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MITT BACK TO HIS OLD TRICKS
On the one hand we have man made climate change and on the other we have natural global warming
Mitt Romney was starting to convince some people that he had left his old flip-flopper self behind. He wasn’t apologizing for his Massachusetts healthcare plan. He wasn’t leaping on the flat tax bandwagon. He said he wasn’t concerned about the rich.
But apparently science is an issue that cannot be left to the scientists. In June he had said in regards to climate change:
“I believe that humans contribute to that. I don’t know how much our contribution is to that, because I know that there have been periods of greater heat and warmth in the past but I believe we contribute to that. And so I think it’s important for us to reduce our emissions of pollutants and greenhouse gases.”
Four months later his position was modified. To a Pittsburg gathering he said:
“My view is that we don’t know what’s causing climate change on this planet. And the idea of spending trillions and trillions of dollars to try to reduce CO2 emissions is not the right course for us.”
Romney is unlike regular guys who have an opinion on many subjects. He has every opinion on every subject.
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MAGICAL THINKING
Rick Perry has an economic plan. Its two main elements are a voluntary flat tax and a repeal of all regulations instituted since 2008.
He says “We need to clearly put in a tax structure that’s flat, that’s simple, that’s fair,” But his plan is not flat as people would have the option of keeping the progressive tax; it isn’t simple as it doesn’t get rid of the thicket of deductions; and it isn’t fair as the poor would not see their taxes reduced but the top tax rate of the rich will be reduced from 35% to 20%.
Perry likes to call his plan “cut, balance and grow”. He is accurate in saying that taxes would be ‘cut’, but how it is going to ‘balance’ anything is anybody’s guess and he offers no evidence how this ‘growth’ is going to occur.
If Romney will say anything to capture the conservative vote, Perry will say anything to capture any vote.
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INCOME INEQUALITY
Perry’s tax plan will add more inequality to income distribution. Care to guess the top 5 most equal and least equal cities?
The least equal cities are:
1. New York City
2. Miami
3. Los Angeles
4. Houston
5. Memphis
The most equal cities are:
1. Salt Lake City
2. Virginia Beach
3. Minneapolis
4. Las Vegas
5. Riverside, CA
It is hard to spot a trend. But it it becomes apparent, when you consider that the Mormon bastion of Salt Lake City is the most equal, that not only is Romney not a real Christian, but he might well be a socialist.
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THE NATIONAL MOTTO
Hi, I'm Randy Forbes and when I say God I mean my God not yours.
Rep. Randy Forbes (R-Va.), has sponsored a bill that would reaffirm “In God We Trust” as the national motto. But this seems inconsistent with the philosophy of ’original intent’.
“In God We Trust” was approved as the national motto in 1956. I think we should use something more in tune with our founding sensibility, such as “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” or “freedom of speech”.
The other difficulty with God is, of course, that there is little agreement as to God’s nature. I think it reasonable that before we agree to ‘trust in God” we should all agree on who and/or what he is.
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GET OVER IT
Most parents are happy to vaccinate their children against disease. Vaccination is an unalloyed triumph of western medicine and combined with sanitation the main reason life expectancy has risen from 47 in 1900 to almost 80 now.
But there are still parents because of illogic or squeamishness put their children in jeopardy. Sometimes it is junk science, for example, the autism/vaccination connection, where one made up study led to a global hysteria.
More recently conservatives have resisted the HPV vaccine because the disease is transmitted sexually.
Their belief is that vaccinations for STDs will encourage sex in teenagers. But while their may be differing theories as to how to control teenage sexuality the fact is that the vast majority of children have sex by 20 and that not one of them decided to because they had a vaccination against cervical cancer.
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