From Kingston, with Love

There’s a heart shaped, painted wooden sign, stuck in the ground somewhere in the town of Centralia PA. Somewhere in town is the best way to put that, I think, since most of the town’s landmarks have been gone for a long time. The sign reads, to Centralia, with love from Kingston New York.

Fifty years ago, the Centralia fire department set fire to a town dump to help clean up the town for a Memorial Day Celebration, and the fire burns to this day. The town sits above a great many abandoned coal mines, and not long after igniting the blaze the mines caught fire as well. Sulphuric steam rises from breaks in the asphalt that was once Route 61.

A fight ensued between residents who wanted to evacuate, and those who didn’t. The evacuees won out, and by the 1980s over a thousand people had moved away, their homes reduced to rubble by bulldozers.

But some residents refused to leave. It seems not all of the homes and lives were in danger. But for whatever reason, the state decided a few years ago to revisit the issue and ordered those remaining to leave. For those souls who have lived in Centralia without incident for the past 50 years, this is nothing more than a land grab for the coal beneath their feet.

At best this is a well intentioned effort to help landowners. Then again, how often has eminent domain been used for the benefit of property owners?

Oh So Special Interests

Time and time again, we read of "special interest groups" lobbying Congress. President Obama derided special interest groups during his election campaign, declaring they would have no place in his administration. The political left, and I would include the President in this category, are particularly vociferous in their condemnation of special interest groups. Over and over again, the print media and the major television broadcast networks fret over the meddling influence of "big business" over Capitol Hill.

What goes unspoken through the vast majority of these outlets is the influence of left leaning organizations.

The latest salvo in the influence peddling and meddling wars comes from the Service Employees International Union, a 2.1 million member strong organization that spent $85 million in support of the current president's election, and plans to spend an equal amount on his re-election.

The union hopes to field 100,000 workers in eight key battleground states to push our sitting president into another term.

For his part, President Obama has reached out to plenty of special interests during his administration. After deriding Mitt Romney for dealing with private equity firms, the president sidled up to the head of the Blackstone Group, garnering a fundraising dinner.

ABC News' Political Punch commented,

The Obama campaign has framed its about-face decision to support a pro-Democratic super PAC as an effort to counteract “unlimited money from special interests,” particularly corporations, allowed in the wake of the Citizens United Supreme Court decision.

So in framing the argument, the president sees all interests other than those supporting his agenda as special interests. His comments are disingenuous at best. In February of 2011, he banned contributions from

"corporations, political action committees and federally-registered lobbyists offering to help pay for the event. (referring to the 2012 Democratic National Convention)."

It was good PR. But the ban on PAC money only referred to the convention, and in that regard, the president has been true to his word.

http://votesmart.org/interest-groups

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/06/19/labor-union-limits-focus-to-8-battleground-states/

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/05/obama-courts-private-equity-cash-at-new-york-fundraiser/

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/02/obama-to-benefit-from-special-interests-via-super-pac/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/04/obama-ban-2012-convention_n_818992.html

Slots for Tots

Gambling has become a national obsession. The promise of millions of dollars annually has cleared the way for casinos in many states. The state of Maryland now has five casinos, the largest and most lucrative, recently opened adjacent to the Arundel Mills Shopping Center.
Slot machines were legalized in a number of Maryland counties back in the 1940s, generally with the promise that proceeds would pay for children's education and lower property taxes. Stories of bankruptcy, theft, and malfeasance soon followed. Several public officials admitted being approached by interested parties to sell their votes for pro-gambling initiatives. By July of 1968 gambling was once again illegal in the state.
But the lure of a cash flow without raising taxes on the public soon brought a state-wide lottery, with the promise (can you see it coming?) of better educations for the children of the state. Then in 2008, voters (again warned that their children's education would suffer without it) voted for casino gambling.
Before the first slots were set in place, State Senate President Mike Miller began saying that five casinos were not enough. If children were to continue to receive a quality education, a sixth casino (in his home county) would be needed.
Before the largest casino was opened, a state official remarked that revenues were not what they'd expected, and therefore table games should be added to the casinos. Who could argue with such logic? After all, you wouldn't want the children to suffer, would you?
The sad truth is that Maryland is no different than any of the other states with lotteries and/or casinos. Raising taxes on the citizenry costs votes, offering fun and excitement doesn't. But what of the real cost? How about the families devastated by bankruptcy, divorce, or jail time for a loved one because of addiction to gambling?
Gambling is a stealth tax that disproportionately reaches into the pockets of those least able to afford the loss of income. That's not to say those who are well off do not gamble, or suffer from the effects of their gambling. They have the luxury of disposable income.
Casinos are the worst form of taxation. With smiles, bright lights, and good food they promise riches and glory one token at a time.
And the children's education? Somebody please show me a state where the education budget went up in direct proportion to the amount of taxes generated by gambling. The truth is this is a shell game. The money exists for the education budget. Monies that would have been allocated for education are redistributed into other departments, leaving the gambling receipts to cover the load.
Some refer to gambling as the "stupid tax." It's more of a luxury tax. One that a lot of people don't have the luxury to afford.

For a nice study of gambling in MD:
http://maryland-politics.blogspot.com/2008/11/marylands-sordid-slots-history-about-to.html

Some info on the effects of gambling:
http://www.troubledwith.com/AbuseandAddiction/A000000707.cfm?topic=abuse%20and%20addiction%3A%20gambling

NARAL Tosses out the Bathwater

Every state and municipality that has either passed or attempted to pass laws requiring abortion clinics to include mandatory sonograms during treatment has met with vehement opposition to such requirements from, among others, the National Abortion Rights League (NARAL).

So I find it somewhat disingenuous for NARAL to accuse Crisis Pregnancy Centers of that very thing.

“Anyone seeking health-care services should receive comprehensive, unbiased, medically and factually accurate information. Women facing unintended pregnancy deserve no less. When women are fully informed, they are better able to make responsible and appropriate decisions about their reproductive health. Mindful of this, the anti-choice movement has for years tried to restrict, control, and manipulate the information doctors give women facing unplanned pregnancies.” (1)

 
NARAL argues that the Centers, “continue their campaign to misinform women about abortion and to dissuade women from exercising their right to choose…” They also state that, “Women are entitled to accurate, comprehensive and unbiased medical information with which they can make their own decisions.” I would like to know how the inclusion of a sonogram during treatment can be considered biased. And how does the exclusion of a sonogram enhance a woman’s right to accurate, comprehensive and unbiased medical information?

NARAL is a large tax-exempt 501(c), eligible to receive contributions deductible as charitable donations. (2) On NARAL’s website, they say they oppose “bans on safe abortion methods that protect women’s health,” and “Dangerous laws that jeopardize young women’s health and safety,” and “distortions of science to instill fear.”(3)

The truth is they have thwarted attempts to bring abortion clinic regulations in line with existing requirements for any other medical facility. Jeopardizing women’s lives in their view is suggesting they carry their baby full term. And while science pushes steadily back the curtain of “personhood” by showing just how alive and human a baby is earlier and earlier in a pregnancy, and doctors save early births at ever earlier points in pregnancy, they want a blanket thrown over such research and procedures. After all, if a child was a child at delivery before, and at five months of a pregnancy now, what can their organization say when scientists stand up and tell them that all the requirements for human life are complete at conception? That would mean abortion is tantamount to murder.

The government should support legitimate, comprehensive reproductive-health clinics, rather than centers whose goals are to prevent women from exercising their constitutionally protected right to choose. (1)

Is that it? Rights trump human life?

Representative Trent Franks (R-Ariz) introduced into the House of Representatives, H.R.3541, “The Prenatal Nondiscrimination Act.” The intent of the legislation is to eliminate the use of abortion to choose the sex of the child, that is to say, aborting a child because the parent(s) wanted a boy instead of a girl, or vice-versa.

Painting the legislation’s supporters as women hating men who oppose prenatal care, equal pay, and contraception, NARAL promises to defeat any law that would prevent a woman from having an abortion for any reason. Nancy Keenan, head of NARAL, sees it as an attack on a woman’s right to choose, and insists NARAL has always been opposed to the use of abortion for sex selection. (4)

Taking her cue from Margaret Sanger, Keenan holds abortion as a sacrosanct right.

I agree with Keenan in that I think the legislation will not have the intended effect. Planned Parenthood and their ilk will no more report sex selection abortions than they have teen rape victims that come to their clinics for abortions.

But I will say dismissing the bill is throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Seeing no baby anyway, NARAL will disagree.

(1) http://www.prochoiceamerica.org/media/fact-sheets/abortion-cpcs.pdf

(2) http://www.bbb.org/charity-reviews/national/health/naral-pro-choice-america-foundation-in-washington-dc-507

(3) http://www.prochoiceamerica.org/what-is-choice/abortion/

(4) http://www.prochoiceamerica.org/media/press-releases/2012/pr05292012_prenda.html

The Law of Our Own Land

Unlike the United Kingdom, the United States of America has a written constitution. Arguments can be made pro and con as to the benefit of having an unwritten constitution, but perhaps one in favor of the written variety is that the law is the law. The law can be altered. New laws can be created. But all laws must pass muster by way of meeting Constitutional agreement.
This can cause problems when the letter of the law creates unintended consequences, or when activist jurists reinterpret constitutional law in order to bring it in line with  a particular set of values.
The truth is that the framers of the Constitution were, in large part, men who held a conscious belief in the God of the Bible. Whether they were Baptist, Congregationalist, Lutheran, or Methodist, the writing and thinking process of these men was influenced by their own understanding of the universe, which for them was a Judeo-Christian view.
Today, of course, a great many men and women in the United States either grew up without or chose to ignore the Christian viewpoint, and that is their prerogative.
But it doesn't change the Constitution. We can try to reinterpret it as many do the Bible, placing a "modern" set of values into the text, and proclaiming that red is now orange, blue is now brown.
But like the Bible, the Constitution is not a living document. It survives intact. True, it has been modified a number of times through the amendment process. But there is no lawful approach to Constitutional amendment that flows through Judicial Fiat, nor is there a mechanism in place for the judiciary to consider the laws of foreign lands or societies when deciding a case.
The State of Kansas has enacted legislation ensuring that Sharia Law cannot be considered when a case is brought before state courts.
The shame isn't that they have done so. The shame is that such legislation had to be enacted in the first place.

The Image of Modern Man

As much as women are portrayed through advertisements, music, and movies as sexual objects, men are imagined as objects of ridicule at best and at worst, contempt. Light hearted advertisements targeting women show men making ridiculous purchases as their wives and girl friends shake their head in disbelief. Men struggle to take care of children, fail miserably to keep the kitchen clean, and can't help but ogle every woman within a hundred yards.

While there will always be heroes in movies and on television, unless the male lead is the dashing romantic who women are anxious to fall into bed with, men are inept, bungling, inconsiderate, unfeeling, ready to be trampled upon by the women in their lives.

Gone are the Ward Cleavers and Lucas McCains, who taught their children valuable lessons, while, in Ward's case, his wife was supportive and caring, and in Lucas's, he raised his son Mark on his own.

I suggest we could go a long way toward restoring family values by departing from these trends. We certainly do no one any good by allowing young boys to grow up with images of men as insipid and spineless creatures driven by the basest of instincts and allowing young girls to be inculcated by the sights and sounds of women driven to fit into a size four.

Secret at Seventeen

A teenager has called out Seventeen Magazine for its patently false imaging of young girls in the magazine's photo spreads. Julia Bloom says the magazine's portrayal of young girls does not help the young readership, and in fact, does them harm.

“Here’s what lots of girls don’t know. Those ‘pretty women’ that we see in magazines are fake. They are often Photoshopped, air-brushed, edited to look thinner, and to appear like they have perfect skin. A girl you see in a magazine probably looks a lot different in real life,” Bluhm said.

Kudos to Ms. Bloom for her courage to take a stand. How many women, your and old, have have dealt with terrible self loathing dimply because they do not measure up to a plastic standard that they can never come close to achieving without hardship and surgery?


But Seventeen Magazine is merely a reflection of the greater society in which we live. A society that values image to such an extent that it sacrifices substance. Weight loss advertisements and exercise videos, while occasionally positing products as producing a healthier you, focus on the visual impact using their food supplements, their diet plans, their gym equipment will have on the user's image. Hair treatments tout the product's ability to attract sexual partners, as do clothing lines and beverages.


Sadly, women's rights organizations pay very little attention to the issue, parlaying political acumen into secondary issues such as equal pay and sexual discrimination. The truth is, both of these are the result of the Barbie image, the Victoria's Secret image, the Seventeen Magazine image that is foisted upon men and women and accepted, making women little more than playthings. We can create laws that demand equal pay for equal work, but that doesn't solve the underlying issue.


Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/2012/05/08/teen-takes-on-seventeen-says-magazine-contributes-to-body-image-issues/#ixzz1uInu1pTF