Day: January 18, 2012

Samantha Garvey: A Model For Our Nation Of Overcoming Adversity!

Ronald 1 Comment

Samantha Garvey is a senior in high school in New York, whose family has suffered hard times due to her mother being injured and unable to work, and her father unable to pay the bills and losing their home, resulting in the family living in a homeless shelter.

Samantha is a semifinalist in an Intel Science Talent Search competition, and her story of accomplishment in the midst of tragedy and turmoil is so inspiring that she has been invited as the guest of President Barack Obama for his State of the Union address next week. She has applied for admission to Yale and Brown Universities.

This is a bright moment in the midst of tremendous economic tragedy, not just for her family, but for millions suffering from the collapse of the economy under George W. Bush, and the slow recovery occurring under Barack Obama.

Newt Gingrich’s Hubris Has No Limits!

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Newt Gingrich, former Speaker of the House, has called upon fellow Presidential contenders Rick Santorum and Rick Perry to withdraw from the race and back him as the alternative to Mitt Romney. What hubris he has beyond belief!

The fact that Rick Santorum may have won Iowa, if not ending up eight votes behind Romney, does not seem to impress Gingrich.

The fact that Rick Santorum came in fourth, ahead of Gingrich, who ended up fifth, in New Hampshire, does not seem to impress Gingrich.

The fact that more than two thirds of evangelical Christian leaders meeting in Texas over the past weekend decided to throw their support to Santorum, does not seem to have impressed Gingrich.

Gingrich sees himself as brilliant, intelligent, far above all other candidates in capabilities, even though a vast majority of former House associates and Republican political leaders nationally have attacked his candidacy on many grounds.

Instead, it is Todd Palin, and now his wife Sarah, either endorsing or speaking up for Gingrich, with Sarah avoiding going as far as her husband.

Is not that involvement by the Palins enough of an answer about the legitimacy of Newt Gingrich? The Palins, particularly Sarah, have loads of hubris like Gingrich, but not even with his intelligence and brilliance! They are the mark of the STUPID group within the GOP, which includes former candidates Michele Bachmann and Herman Cain!

Newt Gingrich has stated that if he does not win South Carolina this coming weekend, that the race is over. Let’s hope that such is the case, and that we will stop having to listen to the braggadocio of this pompous, overbearing, obnoxious, egotistical person who has passed his prime long ago!

Mitt Romney’s Concept Of Taxes And Speaking Fees: A Major Minus For His Campaign For President

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Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney has stirred up a new controversy with his comments about taxes (that he pays only 15% on his income, mostly investment, not work in the past ten years), and his statement that his one higher taxed income on lecture fees ($376,000) is “not that much money”.

This causes outrage among hard working Americans, who do not get a 15% tax rate, because they face the challenge of going to work every day, and dealing with the stresses of life, not sitting back and watching their money make money!

If Romney is worth $250 million, the estimated amount of his fortune, that means even a one percent return is $2.5 million!

And to call $376,000 in lecture fees not much money is an outrage, as that is EIGHT times the average income of a typical American!

Just as a comparison, this author and blogger NEVER made $100.000 a year while working; has a retirement income of about half of that amount; earns about $5-7,000 a year on lecture fees, at about $200 to $250 per lecture, despite his credentials to be an expert being far greater than Romney as a propagandizing politician; and only wishes that his assets were just $1 million to lean back on, instead of being a fraction of that amount!

How can Romney appeal to anyone who knows what it is to earn a living, and does not have a silver spoon in his mouth when he is born, and will never have the “American Dream” fulfilled as Mitt Romney was fortunate enough to be born to?

What should make him entitled to such a low tax rate while everyone else has to struggle on a much lower income and make tough decisions every day? And this is referring to the middle class, not even to the poor who get vilified constantly for their status in society, even with most of them being children and single women!

Wisconsin Recall Petitions On Governor Scott Walker: A Sign Of True Democracy!

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The movement to recall Republican Governor Scott Walker of Wisconsin, who forced through cutbacks in state funding of education, and declared war on state government workers and labor rights last year in his first year in office, has led to more than one million people signing petitions for his recall, almost double the number needed to set up a recall election.

Never before have so many people in any state signed petitions for a recall vote for anyone, and only two governors in the history of the United States have been successfully recalled, but this threat to Scott Walker is real!

If the signatures are proved legitimate, at least half of them, then an election will be held in late spring or early summer, with recalls of the Lieutenant Governor and several Republican State Senators also in play.

This is a great moment of democracy, and shows that the Republicans are in danger, not only in Wisconsin, but other states that have “Bully Governors”, who have run rampant over taxpayers and workers. It is an assault on the Tea Party Movement as well, and on the power of the Koch brothers and other wealthy right wingers who think their money and the Citizens United decision of the Supreme Court two years ago will be able to destroy democracy in America.

The Occupy Wall Street Movement and progressives all over the nation will fight to restore decency and humanity to politics, and the Republican Party will suffer in state after state, as well as nationally, as the people rise up against the injustices perpetrated on the middle class and the poor.

This is a moment of great triumph, but the battle has only begun, and must come in Florida with Rick Scott, Ohio with John Kasich, Michigan with Rick Snyder, and Maine with Paul LePage, and some other states as well!