Category Archives: News

Repeating Losing Tactics

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The RNC is meeting this week supposedly to address issues for the upcoming mid-term elections. Instead, they are talking about changes for the 2016 presidential election. Their idea? Move the party’s convention date forward, from September to June. Mitt just didn’t have enough time before the November election.

Once again, the ‘Pub establishment refuses to really examine the 2012 presidential loss. Romney didn’t lose because he didn’t have enough campaign time. He lost because he was a weak candidate, another wishy-washy ‘moderate’ with no real conservative roots. Romney and the ‘Pub establishment alienated the GOP core voters who, instead of following the party in lockstep, stayed home rather than vote for a candidate with no discernible values, platform nor agenda.

RNC LOOKS READY TO ROLL THE DICE ON 2016 PRIMARY PLAN

The Republican National Committee, meeting in Washington this week, is talking a lot about beefing up its ground game for midterm elections. What’s really driving the discussion among committee members, though, are proposed changes to the party’s presidential nominating process. Casting an eye back to the grueling primary process of 2012, committee member seem inclined to shorten the nomination process for 2016 – with a nominee and running mate emerging from a convention in June rather than September. Getting Republicans to coalesce around a frontrunner sooner would have likely helped 2012 nominee Mitt Romney, but the strategy holds its risks for the next cycle.
 
Advantage – Cutting down the calendar and the number of debates means less infighting and enables a nominee to preserve resources for a general-election fight. If the nomination has been locked up as early as March, that’s much more time for Republicans to turn their fire to the Democratic frontrunner.
 
Disadvantage – That’s a long time for a GOP nominee (and running mate) to sit on the shelf to be scrutinized by the press and Democrats. The status quo puts the ticket out on the trail for a six-week mad dash to Election Day. This would mean three months of microscope gazing. And while the goal is to make it harder for flash-in-the-pan candidates since a shorter process means a greater need for big money and national organization at the outset of the primary race, a rapid-fire primary could also work to the advantage of a surge candidate. Romney was able to weather multiple surges from the likes of Herman Cain and Newt Gingrich. A well-timed burst in a quick process might have made either of them the GOP nominee last time. — FOXNewsletter, January 23, 2014.

***

Matt Bevin, who is running against RINO Mitch McConnell in Kentucky’s primary for the US Senate, picked up another endorsement this week. Freedom Works announced yesterday they will be supporting Bevin against McConnell.

FreedomWorks backs McConnell challenger in Kentucky

Tea party group to spend heavily against GOP leader

By Kellan Howell, The Washington Times, Wednesday, January 22, 2014

U.S. Senate candidate Matt Bevin speaks at a meet and greet, Tuesday Jan. 14, 2014 in Henderson, Ky. The Louisville businessman is running against Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell in Kentucky's GOP primary next May. (AP Photo/The Gleaner, Mike Lawrence)

U.S. Senate candidate Matt Bevin speaks at a meet and greet, Tuesday Jan. 14, 2014 in Henderson, Ky. The Louisville businessman is running against Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell in Kentucky’s GOP primary next May.

Conservative superPac FreedomWorks has endorsed the primary challenger to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell in the upcoming Republican primary in Kentucky.

The Louisville Courtier Journal reported that tea party group would spend as much as $500,000 helping businessman and political newcomer Matt Bevin against Mr. McConnell in the Republican primary in May.

FreedomWorks President Matt Kibbe told the newspaper that the group will help organize grassroots opposition to Mr. McConnell, who Mr. Kibbe said has been in Washington for too long.

“For far too long Mitch McConnell has sat on the sidelines of pivotal fights, helping the Democrats pass unprecedented surveillance powers, the TARP/Wall Street bailout, numerous tax hikes and debt-ceiling increases, and Medicare Part D. Most recently, he orchestrated the McConnell-Reid sellout bargain to increase the debt limit and fully fund a broken health care law, getting a $1.2 billion “special project kickback” in the process,” Mr. Kibbe said. 

He added, “Kentucky deserves better, and looking at the dropping poll numbers for McConnell, there’s no reason to settle.”

In response, the McConnell campaign said FreedomWorks has lost its way.

“FreedomWorks was a constructive partner in the conservative movement and had been supportive of Senator McConnell’s efforts to stop Obamacare and protect the First Amendment when many organizations were afraid to speak out, but internal problems unfortunately have changed their focus from conservative reform to conservative cannibalism in order to pay the bills,” McConnell spokeswoman Allison Moore said in a statement.

Freedom works has changed to “conservative cannibalism in order to pay the bills,” according to McConnell’s campaign. They must be scared and that couldn’t happen to be better RINO. McConnell must go!

***

Remember the electric car fad? Yeah, the one that was supposed to cure all the ills of the internal combustion engine. ‘Course the proponents forgot all about that one important detail…generating electrical power, to recharge those electric cars, burns coal. Now there’s another issue that has appeared. Another scarce resource has arisen—charging stations!

Charge rage’: Too many electric cars, not enough workplace chargers

By Dana Hull, dhull@mercurynews.com

Eager to reduce energy use, German software company SAP installed 16 electric vehicle charging ports in 2010 at its Palo Alto campus for the handful of employees who owned electric vehicles.

Just three years later, SAP faces a problem that is increasingly common at Silicon Valley companies — far more electric cars than chargers. Sixty-one of the roughly 1,800 employees on the campus now drive a plug-in vehicle, overwhelming the 16 available chargers. And as demand for chargers exceeds supply, a host of thorny etiquette issues have arisen, along with some rare but notorious incidents of “charge rage.”

“In the beginning, all of our EV drivers knew each other, we had enough infrastructure, and everyone was happy. That didn’t last for long,” said Peter Graf, SAP’s chief sustainability officer and the driver of a Nissan Leaf. “Cars are getting unplugged while they are actively charging, and that’s a problem. Employees are calling and messaging each other, saying, ‘I see you’re fully charged, can you please move your car?'”

SAP is now drafting charging guidelines for its EV-driving employees.

You can read the entire report here. Another ‘unintended consequence’ of the greenies.

***

In closing today, I’ll label this report as another entry in the Dinosaur Media Deathwatch—CNN lays off 40 ‘journalists.’

CNN lays off more than 40 journalists

By Matthew Garrahan in Los Angeles

CNN has laid off more than 40 senior journalists in its newsgathering operation – including a pregnant producer who was two weeks away from giving birth to twins – as part of a reorganisation of the business under Jeff Zucker.

The cutting of production and editorial staff at the Time Warner-owned group comes as Mr Zucker tries to re-establish CNN as the dominant force in 24 hour cable news, a crown it lost several years ago to Fox News Channel.

The lay-offs at CNN and HLN, its sister network, were concentrated in Washington, Atlanta and Los Angeles at the end of 2013. CNN declined to comment on the laying off the pregnant news producer, who worked for the company for more than a decade, saying it could not comment on individual employees.

The lay-offs at CNN and HLN, its sister network, were concentrated in Washington, Atlanta and Los Angeles at the end of 2013. CNN declined to comment on the laying off the pregnant news producer, who worked for the company for more than a decade, saying it could not comment on individual employees.

The lay-offs coincide with changes to the network’s programming. Mr Zucker has hired new presenters and diversified CNN’s output, adding documentary and reality series to its traditional live news coverage.

Zucker thought adding documentaries and reality shows would boost CNN’s ratings against FOX. Evidently, the thought of reporting unbiased news never occurred to him.

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Oh, *&%@#*, it’s Monday!

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In an earlier post this month, I wrote about Life Events can occur to upset our routines. Well, we had another such event over the weekend. That means today’s post will be rushed and short. Crud!

The Benghazi scandal grew over the weekend and a new one appeared. In case you haven’t heard, the IRS targeted groups applying for tax-exempt status or reviewing the tax exempt status of a number of specific groups. Groups whose name included “Tea Party,” “Patriot,” “912,” or if the groups were Jewish organizations supporting Israel.

A new revelation is that the IRS “leaked” confidential information about some conservatives to the media. Some of those whose info was leaked was Mitt Romney and possibly others.

The Inspector General of the Treasury Service has begun an investigation. It now appears those targeted were not limited to the groups above but in 2012, was expanded.

The internal IG timeline shows a unit in the agency was looking at Tea Party and “patriot” groups dating back to early 2010. But it shows that list of criteria drastically expanding by the time a June 2011 briefing was held. It then included groups focused on government spending, government debt, taxes, and education on ways to “make America a better place to live.” It even flagged groups whose file included criticism of “how the country is being run.” 

By early 2012, the criteria were updated to include organizations involved in “limiting/expanding government,” education on the Constitution and Bill of Rights, and social economic reform. 

Taken together, the findings of the IG and the initial admissions by the IRS Friday are fueling complaints from Republicans on Capitol Hill. — Fox News.

The snowball of revelations, of an enemies list, perhaps of criminal behavior, is rapidly rolling downhill. For those of you who didn’t live through the last months of Nixon’s last term, the events we are seeing now are almost identical to those leading to Nixon’s resignation. Both cases involved a cover-up. In Nixon’s case it was the burglary at Watergate. For Obama, it is Benghazi. For Nixon, it was a criminal act of Breaking and Entering. For Obama, it could be criminal negligence leading to four deaths.

Nixon, at least, had the smarts to realize the end was coming and left office for the good of the country. Obama cares not for the good of the country. His primary care is his own welfare and keeping his hide intact.

As we progress through this morass, do some reading on the events during the last months of Nixon’s second term. Then compare those events with that of Obama’s second term. Amazing how similar the two are, isn’t it?

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It’s not what you know, it’s…

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…what you know that is wrong!

That is a paraphrased quote attributed to Will Rogers. It’s one all too many people overlook. It reminds me of a TV commercial where a woman claims that everything on the internet is true. I hate to disappoint folks, but that could not be further from the truth.

Even the most cynical of us get taken in at times.  My wife and I realized last night that we’d been taken in on one, too. Morgan-FreemanWe like Morgan Freeman, the actor. We don’t care for his politics but we do like his acting. We’d heard a few months ago that he’d died. We checked some sources and they confirmed his death. They were wrong. He’s alive and well.

I noticed that he’s in a number of movies that are just now being released and wondered that he knew his end was coming and tried to finish as many as he could given his remaining time. That lead to question of what caused his death.  I did some research and, lo!, discovered Morgan Freeman is alive and well and the numerous reports of his death were hoaxes.

Like I said at the beginning, It’s not what you know that causes problems, it’s what you know that is wrong that causes problems. We see examples all around us. Global Warming is a good example. The climatologists who started the hoax cherry-picked data to support their position. They claimed that Himalayan glaciers were shrinking. The half dozen they chose for examples were shrinking. However the hundred-plus other glaciers in that mountain range weren’t—in fact they were growing!

Then there was the reports of average temperature rising. They were—at the points being measured. What they failed to inform the public was that many of the monitoring stations that had been in rural areas were moved to metropolitan sites to aid aeronautic weather reporting. Locally, our Lees Summit airport now has automated reporting for pilots. That station didn’t exist a decade ago.

When more automated stations are located in or near metro area, the averages—of those stations, will rise. However when you average ALL of the weather stations, no temperature rise was found.

Metro areas do have higher temperatures than rural areas—all those people, cars and concrete to absorb heat from the sun. When you manipulate the source of the data collection, you change the validity of that data.

Collectively, I call these examples as exercises in pseudo-science. All too often, we believe what we want to believe contrary to the facts. Those beliefs can extend from the belief that cell phones interfere with electronics and sound systems, to the belief that vaccinations cause autism. I was taken to task for that last one, vilified and attacked for pointing out that the original study that created the belief of vaccinations causing autism, was based on a hoax.

Retracted autism study an ‘elaborate fraud,’ British journal finds

By the CNN Wire Staff ,January 5, 2011 8:14 p.m. EST

(CNN) — A now-retracted British study that linked autism to childhood vaccines was an “elaborate fraud” that has done long-lasting damage to public health, a leading medical publication reported Wednesday.

An investigation published by the British medical journal BMJ concludes the study’s author, Dr. Andrew Wakefield, misrepresented or altered the medical histories of all 12 of the patients whose cases formed the basis of the 1998 study — and that there was “no doubt” Wakefield was responsible.

“It’s one thing to have a bad study, a study full of error, and for the authors then to admit that they made errors,” Fiona Godlee, BMJ’s editor-in-chief, told CNN. “But in this case, we have a very different picture of what seems to be a deliberate attempt to create an impression that there was a link by falsifying the data.”

Britain stripped Wakefield of his medical license in May. “Meanwhile, the damage to public health continues, fueled by unbalanced media reporting and an ineffective response from government, researchers, journals and the medical profession,” BMJ states in an editorial accompanying the work.

…

The now-discredited paper panicked many parents and led to a sharp drop in the number of children getting the vaccine that prevents measles, mumps and rubella. Vaccination rates dropped sharply in Britain after its publication, falling as low as 80% by 2004. Measles cases have gone up sharply in the ensuing years.

In the United States, more cases of measles were reported in 2008 than in any other year since 1997, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. More than 90% of those infected had not been vaccinated or their vaccination status was unknown, the CDC reported.

“But perhaps as important as the scare’s effect on infectious disease is the energy, emotion and money that have been diverted away from efforts to understand the real causes of autism and how to help children and families who live with it,” the BMJ editorial states.

Wakefield has been unable to reproduce his results in the face of criticism, and other researchers have been unable to match them. Most of his co-authors withdrew their names from the study in 2004 after learning he had had been paid by a law firm that intended to sue vaccine manufacturers — a serious conflict of interest he failed to disclose. After years on controversy, the Lancet, the prestigious journal that originally published the research, retracted Wakefield’s paper last February.

I’ve heard that a number of lawsuits have been filed against physicians and vaccine manufacturers based on his hoaxed study. Given human nature to try to find blame, somewhere, for their misfortunes, I wouldn’t be surprised.

We’re in an era of exploding scientific research and exploding dissemination of information without restraint nor constraint. We cannot take individual reports at face value, we must do our own due diligence and validate, as best we can, our information and sources personally.

Always remember…

“It’s not what we don’t know that hurts. It’s what we know that ain’t so.”

― Will Rogers

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News you won’t hear from the MSM

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If you’re like me you seldom listen to the MSM. The only time I do is for a different viewpoint—if there is one at all. For example, I’ve posted several times about the events and non-reported events in Benghazi. The MSM is remarkably silent on that subject. If you go to the CBS News website, you’ll find nothing about Benghazi. You’ll find sympathetic stories about children in Egypt, the Syrian civil war but not a word on Benghazi. Ditto for ABC News, NBC News, and CNN. I’m not going to bother with MSNBC.

But Benghazi isn’t the subject for today. It’s all the other news items, some big, some small, that isn’t being covered.

If you rely on the MSM and the local TV stations for your news, you’re being lied to—lied by omission rather than commission. The result of either method is ignorance…your ignorance of what is truly happening in the country and around the world.

An ignorant populace is one that can be easily led, mislead and manipulated. That is the prime reason why pamphleteers such as Franklin and Paine were so important during the revolution. It is also why the press has in integral function in our society. Until that responsibility is corrupted like is has been today.

Being informed in not the sole responsibility of the press or the MSM. Like that of self-defense, insuring we are informed is a personal responsibility.  All the headlines above were found on The Drudge Report this morning. The Drudge website is updated frequently, sometimes within minutes of the event. It is one of a number of sites I use to keep myself informed.

Here are a few others. I would suggest you build a list of favored sites and check them daily, if not more often. Being informed allows you to make good, informed decisions. Decisions at the polls. Decisions at work. Decisions at home.

This is just a short list. I have as well some liberal sites such as The Politico and The Hill because some of their reporters aren’t all that liberal.

Have you created your news list? Everyone should.

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Another print MSM outlet heading towards extinction

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Two items caught my eye this morning. First, Newsweek announced they are going all digital, a new digital newsletter called Newsweek Global. Newsweek is throwing in the towel and is being absorbed into The Daily Beast—a liberal internet outlet. The last print edition of Newsweek will be the December 31, 2012, issue.

Newsweek Global, as the all-digital publication will be named, will be a single, worldwide edition targeted for a highly mobile, opinion-leading audience who want to learn about world events in a sophisticated context. Newsweek Global will be supported by paid subscription and will be available through e-readers for both tablet and the Web, with select content available on The Daily Beast. — The Daily Beast.

When I was in college living in a dorm, we were provided with discount subscriptions to a number of news magazines from Time, U.S. News and World Report, Newsweek, Sports Illustrated and others at about 1/3rd of the usual rate. I subscribed to Time for several years. At that time, in the mid-1960s, network news on the TV was only 15 minutes in the evening, usually from 6:00pm to 6:15pm. The news expanded to a half-hour a few years later as the Vietnam war grew. Most of our national, political and world news came from those magazines.

Even at that time, we could see the political bias. Time Magazine was more conservative, the others more “liberal.” Over the years, Time became just another liberal media outlet.

I’ve called the print media, the dinosaur media for a number of reasons. First, they’ve failed to adapt to changing technology. Second, they’ve failed to adapt to the changing political environment—rather they acquired the idea they are the leaders of social and political evolution. Unfortunately for them, evolution takes its own path regardless of the intentions of the MSM.

The MSM has refused to acknowledge that their failure is not solely due to technology. Their failure is their refusal to acknowledge the changing political and social environment. The current generation is NOT that of the ’60s. The current generation is the child and the grandchild of the ’60s and they’ve seen, personally, all the failings of the ’60s generation—including their slavish devotion to Marxism and Socialism.  It is easy for the child to see the failures of the parent.

This new transition by Newsweek to an all-digital mode will end in failure as well. It retains the subscription model and will retain its leftist bias…two of the failings that killed the print version. Failure to learn and adapt is a powerful contributor to evolutionary extinction. It’s the content and management, not solely the media, that is leading Newsweek to join other print news outlets that have closed over the last decade.

The second example is from the UK. The Guardian and the Observer newspapers are about to abandon their print media outlets as well.

Guardian ‘seriously discussing’ end to print edition

The publisher of the Guardian and Observer newspapers is close to axing the print editions of the newspapers, despite the hopes of its editor-in-chief Alan Rusbridger to keep them running for several years.

The Guardian and Observer publisher has spent the last few years battling to stem losses of £44m a year. However, it has been slow to make savings and any money that it has clawed back has been spent on expanding its US and online operations.

The drivers toward the extinction of the print paper in the UK includes those of the US media with some additions.  The unions and Britain’s welfare state has sucked the profits from the papers.  The move towards a digital-only media is an attempt to shed significant portions of the paper’s expensive union workforce. Whether that move will be sufficient is unknown at this time. The unions are more powerful in the UK than in the US and in many areas practically own the government.

The idea of content subscription for information is evolving. Some, like Rush Limbaugh’s newsletter, are successful because of their unique content. Limbaugh announced recently that his newsletter will be available digitally at a reduced price. I’m unsure if there will be reduced content. We will know when we compare the printed version next to the digital version.  I would suspect they will be the same. The difference in price will be due to the cost difference between the printed version and the digital version.

However, for most information, people do not need subscription to acquire information. Limbaugh and others like him, survive due to their unique content that is unavailable elsewhere. For the MSM, it’s different. For every subscription MSM news-outlet, there are ten or more free news-outlets with the same information.

I expect within a few years, Newsweek will join the other dinosaur media—like the Rocky Mountain News, et. al., into extinction.

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Whoops! And other topics

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After yesterday’s post had been up all day, my wife informed me last night that September didn’t start today, Wednesday, as I thought, but starts on Thursday.  My glaring oversight was visible to one and all the entire day.  

Crud!
***

Just when you thought you’d heard the worse of governmental regulatory abuse, something new comes up.

Feds to Trucking Company: You Cannot Fire Alcoholic Drivers

Lachlan Markay
August 30, 2011 at 3:39 pm
The federal government has sued a major trucking company for its firing of driver with an admitted alcohol abuse problem.
Alcoholism is classified as a disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act, the suit maintains, and therefore employees cannot be prohibited even from driving 18 wheelers due to their histories of abuse.
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which filed the suit against the Old Dominion Freight Line trucking company on August 16, noted that while “an employer’s concern regarding safety on our highways is a legitimate issue, an employer can both ensure safety and comply with the ADA.”
…
If the EEOC prevails, of course, it will mean that Old Dominion will still be liable both for any damage to life or property that results from a potential relapse by one of its recovering drivers – which in turn increases the risks involved in investment in the company – and for the cost of trying to ensure that such damage never occurs. All of these new burdens will raise Old Dominion’s cost of doing business, and hence the cost of everything they transport. And all of this can’t possibly ensure that a recovering driver does not relapse without the company’s knowledge.
That’s called screwed if you do and screwed if you don’t.  I suppose they’d call a self-admitted thief as having property ownership disabilities.
***
Economic news continues in a downward spiral.  The last quarter’s Gross Domestic Product was again downgraded.  The figure now is one percent growth for the year.  It seems that everytime the Obama administration releases some figures, they are updated about a week later…downward.

This time it’s domestic private sector jobs.  New jobs fell to 91,000 last week—a new low.

Private-Sector Job Creation at 91,000; Layoff Pace Slows

Published: Wednesday, 31 Aug 2011 | 9:26 AM ET
The private sector created 91,000 jobs from July to August, a shade below expectations, according to a report from ADP that sets the stage for a likely weak report on nonfarm jobs the government will release Friday.
ADP and Macroeconomic Advisors said service-sector jobs rose 80,000, down from an average increase of 115,000 over the past two months, while the goods-producing sector saw a gain of just 11,000.

Consensus estimates are that the government will show the economy created about 80,000 jobs overall in August—including the public sector—though some economists say the report actually could show a loss of jobs.

The ADP report showed that June’s estimate of 114,000 jobs created was revised down to 109,000.
Ever wonder why, when governmental figures are revised they are always revised downward?  Of course, you rarely hear on the State Media the revised numbers, CNBC and FOX excepted.
***
Old NFO bemoaned in a comment, rightly, the lack of anything positive in the news.  He’s right. It’s tough finding something positive to report.  With that thought in mind, I’ll list a few items that are, in my mind, positive.

WikiLeaks site comes under attack

LONDON (AP) – The WikiLeaks website crashed Tuesday in an apparent cyberattack after the accelerated publication of tens of thousands of once-secret State Department cables by the anti-secrecy organization raised new concerns about the exposure of confidential U.S. embassy sources.

“WikiLeaks.org is presently under attack,” the group said on Twitter late Tuesday. One hour later, the site and the cables posted there were inaccessible. 
Heh!  Guess that goes around, comes around.
ATF HEAD SACKED…  (Drudge headline.)

ATF Director Reassigned; U.S. Attorney Out Amid ‘Fast and Furious’ Uproar

By
Published August 30, 2011
| FoxNews.com

Acting ATF Director Kenneth Melson has been reassigned to a lesser post in the Justice Department and the U.S. attorney for Arizona was also pushed out Tuesday as fallout from Operation Fast and Furious reached new heights.

He wasn’t fired.  But he’s been relieved of his office and put out to pasture.  It appears that Melson isn’t quite eligible to retire so he’ll continue getting a BATFE paycheck.  Still, it’s a start.

Why we’re right to trust our gut instincts: Scientists discover first decision IS the right one

Last updated at 7:05 PM on 30th August 2011
Go on your gut feeling when setting goals – because more often than not it’ll be right, researchers have revealed.
According to a study by Canada’s University of Alberta, when it comes to working out where the future lies your unconscious mind is both smarter than you think and can be a great motivator.
Science has confirmed what we’ve always known.  Vindication!

***
Finally, here’s some cartoons to lighten your day.
From Mallard Filmore…
 
Obama’s most vocal recent critics are…the Black Congressional Caucus.  Not even his friends want to stand near him.  By Glenn McCoy…

One of the problems with Obama and the left in general is their fascination with the failed theory of economics—the Keynsian Theory.  Too bad it’s been thoroughly discredited.  But never let it be said that the left can learn from their mistakes.  They KNOW it’s just because they didn’t use enough money!
Chumming.
Y’all have a great day.  It’ll all get better when Obama is in the unemployment line with no marketable skills.
                        
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Whoops! And other topics

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After yesterday’s post had been up all day, my wife informed me last night that September didn’t start today, Wednesday, as I thought, but starts on Thursday.  My glaring oversight was visible to one and all the entire day.  

Crud!
***

Just when you thought you’d heard the worse of governmental regulatory abuse, something new comes up.

Feds to Trucking Company: You Cannot Fire Alcoholic Drivers

Lachlan Markay
August 30, 2011 at 3:39 pm
The federal government has sued a major trucking company for its firing of driver with an admitted alcohol abuse problem.
Alcoholism is classified as a disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act, the suit maintains, and therefore employees cannot be prohibited even from driving 18 wheelers due to their histories of abuse.
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which filed the suit against the Old Dominion Freight Line trucking company on August 16, noted that while “an employer’s concern regarding safety on our highways is a legitimate issue, an employer can both ensure safety and comply with the ADA.”
…
If the EEOC prevails, of course, it will mean that Old Dominion will still be liable both for any damage to life or property that results from a potential relapse by one of its recovering drivers – which in turn increases the risks involved in investment in the company – and for the cost of trying to ensure that such damage never occurs. All of these new burdens will raise Old Dominion’s cost of doing business, and hence the cost of everything they transport. And all of this can’t possibly ensure that a recovering driver does not relapse without the company’s knowledge.
That’s called screwed if you do and screwed if you don’t.  I suppose they’d call a self-admitted thief as having property ownership disabilities.
***
Economic news continues in a downward spiral.  The last quarter’s Gross Domestic Product was again downgraded.  The figure now is one percent growth for the year.  It seems that everytime the Obama administration releases some figures, they are updated about a week later…downward.

This time it’s domestic private sector jobs.  New jobs fell to 91,000 last week—a new low.

Private-Sector Job Creation at 91,000; Layoff Pace Slows

Published: Wednesday, 31 Aug 2011 | 9:26 AM ET
The private sector created 91,000 jobs from July to August, a shade below expectations, according to a report from ADP that sets the stage for a likely weak report on nonfarm jobs the government will release Friday.
ADP and Macroeconomic Advisors said service-sector jobs rose 80,000, down from an average increase of 115,000 over the past two months, while the goods-producing sector saw a gain of just 11,000.

Consensus estimates are that the government will show the economy created about 80,000 jobs overall in August—including the public sector—though some economists say the report actually could show a loss of jobs.

The ADP report showed that June’s estimate of 114,000 jobs created was revised down to 109,000.
Ever wonder why, when governmental figures are revised they are always revised downward?  Of course, you rarely hear on the State Media the revised numbers, CNBC and FOX excepted.
***
Old NFO bemoaned in a comment, rightly, the lack of anything positive in the news.  He’s right. It’s tough finding something positive to report.  With that thought in mind, I’ll list a few items that are, in my mind, positive.

WikiLeaks site comes under attack

LONDON (AP) – The WikiLeaks website crashed Tuesday in an apparent cyberattack after the accelerated publication of tens of thousands of once-secret State Department cables by the anti-secrecy organization raised new concerns about the exposure of confidential U.S. embassy sources.

“WikiLeaks.org is presently under attack,” the group said on Twitter late Tuesday. One hour later, the site and the cables posted there were inaccessible. 
Heh!  Guess that goes around, comes around.
ATF HEAD SACKED…  (Drudge headline.)

ATF Director Reassigned; U.S. Attorney Out Amid ‘Fast and Furious’ Uproar

By
Published August 30, 2011
| FoxNews.com

Acting ATF Director Kenneth Melson has been reassigned to a lesser post in the Justice Department and the U.S. attorney for Arizona was also pushed out Tuesday as fallout from Operation Fast and Furious reached new heights.

He wasn’t fired.  But he’s been relieved of his office and put out to pasture.  It appears that Melson isn’t quite eligible to retire so he’ll continue getting a BATFE paycheck.  Still, it’s a start.

Why we’re right to trust our gut instincts: Scientists discover first decision IS the right one

Last updated at 7:05 PM on 30th August 2011
Go on your gut feeling when setting goals – because more often than not it’ll be right, researchers have revealed.
According to a study by Canada’s University of Alberta, when it comes to working out where the future lies your unconscious mind is both smarter than you think and can be a great motivator.
Science has confirmed what we’ve always known.  Vindication!

***
Finally, here’s some cartoons to lighten your day.
From Mallard Filmore…
 
Obama’s most vocal recent critics are…the Black Congressional Caucus.  Not even his friends want to stand near him.  By Glenn McCoy…

One of the problems with Obama and the left in general is their fascination with the failed theory of economics—the Keynsian Theory.  Too bad it’s been thoroughly discredited.  But never let it be said that the left can learn from their mistakes.  They KNOW it’s just because they didn’t use enough money!
Chumming.
Y’all have a great day.  It’ll all get better when Obama is in the unemployment line with no marketable skills.