THE ENEMY WITHIN

The Media and too many Americans blame the oil industry for the high cost of gasoline. It is expedient for the Left to blame any catastrophe or negative change in the economy.

Socialists believe and advocate that big government can and should control all forms of commerce for "the common good".

But if you take an in depth look at the real cause of the high cost of gasoline. You will find that the enemy of the American motorist is not Big Oil, but the Ecology and "Global Warming" zealots who have put the U.S. in the sorry state we find ourselves today.

The "Eco Movement" has as their goal the changing of our way of life, as seen in this statement by : Doyle Canning the Organizing Director at the Institute for Social Ecology Biotechnology Project:"Building an ecology movement is embedding the necessity of a systemic response to the systemic breakdown of the planet, in the necessity of synergizing the global movements for peace, global justice, freedom, and direct democracy. It is the project of building a social movement that can simultaneously confront institutions like the WTO and racist war, and cultivate peoples’ food sovereignty and direct democracy at the grassroots level. This is the project of the 21st century ecology movement, and this is the strategy that can ultimately win the struggle to control our lives, and to save the planet. "

Last month, Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, visiting the president at his Texas ranch on April 25, chided him with the message that his country could send more oil, but the United States would not have the ability to refine it. Soon afterward, Mr. Bush offered to provide closed military bases for new refineries.

Over the last quarter-century, the number of refineries in the United States dropped to 149, less than half the number in 1981. Because companies have upgraded and expanded their aging operations, refining capacity during that time period shrank only 10 percent from its peak of 18.6 million barrels a day. At the same time, gasoline consumption has risen by 45 percent.

The only effort to refine oil at a new refinery is being attempted in the State of Arizona 100 miles from Phoenix, by a man named McGinnis. He has plans to build a 150,000 barrel capacity refinery on 1400 acres of his own property. The last refinery was built in 1976.He has been trying for six years to get approval for the construction of the new refinery.

Meanwhile, gasoline demand is forecast to rise 39 percent by 2025, to 12.9 million barrels a day, up from today's 9.3 million barrels, according to a long-term outlook by the Energy Information Administration. By then, gasoline alone will account for nearly half the crude oil consumed in the United States.
By contrast, domestic refining capacity is expected to grow only by 0.8 percent from 2005 to 2007, slightly less than the 0.9 percent increase registered between 1998 and 2004, according to Jacques Rousseau, an oil analyst with the investment banker Friedman, Billings, Ramsey.

While ecological concerns and pressures thwart the production of fossil fuels in the U.S., the Chinese are building an oil refinery in Costa Rica.

China, not a signer to the Kyoto Agreement, is a big consumer of fossil fuels and a bigger producer of "green house" gases than the United States, will have fuel to continue it economic growth.

But then in China they don't have Environmentalists who contribute millions of dollars to Democrats each election cycle.

The next time you Big Oil. Curse the real enemy. The Ecologist zealot!

Happy Birthday Marine Corps.!

In 1775 the Second Continental Congress established two battalions of Continental Marines on the tenth of November. In 1778 President Adams signed the Act establishing the United States Marine Corps.
The Marines have fought in every war since then with courage and valor. Sometimes at great cost to the men who wore the Globe and Anchor.
During WWII the marines lost 5,598 men KIA in 36 days on Iwo Jima, and lost a total of 19,773 KIA during the march toward Japan after Pearl Harbor.
The battle that brought the most consternation to the people at home was the 76 hour battle for Tarawa, in which the Marines lost 990 KIA. Four Medals of Honor were awarded, three posthumously.
The Marine "esprit decorps" and honor among men must be remembered in these days of Leftist anti-military rhetoric. The Marines are sent in to do all the dirty jobs, with little recognition. And for 230 years they have been doing it for this Great Republic. Happy Birthday Marine Corps! Semper Fi!

OBAMA AND HILLARY TRY TO OUT SOCIALIZE EACH OTHER

Democratic candidates for the President of the United States Barrack Obama and Hillary Clinton are both campaigning on a social welfare program that would if implemented, raise taxes for Americans to exorbitant levels and Socialize the Republic that once cherished individual freedoms. Previous blogs have listed Hillary's Socialist agenda. This Blog is about Obama's march toward his Socialization of America.
The McClatchy News Service is reporting that the latest promise Obama has made on the campaign trail includes this "cradle to the grave" proposal.

His program is apparently aimed at women and working-class families.
"The sweeping subsidies and mandates reflect his past as a community organizer.
A retirement plan that would require employers to contribute a 50 percent match on the first $1,000 a year of retirement savings for families earning up to $75,000, an expansion of the current "saver's credit."
Require all companies - except those in their first two years of operation or with fewer than 10 workers - to enroll employees in retirement plans or direct-deposit individual retirement accounts. Workers could opt out.
A $4,000 annual college-tuition tax credit.
A major expansion of the federal Family and Medical Leave Act, which ensures that workers can take time off for health or family reasons."
The kind of welfare state he has in mind for America has been in effect in European countries for decades with disasterous results.
In addition to government spending, he is proposing "job-killing" mandates for employers of all but start-up companies. As the EU social welfare states like Germany and France have discovered, making it very expensive to hire people tends to make new jobs scarce. And firing an unproductive employee has become almost impossible in Countries like Germany.

Last Saturday, while campaigning in East Los Angeles, California. He gave a speech at the Garfield High School, during which he first said that Governor Schwarzenegger's veto of a Bill that would have extended scholarships to students in the United States illegally, was wrong!
He then said: "Diversity is not the enemy of excellence, it is the engine of excellence," he said. I am a strong believer in diversity, and affirmative action is one tool to help achieve it. He then went on to say: "He would institute an urban bank modeled after the World Bank to fund inner-city development, would press for affordable housing, and would back programs to help middle-school students improve their standing. Noting that Latinos and African Americans have higher dropout rates, he said that the problem would expand to affect everyone as the workforce became dominated by those groups."
Of course all of this would have to be paid by the wage earning tax payers, since the Federal Government doesn't earn money, it just spends Our money!

The NFL used to be my favorite sports organization. The players were not paid multi-millions of dollars, and in the days before television commercials made the NFL a multi-billion dollar industry. Players played because they loved football. They were paid less than $5000 per season on average, where as today the average salary is $1,169,470 reflecting a 5% increase over 1999, according to NFL Players Association documents.

In the "glory days" of NFL football, the league was known for it's hard hitting, mean "take no prisoners" play every Sunday during the fall. But in "the Days" the viciousness was on the playing field.

Players like Dick Butkus, Leo Nomillini, Gino Marchetti, Sam Huff, Ray Nitske and Alan Page, to name just a few,were known for their devastating and sometimes injurious attack on the quarterback and any running back who they could get their hands on. Butkus for one, fought ferociously on the field, and runners and offensive linemen were constantly amazed by the ferocity of his hits. Butkus could run down ball carriers from sideline-to-sideline, cover receivers out of the backfield and make the right calls for Bears coach George Halas' complicated defense.

Today the vicious play is highlighted by the dog fighting scandal of Michael Vick, and his numerous other NFL friends, who ran a gambling ring based on the killing of dogs in "DogFights".

Then there are the rule changes made by the league that have not only affected the defensive players ability to do their job, but have cut the playing time short to allow for more commercials(revenue for NFL) in the three hour television time slot.

Just a few will be mentioned here. One of the goals in revising the rules was to shorten the length of games. The game clock now starts when the ball hits the kicker's foot on free kicks and kickoffs, and when the referee signals the ball is ready for play on first downs, instead of at the snap. Many coaches believe these changes will eliminate 10-15 plays per game, and most coaches aren't happy about the changes in clock management. The TV people like it because it will keep the games in the allotted commercial TV window.

The defensive player can no longer tackle a running back or receiver by grabbing the back of his shoulder pads, the quarter back can only be tackled from the tip of his chin to his belt line. No grabbing the helmet, no hitting below the waist. And he can be in the grasp, throw the football into the ground, and still get away with out being called for grounding the ball! The league will now let a defensive player legally strip the ball by batting it or punching it. This rule hasn't been enforced, even though there was language prohibiting a player from stripping the ball by punching or batting it in the NFL rules. Many times, the officials are late in their whistle blowing during "gang" tackling to allow such events to occur. Makes for more excitement for the viewers, but also causes more injuries.

Commissioner Goodell has had to disciple too many players for off field actions. The NFL has suspended many players for varying amounts of time. Three incidents stand out. Pacman Jones being suspended for the entire season of 2007, for being involved in 10 incidents with the police, one involving a shooting that left a man paralized outside a Las Vegas night club. Chris Henry was suspended for 8 games by Goodell for being arrested four times in 14 months by police. Ricky Williams sat out an entire year for substance abuse, and these I believe are just the tip of the iceberg that is criminal activity now going on in professional football.

Former NFL players Nate Newton, Leshon Johnson and Tyrone Wheatley as well as Qyntel Woods, a first-round pick of the Portland Trail Blazers in 2002, have all been linked to dog fighting. Both Johnson and Woods were arrested and convicted of staging them. This all happened before the bomb shell was lobbed into the NFL. NFL star Michael Vick was indicted by a federal grand jury Tuesday on charges of sponsoring a dogfighting operation so grisly the losers either died in the pit or sometimes were electrocuted, drowned, hanged or shot.
The Falcon's quarterback and three others were charged with competitive dogfighting, procuring and training pit bulls for fighting and conducting the enterprise across state lines. Finally on August 24, 2007, Commissioner Goodell sent a letter to Vick suspending him indefinitely.

Then there is the scandal involving the NFL players pension and disability plan. The Courts are filled with suits claiming that the "OLD ERA" players are being denied their duly earned disability benefits.

It doesn't help that some of the biggest names in football history - including Mike Ditka, Gale Sayers, Harry Carson, Sam Huff, Mercury Morris, Jerry Kramer and Sandy Unitas, Johnny U.'s widow - accuse the league and the Players Association of abandoning the very athletes who turned the NFL into a $6-billion-a-year enterprise, the biggest attraction in America's sports-industry.

The former players say the plan is set up to stonewall players debilitated by injuries suffered during their careers. The plan will shop for doctors until it gets an opinion it wants to hear, they charge. Delays are frequent and lengthy. It's often difficult just to get plan administrators to return phone calls. Typical is this comment from former Oakland Raider Dave Pear: "The truth is that the NFL disability process is cruel, evil and deceitful and designed to deny benefits."

In 1986, an arbitrator - using the kind of warped logic that could be called ambiguous at best, decided that Victor Washington(former player for Buffalo Bills and San Francisco 49ers) should get $750 a month for non-football related injuries, instead of the $4,000 he would receive if his problems were football-related. The plan's language, the arbitrator said, specified the higher payment for "a football injury." Since Washington suffered multiple injuries, he was out of luck

More than 60% of retired NFL players suffered at least one concussion during their professional careers, according to the University of North Carolina's Center for the Study of Retired Athletes. Retired NFL players with three or more concussions, the center adds, had a nearly three-fold risk of being diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment, a precursor to Alzheimer's disease. According to former players - Boyd, Bernie Parrish and Morris, in particular, the NFL and the Players Association are taking a stand against claims that could cost them huge amounts of money.

Former Viking Boyd, testified that plan official Miki Yaras-Davis said that his doctors' reports and brain scans would not be considered because "the owners would not open that can of worms" by approving disability for a brain injury. Chris Goetz, a guard who played for the Jets in the early 1990s, told the Daily News one of his doctors, Robert Neviaser, told him the plan doesn't like to pay out a lot of money so it sets its standards unreasonably high.

And if it were not for the following fact, more details on the evolving scandal of the NFL retirement plan probably would be revealed.

Mr. Upshaw( head of the players union) and the NFLPA have hired a "scandal manager" to cover it up for them using their new "Truth Squad." Lanny Davis wrote the book Scandal Management 101 and came up with the line "I did not have sexual relations with that woman," for Bill Clinton and without a stream of NFLPA scandals Lanny doesn't continue collecting his $900 an hour from your NFLPA and Retirement Plan assets.

Gene Upshaw is notorious for having this to say about a ex-player who had the timerity to say something negative about the way the Retirement Fund is managed: "A guy like DeLamielleure says the things he said about me, you think I'm going to invite him to dinner? No. I'm going to break his goddamn neck."

Add this to the scandal sheet. A jury found former Minnesota Viking Moe Williams guilty of disorderly conduct, but cleared him of the other two charges against him for his actions in the infamous sex boat scandal on Lake Minnetonka last October.Williams, 32, charged with indecent conduct, disorderly conduct and lewd or lascivious behavior, stemming from the Oct. 6 cruise chartered from Al and Alma's Restaurant and Cruises, according to WCCO-TV. Williams was found not guilty of indecent conduct and lewd or lascivious behavior.

Earlier in the trial, prosecutors had characterized the party as a "floating orgy".Former Vikings quarterback Daunte Culpepper was also charged in the incident, but a judge later dropped those charges. Vikings Fred Smoot and Bryant McKinnie have court dates scheduled in May for the same charges.

The Commissioner has fined the New England Patriots and their coach, Bill Belichick, for videotaping the signals of the New York Jets during a game.
Belichick was fined $500,000, while the Patriots were separately fined $250,000 and will likely lose a first-round draft pick in 2008.

The Patriots put microphones on their defensive lineman in order to capture the offensive line calls and quarterback audibles. Then, the audio and the video of the game would be matched up, and defensive players would be given the code at halftime.

If principals of the league's best team engage in an intricate game of cheating, that's as bad as it gets. It doesn't look particularly good for the Champion Patriots, on the video taping front. The Packers, Lions and Bills reportedly observed the team doing the exact same thing, ruling out the possibility that it was some rogue video assistant who was doing this on his own.

Roger Goodell works for management. Of course, it has always been this way, even though the story line is that the commissioner is anything but the collective employee of the 32 owners. I believe his main job is to promote the "money machine" that has become a media entertainment event more than a sport. If you don't believe me, look at the past three Super Bowls.

Consider this, the$23 million in retirement benefits that the NFL annually contributes to the Players Retirement Fund, is only 0.003% of $7.1 billion. Visualizing this, it might be easier; an African Bull elephant weights 7 tons (See $7 billion like 7 tons) the amount the owners provide in retirement benefits to those who built their industry is equal to 9 mice or (4 size 10 ball caps worn sideways) in proportion to that elephant's size. The NFL elephant is $7.1 billion in profit per year.

For these reasons, and too many others that would take up too much time for the reader. I have decided to watch College Football instead of NFL games. The colleges have their problems also, but for the most part the majority of players on the field are in college to get an education that will help them in later life after their playing days. Not many will go on to play on Sunday for the "Big Bucks League".

HILLARY NOW THE TARGET NOT THE SHOOTER

In 1969 during her address to the graduating class of Wellesley College Hillary Clinton fired her first salvo against a Republican Politician in a public arena.
The target of her wrath was Senator Edward William Brooke, United States Senator from Mass. The first African-American to be elected to the United States Senate since Reconstruction days.
He was the Commencement speaker at Hillary's graduation. A five year veteran of the U.S. Army who served in the European theater of operations during WWII. who eventually served two terms in the Senate from 1967 to 1979.
Senator Brooke's comments apparently angered the 22 year old Hillary with a Saul Alinsky, leftist leaning position that appears to remain today.
The following are the remarks uttered by the Senator at the conclusion of a lengthy inspirational speech that he hoped would provoke patriotism not radical dissent from the graduating class.
" My message today is a simple one. Lest it be misunderstood in the more complicated discussion of social trends and innovations, let we state it briefly.
This country has profound and pressing social problems on its agenda. It needs the best energies of all its citizens, especially Its gifted young people, to remedy these ills.Let us not dissipate these energies on phony Issues or misguided missions.Let us not mistake the vigor of protest for the value of accomplishment.Let us direct the zeal of every concerned American to the real problems.Let us forsake false drama for true endeavor.Let us, in short, recognize that ours is a precious community that demands and deserves the best--",
Hillary used the Commencement podium, to lash out at the socially liberal Republican Senator that she had once supported, because the distinguished man had the temerity to politely criticize the New Left's anti-war rhetoric, as offering aid and comfort to our communist enemies in Southeast Asia.
Fast forward to 2007 to a Senate hearing on the war in Iraq when General Petraeus was reporting to the Senate on his progress in the fight against militant Islamists. Hillary once again lashed out at her target with biting commentary. She had this to say about the Generals testimony: "Despite what I view as your rather extraordinary efforts in your testimony both yesterday and today, I think that the reports that you provide to us really require the willing suspension of disbelief." Thus illustrating her belief in the Radical activist Saul Alinsky's proscribed technique of "pick the target, freeze it, personalize it and polarize it." To destroy it/him/her as the situation requires. . For her attack she was praised by the Left wing oriented MoveOn.org with the following: Thank You Senator Clinton for Calling General Petraeus a liar"!
But last week this self anointed champion of radical feminists, gay rights and the gimmee-gimme class has had the tables turned on her. The one whose reaction to any criticism or question, that didn't suit her, pulled out the conspiracy or gender cards has been caught in her own web of deceit.
It occurred last Tuesday night in Philadelphia during a Democratic candidate debate. Senator Obama and Ex-Senator Edwards went on the attack with Hillary as the target.
She was asked about New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer's plan to offer driver's licenses to illegal immigrants. Clinton tried to demonstrate empathy for her governor's predicament but duck specifically endorsing his position, as she had in a previous newspaper interview. Thus, she opened herself up on two fronts. Her answer was unclear in a way that can live on in video, and it provided Republicans with a possibly useful weapon against her on an issue that fires up the GOP base. Obama and Edwards jumped on her answer as proof of the kind of double talk they'd been accusing her of all night.

WHY HILLARY WILL NOT WIN

Not since the Days of Karl Marx and his friend Engels, when they published the Communist Manifesto in 1847, has there been such interest in "common good" from people running for the Presidency of the United States.

Senator Clinton, Barrack Obama and John Edwards all have made some Socialistic/Communist pronouncements in the name of "common good" as things they will do if elected.

But a study of Hillary Clintons advocacy positions in her campaign for the White House show an alarming similarity of her promises to those written in the Communist Manifesto.

Both Engels and Marx agreed that for the "proletariat to attain dominance over the Capitalistic system, "there must be first the destruction and replacement of individual rights through defined systems of taxation and the destruction of individual property rights.
To accomplish this they advocated the following :
"Limitation of private property through progressive taxation, heavy inheritance taxes, abolition of inheritance of property, through abolishment of inheritence tax exemptions.
Transforming the relations between the sexes into a purely private matter which concerns only the persons involved and into which society has no occasion to intervene. It can do this since it does away with private property and educates children on a communal basis, and in this way removes the two bases of traditional marriage -- the dependence rooted in private property, of the women on the man, and of the children on the parents.
They also spoke directly to what must be done in America to establish their "Common Good".
"In America, where a democratic constitution has already been established, the Communists must make the common cause with the party which will turn this constitution against the bourgeoisie(aka property owners), and use it in the interests of the proletariat -- that is, with the agrarian National Reformers." This is the redistribution of wealth to the "have nots" from the earners that have the wealth.
It doesn't take a superlative intellect to associate the statements of Hillary Clinton, and Marx /Engels, regarding her plans for her Presidency, God forbid, if she takes the seat in the White House.
Her program of extending insurance to illegal immigrants and others who aren't now insured will trigger a massive increase in the demand for medical services. The result would be a steep price rise that would force rationing of health care, particularly for the elderly. But she mustn't say any of that - so she pretends that her health-care prescription is just a band-aid to cover the nagging little problem of 50 million uninsured and that her solution won't bother anybody else.
Driver's licenses for illegal immigrants? Certainly, she favors them. During her husband's administration, she helped kill proposals to ban them. In the Senate, she voted against prohibiting them. But she can't say so without seeming to be soft on terror, so she dodges the issue, expressing sympathy - but not support - for the plan.
A day after the other Democrats battered her over the issue in the debate last week she released a statement of "general" support for Gov. Spitzer's (New York) goal of making illegal immigrants eligible for driver's licenses. But, once again, a la Hillary, she sent confusing signals by stating that she hadn't studied it and wasn't "endorsing" any plan. So she's apparently for it but not for it. Get it?
The Alternative Minimum Tax? Bill Clinton vetoed legislation to repeal it in 1999. She voted against repealing it in 2006. She likely intends to limit or terminate it once she's elected, but only in return for other massive tax hikes in its place. But, again, she has to criticize the tax because of her need to attract middle-class voters and speak of opposing a "trillion-dollar" tax increase on them.
The preceding facts were obtained from the web page, "The Hillary Project", and illustrates that Senator Clinton is guilty of one of the most popular forms of the Communist/Socialist movement, duplicity".
Senator Clinton does the "two step" when ever she is asked a question that might reveal her personal opinion not that of her political persona.