Black Families in Georgia Are Rejecting Public School by Annie Holmquist

During the 1950s and 60s, America’s black families fought a difficult battle to integrate the public schools, hoping to give their children a better education. Because of this hard-won victory, many black parents have been strong supporters of public schools in the subsequent decades.

But that support may be changing.

According to a recent article in the Christian Science Monitor, an increasing number of black families are leaving public schools for the same reason they once embraced them, and are instead gravitating to homeschooling.

Quoting a former public-school-teacher-turned-homeschool-mom named Nikita Bush,The Monitor explains this movement:

“Despite the promises of the civil rights movement, ‘people are starting to realize that public education in America was designed for the masses of poor, and its intent has been to trap poor people into being workers and servants. If you don’t want that for your children, then you look for something else,’ she says.”

While most states prohibit homeschooling parents from teaching anybody except their own children, Georgia has no such restriction.

Bush is not alone in thinking that the public schools are keeping minority children from reaching their potential. According to a poll released in 2016 by The Leadership Conference Education Fund, minority parents “strongly reject the notion that students from low-income families should be held to lower standards.” In fact, “Nine-out-of-ten African Americans and 84 percent of Latinos disagreethat students today work hard enough and instead believe that students should be challenged more to help ensure they are successful later in life.”

Research backs up the opinion that minority children can be challenged to do better – and even do better – in a homeschool environment. A 2015 study conducted by Brian Ray found that black homeschool students scored in the 68th percentile in reading, the 56th percentile in language, and the 50th percentile in math. By contrast, black public school students scored in the 25th, 30th, and 28th percentiles of the same areas (chart).

But while many would admit that these improvements are terrific, many would also be quick to question whether or not a homeschool scenario is feasible for black families, particularly since more than 65 percent of black children are born into single-parent homes. How can black parents manage to work and support their children while simultaneously homeschooling them?

The answer to that, The Christian Science Monitor explains, may be found in Georgia:

“In most states, home-schooling parents tend to be dual-parent and middle- or upper-income … enabling one parent to stay home and teach the kids.

But Georgia is different, says Cheryl Fields-Smith, a professor of education at the University of Georgia. While most states prohibit homeschooling parents from teaching anybody except their own children, Georgia has no such restriction. That has given rise to co-ops, where, in essence, groups of parents serve as rotating teachers, based on their own skill sets, talents, and fortes.

That, Professor Fields-Smith says, has allowed single black moms to band together to give their children an education that they say better reflects their values and history – while still being able to work.”

What’s clear is that parents – even traditional public school supporters – are growing tired of their children coming out of the system with subpar educations.

Is it possible that homeschooling – and the higher academic achievement which seems to accompany it – might be more accessible to more families if other states adopted Georgia’s model and enabled parents to band together and lead their children to success and a bright future?

This article was first published by Intellectual Takeout.

Annie Holmquist

Annie Holmquist

Annie is a research associate with Intellectual Takeout. In her role, she writes for the blog, conducts a variety of research for the organization’s websites and social media pages, and assists with development projects. She particularly loves digging into the historical aspects of America’s educational structure.

Home Ownership Dips to Nearly the Level in 1960

The U.S. home ownership rate, as recently reported by the Census Bureau, dropped to 62.9% in the second quarter of 2016, a rate about equal to the rate of 61.9% reported over a half century ago for 1960. This stagnation compares unfavorably to 1900 to 1960 when the non-farm homeownership rate increased from 36.5% to 61%.-a period encompassing rampant urbanization, immigration, and population growth. For example, the non-farm population quadrupled from about 42 million to 166 million, yet the non-farm home ownership rate increased by 67%. Except for the interruption caused by the Great Depression, the rate of increase was moderate to strong throughout the period.

How can this be? Isn’t there an alphabet soup of federal agencies-FHA, HUD, FNMA, FHLMC, GNMA, RHS, FHLBs-all with the goal of increasing homeownership by making it more “affordable”? Don’t these agencies fund or insure countless trillions of dollars in home loan lending–most with very liberal loan terms? Could it be the federal government massive liberalization of mortgage terms creates demand pressure leading to higher prices? Could it be federal, state, and local governments’ implement land use policies that constrain supply and drive prices up even further? Could it be government housing policies have made homeownership less, not more affordable or accessible?

The answer is an unequivocal yes. Since the mid-1950, liberalized federal lending policies have fueled a massive and dangerous increase in leverage-one that continues to this day. For example, in 1954 FHA loans had an average loan term of 22 years vs. 29.5 years today, an average loan-to-value of 80% vs. 97.5%, average housing debt-to-income ratio of 15% vs. 28%. Only the average borrowing cost in 1954 of 4.5% is the same as it is today. The result is today’s FHA borrower can purchase a home selling for twice as much as one with the underwriting standards in place in 1954-but without a dollar’s increase in income!

The result is that federal policies and a phalanx federal agencies have made the dream of home ownership, particularly for low-income and minority renters: less accessible, less affordable, less of a means to reliable wealth building, and more dangerous.

Home prices have risen substantially faster than incomes. Nationally, the median home price is 3.3 times median income, up from 2.9 times in 1979 and 2.0 (FHA only) in 1954. Today Los Angeles has a median home price 8.8 times median income, up from 4.2 times in 1979. Observers, including the FHA commissioner in 1963, noted: “Under conditions of limited supply, price changes tend to exceed [construction] cost changes.”

The size of new homes has nearly tripled–from 988 square feet in 1950 to 2687 square feet in 2015
. This wouldn’t be a problem if the demand for larger homes came from growing real incomes not growing leverage. This problem was recognized in President Clinton’s 1995 National Homeownership Strategy (NHS), which noted: “The new entry-level or starter home is fast becoming a thing of the past. … During the [1972-1992] period, the median new home size grew from 1,385 square feet to 1,920 square feet, and prices increased accordingly.” NHS’s goal was “to promote expanded production of starter homes … for all families who want and can afford to buy.” Unfortunately, the demand-side features of the NHS promoting higher leverage worked at cross-purposes and ended up financing even larger homes, so that by 2007 and 2015 respectively the average size had increased 31% and 40% since 1992.

The now standard 30-year loan condemns FHA’s and other low-income buyers to a life of debtorship. The 20-year loan term it replaced built wealth rapidly and reliably.

Finally, it has made foreclosures commonplace again. From 1934 to 1957, FHA had an estimated 13,500 insurance claims on defaulted loans (note: in 1957 the US homeownership rate was 60%). From 1958 to 2014 FHA had an estimated 3.5 million insurance claims. This is the direct result of liberalized credit standards. Government policies have become what they were intended to cure. The FHA itself described the problem it faced in 1936-“To many people, “Mortgage” became just another word for trouble-an epitaph on the tombstone of their aspirations for home ownership.”

The answer? Market-rate, economical housing, along with incentives to reduce leverage so as to reliably build wealth. This starts with bending the local and state government regulatory cost curve so as to increase the supply of market rate, economical housing. This is housing that largely serves service, light manufacturing and entry-level workers. Such housing is economical by design, making it naturally affordable, not expensive housing made affordable by government subsidy. Unleashing private enterprise will expand supply, thereby allowing supply and demand to reach equilibrium at lower and more sustainable price points. Undoubtedly the greatest beneficiaries will be low- and moderate-income and minority households.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared on RealClearMarkets.com.

Mr. Trump Make America Great Again by ending Obama’s ‘policy of cheating small businesses’

american small business league logoDear Mr. Trump,

I would like to offer some suggestions based on U.S Census Bureau data that will help you “Make America great again” and “Jump start America.”

The Census Bureau data indicates there are over 28 million small businesses in America and that they are responsible for over 90% of the net new jobs. The Small Business Administration released a report that found businesses with fewer than 20 employees account for 90% of all U.S. firms and are responsible for more than 97% of all new jobs.

American small businesses are responsible for over 50% of the private sector work force, over 50% of the GDP and over 90% of all U.S. exporters are small businesses.

I have made a five-minute video of Obama, Bush, Secretary Clinton and your pal, Ted Cruz, talking about the importance of small businesses to job creation.

Clearly, if you want to create more jobs you can’t do it without helping small businesses. The single largest federal economic stimulus program ever passed by Congress, specifically for small businesses, is the Small Business Act. Today that federal law mandates that a minimum of 23% of the total value of all federal prime contracts be awarded to small businesses. Within that goal is a separate 5% goal for woman-owned small businesses, a 5% goal for minority-owned small businesses and a 3% goal for service disabled veteran owned small businesses.

Here’s the problem, a long series of federal investigations have found most of the money that is supposed to go to small businesses is actually going to Fortune 500 firms and their subsidiaries.

NBC, CBS, ABC, CNN, MSNBC, CNBC, Fox News, RTTV and Mother Jones have all reported on the abuses.

So here is my suggestion, why don’t you promise America’s 28 million small businesses and the 50% of the private sector work force they employ, if you are elected President, you will guarantee they will receive the 23% of all federal contracts the law requires.

If you end the Obama Administration policy of cheating small businesses and small businesses owned by women, minorities and service disabled veterans, I’m sure they will be very very appreciative.

Lloyd Chapman
American Small Business League

Infrastructure Unites Voters in Divisive Election Year — Advantage Trump

MILWAUKEE, Wis. /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — With 90 days left before Election Day, a national poll released Tuesday by the Association of Equipment Manufacturers (AEM) found that half of registered voters say the nation’s infrastructure has gotten worse over the last five years, and a majority of voters said roads and bridges are in “extreme” need of repair.

Donald Trump at the Detroit Economic Club stated:

We will build the next generation of roads, bridges, railways, tunnels, sea ports and airports that our country deserves. American cars will travel the roads, American planes will connect our cities, and American ships will patrol the seas.

AEM notes that the findings were part of a new national poll to gauge voter perceptions and attitudes about the current and future state of U.S. infrastructure amid a high-profile election. The poll found that registered voters, regardless of political affiliation, recognize the declining state of the nation’s infrastructure as an issue that should be addressed and believe that the federal government should do more to improve infrastructure across the board.

“Americans across the political spectrum understand the dire state of U.S. infrastructure and believe that the federal government should do more to improve our infrastructure,” said Dennis Slater, president of AEM. “Voters recognized that increased federal funding for assets such as roads, bridges, and inland waterways will have a positive impact on the economy, and they are looking to the federal government to repair and modernize.”

The national poll identified a number of key findings, including:

  • Nearly half (46 percent) of registered voters believe that the state of the nation’s infrastructure has gotten worse in the last five years.
  • A significant majority (80 – 90 percent) of registered voters say that roads, bridges and energy grids are in some or extreme need of repairs.
  • Half (49 percent) of the surveyed population feel that the federal government is primarily responsible for funding repairs to the nation’s infrastructure.
  • Seven out of every 10 registered voters say increasing federal funding for infrastructure will have a positive impact on the economy.
  • More than eight out of every ten Americans consider water infrastructure (86 percent), solar powered homes (83 percent) and smart infrastructure (82 percent) as the top three important innovations for the future of infrastructure.
  • Voters across the political spectrum think that the federal government should do more to improve the nation’s overall infrastructure, with 68 percent of Republicans, 70 percent of Independents and 76 percent of Democrats sharing this sentiment.

Registered voters also feel that government across the board should be doing more to improve the nation’s overall infrastructure, with 76 percent of individuals surveyed wanting more from state governments, 72 percent looking to the federal government to do more and 70 percent expecting more from local governments.

“Both presidential nominees have voiced their strong support for infrastructure investment,” said Ron De Feo, CEO of Kennametal and chairman of AEM’s Infrastructure Vision 2050 initiative. “The specific ideas and proposals they offer over the next 90 days will be critically important, and voters should consider them carefully on Election Day.”

The national poll was conducted as part of AEM’s ongoing efforts to develop a long-term national vision for U.S. infrastructure. An analysis of the national poll results is available here.

aem logoAbout the Association of Equipment Manufacturers (AEM) – www.aem.org

AEM is the North American-based international trade group providing innovative business development resources to advance the off-road equipment manufacturing industry in the global marketplace. AEM membership comprises more than 850 companies and more than 200 product lines in the agriculture, construction, forestry, mining and utility sectors worldwide. AEM is headquartered in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, with offices in the world capitals of Washington, D.C.; Ottawa, Canada; and Beijing, China.

Open Letter to Rep. Doug Broxson RE: Your vote to give illegal aliens Florida driver licenses

Dear State Representative Broxson,

Many folks in the local media contacted me in regards to the  thousands of dollars in payments from campaign funds which you gave to Kingfish Strategies an LLC set up in part by State Committee Woman Susan Moore a member of the Escambia county Republican Party leadership in Pensacola.

Instead of remaining neutral she decided to take payments from you to assist your campaign in direct conflict with the Republican Party of Florida ethical standards. The Gulf Breeze media is going to print an editorial about it as per the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

Now I am not sure if the Republican Party of Florida or the local Republican Party will investigate this massive conflict of interest by a leader in the Escambia County Republican Party who is or was getting pay offs from your campaign described as consulting fees because the GOP leadership in my option is pretty much as corrupt at the Democrat Party in some regards. But we shall see.

What is amazing though is the flyer your campaign sent out stating that Representatives Mike Hill supports in state tuition for illegal immigrants. It’s a lie but you know this. Politicians like you are slowly but surely being removed by the voters as the American people wake up.

The record does state though that you voted YES to give illegal immigrants access to state government buildings, access to federal buildings and access US airlines with your YES vote to give illegal immigrants a state issued drivers license.

mohammed atta driver license floridaWith this vote that advocates and enables federal immigration law breakers you did  not discriminate against which illegal immigrants you support with a state issued ID. So you are approving in effect a drivers licence to people like Mohammed Atta a terrorist and Saudi citizen and a former resident in Sarasota, Florida who overstayed his visa and flew one of the planes into the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001.

This man  would have been allowed to keep his state issued drivers license as per your vote because he was classified as an illegal immigrant when he overstayed his visa.

So your position from your voting record is to ignore federal immigration laws and enable and reward foreigners who break into our nation via our unsecured borders with a State ID – Drivers License.

This is un-American and would have placed Florida citizens at great risk.  Its is a national security issue and violates U.S. federal immigration law.

Now I don’t care how powerful your name is in this neck of the woods in Florida but when you support this blatant disregard for U.S. immigration law and try to reward those illegals who came here from nations like Syria, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Mexico, Honduras, Guatemala, etc. with a state issued ID you are part of the problem not part of the solution.

Thank goodness Governor Scott vetoed this attack on our sovereignty and national security. 

Your time is up and soon you will be removed from office by we the voters as will others who are working to embrace the Marxist/Progressive policies of Barack Obama and his heir apparent Hillary Clinton.

Detroit: Trump Unveils an Economic Plan for the 99%

Donald Trump gave a major speech at the Detroit Economic Club. Why Detroit? Because Detroit is a symbol of everything Democrats and Hillary embrace: poverty, high taxes, crime, unemployment and government regulation in every person’s life. The 99% have suffered under Detroit’s Democratic leaders.

Trump noted:

Our party has chosen to make new history by selecting a nominee from outside the rigged and corrupt system. The other party has reached backwards into the past to choose a nominee from yesterday – who offers only the rhetoric of yesterday, and the policies of yesterday.

Trump began with the following:

In short, the city of Detroit is the living, breathing example of my opponent’s failed economic agenda. Every policy that has failed this city, and so many others, is a policy supported by Hillary Clinton. She supports the high taxes and radical regulation that forced jobs out of your community…and the crime policies that have made you less safe…and the immigration policies that have strained local budgets…and the trade deals like NAFTA, signed by her husband, that have shipped your jobs to Mexico and other countries… and she supports the education policies that deny your students choice, freedom and opportunity.

She is the candidate of the past. Ours is the campaign of the future.

Trump then laid out twenty-one policies to save Detroit and with it make American great again. Here are the policy statements from Trump’s Detroit speech:

  1. As part of this new future, we will also be rolling out Proposals to increase choice and reduce cost in childcare, offering much needed relief to American families.
  2. I am proposing an across-the-board income tax reduction, especially for middle-income Americans.
  3. [W]e will eliminate the Carried Interest Deduction, a well-known deduction, and other special interest loopholes that have been so good for Wall Street investors, and people like me, but unfair to American workers.
  4. Tax simplification will be a major feature of the plan. Our current tax code is so burdensome and complex that we waste 9 billion hours a year in tax code compliance. We will work with House Republicans on this plan, using the same brackets they have proposed: 12, 25 and 33 percent.
  5. My plan will reduce the current number of [tax] brackets from 7 to 3, and dramatically streamline the process.
  6. My plan will also help reduce the cost of childcare by allowing parents to fully deduct the average cost of childcare spending from their taxes.
  7. [N]o family will have to pay the death tax. American workers have paid taxes their whole lives, and they should not be taxed again at death – it’s just plain wrong. And most people agree with that. We will repeal it.
  8. These reforms will offer the biggest tax revolution since the Reagan Tax Reform, which unleashed years of continued economic growth and job creation. We will Make America Grow Again.
  9. Under my plan, no American company will pay more than 15% of their business income in taxes. In other words, we’re reducing your taxes from 35% to 15%.
  10. We will also give our police and law enforcement the funds and support they need to restore law and order to this country. Without security, there can be no prosperity.We must have law and order.
  11. One of my first acts as President will be to repeal and replace disastrous Obamacare, saving another 2 million American jobs.
  12. We will build the next generation of roads, bridges, railways, tunnels, sea ports and airports that our country deserves. American cars will travel the roads, American planes will connect our cities, and American ships will patrol the seas.
  13. American steel will send new skyscrapers soaring. We will put new American metal into the spine of this nation.
  14. It will be American hands that rebuild this country, and it will be American energy -mined from American sources – that powers this country.
  15. It is time to remove the [federal regulatory] anchor dragging us down, and that’s what it’s doing – it’s dragging us down. Upon taking office, I will issue a temporary moratorium on new agency regulations.
  16. I will ask each and every federal agency to prepare a list of all of the regulations they impose on Americans which are not necessary, do not improve public safety, and which needlessly kill many many jobs. Those regulations will be eliminated quickly.
  17. I have announced we will withdraw from the [TPP] deal before that can ever ever ever happen.
  18. At the center of my plan is trade enforcement with China.
  19. A Trump Administration will end this war on the American worker, and unleash an energy revolution that will bring vast new wealth to our country. According to the Institute for Energy Research, lifting the restrictions on all sources of American energy will: Increase GDP by more than $100 billion dollars annually, add over 500,000 new jobs annually, and increase annual wages by more than $30 billion dollars over the next 7 years; Increase federal, state, and local tax revenues by almost $6 trillion dollars over 4 decades; Increase total economic activity by more than $20 trillion dollars over the next 40 years.
  20. When we reform our tax, trade, energy and regulatory policies, we will open a new chapter in American Prosperity. We can use this new wealth to rebuild our military and our infrastructure.
  21. It will be American workers who are hired to do the job. Americanism, not globalism, will be our new credo.

Trump ended with:

They want you to think small. I am asking you to think big. We are ready to dream great things for our country once again. We are ready to show the world that America is Back — Bigger, and Better and Stronger Than Ever Before.

RELATED VIDEO: Donald Trump’s Full Economic Plan Speech in Detroit, Michigan (August 8, 2016).

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VIDEO: Obamacare and Death by Prescription Drugs

Seeing ObamaCare as a pending disaster, big insurers are cutting their support. It wasn’t a good deal for taxpayers when the only people who signed up were poorer people whose premiums were largely paid by taxpayers. (WSJ, 8-5-16)

“ObamaCare is taxation without representation,” and Dr. Ben Carson was right, ObamaCare is the worst thing since slavery.

Video: Know the TRUTH about the Government Health Care Bill H.R.3200 – Key Points.

Why should our taxes support medical care for people who eat, drink, smoke and abuse as they please?

We shouldn’t ‘Ask-our-doctor’ for a prescription when the huge majority of symptoms come from what people put in their mouths. It’s usually reversible if they know the cause and they change their habits.

But it’s easier said than done. Doing physicals on executives, several said sugar, cheese or meat bothered their joints, but when I got headaches, I didn’t know the cause. I consulted a neurologist who taught medical students and he said food was an unlikely cause of my tension headaches.

But an allergist, member of the American Academy of Environmental Medicine, tested me and found I was allergic to wheat—bread, pasta and pastry. When I quit those foods 100%, no more headaches! This concept applies to most chronic conditions when the doctor doesn’t know the cause, and I was board-certified in internal medicine.

The body builds a tolerance to the allergic food, like to cigarettes—people don’t get sick when they smoke—they get symptoms when they don’t smoke, and that’s how food allergy symptoms can manifest.

If I had started down the path of prescription drugs, I would probably be an addict now, as millions are dependent on drugs for relief of symptoms. A trial of avoiding suspected favorite foods or beverages is recommended (especially with caffeine as it can cause a wide range of problems). Avoidance for a minimum of a week will often increase one’s symptoms for 2-3 days before a person sees improvement by the 5th -7th day.

Alcohol, tobacco and caffeine can cause severe reactions on withdrawal, but fatality is rare. Withdrawal symptoms are just a natural response to the body cleansing itself.

“Drug action always represents artificial interference with the natural functioning of the organism. In the widest sense of the word, every drug is by definition a poison; pharmacology and toxicology are one, and the art of medicine is to use these poisons beneficially.” Drill’s Textbook of Pharmacology in Medicine, Possible Mechanisms of Drug Action, Chapter 5.

Toxicology was the science of how much chemical kills half the lab animals. The rules have changed, but the game is the same due to Adverse Drug Reactions as the leading cause of illness, disability and death, supported by the following medical reports:

Adverse Drug Reactions put 2.2 million people in hospitals and 106,000 died, “making these reactions between the fourth and sixth leading cause of death.” Journal of American Medical Assoc, 4-15-1998

But how many died at home? 199,000 according to the Western Journal of Medicine,  June, 2000. Deaths in and outside hospitals from prescription drugs totaled 305,000, with 8 million admissions to the hospital and 3 million for long-term care (nursing homes–these people were messed up for life, and the drug companies get a free pass from the Supreme Court—they usually can’t be sued for death or damages they caused.

“From 1998 through 2005, reported serious adverse drug events increased 2.6-fold…fatal adverse drug events increased 2.7-fold…” Archives of Internal Medicine, Sept 10, 2007, p 1752.

But if deaths increased 2.7 fold from 1998 to 2005, they are increased 6.9-fold by 2016, because the cause of the increase, TV drug ads approved in 1997, continue unabated—if anything, they are enhanced. 305,000 deaths/year in 1998 have become 2.1 million/year. These aren’t old people in nursing homes like those dying from heart disease –most of these people weren’t in the hospital when the drug was prescribed.

2,100,000 deaths/year is nearly 7000 deaths daily–like two 9-11′s daily! On 9-11, Congress grounded all planes. Why not stop the drugs or hold their makers responsible? For each death, 40 people are hospitalized with serious ADR, and 15 go to a nursing home, messed up for life in most cases.

Confronted with such figures, a U.S. Senator said I was wasting my time, saying “they own us,” referring to the pharmaceutical industry that spends $400 million/year on congressional re-election campaigns, (Marcia Angell, MD, former editor of New England Journal of Medicine, 60 Minutes’ interview).

Congress voted for ObamaCare—20,000 pages largely written by the drug companies, but Congress declines ObamaCare for themselves. How dumb can we be?

People should consider that the last call in the Bible to come out of Babylon, the confused systems of society, Revelation 18.  Verse 23 says all nations are deceived by [pharmakeia, Greek] Medical texts are filled with diseases of “unknown etiology.” They don’t know the cause, so how can the drug be the cure?

Drugs are substances foreign to the body of a poisonous nature. Some people need hormone help with insulin or thyroid and being natural to the body, they aren’t drugs in the same sense of this discussion, though they are regulated by the FDA.

Trumponomics Means More Jobs And Better Pay by Dr. Sean O’Loughlin, Esq.

NEW YORK, New York /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — Sean O’Loughlin, Esq. provides the following statement:

I am one of eleven people in New York City who donated the maximum amount under law to Donald Trump during the primaries.

My expertise is in the area of business and law. The science of business is about satisfying consumer’s wants and needs with products and services at a profit. The science behind making a profit is based upon scarcity and supply and demand.

If a business entity controls a scarce resource that is in demand, there is an opportunity to make a profit if the price of the product times the units sold is greater than the cost of providing the product or service. Products and services that are in high demand with limited supply command higher prices. Labor is a factor of production. The cost of labor is determined by supply and demand. More specifically, if the supply of labor is greater than the demand for labor, wages will decrease. However, if the demand for labor is greater than the supply for labor, wages will go up.

Donald Trump has been advocating two basic principles that will lead to more jobs at higher pay.

  1. The first basic principle is the reduction of business taxes. When businesses are less burdened with taxes, businesses are in a better position to grow. As businesses grow, businesses will need to hire more people.
  2. The second basic principle that Donald Trump has been advocating involves limiting the labor pool. Basic economics dictate that less people in the workforce who are capable of performing a job means higher wages. In addition, major items of the federal budget include social security and social health care programs. More specifically, the more people we have in the United States, the more money the government and the private sector will need to cover health care and retirement costs. The more money spent on health care and retirement costs, the less money there is available to pay wages. Hence, lower business taxes and a smaller labor pool will mean more jobs at better pay.

I urge our youth to vote for a future with better paying jobs.

ABOUT DR. SEAN O’LOUGHLIN, ESQ.

Dr. Sean O’Loughlin, Esq. is a member of PR Newswire, The International Lawyers Association, The New York State Bar Association, The Federalist Society and The U.S. Press Association.

RELATED VIDEO: Donald Trump’s Full Economic Plan Speech in Detroit, Michigan (August 8, 2016).

I’m endorsing Vic Rohe, Candidate for the Sarasota Charter Review Board – District #2

There are 20 Charter Counties in the state of Florida. In 1968, the electors of Florida granted local voters the power to adopt charters to govern their counties. In these counties the Charter Review Board (CRB) members are elected by the citizens of the county. This is the best way to keep local government in check. It is the purest form of power in the hands of the people, not career politicians.

In November 1971 Sarasotans voted to become a Charter County and control county government via an elected board of citizens.

That ability to control county government rather than be controlled by county government is under attack.

vic rohe

Vic Rohe

Vic Rohe is standing against this effort the disenfranchise Sarasotans.

The Sarasota County Charter is like a limited home rule constitution. It describes the structure of county government and the rules it must operate under.

As Rohe puts it, “Asking the County Commission to control their own power, is like asking your dog to guard your lunch.”

The Charter Review Board is made up of 10 unpaid members elected from 5 districts in county wide elections, one from each district every 2 years. The board holds public hearings at which the public can propose changes to the charter. The board then decides to put those changes on the ballot for voter approval, or not.

During a recent campaign stop Rohe warned:

Someone is trying to steal from the voters of Sarasota County. To Steal from us. Someone is trying to steal from you.  I’m talking about your right to elect The Charter Review Board. Also, your right to a fair hearing, of your ideas before that board. Once you loose these rights you will never get them back.

Right now, as we speak, the Charter Review Board has pending a proposal to change this elected [Charter Review] Board into an Appointed “Puppet” Board. That is a puppet of the County Commission. That’s the same County Commission that challenged in court the Term Limits placed on them by the Charter Review Board and the Voters of Sarasota County. But for serendipity, they would have gotten away with it.

Rohe’s opponent appears to favor turning power to government by taking the elected Charter Review Board away from the people. In a recent Republican Party of Sarasota straw poll Rohe is tied with his opponent in District 2:

  • Donna Barcomb: 126 (50%)
  • Vic Rohe: 126 (50%)

Rohe is a political and fiscal conservative who is committed to preserving the rights of the people as expressed in the original intent of the Constitution for the United States.

Rohe has pledged to keep the Sarasota Charter Review Board independent and elected by the voters. Rohe has a track record of service to the Sarasota County community and is well experience in Legal and Regulatory systems.

The benefit of having Vic on the CRB is that he will use his dedication and experience to help shape legislation for voter approval, only when prudent, and discourage ill advised or unnecessary changes to the Charter.

Learn more about Vic Rohe by clicking here.

Rohe wants to save the Charter Review Board from the political insiders and keep it in the hands of the people. That is why I am endorsing Vic Rohe for the Sarasota Charter Review Board in District 2.

 

EU – USSR: Bleeding Utopias by Alexander Maistrovoy

After the Brexit and recent attacks against migrants in Britain, I can’t get rid of a deja vu feeling. As if I’ve already watched this movie a quarter century ago. I know its end, and it’s not a happy one.

In summer of 1989, the Lithuanian Sejm decided to withdraw from the Soviet Union and establish Lithuanian laws in the country. It was the beginning of the end for USSR — a giant corrupt monster, which for 70 years bullied the world and its people under the pretense of communist ideology.

Intimidation and sanctions could not prevent the collapse. A fabricated artificial entity, thoroughly impregnated with falsehood and lies, fell apart like a house of cards.

It came out of the clear blue sky, but the collapse was inevitable, due to the very nature of the “Red empire” — as was the inevitable disintegration of the EU.

Set aside the scenery and the nuances. Without a doubt, EU’s bright and vivid facade does not resemble the meager greyness of the Soviet entourage. Of course, EU hasn’t the power, assertiveness and strict centralization that USSR had. However, supporting structures and the foundation were made from the same materials with the same guidelines.

Lenin_Stalin

Lenin with Joseph Stalin.

One can easily find numerous and fundamental similarities between these two entities.

  • The Soviet Union created a planned, controlled, and unsustainable economy managed by bureaucratic apparatus. The EU did the same, has tried to regulate economy artificially. USSR has redistributed wealth on an equal basis — the EU has been wasting money on benefits to those who refuse to work.
  • The USSR and the EU had imposed an artificial universalist ideology on their people that promised a paradise on earth for next generations. In the USSR it was called Communism. EU calls it “postmodernism”. Using this slogan — “Let’s denounce the old world!” — Soviet apparatchiks, like the European bureaucrats, drove their people to hell.
  • The USSR created a huge bureaucratic machine, dictated ideology in all spheres of life — from politics to theater, architecture and fashion. This bureaucracy was completely cut off from the reality and the citizens. The same happened in the EU.
  • The USSR instituted most severe censorship with persecution of dissidents. By subjugating governments, national media, the academy and the judicial system, the EU has established a cultural totalitarianism. The pursuit of dissidents has been more sophisticated, thus more efficient, veiled by concepts of “tolerance”, “human rights” and “cultural diversity” — a demonic invention.
  • The Soviet Union cultivated a new “formation of people” — the “Soviet people”. Like the unskillful Gnostic Demiurge, the EU cultivated “post-modern people” – consumers without roots, values and moral compass, unable to see the difference between good and evil, fact and fiction. In order to create a “Soviet man”, the USSR deliberately carried out migration of nations, while destroying homogeneous historical communities and arbitrarily creating alien enclaves in the social body of other republics: Ukraine, Baltic States, Moldova, the Caucasus and in Central Asia. EU has intentionally flooded its countries with masses of migrants from Third World countries and Muslim countries to destroy national cultures — labeling the process “multiculturalism”.
  • Communists created the fussy, worthless and senseless art of “Socialist realism”, symbolized by “Worker and Kolkhoz Woman”. Postmodernists invented infantile “postmodern art” with cult of primitivism, rafting archaic forms, meaningless set of sounds and wall paintings.
  • The USSR intimidated its people with the threat of a nuclear apocalypse to distract them from poverty. EU frightens Europeans with environmental apocalypse; promulgating doubtful ideas about global warming by suppressing the real threat of global terrorism, the clash of civilizations and the collapse of the national states.
  • The USSR drained the resources of wealthy republics — the Baltic States and Ukraine — to feed the weak, unproductive South. The EU doesn’t fall behind.
  • The USSR treated the Jews with the “fifth column”, regardless of their contribution to science and medicine. The EU has betrayed the European Jews while obstinately undermining Israel, despite its contribution to science and medicine, only to appease Muslims. The USSR had created the “Palestinian people” and the PLO, coining “anti-Zionism” to ram through its “anti-imperialist” policies. The EU has turned the creation of “a Palestinian state” into “the sacral dogma” of its foreign policy, ignoring the geopolitical reality, Islamic fanaticism and the Middle East chaos.
  • The USSR has been limitlessly and greedily wasting resources to feed its various regimes until it had ultimately collapsed from exhaustion. In its greediness and unscrupulousness, the EU is infinitely expanding by association with Turkey, North Africa and the Caucasus.
  • The USSR had dispersed the miasma of its pseudo-ideology throughout the world under the pretense of “fighting for the freedom of peoples” and “social justice.” The EU is operating in a similar manner.

Wasn’t it a cruel mockery of History that the European Union that was on the verge of collapse virtually awarded itself the Nobel Peace Prize, as it was done by senile Soviet leaders?

I’ve claimed that I know the end of this “movie”. At first, the collapse will occur alongside the borders of “Pink Empire” countries. After that, the very fabric of the social organism of the countries will start to decay. Alien and hostile enclaves already exist in European cities in the form of extraterritorial “Sensitive Urban Zones”, with laws of sharia or clan and tribal law codes. They will expand and become quasi-states inside states. Territorial entities will appear in Europe similar to Abkhazia, South Ossetia, Nagorno-Karabakh, Transnistria and Chechnya, the republic of Donetsk and Luhansk Republic. In the former USSR, these entities get the support of Russia. In the EU, they will get support from giant Islamic world.

Timeworn grievances will flare up. The body of the crumbling “United Europe” will be covered with ulcers and bleeding wounds. European states (including perhaps new ones such as Scotland, Catalonia, Wallonia and so on) will have to regain power with force, to declare states of emergency, to carry out repressive measures. Dictatorship will be the alternative for chaos, and it will be the end of democracy. Bellum omnium contra omnes (“The war of all against all”) will bring Western Europe back to the “Social Contract” of Hobbes, i.e. to voluntary tyranny. Ironically, hundreds of thousands of migrants will become victims of “multiculturalism”.

The elite will either flee or will “adapt”, like Soviet apparatchiks after “Perestroika” who became oligarchs and Orthodox nationalists.

One more experiment comes to an end, leaving behind anarchy and ruin. The EU-SSR elite has destroyed prosperous countries just in a few decades – ironically, they’ve achieved even more than geriatric Soviet elite.

Alexander Maistrovoy is the author of Agony of Hercules or a Farewell to Democracy (Notes of a Stranger), published recently by Xlibris, Available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

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The Tax Army Is Three Times Larger than the U.S. Army by Donald J. Boudreaux

The Office of Management and Budget has released new data on the amount of time Americans spend complying with the federal tax code. Tax Foundation summarizes the data here.

Individuals and businesses spend 8.9 billion hours a year on federal tax paperwork, which is equivalent to 4.3 million people working full-time and year-round on this unproductive activity. That “tax army” is three times larger than our uniformed military of 1.4 million active duty service members.

The burden of tax paperwork can be expressed in dollars. Based on the average earnings of U.S. workers, Tax Foundation finds that federal tax paperwork imposes a $409 billion annual cost on the economy.

The main reason to overhaul the tax code is to increase incentives for working, investing, and other productive activities. But you can appreciate how wasteful the tax code is by considering the paperwork burden of particular provisions. For example, the federal estate tax imposes $20 billion a year in paperwork costs, but the tax only raises $21 billion a year for the government. It clearly makes no sense to impose a tax if it costs as much to collect as the money raised.

The largest paperwork costs stem from the income tax. Tax Foundation has found that replacing the federal income tax with a simple flat tax would reduce the paperwork burden by about 90 percent. With that reform, Americans would be at peace with the tax code, and we could demobilize the tax army.

Cross-posted from DownsizingGovernment.org.

Chris Edwards

Chris Edwards

Chris Edwards is the director of tax policy studies at Cato and editor of DownsizingGovernment.org.

The CBS Cover-up of ‘Hillary Rodham Clinton’s war on gun rights’

BELLEVUE, Wash. /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — The Second Amendment Foundation today condemned attempts by the agenda-driven media, led by CBS, to provide cover for Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton’s war on gun rights by trying to debunk Republican Donald Trump’s statement Thursday night that Clinton “wants to essentially abolish the Second Amendment.”

Donald Trump during his acceptance speech warned,

[I]f you want to hear the corporate spin, the carefully-crafted lies, and the media myths — the Democrats are holding their convention next week.

“CBS News and others argue that Trump’s allegation is not true, and that ‘Clinton has spoken up for Second Amendment rights on several occasions,'” noted SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb. “They are being disingenuous at best, and they know it.

“More than a year ago,” he recalled, “Clinton made gun control a cornerstone of her campaign. She talked about using Australia’s gun confiscation as something that might be considered. She told a private fund raiser last October that she thinks the Supreme Court was wrong on the Second Amendment, and in an interview withGeorge Stephanopoulos, she even questioned whether the Second Amendment protects an individual right.

“While admitting that Clinton wants to renew the ban on modern sporting rifles and repeal a law that protects firearms manufacturers from frivolous harassment lawsuits, the official media spin today is that she’s never actually said she would abolish the Second Amendment,” Gottlieb stated. “That’s like saying an arsonist really doesn’t intend to burn a building, even though he’s splashing gasoline on the walls.

“The media has adopted the anti-gun lobby’s lexicon,” he added. “They routinely use deceptive terms like ‘gun safety’ and ‘gun violence prevention’ when they are really talking about gun control or gun prohibition. It is intellectually dishonest and we’re going to call them on it.”

He said SAF will soon launch a “Media Action Plan” to counter what he calls “rapidly growing anti-gun propaganda in the news media.”

“The media wants to build a wall around Hillary Clinton,” he said, “protecting her anti-gun agenda from public scrutiny. We are going to tear down that wall, brick by deceptive brick. A right that is strangled by regulation isn’t a right at all, but a highly-restricted government-controlled privilege. The media is wrong to water down Clinton’s gun control agenda, and we intend to reveal the truth.”

ABOUT THE SECOND AMENDMENT FOUNDATION

The Second Amendment Foundation (www.saf.org) is the nation’s oldest and largest tax-exempt education, research, publishing and legal action group focusing on the Constitutional right and heritage to privately own and possess firearms.  Founded in 1974, The Foundation has grown to more than 650,000 members and supporters and conducts many programs designed to better inform the public about the consequences of gun control.

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Test Your Climate Knowledge with Five Easy Questions

Climate Change Dispatch has a five question test to see if you understand climate change. Here it is. Take it and see how you do.

If your friends can’t understand why you don’t believe in man-made global warming, give them this simple, five-question quiz. They may realize they don’t know as much about global warming as they think.

1. The primary greenhouse gas in the atmosphere is:

[a] Nitrous Oxide

[b] Carbon Dioxide

[c] Methane

[d] Water Vapor

2. Carbon dioxide comprises what percentage of the Earth’s atmosphere?

[a] 400%

[b] 40%

[c] 4%

[d] 0.04%

3. When reviewing our planet’s long geologic history, the current level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is:

[a] Among the highest levels ever recorded

[b] Among the lowest levels ever recorded

[c] About average

4. Each new molecule of carbon dioxide added to the atmosphere traps:

[a] The same amount of heat as the previous additional molecule

[b] More heat than the previous molecule

[c] Less heat than the previous molecule

5. In the twentieth century, solar output was:

[a] The same as it’s always been

[b] The lowest in 1,000 years.

[c] The highest in 1,000 years.

ANSWERS:

1. [d] Water vapor. Roughly 80% of the Earth’s “greenhouse effect” is sustained by water vapor.

2. [d] 0.04%. Carbon dioxide is a minor constituent in the atmosphere, which is dominated by Nitrogen (78%) and Oxygen (21%).

3. [b] Carbon dioxide levels are currently among the lowest ever recorded in Earth’s 4.5-billion-year history.

4. [c] Less heat. Carbon dioxide follows a logarithmically declining function. That means, it exponentially loses the ability to trap heat as its concentration increases.

5. [c] The highest in 1,000 years. Starting in the latter part of the 1800s, solar activity ramped back up to the peak output previously seen during the Roman Warm Period (250-400 AD) and the Medieval Warm Period (950-1250 AD).

EDITORS NOTE: If you get more than two answers wrong, you may begin reading Climate Change Dispatch regularly for a crash course in climatology.

The TSA Descends from Incompetence to Inhumanity by Becky Akers

As Americans celebrated their freedom this Fourth of July, headlines graphically proved how diminished that liberty is. Hannah Cohen, 18 years old and severely disabled from a brain tumor, sued the TSA and local cops for beating her bloody. Hannah’s “crime”? She had neither understood nor complied with their orders when trying to board a flight the year before.

The TSA is diminishing our liberty.In June 2015, Hannah and her mother, Shirley, were returning home from St Jude’s Medical Center. Hannah’s tumor and the radiation treating it have left her “partially deaf, blind in one eye, paralyzed, and easily confused…” Not surprisingly, such “substantial limitation[s are] obvious on sight.” No one could have mistaken Hannah for a healthy passenger as the Cohens approached the Transportation Security Administration’s checkpoint in Memphis, TN.

Hannah wore a shirt with sequins on it. Those metallic bits triggered the TSA’s scanner. “‘You could see on the screen what it was pointing out,’ Shirley said. …Agents told Hannah they needed to take her to a ‘sterile area’ where they could search her further. She was afraid, Shirley said, and offered to take off the sequined shirt as she was wearing another underneath, but a female agent laughed at her. … Shirley … [explained to] a supervisor standing nearby. ‘She is a St Jude’s patient, and she can get confused…’” In response, the TSA summoned “’armed guards.’”

Those “guards” grabbed Hannah’s arms, further scaring her. “’I tried to push away,’she said. ‘I tried to get away.’”

But “…in the next instant,” Shirley recalled, “one of them had her down on the ground and hit her head on the floor. There was blood everywhere…” The heartrending picture Mrs. Cohen snapped of her daughter documents the bloody scene as well as Hannah’s terror and anguish.

Not Isolated

Tragically, this incident was neither isolated nor a misunderstanding. Far too many sick, elderly, and otherwise vulnerable victims have endured similar horrors at American airports. Worse, not all of them have lived to tell about it.

In 2005, the TSA’s air marshals killed a 44-year-old Christian missionary suffering from manic depression. Rigoberto Alpizar, jittery and upset, had tried to disembark from a flight preparing to leave Miami, FL. Two marshals followed him off the plane and shot him in the jetway. They claimed he was shouting about a bomb. Other passengers denied that, insisting they heard the word “bomb” only from the police who later questioned them.

To be fair, most of the TSA’s prey doesn’t wind up bloodied or dead. They deal instead with crushing and very public humiliation. Just ask Thomas Sawyer. A bout with cancer of the bladder pushed him into the TSA’s hands—literally. “’Evidently the scanner picked up on my urostomy bag, because I was chosen for a pat-down procedure. … [E]very time I tried to tell them about my medical condition, they said they didn’t need to know … One agent watched as the other used his flat hand to go slowly down my chest. I tried to warn him that he would hit the bag and break the seal … but he ignored me. Sure enough, the seal was broken and urine started dribbling down my shirt and my leg and into my pants.’” No wonder Mr. Sawyer was so “absolutely humiliated” he “couldn’t even speak … They never apologized. They never offered to help …”

Comply Or Else

The TSA’s ferocity extends even to children, including sick or disabled ones. Four-year-old Ryan Thomas was “born 16 weeks prematurely. His ankles are malformed and his legs have low muscle tone.” He required braces to walk. When his parents tried to fly with him, the TSA insisted that they not only remove his braces after the metal detector beeped but that he walk through the machine without them. Nor did his father’s protests avail (“I told [the TSA’s supervisor], ‘This is overkill. He’s 4 years old. I don’t think he’s a terrorist'”).

What has happened to Americans that we tolerate such savagery against the weakest among us?Little girls fare no better. Lucy Forck’s parents hoped to introduce their 3-year-old daughter to Mickey Mouse. But Lucy’s spina bifida confines her to a wheelchair. That allowed the TSA to traumatize her until, “weeping uncontrollably,” she finally screamed, “I don’t want to go to Disney World!” Adding insult to injury, the TSA also “confiscated Lucy’s stuffed toy, ‘Lamby’ … ‘She was crying for her stuffed animal which they wouldn’t let her have for the longest time,’ [Lucy’s father] said. ‘It’s only about a half foot long … but she loves it.’”

What has happened to Americans that we tolerate such savagery against the weakest among us? Does terrorism so menace aviation that children in wheelchairs must forfeit Lamby while manic-depressive passengers are gunned down in jetways?

The officials responsible for the TSA continually assure us that it does; other sources dispute that. But even if the threat were as perilous as self-interested bureaucrats contend, does that excuse the TSA’s mortification of patients with urostomy bags and its brutalizing half-blind, half-deaf teens? Does fear of terrorism—or of anything else—justify gross inhumanity?

The Pat Down

The TSA’s cruelty towards sick, injured or elderly passengers is only one of its sins; its ordinary policies and practices are every bit as immoral. Consider the agency’s notorious “pat downs.”

If we haven’t abolished the TSA for its incompetence, let’s do so for its immorality.As the TSA itself admits that it “has used pat downs since … 2002.” But it never concedes that they are indistinguishable from sexual assault, though neither the TSA’s employees nor passengers can tell the difference. Last year, when “two … screeners at Denver International Airport … were discovered manipulating passenger screening systems to allow a male TSA employee to fondle the genital areas of attractive male passengers,” the District Attorney couldn’t pursue charges because none of the eleven victims had complained.

Test after test demonstrates that the TSA can’t find the weapons and explosives on passengers that supposedly justify its existence. And independent experts in security condemn not only “pat downs” but the agency’s entire rigmarole as hopelessly ineffective: “Most of the layers of security are little more than illusions reinforced by a government agency that feeds off the paranoia and fear of the masses. Doing away with them would make America’s transportation systems no less safe.”

And far more humane. If we haven’t abolished the TSA for its incompetence, let’s do so for its immorality.

ABOUT BECK AKERS

An Amazing Fossil Fuel Advocacy Success Story

Cover - Moral Case for Fossil FuelsA couple months ago I spoke to the Alaska Oil and Gas Association and met a very bright industry member, Ethan Atwood, who told me how he and his company had become incredibly effective advocates by using the moral case for fossil fuels. He recently shared his story on my podcast, Power Hour. Here’s an edited excerpt:

I was offered a job in the oil and gas sector to come up and work in Canada for a company that does oil and gas service. I wasn’t really excited about the idea of it.

When I decided that it was probably OK to do, it was with some reservations, basically thinking to myself “well it is not that bad and we’re just a service company,” and then I got up and started working and I found out wow, we are actually doing… we are actually part of fracking and fracking is bad. Fracking is a bad word and is a bad thing and, you know, I had a little bit of a dilemma there as well.

After a couple of years of working in the industry one of the vice presidents at our company found your book and started to talk about the moral case for fossil fuel and started shaping really the narrative of our company and even the community. So we started talking about it in groups and inside the company that maybe the oil and gas industry is actually a good thing and we are actually contributing to the health and well-being of others.

And we’ve gone from feeling apologetic when people say “Hey, what do you do?” Instead, we say “Yeah, I’m really proud about it and all the stuff you hear about it, I’d like to talk to you about it a little bit more.” And every time we start that people say “Oh, I never really thought about it that way.” And the vast majority of people I speak with, I would say nearing 100%, with just 5 minutes of discussion are willing to concede that it actually is a good thing.

In the interview, Atwood shares his advice for companies on how to replicate his success. Above all he recommended starting employees with this interview/debate, so employees can see how the moral case framework challenges the traditional framework, and then following it with The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels. (You can also start with our new free, two-page preview.)

3 Speeches to Empower Companies

On the topic of employee empowerment, I’ve recently expanded the number of speeches available to companies and trade groups. If one of these might be a good fit for your company, let me know.

Included for every participant is a copy…

New! How to Talk to Anyone About Energy Workshop

A half-day workshop with lots of live practice, demonstrations, and feedback where I teach you how to talk one-on-one to stakeholders, whether attackers, non-supporters, and supporters about your most important energy issues. Included is a copy of our online course How to Talk to Anyone About Energy, but the in-person version is much more customized to your particular issues and your particular team.

The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels

My flagship introductory talk that has inspired tens of thousands of employees to be proud of their work and share that pride with others.

Arguing to 0 vs. Arguing to 100: How to Get Off the Defensive and Take the Moral High Ground

Designed for communications teams and senior executives, this talk explains why companies and trade groups are always on the defensive—and how to reframe the conversation to take the moral high ground and win over stakeholders.