... the men who risked all in the dark days of 1961

Sunday we commemorate the 50th anniversary of the saddest day in Cuban history, the invasion at the Bay of Pigs. It should be a day of reflection for Cubans on both shores. The fighting lasted for several days — Cubans fought and killed one another while the two super powers stood on the sidelines and observed. During the few bloody days of combat all Cubans fought with conviction and honor. But one side (Brigade 2506) was under-equipped, poorly advised and, worst of all, betrayed.

Over the last few weeks I’ve had an opportunity to speak to veterans of those dark days of April, 1961. I have always been amazed by the humility with which many of the Brigade members tell their stories. In fact, there are many Brigade 2506 members in the community, and you would never know that half a century ago they were abandoned in Cuba by the Kennedy administration, left to fend for themselves on a beachhead. They are our grandfathers, neighbors, friends and, sometimes, few know of their plight.

Greece, the last bastion of Socialism

‘Last Congress’ for Cuba’s old guard

BY ANDY GOMEZ

Among the significant changes taking place in Cuba is an unfolding and most unusual pattern where criticism and dissent within the political class at large, intellectuals, and academia is more visible today than ever before.

At the same time, as an initiative of the Cuban government, a political dialogue started with the Catholic church that resulted in the release of scores of political prisoners, in particular those known as the “75 Group,” while dissident groups continue to conduct their activities in what could be described as a tug-of-war relationship with Cuban authorities. In addition, the Catholic Church has been granted permission by the government to establish the first seminary since the start of the revolution and continue its humanitarian aid through Caritas. Meanwhile, the US-Cuba conflict remains very much the same, the main issues being the incarceration of Alan Gross in Cuba, the so-called “Cuban Five” in U.S. jails, and the U.S. trade embargo. Further U.S. concessions are unlikely until Cuba makes the next move.

According to reports out of Havana, the Cuban economy is transforming from an almost 100-percent state economy to a clearly defined mixed, market, socialist economy. By 2015, the Cuban government expects that at least 1.8 million people and their families will represent a huge micro-economy of small businesses, cooperative businesses, and self employed, in the urban areas while most of the land in rural areas from which state farms have disappeared almost entirely will be in the hands of private farmers, finqueros and private cooperatives.

Progressive's Dream Pipe

An open mike caught President Obama in Chicago speaking to donors during a fund raiser, when he didn't realize the microphone was live.

          I found these comments that he made fascinating:


''I had the emir of Qatar come by the Oval Office today. Pretty influential guy. He is a big booster, big promoter of democracy all throughout the Middle East. Reform, reform, reform. ... Now he himself is not reforming significantly. There's no big move toward democracy in Qatar. But you know part of the reason is that the per capita income of Qatar is $145,000 a year. That will dampen a lot of conflict. I make this point only because if there is opportunity, if people feel their lives can get better, then a lot of these problems get solved.''

Is it the beginning of the end of the FED

Federal Reserve Gave, as Part of Bailout, Hundreds of Millions to the Wives of Wall Street Bigwigs

This one is totally insane. Thank heavens Ron Paul has put pressure on the Fed, trying to find out what it is up to. Rolling Stone magazine is out with a story so hot, it is going to rock louder than any music band the mag has ever covered. RS reports:

Now, following an act of Congress that has forced the Fed to open its books from the bailout era, this unofficial budget is for the first time becoming at least partially a matter of public record. Staffers in the Senate and the House, whose queries about Fed spending have been rebuffed for nearly a century, are now poring over 21,000 transactions and discovering a host of outrages and lunacies in the "other" budget. It is as though someone sat down and made a list of every individual on earth who actually did not need emergency financial assistance from the United States government, and then handed them the keys to the public treasure. The Fed sent billions in bailout aid to banks in places like Mexico, Bahrain and Bavaria, billions more to a spate of Japanese car companies, more than $2 trillion in loans each to Citigroup and Morgan Stanley, and billions more to a string of lesser millionaires and billionaires with Cayman Islands addresses. "Our jaws are literally dropping as we're reading this," says Warren Gunnels, an aide to Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont. "Every one of these transactions is outrageous."

Child molesting

Homosexual Brainwashing in Elementary School

With these videos I rest my case for homeschooling:

Cambridge Friends School is a Quaker school, but kids can be subjected to the same perverse social engineering at taxpayer expense:

What possible benevolent purpose could motivate brainwashing small children into accepting as normal a potentially lethal form of sexual depravity?

Art forms

The Spook Racket

Magicians Todd Robbins and Teller take on the supernatural in their bloody off-Broadway sensation Play Dead

Damon W. Root | April 5, 2011

On July 13, 1930, an audience of nearly 6,000 crowded London’s Royal Albert Hall to spend a few hours with the ghost of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The world-famous creator of the great fictional detective Sherlock Holmes, Doyle had also been an outspoken believer in ghosts, Ouija boards, ectoplasm, and other dubious forms of paranormal activity. “That I am perfectly certain is surely demonstrated by the mere fact that I have abandoned my congenital and lucrative work, left my home for long periods of time, and subjected myself to all sorts of inconveniences, losses, and even insults, in order to get the facts home to the people,” Doyle wrote in his 1924 autobiography Memories and Adventures. Who better to deliver a public message from beyond the grave?

So joining Doyle’s widow and assorted relatives onstage was the medium Estelle Roberts, who previously claimed to have made contact with the late King George of Greece. “He is here!” Roberts finally shouted to the restless crowd waiting for a sign from the renowned author. “He is here!” Lady Arthur Conan Doyle later said she was convinced, though a reporter covering the event for theSaturday Review wasn’t so sure. “I should like to have heard Sherlock Holmes examining the medium at Albert Hall last Sunday,” he wrote, “for the methods that were employed were hardly reminiscent of Baker Street.”

Wrong by design

''There is always an easy solution to every human problem – neat, plausible, and wrong''. –H. L. Mencken

Leviathan unbound

Government by Waiver

RICHARD A. EPSTEIN

One of the great achievements of Western civilization is what we commonly call "the rule of law." By this we mean the basic principles of fairness and due process that govern the application of power in both the public and the private spheres. The rule of law requires that all disputes — whether among private parties or among the state and private parties — be tried before neutral judges, under rules that are known and articulated in advance. Every party must have notice of the charge against him and an opportunity to be heard in response; each governing rule must be consistent with all the others, so that no person is forced to violate one legal requirement in order to satisfy a second. In the United States, our respect for such principles has made our economy the world's strongest, and our citizens the world's freest.

Though we may take it for granted, the rule of law is no easy thing to create and preserve. Dictators and petty despots of all sorts will rebel against these constraints in order to exercise dominion over the lives and fortunes of their subjects. But anyone, of any political persuasion, who thinks of government as the servant of its citizens — not their master — will recognize that compliance with the rule of law sets a minimum condition for a just legal order.

They are more than stupid, they are evil

What's next ?

Boston Mayor Thomas Menino KOs Soda, OKs Alcohol

April 10, 2011

Boston Mayor Thomas Menino has banned soda, sports drinks and sweetened ice teas from city property, according to a recent government press release.

In an attempt to reduce the city’s rising obesity rates, Menino has banned all sugary drinks from city vending machines, cafeterias and concession stands, just one day after reaching an agreement with the Boston Red Sox that allows the team to sell mixed drinks at its ballpark.

“I want to create a civic environment that makes the healthier choice the easier choice in people’s lives, whether it’s schools, work sites, or other places in the community," said Menino in the press release issued last week about the soda ban.

According to the release, city buildings and departments have a six-month grace period before they’ll be required to phase out the sale of beverages loaded with sugar, such as non-diet sodas, pre-sweetened ice teas, refrigerated coffee drinks, energy drinks, juice drinks with added sugar and sports drinks. The order allows for the sale of beverages such as diet sodas, diet iced teas, 100 percent juices, low-calorie sports drinks, low-sugar sweetened beverages, sweetened soy milk and flavored, sweetened milk. Beverages such as bottled water, flavored and unflavored seltzer water, low-fat milk, and unsweetened soy milk can continue to be sold.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/04/10/boston-mayor-thomas-menino-kos-soda-oks-alcohol/#ixzz1JHeyDEid

..and since we own them ...

Homosexual Nudging for British 11-Year-Olds

It had never occurred to me that 11-year-olds have "sexual orientations." But they'll need to come up with them, if they are to comply with the nudging inquiries of British educrats:

Children as young as 11 could soon be asked about their sexuality without their parents' consent, it has emerged.

Teachers, nurses and youth workers are being urged to set up pilot studies aimed at monitoring adolescent sexual orientation for the first time.

A report commissioned by the Government's equalities watchdog found that it was 'practically and ethically' possible to interview young children about their sexuality.

Parental consent is not deemed necessary.

The report for the much-criticised Equality and Human Rights Commission recommends that children should be asked if they are gay from the age of 11. A record should be kept of those unsure or 'questioning' their sexuality.

The purpose is to promote homosexuality by encouraging little kids too young to understand it to think of themselves as privileged deviants. According to the report,

"some young people begin to question their sexual orientation as early as age eight and may begin to identify as LGB (lesbian, gay, bisexual) from early adolescence."

Or at least they may with sufficient encouragement.

Obama's North American Association for Man-Boy Love Association (NAMBLA) associated Safe Schools Czar would no doubt approve.

There was a time when we expected public officials to defend children's innocence from predatory perverts. Now they are the predatory perverts.

We also own your children

April 11, 2011

Kids Forbidden From Bringing Lunch to School

First they use your money to provide government cheese. Then they force you to eat it. 

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/education/ct-met-school-lunch-restrictions-041120110410,0,2614451,full.story

At Little Village Academy, a Chicago public school,

students are not allowed to pack lunches from home. Unless they have a medical excuse, they must eat the food served in the cafeteria.

Principal Elsa Carmona said her intention is to protect students from their own unhealthful food choices.

It's a weighty job protecting people from their choices, but Big Government feels up to it. Carmona describes the ban as common.

A Chicago Public Schools spokeswoman said she could not say how many schools prohibit packed lunches and that decision is left to the judgment of the principals.

"While there is no formal policy, principals use common sense judgment based on their individual school environments," Monique Bond wrote in an email. "In this case, this principal is encouraging the healthier choices and attempting to make an impact that extends beyond the classroom."

You won't find a better argument for private school or homeschooling than government educrats attempting to make an impact that extends beyond the classroom.

Being government-issued, the food stinks.

At Little Village, most students must take the meals served in the cafeteria or go hungry or both. During a recent visit to the school, dozens of students took the lunch but threw most of it in the garbage uneaten. Though CPS has improved the nutritional quality of its meals this year, it also has seen a drop-off in meal participation among students, many of whom say the food tastes bad.

"Some of the kids don't like the food they give at our school for lunch or breakfast," said Little Village parent Erica Martinez. "So it would be a good idea if they could bring their lunch so they could at least eat something."

Public schools serve not only lunch but breakfast too. Maybe that's what has replaced discarded old-fashioned activities like teaching the three R's. Coming soon: government dinner.

The press dug up a parent who actually approves:

[P]arent Miguel Medina said he thinks the "no home lunch policy" is a good one. "The school food is very healthy," he said, "and when they bring the food from home, there is no control over the food."

Heaven forbidden there should be no control over food. As Rep. John Dingleberry (D-MI) revealed, controlling the people is what the government's ostensible concern with our health is all about.

Not all schools have progressed this far in their authoritarianism:

At Claremont Academy Elementary School on the South Side, officials allow packed lunches but confiscate any snacks loaded with sugar or salt.

Salt is an essential nutrient, but like CO2 it has been arbitrarily declared unholy according to the bizarre godless religion of our moonbat overlords.

If we're seeing this level of totalitarianism now, imagine how much micromanagement of our diets bureaucrats will insist on imposing when they've finished consolidating control of the healthcare system under ObamaCare.

The Bad Word

... Fascism has attained the dignity of a cuss word in America. When we disagree with a man's social or political arguments, if we cannot reasonably call him a communist, we call him a fascist. The word itself has little more relation to its original and precise object than a certain well-beloved American expletive has to the harmless domestic animal it actually describes. But fascism is something more than a bad name. If we are to have an eye cocked for fascism and fascists in this country we had better be sure we know a fascist when we see one. Of course we will recognize him in an instant if he will go about in a Bundist uniform or storm trooper's black shirt. But what if he wears no such uniform, has never learned to goose-step, speaks with no German gutturals or Italian gestures but in excellent seaboard English and is, in fact, a member of a patriotic American society or labor union and actually hates Hitler and Mussolini and wants them trapped, tried, and strung up — how then will we detect him?

Since you pay social security we own you

Should there be a 'fat tax'?

Offering incentives for lifestyle choices likely to cut medical costs is an idea worth considering.

Los Angeles Times

If an individual's body mass index isn't a purely personal matter, what is? We have the right to choose between healthy food or junk food, even if the latter is more likely to result in obesity and related health problems. But once our choices affect others, there's a natural conflict between individual freedom and social responsibility. In a nation where rising healthcare costs and diminished access to medical care are issues of grave concern, personal decisions are no longer strictly private. The treatment of obesity- and smoking-related disease is tremendously expensive, which in turns drives up health insurance premiums for everyone, as well as raising the costs for Medicaid, Medicare and health coverage for public employees.

These legitimate concerns have resulted in a raft of nanny-state proposals to shape the public's dietary habits by taxing this food or that drink or by outlawing free toys that accompany unhealthy children's meals at some restaurants. Such proposals raise inevitable questions of fairness and effectiveness. Does it make sense to tax a can of soda but not a fruit juice that contains more calories per cup and very little additional nutrition? Would a vitamin-fortified soda be exempt from the tax? And it's hard to figure out whether the bigger obesity culprit is a small order of fried chicken at a fast-foot outlet or a giant slab of prime rib at a pricey restaurant. Or, as many dietitians now think, maybe it's the carbs; has the time come for a public pasta tax? In any case, there is much uncertainty about whether such tactics would have any effect on the country's collective bulging belly.

suicidal government

... government is suicidal because it breeds expectations that cannot be met ...
by Robert Samuelson
Read the article at
 http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/big_government_on_the_brink/2011/04/09/AFNcwrGD_story.html?wprss=rss_opinions

Resistance

Soviet hard tyranny produced dissidents like Alexander Solzhenitsyn. Nanny state soft tyranny has produced Jon Basso, owner of the Heart Attack Grill:

Don't worry moonbats, the business will be closed down by some greedy lawyer before you know it.

government lunacy at it's best

Police arrest salvagers for taking 47p in scrap from recycling centre

Pair of salvagers who took dumped items claim police told them the arrest operation had cost £20,000

read the whole thing at  http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/apr/05/salvagers-arrested-scrap-recycling

Rising Supply, Advances in Drilling Technology and Conservation Will Counteract Rising Oil Prices

1. Basic economic theory tells us that one of the predictable consequences of resources becoming more expensive is that higher prices will stimulate discovery, exploration and greater production on the supply side.  And that's exactly what we're seeing now in Texas for oil and gas, according to today's WSJ article "Chevron Rekindles Old Texas Flame: High Oil Prices, New Technologies Once Again Make the Permian Basin a Popular Spot for Drilling," here's an excerpt:

"Climbing oil prices are making the aging oil fields of Texas's Permian Basin look attractive again to some big petroleum companies. Chevron Corp. has pumped oil from this well-plowed area of west Texas and New Mexico since 1925. But in recent decades, as production in the area declined, Chevron and other companies used it primarily as a lab for oil-extraction techniques that could be employed in larger projects elsewhere.

A better joke of the week

A Greek, an Irishman, and a Portuguese go into a bar. 
The German pays

Joke of the week

A German, a Greek, an Irishman, and a Portuguese go into a bar. The German pays.