Dems Inch Closer To Stealing the Minnesota Senate Race

Didn’t I say this would happen? Was it really that hard to predict?

They are “finding” votes for Franken. And by “finding” I mean in very suspicious places and circumstances.

KSAX TV is reporting that 32 ballots turned up in a car owned by Minneapolis elections director Cynthia Reichert. That’s right, they just “turned up” with no rhyme or reason. Apparently, the ballots had been sitting in her car for several days and she apparently felt no reason whatsoever to report them until now.

Judge: New Ballots Will Be Counted In Senate Race
KSAX TV
November 10, 2008

The integrity of those ballots has clearly been compromised but they are going to be counted anyway.

Amanda Carpenter at Town Hall has some more about why this is turning out to be a very suspicious recount and why we should all be concerned about it:

Nearly every development of the Minnesota Senate recount between Republican incumbent Norm Coleman and comedian-turned-candidate Al Franken has favored Franken. On Election Day, Coleman was 725 votes ahead of Franken. That margin was so slim it triggered a mandatory recount to be conducted by Minnesota Secretary of State Mark Ritchie (D.). That edge winnowed to 477 on Wednesday, 338 on Thursday and then 221 on Friday. 100 of the votes that came in for Franken’s favor from Mountain Iron and St. Louis counties were time stamped on November 2—two days before the election. Ccunty election officials says the voting machines just had the wrong date, but Coleman’s staff doesn’t think they are legit. Every single one of the votes from these two counties went for Franken and Obama. “Obviously, this is highly suspicious. They found 100 votes, and it’s statistically impossible that all 100 votes went to the two Democrats, even in St. Louis County,” Coleman’s campaign manager Cullen Sheehan told the Star-Tribune.

For those who think that the questionable voter registration activities of ACORN are “no big deal,” reality shows us clearly that it is a very big deal.

Update On The MN Senate Race
Amanda Carpenter
TownHall.com
November 10, 2008

Democratic Leaders In The U.S. House Discuss Confiscating 401(k)s, IRAs

So, how hot are the Dems to implement a Marxian plan to take money away from those who worked to earn it and give it to those who did not work to earn it? Pretty hot, it would seem.

The Dems have been discussing such a plan and are trying to disguise it as some sort of retirement rescue package.

What it comes down to is theft. Theft of your hard earned money. Writing for the Carolina Journal, Karen McMahan provides us with the details we need to know about:

Democrats in the U.S. House have been conducting hearings on proposals to confiscate workers’ personal retirement accounts including 401(k)s and IRAs and convert them to accounts managed by the Social Security Administration. Triggered by the financial crisis the past two months, the hearings reportedly were meant to stem losses incurred by many workers and retirees whose 401(k) and IRA balances have been shrinking rapidly. The testimony of Teresa Ghilarducci, professor of economic policy analysis at the New School for Social Research in New York, in hearings Oct. 7 drew the most attention and criticism. Testifying for the House Committee on Education and Labor, Ghilarducci proposed that the government eliminate tax breaks for 401(k) and similar retirement accounts, such as IRAs, and confiscate workers’ retirement plan accounts and convert them to universal Guaranteed Retirement Accounts (GRAs) managed by the Social Security Administration.

Several things to note about this. First, elimination of the tax breaks means that you, the worker, will have a higher tax bill and therefore less money to take care of your family with. Second, the recommendation is to directly confiscate your money, whether you like it or not. Third, and this should cause everyone the most concern, turn that confiscated money over to the Social Security Administration. Yes, the same Social Security Administration that is in danger of bankrupting the entire Federal Government several years down the road because of mismanagment and paying out more than it brings in.

So, what exactly is the plan being discussed? Let’s see:

GRAs would guarantee a fixed 3 percent annual rate of return, although later in her article Ghilarducci explained that participants would not “earn a 3% real return in perpetuity.” In place of tax breaks workers now receive for contributions and thus a lower tax rate, workers would receive $600 annually from the government, inflation-adjusted. For low-income workers whose annual contributions are less than $600, the government would deposit whatever amount it would take to equal the minimum $600 for all participants. In a radio interview with Kirby Wilbur in Seattle on Oct. 27, 2008, Ghilarducci explained that her proposal doesn’t eliminate the tax breaks, rather, “I’m just rearranging the tax breaks that are available now for 401(k)s and spreading the wealth.” All workers would have 5 percent of their annual pay deducted from their paychecks and deposited to the GRA. They would still be paying Social Security and Medicare taxes, as would the employers. The GRA contribution would be shared equally by the worker and the employee. Employers no longer would be able to write off their contributions. Any capital gains would be taxable year-on-year.

By her own admission, Ghilarducci shows that this has nothing to do with fixing Social Security or providing a “fix” to a “broken” retirement system. It is all about confiscating money from people who worked to earn it and giving it to people who did not work to earn it. Notice that the Social Security Taxes are still in place which means you are double-paying into the system. Under this plan, not only do you lose control of your own retirement account, but the government will determine how large it will get, how much of your money to confiscate, who will get that money and you get to pay capital gains taxes on top of it all!

And what are the effects of this plan? Read on:

Analysts point to another disturbing part of the plan. With a GRA, workers could bequeath only half of their account balances to their heirs, unlike full balances from existing 401(k) and IRA accounts. For workers who die after retiring, they could bequeath just their own contributions plus the interest but minus any benefits received and minus the employer contributions. Another justification for Ghilarducci’s plan is to eliminate investment risk. In her testimony, Ghilarducci said, “humans often lack the foresight, discipline, and investing skills required to sustain a savings plan.” She cited the 2004 HSBC global survey on the Future of Retirement, in which she claimed that “a third of Americans wanted the government to force them to save more for retirement.” What the survey actually reported was that 33 percent of Americans wanted the government to “enforce additional private savings,” a vastly different meaning than mandatory government-run savings. Of the four potential sources of retirement support, which were government, employer, family, and self, the majority of Americans said “self” was the most important contributor, followed by “government.” When broken out by family income, low-income U.S. households said the “government” was the most important retirement support, whereas high-income families ranked “government” last and “self” first (2004 HSBC Global survey).

The things to notice here: Ghilarducci basically lied about the HSBC survey she quoted. Also note that this plan is a back door to another inheritance tax. Lastly, from the real survey results, you can see that the lower income households are looking at this plan as a means of getting more money without actually having to work for it.

It does not surprise me that the Dems are seriously looking into a plan like this. It is everything their presidential candidate embraces in terms of a Marxist redistriubution of the wealth.

We need to keep a close eye on these Dems and let them know that we will not tolerate them dragging the United States into the socialist hell that is Europe and most third-world nations.

You can access the complete article on-line here:

Dems Target Private Retirement Accounts
Karen McMahan
Carolina Journal
November 4, 2008

Washington Post Confesses To Biased Reporting During The 2008 Presidential Campaign

The one thing about making an accusation against anyone is that those who are doing the accusing are under the requirement to prove the accusation. However, a confession requires no such proof at all.

Washington Post ombudsman Deborah Howell has released just such a confession. From her November 9th column:

The Post provided a lot of good campaign coverage, but readers have been consistently critical of the lack of probing issues coverage and what they saw as a tilt toward Democrat Barack Obama. My surveys, which ended on Election Day, show that they are right on both counts. … Bill Hamilton, assistant managing editor for politics, said, “There are a lot of things I wish we’d been able to do in covering this campaign, but we had to make choices about what we felt we were uniquely able to provide our audiences both in Washington and on the Web. I don’t at all discount the importance of issues, but we had a larger purpose, to convey and explain a campaign that our own David Broder described as the most exciting he has ever covered, a narrative that unfolded until the very end. I think our staff rose to the occasion.”

As Bill Hamilton’s comments show, this was not an accident. It was a deliberate decision made by the editorial staff of the Post itself. The “larger purpose” he alludes to is getting Barack Obama elected.

More:

The op-ed page ran far more laudatory opinion pieces on Obama, 32, than on Sen. John McCain, 13. There were far more negative pieces about McCain, 58, than there were about Obama, 32, and Obama got the editorial board’s endorsement. The Post has several conservative columnists, but not all were gung-ho about McCain. Stories and photos about Obama in the news pages outnumbered those devoted to McCain. Reporters, photographers and editors found the candidacy of Obama, the first African American major-party nominee, more newsworthy and historic.

So, the Post was more interested in making “history” than they were in presenting a fair, objective and unbiased report of the news. That doesn’t surprise me, but I think many people were done a huge disservice by it.

This little tidbit is very telling:

But Obama deserved tougher scrutiny than he got, especially of his undergraduate years, his start in Chicago and his relationship with Antoin “Tony” Rezko, who was convicted this year of influence-peddling in Chicago. The Post did nothing on Obama’s acknowledged drug use as a teenager.

Note that last sentence. It is not an accusation coming from a right-of-center blogger. It is a confession coming from a left-of-center publication.

And this:

One gaping hole in coverage involved Joe Biden, Obama’s running mate. When Gov. Sarah Palin was nominated for vice president, reporters were booking the next flight to Alaska. Some readers thought The Post went over Palin with a fine-tooth comb and neglected Biden. They are right; it was a serious omission.

Those of us who engage in politcal research and analysis would do very well to remember this in 2010 and 2012 as well as keeping it in the backs of our minds over the next four years as the Post reports on President Obama’s policies and actions. If they did such a deliberate hatchet job during the campaign, what are they going to deliberately mislead us on during an Obama Administration?

Be sure to send this post and the following link to all your friends. We need to get this information out and spread it as far as possible.

You can access the complete column on-line here:

An Obama Tilt In Campaign Coverage
Deborah Howell
The Washington Post
November 9, 2008

Happy 233rd Birthday United States Marine Corps!!!

OOH-RAH!!!!

And God bless Hard Rocker Ted Nugent for writing such a wonderful tribute. From Human Events Online:

When we get older, it’s natural to think about whether we’ve actually done something worthwhile. This is not the case for the leatherneck men and women of the mighty US Marine Corps. President Reagan said it best: “Some people spend an entire lifetime wondering if they made a difference. The Marines don’t have that problem.” I suspect if the Marines know one thing, it is that freedom is not free. There is a toll to be exacted and it is their blood, sweat, sacrifice and lives. As I type these vary words, there are leathernecks pushing ahead and killing Al Qaeda and Taliban voodoo monsters. These leathernecks come from a long lineage of warriors who don’t know the meaning of quit. My hero, Colonel Lewis “Chesty” Puller summed it best when he said during the Korean War, “We’re surrounded? Good, now we can kill the bastards in any direction.” … The US Marines are warriors. They are the few and the proud. Americans are the many and the blessed. So long as the Marines are with us the flame of freedom and liberty will burn brightly. May God bless the United States Marines Corps. Happy 233rd birthday, Devil Dogs. Semper Fi. Godspeed my Blood Brothers. Carry on.

You can access Ted’s complete column on-line here:

Happy Birthday, Marines
Ted Nugent
Human Events Online
November 10, 2008