Month: March 2013

Kasich The Progressive: Medicaid expansion in Ohio and why Republicans lose so often

Let’s play a little game……………guess who said the following—“This budget also takes the significant step of helping more low-income and working Ohioans have access to health care through Medicaid, for which the federal government will pay 100 percent for three years and level off at 90 percent beginning in 2020.  While a complex decision, this reform not only helps improve the health of vulnerable Ohioans and frees up local funds for better mental health and addiction services, but it also helps prevent increases to health care premiums and potentially devastating impacts to local hospitals.”  If you guessed President Obama on one of his frequent campaign speeches that have extended well past the election, you were wrong.  No, the person who said such a reckless political statement cited above was what once people—myself included—thought was one of the most conservative governors in the Union.  The author of that statement was none other than Governor John Kasich.

http://www.redstate.com/jasonahart/2013/02/05/with-medicaid-expansion-gov-kasichs-credibility-collapses/

Kasich has ignored the efforts of Ohioans to reject Obamacare and instead has put his finger to the political winds after the loss of Senate Bill 5, and changed his political philosophy in the wake of the election of 2012.  Kasich seems to be listening to his more progressive friends these days like tabloid television star Bill Cunningham instead of people like Sean Hannity as he has made a noticeable political shift to the far left relative to his previous position.  Kasich’s progressive shift portrays exactly why government continues to grow unsustainably as politicians who lack personal conviction find themselves molded by the mob, (masses) and lose their will to fight, or step out of office to maintain their principles.  I would respect Kasich more if he didn’t allow himself to be swayed by public opinion and simply did not run for re-election in 2014—returning back to Fox News as Bill O’Reilly’s back-up host.  Rather, he has listened to his progressive friends in that an elected representative must put aside their personal feelings and govern on behalf of all people, not just certain groups.  While on the surface, this sounds good—in a democracy it allows for the masses to shape government toward the whims of collective force rather than a republic shaped by the representation of the people who elected that voting presence.  With Kasich we thought we were getting a conservative—instead we ended up with a guy who lost a couple of fights and has now thrown up the white flag—surrendering to progressives allowing government to grow even more under his watch.

I had a state senator tell me recently that he despised the word “Rhino” which is what Tea Party types have been calling Republicans who have shown a willingness to work with progressives to find a “middle ground.”  To such people who don’t desire to fight for their principles, even if it costs them an election, they see the Tea Party position as radical, and too far to the political “right” to win over the “working poor,” “minorities,” and those addicted to government entitlements.  Rhino Republicans like Chris Christie and Kasich have listened to their critics and moved to the left, which is what has been happening to Republicans since the Civil War—and is why government has grown so much over the last hundred years.  Nobody has been present in government to stop that growth and when it has been thought that such people have been elected, they turn out to lose like Kasich has to progressives, and our entire society moves further to the left.  I told the senator that elected representatives need to believe in something and stand for it, and to stop thinking strategically about maintaining the House or Senate as a majority—because if it means compromising fiscal beliefs to hold the office, then their representation is worthless.  He said we’ll have to agree to disagree and we both put more relish on our hot dogs and let it pass nicely—but the implication of his statement stayed with me for weeks.  The game modern politicians are playing on the conservative side is a game of keep away, but even so, they are losing ground in the process by the radical progressives incessant pursuit of moving the goal posts far to the political left with each year that passes.  (SEE MY PREVIOUS ARTICLE ON THIS)

Now that my youngest daughter has had a baby the constant advice from many family members is that she should take advantage of the many government programs available to her such as Wic and various insurance programs supported by the government.  Many of these family members are affluent people and their comments center around, “You already pay taxes honey, just look at it as collecting on your investment.”  This has went on for many years, in fact when my wife was pushed in the same direction when we had kids over twenty years ago and I learned of the nature of the discussion—there were serious fireworks at our house and family rifts that lasted decades.  The reasoning to my wife then was, “you’re husband is riding a bicycle to work for God’s sake, take the pressure off him and get on Wic so that you can afford baby formula.”  I was as violently against government assistance as a 19 year-old as I am today, so this urging did not sit well with me and did not go unanswered.  The expansion of government happens in part because they actively attempt to sign up young women to government programs to take off some of the financial pressure, then the young women as adults have lost their moral authority to speak against those programs as wizened adults, so they justify such endeavors by saying that “we already paid taxes into the program, we might as well get something out of it.”

I learned recently that regarding Kasich’s expansion of Medicaid, offices have been actively attempting to increase enrollment on the program to justify the expansion.  The unsaid strategy from Kasich is that he wants young women and the working poor voters to know that the Governor is looking out for them–to give them a hand up in life—especially during the hard first years of starting a family.   He thinks he’s taking a page from the Democratic playbook and is beating them at their own game, but in the end the progressive wins because they set the measure everyone is playing to.  In that way conservative governors like Kasich and Christie play to the same rules that Obama and the New York progressive Cuomo play by.  In the end, government expands because nobody in government from either side fight for their beliefs, and the republic of America is reduced to a democracy of majority rule which will always perpetuate toward degeneracy.  When politicians refuse to take a hard-line, then chaos becomes the ruler no matter who is in charge.

The senator mentioned that was eating hot dogs for dinner with me will never understand why Tea Party members call him and his kind Rhinos due to their will to compromise, because their goal is not just the health of Ohio, it is in maintaining majorities in the House and Senate.  To do that they must compromise with radical government expansionists who are always looking for new ways to make the public addicted to their services as they redistribute wealth with tax and spend management of state and federal economies.  The people who lose are those who think they are voting for men and women of conviction only to find out that their representatives are weak-willed progressives addicted to public office and perpetual elections that keep them out of the meat grinder of the private sector.  The worst and weakest human beings typically therefore move into public office and they work to stay there.  Real reformers enter office only to leave a few years later in frustration, or do like Kasich has and declared that if you can’t beat them………….you join them.  Which he has.

Now a note about what can be done about these diabolical schemes from the desk of Steve Elliott, which primarily focuses on these issues at the federal level.  It should be noted that many of the sequestration jobs being cut were created in the same manner that Kasich is now expanding Medicaid, so the events are connected directly.

The BIG LIE of BIG GOVERNMENT is about to be exposed — IF members of Congress will stand strong and NOT be bullied by Obama. We must understand precisely what’s happening. Please see below. — Steve

Dear Don,

Yesterday, we warned you that an effort was under way to give Obama unconstitutional authority to raise taxes. This shocking news was confirmed by various  news reports.

The good news … many grassroots citizens responded, and we dodged that bullet!

Now … today … as the doomsdayers in D.C. are counting down to the Sequester-mageddon. President Obama just held a press conference DEMANDING NEW TAXES and blaming conservatives for the coming alleged catastrophe of sequester.

And our Radical-in-Chief is getting ready to unleash his unprecedented grassroots army to PRESSURE your Ohio members of Congress to RAISE YOUR TAXES!

+ + Krauthammer Exposes OBAMA’S BIG LIE

Let’s be clear — the entire sequester “crisis” is a fabrication of Obama himself — the idea originated in the White House. And it’s designed to force us to accept even higher taxes and even more government spending.

Obama thought conservatives would have caved in long ago. Now, as Charles Krauthammer explains in his column today, the BIG LIE of the Left is about to be exposed.

What is that BIG LIE?

Simply this:

The LEFT’S BIG LIE is that any cutbacks to BIG GOVERNMENT will cause severe economic hardship to be unleashed on our nation. But it’s a lie!

As Krauthammer explains, if the sky doesn’t fall with a modest cutback in government spending, “people might get the idea that we can shrink government and live on.”

Do you see what’s happening?

If the sky DOESN’T fall with a 2% cut in government spending, then the BIG LIE of BIG GOVERNMENT will be exposed!

That’s why Obama’s far-left “Organizing For Action” activist group sent this message out to their tens of millions of followers yesterday:

“On the chopping block are 10,000 teaching jobs, more than 70,000 kids’ spots in Head Start, $35 million for local fire departments, $43 million to make sure seniors don’t go hungry, and access to nutrition assistance for 600,000 women and their families.”
Obama and the Left WANT sequester! They want the threat of school teachers and firemen and air traffic controllers losing their jobs because it creates an underlying fear of any cutbacks in government.

+ + TAKE ACTION: EXPOSE THE BIG LIE!

As I write, Obama has unleashed his ORGANIZING FOR ACTION activist group to bombard Congress.

You and I have two choices.

We can sit by silently and let Obama’s fear tactics take the day.

Or …

We can take action and help EXPOSE THE BIG LIE of BIG GOVERNMENT leftists!

If you want to take action, here’s what you can do:

#1 — Call Your Members Of Congress

Tell your two Ohio Senators and your Representative what you think about Obama’s plan to grow government and raise taxes. Let them know that you see through the BIG LIE of BIG GOVERNMENT. Phone numbers:

Sen. Brown: 202-224-2315
Sen. Portman: 202-224-3353
Rep. Chabot and Rep. Boehner (Note: we are listing two Reps because you live in a gerrymandered district.): 202-225-2216 and 202-225-6205

#2 — Sign Grassfire’s “No New Taxes” Petition.

If you oppose the BIG GOVERNMENT plan to raise taxes, join with nearly 100,000 other citizens in signing Grassfire’s “No New Taxes” petition. We will be delivering petitions to leaders in Congress as soon as next week. Go here now:

www.grassfire.com/322/petition.asp

Remember, just two months ago Congress and Obama raised YOUR TAXES by two percent — and exactly 60 days later, they’re back for more! Sign the petition.

#3 — Tell BIG GOVERNMENT Politicians: “We Paid Our 2%! Why Can’t You?”

Grassfire has set up a FaxFire to let you tell Congress, “We Paid Our 2%! Why Can’t You?” After all, they just imposed a two-percent tax on us. That means we were FORCED to cut back our family budgets by two percent. Government can do the same!

As Krauthammer writes:

“…millions of American workers have had to tighten their belts by precisely two percent. They found a way. Washington, spending $3.8 trillion, cannot? If so, we might as well declare bankruptcy now and save the attorneys’ fees.”
Go here now to fax your two Ohio Senators, your Representative and key leaders on Capitol Hill:

www.grassfire.com/5322/offer.asp

Again … Obama and the Left are very nervous today. WHAT IF THE SKY DOESN’T FALL?

Then their Big Lie is exposed.

Thanks for the stand you’re taking.

Steve Elliott

P.S. Liberty News’ Norvell Rose just posted an exclusive that further exposes the sequester madness called “The Sequester Is Falling!” Also, I have posted this update on my Liberty News blog. Go here to comment and share.

ACTIONS:
1. Call your members of Congress.
Sen. Brown: 202-224-2315
Sen. Portman: 202-224-3353
Rep. Chabot and Rep. Boehner (Note: we are listing two Reps because you live in a gerrymandered district.): 202-225-2216 and 202-225-6205

2. Sign our “No New Taxes” petition.

3. Fax Congress.

4.Read Krauthammer’s column.

Rich Hoffman

“If they attack first………..blast em’!”

www.tailofthedragonbook.com

The Rand Paul Filibuster: Fighting for the right to LIVE in America

Rand Paul was one of only 7 Senators who voted against the NDAA Act a few years ago, CLICK HERE FOR REVIEW.  So it should come as no surprise that Paul is filibustering in the Senate over Eric Holder’s comments about the right of President Obama to kill American citizens on American soil with the drone program.   Below Harry Reid attempts to end the filibuster with a frustrated effort about 9 hours into Rand’s marathon talk.  But he failed, and Rand continued on with his filibuster.  Watch the attempt:

It is very refreshing to see a representative in the Republic of The United States who finally has the guts, and sincerity to match those of us who were outraged by the NDAA Act and the idea of a government that has shown a desire to gradually move itself toward tyranny. Thank goodness for Senator Rand Paul. I wish there were about 300 more politicians just like him on Capital Hill.

It’s nice to see a real life Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. Look familiar!

Rich Hoffman

“If they attack first………..blast em’!”

www.tailofthedragonbook.com

The Black Flag of Assassin’s Creed: Why modern politics can be seen in naval ship battles

As I mentioned yesterday, Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed video game franchise is releasing a pirate version of their popular series to be launched prior to Halloween 2013 and it looks fantastic.  So I’m going to take a break from the usual serious matters dealt with at this site and expand a bit more about what I started to discuss regarding Assassin’s Creed as an instructive platform from which all people can learn history, by allowing players get to walk in the shoes of characters as history was made.  Shortly after I wrote the article previously mentioned, I managed to obtain my own ship while playing Assassin’s Creed III which takes place during the American Revolution and engage in the fantastic naval battles which is the new feature developed by Ubisoft.  The ship battle feature in the game is hands down one of the coolest uses of video game technology I have ever seen and it appears to be expanded upon dramatically in their upcoming pirate release, so it deserves mention and a metaphorical analysis in relation to real life.  The ship to ship battles in Assassin’s Creed III are simply breathtaking and deserve comment for the bench mark in history that they represent.  Justifiably so, I am very much looking forward to the release of Assassin’s Creed 4, The Black Flag coming this fall.  I will be one of the first to get it!  There are few places that you can live history from your living rooms and engage in the exhilaration that model ship builders have for years tried to capture when imagining grand galleons perched in combat with cannons firing on the choppy waters of a stormy sea.  But that is exactly what these recent Assassin Creed releases are offering for the first time anywhere and the results are simply stunning.   I’ve never seen anything like what I was able to play in Assassin’s Creed III with the ship to ship combat that alone makes the worth of the game more than justified for gamers who enjoy history.

Hanging in my home I have a painting of two ships firing canons at each other on Lake Erie during the War of 1812.  I have found that the old sea battles from the romantic era of naval combat reflects modern politics in many ways.  Like politics, wind speed is important as well as the direction from which it comes.  Politicians often allow themselves to blow where the winds of public opinion take them, so the metaphor is a proper one.  The old mast driven battleships were very much victims of circumstance, so maneuvering in position at a speed of 8 to 12 knots in order to fire upon an enemy was difficult.  Even then gaining a tactical advantage over an opponent meant that one ship would have to outlast another in broadside combat at close range, because that is often what it came to.  One ship would have to absorb the damage of another and hope that their ship wouldn’t sink to the oceans depths before their enemy.  I see in modern politics that Republicans have constantly been outmaneuvered by the pirate tactics of the Democrats who attack not just with one spectacular galleon, but many small ones.  Republicans often utilize such magnificent ships by displaying lots of guns and massive sails in a fashion that was typical of the British during their imperial rule.  The Democrats use smaller, faster vessels that can overtake larger ships with mass and dirty tricks to take down their superior foes—and such a metaphor describes modern politics clearly.

Many of the tactics seen in modern politics were long ago used on the high sea battles of early naval combat, before engines and modern firepower allowed technology to trump bravery.  In the picture I referred to of the 1812 conflict, I often think of the do or die nature of the ship crews who knew if they lost the fight, there would be no quarter given, no rescue from the enemy–there would be only death as their ship sank becoming their collective tombs.  So it is in this spirit that I love naval conflict from the period of world history where such things occurred, which is so wonderfully rendered in the Assassin games.

Personally I love the violent combat that is required in Assassin’s Creed III to even get to the naval battles.  Many game players over 35 years old might find themselves turned off at having to assassinate so many Redcoats to play through the story mode.  Some of my Tea Party friends who are history buffs and are inclined to spend their spare time building model trains and ships in bottles would love the naval combat graphics engine in the game, but they would find the brutality required to play the main character difficult to get their minds around.  That is the only weakness of the Assassin games.  The cost of the game is worth buying just for the ship battles, but that option should be available right out of the box to the advantage of the history buff—not the seasoned video gamer who loves the violent game play—like I do.

But that aside, it was bewildering to engage in combat with several schooner style ships in the choppy seas off the coast of North Carolina where the waves were 10 to 15 feet high and pitching my ship to and fro in a very violent manner.  I found that I had to time the cannon fire to these rough waters so that the cannons would reach their targets and not nose dive into the water short of their mark.  I have never seen such realism in a combat simulation of any kind, and it is just incredible to look at, let alone play.

The Assassin games are bringing history to life in a way I never thought was possible.  Needless to say, I am incredibly impressed.  As I write this the Horseshoe Casino has just opened in downtown Cincinnati and many adults my age converged upon its opening to spend $10 dollars per game on bets they are likely to never see a positive result.  The gaming that goes on in places like Vegas and casinos like The Horseshoe are consuming exercises that do little to give the players any kind of rewarding experience except for the occasional jackpot.  For my money, I would rather spend my gaming time on a $60 investment into a game like Assassin’s Creed III so at least the time spent playing can put the player into the seat of history and see and feel what it was like to stand on the docks of Boston in 1773 climbing aboard a ship to sail into the open sea blasting canons into the hull of an enemy in a rip-roaring wind attempting to turn ships over as sea water washes over the decks in a bubbling froth.  The ship battles are a heck of a lot more exciting than a casino slot machine that simply is designed to eat money from hopeful treasure hunters dressed to kill, but often losing the shirt right off their backs.  Games like Assassin’s Creed give back where a casino gaming experience can’t.

In such war simulations I tend to be a rammer when it comes to naval combat.  With all things being equal, the way to gain an advantage over an enemy is to be bolder in combat efforts so ramming into an opposing ship to cause them to hesitate before firing yields great results.  I do the same type of thing in actual politics.  Rather than dance around in never-ending stalemates, I tend to think like a pirate in being overly aggressive in achieving a victory.  (SEE THE LAKOTA LEVY FOR A SAMPLE)  I don’t have a lot of patience when it comes to politicians who insist on dancing with the enemy as less aggressive ship captains discover happens often in confrontations if they over-think their scenarios.  Playing games like Assassin’s Creed III can reveal these tendencies in a simulation before millions of wasted dollars go into political campaigns that only end up dancing around the enemy on the seas of life, (LIKE THE ROMNEY CAMPAIGN).  The people reading this who will insist that their strategy was formed from years of experience and that such a simplified answer to age-long questions cannot be found in a video game—they are the same people who have lost many campaigns and are not qualified to provide an opinion.  Players of such a game not only learn a lot about history, but they also learn a lot about themselves.

Regardless of the level of enjoyment, the Assassin Creed video games are unsurpassed in their naval war simulations.  I could play them endlessly, and I scratch my head at those who are my age and older who scamper off to a casino to throw their money away when there are games like Assassin’s Creed III that are much more beneficial to the human mind, and an understanding of the history of our species.  But just for the sheer enjoyment of blowing up a gigantic galleon after a long fought battle, Ubisoft has achieved a level of detail that has never before been achieved in a game or war simulation of any kind any where.  I simply shudder to consider how cool the new game Black Flag will be.  I think I will be taking another vacation come fall of 2013, similar to the one I took to play The Old Republic.  Because if Assassin’s Creed 4 has better ship combat than Assassin’s Creed III, then I may never leave my house again………….because they are a lot of fun, and filled with rich history that will make a modern novel envious.

How much does my family like pirates?  Well, here is my oldest daughter’s birthday where her husband turned their townhome into a pirate haven.  You be the judge.  Needless to say, when Black Flag comes out, there will be a party at my house!

Rich Hoffman

“If they attack first………..blast em’!”

www.tailofthedragonbook.com

Walking the Streets of Old Boston During the Revolutionary War: The new way to think about education

When people ask me what I think education should be, and how much money I think should be spent on it, my thoughts are not even in the same universe as the typical concerned parent.  In such discussions it quickly becomes realized that parents need a babysitting service for their child, and that is their primary concern when discussing education, so they aren’t even willing to discuss the quality of education itself.  I personally think the old top down teaching method is dead, and is obsolete entirely.  I favor one that has individual interaction with all the wonderful media tools available today and that will come to availability tomorrow over a teacher standing in front of a classroom like a dictator reeking with authority toward an uninterested class.  I touched on some of these changes coming to education in my article on School Choice which can be reviewed by Clicking Here.

I recently found myself inspired by playing an MMO video game called The Old Republic in how the power of gaming and story driven content provided a context to how the future of education might take advantage.  After spending roughly 300 hours playing the story portion of that game with my wife I am more convinced than ever that it is in that forum that education might best be stimulated.   Now, under my daughter’s guidance and continued coaxing, I am playing a game on Xbox called Assassin’s Creed III which I previewed here a bit, CLICK FOR REVIEW, and I am staggered by the results of that effort.  Assassin’s Creed III is a visually stimulating game that is a fictional story set during the Revolutionary War taking some liberties with the time period and involves a war between a group of Templers and Assassins that extends for millenniums of human history.  It has some science fiction elements, mystery, drama, action, and some sentimental romance that makes it a compelling story—but more than that I found it educationally thought-provoking.

I more heavily than ever support the Tea Party efforts of my friends in the Liberty Movement and there have been some intense discussions of late over beer, chicken wings, and flat screen televisions in dark corners of dank local pubs that have reminded me of how the Liberty Movement started in Boston during the years of 1750 to 1773.  I see the same thing happening once again in America in these dark corners under hushed voices.  Being a lover of Alan Eckert novels especially The Frontiersman, and Wilderness Empire which cover American development from 1720 through the early 1800’s from the East Coast to Illinois I have a love of information that covers that era.  To date only The Last of the Mohicans really jumped into this time period successfully as Walt Disney attempted on several occasions to tell stories from the period without coming out like stale bread.    The period of 1680 to about 1840 in America is one of the most violent, liberating, and exciting times in American history, yet it has been watered down by modern education to reflect through academic collectivism only the concerns of the Civil Rights debates of the 1850s to 1970s which were only the tail being wagged by the dog which began in the period of the First Great Awakening, roughly 1730 to 1770.  So it was with some excitement that I placed Assassin’s Creed III into my Xbox to play after looking at it on my book shelf for nearly 4 months unopened, as I had other tasks to attend to over that duration.

The game is fun, and it’s wonderful to cut the heads off bad guys and do all the usual video game antics that make them so popular with young people.  But Assassin’s Creed is more than just fun—it is deeply educational, and places the video game player in the sights, sounds, and politics of 1750 – 1773 America very accurately, much more than I anticipated.  Within the first 15 hours of game play I took a journey from England to American aboard a four masted galleon that took 73 days.  Life on the ship was brutally realistic, and even though I have read for years about such journeys, having the ability to walk around a ship, sleep, look-out across the water, talk to people working on the vessel and doing simple chores made the journey very real for me and gave me an appreciation for these boats and their tribulations that I have not received upon viewing actual replicas in port at Jamestown and other such places.  In Assassin’s Creed III I have had the opportunity to walk the streets of Boston as they might have looked at the time and engaged in meetings in those same dimly lit taverns which reminded me very much of my present reality.  I have met and interacted with Ben Franklin, William Johnston, George Washington, and Sam Adams just to name a few.  I have found myself just walking around the streets aimlessly looking at all the street vendors, the ship yards, and various businesses in amazement.  They have done in Assassin’s Creed what Walt Disney attempted to do with his Frontier Land in Disney World, which is recreate Old Boston with as much accuracy possible so that the essence of it would not be lost to time.

To get an idea of where Lexington is in relation to Boston and how the terrain outside of Old Boston might have looked to neighboring Native American tribes has been nothing short of stunning.  The Native Americans speak in their native language with subtitles needing to be read, and I found that after a little while I was starting to understand some of the words in context to the situations without reading the subtitles.  I could literally go on and on about the quality of Assassin’s Creed as a video game.  It is an example of exception that has set a new high bar for video game development.

Yet I could not stop thinking that more kids have probably learned more about American history after playing Assassin’s Creed for 40 or 50 hours than they have in all their years of public education history classes—which makes the video game far more superior as an education tool than a stagnant teacher standing in front of a class writing on a chalk board.  Assassin’s Creed would be a fun game if killing wasn’t even involved, but rather just interacting with the Founding Fathers and watching the slow gradual rebellion fester up against the English over a twenty year period.  It is one thing to read about the occupation of British troops in Boston in 1770, but it is another to watch them patrolling the city and shoving you out-of-the-way if you walk in front of their formation to exert their authority, like what happens in Assassin’s Creed.   I have caught myself saying ahhh, haaaa many times as things I’ve read in different books over the last thirty years came together for me in the video game where I suddenly had visual reference to tie it all together.  The detail is immaculate, even down to the mechanics of riding horses as they splash about on a muddy street from a recent rain.

For me the beauty of the game is in the ships.  Assassin’s Creed III allows me to climb aboard the kind of ships I have built and used in strategic combat CLICK TO REVIEW, and walk the decks, hoist the sails, and steer accurately on the open sea.  In reality those old ships were boring, but Assassin’s Creed makes them realistically boring to the level of excitement if that makes any sense.  The graphics engine for the ship to ship combat in Assassin’s Creed III is so deliciously good, with water looking photo realistic and the ships pitching to and fro so authentically that Assassin’s Creed 4 is going to expand on their ship development with a pirate adventure in the next edition—which for me is equitable to the most ecstatic experience imaginable.  Aside from the Revolutionary Period in America, the Golden Age of Pirates is among my favorites in history, and my daughter knew it when she obtained the leaked news from Ubisoft sending me a text, “DAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! THE NEW ASSASSIN’S CREED GAME IS CALLED THE BLACK FLAG!!!!!!!!!!!!  IT’S ABOUT PIRATES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Being a history buff, I love to interact with these three-dimensional environments that modern video games afford.  They complement my reading in a way that allows a very detailed picture to be painted in my mind, and connects many historical dots obtained from multiple sources.  The games are made for the purposes of entertainment, but it is staggering to consider how effective they could be if they took themselves seriously as educational tools.  As I examine the effectiveness of Assassin’s Creed III next to the stagnant education methods of even the best schools, it is obvious that public education is well down the wrong path, and they refuse to analyze their position in favor of something better.  Not being a gambler I would bet everything that most young people today know more about George Washington not because of the books by Glenn Beck, or the efforts of 12 years of public education, but because they played Assassin’s Creed III during the fall of 2012 and winter of 2013 and had to speak to him, go on missions that he sent them on, and watch history take place in a computer game instead of a solitary, bored individual standing at the front of a class spewing “teacher breath,” (a combination of coffee and teeth in the first stages of gingivitis) toward an uninterested class that has no context to apply any information  to.  Video games provide that context, and to date, none better than Assassin’s Creed III.  Not even the great Sid Meyer games did so well to place a player into the streets of history to interact with its authors as equals so that truth can be grappled with.   That is the power of a video game to become an opportunity to improve education effectiveness.

Rich Hoffman

“If they attack first………..blast em’!”

www.tailofthedragonbook.com

Take Away 2 1/2 Fries from a Big Mac Meal: The real cost of federal sequestration

On the day after the sequestration implemented from the federal government on March 2nd Darryl Parks from 700 WLW covered the events that transpired in the aftermath as government officials calculated that society might come to an end because of the cuts.  Well, in his usual fashion Darryl brought some non-partisan, non emotional, non group affiliated analysis regarding the sequestration cuts to the light of reality.  As many might be afraid of the rhetoric coming out of Washington Darryl put into the context the extent of the cuts in a fashion that everyone can understand.  The ridiculous amounts that Darryl laid out in his broadcast, and that I break down below in written form are so small that they aren’t even worth discussing.  Yet all the news broadcasts on television cried like infants for over three weeks along with virtually every politician, especially Barack Obama about the costs of these cuts to the social fabric of American society.  So without further fanfare have a listen to Darryl’s broadcast as it was given on March 2nd at 9 AM in the morning.

Most people think that 44 billion sounds like a lot of money, but in regard to the sequestration cuts, it is only 1/80th of the total federal budget.  The federal budget is in fact so large, and deliberately made complicated by the same politicians who have been crying wolf, that most Americans cannot even wrap their mind around the numbers.  Nobody can envision a trillion dollars, and one billion is well out of touch from most people’s minds.  Yet American spending is in a deficit trend of over a trillion dollars per year from an income stream where only 1.35 million Americans at the very top of the income bracket pay as much as the bottom 95%.  In total roughly 130 million Americans pay taxes into the total federal budget minus some revenue generated from foreign trade and travel gathered in the form of sales taxes.  So when it is learned that most of the federal yearly budget supplied to the government is provided by only 130 million Americans—while almost as many more pay no taxes off payroll or other direct measures, the situation becomes incredibly frustrating, and daunting.  Like their counterparts in the government school system, federal bureaucrats make it a practice to deliberately deceive voters into protecting the empire of spending they have recklessly erected.  For more information check out the links below:

How much the Top 1% pays in taxes:

http://www.aei-ideas.org/2012/12/top-1-of-american-taxpayers-pay-almost-as-much-in-taxes-as-bottom-95-and-half-of-that-group-paid-nothing-in-2010/

Federal budget by the numbers from the Heritage Foundation:

http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2012/10/federal-spending-by-the-numbers-2012

Most people start to blank out when such large numbers are expressed so they cannot get their mind around such concepts.  Looting politicians like Barack Obama know this, and have successfully hidden the extremity of these federal numbers behind relatable faces, like children, National Park employees, government janitorial staff and so on—so that tax payers will be inclined to vote in favor of more tax increases to help out their fellow Americans.  The federal government essentially uses the same tactics that we have been fighting locally in the school levy debates—they clearly manipulate the numbers in hopes that nobody can wrap their mind around the truth.  However, Darryl Parks did better than President Obama in showing the hypocrisy of the federal diatribes by putting into a context that everyone can understand the amount of the sequestration cuts that prove just how small they really are—and how much politicians in Washington and the doomsday press blew out of proportion the extent of the damage—which proves that none of them can be trusted.

Darryl did the hard math and discovered that it was much easier to understand the 44 billion in cuts coming from the sequestration reductions that went into effect on March 1st by proportionally breaking it down against something that virtually everyone can relate to, a McDonalds Big Mac extra value meal.  Darryl took the known value of 1320 calories that are contained within a Big Mac extra value meal consisting of a Big Mac sandwich, a medium Coke and a large order of French fries that normally contain 87 individual fries within the container they come in and for sake of argument gave that value of 1320 an equal value to the federal budget.  Now we know that 44 billion in cuts is only 1/80th of the total federal budget, so if we apply the same reduction to the Big Mac value meal, we discover that we will only lose 2 ½ French fries from our feast

Most people eating such a meal would not notice a 2 ½ fry reduction, and in the society at large, particularly the 130 million Americans who pay nearly all the federal tax, they won’t notice any reductions at the federal level.  The only people who will notice the reductions are those who have built their careers in the flimsy existence of government and find themselves jobless in the sequestration cuts.  It will be discovered that many of those reduced jobs were not necessary to begin with just as many of the local schools who have had to reduce their staffs have found that they can still operate with fewer employees as they work to meet their budgets.  The impacted parties are those who work for government at wages that are too high for jobs that were created by government for government reasons.

Nobody in their right mind can argue that losing 2 ½ fries per Big Mac value meal will ever be noticed and will drive down the quality of the meal itself.  Just like the sequestration cuts don’t even come close to bringing our federal government into the light of reality when it comes to fiscal spending of those poor 130 million tax payers who are covering the whole bill.  Yet everyone who covered the sequestration in a negative way is guilty of openly misleading the American people with radical rhetoric that belongs in the basement of old hippie flower children engulfed in pot smoke as they watch reruns of Sesame Street and think themselves sophisticated contributors of society.  In reality, much, much, much more needs to be cut from our extra value meals if we wish as a nation to lose any weight and take measures to truly get our budget under control.  Taking away 2 ½ French fries out of 87 won’t do the job—and is not even worth the discussion which has transpired.

Rich Hoffman

“If they attack first………..blast em’!”

www.tailofthedragonbook.com

The Audacity of Government Spending: Putting things in perspective on the national debt

To put in perspective just how ridiculous our current government is in its demands for ever-expanding government, more and more government employees, and exploding encroachments of every individual American life, the video below places into context the audacity of modern politicians regarding the debt crises.  The government through both the Bush administration and Obama administration have attempted to pad the numbers of a declining economy with government expansion to the point of bringing the nation to a current $17 trillion-dollar deficit moving rapidly toward $20 trillion.  Sadly, the video below, which is only a year or two old, was made when people like me were already deeply concerned at $14 trillion.  I and my Tea Party friends were aghast when the deficit hit $10 trillion, and by the time the video below was made, I had already given up on current government.  The state of America today isn’t even on the measuring stick of sanity regarding finance.  When I hear Obama speak about the sequestration cuts and how difficult it is for him to even digest a 2.5% reduction in government which is still deficit spending, it places me in the mind of the banker seen below, with the President playing the idiot asking for an increase in the debt ceiling.

Obama’s argument for increasing the debt ceiling is that “America pays its debts.”  The trouble is the President won’t stop spending money, which forces America to pay for things it can’t afford.  America cannot afford to be a nanny state, it cannot afford to take care of more than 50% of the nation who doesn’t work, or pay taxes.  It cannot take care of senior citizens who retire at 65 and live till age 90 on the government dime as there are fewer children being born than ever before who will have fewer jobs to work in as adults so that they can continue to pay into Social Security.

The government cannot afford to give insurance to every American.  It cannot afford to build the political party of one left leaning side with entitlement spending—which is what has been happening.  Democrats and progressives know that their political base cannot support a voting base with their ideas, but only with what they can give away to purchase votes from the most ignorant among the American population.  They like the guy in the video above when he’s told that he cannot have the money instantly states that without raising the debt limit, his wife will leave him, because if he cannot spend money to keep his wife happy, their marriage will fall apart.

So too will the marriage between young people and progressive Democrats erode away to nothing when the money runs out.  When there are no free things to gain like welfare, free insurance, free education, easy government jobs that pay 40% more than private sector jobs, etc., voters will reject the party of handouts, the Democrats.  Obama knows this, which is why he played the scare game over sequestration only to back pedal when he realized that Republicans like the banker above had reached their limit.

For me, that limit was a long, long time ago.  I reached my limit during 2005 in the Bush years.   People I know best started reading Atlas Shrugged between 2005 and 2007 and were ready to throw George Bush out of office for creating the Department of Homeland Security, the TSA and other massive government programs.  There were already murmurings of starting a Tea Party like organization even back then when I fought the first Lakota levy in Butler County where that government school showed a never-ending tendency to spend more money than they ever take in, just like the guy in the video above.  Once Obama was elected, and the Lakota teachers showed in 2008 what national teachers all across America were really up to, many in the Liberty Movement had already reached their boiling point.  By 2009 and 2010, coordinated measures to expose spending addicts like the guy in the video above were being implemented to render publicly so that voters would come to understand the unsustainable path that America was on.  Unfortunately, half the country presently is just like the guy in the video above.  They are like heroin addicts—in denial of their addiction to spending and they are on a self-destructive path to always spend more than they take in and they are electing politicians into office who will provide them that fix.  What these politicians have in common with these spending addicts is that they too have the same problem—they can’t control themselves.

Obama lies to the public in the same way that an alcoholic or drug addict justifies their mental illness.  Obama appears to have no connection to reality over the issue of money and is just as foolish as the metaphorical display in the video above.  Proportionately he is just as reckless.   Like the banker, we should all dismiss Obama as a fool who has an obvious problem.  He should even be impeached as stated in Article One, section Two of The United States Constitution where it reports, “The House of Representatives shall choose their Speaker and other Officers; and shall have the sole Power of Impeachment.”  The writers of the Constitution intended for American presidents to overstep their bounds and be impeached by the House on occasion, but members of the House and Senate are just as bad.  So who are they to throw stones in a glass house?   The result is that nobody does anything but cave into the addicts, because they all share the same sickness.

The very small cuts that Obama is bellyaching over are just as foolish as the silly amount discussed above.  2.5% is hardly worth even mentioning.  I wouldn’t be happy until more than 50% of the current budget is slashed.  I don’t want the government to do much of anything except build up a military, run a bit of a post office, help NASA along, maintain roadways, and that’s about it.  The private sector could and would take care of virtually everything else.  The people who would be left behind in such an economy are those who refuse to participate even when politicians like Obama steal from others and place the goods at the feet of the malcontent—who even then hardly picks up the food to place in their mouths.  All of society should not be destroyed because the addicts of spending like Obama and his Capitol Hill thugs cannot regulate themselves, and have no understanding of what makes a human being rise in the morning to meet a day’s challenges.

Like the banker we should run Obama out of our offices and take away his credit cards.  We should not feel bad about it either, because it is him who has mismanaged his own life, and built a party around debt and theft.  So the fault of a failing economy falsely propped up by government expansion will be his alone.  The loss of jobs created not by demand, but by whim are the fault of Obama for not measuring need against desire.  The fault of the days to come will fall squarely on Obama’s shoulders and Republicans would do well to close the door and let Obama and his party fall completely into disarray by their own recklessness.  Because the current debt is abysmal—I personally support nothing that contributes to those debts. I do not care about government pensions.  I don’t have one, and I never will—so I don’t want to pay for somebody else’s pension.  I don’t care about public schools.  I’d rather pay for private tutors and instruction.  I don’t care about Social Security.  I have no plans to ever collect a Social Security check and would consider the money dirty if I did.  I have no need of Medicaid, or Medicare.  I manage my own health and well-being under my own funds, and I have no sympathy for those who cannot, or refuse to.    I pay roughly $20K a year in personal taxes when I add up all the little things, and I get very little in return for that money.  Nearly 1/5th of that number goes to public schools alone which I think is a complete waste of money.   I may use $2,000 of that $20K, and it’s been that way for over 15 years, and that is not a good ROI.  When congress messed up the Social Security tax this year, I notice immediately that I was paying $80 more a month in just Social Security tax from December 31st 2012 to January 1st 2013.  Congress allowed those taxes to fly in under the radar while everyone else was looking at the fiscal cliff negotiations.  I don’t get a damn thing for the $80 lost dollars—nothing.  It’s just more looted money lost in the pit of a government being run by money addicts that are just as in denial of their social imposition as any rampant drug user.

More than ever I want to push the government out of the finance office for their unreasonable requests that are every bit as foolish, and animated as the idiot who wants to raise his personal debt ceiling in the video above.  It is astonishing that politicians like Obama can even stand in front of people and ask for more money when $80 dollars here and $80 dollars there fly from our pockets like pennies on a roller coaster.  The arrogant politician has no concept of what they ask, and are just as ridiculous in their demands as displayed in the above metaphor.  And it has to stop.  It has to stop right here, and right now.  The money addicts have to be driven from office and their parties destroyed for the good of America.   Nothing less is acceptable.

Rich Hoffman

“If they attack first………..blast em’!”

www.tailofthedragonbook.com

Palaces of Evil and Factories of Fear: Kim Grant tells the story of alleged Kings School System abuse

For me, it began with only a curious inquiry of why my school district seemed to always be out of money no matter how high the taxes were, or how many levies were passed in the name of children.  I would engage in debates publicly about the nature of education, speak on television and do a lot of radio addressing many of the conditions I saw that would improve education in general, and I hoped that by simply pointing these things out, things might improve discreetly for the better.  But what I discovered with each rock unturned were a pack of some of the most vicious bullies laying in concealment that I have ever seen and it was quickly realized that much of the money spent on public education gets soaked up in the bureaucracy of bullies.  If it’s not the members of the school administration seeking to cover-up every bad deed done by a teacher—and stopping at little to execute the task, it is the radical teachers unions themselves who stop at nothing to advance a progressive education agenda.  Often the school board members in almost every case will go right along with the many acts of villainy they witness to protect the public image of their school—because in public education image is everything.  Like chess board pawns, the guilty parents who feel deeply bad about the role they play in their own child’s life rally to the cause of the school because the neurotic parents wish to believe that they can “purchase” for their children a good life—which they can’t.  Parent/Teacher groups often align to become bullies against the community putting pressure on businesses who don’t support tax increases, stealing thousands of dollars of any political propaganda against their cause without legal recourse and stopping at nothing to destroy the lives of those who stand in their way.  I have personally seen massive cover-ups, destroyed property, harassed businesses, extremely organized smear campaigns equivalent to what might be seen in a presidential election, and a mafia like approach to education that has caused me to move from a moderate reformer of public education to one who despises the entire process and everyone in it.  But don’t take my word for it, and don’t think for a second dear reader that these things are only indicative to my school.  I live in one of the best.  These problems are in every public school and are the largest modern social issue that the human being has in modern times—even bigger than the national debt issue.  To gain a perspective on just how big the problem is, listen below to Kim Grant who was a former teacher union president describe her reasons for blowing the whistle on an alleged bully case at Kings Local Schools involving a teacher sadistically torturing her special needs students.  During the course of the broadcast below Kim will discuss much of what I just stated, which might be a shock to the ears.  So beware.

The number one reason that more people do not come forward to stand up to these bullies who run public education are the same reasons that people do not stand up to the mob—self preservation.  Most people fear the retaliation that often comes, and the social stigma that has protected public education for years.  I could write an entire book about my personal experiences alone.  Many residents like Kim said are afraid that the school will take out their wrath on the students, so they do not make public statements at school board meetings and they certainly don’t go on record in the newspaper.  Also, many parents know at least one person whether it be a mother, a sibling, an aunt or uncle—somebody who works for a school system somewhere, and this makes Christmas and Thanksgiving dinners especially difficult—I have in my family four that I have to speak to a few times a year—and I know how hard it is for me, so I can sympathize how it is for most people.  Many parents just keep quiet to save the peace in their families.  I have even had people who directly supported my efforts with thousands of dollars wish to keep their activity disguised for fear that they might run into the opposition at their local church, or have the teachers union minions—the “latte sipping prostitutes” as I call them, boycott their businesses with revenue shattering collective withdrawal hoping to crush them out of existence.  Further parents are afraid that if they come out against public education that their boss or co-workers might retaliate against them in the workplace.  The incentive to keep one’s thoughts to oneself is very high even when they see many wrongs happening around them.  The need to protect ones career, and social status often takes precedence over righteousness.  These are the grim realities of public education, and it is no wonder that children aren’t learning anything and growing up lost and confused about their roles in the world.  They watch their parents cave under the pressure of this massive machine, and they seek to rebel against it for a while, but in the end, they become part of the machine themselves only to walk through life in T.S. Eliot’s The Wasteland.

I have had many document requests pulled at my school of Lakota, some of which can be seen here.  (CLICK)  There is a reason that much of the information involving public education is “public.” It is so that people like Kim Grant can pull those records and expose wrong doing in order to protect the children of the school from activity that might be unbecoming.  Kim being a former insider knows the tricks, where normal parents do not, or don’t want to know for fear of the responsibility that such knowledge might bring.  The schools are set up like mafias to prevent parents and other tax payers from doing what Kim did.  The schools cannot legally stop the request, they must comply, but they will put a target on the people who try to look into their affairs.  That is how they prevent the “will” to investigate and there isn’t a reporter in any community who wants to be blacklisted from future work because they exposed some wrong at their local school.  Most parents have children in the district and fear the recourse against those children if they make trouble.  I have been in meetings where professional, highly educated school officials turned into beasts from the depths of Hell within one sentence of discussion once they realized that my temper could not be quelled by good tidings.

Public education is a terrible scam that is not helping kids at all in its current state.   It needs a complete overhaul, and time will reveal that to everyone, as more and more stories like the one in Kings is told publicly.  The issue is not isolated to Kings by any stretch of the imagination.  Every public school has these types of scandalous abusers within their walls—and to some extent it is human nature to have such personalities.  But the job of the administrators and school boards is to remove those people from employment in defense of the children—and that is not happening in almost every case.  Instead, the school as a collective unit rallies behind the evil to suppress it from view, and this is what children have been learning in public education and our society will pay gravely for it.  There are not enough Kim Grants out there fighting on behalf of all children and their cowardly parents are too fearful of being targeted as a “reprehensible” for stating the obvious.  Until there are, public schools will be palaces of evil and factories of fear.  In their current state they only serve the employees at the expense of children, and that is a folly that needs to be corrected without concern for personal reputations, or internal family politics.  Thank goodness at Kings at least Kim Grant did the right thing which began with a public records request.  The same could be done at every single school in The United States with a simple request by a bold district resident—which in the end is the best thing for children that any grown adult can do for their educations—expose them to goodness, and the system of checks and balances that they see lacking every day, so that they can trust that the world does contain justice and people with the courage to wield it.

Rich Hoffman

“If they attack first………..blast em’!”

www.tailofthedragonbook.com

Senate Bill 18 in Ohio: Pandering to the fearful, panic driven voter and beta men

Ohio Senator Shirley Smith (D-Cleveland) recently introduced Senate Bill 18, drafted to ban all “assault weapons,” broadly defined as any firearm capable of carrying “ten or more” rounds of ammunition. In a February 12 release, the Senate Democratic Caucus listed the legislation as one of its ten priorities for the current session.  In a wonderful discussion on 55 KRC recently Brian Thomas challenged the premise of Senate Bill 18 with one of the supporting senators in what became a rather vigorous exchange that articulated the gun argument in modern politics very accurately.  Have a listen.

http://ohio.mediatrackers.org/2013/02/20/ohio-democrats-propose-assault-weapons-ban-statewide-ammo-registr/

If passed, the bill – co-sponsored by Edna Brown, Eric Kearney, Michael Skindell, Charleta Tavares, and Nina Turner, all Democrats – would also create a government registry to track all gun and ammunition purchases in the state, maintained by the Attorney General’s Bureau of Criminal Investigation.  The Bill as proposed is the result of overly emotional legislators who are responding to the lobby power of overly emotional voters, who spend much of their time afraid of their own shadows.  This tendency alone does not make them dangerous to the pursuits of freedom.  However, as voters, the fearful are represented in a republic just as much as the brave, and from the political vantage point of the progressive—and their most ardent champion—the Democratic Party, fear is the way they advance their causes of liberalism.

Progressives use fear to expand education spending without results, they use fear to expand government such as what has been seen over the sequester cuts, they use fear to pass police levies, fire levies, and virtually every government program where a legislator writes words into law to appease the weak and small-minded.  It can be argued accurately that the trouble of our modern society is that we have allowed the frailest minded to dictate our path toward socialism through their lack of personal courage.

Senate Bill 18 is driven by these fearful forces.  Their historical accomplices might have been the Mayan society who cut out the heart of a captured enemy to appease the God’s so that their crops would manifest and their city residents would not starve from lack of food.  The advocates of gun control wish to believe that if they impose upon society a weaponless culture that human beings will be forced to embrace each other with intentions of peace.  But they are wrong, terribly wrong.  Their folly is rampant with voodoo like superstition that has no basis in reality and simply settles in their minds the illusion of security.

For a long time the courageous in society have yielded to these panicky politicians and voters so not to hurt their feelings.  It was out of compassion that the American brave shook their heads and treated these law driven entities like children afraid of bolts of lightning that streak across the sky.  But that time has closed, as the brave in America have seen the result of such capitulation.  American society is on its way to becoming just another third world country reeking with rule by superstition instead of bold logic, and we don’t like it.  This realization has given rise to the Tea Party and other liberty pursuing groups that are putting the arguments on the table for discussion in some instances such as in the Brian Thomas discussion for the first time.

Brian Thomas on 55 KRC has stood up for Second Amendment rights for many years—well before there was ever a Tea Party movement.  But the discussions were often categorized as radical conspiracy theory by a far right fringe mentality.  But the viewpoint of gun rights is not a political ideology of the right or the left.  It is of the bold and the weak.   Gun advocates wish to be in charge of their own lives and not trust their life or death to the devices of government.  Government can’t even get public education correct, let alone show up at a home at 2 AM to prevent the robbery of a family defending their property from a villain.

After listening carefully to the words of the senator in the Brian Thomas interview I am convinced that progressives seek to hide their natural cowardness from society with a blanket of security provided by government.  Progressives wish to think themselves equal to the courageous, without being actually brave.  Therefore the cost of government is so great in 2013 because the trend in America is to grow up as soft minded overly emotional, individuals that conglomerate like animal herds to celebrate their lack of courage.  Government expands to provide security to the masses who have allowed their minds to be fearful of every possible tragedy, and to hedge their lives against those threats not by their own actions, but those of collective security.

America is supposed to be the land of the free and home of the brave.  The brave are the backbone of America, and the Constitution assumes that it will be the brave who will defend America from all forms of tyranny, both foreign and domestic.  The Second Amendment is for the brave, who should be on hand to eliminate threats as they happen, not afterwards.  The brave could have prevented Sandy Hook in the halls of that school if such a place would openly embraced in empowering the brave to defend the weak.  It could have prevented Aurora if the entire audience hadn’t been disarmed before seeing a movie in that tragic Colorado shooting.  It is the brave who always protects the weak, and that needs to be celebrated.  There is no law that can truly protect the weak from the parasitic aggressive—only the brave can.  Only the courageous can defend America from those who wish to harm it and that is why there is a Second Amendment.  The brave do not ask the weak to be courageous.  They only ask the feeble-minded to stay out-of-the-way while the strong perform their work—and to have the respect to not muddy the waters of the electorate with cries for more politicians to pander to the whims of the deficient.  Even the beta man has a role in the grand tapestry of society.  They may excel at presenting spreadsheets for fiscal planning; they may even have a fresh perspective on an idea.  They may invent the next great thing in society—but they may not be good with a gun, or putting down a potential rapist attempting to impose themselves on an unwilling victim.  But they should respect those who are good at such things.  Because the best gun control is putting them in the hands of those who know what to do with them, and are brave enough to use those skills to keep society truly safe, with the valor that comes naturally to a minority of the population.

The videos above are America’s version of gun control.

Rich Hoffman

“If they attack first………..blast em’!”

www.tailofthedragonbook.com

Barack Obama is America’s Jeroboam: How History will treat the $17 trillion dollar deficit driving President

I wanted the opportunity to vote for Herman Cain in the 2012 election, so what I am about to say has nothing to do with Civil Rights advances, or even politics.  The game that is being played is clear in a society that ridiculed Herman Cain ruthlessly, yet celebrated Barack Obama even though they are both African-Americans.  The performance of President Obama during the last week of February 2013 before the sequester deadline, which was set by his administration two years prior, proves what many have all along feared about Obama, and I am convinced that history will remember the current presidency as not just an appalling failure, but a horrendous blip on the radar of American prosperity.  It will be revealed that all along, Obama was a domestic terrorist at war with The American Constitution with an aim at radical destruction of prosperity in The United States to redistribute the wealth of America to the rest of the world, only to destroy the global economy in the process.  There is no other explanation for the reckless campaigning Obama engaged in trying to evoke fear in federal workers ahead of the sequester deadline.  What he has failed to report in his campaigning to federal workers is that even with the sequester cuts The United States is still spending more this year than it did last year pushing our national debt on a path toward $17 trillion.  Obama is either a complete idiot, which is possible—or he is a domestic terrorist intentionally attempting to wreck the American economy forever.  There really isn’t any other option, and that makes the situation in Washington a perilous one that may be the greatest threat to our Republic since the War of 1812.

If Obama proves in historical context, once the emotions of the day have quelled, to have been the later of the feared motivations, it would not have been the first time such a thing occurred.  In Biblical history, Obama’s current path might most parallel the actions of Jeroboam who advanced his rule over Israel by means of perpetuating the division of the southern Kingdom of Judah.  Obama like Jeroboam has spent his reign doing nothing but perpetuating war so that in the division would defeat his enemies so they could not rise up against him directly.  Obama has no interest in controlling costs or leaving America better of a country than when he found it, and he seeks to destroy all opposition to him through the kind of antics that history has seen time and time again.  But these mechanisms are invisible to the modern television viewer who believes that Obama’s presidency is about proving America has overcome its follies in a post Civil War America.  But the strategic intent is much, much more sinister.

So who was Jeroboam?  Here is what Wikipedia offers:

Jeroboam pron.: /ˌdʒɛrəˈboʊ.əm/ (Hebrew: יָרָבְעָם yarobh`am, Greek: Ιεροβοάμ Hieroboam) was the first king of the northern Israelite Kingdom of Israel after the revolt of the ten northern Israelite tribes against Rehoboam that put an end to the United Monarchy.

Jeroboam reigned for 22 years. William F. Albright has dated his reign from 922 to 901 BC, while Edwin R. Thiele offers the dates 931 to 910 BC.[1]

Jeroboam was the son of Nebat (Douay-Rheims: Nabat), a member of the Tribe of Ephraim of Zereda. His mother[3], named Zeruah was a widow (and could have been leprous[citation needed], as her name translates; 1 Kings 11:26) He had at least two sons — Abijam[4] and Nadab, who succeeded him on the throne.

While still young, Jeroboam was promoted by Solomon to be chief superintendent of the “burnden”, i.e. the bands of forced laborers.[5]

Influenced by the words of the prophet Ahijah (1 Kings 11:29-39), he began to form conspiracies with the view of becoming king of the ten tribes; but these were discovered, and he fled to Egypt, where he remained under the protection of pharaoh Shishak until the death of Solomon.[6] On the death of Solomon, Rehoboam assumed the throne. However, the ten northern tribes revolted against his rule and invited Jeroboam to become their king. The conduct of Rehoboam favored the designs of Jeroboam, and he was accordingly proclaimed “king of Israel”.[7]

He rebuilt and fortified Shechem as the capital of his kingdom. He at once adopted means to perpetuate the division with the southern Kingdom of Judah. He erected at Dan and Bethel, the two extremities of his kingdom, “golden calves,” which he set up as symbols of God, enjoining the people not any more to go up to worship at Solomon’s Temple in Jerusalem, but to bring their offerings to the shrines he had erected.

Thus he became distinguished as the man “who made Israel to sin.” This policy was followed by all the succeeding kings of Israel.

According to 1 Kings 13:1-6, while Jeroboam was engaged in offering incense at Bethel, a “man of God” warned him that “a son named Josiah will be born to the house of David” who would destroy the altar (referring to King Josiah of Judah who would rule approximately three hundred years later). Attempting to arrest the prophet for his bold words of defiance, Jeroboam’s hand was “dried up,” and the altar before which he stood was rent asunder. At his urgent entreaty his “hand was restored him again” (1 Kings 13:1-6, compare 2 Kings 23:13-16); but the miracle made no abiding impression on him. This “man of God” who warned Jeroboam has been equated with a seer named Iddo.[8]

He was in constant “war with the house of Judah”. While the southern kingdom made no serious effort to militarily regain power over the north, there was a long-lasting boundary dispute, fighting over which lasted during the reigns of several kings on both sides before being finally settled.

In the eighteenth year of Jeroboam’s reign, Abijah, Rehoboam’s son, became king of Judah.[9] During his short reign of three years, Abijah went to considerable lengths to bring the Kingdom of Israel back under his control. He waged a major battle against Jeroboam in the mountains of Ephraim. Biblical sources credit Abijah with having a force of 400,000 and Jeroboam having 800,000.[10] The Biblical sources mention that Abijah addressed the armies of Israel, urging them to submit and to let the Kingdom of Israel be whole again,[11] but his plea fell on deaf ears. Abijah then rallied his own troops with a phrase which has since become famous: “Jehovah (God) himself is with us for a captain (commander of the army).” As per the Bible His elite warriors fended off a pincer movement to rout Jeroboam’s troops — killing 500,000 of them.[12]

Jeroboam was crippled by this severe defeat to Abijah and posed little threat to the Kingdom of Judah for the rest of his reign.[13] He also lost the towns of Bethel, Jeshanah and Ephron, with their surrounding villages.[14] Bethel was an important centre for Jeroboam’s Golden Calf cult (which used non-Levites as priests),[15] located on Israel’s southern border, which had been allocated to the Tribe of Benjamin by Joshua, as was Ephron, which is believed to be the Ophrah that was allocated to the Tribe of Benjamin by Joshua.[16]

Jeroboam died soon after Abijam.

Bill O’Reilly as a journalist is someone I respect tremendously.  He attempts to call things as straight as he can, which is why he is one of the most trusted news sources around today.  I don’t always agree with him, but he really works to get to the truth of an issue.  O’Reilly recently tackled the view that history might take upon gazing at Obama’s Presidency, and it was very good.  O’Reilly covered the topic on one of his Talking Points Memos heard during the same week of Obama’s campaigning during February.  O’Reilly uses less colorful language than I do, but his essence is much the same and is worth reading for just the statistics alone.

How will history view President Obama:

By Bill O’Reilly

In just a few days automatic federal spending cuts might kick in. That is known as “the sequester”, a word we don’t like here at The Factor because it’s a word few understand and it’s largely meaningless.

The issue is very, very simple. President Obama does not want to cut federal spending without another tax increase. Republicans say no way, they are not going to continue to feed the federal spending colossus as can be seen clearly by the following quotes:

OBAMA: Most Americans — Democrats, Republicans and Independents — understand that we can’t just cut our way to prosperity.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE IN BUDGET HEARINGS: I want to disagree with those who say we have a spending problem.

REP. NANCY PELOSI: So it is almost a false argument to say we have a spending problem. We have a budget deficit problem that we have to address.

SEN. MARY LANDRIEU: I am not going to keep cutting the discretionary budget, which, by the way, is not out of control, despite what you hear on Fox News.

O’REILLY: Senator Landrieu and others are simply wrong. The federal spending is certainly out of control. The debt is approaching $17 trillion.

Here is how bad it is. In 2003 the U.S. spent just above $2 trillion. This year, the estimated spending will be $3.6 trillion, a 75 percent rise in spending in a 10-year period with no inflation.

And what do we have to show for all that spending? The economy is not much better. The poverty rate is about the same as it was 50 years ago. And salaries for working people are going down.

So why are we spending all the money? For what reason? I’ll tell you why. Take a look at this chart put out by the Pew Research Center. It says 48 percent of Americans want smaller government and fewer services. But among Hispanics, only 19 percent want smaller government and fewer services. A whopping 75 percent of Latinos surveyed approve of bigger government and more entitlements. That’s why President Obama is spending the money because he knows that a coalition of African-Americans, Hispanic Americans, organized labor, and committed liberals will overwhelm the Republican Party.

So in essence, the President is putting party politics above the good of the nation. History will record that and a few years from now when President Obama’s administration is evaluated historians will not care about his charisma, his co-opting of the press or his demeanor in general. No. History will look at the facts. And the facts are that the USA is on the road to bankruptcy. And when that happens, if it does, President Obama will be blamed.

Previous presidents like Van Buren, Harding, Coolidge and Hoover all got hammered because of perceived bad economic policies. The fact is that right now Barack Obama is in that historical category. And that’s a fact.

And that’s “The Memo.”

– You can catch Bill O’Reilly’s “Talking Points Memo” weeknights at 8 and 11 p.m. ET on the Fox News Channel and any time on foxnews.com/oreilly. Send your comments to: oreilly@foxnews.com.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/oreilly/2013/02/27/bill-oreilly-how-will-history-evaluate-president-obama#ixzz2M6Zihste

Obama’s forgetfulness of his sequestration deadline, which was set by The White House, reminds me most of the Popeye the Sailor character of Wimpy, who was famous for saying, “I’ll pay your Tuesday for a hamburger today.”   Well, Tuesday is here, and Obama doesn’t want to pay for his hamburgers.  Instead, he wants another loan for more hamburgers to be paid on many future Tuesdays, and it is hard to believe that anybody could be so stupid, unless they have deliberate intentions of collapsing the American economy.

Historically speaking, it appears that Obama will be viewed equally as Jeroboam, an intention divider of The United States for aims of power and wealth redistribution using Saul Alinsky tactics to execute the aims of Cloward and Piven.  Unlike the times of Jeroboam, armies are not on hand to fight in hand to hand combat as factions meet on the battlefield to keep people like Jeroboam in power.  These days’ armies are congregated in board rooms and banks.  The new arrows of combat are check books and debt.  The intent of battle and war in general is to force an opponent into concessions through violence, sanctions, or political manipulation.  Obama is not even trying to work with Republicans, instead, he is attacking, and attacking, and attacking at every opportunity while running up a tremendous debt with the recklessness of Wimpy, except he never seems to have a desire to even pay on Tuesday.  The intent appears to be complete fiscal collapse and that would be considered domestic terrorism which is something all Americans should guard against.  Trying to invoke fear into political opponents and the masses behind them can be termed in no other way, and in this case exceeds the parameters of normal political theater.  The level that Obama is attempting to carry the divisiveness of modern politics appears to have the same aim as Jeroboam, and will be remembered as such.  The evidence is clear, and cannot be ascertained in any other fashion, unless of course Obama is just a complete fool that is as reckless in his designs as an intoxicated gambler on a Saturday night.  Either way, history will not be kind to Barack Obama.  The only question is whether America survives such a parasite as sixteen years of progressive rule on top of another eight that have severed half the nation from the values they had always held before the election of 1992.  It is easy to see the demise in historical context over decades.  But not so easy to see in the immediacy of the moment, which is the strategy of war played in modern politics, and seems to be the motivation of Barack Obama, the modern version of Jeroboam.  The severed tribes of Obama are Hispanics, women, African-Americans, union leaders, the poor, the un-ambitious, and the government worker being paid extraordinary sums for a job the tax payer does for nearly half the same market value money.  It is war that Obama is conducting and in order to continue that war, he needs more irresponsible spending and a government that will grow by another 100% in the coming years till America is no better than Europe economically.  The slate of the world will then be wiped clean for Socialist International to step in and rule us all through the United Nations.  That appears to be the intentions of America’s modern version of Jeroboam.

Many enemies work behind a cloak of good intentions, but most of them have other ideas concealed deep in their social plots.  Evil is sometimes a point of view, and what might be evil for America might provoke sainthood among the advocates of global government.  A rival team might be considered evil if they score a touchdown beating the hometown favorite—but the actions behind Obama are much worse than these kinds of trivial competitions.  He is attacking every single American for seemingly ideological reasons, either through reckless stupidity or deliberate sabotage.  But History will grade Obama a failure either way and a menace to all of civilization as they attempt to dig out from underneath the years of Obama with more than shovels.  History will place Obama with the terrorists Jeroboam and the worst of the Roman Emperors.  Such a legacy will outlast the political whims of the modern age, and will forever be viewed with the same kind of sinister sentiment as our current times view Stalin, Mao, and every tyrant who has so far breathed and walked the Earth.  Obama will forever be just another brick in the road to tyranny that threatened the freedoms of every individual in the entire world with soul crushing debt recklessly applied to achieve a military victory long ago hatched in the living room of college Marxist professors in the glory days of being a “community organizer,” where the weak hearts of the great American enemy was discussed over mixed drinks and cigarettes to great effect and long-term strategy.

Rich Hoffman

“If they attack first………..blast em’!”

www.tailofthedragonbook.com