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Friday, October 15, 2010

Rep. Jim Oberstar, D-Minn., has just one donor from his district


"With a potentially competitive race developing back home in Minnesota’s 8th District, Transportation Committee Chairman Jim Oberstar collected a contribution from just one resident of the district between June 22 and Sept. 30, according to a federal election report filed Wednesday.

Jane Robbins of Pine City gave Oberstar $500 on Aug. 22.

Other than that, all of his contributions came from political action committees, Native American tribes or individual donors in other districts and states."

Oberstar is behind:

The infrastructure bill: FedEx vs. UPS

Friday stuff

Wednesday, October 13, 2010

President Obama and Education Politics As Usual


President Obama has seemingly made an entire mountain range out of his Race-to-the-Top reform molehill, while he’s gotten more or less a free pass on all he’s done to enrich the status quo. And now, with big midterm losses looming for his party, he appears to be reverting to one of the easiest political ploys in the book: Claim the GOP will cut funding to education and, in so doing, hurt innocent children and cripple the nation’s economic future. 

Check out the graph below to see how much all that spending has helped "the children":

Post Office Shows Where U.S. Is Headed

Bloomberg reports:

To understand where the advocates of big government will take this country, look at the U.S. Postal Service.

Start with the fact the Postal Service is a great jobs machine, employing 712,000 people at an average annual compensation, including wages and benefits, of $83,000. And those hefty pay checks are a great source of political contributions for Democrats. In 2010, almost 90 percent of the approximately $4 million contributed to campaigns by postal unions went to Democrats. Take a guess where much of the opposition to reform comes from.

But high-priced labor, which accounts each year for about 80 percent of costs, leads to high-priced mail services, and even higher costs for taxpayers. Over the past 10 years, the price of a stamp has risen from 33 cents to 44 cents, exceeding the inflation rate at a time when computerization should have been leading to big cost savings.

Boehner's 'Plan B' for ObamaCare

When it comes to repealing ObamaCare, plan B for John Boehner (R., Ohio) will be more important than plan A

Plan A, of course, is to repeal the new health-care law whole hog. If Republicans take the House in next month's elections, they will surely introduce—and pass—a bill to do so. The question is: What happens when that bill then goes nowhere in the Senate, where even a Republican majority will not be large enough to rebuff a filibuster, much less override a presidential veto?

That's where plan B comes in.

It's the birthday of the US Navy

On 13 October 1775, the Continental Congress, meeting in Philadelphia, authorized the procurement, fitting out, manning, and dispatch of two armed vessels to cruise off our coasts to interdict British supply ships.

The beginning of the Navy hymn:

Eternal father, strong to save,
Whose arm hath bound the restless wave,
Who bidd'st the mighty ocean deep
Its own appointed limits keep;
O hear us when we cry to thee,
For those in peril on the sea. 

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Does Paying Your Mortgage Make You a Good Person, or a Stupid Person?

Time Mag.

10 years ago today: The USS Cole

Cassy Fiano:  "10 years ago today, two Al Qaeda terrorists pulled alongside the USS Cole during a routine refueling in Aden, Yemen and detonated a suicide bomb...

17 sailors were killed. 39 more were wounded. The 17 sailors who died left behind 11 children." 

Of course, the Obama administration has halted prosecution of Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, the alleged coordinator of the attack.

Who's Against Library Volunteers? Teachers Unions

Boston Globe: The teachers’ union in Bridgewater and Raynham has filed a labor grievance that could block volunteers from keeping the school district’s libraries open.

WaPo notices public pension problems

Years behind the rest of the world.