On July 30, 1975, James Riddle Hoffa, one of the most influential American labor leaders of the 20th century, disappears in Detroit, Michigan, never to be heard from again. Though he is popularly believed to have been the victim of a Mafia hit, conclusive evidence was never found, and Hoffa's death remains shrouded in mystery to this day.

Born in 1913 to a poor coal miner in Brazil, Indiana, Jimmy Hoffa proved a natural leader in his youth. At the age of 20, he helped organize a labor strike in Detroit, and remained an advocate for downtrodden workers for the rest of his life. Hoffa's charisma and talents as a local organizer quickly got him noticed by the Teamsters and carried him upward through its ranks. Then a small but rapidly growing union, the Teamsters organized truckers across the country, and through the use of strikes, boycotts and some more powerful though less legal methods of protest, won contract demands on behalf of workers.  (HistoryChannel)

By a vote of 227-195, the House voted to move forward with John Boehner’s lawsuit against President Obama.

The debate before the vote featured Democrats calling the lawsuit stupid and a waste of time, while Republicans claimed that they had no idea what the Democrats were talking about.

Rep. Jim McGovern (D-MA) said that the lawsuit was an attempt to placate the birthers and the tea partiers, but they will never be satisfied. He also said that Republicans are devastated that the ACA is working. McGovern said, “This is show business at its worst. Enough of this stupidity.”  (PoliticusUSA)

The Emerald Queen Casino in Tacoma, Wash., owned by the Puyallup Tribe, has canceled two Ted Nugent concerts on Aug. 2 and 3 because of racist remarks made by the rocker and NRA board member.

The Coeur d'Alene Tribe in Worley, Idaho also said earlier this week that it canceled Nugent's Aug. 4 shows at its casino because of his racist and hate-filled remarks.

A public relations official for the tribe said, "Nugent’s history of racist and hate-filled remarks was brought to Tribal Council’s attention earlier today."  Tribal Chief Allan added that "We know what it’s like to be the target of hateful messages and we would never want perpetuate hate in any way."

The racist remarks most often cited are jabs at President Obama which include  calling him a "subhuman mongrel" and a "chimpanzee." But Nugent's racially-insensitive behavior extends to Native Americans as well. He frequently wears a feather headdress on stage and appropriates a sacred Native symbol in his song "Great White Buffalo," both of which are highly disrespectful to Native culture.

Nugent also considers himself as a savior of Natives:

"Because of my clean and sober, hands-on conservation bowhunting lifestyle and song 'The Great White Buffalo,' Native American tribes have invited me to teach their young people how to reconnect with the land and teach them how to bow hunt the mighty American bison. It was in their midst that I learned firsthand about the terrible problems facing my Indian Blood Brothers."

On Tuesday evening, protesters demonstrated against a Nugent concert at The Wellmont Theater in Montclair, N.J.

Protesters from various organizations chanted: "Two, four, six, eight we say no to Nugent's Hate" and "No hate in the Garden State."

In response, Nugent called his critics "unclean varmints.”

“I call them unclean varmints, I’ve actually gone by them and I mean it, they’re hygiene-challenged, they actually stink, they’re dirty people, they’re unclean, they’re bused in to Connecticut and New Jersey and different places to protest a Ted Nugent concert but, they are so stoned or just brain dead, they actually wear their American Communist Party regalia, they’re not smart enough to take off their identification that they’re not really protesters, they’ve been paid and bussed in,” stated Nugent.  

(sources: Indian Country Network, USA Today) 

Ted Nugent might consider himself a savior of the Native people, but obviously they think otherwise and have canceled his performances.  Residents in New Jersey don’t care for Nugent’s hate filled and racist remarks either.  

Bottom line is that Nugent is an asshole who needs to stick to his music instead of spewing his hate.

On second thought, maybe not.  His music isn’t that good anyway.

Just one day more...

A small city in south-central Kentucky is taking drastic steps to combat rising gas prices. Somerset is literally taking the pump into its own hands.

The Somerset Fuel Center opened last weekend with 10 nozzles and a sale price of $3.36 a gallon for regular gas. The price is only a few cents cheaper than nearby private gas stations, but competitors have reportedly lowered their prices in response.

Mayor Eddie Girdler told ABC affiliate WBKO that gas prices traditionally increase 20 to 30 cents on the weekend in his city.

"If government doesn't do it to protect the public, then who does it?" Girlder told WBKO.

"They're just simply ripping off the public, and they're doing it because of greed," said Mayor Eddie Girdler.

"And what we’re going to do is do our job. Which means, why shouldn't we deal with high gas prices? It's something that affects the quality of life," said Girdler.

"We’re going to set a price, and if the companies want to equal that or go lower than that, we’ve achieved our objective," said Girdler.

Girdler told the Washington Post, “We don’t care if we don’t sell a drop of gasoline. Our objective is to lower the price.”

The mayor says the city will likely break even on the fuel sales. He says the profit is not the point.

"It is our economy, and we can't allow anybody to continue to gouge us and take money away from us," said Girdler. 

Brian Clark, executive director of the Kentucky Petroleum Marketers Association, told ABC News his organization and the Petroleum Marketers Association of America are watching the “unprecedented” city fueling center very closely.

“The city will be competing directly with small businesses directly in the community, which raises many questions, not the least of which is: why is this a good idea?” Clark said. “It’s scary for us who depend on local businesses for their jobs, especially because the government says it intends to interfere with the free market.”  (ABC News)  (WDRB)

I'm sure some will agree with the comments of the Kentucky Petroleum Marketers Association, but I don't.  Mayor Girdler is exactly right.  Government does have a responsibility to protect people when they are being ripped off, as in the case of price gouging on fuel.

This story reminds me of when I was on the city council in our small town before moving to the farm and felt it would be a good idea for the city to provide wifi, just the same as other utility services (water, sewer, garbage) are provided, the exception being that the wifi would be free to all residents.  There was already free wifi at the library and anyone living close could latch on.  It seemed reasonable that the city could provide free wifi city wide as a perk for living there.  That was until I discovered that the cable companies and phone companies had gotten the state legislature to pass a law that specifically forbid communities from providing wifi to all residents. 

Kudos to Mayor Girdler and the city council in Somerset, Kentucky for being proactive in taking care of their citizens.

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Sen. Ted Cruz vowed Thursday to continue blocking confirmation of a series of ambassadorial and other diplomatic nominees despite the Federal Aviation Administration lifting a ban on U.S. airline flights to Israel. 

Cruz said he wouldn't release the holds until the Obama administration answers his questions about the FAA's prohibition, which went into effect Tuesday after a rocket landed about a mile from the Tel Aviv airport. The FAA ended the ban late Wednesday, after Cruz accused Obama of imposing an economic boycott of Israel while it is fighting the militant group Hamas in Gaza.

"There are still serious questions as to the decision-making that went in to the ban on flights and whether it was driven by political consideration at the White House or by objective expert opinion at the agency," the Texas senator said Thursday.

Cruz is demanding to know why Israel was singled out, while commercial flights can still pass over Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen and Ukraine — where a Malaysia Airlines jet was downed, killing all 298 people on board. The FAA prohibited flights over Ukraine's Crimea in April and has ruled out overflights of the east of the country since last week's crash.

Cruz also wants to see any communication between the FAA, White House and State Department to see if the ban on landings in Tel Aviv was designed to punish Israel or advance cease-fire efforts. Almost 800 Palestinians have been killed in fighting over the last 16 days, mostly civilians, according to Gaza health officials. Israel has lost more than 30 soldiers and at least two civilians.

For the second straight day, the suggestion of political motivation behind the flight ban drew a sharp response from the State Department.

"It's just perplexing," spokeswoman Marie Harf said of Cruz's action. "The notion that he would put a hold on State Department nominees when he really has questions for the FAA just doesn't really make sense."

Walgreen's first pharmacy opened 113 years ago inside a hotel on Chicago's South Side and this year, the chain will derive nearly all its sales and most of its profits from its 8,700 U.S. locations.

But Walgreen is currently thinking about leaving American shores, as part a plan to buy the rest of Alliance Boots GmbH, which operates a U.K. drugstore chain and is based in Switzerland. 

The move could help Walgreen lower its U.S. tax bill saving the company hundreds of millions of dollars a year -- money that wouldn't flow into the U.S. Treasury.

If it goes ahead, it would be an unusual use of the controversial and complex maneuver known as an inversion. While well tested among pharmaceutical and manufacturing companies that earn much of their income overseas or have assets like patents that are held offshore, the move has never been attempted by a major U.S. retailer, according to tax experts.

A tax inversion, which would relocate headquarters to a more tax-friendly country like Switzerland, would ensure that those profits aren't stuck overseas and avoid the tax hit that otherwise would come with bringing the money back to the U.S.

Americans for Tax Fairness estimates that Walgreen would pay $4 billion less in taxes over the next five years if it does an inversion, based on calculations from UBS AG (UBS), Deutsche Bank AG and JPMorgan Chase (JPM).

The move wouldn't let Walgreen escape U.S. taxes on the share of profits it generates in the country. Walgreen spokesman Michael Polzin said the company would still pay at least $2 billion a year in federal, state and other taxes. But an inversion would facilitate ways to reduce Uncle Sam's cut through so-called income-shifting transactions.

Walgreen's U.S. business, for instance, could take on much of the company's debt, and the interest would lower its taxable income at home. Alternatively, the U.S. business could pay a fee to its overseas parent corporation for management services.

Walgreen executives are leaning toward moving to Switzerland but are concerned possible new legislation from Congress could become a roadblock, according to a person familiar with their thinking. Congress is considering passing a bill to make inversions more difficult.  (MSN Money)

This is just another corporate loophole.  If Walgreen’s goes ahead with this inversion to avoid paying U.S. taxes it will certainly cause me to reconsider shopping in their stores, unless Congress steps in.  Corporate tax breaks and loopholes are already substantial, so this would just be another example of corporate money influencing Congress if they fail to act.  Once again, the average taxpayer will have to make up the difference.

Just one day more...

We have a Garmin Nuvi 1450, which includes the lifetime map updates.  Swell, we figured when we got it, replacing an older Garmin which did not have map update capability.  Well, there’s always a catch.

Downloading the map updates using a program called Garmin Express was suppose to simplify the painfully slow process.  It did help some, however it takes a long time to download the map updates.  A long time.

Lately a prompt has come up telling me that Garmin Express program will no longer work with the operating system on the computer.  Great - now what?  So, I decided to go through the dreaded process of updating the maps on the Garmin before losing the program to accomplish that.  

In the process I got a prompt telling me that there is not enough memory in the Garmin to do the map update and the only choice was a limited update or put in a memory card.  Geez Garmin, if you knew there wasn’t enough memory to do map updates and a memory card would be required why didn’t you include one with it?  So, I ordered a memory card.

But, I needed to do map updates before the Garmin Express program doesn’t work anymore and the only alternative was a partial map update they call the west, which took a long download time.  I guess we'll be all right if we don't wander outside of the "west" map.  

If I eventually don’t have the ability to download the map updates because the computer operating system isn’t new enough, I’m not sure what to do.  I’m not a tecno-geek, but it seems to me there has to be a better way and I’m not prepared to shell out a couple of hundred bucks for a new Garmin.

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The financial analyst credited with kickstarting the Tea Party movement couldn’t handle the truth when a CNBC host happened to point out that almost everything he had ever predicted had been horribly, laughably wrong.

Rick Santelli, who reports from the floor of the Chicago Stock Exchange, made a name for himself in 2009 when, during a live report, he went a bit nuts and began railing against President Obama and the Washington rank-and-file over their support of the economic bailout. Conservatives latched onto the message and the rest – including an ill-conceived flood of Tea Party candidates being swept into office in 2010 – is history.

The crux of Santelli’s argument is that Obama was going to continue to tank the economy by causing rapid inflation leading to the downfall of the U.S. dollar as an international currency. Obviously, none of which has happened. In fact, the economy has been making gains in jobs and GDP that even surprise optimistic forecasters. The dollar is still prized, albeit slightly battered. There was no hyperinflation. The doom and gloom was premature and foolhardy. But don’t tell Santelli; despite the real world evidence, he is still convinced that he was on to something five years ago.

While discussing the Federal Reserve, Santelli began to follow his well-worn talking points about how badly things are about to get for the economy, but the other hosts, especially Steve Liesman, weren’t having any of it. (Article by: Jameson Parker)

Good one Liesman for showing what a loudmouth idiot Santelli is.  Santelli epitomizes how wrong the Tea Party ideology is.  He best represents the attitude of the Wall Street crooks who stole billions and nearly took this country into a full scale depression.  Too bad he can't man up and admit he was wrong.  Really wrong.

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Not much good comes out of a war.  The exception sometimes is technology and the German designed Fieseler Fi 156 Storch (Stork) airplane was one such example.  The Storch was a rugged plane made of tubing and canvas that they say could “take off and land on a handkerchief.”  With the fold back wings it could be easily transported on a trailer or towed.

The fabric-covered Storch observation monoplane served the German Forces throughout World War Two wherever the Germans saw combat. With ten times the life expectancy of the Bf 109 fighter, the Storch ("Stork") proved to be a rugged Short Take Off and Landing (STOL) airplane that gained the respect of all its pilots. 

The Storch was first flown in 1936. Using a fixed slat over the leading edge of the wing and slotted camber-changing flaps along the trailing edge, the Storch achieved incredible short take-off performance. In a light breeze the Storch could take off in just 200 feet (60 meters) and land in about 66 feet (20 meters). It had a crew of three, and with extensive windows surrounding the occupants, made an excellent observation and liaison aircraft. Production for the German armed forces began with the Fi 156A-1. The Fi 156C, which had the rear glazing raised to accommodate a machine gun for defense, soon replaced the A-1.

The Fieseler Storch was the last dogfight victim of the western front. Pilot Duanes Francies and his observer, Lieutenant William Martin, of the 5th US Army Division, spotted a Storch circling below them while looking for ground targets in their Piper Cub. Diving on the Storch, the two men opened fire with their Colt .45s and the plane spiraled to the ground.  Apart from being the last Luftwaffe plane lost in the west, this Storch was also the only enemy plane downed by pistol fire during the war. 

Specifications (Fi 156C-2):

        Engine: One 240-hp Argus As 10C-3, 8-cylinder inverted-V piston engine 

        Weight: Empty 2,050 lbs., Max Takeoff 2,921 lbs.

        Wing Span: 46ft. 9 in.

        Length: 32 ft. 5.75 in.

        Height: 10 ft..

        Performance:

            Maximum Speed: 109 mph

            Cruising Speed: 81 mph

            Ceiling: 15,090 ft.

            Range: 239 miles

        Armament: One rear-firing 7.93-mm (0.31-inch) machine gun on pivot mount

  

I’m not a pilot, rather simply interested in history and historical innovations.  Some of the restored planes are around today. The Fieseler Storch looks like one of those innovations that would be a real hoot to own and fly.  Wish I had known about them in my younger and more adventurous days.  Who knows what might have happened.

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Woody Guthrie would have been 102 today if  he hadn’t died of Huntington’s disease in 1967. 

Woody Guthrie, a contradictory man who vexed his family and his closest friends as much as he challenged the authorities—“I can’t stand him when he’s around,” Pete Seeger, his friend and also a bandmate for a time, once said, “but I miss him when he’s gone”—scarcely registers as a creature of human dimension. In the popular imagination, where he endures, more than half a century after his creative prime as a writer and singer, Guthrie seems more like Gypsy Davy, Rocky Mountain Slim, and other colorful folk heroes of the songs he sang. He functions as the embodiment of gritty American authenticity, the plainspoken voice of a romanticized heartland.

“I never did make up many songs about the cow trails or the moon skipping through the sky,” Guthrie wrote in “Bound for Glory,” “but at first it was funny songs of what’s all wrong, and how it turned out good or bad. Then I got a little braver and made up songs telling what I thought was wrong and how to make it right, songs that said what everybody in the country was thinking.”  (New Yorker)

"A folk song is what’s wrong and how to fix it, or it could be whose hungry and where their mouth is, or whose out of work and where the job is or whose broke and where the money is or whose carrying a gun and where the peace is—that’s folk lore and folks made it up because they seen that the politicians couldn’t find nothing to fix or nobody to feed or give a job of work."

“I hate a song that makes you think that you are not any good. I hate a song that makes you think that you are just born to lose. Bound to lose. No good to nobody. No good for nothing. Because you are too old or too young or too fat or too slim or too ugly or too this or too that. Songs that run you down or poke fun at you on account of your bad luck or hard traveling. I am out to fight those songs to my very last breath of air and my last drop of blood. I am out to sing songs that will prove to you that this is your world and that if it has hit you pretty hard and knocked you for a dozen loops, no matter what color, what size you are, how you are built, I am out to sing the songs that make you take pride in yourself and in your work. And the songs that I sing are made up for the most part by all sorts of folks just about like you. I could hire out to the other side, the big money side, and get several dollars every week just to quit singing my own kind of songs and to sing the kind that knock you down still farther and the ones that poke fun at you even more and the ones that make you think that you've not got any sense at all. But I decided a long time ago that I'd starve to death before I'd sing any such songs as that. The radio waves and your movies and your jukeboxes and your songbooks are already loaded down and running over with such no good songs as that anyhow.”   (Woody Guthrie)

One of the most recognized songs Guthrie wrote is “This land is your land, this land is my land.”  The lyrics had been written in anger, as a response to Irving Berlin’s “God Bless America,” which Woody Guthrie deplored as treacle. In addition to the familiar stanzas (“As I went walking that ribbon of highway,” and so on), Guthrie had composed a couple of others, including this:

One bright sunny morning in the shadow of the steeple 

By the Relief Office I saw my people— 

As they stood hungry, I stood there wondering if 

God Blessed America for me. 

Woody Guthrie was a common man who used his talent as a singer / songwriter to bring to the attention of the world the plight of his people during the depression.  He also stood up for the working man and unions.

Today unions have been demonized as causing the economic woes of this country, all the while white collar criminals took us into the recession of 2008.  Unions are an easy scapegoat for the politicians who protected Wall Street crooks that nearly took this country into another depression.  This country could do well with another Woody Guthrie.

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It has been announced that up to 200 of the Central American children have been brought to Nebraska and placed with relatives or sponsors.  That sent Nebraska Governor Dave Heineman (R) , an outspoken critic of immigration, into fits.

Heineman, who is at the National Governor’s Association meeting in Nashville, gave a radio interview where he said it is “incredible” and “outrageous” that federal officials will not disclose the names, locations and sponsors of the children, or how long they might remain in the state. 

 "So far they've indicated to me they're not willing to tell the Governor of Nebraska where they've transported these illegal individuals.  And that's not right.  That is not fair. That is not appropriate," Heineman said.

"I'm just very, very concerned and I can't believe in America that we have a federal government that essentially is secretly transporting them to Nebraska, they're illegal immigrants and they won't tell us who they are," Heineman said.

“And what if the children are still here during the school year? Are we supposed to educate them? Our taxpayer dollars from legal Nebraska citizens are going to end up paying, potentially, for their education," Heineman said.

Heineman said it is important he knows the names of the people in our state and who their sponsors are so we can keep track of them.

Most of the children have apparently been placed in Omaha and Grand Island, Nebraska.  School officials from each of those communities were interviewed.

Grand Island Superintendent Robert Winter said he was aware some unaccompanied minors were being placed with relatives in the area. He estimated about 50 to 60 children will enroll in the school system.

“We’re aware that we may be getting some of those kids but we got some last year, so it’s not a new thing for Grand Island,” he said. “We don’t anticipate any problems.”

Grand Island has a large immigrant community, some of whom work in meat packing plants. It has a welcome center that for years has been working with children , Winter said.

“We will do what we need to do to accommodate them,” he said. “Like every school district, we have limited resources. It’s not a new phenomenon for us. We’ll make sure they have breakfast in the morning and a good day at school.”

Omaha Public Schools Spokesman Todd Andrews said, “We are able to accommodate all the students who come to our district. We will continue to do what it takes to meet the needs of our students.”  (Nebraska Watchdog.org)

In 2008, during the Bush administration, Congress passed a law to protect Central American children from sex trafficking by preventing them from being sent packing without a hearing, advocate and attorney. While awaiting their court dates, the children must be placed in the least restrictive setting possible, and sometimes that means with relatives or acquaintances. Essentially, INS is doing what is required in the law.

Governor Heineman is going ballistic because he wants to know the names of the people in our state and who their sponsors are so we can keep track of them.  Never mind the fact that these are minors.  And never mind the fact that they are with relatives or sponsors, not wards of the state.

When interviewed the school officials said it wasn’t an issue and they will accommodate and educate the children without regard to who they are.  That is typical of educators who put the interests of the children first. 

What a contrast in comments of the public officials and evidence of who is really doing what is right instead of politicizing.  It certainly isn’t Heineman.  What a dick. 

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An armed militia has gathered in Von Ormy, Tx., which is south of San Antonio, to train its members who are planning to go Laredo and other Texas towns to secure the U.S.-Mexico border against undocumented immigrants, mostly children.

"We have patriots all across this country who are willing to sacrifice their time, their monies, even quit their jobs to come down and fight for freedom, liberty and national sovereignty," militia commander Chris Davis told Channel 5 News.

In response, the U.S. Customs and Border Protection said in a statement:

Customs and Border Protection does not endorse or support any private group or organization from taking matters into their own hands as it could have disastrous, personal and public safety consequence.

Davis has reportedly served in the U.S. Army and National Guard, and has joined some pro-gun Open Carry Texas events.

The armed militia will secure the border in a "legal and lawful manner," added Davis.

TheMonitor.com recently reported that "a man who identifies himself as Cmdr. Chris Davis" stated in a YouTube video, "You see an illegal. You point your gun dead at him, right between his eyes, and you say, 'Get back across the border or you will be shot.'"

Hidalgo County Sheriff Eddie Guerra said the self-appointed militia is not needed in the Rio Grande Valley.

“We don’t need their services on our border. If we ever did I’m sure we have enough good people in Hidalgo County that I can call up,” Guerra said.

(By Michael Allen

Sources: TheMonitor.com, Channel 5 News)

Armed militia?  Seriously?!

There is a humanitarian crisis in Central America and the result is that children are fleeing to the perceived safety of the United States.  The crisis they are fleeing is the armed drug cartels and gangs.  And what they are fleeing to is the armed militia wackos in the United States.

I don’t have an easy answer for the immigration problems, but one thing is certain - the Border Patrol is a far better solution than a militia armed with assault weapons.  If these clowns want to set up some kind of a fortress in the backwoods of Texas and play their guard the fence games, so be it.  But, turning them loose on the border to intimidate and possibly shoot kids is just plain nuts.


"We have met the enemy and they are ours".  Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry

Just one day more...

When the Defense Subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee meets to mark up the FY 2015 Pentagon spending bill next week, it has a chance to strike a blow for fiscal discipline and sound national security policy. It can do so by scaling back the troubled F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program.

But the Joint Strike Fighter program has been a mess almost since its inception, with massive cost overruns leading to its current acquisition price-tag of $398.6 billion — an increase of $7.4 billion since last year.

The recent grounding of the F-35 due to a fire on the runway at Eglin Air Force Base is just the latest in a series of technical problems suffered by the program. These failures don’t come cheap: the F-35 is slated to cost taxpayers up to $1.4 trillion over its lifetime — the most expensive weapons program ever undertaken by the Pentagon.

Issues with the plane have included lags in software development that make it unsuitable for combat; cracks in the engine; and flaws in the million-dollar high-tech helmet that is supposed to tell pilots what is going on around them.

A big part of the problem with the F-35 is the “buy first, fly later” approach to developing it. The Pentagon’s chief weapons buyer, Frank Kendall, has described this approach as “acquisition malpractice,” and promised to do better. But the fire at Eglin is just the latest indication that the program is far from being “back on track.”

Given all of its problems, why is the F-35 program still alive? It’s mostly due to technological hubris and pork barrel politics. Lockheed Martin and the Air Force continue to assert that the planes can be made to work as advertised. For their part, key legislators like the 49 members of the Congressional Joint Strike Fighter Caucus want to continue a program that creates jobs in their districts — albeit not nearly as many as the company claims.  In fact, a study conducted earlier this year by the Center for International Policy demonstrated that the bulk of F-35 jobs were concentrated in just two states — Texas and California.

Members of Congress who are being lobbied to support the plane based on its economic impacts should take a closer look at whether the program actually supports significant numbers of jobs in their district. In many cases it will not.  (Roll Call)

$1.4 TRILLION??!    What could we get for that $1.4 trillion?

•  For every homeless person in the country you could build a $664,000 home.  Just think what you could do for the homeless shelters.

•  All of the $8.7 billion cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (food stamps) made by House Republicans could be funded.

•  The National School Lunch Program, which feeds approximately 31 million students could have been funded for 24 years.

•  If the U.S. were to have channeled the $298 billion is has spent so far on the F-35 — and continued spending at that level for the next six years — the U.S. would be halfway towards closing the $1.1 trillion gap in investment needed to rebuild America’s roads and bridges.

•  And, we can't fund national health care?  And, we want cuts to Medicare and Medicaid?

Come on America, let’s get our priorities straight!  It's time to tell the Pentagon the gravy train is over.

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A Tennessee couple, among the 100,000-plus people in the state left uninsured because of a gap left by Obamacare and Medicaid, have separated in order to stay covered.

Linda and Larry Drain of Maryville have moved apart because couples whose household makes less than $15,510 don't qualify for Affordable Care Act subsidies and Tennessee, like most Southern states, has refused to expand Medicaid to fill in the gap.

Debilitated by epilepsy and dependent on pricey medications, going uninsured is not an option for Linda. Now staying healthy means not getting to see her husband of 33 years every day.

Trouble began for the Drains when 62-year-old Larry decided to retire early last year.

'In September of last year, I made what looking back on it in retrospect was the worst decision I ever made in my entire life,' he told the Tennesseean. 'I decided to take early retirement from Social Security.'

But the fault doesn't lie solely with the Drains. The U.S. Supreme Court struck down the part of the Affordable Care that required states to expand Medicaid for people like them.

And Tennessee, where a Medicaid expansion failed miserably in the 1990s, and Republican Governor Bill Haslam have been unwilling to expand the program in the wake of the court's decision.

Like an estimated one in three people in the South, where nearly 4 million of the uninsured fall into the coverage gap, the Drains evidently didn't understand that Linda's eligibility would change with their drop in income.

'After one or two months of crying and lots of prayers and lots of yelling and screaming, on Dec. 26 — after 33 years of marriage — we separated,' Larry told the Tennesseean.

The couple now live two miles apart, with Linda at her mother's house and Larry at the apartment they once shared, and don't see each other every day.

While Linda has kept her coverage, Larry remains uninsured.

'The irony of it was I was working full time at a hospital with no benefits,' he said. 'When I got the job, what they explained to me was the hospital was losing money hand over fist because of uncompensated care.'

The now-retired social worker now writes a letter to the governor via his blog each day, pleading for a Medicaid expansion.  (Colorado Newsday)

Nebraska is similar to Tennessee.  The governor and legislature (mostly Republican) in Nebraska refused to implement the medicaid provisions of the Affordable Care Act, as well as refusing to implement a health insurance exchange. Without the exchange seniors are left to fend for themselves in the national exchange and without the medicaid provisions some fall in the same gap as Linda and Larry Drain.

All because of partisan politics we are left with a half-ass national health care program and people like the Drains are caught in the lurch.  This is all the more reason this country needs a single payer, truly universal health care program as in Canada.  But, the partisan right will make sure that doesn't happen.

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A Fourth of July parade float that depicted a figure standing outside an outhouse labeled the “Obama Presidential Library” has created a stir on social media and is also receiving criticism in Norfolk, Nebraska.

The float, in Norfolk’s annual Independence Day parade, was on a flatbed trailer being pulled by a blue pickup truck. The figure was dressed in overalls and standing next to a walker outside of the outhouse. The hands and head of the figure were greenish and appeared to be zombielike; the hands were pressed against the sides of the figure’s head. Miniature American flags were atop the float and on the truck.

Neither the float nor the pickup identified a sponsor; a sign in the windshield said it was entry No. 29.

Liz Guthrie of Pierce, Nebraska, took a photo of the float that has been widely circulated on social media.

From where she watched the parade, Guthrie said she could hear the crowd laughing and clapping as the float passed by.

The World-Herald also received several emails from people expressing concern. One email, from a person who said she had grown up in northeast Nebraska, called it disrespectful that such a display would be allowed in a parade that celebrates America’s history. The Nebraska Democratic Party also issued a statement, calling it one of the “worst shows of racism and disrespect for the office of the presidency that Nebraska has ever seen.”

However, parade committee member Rick Konopasek told the Lincoln Journal-Star that the float wasn’t meant to be any more offensive than a political cartoon. He also said the outhouse float was the most popular one in the parade, and the three judges awarded it an honorable mention.  (Omaha World-Herald)

Yup, that’s right...  we are a state of stupid racist hicks.  Norfolk, Nebraska, hometown of Johnny Carson, perpetuated the stereotype.

Seriously, the parade committee actually gave an award to these stupid bastards.

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Census Bureau: A Quarter Of The US Population Now Living In 'Poverty Areas'

Exclusionary neighborhood zoning and suburban sprawl have led to an increase in the number of concentrated poverty areas, particularly in the South, according to an analysis of a recent U.S. Census Bureau report released Monday.

The report, based on data from the 2000 Census and figures collected from the American Community Survey from 2008-2012, revealed that in 2012 about 77 million people, roughly 25.7 percent of the U.S. population, lived in a poverty area — where more than one-fifth of residents earn an income below the poverty line of approximately $23,600 a year for a family of four.

That is a significant increase from the 2000 level of 45 million people or 18 percent of the population.

Paul Jargowsky, a professor of urban research and education at Rutgers University and one of the study analysts, said the migration of Americans toward poverty areas is primarily driven by two phenomena: exclusionary zoning and suburban sprawl.

Exclusionary zoning is when a suburban district sets a housing requirement that implicitly excludes lower-income families, like setting a minimum square footage of 3,000 feet. Families that cannot afford to purchase a house that large are thus unable to become members of that community. And more affluent people are also migrating into suburban areas, exacerbating the sprawl that leaves poor families in isolated communities.  (Aljazeera)

Today 25.7 percent of Americans live in poverty areas, up from 18.1 percent in 2000. Five of the seven states to see the biggest gains of people living in such areas were the southern states of Arkansas, Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia. The other two were Indiana and Oregon.   (US Census Bureau)

In the State of the Union Address on January 8, 1964, President Lyndon B. Johnson proposed legislation in response to a national poverty rate of 19% and called it “The War on Poverty.”  As part of what he called “The Great Society”, he proposed expanding the government’s role in education and health care.

The War on Poverty did not last and critics, calling it the welfare state, cut federal programs such as Head Start and the Job Corps.  The results can be seen in the Census Bureau report with one fourth of the population now living in poverty areas. Taking care of our own is no longer a priority in this country.  

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How is the country doing this 4th of July?

Yesterday the Dow hit 17,000 for the first time in history.  President Obama has his detractors, however no one can dispute the numbers.  When he took office the stock market was in the tank, as low as 6469 in March, 2009.  Notwithstanding the crooks on Wall Street who brought about the recession of 2008, the economy has rallied.

Fact Check.Org has published the 2014 Second Quarter Report for July, 2014 and other numbers show a picture that the Obama administration hasn’t been as bad for the economy as the nay sayers would have us believe.

Corporate profits are up a staggering 184% and they continue to hoard vast sums of money with the CPI up just 12%.  The middle class are just holding their own with weekly earning up only 0.3%.  And the economic rebound has been good for the gun manufacturers, with handgun production up 128%.   ☹

Most importantly, Obama has also gotten us out of Iraq and Afghanistan, yet there is a move to get us back into Iraq.  One lesson we seem to have not learned.  Peace.

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