"Words don't kill, killers do"

"But all these calls for the nation to 'tone it down' make me nervous."

 - Danny Westneat, The Seattle Times 01.12.11

Danny Westneat writes for The Seattle Times. Sometimes I like him, sometimes I don't. I mean, seriously, I live in Seattle...this place is a haven for liberals and The Seattle Times has serious liberal leanings. Knowing Westneat is NOT a fan of Sarah Palin, he still sees the politicizing of this tragedy and Palin's innocence. He knows words don't kill. 

Take a gander...my favorite part:

"I'm with the father of the 9-year-old girl who was shot and killed in Tucson. He was asked about all this - the killer, his motivations and the debate now swirling about whether our politics is too heated - and he said, no, this is just the price we sometimes pay. 'This shouldn't happen in this country, or anywhere else,' he said. 'But in a free society, we're going to be subject to people like this.'  He added, beautifully considering what he had lost: 'I prefer this to the alternative."

FULL ARTICLE HERE

Politicizing this Tragedy

"I don't want to quell anger. I think people are right to be angry. I'm angry!"

 - President Barack Obama, 03/18/09

Image courtesy of Fox News

The tragic shooting rampage in Tucson has taken center stage this week. It's utterly horrific. It is unnecessary violence committed by a disturbed young man named Jared Lee Loughner. His motives are still a bit unknown. I am disgusted that our nation cannot focus on the fact that this madman has killed six innocent people and injured significantly more. Loughner alone committed this act of horror, but the media started mud-slinging from the outset blaming popular conservative/tea party voices, without any evidence of Loughner's affiliations whatsoever. I am a follower of the conservative grass movement...does that make me somewhat responsible? Absolutely not, even though the mainstream media wants people to believe that. I refuse to accept any responsibility for this troubled young man's act of violence. And I will not accept the destruction of free speech for conservative voices across the country as reparation for the damage Mr. Loughner has caused. 

It's not just the political right who has used references to violence as a form of speech. It doesn't matter what ANYONE says. The person who acts violently is the guilty party. 

But the media went crazy the moment the tragedy occurred...simply throwing accusations without any evidence or details. 

"Nobel Price-winning economist and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman blogged at 3:22pm ET Saturday: 'We don't have proof yet that this was political, but the odds are that it was."

"Krugman's blog post on Saturday linked 'the rhetoric of Beck, Limbaugh, etc.' to ' the violence I fear we're going to see in the months and years ahead,' and added: 'Violent acts are what happen when you create a climate of hate.' "

There is plenty of hate from the other side, Mr. Krugman. And I would say our President has fostered a lot of hate while in office. He is a divider, not a unifier. He said anger is good. He has also said, "When they bring a knife, we bring a gun." 

Rush said it well today: "President Obama's a lifelong political agitator. What do political agitators do but get people angry? That's what a community organizer is." 

So you tell me: Is this really something we can pinpoint on a group of people. NO. Yes, our President has said some things that can be called "violent" and so has almost every politician, political pundit, news commentator, etc. Just because someone says the word "target" does not make them responsible for every subsequent gun that goes off.  

Mr. Loughner should carry this responsibility alone. He acted violently; no one is on the hot seat other than him. We should be spending our time huddled together in support of the families and friends affected by this tragedy. We should come together rather than be divided over whose words incited this act, because no words can ever be responsible for the actual perpetration of a violent act. EVER.

Sources:

Congresswomans Giffords Shot, FOX News

Rush - Examples of Obama Hate Speech

Obama Brings a Gun to a Knife Fight, Politco.com

See ya, Nance!

LOVE this!

Courtesy of Jimmy Kimmel Live...

John Boehner has his work cut out for him and we are watching...

The conservatives of this country will hold this Congress to their promises.

Don't believe the recent words of Harry Reid:

This just makes us stronger. The Tea Party is not a passing trend. It is here to stay until Congress listens to its constituents and discovers they are not smarter than the rest of the country. Reid still doesn't get it. Probably never will.

Drill Baby, Drill

"How often do we hear that oil is a source of incredible value to human life, past, present and future? How often do we hear about the forward-looking ingenuity of the oil industry...? [or] the great benefits of international trade in energy? Almost never. It's time to start talking about these positives and talk about liberating, not restricting oil production. Otherwise, in the name of being 'clean' and 'green' we will adopt policies that will sentence ourselves and our children to energy poverty."

 - Alex Epstein, FOX Opinion, 12.29.10

A friend of mine linked to THIS article today. It destroys all the evil myths you've heard about oil. It's GREAT.  I love it. And it comes perfectly timed with THIS article from Heritage about gas prices under the Bush and Obama administrations. You've noticed they're going up, right??  Well, they will continue upwards thanks to the government handcuffing the oil industry. The sad part is our president WANTS gas prices to rise. It's his way of coercing the public to think more like him: oil is evil, we can't afford it, we are gluttonous users of it, and we must restrict our drilling and pay the cost of our sins.

We have oil, people. LOTS of oil. We have SMART oil engineers. Our country could be mostly independent of foreign oil (if that's what you want), if we could drill. The government regulations tie the hands of our energy industry forcing them into "green" energy that is NOT an equal substitute for oil and costs this country more money than you can fathom.  

And, here is Heritage:

From Heritage: "Fact: President Barack Obama's Energy Secretary Steven Chu wants to 'figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe.' At the time he made the statement, gas cost $7-$8 in Europe."

It will not going away. The regulations, the drill banning, those stupid light bulbs, rising energy costs, rising gas prices, ALL OF IT...is a way for the government to control the way we live our lives. If allowed to continue on this course to destroy oil, they will cripple our freedom in the name of energy. Rising gas prices are just the tip of the iceberg, my friends.

Sources:

Fox Opinion, The 6 Myths About Oil, 10/29/10

The Heritage Foundation, Gas Prices Under President Obama, 1/7/11

Don't Believe the Hype

I have children.  I have vaccinated them.  Five years ago when my first child was born the vaccine decision was hard for me. At the time I consulted with my pediatrician on this decision and now I'm glad I did...

"Vaccine link to autism further discredited", click for full article.

Autism is a serious problem. I know children and parents who struggle with this disability and its wide-ranging scale of symptoms and therapy challenges. But the original (small) publication from the UK linking autism with the MMR vaccine has been completely discredited. 

The Associated Press article today talks about the panic that ensued and how the vaccination scare it caused will probably never go away. From Dr. Paul Offit, an infectious-diseases expert at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia: The original Wakefield report "scared people and it's hard to unscare them."

Just wait...give it ten years and all of this "research" about how greenhouse gas emissions are cause for climate change will be discredited as well. Although it may be too late. The government might take away my big rig before then...

I'm just sayin...

Don't get sold so easily. Don't change your life based on small-scale research with obvious deficiencies and don't let the government tell you how to think. 

Don't go buy that Prius just yet.

The Tax Deal & Obama's Semantics

To extend current tax rates is simply to defer a massive tax hike - nothing more, nothing less.  The grand compromise changes nothing as far as income taxes are concerned. It just means that every American earning income will go on paying at the same tax rates in place for the last 10 years.

 - J.D. Foster, The Christian Science Monitor, 10.09.10

The tax battle is getting ever more interesting. This past week Obama "caved" to a portion of the GOP demands (finally), and his Democrat constituents are up in arms. They are all over Obama...apparently, some serious F-bombs were thrown around Thursday on the House floor. Wow. 

But what's been seriously killing me are the semantics of the whole thing. I saw this article today and it stated perfectly what I could not get into words myself.  Thank you, J.D. Foster. 

Here are a few quotes, but this one is seriously worth a gander. It makes PERFECT sense.

Click HERE for the entire article: "Obama Tax Deal: Watch Your Language, Tax Cuts Don't Cost Government a Dime"

"When the President or, say, The Washington Post talks about lower tax rates “costing” money, they reveal a fundamentally erroneous view: that government somehow has first claim on our money – that it somehow “belongs” to the government, rather than the person who earned it."

"...Extending the 2001 and 2003 income tax rates is not tax relief, and it doesn’t “cost” government anything either. It provides no relief to taxpayers; it simply keeps the tax burden from rising for those who pay income taxes. Your income belongs to you. You earned it – not President Obama, not Nancy Pelosi, not Harry Reid, not any of the politicians or talking heads so fond of arguing that those who refuse to let tax rates rise are “costing” government billions."

"When government spends money, there’s a clear cost from economic and budgetary perspectives. But when government extends current tax policy, that’s not a cost. It’s not even tax relief, unless one believes that money earned belongs first to the government and is given to the taxpayer only through governmental generosity."

"When government cuts taxes further, that, too, is not a cost to the government. It means government will either have to borrow more to keep the same level of spending or it will have to (gasp!) cut spending." 

Don't Ask, Don't Tell...my spin

I've wanted to get this out...It's a thought about the push to repeal the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy, which forbids gays from serving openly in the military, and it's been bugging me. It's on Congress' lame-duck agenda.

Our military has one focus: protect and preserve this country, our freedoms, and our ideals around the globe.

What happens when our military must turn away from that focus and instead have sensitivity training, or make special exceptions (like private living and restroom quarters) for it's gay members? What does that do to a troop's solidarity when some members are treated differently than others? What about their solidarity? How does that affect them in combat?? Does the change in this policy perhaps deflect the military's focus from it's true course?

I'm not sure...but I'm worried about it.

And since when does our government get to weigh in on a person's sexuality? As far as I'm concerned, the government should be neutral. If the government repeals this policy, it's obvious they are not neutral.

Right now, we have gay members of the military choosing to serve and I'm sure, serving well...and they are doing so under the current system. The evidence to overturn is NOT overwhelming. It appears there are far more pressing issues, including a decision on extending the Tax Cuts...that go into effect in T-minus 28 days. That seems a little more pressing to me.

Source: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1210/45947.html