Tag: Postaday 2012

Stay Connected

I have written in the past about Americans access to the web…mainly that I thought it was BS that more are not able to use the internet.  When the Arab Spring started I recall a story that told how the protesters were using social networking to organize….it got me to thinking…..how can a country whose citizens make less than $5000 a year able to use an expensive service like broadband?  How is the possible and since it is how come the US has should shoddy record with broadband and when you can get it…..it costs are almost prohibitive……..

I found an article on the US and broadband……….

Newser) – The real threat to US Internet isn’t foreign intervention—it’s that it currently sucks. Cable companies have kept access limited, expensive, and relatively slow by global standards, complains Susan Crawford at Wired. Roughly a third of Americans don’t have broadband access, and for about 19 million who live in rural areas, it’s not available at any price, because cable companies refuse to expand there. The FCC, which is supposed to ensure reasonably-priced communications access for all has “failed in that task,” Crawford writes.

“Yet we’re moving in the opposite direction,” with telecoms focusing on wireless, and refusing government subsidies to service rural areas. Cable companies “face no real competition or pricing pressure,” and we still have no national plan to switch to fiber-optic cables. Everyone in America should be able to get fast internet, voice, data, and basic cable for $30 a month, and if private companies won’t step up, the government should. “It’s embarrassing that one of the most innovative nations in the world can’t do this.” Read the full column here.

When will corporations let the country become a member of the 21st century?

The Future Of Education?

Every year the media goes batshit crazy with education….they have endless shows and talks on the subject…..and each time we hear that the future of American education is charter schools….personally, I think it is a cope out by those who hate the idea of a public education…..but of course they trot out their paid consultants, think tanks, to do some creative writing to support their position….we hear about the highly successful school in NYC or the one in New Orleans…..but are these institutions the real future?

USAToday did a piece on two separate reports on charter schools……

• Compared with students in regular schools, children attending charter schools perform no better in reading and worse in math, according to a Department of Education study of 150 charters.

• Not so, according to a report from Harvard researcher Caroline Hoxby, who weighed results from charter schools in 36 states and found those students ahead in both reading and math.

What looks like conflicting research, though, is actually a matter of measuring the wrong things. Lumping all charter schools together is mostly useless. Charter schools range from experiments aimed at rescuing dropouts to programs providing performing arts students a school to sing or dance at. What’s to compare?

Parents considering charter schools need better advice than these apples-to-oranges studies. A better guide comes from independent education researchers who say the most successful charters:

The most talked about characteristic is the….INNOVATION……but take a closer look….

Often, what’s innovative about charter schools is not new teaching techniques but how the schools are run. The founders of the five Green Dot charter schools in Los Angeles organized a teachers union and pushed decision-making, including hiring, to the classroom level. That attracts talented teachers and raises salaries — the payoff from using half as many administrators as traditional Los Angeles schools.

The studies lumping charters together point to a problem: Not all charters are successful, and far too many low-performing charters are allowed to continue operating. Instead, mediocre learning results should be grounds for shutting some charters down.

Once again when the nation chooses to have the “education” discussion maybe they will focus on education and not some pie in the sky crap that is only as successful as its weakest linbk…and there are numerous weak links….

Our education is in deep do-do and the best we can do is a system controlled by a lottery…….explain just how this will make everything alright….I am sure that some millionaire somewhere will tell us this is the answer…….there are answers….but they are NOT found in the charter school BS!

Has GOP Turned The Corner?

After poor Mitt took it in the butt…there was lots of finger pointing and condemnation when the GOP tried to explain their humiliating loss……about the only voting bloc they took hands down were old white guys…they lost the Hispanics, Blacks,  most women and the younger voters……and with that loss all the high mucky mucks decided that the GOP had to be a big tent party and that they would reach out to the very groups that they lost……….and here is their outreach program…..

They have made Marco Rubio the man to beat for the nomination…he has traveled extensively making his appearances and his new stances…he started this makeover in Iowa (go figure) and moved on to several “liberal” MSM sources….Meet The Press, CBS news, etc……his makeover is a present to the Hispanic community……

And now with the departure of Jim DeMint from the Senate we have the second part of the party makeover hovering on the sidelines…Gov. Nikki Haley of South Carolina will do her part to make over the party by nominating Rep. Tim Scott as DeMint’s replacement the second part of the new p[arty will be in place….now the Afro-American community will have a single senator to look up to……….. and the party danced……

Let’s look at Rep. Scott….

(Newser) – South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley has chosen GOP Rep. Tim Scott to take over Jim DeMint’s Senate seat, CNN reports by way of GOP sources. She’s set to make the announcement today at noon. Scott will be the state’s first black senator since the late 1800s, the New York Times notes. Says a fellow rep from the state, “There is not a kinder, more humble, sweet-spirited person … That is somewhat antithetical to what you’d expect at this level of politics.”

It would be another auspicious step in the life of a man that the Times describes as having a “unique story”: Scott was raised in a single-parent home and nearly flunked out of high school; but after a Chick-fil-A franchise owner became his mentor, things turned around for him.

A compelling story and will surely turn the GOP’s dismal track record all around (sarcasm)……

I do think the Scott will be a good senator…I mean if he only sponsors one bill he has done a 100% improvement over DeMint……..

I hate to tell the GOP this….but Hispanics and Afro-American voters are not as stupid as they think….token candidates does not a big tent party make……

Recent Mass Killings

I will not do what the MSM is doing….going on and on….these vultures have placed a camera in the town and let whoever passes tell their tale…..it was a horrible, horrible thing to have happened….I hope people take gun violence seriously now and we, as a country, have a substantive conversation on how this could happen and how to try and solve the problem…..

I want to point out a few comments that will NOT help the situation….at all

These were found on AlterNet……..

1. Ann Coulter: Everybody should carry a concealed firearm.  The killings took place in the morning, and by 11:07 a.m., Ann Coulter, the publicity seeker whose big, bad mouth gives the little black dress a bad name, was touting concealed-carry laws as the answer to America’s massacre problem. Coulter’s first tweet on the subject came so soon after the killings, that there was no definitive count yet of the number of people who had perished: ”Only one policy has ever been shown to deter mass murder: concealed-carry laws. – bit.ly/VGDNBo”

Well, that seemed to do the trick for a woman who never found a tragedy she couldn’t exploit, for by 11:30, she tweeted this: “I’m on Hannity radio today, talking about the 1 public policy that provably reduces the incidence of, and deaths from, mass shootings.”

And that, boys and girls, is how to work the Twitter machine for self-promotion on the backs of slaughtered children.

It’s not the first time that Coulter has expressed her love for guns in the wake of murder. At a Florida church in 2007, I heard Coulter describe the assassination of a doctor who performed abortions as “a procedure performed on him with a rifle.”

2. Mike Huckabee: Massacre the result of church-state separation.Apparently, former Arkansas governor and pastor Mike Huckabee thinks that if only the Constitution had been rewritten to allow for the mandatory worship of his God in public schools, the massacre would not have happened. It’s unclear from Huckabee’s remarks, made on the Fox News Channel’s Your World show (Huckabee also has his own show on the cable channel), whether he was saying that if only killer Adam Lanza had gotten religion during his public school education, he wouldn’t have killed, or if Huckabee was suggesting that God was punishing a public school for not allowing organized worship in the classroom.

“We ask why there is violence in our schools but we have systematically removed God from our schools,” Huckabee told host Neil Cavuto. “Should we be so surprised that schools would become a place of carnage?”

Media Matters has the clip.

3. Bryan Fischer: God let massacre happen in public school because he’s not wanted there. Bryan Fischer, the noxious radio-show host and spokesperson for the anti-gay hate group known as the American Family Association, put the blame for the massacre squarely on the Supreme Court, which outlawed organized public school prayer in 1962, as seen in this clipcaptured by Right Wing Watch.

“I think God would say to us, ‘Hey, I’d be glad to protect your children, but you’ve got to invite me back into your world first,’” Fischer told his listeners. “‘I’m not gonna go where I’m not wanted; I am a gentleman.’” Fischer continued in his imagined voice of God. So much of a gentleman is Fischer’s God that the Almighty would await an invitation before rushing in to protect 20 children from being gunned down. Thank goodness the police and firefighters who responded were so terribly rude.

4. Glenn Beck: Killings caused by soul problems. Taking to his Twitter stream, Glenn Beck was quick to tweet, at 12:24 p.m.: “Our communities are suffering and it is because of the ever expanding lack of self control & personal responsibility.”

Tweeter Val Farrelly replied: “It’s nothing to do with self control and everything to do with a lack of gun control.”

Another Beck gem about the shootings: “It is not the gun. It is the soul.”

5. Louie Gohmert: If only Sandy Hook principal had an assault rifle, everyone would have been saved. Speaking to host Chris Wallace on Fox News Sunday, the Republican congressman from Texas let loose with this, as transcribed by the Huffington Post:

“Chris, I wish to God she had had an M4 in her office, locked up so when she heard gunfire, she pulls it out … and takes him out and takes his head off before he can kill those precious kids,” Gohmert said.

The M4 is the rifle favored by the U.S. military; you can view its specs on the site of its manufacturer, Colt. Yeah, that’ll fix everything.

6. Larry Pratt: Making schools gun-free zones caused the problem. The executive director of Gun Owners of America, a far-right group allied with the militia movement, makes a leap of logic by claiming that because the massacre happened in an school designated as a “gun-free zone,” that the absence of guns in Sandy Hook Elementary School must have caused the problem.

Despite the fact that Pratt once addressed a group of white supremacists and advocated for the creation of militias in the U.S. based on the model of anti-communist Guatemalan death squads, the USA Today Web site gave Pratt a big megaphone to its millions of unique viewers (23 million in May 2011, according to the company’s media kit), the day after the Sandy Hook tragedy, in the opinion section of the site.

There, Pratt asserts:

Hopefully, the Connecticut tragedy will be the tipping point after which a rising chorus of Americans will demand elimination of the gun-free zone laws that are in fact criminal-safe zones.

One measure of insanity is repeating the same failure time after time, hoping that the next time the failure will turn out to be a success. Gun-free zones are a lethal insanity.

As AlterNet reported in 2010, Pratt told a rally of gun owners at the Washington Monument that the Oklahoma City bombing was but a battle in a war between the citizens and the government. (He cited the assault on David Koresh’s compound by federal law enforcement in Waco, Texas, as evidence of a purported war on citizens by the government. As we reported in April 2010, Pratt continued his rally speech, saying:

We’re in a war. The other side knows they’re at war, because they started it. They’re comin’ for our freedom, for our money, for our kids, for our property. They’re comin’ for everything because they’re a bunch of socialists.

7. Louie Gohmert: If only Sandy Hook principal had an assault rifle, everyone would have been saved. Speaking to host Chris Wallace on Fox News Sunday, the Republican congressman from Texas let loose with this, as transcribed by the Huffington Post:

“Chris, I wish to God she had had an M4 in her office, locked up so when she heard gunfire, she pulls it out … and takes him out and takes his head off before he can kill those precious kids,” Gohmert said.

In closing let me say something about assault weapons…….if you need them to fulfill some thing lacking in your life, then be a hero and join the military….they will let you play with them as much as you want….my guess is that you had rather stay safe at home and call me a socialist liberal pig for suggesting such a thing……

Of course the usual argument is if they do not have guns then they will just use knives and such….to this I say CRAP!  To kill with a knife is personal and cowards kill with guns….enough said!

Let’s Move On To Immigration

We have had our debate and lies on health care, stimulus and Wall Street reform and at this time the toads in Washington are debating taxes and entitlements……. now we need to address another problem that is in search of a solution…..Immigration.

This issue needs repair…….there will be lots of sprinting for microphones, lots of media coverage and lots of speculations……immigration cannot be repaired by piecemeal legislation…..if it cannot be attacked head on then let it go…….there are issues within the issue…..

Amanda Peterson Beadle has compiled a list of why there is a necessity for comprehensive reform……

1. Legalizing the 11 million undocumented immigrants in the United States would boost the nation’s economy. It would add a cumulative $1.5 trillion to the U.S. gross domestic product—the largest measure of economic growth—over 10 years. That’s because immigration reform that puts all workers on a level playing field would create a virtuous cycle in which legal status and labor rights exert upward pressure on the wages of both American and immigrant workers. Higher wages and even better jobs would translate into increased consumer purchasing power, which would benefit the U.S. economy as a whole.

2. Tax revenues would increase. The federal government would accrue $4.5 billion to $5.4 billion in additional net tax revenue over just three years if the 11 million undocumented immigrants were legalized. And states would benefit. Texas, for example, would see a $4.1 billion gain in tax revenue and the creation of 193,000 new jobs if its approximately 1.6 million undocumented immigrants were legalized.

3. Harmful state immigration laws are damaging state economies. States that have passed stringent immigration measures in an effort to curb the number of undocumented immigrants living in the state have hurt some of their key industries, which are held back due to inadequate access to qualified workers. A farmer in Alabama, where the state legislature passed the anti-immigration law HB 56 in 2011, for example, estimated that he lost up to $300,000 in produce in 2011 because the undocumented farmworkers who had skillfully picked tomatoes from his vines in years prior had been forced to flee the state.

4. A path to citizenship would help families access health care. About a quarter of families where at least one parent is an undocumented immigrant are uninsured, but undocumented immigrants do not qualify for coverage under the Affordable Care Act, leaving them dependent on so-called safety net hospitals that will see their funding reduced as health care reforms are implemented. Without being able to apply for legal status and gain health care coverage, the health care options for undocumented immigrants and their families will shrink.

5. U.S. employers need a legalized workforce. Nearly half of agricultural workers, 17 percent of construction workers, and 12 percent of food preparation workers nationwide lacking legal immigration status. But business owners—from farmers to hotel chain owners—benefit from reliable and skilled laborers, and a legalization program would ensure that they have them.

6. In 2011, immigrant entrepreneurs were responsible for more than one in four new U.S. businesses. Additionally, immigrant businesses employ one in every 10 people working for private companies. Immigrants and their children founded 40 percent of Fortune 500 companies, which collectively generated $4.2 trillion in revenue in 2010—more than the GDP of every country in the world except the United States, China, and Japan. Reforms that enhance legal immigration channels for high-skilled immigrants and entrepreneurs while protecting American workers and placing all high-skilled workers on a level playing field will promote economic growth, innovation, and workforce stability in the United States.

7. Letting undocumented immigrants gain legal status would keep families together. More than 5,100 children whose parents are undocumented immigrants are in the U.S. foster care system, according to a 2011 report, because their parents have either been detained by immigration officials or deported and unable to reunite with their children. If undocumented immigrants continue to be deported without a path to citizenship enabling them to remain in the U.S. with their families, up to 15,000 children could be in the foster care system by 2016 because their parents were deported, and most child welfare departments do not have the resources to handle this increase.

8. Young undocumented immigrants would add billions to the economy if they gained legal status. Passing the DREAM Act—legislation that proposes to create a roadmap to citizenship for immigrants who came to the United States as children—would put 2.1 million young people on a pathway to legal status, adding $329 billion to the American economy over the next two decades.

9. And DREAMers would boost employment and wages. Legal status and the pursuit of higher education would create an aggregate 19 percent increase in earnings for young undocumented immigrants who would benefit from the DREAM Act by 2030. The ripple effects of these increased wages would create $181 billion in induced economic impact, 1.4 million new jobs, and $10 billion in increased federal revenue.

10. Significant reform of the high-skilled immigration system would benefit certain industries that require high-skilled workers. Immigrants make up 23 percent of the labor force in high-tech manufacturing and information technology industries, and immigrants more highly educated, on average, than the native-born Americans working in these industries. For every immigrant who earns an advanced degree in one of these fields at a U.S. university, 2.62 American jobs are created.

Hispanics will be watching and scoring any effort along these lines……..after breaking for Obama in 2012 they will be sizing up the prez which will influence their future votes…..playing games will do little to sure up the support in the Latino community…..

A New Definition For “A Piece Of Ass”?

Okay, there is not much to say…….this is just flippin’ kinky!

A Florida man accused of having sex with a miniature donkey named Doodle is protected by the United States Constitution, his lawyers say.

In a motion obtained by Ocala.com and filed with Marion County court, Carlos Romero’s attorneys argue that the state’s anti-bestiality law deprives Romero of his “personal liberty and autonomy when it comes to private intimate activities.”

Romero’s lawyers said the statute violate’s their client’s due process rights and the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment in the U.S. Constitution.

The 32-year-old previously rejected a plea deal that would have required a year of probation, a $200 fine, a psychosexual evaluation and possible treatment, STD testing, no contact with children in a school setting, no ownership or possession of any mammals and revocation of his license to work in horse racing.

The accusations stem from an August incident in which a witness reportedly saw Romero with his pants down “up against the rear of the donkey,” according to the Smoking Gun.

Romero reportedly stepped away from the donkey and pulled up his pants when he saw the witness.

But, when Marion County detectives questioned him about the incident, he allegedly admitted that, when the donkey is in heat, he will stand behind her, scratch her withers and masturbate. He says he “likes the way her fur feels on his privates,” according to WSTP-TV.

SICKOS!  Thoughts?

A Twist On Smuggling

You have heard all the stories about people that smuggle stuff by swallowing it…..and then there are those that shove stuff up their butts……there is a woman in Spain that has my vote for best smuggling technique………

MADRID (Reuters) – Spanish police arrested a Panamanian woman on Wednesday who landed in Barcelona from Bogota, Colombia with cocaine stuffed inside her breast implants.

The woman was taken to the police at Barcelona’s El Prat airport after her vague answers to questions about the reasons for her trip from Bogota raised suspicion at the border control, the Interior Ministry said in a statement.

Spanish authorities carry out rigorous checks of passengers arriving on so-called “hot flights” from Latin America, to fight drug smuggling.

When border police discovered fresh scars and blood-stained gauze on the woman’s chest she was taken to a nearby hospital to check her claim that she had recently undergone breast implant surgery.

The implants were found to carry 1.38 kg of cocaine.

Breast implants stuffed with cocaine are seen in this handout picture released by Spain's Police December 12, 2012. REUTERS/Spanish Interior Ministry/Handout

It’s The Obesity Thing…… (Again)

I have written 0n this many times and I usually go off after some ridiculous millionaire media type gets on her high horse about obesity and what the government should do to control it….I thought I would illustrate how a think tank would approach the subject…….and it does not matter which spectrum you want….they all approach it similarly……..

Well, this sanctimonious person thinks we have an obesity problem….I will agree with her to this point……but her answer is that we Americans must be made to eat healthy and exercise….I will agree that we all need to eat better and exercise….and there is where this woman and I part ways……her answers are that people make bad choices because they are not educated on proper nutrition…..this is where I think that she slides into the elitist bitch category…..seldom do these toads ever talking about the eating disorders that make people shrink away into skin and bones…I guess if one is skinny then it is not a problem…..

This is where I will illustrate how a decision and political position is formed by those think tanks that everyone so enjoys quoting…..

I think it is a bit delusional to think that everybody has the time to exercise, get the kids ready for school, get self ready for work….unfortunately these are excellent ways to get fit….but not everyone makes a million dollars and has any help with the chores mentioned……and not everyone can afford the high perice for healthy foods…especially if the family is large, by large I mean 4 or more persons……

My theory is poverty has more to do with eating and exercising paths……let us look at the 5 most unhealthy states…….

5–Alabama   4–Arkansas  3–Oklahoma  2–Louisiana  1–Mississippi (my state)

Now let us look at the poorest states…in this case the top 5 poorest…….

5–Texas  4–Alabama  3– New Mexico  2–Louisiana  1–Mississippi (my state)

Do you see a trend yet?  3 of the poorest states are also in the unhealthy list…..could poverty have something to do with this?

A Think Tank will take this information and tilt it to show that the sole cause of an unhealthy lifestyle is poverty……the facts are there, sports fans….

And we could go further…..we could check out how religion could figure into this…….these are the 5 most religious states……

5–Tennessee  4–Louisiana  3–South Carolina  2–Alabama  1–Mississippi (my state)

There you have the facts….3 of the least healthy states are also the most religious states…..also 3 of the most religious states are also the poorest………so could we make a inference that religion could lead to an unhealthy lifestyle?

(For all you dim witted trolls out there…….I am NOT saying that religion causes poverty or unhealthy lifestyle….only some self serving douche bag could use these facts to form an untrue premise….that is all)………

My point is…this is how think tanks work….they take some isolated facts and build a narrative………

Inquiring Minds Want To Know

Or do they?

If you spend enough time on the web then you will run into people that have all the answers and anyone that disagrees with them is a commie or a socialist or a fascist or mentally ill……in other words they are wrong in their beliefs or stands……we have all the terms but my favorite is “sheeple”….meaning people that follow blindly….and the scary part (actually it is more like pathetic)…………….. are the ones blindly following are the ones calling other sheeple…….how is that?

Can a mind be called “inquiring” if it is exposed to only one source?  By one I mean the same sort of thinking…..like NewsMax and Hannerity or NPR and The Nation or Marx and Harrington…..if one does not study opposing ideas how can they presume to be free thinking or have an inquiring mind?

Then there are the “Think Tanks”………these organizations only research for the people and organizations that fund them….there are few independent think tanks……when one reads a paper presented by one of these then go find where their funding comes from and that way you will know if it is a true  exercise in free thought………in short, think tanks serve only special interests….no matter which side of the political spectrum they fall….NOTHING inquiring about their assumptions…..these institutions are no more than propaganda arms of a political party….most are biased and their “academic” work is titled toward their benefactors, seldom without prejudice….

And then there are those that explain away any opposition as being solely biased, blaming their thought processes as some sort of mental illness.  There is nothing inquiring about insults and name calling…that is a small mind working….as the old saying goes….”you are entitled to your opinion, but not to your own facts”……the truth is that thanks to the internet the days of “free and inquiring minds” is long dead…..replaced with bullies and insulting toads.  Sadly, there seems to be no end to the insanity……and sadly this could be the end of inquiring minds.

In conclusion let me quote the words of one of our Founding Fathers, James Madison……..”Knowledge will forever govern ignorance, and a people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives”……….

Turn The States Loose!

College Of Political Knowledge

Since the election of ’08 we have had numerous attempts or perceived attempts, if you like, to limit some of the rights that we have as Americans…..like voting, electing officials, civil rights, on and on……and recently Americans have had an outlet, besides the internet, for their whining and dislike for the direction of the country…….that outlet has been the site where they can partition the government for certain things….the most popular has been the secession partitions….Texas alone has over 100,000 signatures and all 50 states has one also….so it is not an isolated occurrence…..

There are federal laws concerning many of what we like to call rights….but in the recent past the states have started limiting these rights……while the states cannot make them illegal they can, once they stack state legislatures they can severely limit the access to these rights…..want examples?  FINE!  Abortion, whether one approves or not, it is still not illegal by federal law……more?  Marijuana…..federal law against but states are staring the process to de-criminalize it……..voting–states are attempting to regulate who gets elected by using some obscure crap about voter fraud–there is NO rampant voter fraud!  Or states that can eliminate elected officials at the whim of the governor……there are more about for the brevity of this post, you get the idea……

Since states want to control these federal rights and want to undermine the federal government I say there is a way…….since the Tea Party came to power they have stubbornly insisted on massive spending cuts….not so much to make the the government more stable but rather to undermine the federal government to the point that is is nothing more than a group or people that get paid to do nothing but show up once in awhile in the capital…….like I stated previously…..there is a way to do this and make the whiners and the small government people happy……..

Professor, what could that simple answer be?

Articles Of Confederation–return to the beginning and re-install the AOC……but why would this make those people I mentioned happy?

Well, let’s look at the Articles

  1. Establishes the name of the confederation with these words: “The Style of this confederacy shall be ‘The United States of America.'”
  2. Asserts the sovereignty of each state, except for the specific powers delegated to the confederation government, i.e. “Each state retains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by this Confederation expressly delegated.”
  3. Not being sovereign, it does not call the United States of America a “nation” or “government,” but instead says, “The said States hereby severally enter into a firm league of friendship with each other, for their common defense, the security of their liberties, and their mutual and general welfare, binding themselves to assist each other, against all force offered to, or attacks made upon them, or any of them, on account of religion, sovereignty, trade, or any other pretense whatever.”
  4. But to instill a national feeling, “[t]he better to secure and perpetuate mutual friendship and intercourse among the people of the different States in this union,” it establishes equal treatment and freedom of movement  for the free inhabitants of each state to pass unhindered between the states, excluding “paupers, vagabonds, and fugitives from justice.” All these people are entitled to equal rights established by the state into which he travels. If a crime is committed in one state and the perpetrator flees to another state, he will be extradited  to and tried in the state in which the crime was committed.
  5. Allocates one vote in the Congress of the Confederation (the “United States in Congress Assembled”) to each state, which is entitled to a delegation of between two and seven members. Members of Congress are appointed by state legislatures. Also, individuals may not serve more than three out of any six years.
  6. Only the central government is allowed to conduct foreign political or commercial relations and to declare war. No state or official may accept foreign gifts or titles, and granting any title of nobility is forbidden to all. States are restrained from forming sub-national groups. No state may tax or interfere with treaty stipulations already proposed . No state may engage in war, without permission of Congress, unless invaded or that is imminent on the frontier; no state may maintain a peace-time standing army or navy, unless infested by pirates, but every State is required to keep ready, a well-regulated (meaning well trained), disciplined, and equipped militia, with sufficient public stores of a due number of field pieces, tents, a proper quantity of arms, ammunition and camp equipage.
  7. Whenever an army is raised for common defense, colonels and military ranks below colonel will be named by the state legislatures.
  8. Expenditures by the United States of America will be paid by funds raised by state legislatures, and apportioned to the states based on the real property values of each.
  9. Defines the sole and exclusive right and power of the United States in Congress assembled to determine peace and war; to exchange ambassadors; to enter into treaties and alliances, with some provisos; to establish rules for deciding all cases of captures or prizes on land or water; to grant letters of marque and reprisal (documents authorizing privateers) in times of peace; to appoint courts for the trial of pirates and crimes committed on the high seas; to establish courts for appeals in all cases of captures, but no member of Congress may be appointed a judge; to set weights and measures (including coins), and for Congress to serve as a final court for disputes between states.

I think these would make the whiners happy….they could run roughshod over their constituents at will…….they would be in complete control of others lives and rights….but also would mean the each state would have to bear the brunt of the costs for disasters, education, etc……..but they would NO longer be accountable to a central government…….and is not that what all these toads really want?

Under the Articles of Confederation, the central government’s power was kept quite limited. The Confederation Congress could make decisions, but lacked enforcement powers. Implementation of most decisions, including modifications to the Articles, required unanimous approval of all thirteen state legislatures.

States would be in total control of the destiny of the state as well as its residents……now that is what they really want!  If that is what they want….I say screw them….let them go…….

Personally, I think it is a damn silly idea……but I bet we can find a bunch of people that will like it……whatcha think?