White House pastry chef, Bill Yosses, is resigning--FLOTUS just made it too tough to ply his trade. "“I don’t want to demonize cream, butter, sugar, and eggs,” he explained. While he called his resignation a “bittersweet decision,” Yosses already has future projects lined up for his post-White House career.
Yosses is gay, has married his partner, but I guess that didn’t protect this baker.
I see tax returns where people earn next to nothing, their choice, yet due to the great tax credits for the "lower" income earners, they walk away with over $6,000 of a "refund.” A refund?! There was no tax payment to start with!! How wrong is that, I ask.
Those with over $125,000 (depending upon status, tax issue, etc.) have to endure those tax benefit limitations on their Schedule A, alternative tax calculation, limits on deductible IRAs, limits on student loan interest deductions, etc. ... And it doesn't take much for a married couple to get those "dings" of the upper income level to kick in. A nurse and a labor worker can bring in what I would call a decent wage, yet the tax code will not provide those couples with many benefits, other than the child credit, and again, that is limited.
The tax code does everything it can to boost up the lower income earner and brings down the "upper" income earner. That is the tax code.
And try to do some estate planning. The laws for cash poor farmers, who are land wealthy, are detrimental for any planning. How fair is that?
I wouldn't cut off the hand that feeds me (speaking to liberals). The upper income earners are those people who are paying the way for Medicaid and other handout programs. The big corporations are vital to our IRA retirement funds, and that’s YOUR retirement fund.
It was wonderful to see the grounds crew show up today and blow and rake leaves. Let’s hope we don’t have anymore snow storms. I remember one year we had a huge storm in April about 30 years ago.
Sunday morning, March 16, after our tour of the Hardy Art Collection at the Chateau in Nemacolin, we boarded our bus for Fallingwater, one of Frank Lloyd Wright’s most famous houses in our area of the country, and then from there continued on to Kentuck Knob. Fallingwater had just opened for the season, and was snow free, but very chilly. The water was running free of ice, and we could hear it even in the house.
It was designed for the Edgar Kaufmann, Sr. (1885-1955) family of Pittsburgh of department store fame. Edgar Jr. inherited the property and gave it to the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy to make available to the public.
Fallingwater stands as one of Wright's greatest masterpieces both for its dynamism and for its integration with the striking natural surroundings. Fallingwater has been described as an architectural tour de force of Wright's organic philosophy. Wright's passion for Japanese architecture was strongly reflected in the design of Fallingwater, particularly in the importance of interpenetrating exterior and interior spaces and the strong emphasis placed on harmony between man and nature. Wikipedia.
Kentuck Knob video, 2010. 10 miles south of Fallingwater, completed in 1956 for the Hagan family. Now owned by the Palumbo family of England. The trees were planted after it was built. The land had been clear cut for farming many years ago. Of course, we were not allowed to take interior photos which is the policy of most historical places and museums.
Between the two museum tours, the Carnegie and the Frick we had a wonderful lunch in Pittsburgh at Lydia’s of Insalata Caesar, a trio of pasta—malfatti with fresh spinach and ricotta, ziti with sausage and onion, and wild mushroom ravioli with thyme butter sauce, topped off with assorted cookies.
In the beautiful sun room at the Chateau in Nemacolin
Then we continued on to The Nemacolin Woodlands Resort near Farmington, Pennsylvania, about 215 mi. from Columbus. At Nemacolin (named for a famous Indian) there are several elegant hotels, cottages, houses and town homes to rent; wonderful restaurants, a zoo, swimming, skiing, tennis, bowling, dog sledding, off road driving instruction, fly fishing, golf, shooting ranges, spa and fitness, special activities for children and babysitting, an RV park and wonderful shops. There are also accommodations and spa for your pets (dogs, I think). Nearby in Ohiopyle is river rafting. And, a casino. Really there is something for everyone, and all ages.
The owners of the resort, the Hardy family of 84 Lumber, have art valued at $45 million--everything from antique cars to Tiffany lamps to paintings and prints. After breakfast in one of the wonderful restaurants in the Chateau Hotel, our group gathered in the registration area and with docents viewed a very small piece of the collection, primarily paintings, Tiffany glass and some glass sculptures. The collection is best described as eclectic and idiosyncratic.
We had a wonderful week-end of art through Art Escapes of the Columbus Museum of Art. We visited the Carnegie and Frick museums in Pittsburgh; had an Italian lunch at Lydia's; then stayed at the Nemocolin Woodlands Resort, which has a number of art collections, and we saw only a part of it; then on to Fallingwater and Kentuck Knob homes, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright.
The Carnegie and Frick museums in Pittsburgh
At the Carnegie Museum of Art we caught the last day of the 2013 Carnegie International—35 artists from 19 countries. None of us were too excited by Phyllida Barlow’s sculpture at the entrance which looked like scattered steel wrapped with pink and orange ribbons, but after the tour, it made more sense.
One of my favorites was the neon sign pieces by He An, or at least it was until I learned how he had made it—stole the signage from various fast growing cities in China.
While we were observing Erika Verzutti’s strange forms and objects assembled on the floor, we saw a delightful little girl about 7 or 8 with her notebook, trying to copy the imagines.
There was some interesting art made from confiscated guns by a Mexican artist and an abstract sequence of “film frames” by Sadie Benning. Cubes by Lara Favaretto made of confetti were fascinating, although the docent explanation wasn’t clear. There was a large exhibits of photos of lesbians of South Africa by Zanele Muholi. I didn’t find anyone who liked the soft sculpture by Sarah Lucas—sort of stuffed panty hose in very suggestive positions which was supposed to represent the oppression of women, I think. I spent the most time (up close) examining the photos by Taryn Simon of women of the James Bond movies. There are just too many to mention all of them. I’ve not been a fan of contemporary art, but I thoroughly enjoyed the Pezzuti collection we saw last month, which I enjoyed much more than the 2013 International.
“An American Odyssey” is showing at the Frick Museum from March 1 to May 25, 2014. There are many other things to see there like the Frick home and a car collection. This is from the Warner Foundation, the private collection of Jack Warner, who believes American history can be told through its art.
“The Warner collection is one of the most important collections of American art formed in recent decades, and the breadth and variety of works represented are both artistically and historically illuminating. Portraiture, still life, landscape, and genre painting are all represented with major groups of works by Hudson River School artists and American Impressionists, as well as significant groups of work by individual artists like Winslow Homer (1836–1910) and Mary Cassatt (1844–1926).“ http://www.thefrickpittsburgh.org/eventlist/events/index.php?eID=7881
http://www.tuscaloosanews.com/article/20110227/NEWS/110229628
“The actual number of Americans who were involuntarily uninsured was, at worst, somewhere around 13 million [not 47 million as claimed] And it is a myth that these people were ever denied care. This is why HHS isn’t keeping up with the number of uninsured who are signing up through the exchanges. The plight of the uninsured was a phony issue. A genuine issue, on the other hand, was increasing insurance premiums. And, perversely, the authors of Obamacare never addressed the underlying causes of this problem. In fact, the ironically named Affordable Care Act actually exacerbated the cost problem.”
I enjoy watching The Jack Benny show on my "rabbit ears" TV--I rarely listened/watched when it was one of the most popular and long running radio/TV shows in history (1932-1955 radio; 1950-1965 TV). I was looking at the FaceBook page and noticed that the wife (4th) of his announcer and side kick Don Wilson was Lois Corbett. That's the same name (not person) as my aunt. But also the photo on the page shows a different Don Wilson, an Asian martial arts guy. Considering what Don Wilson (rotund) looked like, that's hilarious.
Interesting passage in Acts for Bible study today (and Sunday sermon) which included Cornelius the Centurion. He was an Italian gentile respected by the Jews, a Roman soldier of high rank, over 30, literate, with administrative skills necessary for his rank and position. He was a spiritual leader of this family and staff. Big cultural divide here between him and Peter. He was not a Christian, but is described as righteous, God-fearing, devout, generous to those in need, prayerful, and had a visit from an angel who said, "Your prayers and gifts to the poor have come up as a memorial offering before God." How often Christians think they can't pray or work together with those whose theology or practices are different than their own, who are Mormon or Catholic or Muslim. God apparently has other plans.
Obama finally sees the solution for those who can't afford the Affordable Care Act--prioritize your expenses and buy less of optional items like cable and shoes. Would you ask this over spender for advice on your budget?
The most recent change he's made in the law without Congressional approval is to say if it creates a hardship, you don't need to sign on (until after the 2016 elections to save the Democrats). Ironically, he has finally admitted that Obamacare IS THE HARDSHIP for millions.
[T]he individual mandate is probably done for.
I would now assume that no one will pay the individual mandate fine for 2014. The administration may give up on the mandate in the course of the ongoing enrollment period if the political pressure is great enough, or they may keep up the pretense of it through the end of the enrollment period in March (when it will have finished its work, so to speak, since its purpose is to influence choices made during that period) but then exempt everyone from it as they did with the employer mandate for this year. Having now exempted from the fine people whose policies were canceled and who haven’t spent the money to get more expensive and less appealing new coverage, the politics of still applying the fine to everyone else who is uninsured this year will probably just not be sustainable, and the politics of exempting people from it (especially if they can hold out on doing so until after March 31) will be far too appealing for this White House to resist. They may claim the mandate will be back in 2015, but if they do exempt everyone from it in 2014 it will be hard to bring it back. http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/366853/pounding-panic-button-yuval-levin
Lance Bass of the boy band NSYNC gets the name of the health web site wrong. It’s HealthCare dot gov. He plans to help the President flog the health insurance site that has flagged so badly.
“Our faith teaches us that in the face of suffering, we can’t stand idly by, and that we must be that Good Samaritan.” So said President Obama during the Prayer Breakfast the other week. So say his progressive allies and friends, and his administration, too . . . all the way to the courthouse.
Begin with the most obvious example: the court case brought against the administration by the Little Sisters of the Poor. The Little Sisters argue that their refusal to comply with the HHS contraception-and-abortifacients mandate on grounds of conscience will incur some $2.5 million in annual fines. That’s $2.5 million that could otherwise feed, house, and warm those for whom they care.
If the appeal doesn’t go their way, the administration will have successfully kneecapped their unique mission among the old, the sick, and the dying, whom they take in and treat as “family” when everyone else has thrown them out.
All of which raises an interesting point. From the perspective of sheer public relations, taking on the Little Sisters should have been the political equivalent of slapping babies. Why wasn’t it?"
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/373053/progressivisms-war-winners-mary-eberstadt#!
Lois G. Lerner, the now-retired Director of IRS Exempt Organizations, was extensively involved in targeting conservative-oriented tax-exempt applicants for inappropriate scrutiny. The Lerner report. http://oversight.house.gov/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Lerner-Report1.pdf
And I don't believe she made these decisions to target conservative groups without instruction from those above her.
It’s apparent that Lerner became very impatient waiting for changes in the law, and just decided to take matters into her own hands.
“Republicans are fighting back against proposed new IRS rules that they say would make formal the tax agency’s infamous crackdown on Tea Party groups that oppose the Obama agenda, stripping them of their free speech rights during election cycles. The new rules, first unveiled around Thanksgiving when no one was paying attention, would prevent so-called 501(c)(4) social welfare/advocacy groups from participating in certain kinds of political activity. Such nonprofit organizations would be prevented from communicating with voters about candidates or political parties within 60 days of a general election. “Every American needs to know about this abuse of power,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky) said in a recent speech on the Senate floor. Although new IRS Commissioner John Koskinen said he did not participate in drafting the rules, he has refused demands to block their implementation. Senate Democrats such as Mark Begich (Alaska) and Jeanne Shaheen (N.H.) are demanding that the IRS crack down further on right-leaning nonprofits like Americans for Prosperity.” CRC Organization Trends, March 2013
Dr. Vivek Hallegere Murthy doesn’t like the 2nd amendment. Dr. Murthy is the president and founder of Doctors for America, which grew from the campaign organization that was called Doctors for Obama, started in 2008. The organization has advocated for a number of liberal initiatives, including strongly supporting the passage of Obamacare and Medicaid expansion.
The group has also been supportive of the Obama administration’s failed push for expanding gun control laws in 2013.
I've noticed that people who don't like the 2nd amendment usually don't like the first either. . . especially freedom of religion. Then speech, press, and assembly fall next.
Thirty years ago Ulf Ekman left the Swedish Lutheran Church and founded a very successful nondenominational church in Sweden (Pentecostal/charismatic). He has written over 50 books and established a seminary. I watched a video of one of the services (over 2 hours so you have to move in about 60 minutes to hear him) and they are incredibly up to date in everything dealing with church technology and evangelization. I didn't know the words they were singing, but recognized the repetition, swaying and hand clapping style (voiced translation of the sermon into English is just so-so).
Word of Life’s local church is located in Uppsala, which is the fourth largest city in Sweden, some 70 kilometres (45 miles) north of the capital, Stockholm. The church has around 3,000 members and offers a broad variety of activities, services and gatherings for both young and old, a rich music life, educational facilities and different social projects.
Word of Life has 12 pastors, sharing the responsibility for the church’s everyday life and activities, such as ministry of the Word, prayer groups (also called cell groups), the Bible school, missions, children’s and youth ministry, care for the elderly and sick, as well as outreach projects and social activities.
In the last 7 years Ekman has been moving toward a more classical, historical stance, and yesterday in the Sunday service he announced he and his wife have converted to Catholicism. He retired as senior pastor about a year ago.
http://ulfekman.org/default.aspx?idStructure=8766
“Rev. Ekman was born in Gothenburg, Sweden, and in 1970 – a few days before graduating from high school– he had an encounter with Jesus Christ and became a Christian, an incident that left him totally transformed and that radically changed the direction of his life. He enrolled at Uppsala University and acquired degrees in theology, history and ethnography. In 1976, he met and married Birgitta, daughter of a Methodist pastor and his wife and raised in India where her parents were missionaries. In January of 1979, Rev. Ekman was ordained minister of the Swedish Lutheran Church, and for some years he worked as a student chaplain at Uppsala University.
In 1983 Rev. Ekman founded Word of Life Church and Word of Life Bible Centre in Uppsala, Sweden and resigned from the Lutheran Church and his name and face become known all over the nation. Already from start Word of Life has been the biggest church of the faith movement in Sweden and Ulf Ekman is a highly appreciated and often-invited speaker at churches and conferences of various denominations, not only in Scandinavia but also internationally.”
His blog has not been updated for 2 years, but reading through his own page, I see that the Bible school is being phased out, and the Spring seminar ended last year, as did his ministry at the church.
Recently I received a copy of Zonderkidz’ Bible, “Young Women of Faith Bible” to review (c 2001, 2013 www.zonderkidz.com) For this task, I consulted the three grandmothers in our UALC Bible study group. I’m a little out of touch with the niche market of middle school and high school. They loved it! They all thought any young girl or woman would really enjoy the pink illustrations—hearts, butterflies, flowers--the excellent, informative side bars, the use of a journal for personal thoughts, and explanations. It features weekly Bible studies, memory verses and challenges, and “if I were there” questions, as well as the Biblical notes and journal suggestions. And it has what I would have enjoyed at the target age, a topical index and Biblical maps in color. If you already use Zondervan’s “Women of Faith Study Bible,” this Bible coordinates with it.
The general editor is Susie Shellenberger, a Christian speaker who has written fifty-two books, and lives in Bethany, Oklahoma with her two mini Schnauzers Obie and Amos. Susie is a former youth pastor, high school teacher, and editor. She loves a lot of color with her Scripture.
Nicholas Kristof wrote about one child and one mother for a story, and got 3 comments which he calls an "outrage" and "compassion gap" and then segues into criticism of all conservatives/Republicans--who actually have a much better record for compassion than liberals in all studies. Plus they believe a job is better for poverty than handouts and marriage is one part of the solution to generational poverty!!
He also equates affluence with being Republican, which is just catering to his base—liberal Democrats. Most who read the first story, didn't comment. During the recession, poverty (line) increased by 16%, but food support increased by 58%. And the recent decrease we heard about was because ARRA temporary funding came to an end 4 years after the end of the recession. There is no compassion gap, but the entire nation is getting weary of the liberals' excuses and their failed programs which keep the poor tied to and dependent on politicians.
And where does he come up with this? The liberals propose abortions and close charter schools that help poor and minority children.
“To break cycles of poverty, we have the tools to improve high school graduation rates, reduce teen pregnancies and increase employment. What we lack is the will to do so.”
Like most liberals, he doesn’t break out charitable giving by faith—and whether rich or poor (the very wealthy contribute by far the most, just like they do taxes). And although he notes the importance of marriage in getting out of poverty, it’s just a throw away line, almost a straw man so he can criticize conservatives who promote it. Even his formula isn’t correct: it’s 1) marriage before having children, 2) finish high school, and 3) a job—any job. He lumps unmarried moms, drugs and crime together.
“Critics [this came out of the Clinton administration] note that if a person manages to get through high school and avoid drugs, crime and parenting outside of marriage, it’s often possible to escape poverty. Fair enough. But if you’re one of the one-fifth of children in West Virginia born with drugs or alcohol in your system, if you ingest lead from peeling paint as a toddler, if your hearing or vision impairments aren’t detected, if you live in a home with no books in a gang-ridden neighborhood with terrible schools — in all these cases, you’re programmed for failure as surely as children of professionals are programed for success.”
This is a horribly depressing home life for any child with no government program in the world that could turn it around, but he blames a compassion gap. But that’s his implication—with enough compassion (there are 79 government transfer programs including Medicaid, SNAP, WIC, low income housing, Head Start, Healthy Start, etc.), we could turn this around.
Kristof insults all his readers by judging them based on a few snarky comments on Twitter and e-mail. Man up, Kristof.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/02/opinion/sunday/kristof-the-compassion-gap.html?smid=fb-share&_r=0
Besides, in 2008 Kristof noted that Conservatives were more charitable that Liberals.
Arthur Brooks, the author of a book on donors to charity, “Who Really Cares,” cites data that households headed by conservatives give 30 percent more to charity than households headed by liberals. A study by Google found an even greater disproportion: average annual contributions reported by conservatives were almost double those of liberals.
Other research has reached similar conclusions. The “generosity index” from the Catalogue for Philanthropy typically finds that red states are the most likely to give to nonprofits, while Northeastern states are least likely to do so.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/21/opinion/21kristof.html?_r=0
Remember, he said--Delay the law? That’s not going to happen as long as I’m President.”
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/02/11/us-usa-healthcare-obama-idUSBREA1A20T20140211
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304732804579423293276220608?ampmg=reno64-wsj
WAGGGS is The World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts. Supports International Women’s Day. Story about this pro-abortion group.
Girl Scouts have a 40 year relationship with Planned Parenthood, but deny it in their promotional material. Also, God is optional in the pledge.
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