The NEW American Dream-Unemployment

Growing up we all realized that the possibilities were endless if we had the drive & determination to make our dreams come true. We lived in a country that was the envy of all of the World, that beacon of light on the hill. However today’s country seems to be becoming a dark contrast to this once great nation of patriots.  We are now living our lives by new drastically different standards.

   If I asked you  if you could live on less, not much but a little bit less, have everything you need, free healthcare, food assistance & didn’t have to work, what would you say?  This is the NEW American Dream Obama has created thru unemployment. Let me give an example based on some real world #’s.  A relative of mine lost his job due to cutbacks & was laid off.  He was roughly making $1200 a paycheck for every two weeks.  After taxes & his healthcare plan with the company he took home approximately $950.   He had to pay for child care while both he & his wife worked around $250 a month, so $125 a week.   Now today on unemployment he collects  approximately $400/week & qualifies for a free healthcare program through the state & pays for no child care since home.  Would you go back to work for less $?

 

  Now let me ask you this question, when does income redistribution become blatantly criminal?  When we are taking 50% away from a 1%er who is making 3 million a year, to give it to the government to pay for all of the entitlement programs.  I am from the great state of WI, however I am very happy I am now living in Texas where conservatism & what is stands for  is still very much a part of what makes this one of the best & stable states in the U.S & one of the only that is not struggling like the rest of the country.  I know the bleeding hearts of the world are asking what is wrong with you, why don’t you want to cover these people?

1. Medicaid is bankrupt & the only way it continues is higher taxes, so how can we take money from it to add yet another entitlement healthcare plan? By taking even more away from the BIG BAD RICH SUCCESSFUL PEOPLE

2. Those who are unemployed with ZERO incentive to go back to work, why should we cover them?

3. I don’t believe in taking from the rich & giving to the poor. It is wrong on every level, it sets the example, as to why succeed only to have your hard work taken away & given to those less fortunate.

4. When you take Haiti for example, we are nation of givers & are some of the most charitable people on the planet. Why can’t the government in their respective states use funds to help generate donations for such programs? This way it is voluntary & tax-deductible. 

5. Anything the government runs costs more than the private sector, it has been proven since the very 1st entitlement program, so start with costs, not control.

    Back to the NEW American Dream.  I personally would like 99 weeks off, I could go back to school, qualify for all sorts of government-run plans here soon & no more stress of having to work.  The only way I would ever collect unemployment is between the time it takes to find a new job & that means even it is less money, I wasn’t raised to live off the government on welfare or unemployment, but I can see why those individuals are so happy with Obama, there is no longer any reason to work, they are living the dream.

                         Let’s please wake up,

                                    Clinton H

Racism being fueled by the media & politicians?

  I would love to see what Martin Luther King Jr would have to say about today’s society & how far we’ve come, yet how far we are from his dream.  When he 1st said those incendiary words “I have a dream!”,  it must have seemed to all who followed him, that it would become a reality. Has it? 

Recently the Tea Partiers have been labeled as blatant bigots & racists. I even saw one headline, Tea Party The New KKK?  This sort of thing is the reason why we will never be free of racism, so as long as we can be controlled by the mainstream media & all forms of agenda driven politics.   Why? Because if you are unhappy with your government & want to speak out & were thinking of showing up at a Tea Party Rally, you might think twice now that you will be considered a racist right? 

  At this particular rally Three Democratic congressmen, all black say they heard racial slurs & epithets while they walked through thousands of angry protesters.  Why do you think they decided to walk through the crowd of protesters? My guess is they wanted or hoped they would hear such slurs & epithets, when it didn’t happen they manufactured it.  

Breitbart , the same guy who uncovered the wonderful work ACORN was doing has pledged $100,000 to the United Negro College Fund if anyone provides proof of the epithets. Breitbart posted two columns on his Web site saying the claims were fabricated. Both led with a 48-second YouTube video showing Lewis, Carson, other Congressional Black Caucus members and staffers leaving the Capitol. Some of the group were videotaping the booing crowd(So why didn’t any of their video show up on YouTube as proof?).  “It didn’t happen,” said Breitbart, who wasn’t there. “This is 2010. Even a racist is media-savvy enough not to yell the N-word.”  Breitbart asked why the epithet was not captured by the black lawmakers’ cameras, and why nobody reacted as if they had heard the slur. He also questioned whether the epithets could have been shouted by liberals planted in the crowd. Sounds crazy, but again why do you think they chose to walk through an angry crowd?

   I am not saying the overall tension & hatred for where this administration is taking us was not palpable,  because I am sure it was. A lot of people are very upset & yet the media keeps doing it’s best to distract us & keep us from seeing what is really happening.  Which is it behooves them to have everyone believe if you disagree with this administration, Obama & his agenda, then you must be racist. Sure is funny how he won the election in a landslide in a predominately white America huh?

    “Yes We Can” says Barack Obama,  a lot of African-American friends of mine as much as I love them, liken this very much to MLK & put Obama on the same level. Nothing could be farther from the truth. In fact I have several black friends who said they voted for Obama because he was black & they have never voted prior to this election. How is this not racist? If I said I have never voted because I would only vote for a person of a certain skin color, it makes me a racist.  Those African-Americans who are speaking out against this administration are being called Uncle Tom’s & traitors to their race? Seriously? 

   What we all need to do is come together because we want to.  If the media is fueling racism, then put out the fire by turning it off & having a discussion.  We can fulfill Martin Luther King’s dream someday, but it will only happen if we don’t let the media tell us how to feel & when to feel it.  Don’t get me wrong I know it exists on the conservative side as well, in case you’re wondering & when I see it, I turn it off.  I judge based on my morals & beliefs  & think the U.S will always be the greatest country in the world if we don’t let our government sell it & their agenda to us with no thoughts of our own. 

                    The country is free, is your mind?

                                                Clinton H

Tiger Wood’s Commercial Tacky?

After watching this video, me personally I was happy his father was not here to see this.  I think it was extremely tacky & if anything made me respect him even less, if that was possible.

1. Using your dead father’s voice to make money is pretty sad.

2. If this was not about money & truly a clean slate attempt, why not run it on public access vs as a Nike commercial?

3. I would have been more impressed had they just did a commercial about his early days with his father & what he would like to get back to.

4. I would like to see Nike & Tiger announce that all procedes will be donated to charity.

With all that said, I think Tiger is the greatest golfer to ever play, even though I would like to see Jack’s scores with today’s technology back then.  I want to believe that he is not going to be marred by this his whole career, but it will forever haunt him & his wife. I can’t see their relationship lasting, she will never trust him again & America thinks she is a fool. We all make mistakes & maybe he just had his rebellion period & he needed to get it out of his system. He may have only slept with 10% of all the chances he had for all we know.  He is Tiger Woods.

What does Tiger’s most loyal think??

          We shall See,

                 Clinton H

HP Slate vs Ipad?

 I was one of the many who at first mention of the Ipad was pretty excited to possibly get one. The price seemed right & the idea of playing some of the games on the bigger screen seemed enticing to me. I was pretty much decided on buying one, but figured I would wait out the initial rush to avoid overpaying or to see if there were any glitches in the early weeks. Then low & behold I hear about the HP Slate, & now I am considering my options completely.

Ok, here is a snapshot of them both.

     Well even for the Apple diehards out there, you have to wonder why that Apple always leaves out such little things that would make so much sense to us. Like a web cam, a USB port, how about any external memory upgrades?  This is why I am going to wait for the HP Slate.

   1. It is a fully functional computer with a webcam.

  2.  It has external memory capabilities, up to 128gb! You know how many movies that is?

 3.  It is running a Windows 7, not  Iphone software & Slate will support Adobe Flash.

4.  It has HDMI output, so I can hook this up to my TV & watch HD movies streaming from my Slate.

5.  It has a 2.0 USB port, this is huge.

   Well these are my 5 reasons why I am waiting for the HP Slate. Let me know what you think & if you already have the Ipad what your initial thoughts are, Apps I heard are right around $4.99 each,  sounds like it could get pricey for those with an Iphone & Ipad in terms of money going out the Window, lol. Like the Window reference?

                                                       Tech Care,

                                                           Clinton H

Texas gun case could bring down Health Care Law

A Texas high school student’s decision to bring a .38-caliber handgun to school in 1992 could end up at the center of the legal fight over President Barack Obama’s health care reform plan.

Alfonso Lopez Jr.’s arrest at Edison High School in San Antonio set in motion a legal battle that may prove crucial to 13 state attorneys general fighting the new law.

Lopez, a senior when he was arrested for handgun possession in March 1992, ended up facing federal charges of violating the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990. But the Supreme Court, on a 5-4 vote, threw out his conviction five years later on the grounds that Congress exceeded its regulatory authority under the Constitution when it approved the 1990 law, which makes it a violation of federal law to possess a firearm in a school zone.

In filing a lawsuit last week challenging the new health care law’s mandate that everyone must have health insurance, the 13 state attorneys general—including Greg Abbott of Texas—cited the same legal reasoning that went into the Lopez ruling.

At issue in both cases is the Constitution’s commerce clause, which limits the regulatory powers of Congress to matters involving interstate commerce. In the Lopez decision, conservatives on the court led by then-Chief Justice William Rehnquist ruled that the 1990 gun law was unconstitutional because it had nothing to do with commerce between states.

Upholding the federal government’s right to control guns in school zones would give Congress “a general police power of the sort retained by the states,” Rehnquist wrote for the majority.

That’s almost exactly the argument the states are making now in a lawsuit filed March 23.

Abbott and the other 12 state attorneys general say that health care does not meet the legal definition of interstate commerce, rendering illegal the congressional mandate that all Americans must purchase health insurance.

“In the past 15 years the Supreme Court has scaled back Congress when they’ve tried to inject themselves into purely state matters,” said one of the 13, Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox, in an interview on MSNBC.

The Lopez ruling was one of two Cox cited, saying it was a case where the federal government “tried to criminalize purely state behavior within a state.”

Prior to the Lopez ruling, the Supreme Court had for 60 years mostly followed the lead of Congress, ruling that congressional claims of regulatory power were valid under the Constitution. With the Lopez ruling, court watchers predicted a wholesale scaling back of such claims, clipping the wings of Congress to legislate in any area it wanted.

In the 2000 case of U.S. v. Morrison, the justices knocked down a provision of the Violence Against Women Act that gave victims of rape, domestic violence and other gender-motivated crimes the right to sue attackers in federal court. Rehnquist also authored the opinion.

Still, the attorneys general are hedging their legal bets. They also argue that the health care law’s insurance mandate for individuals violates the 10th Amendment, which states that powers not specifically delegated to Congress by the Constitution are “reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.”

Critics of the lawsuit say the U.S. health care system is national in scope, transcending state lines, and that extending benefits to the uninsured is an economic activity that requires the participation of all in the insurance pool.

If Obama administration lawyers can establish a connection between the health care law’s goals and interstate commerce, the high court’s conservatives may be hard-pressed to rule against Congress, skeptics say.

“The courts are not supposed to overturn the will of the elected representatives of people; that is something that’s generally anathema to conservatives,” said Paul Rothstein, a law professor at Georgetown University. “Conservatives may not like the health care plan, but they don’t want to be put in a position of judicial activism, overturning what the people’s elected representatives put in place.”

Other experts see the lawsuit as having a very good chance of success, especially since Congress entered uncharted waters in approving health care.

The lawsuit “is definitely not frivolous,” said professor Randy Barnett of Georgetown University in an interview with the National Law Journal. “Anyone who says it is—and I know a lot of law professors have—they’re whistling past the graveyard. Anything that has never been done before has no precedent for it.

And this (health care reform law) has never been done before.”

Since the Texas case was decided, Rehnquist has died and Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, a swing vote who sided with the majorities in the 1995 and 2000 rulings, has retired. In their places are two solid conservative votes, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito. Last year, moderate-liberal Justice David Souter resigned and was replaced by a like-minded jurist, Justice Sonia Sotomayor.

Fingers Crossed that This brings down the House, literally.

                                           Clinton H

Doctor says “You support Obama, go elsewhere”

MOUNT DORA — A doctor who considers the national health-care overhaul to be bad medicine for the country posted a sign on his office door telling patients who voted for President Barack Obama to seek care “elsewhere.”

“I’m not turning anybody away — that would be unethical,” Dr. Jack Cassell, 56, a Mount Dora urologist and a registered Republican opposed to the health plan, told the Orlando Sentinel on Thursday. “But if they read the sign and turn the other way, so be it.”

I personally applaud his stance on this, he is one of many doctors in this country whom are unhappy with what the health care law is going to do to the way health care is handled in America. Cassell may be walking a thin line between his right to free speech and his professional obligation, said William Allen, professor of bioethics, law and medical professionalism at the University of Florida‘s College of Medicine.  Allen said doctors cannot refuse patients on the basis of race, gender, religion, sexual orientation or disability, but political preference is not one of the legally protected categories specified in civil-rights law. By insisting he does not quiz his patients about their politics and has not turned away patients based on their vote, the doctor is “trying to hold onto the nub of his ethical obligation,” Allen said.

“But this is pushing the limit,” he said.
 

The limit was pushed when Obama forced this legislation down our throats & now has his hand around our throats in a tax chokehold.  Overall so far, three patients have complained, but most have been “overwhelmingly supportive” of his position.
“Physicians are extended the same rights to free speech as every other citizen in the United States.”

I can see why even the most conservative will still see this as wrong, however what else can one do to help people understand? Tell me your thoughts, too far or about time someone takes a stance?

                                                             Clinton H

One & a Half Men? Charlie wants out.

People.com is reporting that Charlie Sheen — the highly paid star of CBS’ Two and A Half Men, is ready to call it quits after this season. Sheen in the final year of his contract, has reportedly told friends that “he’s not coming back,” “Leaving is 100 percent his idea,” a source told People.com

I am upset, I love this show. It is hilarious & I can’t see it transitioning successfully without Sheen. However, (some reports say that WBTV, in fact, has an offer out to Sheen for two more years at around $1 million per episode). So we will see hopefully he comes back & we get some more hilarity. At 14.98 million, Men remains TV’s most-watched comedy. So I am pretty sure CBS is doing everything they can. 

  With LOST in it’s final season, Two & Half Men possibly going away, what’s next, House? You take away House & I will be wrecking shit. I could watch that show every night.  I don’t think he is going to leave, he is just posturing. Representatives for CBS and Warner Bros. TV declined to comment, which means nothing is final.

   We shall see,

         Clinton H

Democrat Hank Johnson Thinks Guam can Capsize!

All I can say is this guy voted for the health care bill. Johnson serves on the House Armed Services and Judiciary committees. Does that not scare anyone else? He thinks islands float for God’s sake.  If I was the Admiral, I could not have had the decorum he had. I would have literally looked around & asked, what? You are not serious?  Do you honestly believe an island will tip up like your illustrating with your hands & capsize like the Titanic?

This is beyond embarrassing.

Clinton H

Weight Loss Quest

 I have started this past week a quest to lose 10-15 lbs. Here is my basic layout or plan. I have a basic metabolic rate or BMR of 1918 kcal. Your BMR is the amount of calories if consumed you would stay at your current weight with zero activity, so basically a couch potato. Go here for more clarification or to check your BMR , http://www.bmi-calculator.net/bmr-calculator/ One pound is equal to 3500 kcals.

   My goal daily is to create a 1000 calorie deficit, thereby losing 1lb approximately every 4 days. For example on 3/31 I consumed 1180 calories. 1918 – 1180 = 738 calorie deficit. I also did some walking at work & played with my dogs, we will estimate 100 calories + 25 minutes on my elliptical with 320 calories burned. So this amounts to an additional 420 calorie deficit. So if I add it up 738 + 420 = 1158 total deficit for 3/31. Overall goal for this first 30 days is 10lbs or 35,000 calories. So 35,000 – 1158 = 33,842 more to go. At my current rate if I worked out every day I would lose 10 lbs in 29 days. I am going to try to update this weekly as to my progress. My starting weight is 196lbs, & I intend to try to get to 185lbs by early May.  Anyone else with weight loss quests please be encouraging & I will encourage you & follow your progress.

Wish me luck,

Clinton H

Selena-15 years since slaying

It is hard to fathom that 15 years has passed since Selena Quintanilla-Perez was fatally shot & killed in Corpus Christi. Selena was shot in a Corpus Christi motel room after a confrontation with Yolanda Saldivar of San Antonio, her fan club president.  Saldivar is still serving a life sentence at the women’s prison in Gatesville. Still proclaiming her innocence, Saldivar’s most recent appeal for a new trial was turned down.

   The night of the murder, Selena’s father, Abraham Quintanilla, told reporters Saldivar had been mishandling the fan club’s membership dues.  A life lost over money, a terrible loss to anyone who ever met her or listened to her music. I am not a Tejano fan, but I think Selena made a fan out of anyone who listened to her, or watched her. I actually met her in 1993 while working in a sign shop, she came in to order signs for her boutique. I didn’t even know who she was, but thought she was very nice, after she left I was told by a co-worker who she was.

      I believe she was on par with any of the greats who were taken before their time, like Richie Valens.  She has continued to be missed & with this blog, I hope it renews the fact that Yolanda Saldivar never sees the light of day. She was a two-bit scam artist & a heartless murderer.  Even if 15 years have changed her heart, she still deserves to never be a free human being for taking a life.

For Jennifer Lopez her role as Selena in the movie was a breakout success & the start of a very talented career.

Favorite songs: “Bidi Bidi Bom Bom” & “I could fall in love”.

Selena Quintanilla-Perez

April 16, 1971 – March 31, 1995