A Democrat Get's It.

Thanks Pete

Hey folks,

No. I'm not thanking myself. I'm referring to Peter. One of our Newest OPNers. He doesn't agree with me much, but he does participate, and makes some good points. Well, he is the one that pointed this one out to me. In today's From the Energy Front, we will meet a Democrat that actually gets it. Who is he? Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer.

Montana's "Clean-Coal" Governor's Climate Change Blunder
Thursday 31 December 2009 by: Joshua Frank, t r u t h o u t Report

It was a good year for opponents of coal, the most plentiful and dangerous of the world's fossil fuels. No new coal plants broke ground in the US, and a total of 26 were defeated or abandoned by the coal industry in 2009.

Not good for our country, but good for the Dreamers.

As coal-fired power plants are the number one source of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in the country, climate change activists have placed shutting down the industry atop their to-do list.

Not true. The number one source of CO2 emissions is YOU. People. We EXHALE it. Plants USE it, to turn it into Oxygen, in which ALL life use to live. CO2 is not now, nor has it ever been, a pollutant. I know, that's besides their point.

"2009 has been a remarkable year in our fight for clean energy," said Bruce Nilles, director of the Sierra Club's Beyond Coal Campaign. "There is a shift going on across America as companies realign away from old dirty practices involving coal and toward cleaner energy options, including wind, solar and becoming more efficient."

While the Sierra Club may be basking in exultation, coal opponents in Montana aren't quite as happy with the year's outcome in their state.

Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer and other members of the State Land Board, all Democrats, voted 4 to 1 on December 21 to open up Otter Creek, an approximately 10,000-acre checkerboard of public lands, to coal development in Montana's region of the Powder River Basin. An estimated 572 million tons in all will be auctioned off to coal companies for 25 cents a ton, with a small percentage of the money to be funneled to public schools.

"The main beneficiaries of leasing Otter Creek coal won't be coal miners or schools or the Northern Cheyenne or the residents of Powder River County," wrote local residents Bill and Judy Musgrave in the Billings Gazette leading up to the vote. "It will be coal speculators and the proposed Tongue River Railroad."

So anyone care to give that number? What is the amount that the schools will be getting that they would NOT be getting for it NOT for this program? Where would the opponents rather get the money from? Oh, yeah. They don't say.

As of 2006, an estimated 74.6 billion tons of coal reserves existed in Montana, which is the largest recoverable coal reserves of any state in the country. In fact, nearly 7.5 percent of the world's entire coal reserves reside in the Big Sky state.

Denise Juneau, Montana's superintendent of public instruction was the only Land Board member that didn't take the bait that the money would be going to fund the schools she oversees. On the contrary, she argued, the land would benefit the public more if it were left untouched.

"We could sell every parcel of state land and log every tree on state lands, but we don't," said Juneau. "We don't because we want to sustain Montana's lands for future beneficial use ... Of course there is [monetary] value in mining the coal. But there is also value in keeping Montana 'Montana.'"

What would that be? "future beneficial use" Benefit to? What? Again, where would she rather the money come from?

In November Great Northern Properties leased its rights to Arch Coal Inc. to mine 9,600 acres of land that is interspersed with the State's Otter Creek parcels. The opening of these private reserves was a power play that forced the Land Board to consider opening its own lands in the area.

In all, a total of 1.3 billion tons of coal will be opened for development, which equates to about 3,834 pounds of CO2 per ton of coal, or a total of 2.6 billion tons of CO2 if all coal is burned to produce electricity - 78 times the state's annual output of CO2.

About. Truth is no one really knows. It's all made up. Just like "Carbon Footprints" and completely asinine Carbon Credits.

"We are disappointed they decided to stay with old, dirty energy instead of clean, sustainable energy of the future, but this isn't over," Jeanie Alderson, a Birney, Montana, rancher and co-chair of Northern Plains Resource Council's Tongue River Railroad Task Force, told Truthout in regard to the Otter Creek deal.

"We still maintain the entire process is flawed. There has been no overarching public process that includes a discussion of the environmental, economic, and social aspects and costs associated with leasing this coal."

Yet, you will not discuss the BENEFITS of using our own resources. Where all this money is going. Just standard, and mostly untrue talking points.

However, it is difficult to confront the real, burgeoning threat of climate change when Montana's own leading Democrat, Governor Schweitzer, believes that coal can be clean.

There is no threat. That's the whole point. It is a SCAM.

Dubbed the "Coal Cowboy" by CBS's "60 Minutes," Schweitzer has been everything but critical of the industry and is a vocal proponent of "coal-to-liquid" technology. While using coal to make fuel may reduce the nation's dependence on foreign oil, critics are unconvinced that coal-to-liquids could ever combat global warming.

No such thing as Global Warm,, WAIT. Let me rephrase that. There is no such thing as Man-Made Global Warming that is destroying the Planet. There is no consensus. There is no evidence. The actual research they used to base this HOAX? Oh, yeah. They threw it all out. Oops.

"What they're proposing is simply not allowable if we want to avoid the perils of unconstrained anthropogenic climate change," said Pushker Karecha of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies. "The bottom line is that there's one fatal flaw in their proposed [coal-to-liquids] process from a climate protection standpoint. It would allow liquid fuel CO2 emissions to continue increasing indefinitely."

Schweitzer hasn't been listening and has instead proposed a $15 billion coal-to-liquids venture in southeastern Montana. The process, like the coal development in Otter Creek, will require strip mining to bring the coal to the surface and then be burned to generate electricity for the coal-to-liquids refinery, which would in turn be used to run diesel engines for the intense strip mining project. It's an endless cycle of CO2 emissions, which some environmentalists have called "Gov. Schweitzer's Perpetual Pollution Machine."

Schweitzer has made quite a name for himself in pro-coal energy circles, traveling around the country promoting "clean-coal" technology in speeches and presentations. The Montana governor has even appeared on several national television shows, even landing a prime-time spot at the Democratic National Convention in 2008 to promote his coal-intensive energy vision.

Many environmentalists are concerned that what President Bush was for oil, Governor Schweitzer could be for coal if his trajectory in the Democratic Party continues.

Speaking in Bismark, North Dakota, at a recent energy seminar, Schweitzer proclaimed that "clean-coal" technology would help generate billions in revenue for both Montana and North Dakota, not to mention the corporations that would be doing the digging.

Think of all those Jobs.

"With the resurgence of the Democratic Party in the West, many Democrats are reluctant to openly criticize their leaders," wrote Montanan Greg Gordon in High Country News last September about Schweitzer's backward energy policies. "Unity, however, does not mean blind acceptance of misguided policies that will lead to economic and environmental disaster."

MAN. I wish someone would say that about Obama and Crew. Talk about "blind acceptance of misguided policies that will lead to economic disaster."

Indeed, Schweitzer has worked hard to promote the coal industry in Montana, even helping to broker William Buffet's purchasing of the Burlington Northern-Santa Fe railway, which serves as the main transportation means for coal mined in Montana. He's also lauded the reopening of the Signal Hill mine near Broadview, Montana, which will become one of the largest in the state.

"This is a mine that will add 25 percent to the over all coal mining that we do in Montana," stated Schweitzer at the mine's reopening.

A portion of the coal mined in Montana will be shipped over to the exploding Asian markets that are increasingly burning coal to produce energy, but are lower in supplies than the US.

For the climate change movement to succeed in 2010, it seems vital that their fight ought to make its way to Montana's capital in Helena to confront Governor Schweitzer and his pro-coal industry posturing. Even if all new coal plants in the US are abandoned or halted next year, it will mean little if our nation's coal deposits continue to be exploited and incinerated overseas.

Bring out one of the HEADS, not to mention already debunked, GWBS Peddlers.

"What we have now is 387 parts [CO2] per million [in our atmosphere]. But we're going to have to bring that down to 350 parts per million or less," leading climate scientist James Hansen recently warned on Democracy Now! "And that's still possible, provided we phase out [global] coal emissions over the next few decades."

Thanks again Pete. That was very educational. Way to go Gov. Schweitzer.
Peter

Governator Ticked, Reid Appologizes for Being Racist

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger says concessions made to Nebraska Sen. Ben Nelson to win his vote on the health care overhaul bill were a "rip-off" for his state and is urging California lawmakers to vote against it.

Hey folks,

Happy Sunday. Welcome to the OPNTalk Blog, Big Sunday Edition. Glad you made it. That's right, the Governator himself, is pretty ticked off.

In an interview airing Sunday on NBC's Meet the Press, Schwarzenegger says giving extra Medicaid benefits to Nebraska to secure Nelson's vote, critical to Senate passage of the measure, was "like buying a vote." In Sacramento, he says, "it is illegal to do that, to buy votes."

No Governor, it was not LIKE, it WAS buying Nelson's Vote, and YES, that is illegal. But none of what Obama is trying to do with Obamacare IS legal. It is ALL unconstitutional.

Schwarzenegger was one of the few Republicans to express support for health care reform, but last week protested the deal that gave Nebraska more Medicaid money but not other states.

No. Arnold is no Republican. He is not even a RINO. But that doesn't matter. He is one hundred percent right on this one.

Nelson said he is asking the Democratic leadership to extend to all states the extra Medicaid money Nebraska would receive under the bill. The House and Senate are now negotiating the final version.

They can not afford to give EVERY State one hundred percent coverage. But then again, they can not afford to do any of what they are doing anyway.

Coming right up today?

Analysis Of Obama's Clean Energy Investment Speech
Hillary Backing Pelosi's "Chirica" Plan
Florida Healthy Kids
DLA for Sunday 011010
IWA For Sunday 011010

OH did you catch this? Reid is apologizing for being a Racist. Well, at least making a Racist remark. You know, one of those things that would be Front Page News, Lead Story on the Local Evening News for two weeks, and would have the Rev.s calling for his head. If he were a Republican. Since it was Reid, like VP Biden and all his comments, Reid apologizes, and all will be forgotten. Hell, for some of you, this may be the only time you hear about it.

WASHINGTON – Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid apologized on Saturday for saying the race of Barack Obama — whom he described as a "light skinned" African-American "with no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one" — would help rather than hurt his eventual presidential bid.

{Laughing} Like the "First, Articulate, Clean Black guy?" They say that Obama accepted.

Obama quickly accepted, saying "As far as I am concerned, the book is closed." Reid, facing a tough re-election bid this year, spent the day telephoning civil rights leaders and fellow Democrats in hopes of mitigating the political damage.

Yet look at the picture. I'm not so sure.

Alright, just a heads up. The Hillary Backing Pelosi's "Chirica" Plan goes WAY long. Do not click the link unless you have a few minutes. My apologies to the reposters as well. I did not want to cut anything out of Hillary's Speech, ICPD's response, nor the history of "Chirica," so it ended up pretty lengthy.

Alright, going to fill my cup. Get your gogo juice and meet me right back here. I'll be right back.
Peter

Sources:
AP- Schwarzenegger says health care bill a 'rip-off'
AP- Reid to Obama: Sorry for 'no Negro dialect' remark

Analysis Of Obama's Clean Energy Investment Speech

More spending, no answers.

Hey folks,

Yesterday, in a rare Saturday Post here at the OPNTalk Blog, I posted the entire Transcript of Barack's Speech given yesterday about Job loss, and his Clean Energy Investment. What do I think of what he had to say? Here is my analysis of his speech.

THE PRESIDENT: Good afternoon, everybody. Before I announce a significant new investment we’re making in clean energy, I want to give an update on a matter of concern to every American — and that’s our employment picture.

The jobs numbers that were released by the Labor Department this morning are a reminder that the road to recovery is never straight, and that we have to continue to work every single day to get our economy moving again. For most Americans, and for me, that means jobs. It means whether we are putting people back to work.

Cut taxes, DROP Cap and Tax, Kill Obamacare, and WATCH Jobs SORE!

Job losses for the last quarter of 2009 were one-tenth of what we were experiencing in the first quarter. In fact, in November we saw the first gain in jobs in nearly two years. Last month, however, we slipped back, losing more jobs than we gained, though the overall trend of job loss is still pointing in the right direction.

Why would this be a surprise to anyone? Seriously folks. EVERY YEAR, we have a Job surge in November, and a reduction between December and January. Why? The Holiday Season. Part time and Seasonal Jobs. EVERY YEAR this happens. Due to the slower Shopping Season, and the increase of Internet Shopping, retailers found that they did not need as much help as needed this year. So they started unloading their Holiday Season Jobs earlier.

What this underscores, though, is that we have to continue to explore every avenue to accelerate the return to hiring, which brings me to my announcement today. The Recovery Act has been a major force in breaking the trajectory of this recession and stimulating growth and hiring. And one of the most popular elements of it has been a clean energy manufacturing initiative that will put Americans to work while helping America gain the lead when it comes to clean energy.

{Sigh} It's only Popular to the Kooks, and those ignorant to still believe in the whole SCAM that is GWBS. The Recovery Act has done NOTHING. As this new report shows, we are STILL at record Unemployment with people still losing jobs. People are still losing their homes. People are still can't get loans. All the Recovery Act did, was line the pockets of a handful of people.

It’s clear why such an effort is so important. Building a robust clean energy sector is how we will create the jobs of the future — jobs that pay well and can’t be outsourced. But it’s also how we will reduce our dangerous dependence on foreign oil, a dependence that endangers our economy and our security. And it is how we will combat the threat of climate change and leave our children a planet that’s safer than the one we inherited.

All complete BS. Why can these jobs NOT be outsourced? Who is making some of the Solar Panels in use TODAY? What an ignorant thing to say. ANYTHING can be outsourced. I'm not sure when that could be said to be good. But Anything can and WILL be, if some Company Heads discover, "I can move my plant to XWZ, NOT pay Taxes, NOT be regulated to death, NOT be forced to pay Oppressive Healthcare costs. Hell, why not."

As for our decreased security and dependence on foreign governments, we could have achieve that YEARS ago. We could do that within TWO years. It's called use our own resources. Drill Here, Drill Now, that will do it. There IS NO Man-Made Global Warming. Ask Britain right now with 50 BELOW tempts, and most of America. South Florida never got out of the 40s yesterday. No storms to speak of. The Ice is NOT melting. We are in a COOLING CYCLE. A natural pattern.

Harnessing new forms of energy will be one of the defining challenges of the 21st century. And unfortunately, right now the United States, the nation that pioneered the use of clean energy, is being outpaced by nations around the world. It’s China that has launched the largest effort in history to make their economy energy efficient. We spearheaded the development of solar technology, but we’ve fallen behind countries like Germany and Japan in producing it. And almost all of the batteries that we use to power our hybrid vehicles are still manufactured by Japanese companies or in Asia — though, because of one of the steps like the one we’re taking today, we’re beginning to produce more of these batteries here at home.

These Hybrids are not the saving grace everyone though they were folks. I know a few people that have gone out and bought one. They ALL say the same thing. "Kind cool, but over priced, and the savings on gas seems insignificant in the long run." OH, and did Obama not just say that these "green Jobs" CAN'T be outsourced?

Now, I welcome and am pleased to see a real competition emerging around the world to develop these kinds of clean energy technologies. Competition is what fuels innovation. But I don’t want America to lose that competition. I don’t want the industries that yield the jobs of tomorrow to be built overseas. I don’t want the technology that will transform the way we use energy to be invented abroad. I want the United States of America to be what it has always been — and that is a leader — the leader when it comes to a clean energy future.

That's NOT going to create the jobs we need TODAY!

And that’s exactly what this clean energy manufacturing initiative will help us do. It will help close the clean energy gap that’s grown between America and other nations. Through this initiative, we’re awarding $2.3 billion in tax credits for American manufacturers of clean energy technologies — companies that build wind turbines, and produce solar panels, and assemble cutting edge batteries. The initiative we’re outlining today will likely generate 17,000 jobs, and the roughly $5 billion more that we’ll leverage in the private sector investments could help create tens of thousands of additional jobs.

WAIT!! STOP!! NO. 17,000? Do you know how many employees Wal-Mart has? 2.1 million employees. Do you know how many McDonald's has? 1.5 million. We already talked about the fact that if we allowed the Oil and Natural Gas Companies to do what they do, they would create 650,000 REAL, Long term jobs. 17,000? I could buy a couple of fast food franchises and produce more jobs than that. $2.3 Billion dollars for 17,000 new jobs, that may or may not last? After LOSING 7.3 MILLION jobs? Doesn't seem all that worth while or logical.

At the same time, this initiative will give a much-needed boost to our manufacturing sector by building new plants or upgrading old ones. And we’ll take an important step toward meeting the goal I’ve set of doubling the amount of renewable power we use in the next three years with wind turbines and solar panels built right here in the U.S. of A. Put simply, this initiative is good for middle-class families. It is good for our security. It’s good for our planet.

Well, doubling nothing is pretty easy. But who is going to BUY all these things?

Over 180 projects in over 40 states will receive these tax credits. And one of them is TPI Composites, Inc., which is based in Newton, Iowa — one of America’s leading wind turbine manufacturers. Because of these tax credits, TPI Composites will not only be able to expand an existing facility in Newton, they’ll not only be able to build a brand new facility in Nebraska, they’ll also be able to hire over 200 new workers. And it’s my hope that similar stories will be told in cities and towns across America because of this initiative.

In fact, this initiative has been so popular that we have far more qualified applicants than we’ve been able to fund. We received requests for roughly three times as much in funding — $7.6 billion — as we could provide. And that’s why, as part of the jobs package on which I’m urging Congress to act, I’ve called for investing another $5 billion in this program, which could put even more Americans to work right away building and equipping clean energy manufacturing facilities here in the United States.

In the letters that I receive at night, and I — many of you know I get about 10 letters a night that I take a look at — I often hear from Americans who are facing hard times — Americans who’ve lost their jobs, or can’t afford to pay their bills; they’re worried about what the future holds. I am confident that if we harness the ingenuity of companies like TPI Composites; if we can tap the talents of our workers, and our innovators, and our entrepreneurs; if we can gain the lead in clean energy worldwide; then we’ll forge a future where a better life is possible in our country over the long run. That’s a future we’re now closer to building because of the steps that we’re taking today.

Thank you very much, everybody.

10 letters a night? {Laughing} OK. Not sure the point. I can name over 100 people off the top of my head that are not happy with ANY OF THIS. There are MILLIONS of people out there, the MAJORITY of Americans that understand that this is all a SCAM and that YOU, Mr. President, are destroying this Economy. 10 letters? Whatever. Of course if you are giving free money away, you will have a request for MORE. {Sigh}

Folks, my reaction to this is simple. More spending, no answers. Not really.
Peter

Hillary Backing Pelosi's "Chirica" Plan

Transcript of Hillary's ICPD Speech

Hey folks,

You really can't make this stuff up. I know, I know, it's Transcript Weekend here, but you have to hear this, and you HAD to understand what it really means. Hillary delivered a major speech Friday to mark the 15th anniversary of the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD). Here is Hillary.

Thank you very much. (Applause.) Thank you all. Thank you. Thank you all very much.

My goodness, thank you. Wow, this is a wonderful occasion. Several of us were quite nervous when we saw the snow start last night, so I’m delighted the sun is out and shining on all of you here as we gather for this commemoration of the 15th anniversary of the groundbreaking gathering and agreement in Cairo.

When I think about that and the thousands of people who were part of it who came together to declare with one voice that reproductive healthcare is critical to the health of women, and that women’s health is essential to the prosperity and opportunity of all, to the stability of families and communities, and the sustainability and development of nations, it makes me nostalgic for conferences that are held that actually produce results – (laughter) – and give us a framework for moving forward. There is no doubt in my mind that the work that was done and the commitments that were made in Cairo are still really the bulwark of what we intend to be doing and are expected to do on behalf of women and girls.

The year 2015 is the target year. Part of the reason we wanted to have this commemoration is not only to look backwards, but to look forward. What is it we will do between now and 2015? Remember what was expected of us. All governments will make access to reproductive healthcare and family planning services a basic right. We will dramatically reduce infant, child, and maternal mortality. We will open the doors of education to all citizens, but especially to girls and women.

OK STOP! Translation, ABORTION. Continue

It is somewhat hard to believe in retrospect that Cairo was the first ever global forum that recognized the connection between women’s health, the quality of women’s lives, and human progress on a broader scale. So I am delighted to join you in marking this landmark event, but more importantly, to asking you to join with us in rededicating ourselves to the goals that we embraced 15 years ago. They remain critical and they remain unfilled.

We have not made it a Legal RIGHT for Women to get abortions at will, at any time, for any reason. Funding for Abortions is still in Obamacare folks.

I’ve had the honor and privilege as I look around this audience of knowing many of you, some of you for a very long time. And I know how committed many of you have been and continue to be. We have made measurable progress since 1994 in improving the health and the lives of women and children, especially girls. For example, the use of modern contraceptives worldwide has increased from under 10 percent in the 1960s to 43 percent in 2008. We have greater access to neo-natal care, including medicines that prevent the spread of HIV from mother to child. We’ve significantly increased child survival rates. The number of girls enrolled in schools around the world has gone up. And we’ve come closer to a less measurable but still critical goal: The integration of gender into a range of global programs, including our efforts through the United Nations to bring an end to sexual and gender-based violence in places of conflict.

However, vast inequities remain. Too often, still today in 2010, women and girls bear the burdens of regional and global crises, whether it’s an economic downturn or climate change or political instability. They still are the majority of the world’s poor, unschooled, unhealthy, and underfed. They are rarely the cause of violent consequences, but increasingly – of violent conflicts, but increasingly they bear the consequences of such conflicts. We’ve seen that from the Congo to Bosnia to Burma. And 15 years after the Cairo conference, far too many women still have little or no access to reproductive health services, including family planning and maternal healthcare.

Sounds good, but they do not really care about these Women's daily lives, with the exception of Abortion. Why? I'll get to that in a second.

When we look at this deficit in healthcare for women, we can see what it means in terms of lost productivity, lost resources, and lost lives. Nearly half the women in the developing world deliver their babies without a nurse, a midwife, a doctor, or access to crucial medical care. Global rates of maternal mortality remain perilously high; one woman dies every minute of every day in pregnancy or childbirth, and for every woman who dies, another 20 suffer from injury, infection, or disease every minute.

Sounds compassionate. Doesn't it?

More than 215 million women worldwide lack access to the modern forms of contraception, and this contributes to the nearly 20 million unsafe abortions that take place very year. Sexually transmitted diseases, of course including, but not limited to, HIV and AIDS, claim millions of lives annually among women. Fistula destroys the lives of millions, and it is often the result of pregnancies that occur when a girl is too young. An estimated 70 million – that is 70 million women and girls worldwide – have been subjected to female genital cutting, a procedure that is not only painful and traumatic but is also the source of infections and increased risks of injury during childbirth.

Now, as those of us gathered in the Ben Franklin Room on the eight floor of the State Department know very well, the topic of reproductive health is subject to a great deal of debate. But I think we should all agree that these numbers are not only grim, but after 15 years, they are intolerable. For if we believe that human rights are women’s rights and women’s rights are human rights, then we cannot accept the ongoing marginalization of half the world’s population. We cannot accept it morally, politically, socially, or economically. (Applause)

So we’re here today to examine the distance that remains to be traveled before the world fully realizes the ICPD goals. This is a journey that the Obama Administration and the United States Government will travel with you. But we need to travel quickly, because we only have five years to meet our original goals.

For the health statistics that I just mentioned point to a broader impact. There’s a direct connection between a woman’s ability to plan her family, space her pregnancies, and give birth safely, and her ability to get an education, work outside the home, support her family, and participate fully in the life of her community.

Typical Feminist Liberation BS. Women are to important to give Birth. It is BAD to be a Mother. It hinders Women. ETC. But that's not it.

When a girl becomes a mother before she becomes literate, when a woman gives birth alone and is left with a permanent disability, when a mother toils daily to feed her large family but cannot convince her husband to agree to contraception, these struggles represent suffering that can and should be avoided. They represent potential that goes unfulfilled. And they also represent an opportunity to extend critical help to women worldwide and the children who depend on them.

Investing in the health of women, adolescents, and girls is not only the right thing to do; it is also the smart thing to do. That is why we are integrating women’s issues as key elements of our foreign policy agenda and in, especially, our Global Health Initiative and our Global Food Security Initiative. That is why we saw the first appointment of an ambassador for global women issues, and it didn’t take me long to decide who should fill that position. It is why we are launching women’s entrepreneurial efforts through Pathways to Prosperity in Latin America, to ensure that prosperity is spread more broadly, including to women. It is why we are working with religious leaders in Afghanistan and Pakistan to increase access to information about family planning and preventive healthcare.

We are doing all of these things because we have seen that when women and girls have the tools to stay healthy and the opportunity to contribute to their families’ well-being, they flourish and so do the people around them.

Consider this one story from Uganda, where USAID works with the International Planned Parenthood Federation to provide reproductive health services, education, and skills training to low-income women. Among their clients are a group of teenage girls who call themselves the “Moonlight Stars.” Their parents are dead, leaving them the sole providers for their younger brothers and sisters, without any other options, they were working as prostitutes. Through this USAID-funded program, they gained access to condoms and comprehensive sex education to protect themselves from disease and pregnancy. They also began taking classes in sewing and knitting and other kinds of skills that could be used to help support their siblings without endangering their physical or emotional well-being. And thanks to this job training and the support that accompanied it, many of the Moonlight Stars have left prostitution behind and embarked on a new path of opportunity for themselves and their families.

Which is GREAT.

While investing in women lifts many lives, the inverse is also true. In societies where women’s rights and roles are denied, girls are forbidden from attending school or they pay a very heavy price to try to do so. Few have the right to decide whether or when to get married or become mothers. Poverty, political oppression, and even violent extremism often follow.

Maternal and child health are particularly important indicators of broader progress. In recent years, we’ve learned more about the conditions that accompany political unrest. It turns out that one of the most constant predictors for political upheaval is the rate of infant mortality. In places where the rate of infant mortality is high, the quality of life is low because investment in and access to healthcare are often out of reach. And that breeds the kind of frustration, hopelessness, and anger that we’ve seen. We also know that child mortality is closely connected with maternal mortality. When a mother dies, her children are at much greater risk of dying as well.

These struggles can’t be separated, and neither can their solutions. In the Obama Administration, we are convinced of the value of investing in women and girls, and we understand there is a direct line between a woman’s reproductive health and her ability to lead a productive, fulfilling life. And therefore, we believe investing in the potential of women and girls is the smartest investment we can make. It is connected to every problem on anyone’s mind around the world today. (Applause.)

Again, Motherhood is bad. Doesn't come right out and say it, but that is exactly what she means.

So we are rededicating ourselves to the global efforts to improve reproductive health for women and girls. Under the leadership of this Administration, we are committed to meeting the Cairo goals. We’re committed to working in partnership with all of you. One of President Obama’s first actions in office was to overturn the Mexico City policy, which greatly limited our ability to fund family planning programs. (Applause.)

Abortions.

We have pledged new funding, new programs, and a renewed commitment to achieve Millennium Development Goal Five, namely a [three-fourths] reduction in global maternal mortality, and universal access to reproductive healthcare. This goal is, again, critical to and interconnected with every other millennium development goal. But the world has made less progress toward fulfilling that goal than any other.

This year, the United States renewed funding of reproductive healthcare through the United Nations Population Fund, and more funding is on the way. (Applause.) The U.S. Congress recently appropriated more than $648 million in foreign assistance to family planning and reproductive health programs worldwide. That’s the largest allocation in more than a decade – since we last had a Democratic president, I might add. (Applause.)

That's $648 Million of YOUR money to pay for Abortions in other Countries.

In addition to new funding, we’ve launched a new program that will be the centerpiece of our foreign policy, the Global Health Initiative, which commits us to spending $63 billion over six years to improve global health by investing in efforts to reduce maternal and child mortality, prevent millions of unintended pregnancies, and avert millions of new HIV infections, among other goals. This initiative will employ a new approach to fighting disease and promoting health. It will address interrelated health challenges together, for example, by integrating family planning, maternal health services, and HIV/AIDS screening and treatment, so that women receiving reproductive care will also receive HIV counseling, and will be referred to an HIV clinic if they need one.

Another $63 BILLION of your money. That we do not have.

We’re now seeing the rise of the largest youth generation in the history of the world. They need and deserve to know how to stay healthy, and through this initiative, we will be providing critical information to them. The Global Health Initiative will also focus on helping countries strengthen their own health systems. We want to build sustainable health systems in countries. And it will ensure that all of our global health programs, including nutrition, malaria, TB, HIV/AIDS are designed to meet the needs of women and girls, including by taking into account the many social and economic factors that have an impact on their health from sexual coercion to domestic violence to pervasive gender inequities.

You know that HIV/AIDS is now morphing into a women’s disease, and increasingly younger and younger women in many, many poor countries are infected. We know that expanding access to contraception helps only if women are empowered to use it, that protecting oneself from HIV is harder when one’s life depends on staying in a man’s good favor, and that all the prenatal care in the world won’t protect a mother and child from an abusive home. Promoting women’s health and children’s health means improving the quality of their lives on many levels, and it also means reaching out to men and boys to encourage them to become advocates and allies.

So we have our work cut out for us, but we have an excellent roadmap in the Cairo program of action and a worthy target in the Millennium Development Goal Number Five. And we’re going to need your help. In everything that we’re doing in the Department and at USAID, we are injecting the needs and the roles of women and girls. We’re asking for how women and girls can play more of a role in their societies, be more involved in peacemaking and peacekeeping, assist in mitigating against and preventing climate change. Just across the board, we are making it clear that there has to be special attention paid to the needs of women and girls. It’s in America’s national security interests to do so.

OK. HERE is the real meaning behind all this. I know we are going to go REAL Long here. Sorry to all my friends out there that love to repost. You have to pay attention to the following.

I want to close with the story of one woman whose life was transformed by the work that the people in this room do every single day. Caroline Ditina is a young woman from the Democratic Republic of Congo who for years endured the shame and ostracism caused by obstetric fistula. Eventually, she found her way to a clinic supported by the UN Population Fund, and she finally received the surgery, care, and emotional support she needed to heal. Then she started speaking out about her experience to fight the stigma and to let other women know that even in isolated places, treatment is possible.

Her message has traveled the world. Two years ago, she came to Washington and urged members of Congress to support maternal health programs worldwide. And today, the United States is proud once again to support the work of the UN Population Fund. But one advocate, even one with such passion and commitment, can only do so much. Every woman everywhere deserves high-quality care not only at her most vulnerable hour, but at every single stage of life. That’s our goal and that’s our responsibility.

Our responsibility? UN Population Fund?

It is also a matter of simple equity and fairness. I’ve been in many places in many parts of the world where the rich, the educated, the well off, the connected, the powerful, the elite had access to every single form of healthcare. And yet it was denied – denied by law, denied by culture, denied by taboo, denied by regulation, denied by resources to the vast majority of women in the same societies. That is unacceptable.

So part of what we need to do is not only provide services to those who need them, but to change the minds and attitudes of those who can be responsible for delivering those services in countries around the world. I have said in many different settings on, I guess, every continent except Antarctica that the rights that women who have a position in society are able to command cannot, therefore, be denied to the women who live down the street or care for their children or clean their homes or plant their crops, and that we have to do a better job of making the equity argument on behalf of girls and women, and particularly on behalf of the Cairo agenda.

I’m very optimistic and very committed that we can do this together, and I am very grateful for what so many of you have done for so many years. You have ridden the ups and you have survived the downs. You have worked in favorable political environments and unfavorable ones. You have seen the Mexico City policy come and go, and you have stayed true. You’ve stayed true to your commitment, your passion, your belief that every single child in this country – boy or girl – deserves a chance to live up to his or her God-given potential.

I just want to urge that we do not grow weary. I don’t about you, but sometimes it can seem a little bit hard to take. It is also self-evident; it seems so obvious to the rest of us that this needs to be done, and we keep encountering obstacles of every shape and size. But please, stay with us and let’s try to create institutional and structural change that does not get wiped away when the political winds blow. Let’s try to create markets for these goods and ways of funding them and educational and instructional programs along with our commitment to serve that will give women everywhere a chance to take their own lives and their own futures into their own hands.

It is now my great pleasure – you’ve met two of my wonderful team members. I want to introduce two more whom I see. One is Raj Shah, Dr. Raj Shah, our new superb Administrator of USAID. (Applause.) Raj, come here. Come here, Raj. (Applause.)

We want you to get to meet him if you don’t know him. We want you to support him as he makes the changes that are necessary to put USAID back in the forefront of world development agencies.

And now it’s my honor to introduce our Under Secretary Maria Otero. And maybe, Maria, you and Raj could say a few words to close out the program. (Applause.)

Blah, blah, blah. It sounds great doesn't it? But it's really only about one thing here. Abortion. Why? It will save Governments money, and it will save the Planet. Of course the ICPD is happy.

WASHINGTON, Jan. 8 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton delivered a major speech today to mark the 15th anniversary of the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD). Her strong message showed top-level U.S. Government support for the ICPD and other such UN goals, including the Millennium Development Goals, by 2015. These include achieving universal access to reproductive healthcare (RH) and education (especially for girls), and reductions in maternal and child mortality.

But Secretary Clinton's address today indicated much more - a commitment to women and girls' health and progress worldwide, which in turn relates to development and climate change. "It signals a critical five-year window to not only achieve the ICPD objectives, but also make tremendous gains on global environmental and climate sustainability," said Vicky Markham, Director of the Center for Environment and Population (CEP).

Are you getting this?

This is because the world's environment and development issues are inextricably linked so new, strong U.S. commitment to the ICPD's principles is also critical to achieving environmental sustainability worldwide. Now, changes to global climate, water and forest resources, species' habitat and biological diversity are all occurring in unprecedented ways from human activities. "Strong, clear U.S. leadership to achieve the ICPD goals for women's health and equality is one sure way to maintain an important balance between people and nature on our finite planet," said Ms. Markham.

Secretary Clinton paved the way for renewed U.S. leadership on the ICPD for the development reasons mentioned above and as a viable means to achieving environmental sustainability - that is, to help curb climate change, provide clean water to the 1 billion that lack access to it, restore forests as "carbon sinks" and habitat to numerous plants and animals, and begin to alter land use and rapid sprawling development which leads to increased use of fossil fuels and climate change.

While many international forums have reaffirmed the ICPD "Cairo Consensus", including the 1995 Fourth World Conference on Women and the UN Millennium Development Goals, the U.S. has fallen behind in its leadership on these reproductive health issues. Paralleled with this is the lack of strong U.S. leadership on key environmental treaties on climate, water and biodiversity.

But, change is in the air. Secretary Clinton's compelling support now indicates the U.S. is poised to take a leadership role on critical RH/FP, education and maternal and child health issues. The U.S. needs to show similar leadership on global climate, water, forests and biodiversity issues. "When combined, U.S. leadership on the ICPD and major environmental treaties and commitments to sustainability are all mutually reinforcing, representing renewed commitment to these cornerstones of population and development policies for the international community," said Ms. Markham.

Recent polls show that a majority of Americans across the ideological spectrum strongly support the principles in the worldwide consensus reached at the ICPD, including providing voluntary family planning and reproductive health services. Likewise, polls show they support environmental sustainability.

That is COMPLETELY untrue. Completely untrue.

Millions of lives have been improved and saved through effective and affordable reproductive health programs, which have proven to prevent the deaths of women and children, reduce the spread of HIV/AIDS, grow economies, and preserve natural resources.

"Secretary Clinton today provided a much needed boost to a decade's lag on promoting women's and girl's issues as key components of international development and environmental stability. Now let's join her, and take it down the home stretch to 2015," Ms. Markham said.

For more information go to www.ICPD2015.org and www.cepnet.org.

Reuters had a story Fri Sep 18, 2009, Contraception vital in climate change fight: expert This is what Liberal REALLY think.

Leo Bryant, a lead researcher on a World Health Organisation study on population growth and climate change, said the stigma attached to birth control in both developing and developed countries was hindering vital progress.

"We are certainly not advocating that governments should start telling people how many children they can have," said Bryant, an advocacy manager at the family planning group Marie Stopes International, who wrote a commentary in the Lancet medical journal on Friday.

You would LOVE to. Pelsoi even said so. It will save money if these poor and undesirable people would just stop having kids. Now we learn, it will also save the planet.

"The ability to choose your family size...is a fundamental human right. But lack of access to family planning means millions of people in developing countries don't have that right," he told Reuters.

Bryant's study of climate change adaptation plans by governments in the world's 40 poorest countries showed that almost all of them link rapid population growth to environmental impact, but only six had proposed steps to tackle it.

"Acknowledgement of the problem is widespread, but resolve to address seems to be very much a minority sport," he said.

Bryant said 200 million women across the world want contraceptives, but cannot get them. Addressing this need would slow population growth and reduce demographic pressure on the environment.

In most countries with good access to birth control, average family sizes shrink dramatically within a generation, he said. But policymakers in rich donor nations are wary of talking about contraception for fear of being accused of advocating draconian ideas like sterilization or one-child policies.

Bryant's comments echo those by the head of Britain's science academy Martin Rees, who told Reuters this month that the stigma holding women back from getting access to birth control must be removed to reduce the impact of rising populations on climate change.

The world's population is forecast to rise by one third to more than 9 billion people by 2050, with 95 percent of this growth in developing countries.

In a study to be published in the WHO Bulletin in November, Bryant and colleagues said that population growth in poorer nations was unlikely to increase global warming significantly, as their carbon emissions are relatively low. But overpopulation combined with climate change would worsen living conditions by degrading natural resources, they said.

Climate change can also not only cause more natural disasters such as storms, but force people to live in areas at risk of floods, drought and disease.

Bryant said health policies targeting family planning must be combined projects to educate people about sustainable farming and land management.

"Then the gains that you make in environmental sustainability in the immediate term are going to be protected in the long term against a rapidly growing population," he said.

"Chirica" Population Control, Pelosi's Stimulus Idea?

Here is a brief history of the Chinese Population Control Program

August 1956, vigorous propaganda support was given to the Ministry of Public Health's mass birth control efforts. These efforts, however, had little impact on fertility. After the interval of the Great Leap Forward, Chinese leaders again saw rapid population growth as an obstacle to development, and their interest in birth control revived. In the early 1960s, propaganda, somewhat more muted than during the first campaign, emphasized the virtues of late marriage. Birth control offices were set up in the central government and some provinciallevel governments in 1964. The second campaign was particularly successful in the cities, where the birth rate was cut in half during the 1963-66 period. The chaos of the Cultural Revolution brought the program to a halt, however.

In 1972 and 1973 the party mobilized its resources for a nationwide birth control campaign administered by a group in the State Council. Committees to oversee birth control activities were established at all administrative levels and in various collective enterprises. This extensive and seemingly effective network covered both the rural and the urban population. In urban areas public security headquarters included population control sections. In rural areas the country's "barefoot doctors" distributed information and contraceptives to people's commun members. By 1973 Mao Zedong was personally identified with the family planning movement, signifying a greater leadership commitment to controlled population growth than ever before. Yet until several years after Mao's death in 1976, the leadership was reluctant to put forth directly the rationale that population control was necessary for economic growth and improved living standards.

Population growth targets were set for both administrative units and individual families. In the mid-1970s the maximum recommended family size was two children in cities and three or four in the country. Since 1979 the government has advocated a one child limit for both rural and urban areas and has generally set a maximum of two children in special circumstances. As of 1986 the policy for minority nationalities was two children per couple, three in special circumstances, and no limit for ethnic groups with very small populations. The overall goal of the one-child policy was to keep the total population within 1.2 billion through the year 2000, on the premise that the Four Modernizations program would be of little value if population growth was not brought under control.

The one-child policy was a highly ambitious population control program. Like previous programs of the 1960s and 1970s, the one child policy employed a combination of propaganda, social pressure, and in some cases coercion. The one-child policy was unique, however, in that it linked reproduction with economic cost or benefit.

Under the one-child program, a sophisticated system rewarded those who observed the policy and penalized those who did not. Couples with only one child were given a "one-child certificate" entitling them to such benefits as cash bonuses, longer maternity leave, better child care, and preferential housing assignments. In return, they were required to pledge that they would not have more children. In the countryside, there was great pressure to adhere to the one-child limit. Because the rural population accounted for approximately 60 percent of the total, the effectiveness of the one-child policy in rural areas was considered the key to the success or failure of the program as a whole.

In rural areas the day-to-day work of family planning was done by cadres at the team and brigade levels who were responsible for women's affairs and by health workers. The women's team leader made regular household visits to keep track of the status of each family under her jurisdiction and collected information on which women were using contraceptives, the methods used, and which had become pregnant. She then reported to the brigade women's leader, who documented the information and took it to a monthly meeting of the commune birth-planning committee. According to reports, ceilings or quotas had to be adhered to; to satisfy these cutoffs, unmarried young people were persuaded to postpone marriage, couples without children were advised to "wait their turn," women with unauthorized pregnancies were pressured to have abortions, and those who already had children were urged to use contraception or undergo sterilization. Couples with more than one child were exhorted to be sterilized.

The one-child policy enjoyed much greater success in urban than in rural areas. Even without state intervention, there were compelling reasons for urban couples to limit the family to a single child. Raising a child required a significant portion of family income, and in the cities a child did not become an economic asset until he or she entered the work force at age sixteen. Couples with only one child were given preferential treatment in housing allocation. In addition, because city dwellers who were employed in state enterprises received pensions after retirement, the sex of their first child was less important to them than it was to those in rural areas.

Numerous reports surfaced of coercive measures used to achieve the desired results of the one-child policy. The alleged methods ranged from intense psychological pressure to the use of physical force, including some grisly accounts of forced abortions and infanticide. Chinese officials admitted that isolated, uncondoned abuses of the program occurred and that they condemned such acts, but they insisted that the family planning program was administered on a voluntary basis using persuasion and economic measures only. International reaction to the allegations were mixed. The UN Fund for Population Activities and the International Planned Parenthood Association were generally supportive of China's family planning program. The United States Agency for International Development, however, withdrew US$10 million from the Fund in March 1985 based on allegations that coercion had been used.

Here is Speaker of the House Pelosi. The following exchange between Pelosi and George Stephanopoulos came on Sunday morning last week, during ABC's THIS WEEK:

STEPHANOPOULOS: Hundreds of millions of dollars to expand family planning services. How is that stimulus?

PELOSI: Well, the family planning services reduce cost. They reduce cost. The states are in terrible fiscal budget crises now and part of what we do for children's health, education and some of those elements are to help the states meet their financial needs. One of those - one of the initiatives you mentioned, the contraception, will reduce costs to the states and to the federal government.

STEPHANOPOULOS: So no apologies for that?

PELOSI: No apologies. No. We have to deal with the consequences of the downturn in our economy.

Not only would Pelosi and the Libs HERE love to enact something like this in America, they want to do it around the world. {Laughing} Want to save the Planet? Wear a Condom, or if need be, get an Abortion. What ever you do, just do not have any more kids. Don't worry, if you can't, others will pay for it. Even if you live in another country.
Peter

Sources:
White House Press Office
Center for Environment and Population
Reuters - Contraception vital in climate change fight: expert

Florida Healthy Kids

Health and Science for Sunday 011010

Hey folks,

In today's Health and Science Segment, I want to do something a bit different this week. I want to talk about Florida's Healthy Kids.

Florida Healthy Kids currently serves about 300,000 children statewide. Florida KidCare offers Health Insurance for children birth through 18. With Florida KidCare, your kids can go to the Doctor, get the Shots they need, have their Teeth cleaned, and get their Eyes checked for Glasses. In an Economy that has so many trying to decide what to cut out and what to keep, your Child's Health needs, need not be a concern.

I know, I know. I can hear some of you now. This is what Obama wants to do with ALL Health Insurance. No. From their Site

This program is designed to provide affordable access to the insurance market for middle class families and to assist, with premium subsidies, lower-income families not eligible for Medicaid, who would be unable to pay the full premium. The fact that participation by school districts and health plans in this initiative is voluntary is considered a key to its significant success.

This is NOT a Socialized, Obama type plan. This is VOLUNTARY. Those that contribute to it, do so out of their own, and in a lot of cases, generous, Free Will. Those that participate in it, also do so out of their own Free Will. It does not cover those who do not need nor want it. You will not be fined for NOT participating. There are no MANDATES. But it IS there to help those in need.

So why am I talking about Florida Healthy Kids? No. Joshua {My Son} is not in the program. I am Blessed enough to not need this type of assistance. Josh is WELL taken care of. But I do know first hand the positive effects of this program.

OK. Try to follow this one. Just by chance, I happened to come into contact with someone who just happened to come into contact with my "Sister" {Not really. But might as well be.} in Tallahassee. My friend just happened to decorate the RESTROOMS in the Mini mart where she works. This person just happened to go into the Restroom and loved the decor. Then this person, just happened to Blog about her experience. Well, I left a comment when I was alerted to her post. She sent me an Email thanking me. We started Emailing back and forth. Turns out, she has been with Florida Healthy Kids since the first Child. She said, "It's almost like watching a child grow up." That starting bringing back some memories.

I asked a Single Mother, of a now 18 year old, whom I know was part of Kidcare, to let me know what she really thought of the program. Here is what she had to say.

Thankful Parent

I am a single parent with a now young lady of 18. There was a time I didn't think she would ever make it to become the most beautiful person she is now and I have Florida Healthy Kids to thank for that.

My daughter was diagnosis with Asthma at age 6 months. I worked at the time, but I couldn't afford to have her on my insurance at work as it would take to much money out of my check. At first I got Florida Healthy Kids for free, then when I got a raise I paid $15.00.

Through Florida Healthy Kids I was put in touch with Children's Medical Services in Ft. Pierce {Fla}and that's where my daughter got the medical care she needed and she was taught how to handle her Asthma and her breathing. Any doctors or Specialist she needed to see, any medicine she needed to take was provided through Florida Healthy Kids.

Yes, we may have had to travel a distance once in a while to see different specialist, but if it meant they may be able to help my daughter then it was worth it. Florida Healthy Kids, Children's Medical Services, and even her regular doctor helped me have a wonderful 18 year old Senior in High School.

I feel even though I was a single parent that she had a very large extended family that helped her develop into the person she is today. I want everyone at Florida Healthy Kids to know how thankful I am that I had their help. I remember before I had Florida Healthy Kids I went to the Dept, of Children and Family to try and get some medical help as her meds were around $500.00 a month at that time. I couldn't afford to get them filled. I was told I didn't qualify for any help because I made to much money and that if I wanted to get any help I needed to have another child.

I walked out of there very upset. When we got to the car my daughter turned to me and said, "Mommy, does that mean that I'm gonna die sense you can't buy my medicine and they won't help you?" That has burned in my mind forever!

Florida Healthy Kids helped me and for that I'm forever grateful.

Thank you very much for sharing this. Like I said before, I know first hand how Florida Healthy Kids DO help those in need. I have seen a few single Moms get Medical Care for their Kids, when they really had only one other option. The ER. I know one that is about to be a new Mom. Of course I will be pointing her in the FHC direction.

If you live in Florida, and you need assistance, PLEASE feel free to check them out. No strings. No catches. Just here to help. Thank you Florida Healthy kids, for all you do.
Peter

Florida Healthy Kids Website

DLA for Sunday 011010

This is a TRUE Compassionate.

Hey folks,

We hear all the time how Compassionate the Liberal are. They are. They are very generous with YOUR money. But once in a blue moon, we meet a guy like this. Aldo Magazzeni

According to Yournews.com - A new kind of Afghan mission 6:29AM

For one 60-year-old American, bringing simple necessities to struggling Afghan communities means going small.

By Jon Hurdle

PERKIOMENVILLE, Pa (Reuters) - Aldo Magazzeni leans across the table in his farmhouse kitchen and explains why, when it comes to supplying clean water to thousands of impoverished Afghanis, small really is beautiful.

During the last five years, the 60-year-old co-owner of a New Jersey manufacturing firm has arranged for some 75,000 people in remote areas of Afghanistan to be connected to community water systems.

His efforts helped to end the toil of fetching water and to reduce water-borne diseases, particularly among children.

Now here is a guy who truly cares. So he hooked up with some Government Program, got subsidies, and is doing some good with some of your money. Right? Nope.

The key to his success, he says, is not large sums of money or the involvement of international aid organizations, but his willingness to cultivate relationships with communities and to persuade them to donate the labor that has reduced costs to a fraction of what a commercial contractor would charge.

Magazzeni estimates the total cost of 12 water systems built so far at $80,000, in contrast to at least $500,000 that he says would have been charged commercially.

{Laughing} You know, I have often wondered about that. I can build a house that is a pretty good size house for around $100, to $200,000 dollars. Yet, a Subcontractor for the Government, will build the SAME size structure, be it for a court house, school, whatever, and it'll cost $1,000,000. Why? So this guy has done 12 water systems, for $80,000 that would have taken a half a million.

"With less money, and keeping things small, I have accomplished more than I would have done if I had a ton of money," Italian-born Magazzeni said.

As it would be in Government as well. Smaller the better.

His work started after a solo mountaineering trip to Afghanistan in 2004 when he stayed in the remote village of Kwalkoo in the Panjsher Valley, an area rarely visited by outsiders. Villagers had to walk a mile or more to a spring for clean water.

Sensitized to the needs of poor communities after working in Haiti, Kenya and Mexico since the late 1990s, Magazzeni struck up relationships with village elders, who told him they wanted a water system. He found water engineers to help install a system, and won the backing of the local governor.

He sold his BMW back home in Pennsylvania to pay the $7,000, the average cost of his projects, for piping, pumps and engineering advice for the first system. He financed other projects with his personal savings -- he once withdrew $30,000 from his retirement fund -- while travel expenses were paid by his company, Champion Fasteners, of Lumberton, New Jersey.

Now THIS is a dedicated individual. All this talk by the Liberals about how we have to help those less fortunate? What have THEY done? What have they sold? How much have THEY withdrawn from their own PERSONAL accounts? Not much. Just look at their taxes.

Now he has a nonprofit, Traveling Mercies, and his costs are met with funds raised from individual donations, local schools, and Rotary clubs. The nonprofit's budget is set at $100,000 for 2010, up from $60,000 in 2009.

He works full-time for the non-profit but takes no salary, living off income from his company, and his savings. In any spare time, he helps his wife Anna run their 80-acre farm some 40 miles north of Philadelphia.

Busy guy.

Much of the fundraising and promotion of Traveling Mercies is done by Magazzeni, in keeping with his belief that there is no substitute for strong personal relationships.

Suraya Pakzad, an Afghan women's activist who was among Time magazine's 100 most influential people of 2009, has worked with Magazzeni and said his insistence on working at a grassroots level explains his success.

"He sits on the floor. He has no bodyguards. He has no black-window cars," she said in an interview from Afghanistan. "He trusts people and his trust protects him."

With a long beard and a tousled mass of shoulder-length gray hair making him look like an Old Testament prophet, Magazzeni stresses the spiritual nature of his work.

Underpinning the benefits of providing clean water is the link that his projects create between people, he said.

"What they are eventually going to see is that it's all about human beings seeing their common divinity," he said.

Magazzeni acknowledges his similarities with Greg Mortenson, another former mountaineer who has built more than 100 schools in remote areas of Afghanistan and Pakistan since the mid-1990s, described in his best-selling book "Three Cups of Tea."

Like Mortenson, Magazzeni sees his efforts in Afghanistan as complementary to the U.S. war effort in helping to win the hearts and minds of local people through peaceful means.

But unlike Mortenson's Montana-based Central Asia Institute, Magazzeni has no employees.

By keeping it simple, Traveling Mercies shows that helping to alleviate suffering in the developing world need not be the preserve of governments, corporations, or international aid organizations, but should be focused on individuals.

"It's not going to get solved by institutions," he said. "I want to be a story that can be read by anybody who could say 'I could do that.'"

Congratulations MR. Magazzeni, you ARE the Winner of the Display of Logic Award. YOU Sir, should be the winner of the Noble Peace Prize. You Sir, have actually accomplished something great.
Peter

Sources:
Yournews.com - A new kind of Afghan mission

IWA For Sunday 011010

Why Parents HAVE to be involved.

Hey folks,

It's time for the IWA. You know, this is one of those things. A reminder if you will, that no matter how good a Parent you may be, YOU are not there 100 percent of the time. So anytime you feel you need to be a bit more inquisitive, or are concerned about something, you NEED to follow through.

Our Idiot this week, is placed in charge of your most PRECIOUS gift ever given to you, your child. She arrives every morning and returns every afternoon, carrying the whole time, your Children. What's her name?

Most parents can tell you the names of their Kid's Teachers. But can you tell me the name of the Bus Driver? Do you know if the Bus Driver has a criminal past? Do you know if your Bus Driver has any problems? Medical, or otherwise?

Yet from about age Five, you gladly give up your Child to this person, and trust them, to care for your Kid's safety and well being. Well, then we have a story like this. According to AOL Parent Dish - Parents Outraged Over Drunk Bus Driver's Punishment

A school bus driver who drove 37 students while intoxicated was sentenced to five years probation and jail time, but some parents of her terrified passengers say the punishment is not nearly harsh enough.

According to the "CBS Early Show," bus driver Martha Thompson, 56, of Almond, N.Y. pleaded guilty Nov. 2, 2009, to 37 counts of child endangerment and driving while intoxicated on May 8, 2009, while students screamed and begged her to stop. On Jan. 4, the Allegany County Court sentenced her to six months of electronic home monitoring, five years of probation, 12 weekends in jail and mandatory alcohol counseling. She was also fined $1,000.

A video captured the frightening ride, during which several students beg Thompson to pull over. The "Early Show" reports that her blood alcohol level was .15, almost twice the New York state legal limit of .08 percent.

Double the legal limit, a bus full of Kids, NO JAIL TIME? Click the link for the Video. Do you see the Picture of our Idiot? This is not the first time she has had a drink. Thank God for these Kids.

Grace Scherzer, 16, and Chelsey Pierce, 15, were on board that day and were instrumental in helping their fellow passengers off the bus through the back exit while Thompson ranted for them to stay on board. Scherzer tells the "Early Show" that she approached Thompson after noticing the bus was swerving all over the road.

"I went up to talk to her and asked if she was OK to drive," she tells the "Early Show."

The teen says Thompson said she was fine, yet continued to drive erratically. Later, the girl managed to get the bus's back gate open and helped usher her fellow students off the vehicle.

Pierce tells the news program that she called her mother during the scary ride. Her mom, Lori Loomis, says Thompson's punishment is less than satisfactory.

"I am outraged. I am very upset with what she received," Loomis tells the "Early Show." "And I just don't think it's a harsh enough punishment for this woman. She put all these children's lives in danger. She could have killed them all. I'm very upset with the outcome."

Thompson's attorney, Thomas D. Trbovich, tells the "Early Show" that his client is "embarrassed."

"She's very sorry to the children," he says. "She never, ever would intentionally put any of those children ... in any type of risk."

What in the Blue Hell are you talking about Mr. Trbovich? No one FORCED alcohol down her throat. She CHOSE to drink. No one FORCED her to drive the Bus that day. She CHOSE to drive the Bus. No one put these kids in danger EXCEPT Martha Thompson. So she DID "intentionally put any {ALL} of those children ... in any type of {GRAVE} risk." Well, then again, DOES she have a record? Did the School Bus Company check her out? Were there any signs that there could be a possible problem? These are the questions I would be asking.

Congratulations Martha Thompson. You ARE the Idiot of the Week. Didn't anyone ever tell you that with great responsibility comes higher standards. You were responsible for all those Kids. Parents from every walk of life entrusted their well being into your care. YOU chose to allow yourself to drink, knowing that not only would that be placing YOU in danger, other drivers in danger, but all those Kids as well. Yet, YOU chose to do so anyway. YOU Ms. Thompson should be in JAIL! It goes without saying, that YOU, should never have a license to drive ANYTHING ever again. You should be VERY happy that I was not one of those parents.

Kudos to Ms. Grace Scherzer, and Chelsey Pierce. Job well done.
Peter

Sources:
AOL Parent Dish - Parents Outraged Over Drunk Bus Driver's Punishment

Remarks by the President on Job Creation and Economic Growth

Transcript of the President's Speech on Jobs and Clean Energy Investments

THE PRESIDENT: Good afternoon, everybody. Before I announce a significant new investment we’re making in clean energy, I want to give an update on a matter of concern to every American — and that’s our employment picture.

The jobs numbers that were released by the Labor Department this morning are a reminder that the road to recovery is never straight, and that we have to continue to work every single day to get our economy moving again. For most Americans, and for me, that means jobs. It means whether we are putting people back to work.

Job losses for the last quarter of 2009 were one-tenth of what we were experiencing in the first quarter. In fact, in November we saw the first gain in jobs in nearly two years. Last month, however, we slipped back, losing more jobs than we gained, though the overall trend of job loss is still pointing in the right direction.

What this underscores, though, is that we have to continue to explore every avenue to accelerate the return to hiring, which brings me to my announcement today. The Recovery Act has been a major force in breaking the trajectory of this recession and stimulating growth and hiring. And one of the most popular elements of it has been a clean energy manufacturing initiative that will put Americans to work while helping America gain the lead when it comes to clean energy.

It’s clear why such an effort is so important. Building a robust clean energy sector is how we will create the jobs of the future — jobs that pay well and can’t be outsourced. But it’s also how we will reduce our dangerous dependence on foreign oil, a dependence that endangers our economy and our security. And it is how we will combat the threat of climate change and leave our children a planet that’s safer than the one we inherited.

Harnessing new forms of energy will be one of the defining challenges of the 21st century. And unfortunately, right now the United States, the nation that pioneered the use of clean energy, is being outpaced by nations around the world. It’s China that has launched the largest effort in history to make their economy energy efficient. We spearheaded the development of solar technology, but we’ve fallen behind countries like Germany and Japan in producing it. And almost all of the batteries that we use to power our hybrid vehicles are still manufactured by Japanese companies or in Asia — though, because of one of the steps like the one we’re taking today, we’re beginning to produce more of these batteries here at home.

Now, I welcome and am pleased to see a real competition emerging around the world to develop these kinds of clean energy technologies. Competition is what fuels innovation. But I don’t want America to lose that competition. I don’t want the industries that yield the jobs of tomorrow to be built overseas. I don’t want the technology that will transform the way we use energy to be invented abroad. I want the United States of America to be what it has always been — and that is a leader — the leader when it comes to a clean energy future.

And that’s exactly what this clean energy manufacturing initiative will help us do. It will help close the clean energy gap that’s grown between America and other nations. Through this initiative, we’re awarding $2.3 billion in tax credits for American manufacturers of clean energy technologies — companies that build wind turbines, and produce solar panels, and assemble cutting edge batteries. The initiative we’re outlining today will likely generate 17,000 jobs, and the roughly $5 billion more that we’ll leverage in the private sector investments could help create tens of thousands of additional jobs.

At the same time, this initiative will give a much-needed boost to our manufacturing sector by building new plants or upgrading old ones. And we’ll take an important step toward meeting the goal I’ve set of doubling the amount of renewable power we use in the next three years with wind turbines and solar panels built right here in the U.S. of A. Put simply, this initiative is good for middle-class families. It is good for our security. It’s good for our planet.

Over 180 projects in over 40 states will receive these tax credits. And one of them is TPI Composites, Inc., which is based in Newton, Iowa — one of America’s leading wind turbine manufacturers. Because of these tax credits, TPI Composites will not only be able to expand an existing facility in Newton, they’ll not only be able to build a brand new facility in Nebraska, they’ll also be able to hire over 200 new workers. And it’s my hope that similar stories will be told in cities and towns across America because of this initiative.

In fact, this initiative has been so popular that we have far more qualified applicants than we’ve been able to fund. We received requests for roughly three times as much in funding — $7.6 billion — as we could provide. And that’s why, as part of the jobs package on which I’m urging Congress to act, I’ve called for investing another $5 billion in this program, which could put even more Americans to work right away building and equipping clean energy manufacturing facilities here in the United States.

In the letters that I receive at night, and I — many of you know I get about 10 letters a night that I take a look at — I often hear from Americans who are facing hard times — Americans who’ve lost their jobs, or can’t afford to pay their bills; they’re worried about what the future holds. I am confident that if we harness the ingenuity of companies like TPI Composites; if we can tap the talents of our workers, and our innovators, and our entrepreneurs; if we can gain the lead in clean energy worldwide; then we’ll forge a future where a better life is possible in our country over the long run. That’s a future we’re now closer to building because of the steps that we’re taking today.

Thank you very much, everybody.

Hard To Find Illegals, Unless They Are In The NYT

"Those darn Illegals, are just to hard to find."

Hey folks,

Happy Friday to you. Since it is Friday, it's time to go to the Emails. Here it is.

NY Times Publicizes a Four-Person March in Support of Illegal Immigrants By: Clay Waters January 04, 2010 16:10 ET

A “march” from Miami to Washington on behalf of illegal immigrants consisting of a grand total of four marchers somehow merited a 780-word New York Times article by reliably pro-amnesty reporter Julia Preston, “To Overhaul Immigration, Advocates Alter Tactics.”

By contrast, a massive anti-Obama rally that attracted over 100,000 people to the Capitol on September 12 resulted in virtually the same level of print coverage in the Times: A 932-word article.

The text box to Preston's story on Saturday read: “Hoping that a four-person walk will resonate in a way mass marches did not.” That lack of resonance was not through any fault of Times reporters like Preston who mainstreamed the marches and portrayed them in a positive light.

Preston certainly embraced the self-serving melodrama of the protesters:

Lacing up new pairs of walking shoes with a flourish, four immigrant students set out on foot from downtown Miami on Friday, starting a four-month walk to Washington to protest what they called the Obama administration’s lack of action on legislation granting legal status to illegal immigrants.Three of the four protesters, who are current or former students at Miami Dade College, do not have legal-resident status and risk detention by immigration authorities during the 1,500-mile walk.

The protesters must not have felt too much risk, given that all four (!) were identified by photo and name in the story.

The students’ trek showed the resolve and also some limitations of groups supporting an immigration overhaul that would include measures to legalize illegal immigrants. Those groups said this week that they would start a national campaign in January to pressure President Obama to push for the overhaul before midterm elections in November.

But as immigration enforcement has continued at a steady pace during the first year of the Obama administration, many illegal immigrants are clinging to jobs and families in this country and may be afraid to participate in public demonstrations. With unemployment holding at 10 percent, immigrant advocates acknowledge that their campaign could awaken passionate opposition in Congress and around the country.

Preston got to a single opponent of amnesty in her very last paragraph:

“Allowing millions of illegal immigrants to stay and take jobs away from citizens and legal immigrants is like giving a burglar a key to the house,” said Representative Lamar Smith of Texas, the senior Republican on the House Judiciary Committee.

Amnesty is not dead folks. Neither is Cap and Tax. Neither is all the other stuff that they want to do. No. Obama is far from done. As we have seen with Obamacare, the Kooks in congress have taken the Lead of our enemies. They have become Suicide Bombers. Politically speaking of course.

They have discovered, that it is pretty hard to stop someone that is willing to kill themselves for their cause. They are committing Political Suicide in their dark back rooms with Obamacare. They know this. So once they get this passed, they will them move on to Amnesty, and all the rest. There are no more checks and balances. They just simply do not care what you think or even what you do at the polls. They have an agenda, and they are sticking to it, for their Master, King Hussein Obama.

Link: MRC -NY Times Publicizes a Four-Person March in Support of Illegal Immigrants

Have a great Weekend folks. See you Sunday.
Peter

Note: From The Emails is a weekly Segment every Friday, or occasionally anytime, that appears here at the OPNTalk Blog. Please feel free to Email any Articles, Comments, Thoughts, Whatever, that you may like to share to opntalk@gmail.com As always, you never know what you may see here.

Obama Now Says: "Screw You Unions"

No wonder there is an Exodus in the Left

Hey folks,

Happy Thursday to you. This is to funny. Typical. Normal. Yet, those that actually BELIEVE in these idiots, that continuously get screwed by them, continuously blindly follow them. I don't get it. But such is life on the Left.

Why do you think that the Exodus is GROWING on the Left? Why are they actually committing political suicide? They have heard you. They, some, have even shut down their Emails, placed their phone systems on auto, and went out to buy more garbage bags for all those letters from their constituents letting them know that NO ONE WANTS Obamacare. They are going along with it anyway? WHY?

This is serious folks. There is no longer any checks and balances. They know they are done. They know you are about to throw them out over this. Nelson is finished. He is so far down in the bottom of the barrel of sludge that you can not even see him anymore. Dodd? Billions, now "I quit." From Mayors to Senators, the Left are losing Party Members all over the place. Yet, Obama has an agenda, and he's sticking to it.

Now Obama is even telling the Unions, "Screw You." Yes. You heard that correct. According to the AP - AP sources: Obama backs high-end health plan tax By Associated Press Writer Erica Werner, Associated Press Writer – 5 mins ago

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama signaled to House Democratic leaders Wednesday that they'll have to drop their opposition to taxing high-end health insurance plans to pay for health coverage for millions of uninsured Americans.

In a meeting at the White House, Obama expressed his preference for the insurance tax contained in the Senate's health overhaul bill, but largely opposed by House Democrats and organized labor, Democratic aides said. The aides spoke on condition of anonymity because the meeting was private.

{Laughing} ACORN can't be happy with that either. But he DOESN'T CARE. The Leadership, DOESN'T CARE. They are sticking with whatever Obama wants, and Obama WANTS Universal Healthcare. He WANTS Obamacare. He WANTS Socialism. He has come right out and said he wants to change the very foundation of this country. He WANTS a Dictatorship with him in charge. He WANTS to control every aspect of YOUR life from cradle to the grave. Hell, he even wants to decide when the Grave come in.

He did, and said, ANYTHING he had to, to get into power. People are STILL waiting for him to pay off their mortgages and buy them a new car. Some Minorities ACTUALLY still believe that they will wake up one day and find a huge check in their mail box. Meanwhile we all know what the reality is of this situation. There is no check coming. People are still losing their homes in record numbers. Double Digit unemployment. Private Industries being taken over by the Government. Freedoms being restricted. People's very LIFE being threatened now with the guaranteed failure of the Government take over of Healthcare. We are in more debt then anytime in history, and heading even further down the tubes.

So what is behind this exodus? Why would these Democrat be going along with this, even though they are WELL aware that they will be out? Promises. That's right folks. They are being PROMISED they will be taken care of AFTER they Vote for, and PASS Obamacare. They are being PROMISED that they will make MORE money after they leave office. Being appointed to this and that, after they leave. Then, the Party is looking at the weakest links. Those in the most high risk Districts and Positions.

Picture a backroom. They are then saying to those, like Dodd, "Step aside. You have no chance of winning. We want to attempt to run an unknown Democrat, that may even 'say' he is NOT an Obamaite. An Outsider. Someone that will not be just a Pasty. Forget going to the extreme and Voting for a Republican, who will destroy everything we have attempted to give you. Vote for this New Guy. Dodd is out. Give this new guy a chance. You, Dodd, are Toxic. Step aside and we will take care of you. How about working for us in the Private Sector? After all, we gave you all these Billions. Who better to control it in the 'Private Sector' for us?"

Dodd "Well, OK. As long as you take care of me. Because my Constituents are really mad."

Obama Rep. "Forgetaboutit"

This is the only thing that makes ANY Logical sense whatsoever. They ARE committing Political Suicide here. Now they are BAILING. They have dropped a BOMB, and they are flying away out of the destruction zone. One reason they may be announcing all this NOW is to attempt to stave off some of the "Tea Parties" or other types of Protests, letters, Emails, Phone calls, ETC. What would be the point? They are out already after the Vote. So don't bother. You can't do anything to them. So, just lay down and accept it. Obamacare is inevitable. After all, it's for the best of ALL Americans. Sorry Unions.
Peter

Sources:
AP sources: Obama backs high-end health plan tax