Right now, the McCain team is floating Vice-President trial balloons to see if any get shot down or if anyone salutes. So far, they have floated Mitt Romney and Condoleezza Rice. Both have generated a lot of positive comments and a few negative comments.

Romney’s negative comments have come from the followers of Mike Huckabee. They feel that Mike Huckabee should be the Vice-Presidential nominee, even though Huckabee has said that he does not want the position. They, of course for Huckabee supporters, attacked Romney for his religion or religious positions. They, of course, deny that they are attacking Romney on his religion or his religious positions, yet their questions about Romney always do attack his church. They appear to me to be religious bigots that cannot get over their religious bigotry long enough to examine how closely aligned the evangelicals and Mormons are on political positions. They can only see the differences in that their God does not talk to them and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints has a Prophet that talks to God regularly.

Secretary Rice has been mentioned over the weekend as wanting the position of Vice-President. I have been a long time Condi Rice supporter for Vice-President. I do have issues with her. She is not as pro-life as I feel she should be. She is softer on Muslim terrorists than I feel we should be. Those are two things that John McCain is strong on. Supporting John McCain and those positions for 4 years will prepare her for the realities of being President. She does pose a dilemma for the Democrat party. She is black and female. In that, she trumps both of the Democrat potential nominees. No matter which one runs, she has the other trump card to play. Democrats have demonized her for years and her ability to attract black votes is questionable, particularly if Obama is the nominee. If Mrs. Clinton is the nominee she would have a greater chance to pull in the black votes.

The Democrats floated the name of John Kerry as the Vice-Presidential nominee. That would be great. He is such a loser that having him to shoot at would be like shooting fish in a barrel. Either Romney or Rice would tie Kerry into such knots that he would be unable to extract himself for a long time. The people of Massachusetts might actually get a chance to see what a dunce they have elected to the Senate.

Secretary Rice would be particularly daunting to debate. In the farce reports before Congress, she is unflappable. She gives better than she gets. Part of that is her amazing intelligence. She worked her way up from poverty to the peak of power by her own ability. She speaks four languages. She is a concert pianist. She taught at Stanford University. These accomplishments are from a girl that went to the same church that was bombed to kill those girls so long ago. That was another time and seems like another place. She is perched on the pinnacle of power and looks like she will take a step up. That makes me feel good. Her story is such an inspiration to those that are poor. She did it on her own ability. They can do it on their own ability. How far they go is entirely up to them, not the government. That is why Democrats hate her. She shows blacks that they do not have to rely on the government to get ahead. It would be great to have her story told over and over to blacks who are looking for a handout. They might get the message. She will not move many blacks into the Republican ranks, but she will move some. Any will be a help.

There will probably be other Vice-President balloons floated before McCain settles on one. I think that he floated the best two first. Any of the others will be a big step down from either Romney or Rice.

There are news reports out that Huckabee supporters are trying to stop John McCain from picking Mitt Romney as his Vice-Presidential pick. It sounds like Mike Huckabee has not gotten over his Mormon envy from the primaries.

In the primaries, Mike Huckabee feigned ignorance of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and asked a loaded question. The question he asked showed that he had extensive knowledge of Mormon Doctrine. But, he asked the question in such a way that it was like “when did you stop beating your wife.” There was no way to answer the question without being mired in controversy. Mike Huckabee knew that from the start. He was not searching out truth; he was trying to create problems where none existed.

Now, he has surrogates doing much the same thing in trying to stop John McCain from selecting Mitt Romney as his running mate. Mitt Romney would be an excellent choice as Vice-President. He brings to the table everything that John McCain does not. Mitt Romney also brings many blue states into the purple column and makes them competitive. That will be a good thing for the McCain bid to be our next President.

Huckabee’s bigotry is not becoming. He says he is not a bigot. He says that he has no animosity towards Mormons. Yet, whenever he has a chance to shoot at a Mormon, he takes his shot. Huckabee bills himself as the leader of the social conservatives. He is not the leader of the social conservatives. Huckabee is the leader of the bigots of the religious bigotry movement. That is not a position I would wish on my worst enemy. Huckabee has just taken another tumble from the bottom of my Republican list to near the bottom of my Democrat list.

Of course, the Democrats penchant for shooting themselves in the foot is also helping the McCain candidacy. A year ago, it looked like there was no chance that a Republican could be elected this time. Mrs. Clinton looked unbeatable and no Republican stood out from the field. Well, you have to play the game even though the odds are not good. Barack Obama came out of nowhere and is on the threshold of defeating Mrs. Clinton for the nomination. Even if he fails to defeat her for the nomination, he has taken the luster off her nomination. Also, if Obama is denied the nomination, many black voters will be turned off on voting Democrat in this election. Of course, if Obama wins, Mrs. Clinton’s supporters will also be crying foul and may not vote for the Democrat candidate either.

How did we get to this point? First, Barack Obama gave the Democrats something that Mrs. Clinton cannot give them. He gave them a candidate that sounds like a Presidential candidate. Mrs. Clinton sounds like someone that just ate a lemon. Obama also gave the Democrats the chance to really look at what the Clinton’s had done to the party. Many Democrats did not like the picture that emerged from the post-Clinton party. They started attacking Mrs. Clinton at her most vulnerable points. They knew where they were, because they knew where all the skeletons were buried. Mrs. Clinton started sounding like just any old candidate that had no record. She resorted to telling lies to make her sound more important than she really is. The news media called Mrs. Clinton on those lies. Mrs. Clinton then resorted to the time tested Clinton playbook material. She went on the attack against Barack Obama. Of course, she could not attack him where he is most vulnerable because she is also vulnerable there. So, she attacked him wherever she could. She landed many blows and made him into the Chicago politician that he is.

The Democrats now have to choose between a no experience Chicago style politician and a no experience Clinton. They do have the race or gender card to put on top of that playbook. But, the picture does not look good for the Democrats in November. Their cat fight has exposed both candidates to be the far left wing of the Democrat party. That means that they are both outside of the mainstream of American society. They have given the middle and right sides of the field to John McCain. That is perfectly his battlefield. Had they tried to corner John McCain on the right, he would have been toast. But, by giving him the middle as well as the right, they are giving him most of the ground to win.

Washington spends way too much money. That comment should come as no surprise to anyone with a brain. One of the reasons Congress spends too much money is earmarks. The Republicans have been hammering Rep. Murtha for his earmarks. That is as it should be. He is one of the biggest porkers in Congress. It turns out there were two Republicans that had a higher earmark total than did Rep. Murtha.

With a record like that, people are not going to vote Republican. People will say that it does not matter who is elected to Congress they will overspend. That is how we end up with so many Democrats who do not care at all about spending. There are some Republicans that do care about spending. They have a hard time getting elected because of idiots like those two that outspent Rep. Murtha in earmarks last year. We need more in leadership like my Rep. Jeff Flake. He did not take any earmarks last year. When he tried to get on the Appropriations Committee this year, he was rebuffed by the leadership. That should end if the Republicans want to be considered serious about being fiscal hawks. They should limit the people on the Appropriations Committee to people who have used the earmarks system the least. That will show the intent to rein in spending.

Another boondoggle in Congress is Nancy Pelosi’s relighting of the Capitol dome. The cost of the project is over $961,000. The cost to light the Capitol dome each year is $15,000. It would take 45 years to repay the cost of the project if the cost to light the dome is reduced to zero. The cost will not be reduced to zero, so the repayment period will be much longer. It will probably only save $2-3,000 per year. That would mean a repayment period of 300,000 years. The lights will be well worth the cost (heavy on the sarcasm). The other problem with the relighting project is that they rejected two lower bids to select this one. This one is from a company in the district represented by the chairman of the committee that is overseeing the project. This smells like a dead fish. There is obviously no graft in this Democrat led Congress (again, heavy on the sarcasm).

There is an AIDS project that is currently funded at $3 billion per year. The current Democrat led House wants to increase this project to $10 billion per year. That would increase our foreign aid budget by over 15% by itself. There is no need to increase this project to $10 billion from $3 billion. Most of the money increased would be wasted as most government money gets wasted, especially if it gets sent overseas as foreign aid of any kind.

This highlights the problems we have with our elected officials. They overuse the earmark program. There are probably good times to use the earmark program for things that come up too late to go through the regular budget process. It just gets over used by too many lawmakers. They should set a limit of 1 or 2 earmarks per year for lawmakers to use the earmarks. That way they would choose the projects more carefully. Right now, anyone who is a campaign contributor and asks for money gets funded by many of the users of the earmark program. They should also revise how the leadership chooses people for committee and leadership assignments. The biggest users of the earmarks would have the last choice for committee or leadership assignments. That would reward those Congressmen that are concerned with fulfilling their oath of office and improving the country. Those that want to abuse the system can be left out in the cold abusing the system, but they would be identified as such. They would not be mentioned in discussions about leadership or committees. That would get the attention of most of these power hungry people.

We do need government reform. There are some simple rules that would insure that we would have some real reform real fast. The first is my suggestion about those with the lowest earmarks getting the power and choicest committee assignments. With that in place, you can work on the problem of the contractors in the committee chairman’s district getting the bid to do contract work for the government. It should be that any contractor should be eliminated from consideration if they are from any committee member’s district, unless they are an only source. That would eliminate the problem with the lighting contract. The government could have purchased the lighting at a much lower cost from one of the two lower bids. If it can be shown that the bids were deficient in some way, then the rejection could be justified. It just stinks to high heaven right now. We need to eliminate the appearance of graft and collusion from our congressional people. The second rule would not work in the Senate as that would eliminate anyone from about a third of the states. That would be too impractical to work.

The reforms will never be installed. They are too practical. They would work to eliminate much of the problems in Washington. That is why they will not be installed. The people benefiting from the graft would have to vote to eliminate their graft. That will never happen unless they get caught in a big scandal and the news media would never to that to Democrats.

Today, I had a doctor visit. While there, we talked about what I do. I teach students that intend to go into nursing for a career. So, we compared notes on his experience with students that are training to be doctors and mine with nurses.

He was amazed at the lack of interest the students he teaches are. They act bored and disinterested. These are people that will in a short time, be making life and death decisions based on the knowledge they gained as a student. If they are bored and disinterested, they will not be able to make informed decisions.

We compared that to the regular doctor I visit. She is knowledgeable about just about everything in medicine. He has the same impression. He is impressed with how much she knows and how much energy she puts into her medical practice. He is trying to get her to cut back because she has some shoulder problems that would heal with some rest. My doctor is the type that will not rest. She is concerned with providing her patients the highest quality health care possible. That is why after we found her 8 years ago; we have followed her from place to place.

I told the doctor I visited that my nursing students seemed very interested in nursing. But, the competition to get into nursing school is highly competitive. Even though there is a nursing shortage in Arizona and across the country, there are a limited number of students that can be admitted to any nursing school. This makes the competition fierce for those few positions. I know my students are looking for any edge they can get to get into the nursing programs in this area.

One program that eases your way into the nursing program is the bi-lingual nursing program. This program picks nursing students that can speak both English and Spanish and puts them in a fast-track program for nursing. The students are supposed to be fluent in both languages when they start, but some get in because they are fluent in one and acceptable in the other. Because the students speak to each other in both English and Spanish during their classes, they become fluent in both languages by the time they graduate. There was one student I had who was barely acceptable in Spanish in the beginning. At her graduation, she gave the graduation speech in Spanish. That was a big accomplishment for her. She got in because her daughter also applied and was accepted. Her daughter spoke better Spanish in the beginning. The man who gave the speech in English could barely speak English in my class. I was really proud of him in his ability to learn English. It will serve him well.

This bi-lingual nursing program has them take their three years of pre-req’s in two years. Then they are admitted to the nursing program. If they get a D in any class, they are dropped out of that cohort. They can be picked up by the next cohort. Some have dropped from one cohort to the next. The first class of 30 students, graduated 21 nurses. Three more graduated with the next cohort the next year. That is a pretty good success rate. The cohorts are now started twice a year instead of once. That is really meeting a need here in the Phoenix area.

Al Gore is spending $300 million to advertise his global warming hoax. Evidently his propaganda movie did not do its intended job and more work needs to be done. On the one hand, it is good to see that Al Gore feels the need to continue to advertise his hoax to increase his congregation. On the other hand, it means more time spent debunking the obvious hoax that is global warming.

The first clue that global warming is a hoax is the solution to every problem is more government. When is more government ever the solution to any problem? More government is always THE problem, not the answer to any problem. The only people that believe that more government is the answer to any problem are liberals. Liberals believe that more government is the answer to every problem. Socialism believes that more government is the answer to every problem. Freedom believes that less government is the solution to our problems.

The second clue to the idea that global warming is a hoax is the total lack of evidence for global warming in the scientific community. I do not count computer models as evidence. If I want to prove that current conditions will produce terrible ice storms in 30 years then tremendous heat in 60 years, I could do it with a computer model. I just put in the programming I want and out comes the answer that I want. That is what has happened with global warming. They put in their scare, and then they tout it as evidence. Evidence is scientifically produced and documented information on what has happened. Until there is evidence, there is no scientific validity to anyone believing in global warming.

The third clue to the idea that global warming is a hoax is the way they say that all scientists agree or that there is a consensus of all scientists. There is not now a consensus of all scientists nor should there ever be a consensus of all scientists. All scientists believed that the sun revolved around the earth. One scientist disagreed with the majority. The one scientist was correct, the majority was wrong. In the 1970’s all scientists believed that we were approaching a period of global cooling. Now all scientists believe we are in global warming. This proves that scientists are like sheep following the crowd. Right now, if you want funding for something, you can get funding faster if you tie your project into global warming. If you tell the truth that there is no global warming, you will wait for your funding until the temperature has warmed sufficiently, which means never.

Many people point to the IPCC report and all the scientists that signed that report as evidence that scientists are in agreement. That list of scientists is just a list of who contributed to the report, not who agrees with the report. Because of the misuse of the names, many scientists are having their names removed from the list. Even the head of the IPCC admits that the temperature has not risen at all since 1998. In fact, the temperature has gone down since 1998. The peak year of 1998 is only the 7^th highest temperature on record. Five of the top ten yearly temperatures are from the 1930’s. If I remember correctly, all of the five high temperatures from the 1930’s are higher than 1998. I could be wrong.

People who believe in global warming are not interested in the science. If you discuss the science with them and point out that the science points to no global warming, they shrug their shoulders and still believe. Believing in global warming is more of a religion than anything to do with science. You have the high priest in Al Gore. You have your dogma in the global warming myth that you have to take on faith.

I read one author that said that the real problem today is the war against Islamo-Fascism, not global warming. People believe in global warming because nobody is going to die. If you are wrong about global warming, nobody will die. If you are wrong about Islamo-Fascism, people will die. That is why people ignore the important problem and focus on the minor problem, if it is a problem at all.

There is a lot of talk about Al Gore getting into the Democrat Presidential race to achieve party unity. With the animosity flowing both ways between Obama and Clinton, I am not sure that anyone could achieve unity if either one does not win the nomination. One of them has to win the nomination and the other has to lose. The winner’s supporters will really razz the supporters of the loser. This will not be pretty. This will be especially true if Mrs. Clinton manages to pull a rabbit out of the hat and win.

If Mrs. Clinton wins, the blacks in the Democrat party will realize that they are being played for suckers. They might even leave the party for this election and that might even be permanent. Once the blacks find out that they have more in common with Republicans than Democrats, they might just stay with the Republicans and leave the Democrats high and dry. If that happens, the Democrat party is the permanent minority party for the next generation or two.

The Democrats cannot afford to have blacks desert the party for even one election. They have to keep them on the plantation as their voting slaves. Blacks vote for Democrats and get little or nothing except for promises in return. Every now and then the Democrats throw something to them to let them know they are dependent on the Democrat party. Then they blame their lack of getting things done on the “evil” Republicans. Since the death of Dr. Martin Luther King, blacks have believed the lie that Democrats are the party that believes in equal rights.

The Republican Party was formed as the anti-slavery party. Because a Republican was elected to the White House, the Civil War was fought to free the slaves. After the Civil War the Republicans pushed through the amendments to the Constitution that gave blacks equal rights. Every equal rights act from the Civil War until the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was authored and passed by Republicans. In fact, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was originally introduced in the late 1950’s by President Eisenhower. It failed because of the votes of the Democrats.

The Democrat party on the other hand has been against the rights of blacks from the beginning. The Democrat Party was supported heavily in the South before the Civil War. After the Civil War, the Democrat Party in the South instituted the Jim Crow laws to keep blacks down. The KKK was started by Southern Democrats to persecute Republicans that were giving rights to blacks and blacks that were getting to free. The Civil Rights Act of 1954, the Democrats crowning achievement in Civil Rights, was voted on by a higher percentage of Republicans than Democrats. In other words, it passed because of heavy Republican support. If it had to rely on Democrat support, it would have gone down to defeat.

Even today, the Republicans are vilified by the Democrats and the media as being against rights for blacks. But, when you look at blacks in power positions, you find Republicans give blacks more power positions to blacks than Democrats do. I am not talking about a higher percentage, I am talking about more. There are more black Democrats than there are black Republicans. If you were a black person who wanted to aspire to leadership, you should choose the Republican Party over the Democrat party. You would have a much greater chance for a leadership position. You would also have a much greater chance at being elected President in the Republican Party than in the Democrat party.

If you look at the current election, Barack Obama holds positions that are far to the left. He has little chance to be elected President of the United States. Most voters want to pick a President than holds positions that are moderate or conservative. A candidate that holds positions on the left has to also hold positions that are on the center or right in order to be a successful candidate for President. Barack Obama holds all of his positions on the far, far left of his party. That leaves him little chance for election, unless he can fool the voters. So far, he has fooled a large number of voters. It is a long way to November and lots of people would love to paint him on the left. His party wants him to stay on the left. They will be upset if he moves to the center on any issue, especially the war against Islamo-Fascism.

Barack Obama’s connection to Jeremiah Wright and Tony Rezko will also hurt his campaign. He has been the pure and clean candidate that will unite and clean up Washington. It turns out he is just a typical Chicago politician that has accepted lots of campaign cash from big money donors and put some of it in his pocket. He has to rid himself of the sleaze factor in order to have a real shot. Things are not looking good for Barack Obama at this time.

Coming in to work today, I heard a quote from Barack Obama on what he would do as Commander in Chief. He said he would eliminate nuclear weapons and negotiate with other nuclear powers to eliminate their nuclear weapons as well. He also said he would end the war in Iraq, he meant the war against Islamo-Fascism, and spend the money saved on domestic programs. He said some other things, but these were the main points.

The host then played a commercial by John McCain. It starts with the famous fight on the beaches quote by Winston Churchill. Then, John McCain comes in and does his version of that speech. It is quite moving. It also highlights the big difference between Barack Obama or Mrs. Bill Clinton and John McCain.

The most important issue of this election and probably every election for the next 20-30 years is who will be the best commander in chief? These quotes show the difference between the Democrats and the Republicans on the job of the Commander in Chief. The Democrats believe that the Commander in Chief role is to disarm the US and make us a 3^rd world power. The Republicans believe that we should be strong and fight our enemies wherever we find them. The reason the Democrats want to make us a 3^rd world power is that they feel we are the source of evil in the world. If we are weak, we will cease to be the source of evil in the world. Then, everyone will get along and sit around singing folk songs. The Republicans believe that we should be the strongest country in the world. Republicans believe that we are the source for good in the world, not a source for evil.

I believe that most Americans believe that America is a source for good in the world. I believe that most Americans believe that we should have a strong military. When given the choice between a weak kneed Democrat and a strong Republican, the American public will choose the strong Republican every time. The last truly weak Democrat was George McGovern. George McGovern lost almost every state to Richard Nixon. Richard Nixon was not a very good choice for the Republicans, but he was good enough to soundly defeat a weak Democrat. I believe we are repeating 1972. Many people think we are repeating 1968. I think we are more in line with 1972 than 1968. The only thing that makes us similar to 1968 is that there was no incumbent President or Vice-President running.

One other thing about Barack Obama I read last night was a column about his childhood. It stated that he was listed as being a Muslim up until at least age 13 in Indonesia. The article said he went to special Muslim classes that taught the Quran in Arabic. Those classes were reserved for the most devout Muslim students. The article also leaves some questions in your mind by saying that Barack Obama has opposed the war against Terror from the beginning. He attends a church that actively teaches anti-Semitism and accepts Muslims into its congregation. The article questions whether Barack Obama might be a closet Muslim at a minimum, if not a real Muslim. The article stated that people that knew Barack Obama in Indonesia believe that Barack is still a Muslim and is just waiting for the right time to reveal that fact to the world.

I am not sure that I believe that Barack Obama is a Muslim. He has said that he is a Christian. He has also said that he has always been a Christian. The article I read about him being listed as a Muslim and attending special Muslim classes could not be true, if he has always been a Christian. Something is not adding up here. There is a lot about Barack Obama that does not add up. He is always trying to be all things to all people. That is not always possible. He always makes the effort. I never completely trust someone who is always trying to be all things to all people.

Today in the Arizona Republic, I read an article that said that warming in the west is greater than the warming over the globe. They cherry picked a very short period of time, 2003-2007. They also try to make the assumption that this very narrow period of time is representative of a larger period of time. Their justification for calling the years 2003-2007, a period of warming, is because it is above the historical average of the last 100 years.

If you take 1998 as the high year, it has cooled since then over 1.5 degrees Celsius. If you take the year 2002 as the high year, the temperature has not increased at all between 2002 and 2008. They had to eliminate any high years to make any possible increase show up. That is junk science at its best. They are making the facts fit the hypothesis. The way it is supposed to work is that you are supposed to develop a hypothesis. You then run tests to determine if that hypothesis is correct. If the hypothesis is not correct, you go back and tweak it until it is correct. These scientists decided that they wanted to show global warming and made the facts fit their hypothesis.

Unfortunately for believers in global warming, that is how they have to practice science. People that do not care about global warming or do not believe in global warming, they can just let the facts do the talking. Believers in global warming have to lie about what they find in order to “prove” that global warming is true. Non-believers do not have to lie about anything to disprove global warming. This study is a perfect example of believers working overtime to “prove” global warming, while ignoring the facts that are staring them in the face. Scientists are supposed to include all facts in their hypothesis. Global warming believers have to ignore lots of facts in order to make their facts fit the hypothesis.

Global warming people also talk a lot about carbon footprints and carbon dioxide. Carbon dioxide is only 0.003% of the atmosphere. That is such a small amount it cannot have the terrible impacts that global warming believers say that it does. The largest greenhouse gas is water vapor, which we have no control over. That is why they ignore water vapor. There is no way to control water vapor, so they ignore it. Even though water vapor is much higher, global warming believers ignore it. A low water vapor amount in my area of Arizona is around 2-3%. That is about 1000 times more common than carbon dioxide. In my area we sometimes get humidifies in the 40-45% level; that is over 10,000 times more common. You would think that water vapor would be considered more important than carbon dioxide. It is not because it is so variable and so common. If you ignore the water vapor, you are ignoring the largest greenhouse gas and a potential source of the world’s climate.

Since the global warming believers ignore water vapor, they do not include it in their computer models. Then it is little wonder that the computer models are ALWAYS wildly wrong when it comes to predictions. They are even wrong in the short term, where it should be relatively easy to be close. But, they built into the computer model that the temperature is going to go up, so that is what the computer model tells them the temperature will do. When the temperature goes down, the experts on global warming are all amazed. Any third grade student could tell them that if you assume the temperature will go up, you have a 50% chance of being right.

One other thing that the global warming believers are ignoring is this winter. They want us all to consider the past few warm winters where the Arctic ice melted. They want us to ignore this winter where the Arctic ice is now thicker and more wide spread than at any time in the last 50 years. Global warming people do not want to be bothered with the facts. They want to massage the facts into whatever they want them to be. They want us all to ignore all of the evidence that piles up that refutes their stupid global warming theory. Then, they call us names because we say, look at the facts. I cannot understand people who refuse to look at facts. I have always been very fact oriented.

This study that came out to “prove” that global warming is worse here in the west is a clumsy attempt to make the facts fit the hypothesis. Anyone who knows anything will see through the falsehoods. Unfortunately, so many people will only read the headline and not look at the way they massage the facts to fit their hypothesis.

Yesterday, John McCain gave a big speech on foreign policy in Los Angeles. For the most part, I agree with the main thrust of his speech. He gave a big portion to stopping the terrorists wherever we find them. He also put in a good line that anyone who does not advocate stopping the terrorists in their tracks is not worthy to be in the Oval Office. That is a direct swipe at both Democrat candidates who think that if we stop fighting, the terrorists will pick up their weapons and go home.

There were a couple of things that bothered me in his talk. One was that he wants to shut down the terrorist detention center in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. That is a great place to hold them. They are held securely in American control and on foreign soil. Both are good for America. To bring them into the US would allow them access to the US court system which is rife with liberal Democrats appointed by Clinton and even Carter. They would find infinite ways of getting out of detention using our courts. They would also compromise our security setup by making our Intelligence Services disclose what we know in open court. That would allow the terrorist network to work to compromise our techniques and improve their security. All of that is bad for our country. I cannot think of a single good thing that shutting down the base would do. In other words, there are lots of bad ideas for shutting down the base and no good ones. I suppose the only good one is that the liberal Democrats in the media would like the base shut down. That is not a good enough reason to destroy our security.

The second thing that I heard that bothered me was John McCain’s love of global warming. He believes the lies told by the environmentalists hook, line and sinker. There is no scientific evidence that supports the position that John McCain and the loony left have that there is man-caused global warming. The earth has not warmed for at least 10 years. The earth’s oceans are cooler now than they were 10 years ago. The ice sheets in the Arctic and Antarctic are larger and thicker than they have been in at least 50 years. None of this evidence points to global warming occurring at any time within the lifetime of anyone currently living on our planet or their great-great-great grandchildren. And that is assuming that everyone is doing what we are doing now.

The evidence is pretty clear and convincing that global warming is not occurring. It will take awhile for people to realize that global warming has been one gigantic hoax. It was cooked up by the communists to get people to embrace communism in the theory that they were doing something for the environment. The communists realized that people were willing to do things and sacrifice to make our planet a better place to live. They then decided to take over the environmental movement and make communism all the solutions to the “problem” of global warming. Of course they never actually said that communism was the solution. If they had said that communism was the solution to anything, nobody would have followed the movement. They just took the theories of communism and couched them in environmental language to get people to accept them.

If you doubt that comment, let’s look at what their solutions are for all the problems of global warming. Every time they say there is a problem with global warming, they want the government to come in and have a solution. When you add all their solutions up, you have the government controlling almost all of your actions. Let’s now look at communism: in communism, the government is the solution to all the problems. The government controls all aspects of your life. Is there a difference between the two? There may be some semantic difference, but in practical terms the government would control all of your life from cradle to grave. They both sound like communism to me. If they are both communism, then the solution to the global warming crisis is communism.

I think most people with a brain would say that communism is not a solution to global warming. They are not even shooting at the same target. The goal of communism is control over every aspect of your life from cradle to grave. The goal of the solution to global warming is supposed to be control over environmental problems that would stop global warming. As you can see, the environmental movement has been hijacked and they do not even know it.

 It is ridiculous to talk about science to a believer in global warming. They are not interested in the science of global warming. They are invested so heavily in the hysteria that they will not listen to the science. Since they are invested in the hysteria, they will believe any proposed solution. The communists were right in gaining control of the environmental movement and putting their solutions as the solutions for any environmental problem.

We cannot go following the environmental movement and their proposed solutions. If John McCain thinks that conservatives will allow the US government to become communist, he has another thing coming. That is one reason I believe that John McCain is a one term President.

It is interesting that Mrs. Bill Clinton was caught telling a lie about her trip to Bosnia. For the past few weeks, she has been telling the story that when she landed in Bosnia that she had to run for the vehicles because of sniper fire. It turns out that CBS has video of the trip and it shows everyone smiling. It even shows Mrs. Clinton talking to an 8 year old child during the ceremony at the airport. Nobody seems to be worried about any sniper fire. Mrs. Clinton even climbs up on the guard tower to be photographed with the soldiers in the guard tower. That pretty much debunked the story that Mrs. Clinton had been telling recently. She laughed off being caught and said she just remembered it wrong. I would think that if you were there, you would have remembered the children and the flowers, not a non-existent sniper.

But this incident brings up the larger point in that all liberal ideas are built upon a framework of lies. There is usually some truth mixed in to give the framework some stability, but it is generally lies that make up the idea. Let’s look at a couple of liberal ideas to see the lies in action.

First, that we all need socialized health care is a liberal mantra over the past few years. Is this true? No, some people can afford to pay for their own health care and do not want health insurance. They are lumped in with those who cannot afford health insurance. Another group of people that gets lumped in with those without health insurance are those that feel that they do not need health insurance because they are young and strong. By being young and strong, they are invincible. Being invincible they have no need of health care. When you subtract those two groups from the total without health insurance, you find that there are very few without health insurance because they cannot afford it.

So, why would you want to punish those who do not want health insurance by making them buy something they do not want, just to enable the few who need it. Why not come up with some plan to insure those that are truly uninsured?

But, the other thing to look at is what about the quality of health care for the majority of the public. Whenever you institute a socialized medical system, you end up rationing health care. That means people have to wait for important medical procedures. In Canada, people have to wait up to a year to get heart bypass operations. In the US, people get the heart bypass operations almost as soon as the need is identified. By the time Canadians get the bypass, they are sometimes pushing up daisies in the local cemetery. That is the goal of the socialized medicine managers. They want to cut costs as much as possible. If they can get people to die before undergoing an expensive medical procedure, they chalk it up to cost savings. The same story could be cited in England, Australia, Germany, France or any country with socialized medicine. The Democrats tell us that everything will remain like it is today, only we will have the government paying for our health care. That is a lie. That can not happen in the long run. It can happen for a few months to a year, but eventually rationing will occur and people will die waiting for their medical procedure.

Second, let’s look at something the liberals have pushed on us for years, Social Security. Social Security is really a Ponzi scheme. A Ponzi scheme is where you get a group of investors to put money into an investment. You do not invest any money; you just pay off the original investors with the later money. The problem is that you continually have to find larger and larger groups of investors. Eventually, the pool of potential investors runs out and the Ponzi scheme falls under its own weight. Social Security is set up like a Ponzi scheme. There are no investments. The original investors in Social Security are being paid off by later investors in Social Security. Larger and larger pools of people are needed to continue this system. The problem with the Social Security Ponzi scheme is that the Baby Boom hit. The baby boom is getting ready to retire. When we do retire, there will not be enough people paying into Social Security to pay us what we are told we will receive. The Ponzi scheme will collapse without a massive increase in the amount of money that people pay into the system. The public will not stand for that kind of an increase.

Every time someone comes along and says that we need to make Social Security solvent, the Democrats claim that the person is going to take their Social Security away. Since there are so many on Social Security and they vote, the idea always gets shot down. The people do not seem to realize that the plans always are better than the current Social Security plan for the people. The plan is always worse for the politician. That is because the Democrats love to tell Social Security recipients that the Republicans are going to take their benefits away if they do not vote Democrat. Enough of them are afraid of losing what little they get, so they vote Democrat. If a real fix was introduced and passed, the Democrats could no longer fool people into believing they would no longer get their benefits. And the people could pass their nest egg to their future generations. The generation of wealth in this country would be enormous.

How do I know that the plans to fix Social Security would be better than the Social Security system we have now? In the 1970’s, the federal government let cities and counties opt out of the Social Security system if they wanted to. A few cities or counties in Texas did just that. Those people are now retiring. They are receiving more money in retirement benefits than they did in their last year’s salary. That same thing could be happening to every person in the US, but the liberals do not want you to be rich. They want you to be poor and dependent on the Democrat party for everything.

Those are just two programs that are built on lies. One is one the Democrats (liberals) are proposing and the other is one they have had for over 60 years. One cannot work and the other does not work. Both are built upon lies to get them started and will be built on lies to keep them going. The Democrats are the party of lies and don’t let anyone lie to you and tell you otherwise.

The polar bear listing comment period has lapsed. There are some that are asking that it be extended as many are just learning of the impact of this listing on their business. Those impacted include major businesses. Some are just now being made aware of the impact of this back door to implementing Kyoto.

The Kyoto protocol is a flawed agreement. It puts restrictions on the US and our western allies. It lets the biggest polluters get away with continuing to pollute. The agreement is obviously not an attempt to reduce pollution; it is an attempt to rein in the US economy. If implemented, the Kyoto protocol would require that the US economy go back to where we were about 150 years ago. If we do not go back to where we were 150 years ago, we would have to pay fantastically high fines to the polluting countries. We have the cleanest economy in the world. It is not perfect and pollution does occur. We have no business enacting the Kyoto protocol. Even the US Congress rejected it 97-0 when it was put to a vote in the Senate. That means that every Democrat voted to reject Kyoto. They are all for implementing it now that it would dramatically impact a Republican administration. If a Democrat gets in office, the Democrats would be less likely to put the brakes on the US economy.

Democrats are willing to destroy the US economy to regain power. That is a fantastic statement when you think about it. They are willing to see the US defeated in a war to regain power. That also is a fantastic statement. For Democrats the goal is regaining power. They do not care what happens to the economy or the US military. They should not be trusted until they get some patriotism in their veins. Republicans would never sacrifice the US economy or the US military to regain power. At least the Republicans I know would never sacrifice the US economy or the US military to regain power.

Back to the polar bear listing; if listed the polar bear would be listed because of global warming. It would be the first animal or plant listed as endangered because of a hoax. But, because everything impacts global warming, the listing would impact every aspect of American life. If anybody wanted to do anything, they would have to get an environmental impact statement from the US Fish and Wildlife Service that it would not negatively impact the polar bear. That would gradually force our economy into the 1800’s again.

It would force us to implement activities like we had in the 1800’s. No coal burning power plants could be built. No nuclear power plants could be built. Building cars and trucks would end as they cause global warming to increase. We would be forced to use horse and buggy to get anywhere. Anything electric would be rationed in its use as electricity would be rationed. All this would happen gradually, but inevitability. It all would happen because people believe in a hoax. Because they believe in a hoax, they put the polar bear on the endangered species list. Because people that believe in the hoax would have to administer the law, they would outlaw anything that improved our lives. It would all happen because of a belief in the greatest hoax ever forced on mankind.

This is happening despite 10 years where the temperature of the earth has fallen. But, to believers in global warming, that proves that global warming is true. The believers in global warming believe that the Arctic ice cap is melting and that the polar bears are endangered. The fact is that the Arctic ice cap is larger than at any time in the last 50 years. Polar bears have more than enough room to find suitable habitat. Global warming believers believe that the Antarctic ice cap is melting away. The Antarctic is colder and snowier than any time in recorded history. But to believers in global warming, facts do not matter. They hold true to their belief that global warming is a threat. To counter the scientific facts the believers in global warming have changed it to global climate change. That way no matter what the climate does, they are right. The climate is always going up or down, so by calling it global climate change they can always be right. That is the stupidest mode of thinking that I have ever heard of.

Global warming is a hoax. Scientific evidence does not support any of the computer models that global warming believers use. The computer models are great, but garbage in, garbage out. We do not understand all the things that go into the environment. How are we going to make a computer model that takes them all into account? Until we do understand what goes into the world climate, we should study it and make notes. We should leave the predicting to the soothsayers. One thing we do know, the climate in the future will be different or the same as the climate we have now.

Reading the Arizona Republic today, I came across an article that was incredibly stupid. Yet, the topic is also incredibly dangerous for our Republic.

The article described an effort to have the President of the United States elected by popular vote only. The way it would work like this; states would pledge that their Electoral College votes would go to the person that won the popular vote. While this sounds good to anyone with a third grade education or that is still mad that George Bush won the 2000 election and received fewer popular votes that Al Gore, it is not a good idea. The Founding Fathers put the Electoral College in the Constitution for a reason. The reason is that it gives the small states a say in who is elected President. If the popular vote alone elected the President, the candidates would spend all their time on the east and west coasts and none in the middle. Right now they have to go everywhere to campaign for votes.

We are a Republic. We are not a direct Democracy. We do not want to be a direct Democracy. This proposal is one more step to make us a direct Democracy. Direct Democracies do not work very well or for very long. The majority learns that it can make the rules and it does. The minorities then bear the brunt of the tyranny of the majority. In a Republic, the minorities have to be respected. That is the beauty of a Republic over a Democracy. There has only been one Direct Democracy in the history of the world. That was ancient Athens. Ancient Athens only had their direct Democracy for a very short period of time before the majority started the tyranny of the majority. Minority rights were not respected and the entire system came crashing down. Ultimately they were conquered by the Spartans.

So far, the states that have endorsed this stupid idea have been big states controlled by Democrats. That figures as Democrats are still mad about the 2000 election. The big states also originally did not want the Electoral College. They wanted direct election of the President. The reason is that direct election of the President gives the big states an advantage in selecting Presidents. Small states insisted on the Electoral College in the original Constitution as a means of keeping some power. The system has worked extremely well over the 221 years since the Constitution was adopted. To change it now would be to give the big states the wish they have wanted all along and deprive the smaller states of a voice in selecting our next President. The backers of the proposed stupidity say that one vote in Wyoming should count the same as one vote in Ohio. Right now, the two votes are equal. If the stupidity gets adopted, the two votes would not be equal. One will be represented by the President, the other will be ignored. Right now, the President represents ALL the states. With the stupidity adopted, the President would only have to please about 10 states.

If enough states fall prey to the falsehoods put forth by the backers of this stupidity, the Supreme Court would have to declare that it is unconstitutional. It goes against what the Constitution says. The vote in the state is to elect electors that will then reflect the will of the voters. This pact would go around that and have electors vote against what their state did. For example, in the last election George Bush won the popular vote. If the backers of this stupid idea had their way, the electors from California would have voted for George Bush instead of the person their state voted for. That would mean that a vote in California for John Kerry would mean less than a vote in another part of the country that voted for George Bush.

I lived for a while in North Dakota. Every four years we could count on at least a Vice-Presidential candidate from each party to arrive in Fargo to campaign. With this pact, that would never happen again. Candidates would spend all their time in the 10-12 most populous states and forget about the rest. There would be no need to go to Nebraska or Arizona, just campaign in New York, Florida, Texas and California.

This is an idea that is too stupid to ever see the light of day. Unfortunately, it is being pushed by Democrats. The average Democrat voter is too uneducated to understand that we are living in a Republic, not a Democracy. If this idea was put to a vote, most Democrats would be fooled into voting for it. That is not a good thing. That would not be good for the health of our country.

A report came out today on earmarks. Earmarks are the payoffs that Congressmen and Senators give to contributors. The report stated that Arizona is last. That is a good report to be last in. My Congressman, Jeff Flake, is one of the three Arizonans that did not have any earmarks last year. The other two are John McCain and John Shadegg. One other was nearly zero, Jon Kyl. Jon Kyl gave a couple of earmarks to some carefully screened projects, not donors. Our three Democrat Congressmen had significant earmarks. Ed Pastor led the group with the two newcomers following his lead.

This report made me think of how to make a true earmark reform. There are two alternatives I came up with. The first is to have committee assignments be based on earmarks. The Congressman or Senator with the fewest earmarks would have first choice of committee assignments. This would mean that a Senator or Congressman could bring home the Pork or have influence in the halls of Congress, not both. Right now, the ones that dole out the highest earmarks are given the best committee assignments. That is exactly backwards to the way it should be done. There is probably little chance for this to be implemented, particularly by Democrats. The biggest pigs like the system as it is.

The second idea is to select leadership from among those who use earmarks the least. If a Senator or Congressman is within 10% of the lowest earmarks, he/she would be eligible for a leadership position like majority leader or minority leader. This idea again has the same thrust, a Senator or Congressman could have power or they can bring home the pork, not both. If everyone were at zero, it would be a tie for first and everyone would be eligible. Using my Senators as an example, both would be eligible for leadership right now. If everyone were at zero and Senator Kyl was not, he would not be eligible. That would be the case even if his total was a few thousand dollars. Again, this has little chance of passing. Most of the leadership in both parties uses earmarks extensively. Jon Kyl is the exception to that rule. He only uses it a little bit.

Right now, earmarks are out of control in both houses of Congress. Something has to be done to correct the problem. Here in Arizona, we are electing people that want to be part of the solution, not part of the problem. We are not perfect, but we are better than anyone else. I would hope that the voters in the districts where their Congressmen use earmarks see the light and vote to remove these abusers. I must admit that the Arizona lawmakers that use earmarks use them much less than in other states, but abuse is still abuse. It is like being a little big pregnant.

At one time, earmarks were a sign of power and prestige in Congress. Now times are changing. I would hope that within 10 years we can end earmarks and get some fiscal discipline into Congress. The main reason Congress cannot pass a balanced budget is because of earmarks. Right now, we have to live with them and cry over their abuse. In the future, anyone who uses earmarks will face ridicule. That would be the best tool to rid Congress of this budget busting instrument forever.

Barack Obama is having a real hard time trying to explain why he threw his grandmother under the bus in his big speech this week. He was on Philadelphia radio last night and called her a “typical white person”. By that he meant that she was “bred” to have certain ideas. Those comments are obviously racist in origin, but nobody will call him on it.

Barack Obama has been trying to portray himself as beyond race. From his comments in his speech and his “clarification” last night on Philadelphia radio, Barack Obama is showing himself to be a “typical” black politician. He is willing to say anything to anybody to get elected. But, when pressed has racist ideas that come out. That may fly in the Democrat primaries and even get him nominated, but ordinary Americans will see that the Emperor has no clothes.

Barack said that his grandmother was a good person and cared for him well. But, she harbors fear when confronted by black men on the street. She is afraid of being attacked. Let us look at that statement for a minute. She is afraid of being attacked by black men on the street. Who commits a majority of the crime in this country? Black men by far commit the most crimes. It is not unreasonable to be afraid when meeting black men that you do not know. That is not something that she was born with; it is something she has learned by watching the news programs.

To think that the fear of his grandmother, of being attacked by strangers, is equal to the comments by the Reverend Wright is crazy. Reverend Wright attacks America as being a bad place. He wishes that God will condemn America. He said that America deserved the attacks on 9/11 because of the atomic bombs we dropped on Japan to end WWII. Those comments are not fears that were learned because of watching the news. Those ideas are crack pot ideas at best. They are offensive to most Americans. They may resonate with some people, but they are outside of the mainstream of American thought.

All women have some fear of being attacked by strange men when they are alone. For Barack’s grandmother to have a fear of being attacked by strange black men is perfectly in line with what women think. She would probably have a similar fear of being attacked by strange white men if she was alone and they dressed like they were up to no good. You also have to remember that Barack’s grandmother is still alive and well.

Reverend Wright has cooked up his crazy ideas out of whole cloth. They have no basis in reality. Even if you look at blacks that were slaves, they did not have such crazy notions of America. They all looked at America as a place of opportunity. Reverend Wright looks at America as a place of oppression and woe. The pulpit is not the place for political opinion. I know that some political opinion will creep into what a person says from the pulpit. It cannot be divorced from what you say. Even when I give talks about Jesus Christ, my political opinion probably can be found in the way I discuss Jesus. But, I would hope that my political opinion would be difficult to find. Reverend Wright put his political opinion out for everyone to see. That is a very different situation. There is nothing wrong with ministers discussing politics. It is where they discuss politics that bothers me. When they preach from the pulpit, they have an audience that came to hear them discuss some scriptural doctrine of Jesus Christ. They did not come to hear a political speech. If the minister wants to talk about politics, he/she should schedule a separate time and place to do just that.

There have been political leaders that have run for President or other political office. I have no problem with that as long as they did not talk about their political candidacy from the pulpit. If they kept the two separate, then there is no problem with them running. Many people that are/have been ministers have held public office. I applaud them for having the spark to run and to serve. The pulpit is not a place for political discourse. I know that Democrats love to tell Republicans that they should not preach from the pulpit. Then those same Democrats go to church and do just that. You rarely, if ever, hear of a Republican politician speaking in a church. You regularly hear of Democrat politicians speaking in primarily black churches. I believe there is a problem here, but nobody will say anything about it.

The past couple of days Hugh Hewitt has had a note in his blog about an attempt to have the Polar Bear put on the endangered species list. That would be a stupid idea. There are more Polar Bears today than there were 50 years ago. The Polar Bear population is increasing, not decreasing. The Arctic ice cap is larger today than it has been in the last 50 years. That makes it prime Polar Bear habitat.

The reasoning behind the attempted listing is that the Polar Bear lives on the ice. The proponents of the listing believe that global warming is destroying the ice caps. Therefore, the Polar Bear habitat is decreasing and that should cause a decrease in Polar Bears. If there is a decrease in Polar Bears, that would mean that Polar Bears are threatened or endangered with extinction. The proponents of the listing have not been doing any fact checking in the last 12 months or even the last 5 years.

The effect of this listing would be dramatic and catastrophic. Everything that the federal government does or even private business does that would have an impact on global warming would have to be reviewed. Since everything has an impact on global warming, everything would be impacted. Since everything would be impacted, everything would be disrupted and probably stopped. The progress in technology that we have enjoyed the past 200 years would come to a screeching halt. The bad thing is that nothing done would have any impact on the Polar Bear habitat. There is no such thing as global warming, caused by man. If there is any global warming going on, and global temperatures have stayed the same or gone down in the last 10 years, it is caused by the sun, not man. There is a report out in the last few days that reports that the temperature of the ocean has not changed in the last 5 years. If the ocean temperature has not changed in the last 5 years, there can not be much of a problem with global warming.

 People that believe in man caused global warming do not worry about facts. They go on and on about the terrible things that will happen because of global warming and ignore what is actually happening. The fact that their predictions have not been even close at any time does not bother them. If I had such a bad prediction record I would be ashamed. When they consistently do not meet the prediction that they set, they just ratchet up the prediction and make one even more outlandish.

Global warming believers predict that the ocean will rise by some ridiculous amount in feet. There was a report out last month that said that the oceans will fall by up to 50 feet. It will not be because of global warming or global cooling, it is because the oceans are falling at a fast rate. If all the ice melted, it would not fill the space left when the oceans fell. But, try to tell that to a global warming believer and they go ballistic and call you a non-believer. I am just trying to rely on scientific facts. Global warming believers are just relying on made up scares.

That is one of the problems being a scientist. I have to see facts before I believe something. I have a real problem taking things on faith alone. On global warming, all the facts point to the truth that man caused global warming is a hoax or myth. In other words, it is false. Global warming may occur, but it will occur because of the sun. The sun will determine whether the earth warms or cools. The earth has been warmer and cooler during the time man has been on the earth. It has been much warmer and much cooler during the entire time the earth has existed. To get excited over this hoax of global warming is to believe a fear monger. I have to see the facts and they are not pointing towards the global warming crowd.