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Politics : Liberalism: Do You Agree We've Had Enough of It? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Kenneth E. Phillipps who wrote (102205)	4/1/2011 11:47:03 AM
From: d[-_-]b	2 Recommendations Respond to of 224750

A living wage is twice the minimum wage rate. Get married.

To: Kenneth E. Phillipps who wrote (102205)	4/1/2011 12:20:53 PM
From: TideGlider	5 Recommendations Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 224750

57% Okay With Government Shutdown If It Leads to Deeper Budget Cuts Friday, April 01, 2011 Email to a Friend ShareThis.Advertisement A majority of voters are fine with a partial shutdown of the federal government if that’s what it takes to get deeper cuts in federal government spending. A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 57% of Likely U.S. Voters think making deeper spending cuts in the federal budget for 2011 is more important than avoiding a partial government shutdown. Thirty-one percent (31%) disagree and say avoiding a shutdown is more important. Twelve percent (12%) are not sure. (To see survey question wording, click here.) Republicans want to make more spending cuts in the current budget than Democrats do, but 36% of voters think it would be better to avoid a government shutdown by authorizing spending at a level most Democrats will agree to. Fifty-seven percent (57%) would rather have a shutdown until Democrats and Republicans can agree on deeper spending cuts. This shows little change from late February when 58% of voters said it was better to have a partial government shutdown than to keep spending at current levels. Since then, congressional Democrats have agreed to spending cuts but now are accusing Republicans of being held hostage by the budget-cutting demands of Tea Party voters. The legislators have avoided a shutdown by passing a series of stopgap budget bills, but several conservative Republicans now say they will not support any more of these measures. In the event of a shutdown, payments for things like Social Security, Medicare and unemployment benefits would continue. Still, a plurality (44%) of voters thinks a partial shutdown of the federal government would be bad for the economy, down four points from February. Twenty-three percent (23%) say a shutdown would be good for the economy, while a similar number (22%) say it would have no impact, a seven-point increase from the previous survey. (Want a free daily e-mail update? If it's in the news, it's in our polls). Rasmussen Reports updates are also available on Twitter or Facebook. The survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted on March 30-31, 2011 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology. Most voters, as they have for years, say cutting taxes and reducing government spending are best for the economy. The partisan divide is predictable. Fifty-four percent (54%) of Democrats say avoiding a government shutdown is more important than deeper spending cuts. Seventy-six percent (76%) of Republicans - and 67% of voters not affiliated with either of the major parties – disagree. Sixty-nine percent (69%) of Democrats feel it’s better to authorize spending at a level most legislators from their party will agree to rather than have a partial shutdown until both parties can agree on deeper spending cuts. Seventy-four percent (74%) of GOP voters and 70% of unaffiliateds would rather have a shutdown until an agreement on deeper cuts can be reached. Democrats also are more than twice as likely as Republicans and unaffiliated voters to believe that a partial government shutdown would be bad for the economy. There’s a similar divide between Political Class and Mainstream voters. Fifty-two percent (52%) of the Political Class say avoiding a shutdown is more important than deeper spending cuts. Sixty-five percent (65%) of Mainstream voters put more emphasis on spending cuts. Seventy-six percent (76%) of Political Class voters say it is better to avoid a shutdown by authorizing spending at a level most Democrats will agree to. Sixty-six percent (66%) of those in the Mainstream would rather see a shutdown until deeper spending cuts can be agreed on. Most of those in the Political Class (52%) see a shutdown as bad for the economy, but just 38% of Mainstream voters agree. Midterm elections and a change of power in the U.S. House of Representatives haven't lowered the level of voter discontent with the federal government and the leaders of the two major political parties. Voters are less supportive than ever of congressional incumbents, and fewer than one-out-of-three think their own representative is the best person for the job. Even though Republicans have taken over the House of Representatives, voters still expect government spending, taxes and the deficit to go up over the next two years. The Obama administration has acted on the belief that increased government spending is good for the economy, but a solid plurality of voters recognize that this view is not widely shared by the American people. Seventy percent (70%) of voters think voters are more willing to make the hard choices needed to reduce federal spending than elected politicians are.

To: Kenneth E. Phillipps who wrote (102205)	4/1/2011 12:52:28 PM
From: JakeStraw	3 Recommendations Respond to of 224750

We've Become a Nation of Takers, Not Makers online.wsj.com More Americans work for the government than in manufacturing, farming, fishing, forestry, mining and utilities combined.. If you want to understand better why so many states—from New York to Wisconsin to California—are teetering on the brink of bankruptcy, consider this depressing statistic: Today in America there are nearly twice as many people working for the government (22.5 million) than in all of manufacturing (11.5 million). This is an almost exact reversal of the situation in 1960, when there were 15 million workers in manufacturing and 8.7 million collecting a paycheck from the government. It gets worse. More Americans work for the government than work in construction, farming, fishing, forestry, manufacturing, mining and utilities combined. We have moved decisively from a nation of makers to a nation of takers. Nearly half of the $2.2 trillion cost of state and local governments is the $1 trillion-a-year tab for pay and benefits of state and local employees. Is it any wonder that so many states and cities cannot pay their bills? Where are the productivity gains in government? Consider a core function of state and local governments: schools. Over the period 1970-2005, school spending per pupil, adjusted for inflation, doubled, while standardized achievement test scores were flat. Over roughly that same time period, public-school employment doubled per student, according to a study by researchers at the University of Washington. That is what economists call negative productivity. But education is an industry where we measure performance backwards: We gauge school performance not by outputs, but by inputs. If quality falls, we say we didn't pay teachers enough or we need smaller class sizes or newer schools. If education had undergone the same productivity revolution that manufacturing has, we would have half as many educators, smaller school budgets, and higher graduation rates and test scores. The same is true of almost all other government services. Mass transit spends more and more every year and yet a much smaller share of Americans use trains and buses today than in past decades. One way that private companies spur productivity is by firing underperforming employees and rewarding excellence. In government employment, tenure for teachers and near lifetime employment for other civil servants shields workers from this basic system of reward and punishment. It is a system that breeds mediocrity, which is what we've gotten. Most reasonable steps to restrain public-sector employment costs are smothered by the unions. Study after study has shown that states and cities could shave 20% to 40% off the cost of many services—fire fighting, public transportation, garbage collection, administrative functions, even prison operations—through competitive contracting to private providers. But unions have blocked many of those efforts. Public employees maintain that they are underpaid relative to equally qualified private-sector workers, yet they are deathly afraid of competitive bidding for government services. President Obama says we have to retool our economy to "win the future." The only way to do that is to grow the economy that makes things, not the sector that takes things.

To: Kenneth E. Phillipps who wrote (102205)	4/1/2011 12:55:26 PM
From: lorne	2 Recommendations Respond to of 224750

kenny...Do you have your very own teleprompter...like hussein has?

To: Kenneth E. Phillipps who wrote (102205)	4/1/2011 1:50:53 PM
From: Hope Praytochange	Respond to of 224750

Message 27279559

To: Kenneth E. Phillipps who wrote (102205)	4/1/2011 3:05:42 PM
From: lorne	2 Recommendations Respond to of 224750

You must be so proud...are you a moslum? ...."It's the second Muslim-Christian battle in Africa recently. The earlier dispute was in 2007, when Barack Obama campaigned for now-Kenyan Prime Minster Raila Odinga. Appearing with Odinga at campaign stops, Obama gave speeches accusing the sitting Kenyan president of being corrupt and oppressive. Then on Aug. 29, 2007, Odinga signed a secret Memorandum of Understanding with Muslim Sheik Abdullah Abdi, the chief of the National Muslim Leaders Forum of Kenya. In exchange for Muslim support, Odinga promised to rewrite the Kenyan Constitution to install Shariah as law in "Muslim declared regions," elevate Islam as "the only true religion" and give Islamic leaders "oversight" over other religions, establish Shariah courts and ban Christian proselytism."... U.N. demands exit of elected Christian president Sides with Muslim challenger against nation's own constitutional process March 31, 2011 © 2011 WorldNetDaily wnd.com Another North African nation apparently is being plunged into civil war by rebel Muslims who want to get rid of a Christian president, according to a report from Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin. They are being supported by United Nations and U.S. efforts, even though the nation's own constitutional process affirmed Christian President Laurent Gbagbo's election victory. Already Arab revolts have spread across North Africa and the Middle East. Libya is involved in what could be called a civil war, and Yemen appears about to enter one. Now, in the Ivory Coast, forces of Muslim-backed Alassane Ouattara from the northern part of the country have taken over the capital, Yamoussoukro, just as the U.N. Security Council has voted to impose sanctions against the country until its current president, Gbagbo, relinquishes power. Gbagbo has his major backing from the southern Ivory Coast. Already, rebel forces of Ouattara have captured six towns in a month from security forces loyal to incumbent Gbagbo. Reports from the area say that fighting has broken out in the eastern portion of the country bordering Ghana. Ouattara forces have just seized San Pedro, the world's largest cocoa exporting port, and are on the outskirts of the country's economic capital of Abidjan. Gbagbo had called for a cease-fire, but Ouattara said that was just a diversion, insisting that forces loyal to Gbagbo surrender. Since last November's election, pro-Gbagbo troops have lost every battle to pro-Ouattara forces, suggesting that they may be getting assistance from foreign military advisers, which could include Islamists who have had battlefield experience, one source said. The U.N. Security Council has stated Gbagbo must stand down and allow Ouattara to take control even though the nation's own constitutional process upheld his concerns over vote fraud in the election and declared Ghagbo the election winner on that basis. It's the second Muslim-Christian battle in Africa recently. The earlier dispute was in 2007, when Barack Obama campaigned for now-Kenyan Prime Minster Raila Odinga. Appearing with Odinga at campaign stops, Obama gave speeches accusing the sitting Kenyan president of being corrupt and oppressive. Then on Aug. 29, 2007, Odinga signed a secret Memorandum of Understanding with Muslim Sheik Abdullah Abdi, the chief of the National Muslim Leaders Forum of Kenya. In exchange for Muslim support, Odinga promised to rewrite the Kenyan Constitution to install Shariah as law in "Muslim declared regions," elevate Islam as "the only true religion" and give Islamic leaders "oversight" over other religions, establish Shariah courts and ban Christian proselytism. Even with strong Muslim backing, Odinga was beaten in the December 2007 elections. He then accused the incumbent president of rigging the vote and allegedly incited his supporters to riot. Over the next month, some 1,500 Kenyans were killed and more than 500,000 displaced – with most of the violence led by Muslims, who set churches ablaze and hacked Christians to death with machetes. Odinga eventually ended up as prime minister in Kenya through a power-sharing arrangement that was installed in an effort to appease the rioters.