First things first

Ho Chi Minh, the Communist

Ho Chi Minh slaughtered millions. Mostly Vietnamese. And it continued after the Americans left. Instead of trying to rewrite history, maybe Obama should have told President Truong Tan Sang the truth? I'm not even going to give him credit for a gaffe. I think he believes his own nonsense. http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/07/26/uh-ho-obama-says-vietnamese-dictator-inspired-by-founding-fathers/

Sneaking out of the White House

Imagine if the president and his daughters decided to sneak out of the White House at night to get a Dairy Queen without security (and without Michelle knowing about it). They see six figures coming toward them--can't see the race, but get close enough to identify the clothing and gender.  Which group would make them feel safer—six teen-men in hoodies and low slung pants, or three middle aged men in khaki shorts walking with their wives/girlfriends? Obama grew up white—he’d be the first to be profiling for the safety of his girls and relieved he didn’t have to confront the hoodies in his hood.

Don’t fund Obamacare

JFK at the U. of I., October 24, 1960

Photos of Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John F. Kennedy making a campaign stop at the University of Illinois. (U. of I. Archives photo.)  Can't be positive but that looks like McKinley Hall over on the far left in the motorcade photo where I lived in 1960. 801 S. Wright. However, I got married in September and was living and working in Indianapolis.

The American Elms that formed a cathedral arch over the campus walks were gone by then, in fact, I believe they had all been cut even before I got there in 1958.

Update:  looking closer, I think the motorcade is further south, nearer the library.  That’s not McKinley.

Friday Family Photo—The Lustron

I love the Lustron, I really do. There are many in Mt. Morris, IL where I graduated from high school, and my grandparents owned one. They are beautifully designed and very functional. But they were the Solyndra of the 1940s--a federal government boondoggle that ran into problems with the local housing codes, unions, and an over priced product that eventually failed. They live on today.

[Carl] Strandlund knew a major investment would be required to achieve the efficiencies necessary for financial success, so he heavily lobbied the federal government for support. The Truman administration saw the potential of his concept and, in 1947, helped him secure a $15.5 million dollar loan from the Reconstruction Finance Corporation, a government agency formed to assist industry during the Depression. In addition, Strandlund got the keys to a million-square-foot former Curtiss-Wright plant next to the Columbus airport. It was an unprecedented government venture into the housing industry, but, according to Knerr, that fact actually gave the project greater credibility and notoriety.

 http://www.ohiohistory.org/publications/ohio-histore-news/2013/july-25-2013/the-lustron-home

Unlike this story reports, there was no post-WWII housing shortage. Housing was taken off the market with government regulations, and that created the shortage which created a housing and mortgage boom.

My grandparents enjoying the porch on the Lustron.

My cousins Pam, Ron, Fred, Jenny Sue, and Lorrie in front of the Lustron owned by their grandparents.

Christian non-profits

“CARM is a 501(c)3, non-profit, Christian ministry dedicated to the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ and the promotion and defense of the Christian Gospel, doctrine, and theology.”

If the government gives, it can take away.  This is a bad idea from several angles.  Eventually, Christian non-profits will have to do something contrary to their beliefs if they want this tax status—maybe recognize same sex marriage, or provide insurance for abortion, or accept non-Christians on their board.  It’s also wrong, I believe, to ask non-Christians to support our religion—because that’s what we’re asking for in not paying  taxes on the income that pays the staff or the office supplies or the real estate costs.  Also, now that we know the government is using the IRS to punish and control, why should be put our people in harm’s way.  Why should board members and staff have their private accounts audited because the organization is under scrutiny.  Let’s get the churches and para-church organizations out from under the government’s thumb so we can be free to speak truth to evil, and the good news to the masses.

Don’t blame Obama for Detroit . . .

Blame Democrat control since the 1960s.

“Detroit is an apropos metaphor for Obama's America. It is the prototypical terminal manifestation of the Democratic Party's socialist economic policies that have created ever-expanding urban poverty plantations in once-great cities across the nation. That in turn drives the departure of middle-class families for greener pastures in outlying suburban counties with better schools and lower crime.

Over just the last decade, some 240,000 of Detroit's residents (25 percent of its population), and thousands of businesses, fled the city's oppressive taxes and corrupt one-party government. Indeed, Detroit was a bustling city of nearly 2,000,000 residents as far back as 1950; today, that number is just over 700,000. (Not coincidentally, Detroit's last Republican mayor, Louis Miriani, served more than a half-century ago, from 1957 to 1962.)”  Mark Alexander, Patriot Post

Stand your ground, Texas.

True the Vote (TTV), the nation's leading voters' rights organization, responded today to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder's plans to launch a wholesale attack against the State of Texas by filing federal lawsuits against Texas' voter ID law and election procedures.

"We will not sit idly by and allow the most politically charged Department of Justice in US history to set aside the US constitution and attempt to bully the people of Texas", True the Vote President Catherine Engelbrecht said. "We will meet Attorney General Holder in court and we will do whatever we need to do to advance the cause of voters' rights for all Americans."

"General Holder's announcement today demonstrates just how radical the DOJ has become. The same department that criminalizes journalism and fails to prosecute IRS agents who violate the rights of American taxpayers is promising to sue states with taxpayer dollars to block laws passed by elected legislators such as voter ID and citizenship verification.

"Every American voter deserves to have his or her vote counted - and not diluted by fraud or error. The DOJ just put itself between the voters of Texas and their guaranteed constitutional and civil rights.

"True the Vote has watched as Attorney General Eric Holder has repeatedly disregarded the rule of law," Engelbrecht continued. "We understand that this Department of Justice does not believe that protection of voters' rights should be colorblind.

"Texas will stand its ground in San Antonio - that's a promise."

Beating the middle class to death in boring speeches

Obama's speeches on the campaign trail show he says he's not the president of poor Americans, or rich Americans, only the middle class, and he's killing that class with his policies. Under Obama the 1 percenters have really grown, and so have the very poor--he's really growing the SNAPper class, making them dependent on the government so they'll vote Democrat.

"For four and a half years, Mr. Obama has focused his policies on reducing inequality rather than increasing growth. The predictable result has been more inequality and less growth. . . median real household income [$51,500] is $2,718, or 5%, lower than the $54,218 median in June 2009 when the recession officially ended." WSJ, July 24. Doubling the number on food stamps is not a plan, Mr. President. Forcing Obamacare on businesses which then reduce hours and employees is not a plan. Expanding the wars in the middle east is not a plan. Fomenting race riots is not helpful to cities with high minority unemployment. Blaming and not accepting responsibility is not a plan.

A lot of support for this little guy

Former President George H.W. Bush and members of his Secret Service detail shaved their heads to show solidarity for a 2-year-old boy undergoing treatment for leukemia. http://on.wsj.com/17G8IpO

George and Barbara Bush lost their second child, 4-year-old Robin Bush, to leukemia almost 60 years ago.

Sister Simone Campbell, dupe of the CPUSA

CPUSA,  (The Communist Party of the USA) the Democratic Socialists of America, Freedom Road Socialists, and the so-called Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism came together to discuss “how to better unite the left” on June 5 hosted in the New York City union hall of SEIU 1199 United Healthcare Workers East. Their topic was how to expand—“new allies must be carefully sought out, identified, upheld, tapped—in a word, used.”  What better group than a renegade group of Catholic nuns that have beat the drum for Obamacare? The communists and catholic nuns practically fell into each others arms.

http://spectator.org/archives/2013/07/19/the-communist-party-usas-netwo

http://www.catholicworldreport.com/Item/578/the_59000_nuns_for_obamacare.aspx

http://www.womenofgrace.com/blog/?p=16323

Obama on jobs, the economy and the middle class--again

November 2009: Meeting with his Economic Recovery Advisory Board, the president says his administration "will not rest until we are succeeding in generating the jobs that this economy needs."

April 2010: Obama goes on a "Main Street" tour, saying "it's time to rebuild our economy on a new foundation so that we've got real and sustained growth."

June 2010: The president declares a "Recovery Summer" to highlight the jobs created by stimulus-funded infrastructure projects. "If we want to ensure that Americans can compete with any nation in the world, we're going to have to get serious about our long-term vision for this country and we're going to have to get serious about our infrastructure," he said.

December 2010: The president tells reporters "we are past the crisis point in the economy, but we now have to pivot and focus on jobs and growth."

August 2011: After lawmakers reach a compromise to avert default, the president vows "in the coming months, I'll continue also to fight for what the American people care most about: new jobs, higher wages and faster economic growth."

February 2013: At the start of his second term, the president refocuses on job creation in his State of the Union address, saying "a growing economy that creates good, middle-class jobs--that must be the North Star that guides our efforts."

May 2013: Kicking off his "Jobs and Opportunity Tour," the president says "all of us have to commit ourselves to doing better than we're doing now. And all of us have to rally around the single-greatest challenge that we face as a country right now, and that's reigniting the true engine of economic growth, a rising, thriving middle class."

July 2013: The president says his speech Wednesday is going “to be the kickoff to what is essentially several months of us trying to get Washington and the press to refocus on the economy and the struggles that middle-class families are going through.”

This list was compiled by Mary Bruce, not Norma Bruce.  She works for ABC – or did.  I hope she can keep her job.  Obama doesn’t like having the truth, or even the obvious, come to light.

The fact is, he hasn’t a clue how to fix the economy since he only knows higher taxes, kiss union butts, spread the war resources thinner and wider, spy on American citizens, and blame someone else for his own failures in leadership.

Father Hunger—guest blogger

“In America’s families, much has been made about the effect on boys whose fathers are not around to help raise them, but Dee Louis-Scott, co-chair for the Black Family Technology Awareness Association’s Youth STEM Fair, says the consequences are very tangible in the lives of girls, too.

“Even though my father was in my life until his passing, I did not understand him, and it was always an emotionally distant relationship,” says Louis-Scott, author of “Believe in the Magic,” (www.mattiefisher.com).

“The men I married were emotionally distant; much of my time was spent chasing their love, time and attention. The problem was that I never experienced a true partnership between a husband and wife as a girl.”

New polls suggest “father hunger” is continuing to alter the family structure in the United States. A recent Associated Press poll finds 42 percent of women would consider having a child without a partner. Additionally, more than 24 million daughters and sons in America live in homes without their father, according to the U.S. Census data.

“I know fathers and mothers who are unmarried, yet both are very proactive in their children’s lives and are by all accounts doing a great job with their kids,” Louis-Scott says. “Unfortunately, the number of fathers living outside the home of their children often reflects a lack of participation from most of those fathers.”

A girl’s first love is her father, and if he has abandoned her, she will find herself in romantic relationships that are similarly unhealthy later in life, she says. While writing the book on the extraordinary life of her mother, Mattie Fisher, who was married five times and who didn’t have a relationship with her father until midlife, Louis-Scott realized just how formative a father’s role is in his daughter’s life.

“If a father treats his daughter like a princess, she will demand better treatment in her romantic relationships,” she says. “But if he treats her poorly, she will come to expect that and even seek it out in future relationships.”

For women whose fathers have provided a poor example, Louis-Scott offers these relationship tips for women who want to break the cycle of unhealthy partner-seeking:

• Consider your relationship with your father: Ladies, what kind of chemistry do you have with Dad; do you even have a relationship with him? How might this be influencing your romantic decisions? Take an in-depth look at the relationship between you and your father. A painstaking review will help you avoid sabotaging a current or future romantic bond.The first (and probably the hardest thing to do) is to recognize and define the problem, if any.

• Take time for you: Get up every morning with the thought that you are rebuilding your life. Reward yourself, perhaps with a massage, a good book or a long bike ride. While reflecting in your solitude, think about the role you played in the failure of your relationship. Consider your past relationship mistakes, and be honest. Remember, as long as you make it the other person’s fault, you will remain a victim.

• When you are ready, ease back in to new relationships: Take a little longer than you normally would to get to know someone. Enjoy the dates and learning about each other. See your potential partner as they are and not how you want them to be, because when we are in a low place it’s easy to put a high value on a person’s potential. Trying to change a man is a bad idea; relax and enjoy getting to know more about him to decide whether you’re compatible just the way he is.

About Dee Louis-Scott

Dee Louis-Scott is retired after working 30 years as a federal employee. She has a Bachelor of Science degree in business administration. Scott has co-chaired the Black Family Technology Awareness Association’s Youth STEM Fair for nine years; its mission is to encourage studies in the Science, Technology, Engineering and Math curriculum in urban communities. Twenty years since the death of her heroic mother, Mattie Fisher, Louis-Scott honors her life, which was experienced in a time in American history when it was a double-curse to be a black woman. “

The speech at Knox College

I have rarely heard or seen such a tepid audience.  Even hand picked they’ve heard it all before.

On the road again with Obama

In a speech in 1963, John F. Kennedy (who incidentally cut taxes to goose the economy) said, "a rising tide lifts all boats," and he used that saying several more times. In 2013, President Obama who never met a tax increase he didn't love, denied it.

Obama can't point to a single success in his 5 years in the 21st century, but he can point to the 1950s as the golden era of the middle class. Go Conservatives!

Obama is clueless about the middle class. All his speeches say that (they are reruns). But he's added a new paragraph of blame to add to Bush and the GOP--the sequester. It's the drag, not Obamacare, not over regulation. He's added 7.2 million jobs, and twice that on food stamps.

I’ve never seen less enthusiastic more lack luster audiences than those on this campaign swing.  Some don’t even bother to clap.  The only ones clapping are those that didn’t hear this speech in 2008.

Tip for the president: Homeownership doesn't lift anyone into the middle class. Clinton and Bush tried that and we got the 2007 mortgage melt down. Obama's refinancing of their administrations' defaults have already defaulted. He is economically impotent.

Allen West on Stand your Ground in Florida

“In a sure case of foot in mouth disease, seems US Attorney General Eric Holder, speaking in Florida, may want to study up on Stand Your Ground use in the Sunshine State, my home. Based on data maintained by Tampa Bay Times, approximately one-third of Florida Stand Your Ground claims in fatal cases have been made by black defendants, as a defense with a 55% success rate. Blacks used Stand Your Ground defenses at nearly twice the rate of their percentage of Florida's population (16.6% in 2012). As well, it seems the majority of victims in Florida Stand Your Ground cases have been white. Either Attorney General Holder is incompetent or ignorant, regardless, we all await his clarification, or correction, of his comments before the NAACP in Orlando.”

What does Al Sharpton have against this white family?

They were an automobile accident in Florida.  George Zimmerman came to their rescue and pulled them out of the car.  Now they fear for their lives lest they be targets for the hate Sharpton, Obama, Holder and Jackson have helped whip up.  Sharpton’s campaigns over the years have contributed to many deaths and injuries.

He’s on the campaign trail again

7.2 million more jobs, 15 million more on food stamps than 2009.

It made me laugh

Didn’t know Geraldo was sending pics . . . he’s just one who is the balance on Fox.