As a 99-year-old man prepares to divorce his 96-year-old wife after 77 years of marriage, another pair of nonagenarians exchanged vows after 40 years of friendship.
Retired Air Force Col. William Thomas — once President Dwight Eisenhower’s personal pilot — married his longtime pal Margaret McSpadden, a former antique shop owner, at their retirement home on James Island, South Carolina, this past Wednesday.
McSpadden is 91; Thomas turned 92 yesterday.
According to Kimberly Farfone, Bishop Gadsden’s development director, the newlyweds were good friends for over four decades — sharing meals, playing golf, and traveling the world along with their respective spouses.
Within the last two years, both lost their significant others, and moved into the assisted-living facility. Living next door to each other helped bring the two closer, and eventually they decided to take their relationship to the next level.
“He constantly surprises us with his sense of adventure, in every aspect of his life,” Thomas’s daughter Shelley said. “Of course we didn’t expect it, but we’re like, ‘OK, now here’s one more incredible thing he’s doing.’”
(wonder how that muddles the whole inheritance scheme for their kids, grandkids, great grandkids, etal?)
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This cartoon seems to bring the left out as this is how they act and think.
I think this is hilarious, that a precinct captain for Ron Paul gets arrested for protesting Ron Paul!
PoliticalTicker
Five members of the Occupy the Caucus movement in Des Moines Iowa were arrested this morning while blockading the entrance to Ron Paul’s campaign headquarters.
Using their iconic mic-check speaking style, the protestors spoke out against Ron Paul’s campaign pledge to close the Environmental Protection Agency if elected.
Sitting arm in arm, the members of the Occupy movement chanted; “We are fighting for the future generations. In order to live we need clean air, clean water, and safe food. Don’t dismantle the EPA. We won’t allow this business to open before our demands are met.”
Police gave the protestors the opportunity to move from the private entrance to the public sidewalk twenty feet away. Some complied, but five refused to move and were arrested.
Many of the occupy demonstrators claimed sympathy, if not outright support for the ideology of Ron Paul, which made this protest especially uncomfortable for both the occupiers and the campaign.
One of the arrested protester’s named Clark Davidson claimed to be a Ron Paul precinct captain as he was led away in handcuffs.
“I don’t believe with Ron Paul on every single issue…I came to stand with my sisters. I came to address that with the campaign and I just got arrested,” Davidson said.
No one from the Paul Campaign was immediately available for comment.
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Budget Collapse: Too Much Free Money
by Lewis E. Lehrman, American Spectator
The super-committee of Congress is the latest group to confess abject defeat by the Treasury budget deficit. Who can be surprised by this total failure? During the past generation Congress has made as many as fifteen legislative attempts to control government spending — aimed ultimately at a balanced budget. The most notable efforts were those sponsored by the all-time budget hawk, Senator Phil Gramm of Texas. But every administrative and legislative effort by the authorities, no matter how well-intentioned, has collapsed. Why is this so?
Nobel economist Milton Friedman believed the solution to the budget deficit problem was to deny Congress tax revenues. So he advised Congressmen and Presidents to oppose all tax increases — thereby denying bloated government the funds with which to increase spending. But Friedman’s advice has failed, too. We know this because marginal tax rates have been reduced from as high as 70% in 1964 to 15-20-39% in 2011 — depending on the type of income. But congressional spending has nevertheless increased every year — such that, today, only 60% of the Federal budget is financed by taxes, the remainder by Treasury debt. Total direct Federal debt is now about equal to total U.S. output.
The intractable budget deficit and the inexorable rise of government spending has a simpler explanation. Congress and the Treasury are in possession of several open-ended charge accounts — “permanent credit card financing” — with no limits. With its charge cards the Treasury can borrow new credit (money) from the banking system — much of what it needs every year to finance the ever-rising budget deficit.
A look at the current Federal Reserve Balance Sheet shows that the Fed has created about $1.7 trillion of new credit (money) with which to purchase Treasury debt. Foreign central banks have created about $2.7 trillion of new credit to purchase U.S. Treasury bonds. This global, electronic, money-printing exercise has financed almost 30% of the total direct debt of the U.S. Treasury. In 2002, Ben Bernanke, now Chairman of the Fed, did not mince words to describe this process:
[U]nder a fiat (that is, paper) money system, a government (in practice, the central bank in cooperation with other agencies) should always be able to generate increased nominal spending and inflation, even when the short-term nominal interest rate is at zero…. [T]he U.S. government has a technology, called a printing press (or, today, its electronic equivalent), that allows it to produce as many U.S. dollars as it wishes at essentially no cost.
He might have added that these “no cost” dollars, printed by the Fed, are the enablers of the perennial U.S. budget deficit.
Read the article here.
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How to destroy Islam – non-violently
If we don’t destroy Islam as an ideology it will exterminate us culturally and physically
Islam is an utterly ruthless totalitarian political system disguised as a religion. Islam will literally stop at nothing to achieve its objective of world domination, with all non-Muslims exterminated or enslaved. Muslims who deny this are lying (Muslims are encouraged to tell lies to further the expansion of Islam). Terrorism is an intrinsic and inseparable part of Islam.
Consequently, the ideology of Islam MUST be defeated. It must be consigned to the dustbin of history along with those other vicious totalitarianisms – Nazism and Communism. The alternative is our extermination as a civilisation, and the whole world being plunged into an endless theocratic Dark Age.
There can be no violent solution
In an age of nuclear weapons, the option of exterminating Islam the way we exterminated Nazism – by world war – is unthinkable. Apart from anything else, there is no guarantee that the West could win an all-out World War III against Islam. Our infrastructure, government and military have been too far infiltrated by jihadists. There would be thousands of Fort Hood style massacres of our troops if a war broke out between Dar al-Harb and Dar al-Islam, not to mention massive sabotage of military and civilian infrastructure and violent intifadas in Muslim-dominated cities throughout the West.
This is not to say that the Muslims would win a World War either. The victors of WWIII would be well-organised authoritarian states with small Muslim populations who would be prepared to be ruthless in keeping their Muslims in order. China springs to mind.
Read it all HERE.
Electric car company that received a $529M federal loan recalls vehicles
WSJ: Holder’s Racial Politics
Ed Schultz Rips Romney Over Bain Capital, Then Forced To Disclose MSNBC’s Ties To Bain Capital
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The Obamas have no problem with dozens of photographers taking pictures of them as they shop at pet stores, Target, etc. In this photo, the dog is in Best Buy. Has anyone else tried taking a dog that size into a store like Best Buy and gotten away with it?
But let some photographers try and photograph them eating a $260 meal at a fancy restaurant and the advanced staffers shoo them all away:
President Obama and Michelle had dinner last night at Honolulu’s famed foodie paradise, Alan Wong’s. [...]
I realize the Obamas are wealthy people, and that wealthy people have the right to drop $260 of their disposable income on chow. But if you’re going to invite Associated Press photographers along to capture your trip to Target and stage photo ops at PetSmart and Best Buy, then I’m going to write about your unpublicized excursion to Alan Wong’s.
Diners have been trying to takes pictures of POTUS, only to be chased off by advance staffers.
Since when are people not allowed to take pictures?
According to the pool report, the Obamas and their friends dined on the five-course “tasting menu” that was tasty to the tune of $75 a person, $105 with wine. Among the highlights were “Sassey Salad” and bacon wrapped pork loin.
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Take a look at this woman. She’s about to collect almost HALF A MILLION DOLLARS in pension and then return the very next day to her same job.
Philadelphia is known as the city of brotherly love and, apparently, paying out massive pensions to public employees who will continue working for the city.
Marion B. Tasco, who has been described as being “politically savvy,” will retire from her sixth term as councilwoman, collect $478,057, and then be sworn in on Monday to serve her seventh term, Catherine Lucy and Chris Brennan of the Philadelphia Daily News.
How does she get away with this?
Tasco, along with many of her fellow Council members, is enrolled in Philadelphia’s Deferred Retirement Option Plan (DROP). DROP allows city workers to collect salary and build up pension money during the last four years of their employment, writes Aaron Kase of Philadelphia Weekly.
Naturally, when DROP was originally introduced, it was touted as being “revenue neutral.” It’s been anything but that. SInce its introduction, Philadelphia’s DROP program has cost the city $258 million in extra pension costs over a decade, according to a 2010 Boston College study.
Philadelphia’s Mayor Nutter has tried on numerous occasions to eliminate the DROP program.
“In September, Council voted to override Nutter’s veto of a bill, sponsored by Tasco that would preserve the DROP program, while reducing its cost,” writes Jan Ransom of the Daily. Nutter has vowed to work “tirelessly” to abolish the program.
And his attempts didn’t deter Tasco.
“While many of Tasco’s fellow council members dropped out of the re-election race after controversy broke out over their enrollment in DROP, Tasco stayed in the race and won,” writes Robert Johnson of Business Insider.
That means, come Monday, she will be elected as City Councilwoman for Philadelphia’s Ninth District, with all the pay and benefits that come with that position — as well as an additional $478,057.
(and that is what is wrong with too may cities and states when it comes to pension plans for the elected officials!)
