More Jewish Humor: Subject: Satan

A few minutes before the Kol Nidre service was scheduled to begin, the congregation

was sitting attentively awaiting the beginning of the service.
.
Suddenly, the Malchamuvis (i.e., Satan) appeared at the front of the congregation.

Everyone started screaming and running for the exit, trampling each other in a frantic

effort to get away from evil incarnate.

Soon the shul was empty except for one elderly gentleman who sat calmly,

seemingly oblivious to the fact that God's ultimate enemy was in his presence.

So Satan walked up to the man and said, "Do you know who I am ?"

In true yiddish form the man replied, "Do you know who I am ?"

"Aren't you afraid of me ?" Satan asked.

"Hapsolutely not" said the man.

"Don't you realize I can kill you without a word ?" asked Satan.

"Be my guest" replied the old man, in an even tone.

"Don't you know that I can cause you profound horrifying agony for all eternity?"

persisted Satan.

"So big deal" was the man's calm reply.

"And you are still not afraid ?" asked Satan.

"Nope" said the old man.

More than a little perturbed, Satan asked, “Why is it you're not afraid of me?
"Because" the man calmly replied, "I've been married to your sister for 62 years!"
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Thoughts on the Government Shutdown



All eyes are on the government shutdown battle over Obamacare. Here are a few thoughts:

House Republicans had six months to strategize since the last budget battle, so why did they leave it until the last minute to figure out what to do? They seem to have been unified in recent votes to defund and delay Obamacare. So why didn’t they announce their strategy months ago, draw a hard line, and then spend the summer building public support for their plan? The Democrats have a stronger hand because they have been giving a consistent message.
  • The lack of leadership from the House created a void that Senator Cruz filled. Some House members didn’t like Cruz getting the spotlight and telling them what to do, but they should have had their act together.
  • Obamacare opposition has been rising steadily this year. Even if Republicans don’t succeed with defunding Obamacare at this point, the polls may convince them to try again later. This battle could have been just a warm-up for a future battle if the polls get even worse for Obamacare.
  • Why might the polls get worse? Some reasons are: more employers dropping health benefits, more employers cutting worker hours, more insurers cutting doctors out of their plans, premiums continuing to rise, individuals rebelling against the mandates and penalties, health exchanges suffering glitches and meltdowns, rising privacy concerns from the massive government data grab created by the law, etc, etc. See Mike and Mike for more.
  • Obama and the Democrats brought the Obamacare backlash onto themselves, not only by imposing a very bad law, but also by slamming it through Congress in a very partisan manner. No Republican voted for it in either the House or the Senate. If you want a law to garner sustained political support, it is much better to pass it in a bipartisan manner, as was the case with welfare reform in 1996 and tax reform in 1986.
  • The 2001 Bush tax cuts garnered 28 House Democratic votes and 12 Senate Democratic votes. Yet even with that bipartisanship, Democratic leaders spent the subsequent decade relentlessly demonizing the law and trying to repeal parts of it. So for Democrats to say that it is unfair for Republicans to try and repeal Obamacare just because the president was reelected is ridiculous.
  • Democrats say that it is irresponsible to hold the economy and budget “hostage” to Obamacare repeal efforts. I don’t think so. Unless repealed, Obamacare is a huge issue for the nation’s health care system and the economy in coming years, so any short-term unpleasantness is a trifle compared to what’s at stake. As for the economy, the stock market rose during the last shutdown period in 1995/1996.
  • It is not fair for media stories to say that it is just a few “extremists” who want to delay or defund Obamacare. The House delay vote garnered all the Republicans except two, which made for a substantial majority in the people’s chamber. Indeed, Republicans probably wouldn’t be trying to defund Obamacare without the people’s strong and consistent opposition.
  • The way to limit Washington’s battles from harming the economy is to untether the economy from Washington. We should, for example, privatize many of the national parks or hand them over to the states and privatize air traffic control. Washington budget battles will likely get even more disruptive in the years ahead, so let’s startprivatizing and devolving as many federal activities as we can right now. The problem isn’t the GOP taking the budget “hostage” to repeal Obamacare, it is the government taking hostage far too much of the American economy.
  • So I favor government shut-downs. That is, permanent shut-downs of federal activities that ought to be funded by state governments, the private sector, or nobody at al

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  • What Liberals want!  (See 1 below)
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  • Standing alone can be comforting when you believe in what you stand for!  (See 2 below.)
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  • Any looming debt default is de fault of these Democrat morons who want it to happen for political gain! (See 3 below.)
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  • I have been writing about how this administration has been covering up this for months and now it is beginning to surface: 

Subject: Fwd: Proof of who is starting Fires in the U.S.


Subject:   Proof of who is starting Fires in the U.S.
This is most disturbing!! . It sure is not shown on national media outlets, is it?

UNREAL!!!! This is the most likely cause of the 346 homes lost in the Waldo Canyon fire in Colorado Springs ...and now 510 homes in Black Forest at Monument, 12 miles north of Colorado Springs .
      
Is this why they waited so long to tell us what started the Waldo Canyon fire in Colorado? The public still has not been told what was used to start the fire.

It is becoming quite obvious that we are now at WAR in our homeland, and we need to realize this and ALL begin to Watch, Respond and Defend to save our way of life!     

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PJTV.Com


PAY ATTENTION TO OBAMACARE!
Conservatives complain that the liberal media aren’t doing their job in reporting the truth about Obamacare. Alfonzo Rachel replies that the right should stop expecting journalistic integrity from
the left. In this new ZoNation video, he explains that conservatives must compete with a hostile
media if they want to promote the correct message.
===
  • Dick
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  • 1)


Nationalreview.com
The Goldberg FileBy Jonah Goldberg

Progressives and Power
Charlie Cooke had a very good column and follow up post this week on progressive disdain for our system of separated powers. What liberals want, according to Charlie, is an "elected king" who can do whatever he wants. I agree with him almost entirely. For instance, he doesn't say it, but this is exactlywhat Thomas Friedman wants. It's what all the pseudo-eggheady-jagoff technocrats always want. The desire to simply impose "optimal policies" heedless of democratic or legal impediments lies behind virtually every technocratic fad of the last couple of centuries. We know what to do, and the problem with democracy is that the rubes won't let us do it! Stuart Chase, one of the architects of the New Deal (who some say coined the term), openly pleaded for an "economic dictatorship." After all, he asked, "why should the Russians have all the fun remaking the world?"
But here's where I disagree a bit with Charlie. The key issue for progressives has never been the formpower takes, but power itself. You want my five-second lesson in progressive history? No? Sucks for you, because I'm going to tell you anyway: They always go where the field is open.
That's it.
When the public was on their side the progressives relied on the public. That's why we have the direct election of senators. That's why women got the franchise. Etc. In his early years as an academic Woodrow Wilson wanted Congress to run the country -- the way parliament runs England -- and relegate the president to a glorified clerk. When the public became unreliable and Congress was no longer a viable vehicle, progressives suddenly fell in love with a Caesarian presidency. Indeed, Wilson himself, the former champion of Congress, became an unapologetic voluptuary of presidential power the moment it suited him -- and nary a progressive complained (save poor Randolph Bourne, of course). The progressives rode the presidency like it was a horse they never expected to return to a stable. And when that started to hit the point of diminishing returns, they moved on to the courts (even as they bleated and caterwauled about Nixon's "abuses" of powers that were created and exploited by Wilson, FDR, and Johnson). After the courts, they relied on the bureaucracy. Like water seeking the shortest path, progressives have always championed the shortest route to social-justice victories.
My point is that I think Charlie is entirely right that progressives want to maximize their power. But the elected king scenario is just one of many they'd be perfectly happy with. If they could have a politburo instead of a unitary executive, they'd probably prefer that. But the point is that the instruments are, uh, instrumental. The core imperative is power. We see this in miniature when liberals don't control the presidency but do control Congress. Suddenly, it's vital that the "people's house" exert its constitutional prerogatives! When the president is a Democrat he needs to rule unimpaired. When he's a Republican, his dictatorial tendencies must be held in check. When liberals want to reinterpret the Constitution by judicial whim or fiat, it's proof that the Constitution is living up to its nature as a "living, breathing, document." When conservatives actually want to amend the Constitution -- the only legitimate and constitutional means to change the meaning of the Constitution, I might add -- it is a horrible affront to the vision of the Founders!
Once you realize this it helps explain so many of the Left's hypocrisies and alleged double standards. I say alleged, because they aren't really double standards. You can only have a double standard when you actually believe something should be a standard. Ultimately, for progressives these procedural debates about how power is used in America are just that: procedural debates. The alleged standards at stake are evanescent and petty -- for liberals. The only true standard is whatever advances the progressives' ball downfield. That is the very heart of "social justice" -- doing whatever "good" you can, when you can, however you can. As they say, behind every confessed double standard there is an unconfessed single standard. And for progressives, the single enduring standard is "whatever works for us."
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2)Standing Alone

By William Kristol and Michael Makovsky


In the midst of media coverage of the government shutdown (it’s the Republicans’ fault!) and the glitch-filled rollout of Obamacare (it’s not Obama’s fault!), Americans may not have noticed the October 1 speech by Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the United Nations General Assembly. But Netanyahu’s declaration that Israel was prepared to act alone to prevent the Iranian regime from acquiring nuclear weapons may well prove of more lasting significance than the developments in Washington that overshadowed it.

 Netanyahu tried to puncture the wishful thinking that has made the Obama administration so eager to succumb to the charm offensive of Hassan Rouhani, the new Iranian president. Netanyahu pointed out that Rouhani has done nothing, and almost certainly will do nothing, that warrants trusting that the Iranian regime will yield in its pursuit of nuclear weapons (a pursuit Rouhani still denies in the face of mountains of incontrovertible evidence). Netanyahu warned against a relaxation of pressure on that regime and against being dragged into endless negotiations or, even worse, a bad deal with it. 

 As Netanyahu said, Rouhani “definitely wants to get the sanctions lifted; I guarantee you that. But he doesn’t want to give up Iran’s nuclear weapons program in return.” Netanyahu laid out the terms for an acceptable agreement: “The only diplomatic solution that would work is the one that fully dismantles Iran’s nuclear weapons program and prevents it from having one in the future.” And he explained the dangers of a “partial deal” that would permit Iran “a residual capability to enrich uranium” in exchange for lifting international sanctions that took years to put in place and likely wouldn’t be reestablished. But this is, unfortunately, the kind of deal toward which the Obama administration is heading​—​that, or endless negotiations while the Iranian nuclear program moves toward a successful conclusion.

 The most dramatic part of his speech was Netanyahu’s declaration: “I want there to be no confusion on this point. Israel will not allow Iran to get nuclear weapons. If Israel is forced to stand alone, Israel will stand alone.” Netanyahu, who has a photo of Winston Churchill on his office wall behind his desk, was echoing Churchill’s remark on July 14, 1940, during the Battle of Britain: “And now it has come to us to stand alone in the breach.”
Will Israel in fact be forced to stand alone? Many informed Israelis, including those who are by no means supporters of Netanyahu or on the right side of the political spectrum, are now convinced he will have to, after witnessing last month’s appalling spectacle of President Obama squirming out of his pledge to retaliate against the regime of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad if Assad crossed a “red line” by using chemical weapons. We were each in Israel recently, and it’s clear that the confidence of some current and former senior security officials that Obama would strike Iran has evaporated. We’ve also spoken with Arab government officials, and none believes any longer in the credibility of a U.S. military threat. In fact, it’s hard to find any serious person in allied capitals​—​or in enemy capitals​—​who takes Obama at his word when he talks about keeping “all options on the table” to prevent a nuclear Iran. Everyone assumes that President Obama will find any excuse the Iranians give him to leave the military option right there, on the table​—​and that if the Iranian regime doesn’t give him a plausible excuse, President Obama will find one anyway.

 No one likes the truth-telling skunk at the appeasement party. The New York Times clucked editorially that Netanyahu was “sabotaging diplomacy” before “Iran is tested” by angering the Iranians, making the use of force more likely​—​which “would be the worst result of all.” But he knows that an Iran with nuclear weapons is the worst result of all​—​that bombing Iran is better than Iran with a bomb. He sees that behind the Obama administration’s façade of hard-headed diplomacy is a soft-headed, even desperate, desire for some sort of deal, any deal, and that such a deal will be rationalized by foreign policy elites who know it’s a bad deal but who have talked themselves into accepting the case for containment rather than prevention of a nuclear Iran. And Netanyahu understands that behind all of this lies a failure of nerve and a collapse of will in much of the West that deserves to be compared to what Churchill faced in the 1930s.

 There are those who believe Netanyahu was being overly dramatic and indeed was blustering when he made his unequivocal statements at the United Nations about the Iranian regime and nuclear weapons. It’s true that the U.N. is a place of much drama and bluster. But we believe Netanyahu meant what he said.

 Of course, an Israeli prime minister can’t decide to launch a strike alone. Netanyahu will require the approval of his security cabinet, and he will also likely need the support of the top ranks of the Israeli military establishment. The Israeli national security apparatus has been cautious about a strike against Iran, believing there was time and hoping that sanctions or the United States would take care of this issue. The Syrian fiasco has virtually eliminated the last option in the minds of many military leaders. And now there’s a consensus that time is growing short. Almost no Israeli security expert believes Israel should resign itself to live with a nuclear-armed Iranian regime dedicated to the destruction of Israel. Furthermore, current and former senior military officials consistently claim they have a viable military option, even though they have less military capacity than the United States. So an Israeli strike is likely.

 Netanyahu said at the U.N. that “in standing alone, Israel will know that we will be defending many, many others.” This too echoes Churchill in his July 1940 speech: “We are fighting by ourselves alone; but we are not fighting for ourselves alone.” Churchill asserted that London, “which enshrines the title deeds of human progress,” was defending civilization itself. So today, if Israel​—​an outpost of human progress in the Middle East​—​decides that she has no choice but to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities, Israel will not be fighting for herself alone.
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3) Possible default -- Thanks, Mr. President and Mr. Majority Leader


Dancing With Default
For people who claim that defaulting on U.S. debt is unthinkable, President Obama and Harry Reid are sure behaving as if they can't wait for that day to arrive. Why else are they refusing to take up the multiple Republican offers to guarantee that the U.S. will never default?
Treasury Secretary Jack Lew now says his department can't be sure it will have enough cash to guarantee interest payments after October 17, and he is raising alarms about a default catastrophe. Mr. Obama declared again on Wednesday that he'll only negotiate with Republicans on taxes and spending if they first raise the debt limit without conditions—so dire would the damage from default be to the U.S. economy and reputation.

 House GOP leaders also insist they don't want a default, and they've already passed a bill to prevent it—not that the media have paid any attention. First sponsored in 2011 by California Republican Tom McClintock and Pennsylvania Senator Pat Toomey, the Full Faith and Credit Act is essentially an insurance policy against miscalculation. Their bill certifies that U.S. sovereign debt will always be repaid, on time and in full.
If Congress fails to authorize a statutory increase in the debt limit—during a period of, say, intense political conflict over the fisc like the one now—the bill stipulates that Treasury can continue making contractual interest and principal payments to bond holders and rolling over debt with incoming tax payments. Debt service gets the first call on revenue.
The McClintock-Toomey bill replicates the guarantees that state constitutions have had for hundreds of years to strengthen investor confidence. It gives the Treasury Secretary discretion to prioritize among other federal obligations until the political deadlock ends, tempers cool and the parties can reach a deal. But it makes his first priority to protect the full faith and credit of the U.S.
Yet instead of embracing this insurance against default, Democrats have voted to kill it even as they cry havoc about the risk of default. The House passed McClintock-Toomey in May, but only on a 221 to 207 party-line vote after a raucous debate. The White House issued a formal veto threat, calling it "unwise, unworkable and unacceptably risky."
House Republicans have continued to press the measure, attaching it to a continuing resolution last week. But Mr. Reid moved to strip it out, and his motion passed the Senate 54 to 44. The Majority Leader denounced McClintock-Toomey as the "Pay China First Act."
Mr. Reid may think that is clever xenophobic political cover, but someone should tell him that millions of Americans have a stake in Treasurys through pension funds, 401(k)s, savings accounts and as individual investors. Two-thirds of U.S. debt is held domestically and the Chinese own roughly 7% to 10%, though who cares who U.S. creditors are if the goal is for the U.S. to reassure its creditors?
In the May debate, Democrat after Democrat made the argument that the provision would make school lunch programs, student loans, unemployment insurance and the rest second-class. So they are denouncing Republicans for putting U.S. credit at risk even as they are denouncing Republicans for putting U.S. credit first. Which is it?
A more serious objection to the bill is that investors might still interpret such a funding shortfall as a reason to panic about U.S. finances. Investors and bond vigilantes might read a failure to make prompt Medicare payments as tantamount to default. But this would still be better than an actual default that would mean breaking legal and financial contracts. Markets can tell the difference between a failure to pay contractually obligated interest on time and a need to delay some government bills due to a political impasse.
Let's be clear: We aren't recommending either outcome. The U.S. should meet all of its obligations. But amid Washington's current dysfunctions and partisanship, anything can happen. Mr. Obama's refusal to negotiate and his demands that Republicans surrender entirely to his priorities has created his mirror political image in a GOP faction that wants to treat him the same way. This is when accidents happen.
The U.S. will pay its bills, but a short-term miscalculation is possible. A President who really wants to limit the chance of default would take the GOP up on its Full Faith and Credit offer. Mr. Obama's refusal suggests that his real goal is to go to the edge of default, gambling that he can then either coerce total surrender or blame a default on Republicans and use it to take back control of the House in 2014. This isn't how leaders looking out for the interests of all Americans behave.
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