“Conservatives” who supported the candidacy of Objectively Unfit Mitt Romney for President, many of whom continue to encourage John McCain to take him on as VP, should be ashamed of themselves. The shocking part of all of this is that they know that what Jackson says below is true. I have personally verified this in the case of one very well-known “conservative”; others have sufficient legal grounding that they surely understand it, yet they ignore it.

Memo to conservative talkers and others who are still on the Romney bandwagon, or were during the primaries: Your non-stop advocacy on behalf of Romney just had consequences this week. Your failure to acknowledge the disastrously irresponsible role you have played to this point is a stain on your reputations.

THE LETTER

Foundational links:
- The Massachusetts Constitution.
- The Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts’s Goodridge decision.

The LA Times article to which Gregg refers is already archived. For fair use and discussion purposes, I obtained the article from the ProQuest library database, and have posted about half of it here at my host.

One clarification: While I agree with Gregg’s characterization that efforts to codify same sex marriage in Massachusetts were “defeated” (i.e., “turned back”), the bills involved were technically put under a “study order” (H1710; S918), which appears to be a form of legislative limbo. I would suggest, but someone would have to confirm, that the bills never came to the floor of their respective chambers for an up-or-down vote either because the votes weren’t there, or because the legislators didn’t want to be forced to go on the record. If the result of this Boston Globe search on “gay marriage law” (without quotes) is any indication, the press in Massachusetts appears not to have covered the progress, or lack thereof, of these bills at all.

So here is Gregg’s letter (other links and the blockquotes within his letter were added by me; bolds and italics are in the original):

+++++++++++++++++++++

Same Sex Marriage is NOT legal in Massachusetts or California!

Your above the fold headline in today’s LA Times, “Massachusetts lives happily with same-sex marriage law,” by Elizabeth Mehren is totally inaccurate and misleading, and it is vital that you clarify this error for your readers.

The truth is that “same sex marriage” is not legal in Massachusetts which is why only about a month ago legislation was introduced to amend the current Massachusetts marriage statute (chapter 207) to legalize “same sex marriage.” (H1710 and S918) which were both defeated. This alone disproves your inaccurate headline!

Under the Massachusetts’ Constitution, the oldest functioning constitution in the world authored by John Adams, which served as the model for our Federal Constitution:

“[T]he people of this commonwealth are not controllable by any other laws than those to which their constitutional representative body have given their consent.” (PART THE FIRST, Article X.)

And “the people” via their elected representatives never “consented” to “same sex marriage.” The current marriage statute was never amended or suspended and to this day doesn’t include a provision for “same sex marriages.”

Many, including former Governor Romney, have claimed that the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, “legalized same sex marriage” in issuing their Goodridge opinion in 2003, and that he was “ordered to enforce the law.” Both assertions are totally false.

Even the Goodridge Court admitted that their opinion in no way “legalized” same sex “marriage”:

“Here, no one argues that striking down the marriage laws is an appropriate form of relief.”

In fact, they admitted that under the statute, Chapter 207 of the Massachusetts General Laws, homosexual marriage is illegal:

“We conclude, as did the judge, that M.G.L. c. 207 may not be construed to permit same-sex couples to marry.”

The truth is that the Goodridge declaratory opinion should have been declared null and void since the court lacked the subject matter jurisdiction under Article V to even hear the case:

“All causes of marriage…shall be heard and determined by the governor and council, until the legislature shall, by law, make other provision.” (PART THE SECOND, Ch. III, Article V.)

Although many “conservative” lawyers and pundits have claimed that the “activist MSJC Court” legalized “same sex marriage,” it was the acting governor Mitt Romney, a “conservative” Republican who illegally ordered the Department of Public Health to change the marriage certificates from “husband” and “wife” to “partner A” and “partner B” and ordered Justices of the Peace and Town Clerks to solemnize and perform same sex marriage ceremonies or resign (which one did). Romney did this without an accompanying legal statute and in doing so violated his sworn oath to uphold and enforce the Constitution and the laws and statutes of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

That being said, while it was Romney, not the court, who was solely responsible for installing “same sex marriage,” the certificates that Romney issued (over 150 of them he personally issued) are not worth the paper they are written on because they lack an accompanying enabling statute that recognizes “same sex marriage” and are therefore, according to the Massachusetts Constitution, null and void.

The truth is that according to the highest law of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, the Massachusetts Constitution, “same sex marriage” is not “legal.”

Nor is “same sex marriage” “legal” in California. The citizens in California approved a voter initiative to define marriage as between one man and one woman in 2000. The judiciary lacks the requisite constitutional authority to overturn any statute passed by the voters. Only the voters themselves can reverse a statute they themselves voted in. While the court is free to interpret the constitution of California and issue opinions, they are not authorized to “strike down” any specific statutes. It is vital that you acknowledge that “same sex marriage” is not legal in California either or prove that it is. Neither the people nor their elected representatives voted to amend or suspend the current marriage statute that doesn’t allow for “same sex marriage.” Until they do, it remains illegal.

You have an solemn obligation to acknowledge these facts and run a retraction for your readers. Anything less is journalistic and legal malpractice.

Looking forward to seeing if you choose to run this letter.

Sincerely,

Gregg Jackson
Los Angeles, CA

For more information on how “same sex marriage” is not “legal” in Massachusetts go here:
– Joint Letter to Governor Mitt Romney from Pro-Family Leaders; December 22, 2006
– And here: http://www.robertpaine.blogspot.com/

_______________________________________________

RELATED: “Still Illegal Coast to Coast“

This is the full text of a Saturday Cincinnati Enquirer editorial:

It may have taken us 39 years to learn Eddie Van Oliver Jr.’s story, but now that we’ve heard it we will never forget it.

As reporter Howard Wilkinson recounted in a story that captures the classic tragedies and loyalties created by war, Eddie was just 19 when he was killed serving as point man for his Marine platoon in Vietnam.

All that died that day in 1969 in the jungle, we will never be able to say. His life seemed as if it were just getting started.

But however long or short it is, the life of a fallen warrior is a full arc. It is a life of service so complete, of sacrifice so unselfish that, while other lives are measured in years and months, these lives are measured in brave acts and intentions, and never found wanting.

Duke Heller knew such a life should not be forgotten.

Duke was a young Marine himself, a Cleves native who had never heard of Eddie’s West End neighborhood, so limited were both young men’s experiences.

The day Eddie died, Duke and his fellow Marines undertook a mission most of us could not have completed. They wrapped Eddie’s body in a poncho and carried him for nearly a week so he could leave behind that jungle and come home.

A few years later during a visit to Spring Grove Cemetery, Duke learned that return was to a numbered grave, with no acknowledgement of the sacrifice Eddie had made.

Duke never forgot Eddie but he knew that without some memorial, very few people would ever know his story. Duke worked to secure a government grave marker but got only frustration. But after he told Eddie’s story to Jeff Foran, an Air Force veteran and VFW post commander who knew his way around the bureaucracy, the oversight was set to rights.

The marker was put in place earlier this week. A memorial ceremony is planned for 2 p.m. Sunday at the cemetery.

The pain underlying this story is palpable. The loss of a 19-year-old man, the “what-ifs” of a grieving family, the young Marine’s fears that materialized and the hopes that never will.

But woven with that pain is evidence of the best in human nature.

It is the bond that, in some of the worst moments of their lives, human beings sometimes wordlessly unite with each other.

Eddie and Duke knew each other only briefly, but long enough to understand that they were both Marines and Americans and, in those shared associations, had some obligation to each other.

It took 39 years, but Duke kept up his end.

Two young Cincinnatians went off to war 40 years ago. They both came home heroes.

If you didn’t click the link above, go here for Howard Wilkinson’s story.

That “bad light” directive seems seared into the minds of the Associated Press’s Martin Crutsinger and his AP colleagues, as they continue to “cling to recession,” and attempt to convince consumers and businesses that if perchance we’re not already in one, it’s just around the bend.

The AP’s persistence has borne dreadful fruit. Relentlessly downbeat reporting during at least the past six years by the wire service’s business reporters — who largely determine what most Americans see, hear, and read about the economy — is a big reason, if not the most important reason, why most Americans, as seen in the latest consumer confidence report, have a negative economic outlook and are convinced that we are in a recession.

Friday, Crutsinger worked mightily to take the lemonade that was the good housing starts report and turn it into lemons:

Construction of new homes increased by the biggest percentage in more than two years in April, a rare spot of good news amid the worst downturn in housing in more than two decades.

Analysts, however, played down the increase, noting that all the strength came from the volatile apartment sector. They said the painful housing slump is far from over as a record flood of foreclosures continues to add to the sizable stockpile of unsold homes.

….. The correction has proven to be a serious drag on the overall economy, raising worries that the country could be in danger of falling into a recession.

A second report yesterday showed that consumer confidence as measured by the University of Michigan/Reuters survey fell to a 28-year low of 59.5 in early May, down from 62.6 in April. The drop was blamed in part on rising concerns about higher gas and food prices.

Well, at least the AP reporter seemed to be acknowledging that we’re not currently in a recession.

But earlier today, in a story about a speech by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, Crutsinger found some curiously unnamed others to do it for him:

Treasury secretary says markets are calmer now

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said Friday that financial markets are “considerably calmer” now than they were two months ago. He predicted the economy will be rebounding by the second half of this year.

The economy has been pushed to the brink of a recession by a prolonged housing slump, a credit crisis, soaring energy prices and more than a quarter-million job layoffs over the past four months.

In his remarks, Paulson never used the word recession, although many private economists believe the country is in one.

But he did forecast that the stimulus checks going to 130 million households would help spur growth in the second half of the year.

Part of the problem with Crutsinger, AP’s business writers, and others is that they really don’t seem to understand that no one can show that “a quarter-million job layoffs” have occurred (starting point for obtaining the data below is here):

What HAS occurred is that total employment in the economy on a seasonally adjusted basis has gone down by 260,000 so far this year. But on the ground in the past four months, larger than usual job reductions in January, many of which represent seasonal workers leaving the workforce, were followed by smaller than usual job increases in February, March, and April. The net change is a pretty big negative number (-1,209,000), and does not compare well to the same months in the three preceding years. No one around here is claiming that the employment situation is wonderful, because it isn’t.

But no one, not even AP business reporters, can tell whether how much of these changes represent layoffs, voluntary terminations, firings for cause, retirements, or merely returning home after working the Christmas season or the post-Christmas retail closing season. Crutsinger’s characterization of what has occurred as “a quarter-million layoffs” (or “pink slips,” a favorite term of AP’s Jeannine Aversa) makes it look as if one can identify each person in the reported number by name. These and similar renderings by other AP business reporters during the past few months are totally disconnected from reality.

Clearly, we aren’t getting enough of the balanced output exemplified in the report by the WSJ’s Evans and Lahart.

In fact, given what we’ve been fed for so long by AP, what the pair wrote will come as a shock to some (original was published Wednesday in the Wall Street Journal; original title was “Recession? Not So Fast, Say Some”; link may require paid subscription; bolds are mine):

As recession fails to materialize, economists revise predictions

A funny thing happened to the economy on its way to recession: It has taken a detour.

That, at least, is the view of a growing number of economists, including some who not long ago were saying a recession was all but inevitable.

They note that stock and credit markets have steadily improved since the Federal Reserve intervened to keep Bear Stearns Cos. from bankruptcy in early March, while a series of economic reports have been stronger than expected.

….. “A couple months ago it seemed like we were on the abyss,” said Jay Bryson, global economist with Wachovia Corp., referring to the seizing up of credit markets and the collapse of Bear Stearns. “Things have changed. . . . The numbers we’ve seen recently haven’t been as bad as we were led to believe just a few months ago.”

….. Job losses, meanwhile, have been less severe than they usually are in recessions. Many economists think the government’s earliest estimate of first-quarter GDP growth - 0.6 percent - will be revised upward. After reviewing the retail-sales data, economists at Global Insight, a Waltham, Mass.-based forecasting firm, predicted the government would increase its assessment of GDP growth in the first quarter to 1 percent at an annual rate. They forecast continued growth in consumer spending, partly because of tax rebates and stimulus checks.

In February, Global Insight joined Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, UBS and Merrill Lynch in declaring the U.S. to be in recession. Now, Global Insight’s Brian Bethune says that while the firm is still forecasting a recession, “it’s conceivable we could avoid it” …..

When are the luminaries just cited, who just a few months ago said that a recession had already begun, going to say, “We were wrong. We are sorry”? And how could the crack AP business reporting corps not have picked up on the change of sentiment reported by Evans and LaHart?

Cross-posted at NewsBusters.org.

Parents’ losses compounded by China’s one-child policy

Li Yunxia wipes away tears as rescue crews dig through the ruins of a kindergarten class that has buried her only child — a 5-year-old boy.

Other parents wail as soldiers in blue masks trudge through the mud, hauling bodies from the rubble on stretchers.

“Children were screaming, but I couldn’t hear my son’s voice,” she says, sobbing.

This grim ritual repeated itself Thursday across southwestern China, as thousands of mothers and fathers await news about their sons and daughters.

….. The grief is compounded in many cases by a Chinese policy that limits most couples to one child, a measure meant to control explosive population growth.

As a result of the one-child policy, the quake — already responsible for at least 15,000 deaths — is producing another tragic aftershock:

Not only must thousands of parents suddenly cope with the loss of a child, but many must cope with the loss of their only child.

China’s population minister recently praised the one-child rule, which dates to 1979, saying it has prevented 400 million children from being born.

….. That reality has cast parents like Li into an agonizing limbo — waiting to discover whether their only child is alive or dead.

Joe Stalin, himself responsible for the deaths of countless millions (literally true; the total has been best-guesstimated at between 20 million and 30 million), once said that “One death is a tragedy; a million is a statistic.” What does that make 400 million? It would appear that at least 300 million of those “prevented” children were victims of abortion; this Abortion Facts link reports that over 10 million abortions took place in China in just one of the 29 years since the one-child policy took effect.

Though I suppose the point might be made, I’m not going to try to argue that losing “only” one child of several would make parents’ grief more manageable. I just find it very interesting, given the relative pass the US media has given Communist China during its government-imposed 29-year “one-child” horror, that this story took the angle that it did — and that it got past its editors.

It will be very interesting to see how long this Kyung Lah’s CNN dispatch remains available. Saving it to the hard drive might be advisable.

Cross-posted at NewsBusters.org.

___________________________________________

The April Monthly Treasury Statement issued by Uncle Sam on Monday should put to rest the idea that the government is not getting enough in “revenues” (i.e., taxes) to get by.

Contrary to the expectations of many, including myself, that report, along with the April 30 Daily Treasury Statement that preceded it, showed that there is still a bit of life left in George Bush’s supply-side tax cuts:

After April 2007’s record collections of $383.6 billion, which broke the previous one-month record set in April 2001 by over 15%, I expected the sluggish economy’s mediocre 0.6% growth in each of the past two quarters to cause April 2008’s receipts to come in lower. Surprise.

What is especially heartening in the table above is the large increase in not-withheld receipts. As I noted at my home blog on April 29 when it first became clear that a new receipts record was on the horizon (bold is mine):

The unexpected increase in this not-withheld category consists mostly of final payments that accompany individual 1040s for 2007, plus first-quarter 2008 estimated payments. The increase may not only reflect that entrepreneurs and the self-employed had pretty decent years in 2007, but that many of them are thinking, in the face of relentless media harping to the contrary, that 2008 will be at least as profitable. Estimated payments are supposed to be 25% of last year’s total tax bill, unless the taxpayer figures that the current year’s tax bill will be lower, in which case they can pay in less. I would think that anyone who could defensibly pay in less, would pay in less.

If these not-withheld receipts continue to soar in comparison to previous years, we may see further overall increases in collections that outpace inflation in the next few months. Imagine that.

The record-breaking news from the Treasury also leads to a pretty good question relating to the overall economy: If things are so bad, why were April’s tax receipts, which include first-quarter 2008 estimated payments, so high?

In fact, as I pointed out last week, things aren’t so bad. They’re actually improving, and the media’s seemingly fond wish for a recession may go ungranted. Last week, the Institute for Supply Management’s Spring 2008 Semiannual Economic Forecast predicted annualized 1% growth in manufacturing and 2.7% growth in services, which includes the troubled housing and financial services sectors, during the rest of the year. On a weighted-average basis (15% manufacturing, 85% services), that’s 2.4% — not great, but certainly not recessionary.

Looking back, the increases in collections during the past four years have been nothing short of remarkable:

As was the case in the 1920s with Coolidge, the 1960s with Kennedy, the 1980s with Reagan, and 1997 with the Clinton capital-gains tax cut, Bush’s lower tax rates and investment-related tax cuts have led to impressive increases in money coming into the government. Supply-side economics’ naysayers have once again been shown to be wrong.

Supply-side econ works in the opposite direction too. If taxes are allowed to return to their pre-2003 levels over the next few years, as will be the case if Congress does not act, Treasury collections will likely decline, or will at least trail inflation significantly. One could and should argue that in addition to extending the existing tax system — the one the markets have gotten used to for the past six years — the next president should push to enact another business-stimulating, collection-increasing tax cut. Hong Kong, Ireland, Iceland, and Australia, as well as Reagan during the 1980s, have all shown that multiple supply-side cuts continue to lead to increased collections.

Unfortunately, as has been the case during almost all of the current fiscal year and most of the past seven years, April’s great collections news was more than negated by out-of-control spending:

This is a reversal of what had been an unusually good fiscal 2007, where spending only grew 2.8% (last item at link), the lowest in many, many years. Last year’s result occurred because a vulnerable Republican Congress finally got spending religion when it put together the fiscal 2007 budget. Too bad for them that it was too little and too late to save them from losing control of both chambers in the November 2006 elections.

Fiscal 2008 thus far represents the first output of the Pelosi-Reid Congress, which deserves at least half the blame for its dismal result (President Bush gets the rest). Even before considering the “stimulus” checks that are being mailed this month, 7%-plus spending increases with revenues going up at a much slower rate is an unsustainable situation. Yet all three remaining presidential candidates are proposing huge spending initiatives. While Barack Obama’s and Hillary Clinton’s proposals are better known, John McCain’s plans for a massive conversion to a greener economy — in the name of global warming that hasn’t been happening for about ten years — will create a bureaucratic monster that will demand whatever money is necessary to carry out its goals. And it won’t be cheap.

Will anyone tell the candidates that we can’t afford their grandiose plans?

Saturday, May. 10 2008

Chesterfield — Church bells tolled in the distance as an unintentional but perhaps fitting signal just before Terry Marcrum climbed out of a wheelchair Friday and took slow, deliberate steps back toward his old life.

Some say his walking, his very survival, is a miracle.

Staff at St. John’s Mercy Rehabilitation Hospital in Chesterfield offered hugs, and fellow patients wiped away tears, as they said good-bye to Marcrum, a mail carrier who survived a gunshot to the head and became an inspiration for them.

Returning home for a long recovery, Marcrum, 44, said he carries no anger toward the stranger who shot him with no explanation April 14 on his postal route in St. Louis.

“I thank God I’m alive everyday,” Marcrum said. “It was like I was given a second chance at life.”

He already has been putting that second chance to good use.

In 2½ weeks at the rehab center, he encouraged other patients to push against obstacles, and impressed his doctors and physical therapists.

“He makes so many people feel good,” said David Poertner, 24, of Valley Park, who came to the rehabilitation center depressed that back problems might cost him the ability to walk. “I really felt like my life was over. The doctors told me I was paralyzed. Terry told me I wasn’t. He believed in me.”

Marcrum, 44, talked to reporters Friday with slow, broken speech. On instructions from prosecutors, he avoided discussing the shooting. He focused instead on his recovery, and gratitude.

“I just wanted to thank everybody for the support they have given me,” he said. “Their prayers and well wishes — it’s been overwhelming.”

Marcrum said that since moving from a hospital to rehab on April 22, he had to learn to speak again and to regain his balance. He said his goal is to encourage others through similar struggles.

He recalled joking one day with a fellow patient who was so self-conscious about a speech problem that she would avoid talking to anyone. “I asked her if I smelled or something,” Marcrum remembered. “Ever since, I couldn’t get her to shut up.”

THE BEST MAN

Another goal, achieved, was to be released in time to be best man at his brother Tony’s wedding today in St. Louis County.

“He’s always kind of been sunny-side up,” said another brother, Jerry Marcrum. “To see him here today is a miracle. I told him God is on his side.”

Go here for the rest of the story.

That’s the question that occurred to me as I looked at April’s Bureau of Labor Statistics regional and state employment and unemployment report this morning.

Three things stick out:
- How big of a drag California is in the overall employment picture.
- How much of an outlier Michigan is.
- How Oklahoma continues to impress.

How much California and Michigan are affecting the overall picture is a real eye-opener:

(Note: The seasonally adjusted rate for all states differs from the nationally reported rate of 5.0% earlier this month because of differences in data collection methods.)

The Not-So-Golden State and the home of the Wolverines have a combined 15% of the workforce, but almost 20% of the unemployed. Without them (tempting, but I have relatives in CA who needs to be warned first), the seasonally adjusted unemployment rate would be 0.2% lower, the unadjusted rate would be 0.3% lower, and the press wouldn’t be talking about the supposed recession (OK, they wouldn’t be talking about it quite as much).

Only three other “states” — relatively small AK, DC, and RI — have seasonally adjusted or unadjusted unemployment rates of 6.0% or above. Roughly two-thirds of all states have unemployment rates of 4.9% or lower.

So at least from a jobs standpoint, if you want to talk about “economies” in recession (a term that should really be limited to whole countries), we should be talking about the states of California and Michigan, because the rest of the country is doing pretty well. I don’t recall two states having such a disproportionate impact on the national picture during other economic rough patches, with maybe Texas and Louisiana in the late 1970s and early 1980s being an exception.

If the election ends up being about the economy, and John McCain loses, it’s a pretty good bet that Arnold Schwarzenegger won’t make the Arizona Senator’s Christmas card list.

Many in the business press, rather than focusing on the mostly self-inflicted problems in California and Michigan, would appear to want to make it look as if economic sluggishness is a nationwide phenomenon, when it clearly isn’t.

Meanwhile, Oklahoma’s exceptional performance continued in April, as its seasonally adjusted and unadjusted unemployment rates came in at 3.2% and 2.9%, respectively — down 1.2% and 1.0%, respectively from April 2007. No state with a larger population has lower unemployment.

I theorized last month (at NewsBusters; at BizzyBlog) that the Sooner State’s enforcement-focused immigration legislation passed last year might a main contributor to its outstanding employment situation. The longer its rate stays much lower than the rest of the nation’s — even if California and Michigan are taken out of the comparison — the more compelling that theory will be.

Cross-posted at NewsBusters.org.

• Planned Parenthood makes excuses for getting caught sympathizing with the desirability of aborting black babies. Wire service proabort mouthpiece the AP laps it up (HT WND).
• If Gateway Pundit isn’t the best and most varied deep-digger out there, I don’t know who is. This post on how Nancy Pelosi and Congress are giving Colombia the free-trade shaft is outstanding.
• The idea that President Bush was “sending a message” to the presidential candidate I refer to as “Mr. BOOHOO-OUCH” (Barack O-bomba Overseas Hussein “Obambi” Obama - Objectively Unfit Coddler of Haters) yesterday in his speech in Israel is comical. But, since the Obama campaign brought it up, their candidate resembles Bush’s remarks about appeasers. As Instapundit noted, “When somebody condemns appeasement, it doesn’t help things to jump up and yell ‘Hey, he’s talking about me!’”
• If Obama IS in control of the person putting out the YouTube vid questioning the ability of the candidate I refer to as JS3M3 (John Sidney the Mad Maverick McCain III) to get his business done in the bedroom, it may be the dumbest campaign move designed to alienate a major voting bloc I have ever seen.
• Correlation of the day: An anti-tax Massachusetts group is working to get repeal of the state’s income tax (HT Club for Growth) on the ballot. It only needs a ridiculously low 11,000 signatures. The correlation is this: If so few signatures are needed, why didn’t pro-same sex marriage advocates in the Bay State ever put the measure on the ballot — i.e., the way it’s supposed to be done — instead of running to the state’s Supreme Judicial Court to get the still-not-codified-into-law (at least that was the case the last time I checked) Goodridge ruling? You know why. It’s for the same reason those in favor of same sex marriage got the California Supreme Court to invent a right that isn’t in that state’s constitution yesterday.
• Megan McArdle is right (HT Instapundit): “It’s a miracle unemployment is as low as it is.” Read this CNN article about job interviewing tips, and you’ll wonder what planet some applicants are on that they don’t know these things already. Don’t miss the 10 apparently real examples near the end of what some applicants did or said during interviews. How many tenths of a percent should we handicap the current unemployment rate to make it comparable to 20 or so years ago when the vast majority of applicants had a clue?

09 May 2008 | 12:30

A HEROIC father today described how he fought his way into a burning car to rescue two people from raging flames.

Salim Alleesaib was driving along the A12 when he saw a car collide with a vehicle, which contained Ipswich Town boss Jim Magilton and chairman David Sheepshanks.

A dramatic scene unfolded as the vehicle burst into flames, promoting Mr Alleesaib to spring into action and rescue those trapped inside.

Mr Sheepshanks and Mr Magilton, along with club advisor Charlie Woods and player liaison officer Wolfe Powell, were travelling in a Toyota Land Cruiser on the northbound carriageway near Brentwood when they got caught in traffic.

As it slowed to walking pace, another car collided with their vehicle before bursting into flames.

Mr Alleesaib, a 43-year-old father-of-three who lives in Brentwood, said: “I saw some brake lights on in front of me and slowed down.

“Then there was a car coming along faster and didn’t notice what was happening. It collided with another car, which caused a big impact and then lit up and caught fire.

“I put my hazard lights on and got out of the car and ran over to help. I went to the driver’s side first but couldn’t open the door so went around to the passenger’s side and dragged the driver’s wife out first. They were both saying they were in pain but all I could think was that the car was going to go up in any minute.

“I didn’t think of the consequences - it was just natural instinct and I wanted them to be safe. I would hope someone would do the same for me if I was in that situation.” …..

Go here for the rest of the story.

In May 2001, that same report showed that production fell for the seventh consecutive month.

Seasonally adjusted data from the Fed indicates that industrial production during those seven months (October 2000 through April 2001) fell 2.6%.

During the past seven months (October 2007 through April 2008), industrial production has fallen 1.7%.

Guess which set of circumstances generated more talk of recession?

Covering the the 2001 report, the New York Times, appearing ever mindful that a Republican had occupied the White House less than four months, kept talk of a recession to a bare minimum:

Production At Factories Decreases For 7th Month

Industrial production fell in April for a seventh consecutive month, the longest string of declines since 1982.

Production at factories, mines and utilities declined 0.3 percent last month, after falling 0.1 percent in March, the Federal Reserve said. Manufacturing of business equipment, appliances and metals all dropped in April.

….. The string of declines in industrial production is the longest since March-December 1982. The economy was in recession from July 1981 to November 1982, according to statistics from the National Bureau of Economic Research.

Note that the Times made no attempt to claim that the country was currently in a recession.

The Associated Press’ Martin Crutsinger technically didn’t do that either, but he got as close as he possibly could while raising R-word specter and playing clever word games (bolds are mine):

Industrial output falls, second time in 3 months

Industrial output plunged in April as factories making everything from autos to heavy machinery felt the adverse effects of the weak economy. Analysts held out hope that production will revive in the second half of the year, helped by the government’s economic stimulus checks.

Industrial production dropped 0.7 percent last month, the Federal Reserve reported Thursday, more than double the decline that economists had expected.

….. Brian Bethune, an economist at Global Insight, said production will shrink again this quarter, marking the third negative quarter, the longest stretch of weakness in manufacturing since the last recession in 2001.

Bethune predicted a mild rebound for manufacturers starting this summer when consumers start spending 130 million economic stimulus checks that are now being mailed out.

“That extra cash is expected to roll gradually into consumer spending by June,” he said, calling the timing “indeed fortuitous.” Many analysts believe the $168 billion stimulus program Congress passed in February will not keep the country from toppling into a recession but will make the downturn shorter and milder than it otherwise would have been

….. The weak economy has triggered four straight months of job losses, often a sign that a recession has started. However, the April drop was just one-fourth the size of job losses in March, giving hope that the current economic slowdown may not be as severe as the past two recessions.

Clever Crutsinger is treating “recession,” “downturn,” and “current economic slowdown” (emphasis “current”) as synonyms. This would appear to be his lame attempt to get his “we’re in a recession” digs in while claiming plausible deniability.

There is nowhere near the level of evidence available to credibly claim that a recession is underway. Economic growth has been positive if anemic, the unemployment rate declined in April, and the weighted average of the Institute for Supply Management’s manufacturing and non-manufacturing indices is decidedly positive.

Yet Crutsinger, as noted last week, continues to “cling to recession.”

Cross-posted at NewsBusters.org.

Story here.

Trumpet is the mostly-monthly magazine published by Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama’s 20-year pastor and “sounding board” Jeremiah Wright of the Trinity United Church of Christ (TUCC) on Chicago’s South Side.

Stanley Kurtz of the Weekly Standard is the person who did the original detailed work to reveal the radical, controversial nature of what has been in Trumpet since it transitioned from being an in-house organ of the TUCC to a magazine available to the general public. The covers of the pre-transition Trumpets indicate that the radicalism was present well before the move to public availability.

Barack Obama has been on Trumpet’s cover at least three times, once by himself (first and third images are clickable, and will open in a separate window):

Louis Farrakhan has also been on the cover at least three times, twice by himself (all graphics are clickable; each will open in a separate window), and once in a montage that included Wright and Obama:

Jesse Jackson and Al “Close This City” Sharpton have also appeared (all graphics are clickable; each will open in a separate window):

Kurtz’s core and inescapable conclusion (at very end):

There can be no mistaking it. What did Barack Obama know and when did he know it? Everything. Always.

The three previous detailed posts are these:
- May 14 — Jeremiah Wright’s Trumpet Newsmagazine: Cover Pic ‘Highlights’ (Farrakhan, Sharpton, Jackson, Others)
- May 14 — As Media Ogles, Stanley Kurtz Trumpets the Obviously Deep Obama-Wright Connections
- May 12 — Attention Stanley Kurtz Re Obama, Wright, Trumpet: I’ve Got You Covered

I’ll post it at BizzyBlog on Saturday after the blackout expires.

May 10, 2008 07:40pm

A MAN who was savaged by a 4m shark just off a popular beach in WA owes his life to a local hero who swam to his rescue and helped bring him to shore.

The shark tore two chunks from 37-year-old Jason Cull’s left leg, leaving him flailing and yelling for help from passersby at Middleton Beach in Albany at 7.30am.

He was rescued by a woman and received first aid before being taken to Albany Regional Hospital for surgery.

The extent of Mr Cull’s injuries are not known, but St John Ambulance confirmed he had suffered bites to one leg.

Albany Sea Rescue yesterday tracked the shark, which was described as a white pointer with a “belly the size of a 44-gallon drum”.

Authorities closed the beach and sent a spotter plane to monitor the movements of three sharks _ two of 4m and one 5m — sighted in the bay.

Albany locals yesterday said the sharks may have been enticed into the bay by schools of salmon or a pod of dolphins that had been seen in the area earlier.

Joanne Lucas grabbed Mr Cull and dragged him to safety as the shark loitered just 3m away.
“Instinct just kicked in,” Mrs Lucas told The Sunday Times.

“I didn’t even have to think about it, which is amazing really. It all just happened. I didn’t think, I just thought I had to get in there.”

Mrs Lucas, a mother-of-one, said she swam to Mr Cull, but was acutely aware that two other swimmers in the water were at grave risk of being attacked.

“I got to him and he said: ‘Thank God. Thank you so much — a shark has attacked my leg.”

“It thought it was a dolphin to start with, but when he told me it had taken a big chunk (from his leg), I thought `Oh no’.

“I kept thinking that I’ve got to get him in before it turns around and comes after us. I was thinking I have to beat (the shark) in (to shore). …..

Go here for the rest of the story.

Last updated at 21:08pm on 10th May 2008

Leanne Nicholson is in many ways like any other 18-year-old. Slim, blonde, pretty, and planning a career as a youth worker, she is devoted to her pony Merrylegs and her fluffy Pomeranian dog Timothy.

But she is also a medical miracle, and lucky to be alive.

In her short life Leanne has had no fewer than three hearts - the one she was born with and not one, but two transplanted hearts.

Today, she is recovering at her home in Choppington, in Northumberland, from her second heart transplant three months ago.
(more…)

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