Bob Marshall’s Ill-spoken Words

MoonHowler

Another article people have to read for themselves appears below, therefore it is posted in its entirety.  We are not going to comment from the post.  All 3 moderators do not agree on the topic of abortion.  Therefore, we will not comment from the post. 

UPDATE:  Thread titled changed.  I just found that too offensive to have sitting there on this blog. 

From The Gainesville Times:

Lawmaker: Disabled kids are god’s punishment

 

February 22, 2010 – 11:27am

RICHMOND – Western Prince William Del. Bob Marshall, R-13th, says disabled children are God’s punishment to women who have aborted their first pregnancy.

He made that statement last Thursday at a press conference to oppose state funding for Planned Parenthood.

“The number of children who are born subsequent to a first abortion with handicaps has increased dramatically. Why? Because when you abort the first born of any, nature takes its vengeance on the subsequent children,” said Marshall, a Republican.

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Colin Powell reassures us we are as safe now as under Bush

MoonHowler

Colin Powell, former Secretary of State under George W. Bush, and former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has spoken out on Face the Nation about national security and whether we are as safe now as we were under former President Bush.  Powell says yes.  Very little has changed under President Obama and most of the policies put in place by President Bush are still in place. 

“To suggest that somehow we have become much less safer because of the actions of the administration, I don’t think that’s borne out by the facts,” Powell said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.”

Colin Powell also stated:

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence was also created under President Bush, “and it is still under President Obama, working hard,” Powell continued. “Our counterterrorism authorities and forces are hard at work. Our law enforcement officials are hard at work. We have gone after the enemy in Afghanistan with 50,000 more troops, more predators are striking al-Qaida and Taliban leaders in Pakistan. We have continued the policies that President Bush put in place with respect to Iraq. And so I don’t know where the claim comes that we are less safe.”

Powell is a Republican.  He  shocked many Americans by eventually supporting then Democratic candidate Barack Obama in the presidential bid, ultimately throwing his support to Obama.  He said he liked and respected Republican candidate John McCain but he felt he was unsure on the economy and he didn’t feel Sarah Palin was ready to take over as president, which is the VP’s job.

Powell’s discussion on security begins about 10:00


Watch CBS News Videos Online

 

Powell reminds us of the need to search for compromise.  He feels our system is in some disarray.  Powell has always seemed like the voice of reason and truly a person of the people.  He speaks to  concerns over military trials over criminal trials.   Colin Powell is a smart man.  I always find him to be reassuring. 

It seems that our politicians get crucified by their base if they compromise.  The American voter has to get over this idea that compromise is tantamount to caving in.  If we don’t learn to accept compromise and common ground, then we simply need to begin procedings to divide the country.  It is absolutely ridiculous to never get anything done because congress fears that compromise will get them thrown out of office.

There Were No Better Times or Good Old days

MoonHowler
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As a response to Glenn Beck’s yearning for another time, perhaps John Oliver has the answer. 

Jon Stewart and John Oliver seek to find the good old days.  They are trying to go back to those simpler times when life was good in American.  Could it be that those days simply do not exist? 

Stewart and Oliver both discover that the reason Americans have such nostalgia over the good old days is because they were children.  Most children had much simpler lives.  They remember the good and don’t dwell on the bad.  Is this true for all children?  No.  But somehow most kids are resilient and seem to have good memories.

For those who thought the 50’s were happy days, they really weren’t in some respect.  Your parents scared the crap out of you over polio for a while. Then came the cure which meant getting stuck with horse needles.   Kids also had air raid drills still where you had to dive under a desk and duck and cover.  The films about the A bomb weren’t so swift.  But that stuff only took up a tiny sliver of your life as a kid.  The rest of the time you could put on your zorro cape, Davy Crockett coon skin cap and have the time of your life. 

America is still a good place.  It might have its issues, its days, its not so bright spots, but it is still home and beats the hell out of all the other places. 

Warning:  Offensive language.

Key Note Speaker: Glenn Beck

MoonHowler

Remember Chris Farley in the SNL skit In a Van Down By the River?

How soon before regular Republicans will be jumping up and locking their doors? Most people don’t like being insulted. Is it possible to be too conservative? I am not exactly sure what too conservative America would look like. It does not seem very realistic.

Right now, it appears President Obama’s best friend is this group. The Republicans all get together and their key note speaker disavows their party?

CPAC Comes to Town

MoonHowler

The CPAC has come to town. It arrived on Thursday. For those who aren’t card carrying conservatives, CPAC stands for the Conservative Political Action Conference and it has come to town full throttle. The list of key note speakers is enough to make moderates and liberals break out in a sweat:

Hon. Dick Armey
Hon. John Ashcroft
Rep. Michele Bachmann
Glenn Beck
Amb. John Bolton
Andrew Breitbart
Herman Cain
Tucker Carlson
Liz Cheney
Ann Coulter
Sen. Jim DeMint

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Al Alborn: Part 2

MoonHowler

Al Alborn continues to share his thoughts on where America is now and where it is going. Hopefully, discussion will be about his ideas rather rather than about who filmed Al. No one cares. Trying to pigeon-hole Al into some sort of ideology doesn’t work. He just doen’t fit. If you want to sit down face to face with Al, let me know. He has indicated he would be more than willing to sit down to share ideas.

Small Plane Plows into Office Building in Austin, TX

MoonHowler

A single engine plane has crashed into a 7 story office building in Austin, Tx.  Authories do not think it is terrorism but full details are not available.  There are people trapped in the building still.  Many people were able to get out, thank goodness. 

Structurally the building appears to be intact.  The windows are all out.  The impact was on the north side of the building.  Fire seemed to cover 2 floors.  The FBI building is right next door to this office complex, however they are saying this is not a terror attack.  The crash is about 15 miles from the airport.

photo compliments of myFox

UPDATE:  It is now thought that the crash was intentional.

Lowlights of the Governor’s Budget Recommendations

MoonHowler

The Governor’s budget recommendations were released today.  According to Governor McDonnell:

“All the cuts give me heartburn,” McDonnell said at a news conference. “All of them were difficult because I know that behind every cut there is a Virginian . . . that might be affected.”

Some of the lowlights from the governor’s cuts are as follows:

  • $730 million in reductions to k-12 education
  • Up to 10 unpaid furlough days for state workers
  • Freezing enrollment in a health insurance program for low income children and pregnant women
  • Increased employment contribution to the state pension program.
  • Eliminate funding for the state school breakfast program for low income children.

Some of the highlights include 

On the other side of the employees’ proposed unpaid days off, McDonnell wants to give them a 3 percent Christmas bonus in December 2011.

He also wants to eliminate former Gov. Timothy M. Kaine’s proposal under which state employees would be required to contribute 1 percent of their salaries to their retirement plans in fiscal 2011 and 2 percent in fiscal 2012.

Details haven’t been worked out and there are definitely other programs on the chopping block.  The General Assembly now has to get down to business. According to House Majority Leader Morgan Griffith, R-Salem in the Richmond Times Dispatch:

McDonnell’s recommendations were welcome.
 
“We all are going to have a lot of tough decisions,” Griffith said. “Ours may not be the same tough decisions the governor makes, but we’re all trying to get to the best budget we can get with the money we have and all ideas are.”
 

Griffith also agreed with the governor about unfreezing the LCI formula. according to the Roanoke Times.

House Majority Leader Morgan Griffith, R-Salem, defended McDonnell’s decision to lift a proposed freeze on adjusting the state’s local composite index school funding formula. The composite index measures a locality’s ability to pay for its public schools, and Kaine had proposed delaying an adjustment to the formula in his December budget. Lifting the freeze will steer more money to Northern Virginia at the expense of other localities, but Griffith said the governor is right to propose the change.

“If we start saying when it benefits another region of the state that we don’t like it, then in a couple of years they may do away with it and we’ll be getting the short end of the stick,” Griffith said. “It’s helped us for 30 years. It hurts us this year. But I suspect it will help us for 30 years in the future, and messing with it and playing games with it in a single year is foolish.”

Much will unfold over the next week or so as far as budget cuts.  Most of us will be unhappy over something.  People will attempt to defend their own turfs.  In most cases it won’t always be possible.  However, these are tough times and we knew it was coming.  Feel free to add to the list in this thread as we find out more proposals by the governor or the General Assembly.

Virginia’s immaculate reductions

MoonHowler

Editorial posted in its entirety 2/17/10:

Editorial from the Washington Post:

EVEN BEFORE Virginia Gov. Robert F. McDonnell took office a month ago, he made clear that he would force cuts of almost $2 billion from the state’s two-year, $30 billion operating budget. That’s on top of $2 billion-plus in cuts already proposed in the spending plan submitted by his predecessor, Timothy M. Kaine, shortly before he left office — to say nothing of the billions more Mr. Kaine had already lopped from the budget. Mr. McDonnell, who ran for election on a platform opposing higher taxes, was within his rights; having preached the Republican gospel of smaller government as a candidate, he has something close to carte blanche to cut the budget.

But with crunch time approaching, Virginians have heard next to nothing from the governor about how to shrink an already badly depleted budget. And having dodged tough questions in last fall’s campaign about how to spare public education and core services, Mr. McDonnell is now attempting to outsource the political pain to the state legislature.

Past Virginia governors, faced with having to make cuts, proposed budget amendments and took the political responsibility. By contrast, Mr. McDonnell, after weeks of consultations with top lawmakers in Richmond, has made only private recommendations to make heavy cuts that would involve closing schools across the state, firing state employees and slashing health and social service programs.

The governor’s approach has left even Republican lawmakers seething. “I just wish he’d be clear with us and with the public right now and send down amendments that say exactly what he wants us to do,” an unnamed veteran GOP lawmaker told the Associated Press. “That’s how you lead.”

So far, Mr. McDonnell has proposed more government spending than reductions. He wants to pump up programs geared toward job creation, which is fine with us, and charge the state $29 million in the course of shifting more education funds to Northern Virginia from downstate: also fine. No doubt, it’s more pleasant to tell taxpayers how their dollars will benefit the commonwealth than to let them in on the news that services and schools will be gutted.

We’d ask the same question about his much-vaunted transportation plan. The governor said he would raise hundreds of millions of dollars to build roads by selling off state-run liquor stores. But at his urging, a bill in the legislature to do just that was killed last week. The probable reason? Profits from such liquor stores go directly into the state’s coffers, to the tune of about $100 million a year. Mr. McDonnell, having promised to tackle Virginia’s transportation funding crisis in his first year in office, still has time. What Virginians have yet to see are viable ideas that will yield cash for a transportation budget whose construction funds are just about gone.

The governor has taken the reins at a difficult juncture. He faces agonizing decisions. To his credit, he has appointed moderate, pragmatically oriented cabinet secretaries to help make those calls. There is no reason to expect the deliberations on budget-cutting or transportation to be quick and easy. But having ruled out new taxes to preserve schools and services, we wish he would level with Virginians about the pain, and shortfalls, to come — and take some responsibility for them.

If Republicans legislators are irriated, what about the Democrats and the rest of us. When is McDonnell going to shed some sunshine on what type of budget cuts he is going to make. Maybe he will find that it isn’t as easy from the Governor’s Mansion as it was from the campaign trail. Why is he not forthcoming with budget information? These are issues Virginians need to know and talk about.

The Post is to be commended on its catchy editorial title.

UPDATE: The Governor has released his budget.  You may view it in the Roanoke Times.  Click the blue.

Governor’s Office

Concealed Weapons in Bars Passes VA Senate

MoonHowler
Sen. Emmett W. Hanger said the law kept citizens from enjoying such restaurants as Red Lobster. Sen. Mary Margaret Whipple responded she never felt threatened at Red Lobster.
Sen. Emmett W. Hanger said the law kept citizens from enjoying such restaurants as Red Lobster. Sen. Mary Margaret Whipple responded she never felt threatened at Red Lobster.

From the Richmond Times Dispatch: (by Jim Nolan)

The Virginia Senate today cleared the way for Virginians to be allowed to carry concealed guns in cars and bars.

In a 22-18 vote, senators approved Senate Bill 334, which would allow people with concealed gun permits to carry their firearms into restaurants that serve alcohol.

Six Democrats joined 16 Republicans to pass the legislation, which had passed the General assembly last year but was vetoed by then-Gov. Timothy M. Kaine.

Senators also passed legislation that would allow Virginians who do not hold concealed gun carry permits to transport their handguns in a locked glove compartment or container in their car. The vote on Senate Bill 408 was 24-16, with six Democrats joining 18 Republicans to support the bill.

Both bills now head to the House of Delegates, which is likely to pass them. If the measures clear the House, Gov. Bob McDonnell is expected to sign the bills into law.

The legislation allowing concealed guns in bars prohibits any concealed gun carrier from drinking alcohol while armed.

Currently gun owners may bring their weapons into restaurants, provided the guns are clearly visible. They can also carry concealed weapons into restaurants that do not serve alcohol. Restaurant owners, however, have the right to exclude guns or weapons of any kind from their establishments.

All of us can think of reasons why drunks and alcohol don’t mix. However, is that what this is really about? What are the compelling reasons for people to carry concealed in a bar? Should those people be forbidden to consume alcohol also?

An Issue of Fairness

MoonHowler

Last year, pro life groups petitioned the State of Virginia for a pro-life license plate.  It passed, and the governor signed the bill into law.  $15 of the yearly fee goes to Heartbeat International. 

This year pro-choice groups, spearheaded by Virginia Planned Parenthood, are attempting to have a pro-choice license plate.  The plate will say: “Trust Women/Respect Choice”.

$15 of the annual fee after the first thousand was to go to Planned Parenthood for prevention, health screening, HPV vaccine, etc.  NO MONEY WAS TO GO TOWARDS ABORTION. 

Yesterday, HB 1108 was amended to divert the money to the Virginia Pregnant Womens Support Fund.  This fund, according to Richmond Sunshine, supports  the following:

Pregnant Women Support Act.As a routine component of prenatal care, every licensed practitioner who renders prenatal care shall provide information and support services to patients receiving a positive test diagnosis for Down Syndrome or other prenatally diagnosed conditions. This bill also creates the Virginia Pregnant Women Support Fund as a special nonreverting fund to be administered by the Board of Health to support women and families who are facing an unplanned pregnancy.

According to Lake Wylie Pilot:

Opponents, including the state’s attorney general and governor, say they oppose diverting money from plate fees to Planned Parenthood offices – not necessarily the plates themselves.

A state Senate committee heard testimony on the bill Thursday and could vote on it this week. The full legislature’s approval and the governor’s signature are needed for the plates to be sold.

Last year, Virginia became the 23rd state to approve the “Choose Life” plate. 

The money should go to Planned Parenthood as the bill’s sponsor intended. How dare Delegate Todd Gilbert (R-15) attempt to funnel pro-choice money to any cause other than the one intended? This move is just another attempt to control what Virginians think. No one is being forced to buy that plate. The money comes from the person buying the plate, not tax payer money. That’s the rub.

Those who truly oppose abortion should know that preventing the need for it in the first place is the best way to do away with it.  Shame on those who divert money away from Planned Parenthood.  

This legislative  end run appears to be a left handed way of inhibiting free speech. If one group gets to have a license plate with part of its funds designated as they choose, shouldn’t the other group have equal choice?

“Good People Trapped in a Dysfunctional System” … Evan Bayh

MoonHowler

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Yesterday’s bomb shell announcement by Evan Bayh sent ripples through both political parties.  For the Democrats, it spelled yet another questionable seat up for grabs since Bayh was some 20 points ahead in polls.  For the Republicans, the announcement meant greater potential to pick up yet another seat in the mid term election. 

Neither party should be setting off fireworks.  Bayh had the following to say, according to the Guardian:

“There is too much partisanship and not enough progress – too much narrow ideology and not enough practical problem-solving. Even at a time of enormous challenge, the peoples’ business is not being done,” he said.

He further added according to MSNBC:

“There’s just too much brain-dead partisanship,” Bayh said in a nationally broadcast interview Tuesday. He said the public will continue to harbor hostile feelings toward Congress “until we change this town.” He also said that “the extremes of both parties have to be willing to accept compromises.”

Bayh denied an interest in running for president in 2012 either as a Democrat or independent. Asked on MSNBC’s ‘Morning Joe’ if there were any chance he would run, Bayh said, “None, whatsoever.”

But he also said the American people could deliver “a shock” to Congress by voting many incumbents out if the institution doesn’t curb its divisiveness. Bayh said voters could simply decide they want to vote out people they believe are too partisan and said Congress should change its rules of operation “so that sensible people can get the job done.”

Republicans shouldn’t be cheering.  

Republicans saw a more partisan motivation in Bayh’s departure.

 
 

“The fact of the matter is Senator Evan Bayh and moderate Democrats across the country are running for the hills because they sold out their constituents and don’t want to face them at the ballot box,” Michael Steele, chairman of the national Republican Party, said in a written statement.

 

 

Michael Steele doesn’t get it either.  He should because he will get kicked to the curb fairly soon by his own party.  Another person who doesn’t get it is Scott Brown, still basking in the after-glow.  He has served his purpose which was snagging the ‘Kennedy seat.’  He too will either need to go radical or get kicked to the curb. 

Actually both parties should start taking a good look in the mirror.  The rancor, stubbornness, the nastiness are so excessive now I have to keep the news off during the day.  Moderate Democrats and Moderate Republicans are being drowned out by extremists in both parties.  Bayh is right.  Why do something you don’t have to do.  He comes from a political family.  His father, Birch Bayh had a long, distinguished political career.  Evan Bayh has always been seen as a moderate who could work with both sides of the aisle. 

There is no room for discussion when ideas and idealogy are so politicized.  Those who attempt to reach out and take a moderate position are savaged and vilified by the extremists.  Good for Bayh.   I wish him well.

JFK Love Letters Go on the Auction Block

MoonHowler

Love letters that chronicle the love affair of then Senator JFK and Swedish beauty Gunilla Von Post go on sale at auction today starting at $25,000.  Kennedy and Von Post met on the French Riviera when he was a senator engaged to be married to Jackie and she was 21.  The 2 danced the night away. 

Both returned to their normal lives but kept up a steamy correspondence.  JFK planned a cruise that involved Ms. Von Post but injured his back and was out of commission for several months.  Not surprisingly, the affair lasted after Kennedy was married to Jackie.  According to the New York Daily News:

The pair met on the French Riviera in the summer of 1953. At the time, he was 36, 15 years her senior. In a letter from June 28, 1954, just after he was married, Kennedy wrote to von Post “I might get a boat and sail around the Mediterranean for two weeks – with you as crew.”

Those plans went south when Kennedy injured his back. Kennedy wrote to von Post when he was recuperating in Manhattan.

“I am still in the hospital after two months. I was terribly disappointed that at the last moment I was not able to come to Europe, especially when you were going to be in Paris and we could have had such a good time … ”

He wrote that he was going to see her without fail if she wasn’t “all settled down” by then.

In the same letter, he writes at the end: “Is there any chance you will be coming to the U.S.?”

The now 78-year-old Post first revealed the affair in a 1997 book. She also gave an interview to ABC News’ 20/20 that year, describing how her heart went “boom boom boom boom” when she was with Kennedy.

“I was very happy to hear from him, but I said ‘he’s a married man,'” she told “20/20.”

The very next year, however, the two got together again in an old castle in Sweden.

“I borrowed him for a week, a beautiful week that no one can take away from me,” she told “20/20.”

Kennedy’s final letter to von Post is dated August, 1955. In it, he waxes wistful about the affair.

“I just got word today – that my wife and sister are coming here. It will all be complicated the way I feel now – my Swedish Flicka. All I have done is sit in the sun and look and the Ocean and think of Gunilla … All Love, Jack.”

The letters are expected to bring in more than $100,000.  Meanwhile, it is hard to keep with with the picadillos of JFK.  Was the press ignorant of his infidelities and womanizing or did they know and just keep quiet?  What would motivate the press to keep quiet about something like this and the many, many other instances of our former president being a horn dog? 

I am not sure I will ever understand this powerful family.  At a time when people’s moral behavior was much more carefully scrutinized than it is today, a senator, soon to be president has affair after affair.  Today, in an almost anything goes society, one little affair such as this one can ruin one’s political career.  The irony does not escape me.  I don’t think Kennedy could ever be elected today because he appeared to have been a sexual predator.  He would be going to sexual addiction rehab right along with a certain famous golfer.