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Libby Spencer jumping to conclusions right after Tiller shooting
Libby the day after the Fort Hood shooting: "After the initial scramble for details and much needless speculation, the story of the Ft. Hood shooter is becoming a bit more clear. However, it's far from complete. No one knows yet why this man went off the rails. That will be revealed in the months to come when he goes to trial. So people should be careful before they jump to conclusions about his motives."
Libby the day after the Tiller shooting: "If you remember the firestorm over the DHS advisory report on far right, domestic terrorists, this is exactly what they were talking about. The suspect in the murder of Dr. George Tiller, Scott P. Roeder, was a member of an anti-government group in the 1990s and a staunch opponent of abortion. He has posted disturbing comments on various anti-choice forums and was apparently a supporter of a group that not too subtly advocates the murder of abortion doctors."
How does an acid case from the 60's write a political blog for the Detroit News anyway?
Not so fast Mako
Mako - you're a bit out to lunch on this one. Although it is true that Maryland has a wiretapping statute, it makes exceptions for law enforcement. Courts have extended these exceptions to include journalists, and rightly so.
In the bigger picture, a local statute cannot trump 1st amendment rights to a free press, especially for citizen journalists. Giles and O'Keefe did nothing different than what 60 minutes has been doing forever: undercover, hidden-video journalism.
Size DOESN'T matter
You know Libby, the left has really shown it's true colors once again when Keith Olbermann, Anderson Cooper, Rachel Maddow and their ilk used nasty sexual slang to describe the tea party protesters themselves. They did so gleefully. (reference: http://gatewaypundit.blogspot.com/2009/04/gutter-journalism-angry-mainstream.html)
It's a shame that you have sunk right into the gutter with them with a post titled "Does size matter?" where you use the crude "lack of staying power" to describe the protests. Nice. Real nice.
Stay classy there, Libby! You show the same hostility towards the protesters as CNN has (reference: http://theblogprof.blogspot.com/2009/04/cnn-openly-hostile-at-tea-parties-part.html), minus the big microphone. You are dismissive and surely suffer from Fox Derangement Syndrome. FoxNews didn't come up with the idea of a tea party, Rick Santelli of CNBC did. FoxNews only covered what other outlets refused to, and have kicked some journalistic booty in the ratings as a result, beating out CNN, Headline News and MSNBC on tea party day - combined! (reference: http://theblogprof.blogspot.com/2009/04/foxnews-ratings-tsunami-with-tea-party.html)
Take the red pill one of these days, Libby, and have a look at the real world around you...
One Cause of Our 12.6% Unemployment Rate
And we're still #1! Unfortunately, not the kind of top spot anyone wants to hold, but anyway - the whole silver lining thing or something. Or not. The DetNews had this today (http://www.detnews.com/article/20090415/BIZ/904150433/1361/Michigan+s+jobless+rate+hits+12.6+percent+in+March):
"Michigan's unemployment rate increased six-tenths of a point for March, moving from 12 percent in February to 12.6 percent. That's 5 points -- more than 60 percent -- worse than March of last year.
According to data released today by the state Dept. of Energy, Labor & Economic Growth, total employment fell by 41,000 jobs during March, while unemployment increased by 25,000. The Michigan labor force shrank by 16,000 workers in March."
And then there was this:
" "The weakness in the auto industry, along with the national recession, have severely impacted Michigan's labor market over the past year," said Rick Waclawek, director of the department's Bureau of Labor Market Information and Strategic Initiatives."
Uh - is there an echo here? Déjà vu? A glitch in the matrix? That last part appears in the freep this morning in the exact same form. Anyway, we have a cause and effect here that is not explored in the piece (in eaither paper). Make the state an unfriendly place to do business, with a combination of draconian confiscatory taxes and endless government regulation, and this is what happens. And for anyone that wants to solely blame the national economic outlook should look at the history of the Granholm administration, much of which was during a time of economic prosperity for the rest of the nation. Spending in particular has been out of control, and has increased every single year under Granholm while we simultaneously lost jobs each of those last 6 years. (we in the scientific community call this a "trend") Here are the budget numbers for each year of the Granholm administration:
2003 Total Budget: $38,546,223,200
2004 Total Budget: $39,236,530,900
2005 Total Budget: $40,224,217,400
2006 Total Budget: $41,672,547,100
2007 Total Budget: $42,791,804,000
2008 Total Budget: $43,827,383,200
2009 Total Budget: $44,200,000,000 (proposed)
See the problem? All the while, jobs have been disappearing every single year. Here are the employment numbers during the Granholm/Cherry administration (actual job numbers are even more dismal):
2003: -63,800
2004: -3,100
2005: -28,100
2006: -79,500
2007: -67,300
2008: -81,000 (not yet official)
2009: -108,000 (projected)
2010: -24,000 (projected)
I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that those projections are going to be exceeded. By a lot! Here are the new taxes that have been foisted on us by Granholm during her one-state recession which is a direct cause of Michigan being dead last in economic activity in the nation (the list below is just from 2007-2008):
Income tax - 11.5% increase from 3.9 to 4.3%
Additional property tax millages for the Detroit Zoo and veterans fund (tri-county metro area)
MBT where some businesses got slammed with 500% tax increases (even some prominent libs are complaining now!)
MBT surcharge - all 22% of it, which was on top of the MBT
Increased tobacco tax
License fee increase - tax/fee, what's the difference anyway? Mostly on business licenses (plumbers, electricians, etc)
Increased energy costs due to renewable energy regulations (it's an invisible tax, but is a tax nonetheless)
In addition, property taxes for many rose while their home values have plummeted. This is in addition to regulating new stimulus out of existence. Then there were the new tax proposals:
Graduated income tax - class warfare here we come!
More income tax - 1.15% increase to fund preschool
Gas tax - replace current per gallon tax with a percentage that will increase taxes as gas prices rise
Beer tax - to fund welfare
Doubling liquor license fees
Removing tax exemptions for international phone calls, tractor-trailer sales and commercial rental property
Freezing the automatic inflationary increase of the personal exemption on the Michigan income tax. The exemption is supposed to increase from $3,500 to $3,600 per person in the 2009 tax year.
Transit tax - to fund high-speed buses and trains
Driver's licence fee increases
Proposal A subterfuge (more millage increases!)
Property tax increase in Macomb County for the first time in more than 2 generations
Quite a list, no? Here's the list of tax cuts that the Governor has proposed:
There. That didn't take so many zeros and ones, now did it??? Anyone feel blown away yet??? Cause. Effect. Let's not lay the entirety of the state of our State on the current economic crises that began just this last fall then, shall we?
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