Yeah Senator Kennedy...And just WHEN are you going to stand trial for Manslaughter? Actually, under current law it would be TWO charges...any idea who the father of MayJo's unborn fetus floating bit of protoplasm baby was?

Not to mention that when there was an opportunity to show support for an alternative energy producing project, you fought it with the "not in MY backyard" argument.

Thanks to TNS for putting up the pic for me to steal borrow

Posted by: Delftsman3 at 09:42 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Well, the Supremes seem to be on a roll; first they essentially negate private property rights, and now they've ruled that the police don't really HAVEto do their jobs in protecting the people as individuals, even whenthere is a court ordered restraining order.....

And to all those GFW's out there that say "YOU don't need a weapon; that's the job of the Police":
I TOLD YOU SO.

In the final analysis, we are all responsible for our own protection; and for the protection of those we hold dear. And with this most recent ruling, this fact of life even more evident to anyone with more than three firing neurons left. If you aren't willing to protect yourself/family; then you are nothing more than a parasite on the body of society.

Posted by: Delftsman3 at 10:37 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Continuing a theme from an earlier post....We now have lost some of our rights under the 1st Amendment and 5th Amendment...and now I read about forfeiture of "suspected" illegal gains cash by Federal Law Enforcement officials (DEA).....

So lets recap shall we? We are being restricted in political free speech sixty days before an election by McCain-Feingold; the SCOTUS has said that any government entitity can seize your property under Emminent Domain, if they believe that they can increase revenues to the government by doing so; and law enforcement can seize your money from your person as being SUSPECTED of being obtained by illegal means. No PROOF of illegality is required....just the fact that people don't normally carry large amounts of cash serves as prima facia evidence of illegality; and you have to sue and prove that it's not illegally obtained to recover your funds.

As I said in my earlier post, there is a monster on the loose...how long do we allow it to roam free before we do something to cage it?

"For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury" (WHAT would YOU call it when a law enforcement official can seize your assets on "a hunch" that your engaged in illegal activity?)

"In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people."

"For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies"

Hmmm seems that allowing Emminent Domain for the purpose of raising revenue to the State and restricting free political speech prior to an election is "enlarging it's boundries" and "introducing (the same) absolute rule".

There you have three "triggers" that were part of what made the FF's rebel reoccurring in our time by our own government.

As the FF's said:
"That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."

Are we made of the same stuff as our Forefathers?

Do we have the courage to stand up and be counted in asserting our rights granted to us by God? Remember that our Constitution is predicated on that assumption, no matter WHAT the anti-religionists say.

We need to redouble, nay, treble, our efforts to reassert those rights within the framework of the law, and yet, prepare ourselves for the possibility that it may be too late for the system to be changed by anything less than an armed resistance.

We owe our Progenitors nothing less than to show the same courage and sacrifice that they did, to continue the brave experiment they handed down to us for safekeeping. That those that would contaminate that experiment come from within and not from an external source, makes it no less necessary to demonstrate the same courage and willingness to defend our rights and liberties. At the ballot box and in the public forum for the present, but also on the battlefield, should it come to that point.

Posted by: Delftsman3 at 01:01 AM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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Just the other day I was engaged in an IM disussion with one of my friends that was prompted by my post on why I hold the 2nd Amendment so dear, and my feelings that the time for a second American Revolution may just be closer than we would wish. My friend is of the staunch opinion that "working within the system" will forstall any such need for open rebellion; and he asked me a very cogent question: Just WHEN will we know that the time for taking up arms has come?; what will be the trigger to let us know that it is no longer possible to redress our complaints against government through the law, and go on to take up arms?

I told him that there probably wouldn't be just one major trigger, but a series of seemingly minor incursions on our individual liberties, to the point where it becomes obvious that our government no longer deserved to be in power; AND that the ballot box was no longer effective in effecting peaceful changes in the course of policies.

Our 2nd Amendment rights have been under fire for a great many years now, a battle that ebbs and flows, but one that has been leading ever closer to the loss of those rights.

The SCOTUS upholding the McCain-Feingold act has already curtailed our 1st Amendment rights of free political speech. The urging of the FCC to regulate the Blogosphere in regards to the M-F Act only furthur imperils that freedom of speech, although it's too early just yet to know to just what extent that curtailment shall be.

However, with the latest SCOTUS decision, I fear that a major trigger has been pulled, and the time has been drastically shortened to when an armed revolt just may need to occur. This decisions strikes deeply into our 5th Amendment rights

In case you don't realize the effect of that decision just yet; it is, simply put, that no longer are private property rights held to be inviolable.
Government at any level can now decide that YOUR property can be better utilyzed by another for the betterment of "the People" as a whole. Read that to mean that when government can get more money from someone else by transfering your property to them via "condemnation for public use," they are not completely free to do so.

Yes, there is the fiction of "just compensation" for the property involved. But think about it. If the developer in question would be willing to pay you fair market value for your property, there wouldn't be any need for the government to be involved at all, would there?

And regardless of price, If you don't wish to sell for any reason, WHY should the government have the power to force you off your land just because they can garner higher tax revenues from the petitioner for your property?

This isn't a minor little disagreement, this is the end of true private property rights for good and all, and the removal of one of the prime pillars of our liberty.

For all intents and purposes, the concept of private property ownership ended when government started assessing property taxes, but at least we could maintain the fiction that we still were the lords of our manors. The taxes weren't unduly burdonsome in the majority of cases, and after all, that money went toward the needed infrastructures to make our property more valuable, so there was some equity in the exchange. This decision will strip the wool from the eyes of many people that heretofor were content in the delusion that they were more than mere lessors of their property, and will lead to an ever growing awareness that there is a monster on the loose, and that monster is our own government.

"The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence."
~John Adams~

Lay in your supplies, weapons, and ammunition NOW.

Posted by: Delftsman3 at 08:51 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Any pretense at making believe that the Palestinians Misplaced Arabs are a civilized people should be shattered by a story like this, in fact that pretense is belied by her own words:
"My dream was to be a martyr," she said, adding that she was recruited by the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a violent offshoot of Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah movement. "I believe in death."

Posted by: Delftsman3 at 01:30 AM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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Back in the Campaign, Democrats were protesting that we couldn't queastion their patriotism, even though such allusions were never made against them.

Mark Steyn has a great post questioning Dick "the Turbin" Durbin on his patriotism, and makes a great case showing it's non-existance.

Paraphrased from the article:

As Sen. As Leahy implicitly acknowledges, Guantanamo is about "image" and "perception" -- about how others see America. Around the planet, folks naturally figure that, if only 100 people out of nearly 300 million get to be senators, the position must be a big deal. Hence, headlines in the Arab world like "U.S. Senator Stands By Nazi Remark." That's al-Jazeera, where the senator from al-Inois is now a big hero -- for slandering his own country, for confirming the lurid propaganda of his country's enemies. Yes, folks, American soldiers are Nazis and American prison camps are gulags: don't take our word for it, Senator Bigshot says so. This isn't a Republican vs Democrat thing; it's about senior Democrats who are so over-invested in their hatred of a passing administration that they've signed on to the nuttiest slurs of the lunatic fringe, and providing our enemies in a time of war with the juciest propaganda coup that they could have ever wished for.

I don't question the good Senator from Illinois's patriotism, he's already settled that question in my mind.
There is are words for such as "the Turbin" Quisling Or to be even more blunt, Traitor, come to mind...

more...

Posted by: Delftsman3 at 12:58 AM | Comments (10) | Add Comment
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1 There are some pretty shocking reports coming out regarding torture and the like (from a country that is supposed to be above that kind of behaviour/thinking). There have also been some very inappropriate photos taken by US soldiers treating prisoners like an attraction at some kind of sick theme park. No, that doesn't make them Nazis. However... A person who calls to others' attentions the actions of their own government or military, when those actions are contrary to the stated ideals or standards of that nation is NOT a traitor. In some respects they are actually a patriot.

Posted by: chosha at June 26, 2005 07:06 PM (DsXU5)

2 I agree Chosa, that calling attention to not meeting the ideals of a society isn't being a traitor, BUT there is a CORRECT way to do it, and Durbin sure didn't do it that way. He went far beyond calling attention to something that we shouldn't be doing. THAT is where the "traitor" part comes in.

Posted by: delftsman3 at June 26, 2005 10:27 PM (vooSr)

3 Actually I disagree, and I get the impression that you are so busy being outraged at him that you have not considered what he said objectively. (And at least read to the end of the comment before you reply.) From the Washington Post: "During a speech Tuesday, the Senate's No. 2 Democrat quoted from an FBI agent's report describing detainees at the Naval base in Guantanamo Bay as being chained to the floor without food or water in extreme temperatures. "If I read this to you and did not tell you that it was an FBI agent describing what Americans had done to prisoners in their control, you would most certainly believe this must have been done by Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad regime - Pol Pot or others - that had no concern for human beings," Durbin said." In other words, the man is saying 'If I just read this out, you would assume I couldn't be talking about Americans. You think that Americans don't do this; that it is in fact what we fight against. You would surely assume I was reading from a report about nations we normally associate with having no concern for human life, like the Nazi, Pol Pot, etc.' Isn't that true? Or would you have heard the report and thought, 'yeah that could as easily be US soldiers as any others...'?? Your post accused him of 'slandering his own country'. If the FBI report from which he was quoting is accurate, in what way did he slander his own country. If the FBI report is accurate, then he is perfectly justified in saying: "This administration should apologize to the American people for abandoning the Geneva Conventions and authorizing torture techniques that put our troops at risk and make Americans less secure." Because if that report is correct, that is exactly what they have done.

Posted by: chosha at June 26, 2005 11:02 PM (DsXU5)

4 By the way, an FBI report is hardly "the nuttiest slurs of the lunatic fringe". You said there is a "right way" to go about holding the government and its military to account for their actions - what would you have considered "the right way" to handle this situation? He read a disgusting report. Should he have denied the report? Hidden the report? Is it fair to say that he has "provided our enemies in a time of war with the juciest propaganda coup"? Hasn't the military at Guantanamo Bay actually done that?

Posted by: chosha at June 26, 2005 11:10 PM (DsXU5)

5 It's the comparision that's out of line. He had every right to read the report, and every right to call everybody's attention to the report. If anything it's his duty as an opposition senator. It's the Nazi cracks that were out of line, and it's those that he needs to pay for.

Posted by: phnxfire54 at June 27, 2005 01:06 AM (uTM33)

6 "Because if that report is correct" Remember that key word IF. Just because it was an FBI report,doesn't make it true. There is no context to judge it's veracity. AND the context in which the supposed "atrocities" had been done. Go to any prison in the US and I believe that you will find things that would be labeled "atrocities", and far worse than anything reported having been done at Gitmo. And you have to remember just WHO we are dealing with at Gitmo, these aren't misunderstood Sunday school dropouts. These people live in better conditions than most of our soldiers in the field, and FAR better than a great many of their compatriots in their places of origin. We are SO brutal that they get released in better physical condition than they've probably been in their lives.... and the fact that over 200 HAVE been released proves the lie that "there is NO system of evaluation". 12 of those released were recaptured on the battlefield, seems the system might have been a little lax...

Posted by: delftsman3 at June 27, 2005 01:17 AM (vooSr)

7 "It's the Nazi cracks that were out of line, and it's those that he needs to pay for." Actually, in context, those comparisons make sense. The report indicated that these prisoners were being treated in ways in which it is unacceptable to treat a human being. But let's assume for a moment that the comparison IS totally out of line...aren't you still focussing on the lesser evil. Is a careless REMARK really more serious in your mind than the crimes he is describing. And on that note, delftsman, there is no context to consider. Those actions are not acceptable in any context - at least not if you truly believe what the US claims to stand for. The fact that similar or worse may happen in a US prison is cause for shame, not justification. And your soldiers in the field are not chained to a floor without food and water. Trying to argue that the prisoners at Guantanamo Bay are living a better life for being there is ludicrous, and it only highlights your subjectivity. You are right to say that it is important whether or not the report is accurate. However, apart from your deep desire for it to be untrue, have you any evidence to suggest that the report is false? Can you think offhand of any reason the FBI would seek to falsify a report to make it look like the US is ignoring the Geneva Convention? I'm open to evidence, and I'd be very happy to find that prisoners are not being tortured, but it's not the first report of this kind of unacceptable behaviour, and I haven't seen any reason to assume this one is false.

Posted by: chosha at June 27, 2005 10:38 AM (DsXU5)

8 Chosha,might I suggest that you go to Terrorist Media, register, and see what REAL torture and Nazi's look like?

Posted by: delftsman3 at June 27, 2005 12:13 PM (vooSr)

9 "I'm open to evidence, and I'd be very happy to find that prisoners are not being tortured.." OK Chosa, Would you believe a Marine Lieutenant that was at Gitmo for over a year? Let's see...an unnamed FBI agent vs a Marine Lt. that speaks on the record...WHO do I believe?...it's not like the FBI would ever "play politics" that would reflect badly on a President..at least not since "Deep Throat"... "Trying to argue that the prisoners at Guantanamo Bay are living a better life for being there is ludicrous..." Lets see...average weight gain among detainees is between 20 and 30 lbs...there are more medical staff than detainees...they have three square meals a day, exercize on a daily basis..access to their scripture, with prayer call five times a day...clean beds to sleep in..Yep, its a real Gulag, allright! May I quote the Lt.?: "For starters, the food is good. ("To be honest with you," says Hegseth, "I think their food is better than what my guys got.") Detainees get top-notch medical care, along with dental care -- which some have never had before. Many detainees correspond with family members, and have access to soccer fields and other recreational facilities." "My men and I once spent nine hours on a runway trying to get a detainee on a plane to take him home. He refused to get out of the van. He was being well-treated, and he knew what torture and maltreatment were like back home." Hegseth puts it like this: "Critics ask, 'How are we to win if we are conducting ourselves this way?' I think the opposite: If we're conducting ourselves this way, it's evidence that our cause is just." "Actually, in context, those comparisons make sense" Amnesty International recently compared the U.S. Guantanamo prison to the Soviet Gulags under Stalin. Here are the facts that they used to draw their conclusion: Individuals Detained: Gulag -- 20 million. Guantanamo -- 750 total. Number of Camps: Gulag -- 476 separate camp complexes comprising thousands of individual camps. Guantanamo -- five small camps on the U.S. military base in Cuba. Reasons for Imprisonment: Gulag -- hiding grain; owning too many cows; need for slave labor; being Jewish; being Finnish; being religious; being middle class; having had contact with foreigners; refusing to sleep with the head of Soviet counterintelligence; telling a joke about Stalin. Guantanamo -- fighting for the Taliban in Afghanistan; being suspected of links to Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups. Red Cross Visits: Gulag -- none on record. Guantanamo -- regular visits since January 2002. Deaths as a Result of Poor Treatment: Gulag -- multiple millions. Guantanamo -- no reports of prisoner deaths. Daily Diet: Gulag -- meager portions of swill. Guantanamo -- two hot religiously correct meals per day with constant supply of snacks. Work Requirements: Gulag -- forced labor. Guantanamo -- none. Medical Treatment: Gulag -- none. Guantanamo -- better than the 20 million report "uninsured" American citizens. Torture Methods: Gulag -- starvation, beatings, exposure to elements, slave labor. Guantanamo -- humiliation, standing on the koran. Get the picture?

Posted by: delftsman3 at June 27, 2005 01:16 PM (vooSr)

10 1. "Chosha,might I suggest that you go to Terrorist Media, register, and see what REAL torture and Nazi's look like?" You can't justify torture but comparing it to worse torture. It's like justifying a rape by giving an example of a rape/murder and saying, 'at least he didn't kill her'. Argue, by all means. But argue well. 2. (3 is positive! )"...an unnamed FBI agent vs a Marine Lt. that speaks on the record...WHO do I believe?...it's not like the FBI would ever "play politics" that would reflect badly on a President..at least not since "Deep Throat"..." I'm not going to claim that the Lt is lying. I don't know that one way or the other. But I do know that he is a subjective source. Anyone even vaguely familiar with military culture should recognise that military personal lying to cover the military's ass is not remotely new or unusual, loyalty and obedience being the paramount virtues of the military. As for the FBI, you had to go back a long way to find an example of them having a reason to discredit a president. And in that case they were discrediting that president personally. A little different. Obviously I can't say definitively which is true, but I do think it's pretty easy to say which is more likely to have occurred. I wouldn't say he's lying about most of what he said. I just think it's fair to consider he may not be honest about torture methods that occur. 3. Now the Amnesty International report is a better, much more objective source. That I can take on board, and it does suggest lend more weight to the idea that the other report could be false. I'd much rather believe that was the case. If, however, it ends up being accurate, you might want to note that would add 'starvation' and 'exposure to elements' to your list of torture methods, which both appear on the gulag list. (Therefore again backing up the reasons the senator used that comparison for the acts described in the report...as you've just pointed out from the AI report, they are gulag style practices.)

Posted by: chosha at June 28, 2005 11:15 PM (Zzc10)

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I found the link to this story via Kim du Toit> Go there and read how he feels about it, he said it better than I ever could.

Posted by: Delftsman3 at 09:42 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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With all the breast beating by the MSM, Amnesty International, and some members of the Dimwit™ Party over the supposed "brutality" of the conditions at Gitmo, I thought that it might be interesting to see how the "Minutemen" of Iraq (as the Moron from Michigan has described them) treat those that they consider as enemies.

Just an excerpt :

"But he still had been hurt badly. Marks from beatings criss-crossed his back, and deep pocks, apparently from electric shock burns, were gouged in his skin."

"The shocks, he said, felt "like my soul is being ripped out of my body." But when he would start to scream, and his body would pull up from the shock, they would begin to beat him, he said."

"In an interview with an embedded reporter just hours after he was freed, he said he had never seen the faces of his captors, who occasionally whispered at him, "We will kill you." He said they did not question him, and he did not know what they wanted. Nor did he ever expect to be released."

"They kill somebody every day," said Mr. Fathil, whose hands were so swollen he could not open a can of Coke offered to him by a marine. "They've killed a lot of people."

But at least they didn't play Christine Agulara tapes! Note that the prisoners didn't have to worry about the Queran being desecrated, they weren't provided any. Nor were they allowed to make their required prayers in the manner prescribed....kinda hard to do when your chained up on a wall.

Another excerpt:

His town has always been a good place, he said, but the militants have made it hell.

"These few are destroying it," he said, his face streaked with tears. "Everybody they take, they kill. It's on a daily basis pretty much."

Mmmm and just how many fatalities at Gitmo?.....

Lets see: Insurgants Islamofacists treatment of prisoners:

1 chained to the walls.
2 beaten on a daily basis.
3 fed once a day.
4 Subjected to electric shock.
5 kept in a darkened house.
6 Prevented from practicing their religious duties.

Treatment of detainees at Gitmo:

1 Kept in cells equivelent to any modern prison
2 May be subjected to uncomfortable heat or cold, to break down resistance for questioning--DONE with close medical supervision to ensure no physical damage.
3 Fed three meals a day, of religiously appropiate food, including chicken ala'orange, peas and dates (average weight gain of detainees is 20-30 lbs since arrival)
4 Allowed access to Queran, arrows to indicate East, prayer rugs furnished, and a bell rung to indicate the proper times to pray.
5 Allowed access to a fenced yard to excersize and be in the fresh air.

So YOU tell me, WHICH side is running a Gulag?

Posted by: Delftsman3 at 07:18 AM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
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Now Sen. Durbin (D-Il) is blaming the media for "taking his comments (likening our military to Nazi's, the Soviet gulags, and Pol Pot) out of context".

Sen. Durbin, You are a flaming idiot if you think that you can play that game. Yes, the purported conditions that you were citing came from an e-mail, but your remarks prefacing the "information" were all yours.

YOU were the one likening our military to some of the most heinious human events in history, and in so doing were giving a signal to our enemies that they were succeeding in causing a division of will and purpose in our political ranks while we're in a state of war.

In my mind, that was not mere disagreement with policy, but sedition. I firmly believe that not only should you be stripped from your Seat, but you should be prosecuted, convicted by the words out of your own mouth, and incarcerated.

No citizen should blindly follow ANY administration, it is the duty of every citizen to protest when they feel that our government is acting in a manner that is not in keeping with our traditions,laws and Constitution, but having said that, there is a right way and a wrong way to disagree. You,sir, most certainly followed the wrong way, and you should suffer the consequences of your actions.

As a Senator,you should be capable of judging the effect of your public statements can have on our country, the blatent disregard for those effects
you demonstrated can only lead one to conclude that you are not fit to be in the position that you hold.

Posted by: Delftsman3 at 04:39 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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The Fifth Amendment guarentees that the government cannot seize private property without "just" compensation; but what is a homeowner to do when that government only offers a fourth of what a property is worth? The Kruses are disputing the condemnation of 3/4 of an acre of their property when they disagreed that $5,000. was "just" compensation. The problem is, even if they do win their case, the deed has already been done and that land is forever lost to them, along with their faith in their right of private ownership.

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In a show of what ignorance that revisionist history engengenders, Black protesters are picketing the King Tut exhibit in L.A.

They are protesting that a recreation bust made from cat scans of the Phaeroh's mummy depict him as "white". Regardless of what the Black Historical revisionists have tried to claim over the last ten years or so, the Egyptions DIDN'T have airplanes, DIDN'T have some form of mysterious power sources capable of levitation, and they were NOT a Negroid race. They certainly weren't lily white either, they were a Semetic people along the lines of Arabs and Hebrews.

Black history is something that is important to be taught, just as all history is, but some of the current revisionist views of that history does a disservice to the truth, and sets back support for teaching that history.

Mr Cleggs contention that the Egyptions were descended from the Nubians is a blatent demonstration of ignorance. The Nubians were enslaved by the Egyptions, and were a co-inhabiting race of the period. That is from the written records of the ancient Egyptions themselves, and from the tomb paintings in the Valley of Kings; and from the Roman Empire that conquered the region in a later era. The Romans were very specific in their historical records, and they made the distinction between Nubian and Egyption.

The Nubian Empire in itself is a thing to be proud of in Black history; it was the richest kingdom ever seen prior to the rise of the Egyption Empire. There is no need to usurp the Egyption history except from those that feel some sort of inadequacy because they have been led astray by revisionists trying to make a name for themselves with un-founded CRAP trying to pass for history.

Posted by: Delftsman3 at 09:46 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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What are we to make of Senators that liken our troops to Nazi's? I think that Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) spoke in a manner sure to lower morale of our troops....can you say "aid and comfort to the enemy" boys and girls? I'm sure you can.

And Senators Babs Boxer (D-Ca) and Russ Feingold(D-Wi) want to try to force the White House and the Pentagon to come up with a time table for the withdrawal of forces in Iraq, supported on the House side by Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi(D-Ca). Sometimes it seems that some members of the party of the "little guy" could be better characterized as being agent for Al Quaida, at least by their proposals, if not their religion.

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President Bush has contiually put pressure on Isreal to cooperate with the PA over establishment of an autonomous Palistinian Misplaced Arab State.
Just how does the PA return the favor? Just a cursory check through what the PA controlled media puts out to the people reveals that the PA is interested in what it has always been interested in, their own power, and the elimination of Israel and the Jewish people.

Palestinian Media Watch has all the examples you'll ever need to realize that the PA is not a "partner in finding peace" in the Israeli/Palastinian conflict, but a fomenter of that conflict.

The silence in our own media about what is being disemminated in the ME only further confirms the impression of their Liberal bias.

Posted by: Delftsman3 at 06:11 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Having a wife that works in a hospital, i'm somewhat familiar with how hospitals are trying to cut costs and raise revenues in every manner possible, but I think that the United Hospital in St. Paul, MN. had stepped over the line into minor extortion with a new policy that adds a $5.00 charge on flowers delivered by florists to paitients in the hospital. They say it's to cover the expense of supervision of the hospital volunteers that deliver the flowers to the patients room. I call BS on that. The fact is that those volunteers are there in any case, and would require the supervision if there were never another bouqet delivered. The purpose of a volunteer program is to free medical personell from non medical tasks in seeing to the comfort of patients and their families, and bringing flowers up to a patients room would certainly qualify in that area.
Is the hospital next going to charge for every little service that a volunteer might provide? Want a magazine from the gift shop to help through the boredom/anxiety between tests and blood draws? Sure, that will be a $3.00 delivery charge, please. Want a special snack from the cafeteria? $4.00 is the tarriff.

These people give of their time and energy to have a sense of helping their fellow man in a time of stress and pain; for a hospital to try to turn their altruistic service into another profit generating center is nothing short of despicable. Yes, it does take some amount of capital to administer such a program, but it should be covered within the cost of what a patient already pays for his room, the average being around $300.-500. a day in the average hospital these days.

Let's hope the hospital adminstration rethinks this proposal, for the benefit of their public relations, if nothing else.

Update:It seems that the United Hospital felt the pressure almost as soon as they announced their new flower delivery surcharge scam. You can try to register for the original story, but here's the meat of it:

United Hospital officials announced this morning that they have postponed their plan to charge $5 for all flowers and plants delivered to patients by florists. Following a story in today's edition of the Star Tribune, many people called the hospital to protest the change and by mid-morning the policy was rescinded.

The calls came from more than the metro area, so it may be an example of the power of the Internet to effect change.

Posted by: Delftsman3 at 05:44 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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The Progressive side of the aisle is constantly referring to us of the conservative persuasion as being cold and heartless because we don't wholeheartedly support a robust wefare system and believe Social Security isn't the best idea since sliced bread. I think we hold to these beliefs because we are realists and realize that "if you want more of something, you subsidize it."
Progressives seem to believe that the "the poor" as a group are that way because the "society has treated them unfairly" and "held them back from succeeding", despite multitudinous examples of people achieving great success despite having had their starts in some pretty appalling squalor.

I came across this story at Tech Central Station of an Irani-Swedish emmigrant that proves the contentions of the conservatives point of view. The author describes just how an overgenerous welfare system leads to the dependancy of it's constituants on government largesse, not a helping hand on the ladder of success. (note- Social Security is the Swedish term for Welfare here)

Some telling little snippets:

"The strong work ethic that we had brought from our home countries simpered away and we became used to the idea that social security was responsible for our lives."

Social security secretaries assumed that the people that they supported had no sense of responsibility.

One thing that my up growing has shown me is that there is little incentive to work and educate yourself in the Swedish welfare system. According to the Institute for Labour Policies the average salary of a person who has studied at a university for three years is only five percent higher of somebody who is uneducated. Most Swedish families would have higher income if they lived off government and made some money working in the black market.
Note that word incentive, it's the major difference between the Conservative and Progressive view. Conservatives want to help those in need just as much as Progressives do, the difference is we want to give a boost up to survive in hard times, and Progressives seem to think that any restrictions placed on the public largess is "discriminatory" and "demeaning" to the poor.

The author in the story also has fears for the future of her adopted country as a whole, as she has seen first hand the corrosive effects of government handouts. She makes the point that such a system cannot be sustained for the long term because of those corrosive effects on the population as a whole:

For a long time the strong work ethics in Sweden has prevented people from exploiting the system. But this seems to be changing. The work ethic has dramatically fallen in Sweden. More and more people are finding ways of living off government as an alternative to working. Between 20 and 25 percent of the working age population does not work. Between 1997 and 2003 the number of people who were on sick leave increased by more than 200,000, a dramatic number for a small country such as Sweden.

There hasn't been a great epidemic sweeping the country during this period, but rather a change in attitude. Today 62 percent of the employees in Sweden believe that it might be OK to take a sick leave even though illness doesn't stop you from working. This attitude is probably simply an adjusting of ethics to the Swedish system. What can you expect in a country where 9 out of 10 females who are living off sick leave would have less money in their pockets if they went back to their jobs?

The European welfare systems have functioned because of strong work ethics that made people reluctant to exploit them. But these work ethics are the product of a society where you had to work in order to provide for yourself and your family. As people adjust to the political systems we have today the ideas of individual responsibility diminishes. This is exactly what has happened among the large number of emigrants who are dependent on social security. What happens when the rest of the population adjusts to the system?

Welfare, and to a lesser extent Social Security, erodes the work ethic, and in the end leads to a permanent subclass of people that live as parasites of the society that has too much false compassion. Why would I include Social Security in that statement? Think about it...SS gives people the false impression that they need not plan for their future income when the time comes they can no longer work. It's true that they are paying into the system for that purpose, but the fact is that the lower income earners get back benefits in excess of their contributions, even though those benefits are really not high enough to really provide for a comfortable living on their own...so in effect the low income earners are actually being cheated twice.

If they invested the same amount in private accounts, they would receive a much higher rate of return, so they are not getting the full benefit of their hard earned money, yet they have no choice, and the mandatory nature of the system precludes them from making their own investments; the money for that has already been taken by SS. Once in the system, they are bound to it with no chance for improvement other than voting in vote pandering polititions promising to raise their slice of the pie on the backs of the taxpayers. And the cycle continues untill it's inevitable collapse.

Individual Progressives support the system because they have this strange idea that it is the "governments money" that is involved. They have forgotten the basic fact that the government HAS no money other than what they can squeeze out of population through taxes, tarriffs, and licensing fees. The more generous the government largess, the larger the bite they take out of YOUR wallet to pay for it.

Some progressive may point to some of those individuals that rose out of a welfare family background to make great success for themselves, and those individuals do indeed deserve to be lauded for their achievments, but the facts show that for a large percentage of such families; it becomes a multi-generational way of life where the sons and daughters only learn how to "game the system" to receive the maximum amount possible. This is an attitude that is a cancer on any society, and can only lead to an ever increasing sickness in that society's economy to the point of collapse.

Posted by: Delftsman3 at 05:07 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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I may have posted this before, If so, I don't care, I think it gives everyone a perspective on what a reality check is all about.

Try driving around as a Gringo in Mexico with no liability insurance and have an accident.

Enter Mexico illegally...Never mind immigration quotas, visas, international law or any of that nonsense.

Once there, demand that the local government provide free medical care for you and your entire family.

Demand bilingual nurses and doctors.

Demand free bilingual local government forms, bulletins, etc.

Procreate abundantly.

Deflect any criticism of this allegedly irresponsible reproductive behavior with, "It is a cultural United States thing... You wouldn't understand, pal."

Keep your American identity strong. Fly Old Glory from your rooftop or proudly display it in your front window or on your car bumper.

Speak only English at home and in public, then insist that your children do likewise.

Demand classes on American culture in the Mexican school system.

Demand to be eligible for Mexican retirement funds into which you never contributed.

Demand a local Mexican driver license. This will afford other legal rights and will go far to legitimize your unauthorized, illegal presence in Mexico.

Insist that local Mexican law enforcement teach English to all its officers.

Good luck! Because it will never happen. It will not happen in Mexico or any other country in the world..except right here in the United States...Land of the naive! If you agree, pass it on. If you don't, move to Mexico...or Iraq...or France.

Oh... And one more thing... don't drink the water.

Posted by: Delftsman3 at 02:56 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Once again Sir George at the Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiller has sent the ball out of the park with this post on the ideas contemplated by the 9/11 Memorial Committee. Follow the link at the end of the post and add your voice to those who want to see the correct thing done, and refuse to let what should be a monument to the 3,000 Americans lost turned into a PC tribute to the Hate-America First crowd.

Posted by: Delftsman3 at 03:54 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Diana West of the Washington Times points out something that we should all take note of the in the aftermath of the "Koran flushing" fiasco of a story that Newsweek disseminated, then retracted.

Take heed of her point, and heed it well, it may mean our survival. The attitude of submission is not one to take with a hungry wolf.

Posted by: Delftsman3 at 02:37 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Here's an update on the "Koran abuse" that, should you believe the MSM, is an almost hourly event at Gitmo. Seems that the Muslim extremists don't have all that much respect for their own Holy Scriptures, as compared to the soldiers guarding them.

Posted by: Delftsman3 at 04:08 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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For some unknown reason, my "posted by" and comments line have just disappeared. Comments show "open" on my posting page. Other Mu.nu sites seem to be ok, so I don't think it is a server problem. I haven't been into my templates, so I don't see how I could have changed anything there.

Any of you savvy folk have any suggestions? Pop them into an e-mail to me.

(delftsman3@sbcglobal.net)

Any help would be most appreciated.

update: And wouldn't you know it, the byline came back on for this post. Still won't go up on the others on rebuild though...

Posted by: Delftsman3 at 03:04 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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