Economics Gurus Disagree!

In the 20 April issue of the Lexington Herald-Leader appeared a column by John Garen, an economics professor at the University of Kentucky, having to do with Earth Day as impacted by economics and vice versa. One suspected that in an ultraliberal paper owned by McClatchy the prof would lay the usual guilt trip on people who eat too much, drive too much and do anything else too much (or at all), consequently killing the earth in almost real time.

Didn’t happen, not even by a prof on the as-usual-liberal university campus! Garen went to some pain to explain that the market-based approach to the financial status of the country posed no threat to the economy or the earth, though the manmade-global-warming-climate-change thing has already been totally identified as a monstrous hoax by actual scientists/climatologists, the latest being part of the brain-trust at NASA. Indeed, he proved that entrepreneurial forces made things affordable, easily understandable since competition drives prices down, while government ownership and over-regulation do the opposite.

Garen said that the wide-open spaces (air, water), for instance, are not susceptible to ownership, while defined land areas are. When government over-regulates industry at great expense to producers (cap/trade) on the phony premise that it is somehow either protecting or appropriately changing the climate (atmospheric temperature) it incorporates huge overcharges for everything that’s bought and sold, with little or no effect on the environment other than locally, i.e., regulating landfills, negating pollution of streams, etc., legitimate concerns of the citizenry.

Both Al Gore and President Obama – recipients of the Nobel Peace Prize account saving the earth from a danger that never existed – have been main movers and shakers in the climate hoax, either by design or by stupidity. Obama promised in 2008 that if elected he would make electricity costs “skyrocket.” He’s made good on that promise, at least in Kentucky, where those rates are going up exponentially, even though the costly over-regulation of steam plants has not one iota of effect on the climate. So…the president either has meant to bankrupt power companies for reasons of his own or he has acted stupidly (his description of Cambridge policemen).

To even things up, the Herald-Leader gave the world a column on 26 April by a retired UK economics professor, Marty Solomon, whose shtick was that the “oligarchs have plundered and now control our country,” which, translated, means that the evil one percent has finally risen to its apex – making the 99% into a serfdom. The oligarchs are the moneyed class, including all the government officials who do grunt-work legislatively and administratively, Obama being hand-in-glove with the Wall Streeters.

Former Goldman Sachs honchos Robert Rubin and Henry Paulsen were Treasury secretaries under Clinton and Bush 43, respectively, while that spot under Obama has been held by tax-cheat Tim Geithner, who came in from the cold of the New York Federal Reserve Bank. So…give Solomon a cigar for recognizing the obvious…collusion courtesy government and special interests.

Obama and Geithner have given the revered “middle class,” whatever that is, a genuine screwing with such as the Stimulus disaster of $787 billion thrown down the proverbial rat-hole, and the “friends of friends” piece-of-the- pie known as Solyndra, worth $535 million picked up by John Doe(s). Garen could have warned that making solar panels at a cost of six dollars and selling them for three dollars would certainly lead to bankruptcy…and did, notwithstanding all the bonuses for failure – $368,500 to 20 people who had a total base pay of only $2.49 million…hard times.

Solomon: “If it hadn’t been for WWII, we might be a communist nation today.” Naw, through the Great Depression of the 30s (average unemployment rate of 19.1% during 1932-40) and with the commies a legal and strong organization, not even the folks in the soup lines and unions went for communism. Maybe Solomon has forgotten that oligarchs such as John D. Rockefeller and Andrew Carnegie were big-time one-percenters in the 1800s, both born in the 1830s. Folks of their ilk didn’t kill the nation even when they pulled greater strings than those of today.

Is there greed in the land? Oh yeah! Would the greedy make much difference if they were taxed at 60%? Of course not! There’s nothing new in this class-warfare stuff! While a case can be made for the Social Security that came out of the 30s, the back-breaker started with the entitlements of the 60s, including Medicare although folks who gain from it paid into it, just as into SS, and for which a case can also be made. Corruption/fraud and the fear by doctors of lawsuits have made Medicare/Medicaid into economic killers.

Sixty-nine percent of the FY 2011 federal budget accrues to defense, healthcare and pensions, each of which can be reasonably trimmed/adjusted/reconfigured to save billions. The instituting of a permanent underclass accruing to the welfare enactments of the 60s (now comprising 13% of the budget) is and will remain the albatross around the nation’s neck, along with other enactments guaranteed to slide the U.S. down the same path as Olde Europe – socialism, pure and simple.

Perhaps that’s what Obama wants. Sadly, the nation might buy it, especially if the current Washington crowd stays in office. One has only to look at Greece and Spain (24.4% unemployment rate) to see the result.

Solomon: “Karl [Marx], where are you when we need you now?” Gimme a break! Oligarchs per se are not killing the nation, but stupid government is.

And so it goes.

Jim Clark

Faith vis-a-vis "Fair Share"

Even as the nation becomes more secularized, following the Olde Europe pattern, there remains an inevitable quadrennial presidential-campaign hullabaloo about the candidates’ religions or religious preferences or church memberships. The current cycle is no different.

Within days of his inauguration in 2009, President Obama resigned his 20-year membership in the Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago and has asserted that his primary place of worship now is the Evergreen Chapel at Camp David. He might have resigned sooner except he had made an impassioned, wrong-headed speech (advertised as about race) in Philadelphia in March 2008 in an effort to somehow legitimize the Rev. Dr. Jeremiah (God damn America) Wright, his pastor and mentor. However, a resignation then would have represented disloyalty to his church of 20 years, not good behavior for his campaign even though he had thrown the reverend under the bus, which was absolutely necessary.

Vice President Biden, the presumptive vice-presidential candidate, is a member of the Roman Catholic Church, headquartered in Rome. Presumptive republican candidate Romney is a member of the Church of Latter Day Saints (Mormon), headquartered in Salt Lake City. Denominationally, Obama is or was a member of the United Church of Christ, headquartered in Cleveland, with the distinction of being perhaps the largest and only denomination (some one million members) that officially endorses marriages between homosexuals. Perhaps this explains Obama’s “evolving” attitude vis-à-vis such marriages since he declared in 2008 that marriage was only heterosexual, as prescribed by law.

Obama and Romney, according to their 2011 and 2010 tax forms, respectively, are prolific contributors to charity, the former at 22% of income and the latter at 16%. The stingiest is Biden at 1.5%. In fact, in the years 1998-2007 (last election cycle) according to tax returns, Biden gave only .14% of his (and his wife’s) income to charity, an average of $369 per year or roughly one-seventh of one percent. It’s hard to imagine that kind of insensitivity. The Bidens’ combined income ranged between $210,432 and $321,379.

So what!…one might say. The reason this is mentioned has to do with just how important religion is to the candidates, especially since it is generally thought to be at least a factor in the making of decisions as well as determining behavior, especially with regard to the word often mentioned by office-seekers – Sacrifice. None of the candidates is a sacrificial giver since after he/they’ve given their contributions they’re still among the most well-off folks in the country, able to secure “things” far beyond anything actually needed.

By remarking their giving to churches or church-related entities, however, one might attempt to form an opinion as to how serious the candidates are about spiritual matters and consequently therefore to what extent their faith (or lack of faith) might impact their performance. One way to quantify this is to “follow the money.” The level of sincerity can most often be determined by how much an individual financially invests in anything, including his church or denomination.

From an income in 2011 of $789,674, the Obamas gave to religious organizations the amount of $2,500, according to their tax return, or .32%, or one-third of one percent. The Bidens, on an income of $379,035, gave $2,100 or .55%, or just over one-half of one percent. Individual giving to churches has been steadily decreasing for a number of years, not just during the recession, but it’s probably not too far off to accept that the average is around two percent. Many members give far more, especially those who tithe (give 10%) and thus make the average as high as it is.

Romney is a tither, according to his pronouncements. On his 2010 tax return, his gift to his denomination was $1,525,167, under the caption of 50%. His income was $21,661,344, so he probably gave well in excess of the tithe, which would have been just over $2.1 million. His estimated income for 2011 is $21 million, about the same as 2010.

Obama has worn the term “fair share” with regard to taxes to the point that it’s virtually irrelevant. The tax code already comprises at least four different levels, each supposedly representing a specific income-group as giving its “fair share.” Transfer the “fair share” thinking to the matter of giving to religious organizations and the comparisons to be drawn among these three men are obvious.

On the basis of their financial investments in religious organizations/endeavors, Obama and Biden might as well be unbelievers, so inordinately miniscule are their contributions to institutions designed to make their offerings worthwhile, particularly concerning what they and their often-as-cheap fellow-liberals constantly caterwaul about – “social justice,” the thing churches try to address. They obviously believe their “fair share” spiritually is zilch, ergo, sending the message that none of their fellow adherents should take seriously any church/denominational endeavor. Hypocrisy on their level of intensity is off the charts, and their examples are ludicrous.

Contrarily, Romney could be said to be “living his faith,” putting his money where his mouth is and signaling that he considers the good works of the church important enough to give liberally. A relative handful of Christians give a tenth of their income but those who give liberally, whether tithers or not, carry on their backs the burden of addressing the problems of the world from the standpoint of “what would Jesus do,” never mind the overworked cliché.

The figures speak for themselves, so let the chips fall where they may. With regard to religious utility, by their exponential neglect of what actually matters and their insensitivity to the needs of others less well-off than they, Obama and Biden give the term “fair share” a hypocritical emptiness virtually unsusceptible to comprehension.

And so it goes.

Jim Clark

College Sports...Corrupt Goldmine

The rank hypocrisy and patently obvious corruption connected with college/university sports “programs” (once called “teams”) is being shown currently via the huge publicity in the media, local and national, concerning the hallowed rite of spring called the “declaration for the NBA draft.” It entails the pronouncements of tall and fast players announcing the earth-shaking fact that they’re headed for the riches of the pros after having served their apprenticeship at the expense of the taxpayers, never mind all the hoopla about the “totally separate” athletic departments furnishing the costs. That’s called “cooking the books,” since the AD money could be applied to actual academic enterprises.

A similar phenomenon applies to football and baseball, relative to the NFL and MLBs, respectively, but on a scale much smaller, at least in Kentucky, where basketball is roughly equivalent to a Catholic Mass in importance and dedication, not to mention a worship activity fit for the archangels. This, however, is not a condemnation concerning the athletes, who can’t be faulted for “going for the gold,” amounting in many cases to signing-bonuses alone in the seven figures, not to mention the multi-millions annually in salaries and endorsements for providing the public with spectator sports-activities that garner billions of dollars for club-owners and television.

Baseball at least funds its own minor leagues, which are what for basketball and football the universities fund – minor leagues in the guise of educational endeavor. At the University of Kentucky, basketball coach John Calipari makes it publicly and abundantly clear (at least that’s honest) that his “program” is designed to take on high-school all-Americans and prepare them in one year for the jump to the pros and the cash. The critical element in the process is in recruiting the best athletes. The most important element, then, is not so much coaching as it is in convincing the players that team play is the way to success, which it is, not the hot-dogging individual stuff for which they are practically worshiped in their high-school years.

Part of his argument to the players could be that teamwork pays off in dollars and cents down the road, not only for them in getting to the big leagues but also for their post-pro years, when they head into coaching, business, or whatever, ergo, be unselfish in the university in order to make big bucks later. One- or two-man teams are not likely to gain the greatest success in the NCAA-tournament venue, but five guys playing together unselfishly – as was the case at Kentucky this year in winning it all – can win big, even if fueled by freshmen, three of Kentucky’s starters this year, along with two sophomores – seven years experience altogether as opposed to a team of three juniors and two seniors, for instance, at 17 years experience. All five of Calipari’s starters have declared for the draft.

Calipari can claim that the proof is in the pudding, of course, giving himself as the perfect example of how to turn playing games into millions of dollars…and largely off the backs of other people, in his case, his players. His base salary at UK is $400,000. This is augmented by endorsements, broadcasting, etc., to the tune of $3.4 million, making a total on the ground of $3.8 million, not bad as an annual salary, certainly way beyond the salaries paid in academia, millions more than even the head honchos in the med-school.

Shrewd operators – coaches and athletic directors, most often abetted by university presidents – contrive contracts designed to make everybody well…off the backs of others. For his team’s winning the Southeastern Conference regular season title, Calipari picked up a bonus of $50,000. For making the NCAA “sweet sixteen,” “elite eight,” and “final four,” Calipari picked up a cool $100,000, $100,000 and $150,000, respectively. For winning the NCAA championship on the backs of his players, Calipari collected another $350,000, for a total of $750,000 in bonuses to add to his $3.8 million, for a total wage of $4,550,000 – not bad for one year.

The athletic director (base salary $600,000 plus cars, club memberships, etc,) got his cut from the goodies, too, to the tune of $65,000 (men’s events plus $15,000 courtesy of the women’s basketball team [SEC regular season title]) for doing absolutely nothing. The women’s basketball coach, with a base salary of $250,000 + $375,000 for broadcasting and endorsements, also picked up a cool $145,000 in bonuses off the backs of his players. His total for the year: $770,000. The main job of the athletic director is to hire enough smart people to make sure the school doesn’t violate any NCAA rules or at least doesn’t get caught.

The latter is important, especially at UK, where there’s a history! For instance, for the 2010-11 season, Calipari brought in a ringer (height 6-11) from Turkey, who had played professionally (for [gasp] pay) in Europe and was consequently anything but an amateur. For about the entire season Calipari and the AD, Mitch Barnhart, tried to get the guy approved by the NCAA but had no luck. The team didn’t make it to the hallowed Final Four but the actual winner was a player who probably wouldn’t have played ten minutes a game (and been “discovered” by the NBA) if the Turk had made it. Ironically, the substitute made it to the pros.

This is what one of the NBA-bound UK freshman was quoted in the local paper as saying: “We all did a lot for this school and I’m going to miss it.” That just about says it all…he did a lot for the school that, while paying its faculty and others peanuts by comparison, made it possible for him to become a millionaire overnight at age 19. The profiteers: coaches and the athletic director. The miscreants: the board of trustees that allows this stuff to happen. The unknown/covered-up: all the goodies delivered “under the table” lest the NCAA notice. The losers: the upper-class players left behind to watch the new class pass them by on their way to the gold.

And so it goes.
Jim Clark

Obama, Reagan & Race

President Obama is quoting Ronald Reagan these days, even though out of context and consequently deviously. One of his latest allusions to the “Great Communicator” has to do with the Gipper’s words about closing loopholes and restructuring the tax system. Obama turned that subject into a reason for raising taxes on the wealthy or something called the “Buffett Tax,” i.e., some sort of minimum tax for millionaires, though in reality it also seems to mean a tax increase on others…a “fair share,” in other words. It’s great campaign rhetoric with no risk involved in that such a proposal hasn’t a chance of being enacted, but the administration deems the hoi polloi to be too dumb to catch on.

If Obama had any intention of mimicking Reagan, he would go for an immediate lowering of all taxes, which is what Reagan did in pulling out of the horrible recession left him by the Carter administration (prime interest rate at 21% and unemployment rate at 6.3% and climbing). This is what George Bush did early-on when inheriting the recession left by Clinton, though the situation was not nearly as dire.

When the democrats took over Congress in 2007, unemployment stood at 4.6%. By October of 2009 (well into Obama’s tenure), it stood at 10% and has been lowered significantly recently not by a great increase in the jobs market but by the administration’s cooking the books by simply claiming a gross reduction in job opportunities and/or because huge numbers of people have stopped looking for work.

The actual unemployment rate, as provided by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, is 9.6%, though the BLS lists the official figure at 8.3%, and as the year progresses the administration will lower it even more. The BLS calculates both scenarios but the BLS belongs to Obama currently, while California Congressman Duncan Hunter is attempting to pass legislation requiring the actual rate to be official. In reality, the unemployment rate may be closer to 15%, though according to the BLS valid assessment of 9.6% it is relatively unchanged from late 2009.

But what does Obama actually think about Reagan, at least as opposed to what he once thought about Reagan? As recorded on page 133 of his book Dreams from My Father (subtitled A Story of Race and Inheritance) and in response to a question about his decision to be a community organizer in 1983, Obama wrote that he “couldn’t answer them directly” but instead would pronounce the need for change.

This is what Obama wrote: “Change in the White House, where Reagan and his minions were carrying on their dirty deeds. Change in the Congress, compliant and corrupt. … Change will come from a mobilized grass roots. That’s what I’ll do, I’ll organize black folks.”

He didn’t say he would organize all poor or disadvantaged folks, just black folks. Reagan and the vast majority in Congress were white folks and, presumably, he intended to turn them around. Reagan’s deeds were dirty, according to then-Obama, but now he quotes Reagan out of context for purely political purposes. Dreams from My Father was written in the middle nineties, so Obama in more than a decade had not changed his mind but now claims to follow the “dirty deeds” route?

In the 2004 election year when John Kerry was the presumptive Democrat favorite and ultimately the candidate, men who had served with him in the Navy put together a book titled Unfit for Command. During that same year shortly before the election, CBS anchorman Dan Rather attempted to foist off on the public what he claimed were damaging documents concerning George Bush. His effort was a complete hoax.

The 2004 race was close but there can be little doubt that Unfit for Command played a vital role in Kerry’s defeat. Rather’s effort was totally exposed, forcing some CBS honchos to be fired, though Rather stayed on for a while but not for long (“resigned” March 2005). People should read Obama’s Dreams from My Father in order to get an idea of how the president actually feels about white people and how seemingly with purpose he intends to be divisive…promulgating class warfare.

Obama’s effort to somehow emulate Reagan is entirely comparable to Rather’s effort at deception. It’s an ugly business, down and dirty and designed to somehow fool the public, a large segment of which is aware of the culmination of Reagan’s policies and the tremendous upsurge in this country from everything from the GDP to the standard of living. His policies were diametrically opposed to those of Obama, who seems disposed to destroy the economic system that has made this nation the envy of the world.

When asked why he was reading the book Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad (page 103 of Dreams from My Father), Obama wrote in part: “And because the book teaches me things, about white people, I mean. … It’s about the man who wrote it. The European. The American. … So I read the book to help me understand just what it is that makes white people so afraid. Their demons. The way ideas get twisted around. It helps me understand how people learn to hate.”

Obama’s writing evinces a certain personal altruism that’s admirable, but perhaps also either a complete misunderstanding of white people, particularly, or a refusal to attempt an understanding. In an interview in Philadelphia on 20 March 2008 after his famous “race speech,” he referred to the “typical white person,” whom he described as one who is wary of the company of people she/he doesn't know.” One wonders at his definition of the “typical black person.”

And so it goes.
Jim Clark

DNC Memorandum #8

From the office of the chairWOMAN, 09 April 2012

***LISTEN UP! While POTUS has taken time from his rigorous schedule to demand that Augusta National (home of the Masters Golf clambake, for recent Yale grads) not only allow but invite women into membership, the rumor that he has declared that the Augusta CEO must go is unfounded, untrue, and unmentionable in any town-hall meeting. POTUS has stated unequivocally that he did not make that demand, did not consider deploying the Georgia National Guard to Augusta, did not bring the matter to the attention of NATO or the UN, and will not do any of the above again. This is not for public assumption on pain of being assigned to Arizona desert towns to knock on adobe doors in the campaign if it is mentioned anywhere, but his statement about Augusta actually was written by FLOTUS account POTUS not being invited to join or even play in the Masters. This subject plays wonderfully with women voters so use it extensively in working the ignorant crowds.

***Do not…repeat – DO NOT – mention anything about POTUS’s remarks about the SCOTUS (Supremies for Princeton grads) not being able legally to overturn stupid legislation. Senator McConnell counted only 169 times SCOTUS has done that, hardly once a year since the nation was formed. That should be proof enough that SCOTUS should not touch the healthcare law…not even once a year has such a thing been done! Besides, POTUS was a lecturer on the Constitution at the University of Chicago Law School, meaning that he knows more about it than anyone (the document, not the school). Also besides, POTUS never mentioned which Constitution or the country upon which he furnished constitutional expertise. If questioned too closely, simply remind folks of this fact and say something like POTUS is an expert on the Zambian Constitution or generic constitutions or constitutions in general.

***Even though Senator Grassley tweeted that POTUS is stupid, at least concerning the U.S. Constitution, this is not to be mentioned in door-to-door canvassing because to do so might remind the ignorant masses that POTUS accused the policeman (white guy, of course) of Cambridge of acting stupidly, soon after he took office. Change any conversation on this subject quickly to the fact that evil republicans have declared war on women and that any woman who thinks Romney is a hunk is stupid in swallowing his line that he has no problem with contraception. Any man who has five children in this age of enlightenment is obviously against contraception and has committed assault and battery against his wife. That’s a felony (something legally mean, for recent Harvard grads, almost as bad as pregnancy or at least as inconvenient since a felony means jail-time). The same goes for Santorum, although he’s finally thrown in the towel.

***Since the Rev. Dr. Jeremiah Wright, to whom POTUS listened for 20 years, recently declared in a West Virginia speech that the God of the Bible and Allah are one and the same, there is to be no discussion about religion in any canvassing or town-hall meetings, at least not while people are still sober. If the subject can’t be avoided, just insist that Jesus was no better than Mohammad, who did little girls and thus was enlightened ahead of his time, and that the Southern Baptists commit spiritual jihad in their evangelization efforts, which makes Islamic jihad an okay thing, too. Under no circumstances…repeat NO circumstances, mention that Islamic evangelization is done on the point of the sword or that Wright and the Rev. Dr. Imam/Mullah/Ayatollah “Calypso Louie” Farrakhan share the same theology, having as its centerpiece the matter of reparations and “death to the infidels,” at least the ones not working to fund those reparations. If the subject of damning America (Wright’s prayer) comes up, carefully explain that the election of Bush, not current POTUS, was the answer to that prayer, but refrain from ever saying “Allah Akbar,” which is what Major Hasan screamed before he did the Ft. Hood massacre but was unlucky enough not to be martyred (only somewhat paralyzed) and transported to the virgins and fellowship with Osama and Saddam and Moammar (if they have time), though Osama committed suicide-by-cop and may not be eligible.

***With the campaign in full swing and the suspicion that many secret service agents are republicans, Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn of Weather Underground fame, the couple who advanced POTUS to the Illinois legislature, may soon be added to the POTUS security detail. They’re both known as haters of police/agents and so will cover POTUS’s back. Ayers is famous for the Viet-era bombings and Dohrn, whose admitted role model is Charles Manson, for occasionally dunking a dog in turpentine and stabbing the family-cat with a dinner fork.

***Be prepared for a negative SCOTUS ruling on POTUS’s healthcare law, the main reason being that no one yet knows what’s in the law, notwithstanding Minority Leader Pelosi’s insistence that everyone would know what’s in it once it was passed and notwithstanding that she has no idea yet, even though it was passed nearly 18 months ago. The SCOTUS law clerks are rumored to have given up on determining what’s in it, and they’ve read it, though it’s been rumored that one of them is still baying at the moon, two have become drunks, and that a fourth froths at the mouth when the law is mentioned. In his West Virginia speech, the Rev. Dr. Wright claimed that POTUS Justice Clarence Thomas worships “some other god” but didn’t say which one, so there’s been a request from the White House for a red/yellow/black/white paper outlining all the possibilities with a view toward possible removal of Thomas from the bench for a Constitutional reason, even though, as POTUS has suggested, the Constitution is passé, an anachronism, and steeped in values unrelated to the twenty-first century. For instance, if the mysterious god should turn out to be Kim Jung Un, the current North Korean deity, treason might be applicable. Whoever submits the best paper will win a new tire-gauge and a year’s supply each of light-bulbs and toilet-paper.

And so it goes.
Jim Clark

The Martin Affair & Yellow Journalism

Yellow journalism, defined as “biased opinion masquerading as objective fact,” is despicable at best and virtually criminal at worst. A good example of a complete yellow distortion of what purported to be a “news account” recently was the doctoring of a 911 tape by NBC News in its reporting about the Trayvon Martin shooting in which the shooter, George Zimmerman, seemed to voluntarily indicate Martin’s ethnicity; however, he furnished that information only AFTER he was asked for it by the 911 dispatcher. He did not volunteer this information (making him a racist), as the tape abridgment was made to show by a deceiving NBC through its selective editing.

As if that weren’t a bad enough skewing of “facts,” the news outlets attempted to make it appear that Zimmerman had suffered no injuries as a result of his altercation with Martin, regardless of the circumstances. The proper high-definition camera-work/production necessary for accuracy involving any significant distance between camera and object plainly showed that Zimmerman had a head-wound, a corroboration of the police report but bad news for the “newsies,” caught yet again red-handed in advancing various agendas disguised as actual news accounts.

Perhaps NBC’s main player in this skewing – or at least as a result of it – is MSNBC’s intrepid reporter(?), the Rev. Al Sharpton, who, despite his activism that would have been unwarranted even if he had gotten the facts straight, betrayed him for what he is, an opinionated bigot and certainly not to be taken seriously as a bona fide objective viewer of any scene. The edited tape popped up on NBC’s morning clambake, the “Today Show,” but as a news item it’s the baby of top-anchor Brian Williams, who had to know just how deceptive the reporting was and let it go on…or, more probably, saw that it did.

What Williams allowed or advanced was as false and yellow as the “journalism” produced by CBS top-anchor and news editor Dan Rather in 2004 when he attempted to sell the public, using falsified documents, on the fact that George Bush was guilty of violating some sort of Air National Guard regulation or given special treatment of some kind. Even in light of this scandal, Rather was allowed to stay on at CBS just as Sharpton has been allowed to continue to spread his crap at MSNBC. This is instructive regarding the integrity of the networks.

Star NBC reporter Michael Isikoff is now on the Martin case. Isikoff’s claim to infamy was his reporting a while back of Korans being flushed down the toilet at Gitmo. There was a catch…this didn’t happen but 15 Afghanis somehow got religiously killed because they believed Isikoff’s huge lie. Result: Isikoff’s credibility rises to that of a porcupine but he’s good enough for NBC.

It’s especially galling in the case of Sharpton, though his presence on the Martin scene was aided and abetted by Jesse Jackson, known for his rifling of his own organization’s funds (hundreds of thousands) for the upkeep of his mistress and their “love-child.” Sharpton’s main claim to infamy had to do with the Tawana Brawley case in 1987. According to the Associated Press, Sharpton and Brawley's lawyers asserted "on 33 separate occasions" that a local prosecutor named Steven Pagones "had kidnapped, abused and raped" Brawley (15-year-old black girl). There was no evidence, and Pagones was soon cleared. Sharpton had to cough up $65,000 to Pagones as a result of the lawsuit that followed. So much for Sharpton’s credibility.

Obama, without knowing the facts, foolishly entered the Martin matter, merely a local one in which a president would hardly be expected to intervene, saying that Martin would look like his son if he had one, whatever that means. The Rev. Jesse Jackson said, "Blacks are under attack," as if the U.S. Army and all police departments were doing what Obama said the Pennsylvanians did in 2008 – grasping their Bibles and shotguns and hunting down illegals. This kind of race-baiting is just as yellow as jaundiced journalism. The statistics overwhelmingly indicate that blacks have declared war on each other with regard to black-on-black killings, especially among young blacks.

The tip-off on yellow journalism was concocted by the New York Times when it referred to Zimmerman as a “white Hispanic,” ostensibly because one of his parents is white. Yet, the august Times would never refer to Obama as a white African American even though one of his parents was white. The paper is a propaganda hack for Obama but this was just too big a stretch.

The mainstream media, especially including ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, MSNBC, see no story opportunity about interracial killing unless the white involved can be made to appear as the villain. The killing, for whatever reason, has to be some strain of white-on-black, never or seldom black-on-white or black-on-black, which is the main, deplorable story today. In other words, yellow journalism, far from being the exception, is the rule. The lesson advanced: whites are a mean oppressor people. What garbage!

And so it goes.
Jim Clark

Homosexuality...a Civil Rights Matter?

The latest flap concerning alleged discrimination in Lexington, Ky., has to do with the decision of Hands On Originals not to produce T-shirts for the Gay and Lesbian Services Organization, such shirts to be used promoting the “gay pride festival” in June, something the city endures every year in accommodating the homosexual community, which can be guaranteed to scream “Bigotry” if not allowed to parade its collective self on the city streets, complete with all the lewdness it can get away with.

The GLSO has lodged a complaint with the human-rights-commission in an obvious effort to destroy HOO, never mind that HOO’s reason had to do with religious convictions and not “hate,” the term used by the mainstream media for every action with which it disagrees. Also, getting another provider presented no problem. The local newspaper, Lexington Herald-Leader, has been inordinately cooperative editorially and “journalistically,” even advertising a “grand protest” in a downtown park, conveniently 2.5 miles from the HOO headquarters, which might be hard for some folks to find. Sixty people showed up out of a population of 297,000 or so, an indication that folks are fed up with this stuff.

This is not all that surprising since political correctness (translated “anything goes”) drives decisions by bureaucrats and legislative bodies from the Congress all the way down to the local city commission. The notion that anyone can take a principled stand, religious or otherwise, that does not impinge upon the rights of others is inoperative/inexcusable if it makes any entity(ies) mad is the liberal mantra these days.

HOO exercises its rights under both the religion and free-speech elements of the First Amendment and the GLSO does the same. That’s even-up and fair enough, you say? Well…no. The GLSO can propagate its “gospel” concerning lifestyle and punish those who disagree with it but HOO can’t do the same with regard to Christian faith or lifestyle. This is unfairness taken to a ridiculous level but the HRC will adopt this stance every time and the mayor, a homosexual who has been “hated” and persecuted to the extent of being elected to the city’s highest office, will see that “justice is done,” having already publicly condemned HOO in behalf of the 296,940 folks who didn’t demonstrate against HOO and likely couldn’t care less what the mayor thinks.

Perhaps a case can be made relative to “rights” with respect to ethnicity since ethnicity doesn’t involve behavior that is obviously aberrant, as well as abhorrent to nearly everyone, not to mention unsanitary and susceptible to ungainly diseases. Forcing a landlord to rent a furnished apartment to people who habitually engage in anal intercourse, for instance, is untoward. One can only imagine how this activity can ruin beds, sofas, rugs…almost anything. It’s politically incorrect to say this but there it is.

Bodily orifices are designed for specific purposes. Mouths and genitals have their uses and should not be confused with each other. The mouth is a receptacle for food and drink and medicine, not for bodily emissions – anyone’s. Forcing any non-medical object into an anus is unnatural, completely alien to the body’s design. This goes for any perverted behavior, including by lesbians, and all the “fairness” claims forcing any property-owner to kowtow to the political-correctness crowd is unseemly at best, tyrannical at worst, particularly when personal, private, religious convictions are involved.

Because of their strange practices (not common among the general population, as the elitist social engineers insist), the GLBT community has designated itself as a “minority,” which, obviously, it is, and therefore to be protected with specific rules/laws that often impact the rights of others, such as in the HOO matter. Since left-handed people comprise only about 10% of the population, they could make outrageous demands, too, but they don’t, considering themselves perfectly normal, which they are. By their demands, homosexuals account themselves as not normal; otherwise, they wouldn’t demand some sort of special treatment. Rather than change their lifestyles (mind over matter), they demand a governmental imprimatur on their aberrant behavior through special laws. Makes no sense, but that’s what political correctness demands.

There’s no argument here regarding the private lives of homosexuals. They can do whatever they like with/to each other, though not wherever, such as in public restrooms, sometimes places of hanky-panky, as noted periodically in the media. On the web-site Cruising Gays, Lexington’s Jacobson Park is highly recommended (even has some woods for a “quickie”), the reason why parents should monitor their children’s visits carefully, especially to restrooms. The web-site shows other “areas,” such as gyms, bars, food-court restrooms (one with a peep-hole between stalls), etc., where there’s plenty of “action.”

The point here: There should be no special privileges for people who choose aberrant lifestyles and demand rules abridging the freedom-of-speech and religious rights of others because of their more equal “rights.” The HRC should keep “hands-off” with regard to Hands On Originals.

And so it goes.
Jim Clark