Is paying unemployment benefits a crime?

Senator Tom Coburn, Republican Senator of my native state of Oklahoma thinks that extending payment of unemployment benefits to the jobless amounts to a crime, unless money is found to pay for it.

He says, “It is theft,” because it is essentially stealing from future generations.

On the other hand, Senator Tom Harkin, Democrat of Iowa, thinks the real injustice is holding up badly needed help to the jobless. He says, “It is as if a tornado hit their home or a flood wiped out their community. It is an emergency, and we respond to emergencies with emergency spending.”

It is a classic display of a difference between the Libertarian, Republican and Democrat’s thinking.

Coburn, a fiscal conservative, is against spending money the federal government doesn’t have. Few of us would disagree with that. If you don’t have it, don’t spend it.

Yet, what do you do if you are faced with an emergency? Borrow the money or not?

Look at New Orleans following hurricane Katrina. That was an emergency of major proportions. Thousands were homeless. Scores of people were drowning. Relief had to be provided. What could the Louisiana state and federal government do? Decline assistance on the ground they didn’t have nor could find the money to come to the aid of the citizens of Louisiana? New Orleans has a heavy population of the poor. Why spend money you have to borrow helping them? Are they worth helping?

Wouldn’t that be just another display of some kind of wealth redistribution from the wealthy to the poor by the government? Is that the Libertarian way? The Republican way? The Democratic way? The Tea Party way?

Now put yourself in the place of one of those unfortunate souls in New Orleans? Odds are you’d do whatever you had to do to escape the agony of your predicament.

So, would Senator Coburn maintain his position of refusing financial aid to Louisiana and the gulf coast if the money had to be borrowed? I don’t know.

Is governmental response coming to the aid of people caught in such turmoil a socialist act? Is it defensible in a capitalistic economic system? Certainly there is no profit to be gained. Who is to make the decision?

If you are jobless, through no fault of your own, your kids sitting at the bare dinner table, the electric bill is overdue—VEA is threatening to cut off your power, the mortgage payment or rent is due and the mortgagor is on the verge of foreclosing on your home, the landlord on eviction. You can only find five dollars in your pocket and no income. What do you do?

Do you head to the unemployment office to pick up your unemployment check—to be told your benefit had expired? Then go off to the welfare department, hat in hand, seeking welfare assistance?

Would it concern you that you might be taking money from the wealthy by doing so, or increasing a debt your descendants may wind up paying for? Or that you were taking assistance from a government being criticized as being socialist?

Is that what a self-professed Christian nation would do?

What if you knew that Business Insider, a financial management resource center, found that in 2007 the top 1 percent owned over a third of the nation’s wealth while the bottom 50 percent had a measly 2.5 percent and that you are taking some of the wealth of that top 1 percent?

Would you take that unemployment and welfare help if you were a Libertarian, Republican, Democrat, or member of the Tea Party? Of course you would.

Citizens of Pahrump will be treated to a free showing of Michael Moore’s new documentary Capitalism: A Love Story.

Capitalism: A Love Story is a 2009 American documentary film directed, written by and starring Michael Moore. The film centers on the financial crisis of 2007–2010 and the recovery stimulus, while putting forward an indictment of the current economic order in the United States and capitalism in general.

Topics covered include Wall Street‘s “casino mentality”, for-profit prisons, Goldman Sachs‘ influence in Washington, DC, the poverty-level wages of many airline pilots, the large wave of home foreclosures, and the consequences of “runaway greed.”

The film also features a religious component where Moore examines whether or not capitalism is a sin and if Jesus would be a capitalist.

When and where is it showing for free in Pahrump?

The film runs for 127 minutes. I’ve seen it twice. I can tell you that if you are into politics at all you will find the film enlightening and it will hold your undivided attention. Be sure to go to the bathroom before the film starts.

A tip of my hat to Val Von Holt and Margery Kay Hanson for putting all this together.

Type:

Education – Workshop

Date:

Saturday, March 20, 2010

Time:

8:30am – 12:00pm

Location:

1210 S Valley View Blvd, STE 114

Description

The Nevada State Democratic Party and The Clark County Democratic Party invite you to a Fundraising and Communications Workshop. Whether you’re a candidate, an officer or activist in a club, caucus, or committee, please join us for this valuable FREE workshop featuring experts Amy Ayoub and Dan Hart.
WHEN: Saturday, March 20, 2010, 9 a.m. to noon. Registration opens at 8:30 a.m.
WHERE: NSDP Headquarters, Conference Room, 1210 S Valley Blvd, Suite 114, Las Vegas, NV 89102
————————————————————–
Political Fundraising: Success Secrets You Need to Know
It’s All About the Money
Successful fundraising can be the difference between a winning campaign and a losing effort. Here is your chance to learn the secrets of successful fundraising from Nevada’s top political fundraiser and certified World Class Speaking coach, Amy Ayoub. Since opening her firm in 1998, Ayoub’s proven techniques and strategies have raised more than $100 million for her political and charitable clients.
In this exclusive and one-of-a-kind forum, prospective Democratic candidates and their staff members will:
* Conquer the Fear of Asking for Money
* Learn the Secrets to Successful Call Time
* Master Proper Prospect Identification
* Discover When and How to Hold a Profitable Event
* Develop a Plan of Action
This workshop is designed for candidates, campaign staff and volunteers responsible for raising ANY amount of money.
——————————
Ask and You Shall Receive
Are you overwhelmed at the thought of using internet-fundraising for your campaign?
Have you ever thought: I need the financial support of my friends and family but I don’t have enough hours in the day to call them. Would an email work? Where do I begin? I don’t even have a website.
Erica Norris, political fundraiser and marketing coach, will help you understand how to put the internet to work for you. You will learn to:
* Create an Engaging Website
* Build an Active Online Community
* 5 Steps to Successful Online Solicitations
—————————————————————
Communicating (On Your Terms) With the Political Press
When interacting with the press during political operations what you say and how you say it can make the difference between success and failure.
Join Dan Hart, well-known political operative and sought-after political commentator, as you learn how to face this challenge and turn it to your advantage.
You will become skilled at:
* Understanding the nature and motivations of press people
* Being consistently ON message
* Answering tough questions
* Handling a crisis
Please RSVP at rsvp@nvdems.com, and call 702-737-VOTE for more information.

Health Care Reform has been resurrected like Lazarus from the grave. I suspect Anthem Blue Cross’s raising of health insurance premiums up to as much as 39% has been the catalyst.

The Daily Beast today displays the following:

The televised health-care summit President Obama will host Thursday is being billed as likely the last chance for the GOP to influence the legislation. The Obama administration said health-care proposals will be published on its website Monday and will likely be a melding of the House and Senate Democrats’ versions of the reform legislation. The summit has been hyped as a chance to break through partisan gridlock and listen to Republican ideas. But Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid announced Saturday that the final Democratic bill will be unveiled Monday evening, and that Democrats will finish up health care within the next 60 days using the budget reconciliation process, a procedure that requires a simple majority vote and would block a potential Republican filibuster. Republicans have decried reconciliation as a partisan move.

Maybe, just maybe, the Democratic leadership is about to cast off its timidity and going to move forward on health care reform. Thank you Anthem Blue Cross!

The White House will publish its updated healthcare proposals sometime tomorrow, Monday, so we can all see for ourselves what is being touted. Something that should have been done, I think, many months ago.

We can all, then see our elected representatives deal with the plan on live TV on C-SPAN when members of congress meet on Thursday. Now that is transparency!

I’m not a fan of the Tea Party. CNN ran a poll to determine just who those folks are that populate the new Tea Party.

Activists in the Tea Party movement tend to be male, rural, upscale, and overwhelmingly conservative, according to a new national poll.

CNN found that Tea Party activists would vote overwhelmingly Republican in a two-party race for Congress.

“If the Tea Party runs its own candidates for U.S. House, virtually every vote the Tea Party candidate gets would be siphoned from the GOP candidate, potentially allowing the Democrats to win in districts that they might have otherwise lost.”

[Read more →]

The following is a letter to the editor that appeared in today’s Las Vegas Sun. It was written by a school teacher, Jeremy Christensen of Las Vegas. I’m running it here because I agree with what Mr. Christensen writes:

“It’s time to stop whining that education in Nevada doesn’t work because of a lack of funding,” Gov. Jim Gibbons said in his State of the State address last week. “We need to quit throwing money at programs that haven’t worked and don’t work for our children.”

What hasn’t worked and doesn’t work for our children is throwing clichés and ideology at problems.

This question is not as complicated as it seems. What is a reasonable cost to educate a child? Most of the other states in our nation believe that it costs more than what we spend in Nevada. How do these other states pay for the generous investments they make to educate their children?

Forty-five states in our country have an effective state-level corporate tax rate of at least 5 percent. How long have zealous ideologues proclaimed that businesses would flee if we even considered any taxes on corporations? These corporations pay taxes almost everywhere else in the United States. How long have our children suffered some of the largest class sizes in the nation and parades of long-term substitutes in vital courses such as mathematics because of this outrageous lie?

The state of Nevada is not making a good-faith effort to provide quality education for its children. Apparently our children have no voice or heroes to stand up for them and say enough is enough. The greatest sins in Sin City are committed against its children.

Governor “No New Taxes” Gibbons has a duty to those school children to see that their education proceeds with quality and unabated. It is his duty as elected governor whether he wants to raise taxes or not. I personally don’t care whether he gets re-elected or not. I didn’t vote for him to start with. I do care about the education of Nevada’s children.

All my kids are now grown with kids of their own. All still in California, which has its own financial problems. My grand daughter, Joan, will graduate from the University of California-Chico in June. She plans to then attend law school. She works and attends college now, has she has done since she started. One of my grand sons, Aaron, is attending college in California with the objective of obtaining a degree for his future as an accountant. He also works to pay for and attend school. But the financial burden of college tuition and expenses for law school are mammoth to a 22 year old.

Cutting the education budget, again, as proposed by Governor Gibbons, may be expedient to him, but not to those kids trying to get a college education.

Nevada maintains one of the lowest commitments in the nation for education. California is slipping fast, losing it’s once high education status.

I read that Nevada’s mining industry has enjoyed a low rate of taxation for 150 years. The implication being that that industry does not pay its fair share of taxes—a tax status that is unfair to ordinary taxpayers in Nevada.

I, frankly, think it is time that Governor Gibbons begin to realize that his obligation to Nevada taxpayers is higher than his adherence to his “no new taxes” creed. It is time to fairly and evenly raise taxes in Nevada, even if it requires applying a fair tax on the mining industry.

Dr. Jack Schofield announced his candidacy for election to the House of Representatives for Nevada’s Congressional District #2 on Veteran’s Day.

I had the pleasure of meeting Dr. Schofield last summer here in Pahrump. I was impressed and want to introduce him to the voters of Nye County. He is unique.

He is a former Nevada State Assemblyman and State Senator. Born in 1923. In 1941 he was the Golden Gloves Welterweight Champion. He earned a Bachelor’s of Science degree from the University of Utah in 1949, a Master’s degree from University of Nevada Reno in 1967, and a doctorate in Educational Administration and Higher Education from University of Nevada Las Vegas in 1995.

He is a veteran of World War II and a member of the famous Flying Tigers.

During World War II, Jack served as a B-25H Mitchell bomber pilot for the United States Army Air Force. Lieutenant Schofield was a member of the 22nd Bomb Squadron, 341st Bomb Group, 14th Air Force based at Yangkai, China. As part of the 14th Air Force Flying Tigers, Lieutenant Schofield and his crew flew combat for allied troops fighting in China. The Flying Tigers were renowned for their flights and bombing runs through enemy fire, over the Himalayan Mountains to deliver supplies and support the ground troops in the China-Burma-India campaign.

He is experienced.

He served as a Nevada State Assemblyman from 1970-1970, and as a Nevada State Senator from 1974-1978 where he fought for the rights of Nevada’s working people. Jack served as an instructor and administrator in the Nevada public school system for forty-four years from 1953-1997 and currently presides on the Nevada Board of Regents where he has held a seat since 2002. He remains active in the Civil Air Patrol as a lieutenant colonel and serves as the Government Affairs Advisory for the Nevada Wing. He is an entrepreneur and real estate developer. He currently sits on the Board of Regents of the Nevada System of Higher Education.

He is a devoted husband and family man.

Jack and his wife, Alene Earl, recently celebrated their sixty-seventh wedding anniversary. They are the proud parents of six children, they have thirty-two grandchildren, and forty-eight great grandchildren. He has maintained a lifelong interest in weight lifting, nutrition, boxing, and still enjoys golf and tennis. He is honored to attend graduation ceremonies at the Jack Lund Schofield Middle School in Las Vegas. At his request, the middle school is proud to have the Flying Tiger as its mascot.

Jack is seeking the Democratic nomination in Nevada’s 2nd district. He is running to restore Nevada’s economy, protect America’s military veterans, and guarantee every Nevadan’s right to a proper education.

It is obvious he has devoted his life to public service. I can remember World War II and the history making flights of the Flying Tigers over the Himalayan Mountains.

Being a beneficiary of the GI bill I share Dr. Schofield’s support and advocacy for educational opportunities.

I will endeavor to follow Dr. Schofield’s campaign on the blog I write. Those of you who do not yet know of him can learn all about him on his campaign website at http://jack2010.com/. When you get to his campaign site be sure to read the “15 American Rights” on his home page. Those are core fundamental rights which I endorse as well.

When his campaign comes to Nye County I recommend you try to attend and personally meet Dr. Schofield yourself. I think you will find him, as I did, friendly, articulate, gracious and capable.

Alan Grayson (D-FL) who gave us “The Republican Health Care Plan—Don’t Get Sick” and if you do “Die Quickly” has prompted the Republicans to initiate a money-raising website called Alan Disgrayson.com which proclaims:

The time has come to send (dis)Grayson home. That is why, Leader Boehner and NRCC Chairman Sessions are pleased to announce the official “FL-08 Nominee Fund.” Any dollar donated to this fund will go directly to the Republican candidate who emerges from the primary to challenge (dis)Grayson in 2010.

Looks like Grayson is doing something right. (See The Republican Health Care Plan.