Eleanor Duckwall's Spotlight

Ban the burka? Yes, indeed!

Pat makes some very good points regarding health problems, security problems, and the curious silence of feminists.

And I love Pat's recommendation that Muslim men should be obliged to wear it.

In fact, men should be obliged to wear and do anything that they insist women should do and they should not.

It's only fair, and then, perhaps, they will learn why their insistence is unacceptable.

Unfortunately, empathy for some comes only through direct participation.

Dr. Tim Ball Debunks Global Warming Alarmism

Why is global warming being pushed so hard? In my view, and in the view of a growing number of others, so-called global warming or climate change is a massive business opportunity that will make some fabulously rich at the expense of the rest of us.

And remember, once an industry is created, especially one with government backing, and a regulatory bureaucracy, it will be virtually impossible to stop.

To listen to the podcast,Click here

Why Some Fall Victim to Islamist Rhetoric

Robert Spencer at Front Page:

...This kind of Islamophobophobia especially manifests itself among politically correct types who find themselves for whatever reason in the position of discussing some human rights abuse or terrorist activity that its perpetrators justify by reference to Islamic teachings -- they will discuss it, all right, but will go to any length to make sure nobody thinks that it really has anything to do with Islam, or that it is any different from what those nasty Christians do.

This form of “Islamophobophobia” is in abundant display at the release of the excellent movie The Stoning of Soraya M. Many fall victim to Islamophobophobia not just because they are addled multiculturalists or politically correct cowards, but because they really don’t want innocent people to be victimized, and they think that it is somehow an act of generosity or fairness to downplay the Islamic connection to whatever wrongdoing they are discussing, and to play up the evils of Christianity. What they fail to realize is that by deflecting attention away from the real causes of the phenomena they oppose, they are only helping ensure that those phenomena will continue.

Get Ready for Inflation and Higher Interest Rates

The unprecedented expansion of the money supply could make the '70s look benign.

Arthur B. Laffer, of the Laffer Curve, and the one who "favors the VAT," writes in The Wall Street Journal:

Rahm Emanuel was only giving voice to widespread political wisdom when he said that a crisis should never be "wasted." Crises enable vastly accelerated political agendas and initiatives scarcely conceivable under calmer circumstances. So it goes now.

Here we stand more than a year into a grave economic crisis with a projected budget deficit of 13% of GDP. That's more than twice the size of the next largest deficit since World War II. And this projected deficit is the culmination of a year when the federal government, at taxpayers' expense, acquired enormous stakes in the banking, auto, mortgage, health-care and insurance industries.

With the crisis, the ill-conceived government reactions, and the ensuing economic downturn, the unfunded liabilities of federal programs -- such as Social Security, civil-service and military pensions, the Pension Benefit Guarantee Corporation, Medicare and Medicaid -- are over the $100 trillion mark. With U.S. GDP and federal tax receipts at about $14 trillion and $2.4 trillion respectively, such a debt all but guarantees higher interest rates, massive tax increases, and partial default on government promises.

Kill the VAT Now and Forever

Europeans are familiar with the pesky tax that is added to every purchase. They are so familiar that they have come to expect the expense and no longer see it, much in the same way that Americans pay taxes on gasoline, cigarettes, boozes, restaurant foods, and phone bills.

The taxes have become invisible.

As Bruce Blalosky tells us at Town Hall, some Europeans love it because it simplifies: in some countries they pay a flat rate that includes the tax and a gratuity, whereas here we pay for the product or service, then a tax, and then we may choose to offer the tip.

Hmmm. Where's the incentive to give good POLITE service in that?

Presumably the government can then be certain of the amount of tip revenue a server earns and can tax accordingly.

Excessive Government Involvement Is the Malady in Healthcare

Americans are wondering why their country is "sick." For decades we have infected by a disease of government involvement that begins with the familiar chestnut: "I'm from the government and I'm here to help." The problem with "government help" is that it becomes stifling, a permanent overbearing presence that remains like the effect of some terrible disease that leaves a patient weakened, permanently impaired, and dependent upon caretakers.

Some politicos and their backers have planned to create such an America.

The Clintons were such a pair as are other politicians on both sides of the aisle.

The problem with politicians is that can't get into office without a retinue of backers, many of whom are, in my opinion, shady characters with agendas that are toxic to freedom.

ccartaginese at Newsreel Blog explains "Michelle and Barak Obama's Lies about Healthcare. The title implies that they are the only two involved. But don't be fooled. There is a whole raft of groups and individuals with sharpened knives and blunt instruments waiting to prod and bludgeon the American people into line, much as did the Red Guard for Chairman Mao during the Chinese "Cultural Revolution" that eradicated or "re-educated" those that chose to stick to their principles.

Could 'Coal-eating' microbes help solve the energy crisis?

Scientists have long been searching for microbes that could change coal into a liquid or gaseous state. Lab experiments have alternated the genetic make up of various microbes that could do the trick. Craig Venter, the 'controversial' American scientist who helped decode the human genome, has announced the discovery of natural ancient bacterial existing a mile underground that could turn coal into methane, "suggesting they may help to solve the world's energy crisis."

Will They Ever Learn? FBI Replaces Muslim Brotherhood-Tainted Liaison with Another Brotherhood-Tainted Liaison

At The Investigative Project on Terrorism:

A top FBI official met Wednesday with the vice president of the Islamic Society of North America, a move which followed the Bureau's decision "to use ISNA as their official point of contact with the American Muslim community," an email from an intelligence community veteran that was widely distributed Wednesday said.

The Investigative Project on Terrorism (IPT) has previously reported on the depth of ISNA's Muslim Brotherhood ties.

The FBI has not yet commented on the claim. But the IPT has confirmed that the meeting did take place at FBI headquarters. The decision to make ISNA the FBI's contact point came over the objections of case agents and supervisors investigating Muslim Brotherhood activity in the U.S.

Last year, the FBI cut off outreach communication with the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), after evidence in the Hamas-support trial against the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (HLF) raised questions "whether there continues to be a connection between CAIR or its executives and HAMAS." The FBI's case agent testified that CAIR was a Hamas front.

Like CAIR, ISNA was an unindicted co-conspirator in the HLF trial. It is listed among "who are and/or were members of the US Muslim Brotherhood." Jamal Badawi, an ISNA board member, also was named as an unindicted co-conspirator, listed among people who raised money for HLF.

America's Socialist Past: Not What We Are; But What We Should Be?

Obama has said it himself. Paraphrasing, we should create a America as it should be. That's all well and good, but how does his view of what "it should be" mesh with the American spirit ... or even human nature?

The question has always been: What should we be?

Utopia, an idealized society where everyone is equal, where all needs are met, and everyone is happy. Is this even possible?

At more than one time in America's history, men and women have attempted to create utopias ... and failed. A short history of their efforts:

Ryan Siefert at The American Thinker:

There seems to be a need in American society to have to relearn the same hard lessons over and over again, regardless of whether the results were seen on the other side of the planet or suffered through by our own people.

We're living in a country that elected a President that believes in redistributing wealth. He's mentioned this himself, from the "Joe the Plumber" incident[i] to his critique[ii] of the failures of the civil rights movement. Whether you call it Socialism, Communism, Marxism, or by its simpler name, theft, they are all part of the same economic system that destroys private property and puts everything in central control of the state.

The lesson we, and the rest of the world, seems to fail to learn is how socially and economically destructive this sort of system is. The problem is, these lessons don't have to be learned from studying the histories of far off lands, for we have numerous examples of collectivist/socialist experiments here at home.

A plan to hurt you ... to hurt us all

Of course I am writing about the fantastically stupid national health plan, aka as socialism, that has been tried and has failed in Britain and in Canada.

Here are Floyd and Mary Beth Brown at Front Page:

Imagine waiting for a year to have cancer surgery while the malignancy spreads – and then be told, "Sorry. You waited too long. Go home and die.” It happens in Britain and Canada because they have socialized medicine.

Now imagine a federal bureaucrat possessing the power to choose your doctor, tell doctors what treatments they can prescribe and which tests they can run. They decide at what age you are no longer eligible to undergo dialysis or receive an organ transplant or a CAT scan, even treatments as simple as antibiotics.

Are you ready for a law that forbids you from consulting a private physician for better treatment or to get a second opinion -- even if you’re willing to pay for the service yourself?