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Selected News For Apr 4 – Apr 10

This thread is for the busy bees of S&L to post news items we might otherwise miss.

If you do post an article, please follow these guidelines as much as possible:

  • In order to make the articles as readable as possible, please try to stick to the format described in the first of these weekly editions here.
  • Do not just post a link without noting the source, giving the headline and a brief excerpt from the article.
  • Remember to link to the original source for each item you post.
  • Avoid articles from blogs or hugely popular sites like the Drudge Report, since most people will presumably see such material elsewhere.
  • Any articles that fit under the topic of a recent thread should be posted there.
  • Remember to excerpt heavily. Posting less than a third of the article, is a good rule of thumb.

Thanks!

Related Articles:

 

This article was posted by Steve Gilbert on Saturday, April 4th, 2009 at 12:00 am. You can leave a response.

63 Responses to “Selected News For Apr 4 – Apr 10”

  1. crosspatch
    April 4, 2009 at 1:21 am

    My translation of the “english” version of this story at IraqDirectory.com

    Iraqi Airways is now flying to Europe for the first time in 19 years. A flight from Baghdad landed in Athens, Greece and continued on to Stockholm, Sweden.

    According to an official statement from the Ministry of Transport, Minister Amer Abdul-Jabbar Ismail was on the plane and held talks with Greek officials on developing relations between the two countries in the field of transport. Transport Minister Ismail also held meetings in Stockholm with Swedish officials on the initiation of the Iraqi-Swedish Joint Committee.

    The statement confirmed that the intention is to open air routes to Germany, India, Qatar and Bahrain in the near future.

  2. canary
    April 4, 2009 at 6:28 am

    From the Assoicated Press:

    Winds may have delayed launch of NKorea rocket

    By HYUNG-JIN KIM, Associated Press Writer Hyung-jin Kim, Associated Press Writer

    SEOUL, South Korea – North Korea said it would launch its controversial rocket “soon,” but the window for a launch Saturday passed without word of a liftoff, possibly because of strong winds.

    Regional powers deployed warships and trained satellites on the communist country to monitor what they suspect will be a long-range missile test.

    Preparations for launching “an experimental communications satellite” were complete, state-run media said in a dispatch Saturday morning, adding: “The satellite will be launched soon.”

    However, the day’s stated 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. timeframe passed without any report of a launch, possibly due to relatively strong winds reported in the area around the northeastern North Korean launch pad in Musudan-ri.

    Paik Hak-soon, a North Korea expert at the private think tank Sejong Institute near Seoul, said winds likely stopped the North from launching the rocket, which is similar to one that in 2006 fizzled less than a minute after takeoff.

    “North Korea cannot afford any technical failure this time,” he said. “North Korea wouldn’t fire the rocket if there’s even a minor concern about the weather.” …

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200.....ea_missile

    As you can see Obama and Hillary’s original warnings if they launched, has now changed that they expect and it will be discussed. A strong signal to the world that the new American leaders are weak. NATO’s words have watered down too.

    I think they should figure out which way the heavy winds are blowing in N. Korea, and figure their aim is waiting for the winds to die down, or blow the opposite way, which would give indication of their target. lol. Norh Korea’s leader has threatened to nuke the U.S. fo over a decade now. Course N Korea might wait til Obama decreases our defense technology first. lol. not.

  3. Melly
    April 4, 2009 at 8:03 am

    Here’s a great video of the Mayor of Mississauga, Ontario, Canada, Hazel McCallion, born February 14, 1921.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....r_embedded

    You can read her bio here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hazel_mccallion

    Apparently she’s been mayor for over thirty years. She believes in low taxes. There is NO debt in her very large city and they have a reserve of over 700 million dollars.

    She is just inspirational and a hoot to watch. I hope you all enjoy it.

    • Smart Power
      April 4, 2009 at 10:40 am

      I loved the video – love Hazel!
      What a sweet heart.
      What a leader.
      Thanks for posting.

    • U NO HOO
      April 4, 2009 at 10:42 am

      WOW!

    • dulcimergrl
      April 5, 2009 at 11:07 am

      She’s 88 years old and seems sharper than most 40 year olds. Just last week, I posted a message on a teacher discussion group, asking for insight into why my husband was not accepted into the teacher internship program where he goes to college and is trying to get a credential (he’s 59 and this is his 2nd or 3rd career). Some schmuck wrote back saying stuff like “why does he want to do this?” and “most people over 65 are senile”. Idiot

    • proreason
      April 5, 2009 at 11:31 am

      “a teacher discussion group,…Some schmuck wrote back saying stuff like “why does he want to do this?” and “most people over 65 are senile”

      And they are one of the greatest influences on children’s lives…..and an entrenched union whose members can only be fired if they commit mass murder. (apologies to the many dedicated teachers who actually do want to help kids learn)

  4. canary
    April 4, 2009 at 6:29 pm

    Obama’s org’s now using Obama and his speeches in ad flooding.
    I nearly fell over last night when an add on TV of Obama speaking came on. It appeard in present tense, with the blue background and symbols. So, I found this article, which is too long to post, as to the contents of many ad which will be flooding this country. I also feel the figure for paying the ad’s is probably inaccurate. If you’re sick of his mug and words, it’s just the beginning.

    When the media get’s sponser’s money for commericials, and the sponser is Obama, it comes with a baised catch.
    So, expect to see more leftist propaganda, less accurate news reporting.
    There should be a law against this kind of conflict of interest. The press is being paid off.

    Americans United for Change Pushes Obama’s Budget in TV Ads
    March 25, 2009 03:46 PM ET | Paul Bedard | Permanent Link | Print
    By Paul Bedard, Washington Whispers

    In its largest national ad buy ever, the progressive pro-Obama group Americans United for Change says that it plans to spend some $700,000 in a TV campaign starting today to promote President Obama’s budget campaign. “The work that begins this week on President Obama’s budget is by far the most significant in shaping the president’s transformational commitments to healthcare reform, education, and clean energy,” says Tom McMahon, the group’s acting executive director. In a statement to Whispers, he added, “This ad is designed to engage the American people in the process of bringing about the transformational change they voted for in November by contacting their elected representatives and asking for their help in putting our country on the road to prosperity. It is our hope that Congress gets the boost it needs to stand up to the special interests that will do anything to maintain the failed policies of the last eight years that were entirely stacked in their favor and that turned our economy into a house of cards.”

    The ad, called Blueprint, essentially reviews the economy Obama inherited from President Bush and lays out Obama’s budget plan, which he highlighted in last night’s press conference. It will run on YouTube, cable, and local TV, especially in districts of key lawmakers. Some 23 local markets will be targeted, including Omaha; Indianapolis; Richmond, Va.; Little Rock, Ark.; New Orleans; Anchorage; and Tucson and Phoenix in Arizona.

    (it fails to list other Republican states the ads are playing, I guess when Obama said he’d soon be visiting them, this is what he meant.

    For highlights of the propaganda aired check the details.

    http://www.usnews.com/blogs/wa.....v-ads.html

    http://www.usnews.com/blogs/wa.....v-ads.html

    • caligirl9
      April 4, 2009 at 6:32 pm

      I didn’t vote for that transformational change. Why do I have to play?

      I don’t see the Bay Area in that list. No need; there are lots of kool-aid drinkers in this neck of the woods.

    • sheehanjihad
      April 5, 2009 at 6:45 am

      What chaps my hide is this Americans United for Change crappola…they have it so wrong…because Americans are anything but united for this socialistic bull….but are emphatically united to stop it. They have the right phrase, just the wrong people.

  5. canary
    April 5, 2009 at 5:49 pm

    Warning. Beware. Keep your doors locked. Period. Please, inform your children not to answer the door, “even” if someone says they are “a pastor” or law enforcement. Any criminal aware of this new Census method, can use this to full advantage to rob you, rape you, and kill you.
    Even if you have not mailed in your census, you do not have to open your doors.
    If someone at your door doesn’t leave after you request, you could inform them you have a gun, or dial 911. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure

    Highlights from CNS article of what’s in store.

    http://www.cnsnews.com/public/.....p;print=on

    CNSNews.com
    Census Bureau: We’ll Work with ‘Community Organizations’ to Count All Illegal Aliens in 2010
    Thursday, April 02, 2009
    By Nicholas Ballasy, Video Reporter

    (CNSNews.com) – The acting director of the U.S. Census Bureau, Thomas Mesenbourg, told CNSNews.com that the bureau intends to work with community organizations to make sure every illegal alien in the United States is counted in the 2010 Census.

    The Census is used to apportion the seats in the U.S. House of Representatives. There are 435 House seats that are divided among the states in proportion to their population, which is determined by the decennial census. States with more people get more seats in the U.S. House.

    This means that a state harboring more illegal aliens can gain more House seats as long as the Census Bureau finds the illegal aliens and counts them. This also means that the illegal alien population resident in the United States during a census year has the potential to alter the regional and philosophical balance of power in Congress.

    Mesenbourg’s comments were made after a press conference on Wednesday where Commerce Secretary Gary Locke joined several interest groups, including Univision, the National Council of La Raza, the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) and the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials (NALEO) to talk about efforts to ensure a full count of Latinos in the 2010 Census.

    “It’s more than just the Census Bureau telling them that it’s safe,” said Mesenbourg. “We need somebody that they view as a trusted voice–somebody from that community,

    whether perhaps the local pastor or somebody in a community organization that can assure them that it’s safe.”

    “One way to improve the safety is you get a census form, fill it out, return it by mail and no one will come knocking on your door after that,” he said.

    Mesenbourg explained why he and Commerce Secretary Gary Locke attended the event with several Latino special interest groups.

    “Well, getting a full and accurate count is job number one for us,” said Mesenbourg. “The secretary recognizes that and we recognize that the Census Bureau and the Department Commerce alone can’t carry out a successful census.”

    “We need to partner with organizations that are viewed as trusted voices in their local community, and certainly this coalition’s going to go a far way in terms of accomplishing that goal,” he said.

    The executive director of the NALEO Educational Fund, Arturo Vargas, said they want to make sure every single person who resides in the county is counted.

    Ruben Keoseyan, publisher of the newspaper La Raza, said the organizations at the press conference have partnered with the Census Bureau to help undocumented immigrants “come out and register” for the census.

    Mesenbourg: “Well, the local communities are going to have a strong partnership program in each of the local communities and we’re going to focus on the hard to count geographic areas. That typically has been areas with high numbers of undocumented workers, but it’s much more diverse than that. So, what we’ll do is we’ll have Census Bureau folks out in those neighborhoods recruiting community organizations, faith-based organizations, and local media to get that message out that it’s safe, it’s easy and it’s important to file your 2010 census form.”

    oops, had to delete a part already in there.

    • caligirl9
      April 5, 2009 at 8:28 pm

      There has GOT to be remedy in the courts for this! Obviously we aren’t going to be remedied through any sort of elected officials …

      This fruitcake state I live in DOES NOT deserve more representation! Most of the people holding elected office are wackjobs!

    • canary
      April 6, 2009 at 1:33 am

      Well, I was doing some searching, because I could not recall the minimum of information, or questions that must be answered according to our Constitutional rights. Ten years ago, we had a Congressman who was honest enough to tell citizens. The questions were so invasive, and can’t even imagine what is on this years. The link below is a court ruling that came out in 2000.
      The original census was that all free persons, except Indians who did not pay taxes, had to be given.
      What is really wrong about the fact that the government is going to churches and pastors is that the government has no right to know your religion on the census period. There are threats on the census, such as failure to respond is 100 dollar fine. Giving false information is 500 dollar fine. However, I’ve never heard of anyone being fined for refusing to answer all the questions, such as the value of your car, do you have an oven, etc. This is taking the purpose of the census for housing purposes way beyond the original purpose of how many homes, how many people. Not sure if race has to be marked either. Think only how many adults and how many children is all. Remember they want to know race, but don’t think that has to be answered. The Civil Liberties doesn’t get invovled with our civil liberties being violated since they like to know about minorities. And illegals have a right to fill out the census, because they are free people. And the real rip off in the illegals filling out the census is that it can give blue states more representitives, and that is the reason there is such a drive this year to get minorities to fill out the census!!! But, these census have asked if anyone is handicapped, which you absolutely do not have to answer, along with all the other questions. I have not looked at the form. My concern is that the government through the U.S Postal Service has computer records of every address in the U.S. even homes that are vacant, and I thought they were to mailed April 1. My concern is individuals, who get low pay, like putting pizza adds on your door, or phone books, may actually hit each and every home. Can’t imagine what that would cost, yet alone the unsafety. I recall they can be called in by phone. And possible they are skipping mail, and expect in todays technology for people to do on-line, to save paper, etc. But, do remember that
      identity theft is number one crime, and although the census collectors are not to give out your personal information (which I would not fill out anything that would be personal) because you have no idea what some of these strangers might do. Also, they are to have badges (can you trust the badge is legit in these days of high technology) so, if you are late, and it comes down to it, and they are at your door, ask them to leave the form. Refuse to open the door.
      Anyways, no one I know got penalized 100 dollars for refusing to answer all the questions. Under this administration and it’s regime, who are going to churches when it says the absolute law is they can’t ask your religion. Who knows. Just my opinion. I hope to find out more on this, and will pass it along. I found some really bad stories posted, of people that got phone calls by people pretending to be the census regime, and since I’ve not heard of them calling them prior, I would ask for their number and tell them you will call them back. Just not sure what’s going on. Sorry for mispellings etc. Hurts to type right now.

      recent article showing 2000 ruling
      http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?pageId=4654

    • pdsand
      April 6, 2009 at 10:58 am

      I was reading through William F. Buckley’s “Let us talk of many things”, and one of his speeches was a eulogy of a friend and colleague at National Review who sued and won regarding the prosecution of census evaders. He had gotten the long form and refused to answer. He was fined like a dollar or something, but he fought it and won, and I’m sure this was in the 50s.

  6. jobeth
    April 5, 2009 at 7:32 pm

    From Canary’s post and news story:

    “This means that a state harboring more illegal aliens can gain more House seats as long as the Census Bureau finds the illegal aliens and counts them”

    WHY IN THE H*** SHOULD ILLEGALS BE COUNTED AT ALL AND/OR ALTER THE THE HOUSE SEATS!!!!

    THEY ARE ILLEGAL FOR PETE’S SAKE!!!!

    (yep, I’m P*****! and shouting!!

    I am waking up each morning in Oz…this isn’t real is it? This isn’t even constitutional! And yet it continues and no one stops it.

    Start working on everyone you know who has even a smidge of common sense to vote conservative next election! It’s going to take all we have to stop this bunch of clowns. Especially the way they steal votes and elections. It has to be a BIG conservative win.

    I want to cry I’m so frustrated.

    • dulcimergrl
      April 5, 2009 at 11:38 pm

      You and me both, Jobeth, you and me both. Things have been snatched away so fast, most folks have no idea what’s happened. The whackjobs around here where I live are still blaming Bush for everything, that’s how stupid they are. I guess people like that won’t wake up until…well, maybe never. :-(

    • canary
      April 6, 2009 at 4:26 am

      dulcimergrl, It was Al Gore in the second half of the 90’s quickly made 1.2 million Mexicans legals, because of the backlog. Proper background checks weren’t done. Then it just spiraled, and of course there’s alot that vote illegally. Not sure what you were thinking about”…well, maybe never. :-( ”
      Myself I was looking over 4 maps that differ a bit, as to muslim terrorist cells, and most are in the blue states where the Mexicans live. Along the West case, around the DC area, E coast, and New England states. They don’t like those rosary’s and jesus statues in the Mexicans neon trucks too much. Just kidding. But, ya know, I was hoping that N. Korean bomb would explode before lift off. And think Obama should make N. Korea clean up the Pacific Ocean. lol. But, things change. So, don’t give up hope. With God “All” things are possible. And “all” means “all”. Though 10,000 fall at our side. Don’t forget the few banging of clay pots that ran thousands off.

    • jobeth
      April 6, 2009 at 10:25 am

      dulcimergirl

      ” The whackjobs around here where I live are still blaming Bush for everything, that’s how stupid they are. I guess people like that won’t wake up until…well, maybe never. :-(”

      Sorry, I just HAVE to get this off my chest!

      Yesterday I was talking to my pastor, saying that it was a good thing we are on THIS side of Obama’s Health Care Reform (his wife is fighting breast cancer) He is a conserv.

      A woman I have tried hard to befriend because she has no friends (very argumentive about everything) overheard me and jumped all over me, full of vitriol, because I said something against Obama!

      At first I tried to ignore her but then I addressed her by asking for details of the usual broad stroke leftist talking points. Of course she could never answer any. She went off on how America tortures etc. (usual leftie stuff right off the MSM) she sited waterboarding and when I ask her how that injures anyone…she said it was uncomfortable for the prisoners. UNCONFORTABLE!

      And of course she couldn’t/WOULDn’t answer me when I asked if it was between them being uncomfortable and American’s dying, which is better? She would only change to another broad brush accusation of the evils of America.

      Then she went on to condem her bro-in-law for owning 3 houses. “They don’t need those houses…Do you know how many people that would feed?”

      In short she is fondly up the O’s B***. She left in a huff.

      Being a Christian and wanting to continue to TRY to love the unloveable I first thought about sending her an olive branch in the form of an Easter Card. I bought the card,b ut you know what… I am just sick to death of this stuff. I’m sick of trying to not “offend” these goofballs. (I wasn’t even talking to her in the first place)

      I’m keeping the card. She can approach me if she values our friendship. I’ll be nice to her.

      I said all this to say, I’m fed up with these whackjobs as you call them (great word BTW). Let’em enjoy the fruits of what they sow.

      I make no appologies nor will I keep quiet any longer in order to keep peace…even in church…altho I will remember where I am out of respect for my Lord.

      Thanks ya’ll…I feel better now! :)

    • Liberals Demise
      April 8, 2009 at 1:44 pm

      jobeth……they shoot rabid dogs because they pass the rabies on to all they bite. Be careful that this rabid libtard doesn’t bite you!!
      I’m sure the Lord will forgive you if you happen to club this liberal like a baby seal. Sometimes it’s for the best!!
      Now carry on like a good soldier…..and smile!!

  7. imnewatthis
    April 6, 2009 at 3:49 am

    There should only be one reason to locate all these illegals- so they can be deported.

    • pdsand
      April 6, 2009 at 11:08 am

      From the NYT, Sunday:

      Texas Mayor Caught in Deportation Furor

      By RANDY KENNEDY
      Published: April 4, 2009

      IRVING, Tex. — Just after sunrise one morning last summer, as his two sons hurried out the door to school, Oscar Urbina might have presented a portrait of domestic stability in this Dallas suburb, a 35-year-old man with a nice home, a thriving family and a steady contracting job.

      But a few weeks earlier, after buying a Dodge Ram truck at a local dealership, he had been summoned back to deal with some paperwork problems. And shortly after he arrived, so did the police, who arrested him on charges of using a false Social Security number.

      Mr. Urbina does not deny it; he has been living illegally in the Dallas area since coming to the country from Mexico in 1993. But the turn of events stunned him in a once-welcoming place where people had never paid much attention to Social Security numbers.

      If the arrest had come earlier, it might have had little effect on his life. But two years ago, Irving made a decision, championed by its first-term mayor, Herbert A. Gears, to conduct immigration checks on everyone booked into the local jail. So Mr. Urbina was automatically referred to the federal authorities and now faces possible deportation, becoming one of more than 4,000 illegal immigrants here who have ended up in similar circumstances.

      http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04.....odayspaper

      Would that it were always so. This front page below the fold article is meant to make us pity the poor soul and have us evoke anger at the callous mayor whose policies would interrupt such domestic tranquility, but all I could say was, that’s the way it should always be. Illegals should walk around in constant fear that they will be discovered and deported. They shouldn’t be able to buy houses and vehicles with impunity. Much less commit identity theft or fraud in order to do it. They dang sure shouldn’t be counted in the census with no fear of being deported. Let’s not even talk about the number of illegals who vote in our elections.

    • caligirl9
      April 6, 2009 at 8:37 pm

      And am I supposed to cry over this?

    • Liberals Demise
      April 8, 2009 at 1:34 pm

      See you in the sewer called Mexico……..SUCKA!!
      Do not pass go and forget ever becoming a US citizen!!
      (that is the way it should be)

  8. bullforever
    April 6, 2009 at 11:39 am

    MSNBC Poll on Obama Perfomance.

    http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29493093/

    Interesting that 1.7 million votes so far show that Obama is getting either an “F” (42%) or a “D” (14%), while only getting an “A” from 32% of the voters….this at MSNBC of all places

  9. BillK
    April 6, 2009 at 4:09 pm

    Wow, the University of Wisconsin law school finds there is no “excessive litigation” in Wisconsin!

    From the extremely far-left Madison, WI Capital Times:

    UW report: WMC claims of excessive litigation in state are bogus

    By Todd Finkelmeyer

    Advocacy groups have long claimed Wisconsin’s overly litigious climate costs state businesses money and keeps others from locating here in the first place. For the past few years, Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce, the state’s largest business lobby, has made reforming the state’s legal system one of its top priorities — proclaiming that excessive litigation “is costing businesses and individuals billions of dollars, and is affecting our international competitiveness.”

    Not true, says a new study published by the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Law School that aims to “examine some of the persistent myths” about civil litigation. In fact, it says, the number of civil cases in which individuals seek compensation for personal injury and property damage fell 17.4 percent in Wisconsin from 1996-2007.

    “The notion that somehow civil justice is hurting business in the state is just totally unfounded,” said UW law professor emeritus Marc Galanter, who co-authored the study, recently published in a booklet entitled “Civil Justice in Wisconsin: A Fact Book, With Commentary.”

    Although the overall number of civil cases filed in state and federal courts of Wisconsin has risen over the past decade-plus, the vast majority of these were small claims filings and the study says there is no evidence that excessive litigation is harming the state’s business climate.

    Challenging another frequent criticism, that Wisconsin is rife with trial attorneys, the 42-page report notes there are fewer lawyers per person in Wisconsin than in most states. Across the nation as a whole in 2000, there was one lawyer for every 264 people. During that same period, there was one lawyer for every 401 people in Wisconsin.

    Jim Pugh, a spokesperson for WMC, said he has not yet seen the report but said he finds its focus predictable.

    “It should come as a surprise to no one that the UW Law School is trying to say that we don’t have enough litigation in Wisconsin,” said Pugh. “They have a vested interest in trying to graduate as many future lawyers as they can accommodate. So they have an interest in expressing that point of view.”

    “Civil Justice in Wisconsin” was co-authored by Susan Steingass, a former Dane County Circuit Court judge, the ex-president of the State Bar of Wisconsin and a lecturer emeritus at the UW Law School.

    The authors believe this report is the first “neutral and objective account” of any state’s civil justice system. They write that the goal of the publication “is not to provide answers but to dispel illusions about the system in favor of a realistic, if necessarily incomplete, picture of what is actually out there.” …

    http://www.madison.com/tct/news/stories/445934

    So a law school states there is not an excess of litigation in Wisconsin and further, that Wisconsin doesn’t have too many lawyers.

    A report the law school considers “neutral and objective.”

    Hmmm, what’s next, a report from Microsoft saying there aren’t enough computers in American schools?

    Hint: One lawyer per 401 residents is a horrific statistic, let alone other state’s one lawyer per 264 people…

    • dulcimergrl
      April 6, 2009 at 4:16 pm

      Well gee, I thought California had the most lawyers per capita! I’ll have to look that up.

      Reminds me of a joke, though (and heaven knows, we could all use a laugh):

      Q-Do you know why California has the most attorneys, and New Jersey has the most toxic waste dumps?

      A-New Jersey got first pick!

  10. BillK
    April 6, 2009 at 4:23 pm

    Isn’t it amazing how liberal logic is of course based on the topic?

    From the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:

    Rising cigarette taxes could push more smokers to quit

    By Stacy Forster

    Madison – For years, Lila Wald has tried to stop smoking. Nothing – not nicotine patches, not hypnosis – has worked.

    But rising cigarette taxes might finally do the trick, because it’s getting too expensive on her fixed income, said Wald, of Arkdale.

    “I try not to smoke that many, but I’m not going to smoke at all I guess,” she said.

    Smokers are dealing with a 62-cent increase in the federal cigarette tax that took effect last week, and are bracing for another potential bump.

    The budget proposed by Gov. Jim Doyle includes a 75-cent-a-pack increase, which would take the state tax to $2.52 a pack – one of the highest in the nation. The previous budget raised the state’s cigarette tax by $1, to $1.77 a pack, on Jan. 1, 2008.

    Doyle said the further increase is necessary to prevent young people from picking up the habit and to encourage smokers to kick it. Treating smoking-related illnesses costs state health care programs $480 million a year, said state Department of Health Services Secretary Karen Timberlake.

    “It’s been proven over and over again that the most effective method of reducing smoking, and particularly reducing teenagers starting to smoke, is increases in price,” Doyle said.

    Wisconsin’s adult smoking rate reached an all-time low in 2007, with 19.6% of adults smoking, compared with 20% in 2006. The smoking rate was expected to drop by 33,000 adults in 2008 after the $1-per-pack cigarette tax increase took effect, according to projections from the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids.

    Timberlake said the decline in smoking rates was due to the combination of increased taxes and more smoke-free ordinances around the state. Doyle and other state officials and lawmakers continue to push for a statewide workplace smoking ban.

    There were nearly 40,700 calls to the state quit line in 2008, close to a threefold increase from nearly 14,000 calls in 2007.

    “That’s exactly what we wanted to see,” said Aaron Doeppers, director of the Midwest region for the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids.

    Smokers wonder, however, how the state will make up for lost revenue if more and more people quit smoking. …

    http://www.jsonline.com/news/s.....06137.html

    Aside from the correct observation regarding tax revenue from cigarettes, we’re told time and time again that a way to reduce crime is to legalize drugs, because then the price will come down and addicts won’t need to commit crimes to afford their fix.

    Yet the price of cigarettes continues to go up and up.

    I’m sure the local street gangs are already gearing up to start transporting cigarettes – something that organized crime has been involved in forever but really hasn’t been a big money-maker in most states.

    However, at a $.75/pack savings by simply buying smokes over the Wisconsin border, there’s obvious easy cash to be made here.

    • caligirl9
      April 6, 2009 at 8:28 pm

      I was on the light rail a few weeks ago, and there were a group of women who knew each other from parenting classes of some sort (each had kids in foster care due to whatever misadventures the women had committed ..)

      Anyway, one was vigorously complaining about the price of smokes …

      I just couldn’t help think, what messed-up priorities those women had, on the light rail talking about their kids in foster care like it was “whatever” but angry about the price of cigarettes!

  11. caligirl9
    April 6, 2009 at 8:24 pm

    Duh. From Buzzle.com.

    US Poll Reveals Deep Polarisation in Early Stage of Obama Era

    Barack Obama’s promise to reunite the United States has so far failed to materialize, according to Pew Center poll

    Barack Obama’s promise to overcome partisan political divisions and reunite the United States has so far failed to materialise, according to independent analysts in Washington.

    The Pew Research Center carried out a survey of polls six weeks into the Obama era and found that, contrary to the bipartisan note he has sounded, US politics is more polarized at this early stage in his presidency than at any equivalent point in the past four decades.

    The researchers looked at the approval ratings for Obama reflected across several polls in early March, comparing his support among Democratic voters which stood at a huge 88% with that among Republican voters – only 27%. That gives a partisan gap of 61 points.

    That is wider than even the 51-point gap between Republican (87%) and Democratic (36%) voters recorded at the start of George Bush’s first term in 2001, despite Bush’s reputation for divisiveness.

    It is also notably greater than during the early presidencies of BillClinton in 1993 (a 45% gap) and Ronald Reagan (46% gap), both of whom were labeled as partisans.

    Obama has made it a central pillar of his presidency, articulated over two years on the campaign trail, to try and heal the wounds of a divided nation that became most evident during the first three years of the Iraq war. In the final days of the election campaign, he rebuffed Republican claims to represent the “real America” by saying “There is no city or town that is more pro-America than anywhere else; we are one nation, all of us proud, all of us patriots.”

    But the Pew findings suggest that, at least up to now, he has been unable to turn back an historic trend in American politics and society. Over the past 40 years the country has grown steadily more polarized.

    Richard Nixon at the start of his first term in 1969 had a partisan gap of only 29%, and Jimmy Carter in 1977 of only 25%. Since then the gulf has widened with every new presidency other than the elder George Bush who succeeded in reducing the gap after Reagan to 38%.

    “Thirty years ago people on the losing side of an election tended to give new presidents the benefit of the doubt early on, but that seems to have gone,” said Michael Dimock, Pew’s associate director who wrote the analysis.

    True to form, the explanation for Obama’s failure to reintroduce a bipartisan note is in itself polarized.

    As Dimock puts it: “Some would argue that he inherited this problem – a nation where divisions were raw and the country divided, despite his best efforts. Others will follow the ‘he brought it on himself’ school of thought, pointing to his ambitious agenda that was always going to ruffle feathers.”

    http://www.buzzle.com/articles/261138.html

  12. Al Morone
    April 7, 2009 at 2:00 am

    The rich just keep getting richer. Liberal billionaire Warren Buffett is getting even richer from taxpayers bailing out the financial scumbags:
    http://www.sacbee.com/341/story/1755868.html

  13. BillK
    April 7, 2009 at 7:18 am

    Yet another entry into the Police Departments as cash register sweepstakes, from Denver’s KUSA Television:

    Bicyclist sues Denver Police over beating caught on tape

    By Deborah Sherman

    DENVER – A videotape recorded a Denver Police officer slamming his face into the ground during an arrest, and now the man who was punched and kicked is suing both the officers involved and the Denver Police Department.

    The civil rights lawsuit claims police assaulted John Heaney during a false arrest and the police department failed to properly train and supervise its officers.

    “The claims are against the officers who actually beat up Mr. Heaney, but the claims are also against officers for not intervening when they saw something wrong happening,” Heaney’s attorney, Lonn Heymann, said. “Mr. Heaney has a right to be protected by the police officers even against other police officers.”

    The arrest was caught on videotape by a professional photojournalist on April 4, 2008 on the opening day of the Rockies season.

    The video shows officers repeatedly hitting and kicking Heaney near Coors Field. Once Heaney was lying on his stomach with his hands held behind his back, the video shows an officer, later identified as Michael Cordova, lift Heaney’s head and smash his face into the ground. Heaney claims the act broke his two front teeth. The cracking teeth can be heard on the tape.

    The officers claim Heaney swore at them and punched one of them in the nose as he was riding his bike past the stadium. That allegedly took place off-camera.

    Heaney claims the officers, who were working on an undercover scalping sting, attacked him first. …

    http://www.9news.com/news/arti.....;catid=339

    Note the usual elements:

    1) An “innocent” person who just happens to be singled out for police abuse.
    2) A “professional photojournalist” nearby who just happens to start taping after any provocation of the Police has ended
    3) A videotape that magically shows up at local TV stations when the lawsuit is filed
    4) A lawsuit that will likely result in a six-figure settlement
    5) Officers that get screwed over and a perp that goes free:

    Heaney was charged with second-degree assault against a police officer until the videotape surfaced and was shown on 9NEWS.

    The Denver District Attorney’s office immediately dropped the charges against Heaney and charged Cordova with second-degree assault.

    Cordova has pleaded not guilty to the charges. He is out of jail on bond and has been suspended from the police department without pay during his court case.

    “Officer Cordova and some of these other officers who were involved were clearly willing, we’re alleging, to have Mr. Heaney go to jail and become a felon to cover-up their wrongful actions,” Heymann said.

    You can also tell where the reporter stands in reporting the officer’s side as “officers claim” and the bicyclist’s actions as “allegations” by the officers.

    Because they have nothing better to do than beat up random cyclists, right?

    Out of the tens of thousands of people at Rockies’ opener last year, they just decided this guy deserved a beating for no reason, right?

    Sad thing is, as the Churchill verdict showed last week, that’s exactly what liberal Denver residents believe and what a jury would find.

    Frankly I don’t know why Denver Police officers even bother going to work anymore.

  14. BillK
    April 7, 2009 at 7:29 am

    From the (Madison) Wisconsin State Journal:

    Stolen Canadian plane prompts Capitol evacuation; all-clear given

    State Capitol police hastily evacuated the Capitol at 5:15 p.m. on Monday as a precaution after state officials learned that a small, stolen plane might be headed toward Madison.

    Federal officials told the Wisconsin Air National Guard at about 3:30 p.m. that a suspicious Cessna 172 had entered Wisconsin air space and the pilot was not responding to messages from the Federal Aviation Administration. Two of the Guard’s F-16 fighters jets took off at about 5 p.m. to try to make contact with the plane, which the North American Aerospace Defense Command in Colorado said was believed stolen from Thunder Bay, Ontario, at 2:30 p.m. by a student pilot.

    NORAD spokesman Mike Kucharek said the Cessna 172 was south of Madison at about 5:30 p.m. and had been heading southwest. He said the plane had been flying erratically but was not believed to be a terrorist threat.

    Brig. Gen. Don Dunbar, Wisconsin’s homeland security adviser, ordered an evacuation of the Capitol at about 5 p.m. as a precaution, according to the Air National Guard.

    During the evacuation, Capitol police urged bystanders to walk at least one building away. Many workers had already left for the day, and Gov. Jim Doyle was in Chicago on Monday. Police cars with sirens on drove on the sidewalks by the doors of the Capitol. Others drove on the streets of the Capitol Square, telling people to move away.

    The evacuation order was lifted at 5:44 p.m.

    Kucharek said that by 7:15 p.m., the Cessna 172 had traveled south over Illinois and was approaching the St. Louis area with the pilot continuing to refuse to communicate with authorities.

    “We don’t know what the motive is. I wouldn’t want to speculate on that. We are treating this with the most utmost seriousness,” Kucharek said.

    Plans were being made to swap the Wisconsin jets out for other aircraft as the pursuit continued, Kucharek said.

    The pilot had acknowledged seeing the F-16s but he had not obeyed their nonverbal commands to follow them, Kucharek said in a telephone interview from Colorado Springs. …

    http://www.madison.com/wsj/home/local/446037

    One wonders just how explicit one needs to be when say, piloting a stolen aircraft to be considered a terrorist threat.

    Do you need to have a biohazard, explosives or radiation warning sign on the side of the plane?

    Do you need to have sent a martyr tape to the press ahead of time?

    Quite the radiation trail or literally gallons of biological agents could be spread out of a stolen Cessna 172.

    But that’s OK, the pilot wasn’t “thought” to be a threat…

    • DW
      April 7, 2009 at 7:10 pm

      Some more on this story, from the AP:

      Plane stolen by Canadian was suicide bid

      By Robert Imrie, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

      WAUSAU, Wis. – A man suspected of stealing a plane in Canada and flying erratically across three states was trying to commit suicide, hoping he would be shot down by military fighter planes, a state trooper said Tuesday.

      Adam Dylan Leon, 31, was arrested at a convenience store in Ellsinore, Mo., shortly after landing the single-engine, four-seat Cessna on a rural Missouri road Monday night, ending a six-hour flight, police said.

      The plane was tracked as a “flight safety issue” and was not believed to be a terrorist threat, Mike Kucharek, spokesman for the North American Aerospace Defence Command, said in a telephone interview from Colorado Springs…

      FBI spokesman Richard Kolko told CNN that Leon was a native of Turkey who changed his name from Yavuz Berke and became a Canadian citizen last year…

      Full article:
      http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Ca.....56-ap.html

      Hmm…

    • canary
      April 7, 2009 at 7:22 pm

      Plane Thief, former muslim. CTV’ aviation expert Mark Miller finds the lack of security bizarre. For full article click on link below. Theif admits wanting to commit sucide, but chickened out.

      Canadian charged with flying plane into U.S.
      Updated Tue. Apr. 7 2009 6:02 PM ET

      CTV.ca News Staff

      A Canadian man has been charged after a stolen plane was flown into the United States from Ontario in what authorities are calling a suicide attempt.

      Leon is believed to be a former Turkish national who became a Canadian citizen last year and changed his name from Yavuz Berke.

      Adam Dylan Leon, 31, was arrested Monday night near a stretch of rural road in Missouri shortly after a pilot landed a stolen single-engine four-seater Cessna 172 following a six-hour flight over three states.

      The pilot did not communicate by radio with the fighter pilots, nor did he obey their non-verbal commands to follow them.

      Eventually, the pilot landed the plane on a highway in southeastern Missouri at Ellsinore, and taxied to a side road.

      He is then believed to have hitched a ride to a nearby convenience store where he remained until police came into the location to arrest him.

      The plane was stolen from Confederation College Flight School at Thunder Bay International Airport.

      CTV’s aviation expert Mark Miller said air-traffic controllers would have known immediately that something was amiss.

      “Don’t kid yourself, Thunder Bay is not a Mickey Mouse airport. There are scheduled flights in and out of there. It’s a secure airport, and it’s a relatively busy place, so as soon as that guy got in the airplane and started taxiing everyone would have been alerted,” Miller told Canada AM.

      Pilots flying into U.S. airspace are required to land at the closest airport that has a customs office. When the pilot failed to do that, likely at Duluth, Minn., authorities would have been alerted immediately, Miller said.

      The biggest question, Miller said, is why the keys would have been left in the plane — an almost unheard of practice, he said.

      “Certainly in all the flying I’ve ever done, whether with flight colleges or renting airplanes, I’ve never seen keys left in airplanes, and that will be the big question, why were the keys left in that airplane.

      “Was it an accident? But it’s clearly to me a lapse in security,” he said.

      Madison, the Wisconsin state capitol, was evacuated briefly over fears of an attempt to attack the state legislature.

      Maj. Brian Martin, of NORAD, said Canadian air navigation authorities first notified the air defence group that a plane had been stolen.
      The organization then began tracking the plane, and eventually decided to scramble the fighters to get a closer look at the unresponsive plane.
      Once it landed, the NORAD pilots returned to their home base and police moved in.

      http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/Arti.....?hub=World

  15. BillK
    April 7, 2009 at 7:37 am

    This is what we’ve come to.

    From the (Madison) Wisconsin State Journal:

    Note to Capitol Square squirrels: Hoard your peanuts

    The squirrels around the State Capitol will soon be without peanuts if state officials have any say in the matter.

    State officials want to stop the person on the Capitol Square who “carpets” the grass with peanuts for the long-tailed rodents. Concerned about children with peanut allergies visiting the Capitol, a state official had an e-mail sent Monday afternoon to offices in the nearby building where the unidentified squirrel feeder works, asking employees there to nix the nuts.

    “Our folks were seeing these mounds of peanuts under the trees,” Department of Administration spokeswoman Linda Barth said. The state employee “was just asking that people be considerate.” …

    http://www.madison.com/wsj/home/local/446050

    How long before peanuts are banned from other locations such as circuses and baseball stadiums?

    After all, it’s possible a child with a peanut allergy could visit those locations as well…

  16. BillK
    April 7, 2009 at 7:45 am

    War is Hell… on XBox.

    From the San Francisco Chronicle:

    Six Days in Fallujah brings the battle home

    By Ryan Kim

    Video game developers have long mined old conflicts for story lines. But an ambitious and potentially controversial video game on tap for next year will allow players to participate in a current conflict – a first for a major console and PC title.

    Six Days in Fallujah, developed by Atomic Games and set to be published by Konami, takes gamers into the 2004 battle for Fallujah, the largest urban assault since Vietnam. Developers said they’re not seeking to exploit the war in Iraq for profit but to use video games, the medium of choice for young people and soldiers alike, to illuminate an important battle. To that end, the game is incorporating recorded interviews and other documentary techniques.

    Developers say it’s high time a video game aspired to do more than just entertain.

    “It’s time for video games to do what movies, music and television have done: give people insight into this war that is shaping our world,” said Peter Tamte, president of Atomic Games, based in Raleigh, N.C.

    It’s a tricky balancing act. Atomic Games must pull off a high-quality military shooter or the game won’t sell. But it must pack in as much reality, information and interviews to justify the foray into such a fresh conflict.

    Tamte believes they have the equation down. The company already was developing training software for the Marines when the Fallujah battle took place in November 2004. After being encouraged by returning soldiers to take on the topic, Atomic decided to make a game on the battle.

    Atomic interviewed more than 30 soldiers who participated in the fighting as well as handfuls of Iraqi civilians and insurgents from various countries. They also consulted battle maps, photos, reports and other information. Developers even built a game engine to allow for fully destructible environments. The result is a faithful recreation of the events, taking players through the actual steps of the Marines who fought in Fallujah.

    “People are curious about what it’s like to be in war and what they’d do differently,” said Juan Benito, the game’s creative director. “We’re setting the table for them here.”

    Read Omohundro, 39, a former company commander in the 8th Marine Regiment who consulted on the game, said he was skeptical at first. But he welcomed the chance to paint an accurate picture of the actions of his men, some of whom died in the battle.

    “The game allows you to review what was occurring in different scenarios from actual interviews of the Marines who were actually there,” he said. “It gives you a better grasp of the objectives to be obtained; you’re not just randomly shooting enemy forces; you have a more definitive goal and a way to achieve the goal.”

    Tamte said developers were sensitive to the participants in the battle. He said the team incorporated Iraqi and insurgent viewpoints and has Muslim staffers on the title. Family members of Marines who lost their lives in Fallujah also were consulted. Tamte said the goal is not to advance a certain argument but help players empathize with the participants.

    Tamte said he expects – and wants – the game to generate debate.

    “We want people to talk about this,” he said. “I hope people from both sides will say they’re informed and have an understanding of the experience.” …

    http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/.....16TJFO.DTL

    Nope, can’t have a game that tells things from the point of view of the good guys, but we need to make sure the “insurgent” story is told, too. So players can “empathize with the participants”… on both sides.

    I can hardly wait until Activision decides the next version of “Call of Duty: World at War”:

    …

    You’ve never encountered combat challenges like those presented in Call of Duty: World at War. Prepare yourself to face off against ruthless enemies who employ advanced tactics. Your foes will stop at nothing to defend their homelands. With swampy ambushes, tree-top snipers, and fearless Kamikaze attacks, there is no safe place to turn. As U.S. Marine and Russian conscripts, you’ll battle against the fearless Imperial Japanese and elite German soldiers in epic infantry, vehicle, and airborne missions across a variety of Pacific and European locations. On foot, behind the wheel, or in the air, you’ll have to be relentless to achieve victory.

    …

    http://www.amazon.com/Call-Dut.....B001AWIP68

    should be sure to include Japanese and German viewpoints (heck, even in the description above they’re simply fighting to “defend their homelands.”)

    Needless to say, the brain trust of Chronicle readers has already weighed in with insightful comments like:

    I wonder if the game educates its players on the history of the Iraq conflict, beginning with the lies told by former US President George W. Bush and former US Vice President Dick Cheney that were used as excuses to illegally invade Iraq. And I wonder if the game illustrates the use of the deadly white phosphorous on the city’s residents, or how the US forces did not allow young boys to leave the city, instead forcing them back to hide and face likely death. Or what about the immoral war profiteers like Halliburton (Cheney’s company) and Blackwater that made BILLIONS off of this illegal “war” that has cost over one million Iraqis their live?

    • Liberals Demise
      April 8, 2009 at 3:43 pm

      They consulted with “insurgents”?
      Ummmm………what insurgents would that be?
      ———-(cough)———–BULLSHIITE———-(cough)——–

  17. pdsand
    April 7, 2009 at 4:02 pm

    My sincere apologies if this has already been reported on, as it is from 10 March. But I happened upon this and felt the ground shift beneath my feet, as I myself am in a majority-minority district in the Georgia General Assembly.

    From the Los Angeles Times:

    “Supreme Court limits the reach of Voting Rights Act
    J. Scott Applewhite / Associated Press
    Justice Anthony M. Kennedy wrote the opinion for the 5-4 majority.
    The justices rule in a North Carolina case that there is no duty to draw voting districts that would elect black candidates in areas where blacks are less than a majority.
    By David G. Savage
    March 10, 2009
    Reporting from Washington — The Supreme Court limited the reach of the Voting Rights Act on Monday, ruling that there was no duty to draw voting districts that would elect black candidates in areas where blacks were less than a majority.”

  18. BillK
    April 7, 2009 at 4:55 pm

    The Ward Churchill saga continues.

    From the Boulder (Colorado) Daily Camera:

    Churchill to ask for $1M if judge won’t reinstate CU job

    By John Aguilar

    BOULDER, Colo. — If a judge won’t give Ward Churchill a job back at the University of Colorado, the former ethnic studies professor plans to ask for more than $1 million, he said Monday.

    Churchill, who won a wrongful-termination lawsuit against the university last week, said he doesn’t accept the contention that dissatisfaction with his presence on campus should prevent his reinstatement.

    “If it would make a bunch of people uncomfortable on the Boulder campus, what’s the argument?” Churchill said. “They violated my rights, therefore to spare them discomfort I should not be restored to what I was unlawfully deprived of? That’s somewhat tenuous.”

    For those at CU who can’t stand having him so close, Churchill has an offer:

    “If it really makes you that uncomfortable, you’re free to leave,” he said.

    A Denver jury determined Churchill, 61, was unlawfully fired by CU for exercising his First Amendment rights in a scathing essay about the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. But jurors awarded him only $1 in damages.

    Chief Denver District Judge Larry Naves will decide at a yet-to-be scheduled hearing whether Churchill can return to the university, which says it fired him because of academic fraud that surfaced after the essay caused a national firestorm.

    One factor the judge can consider, employment law experts say, is whether Churchill’s presence would cause such irreconcilable problems with his campus colleagues that ordering CU to pay him a lump sum of money instead would better serve to keep the peace.
    Churchill sat down Monday over a plate of cheese enchiladas at an east Boulder Mexican restaurant to talk at length for the first time since Thursday’s verdict.

    If the judge declines to give Churchill his job back, he said he’ll ask for 10 years worth of lost “front pay” — at about $110,000 a year. …

    http://www.dailycamera.com/new.....ulder-job/

    Yes, only in academia can you make $110,000/year after being found to commit fraud.

    This shows the reason why liberal philosophy works so well:

    * If I, as a liberal, am offended by you, you must leave.
    * If I, as a liberal, offend you, once again, you must leave.

    No matter what, it’s a no-lose situation for Churchill.

    Really, it makes you wonder how stupid conservatives are for not thinking up such scams and the academic infrastructure that makes it all possible.

  19. BillK
    April 7, 2009 at 5:01 pm

    Another state falls, from a delighted AP:

    Vermont legalizes gay marriage with veto override

    MONTPELIER, Vt. — Vermont on Tuesday became the fourth state to legalize gay marriage — and the first to do so with a legislature’s vote.

    The House recorded a dramatic 100-49 vote — the minimum needed — to override Gov. Jim Douglas’ veto. Its vote followed a much easier override vote in the Senate, which rebuffed the Republican governor with a vote of 23-5.

    Vermont was the first state to legalize civil unions for same-sex couples and joins Connecticut, Massachusetts and Iowa in giving gays the right to marry. Their approval of gay marriage came from the courts.

    Tuesday morning’s legislative action came less than a day after Douglas issued a veto message saying the bill would not improve the lot of gay and lesbian couples because it still would not provide them rights under federal and other states’ laws.

    House Speaker Shap Smith’s announcement of the vote brought an ouburst of jubilation from some of the hundreds packed into the gallery and the lobby outside the House chamber, despite the speaker’s admonishment against such displays.

    Among the celebrants in the lobby were former Rep. Robert Dostis, D-Waterbury, and his longtime partner, Chuck Kletecka. Dostis recalled efforts to expand gay rights dating to an anti-discrimination law passed in 1992. …

    http://www.dailycamera.com/new.....-override/

  20. Odie44
    April 7, 2009 at 6:04 pm

    The Biden Danger Keeps Growing from AP:

    Biden says Cheney ‘dead wrong’ on security policy

    WASHINGTON – Vice President Joe Biden said Tuesday his predecessor, Dick Cheney, is “dead wrong” when he says President Barack Obama’s national security policies are making the United States less safe. Biden said the exact opposite is true and added that President George W. Bush’s vice president was part of a dysfunctional decision-making system…

    “I don’t think he is out of line, but he is dead wrong. … The last administration left us in a weaker posture than we’ve been any time since World War II: less regarded in the world, stretched more thinly than we ever have been in the past, two wars under way, virtually no respect in entire parts of the world,” Biden said. “And so we’ve been about the business of repairing and strengthening those. I guarantee you we are safer today, our interests are more secure today than they were any time during the eight years” of the Bush administration.
    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200.....den_cheney

    Isn’t this the same clown who said Bambi would be tested? Hadn’t Bush and Cheney prevented any attack on our soil from radical terrorists after 9/11 and the Bush Doctrine became real?

  21. caligirl9
    April 8, 2009 at 12:11 am

    Just how many locations around the world claim TOTUS/DOTUS as a “native son?”

    And what is the solution for an increase in Hawaiian tourism—I know, Hawaii tix in next month’s welfare checks! ‘Cause the unemployed need vacations too, you know!

    From the Los Angeles Times:

    Hawaii, suffering tourism drop, appeals to President Obama

    Hotel occupancy rates in the winter are the lowest in at least five years. State officials urge the president to block any policies that would limit business travel.

    Hawaii has suffered one of the worst winters for tourism in recent years and has appealed to the state’s most famous native son — President Barack Obama — to help turn its fortunes around.

    Hotel occupancy rates in the winter were the lowest in at least five years, and in February — traditionally the state’s busiest month — the rate dropped to 75%. That was the lowest level since 1991, during the Persian Gulf War, when it fell to 69.7%, according to Smith Travel Research.

    The firm said Tuesday that the rates for February have ranged from about 80% to 88% over the last five years. The average daily room rate — another key measure of the industry’s health — dropped 12.4% in February from the same month in 2008.

    Because of the country’s stubborn recession, Americans have held tight to their travel dollars. But Hawaii’s problems are compounded by an increasingly hostile attitude toward business travel, particularly when major corporations are laying off hundreds of workers and accepting government bailouts.

    In 2008, business travel, such as conferences, conventions and business incentive programs, accounted for about 7% of all tourism in the state, or 442,000 visitors, according to state officials.

    In a letter to Obama last month, Gov. Linda Lingle and 95 government leaders, business owners and tourism officials urged the president to block any policies that would limit business travel in the future.

    Lingle said 132 meetings and business trips have been canceled so far this year and next year, representing a loss of 87,003 room nights. The cancellations amount to losses of $58.8 million in direct revenue and 694 full- and part-time jobs in the state’s tourism industry, according to the letter.

    “In this period of economic downturn when our government and businesses are striving to restore economic stability, the last thing we should do is implement policies or encourage behavior that jeopardizes any industry,” the governor wrote.

    Obama himself may have contributed to what many tourism officials see as the vilification of business travel during an Indiana town hall meeting in February.

    Asked about corporate spending and the federal bailout, the president said: “You can’t get corporate jets, you can’t go take a trip to Las Vegas or go down to the Super Bowl on the taxpayer’s dime.”

    Later, the White House tried to clarify the statement, saying the president encouraged travel, except for companies accepting government bailout money.

    Northern Trust Corp. became an example of excess when it hosted clients and employees at a golf tournament at the Riviera Country Club in Pacific Palisades in February after accepting $1.6 billion in taxpayer assistance. Afterward, Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) introduced legislation barring such expenditures for companies receiving taxpayer dollars.

    Marcia Wienert, the governor’s tourism liaison, said Hawaii’s tourism industry has been hurt by companies that have not accepted government money but canceled trips for fear of a negative perception.

    “Those are the residual effects that were unintended but are having huge impacts on our economy,” she said.

    In response, Hawaii’s tourism leaders have launched a campaign pushing the message that workers who meet in Hawaii are happier, more productive and more focused afterward.

    “If you make the decision to cancel your trip to Hawaii or go elsewhere, ultimately that can affect your bottom line,” said Mike Murray, vice president for corporate meetings and incentives at the Hawaii Visitors and Convention Bureau.

    http://www.latimes.com/busines.....2226.story

    Vilification of business travel? I thought Hawaii was more of a vacation destination? The article itself says 7% of Hawaii’s visitors are there on business. So how can one logically argue that a loss of business travel is killing them? Isn’t it more of a “those of us who work (or try to) are afraid to spend any money in the fear that next week we won’t have a job? And of course because we were working, we can’t possibly get any of that gov’ment cheese and checks because our tax returns indicated we worked last year.

    Am I making sense? For me, when I get work, I can’t turn any down or turn it over slowly. So I’ve been working a lot and am kind of goofy. Feast or famine with this self-employed stuff.

    • Odie44
      April 8, 2009 at 1:23 pm

      Cali –

      I am in the same boat as a self employed person. Also the reason why me and the wife balked at a $6,000 Hawaii honeymoon, which was the Hawaii “special offer” and instead went to the Caymans for about $4,500. Oh and Caymans crime rate is 1/1000 less than Hawaii and 20 hours less travel time.

      Good luck to you and your efforts.

    • proreason
      April 8, 2009 at 1:35 pm

      Cali, you make perfect sense and have hit on another eentsy tiny flaw in The Moron’s strategy.

      As the Big Mouth in Chief, actually the biggest of all time, the very anti-business screeds he depends on to inflame the serfs also destroy the serfs’ livlihood. The impact to Hawaii is probably far greater than anyone yet knows. Tourism is like a canary in a coal mine. The canaries go first.

      I wonder if the peasants will ever catch on.

      And as for Hawaii, perhaps they should import some community organizers to fix the economy there.

    • Colonel1961
      April 8, 2009 at 1:48 pm

      Cali: I can give you dozens of reasons to avoid Hawai’i (as they now spell it – a pretentious bastardization of the English language), not the least of which is that the ‘locals’ hate the tourists – which is really ironic. But the best reason to avoid Hawaii is because they’re a blue state – and the boyhood ‘hood of Slowbama.

      Let them eat poi.

      p.s. self-employed, too. Know the feeling about work. I was hitting it seven days a week for about four months (including working on Christmas and New Year’s Day) but there is nothing more rewarding than being your own boss and the thrill of being an entrepreneur. Free advice for the day: enjoy the down time as much as possible. It’s tough sometimes and you’ll start to worry about the next job, but it will happen. Best wishes!

    • caligirl9
      April 9, 2009 at 10:51 am

      Thank you, my dear friends! I like what I do, but my workplace (when I do work onsite, sometimes it’s just easier) is a den ‘o libs. I have one fellow conservative (bless her!) and a second co-worker who is afraid to say the “R” or “C” word, but she believes in the same things as I do. She admitted her son, whom she raised as a “democrat” is “out” as a conservative. I told her she did a good job of raising him!

      Yesterday I told her it was okay to take a baby step in considering herself “independent.” *wink*

    • U NO HOO
      April 9, 2009 at 3:03 pm

      Maybe gays from Vermont will go to Hawaii for their honey-moons!

      Honey, moon me.

  22. BillK
    April 8, 2009 at 1:41 am

    Don’t know how I missed this one.

    From the UK’s Guardian:

    Barack Obama rejects Normandy trip to avoid offending Germany

    By Toby Harnden

    White House officials travelled to France at the start of March to discuss a visit by Mr Obama to Omaha Beach, the site of the American Cemetery, established in 1944 just after D-Day and where 9,387 American personnel are buried. Among them is Theodore Roosevelt Jr the eldest son of the 26th US President.

    French officials and senior American military officers walked with White House staff through the cemetery discussing how the two presidents might follow the same route. But even before their trip, the White House had decided that Mr Obama would not travel there this week.

    “It wasn’t going to happen,” said an American official in Washington. “We went through the motions to placate President Sarkozy but giving special treatment to France was not on our agenda.

    “During this trip, we wanted to maintain a balance between the British, German and France“. A White House spokesman in London declined to comment. Last month, White House officials briefed that a Normandy visit had been considered but it had not been logistically possible. …

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/new.....rmany.html

    It’s great – he doesn’t even need to pretend to care.

  23. BillK
    April 8, 2009 at 1:43 am

    George Soros’ shorted positions obviously haven’t made him enough money yet.

    From the UK’s Guardian:

    George Soros warns shares will fall further

    By Louise Armitstead

    George Soros, the billionaire financier, helped unsettle markets by voicing fears that share prices had further to fall. In an interview, he said: “It’s a bear-market rally because we have not yet turned the economy around. This is not a financial crisis like all the other financial crises that we have experienced in our lifetime.”

    Markets across the world slid as a raft of bad news stalled the powerful rally that has fuelled optimism for over a month. In Britain, fresh concerns over bank stability and oil prices pushed the FTSE 100 index down 63 points, or 1.6pc, at 3930.5. The Dow dipped 2.3pc to 2789.6 on fresh concerns that the bank bail-out would not stabilise US lenders and after a report showed that chief executives’ confidence in the economy had fallen in the past few months.

    Germany’s DAX lost 0.6pc and France’s CAC 0.9pc. In Asia, Japan’s Nikkei was down 0.3pc, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng sunk 0.3pc and Australia’s ASX slipped 1.3pc after interest rates were cut to a 49-year low. The trend threatens to undo the recent two-week rally, in which time the FTSE 100 has jumped 13pc, the S&P 24pc and the Nikkei 25pc.

    Like Mr Soros, analysts at Morgan Stanley warned the bear market was not over. They said in a note: “We have to decide whether this is towards the end of another bear market rally that we should sell into now that hope has grown, or the start of a much larger advance, maybe even a new bull market. Our decision is to sell into strength now.”

    Optimism around the world was boosted last week after the leaders of the G20 countries agreed to a six-point plan designed to ensure the global recession does not turn into a depression. But now there are concerns the leaders did not go far enough.

    Mr Soros, whose flagship Quantum Endowment Fund generated 8pc returns last year compared to an average decline of nearly 20pc among other hedge funds, told Bloomberg Television: “The recovery will look like an inverted square root sign. You hit bottom and you automatically rebound some, but then you don’t come out of it in a V-shaped recovery or anything like that. You settle down, step down. …

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/fin.....rther.html

    Can’t have a recovery when there’s money to be made by talking the economy down…

  24. BillK
    April 8, 2009 at 2:13 am

    From the Wall Street Journal:

    Latest Tally Extends Franken’s Lead

    By Naftali Bendavid

    Democrat Al Franken on Tuesday expanded his lead over Republican Norm Coleman in Minnesota’s tally of contested ballots, leaving Mr. Coleman with dwindling options and Democrats hopeful they will soon seat their 59th senator.

    Mr. Franken, a former comedian, has been certified the winner of November’s election by 225 votes out of 2.9 million cast. But Mr. Coleman, the incumbent, challenged the results, arguing that thousands of absentee ballots were wrongly excluded.

    A three-judge panel hearing the case decided to review several hundred ballots, and after those were opened and counted, Mr. Franken’s lead had grown to 312.

    Benjamin Ginsberg, Mr. Coleman’s lawyer, promised an appeal to the Minnesota Supreme Court. “The court is wrong in its decisions thus far. We will appeal those decisions,” Mr. Ginsberg said. “That’s pretty easy.”

    Franken attorney Marc Elias noted the candidates had already been through a recount and a seven-week trial. “The problem that former senator Coleman has is that he lost fair and square,” Mr. Elias said. “He lost because more Minnesotans voted for Al Franken than voted for Norm Coleman.”

    The case has significant implications for national politics and President Barack Obama’s agenda. Democrats in the Senate, who need 60 votes to end Republican filibusters, have 58. With Mr. Franken, they would have 59 and would need to attract just a single Republican vote to pass many bills. …

    http://online.wsj.com/article/.....97453.html

    I’m sure most of you have seen the ballots very explicitly marked for Coleman that have been ruled “votes for no one.”

    But in the end, why even bother fighting it?

    Simply put, both here and in the 20th CD, the left will simply manufacture as many ballots as necessary.

    No court will rule otherwise.

  25. BillK
    April 8, 2009 at 3:20 pm

    From Fox News:

    Muslim Girl Gets $400G From Nevada School District in Head Scarf Bully Case

    A Nevada school district agreed to pay $400,000 to a Muslim girl and her friend over allegations that other students threatened to kill her in the stairwell for wearing a religious head scarf and the staff did nothing to stop it.

    The Washoe County School District in the Reno area will give Egyptian former student Jana Elhifny $350,000 and her non-Muslim friend and supporter Stephanie Hart $50,000 as part of the civil settlement.

    Elhifny and her family came to Reno from Egypt in 2003, and the girl enrolled as a freshman at North Valleys High School.

    She didn’t finish the year after she told teachers and administrators that someone had threatened to kill her in the stairwell because of her Muslim hijab or head scarf, the district’s independent attorney in the case, Robert Cox, told FOXNews.com.

    Shortly afterwards, Cox said, Elhifny filed the lawsuit and returned to Egypt, where she married her fiancé.

    The lawsuit, handled by U.S. District Court in Reno, alleges that Elhifny faced death threats and harassment and school administrators did nothing to stop the abuse.

    Cox said that wasn’t true, and the teen was unable to give any description of her tormenter — including his or her gender, size and tone of voice.

    He said the high school tried to investigate her claims but was unsuccessful because of the lack of information.

    “The district did an incredibly thorough investigation,” Cox told FOXNews.com in a phone interview. “They could never identify the person who perpetrated these acts. … The district did everything it could do to try to help this young woman who is an Egyptian and of the Islam faith.”

    Cox said school officials couldn’t confirm the stairwell death threat story.

    “They tried to prove that, tried to track down who it was, but without a description … that couldn’t be done,” he said. “The district did watch her constantly and had people in the hallway.”

    He said the settlement was agreed upon to end lengthy and “expensive litigation.” The case has been fought in the courts for the past four years, according to Cox. …

    http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,513221,00.html

    Isn’t this great?

    Claim harassment, state you can’t remember anything about your harasser, even their sex or the “tone of voice” in which they allegedly threatened to kill you, “drop out” to return home and marry your fiancé, and get $350,000 tax-free from the Government so they can “end expensive litigation.”

    Plus for supporting her story at zero risk (no details, remember?) her friend gets $50K.

    Who says Muslims aren’t integrating into the American way of life?

    I’d say they’ve got it nailed down perfectly.

    • Liberals Demise
      April 8, 2009 at 3:36 pm

      How do you think they get their money for IEDs here in America…..to use against Americans?
      Well….now I can say I’m ashamed to be an American!

  26. proreason
    April 8, 2009 at 9:56 pm

    Pesky climate data just refuses to cooperate with AlToad. From the sometimes truthful Australian:

    Climate facts to warm to

    CATASTROPHIC predictions of global warming usually conjure with the notion of a tipping point, a point of no return.

    Last Monday – on ABC Radio National, of all places – there was a tipping point of a different kind in the debate on climate change. It was a remarkable interview involving the co-host of Counterpoint, Michael Duffy and Jennifer Marohasy, a biologist and senior fellow of Melbourne-based think tank the Institute of Public Affairs. Anyone in public life who takes a position on the greenhouse gas hypothesis will ignore it at their peril.
    Duffy asked Marohasy: “Is the Earth stillwarming?”

    She replied: “No, actually, there has been cooling, if you take 1998 as your point of reference. If you take 2002 as your point of reference, then temperatures have plateaued. This is certainly not what you’d expect if carbon dioxide is driving temperature because carbon dioxide levels have been increasing but temperatures have actually been coming down over the last 10 years.”

    Duffy: “Is this a matter of any controversy?”

    Marohasy: “Actually, no. The head of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) has actually acknowledged it. He talks about the apparent plateau in temperatures so far this century. So he recognises that in this century, over the past eight years, temperatures have plateaued … This is not what you’d expect, as I said, because if carbon dioxide is driving temperature then you’d expect that, given carbon dioxide levels have been continuing to increase, temperatures should be going up … So (it’s) very unexpected, not something that’s being discussed. It should be being discussed, though, because it’s very significant.”

    Duffy: “It’s not only that it’s not discussed. We never hear it, do we? Whenever there’s any sort of weather event that can be linked into the global warming orthodoxy, it’s put on the front page. But a fact like that, which is that global warming stopped a decade ago, is virtually never reported, which is extraordinary.”

    Duffy then turned to the question of how the proponents of the greenhouse gas hypothesis deal with data that doesn’t support their case. “People like Kevin Rudd and Ross Garnaut are speaking as though the Earth is still warming at an alarming rate, but what is the argument from the other side? What would people associated with the IPCC say to explain the (temperature) dip?”

    Marohasy: “Well, the head of the IPCC has suggested natural factors are compensating for the increasing carbon dioxide levels and I guess, to some extent, that’s what sceptics have been saying for some time: that, yes, carbon dioxide will give you some warming but there are a whole lot of other factors that may compensate or that may augment the warming from elevated levels of carbon dioxide.

    “There’s been a lot of talk about the impact of the sun and that maybe we’re going to go through or are entering a period of less intense solar activity and this could be contributing to the current cooling.”

    Duffy: “Can you tell us about NASA’s Aqua satellite, because I understand some of the data we’re now getting is quite important in our understanding of how climate works?”

    Marohasy: “That’s right. The satellite was only launched in 2002 and it enabled the collection of data, not just on temperature but also on cloud formation and water vapour. What all the climate models suggest is that, when you’ve got warming from additional carbon dioxide, this will result in increased water vapour, so you’re going to get a positive feedback. That’s what the models have been indicating. What this great data from the NASA Aqua satellite … (is) actually showing is just the opposite, that with a little bit of warming, weather processes are compensating, so they’re actually limiting the greenhouse effect and you’re getting a negative rather than a positive feedback.”

    …

    http://www.theaustralian.news......83,00.html

    How shocking. The finger-in-the-politics computer models haven’t predicted what the ACTUAL DATA says is happening.

    Well, faced with such a controversy, there is really only one thing to do. IGNORE THE DATA.

    Because if you believe your own lying eyes, you really aren’t going to be able to control the way people live by scaring them to death, are you?

    And besides, AlToad and many others are heavily invested in companies selling carbon indulgences now. We can’t let them go broke, can we?

    • proreason
      April 9, 2009 at 1:53 pm

      Here’s a yummy follow-up:

      “Arctic warming has been caused in large part by laws introduced to improve air quality and fight acid rain.”

      NASA: Clean-air regs, not CO2, are melting the ice cap

      http://www.theregister.co.uk/2.....institute/

      Calling the Global Warming nuts stupid is an abuse of the word stupid.

  27. BillK
    April 9, 2009 at 9:27 am

    I laughed out loud when I read this this morning.

    Polis is far from being an ineffective loon – he and his buddy Tim Gill were almost single-handedly responsible for turning Colorado from a Republican state into a hard left one using their millions of personal dollars.

    Still…

    From the Denver Post:

    Polis takes Iraq to task over attacks on gays

    By Michael Riley

    WASHINGTON — As Rep. Jared Polis toured Iraq this week, he had something more than security conditions or troop withdrawals on his mind: the case of a man allegedly sentenced to death in a criminal court for membership in a gay-rights group.

    An openly gay member of Congress, Polis has been investigating the treatment of gays in Iraq for several months, and last week he spoke through a translator by phone to a transgender Iraqi man who said he had been arrested, beaten and raped by Ministry of Interior security forces.

    Human-rights groups tracking the issue also passed Polis a letter, allegedly written from jail by a man who said he was beaten into confessing he was a member of the gay-rights group Iraqi-LGBT. The group said the man had been sentenced to death in a court in Karkh and finally executed.

    “Is there anyone to help me before it is too late?” said the letter. Its author’s name was being withheld to protect his family.

    Polis carried some of that evidence with him to Iraq and presented State Department officials in Baghdad with a letter outlining the allegations and pressing members of the Iraqi parliament’s human-rights committee.

    “We will see whether the Iraqi government is serious about protecting the human rights of all Iraqis, and we can also see what role our own State Department can play in helping to protect this minority in Iraq,” Polis said by phone Wednesday after leaving Iraq.

    The allegations are extremely sensitive for both the Iraqi government and U.S. officials, who have dispensed billions of dollars to support the current Shiite-led regime and the new democratic era that it represents.

    Iraqi officials conceded that six gay men have been killed in Sadr City in the past two weeks.

    Wednesday, the New York Times reported that Iraqi police had begun a crackdown on homosexuals — whose status is illegal in Iraq — and that influential clerics have urged that they be sought out and killed. …

    http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_12103017

    We’ll see how long before Iraq’s government is overthrown should they agree Polis has a point.

    Not because the government shouldn’t take action, but because the radical Islamicists throughout the region would never allow it.

    The question is whether Polis is so clueless he doesn’t realize that or whether, of greater concern, he does, meaning he’s actively working to undermine the Iraqi government…

  28. canary
    April 10, 2009 at 1:13 am

    Twelve alleged Pakistani al-Qauida terrorists arrested in London, though more were probably involved.

    By NANCY ZUCKERBROD, Associated Press Writer Nancy Zuckerbrod, Associated Press Writer – 59 mins ago
    LONDON – Britain’s top counter-terrorist police officer resigned Thursday after he was photographed carrying clearly visible secret documents about an operation against an alleged al-Qaida plot by Pakistani nationals to launch an attack in Britain.

    Prime Minister Gordon Brown said the raids had disrupted “a very big terrorist plot.”

    “We perceived a threat was there and we had to take action,” he said.

    “What happened essentially meant we have brought the matter forward but it would have happened in the next 24 hours in any event,” he said.

    Police said 11 of the men arrested were Pakistanis, most on student visas, and the twelfth was British. The suspects ranged in age from the teens to a 41-year-old man.

    “We know that there are links between terrorists in Britain and terrorists in Pakistan,” said Brown. He said he would be asking Pakistani Prime Minister Asif Ali Zardari to take tougher action.

    ……Manchester Police said the suspects were detained under anti-terrorism laws in the cities of Manchester and Liverpool and the surrounding area, about 200 miles (300 kilometers) northwest of London.

    The raids targeted homes, an Internet cafe, Liverpool’s John Moores University and a car driving along a highway.

    It’s not the first time officials calling on the prime minister have been caught out by photographers standing in Downing Street with powerful telephoto lenses.

    Associated Press Writers Robert Barr and Jill Lawless in London contributed to this report.

    Full article
    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200.....EnaS5vaA8F

  29. BillK
    April 10, 2009 at 4:26 pm

    It’s always fun to see what the whackos in Madison are up to, often because it’s what the mainstream left is up to shortly thereafter.

    This week, from the ultra far-left Capital Times:

    Saturday rally will urge feds to ‘break up the banks’

    “Break up the banks” will be the rallying cry of people marching on the Capitol Square Saturday afternoon, part of a nationwide effort demanding that the nation’s biggest banks be taken down to force real financial reform.

    The rally will start at 1 p.m. at the Capitol with marchers heading to the downtown branch of Chase Bank, 22 E. Mifflin St.

    The local march is one of 50 planned across the country, part of a grass-roots movement called “A New Way Forward.” The movement is calling for federal government intervention that would result in the breakup and sale of the nation’s big banks instead of handing out a trillion dollars to make sure banks that are “too big to fail” don’t go under.

    “The only reason these banks can get away with blackmailing the taxpayers into covering their losses is because they’ve been allowed to become too big,” said Steve Burns, program coordinator of the Wisconsin Network for Peace and Justice. “Any effort at real financial reform has to start with Congress using its antitrust powers to break up the biggest banks.”

    http://www.madison.com/tct/news/446576

    Conveniently ignoring that it’s the Obama Administration is suddenly deciding which banks and businesses are “too big to fail.”

  30. BillK
    April 10, 2009 at 4:32 pm

    Rest assured the Government will protect you.

    From the AP:

    State says fish pedicures at Milwaukee mall illegal

    WAUWATOSA — State regulators say the trendy fish pedicures making their way into some U.S. cities are illegal in Wisconsin.

    An inspector from the Department of Regulation and Licensing has visited the Doctor Fish Magnifique salon at Mayfair Mall in Wauwatosa, a Milwaukee suburb.

    For $35, customers can stick their feet in a small pool of water where 100 tiny garra rufa fish, known as doctor fish, will eat the dead skin. The treatment is popular in Asia and has recently moved into the U.S.

    Regulators are concerned because there’s no way to disinfect a pool of fish in between uses.

    The salon says the procedure isn’t technically a pedicure and is not subject to the licensing requirements. …

    http://www.madison.com/tct/mad/latest/446445

    Wisconsin’s tax dollars at work.

  31. BillK
    April 10, 2009 at 4:37 pm

    From an overjoyed WaPo:

    Faith groups increasingly losing gay rights fights

    By Jacqueline L. Salmon

    Faith organizations and individuals who view homosexuality as sinful and refuse to provide services to gay people are losing a growing number of legal battles that they say are costing them their religious freedom.

    The lawsuits have resulted from states and communities that have banned discrimination based on sexual orientation. Those laws have created a clash between the right to be free from discrimination and the right to freedom of religion, religious groups said, with faith losing. They point to what they say are ominous recent examples:

    – A Christian photographer was forced by the New Mexico Civil Rights Commission to pay $6,637 in attorney’s costs after she refused to photograph a gay couple’s commitment ceremony.

    – A psychologist in Georgia was fired after she declined for religious reasons to counsel a lesbian about her relationship.

    – Christian fertility doctors in California who refused to artificially inseminate a lesbian patient were barred by the state Supreme Court from invoking their religious beliefs in refusing treatment.

    – A Christian student group was not recognized at a University of California law school because it denies membership to anyone practicing sex outside of traditional marriage.

    “It really is all about religious liberty for us,” said Scott Hoffman, chief administrative officer of a New Jersey Methodist group, the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association, which lost a property tax exemption after it declined to allow its beachside pavilion to be used for a same-sex union ceremony. “The protection to not be forced to do something that is against deeply held religious principles.”

    But gay groups and liberal legal scholars say they are prevailing because an individual’s religious views about homosexuality cannot be used to violate gays’ right to equal treatment under the law.

    “We are not required to pay the price for other people’s religious views about us,” said Jennifer Pizer, director of the Marriage Project for Lambda Legal, a gay rights legal advocacy group.

    Twelve states now offer some form of same-sex marriage or same-sex partner recognition. Twenty states and more than 180 cities and counties, including the District of Columbia, ban discrimination against gays, according to the Human Rights Campaign, a gay rights group.

    These laws generally offer some type of exemption to religious entities when hiring employees. But some groups are working to expand that exemption to include commercial businesses to protect owners and their employees when exercising their religious views.

    Gay rights groups said they do not object to making faith groups’ religious jobs exempt from the discrimination laws but that offering services to the public is different.

    “In their role as a participant in the marketplace, they are being required to do that in a non-discriminatory way,” said Brian Moulton, Human Rights Campaign senior counsel.

    Battles are increasingly including private businesses. Last August, the California Supreme Court ruled in favor of Guadalupe Benitez, who is a lesbian, when she sued the North Coast Women’s Care Medical Group after doctors said their religious beliefs prevented them from artificially inseminating her.

    “We were devastated,” said Benitez, 37, who has been with partner Joanne Clark for almost two decades. Sexual orientation “should never have been an issue,” she said. “The issue was that I had a medical condition.”

    The court ruled that North Coast Women’s Care did not have a free speech right or a religious exemption from the state antidiscrimination law.

    Sometimes, organizations that don’t wish to serve gays give in rather than go to court.

    The online dating site eHarmony agreed to provide gay and lesbian matchmaking services to settle a complaint by a gay New Jersey man accusing it of discrimination. The new site, CompatiblePartners.net, started Tuesday.

    The site eHarmony, founded by evangelical psychologist Neil Clark Warren, does not provide a same-sex option. Warren said his research into successful relationships did not include same-sex couples.

    Company attorneys said that it settled because of the unpredictable nature of litigation and that New Jersey’s attorney general did not find that eHarmony had violated the state’s anti-discrimination law.

    “People seem to say that if you enter the world of commerce, you lose all your First Amendment rights” to free exercise of religion, said Jordan Lorence, senior counsel at the Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian legal organization that has represented several businesses. “They … have become nothing more than vending machines, and the government can dictate the conditions under which they dispense their goods and services.” …

    http://www.madison.com/tct/top5/446599

    So what else is new?

  32. BillK
    April 10, 2009 at 5:09 pm

    This is where we are – our leaders now have less of a willingness to use force than the French.

    From CNN:

    Hostage dies as French attack Somali pirates

    (CNN) — A French hostage and two pirates died Friday in a rescue operation off Somalia, the French president’s office in Paris said Friday.

    Four hostages, including a child, were freed from the hijacked yacht after almost a week of captivity, Nicolas Sarkozy’s office said.

    The French military decided to move in when pirates refused their offers and increased threats against the hostages, it said.

    A defense ministry source told CNN the pirates were threatening to execute their captives.

    The four adults and a child had been held aboard their yacht, the Tanit, since it was seized in the Gulf of Aden on Saturday, the president’s statement said.

    CNN Jim Bitterman in Paris reported the French military came under fire as they attacked Tanit using Zodiac motorized rubber rafts.

    There has been a series of high-profile and increasingly sophisticated pirate attacks in recent months.

    Also off Somalia this week, the cargo vessel Maersk Alabama was boarded by pirates, who briefly took control of the ship.

    Although the crew retook the ship, its captain, Richard Phillips, was Friday still being held by the gang holed up in a lifeboat. …

    http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/.....index.html

    Meanwhile the pirates have threatened to kill the captain, and Obama has done… nothing, naturally.

    Between this and polls at People magazine showing people preferred the way Bruni was dressed to Michelle, Barack must be truly discouraged…

  33. Clarissimus
    April 10, 2009 at 10:18 pm

    No, it’s not from The Onion, although it looks a lot like it:

    Saudi man divorces wife by text message
    RIYADH (Reuters) – A Saudi man has divorced his wife by text message, a newspaper said on Thursday.

    The man was in Iraq when he sent the SMS informing her she was no longer his spouse. He followed up with a telephone call to two of his relatives, the daily Arab News reported.

    A court in the Red Sea city of Jeddah finalised the split — the first known divorce in Saudi Arabia by text message — after summoning the two relatives to check they had received word of the husband’s intention, the paper said.

    Saudi Arabia practises a strict form of Islamic Sharia law, and clerics preside over Sharia courts as judges. Under the law a man can divorce his wife by saying “I divorce you” three times.

    The Saudi man was in Iraq to participate in “what he described as ‘jihad’,” according to the Arab News. Many Saudis have gone to fight with al Qaeda militants against the Iraqi government and U.S. forces.

    (Reporting by Asma Alsharif)

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/200....._divorce_1

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