Archive for the ‘Liberals’ Category
Political Views Are Reflected in Brain Structure
New scientific information show liberals are able to take conflicting information and “cope” with it better than conservatives. According to the study, liberals are likely to see threatening and conflicting sets of data as opportunities to explore.
For this reader, the study sheds some light on how liberals tend to make decisions which can lead to trouble. A current case illustrating this is represented by the nation’s astronomical debt level and the inability of liberals to recognize these fiscal conditions as a threat to our nation’s well-being. For them these conditions are viewed as an opportunity to explore further, a tack that does not lead to the correct actions required by these conditions. This is further represented by their willingness to continue to spend money which exacerbates the situation further.
On the other side, conservatives recognize the situation for what it is. It is viewed as threatening or upsetting to a desired and sound state, which is fiscal responsibility sans exploratory policies (liberal adventurism) that are dangerous to the country’s well being.
The irony here which is often repeated where liberals are involved, is that while liberals see the demise of their social programs as destructive to the country, the pursuit of such policies will actually deliver to everyone what they hope to avoid.
On the contrary, following sound fiscal policies, i.e. less spending, lowered tax rates, lowered federal debt ceilings and the reduction of entitlement programs (unsustainable access to the treasury), will actually give them what we all want, which is a healthy country whose populace are not enslaved by its government. With such an environment, everyone is in a better position to realize their own potential to succeed.
Individuals who call themselves liberal tend to have larger anterior cingulate cortexes, while those who call themselves conservative have larger amygdalas. Based on what is known about the functions of those two brain regions, the structural differences are consistent with reports showing a greater ability of liberals to cope with conflicting information and a greater ability of conservatives to recognize a threat, the researchers say.
Based upon the findings, it suggests liberals need to employ conservative thinking to save them from themselves. But it also sheds some light on why liberals are fond of viewing conservatives as unwilling to “progress” as they would want and why they generally view the Republican Party as the party of “No!”.
The other message here is that liberals cannot be reasoned with because they are inherently incapable of seeing the other side which is often pointing them to the error of their thinking.
The full story can be read here.
Scientists Find ‘Liberal Gene’
Scientists at UCSD, Harvard have determined what I have suspected for a long, long, time. A given individual’s tendency to adopt liberal values with the accompanying mindset is based upon a genetic predisposition.
According to scientists at UC San Diego and Harvard University, ideology is affected by a dopamine receptor gene called DRD4.
The researchers determined that people “with a specific variant of the DRD4 gene were more likely to be liberal as adults.” However, the subjects were only more likely to have leanings to the left if they were also socially active during adolescence.
“It is the crucial interaction of two factors — the genetic predisposition and the environmental condition of having many friends in adolescence — that is associated with being more liberal,” according to the study.
The study was led by UCSD’s James Fowler and focused on 2,000 subjects from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health.
“These findings suggest that political affiliation is not based solely on the kind of social environment people experience,” said Fowler, who is a professor of political science and medical genetics.
The conclusion is that without this gene, a person’s tendency to adopt conservative thinking and the accompanying values are not predisposed by genetics; they are based solely upon life experiences, observation and education. By extension, a liberal’s reasons for becoming a Democrat is based less upon these reasons, driven by their genetic predisposition.
In short, liberals can’t help themselves. In addition, there is no use in trying to reason with them as their genetic makeup prohibit them from changing their minds, which is not totally their own to change.
While this study is only the latest, there have been others, some even conducted by clinical psychiatrists who describe them as having “strikingly irrational beliefs and emotions, modern liberals relentlessly undermine the most important principles on which our freedoms were founded.”
Dr. Rossiter compares liberals to “spoiled, angry children,” who are rebelling against “the normal responsibilities of adulthood and demand that a parental government meet their needs from cradle to grave.”
You can read about Dr. Rossiter’s research and evaluation of the liberal mind here.
So what’s so wrong with the left?
This might give a clue.
Massachusetts may be one of the most liberal states in the U.S. today. Some would argue for alifornia and they might be right, but most would agree Massachusetts ranks right up there at or near the most liberal.
So it really is no surprise that a school board in Massachusetts unanimously votes to offer free condoms to all students in the district without parental consent, sparking national outrage.
If that weren’t outrage enough, and to show there are other states vying for that number 1 slot of “Most Liberal”, the Fayetteville, Ark., Gay Pride Parade will be led by a young man who has made a career out of fighting for gay rights. That young man is 10 years old.
So what’s so wrong with the left, anyway?
Plenty, and the above events show how sick they’ve become.
Democrat Party racism legacy
Certain liberals of late have worked hard to label Tom Tancredo as a racist. The boneless finger pointing comes as a result of recent comment which he made at a Sarah Palin gathering where he spoke to the audience. The liberals use his comments about the number of uneducated voters who cannot speak English as their evidence.
I do not support Tancredo, but I find it difficult to leap to the same conclusion. While the Dems cry long and hard, getting their panties in a wad and frothing at the mouth while casting this baseless accusation, they have no problems affiliating themselves with a political party whose legacy on racism is appalling.
If liberals actually believed in what they spew, they would distance themselves from it, but they won’t.
So, let’s look back at the Republican Party’s record.
Mississippi Senator Trent Lott recently stepped down from his post as Senate Majority Leader because of racially offensive comments which he made. He was persuaded to take this step by Republicans who believed that his comments were at odds with the principles of their party.
Being the hypocrites they are, Democrats used the Lott affair to paint Republicans as racists. Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle, who had first dismissed the idea that Sen. Lott was a racist, later claimed that his stepping down did not really address the 
Republican Party’s inherent racism. “Republicans have to prove, not only to us, of course, but to the American people that they are as sensitive to this question of racism, this question of civil rights, this question of equal opportunity, as they say they are,” Senator Daschle said. Among high-profile Democrats, Senators Hillary Clinton and Charles Schumer offered similar comments.
Makes ya wanna puke, doesn’t it?
In both principle and practice, the Republican Party has a far better record than the Democrats on race. Even more importantly, historically and enduring even today, the Democratic position represents racism of the most offensive sort—a patronizing racism that denigrates Blacks every bit as badly as the old racism of Jim Crow and segregation.
The Republican Party was founded on the basis of principles invoked by Abraham Lincoln who often referred to the Declaration of Independence. It can be said the principles of the Republican Party are the principles of the nation. Those principles clearly state that people have rights and that the only role of government is to protect the rights of its citizens. They are the rights invoked by the Declaration of Independence—life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness—not happiness, but the pursuit of happiness.
The Republican Party was created in response to a crisis arising from the fact that American public opinion on the issue of slavery had drifted away from the principles of the Founding. While the Founders had tolerated slavery out of necessity, many Americans, especially within the Democratic Party, had come to accept the idea that slavery was a “positive good.” While Thomas Jefferson, the founder of what evolved into the Democratic Party, had argued that slavery was bad not only for the slave but also for the slave owner, John C. Calhoun, had turned this principle on its head: slavery was good not only for the slave holder, but also for the slave.
In the 1920s, the Republican Party platform routinely called for anti-lynching legislation. The Democrats rejected such calls in their own platforms. When FDR forged the New Deal, he was able to pry Blacks away from their traditional attachment to the Party of Lincoln. But they remained in their dependent status, Democrats by virtue of political expediency, not principle.
When Strom Thurmond, the praise of whom landed Sen. Lott in hot water, ran a segregationist campaign in 1948, he ran as a Dixie-CRAT, not a Dixie-CAN. When he lost, he went back to being a Democrat. He only repudiated his segregationist views when he later became a Republican.
Even the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which supposedly established the Democrats’ bona fides on race, was passed in spite of the Democrats rather than because of them. Republican Senate Minority Leader Everett Dirksen pushed the bill through the Senate, despite the no-votes of 21 Democrats, including Gore Sr. and Robert Byrd, who remains a powerful force in the Senate today. In contrast, only four Republicans opposed the bill, mostly like Barry Goldwater on libertarian principles, not segregationist ones.
Indeed, the case of Sen. Byrd is instructive when it comes to the double standard applied to the two parties when it comes to race. Even those Democrats who have exploited the Lott affair acknowledge that he is no racist. Can the same be said about Sen. Byrd, who was a member of the KKK and who recently used the “n” word on national TV?
“Ah, but this is all in the past,” say the Democrats. “Now we push a pro-African-American agenda.” But the reality differs significantly from the claim.
Take the issue of education. The single biggest obstacle to the achievement of true equality in the United States is not poverty, but education. If Democrats sincerely wished to help the minority children on whose behalf they claim to labor, they would embrace school choice to help such children escape the trap of sub-standard schools. But that would offend the teachers’ unions upon which the Democrats depend for financial and “in-kind” support. So as has often been the case with the group politics of the Democratic party, African-American interests are sacrificed to other groups who have more pull.
“Affirmative action” has become the touchstone of Democratic racial politics. Democrats portray anyone who opposes affirmative action as racist. But affirmative action, as currently practiced, is racist to the core. It is based on the assumption that African-Americans are incapable of competing with whites. It represents the kind of paternalistic racism that would have done honor to Calhoun. For the modern liberal Democratic racist as for the old-fashioned one, blacks are simply incapable of freedom. They will always need Ol’ Massa’s help. And woe be to any African-American who wanders off of the Democratic plantation. Ask Clarence Thomas, Thomas Sowell, Shelby Steele, or Ward Connerly. Although they echo the call for a “color-blind society” that once characterized the vision of Martin Luther King Jr., they are pilloried as “Uncle Toms” of “Oreos” by such enforcers of the Democratic plantation system as Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton.
If we need the perfect symbol for the true character of the Democratic Party when it comes to race, we need look no farther than Rhode Island Congressman Patrick Kennedy. Rep. Kennedy portrays himself as a friend of African-Americans. But his touching solicitude for African-Americans as a group is gross hypocrisy. When inconvenienced by a real African-American woman trying to do her job, Rep. Kennedy shoved her out of his way, giving her arm a yank for good measure. In practice, the Democratic Party as a whole cares as much about real African-Americans as Rep. Kennedy does.
John Murtha (D-PA), dead. Good Riddence.
THIS is a Democrat’s idea of democracy in America, 2010.
He will not be missed as his behavior represents just what is wrong with congress today. Indeed, he is a scumbag.
The Selective and Self-Serving Memories of the Left
This idiot can’t determine the difference between “there” and “their”. T-shirt says it all.
Same idiot.
Again.
San Francisco Protects Illegal Immigrants
The Board of Supervisors gave final approval to a measure that would keep law enforcement from turning over minors to immigration authorities unless they have been found guilty of a felony.
San Francisco. It’s a city infamous for its liberal policies. It is known for tackling issues ranging from gay marriage to universal health care. Now, it is wrestling with another divisive issue.
The Board of Supervisors gave final approval Tuesday to a measure that would keep law enforcement from turning over minors to immigration authorities unless they have been found guilty of a felony.
The move pits the panel against Mayor Gavin Newsom and law enforcement by reversing his policy of turning over youths to Immigration and Customs Enforcement after their arrest.
Newsom took the stance in 2008 after the city was accused of protecting young offenders such as Edwin Ramos from deportation.
Ramos, an undocumented immigrant from El Salvador, was charged with felonies as a minor, but the sanctuary policy allowed the suspected gang member to stay in the U.S.
Now 22, Ramos is awaiting trial in the shooting death of a man and his two sons in San Francisco as they headed home from a barbecue.
Since the mayor changed the policy, 149 undocumented juveniles charged with felonies have been referred to immigration officials, ICE said.
The newly approved measure is supported by civil rights groups, immigrant advocates and the Juvenile Division of the Public Defender’s Office, who contend it restores the right of minors to due process and gives them a chance to defend themselves before facing possible deportation and separation from their families.
“We need to treat children as children — they are vulnerable and they are different from adults,” said Patricia Lee, head attorney with the Juvenile Division of the Public Defender’s Office.
Newsom’s policy, she said, “flies in the face of any code in the nation that provides for the protection of the child and reunification with the family.”
Those siding with the mayor — the police chief and district attorney, among others — argue the new ordinance will force officers to go against federal law by shielding undocumented immigrants and exposing the city to lawsuits.
“The mayor is not going to force his own law enforcement officials to break state and federal law just because supervisors have made this Quixotic gesture,” said Nathan Ballard, a spokesman for Newsom. “If you have committed a serious crime, there is no sanctuary for you.”
The measure must now go to Newsom, who has said he would veto it. Supervisors have said they would overturn his veto, a move likely to touch off a legal fight.
“The mayor does not have the authority to disregard it unilaterally,” said David Campos, the supervisor who initiated the measure. “If the law is challenged, it will be up to the courts to decide its legality.”
Other cities are watching San Francisco to see how it decides to handle undocumented minors. Requiring due process for children before they are referred to ICE is an innovative strategy and could be implemented elsewhere, said Angela Chan, staff attorney with the Asian Law Caucus, a legal and civil rights group that has worked closely with youth affected by the city rule.
At the heart of the issue is San Francisco’s City of Refuge ordinance, adopted in 1989 as part of a national sanctuary movement intended to help refugees from Central American civil wars. Dozens of cities across the country adopted similar sanctuary policies.
The sanctuary policy allows officials who encounter undocumented immigrants not to report them to federal officials. It’s credited with improving law enforcement relationships with the city’s large immigrant community.
Adults who commit crimes are completely exempted from protection, but the situation of minors was unclear under the rule. Instead of turning juveniles suspects over to immigration officers, San Francisco was housing them or flying them back to their home countries at city expense.
Bill Ong Hing, a law professor at the University of California, Davis, who testified in favor of San Francisco’s sanctuary ordinance when it was first proposed, said federal law does not require officers to turn over undocumented immigrants.
“Every day across the country, local law enforcement officials often do not turn over undocumented immigrants that they come across,” he said. “They want to maintain a good, trusting relationship with immigrant communities because that is better for public safety.”
Deputy probation officers, who would be responsible for taking youths from police and deciding whether to hand them over to ICE, are afraid that obeying the new measure would mean violating federal law. They have vowed not to follow the new rule, said Gabriel Calvillo, head of the San Francisco Deputy Probation Officers Association.
“We just want to be safe, to make sure our officers are not put in the cross hairs of federal officials,” Calvillo said. “We’re going to continue to follow the mayor’s direction.”
Mind Games
If we can accept the notion that all conservatives i.e. Republicans, are against abortion, can we accept the notion that all Catholics are liberals and Democrats?
Does the issue of abortion transcend political parties?
Nancy Pelosi – What a piece of work
It is obvious this lady has been elevated to a position requiring more intellect than she is able to bring forth to enable her to do the right thing.
Hopefully there will be those around her who will gently guide her to the nearest exit and deposit her back home into her kitchen where she would, without doubt, excel.
But something tells me that when she got there, she would hand you a plate of cookies and tell you they’re pancakes.
This lady is an inept pathological liar and needs to be removed from office immediately.
$100 Million in savings!! Wowsers!!!!
I know that $100 million dollars is a lot of money, but when you compare that against the pile it came from, it is a mere pittance.
So which should make me the most angry about this? Is it the fact that Obama did not try to save us from a mountain of debt by taking a bigger budget cut? Or, should I be angry at the fact that I’m expected to be satisfied and grateful with this symbolic effort to reduce the size of the colossal budget, and in so doing, realizing that I and every other thinking American are begin played as an idiot.
An unjust exercise of authority or power
On the evening of April 14, 2009, University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill police released pepper spray and threatened to use a Taser on student protesters when a crowd disrupted a speech by former Colorado congressman Tom Tancredo opposing in-state tuition benefits to unauthorized immigrants.
Hundreds of protesters converged on Bingham Hall, shouting profanities and accusations of racism while Tancredo and the student who introduced him tried to speak. Minutes into the speech, a protester pounded a window of the classroom until the glass shattered, prompting Tancredo to flee and campus police to shut down the event.
Tancredo was brought to campus by a UNC chapter of Youth for Western Civilization, a national organization of students who oppose mass immigration, multiculturalism and affirmative action.
Inside the classroom, several student protesters screamed curses at Tancredo and Riley Matheson, president of the UNC-Chapel Hill chapter of Youth for Western Civilization.
“This is the free speech crowd, right?” Tancredo joked.
“Fascists are fascists,” Tancredo said. “Their actions were probably the best speech I could ever give. They are what’s wrong with America today. … When all you can do is yell epithets, that means you are intellectually bankrupt.”
UNC graduate student Tyler Oakley, who had organized the protest, said he regretted the broken window but not silencing Tancredo. “He was not able to practice his hate speech,” said Oakley. “You have to respect the right of people to assemble and collectively speak.”
ED:
A former congressman is invited to speak on a very important topic for all of us only to be shouted down by oppressive, emotionally immature, idealistic youth agitated by their professors to disrupt. Very nice.
Tancredo spoke about the shout-down on Fox News and said their professors were in the audience and incited and participated in the ensuing mini-riot.
So what are our professors teaching our youth? Is it that it’s acceptable to oppress free speech? Or perhaps it is to use emotion and violence as a tool of debate instead of engaging in intellectually driven dialog and – oh God – usher in real and meaningful change?
Folks, we are at a cross roads here. These kids – these morons taught by intellectually lazy professors bent on saving their tuition-driven salaries are our future. Some of them will even find their way into politics. These are our future leaders.
To know what this brings, we only have to look at the White House.
The (not so) mainstream media agrees Dems obstructed reform
International Herald Tribune: “Democratic takeover of Congress was major victory for Fannie and Freddie … Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the two mortgage finance giants, which have been recovering from accounting scandals, had faced the possibility of tight new oversight laws pushed largely by Republicans. But some powerful Democrats had resisted, preferring to promote the companies’ housing mission over tighter capital standards and portfolio limits. (International Herald Tribune, 11/8/06)
American Banker: “Democrats Oppose White House plan to strengthen Fannie and Freddie oversight.” In late summer Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson Jr. began an effort to reach an agreement in the Senate, where Democrats oppose a White House-favored provision that would force Fannie and Freddie Mac to slash their mortgage portfolios. (American Banker, 12/1/06)
Origination News: “Until recently, the administration and Sen. Shelby have pushed for limits on the size of the GSE portfolios, which Democrats opposed. Now it appears that Secretary Paulson will insist on language that would allow the new GSE regulator to use systemic risk considerations in determining proper size of the portfolios. But the Democrats see systemic risk as a code word for portfolio limits.” (Origination News, 12/1/06)
Talking with the left
I have just read about an experience of another blogger here at WordPress. Their post was about the reaction of an individual who took issue with the banner the blogger had hung from the front of his home with a message encouraging voters to “Vote yes on proposition 8”. Proposition 8 is an initiative measure on the 2008 California General Election ballot titled Eliminates Right of Same-Sex Couples to Marry. If passed, the proposition would “change the California Constitution to eliminate the right of same-sex couples to marry in California.”
You can read the post here
His experience was the same as mine whenever I have engaged in “discussion” with liberal “thinkers”.
In my case the topic was about national and foreign policies. While I had given facts, figures, documented quotes, studies, charts, graphs, etc. etc. I was always met with tirade, rant, yelling, name calling, hateful remarks and also being accused of being narrow minded. Clearly they were shooting the messenger.
In the end I am always left with the thought that I am arguing with an emotional 4 year old throwing a tantrum in the middle of the grocery store. You can’t win with emotionally charged and intellectually lazy individuals who go out of their way to tear down traditional institutions. When confronted with facts they can’t repute they unleash their emotions and launch into personal attacks. Your case is no different.
In my final analysis I blame the lazy voters who stays home the first Tues. in November. We get what we deserve.
The way our country is evolving, in a few more decades Islam will be well established and their leadership will deal with the types who visited your neighborhood.
In the meantime, brace yourself. If Obama gets in office, nothing is sacred.
Democrat quotes about the health of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac
Article and video can be seen at the Wall Street Journal web site
Take a deep breath and read some of the excerpts below. If it is upsetting to you, it should be.
Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.): “Through nearly a dozen hearings, where frankly we are trying to fix something that wasn’t broke, Mr. Chairman, we do not have a crisis at Freddie Mac and in particular at Fannie Mae under the outstanding leadership of Mr. Frank Raines.”
Rep. Maxine Waters (D., Calif.): “Mr. Chairman, we do not have a crisis at Freddie Mac, and in particular at Fannie Mae, under the outstanding leadership of Mr. Frank Raines. Everything in the 1992 act has worked just fine. In fact, the GSEs have exceeded their housing goals.”
Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY): In a hearing several years ago about a report on the safety and soundness of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac from their regulator, Armando Falcon, Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight Director, Falcon came under fire. Meeks said; “The GSEs have done a tremendous job. There has been nothing that was indicated that’s wrong with Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac has come up on its own,” adding the regulator was trying to give the two a “heart surgeon [sic] when they really don’t need it.”
Rep. Barney Frank (D., Mass.): “The more people, in my judgment, exaggerate a threat of safety and soundness, the more people conjure up the possibility of serious financial losses to the Treasury, which I do not see. I think we see entities [Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac] that are fundamentally sound financially and withstand some of the disaster scenarios.”
Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.): In the same hearing several years ago about a report on the safety and soundness of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac from their regulator, Falcon, Frank attacked Falcon: “I don’t see anything in your report that raises safety and soundness problems.”
Sen. Christopher Dodd (D., Conn.): “I, just briefly will say, Mr. Chairman, obviously, like most of us here, this is one of the great success stories of all time.”
Sen. Charles Schumer (D., N.Y.): “And my worry is that we’re using the recent safety and soundness concerns, particularly with Freddie, and with a poor regulator, as a straw man to curtail Fannie and Freddie’s mission.”
Franklin Raines, former head of Fannie Mae: “These assets are so riskless that their capital for holding them should be under 2%.
Richard Syron, former head of Freddie Mac: “If I had better foresight, maybe I could have improved things a little bit. But frankly, if I had perfect foresight, I would never have taken this job in the first place.”
Note: Raines was forced out of Fannie Mae in December 2004 after the Securities and Exchange Commission launched an investigation into alleged accounting problems at Fannie Mae involving an estimated $6 bn in accounting problems. The Office of Federal Housing Oversight sued Raines in 2006, accusing him of aiding accounting shenanigans at Fannie, which allegedly involved the delay of reporting losses so top executives could earn large bonuses.
The suit attempted to recover the $50 mn Raines in pay got based on billions of dollars in overstated earnings. In total, OFHEO demanded $110 mn in fines and a clawback of $115 mn in bonuses for three executives accused, including Raines.
Raines, Fannie’s former chief financial officer and its former controller settled the case in April 2008, agreeing to pay fines totaling about $3 mn, paid for by Fannie’s insurance policies.
Raines also agreed to donate the proceeds from the sale of $1.8 mn of his Fannie stock and to give up stock options, though the options were worthless. Raines also gave up an estimated $5.3 mn of “other benefits” said to be related to his pension and forgone bonuses. In the end, Raines kept most of his largesse–in 2003 alone, his compensation was estimated at over $20 mn.
From the Right 
When I look at the planks in each of the platforms from which we have to chose, it quickly becomes clear which of the two our country can best tolerate and at the end of the 4 years, will have less of a legacy to undo.
It’s about the country – not what government promises to do for me. I will do for me if the government will get out of my way and let me have the opportunities to do it. I do not need for the government to dip into my pocket any more than it already does and to give it to whom they deem worthy of what was mine.
If I took the attitude which Obama and his ilk wants me and the rest of the country to warm up to I would have taken the candy from each one of the Trick-or-Treaters who knocked on my door last night instead of giving them any. Better yet, I should have taken candy from one kiddos bag and given it to the other standing next to them. Boy – I can almost see the expressions on their faces now.
I will keep my money, my guns and my freedom. The Dems can keep their change.
Vote for the country’s sake.