Koch Unhidden in Michigan

No Ninja Points for the Koch Brothers in Michigan ... and it looks like they are dead on the mark with the info as well. 

Wednesday reader's view: Imposing values

Wednesday, October 8, 2014, 10:00 am

By the Midland Daily News

To the editor:

The billionaire Koch brothers are bent upon imposing their values on the United States in general, and Michigan in particular. They want, among other things, to eliminate taxes on big corporations, dismantle public education, destroy unions, weaken environmental regulations, eliminate the middle class and restrict voting rights.

To accomplish their goals, they make “campaign contributions” to Michigan legislators through nonprofit front organizations such as “Americans for Prosperity” and the tea party. In order to have exactly the kind of laws they want, they created the American Legislative Exchange Council. ALEC creates templates so their lawmaking “members” can fill in the blanks, more or less, while they appear to have written the laws themselves.

Rep. Kevin Cotter’s voting record is closely aligned with the Koch brothers’ goals. Cotter has voted to defund public education, fought health care reform, gutted unions by voting for Right to Work (for less), given tax breaks to corporations while raising taxes on the middle class and restricted voting rights.

These are Koch and Cotter values, not Michigan values. Your vote on Nov. 4 will decide whether the Koch brothers continue to influence our laws through Kevin Cotter, or whether laws will be based on Michigan values. I’ll be voting for Michigan values, and I hope you will too.

Timothy Caldwell

Mount Pleasant

Climate Change: Key Data Points from Pew Research

http://www.pewresearch.org/key-data-points/climate-change-key-data-points-from-pew-research/

The American public routinely ranks dealing with global warming low on its list of priorities for the president and Congress. This year, it ranked second to last among 20 issues tested. 

There are substantial partisan differences over the importance of dealing with global warming, according to our  survey conducted Jan. 15-19. About four-in-ten (42%) Democrats cite it as a top priority compared to 14% of Republicans and 27% of independents.

When we asked about climate change again in a survey conducted in Feb. 2013, only 34% of the public viewed new climate change policies as something that was essential for the White House and Congress to tackle last year.

Fewer Americans cite global climate change as a major threat to their country than most publics around the world.

In a poll of 39 countries conducted March through May. 2013, a median of 54% of those surveyed cited global climate change as a major threat to their countries, putting it at the top of the list of items tested. In contrast, 40% of Americans said climate change was a major threat.

Two-thirds of Americans say there is solid evidence that the earth has been getting warmer over the last few decades.

A survey conducted in October, 2013 found that 67% of Americans believe there is solid evidence that the earth has been getting warmer over the last few decades, a figure that has changed little in the past few years.

There are sharp partisan divides about whether there is solid evidence of warming.

In 2009, 35% of Republicans, 53% of independents and 75% of Democrats said there was solid evidence of rising temperatures on earth. Today, half of Republicans (50%), 62% of independents and 88% of Democrats say this, according to our October, 2013 survey.

Among Americans who believe there is solid evidence of global warming, more attribute it to human activity than natural patterns. But there is a big partisan gap on this question.

Currently, 44% say there is solid evidence of global warming and it is mostly due to human activity; 18% say it is mostly because of natural environmental patterns, according to our October, 2013 survey. Two-thirds of Democrats (66%) say that warming is mainly because of human activity, up nine points from earlier this year. Fewer independents (43%) and Republicans (24%) than Democrats say that human activity is the primary cause of global warming.

Nearly two-thirds of the public favors stricter emissions limits on power plants.

A September, 2013 survey found that 65% of Americans favor stricter emissions limits on power plants, including 74% of Democrats, 67% of independents and 52% of Republicans.

Dr. Anthony Fauci Tells us to Hype Down on Ebola

NIH Doctor Takes Fox’s Chris Wallace to Science School over Ebola Panic | Mediaite

Dr. Anthony Fauci of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases explained the Sciences to Fox News Sunday host Chris Wallace, who quizzed him on a variety of ebola-related issues, some of which veered toward the wildly hypothetical. Wallace especially wanted to know why flights out of affected countries like Liberia had not been banned. Fauci explained that isolating a country in the midst of a crisis created an unbearable strain on an already vulnerable infrastructure and prevented supplies from making it to affected regions. 

“Experience is that when you close off a country, you create such stress and fear, you amplify the problem,” Fauci said. Wallace added that only two people out of 10,000 receiving additional screening when they landed. Fauci explained that this was because nobody symptomatic would have been allowed to fly in the first place. “If you have symptoms or a fever,” he said, “you will not be allowed on the plane.” 

Fauci also all but rolled his eyes at Wallace’s suggestion that ebola could sneak across the border, either through undocumented immigrants or as part of a bioterrorist plot. “I wouldn’t be worried about ebola coming across our southern borders when we have an ebola issue right now in South Africa,” Fauci said. “That’s a hypothetical that’s very far-fetched. As far as terrorism — nature right now is the worth bioterrorist. I’m worried more about natural evolution in west Africa than I am about a terrorist.” 

“If I were a bioterrorist, [ebola] would not be my choice,” Fauci added, given that it required contact to spread. “It would be inefficient.” Fauci concluded that he understood the fears over the virus, but that the strength of the U.S.’s health infrastructure made it close to impossible to replicate what’s happening in west African in the U.S. “We have to get our actions and our policies based on scientific testing,” Fauci said. “It could be will see another case, but we won’t have an outbreak.”

Remember FACTS not FOX kids. Always check the source. 

Our GOP - Drugs, Alienation, Obstruction. -- RANT

GOP Congress has a 12% Approval Rating. Obama is 40% and Boehner thinks Obama needs  help.

“The biggest impediment we have in moving immigration reform is the American people don’t trust the president to enforce or implement the law that we may or may not pass,” Boehner said. “He’s got to show the American people and show the Congress that he can be trusted to implement the law the way it may be passed.”

No Boehner, we don't trust you. In fact we haven't trusted you since you shutdown the Government last year -- nothing you have done since then has changed anyone's mind about you either. 
Trey Radel, Busted On Cocaine Charge, Voted For Drug Testing Food Stamp Recipients

"Why don't we drug test all the members of Congress here," McGovern said shortly before the drug-testing measure passed. "Force everybody to go urinate in a cup or see whether or not anybody is on drugs? Maybe that will explain why some of these amendments are coming up or why some of the votes are turning out the way they are."

And to further their Culture of Obstruction, House Speaker is ready to Shut Down again.. for same reason. 

WASHINGTON -- Less than a year after House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) called the 2013 government shutdown over funding for Obamacare a “predictable disaster,” Republicans are hinting they might be willing to do it again in a few months.
A group of 14 Republicans, led by Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) wrote to Boehner on Wednesday identifying a provision of the Affordable Care Act that a Government Accountability Office report concluded would require an additional appropriation from Congress in the next fiscal year

To which any sane person should say "So F%#king What?"  53 Times? Is that how many times they have tried to take our Healthcare away from us? Over 53? I loose track. The idea has reached the level of Ludicrous. 65% Approval rating for the Healthcare program. Congress only has a 12% approval rating right now. 
Senator Says Obama Is Only Fighting ISIS To Help Democrats

New Hampshire Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R) argued on Sunday that President Obama has declared war against ISIS in Iraq and Syria in order to help Democrats win the midterm elections in November and expressed concern that he would abandon the fight in the new year.
“I think we have a problem where the president’s foreign policy is being trapped by his campaign rhetoric,” Ayotte began during an appearance on Fox News Sunday. “I’m very fearful as we look at the current military strategy that it is surrounding the November elections and he won’t have the resolve to follow through with what needs to be done in a sustained effort to destroy ISIS, and we’re about to repeat the same thing with Afghanistan,” she added, referring to the effort to withdraw American troops from that country.

It is stuff like this which powers the 80% disapproval rating America has given the GOP. There is no reason for this comment. It has no bases except for personal opinion. Even if it is true, so what? Seriously. He is the Commander and Chief. Her only purpose is to throw out into the media confusion, controversy while attempting to garner distrust. The GOP is a Culture of Obstruction. It would be nice if they would just do their damn job.
That drug testing thing is sounding Really Good.

80% Against Citizens United

Memo to the Supreme Court: President Obama isn't the only one who's annoyed.
Obama raised eyebrows at his State of the Union address last month by criticizing the high court's ruling throwing out limits on corporate spending in political campaigns. Turns out he's got company: Our latest ABC News/Washington Post poll finds that 80 percent of Americans likewise oppose the ruling, including 65 percent who "strongly" oppose it, an unusually high intensity of sentiment.(Story Here)

There is some strong feelings going through this country. I feel that we are reaching a ceiling of tolerance 80% Against the Citizens United ruling. 80% Against the current Congress... I bet if I search, I'm going to find more 80% "Pissed off and Done With BS" topics.

Why Is This So Hard To Understand? AP US History

From The AP US History Webpage 

-- READ ME -- 

First Lines of Content

The AP® Program unequivocally supports the principle that each individual school must develop its own curriculum for courses labeled “AP.” Rather than mandating any one curriculum for AP courses, the AP Course Audit instead provides each AP teacher with a set of expectations that college and secondary school faculty nationwide have established for college-level courses.

AP teachers are encouraged to develop or maintain their own curriculum that either includes or exceeds each of these expectations; such courses will be authorized to use the “AP” designation. Credit for the success of AP courses belongs to the individual schools and teachers that create powerful, locally designed AP curricula.

The AP U.S. History course should be designed by your school to provide students with a learning experience equivalent to that of an introductory college course sequence in United States history. Your course should provide students with the analytic skills and factual knowledge necessary to deal critically with the topics and materials in U.S. history.

There are no specific curricular prerequisites for students taking AP U.S. History.

All students who are willing and academically prepared to accept the challenge of a rigorous academic curriculum should be considered for admission to AP courses. The College Board encourages the elimination of barriers that restrict access to AP courses for students from ethnic, racial and socioeconomic groups that have been traditionally underrepresented in the AP Program. Schools should make every effort to ensure that their AP classes reflect the diversity of their student population.

High schools offering this exam must provide the exam administration resources described in the AP Coordinator’s Manual.

http://www.collegeboard.com/html/apcourseaudit/courses/us_history.html


So I have to ask -- exactly what is the District Board and Williams going to Investigate?  THERE ARE NO LESSONS TO APPROVE OF!  Schools/Teachers using the Manual, following the EXAMPLES create their own lessons, and tests for their students. 

Julie Williams started this mess with the Kids, solely on the baisis of what she read about the AP USHistory posted by extremists on the Internet. She didn't check her facts. She didn't care about the Kids, her Schools, she only cared about her agenda. So, she incited a walk-out over nothing.  Please... Do something about this. 

The New York Times -- The New History


Board Violations -- Of the Repeated Type