From IBDeditorials.com:

How End-Users Suffer Under Socialism

If you ever wonder why we so resist socialism, consider the latest news out of that collectivist island paradise known as Cuba.

Central planners announced this week that they were fresh out of money to buy toilet paper — yes, toilet paper — for the island’s 9 million citizens. But not to worry. A nameless official for state-run monopoly Cimex and quoted by Reuters assured that “the corporation has taken all the steps so that at the end of the year there will be an important importation of toilet paper.”

The predicament would be funny if it wasn’t so pathetic. But toilet tissue is hardly the only item Cuba is lacking. Food itself is in short supply, with red bean and chickpea rations cut by a third, according to the Miami Herald. Special hard-currency-only stores for the elites have mysteriously failed to open after last week’s “inventory,” with no explanation given.

There’s no gas, either. The Associated Press this week reported that state planners have decreed that oxen — yes, oxen — would replace tractors in the fields, a bid to conserve fuel. This, despite the fact that Cuba gets 100,000 barrels of oil a day from Hugo Chavez’s Venezuela — effectively free, because Cuba never pays its bills.

But again, not to worry: Cuban socialists say the ox represents progress because it’s so eco-friendly.

As these examples of Cuban progress roll in, CNN is presenting Cuba’s socialized health care system as “a model for health care reform in the United States,” according to a report on the cable network last week. The report credits low cost and universal coverage.

…. CNN gives little attention to the fact that hospitals in Cuba have no Band-Aids and are short on aspirin and actual medicine. Photos from TheRealCuba.com show hospitals strewn with filthy mattresses, infested with cockroaches and full of bony patients nursing ugly bedsores. The only plenty within Cuba’s universal coverage system is one of want.

…. An economic system that can’t supply its people with commodities as basic as toilet paper is no model for anyone.

Raul Castro should call in the Sheryl Crowe TP-Use Brigade. She later said she was kidding about limiting people’s to one TP sheet per wipe when she wrote:

Crow (4/19, Springfield, Tenn.): I have spent the better part of this tour trying to come up with easy ways for us all to become a part of the solution to global warming. Although my ideas are in the earliest stages of development, they are, in my mind, worth investigating. One of my favorites is in the area of forest conservation which we heavily rely on for oxygen. I propose a limitation be put on how many squares of toilet paper can be used in any one sitting. Now, I don’t want to rob any law-abiding American of his or her God-given rights, but I think we are an industrious enough people that we can make it work with only one square per restroom visit, except, of course, on those pesky occasions where 2 to 3 could be required.

I don’t believe her. There’s nothing in the context of the paragraph or the WaPo article that would make you think she is.

I also don’t believe the unending crap we hear about “free universal wonderful health care” in Cuba. Nor should anyone else.

From Phoenix:

Aug 7, 2009 / 06:53 am

At Wednesday’s awards session in Phoenix, a Massachusetts Knight’s council was awarded the Order’s 2009 Community Activities Award for their efforts in organizing a prom for 75 special needs students in and around the Pembroke, Massachusetts area.

CNA spoke with council’s Grand Knight, Kevin McKenna, who explained that for the past two years, he and his council have put together a prom night for 75 local special needs students to not only give them an opportunity to dress up and celebrate, but also to help teach the community about different disabilities children face.

McKenna and his wife, Hope, explained to CNA that they were motivated to organize the dance after realizing that other students and parents didn’t seem comfortable around their autistic daughter while she was in middle school.

McKenna presented the idea to his council, Council 6267, then spoke with other councils in the area to obtain resources, donations and volunteers.

The council received donations from restaurants, formal wear stores and a strong response from those interested in helping out. A variety of community members have had a hand in the event: National Honor Society students looking for service hours, women from Bingo nights, other councils and the Rotary Club.

McKenna explained that since the prom draws in so many community members, it serves an additional purpose: not only is it fun for the students, but it also eases the intimidation some people feel when encountering someone with a disability.

“We’ve tried to make a difference in the community around us as well as for the children who come to the prom,” he said.

“It’s amazing, he added, “you go there and see the expressions on the faces of the students and they’re having a great time.”

Parents of the students are also invited, but are treated into a sit-down pasta dinner instead of a dance. Hope McKenna explained that the dinner gives the parents time to relax and also to talk to other parents about children with similar disabilities and share information about doctors or other resources. …..

Go here for the rest of the story.

What Shawn Tully’s column at CNNMoney.com did on July 24 to expose the truth about what ObamaCare does to the coverage of those who have employer-provided health insurance (discussed yesterday at NewsBusters; at BizzyBlog), the Washington Post’s Charles Lane did on August 8 (“Undue Influence; The House Bill Skews End-of-Life Counsel”) to the myth that ObamaCare won’t have serious negative consequences for patients who begin to have serious, potentially life-ending health issues.

Mr. Lane has clearly read the bill, clearly doesn’t like what he sees, and calls it out in specific detail.

He starts out slowly by creating the straw-man argument that those “on the far right” see ObamaCare “as a plan to force everyone over 65 to sign his or her own death warrant. That’s rubbish.”

Of course it is, but so is the claim that opponents on the right or left are saying that. Even Sarah Palin’s Facebook post never mentions “euthanisia,” and Ann Althouse correctly characterizes Pailn’s reference to “death panels” as “a good and fair polemical expression if in fact life-saving care will be rationed on this basis (of what Palin described as “level of productivity in society”).”

There is plenty of reason to believe it will be, as Lane explains (bolds are mine):

….. I was not reassured to read in an Aug. 1 Post article that “Democratic strategists” are “hesitant to give extra attention to the issue by refuting the inaccuracies, but they worry that it will further agitate already-skeptical seniors.”

If Section 1233 is innocuous, why would “strategists” want to tip-toe around the subject?

Perhaps because, at least as I read it, Section 1233 is not totally innocuous.

Until now, federal law has encouraged end-of-life planning — gently. In 1990, Congress required health-care institutions (not individual doctors) to give new patients written notice of their rights to make living wills, advance directives and the like — but also required them to treat patients regardless of whether they have such documents.

….. Section 1233, however, addresses compassionate goals in disconcerting proximity to fiscal ones. Supporters protest that they’re just trying to facilitate choice — even if patients opt for expensive life-prolonging care. I think they protest too much: If it’s all about obviating suffering, emotional or physical, what’s it doing in a measure to “bend the curve” on health-care costs?

Though not mandatory, as some on the right have claimed, the consultations envisioned in Section 1233 aren’t quite “purely voluntary,” as Rep. Sander M. Levin (D-Mich.) asserts. To me, “purely voluntary” means “not unless the patient requests one.” Section 1233, however, lets doctors initiate the chat and gives them an incentive — money — to do so. Indeed, that’s an incentive to insist.

Patients may refuse without penalty, but many will bow to white-coated authority. Once they’re in the meeting, the bill does permit “formulation” of a plug-pulling order right then and there. So when Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.) denies that Section 1233 would “place senior citizens in situations where they feel pressured to sign end-of-life directives that they would not otherwise sign,” I don’t think he’s being realistic.

What’s more, Section 1233 dictates, at some length, the content of the consultation. The doctor “shall” discuss “advanced care planning, including key questions and considerations, important steps, and suggested people to talk to”; “an explanation of . . . living wills and durable powers of attorney, and their uses” (even though these are legal, not medical, instruments); and “a list of national and State-specific resources to assist consumers and their families.” The doctor “shall” explain that Medicare pays for hospice care (hint, hint).

….. Section 1233 goes beyond facilitating doctor input to preferring it. Indeed, the measure would have an interested party — the government — recruit doctors to sell the elderly on living wills, hospice care and their associated providers, professions and organizations. You don’t have to be a right-wing wacko to question that approach.

Lane gets close to another key point, but doesn’t quite get there. It’s reasonable to believe that the medical profession would in short order determine that performing end of life consultations is the conscientious thing to do. Conversely, not doing them under ObamaCare would likely be seen as problematic in medical quality control and peer reviews, as well as in matters relating to professional advancement.

Nonetheless, the nuking (based on specific language in the plan itself) by an editorialist at a clearly left-leaning outfit of the claim that ObamaCare’s end of life consultations are mere angelic, pressure-free additions to a pure patient-driven plan should be seen as a significant milestone in discrediting the whole unwieldy contraption — which is more than likely why Lane’s contrarian editorial has gained relatively little establishment media.

When you combine Lane’s a clear understanding of how the counseling “feature” would incentivize denial of care with the frightening utilitarianism of many of the President’s closest advisers and the clear evidence that the President himself has succumbed to a great extent to the utilitarian non-ethic, you realize that not only is there is no moral alternative to opposing ObamaCare as it currently stands, but that there is no way to make it acceptable as long as those who are in charge remain in charge.

Perhaps if more beat reporters would actually read the bill and investigate some of the ghoulish beliefs of many of those who are closest to the President, we wouldn’t have to wait for people like Tully at Fortune and Lane at the Post to do it for them. In the old newspapers days, getting scooped by someone on the opinion side would be seen as a humiliation to those in the trenches. Alas, it appears that their capacity for embarrassment has diminished to near nothingness.

Cross-posted at NewsBusters.org.

This is Congressman Eugene Green (HT to an e-mailer), Democrat from Texas, telling the world that if you’re not from his District, you’re not welcome at his future town hall meetings — oh, and how he’ll enforce his new rule (bold is his):

This is how Gene Green has voted on laws relating to requiring photo identification to vote (from the web site “On the Issues”):

Any questions?

Oh, I do have a couple:

• How many dozen other Congressmen who oppose voter ID laws are going to hypocritically enforce voter-ID rules at their town halls — And does that mean that controlling their meetings is more important than controlling the voting process?
• Will this be newsworthy to the establishment media, which would be all over this if Gene Green were a Republican, and which is scouring town hall sign-in sheets as you read this for evidence of out-of-district attendees?

Cross-posted at NewsBusters.org.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported this morning that productivity rose 6.4% in the second quarter. Reuters says that “U.S. non-farm productivity in the second quarter rose at its fastest pace in six years as hours worked fell much steeper than output, while the cost of labor fell at the quickest rate in nine years, data showed on Tuesday.” The result beat expectations of +5.3%.

In the long haul, this is a good thing. It is NOT in and of itself a sign of a recovering economy, though it could be setting the stage for one, IF businesses, entrepreneurs, and investors aren’t still holding back because of the FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt) factor.

A report like this during the Bush administration would likely have been combined with an “incomes are stagnant” riff and treated as a sign of employer exploitation. Don’t expect to see that today.

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ISM catch-up – The Institute for Supply Management’s Manufacturing Index increased nicely, going from 44.8% in June to 48.9% in July, while the Non Manufacturing Index declined from 47.0% to 46.4% in the same period. The weighted average of the two, assigning 15% to Manufacturing and 85% to Non Manufacturing, increased from 46.67% to 46.775%. On balance, that’s not a lot of progress.

Two other thoughts:

1. No one can start to claim that a recovery is even occurring until the weighted-average ISM number gets above 50%, because that’s what it takes for expansion (i.e., getting off the trough). But you can almost write it down that some clowns are going to take 50%-plus reading as proof that the recession is over. That would be nice, but it wouldn’t be true unless 50%-plus weighted-average readings continue for several months.
2. Given how much battering it has taken during the the Manufacturing number has to be viewed as a “we’ve been down so long, it looks like up to me” phenomenon. It beats the alternative, of course, but the sector has a big mountain to climb.

A little history (Manufacturing data is here; Non Manufacturing can be found on a spreadsheet at this link):

As with so many other economic measurements, the decay in manufacturing didn’t start in earnest until Nancy Pelosi, Barack Obama, and Harry Reid initiated the POR (Pelosi-Obama-Reid) Economy, now the POR Recession/”Repression” As Normal People Define It, in June of last year. While Non Manufacturing struggled in late 2007 and early 2008 (ISM switched indices in January 2008; ISM’s data for the old Services index couldn’t immediately be located), it righted itself and hung on until early fall 2008, when the POR Economy also brought it crashing down.

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Doug Ross, with tons of charts and graphs — “Green Job, Green Shoots …. Brown Economy.”

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Last Thursday, the Congressional Budget Office issued its own deficit report ahead of the Treasury Department’s Monthly Treasury Statement that will arrive tomorrow at 2:00 p.m. The Dow Jones report on the release has a very odd sentence at the end of the sixth paragraph (bolded below):

The federal budget deficit continued to spiral higher, reaching $1.3 trillion through the first 10 months of fiscal 2009, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said Thursday.

In its monthly assessment of the state of the federal government’s fiscal picture, the CBO said the deficit is now running $880 billion higher than the comparable period in fiscal 2008.

The CBO has forecast the deficit will reach $1.8 trillion for the complete fiscal year. The federal government’s fiscal year ends Sept. 30.

….. The agency said the deficit figure includes $169 billion related to the Treasury financial rescue program, the Troubled Asset Relief Program, and another $83 billion in payments to prop up Fannie Mae (FNM) and Freddie Mac ( FRE).

This compared to $147 billion related to TARP and $87 billion for the two housing guaranty agencies through June, it said.

So far, $125 billion in spending increases and lower revenues have been recorded stemming from the $787 billion economic stimulus plan, the CBO said.

So how is the stimulus plan causing “lower revenues”? (Contrary to a previously posted question, which wondered if CBO had determined an employment effect) It has to do with $400-$800 credits under “Making Work Pay,” which because they start phasing out at income amounts that exclude tens of millions of Americans from the credit ($75,000 a year for singles and $150,000 for marrieds), are in essence what most people would refer to as “handouts.”

Also, according to the CBO’s blog, the $147 billion in TARP is the “Net Present Value” of TARP investments. CBO is considers that to be part of “outlays” in its deficit calculation; Treasury hasn’t been doing that, and therefore will I believe report a lower deficit tomorrow. As I noted several months ago (“The Federal Deficit Gets Nearly Indecipherable”), whatever the “Net Present Value” is, if treated as spending would increase the deficit beyond what is being reported. The Monthly Treasury Statement should be treating all spending as, well, spending, because it’s supposed to be a cash-flow report. Instead, it’s now a mucked-up hybrid that makes a reporting muddle and partially conceals what’s really happening.

From Anchorage, Alaska, and Poland:

Aug 9, 2009 / 02:21 pm (CNA).- What is believed to be the first known Mass ever celebrated at the top of Mt. McKinley took place on July 3, when three childhood friends from Poland summited the 20,320-foot peak.

Father Krzyaztof Grzybowski and his brother Father Robert Grzybowski celebrated a Mass with their childhood friend Adrian Przyluski attending.

In a letter to the Catholic Anchor, Father Richard Tero, pastor of Sacred Heart Church in Seward, Alaska and local church historian in the state, said he believes the Mass was the first on the top of North America’s highest peak.

“In a most exceptionally clear and calm day, at about 4 p.m. after a long climb from 17,000 feet, on the West Buttress route, they were able to spend about 45 minutes at the 20,320 foot summit,” Father Tero wrote.

Other priests known to have summited Mt. McKinley include Father Carl Abele in the early 1970s, as well as Father Michael Shields and Dominican Father Tim Conlin in the 1980s, Father Tero said.

“I’m sure other foreign priests have also had success but didn’t share it with the local priests,” Father Tero added, “but to have no wind on Mt. McKinley is extremely rare.”

Father Tero hosted the priest brothers and their friend in Seward, where the Polish men enjoyed a Kenai Fjords tour after their climb. …..

Go here for the rest of the story.

Someone forgot to send the CNN health care kool-aid over to the office of Fortune editor at large Shawn Tully in the days leading up to July 24. Tully in turn forgot to toot his own horn, and ObamaCare opponents forgot to take a peek inside what is normally enemy lines to find it.

In a must-read special report at affiliate CNNMoney.com, Tully lays bare Barack Obama’s core claim, while identifying five freedoms many Americans will lose if ObamaCare passes in its current form. In fact, Tully’s piece is so good, it should be the equivalent of Betsy McCaughey’s 1994 broadside that helped torpedo HillaryCare — if only people knew about it.

Anyone who knows the e-mail address of CNN senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen, who, as Matthew Balan of NewsBusters noted earlier today, is an ardent ObamaCare defender, should forward Tully’s column to her. Copies to Wolf Blitzer, Anderson Cooper, Howard Kurtz, and many others at CNN wouldn’t hurt either.

Here are the introductory paragraphs and key points Tully made (bolds in text are mine):

5 freedoms you’d lose in health care reform

If you read the fine print in the Congressional plans, you’ll find that a lot of cherished aspects of the current system would disappear.

In promoting his health-care agenda, President Obama has repeatedly reassured Americans that they can keep their existing health plans — and that the benefits and access they prize will be enhanced through reform.

A close reading of the two main bills, one backed by Democrats in the House and the other issued by Sen. Edward Kennedy’s Health committee, contradict the President’s assurances. …. page by page, the bills reveal a web of restrictions, fines, and mandates that would radically change your health-care coverage.

If you prize choosing your own cardiologist or urologist under your company’s Preferred Provider Organization plan (PPO), if your employer rewards your non-smoking, healthy lifestyle with reduced premiums, if you love the bargain Health Savings Account (HSA) that insures you just for the essentials, or if you simply take comfort in the freedom to spend your own money for a policy that covers the newest drugs and diagnostic tests — you may be shocked to learn that you could lose all of those good things under the rules proposed in the two bills that herald a health-care revolution.

In short, the Obama platform would mandate extremely full, expensive, and highly subsidized coverage — including a lot of benefits people would never pay for with their own money — but deliver it through a highly restrictive, HMO-style plan that will determine what care and tests you can and can’t have. It’s a revolution, all right, but in the wrong direction.

Tully then lists and discusses the five freedoms lost under ObamaCare:

1. Freedom to choose what’s in your plan
2. Freedom to be rewarded for healthy living, or pay your real costs
3. Freedom to choose high-deductible coverage
4. Freedom to keep your existing plan
5. Freedom to choose your doctors

The following paragraphs from Tully about Point 4 should be enough to shut down the nonsensical claim that ObamaCare won’t ultimately end up being state-controlled and state-run, whether you’re currently in an ERISA (i.e., company-sponsored) plan or not (bolds are mine):

The bill gives ERISA employers a five-year grace period when they can keep offering plans free from the restrictions of the “qualified” policies offered on the exchanges. But after five years, they would have to offer only approved plans, with the myriad rules we’ve already discussed. So for Americans in large corporations, “keeping your own plan” has a strict deadline. In five years, like it or not, you’ll get dumped into the exchange. As we’ll see, it could happen a lot earlier.

The outlook is worse for the second group. It encompasses employees who aren’t under ERISA but get actual insurance either on their own or through small businesses. After the legislation passes, all insurers that offer a wide range of plans to these employees will be forced to offer only “qualified” plans to new customers, via the exchanges.

The employees who got their coverage before the law goes into effect can keep their plans, but once again, there’s a catch. If the plan changes in any way — by altering co-pays, deductibles, or even switching coverage for this or that drug — the employee must drop out and shop through the exchange. Since these plans generally change their policies every year, it’s likely that millions of employees will lose their plans in 12 months.

Wow. After ready Tully’s column, even those who have deeply imbibed the kool-aid won’t be able to say they weren’t warned.

Cross-posted at NewsBusters.org.

State-controlled General Motors issued a supposedly comprehensive 8-K report to the Securities and Exchange Commission last Friday.

If you only read the Associated Press’s coverage of that document’s release, courtesy of reporter Tom Krisher, you would at least know that:

• The company doesn’t expect sales to improve during the rest of the calendar year.
• That the $50 billion in post-bankruptcy funding it has received (over and above tens of billions in other forms of aid ranging from bailout loan write-offs to pension relief, none of which Krisher mentioned) may not last beyond “the short-term,” which in accounting parlance usually means a year.
• Despite the item just mentioned, GM has taken steps to get ready for a hoped-for initial public offering next year. (Though only time will tell, yours truly, as explained below, thinks this move looks more like posturing and misdirection than anything substantive.)

All of that is nice, but the fact remains that GM produced no second quarter financial results. Further, as I noted this weekend, GM has said that second quarter financials won’t be coming out for a long time, if ever.

Exhibiting very weak news judgment, Krisher saved that information for the last two paragraphs of his 23-paragraph story, which read as follows (saved here at host for fair use and discussion purposes, and for future reference after AP makes it inaccessible):

The company also disclosed Friday that it would not report second-quarter earnings this year, but it will disclose its performance for the three- and nine-month periods before Sept. 30. Those reports will come after the third quarter closes, and the company said they will not comply with general U.S. accounting principles. GM, however, will file reports that meet the accounting standards in 2010.

Spokeswoman Renee Rashid-Merem said GM won’t file the second-quarter earnings because of the extensive work still needed to set up the books for the new company. The new company also needs to finish accounting changes made necessary by selling its good assets to the new company.

“Would not report second-quarter earnings this year” in the first sentence above, combined with “won’t file second-quarter earnings” in the second paragraph, would appear to really mean, “won’t ever,” or “won’t ever, unless we decide to go public.” And the GM spokeswoman’s excuse for not filing is pathetic, given that accounting systems at the “old GM” were in place for decades, and in bygone days were seen as the model the world should follow.

Here are some other things one learns from the GM’s 3,100-page 8-K (over 90 pages of primary test and followed by 3,000-plus pages of exhibits) that Krisher either chose to leave on the cutting-room floor, or didn’t detect in the first place. These are the kinds of things you see either in poorly-run companies, or as is the case with this one, companies controlled by a government:

• “As part of our business plan, we have reduced compensation and have reduced and will continue to reduce headcount for our management and non-management salaried employees, which may adversely affect our ability to hire and retain salaried employees.” Translation: Since the government is dictating salaries, good people may leave, and we may suffer.
• “Our plan to reduce the number of our retail channels and core brands and to consolidate our dealer network is likely to reduce our total sales volume ….” Translation: We’re trying to shrink our way to profitability. That can work, but shrinking companies don’t usually do IPOs, and an astute Krisher might have pointed that out.
• “MLC (Motors Liquidation Company, the new name of the “Old GM) determined that its internal controls over financial reporting were not effective. …. The lack of effective internal controls could materially adversely affect our financial condition and ability to carry out our business plan.” Translation: We didn’t have a handle on things when the government started bailing us out, we still don’t, and we don’t know when if ever we will.

Also, one of the voluminous loan or security agreements in the 8-K exhibits has a limitation on purchases of corporate jets. I wonder how the car czars and the apparatchiks from Treasury (known as “UST”) are getting to and from Detroit?

To me, here’s the real kicker, showing that the administration’s promise not to meddle in GM’s affairs is in no way binding:

“The UST (or its designee) owns a controlling interest in us and its interests may differ from those of our other stockholders. …. To the extent the UST elects to exercise such influence or control over us, its interests (as a government entity) may differ from those of our other stockholders and it may influence matters including:

- The selection and tenure and compensation of our management;
- Our business strategy;
- Our relationship with our employees, unions and other constitutencies; and
- Our financing activities, including the issuance of debt and equity securities.”

Translation: It only looks like we’re in charge here.

Also, while GM cited customer confidence as a risk factor, it didn’t cite the real and serious problem it has with the significant plurality of American consumers who are opposed to the bailout of the company, to the point where they have told pollsters that they won’t buy GM vehicles under any circumstances. The risk to GM is that these people really mean it, and that they will stick to their no-buy pledge over the long-term.

Readers who have hung in there through this post will also be amused by this paragraph from the 8-K:

We are a private company (technically, they are, according to business definitions — Ed.) and are not subject to the filing requirements of Section 13 or 15(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. We are a voluntary filer with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Translation: Even though U.S. taxpayers essentially own 61% of the company, we don’t have to tell anyone anything if we don’t want to. Be thankful for what you get, and leave us alone.

Cross-posted at NewsBusters.org.

At least not for Christians in Richmond Virginia, that is…

From Catholic News Agency (bold is mine)

Jail officials censored mother’s letters over religious content

Richmond, Va., Aug 8, 2009 / 10:06 am

Civil rights and religious freedom groups are criticizing the Rappahannock Regional Jail in northern Virginia, charging that the jail illegally censored the letters a Christian mother sent to her jailed son for being “too religious.” Jail authorities cut out so many Bible passages that her letters resembled “Swiss cheese,” the groups said.

The letters of inmate mother Anna Williams were stamped for censorship with the words “Religious Material from Home,” a press release from the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty reports. On at least one occasion, all that was left of a three-page letter was its salutation, its first paragraph, and its signature “Love, Mom.”

A July 9 letter from civil and religious liberty groups to the jail’s superintendent, Joseph Higgs, Jr., protested the alleged censorship.

Alleged?

…Such censorship destroyed the religious messages Ms. Williams sought to convey to her son and reduced her letters to something resembling Swiss cheese. Using scissors or a hobby knife, Jail officials literally cut the religious portions out of Ms. Williams’ letters and delivered only the snippets that did not quote the Bible.

…The letter to the superintendent was signed by officials from the Becket Fund, the Rutherford Institute, Prison Fellowship, the Virginia Interfaith Center for Public Policy, the Friends Committee on National Legislation and several local and national American Civil Liberties Union officials.

…Eric Rassbach, National Litigation Director at the Becket Fund, was a signatory to the letter.

The citizens of Rappahannock County should be alarmed that their government has decided to join North Korea, Saudi Arabia, and Iran in treating the Bible as dangerous contraband,” he said in a statement.

Although the Bible says, ‘the truth shall set you free,’ prison authorities shouldn’t treat the Bible as a security risk,” he added. “In censoring this mother’s letters, the prison violated the First Amendment rights of both the prisoner and his mother.

Ya think? You know I can’t help but wonder how much coverage this would have gotten if it had been a Muslim mom sending her boy passages from the Koran…

The following piece came from Pravda in late April:

American capitalism gone with a whimper…

It must be said, that like the breaking of a great dam, the American decent (sic) into Marxism is happening with breath taking speed, against the back drop of a passive, hapless sheeple, excuse me dear reader, I meant people.

True, the situation has been well prepared on and off for the past century, especially the past twenty years. The initial testing grounds was conducted upon our Holy Russia and a bloody test it was. But we Russians would not just roll over and give up our freedoms and our souls, no matter how much money Wall Street poured into the fists of the Marxists.

Those lessons were taken and used to properly prepare the American populace for the surrender of their freedoms and souls, to the whims of their elites and betters.

First, the population was dumbed down through a politicized and substandard education system based on pop culture, rather then the classics. Americans know more about their favorite TV dramas then the drama in DC that directly affects their lives. They care more for their “right” to choke down a McDonalds burger or a BurgerKing burger than for their constitutional rights. Then they turn around and lecture us about our rights and about our “democracy”. Pride blind the foolish.

…The final collapse has come with the election of Barack Obama. His speed in the past three months has been truly impressive. His spending and money printing has been a record setting, not just in America’s short history but in the world. If this keeps up for more then another year, and there is no sign that it will not, America at best will resemble the Wiemar Republic and at worst Zimbabwe.

These past two weeks have been the most breath taking of all. First came the announcement of a planned redesign of the American Byzantine tax system, by the very thieves who used it to bankroll their thefts, loses and swindles of hundreds of billions of dollars. These make our Russian oligarchs look little more then ordinary street thugs, in comparison. Yes, the Americans have beat our own thieves in the shear volumes. Should we congratulate them?

These men, of course, are not an elected panel but made up of appointees picked from the very financial oligarchs and their henchmen who are now gorging themselves on trillions of American dollars, in one bailout after another. They are also usurping the rights, duties and powers of the American congress (parliament). Again, congress has put up little more then a whimper to their masters.

…So, should it be any surprise to discover that the Democratically controlled Congress of America is working on passing a new regulation that would give the American Treasury department the power to set “fair” maximum salaries, evaluate performance and control how private companies give out pay raises and bonuses? Senator Barney Franks, a social pervert basking in his homosexuality (of course, amongst the modern, enlightened American societal norm, as well as that of the general West, homosexuality is not only not a looked down upon life choice, but is often praised as a virtue) and his Marxist enlightenment, has led this effort. He stresses that this only affects companies that receive government monies, but it is retroactive and taken to a logical extreme, this would include any company or industry that has ever received a tax break or incentive.

The Russian owners of American companies and industries should look thoughtfully at this and the option of closing their facilities down and fleeing the land of the Red as fast as possible. In other words, divest while there is still value left.

The proud American will go down into his slavery with out a fight, beating his chest and proclaiming to the world, how free he really is. The world will only snicker.

Read the whole thing here. I’m overjoyed at how the whole world now “thinks so much better” of us (eyeroll).

So was the author a prophet who can spot a Stalin-like regime from a mile away; or just another crazy Ruskie on too much vodka?

Well, let’s look at some of what’s happened since he wrote the article…

1. The Long-Legged Mack Daddy and his “Gangsta Government” decided in May that fundamental property rights should be confiscated and given to the UAW lap dawgs (the organization who contributed millions to BO). Fiduciary duty? Rule of law? Fool, please…
2. To the peril of the very auto companies taxpayers were forced to bail-out, racist, bigoted homophobe “PDB” (Puff-Daddy BO) and his “Gangsta Government” disproportionately closed white-owned auto dealerships, even though most of them would be getting taxpayers a better return on their forced investment than the minority-owned dealers who were kept on.
3. In an attempt for more “turf,” er, I mean power & control, DJ Scary Barry and his “Gangsta Government” push for a complete & comprehensive overhaul of a healthcare system with which over 80% of the American people are satisfied. If passed, he and his “peeps” will decide who “is worth” getting care and by extension who lives and dies.
4. Lost in a tidal wave of dissent and disapproval, “Fitty-Trillion Cent” and his “Gangsta Government” have started a new company: “UberCommie & Snitch.” A thug will track you down, fit you with shackles and/or violent crimes and make you pay for disagreeing with “the one.”

Seeing as that just skims the surface, I’d say the old Russian was right on the money. I think I need the vodka now…

Positive for STD’s that is…this from the Washington Times (HT: The New Media Journal)

D.C. to Offer STD Tests In Every High School
Expansion of Program Draws Praise
By Darryl Fears and Nelson Hernandez
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, August 5, 2009

D.C. school officials are planning to offer tests for sexually transmitted diseases to all high school students in the coming school year, expanding a pilot program that uncovered a significant number of infected children.

The program conducted last year at eight high schools found that 13 percent of about 3,000 students tested positive for an STD, mostly gonorrhea or chlamydia, according to the D.C. Department of Health.

The expansion places D.C. public schools in the vanguard of a growing number of urban school districts that test adolescents for STDs. About 12,000 students attend public high schools in the District.

… “The program tells us that a lot of students in the public school system are engaging in unsafe sex,” said Walter Smith, executive director of D.C. Appleseed, which advocates for more AIDS outreach and education in the schools. “If 13 percent of these students are testing positive for STDs, those same kids could get HIV. A lot needs to be done to get the message out to the schools . . . and this very high STD rate is an indication that what we’ve been doing is not effective.”

In a 2007 study by the D.C. public school system, 60 percent of high school students and 30 percent of middle school students reported having had intercourse. Twenty percent of the high school students said they had had sex with four or more partners, and 12 percent of the middle school students said they had had three or more partners.

… “We have Third World statistics in terms of our HIV issues, and from the HIV perspective, we do need to find a way to identify students so that we can help them,” said William Lockridge, a member of the State Board of Education representing Ward 8.

But he said parents need to be involved. “Right now, if you play sports in a public school, you have to get permission from your parents. If you take a field trip, you have to get permission from your parents. Why would it be any less for this? …. Only if the parent gives the consent upfront would I do this.”

D.C. Council member David A. Catania (I-At Large) offered a different viewpoint. “This isn’t necessarily intended to comfort adults,” said Catania, who chairs the health committee. “I don’t think you turn a blind eye and pretend these problems don’t exist.”

Well, seeing as [the lack of] parental involvement is the very condition that plagues most low-performing and/or inner-city schools, I don’t see that as being a far-reaching, effective solution.

So much for handing children condoms and expecting them to morph into responsible creatures capable of interjecting common sense and good decision-making into a situation.

The United States Congress has proven that strategy a failure time and time again…

RedState — “Let’s Talk Astroturf (Democrats Are Paying People to Show Up at Congressional Town Halls)”; “What if Obama Threw an Astroturf Party and Nobody Came?”

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WashTimes’s editorialists have read Australian press reports concerned that Burma aka Myanmar “could be ready to build a (nuclear) bomb in less than five years.”

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Well, President Obama is getting it right in Afghanistan, says the Wall Street Journal in an editorial –

Pakistan has been an early Obama Administration foreign-policy success. Only three months ago, the Taliban were marching on Islamabad and U.S. officials were fretting about the lack of Pakistani will to resist Islamist extremism. But the U.S. worked behind the scenes to encourage a counterattack, Pakistan’s military has since retaken the Swat Valley in the north, and Mr. Zardari’s government has put aside some of its petty domestic squabbling to focus on the main enemy. President Obama has also stepped up the pace of drone attacks, which are now thought to have killed more than a third of the top Taliban leaders.

May it continue until all of them are either pushing up daisies or have surrendered, and we achieve something Obama has said shouldn’t necessarily be our goal: Victory, just like in Iraq — twice — under his predecessor.

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Noted at Hot Air (via CityBeat; go here to find the underlying link) — “CBO Missed ObamaCare Cost by $1 trillion?” Given the track record of government programs, the question mark probably isn’t necessary.

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Sarah Palin’s right, as usual — Also at Hot Air, this time in the Green Room from Legal Insurrection (bolds are mine) –

(Palin’s) critics, however, didn’t take the time to find out to what Palin was referring when she used the term ‘level of productivity in society’ as being the basis for determining access to medical care. If the critics, who hold themselves in the highest of intellectual esteem, had bothered to do something other than react, they would have realized that the approach to health care to which Palin was referring was none other than that espoused by key Obama health care adviser Dr. Ezekial Emanuel (brother of Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel).

…. Put together the concepts of prognosis and age (as bases for determining whether someone is worthy of care), and Dr. Emanuel’s proposal reasonably could be construed as advocating the withholding of some level of medical treatment (probably not basic care, but likely expensive advanced care) to a baby born with Down Syndrome. You may not like this implication, but it is Dr. Emanuel’s implication not Palin’s.

Obama has surrounded himself with people holding views in the neighborhood of Dr. Emanuel’s — or worse. It’s absurd to think that people whose beliefs are of or close to Dr. Emanuel’s mindset would not end up running statist health care.

As noted yesterday, Palin, as usual, fearlessly called it as it is — which is why she is so hated by those whose mission in life, as is the case with ObamaCare, is to obfuscate, deceive …. and control.