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As most of America moves onto domestic news coverage of Hurricane Irene, the poor economy, Beyonce’s pregnancy, and the latest line up for Dancing With the Stars, things in the Middle East and North Africa have grown increasingly unstable and uncertain.   In North Africa alone, the previously authoritarian regimes in Tunisia, Egypt, and now Libya have fallen only to be replaced with what?   In Tunisia, the peaceful overthrow of the Ben Ali regime has led to a shaky government with many of the previous regime’s power brokers still in positions of influence and authority and little or no economic opportunity. Next went Egypt and its president Hosni Mubarak, by far the biggest shoe to drop.   Mubarak’s ouster has had significant effects on the region not least of which is the rise of the previously banned Muslim Brotherhood and the even more fundamentalist Salafist movement closely tied to Al-Qaeda and its dream of a global caliphate.   The fall of Mubarak set off alarms in Israel and the

So America has become uncompetitive because of the marginal corporate tax rate?   Is the marginal rate of 35% one of the highest in the world?   Absolutely, only Japan has a higher marginal rate.   Do other developed nations have much lower marginal rates?   You Betcha (ooops sorry): Ireland (12.5%), Germany (15.8%), and Canada (16.5%) to name a few.   But there is a big difference between marginal rates and effective rates in the U.S.   In Europe, they are one in the same, but in the U.S. the differences are enormous thanks to loopholes, credits, and offshoring.   Did you know that of the S&P 500, 115 paid tax rates below 20%, 30+ paid less than 10%, and some of the true tax masters include Southwest Airlines (6.3%), Boeing (4.5%), Yahoo (7%), General Electric (3.6%), Merck (12.5%), H-P (20%), and J&J (22%).   GE gets special consideration for claiming a loss of its U.S. operations in 2009 due to losses at GE Capital while globally it earned $14.2Billion in global profits.   I

1.        Can you be a Christian and for capital punishment? 2.        Is a person that is pro-life and pro-death penalty inconsistent? 3.        Was Jesus a socialist? 4.        Why do people in the South call themselves Patriots but they were the last to join the revolution, many sided with the British, they seceded from the USA, and they still love to fly the Stars and Bars? 5.        Do European leaders really think they can save the Euro and the EU? 6.        Can Hollywood make a movie that isn’t a sequel, a comic book adaption, or a remake? 7.        Does anyone in America have a tougher job than new Apple CEO Tim Cook? 8.        Will the broadcast networks ever air a show that isn’t a safe sitcom, a serial drama, or a cop show? 9.        Do Meteorologists have to read off the temperatures in every town and city within broadcast range? 10.    Did the Bay Area Rapid Transit’s (BART’s) anti protest maneuver of cutting off cell communications strike you as something a dictator would

Congress’ approval rating has sunk to an all-time low of 12%.   It is safe to say that Hurricane Irene is more popular than John Boehner.   Shocking development in Major League Baseball: It’s the Yankees and Red Sox battling it out for the AL East. Did you know at this time in the election cycle four years ago that Hillary Clinton led Barack Obama by 20 points and Rudy Giuliani was the Republican front runner?   Moral of the story: polls at this stage mean less than a politician’s promise. Granted it has been only two preseason games, but Patriot fans have to be excited about what they see.   Brady and the high powered offense now coupled with an aggressive 4-3 Defense.   Yep, lots to like. Channel surfed and came across the first episode of Deadwood.   Lost count of the f bombs, c—k suckers, and g-d damns after just 15 minutes.   Though, Ian McShane was tremendous. 82% of America’s high schools are failing the No Child Left Behind math and reading minimum standards with the 2014 deadl

So Rick Perry wants to repeal the 16 th Amendment (Income Tax) and thinks Social Security is a sham: “ This unsustainable fiscal insanity is the true legacy of Social Security and the New Deal. Deceptive accounting has hoodwinked the American public into thinking that Social Security is a retirement system and financially sound, when clearly it is not….Now if you say Social Security is a failure, as I have just done…”   Mr. Perry’s 2010 book “Fed Up” will provide lots of fodder for his opponents.   I suppose he will claim that passages were taken out of context (reminds me when Charles Barkley complained that words from his own autobiography were out of context), which is exactly what he did when he cherry picked quotes from the Federalist Papers.   A vote for Perry is a vote for no healthcare coverage and minimum wage jobs.   By the way did you know that since June 2009, Texas has lost 1,800 manufacturing jobs while adding 39,000 government jobs?   Perhaps it is time to talk about qu

Still on Libya.   In a statement issued late Sunday, Republican Sens. John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina said they regretted that "this success was so long in coming due to the failure of the United States to employ the full weight of our airpower.   Ultimately, our intervention in Libya will be judged a success or failure based not on the collapse of the Qaddafi regime, but on the political order that emerges in its place," the two senators said.     How about simply stating “We are happy to see this successful six month operation coming to an end   as per the U.N. Mission Charter our coalition of NATO and Arab League nations was able to prevent a humanitarian slaughter AND dethrone one of the world’s most heinous and destructive dictators.   Success is also measured by minimal collateral damage and that President Obama has demonstrated that diplomacy and firepower can be used by the U.S. to achieve mission objectives.” Yeah, what was I thinking?   T

Are we really so broken we cannot fix our fiscal house?   Has ideology trumped common sense?   Has patriotism, the love of or devotion to one’s country, been corrupted by blind faith?   Has critical thinking been replaced with pledges?   When did compromise become an abhorrent trait, the anathema of politics?   A sad sad day in America. The Middle East and North Africa, short of all-out war, are quickly descending into chaos.   Things will get decidedly worse before they get better.   Wherein the U.S. elections tend to end debate and settle uncertainty, the aforementioned seem to go from dictatorship to revolution to election to anarchy to oligarchy to dictatorship.   Democracy without rules is corruption; life without personal and property rights is not freedom.   So the next time Ron Paul bitches about a lack of freedom in the U.S. he should thank his lucky stars that we had great men who understood the nation’s survival, its very existence, must be placed above personal glory or imp

Even on vacation, one cannot escape from the stupidity, pettiness, and lies… So the Secret Service commissioned two armored buses for the President to travel domestically at a cost of $2.2Million.   If it’s not his vacations or his limousine, it’s now these buses that have the right wing firing up their mock outrage machine.   What would you have the Secret Service do rent the Partridge Family School bus and hire Shirley Jones to drive?   Besides, it created jobs (that’s sarcasm).   Move on righty. I am very happy to see the truth seekers digging into Rick “The Miracle Man” Perry’s real record in Texas.   I do not doubt he is master politician, but he is not a great economist, no on second thought he knows as much about economics as I know about cow milking.   Not a freaking thing.   Let’s see; an energy producing state that had economic growth when oil was $140/barrel, he used federal stimulus money to fill budget gaps, he inherited a highly restrictive lending policy (some on his sid

Some thoughts about Iowa and politics: 1)       Never has one state done so little to be so important in the election of our nation’s leader. 2)       Which brings me to the unbalanced process in electing our leaders and representation.   Should Iowa or North Dakota have equal representation as say Texas, California, or New York? And while we are it, why not an open election?   If every vote is to truly count, then where is the general popular election?   A republican voter in New York feels his presidential vote is as meaningless as a Democrat’s in Texas.   Besides, I grow weary of the swing state phenomenon.   I can already tell you that the citizens of Ohio, Indiana, Virginia, Florida, Colorado, and North Carolina will be inundated with countless political ads. 3)       When can we get citizen selected redistricting commissions like California?   If you allow the elected officials to redraw the districts we have gone from citizens choosing our representatives to representatives cho

Hypocrite: a person who acts in contradiction to his or her stated beliefs or feelings Exhibit One: GOP Frontrunner and former Massachusetts’ Governor Mitt Romney.   Romney was amongst all eight GOP candidates who last night said they would not accept a budget deal that included $10 of cuts for every $1 of tax increases.   A problem for Romney, there are many, is that he increased taxes to help balance the Bay State’s budget, though he wouldn’t use the ‘T’ wprd, instead he called them fees.   Here is an exchange years ago with the late great Tim Russert: Mr. Russert : The AP says it this way: “When Romney wanted to balance the Massachusetts budget, the blind, mentally retarded and gun owners were asked to help pay. In all, then-Gov. Romney proposed creating 33 new fees,” [and] “increasing 57 others.” The head of the Bay State Council of the Blind said that your name was “Fee-Fee”; that you just raised fee after fee after fee. That’s a tax.... A fee’s not a tax? Gov. Romney : A fee —

George W. Bush liked to call his Adventures in Iraq a crusade of the coalition of the willing.   Most of us realized it was more like the coalition of the bribed and browbeaten.   Nonetheless, right before our eyes, there has been a coalition of the willing forming with the U.S. guiding the process, not demanding it.   Where is this happening?   Syria.   Moderate Sunni Arab Kuwait and Saudi Arabia have recalled their ambassadors in protest of the al-Assad regime’s brutal crackdown on the people of Hama, Homs and other cities.   It appears Turkey, once a strong ally and partner of Syria, has also given al-Assad his final warning and it looks like President Obama will lead the western nations call for al-Assad to step down. One group you are not hearing a peep out of is the Shia terrorist/political militant group Hezbollah.   While Hezbollah and its leader Hassan Nasrallah were extremely vocal in calling for the resignation of Egypt’s Mubarak, Yemen’s Saleh, and Libya’s Gaddafi, they hav