Monday, February 24, 2014

The Obama Regime's 2013 Accomplishments

Team Obama congratulated themselves for their actions
in 2013, and tried mightily to spin their record as a great
success. However, last year was quite the opposite for
Obama and his merry men and women, as your faithful
Peasant will detail here.

While the Democrats and Republicans came together to
to pass a budget after a great tussle, the Dems were at the
time faced with a new "no budget, no pay" provision
which meant that if a budget was not passed by April 15,
all senate salaries would be held in escrow until a budget
was approved. The Dems finally passed a budget, although
the original senate version called for increasing taxes in
2014 by $1 trillion and passed by a single vote --- with no
Republican votes and four Democrats joining the GOP to
vote against the measure.

The Dems boast that American businesses created 2 million
jobs in the old year, but conveniently failed to mention that
the staggering job losses experienced in the first term of
Obama's presidency is still weighing down our economy.
Furthermore, if the number of people who lost their jobs
in that period and have left the job market --- that is, that
they have ceased looking for new jobs --- are added into
the calculation of our unemployment rate, the rate would
be in double-digit per cent territory.

The party of the donkey also brags that the economy is
growing; the truth is, though, that the alleged recovery
is the slowest in many decades, and that we still have not
recovered the jobs that died off in Obama's first term.
And the effects of Obamacare and Obama's high corporate
taxes have proved to be an extra couple of albatrosses
around the neck of the economy. And the former has not
been fully implemented yet!

These same charlatans claim to have cut the nation's budget
deficit in half since Obama took office in 2009, but Obama
has presided over the five largest budget deficits in history,
and this is one of his and his regime's biggest and hairiest
lies to date.

Now, the US oil industry is, in fact, having some fat times.
This, in the face of Obama trying to kill off the Keystone
Pipeline which would bring oil down from the Canadian
oil fields, denying oil permits on federal lands and off
US coastlines, and heaping on more regulatory oversight.
Credit oil drilling on private lands and fracking for the oil
industry's high productivity, not Obama's misguided
policies.

The American auto industry is not thriving like Obama and
friends would have us believe; The US has at last sold its
final stake in General Motors, saddling the taxpayers with
a $10 billion loss. And recently, the Italian automaker Fiat
bought the shares of Chrysler which were also held by Uncle
Sam to have a strong controlling financial stake in the
company. Now our "Big Three" car makers numbers two.
Yippee.

And Obama and his fellow Dems are boasting that Americans
are getting better and more affordable health care coverage
thanks to the so-called Affordable Health Care Act. We have
examined the myriad flaws in both the program and in the
website to register for it here on this blog. And Americans
are continuing to lose their old, affordable health care policies,
in greater number than that of Americans that have signed up for
the Obamacare monstrosity so far. Remember Obama's pie crust
promise that if we "liked our health care policies, we could
keep (them)"? one of the biggest whoppers yet from the Liar-
In-Chief!

And let's not forget the biggest attempted backside covering
in history, the Benghazi scandal. We discussed that ugly
event here as well.

So we know what to expect for 2014 and the remaining two years
to come from the Obama reign. And it won't be pretty. However,
we can mitigate the effects of the waning time of the lame duck
imperial president by electing a conservative senate (not merely
a Republican senate, mind, but a conservative senate; electing
truly conservative Republicans to that chamber) and beefing up
the Republican ranks in the House with more conservatives.
If we do this, we will make Obama the lamest lame duck that
ever watched the hourglass sands trickle out on his remaining
time in the Oval Office. Having thus mitigated this misbegotten
president, we then can concentrate on electing a conservative
president who will undo the damage that this president
has done to our economy, our laws, our livelihoods, and
our lives.


MEM

Wednesday, February 19, 2014

Shirley Temple, R.I.P.

Shirley Temple Black, child actress extraordinaire,
American diplomat, politician, and a role model
for girls and ladies back in the days when it was
fashionable to be ladylike, as well as a symbol of
courage for women suffering breast cancer, sailed
on the Good Ship Lollipop for heaven's shores on
February 10. Having lived on this earth for 85
years, Temple lived both a long and a full life.

Having gotten into show business by her mother's
design as a tot, Temple was signed by 20th Century
Fox in the 1930s and made an impressive (for those
Depression-era times) $250,000 per picture, making
her the richest child actress in movies. She was
a bright and cheerful diversion for a gloomy, finan-
cially-struggling people seeking to forget their
troubles for an hour or two at their local cinemas.
At the tender age of six, she received a miniature
Academy Award and had her footprints immor-
talized in front of Grauman's Chinese Theatre,
joining the other movie luminaries so honored.

Among the movies that Temple starred in were
"Curly Top"; "Wee Willie Winkle"; "Heidi";
"The Littlest Rebel", in which she famously tap
danced with famed tap dancer Bill "Bojangles"
Robinson, and "Dimples". Temple was also known
for her curly hair and her dimples. In one film
she sang "On The Good Ship Lollipop", which
had practically become her signature song.

At 22, Temple saw her acting career wane as she
had outgrown her typical roles upon attaining
womanhood, so she married and started a family.
However, her first marriage ended in divorce,
and she next threw herself into politics, becoming
active in the Republican Party. She was appointed
Ambassador to Ghana by President Richard Nixon,
later named Ambassador to Czechoslovakia by
President George H.W. Bush, and was appointed
Chief of Protocol by President Gerald Ford in
between these postings, this appointment making
her the first woman to hold this post. Temple
once ran for Congress but lost. Her fame from her
first career made her visible and prominent abroad,
increasing her effectiveness in her diplomatic duties.

Temple had been diagnosed with breast cancer and
had undergone a mastectomy in the 1970s, at a time
when women generally didn't openly discuss having
either the disease or the surgery, and helped make
it easier and more sociably acceptable to do so by
making public her surgery. In so doing, she helped
save many womens' lives.

She remarried, taking as her second husband former
naval officer Charles Black, with whom she had two
children; Temple had had one child with her first hus-
band. This marriage gave Temple the marital bliss
and joy that her first marriage failed to deliver. She
remarked in an interview that her life was "overflowing"
with happiness and that "It is because I am Mrs. Charles
Alden Black ... housewife and mother of three happy
and healthy children. Not because I was Shirley Temple."
A successful woman in two career endeavors and in her
family life. Not exactly music to the ears of radical
feminists.

In summation, Shirley Temple Black succeeded in life
on her own terms, and she did so without ever compromising
her femininity, her dignity, or her morals. She was a role
model for women throughout her long and storied life,
and could be so again after her passing, if the women
of today would take the time to give her a long, serious
look; for they would learn that they could have fulfilling
lives without making gratuitous sideshows of themselves.
Rest in peace, Shirley.


MEM

Thursday, February 13, 2014

Further Developments on the IRS Scandal

The investigation continues into the IRS' harassment
of Tea Party groups, and has turned up some revealing
e-mail pieces by Lois Lerner, the high-ranking IRS
official who has been the focal point of the investigation.
The content of the e-correspondence between Lerner and
the Federal Election Committee (FEC) showed that
Lerner had been sharing tax information on certain
political groups with that governmental body, which is
a violation of federal law. The latter prohibits the sharing
of confidential taxpayer information by the IRS with other
government agencies, nor with anyone else. Once the IRS
assembles a file on an individual or a group, the contents
of that file are forthwith considered taxpayer information,
and Lerner had been sharing this sensitive and confidential
information after these political groups --- all conservative,
some being Tea Party groups --- after the groups had filed
for tax exempt status. Although the Tax exemption application
is public information, such documents as the minutes of
meetings and correspondence are not, and Lerner had been
giving these documents over to the FEC.

News reports in August had told that the IRS and the FEC
were sharing information on conservative groups, smacking
of at least potential collusion between government agencies
in targeting conservative political groups for audits and
demands for further confidential information from these
groups.

The Peasant is grateful for The Blaze, radio talker-turned-
alternative media mogul Glenn Beck's publication for the
latest information in this disturbing case which I have
related here for you, my dear readers. As your faithful
Peasant learns more on this matter, I shall post the
information here for your perusal. Lois Lerner had since
retired (read: got out of Dodge!) since this scandal broke,
but she could still be held legally culpable for her actions.
We can but hope and pray. This is but another example of
the "Change" part of President Obama's "Hope and Change"
plans in which he hopes to change our country into a
statist fiefdom for himself and his liberal establishment
patrons.


MEM

Thursday, February 6, 2014

A Stroll Through the News

A stroll through the latest news stories:

Our nation's debt, as of the start of this brand new year,
stands at $17,308,849,523,342.29. Our second president,
John Adams, noted that "There are two ways to conquer
and enslave a nation. One is by the sword. The other is
by debt." Thanks to the Obama regime, our children,
our grandchildren, and one can likely now add our great-
grandchildren will be encumbered with this growing
monster. They will have to work slavishly to pay even
a noticeable portion of it down. Let's keep this in mind
as the 2014 election approaches. Obama may have gotten
a second term, but at least we can make him a lame duck
before he can finally make our nation a dead duck.

The federal government slapped 141 new regulations on
the nation at the start of the new year. The Obama gang
is plowing ahead with even greater alacrity to micromanage
us, our homes, our businesses, and our lives. All the more
reason to make Obama a lame duck in the fullest sense
of the term come November.

The content editor for the website Reddit has banned
global warming/climate change dissenters from posting
responses on the site's science forums. This website joins
the Los Angeles Times in so banning anyone daring to
go against the left-wing junk-science orthodoxy on this
subject. Yet another example of the Left's view of free
speech, "Free speech for me, not for thee", especially
whenever someone will not go along with the party line;
this on the heels of the IRS and the NSA hassling and
snooping on people openly critical of Obama and his
statist governance, notably Tea Party activists.

Additionally, Santa Clara (CA) county officials recently
banned employees of that county from criticizing
Obamacare, worried that such outspokenness may cause
"stress" for those employees who favor it. A 20 year
employee, Norina Mooney, was so warned by said
officials with the threat of  repercussions, prompting her
to sue the county. Mooney states that Obama T-shirts,
posters, and calendars are permitted, but nothing at
all critical, including discussion among co-workers.

Here in my neck of the woods, due to the abnormally
cold weather, Milwaukee County Executive Chris Abele
ordered the county courthouse closed for one day.
This caused postponement of court dates for that period
of time, with some cases needing to be rescheduled for
still later on. While some in town have questioned Abele's
decision, seeing as how with the exception of Milwaukee's
public schools, other local government branches and their
facilities were not closed for this exceptionally and
dangerously cold day, including local conservative radio
talk show host Mark Belling on WISN-AM asking Abele
directly on the air, Abele said that he acted upon the infor-
mation he got from the local weather forecasts and wanted
to keep people safe from the ravages of the subzero tem-
peratures and wind chills. The day turned out to be not
as perilously cold as was predicted, but in your humble
Peasant's opinion Abele acted properly, citing the reasons
that he gave to Belling on the latter's show. In the bitterly
cold spells we in Milwaukee (and much of the rest of
the country) have been suffering through, some people
have chosen to be more risk-averse than others, thus stay-
ing home and closing businesses, postponing activities
that would have them venture outside, keeping their
children home, etc. One day here in Milwaukee the
temperature was -10' with wind chills of -35' to -40',
and weather forecasters warned that one could get
frostbite on any exposed skin, even the tip of the nose!
So it was good of County Executive Abele to choose
the safety and the health of the Milwaukee County
courthouse staff and all who had business scheduled there
for that day over getting on with everything as placed
on the dockets. Such business can be rescheduled; one's
health is harder to regain and, along with one's safety, is
of course more important. A true no-brainer to be sure.
Although the day in question proved to not be so
dangerously cold, Abele erred on the warmer side.
Your faithful Peasant heartily commends his county's
executive.

The Peasant wishes to thank Freedom Weekly for the first
four stories which I have shared here with you. The fifth
story I got right from my radio when I tuned in to Mark
Belling's weekday afternoon show. Freedom Weekly is
one of my favorite conservative periodicals, and I heartily
recommend it to you, my fabulous readers. They have an
online version too:  freedomweekly.com

Stay warm and we'll get together again soon!


MEM