Caught in the act!

Our own Rep. Woolsey was snapped in the act of working a crossword puzzle on the House floor. I guess she had no pressing bills to read herself to prepare for votes. And maybe it was too much trouble to actually listen to her colleagues speaking. Oh well, she is retiring next year. Perhaps she doesn’t think it is necessary to do something more productive since she is a lame duck?

Seriously, eveyone needs a little down time, but pick your time and place better. A member of Congress should be have something more important to do than The Washington Post crossword.

Setting Democrats right on Social Security

The Press Democrat and Watch Sonoma County feature a “Close to Home” op-ed piece by North Coast Rep. Mike Thompson entitled, “GUEST OPINION: Social Security is not broken, broke or bankrupt.” Since the new congressional districts that will be effective in 2012 will put many of us current District 6 voters into the central district in which he is expected to run, it is important to take note of his attempts to feed the citizenry the “reassuring” line that everything is okay with Social Security. Lynn Woolsey, of course, has also expressed this same, incorrect view. These two Democrats are not the only ones of their party who fail to understand the need for firm and immediate action to put Social Security on a sustainable path again. Back in February of this year, FactCheck.org published a refutation of the Democrats’ contentions that Social Security doesn’t add to the deficit. This blog too has discussed Rep. Woolsey’s blatant misunderstanding of Social Security. Here, for example.

Mike Thompson also needs to educate himself on the realities of Social Security (and Medicare). The Social Security and Medicare Boards of Trustees, in A Summary of 2011 Annual Reports , clearly tells Congress:

Projected long-run program costs for both Medicare and Social Security are not sustainable under currently scheduled financing, and will require legislative corrections if disruptive consequences for beneficiaries and taxpayers are to be avoided.

The financial challenges facing Social Security and Medicare should be addressed soon. If action is taken sooner rather than later, more options and more time will be available to phase in changes so that those affected can adequately prepare.

In the Trustees’ 2010 Report as reported by The Heritage Foundation, there was this admonition:

• Social Security must be reformed—now. Today’s Social Security program cannot last. The report shows that there is a 95 percent chance that Social Security will run permanent annual multi-billion-dollar deficits starting around 2015. The system has promised trillions of dollars more in benefits than it will have the ability to pay.

And “The CBO’s Long-Term Projections for Social Security: Infographic” and “The CBO’s Long-Term Projections for Social Security: Additional Information” shows that reform is necessary if the program is going to be there for Americans in the future.

It is necessary for Congress to act now to make the prudent reforms In 2010, the CBO released recommendations for reform options. Both Lynn Woolsey and Mike Thompson should study these and get on board.

Lynn Woolsey speaks to Fox News about outdoing Mr. Obama on jobs

In an interview this morning with Fox News, Rep. Woolsey talked up the Congressional Progressive Caucus’ (CPC) alternative to Pres. Obama’s jobs plan. She explained that the CPC supports the president’s plan but just wants it to be a lot more encompassing. In other words: spend, spend, spend money we don’t have to “create” jobs through government bureaucracy.

Not a word about how to actually, practically create jobs. Just that they are needed right now and here. Yes, Rep. Woolsey, Sonoma County does have at least 10% unemployment, and we do need to get our economy moving and more jobs created. But as usual you ignore the private sector and think the only engine available is the government. And that is bass-ackwards!

Jobs will be created again by the private sector (where they should be) when the government (at all levels) ceases to interfere so much and confidence is restored.

I hope this county will elect representatives (2) to the House next year who understand economics far better than does either Rep. Woolsey or Pres. Obama! 

 

 

DHS changes TSA policy for touching children

Golly, Big Brother, are we supposed to be ever so grateful for this new policy Sec. Napolitano just announced? She told the country ” that children will no longer have to take off their shoes when passing through security, and will be subject to a revised pat-down from Transportation Security Administration (TSA) officers with less frequency than they currently are.” Her exact words were:

“We have also been piloting programs to deal with children under the age of 12 with respect to not only taking off their shoes but also pat-down procedures and we hope over the coming weeks and months to be able to begin rolling that out,”

The U.S. government’s idea of keeping people safe at airports continues to violate the constitutional rights of the innocent — the rights of children and also adults. And has Rep. Woolsey said or done a thing to change this unnecessary and outrageous policy? NO. She has been quite worthless as an advocate on this issue.

Congress needs to rein in the TSA and the DHS. It is within Congress’ power and purview. That representative body needs to act.

The 10th Anniversary

from http://www.world-memorial.org/Credits/info.html

 

BRIAN DOYLE: A couple leaped from the south tower, hand in hand. They reached for each other and their hands met, and they jumped. I try to whisper prayers for the sudden dead and the harrowed families of the dead and the screaming souls of the murderers, but I keep coming back to his hand in her hand, nestled in each other with such extraordinary, ordinary, naked love. It’s the most powerful prayer I can imagine, the most eloquent, the most graceful. It’s everything we’re capable of against horror and loss and tragedy.

It’s what makes me believe that we’re not fools to believe in God, to believe that human beings have greatness and holiness within them, like seeds that open only under great fire, to believe that who we are persists past what we were, to believe, against evil evidenced hourly, that love is why we are here.

[From the 2002 PBS documentary Faith and Doubt. A longer version of this meditation on one of the tragedies of 9/11 appears in “Leap,” first published in The American Scholar and then reprinted in The Best Spiritual Writing 2002.]

 

I'm wearing this lapel pin (smaller diameter) proudly today.

Rep. Woolsey to talk about government’s “role” in creating jobs…

Next Tuesday at 11:00 a.m., a panel including Lynn Woolsey will discuss “Government Works: Growing JOBS in the North Bay.” According to the announcement posted on our congresswoman’s website, other “experts” on the panel will be

• Sylvia Allegretto, Research Economist at the UC Berkeley Center on Wage and Employment Dynamics
• Bill Scott, Secretary-Treasurer, Marin Building Trades Council
• Ruben Perez, Business Owner, Napa Electric
• Chris Snyder, District Representative, International Union of Operating Engineers Local 3
• Lisa Maldonado, Executive Director, North Bay Labor Council, AFL-CIO

The public is encouraged to attend — although the time certainly isn’t convenient for working individuals — and the event is sponsored by “the North Bay Labor Council and SEIU Local 1021.”

How typical is it that Lynn Woolsey would associate herself with something advocating “job creation” by government? Government is her answer, her crutch, for everything. She doesn’t fathom that a healthy nation’s economy MUST have a primarily private sector job creation engine. Jobs “created” by government are subsidized by the taxpayers; jobs created by free enterprise actually expand the tax base. In other words, the former feeds off the public trough; the latter does not and provides jobs that increase the country’s treasure rather than diminish it.

It is important that we who understand that real jobs are created by the private sector show ourselves at this event and counter the “leftist” views that will undoubtedly be bandied about as “facts.” Go, if you can!

Lynn Woolsey goes to Fidel Castro’s birthday party

Well, not quite. No birthday cake with the dictator. But she did travel to Cuba “for” the Castro’s 85th birthday and met with his daugther. Rep. Woolsey and two others of the Congressional Progressive Caucus took this junket sponsored by the “Center for Democracy in the Americas,  an ultra-left organization with strong ties to the Castro regime.”

Audit the Fed.

 

A renewed effort to legislate an audit of the Federal Reserve is underway. Believe it or not, Lynn Woolsey was a supporter of this proposal when it was introduced previously. I applauded her for that stand. Unfortunately, various backdoor efforts to change and water down the bill in the Senate caused it to lose the wide backing it had garnered in the House, and no bill was passed. Now, the House version of this bill (H.R. 459) has 162 cosponsors and happily again Rep. Woolsey is among that number! I hope every politician in Congress, regardless of party, will support this necessary tool for getting our fiscal house in order in Washington D.C. At this website Americans can sign the petition urging Congress to make it happen this time.

Dan Roberts to run for Congress in 2012

The first person to declare serious intention to run as a Republican candidate for Congress in Sonoma/Marin is Dan Roberts. The Marin Independent Journal listed him as a potential candidate in a recent article that also mentioned the many Democrat declared and considering contenders (Jarod Huffman, Norman Solomon, Tiffany Renee, Susan Adams, and others). Today, he posted on WSC, indicating his plan to move forward, although as yet I see no report of his having filed official papers (and I trust that in the future he will post with proper capitalization rather than all lower-case letters). However, he does have a campaign website which I urge all to peruse. Mr. Roberts has run previously as an American Independent. His published platform is as follows:

Platform:

• Pursue fiscal soundness i.e. demand a Balanced Federal Budget.
• Less government: Ronald Reagan “government is the problem not the solution.”
• Allow the private sector to succeed.
• Benign foreign policy: no wars of adventure.  Stop nation building.
• Fairness in tax policy: “all pay some, not some pay all.”
• Strong support of Israel.  No nuclear proliferation in the Middle East.
• Follow dictates of U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights.

These are solid American values, and we sorely need them to be fully represented in Congress. I am encouraged to hear of Mr. Roberts’ intention to run.

More people calling themselves “conservative” — Gallup

 

A new poll by Gallup reports

If this pattern continues, 2011 will be the third straight year that conservatives significantly outnumber moderates — the next largest ideological bloc. Liberalism has been holding steady for the past six years, averaging either 21% or 22%, although notably higher than the 17% average seen in Gallup polling during the early to middle ’90s.

Conservatives can be Republicans, Democrats, Libertarians, etc. It isn’t a matter of what political party one joins so much as what core beliefs one espouses and puts into practice. It is time that conservatives in our area participate more openly and strongly in the political process here. Just because there are more Democrats here doesn’t necessarily mean that the majority of people here approve of the uncontrolled spending of the progressives/liberals or of some of the other big-government, big-interventionist policies they try to force down our throats. So, no matter what party we belong to, let’s find, support and vote for candidates in the next election who will represent us and a more conservative political perspective!

Lynn Woolsey is retiring. She does not have to be replaced by a clone of herself. It is time for real CHANGE in 2012!