Peanut powder

I bought some Jif Peanut Powder yesterday. Mixed up about a TBSP today to eat with celery and to taste test. Not bad, but obviously missing a lot of fat--which is the whole point. 2g fat per serving of peanut powder compared to 16g fat per serving of peanut butter. Unlike Jif Peanut Butter this ingredient list contained only peanuts. Next, I'll mix it with a little chocolate.

  

Obama's Cuban Legacy

While our President cavorts with the dictator of Cuba, and the smoke clears and the bodies are counted in Brussels, let us remember that ISIS would be but a failed footnote in history if Obama hadn't turned tail and run from Iraq. He's so anxious for a legacy? He's got one.

 How is it Obama is able to connect the history of the two countries with the slave trade and leaves out 60 years of Communism which devastated the economy and culture of a vibrant island nation and which the U.S. defeated economically? He must have brought thousands into the Trump movement with that speech, unfortunately.

 Have you ever noticed how Obama gets his little digs into American blacks and the civil rights struggle by pointing out his father was from Kenya, who had no slavery in his background (but he was a Communist and atheist)? He let the Cubans know today that his blood lines are above all that, no history of slavery for him. Such a snob.

Obama's legacy--Cuba, Russia and Iran--all stronger

Paula Priesse writes: "Barack Obama didn’t feel the need to attend the funerals of Margaret Thatcher, Chris Kyle, Antonin Scalia or Nancy Reagan. Nor (unlike Michael Brown & Freddie Gray) did he send WH representatives to the funerals of police officers senselessly murdered, such as slain NYPD Officers Rafael Ramos & Wenjian Liu. And O didn’t have the time to march in solidarity with other world leaders in Paris after the Charlie Hebdo attack. But somehow he has found the time to play hundreds of rounds of golf, fill out his NCAA brackets for eight straight years and to pose in Cuba for the photo below. Perhaps someday America will once again have a president who believes in freedom. Because we sure as hell don’t have one now!"
 

"The truth about Che now has its boots on. He helped free Cubans from the repressive Batista regime, only to enslave them in a totalitarian police state worst than the last. He was Fidel Castro’s chief executioner, a mass-murderer who in theory could have commanded any number of Latin American death squads, from Peru’s Shining Path on the political left to Guatemala’s White Hand on the right." World Affairs, Feb. 7, 2014

Obamacare mandate is a threat to religious rights guaranteed under First Amendement

It's the erosion of your religious rights, also. Big unions were adamantly opposed to ACA until they got their exemptions. But nuns taking care of the elderly poor? A threat to the most powerful government in the world.

"First, given how politicized the Affordable Care Act has become, it’s important to clarify that our case is not a challenge to the act, and winning our case in no way endangers it. We’re merely asking the court to ensure that Health and Human Services adjust...s a regulation it developed that would force us to change our religious health plan and start offering benefits that violate our religious beliefs.

Second, some have mistakenly claimed that we can just sign a piece of paper and receive an exemption. Indeed, Health and Human Services claims it “accommodated” our religious beliefs and offered us an “opt-out.”

I wish that were true. In fact, the government has candidly told the Supreme Court that we “don’t get an exemption” at all. Rather, what Health and Human Services is calling an “opt-out” is really an “opt-in” — a permission slip where we authorize the use of our religious health plan to offer services that violate our beliefs and waive our protections under federal civil rights laws. That’s why they need our signature." http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/03/19/opinion/obamacaresbirth-control-exemption-still-tramples-on-rights.html?referer&_r=1

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/jan/4/little-sisters-poor-nuns-will-take-obamacare-birth/?page=all

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/07/obama-beats-the-nuns-on-contraception/398519/

Wealth transfer and illegal immigration

"Remittances are essentially a tax-free transfer of wealth out of the U.S. by foreign born workers. Approximately $20 billion of Mexican remittances each year [$24 billion in 2014] disappear from the U.S. economy via the institutionalized money transfer industry (banks, credit unions, post offices, money transfer operators, individual businesses, and chain stores), never to return. While this massive amount may be considered virtual foreign aid, it is a non-sanctioned transfer of wealth that is based on a fundamental violation of America’s immigration and employment laws."

The carelessness of multiple U.S. administrations has allowed their home governments to do nothing about their conditions at home--it's a big chunk of their GDP. In resources, minerals, and labor force, they are very wealthy countries.

 http://www.cairco.org/issues/remittances

Angels

I don't know if we each have an individual angel, but there sure are a lot of them--enough to go around. “The angel of the Lord encamps all around those who fear Him, and delivers them” (Psalm 34:7) “For He shall give His angels charge over you, to keep you in all your ways. (Psalm 91:11) “Are they not all ministering spirits sent forth to minister for those who will inherit salvation?” (Hebrews 1:14)

http://www.beliefnet.com/Inspiration/Angels/2009/03/Catholics-Protestants-Angels.aspx

http://www.catholic.com/quickquestions/must-we-believe-in-angels

http://www.seattlepi.com/lifestyle/blogcritics/article/Book-Review-Angels-God-s-Secret-Agents-by-Billy-1350618.php

Don't leave God out of retirement

Have you ever seen a really nice ad that needed just a bit of tweaking? This is from Thrivent Financial, which formerly was call Lutheran Brotherhood. If you look closely, you see a shadowy figure in the background. Her husband? Her friends? Those saints who have gone before her who shaped her life? I think I can even see a faithful dog. Don't know. You see some foggy things, others with clarity in this ad. But God was missing, and from my experience with retirement, he's key to a solid foundation. The "contact" will be different depending on your church, family or friends.

Spurgeon on evil

The link between abortion and illegal immigration

There’s a strong link between being pro-abortion and pro-illegal immigration, two pillars of the Democrat Party. It’s not because this is the party of caring and social justice, either. The U.S. birth rate is below replacement. We can’t support our current social programs without more people coming into the work force to pay taxes. Since we’ve been killing off our population legally since 1973, many of whom would be in the prime work years of their lives, we have to import poor, and mostly brown people from Mexico and Central America for the grunt work of harvesting crops and roofing buildings, and Asians for the high tech jobs with the legal visa program, H-1B.  

There were 11.3 million unauthorized immigrants in the U.S. in 2014 according to Pew Research. The population has remained essentially stable for five years, and currently makes up 3.5% of the nation’s population. The number of unauthorized immigrants peaked in 2007 at 12.2 million, when this group was 4% of the U.S. population. 

 Blacks are about about 13% of our population, and Hispanics about 17%, and that's just a recent change due to amnesty in the IRCA and a fluid border. Unauthorized immigrants make up 5.1% of the U.S. labor force. In the U.S. labor force, there were 8.1 million unauthorized immigrants either working or looking for work in 2012. Among the states, Nevada (10%), California (9%), Texas (9%) and New Jersey (8%) had the highest shares of unauthorized immigrants in their labor forces. 

Since these people all have a better chance for the good life in the U.S. than their home countries, of course they fall into the arms of the party that welcomes them. But they don’t look behind the curtain.

http://money.cnn.com/2013/09/06/news/economy/birth-rate-low/

http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/11/19/5-facts-about-illegal-immigration-in-the-u-s/

 

David Brooks on Donald Trump

"Donald Trump is epically unprepared to be president. He has no realistic policies, no advisers, no capacity to learn. His vast narcissism makes him a closed fortress. He doesn’t know what he doesn’t know and he’s uninterested in finding out. He insults the office Abraham Lincoln once occupied by running for it with less preparation than most of us would undertake to buy a sofa.

Trump is perhaps the most dishonest person to run for high office in our lifetimes [I would disagree here--Hillary is that]. All politicians stretch the truth, but Trump has a steady obliviousness to accuracy." David Brooks

Made me laugh, then cry

Lovely spring day

Photo is spring 2011, but the yard work never ends

Spring flowers everywhere, but I think snow is predicted for the week-end.

We drove to Lakeside to check on the cottage and do a little yard work. Beautiful day for a drive--blue skies, not much traffic except near Columbus.

Drove home, went to the fish fry with neighbors. We saw a lot of people we knew.

Tired.

Why do a fraction of a percent get to undo our bathroom safety?

I don't understand the bathroom bills. Cropping up in a number of states.  Can't we just have a 3rd toilet with a lockable door for the gender confused, gender transitioning, and gender curious? Sort of like the toilets in airplanes?  They aren't gender segregated.  I don't want young men with genitals fully in tact wearing mascara pumped with estrogen hormones coming into the ladies room.  And if you've got a young son using the men's room, do you really want ladies watching him at the urinal or talking to him?

Remember how the gay marriage push started in the 80s? "We just want the right to love." Now it's "We just want to sue and pay back for years of hurt."

 http://www.cnn.com/2016/03/01/us/south-dakota-transgender-bathroom-bill/

http://www.tennessean.com/story/news/politics/2016/03/07/tennessee-lawmakers-consider-transgender-bathroom-bill/81441106/

It's about feelings of the transgendering

Lies by posters on Face Book

The political lies are all over the place, both from the left and the right, often with misspelled words and bad grammar.  I usually don't answer them, but since Bernie Sanders recently made a huge gaff about who is poor (poverty and crime rate is lower among whites, but actual numbers are higher than blacks since over 60% of the population is white, compared to about 13% for black), I thought I'd answer this one probably from a Bernie supporter (SnarkyPundit), because Hillary just talks about ruining the jobs of coal miners, denying that her server sent classified e-mails,  and that it's her turn to be president because of her lady parts.

I wonder what the poster creator is calling public assistance--apparently not the ER of hospitals which have federal and state money to never turn away anyone, or public schools required by law to hire special teachers and meet federal guidelines, apparently not people--usually men--who are put out of work by wages being slashed for roofers, cooks, gardeners, carpenters, not churches and charitable institutions that provide food and medical care and housing, plus job training many with government grants, not ESL programs that are free but using government grants for personnel. The correct part is YES indeed they do work, send money home, and pay off the criminal coyotes who brought them up from Ecuador or Guatemala dropping them in NYC. And of course, trafficking in persons (either prostitution or labor) isn't welfare, but they are very vulnerable under threat of being exposed. Yes, the creator of this lie needs a bit more research.

Diabetic eye disease

ID for train travel at reduced rates for blind citizens

 Because my grandmother was blind, I've always been sensitive to (and frightened by) eye diseases. Her condition was not caused by diabetes (most likely a disease/virus transmitted by poultry when she was a child, but no one really knows), but diabetes is the leading cause of blindness in adults today. There is a lot that can be done to stop the progression of diabetes, particularly weight loss, proper diet and exercise, and then medication, but too many think, "It will never happen to me."  Even some in my own family! Even some who read this blog!!

1. Diabetic eye disease comprises a group of eye conditions that affect people with diabetes. These conditions include diabetic retinopathy, diabetic macular edema (DME), cataract, and glaucoma.
2. All forms of diabetic eye disease have the potential to cause severe vision loss and blindness.
3. Diabetic retinopathy involves changes to retinal blood vessels that can cause them to bleed or leak fluid, distorting vision.
4. Diabetic retinopathy is the most common cause of vision loss among people with diabetes and a leading cause of blindness among working-age adults.
5. DME is a consequence of diabetic retinopathy that causes swelling in the area of the retina called the macula.
6. Controlling diabetes—by taking medications as prescribed, staying physically active, and maintaining a healthy diet—can prevent or delay vision loss.
7. Because diabetic retinopathy often goes unnoticed until vision loss occurs, people with diabetes should get a comprehensive dilated eye exam at least once a year.
8. Early detection, timely treatment, and appropriate follow-up care of diabetic eye disease can protect against vision loss.
9. Diabetic retinopathy can be treated with several therapies, used alone or in combination.
10. NEI supports research to develop new therapies for diabetic retinopathy, and to compare the effectiveness of existing therapies for different patient group

National Eye Institute (NEI) 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VX4w6U-Qs1k

Sloppy handwriting

I used to have very nice handwriting--looking back (didn't think so then), but years of keyboarding have pretty much ruined that. Can't attribute it to anything more grand. My mother didn't care much for her handwriting because in the 1920s her father thought it should be more calligraphic. But I love looking at her old letters just to see the distinctive handwriting. Can't imagine that old e-mails will be the same for those of you who have no hand written letters from your Mom. One treasure I have is a letter my mom wrote in 1929 as a teenager to a girlfriend (whose family passed it along to our family).

You're being lied to by Democrats, socialists and progressives

Income inequality hasn't changed at all in the last 20 years--if you look at individuals. What has changed is how we group ourselves into families, households, neighborhoods and schools.

Doctors marry doctors, lawyers marry lawyers, their children go to the same schools and clubs and meet each other and marry. Teens with babies don't get married at all and their children also meet and get together socially. HUGE income inequality in those households which extends to values and work ethic. In fact, two adults working at minimum wage full time are above poverty level and making much more than that teen mom. That teen may be getting generous benefits to raise her children, but it's not boosting her income.

In the bottom quintile there are .97 men for every 100 women, and in the 4th quintile there are 1.05 men for every 100 women. The government can't take enough away from earners who choose to create a home for children with 2 parents and give it to someone not working. That's not socialist; it's just destroying families.

We are an aging population. Income changes in households with older adults too, but for the household, first as two reduced incomes. Then when one spouse dies, depending on how pensions or Social Security are structured, one income disappears. That's not inequality; that's math. Don't believe the lies that we are a greedy, unfair society. Believe instead that we are making choices in lifestyle that have a life time effect. (As for that top .01%, they've done extremely well under Obama, but I'll let a Democrat explain that one.)

 http://politicalcalculations.blogspot.com/2011/10/real-story-behind-rising-us-income.html#.VugxJEBk-GZ