Friday, October 24, 2008

Integrity?

The following is a wholly reproduced copy of the article written by Orson Scott Card in the Rhinoceros Times on October 20, 2008. The URL for the story there is:
http://www.linearpublishing.com/orsonscottcard.html ...

Truth is where you find it. Unfortunately, the media figures that this story targets really don't care about their images nor anything but a myopic goal of ushering in an era of socialism here in America. They don't even seem to care that socialism has never worked anywhere it was tried. To quote Albert Einstein, "Insanity is doing the same things over again and expecting different results." The mainstream media in this country, maybe in all of the Western World, are completely insane.
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Would the Last Honest Reporter Please Turn On the Lights?
by
Orson Scott Card

October 20, 2008

An open letter to the local daily paper -- almost every local daily paper in America:

I remember reading All the President's Men and thinking: That's journalism. You do what it takes to get the truth and you lay it before the public, because the public has a right to know.

This housing crisis didn't come out of nowhere. It was not a vague emanation of the evil Bush administration.

It was a direct result of the political decision, back in the late 1990s, to loosen the rules of lending so that home loans would be more accessible to poor people. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were authorized to approve risky loans.

What is a risky loan? It's a loan that the recipient is likely not to be able to repay.

The goal of this rule change was to help the poor -- which especially would help members of minority groups. But how does it help these people to give them a loan that they can't repay? They get into a house, yes, but when they can't make the payments, they lose the house -- along with their credit rating.

They end up worse off than before.

This was completely foreseeable and in fact many people did foresee it. One political party, in Congress and in the executive branch, tried repeatedly to tighten up the rules. The other party blocked every such attempt and tried to loosen them.

Furthermore, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae were making political contributions to the very members of Congress who were allowing them to make irresponsible loans. (Though why quasi-federal agencies were allowed to do so baffles me. It's as if the Pentagon were allowed to contribute to the political campaigns of congressmen who support increasing their budget.)

Isn't there a story here? Doesn't journalism require that you who produce our daily paper tell the truth about who brought us to a position where the only way to keep confidence in our economy was a $700 billion bailout? Aren't you supposed to follow the money and see which politicians were benefiting personally from the deregulation of mortgage lending?

I have no doubt that if these facts had pointed to the Republican Party or to John McCain as the guilty parties, you would be treating it as a vast scandal. "Housing-gate," no doubt. Or "Fannie-gate."

Instead, it was Sen. Christopher Dodd and Congressman Barney Frank, both Democrats, who denied that there were any problems, who refused Bush administration requests to set up a regulatory agency to watch over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and who were still pushing for these agencies to go even further in promoting subprime mortgage loans almost up to the minute they failed.

As Thomas Sowell points out in a TownHall.com essay entitled "Do Facts Matter?" (http://snipurl.com/457to): "Alan Greenspan warned them four years ago. So did the Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers to the President. So did Bush's Secretary of the Treasury."

These are facts. This financial crisis was completely preventable. The party that blocked any attempt to prevent it was ... the Democratic Party. The party that tried to prevent it was ... the Republican Party.

Yet when Nancy Pelosi accused the Bush administration and Republican deregulation of causing the crisis, you in the press did not hold her to account for her lie. Instead, you criticized Republicans who took offense at this lie and refused to vote for the bailout!

What? It's not the liar, but the victims of the lie who are to blame?

Now let's follow the money ... right to the presidential candidate who is the number two recipient of campaign contributions from Fannie Mae.

And after Fred Raines, the CEO of Fannie Mae who made $90 million while running it into the ground, was fired for his incompetence, one presidential candidate's campaign actually consulted him for advice on housing.

If that presidential candidate had been John McCain, you would have called it a major scandal and we would be getting stories in your paper every day about how incompetent and corrupt he was.

But instead, that candidate was Barack Obama, and so you have buried this story, and when the McCain campaign dared to call Raines an "adviser" to the Obama campaign -- because that campaign had sought his advice -- you actually let Obama's people get away with accusing McCain of lying, merely because Raines wasn't listed as an official adviser to the Obama campaign.

You would never tolerate such weasely nit-picking from a Republican.

If you who produce our local daily paper actually had any principles, you would be pounding this story, because the prosperity of all Americans was put at risk by the foolish, short-sighted, politically selfish and possibly corrupt actions of leading Democrats, including Obama.

If you who produce our local daily paper had any personal honor, you would find it unbearable to let the American people believe that somehow Republicans were to blame for this crisis.

There are precedents. Even though President Bush and his administration never said that Iraq sponsored or was linked to 9/11, you could not stand the fact that Americans had that misapprehension -- so you pounded us with the fact that there was no such link. (Along the way, you created the false impression that Bush had lied to them and said that there was a connection.)

If you had any principles, then surely right now, when the American people are set to blame President Bush and John McCain for a crisis they tried to prevent, and are actually shifting to approve of Barack Obama because of a crisis he helped cause, you would be laboring at least as hard to correct that false impression.

Your job, as journalists, is to tell the truth. That's what you claim you do, when you accept people's money to buy or subscribe to your paper.

But right now, you are consenting to or actively promoting a big fat lie -- that the housing crisis should somehow be blamed on Bush, McCain and the Republicans. You have trained the American people to blame everything bad -- even bad weather -- on Bush, and they are responding as you have taught them to.

If you had any personal honor, each reporter and editor would be insisting on telling the truth -- even if it hurts the election chances of your favorite candidate.

Because that's what honorable people do. Honest people tell the truth even when they don't like the probable consequences. That's what honesty means. That's how trust is earned.

Barack Obama is just another politician, and not a very wise one. He has revealed his ignorance and naiveté time after time -- and you have swept it under the rug, treated it as nothing.

Meanwhile, you have participated in the borking of Sarah Palin, reporting savage attacks on her for the pregnancy of her unmarried daughter -- while you ignored the story of John Edwards' own adultery for many months.

So I ask you now: Do you have any standards at all? Do you even know what honesty means?

Is getting people to vote for Barack Obama so important that you will throw away everything that journalism is supposed to stand for?

You might want to remember the way the National Organization of Women (NOW) threw away their integrity by supporting Bill Clinton despite his well-known pattern of sexual exploitation of powerless women. Who listens to NOW anymore? We know they stand for nothing; they have no principles.

That's where you are right now.

It's not too late. You know that if the situation were reversed, and the truth would damage McCain and help Obama, you would be moving heaven and earth to get the true story out there.

If you want to redeem your honor, you will swallow hard and make a list of all the stories you would print if it were McCain who had been getting money from Fannie Mae, McCain whose campaign had consulted with its discredited former CEO, McCain who had voted against tightening its lending practices.

Then you will print them, even though every one of those true stories will point the finger of blame at the reckless Democratic Party, which put our nation's prosperity at risk so they could feel good about helping the poor, and lay a fair share of the blame at Obama's door.

You will also tell the truth about John McCain: that he tried, as a senator, to do what it took to prevent this crisis. You will tell the truth about President Bush: that his administration tried more than once to get Congress to regulate lending in a responsible way.

This was a Congress-caused crisis, beginning during the Clinton administration, with Democrats leading the way into the crisis and blocking every effort to get out of it in a timely fashion.

If you at our local daily newspaper continue to let Americans believe -- and vote as if -- President Bush and the Republicans caused the crisis, then you are joining in that lie.

If you do not tell the truth about the Democrats -- including Barack Obama -- and do so with the same energy you would use if the miscreants were Republicans -- then you are not journalists by any standard.

You're just the public relations machine of the Democratic Party, and it's time you were all fired and real journalists brought in, so that we can actually have a daily newspaper in our city.



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There is a virtuous fear which is the effect of faith, and a vicious fear which is the product of doubt and distrust. The former leads to hope as relying on God, in whom we believe; The latter inclines to despair, as not relying on God, in whom we do not believe.Persons of the one character fear to lose God; those of the other character fear to find Him.--Pascal

“Democracies are most commonly corrupted by the insolence of demagogues.” —Aristotle

“Understanding is the reward of faith. Therefore seek not to understand that you may believe, but believe that you may understand.” —Augustine of Hippo

“The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane.” – Marcus Aurelius

Veritas vos Liberabit!

God Bless America, we need it!

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How worthless is the MSM?

That title may be a non sequitur but I think it makes the point clear. Worthless is what they are, there are no values of worthless other than being without worth. “What am I talking about?” you may well be asking yourself. OK, read this and see if you understand:

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,433314,00.html

The mainstream media has no worth as a news agency when it is simply acting as the propaganda arm of the Obama/Biden campaign. There used to be a time when the media would be all over these gaffs by Biden and also would have known that Gov. Palin was right in her answers to her questions, used as examples. Biden’s ignorance of basic Constitutional tenants would have been all over the networks and newspapers, not just a lone story on the one news agency that makes an attempt at integrity.

We are living in very dangerous times and the MSM is exacerbating the danger. How dangerous? Watch the stock market the day after the election… McCain’s victory will start its recovery; Obama’s victory will precipitate the long awaited, final crash that will excuse the switch to socialism and the destruction of America’s financial leadership role in the world. (Why do you think so many people are selling off their portfolios now, before the market completely makes them worthless, if not in preparation for an Obama ‘victory’? I put that in quotes because a victory for Obama is a severe defeat for America. It will certainly mark the end of the country as we grew up knowing it. The US of A will more closely resemble a South American country than anything else; it’s heading there as it is but Obama will usher in the final transition. He’s already set to Nationalize all your pension funds… have you heard that? Oh yes he is.

Biden mentioned that corporate big-wig pensions will be the first to go; but right now, in Washington, there is a hearing on a method of completely Nationalizing 401k’s and rolling them into the Social security System. Oh, for sure they’ll sweeten the deal and make some people think it’s a good idea, giving you the August (2008) value of your 401k; but it will just be a little value added to your SS benefits and only 50% of it will be transferable to your heirs. (A way to apply the death tax to your pension.) Right now you have, at least the illusion that your money is yours, that is, the part of what you make that the government allows you to keep; but before much longer, if the democrats put their plans into action, you won’t even have that illusion. Are you so enamored with the Social Security Administration that you can’t wait to retire on what they will provide you with?

If all the money that was put into your SS account by just you over the course of your life was in a 401k, even with the resent market losses, you would have quite a nice nest-egg that would pay you better than a living wage throughout your retirement years; but there is actually twice that amount in your account, isn’t there, what with your employers’ contribution; yet your SS benefits will hardly be enough to live comfortably on, will it? I know because I get just about the maximum payout from SS along with about half that by way of a VA pension and I’m just getting by in today’s economy. Without that VA pension I’d be living in a slum tenement on tuna fish. The democrats in congress want them to handle all your retirement. You aren’t capable of taking care of yourself, in their elitist opinion.

What do you think he means when Obama said that industry should start from the bottom up? Think about that… “from the bottom up.” Did your company, the one you work for or own now, or any one in the past start out by hiring a bunch of people then sit around and decide what you were going to do to make money? …or did it start with an idea, risked money on it, worked until help was needed, and then hired people to handle the work that the owner couldn’t do by themselves? The latter is a ‘top down’ enterprise – that’s how all companies started. Obama thinks it should be the other way around. How do you think that will work? Will it work? Can it work?

Ten days to find out.


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There is a virtuous fear which is the effect of faith, and a vicious fear which is the product of doubt and distrust. The former leads to hope as relying on God, in whom we believe; The latter inclines to despair, as not relying on God, in whom we do not believe.Persons of the one character fear to lose God; those of the other character fear to find Him.--Pascal

“Democracies are most commonly corrupted by the insolence of demagogues.” —Aristotle

“Understanding is the reward of faith. Therefore seek not to understand that you may believe, but believe that you may understand.” —Augustine of Hippo

“The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane.” – Marcus Aurelius

Veritas vos Liberabit!

God Bless America, we need it!

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Friday, October 10, 2008

Can Obama be any More Dangerous?

Now that ACORN is coming under fire for their voter fraud activities in several states (and a possible RICO investigation), Obama is denying any association with that organization. You might remember, however, that ACORN is where he did his ‘community organizing’! Like his associations with the Rev. Wright, Louis Farrakhan, Richard Ayers, Bernadette Dohrn, Council of American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), and others, he is trying to hide his radical background. In fact, insofar as CAIR goes, he had a campaign staffer last year that left his campaign over his association with that group but he was replaced with another person connected with it, who is now coming under fire for that connection. CAIR, in case you don’t know, is on the Homeland Security watch list because of its connection to Hamas and Hizballah.

Who is Obama, anyway? The person he says he is in his book(s) is a radical who learned to fool people by being friendly, articulate, and soft spoken. (‘Fooling People’ is the phrase he used in his book, by the way, not something I am attributing to him.) Something is very odd about this guy, at the very least. Like when he was twenty years old, why did he go for a visit to Pakistan (from Malaysia)?

Remember my report on the issue of his birth? He is using a CAIR lawyer for that, too, rather than simply show the record number on his ‘live birth certificate” that is redacted on the copy shown on his website. Then the plaintiff could go to Hawaii and ask to see that record at the hospital where it was issued. He chooses to fight the suit instead. How suspicious does that seem? He doesn’t seem to care, though, and as long as the MSM is carrying his water, he can obfuscate all he wants to and the MSM will make his excuses for him.

The old saw for the time of the Third Reich goes something like, “The bigger the lie, the easier it is for more people to believe it.” Obama would seem to be the personification of that saying; nobody wants to believe that he is the dangerous radical that more and more evidence seems to say he is. He says so in his books (his version of Mien Kampf); he says so with the people he learned from growing up (one of which was a charter member of the American Communist Party); he does have some Muslim background, which normally wouldn’t be an issue, but why did he visit Pakistan when he was twenty and why would he deny it now? He uses CAIR lawyers (who would do that?), and has great mutual respect for Luis Farrakhan. Moammar Kaddafi talks highly of him, as does the Iranian President; and he seems to be drawing money (some of which was found out about and sent back) from Palestinian sources linked to Hamas. His friends and neighbors, with whom he also served on ‘charitable learning foundations’ (that seem to have lowered the standard of education in Chicago) were members of the Weather Underground who addmiitedly bombed Congress, the Pentagon, police stations and other government facilities; only to get away with it due to legal technicalities. Now, of course, Obama denies knowing them. He has denied so much of his background and the people in it that we must believe he lived for over thirty years in a vacuum, with no friends, no associates, did nothing with anyone, worked alone as a community organizer (how does that work?) – he’s just a blank piece of paper, just like his resume. In the difficult times ahead for the country, how can we even be thinking about letting someone who has done nothing, with nobody, and did it no where, get into the White House where experience and decision making is a major part of the job?

The current market crash is likely in response to the polls that say Obama is likely to be the next President, too. With the financial crisis facing us and the collapse of industry due to lack of money and credit, what will he do? That must be what Wall street is asking itself as investors are desperately trying to sell everything they have. Will he Nationalize the nation and bring Socialism to America for keeps to fill the void left by the collapse of Capitalism? If you think that’s good or even funny, think about whatever retirement portfolio you have and what it will be worth when/if that happens – zero! Some people want to turn to the government in times of financial uncertainty; but the government is what has caused this financial uncertainty to begin with, especially the liberal policies from the New Deal, to the Great Society, to the Community Reinvestment Act, we are coming closer and closer to Socialism and the collapse of industry here and around the world.

Global Warming has its role to play in all this too; we all heard Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House of Representatives tell us that she would stand in the way of oil development in this country in order to “save the world.” Do you think these democrats in Congress will be disappointed if industry fails? Hell no! That would be the end of pollution; and that means more to them than your lives, your jobs and you futures! That’s who they are; that’s what they’ve said in hundreds of ways, culminating with MS Pelosi spelling it right out for us. She would sell us all out in order to Save the World… The world doesn’t need saving except from the likes of Nancy Pelosi and the rest of these liberals with their heads up their asses, thinking it’s in the sky!

I heard today where some financial experts are saying that if Obama gets into the White House, the Auto industry in this country, maybe around the world, will be the first of all the major industries to collapse and them by next year! Expect all coal-fired electrical generation plants to be shut down quickly, too. The House democrats, again lead by Nancy Pelosi, have already blocked the construction of new coal fired electrical power plants; it’s just one short step to close the ones that are already running. What then? How will industry run without electricity? Coal produces the vast majority of electricity now; but burning coal puts CO2 into the atmosphere! How long will we even be able to get gasoline, at any price, once industry is shut down? It won’t matter because you won’t need to commute anyway, there’ll be no jobs at all by then.

So what will the future hold? If Obama wins, there won’t be a future as we know it. If he loses we might have a chance. Nothing is yet too far gone that it can’t be rectified; but it’ll take a lot of changes to the way the government runs. All these cancerous programs and liberal policies will have to end or be restructured so they can work in a way so they will not be totally dependant on taxes, that’s for sure. They are all sagging under the weight of the Baby Boomer generation retiring anyway. Something has to give, folks; and only a determined and focused electorate can do it.

Things always look darkest before the storm. We have 24 days left to save the country. I will finish as much as I can with the blog I am getting ready that names culpable names and explains how this housing bubble came to be and came to burst, causing this financial crisis the country is in. I don’t know how it relates to the financial crisis happening in Europe and Asia, yet; but I will include that too, if I can. It is getting close but some things are harder to dig out than others. From what I’ve been able to uncover, so far, Obama and his associates are deep in the thick of it. Don’t let the democrats fool you into thinking they are fixing anything – they are who are culpable. As I’ve been saying, with all the digging I’ve done I have yet to find a republican name attached to any of it – the democrats wanted all the money and all the glory; but what they earned is all the blame in a multi-trillion dollar scandal/swindle that may well mark the end of the country.

We have to stop Obama’s run to the White House; he is the biggest disaster the democrats have ever perpetrated on us to date. Compared to Obama, Kerry would have been desirable (and he’s a full-fledged traitor); but I don’t think he was capable of destroying the country – Obama has us nearly there now!

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There is a virtuous fear which is the effect of faith, and a vicious fear which is the product of doubt and distrust. The former leads to hope as relying on God, in whom we believe; The latter inclines to despair, as not relying on God, in whom we do not believe.Persons of the one character fear to lose God; those of the other character fear to find Him.--Pascal

“Democracies are most commonly corrupted by the insolence of demagogues.” —Aristotle

“Understanding is the reward of faith. Therefore seek not to understand that you may believe, but believe that you may understand.” —Augustine of Hippo

“The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane.” – Marcus Aurelius

Veritas vos Liberabit!

God Bless America, we need it!

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