Saturday, February 14, 2009
Friday, February 13, 2009
What Do Green Jobs and Joe Biden Have In Common? Soaking the Tax Payer
This reminds me of a commentator mentioning that while Joe Biden made it a point to say that he rode the Amtrack train to and from work all the time -- trying to make it sound like he is "saving the planet." What he is really doing is costing the tax payers about $250 a day. Amtrak has been subsidized since its inception. They cannot make a profit to kill them! So the government subsidized them. Joe Biden was/is costing the tax payers every ride of that train! The below is imported (Reihl World View):
Biden's Free Pass On Amtrak Soaks Taxpayers, Not The Rich
Following up on an Extreme Mortman post with an image of Biden and Specter riding Amtrak together reveals that Laura Nichols does little more than regurgitate a purposely designed DNC talking point through the Washington Post. But the real story behind Biden and Amtrak is far from all that for the American taxpayer.
SPRINGFIELD, Ill. -- Have you heard Joe Biden takes the Amtrak train home every night from Washington, D.C., to Wilmington? If not, you will soon -- over and over again.
The National Taxpayers Union has been railing, pardon the pun, about Amtrak for years.
Nixon Administration correspondence on Amtrak stated, “It is expected that the corporation would experience financial losses for about three years and then become a self-sustaining enterprise.”
Instead, as you can see from page ten of this NTU pdf, never profitable Amtrak has been soaking taxpayers for years and it still isn't enough.
Amtrak could face the elimination of routes across the country, as its funding would fall $180 million below the Fiscal 2006 level. In addition, the maintenance and upgrades that many Members of Congress have advocated to make Amtrak more competitive would be delayed, undermining Amtrak’s safety and service especially in high-traffic areas like the Northeast Corridor.
Also see this from 2002:
(Alexandria, VA) – Today was supposed to mark the beginning of liquidation for Amtrak, yet the fiscally-challenged passenger railroad will continue to chug along on government subsidies. This broken promise to taxpayers from politicians is only the most recent of many failures documented in a new historical study from the 335,000-member National Taxpayers Union (NTU).
Here's a blogger and Amtrak rider who probably won't make the Washington Post.
In practice, Amtrak is one of the most dysfunctional organizations operating today.
American taxpayers looking at warm fuzzy images of Joe Biden riding Amtrak should at least stop and consider the fact that they've been subsidizing Slow Joe's ride home every night to the tune of billions of dollars for years.
Since its creation, Amtrak has absorbed more than $29 billion in subsidies and more than $6.5 billion since 1997 alone. It was in 1997 that a federal reform board mandated that Amtrak either become profitable by 2003 or be liquidated. Both the federal government and the state of Michigan must stop providing cash subsidies to this unnecessary and expensive intervention in the transportation marketplace. Taxpayers would be better off with some sort of privatized version of Amtrak, but that does not look like it will happen in the short run.
Of course, it wasn't liquidated. And all Amtrak defender and traveling free loader Joe Biden did was have his lobbyist son placed on the Amtrak Board. That would be the board of a government owned corporation whose stock is worth ... well, about as much as the talking point that Biden is somehow doing American Taxpayers a favor by ensuring he gets to hold on to his subsidized ride back and forth to work everyday.
Wiki Link: Government aid to Amtrak was controversial from the beginning. The formation of Amtrak in 1971 was criticized as a bailout serving corporate rail interests and union railroaders, not the traveling public. Critics assert that Amtrak has proven incapable of operating as a business and that it does not provide valuable transportation services meriting public support,[50] a "mobile money-burning machine."[51] They argue that subsidies should be ended, national rail service terminated, and the Northeast Corridor turned over to private interests.
Hamas vs Palestinians
Wife Beheaded "amid hopes that it would help portray Muslims in a more positive light."
Founder of Islamist TV Channel Arrested in New York for Beheading Wife
The founder and CEO of Bridges TV, a popular Muslim channel carried by many cable networks, has been arrested in Buffalo, New York, for beheading his wife.
Orchard Park police are investigating a particularly gruesome killing, the beheading of a woman, after her husband — an influential member of the local Muslim community — reported her death to police Thursday.
Police identified the victim as Aasiya Z. Hassan, 37. Detectives have charged her husband, Muzzammil Hassan, 44, with second-degree murder.
“He came to the police station at 6:20 p.m. [Thursday] and told us that she was dead,” Orchard Park Police Chief Andrew Benz said late this morning.
Muzzammil Hassan told police that his wife was at his business, Bridges TV, on Thorn Avenue in the village. Officers went to that location and discovered her body.
Muzzammil Hassan is the founder and chief executive officer of Bridges TV, which he launched in 2004, amid hopes that it would help portray Muslims in a more positive light.
Thursday, February 12, 2009
A Lebanese Reporter Resigns After Long Battle Against A Terrorist Attack
(From Drudge) Cable News Race
CABLE NEWS RACE
TUES NITE, FEB 10, 2009
VIEWERS
FOXNEWS O'REILLY 3,494,000
FOXNEWS HANNITY 2,658,000
FOXNEWS BECK 2,370,000
FOXNEWS BAIER 2,305,000
FOXNEWS SHEP 2,190,000
FOXNEWS GRETA 1,847,000
CNN KING 1,761,000
MSNBC OLBERMANN 1,485,000
CNN COOPER 1,286,000
CNN BLITZER 1,246,000
MSNBC MADDOW 1,240,000
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Cut Backs
"Due to recent economic conditions,
and the rising cost of electricity, gas and oil;
the light at the end of the tunnel
has been turned off.
We apologize for the inconvenience."
~ GOD
Obama... Make McDonalds "Change" (this guy thanks God for Obama's time)
(I bet Obama was thinking... "Why did I take one more question?")
Going Green Kills!
More leftist ideology of control over peoples land leads to death. Australian firekills many. Some say these deaths could have been averted if only people were allowed to manage there own property instead of bowing down to edicts from on green high.
Angry survivors blame council 'green' policy:
ANGRY residents last night accused local authorities of contributing to the bushfire toll by failing to let residents chop down trees and clear up bushland that posed a fire risk.
During question time at a packed community meeting in Arthurs Creek on Melbourne's northern fringe, Warwick Spooner — whose mother Marilyn and brother Damien perished along with their home in the Strathewen blaze — criticised the Nillumbik council for the limitations it placed on residents wanting the council's help or permission to clean up around their properties in preparation for the bushfire season. "We've lost two people in my family because you dickheads won't cut trees down," he said.
"We wanted trees cut down on the side of the road … and you can't even cut the grass for God's sake."
Later, the meeting was cut short when Mr Spooner's father, Dennis, collapsed in his chair and an ambulance had to be called. Despite losing his wife and son and everything he owned, a friend later said he had not stopped or slept since the weekend.
Another resident said she had asked the council four times to tend to out-of-control growth on public land near her home, but her pleas had been ignored.
There was widespread applause when Nillumbik Mayor Bo Bendtsen said changes were likely to be made about the council's policy surrounding native vegetation.
But his response was not good enough for Mr Spooner: "It's too late now mate. We've lost families, we've lost people."...
Piper - Suffer for Him
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Monday, February 09, 2009
Wanda Sykes on Jay Leno -- Bailout Discussion