we could be driving in. Pictures of tiny babies who will be a "precious commodity" in the future-- like they aren't now?

Is this 1970- population control?

I've had it with these bizarre scare-tactics- the enviro-nuts are taking over! It's one thing for flipping Miley Cyrus to tell kids that the need to "Reg and Pledge" (Register and Pledge to be a Part of the Friends for Change Climate Challenge). Note Disney/ABC the same company....this is CRAZY!

And lefties like to call US Nazis??

We are officially undergoing a government Propaganda campaign- I'm starting to get scared- seriously. WHO is behind this crap?? Don't tell me this is winning ratings for the network.

You know sometimes when I get hopeful (see previous post) that people are on our side- I see this stuff and I almost want to cry, I feel like we're up against this awful machine. This is exactly how they want us to feel- defeated.

This will be all over the radio and blogs tomorrow.

Pulse Check

2009-06-02T20:14:00.005-05:00

It's been a busy day and my scattered political brain is even more scattered now with Governor Pawlenty's announcement that he won't seek a 3rd term in office. My initial thought was "Oh no!" The idea that we wouldn't have our goaltender at the net in St. Paul with the crazy DFL here scares the daylights out of me. But then I thought about the weak field of candidates on the Dem side and the vibe that I've been getting lately that the tide could be turning.

The national mood in 17 months will be the most important factor, but my gut read on Minnesota politics is that people (not just conservative Republicans like myself) have had it with 1. Ridiculous levels of Government spending 2. Government picking winners and losers and and 3. Power-hungry politicians who stay in office forever

I always thought Pawlenty would stay Governor, if indeed his aspirations are to be a Presidential candidate- it only made sense. But this is really a smarter move because he's coming off some very good press from his "Unallotment move" (he's single-handedly cutting almost $3 Billion off our state budget without raising taxes- in response to a showdown with our DFL-led Minnesota legislature). Quit while you're ahead, why take the chance of residing over a 3rd 4-year term when many things could go wrong? Pawlenty is a career politician and although his speech today (wisely) made reference to term limits, make no mistake, he's going to be in the public-sector for many years to come. (Perhaps he'll take something in the private sector to fill out his resume, but he'll be back).

I attended a local Townhall meeting last Saturday with our local legislators, State Senator David Hann, Representative Jenifer Loon (42B- Eden Prairie) and Representative Maria Ruud (42A Eden Prairie, S. Minnetonka). I only knew perhaps 10 of the 40 (or so) people there. Some local Republicans, some of the leaders of the local DFL (Including Eden Prairie School Board Chair Carol Bomben and Progressive-Majority School Board Member Kim Ross). I have no scientific evidence to support this- but the questions were mainly from the conservative standpoint. One woman questioned Ruud on taxes and why the DFL always insisted on raising taxes as an answer- Ruud explained "we're only raising taxes on those making over $250,000" -- the woman shot right back "we'll we're not rich and we're seeing our taxes continually increase" she also added (as I recall) that those "rich" are the job creators.

Another woman asked a simple question: "How do states without income taxes survive?" One guy questioned the "rancor" in St. Paul and the lack-of-ability to get a budget done and another said "there should be no special sessions" and got a round of applause. Another guy asked why the DFL chose to ignore the Governor when he said that the budget proposals shouldn't include new taxes. There was a gentleman there who said he represented the Fair Tax organization in Minnesota who asked why the state would be unwilling to spend $30,000 to have a study done to see if it's feasible in Minnesota (he mentioned 11 other states have the model in place and aren't in the red like we are)-- Ruud shot back that he would have been better off finding private funding for the study. I laughed out loud at that remembering that the state's Climate Change Advisory Group cost taxpayers $40,000 and I'm sure if I looked at voting records Ruud approved that cost... The Fair Tax guy shot right back at Ruud that he talked to the Tom Baak- Chair of the Tax Committee- who told him specifically that such a study needed to have some government money to pay for it so there were no conflicts. Ruud looked pretty bad with that exchange.

Another senior gentleman provided a little Minnesota tax history when all taxes were derived from property owned- saying that "if someone owned a typewriter, they hid it when the tax man came".

The event ended with some rambling lib offering up ideas of how the U.S. could run more like Ireland and then babbled about other DFL platform planks in his non-question-speech. I also heard there was some crazy DFL'er that kept walking out of the room saying loudly "I can't take this" anytime a conservative viewpoint was expressed- loudly slamming the City Council Chamber doors- if anybody can tip me off on who this is- shoot me an email!

Bottom line- that room went our way- big time.

Hann and Loon were fact-based calm and reasoned. They were all congenial. Ruud was anecdotal- sharing that her nephew who is graduating with an MD from Johns Hopkins doesn't want to move to Minnesota because he's "worried" about the brain drain and our health care system. Poor little Johns Hopkins grad! She contradicted herself too when she hinted that a special session was needed to "negotiate" and then said "I agree" when an attendee stated "there should be no special sessions" and got a round of applause. She also told a story of how she "stood up" in front of her caucus to deliver a "no tax" message -- that she wasn't hearing from people in her district that they wanted tax increases even adding "there were witnesses!"-- but then said she later was told by constituents that they wanted new taxes, that "everyone should share the pain". Say, what? Maria- some free political advice-stand up like the liberal you are and OWN those tax hikes. Don't try to play both side of the fence it will bite you.

She talked about cuts to welfare throughout the event and said "her heart" was in the General Medical Assistance Care program- she got applause when she said that cuts to the program reflected a "change in Minnesota values"....although the applause was fewer people doing it louder, as it came after the other round of applause- sort of a "we've got spirit, yes we do, how bout you" move.

Ruud may be a nice-enough person, but she's very weak on facts and surprisingly not strategic at these types of public events. She's all-over-the-place. I only hope she holds more of these meetings.

So, I'm rambling- back to the Governor. There are many good candidates on the GOP side- State Senator David Hann and Representative Marty Siefert would be my favorites. Night and Day in their delivery of the GOP message- the former is cerebral, highly articulate and always calm in his persuasion- the latter is just downright funny and entertaining. I really like Representatives Paul Kohl and Laura Brod too- big fans of both, but I think they're both pretty young. Of course if Hann decides to run it will open up all sorts of fun in our local political landscape.

As I've said- I think we have people on the side of smaller government- at least on the side of questioning the judgement of big-government liberals. I also see activists chomping-at-the-bit to work for principled candidates and try to steer the ship off the course of mealy-mouthed mediocrity- if only the party can figure out how to harness that energy....the time clock is ticking.

Off the Top of My Head

2009-06-02T10:41:00.003-05:00

My blogging is light these days- newborn twins combined with a Minnesota summer.

Also, I have so much to say and yet nothing to say- does that make sense? I can't seen to get my thoughts together. This is all I can offer:

Obama's Date Nights- Dude you're the President of the United States, not some suburban dad. Quit being so arrogant (shutting down streets in NYC to see a play and eat in The Village) and your safety is critical to our nation (taking a Gulfstream jet?)

Tim Geithner being laughed at by Chinese students. He's a joke here and abroad.

The proposed Government-ownership of GM 67% of Americans oppose it. Want to save U.S. Automakers? Get rid of CAFE standards and let them build cars that people want to buy. Personally I'd like something that's not a mini-van or a huge SUV, but can still seat 6 people, haul stuff and look cool. Even the Prius is touting that "it's larger"-- I LOVE their new commercial ("Harmony" Ad Campaign- brilliant) and sing along to it every time it's on.

Conan O'Brien's now hosting "The Tonight Show" (I'm up feeding babies) Juvenile- the show no longer has an ounce of the sophistication and wit of Johnny Carson...I feel very old at 35.

More soon.

Jury Duty

2009-05-29T21:01:00.003-05:00

Light blogging this week- a lot going on!

I've been called up for Jury Duty twice- down in Atlanta. Both times I was dismissed. One time I made it all the way to questioning. The case was about a male professor who hit a female student at Emory with his car and she was suing for chiropractor bills many moons after the accident. They found out my husband was a resident physician in training and I mentioned my skepticism about certain aspects of chiropractic care and that was enough to dismiss me. Can you imagine if I would have said something like: "I believe that weight should be given to the fact that this was a white male professor hitting a minority female student"?

I just read this great article at National Review online which makes the case that Supreme Court nominee Sotomayor isn't even qualified to sit on a jury with her stated biases- let alone on the Supreme Court. If Republicans were wise, they'd fight this nomination, tie Sotomayor's ridiculous bigoted statements to Obama's views on race and then debate this thing. I'm not holding my breath.

And a quick FYI- here is the simple oath of office for our Supreme Court Justices:

"I, [NAME], do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will administer justice without respect to persons, and do equal right to the poor and to the rich, and that I will faithfully and impartially discharge and perform all the duties incumbent upon me as [TITLE] under the Constitution and laws of the United States. So help me God."

Obviously Obama would be unfit to hold that office...as would most Democrats these days.

Cult of Personality

2009-05-26T14:01:00.003-05:00

At the grocery store today- here's what I see:

Gag. Newsweek- here's the article.

From the article:

In Obama's universe, strength and subtlety are not mutually exclusive. He may make the wrong call—things could go disastrously awry, at home or abroad, on his watch—but one of the most interesting and underappreciated things to emerge from these early days is how comfortable Obama is in making the call. He savors exercising the power of the presidency. Woodrow Wilson described the office as "the vital place of action in the system." From the financial sector to the automobile industry to terrorism, Obama has personally taken on those institutional characteristics. He is the action.

At decorting store Homegoods I see this:

Mary sees the same thing at her Homegoods in Atlanta...because we suburban women can't wait to hang a huge picture of the annointed one next to our botanical prints and transferware plates. Must be for the dorm rooms.

Gag again.

And Let the Extreme Media Bias Begin

2009-05-26T09:46:00.008-05:00

Obama has picked his Supreme Court nominee. I read the Chicago Tribune piece this morning on Sonia Sotomayer and was immediately asking: "What are her politics?" (like I don't know). The piece was so positive and beaming- like a high school newspaper touting the merits of the lead in the school play. Even the headline was juvenile: "Plucky Manhattan jurist Sotomayer finds spotlight appealing, even under brightest lights"

Here's what I learned in the piece:

The Manhattan-born Sotomayor's humble upbringing has shaped her personality — vibrant and colorful, and so different from the Bronx projects where she grew up in a working-class existence in a home with a drab yellow kitchen. She is a food-loving baseball buff as likely to eat a hot dog at a street corner stand as she is to sit down for a lengthy meal at a swanky Manhattan restaurant.

Sotomayor describes herself as "extraordinarily intense and very fun-loving."

She's also heralded as a hero for presumably single-handedly bringing "baseball back to the nation" during the 1995 players' strike.

She's just like Obama! She's just like one of us! Yea! Hurrah! What a great, fun lady- I'd like to have a drink with her.

Shoddy, WORTHLESS journalism. I'm left with no idea of what her politics are-- the word liberal, the word left, the word ideology for that matter-never used in the piece. As far as I can tell she's a centrist.

Contrast that piece with what the Tribune (below) wrote about Bush nominee Samuel Alito where the word "conservative" is used to describe the judge eight times- it's even in the headline! "Alito has a record of steady conservatism, reputation for civility". We are left with absolutely no doubt that Alito will rule like a conservative ideologue- even those at his high school say so!

Here's the article from the Chicago Tribune Oct 31, 2005 (day of the annoucement)

COPYRIGHT 2005 Chicago Tribune
Byline: Andrew Zajac WASHINGTON _ The 1972 Princeton University yearbook contains this self-authored entry for senior Samuel Alito: "Sam intends to go law school and eventually to warm a seat on the Supreme Court."

It was partly collegiate whimsy, but Alito was not alone in this high estimation of himself; his faculty adviser also saw in him a distinguished judicial career. And since then, his professional life as a lawyer and judge has been one long march forward for the son of an immigrant who is known for his unflinching but low-volume conservatism.

The 55-year-old federal appeals court judge nominated Monday by President Bush to replace Justice Sandra Day O'Connor is perceived as a steady conservative with a pedigree as a Reagan-era government lawyer and a reputation for civility.

He holds in many respects the precise kinds of credentials that conservatives found lacking in Bush's initial pick, White House counsel Harriet Miers. Alito is a son of the Ivy League, Yale Law, a former federal appeals court clerk, and a longstanding member of the so-called judicial monastery that Bush earlier said he wanted to reach beyond to shape the court.

While Alito easily won confirmation to the federal appeals court in Newark, N.J., in 1990, this confirmation hearing promises to be a passionate fight over issues like abortion, where Alito has favored strong restrictions. It is one of many issues where Alito leans rightward, long endearing him to conservatives, but sure to inflame liberals during the confirmation process.

Until now, Alito has had an accomplished and largely non-controversial career. But because he is replacing O'Connor, the court's swing vote on many social issues, Alito's opinions will be combed line by line for deeper meaning, his speeches examined and his life story told and retold.

And he does have one apparent conflict-of-interest on his record. In 2002, a plaintiff complained after Alito issued an opinion favoring The Vanguard Group Inc. while owning hundreds of thousands of dollars of the firm's mutual funds. At the time, Alito said he believed he had done nothing improper.

But he had told the Senate Judiciary Committee at his confirmation hearing a dozen years earlier that he would not rule on cases involving Vanguard.

Alito was nominated to the bench by the first President Bush in a batch of judicial candidates that included David Souter, who was under consideration for the appeals court slot that would serve as his springboard to the Supreme Court.

Now, in the ideological calculus of the high court, conservatives are betting on Alito, as O'Connor's replacement, to steer the court to the right.

Alito has been dubbed "Scalito" because of a perceived ideological resemblance to Justice Antonin Scalia, one of the most conservative members of the court, who, coincidentally, also was born in Trenton.

The parallels are not complete, since, among other things, Alito's manner and bearing are mild, particularly when compared to the often combative Scalia. But Alito's lengthy track record on the bench is consistently conservative, though friends and associates insist it has not been compiled through the pursuit of an ideological agenda.

Friends describe Alito as reserved but friendly, with a dry, self-deprecating sense of humor. In introducing his two children after being nominated by President Bush on Monday, Alito described them as the "pride of my life," adding that "they have made sure that being a judge has never gone to my head."

"He literally does not have an enemy in the world, unless it's some of the criminals he's prosecuted," said Charles Cooper, a Washington attorney who worked with Alito at the Justice Department. Alito also served as U.S. attorney in Newark before becoming a judge.

For all of his likability and self-effacement, Alito is not without ambition.

In a brief phone conversation Monday, Alito's 90-year-old mother, Rose, said her son was let down at not being nominated last month when Bush picked Miers. "He wanted it, definitely," Rose Alito said, adding that she could tell by "his attitude, he was disappointed" at being overlooked.

Alito grew up in a household that prized learning, with both of his parents trained as teachers. His sole sibling, Rosemary Alito, 52, is a well-regarded employment lawyer in New Jersey.

His late father, Samuel Alito Sr., was the first director of the New Jersey Office of Legislative Services, which provides staffing and research for the state legislature.

Born in Italy, the elder Alito was a skilled researcher with a reputation as an honest broker amid partisan statehouse turf fights, recalled Albert Porroni, the current director of the office. Samuel Alito Sr. was also an expert in the arcana of drawing legislative district borders, and his mastery of the subject in a federal court case would eventually give his son's legal career a boost.

Alito attended suburban public schools in Hamilton Township, a middle-class enclave outside Trenton.

At Steinert High School, Alito was valedictorian, editor of the school paper, a member of the state finalist debate team and a member of the track team.

He was a teacher's dream, tearing through Steinbeck, Hemingway and Dickens and requiring additional assignments to stay challenged, said Elaine Tarr, his 10th grade English teacher. "He never ever did anything slipshod. Never," said Tarr. "If it required a Piper Cub, he'd give you a Boeing 747."

Alito seemed preternaturally free of adolescent angst and he wasn't caught up in the social turmoil of the times. "He was always very rational, very emotionally in control," Tarr said. Even then, Tarr said, "I think he had a conservative point of view."

At Princeton, Alito was a debater and honor student who used his ability to read Italian to help craft a senior thesis on Italy's constitutional court.

While many of his classmates were caught up in protests and challenges to authority typical of the Vietnam era, the clean-cut Alito was a reserved deliberate and focused on his studies, said Walter Murphy, his faculty adviser.

"He pondered. He looked at the pros. He looked at the cons," recalled Murphy, who recognized judicial temperament when he saw it. "I made a prediction" to him, said Murphy, now retired and living in New Mexico. "One day Sam was going to be a judge.

" Following graduation from Princeton, Alito entered Yale Law School and joined the Army Reserve. He left Yale with a law degree in 1975 and stayed in the Reserve until 1980, when he was honorably discharged with the rank of captain.

Alito began his legal career as a clerk to federal appeals court judge Leonard Garth and subsequently served as an assistant U.S. attorney in New Jersey before moving to the Justice Department.

Garth, a centrist Republican appointed by Richard Nixon, said he selected Alito out of perhaps 400 applicants in part because he remembered the thoughtful testimony of the elder Sam Alito in a reapportionment case. "The name struck a bell," Garth, now 85 and partly retired, said in a recent telephone interview. "I knew I wanted to interview him."

"I've had over 80 (clerks), and he pretty much tops the list," Garth said, adding that Alito also tops the list of judges in the circuit. "I think he is the brightest member of my court," Garth said.

Like others close to Alito, Garth said he has an economy of style, both in speaking and writing. "He's very reserved," Garth said. "He doesn't say anything unnecessary."

In a May interview with the Newark Star-Ledger, Alito described his sense of judicial boundaries. "Judges should be judges," he told the newspaper. "They shouldn't be legislators, they shouldn't be administrators."

Alito's wife, Martha, is a librarian. The couple's daughter, Laura, is a high school student and well-regarded competitive swimmer. Their son, Philip, is a college student.

An ardent fan of the New York Giants and the Philadelphia Phillies, Alito attended a Phillies' fantasy camp and has displayed a baseball card of himself in a uniform. An applicant for a law clerkship was startled by a nearly life-size photo of Phillies Hall of Fame third baseman Mike Schmidt in Alito's chambers.

"He looked at me and said, `Do you know who that is?,'" recalled Cheryl Stanton.

Stanton blanked on the name but remembered that "he's one of the greatest third basemen of all time."

"He seemed tickled that I knew that," said Stanton, who was hired and worked for Alito in 1997 and 1998 and now is in private practice.

Like John Roberts Jr., who was sworn in as chief justice on Sept. 29, Alito earned his political and legal bona fides in President Reagan's Justice Department.

From 1981 until 1985, he was an assistant to the solicitor general, writing briefs, doing research and trying a dozen cases before the Supreme Court.

"The main thing that drew me to him was that he was a beautiful writer, not just the clarity but the aptness of expression," said Charles Fried, who served as solicitor general from 1985 through 1989 and now is a professor at Harvard Law School. The solicitor general's office represents the administration before the Supreme Court.Later, Alito spent two years in Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel, where he provided legal advice to various administration agencies.

From 1987 until 1990, he served as U.S. Attorney in Newark, earning plaudits for his pursuit of mobsters and white-collar criminals.

When nominated to the appellate bench by the first President Bush in early 1990, Alito was enthusiastically endorsed by New Jersey senators Frank Lautenberg and Bill Bradley, both Democrats, and was approved by a unanimous voice vote in a Democrat-controlled Senate.

Bradley told the Judiciary Committee that Alito excelled in every legal job he'd held and inspired colleagues in the U.S. Attorney's office "with a low-key sense of professionalism." Bradley also said that he was pleased "to back him 100 percent.

Right-leaning groups are unabashed in their endorsement of many of Alito's rulings in the 15 years since then, particularly on religious expression.

"He has always ranked near the top for us," said Jan LaRue, chief counsel for the Washington-based Concerned Women for America, an organization whose stated goal is to protect and promote biblical values.

Among the decisions she cited: Alito's support for a Pennsylvania law requiring a woman to inform her husband before an abortion; his decision upholding Christmas displays on public property if secular and other symbols are there, too; and his support for an evangelical children's group that wanted to hold meetings in a public school.

Alito associates say that while he frequently comes down on the conservative side in his rulings, he does not do so as the result of an agenda. For example, Alito, unlike some federal judges, is not known for making a point of picking conservative clerks.

"My politics would be perceived as far to the left of his," said Mitu Gulati, who clerked for Alito in 1996-97 and described his one-time boss as "the fairest person I've ever met."

Gulati, a visiting professor at Duke University, and others who see a more complex jurist than merely a reliably conservative thinker, point to two episodes they say demonstrate Alito's independence.

In 2003, Alito headed a judicial committee that pushed to allow lawyers to bolster their cases by citing unpublished opinions issued by judges. "He's not a believer in the imperial judiciary," Gulati said.

Clark Lombardi, who clerked for Alito in 1999 and 2000, said that following the law sometimes will lead Alito to places that would disappoint some conservatives.

In 2000, for example, Alito dissented in a case in which the 3rd Circuit ruled against a phone company worker who asked for more time to pursue an employment discrimination case.

"In interpreting a statute ... we are not free to disregard Congress' approach in favor of one that seems better to us," he wrote in arguing that Congress intended to give grievants like the plaintiff, Madhat Zubi, four years instead of two years to pursue their claims.

Nan Aron, executive director of the left-leaning Alliance for Justice, finds none of this comforting. "He is a known ideologue who places many of our rights in great jeopardy," said Aron.

Aron pointed out that Alito appears to have a restrictive view of abortion rights and said that his dissent in a 1997 case, in which he argued that Congress did not have the power to restrict machine gun sales under the Constitution's Commerce Clause, suggests a limited view of the legislature's power to remedy social ills.

Jurisprudence aside, there is one known occasion on which Alito has been accused of an ethical lapse. In 2002, he issued an opinion in a 3-0 ruling dismissing a case brought by a woman suing Vanguard Group. At the time, Alito held between $390,000 and $930,000 of Vanguard's mutual funds, according to news accounts.

White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said the case came before Alito due to computer error.

"The case should not have been sent to him," Perino said.

But Perino could not explain why Alito continued to participate in the case once he was aware that it involved Vanguard. "That's all I have for you," Perino said, adding that Alito has a record of unquestioned integrity.

Alito was quoted at the time as saying that he did not think he had a conflict because Vanguard managed $600 billion and the $170,000 at stake in the case was trivial by comparison.

In a questionnaire he filled out for the Senate Judiciary Committee when he was nominated to the bench in 1990, Alito had listed his Vanguard holdings and wrote that "I would ... disqualify myself from any cases involving the Vanguard companies ... ." ___

(Chicago Tribune correspondents Mike Dorning and Cam Simpson contributed to this report.) ___ (c) 2005, Chicago Tribune. Visit the Chicago Tribune on the Internet at http://www.chicagotribune.com/ Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services.

Why am I suprised? Why? There are other obvious problems when comparing the two pieces, a dissertation could be written....

Do you think the MSM will pick up on the video of Sotomayer saying that the courts are "where policy is made"-- do you think? Yeah, I don't think so either.

So He's Picking a Conservative?

2009-05-24T18:01:00.002-05:00

President Obama talking about his search for a Supreme Court nominee:

"I want somebody who has the intellectual fire power, but also a little bit of a common touch and has a practical sense of how the world works,” Obama told C-SPAN political editor Steve Scully.

"A practical sense of how the world works?"-- like you, Mr. President? He always says what people want to hear and yet has absolutely no connection to the words he speaks.

Moving to the Left Won't Win Us One Vote

2009-05-24T13:22:00.003-05:00

Colin Powell still thinks he's a Republican and I don't get it....

He was on "Face the Nation" this morning and said that he supported Obama because he was "the most qualified to lead". More qualified than your fellow moderate and Republican critic John McCain? Come on. I mean- what Republican would have earned your support over Obama in 2008?

Hey Colin- newsflash- you can't wholeheartedly endorse the most liberal Senator in Washington and still be a Republican. You can't say that someone should be our President- someone who doesn't share one iota of our platform- and then say you're still a Republican.

Why would you want to be in our party anyway when you obviously have so much disdain for the base? It doesn't make sense.

More Money

2009-05-22T08:54:00.001-05:00

Here we go again....

City Manager Scott Neal gets his annual performance bonus. (3 hours 30 minutes into the linked video of this week's Council meeting).

He's presented as some saint for not taking a salary increase in these tough times, but the city negates that good will by granting him a performance bonus. Who- who- who is getting performance bonuses in 2009? I know who- the highest paid government employees- that's who. It looks so bad- it is so bad!

So a $4,723 total bonus to ensure that this "poor guy" doesn't take any cut in pay year over year. OK- so that's not a lot of money right? It's the principle, it's the principle. Our suburban City Manager already makes more than the Governor of this state- $20,000 more.

Bravo to Councilmembers Phil Young and Jon Duckstad for voting against this merit pay provision and for generally questioning merit pay bonuses for public employees.

It annoys me to no end that this guy sits up with the City Council at the meetings, it annoys me that he gives the "State of the City" address, it annoys me that he has a taxpayer funded blog to promote his agenda on the city website, it's really annoys me that he gets a $6,000 a year car allowance (is it 1990?) when he lives in Minneapolis. He has way too much power. I'm confident- completely confident- that you could replace him for about $80,000 a year- especially in this economy when so many great people are out looking for employment. Neal makes $140,000 a year- this is not his total compensation package.

I simply can't understand why- when they're laying off six employees from the city staff- that the majority of the Council would give him this bonus.

I take some comfort in knowing that Mr. Neal is a career-government employee and that EP is just a stop along his way to more money in a nice, comfortable public-sector job. If only the City wouldn't work so hard to make it so appealing for him to stay.

The Lies of Handy Manny

2009-05-21T10:58:00.003-05:00

So I'm zoning out the other day and have Disney's "Handy Manny" on the tube- the girls are watching it. I rarely pay attention to the content of the cartoons that are usually playing in the background, but for some reason I was taking in the plot of this particular episode.

Manny is a Mr. Fix-It with a box of talking tools that help him go around his town and fix things. It's deep.

This episode Manny needs to help Mr Kumar install a big moving teacup sign outside his store.... This sign would never meet local zoning codes- it's enormous!

They get to the shop and Manny realizes there is no outdoor electrical outlet therefore he simply can't install the sign. No can do. It's a hot day and Manny looks at the sun and realizes that solar power is the solution. He buys a solar panel at the local hardware store, puts it on the roof and installs the 1-story teacup at the top of the building. Hooray!!

His tools say "we never would have been able to put up Mr. Kumar's moving sign if it wasn't for solar power"

Manny says "that's true".

No- Manny-that's a lie. Perhaps you need to go back to trade school and learn how to install an outdoor electrical outlet.

Manny also has a "Green Team" video out--

Ugh. Liberal cartoon indoctrination- a daily thing.

It Just Keeps Getting Worse

2009-05-21T10:08:00.000-05:00

From Mary:

Rep. Alan Grayson was standing in the middle of Disney World when it hit him: What Americans really need is a week of paid vacation.

So on Thursday, the Florida Democrat will introduce the Paid Vacation Act — legislation that would be the first to make paid vacation time a requirement under federal law.

The bill would require companies with more than 100 employees to offer a week of paid vacation for both full-time and part-time employees after they’ve put in a year on the job. Three years after the effective date of the law, those same companies would be required to provide two weeks of paid vacation, and companies with 50 or more employees would have to provide one week.

The idea: More vacation will stimulate the economy through fewer sick days, better productivity and happier employees.

“There’s a reason why Disney World is the happiest place on Earth: The people who go there are on vacation,” said Grayson, a freshman who counts Orlando as part of his home district. “Honestly, as much as I appreciate this job and as much as I enjoy it, the best days of my life are and always have been the days I’m on vacation.” Read more: "

Alan Grayson to introduce Paid Vacation Act - Erika Lovley - POLITICO.com" - http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0509/22794.html#ixzz0G9SatnO7&A

Socialist Moron.

GOP Nursery

2009-05-20T18:11:00.005-05:00

By popular demand- pictures of the boys' room.

What's a GOP Activist to do besides have an elephant-themed nursery? We have a small upstairs bedroom with double doors (weird room) that we had painted a lime green (which I never liked) and used as a TV/toy/junk room off our smallish master bedroom. I was going to paint it something more "boyish"-- but found the Pottery Barn sheets and decided to stick with the classic blue and green.

The girls had a "vintage lambie shabby chic" theme with lots of 1950's lamb chotchkies off of ebay- pale blue walls and lots of pink accents. I had a hard time finding non-jungle/non-circus-themed elephants....but did find these awesome Frankoma vintage 1981/1985 Reagan/Bush mugs online...thanks to a fellow Prepublican's tip.

The blue cribs were Jane and Kathleen's (I was convinced I'd have at least one boy out of that pair). If you look closely- you can see teeth marks on both of them. The rocking chair was also from their room- as were the vintage white chenille bumpers and changing table baskets. That's"reuse and recycle"GOP-style...The chair has matching curtains which I kept in the girls' room-- went with Plantation Shutters for some "architecture" on really ugly casement windows (a Minnesota curse-- oh, I miss double-hungs).

Elephant sheets, elephant rug (floor sample- score!) and elephant lamp all from Pottery Barn. Awesome blue trimmed retro shade pendant (thanks for the suggestion Mary) is from Restoration Hardware Kids.

Changing Table is an el-cheapo from Target- found the blue super soft "minky" fabric cover at Marshalls.
John S. McCain the moderate elephant is in his Navy Finery- and a print from online in a Target frame hangs above the dresser (scale is way-off- there is no cute elephant art online!!) Holding out for some cute plates to flank...

My very talented MIL designed and made the adorable twin-elephant quilts. I love them.

And more hand-crafted cute from my sister who made these adorable elephant monogram plaques with ribbon and button detail...SO CUTE!!

Tom and Mike will soon outgrow this baby room, but it's been fun to decorate with a bit of old and new. Our party mascot is the best-- can you imagine a nursery filled with jackasses??

Poor Jeep

2009-05-20T16:37:00.002-05:00

I understand that this is old news, forgive me. I've been a little distracted lately.

I heard on the radio today that the Obama administration cut the ad budget for Chrysler and couldn't believe it. Are we living in a communist country?

Who do they think they are?

Obama has never worked a day in his life in the business world yet thinks he knows how to fix a car company.

End of Session

2009-05-20T09:58:00.004-05:00

Liberals are out there whining about what Governor Pawlenty did to them- made them look like the bunch of fools that they are.

They are whining that there's been no public input...um, you ran around the state gathering public input for months and hint: you are publicly elected officials who represent public input.

Our household breathes a sigh of relief that we bought at least one more year of not paying one of the highest tax rates in the nation. Our Minnesota tax bills are already absolutely outrageous and both the DFL and GOP wanted even more of our money. The DFL wanted another $6,000 or so (not including their mortgage deduction plan which would have added another huge amount of money to that number).

And the Governor wanted another $5,000 or so-- Little known fact, Governor Pawlenty wanted to raise the "Provider Tax" on physicians to 2% of gross billings and dump it into the general fund, so when people say there were no tax hikes in his original budget proposal, they were wrong. There is no "provider tax" on lawyers- of course. Not on dentists, or accountants or any other profession- just doctors.

So we are able to keep $10,000+ of our money.

The interesting thing is- is that even if they got their way- and got that money- it still wouldn't be enough to support even one welfare mom with one child in this state for one year. Think about that. There are only so many "rich" people to take more from and even if they all got their way- it still wouldn't do the trick. The spending is simply, factually unsustainable.

The sad part about this session is that there was so little talk of reform from both sides. Of course I blame the DFL for this because putting a budget together months ahead, instead of days ahead, could have led to some of this conversation.

No education reform conversation. We can do so much better in this state, we should be leading the nation in a conversation about education funding and innovation to have the best system in the country. Redefine public education as we know it. It can be done and we could get all-sides on board. No real healthcare reform conversation. No welfare reform conversation. Nothng.

The DFL just wants to dump more money at problems and tax more to get the money. It's really sad. These are supposed to be smart people, right?

"Tax the rich"-- that's all that progressives have right now-- "they wouldn't let us tax the rich, that's why we failed"

More on Daniel Webster

2009-05-19T11:04:00.002-05:00

The Star Tribune has another article today about the change of name from Webster Elementary to Barack and Michelle Obama Service Learning Elementary over in St. Paul- the School Board votes tonight.

Because the school followed the prescribed process, board member Anne Carroll said she'll likely vote to approve the change. She said when one board member asked her, "Well, what if they had come up with Ronald Reagan High School?" she replied, "Well, I would hold my nose" and vote for it, if they followed the process.

"If [Obama] turns out to be the most awful president on the planet, and we're embarrassed to have his name associated with us, then we'll change it back," she said.

My sister reported on this farse a while I was out-- the most stunning finding to me is that a bunch of elementary school students are the ones forcing this change (led by their liberal principal of course).

"Students, staff and St. Paul residents were invited to cast ballots Thursday. The Obama name came away with roughly 60 percent of the 854 votes cast."

Staff voted slightly in favor of keeping the Webster name, 57-43

All St. Paul residents were invited to vote, but only 59 did. That group slightly favored the Webster name (34-25).

Parents of Webster students favored Obama, 30-12. That means that the other 653 votes were cast by students (I've sent these number to Acorn and am awaiting confirmation).

Why don't we just let all students across the state re-name their schools with 2 names on the ballot?

SAMPLE BALLOT:
Vote for one:
Eden Lake Elementary or
Jonas Brother Learning Academy

What a joke.

Falling in Love Again

2009-05-15T20:05:00.005-05:00

"Falling in Love Again, What's a girl to do? I can't help it."

There was a man in my life who I wanted to depend on. I wanted him to protect me from the liberal agenda in this blue state and I was secure in the knowledge we would do so. I gave him my time, I gave him my loyalty.

My mother tried to warn me off..."I don't like him, I don't know why, I just don't".

I defended him at every turn, "but mother, how can you not like him?" I didn't understand, I couldn't understand. He was my Governor and I loved him.

And then it happened- that day in April of 2007 when I caught him. I caught him with the Star Tribune. A fawning editorial written about his proposed Climate Change Advisory Group and I knew- right then- it was over.

He told us we should have listened to Jimmy Carter and then he criss-crossed the nation to support another "Cap and Tax" Republican (who always seemed to apologize for being a Republican) in his bid for the White House.

And then he was dumped. Dumped for an Alaska babe. Good. I was glad. Now he knew how it felt to be lonely and abandoned and confused-- trying to figure out how something could go so wrong.

Friends would invite me to functions where he was making an appearance- but I'd refuse to go.

"Who cares?" I'd choke out between my sobs, "I never want to see him again".

But all that changed today. Governor Pawlenty has won back this conservative's heart in one press release.

Profile in Courage

2009-05-15T09:06:00.003-05:00

Finally, a politician with the chutzpah to stop the spending.

From today's Pioneer Press:

If the Legislature won't balance the budget, Gov. Tim Pawlenty will do it all by himself.
And he will do it without a special session, a government shutdown or a tax increase.

Pawlenty said Thursday he will use vetoes and his power to single-handedly reduce spending to slash up to $3 billion from Minnesota's next two-year budget.

"I'm here to let all Minnesotans know that this year, politics as usual around this place is over," he said at a Capitol news conference.

"There will be no special session. There will be no government shutdown. And there will be a budget that lives within the means of Minnesota's taxpayers and the revenues available to the state of Minnesota."

The governor's action came after Democratic-Farmer-Labor majorities in the House and Senate passed budget bills that leave a $3 billion gap between spending and the amount of revenue the state will collect over the next two years.

The Legislature passed budget bills that spend $34 billion during that period, when the state is expected to collect $31 billion.

He said he would make the biggest cuts in publicly subsidized health care, welfare, social services, state aid to cities and counties and "probably a little bit in higher education."

A "significant" number of state employees will be laid off, he said. And he will veto "numerous" projects in the $300 million public works bill the Legislature passed Wednesday.

He said he would try to protect public schools from state aid cuts, but he indicated some school payments would be delayed.

DFL legislators were incensed.

"This is a democracy. It's not a monarchy," said Senate Majority Leader Larry Pogemiller, DFL-Minneapolis.

House Speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher, DFL-Minneapolis, called Pawlenty "Governor Go-It-Alone" and accused him of a "little bullying." She demanded he tell the public what he's going to cut.

"There will be no public input. There will just be a governor alone with unelected people whispering in his ear of what to cut and what not to cut," she said.

She asked Pawlenty to tell legislators today what he plans to cut, and she said she would hold public hearings on those cuts.

The DFL is laughable- they had a multi-city Misery Tour to get public input back in February an then waited two more months to get a budget passed to negotiate from....It's done. If you can't balance a budget without raising taxes in this economy...then it will be done for you. Like a bunch of teenager's with mommy and daddy's credit card spending away.

I look forward to seeing how this all plays out.

Cam-e-NOT!

2009-05-14T08:54:00.012-05:00

The Obama's Hosted A "Poetry Jam" at the White House on Tuesday night.

Mrs Obama said: "I have wanted to do this from day one, the notion of standing in this room and hearing some poetry."

Racing with speed

Needing reform

Our healthcare in jeopardy

By July we'll have Change!

The press is so excited about her asymetrical top, but look at those bottoms. Who is dressing her?

Trying SO hard to be the new Kennedys with poetry and designer fashions at the White House. How many more years of this??

Coyote Ugly

2009-05-12T21:07:00.000-05:00

I'm a bit freaked out- we had a large coyote in our backyard about 9pm last night. It howled a really weird howl and was about 20 feet from the house right by our outdoor playset. Don't have a picture- Todd turned on the lights and banged on the windows and he eventually jumped the chain link fence across the back of our lot, back into the woods near Purgatory Creek. He wasn't in a huge hurry either.

We purposely bought in our neighborhood because it was one that allowed fences to be built on the lots. We like our privacy and we had a large dog who wasn't very friendly to strangers. We had to put him to sleep 3 months after we moved in when he bit a good friend of mine. It was the most awful thing, but it had to be done.

We have lots of wildlife- ducks, muskrats, owls, etc- that have come into the yard- we even had a large buck trot right down the middle of our street a couple of years ago- but this is a first and it really scares me. We have a pretty steep lot down to the creek (unusable land for us, but provides a lot of tree coverage)....it took some effort to climb up that slope and jump a fence- he must have been chasing something.

A neighbor in an adjacent neighborhood had a coyote in their yard last summer in the early evening and Todd saw one crossing the street on Sunnybrook Road about a year ago, another friend saw one crossing Franlo Road recently-- seems obvious that we have a problem. I enjoy Minnesota wildlife (well except Canadian Geese) but when they're bold enough to jump fences-- it needs to be addressed. Also- these coyotes are new to the area- we didn't move to their territory- they're moving to ours.

A resident wrote a letter to the editor last year in the EP News about this problem when somebody saw a coyote jump her fence (she has two small dogs).

According to my research around the web and a phone call to the DNR- it's up to local law enforcement agencies to deal with the problem- leaving a wide variety of solutions depending on where you live. They are not a protected animal- so it's legal to have them killed.

In Red Wing, MN- the City voted a couple years ago to immediately trap and kill 10-20 coyotes that were in residential neighborhoods.

In Blaine- the City paid $1,500 to have five coyotes removed from a park.

In Minnetonka- the City Police department is keeping track of sightings and encounters. They encourage residents to call 911 if they encounter an aggressive coyote.

In Plymouth- they receive 6 calls a week from residents about coyotes in their yards.

In Madison, WI they're calling in the feds for Madison neighborhoods being affected by coyotes.

In Eagan- two coyotes attacked a small dog (who had been attacked twice previously by coyotes), that had to be euthanized this March. One of their Animal Control officers said this about the incident:

“Coyotes have become well adapted to suburban living, and are a sign that Eagan has a healthy ecosystem that can easily support all types of animals,” she wrote.

Oh, that's nice. The suburbs of the Twin Cities are not the natural habitat of these predators- according to a WCCO article from March-

Wildlife experts said the number of coyotes has increased in the suburbs because their comfort level has increased. As humans continue to build in their habitat, coyotes are coming to us for food.

The City of EP seems to take a laid-back approach- per it's website:

Typically, coyotes are opportunistic hunters and will take advantage of the easiest and most available food sources. This includes many different types of food ranging from garbage to small mammals and birds. Unfortunately, theymay infrequently also prey on domestic cats or small dogs so it’s always a good idea to monitor your pet while it's outside, even if you aren’t aware of anything in your area.

Although coyotes can be a threat to domestic pets, they are not a threat to humans. In fact, according to the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR), there has never been a documented coyote attack on a human in Minnesota. Statistics from around the country show people are far more likely to be bitten by a domestic dog than to be bitten by a coyote.

Well- that's comforting. Of course coyotes have attacked people in other parts of the country where they are overpopulated. Just a year ago in residential areas of California- coyotes attacked three toddlers in three separate incidences including dragging children from their yards and a local playground.

I decided to call the City today. I left a message and quickly got a call back from a gentleman in Animal Control this morning- he tells me that they get these coyote sighting calls, but they don't do anything with the information. There's no plan by the city to address the problem. I ask if I can shoot the coyote if it's on my property- "No"- Can I shoot him with a bee-bee gun? "No, you can't shoot a gun in Eden Prairie"-- "I can't shoot a gun in Eden Prairie? Sure I can."-- "Not without a permit"- "Oh, a permit to shoot the coyote?"- "Yes, and you won't get one- you need like 80 acres of land". (Actually it's 40 acres).

I ask about how many calls they get a month- he guesses about 12. For a full year- that's a lot of sightings- and let's assume that many other people don't even call.

The guy tries to compare the coyotes to rattlesnakes, etc- I cut him off "A snake is not the same as a coyote and I see that your website says they haven't attacked humans in MN- but that doesn't mean they haven't in other states"-- the guy concurs and gives me another name of somebody to call at City Hall. Okay....I left that person a message this afternoon and I'll keep you posted on what he says.

An interesting exercise so far- I've learned that the City of Eden Prairie has 1989 Ordinance and a permit process to discharge a firearm, but isn't that negated by this last provision?

Subd. 6. Lawful Defense of Person, Property or Family. Nothing herein shall be construed to prohibit any firing of a gun, pistol or other weapon when done in lawful defense of person, property or family or by law enforcement personnel executing their official duties.

Oh- that pesky 2nd Amendment. I have no intention of sitting on my back deck with a double-barrel shotgun looking for critters to shoot- but if one of these predators comes in my backyard again when my kids are outside, I'd like to know my recourse-- besides hanging my Marc Jacobs coyote trimmed winter coat along my back fenceline....

Seems to me that the DNR needs to step in with an overall plan to control the growing coyote population in the suburbs and knock-off the P.C. attitude that these predators aren't a problem.

Do As I Say...Not As I Do Part 2

2009-05-11T14:01:00.003-05:00

A belated "Bravo" to Brenda Ritzen, Co-Creator of the Eden Prairie Schools Parents Forum for this recent commentary in the EP News on Superintendent Melissa Krull's compensation.

From the piece:

Two weeks ago there was a commentary in the Eden Prairie News about City Manager Scott Neal’s compensation.

The argument was made that at a time when many of our citizens are freezing or decreasing wages, we should not be increasing compensation for our public employees, especially considering some of the perks included in Mr. Neal’s contract.

The same argument could be made regarding the Eden Prairie School Superintendent, Dr. Melissa Krull.

Dr. Krull could potentially receive on average approximately $225,000 per year.

I sure hope some of these active parents will field a school board candidate- goodness knows there's discontent with Jim Mortenson- one of the Board Members up for re-election this fall. The guy who made the proposal to move public comments from the beginning of school board meetings to the end...a true proponent for open government I'd say!

I support a major consolidation of state education resources by drastically cutting administrative costs by consolidating school districts while mantaning more active, powerful local school boards. If Krull alone is taking in that much money in one Minnesota school district then think about how much money we spend on administration when Minnesota has:

"339 independent school districts, three intermediate districts, five integration districts, 17 education districts, four tribal schools, 20 cooperative districts, 9 telecommunications districts, and 136 charter schools."

But- hey- that's just me. With the Teacher's Union promoting the continued lie that more funding = lower class sizes vs. more bureaucracy- I doubt many would buy into such a radical change to the way we fund School Districts.

I continue to be amazed by the fact that public-sector employees continue to receive raises year after year in spite of a bad economy. Obviously this isn't true for everybody. I know a longtime hourly employee for the City of Eden Prairie who informed me last week that their department head is telling all employees that there is a salary freeze in place- while at the same time hiring new hourly employees at higher hourly rates than people who have been there for years.

Is there a salary freeze for hourly employees at the city? Scott Neal, City Manager, has asked departments to propose budgets with spending cuts- isn't that funny when he himself hasn't taken any cut to his $138,000 a year job?

It was my understanding that the Eden Prairie Taxpayer's Alliance had proposed salary freezes for those at the top- not those at the bottom. It's unfortunate that those at the top of the public dole have no problem taking these raises while they issue edicts to departments to cut their staffs' pay.

I'm Back

2009-05-11T12:22:00.002-05:00

Well it's been 12 days since the boys were born and I'm back to blogging. God bless Sarah Palin for being able to have a kid and be back at the Governor's desk within a few days....not me folks. As Mary said- the whole thing was kind of dramatic- I was in the ICU (just for a day or so)- and my mom came in and said I was asking about one of Obama's latest policies while on my 7th blood transfusion. I think this confirms one thing....that I am....well....nuts.

Thanks to my sister Mary for blogging- she'll have guest access to post whenever the mood strikes- I enjoyed reading all of her pieces- didn't you?

I'm going to cheat with my first few posts and just point you to things I've been reading while laid up. Little sleep isn't the best for a blogging brain- but I promise some deeper stuff soon.

I'm so happy about the beautiful- perfect weather. Sunny and 60's- my absolute favorite.

I'm excited about having two little boys too- the final names?

Michael Todd Kihne and Thomas Reagan Kihne :)

Mike is on his Boppy pillow right next to me- the tapping of keys may become a familiar sound to my little guys.