Say Anything Blog

Is Tougher Airport Screening Going Too Far?
WSJ 7-2-09

The Transportation Security Administration has moved beyond just checking for weapons and explosives. It’s now training airport screeners to spot anything suspicious, and then honoring them when searches lead to arrests for crimes like drug possession and credit-card fraud.

But two court cases in the past month question whether TSA searches—which the agency says have broadened to allow screeners to use more judgment—have been going too far.

A federal judge in June threw out seizure of three fake passports from a traveler, saying that TSA screeners violated his Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable search and seizure. Congress authorizes TSA to search travelers for weapons and explosives; beyond that, the agency is overstepping its bounds, U.S. District Court Judge Algenon L. Marbley said.
read the rest here:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204556804574261940842372518.html

I can tell you from personal firsthand experience, the TSA makes the IRS look like a bunch of kittens. From draconian airline shipping and boarding regulations to the abuses/illegal activities outlined in the article, this agency seems to think they are above all law and reason. They have cost me more in additional operating expenses, increased my paperwork load signifigantly, and caused many problems with routine business activities. A few years ago they tried and failed(barely) to eliminate all cargo from commercial passenger flights. Customs and the IRS(both angencies I have had extensive dealings with) are easier to work with, and thats saying something.
Again, another example of government using scare tactics and fear to strip you of your personal liberties and obstruct private business activities.

http://www.politico.com/singletitlevideo.html?bcpid=1155201977&bctid=25947222001

This stuff makes Ross Perot and his charts look like genius. I hope there still folks out there that can express this serious problem in a way that doesnt make it seem like they are speaking to imbeciles. Is this how rank and file conservatives expect complex problems to be addressed? With PAC_MAN illustrations? Oh My.

http://www.politico.com/singletitlevideo.html?bcpid=1155201977&bctid=25947222001

Conservatives Warn Quick Sex Change Only Barrier Between Gays, Marriage

Treasury Department Issues Emergency Recall Of All US Dollars

Study: Children Exposed To Pornography May Expect Sex To Be Enjoyable

For GOP, A Southern Exposure
Republican strength in the South has both compensated for and masked the extent of the party’s decline elsewhere.
by Ronald Brownstein

Saturday, May 23, 2009

Southernization Of The GOP
Founded in the decade before the Civil War as the Northern voice of union, the Republican Party today is more electorally dependent on the South than at any point in its past.

In the House and Senate, nearly half of all Republicans were elected from that region, defined as the 11 states of the Confederacy, plus Kentucky and Oklahoma. In each chamber, Southerners are a larger share of the Republican caucus than ever before. Similarly, beginning with the 1992 presidential election, the South has provided at least 59 percent of the Electoral College votes won by the GOP nominee, including by George W. Bush in his 2000 and 2004 victories. That percentage is nearly double the South’s share of all Electoral College votes and by far the most that GOP presidential nominees have relied on the region over any sustained period.

Republican strength in the South has both compensated for and masked the extent of the GOP’s decline elsewhere. By several key measures, the party is now weaker outside the South than at any time since the Depression; in some ways, it is weaker than ever before.

Today the GOP holds a smaller share of non-Southern seats in the House and Senate than at any other point in its history except the apex of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s popularity during the early days of the New Deal. What is perhaps even more dramatic is that Republicans in the past five presidential elections have won a smaller share of the Electoral College votes available outside of the South than in any other five-election sequence since the party’s formation in 1854. Likewise, since 1992, Republican presidential nominees have won a smaller share of the cumulative popular vote outside of the South than in any other five-election sequence since the party’s founding, including the five consecutive elections won by Roosevelt and Harry Truman (1932 to 1948).

The Republican domination of the South “looked great when we were holding on to our Northeastern and Midwestern seats and continuing to sweep the South,” said Whit Ayres, a GOP pollster who specializes in Southern races. “The challenge arises when the rest of the country says, ‘I don’t believe the same things,’ or ‘I don’t admire the same candidates,’ as the South does.”

Read the rest here:
http://www.nationaljournal.com/njmagazine/cs_20090523_2195.php

Demographics dont lie.

Surging ministry, growing questions
By Ames Alexander and Tim Funk
aalexander@charlotteobserver.com,
tfunk@charlotteobserver.com
Posted: Saturday, May. 23, 2009

As Easter approached, the ad ran repeatedly on the Inspiration Network: David Cerullo, clutching a Bible, told viewers they, too, could receive prosperity, physical healing and other blessings God gave the ancient Israelites.

All they had to do, the televangelist said, was send $200 or more.

“Go to your phone,” he said. “Sow your Passover offering and watch God do what he said he would … Call now.”

Pitches like this have transformed the Charlotte-area cable network into one of the world’s fastest-growing Christian broadcasters, beaming into more than 100 countries on five continents. They’ve also helped turn Cerullo, Inspiration’s CEO and on-air host, into a wealthy man.

He brings home more than $1.5 million a year, making him the best-paid leader of any religious charity tracked by watchdog groups. His salary dwarfs those of executives leading far larger religious nonprofits.

David and Barbara Cerullo live in a 12,000 square-foot lakefront home in south Charlotte – complete with an elevator and an 1,100-square-foot garage. Their grown children also receive handsome salaries.

His network, with a budget of nearly $80 million last year, sprang from the remnants of Jim Bakker’s PTL Club. Cerullo and his colleagues have raised much of the money by repeating this on-air assertion: God brings financial favor to those who donate.

Cerullo says he’s heard from many people who’ve “reaped a harvest” after contributing.

But some donors are disillusioned. Rebecca Mills, 54, of north Mississippi, gave about $400 two years ago. Money was tight. But it was a time when she was recovering from breast cancer and trying to get closer to God.

The more she read the Bible, the more she wondered why she’d written those checks: “I could just … tell that what they were saying wasn’t right.”

Read the rest here:
http://www.charlotteobserver.com/408/story/741812.html

How many of you religious types want to defend this church and pastor? These mega-churches should be taxed just like any other business. Its an industry, nothing more. Money/profit is what matters here, so let them pay taxes like everyone else.
  I am tired of subsidizing the GOD industry with MY tax dollars. You should be as well.

This is what happens when crusty old trolls decide to try the “smacking” thing.
WHO COULD THIS BE? HHHMMM?

The nation needs a better GOP
Republicans have to put a leash on attack-dog tactics and engage in a constructive manner to deal with serious problems facing the country.
By Mickey Edwards
May 10, 2009
There are optimists within the Republican Party. They look at the wreckage left behind after last year’s elections, and recall 1964. That was the year that Barry Goldwater, the Republican nominee for president, was so badly trounced that pundits proclaimed the GOP dead. But it was also the year that a new breed of conservative activists, myself among them, brought a new energy to the party that eventually reshaped it and led to years of Republican domination of the executive branch.

The whistle-past-the-graveyard crowd imagines that this year’s doomsayers have simply forgotten history: Four years after the 1964 disaster, they remind us, Republicans won the presidency. We’ll just do it again, they say. But the Republicans’ defeat last year was far different from their 1964 loss—and it will be a lot harder to come back from.
Read the rest here:
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-edwards10-2009may10,0,2427294.story

then let the denial screeching begin.

This is the kicker(from the article):
There are now large chunks of the country almost without a Republican presence. Draw a map of the east side of the U.S., from the tip of Florida to the Canadian border, and see how many Republican senators or governors you find. In 1969, by contrast, the GOP held both Senate seats in New York, Delaware, Pennsylvania and Vermont; there were Republican senators from New Jersey, Michigan, Maryland, even Massachusetts. In the House, Republicans held three of the six Connecticut seats, five of 12 in Massachusetts, both in New Hampshire, 15 in New York, seven of 10 in Wisconsin. You get the idea.

What can you say about the Republican Party in 2009? That it has Alabama locked up? Well, that’s not even true: Democrats are far more competitive in the South than Republicans are in much of the country.
and this:
At one point, Republicans put forth a coherent, idealistic vision of America, one that summoned it to greatness. There was a profound belief in the dignity of the individual, a reverence for the Constitution and the founders who proposed it, a belief in doing whatever it took (including spending tax dollars to build a military second to none) to preserve the peace. Republican platforms preached prudence and the virtues of small business.

Today, the Republican belief system has degenerated into an embarrassing hodgepodge that worships political victory more than ideas; supports massive deficits; plunges the nation into “just-in-case” wars without adequate troops, supplies or armor; dismisses constitutional strictures; and campaigns on a platform of turning national problem-solving over to “Joe the Plumber.” It’s hard to see how all that points the way to a reawakening of voters to trust in the GOP.

Advocates of ending marijuana prohibition have been wandering the desert of American politics for forty years and have yet to find the Promised Land, but a new poll provides the latest evidence that at least in some parts of the country, the public is ready to say “legalize it,” or more benignly, “regulate and control it.” The new Zogby International poll of registered US voters finds that a majority of voters contacted on both the West Coast and the East Coast would support amending federal law “to let states legally regulate and tax marijuana the way they do liquor and gambling.”

Nationwide, 46% supported making marijuana policy a state option, while 53% did on the East Coast and 55% on the West Coast. In the South and Midwest, by contrast, 55% opposed it. In partisan terms, support was strongest among Democrats, with 59% in favor, while only 33% of Republicans favored letting states set their own marijuana laws. Independents split, with 44% in favor and 49% against.

Support for letting states tax and regulate marijuana also divides along religious and age group lines, sometimes in a surprising fashion. Protestants were least likely to support state marijuana reform (38%)—and only 26% of “born again” people—while 48% of Catholics, 60% of non-believers, and 70% of Jews approved.

More unexpected were the differences among age groups. While 18-29 year-olds unsurprisingly strongly favored state regulation (66%), the opinion of 30-49 year-olds was the reverse, with 58% opposed. Favorable opinion rose again in the 50-65 group before declining in the post-65 group. Commissioned by the NORML Foundation, the Zogby poll is based on interviews with 1,004 registered voters. It has a margin of error of 3.2%.

The Zogby poll is the latest to suggest that support for marijuana law reform is approaching critical mass, at least in some parts of the country. A Gallup poll released in November showed 36% of adults nationwide supporting marijuana legalization, an all-time high, with 47% of Westerners agreeing with freeing the weed. Support for reform can reach even higher, if the right question is asked. A 2001 Zogby poll asked respondents if they favored “arresting and jailing marijuana law offenders,” and 61% answered no. In its soundings in Nevada, where it is backing an initiative to legalize the adult possession of up to an ounce of marijuana and create a system of regulated distribution, the Marijuana Policy Project reports a substantial difference in favorable responses when potential voters are asked if they support “legalizing marijuana” or “regulating and controlling marijuana.”
read the rest here:
http://www.zogby.com/templates/printsb.cfm?id=12917